Those girls believed I was a desperate devil of a cowboy, who had been held back from spilling blood solely through their kind relation to me.

“Oh, no!” exclaimed Sally.  “Diane, don’t let him go!”

“Russ, pray don’t get angry,” replied Miss Sampson and she put a soft hand on me that thrilled me, while it made me feel like a villain.  “I won’t discharge you.  I need you.  Sally needs you.  After all, it’s none of my business what you do away from here.  But I hoped I would be so happy to—­to reclaim you from—­Didn’t you ever have a sister, Russ?”

I kept silent for fear that I would perjure myself anew.  Yet the situation was delicious, and suddenly I conceived a wild idea.

“Miss Sampson,” I began haltingly, but with brave front, “I’ve been wild in the past.  But I’ve been tolerably straight here, trying to please you.  Lately I have been going to the bad again.  Not drunk, but leaning that way.  Lord knows what I’ll do soon if—­if my trouble isn’t cured.”

“Russ!  What trouble?”

“You know what’s the matter with me,” I went on hurriedly.  “Anybody could see that.”

Sally turned a flaming scarlet.  Miss Sampson made it easier for me by reason of her quick glance of divination.

“I’ve fallen in love with Miss Sally.  I’m crazy about her.  Here I’ve got to see these fellows flirting with her.  And it’s killing me.  I’ve—­”

“If you are crazy about me, you don’t have to tell!” cried Sally, red and white by turns.

“I want to stop your flirting one way or another.  I’ve been in earnest.  I wasn’t flirting.  I begged you to—­to...”

“You never did,” interrupted Sally furiously.  That hint had been a spark.

“I couldn’t have dreamed it,” I protested, in a passion to be earnest, yet tingling with the fun of it.  “That day when I—­didn’t I ask...”

“If my memory serves me correctly, you didn’t ask anything,” she replied, with anger and scorn now struggling with mirth.

“But, Sally, I meant to.  You understood me?  Say you didn’t believe I could take that liberty without honorable intentions.”

That was too much for Sally.  She jumped at her horse, made the quickest kind of a mount, and was off like a flash.

“Stop me if you can,” she called back over her shoulder, her face alight and saucy.

“Russ, go after her,” said Miss Sampson.  “In that mood she’ll ride to Sanderson.  My dear fellow, don’t stare so.  I understand many things now.  Sally is a flirt.  She would drive any man mad.  Russ, I’ve grown in a short time to like you.  If you’ll be a man—­give up drinking and gambling—­maybe you’ll have a chance with her.  Hurry now—­go after her.”

I mounted and spurred my horse after Sally’s.  She was down on the level now, out in the open, and giving her mount his head.  Even had I wanted to overhaul her at once the matter would have been difficult, well nigh impossible under five miles.