“Darn me!” yelled the man; “I’ll burn you, sure as you live, if you don’t kneel on your bare bones and beg my pardon.”
“I will not do that.”
“You won’t beg my pardon for cheeking me?”
“No: you are a wicked man.”
Bertie’s eyes closed; he grew faint; he fully believed that in another instant he would feel the hissing fire of the brand. But he did not yield.
The man’s hand dropped to his side.
“You are a plucked one,” he said, once more. “Lord, child, it was a joke. You’re such a rare game un, to humor you, there, I’ll let the crittur go without marking her. But you’re a rare little fool, if you’re not an angel down from on high.”
Bertie’s eyes filled with tears. He held his hand out royally to be kissed, as he was used to do at Avillion.
The big, black-looking man crushed it in his own brown paw.
“My! you’re a game un!” he muttered, with wonder and awe.