There was an astonishing deal of life in the town, however. A large company had reopened some old diggings across the range to the north of Calkins, and some small fragments of business drifted the way of the little cattle town. Terry found a long line of a dozen horses waiting to be shod before the blacksmith shop. One great wagon¹ was lumbering² out at the farther end of the street, with the shrill³ yells of the teamster calling back as he picked up his horses one by one with his voice. Another freight-wagon stood at one side, blocking half the street. And a stir of busy life was everywhere in the town. The hotel and store combined was flooded with sound, and the gambling⁴ hall across the street was alive even at midday.  
It was noon, and Terry found that the dining room was packed to the last chair. The sweating waiter improvised⁵ a table for him in the corner of the hall and kept him waiting twenty minutes before he was served with ham and eggs. He had barely worked his fork into the ham when a familiar voice hailed him.
 
"Got room for another at that table?"
 
He looked up into the grinning face of Denver. For some reason it was a shock to Terry. Of course, the second meeting was entirely⁶ coincidental, but a still small voice kept whispering to him that there was fate in it. He was so surprised that he could only nod. Denver at once appropriated a chair and seated himself in his usual noiseless way.
 
When he rearranged the silver which the waiter placed before him, there was not the faintest click of the metal. And Terry noted⁷, too, a certain nice justness in every one of Denver's motions. He was never fiddling⁸ about with his hands; when they stirred, it was to do something, and when the thing was done, the hands became motionless again.
 
His eyes did not rove; they remained fixed⁹ for appreciable¹⁰ periods wherever they fell, as though Denver were finding something worth remembering in the wall, or in a spot on the table. When his glance touched on a face, it hung there in the same manner. After a moment one would forget all the rest of his face, brutal¹¹, muscular, shapeless, and see only the keen eyes.
 
Terry found it difficult to face the man. There was need to be excited about something, to talk with passion, in order to hold one's own in the presence of Denver, even when the chunky man was silent. He was not silent now; he seemed in a highly cheerful, amiable¹² mood.
 
"Here's luck," he said. "I didn't know this God-forsaken country could raise as much luck as this!"
 
"Luck?" echoed Terry.
 
"Why not? D'you think I been trailing you?"
 
He chuckled¹³ in his noiseless way. It gave Terry a feeling of expectation. He kept waiting for the sound to come into that laughter, but it never did. Suddenly he was frank, because it seemed utterly¹⁴ futile¹⁵ to attempt to mask one's real thoughts from this fellow.
 
"I don't know," he said, "that it would surprise me if you had been tailing me. I imagine you're apt to do queer things, Denver."
 
Denver hissed¹⁶, very softly and with such a cutting whistle to his breath that Terry's lips remained open over his last word.
 
"Forget that name!" Denver said in a half-articulate tone of voice.
 
He froze in his place, staring straight before him; but Terry gathered an impression of the most intense watchfulness—as though, while he stared straight before him, he had sent other and mysterious senses exploring for him. He seemed suddenly satisfied that all was well, and as he relaxed, Terry became aware of a faint gleam of perspiration¹⁷ on the brow of his companion.
 
"Why the devil did you tell me the name if you didn't want me to use it?" he asked.
 
"I thought you'd have some savvy¹⁸; I thought you'd have some of your dad's horse sense," said Denver.
 
"No offense," answered Terry, with the utmost good nature.
 
"Call me Shorty if you want," said Denver. In the meantime he was regarding Terry more and more closely.
 
"Your old man would of made a fight out of it if I'd said as much to him as I've done to you," he remarked at length.
 
"Really?" murmured Terry.
 
And the portrait of his father swept back on him—the lean, imperious, handsome face, the boldness of the eyes. Surely a man all fire and powder, ready to explode. He probed his own nature. He had never been particularly quick of temper—until lately. But he ............