"She's a good child, Maggie air," he observed, contemplating her, remembering the little creature's eager help.
The child's small friendly gray eyes were fixed intelligently upon him as he sat resting a moment on the opposite side of the hearth; the flickering fire-light showed her shock of tousled red hair and threw her magnified shadow on the wall. The shutters of the low, broad window stood open to the fresh balsamic mountain air, revealing the myriads of scintillating stars in the dark moonless concave above the western ranges; the greenish-white clusters of an elder-blossom, growing close outside in a clump of weeds, looked in and nodded, as if in greeting to those within.
"An' she's a mighty smart leetle gal too," he added.
"Yes," her mother drawled, disparagingly, "but so turrible ugly. I hain't never tuk no comfort in her. But Bob, he 'lows he kin put up with her looks mighty easy."
"Waal, the bes'-lookin' gals ain't always pritty whenst little," said the sheriff, optimistically.
His plastic countenance took on a sudden absorption in graver matters, and he arose and strode to the middle of the room, stooping to glance out of the window, as if to exert some slight surveillance upon the members of his posse without.
The door-yard was all illumined. A fire of pine knots and hickory logs flared in its midst. Around it were grouped the figures of the night-bound posse, making what cheer they could for themselves. Spurred and booted and armed, they had a reminiscent suggestion for the sheriff, who had been a soldier and could look down the vistas of memory, where many a bivouac fire was still ablaze. The familiar features of the place seemed now and again to advance, then to shrink away askance amongst the shadows, as the yellow and red flames rose and fell with a genial crackling sound pleasant to hear. The rail fence showed with a parallel line of zigzag shadows; the ash-hopper, the beehives all awry, the haystack, were distinct; and the roof of the barn looked over them all, the window-shutter of the loft flaring wide, revealing the stores of hay whereon the visitors were to sleep; through the open door below their horses were visible, some stalled and at the mangers, but one or two lying on the straw. Quite outside stood another—a sleek, clay-bank creature—so still that, with the copperish hue and the lustre of the fire, he looked like some gigantic bronze. Around all the dark forest gloomed. Sometimes the flames were tossed so high, with a flickering radiance so bright, that the outline of a mountain would show against that dark, cloudless, starlit sky; and once were discovered mists in the valley—silent, white, secret, swift—journeying on their unimagined ways under cover of the night. The fire-lit figures sprawling about the logs wore merry, bearded faces, and jests and stories were afoot. Amongst the men were certain canine shapes, seeming to listen and to share the mirth; a trifle ill at ease, they now and again made a sniffing circuit of the guests, wondering, doubtless, where poor Bob Millroy was, and that upon them alone should devolve the entertainment of so many strangers.
The sheriff had a keen eye; one glance at the group and he went forward to the window, leaning his palms on the sill. The rank weeds below glowed in the fire-light; the elder-bloom breathed dew and fragrance in his face. He gave a low whistle, which a dog heard first, and turned its head, its ears cocked alertly, but nevertheless sat still, loath to leave the merry company. A second summons and one of the men sprang up, and approached the window.
"Whar's Felix Guthrie?" demanded the officer.
The fire-light showed a surprised glance from under the brim of his interlocutor's old slouched hat. "Why, I thunk ye sent him on some yerrand. He saddled his beastis an' put out long ago fur down the mounting. An' I axed him ef he warn't afeard o' the gorges. An' he 'lowed he war 'bleeged ter go."