There was a moment's pause, wherein the mongrel whined impatiently.
"Aren't you going to kiss me first, Benjamin?"
The little lad retraced his steps, until, bending over, his lips touched those of his mother. As he did so, the hand which had lain upon the coverlet shifted to his arm detainingly.
"How were you thinking of going, son?"
A look of surprise crept into the boy's blue eyes. A question like this, with its obvious answer, was unusual from his matter-of-fact mother. He glanced at her gravely.
"I'm going afoot, mamma."
"It's ten miles to town, Benjamin."
"But you and I walked it once together. Don't you remember?"
An expression the lad did not understand flashed over the white face of Jennie Blair. Well she remembered that other occasion, one of many like the present, when she and the little lad had gone in company to the settlement of which Mick Kennedy's place was a part, in search of someone whom after ten hours' delay they had succeeded in bringing home,—the remnant and vestige of what was once a man.
"Yes, I know we did, Bennie."