Then in a moment he added;
"I'm glad you told me, parson. I know now the low-down brute that sent
him off with the Piute hunters can't never come to Borealis and take
him away."
And yet, all through their homely breakfast old Jim was silently
thinking. A newer tenderness for the innocent, deserted little pilgrim
was welling in his heart.
Keno, having declared his intention of shovelling off the snow and
opening up a trench to uncover the gold-ledge of the miner's claim,
departed briskly when the meal was presently finished. Jim and the
preacher, with the pup, however, went at once to the home of Miss
Dennihan, where the children were all thus early engaged in starting
off the day of romping and fun.
The lunch that came along at noon, and the dinner that the happy Miss
Doc prepared at dusk, were mere interruptions in the play of the tiny
Carson and the lively little girls.
There never has been, and there never can be, a measure of childish
happiness, but surely never was a child in the world more happy than
the quaint little waif who had sat all alone that bright November
afternoon in the brush where the Indian pony had dropped him. All the
games they had tried on the previous day were repeated anew by the
youngsters, and many freshly invented were enjoyed, including a romp in
the snow, with the sled that one of the miners had fashioned for the
Christmas-tree.
Pages:
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172