"Why the hell didn't you give Quintana the packet?" he demanded. "What does that count for — what does any damn thing count for against you, girlie?"
She looked up at him out of heavy-lidded eyes: "You told me to take good care of it."
"It's only a little truck I'd laid by for you," he retorted unsteadily, "— a few trifles for to make a grand lady of you when the time's ripe. 'Tain't worth a thorn in your little foot to me. … The hull gol-dinged world full o' money ain't worth that there stone-bruise onto them little white feet o' yourn, Eve.
"Look at you now — my God, look at you there, all peaked an' scairt an' bleedin' — plum tuckered out, 'n' all ragged 'n' dirty——"
A blaze of fury flared in his small pale eyes: "— And he hit you, too, did he? — that skunk! Quintana done that to my little girlie, did he?"
"I don't know if it was Quintana. I don't know who he was, dad," she murmured drowsily.
"Masked, wa'n't he?"
"Yes."
Clinch's iron visage twitched and quivered. He gnawed his thin lips into control.
"Girlie, I gotta go out a spell. But I ain't a-leavin' you alone here. I'll git somebody to set up with you. You jest lie snug and don't think about nothin' till I come back."