They trudged on, following a faintly defined path well back from the brink, invisible to any eye which might look up from below. After awhile she said softly, as if talking to herself: “Steve’s gittin’ awful whiskers onto his face.”
Remembering the bristly black beard he had noticed on the fugitive’s unshaven face at their last meeting, he nodded carelessly.
“Of course. How can he shave?” he reminded her. “But maybe he can clean it off soon. We’ll see.”
“What you figgerin’ to do?”
“Ask him to come down and hide in my house, where he’ll be dry and warm.”
She gave a little gasp.
“Why—why, he can’t! With them detectives pesterin’ round—if they should come he’d be caught into a reg’lar trap. And you’d git ’rested too.”
“Maybe. But it’s getting too cold for him to lie up here. To-day’s hot, but to-morrow—— He’s got to move somewhere soon.”
Soberly she studied him.
“That’s so, but he won’t come, I don’t b’lieve. I tried to git him to come down and stay to our house, but he wouldn’t. He dasn’t trust pop. And them detectives, they watch everywheres. They come there one time and asked pop a lot of questions. I dunno what they asked him—I wasn’t round; but pop’s apt to say ’most anything or do ’most anything—depends on how drunk he is.”