“No, you don’t, you wriggly wretch! I know perfectly well what you’ve got in that bucket of yours this time of day—nothing but the saved-up old bones that they don’t want you to bury in the flower-beds about the Sheepfold.”
When Kicko, as if acknowledging himself caught, seized the handle of his pail and shook it toward her appealingly, she took off the lid and laughed aloud at his ruse. In the regardless embrace which she threw around his scraggy neck, she spilled what showed to be a collection of more or less aged bones.
“Just because you’re so attractive, I’ll maybe let you have your way,” she informed him seriously as though addressing a human. “If I don’t find what I’m after, you may bury your precious debris as I scoop back the dirt. But you’ll have to wait until I— Back, now! I tell you, you’ve got to wait until I’m sure this isn’t the place where——”
Pape didn’t stand still longer. Her voice—sweet, strong, familiar—lured him. He forgot his question to advance or retreat. He advanced—and rapidly. By the time he reached her he had outstrode all his consideration for her age and forlorn state. His hurry made him rough. He stooped over the lowered poke bonnet; unclasped the two arms from about Kicko’s neck; literally, jerked the woman to her feet.
Well proportioned, for so old and ill-clad a lady, did she show to be as she sprang back from him, surprised into height, straightness and lissome lines. The face within the scoop of the bonnet was pale from passion—surprise, anger, fear—or perhaps all three. She was——
“Jane!” he exclaimed.
“You!” cried she.
He stared at her, his tongue too crowded with demands to speak any one of them. He continued to stare as she fell back to her knees and, with her trowel, refilled the hole she had dug. Before he realized what she was about, she had picked up a pile of wilted plants that lay nearby; had down-doubled her tallness, straightness and lissomeness into her former old-lady lines; with a rapid, shuffling walk, had started down and around the hummock.
“Just a minute, Miss Lauderdale,” he called. “I didn’t mean to startle you. Can’t we have a word or two or three?”
She did not answer, did not turn—only hurried away from him the faster. He set out after her; recrossed the bridle path; entered the deepening shadows toward the heart of the park.