Joan’s complaint was made half-laughingly and half-seriously. Buck saw the reality underlying her words, but determined to ignore it and only answer her lighter manner.
“If you’d only asked me these things I’d have told you right away,” he protested, smiling. “Y’ see you never asked me.”
“I—I was trying to,” Joan said feebly.
Buck paused in the act of securing Kitty’s harness.
“That old—your housekeeper wouldn’t ha’ spent a deal of time trying,” he said dryly.
Joan ignored the allusion.
“I don’t believe you intend to tell me now,” she said.
Buck left the stall and stood before the corn-box. His eyes were still smiling though his manner was tremendously serious.
“You’re wantin’ to know who I am,” he said. Then he paused, glancing out of the doorway, and the girl watched the return of that thoughtful expression which she had come to associate with his usual manner. “Wal,” he said at last, in his final way, “I’m Buck, and I was picked up on the trail-side, starving, twenty years ago by the Padre. He’s raised me, an’ we’re big friends. An’ now, since we sold his farm, we’re living at the old fur fort, back ther’ in the hills, and we’re goin’ to get a living pelt hunting. I’ve got no folks, an’ no name except Buck. I was called Buck. All I can remember is that my folks were farmers, but got burnt out in a prairie fire, and—burnt to death. That’s why I was on the trail starving when the Padre found me.”