The girl's entire expression altered.
"So that's the sort you are," she said. "I thought you different. But you're all a rotten lot——"
"Hold on," he interrupted, "what do you mean by that?"
"I mean that the only men who ever come to Star Pond are crooks," she retorted bitterly. "I didn't believe you were. You look decent. But you're as crooked as the rest of them — and it seems as if I — I couldn't stand it — any longer——"
"If you think me so rotten, why did you run all the way form Clinch's to warn me?" he asked curiously.
"I didn't do it for you; I did it for my father. They'll jail him if they catch him hiding you. They've got it in for him. If they put him in prison he'll die. He couldn't stand it. I know. And that's why I came to find you and tell you to clear out——"
The distant crack of a dry stick checked her. The next instant she picked up his rifle, seized his arm, and fairly dragged him into a spruce thicket.
"Do you want to get my father into trouble!" she said fiercely.
The rocky flank of Star Peak bordered the marsh here.
"Come on," she whispered, jerking him along the thicket and up the rocks to a cleft — a hole in the sheer rock overhung by shaggy hemlock.