Barr’s eyes asked the question his lips refused to speak. Supper eaten, the men went outside and sat with their chairs tilted back against the cabin. Something in the younger man’s frank face had softened old Kit into a reminiscent mood and made him strangely inclined to gratify an idle curiosity.
The soft evening winds sighed through the branches of the tall spruce pines, and the declining rays of the setting sun caused the shadow of the rude home to stretch out longer across the greensward. From its shelter where he sat John Barr looked out on the grand ranges of the Rockies and wondered where in their vastness he would find the man he sought—the finding of whom had brought him out into this wild and almost forsaken mining camp.
“Stranger, I’ve took a likin’ ter you. Ye’ve a sumthin’ about you thet reminds me of sum one I know, an’ you look like an honest chap. Say, do you b’lieve in ghosts?”
He put the question very suddenly, and a look of disappointment crossed his face when Barr told him that he did not believe in spooks.
“Waal, I’ve seen ’em!”
A thought connecting the pink calico with something in the past came to Barr’s mind.
“Can’t you tell me about it?” he asked.
“I’d like ter if you’ll sw’ar, on yer derringer, never ter blab. Will you sw’ar?”
The solitary guest started to smile, but the smile faded at the thought of unshed tears in Polly’s eyes. It might make it easier for her if he humored the old man.
“I’ll swear,” he said. And he did.