She did not tell Dora that she knew herself to be dying from pneumonia, for she knew the child then would not leave her, so she held Dora close to her heart for a moment, and then sent her away.
“I thank you with all my heart for all your goodness to me, and I will pray that Heaven may repay you for all you have endured for me!”
“Go, go! I fancy I see them following us in the crowd back there. And it will cost our lives if they find us again! Go, Dora!”
“Good-bye, dear Muriel. God bless and keep you safe!” And Dora mingled with the crowd, none of whom took more than casual notice of the squaw, for squaws were common about there.
Shoshone came by the box, hoping to find the shoemaker. Helen was with him, but the boy was not. “And,” he said, continuing a conversation they had had:
“Don’t worry about the boy, Helen. He is safer with the boys than with you.”
They did not notice Muriel, who looked at Helen for a moment with tears in her eyes and then slipped away unseen by Helen, whose sorrows she had caused in a great measure.
“Are you sure he would be safe with them? Think what it would mean to me to lose him again!”
“Don’t worry. Anyone of the boys would die for you any day, and as he is your boy they would naturally transfer their allegiance to him. And you say it is his father who, to rob you of him, killed your brother, ‘Cactus Bill,’ and stole this poor Dora? Say, he must be aching for the noose. And, besides, it was he who tried to kill Goldberg!”
“Yes; he is John Pierson. I saw him but just now, and he tried to take my child again. Oh, I wonder such men are permitted to live! He outraged every human emotion, abandoned me with another woman, and to think that he should have killed my poor brother! He was an honest man.”