Donoghue jeered.
"Waal! Here's where I come in! Here's the beauty of not being ediccated to big words nor what they mean, nor bein' able to follow a high-toned talk except the way a man follows a poor-blazed trail."
Apache surveyed him with interest for a moment and then again turning to me he heaved a little sigh and said:
"I wonder if you would do something for me after we get through with this expedition? If I were to give you a little wad of bills, enough for a year's holiday at home, I wonder if you 'd go and take a squint at the house where my folks lived when I left home; find out if they are still there, and if not, trace them up? You 'd need to promise me not to let that sentimental side of you run away with you. You 'd need to promise not to go and tell them I'm alive; for I 'm sure they have given me up for dead years ago and mourned the allotted space of time that men and women mourn—and forgotten. It would only be opening fresh wounds to hear of me. They have grieved for my death; I would not have them mourn for my life. But I—well, I sometimes wonder. You understand what I mean——"
"Watch your eye!" roared Donoghue. "Watch your——" but a shot out of the forest sent him flying along the ground, he having risen suddenly and stretched for his rifle.
Instead of clutching it he went far beyond, ploughing the earth with his outstretched hands; and right on the first report came a second and Apache cried: "O!"
He sagged down all in a heap, but I flung round for my revolver—the one with which I had had no practice. I heard the quick, dull plod of running feet and before I could get my finger on my weapon a voice was bellowing out:
"Don't shoot, man; don't shoot! It's Canlan; Mike Canlan. You ain't hostile to Mike Canlan."
I wheeled about, and there he was trailing his smoking rifle in his left hand and extending his right to me; Mike Canlan, little Mike Canlan with the beady eyes, the parchment-like, pock-marked face, and the boy's body.
Had my revolver been to hand, he had been a dead man, I verily believe—he or I. As it was, I leapt on him crying: