For a moment or so the exhausted girl strove to speak in vain, but at last she found her voice.
“No, father, no. But Jim, Jim, it is you they want! Come, Jim, quick, quick! They very close now.”
“What in thunder are you talkin' 'bout, Em? An' who wants Jim?” And then, turning to his son, he asked, “Have you been a-thumpin' any o' those south-end natives lately, Jim?”
“No, no,” said the girl, rising to her feet, and endeavouring to speak calmly; “you don' know, father. But Jim must go, an' you an' me mus' stay here. Quick, quick, for God's sake, dear, go out at the back an' cross to the windwar' side. Plenty place there for you to hide, Jim, for two or tree day.”
A savage light came into the half-caste's eyes, as with an abrupt yet tender gesture he placed his huge brown hand on his sister's curly head; then, without a word, he seized a musket and cutlass, and with a farewell wave of his hand to the wondering old man, opened the door at the back of the house and disappeared among the pandanus thicket.
Leaning his musket against the wall, the old man poured some water into a cup and, putting his arm round the trembling figure of the girl, placed it to her lips.
“Here, take a drink, Em, an' then tell me what all this here means. What's the boy been a doin', an' who's after him?”
With shaking fingers the girl raised the cup to her lips and drank; then, with terror-filled eyes, she placed her hand upon his knee.
“Listen.”
“Thar's nothin' outside, Em. What in the worl' has scared ye so, gal?”