"You ain't makin' no complaint to the boss, ma'am? It was jest a darn
fool mistake of mine. It surely was. I ken see it was. I can't
figger how I mistook you fer the lady I was thinkin' of. Y'see, she
was no account anyway. She was jest one o' them vampire sorts who'd
sell her soul fer a price, yep, and sell any man's life that way, too.
Y'see, that's how I come to know her. She handed over a bunch o' guys,
scallawags, sure, who didn't need nothin' better, fer the price o' ten
thousand dollars. She corralled the information, an' drove her
weak-livered man to do the lousy work. I tell you, ma'am, a woman who
gits that low is pretty mean. You was sure right to figger on an
insult when I guessed you was that 'piece.' But I didn't mean it that
way, I sure didn't."

The marble coldness of Elvine's face as she listened to the man's words
gave no indication of any feeling behind it. At the end, however, she
forced a smile to her lips.

"You can forget it," she said. Then she added deliberately: "I shall
not inform my husband."

"Thank you, ma'am. Then I guess I'll get right on back--if you'll
carry in the report. Y'see, we're huntin' the trail. That-a-way I'll
be able to join up with the boys."

"Yes."

The man hesitated as though waiting for her to depart first, but as she
made no movement, and offered no further word, he was forced to the
initiative. With an astonishing deference, which, perhaps, was even
too elaborate, he wheeled his horse about and rode off.

Elvine watched him until he was swallowed up by the narrow pathway
between the bluffs, then she turned back and rode slowly homeward.

But the face which was now turned down the river was no longer the face
which had confronted Sikkem Bruce. It was ghastly. It was the face of
a soul-tortured woman.

"She was jest one of them vampire sorts who'd sell her soul fer a
price, yes, an' sell any man's life that way, too."

The words, even the tones of the man's voice dinned in her brain, and
she knew that the legions of Fate had appeared upon a fresh horizon.

CHAPTER XVII

THE CALL TO ORRVILLE

The windows were wide open. Voices from within the parlor reached Nan.
She was waiting on the veranda. Waiting for the long council of
men-folk to reach its conclusion. She had elected to remain outside.
She knew that the future well-being of the Obar Ranch was being
considered by men whose sole regard that well-being was. And somehow