"Were they—real dead, daddy? Couldn't we—can't we do anything?"
Horror stared from Tressa's eyes; she was trembling from head to foot.
"I thought you or—or Adrian were under it, and I almost fell over.
I'd have fainted if I hadn't thought you might need me."
The big man laid his arm across the shaking shoulders and drew her to him.
"I guess it was Adrian before your old dad."
"No—I don't think so." She continued naively: "Adrian's so quick; I don't think he'd be caught like that. It was you I thought of—too."
He smiled a little wistfully. "That's right, little girl, be honest. We all had it—once. When your mother was alive there was no one counted but 'Jim.' God, if I could hear her say it now! . . . 'Jim.'" He lingered over the word, repeating it in reverent whisper. "It was 'Jim' kept me straight them days. . . . Just the little word 'Jim.' I've always thought if I could die with that in my ears, perhaps there might—might open up a bit of a chance for the big rough fellow who hasn't had much chance to get away from things that make men rougher. . . . 'Jim.' Now I'll have to kick out without it."
The girl in his arms was frightened of him when he talked that way; and it was happening more frequently in these days of worry. She had scarcely known her mother, except through the lips of her daddy, but the woman who touched only the fringes of her memory was to her, as to him, a being not quite of this earth.
"'Jim,'" she whispered, scarce knowing she said it.
His arms closed convulsively, and she could feel his beating heart.
"Say it to me—sometimes—won't you, little girl?" he whispered.
But she was suddenly conscious of treading sacred ground.