“Here’s what I used to read when I was your age,” he said. “I read them even now, sometimes. ‘Treasure Island’—you’ll like that.” He drew it out and laid it on the floor. “‘From Powder Monkey to Admiral,’ ‘My Friend Smith,’ ‘The Lady or the Tiger,’ ‘Red Fox,’ ‘The Gold Bug,’ ‘The Black Arrow,’ ‘Robbery Under Arms,’ ‘Davy and the Goblin’—you’ll like all these.”
The little girl stared speechless at the pile of books on the floor. Ben recrossed the room, climbed through the window and reshouldered his hoe. He met Uncle Jim at the near edge of the potato patch.
“I’ve been waiting for you,” said McAllister. “I don’t want to take any advantage of you by starting in at these spuds ahead of you.”
“I stopped a minute to show the little Sherwood girl some good books to read,” explained the youth.
“Can she read?” asked Uncle Jim. “How would she learn to read, way up there on French River?”
“Her father taught her. He taught her and her mother to read at the same time. And her mother’s dead. I’m sorry for that kid, Uncle Jim. Mighty tough, it seems to me—no mother—and to be left all alone in a big pirogue by her father. I’d like to know why he did that.”
“So would I,” returned McAllister. “I asked your ma and she didn’t seem to know exactly. Couldn’t make out anything particular from the letter nor from what the little girl told her—but it’s something real serious, I guess. He had to run, anyhow. He is fond of the little girl, no doubt about it. His letter to Flora told that much. And he was mighty fond of his wife too, I reckon; and I wouldn’t wonder if there wasn’t more good in him than what we figured on, after all. He had wild blood in him, I guess; and Louis Balenger was sure a bad feller to get mixed up with.”
They worked in silence for half an hour, hilling the potatoes side by side.
“I’d like to know why he left her in the pirogue. Why he didn’t bring her all the way,” said Ben, pausing and leaning on his hoe.
“How far down did he bring her?” returned McAllister.
“Likely he was scared. Maybe the wardens were close onto his heels. It looks like he figgered on just coming part way with her, by his having the letter to your ma already written.”
Again they fell to work and for ten minutes the hoes were busy. Then McAllister straightened his back.