Page:Max Brand--The Seventh Man.djvu/314

300 came silence, and the tall foreman striding across the hill with the child high in his arms. He came panting through the door and stood her up on the end of the table, a small and fearless creature. She wore on her feet the little moccasins which Dan himself had fashioned for her, but the tawny hide was not on her—perhaps her mother had thrown the garment away. The moccasins and the white nightgown were the sum and substance of her apparel, and the cowpunchers stood up around the table to admire her spunk.

“Damed near spat pizen,” observed Ben Swann, “when I hung into her—tried to bite me, but the minute I got her in my hands she quit strugglin', as reasonable as a grown-up, by God!”

“Shut up, Ben. Don't you know no better'n to cuss in front of a kid?”

The great, dark eyes of Joan went somberly from face to face. If she was afraid, she disguised it well, but now and then, like a wild thing which sees that escape is impossible, she looked through the window and out over the open country beyond.

“Where was you headed for, honey?” queried Ben Swann.

The child considered him bravely for a time before she replied.

“Over there.”

“Over there? Now what might she mean by that? Headed for Elkhead—in a nightgown? Any place I could take you, kid?”