The woman smiled affirmation. "So he does," she said, reflectively. "He
is big, and imposing, and strikingly handsome. And he is educated, too,
isn't he?"

"I reckon he is," said Corwin. "Privately, that is. His maw was a
scholar of some kind back East, before she married Luke Lawler an' come
out here to live with him. Luke's dead, now--died five years ago. Luke
was a wolf, ma'am, with a gun. He could shoot the buttons off your coat
with his eyes shut. An' he was so allfired fast with his gun that he'd
make a streak of lightnin' look like it was loafin'. Luke had a heap of
man in him, ma'am, an' Kane is just as much of a man as his dad was, I
reckon. Luke was----"

"About Kane Lawler," interrupted the woman. "You say he is well
educated?"

"That's about the only thing I've got ag'in' him, ma'am. I hold that no
cattleman has got a right to know so durned much. It's mighty
dangerous--to his folks--if he ever gets any. Now take Kane Lawler. If
he was to marry a girl that wasn't educated like him, an' he'd begin to
get fool notions about hisself--why, it'd make it pretty hard for the
girl to get along with him." He grinned. "But accordin' to what I hear,
Kane ain't goin' to marry no ignoramus exactly, for he's took a shine to
Ruth Hamlin, Willets' school teacher. She's got a heap of brains, that
girl, an' I reckon she'd lope alongside of Kane, wherever he went."

The woman frowned. "Is Mr. Lawler going to marry Ruth Hamlin?"

Corwin looked sharply at her. "What do you suppose he's fannin' up to
her for?" he demanded. "Neither of them is a heap flighty, I reckon. An'