He laughed at her teasingly, expecting to see her show temper again, but she did not. She only bent her head a little lower, and when she lifted it, she looked at him with a certain daring.
“He was right, and I was silly, I guess. He was good—so good, and I’m mostly bad. I was bad to him, anyway, but I ain’t too much of a baby to say so. And if he’s mad at me when he comes back, I’ll just pack my traps and take another trail.”
“Back to Akkomi?” he asked, gaily. “Now, you know we would not hear to that.”
“It ain’t your affair, only Dan’s.”
“Oh, excuse me for living on the same earth with you and Dan! It is not my fault, you know. I suppose now, if you did desert us, it would be to act as a sort of guardian angel to the tribes along the river, turn into a whole life-saving service yourself, and pick up the superfluous reds who tumble into the rivers. I wondered for a whole day why you made so strong a swim for so unimportant an article.”
“His mother thought he was important,” she answered. “But I didn’t know he had a mother just then; all I thought as I started for him was that he was so plucky. He tried his little best to save himself, and he never said one word; that was what I liked about him. It would have been a pity to let that sort of a boy be lost.” 91
“You think a heap of that—of personal bravery—don’t you? I notice you gauge every one by that.”
“Maybe I do. I know I hate a coward,” she said, indifferently.
Then, as the canoe ran in to the shore, she for the first time saw Overton, who was standing there waiting for them. She looked at him with startled alertness as his eyes met hers. He looked like a statue—a frontier sentinel standing tall and muscular with folded arms and gazing with curious intentness from one to the other of the canoeists.
In the bottom of the boat a string of fish lay, fine speckled fellows, to delight the palate of an epicure. She stooped and picking up the fish, walked across the sands to him.