A little sound or movement in the room behind him brought the man’s glance around with such a malignant scowl that Huldah, noting it, deemed her time to speak out had come. “See here, sir,” she began, turning away from the stove—“Manuelita, tend to that steak, and don’t let it burn, for goodness’ sake—see here, sir, you know a lot more’n I do about what ails that woman in there. But I know enough to know that she’s goin’ to die if she’s driv’ like you’ve been drivin’ her.”
“Like I’ve been driving her!” echoed the man, angrily. “She’s the one that’s making it hot for me. There’s nothing the matter with her.”
“All right,” returned Huldah, applying herself once more to the cooking. “If there’s nothing the matter of her, what did you come out here to ask me about it for?” Sudden rage mastered her as she worked over the steak gravy. She whirled and shook a finger at her interlocutor so sharply that he drew back. “I tell you that little creatur’ in the room behind you is a-goin’ to die if she ain’t let up on,” she finished, impressively.
Fear, indecision and rage contended upon the man’s face. “Oh, Lord!” he ejaculated, “if one woman can’t raise enough row, there’s always another to help her. Well, come in here. You can take her over. To your own room, mind—nowhere else. And let nobody else see her or talk to her. You’ll come right back, and not stay with her.” He looked at Huldah Sarvice’s strong, benevolent face, which smiled upon him inscrutably. “I expect I’m a fool to risk it,” he muttered. “But—well, come in.”
“Stay with her!” echoed Huldah, tossing up her head with a peculiar, free motion which belonged to her in times of excitement. “Stay with her? I don’t want to stay with your wife. I’ve got my work to do. I don’t spy on nobody—no matter how bad things looks for ’em.”
She had spoken the latter words in an undertone, as she gathered the drooping girl and her belongings upon a capable arm. Now, as a heavy, drumming roar became audible, she added, in excitement: “Land sakes! There’s a train. No, it can’t be no train; but for sure them’s engines out on the Magdalena Branch! I’ve got to fly ’round and git supper for them train crews. All the boys o’ the Magdalena Branch eats with me.” She made as though to release her charge, saying sharply: “I guess I ain’t hardly time to take your wife acrost—let alone hangin’ ’round to chat with her.”
“Hi, colonel! That big trunk of yours bu’st open when we tried to get it off the freight,” announced a man’s voice in the doorway. “Want to come over and see to it?”
This was the help that Huldah could have asked for. The man addressed as “colonel” turned from one to the other with a worried look. “I guess I’ve got to,” he replied to the brakeman. “How bad is it?”
“I didn’t see it,” returned the other, “but Billy said it was plumb bu’st, and the things fallin’ out. It’ll have to be roped, I guess.”
As the men hurried away in the direction of the station, Huldah turned briskly and tightened her arm about the girl. “Now, honey,” she whispered. And they hastened across the straggling red mud road in the face of a shower whose large drops were beginning to pelt down like hail. Aunt Huldah gathered up her petticoats and ran. “I’ll have to git them winders shut,” she panted. “I hope to gracious Manuelita’s got the sense to shut ’em in the other house.”