"No," answered Oliver bluntly—"no, indeed; you must be crazy!"
She drew her hand away, and leaning over the edge of the precipice, called, "Carl, Carl, are you there?"
Oliver caught hold of her dress and pulled her back. "You absurd little creature, you'll slip and fall if you do so!"
"Oh, never mind that. If I could make him hear me—if I could but make him hear!" she wailed. "But I am not to talk about the wolves—I'm not to talk."
"Yes, you may to me; you may say anything you like to me," interposed Oliver, resolutely turning her round and walking back towards the house.
"Do you speak the truth?" asked Kathleen.
"I tell you what, young lady: I don't admire your ways one bit. If you had only been a boy, I'd have bowled you over for that in less than a minute. What do you mean by asking me such a question?" he retorted in hot indignation.
"Then I may believe what you tell me, and you said he was alive in the jungle!" she exclaimed.
Oliver gave a long-drawn "Oh!" adding slowly, in a considerate tone, "Yes, I did. I said so because I thought so."
"And the milkmaid thought so!" she cried. Then for the fiftieth time she pictured the dusky face, with its rags and beads, and repeated the soft Indian words until the white walls of the bungalow were once again in sight.