"What did you stop me for? Couldn't you get out of the way?" he asked.
"Why were you driving at that breakneck pace?"
"A jack-rabbit bolted right under Volador's feet. I'll get on again if you'll move your buggy."
"It depends," replied Thorne, "on what I'm expected to do and whom they're coming from."
"I'm anxious to get hold of somebody who'll drive me to the settlement. This horse is played out."
"In that case I'm not open. I'm too busy."
"I'll give you your own price for your time. It will probably pay you better than--selling mirrors."
Thorne noticed the half-contemptuous stress upon the last words.
"You should have been content with the reason I offered," he retorted. "As you were not, I'll give you another; I'm not a very particular person, but I shouldn't like to touch your money."
Nevis stood up with a laugh of half-veiled malevolence.
"Do you think that kind of thing is wise?"
"I haven't troubled to ask myself the question. I've never been remarkably prudent, and when I saw that you meant to hold me up my first impulse was to drive smash into your buggy. It was only out of regard for the horses that I didn't do so."
"Is there any particular reason for this gratuitous insolence?"
"There are two," explained Thorne. "In the first place, I don't like being stopped on an open trail; and in the next, I've spent the last few days borrowing things for a friend of mine whom you pitched out on to the prairie with his wife and child."
"I might have guessed it was something of that kind. You're rudimentary and haven't the crudest notion of what you have up against you. It would be about as sensible for one of your horses to start kicking because it didn't like your style of driving."
"That," returned Thorne, "is just where you're wrong. I've no complaint against human nature in general or the way this country's run. My dislikes are concentrated on a few particularly obnoxious people who live in it, of whom you're one. You're a discredit even to the profession which you follow."
"It's not as dangerous to the people I deal with as yours is," Nevis retorted.
"We'll let that pass. I've already stopped here talking with you longer than I care about. Will you pull your buggy out of the way?"