"Would you like one for your hat?" Knight asked.
"Oh, wouldn't I!" she cried eagerly.
Quick as flash Knight swung his rifle about, aimed and fired. Blue Bonnet put her fingers in her ears with an exclamation of alarm. The bird toppled as if to fall, then righted itself with a lurch and fluttered out from the tree. Blue Bonnet gave a sigh of relief.
"I was so afraid you had hurt him!" she cried,—and the words died away in a gasp of distress. The kite, pitching headlong, had fallen almost at her feet.
She dropped on her knees beside it; but the bird was still. Knight, bending over her, was suddenly filled with surprise and dismay; she was crying like a child.
"It was so mean and vain of me," she said with quivering lips, "—to want him just for a hat, when he was having such a beautiful time."
Knight was pale with hatred of himself.
She looked up at last and smiled mistily through her tears. "I reckon you think I am pretty much of a baby. But I can't bear to see things—die."
"It's only a big hawk," he said to comfort both himself and her.
She looked up hopefully. "And hawks are mean birds, aren't they,—that kill little chickens and other birds?"