“Well?” said John Carrington, and his voice whistled like a pistol shot.
“Down with his arm, ’n’ half out of the saddle—grab—’n’ yank up—’n’ ’bout face—hand the baby to a long-legged girl—’n’ off he goes, leaving me to destroy my c’nstitution, breathin’ dust all the way home. Thet’s your son’s idea of gettin’ here,” he concluded, dryly.
John Carrington drew a breath of relief.
“If anything had happened to that baby, we should have had the devil’s own time,” he said. “Trevanion has been sullen ugly ever since his wife died—took his trouble that way—and the baby is the only thing in the world he cares for. If—well, we might have lost the best shift boss in the country.”
Young Carrington stood very still, looking out of the window. If the incident had shaken him a bit, there was at least no outward sign of it.
Mr. Kipley drew nearer to the bed.
“There’s good stuff in him,” he said, semi-confidentially, as though recent residence in a foreign land unfitted one to hear undertone, “’n’ grit. But, for the sake of Moses, get those clo’s offen him.”
Upon which advice, he retired hastily from the room.
John Carrington looked across the room at his son with a smile that was at once quizzical and affectionate.
“Yellow Dog finds you a trifle too picturesque, boy,” he said, and his tone suggested that he at any rate was satisfied. “How about you? Pretty big trial to come back?”