The Bad Man Part 13

"Now, father!" she pleaded. She hated this business.

But Hardy paid not the slightest heed to her. He was a man of action, and women shouldn't interfere--particularly young and pretty girls.

"Then I reckon I'll have to foreclose," he went on relentlessly. "There's nothing else to do." His hands closed tightly, and his hard eyes looked even harder.

"I'm afraid you're right," Gilbert said. "I was afraid it would be inevitable. I couldn't have hoped for anything else."

"I'm sorry," Jasper Hardy announced; but did not mean it.

Gilbert told him so. "Moreover, I know how you got your money," the young man was not afraid to say.

"I know how he got mine, gol darn it!" Uncle Henry cried. Hardy glared at him, seemed to smite him with his eyes.

"I'm not in business for my health," he said coldly.

"Nor for anybody else's," Uncle Henry, unabashed, told him.

Angela feared there was going to be trouble. "Now, daddy, you mustn't--you really mustn't--I feel--"

But her father did not hear her.

"The time's up at eight o'clock," was all he said, and looked sternly at Gilbert, much as a judge who is p.r.o.nouncing sentence looks at the prisoner at the bar.

"I know it," said Gilbert.

"Now, daddy--" Angela began again.

Hardy was angry at her repeated solicitation. "Will you let me alone? This is my business," he said to her in a firm voice, "Remember that, and don't attempt to put your finger in the pie. This is my business, I tell you."

"Yes, I know daddy; but you needn't be so mean about it."

"I'm a plain man, and I don't believe in beating about the bush. Get that through your head--every one of you, I mean."

"But you might at least be--" his daughter began once more.

"Won't you please keep still?" His rage was mounting; and his brow darkened.

"I only want you to be nice about it, daddy," Angela persisted, sweetly.

"How can anybody be nice about a thing like this?" said the man of iron.

"I know I could be," Angela informed him.

Her father looked at her. "Well, what would you do?"

"Give him his ranch back, of course!"

Jasper Hardy couldn't believe what he had heard, and from his own child.

"Well, for the love of heaven!" he cried, and almost burst out laughing.

"We've more ranches now than we know what to do with. Everybody is aware of that."

Here was Uncle Henry's chance. "That's the idea!" he cried. "What do you want it for, anyhow?" But no one paid any attention to him.

"Oh, will you, daddy--for my sake?" Angela pleaded.

Hardy was adamant. "Certainly not! What a stupid request. How did such ideas come into your head?"

"But I don't see why--" the unremitting Angela started to say.

Her father was furious now, and tired of her prattle. He turned to "Red."

"Take her out doors, will you?" as though she were a child.

"Red's" face gleamed as if a lantern had been lighted behind it. He turned eagerly to Angela. "_Will_ I!" he cried.

But Angela was scornful. How foolish of "Red" to think her father could dismiss her in this way! She proceeded as though no such suggestion had been made, and addressed her father once more, not in the least perturbed:

"Of course, if you're going to be nasty about it--" Then, sweetly, to Gilbert she continued: "Please don't think too badly of us, Mr. Jones.

Father doesn't really mean any harm."

"No more'n a rattlesnake," Uncle Henry leaned out of his chair to whisper in a voice that could be heard by everyone.

"It's just that he doesn't know any better," Angela went on to Gilbert.

"He's really very neighborly when he wants to be."

She rose, and "Red" offered her his arm; but she haughtily rejected it, and went out the door, unaware that the devoted and humble "Red" followed her.

Jasper Hardy was glad she had gone. He could speak freely now. He addressed Jones.

"Packed up yet?" he inquired, sarcastically, as though he meant to intimate that his coming journey would be a pleasant one.

Gilbert could have struck him; but he replied quietly: "I'll just put on my hat and I'll be ready."

But the literal-minded Hardy remarked:

"Them crockery, and the rugs?" pointing to the articles significantly.

"The rugs I'm presenting to a friend of mine. The crockery goes to the cook. He has a family, you know." His irony was lost on the imperturbable Hardy, who merely asked:

"And you ain't got anything more to say, Jones?" He watched him closely.

"Nothing of general interest."

But Uncle Henry wasn't going to let matters end here.

"I've got something to say," he announced like an oracle. "Your daughter wants to marry him!" He imagined this would prove a thunderbolt; but Hardy calmly asked:

"How do you know that?"