Here there was a jolly chuckle.
Their packhorses joining them noisily, the dialogue was cut short.
"Some one comin'," said the voice.
Rounding the clump of bushes, Garth and Natalie found themselves in a grassy opening in the bush. An untraced wagon stood in the centre; and two horses browsed. Immediately under the bushes, an old man sat on the ground. They instinctively looked around for the other persons brought into his conversation; but, save for the horses, he was alone.
At the sight of them his face lighted up with the pleased naïveté of a child. "How do! How do!" he said immediately, without getting up or raising his voice at all. "My horses are quiet. They won't tech yours. The spring is down there at the foot of the spruce. Just blow up my fire a little and it will do for you." He seemed to take them entirely for granted; and he spoke as if resuming a dropped conversation.
There was something very troll-like in the old figure, squatting on the ground; in his bright, glancing eyes, in his incessant, matter-of-fact loquacity, and the slight, peculiar gesticulation, with which he illustrated his talk. He was all of a colour; high moccasins, breeches, shirt and cap were weathered to the same grayish-brown shade—and that much the colour of his skin. Against a background of withered grass, only his white hair would have been visible. He was like some good-tempered, little familiar of the forest.
He stared hard at Natalie in his bright-eyed, impersonal way; and as soon as Garth, having made his horses comfortable, came to build up the fire, he started in with his questions.
"Where you going?"
"Spirit River Crossing," said Garth.
"Thinking of settling?"