“We’ll take a packhorse between us,” said he to Turner, “it’ll save trouble; and I ‘ll show you a decent camping-place for to-night.” Then he followed the girl outside, and his companion began rolling up his swag.
He came back a few moments later, the girl following, and Turner could not but note the change in her face. It was not angry now, there was hardly even a trace of sullenness on it. Fear and sorrow seemed struggling with one another for the upper hand, and she was sobbing every now and then heavily, as if she could not help herself.
“Good Lord! Stanesby, what the dickens have you been doing to the girl?” he said.
Stanesby looked at him angrily.
“You seem to take a confoundedly big interest in the girl,” he said.
“Well, hang it all, man, she looks as if she had been having a jolly bad time, and really she’s only a child.”
“A child, is she? A child that’s very well able to take care of herself. I haven’t been beating her, if that’s what you ‘re thinking. I suppose I may be allowed to go into the head-station occasionally without asking my hutkeeper’s leave.”
“Oh! that’s the trouble, is it? Depends upon your hutkeeper, I should say. I don’t ask mine, but then—”
Turner paused, and Stanesby answered the unspoken thoughts with an oath.
“Oh, if you feel that way,” began Turner, but his companion flung himself out of the hut angrily.