With that he was off. She stood motionless, watching his receding shoulders, her head lifted at the same proud angle. But, as he disappeared around the curve from which he had sprung to her rescue, that haughty head slowly drooped. She set her teeth into one red lip. The clear gray eyes became blurred with tears.
Beyond the curve, Douglas stalked rapidly on. Into the Wilham yard he marched with never a backward glance, and, after a quick look toward the barn, up into the open doorway of the house. Uncle Eb, cheek bulging with a chunk of bread-and-cheese, nodded to him from the table where he was devouring his belated cold lunch.
“Shet the door,” he suggested. Douglas closed it. “Them fellers gone?”
“They’re on their way. They’re sore at each other now, as well as at Sanders. Where’s our friend?”
“Down cellar. Ther’s a winder he can git out by if he has to. What’s them fellers mad ’bout now?”
Douglas briefly told him. Uncle Eb stopped chewing, looked at him keenly, cackled out all at once, then wondered: “Why didn’t Marry come ’long with ye?”
“I don’t know. Said she didn’t want to walk with me. So I jest walked right ’long by my own self.”
The old man looked quizzically at him, then cackled again.
“Ye’re a-gittin’ to talk like ye b’longed into the Traps,” he chuckled. “An’ after what ye done this afternoon, boy, ye do b’long! ’Most anybody with the right kind of a heart round here would a-helped that pore misfortunit boy, but ’tain’t every feller from outside, like you, would a-done it. An’ that Marry gal—she prob’ly thinks ye’re a detective, like the rest. She’ll soon know diff’rent.”
“Never mind. But now, Uncle Eb, I don’t like to ask questions that don’t concern me, but just what did Steve do that sent him to the pen?”