“If you will let me go, I’ll tell,” she replied, assuming a childish seriousness that made him laugh. She slipped from him and ran to her room. In the doorway she turned and, putting her finger on her lips, cast an absurdly penitential glance toward the floor. “Yes, we did race going down, and Dave won.”
“Did the winner treat—?” began Avery.
“Mrs. Cameron was home,” replied Swickey evasively. “Jim had gone to Tramworth. The sheriff sent for him. But I’m going to change my stockings. Ask Dave.” And she closed the door.
“Jest like ole times—Swickey cuttin’ up and actin’ like the leetle Swickey ag’in.”
“Better than that,” said David absent-mindedly. Then, aware of Avery’s twinkling eye, he added, “That is—Swickey—you know Smoke—she felt badly—”
“Ya-a-s,” drawled Avery. “I reckon I know, and I’m pow’ful glad things is as they be.”
After supper Swickey lay stretched lazily on a camp-blanket near the stove, with Beelzebub purring a satisfied monotone as he lay curled in the hollow of her arm. Avery questioned David as to Cameron’s absence from home.
“I don’t know,” replied David. “Mrs. Cameron said the sheriff sent for him. Must be something important or he would have come up to see Jim himself.”
“Thet Curious Jim’s a queer cuss, always interestin’ hisself in other folkses business—howcome they ain’t nothin’ mean about Jim.”
“Maybe it’s about Fisty Harrigan,” said Swickey. “Mrs. Cameron said Fisty had been laying around Tramworth, drinking and making threats against—Dave.” She glanced up at him, and he smiled reassuringly. “And Jim knows more about—that time—than any one else.”