Garth shook his head.
"No, you don't look like settlers. Company business, maybe?"
"No," said Garth.
"Police? Gov'ment survey?"
"Private business," said Garth—his usual answer to the question direct.
Baffled inquisitiveness, vice of the kindest natures, made the old man's face ugly; and for a moment he looked like a wicked troll. For a little while he preserved an offended silence; but then, probably recollecting that he would hear the whole story at the Settlement, or simply because he could not keep still any longer, his face cleared, and he resumed his engaging, inconsequential babble.
"See that horse over there, the buckskin? Best horse I ever had! True buckskin! Mark the zebra stripes round his legs, Miss; and the black stripe on his backbone. You can't kill a buck; he's got more lives than a cat. I call the old one Mother; she's good-natured, she is!"
"You're a freighter, I see," remarked Garth as a leader.
"Sure thing, stranger! Tom Lillywhite and his team is known to every settler in the country! Been here thirty-five year; and always on the move! Never sleep in the same place two nights going! That wagon there, and the grub-box is my home. It's a variegated life!"
Garth bethought himself the old man would likely prove a valuable source of information. "You must know everybody in the country!" he said, feeling his way.