embling in every muscle when
Jolly Roger caught him up under his arm, and with a happy laugh plunged
through the creek with him. For a good five minutes after that Jolly
Roger stood aside watching Peter and Nada, and there was a glisten of
dampness in his eyes when he saw the wet on Nada's cheeks, and the
whimpering joy of Peter as he caressed her face and hands. Three weeks
had been a long time to Peter, but he could see no difference in the
little mistress he worshipped. There were still the radiant curls to
hide his nose in, the gentle hands, the sweet voice, the warm thrill of
her body as she hugged him in her arms. He did not know that she had
new shoes and a new dress, and that some of the color had gone from her
red lips, and that her cheeks were paler, and that she could no longer
hide the old haunted look in her eyes.

But Jolly Roger saw the look, and the growing pallor, and had noted
them for two weeks past. And later that afternoon, when Nada returned
to Cragg's Ridge, and he re-crossed the stream with Peter, there was a
hard and terrible look in his eyes which Peter had caught there more
and more frequently of late. And that evening, in the twilight of their
cabin, Jolly Roger said,

"It's coming soon, Peter. I'm expecting it. Something is happening
which she won't tell us about. She is afraid for me. I know it. But I'm
going to find out--soon. And then, _Pied-Bot_, I think we'll probably
kill Jed Hawkins, and hit for the North."

The gloom of foreboding that was in Jolly Roger's voice and words
seemed to settle over the cabin for many days after that, and more than
ever Peter sensed the thrill and warning of that mysterious something
which was impending. He was developing swiftly, in flesh and bone and
instinct, and there began to possess him now the beginning of that
subtle caution and shrewdness which were to mean so much to him later
on. An instinct greater than reason, if it was not reason itself, told
him that his master was constantly watching for something which did not
come. And that same instinct, or reason, impinged upon him the fact
that it was a thing to be guarded against. He did not go blindly into
the mystery of things now. He circumvented them, and came up from
behind. Craft and cunning replaced mere curiosity and puppyish egoism.
He was quick to learn, and Jolly Roger's word became his law, so that
only once or twice was he told a thing, and it became a part of his
understanding. While