“The river’s droppin’ fast all day,” said Dan, looking at her, “an’ they’re thinkin’ that wi’ extra horses, maybe, they might be passable be mornin’.”
“By morning?” said Mrs. Dan, with a gasp of dismay. “He wouldn’t go in the morning, without bidding us good-bye.”
“He’d go this night widout biddin’ his own father an’ mother good-bye, the way he is now,” said Dan. “’Tisn’t well he is at all, at all, wid the eyes shinin’ out av his head like lighted lamps an’ the two cheekbones of his white face wid a flush on them ye cud light yer pipe at. His chest wounds opened wi’ the rowin’ he tells me——”
“There’s deeper than his chest wounds opened I’m thinkin’, Dan,” she said. “But don’t take off your boots yet. Go out and see him, and make him promise to come an’ say good-bye at least.”
“I’ve done better than that,” said Dan, with calm satisfaction, as he pulled a boot off. “I’ve fixed it wid them at the stables to tell me the minute there’s word of the horses bein’ asked for.”
Mrs. Dan had to content herself with that, but as they were going to bed, she said quietly, “Dan, how was it you kept that back about Steve?”
Dan stared at her, and then his eyes flickered, and she knew that he understood.
“I never kept back aught about Steve,” he said firmly, “that he didn’t have my sacred word to keep to myself.”
“It’s all right now—only I wondered,” she said. “But, of course, a man’s word is his word, though hearts and the heavens break for it.”
“Mine is,” said Dan.