ch out to grip his fingers in
the silken mass of Nada's hair. He laughed, as if something was choking
him, and turned away with a toss of his arms.

"You ain't seein' me hit her any more, are you, Nady?" he said, and
disappeared around the end of the cabin.

The girl laid a hand on the woman's arm. Her eyes softened, but she was
trembling.

"I've told him what'll happen, an' he won't dare hit you any more," she
comforted. "If he does, I'll end him. I will! I'll bring the police.
I'll show 'em the places where he hides his whiskey. I'll--I'll put him
in jail, if I die for it!"

The woman's bony hands clutched at one of Nada's.

"No, no, you mustn't do that," she pleaded. "He was good to me once, a
long time ago, Nada. It ain't Jed that's bad--it's the whiskey. You
mustn't tell on him, Nada--you mustn't!"

"I've promised you I won't--if he don't hit you any more. He kin shake
me by the hair if he wants to. But if he hits you--"

She drew a deep breath, and also passed around the end of the cabin.

For a few moments Peter listened. Then he slipped back through the
tunnel he had made under the wood-vine, and saw Nada walking swiftly
toward the break in the ridge. He followed, so quietly that she was
through the break, and was picking her way among the tumbled masses of
rock along the farther foot of the ridge, before she discovered his
presence. With a glad cry she caught him up in her arms and hugged him
against her breast.

"Peter, Peter, where have you been?" she demanded. "I thought something
had happened to you, and I've been huntin' for you, and so has Roger--I
mean Mister Jolly Roger."

Peter was hugged tighter, and he hung limply until his mistress came to
a thick little clump of dwarf balsams hidden among the rocks. It was
their "secret place," and Peter had come to sense the fact that its
mystery was not to be disclosed. Here Nada had made her little bower,
and she sat down now upon a thick rug of balsam boughs, and held Peter
out in front of her, squatted on his haunches. A new light had come
into her eyes, and they were shining like stars. There was a flush in
her cheeks, her red lips were parted, and Peter, looking up--and being
just dog--could scarcely measure the beauty of her. But he knew that
something had happened, and he tried hard to understand.

"Peter, he was here ag'in today--Mister Roger--Mister Jolly Roger," she
cried softly, the pink in her cheeks growing brighter. "And he told me
I w