“Yes, yes,” cried Balser. “For goodness’ sake, Liney, why didn’t you stay in the house?”
“You bet I stayed in,” said Jim.
“And so did I,” said Tom.
No one paid any attention to what Jim and Limpy said, and in a moment Liney was weeping gently with her face in her hands.
Jim and Limpy then began to cry, and soon Polly was boohooing as if he were already at the point of death. It required all of Balser’s courage and strength to keep back the tears, but in a moment he rose to his feet and said: “Stop your crying, everybody. I’ll kill that bear before the three months is half gone; yes, before a month has passed. If Liney saw him, the bear dies; that settles it.”
Liney looked up to Balser gratefully, and then, turning to Polly, said:—
“He’ll save us, Polly; he killed the one-eared bear, and it was enough sight worse to fight than the Fire Bear. The one-eared bear was a—was a devil.”
Polly did not share Liney’s confidence; so he sat down upon the hearth, and gazed sadly at the fire awhile. Then, taking his elbow for his pillow, he lay upon the floor and moaned himself to sleep.
The children sat in silence for a short time; and Jim lay down beside Polly, and closed his eyes in slumber. Then Limpy’s head began to nod, and soon Limpy was in the land of dreams. Balser and Liney sat upon the spare backlog for perhaps half an hour, without speaking.
The deep bed of live coals cast a rosy glow upon their faces, and the shadows back in the room grew darker, as the flame of the neglected fire died out. Now and then a fitful blaze would start from a broken ember, and the shadows danced for a moment over the floor and ceiling like sombre spectres, but Balser and Liney saw them not.