"Perhaps to-morrow we can talk of it. I can't to-night," answered Overton. "To that little girl in there one-third of the stock belongs; another third belongs to that paralyzed man in the other cabin. I have to look after the interests of them both, and need to have my head clear to do it. But with her there sick--dying maybe--I can't think of dollars and cents."
"You mean to tell me that the young girl is joint owner of a gold find promising a fortune? Why, I understood Max to say she was poor--in fact, indebted to you for all care."
"Max is too careless with his words," answered Overton, coldly. "She is in my care--yes; but I do not think she will be poor."
"She has a very conscientious guardian, anyway," remarked Mr. Haydon, "when it is impossible for a man even to look in her cabin without finding you on his track. I confess I am interested in her. Can you tell me how she came in this wild country? I did not expect to find pretty young white girls in the heart of this wilderness."
They had reached the little camp fire by this time, and he threw some dry sticks on the red coals. As the blaze leaped up and made bright the circle around them, he looked at the stranger and said, bluntly:
"Yes; the old Indian who went in with you to see her."
"I guess he must have said that she looks like you," decided Overton. "I rather think that was it."
"Like _me_! Why--how--" and Mr. Haydon tried to smile away the absurdity of such a fancy.
"For there is a resemblance," continued the younger man, with utter indifference to the stranger's confusion. "Of course it may not mean anything--a chance likeness. But it is very noticeable when your hat is off, and it must have impressed the old Indian, who seems to think himself a sort of godfather to her. Yes, I guess that was why he spoke to you."
"But her--her people? Are there only you and these Indians to claim her? She must have some family--"
"Possibly," agreed Overton, curtly. "If she ever gets able to answer, you can ask her. If you want to know sooner, there is old Akkomi; he can tell you, perhaps."
But Mr. Haydon made a gesture of antipathy to any converse with that individual.
"One meets so many astonishing things in this country," he remarked, as though in extenuation of something. "The mere presence of such a savage in the sick girl's room is enough to upset any one unused to this border life--it upset me completely. You see, I have a daughter of my own back East."