"So I hear, mine host," she said, bowing low in mock gravity, "and that is why we have been scared to death at your long absence. I feared the Indians had carried you off."
"I was detained unwillingly," he responded. "But, really, Miss Bright, I am not joking. It is perilous for you to tramp these mountain roads as you do, and especially near nightfall. You are tempting Providence." He nodded his head warningly.
"But I am not afraid," she persisted.
"I know that. More's the pity. But you ought to be. Some day you may be captured and carried off, and no one in camp to rescue you."
"How romantic!" she answered, a smile lurking in her eyes and about her mouth.
She seated herself on a stool near the fire.
"Why didn't you ask me why I was so late? I have an excellent excuse."
"Why, prisoner at the bar?"
"Please, y'r honor, we've been making ready for Christmas." She assumed the air of a culprit, and looked so demurely funny he laughed outright.
Here Mrs. Clayton and Edith, her fifteen-year-old daughter, entered the room.