"Yes, that is it. Then I would go with it a little distance from Tara, and would begin to struggle with it, and scream. The third time, when Tara saw me lying under it, kicking and screaming, he gave it a blow with his paw that ripped it clean in two! And after that...."
Her eyes were glorious in their wild triumph.
"He would tear it into bits," she cried breathlessly. "It would take me a whole day to mend it again, and at last I had to steal more clothes. I took Hauck's this time. And soon they were gone, too. That is just what Tara will do to a man—when I fight and scream!"
"And a little while ago you were ready to jump at me, and fight and scream!" he reminded her, smiling across their rock table.
"Not after you spoke to me," she said, so quickly that the words seemed to spring straight from her heart. "I wasn't afraid then. I was—glad. No, I wouldn't scream—not even if you held me like Brokaw did!"
He felt the warm blood rising under his skin again. It was impossible to keep it down. And he was ashamed of it—ashamed of the thought that for an instant was in his mind. The soul of the wild, little mountain creature was in her eyes. Her lips made no concealment of its thoughts or its emotions, pure as the blue skies above them and as ungoverned by conventionality as the winds that shifted up and down the valleys. She was a new sort of being to him, a child-woman, a little wonder-nymph that had grown up with the flowers. And yet not so little after all. He had noticed that the top of her shining head came considerably above his chin.
"Then you will not be afraid to go back to the Nest—with me?" he asked.
"No," she said with a direct and amazing confidence. "But I'd rather run away with you." Then she added quickly, before he could speak: "Didn't you say you came all that way—hundreds of miles—to find me? Then why must we go back?"
He explained to her as clearly as he could, and as reason seemed to point out to him. It was impossible, he assured her, that Brokaw or Hauck or any other man could harm her now that he was here to take care of her and straighten matters out. He was as frank with her as she had been with him. Her eyes widened when he told her that he did not believe Hauck was her uncle, and that he was certain the woman whom he had met that night on the Transcontinental, and who was searching for an O'Doone, had some deep interest in her. He must discover, if possible, how the picture had got to her, and who she was, and he could do this only by going to the Nest and learning the truth straight from Hauck. Then they would go on to the coast, which would be an easy journey. He told her that Hauck and Brokaw would not dare to cause them trouble, as they were carrying on a business of which the provincial police would make short work, if they knew of it. They held the whip hand, he and Marge. Her eyes shone with increasing faith as he talked.
She had leaned a little over the narrow rock between them so that her thick curls fell in shining clusters under his eyes, and suddenly she reached out her arms through them and her two hands touched his face.