“No one.”
The girl’s answer came very short. She didn’t like being laughed at. And she thought he was laughing at her now.
“Some one’s said something,” Seth persisted. “You see Little Black Fox has hated me for six years. There is no more danger for me now than there was when I shot Big Wolf. With you it’s kind o’ different. You see—you’re grown——”
“I see.” Rosebud’s resentment had passed. She understood her companion’s meaning. She had understood that she was “grown” before. Presently she went on. “I’ve learned a lot in the last few days,” she said quietly, gazing a little wistfully out of the window. “But nobody has actually told me anything. You see,” with a shadowy smile, “I notice things near at hand. I don’t calculate ahead. I often talk to Little Black Fox. He is easy to read. Much easier than you are, Seth,” she finished up, with a wise little nod.
“An’ you’ve figgered out my danger?” Seth surveyed the trim figure reposing with such unconscious grace upon the table. He could have feasted 116 his eyes upon it, but returned to a contemplation of his note-paper.
“Yes. Will you promise me, Seth—dear old Seth?”
The man shook his head. The wheedling tone was hard to resist.
“I can’t do that,” he said. “You see, Rosebud, ther’s many things take me there which must be done. Guess I git around after you at times. That could be altered, eh?”
“I don’t think you’re kind, Seth!” The girl pouted her disappointment, but there was some other feeling underlying her manner. The man looked up with infinite kindness in his eyes, but he gave no sign of any other feeling.
“Little Rosebud,” he said, “if ther’s a creetur in this world I’ve a notion to be kind to, I guess she ain’t more’n a mile from me now. But, as I said, ther’s things that take me to the Reservation. Rube ken tell you. So——”