"Ef I was shootin' at a man, I'd be as stiddy as a
clock. Gad! I'd be cool as an ice-wagon. But when that little old brown
chicken scoots a-scutterin' up out o' the grass like a hummin'-top, it
rattles me." His teacher apparently took no note of the significance
contained in this statement; yet Kerry's very ears were red as it slipped
out, and he felt uneasily for the handcuffs, which no longer clinked in his
pocket, but now lay carefully hidden under his fern bed.
There had been a noon-mark in the doorway of the cave, thrown by the shadow
of a boulder beside it, even before the Irishman's big nickel watch came
with its bustling, authoritative tick to bring the question of time into
the mountains. But the two men kept uncertain hours: sometimes they talked
more than half the night, the close-cropped, sandy poll and the unshorn
crest of Jove-like curls nodding at each other across the fire, then slept
far into the succeeding day; sometimes they were up before dawn and off
after squirrels--with which poor Kerry had no better luck than with the
birds. Every day the Irishman dressed his host's hand; and every day he
tasted more fully the charm of this big, strong, gentle, peaceful nature
clad in its majestic garment of flesh.
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