“I don’t want to shoot no million b’ars or no hun’red to oncet.”
There were tears of anger and chagrin in her voice. She had tried to learn. The lessons usually ended that way. Rebellion on Swickey’s part and gentle reproof from her father.
“Don’t git mad, Swickey. I didn’t calc’late to hurt you,” said the old man, as he stooped and picked up the cartridges.
He had often tried to teach her what he knew of “book larnin’,” but his efforts were piteously unsuccessful. She was bright enough, but the traps, the river, her garden-patch, the kitten, and everything connected with their lonely life at Lost Farm had an interest far above such vague and troublesome things as reading and writing.
Once, after a perspiring half-hour of endeavor on her father’s part and a disinterested fidgeting on hers, she had said, “Say, Pop, I ain’t never goin’ away from you, be I?”
To which he had replied, “No, Swickey, not if you want to stay.”
“Then, ding it, Pop, ain’t I good ’nough fur you jest as I be, ’thout larnin’?”
This was an argument he found difficult to answer. Still, he felt he was not doing as her mother would have wished, for she often seemed to speak to him in the soft patois of the French-Canadian, when he was alone, by the river or on the hills.
As he sat gazing across the clearing he thought he saw something move in the distance. He scowled quizzically over his spectacles. Then he drew his daughter to him and whispered, “See thar, gal! You git the rifle.”
She glided to the cabin noiselessly and returned lugging the old .45 Winchester. Avery pointed toward a lumbering black patch near the river.