"O, well, it's nat'ral enough for you," said Zac, with magnanimity, "nat'ral enough for you, course, to like your own place best—'twouldn't be nat'ral ef you didn't. All your friends live thar, course. You were born thar, and I s'pose your pa an' ma may be there now, anxiously expectin' to hear from you."
Zac put this in an interrogative way, for he wanted to know. But as he said these words, the smiling face of Margot turned sad; she shook her head, and said,—
"No; I have no one, no one!"
"What! no relatives!" said Zac, in a voice full of commiseration and tender pity.
Margot shook her head.
"An' so you've got no father nor mother, an' you're a poor little orphan girl!" said Zac, in a broken voice.
Margot shook her head, and looked sadder than over.
Tears came to Zac's eyes. He felt as he had never felt before. There was something so inexpressibly touching about this orphan! He took her little hand tenderly in his own great, brown, toil-worn fist, and looked at her very wistfully. For a few moments he said nothing. Margot looked up at him with her great brown eyes, and then looked meekly at the deck. Zac heaved a deep sigh; then he placed his disengaged hand solemnly upon her head.
"Wal," said he, gravely, "I'll protect you. Ef anybody ever harms you, you jest come to me. I'll—I'll be—a father to you."
Again Margot looked up at him with her great brown eyes.