Nobody's Child

efore the other horseman had time to dismount. She was be

he asked

r of keen eyes, grayed into coldness by an

e answered breathlessly. Her own eyes w

a mi

dashed it over the unconscious man's face-and over Ann's hovering hands as well. "It's pro

had wiped the wet from his face, looked at the two with full conscio

me-the dam

bones," the other returne

et, watching him critically as he stretched hi

hink

re lu

d through his teeth. Then

, nosing the leg that hung limp. He had essayed a step, then stopped, grown suddenly moist. There was something very h

e sharply to Ann as she stood with hand p

e shoulder strained-I'

in that rabbit

poor

ne?" Garvin's vo

-he's do

suffering animal, curiously and tensely excited. He glanced behind him, then to either side, an uncertain look that passed over Ann and

rse and the sharp echo sent back from the Mine Banks and the chattering lift of the birds in the

m hiding her face, and his angry exclamation were the first words

he said with a note of shame. "The idea of his doing such a thin

be frightened, Ann," he said softly, with the air of one who knew her well. "I'm sorry. I forgot you were here. I couldn't see the animal suffer-that was all." Then meeting over Ann's head the commingling of disgust and anger and something else, t

rl, but he was answ

enjoyed doing it," B

of a dagger. It came and went. "I wanted the beast out of pain-if that is what you mean," he said with hauteur. "A

es, until she consented to look up at him. "I don't see how y

ood had slipped off, and he tried now to draw it up over her fallen hair. She

she gathered it up, Baird noticed how beautifully it grew about her low forehead-that her features were regular, and that, contrasted with black hair and brows and lashes, her skin was very white, luminously white. She was certainly very young; her cheeks and chin were as softly rounded as a baby's. And Garvin

removed from the ranks and of the type that car

walk, while he eyed the group in the distance. Though well mounted and in faultless riding attire, he was evidently not of the hunt; he wore no signs of haste or eagerness. He had crossed the bit of pasture deliberately, and had come to the other side of the creek. Then

group before he spoke:

hastily from Ann, who with hands still lifted to her

at's happened, Ed. The sorrel went down in a rabbit-hole

ing him time to say his praye

sed him," Garvin answered, wit

res were the same, the Westmore features; only the elder man's black hair had streaks of gray about the temples and his face was sa

g color indicated the same anger Baird had felt, he restrained himself well. He said nothing at all, simply looked at her steadily, flushing and breathing quickly. Th

r an explanation of the girl's presence and discovered it in the waiting bu

"But it can't be helped.... You'll have to get the animal off this l

"It's old Penniman's land. He hasn't learned t

her to her buggy, and come back," he said, and turned

his brother's backward glance, he turned away. Neverthel

you-the bank

ild, but without the nasal twang usual with the country-folk of the Ridge. "Don't you come, suh-I can get up easi

and for a time, evidently talking to her. And, finally, when she drove off, he bowed to her, as dee

the aristocracy, depleted and poverty ridden as a rule, clinging tenaciously to bygone glory while casting a half-contemptuous and at the same time envious eye on the sheer power of money; the second somewhat heterogeneous class developed during the forty years since the "war," and that, on the Ridge, had as its dist

in's manner to the girl closely. And he had also noted Garvin's look of surprise when Edward had followed her. He saw that while Garvin w

ion a little abruptly

tion. "Ann Penniman," he said, w

asked, conscious that he was

ughter. His farm runs down through the woods there, and this field is part of it-up to the Mine Banks.

f from the subject. "She's the prettiest

ome sort. Ann's just a farm girl and has been brought up like all of them about here." Garvin nodded in the direction of the disappearing buggy. "She's back now from taking butter and eggs to the village in exchange for a few doled-out groceries-they're hard up, the Pennimans." He looked down

nt emotion. Baird had had a good deal of western experience which had taught him to re

dormered roof, crisscrossed by naked branches, which he could see from his window at the Hunt Club, cov