"I want to apologize for striking you on the street in Macon."
The sentence was cold as ice, and formal. There was no feeling in it. The man to whom it was addressed stood with arms hanging loosely at his sides, his face sullen and crafty. He did not reply.
"You know I had to do it," went on the steel-like voice. "I regret the necessity more than I apologize for the blow. You deserved that. Let it pass."
"What in the devil do you want here? Begone, before I put the dogs on you!"
"I am here to give you a thrashing you won't forget as long as you live! You are a coward and a cur!"
The stinging words brought no added colour to Marston's face. They did not hurt him; his sensibilities were hardened, and were difficult to reach. But he cast an involuntary look of longing towards the revolver lying partly concealed in the long grass a rod or more away. The sombre eyes watching him with hawk-like intentness noticed the glance, and instantly turned in the same direction. Glenning saw.
"Don't you wish you had that in your hand?" he said. "I know you haven't one on your person, or you would have shot me before now. To relieve you of any apprehension I don't mind telling you that I am totally unarmed. How did that come there?"
He nodded abruptly in the direction of Julia's revolver.
"I don't see that I'm in a witness box!" Marston answered, viciously.
"Take comfort," retorted Glenning, evenly. "You will be if you live long enough. We are wasting time and bandying words to no purpose," he resumed briskly. "I met a young lady coming from your house in evident distress a few moments ago. She was riding hard and she was scared. Did _you_ scare her, and had she anything to do with that revolver?"
The words of the last sentence came hard as lead bullets against Marston's ears, and frightened him. The face of his caller had suddenly grown white and fierce. Glenning's knotted fists were writhing under his folded arms. Marston knew he had better speak, and speak the truth.
"She came to see me of her own free will. I invited her in, and she drew her pistol on me. I knocked it out of her hand to keep from getting shot."
"A likely tale, and the skeleton of truth alone, I daresay. What did _she_ want with _you_?"