rn, ignoring any possible grotesqueness in my
manner of eating in private.

"Come here, Johnny," I said blandly.

The two elder ones, a girl and a boy, disappeared instantly, as if the
crowning joke of this remark was too much for them. From a scraping and
kicking against the log wall I judged that they had quickly dropped to
the ground outside. The younger one, the giggler, remained fascinated,
but ready to fly at a moment's warning.

"Come here, Johnny, boy," I repeated gently. "I want you to go to your
mother, please, and tell her"--

But here the child, who had been working its face convulsively, suddenly
uttered a lugubrious howl and disappeared also. I ran to the front door
and looked out in time to see the tallest girl, who had received me,
walking away with it under her arm, pushing the boy ahead of her
and looking back over her shoulder, not unlike a youthful she-bear
conducting her cubs from danger. She disappeared at the end of the
extension, where there was evidently another door.

It was very extraordinary. It was not strange that I turned back to
the cabin with a chagrin and mortification which for a moment made me
entertain the wild idea of saddling Chu Chu, and shaking the dust of
that taciturn house from my feet. But the ridiculousness of such an act,
to say nothing of its ingratitude, as quickly presented itself to me.
Johnson had offered me only food and shelter; I could have claimed no
more from the inn I had asked him to direct me to. I did not re-enter
the house, but, lighting my last cigar, began to walk gloomily up and
down the trail. With the outcoming of the stars it had grown lighter;
through a wind opening in the trees I could see the heavy bulk of the
opposite mountain, and beyond it a superior crest defined by a red line
of forest fire, which, however, cast no reflection on the surrounding
earth or sky. Faint woodland currents of air, still warm from the
afternoon sun, stirred the leaves around me with long-drawn aromatic
breaths. But these in time gave way to the steady Sierran night wind
sweeping down from the higher summits, and rocking the tops of the
tallest pines, yet leaving the tranquillity of the dark lower aisles
unshaken. It was very quiet; there was no cry nor call of beast or bird
in the darkness; the long rustle of the tree-tops sounded as faint as
the far-off wash of distant seas. Nor did the resemblance cease there;
the close-set files of the pines and cedars, stretchin