Part 11 (1/2)
”'Cause Boswell'd been at his heels, and the whole caht,” replied Bobaday ”Old Johnson was under our wagon; I don't knohere Bos was I was careful not to wake hirowth they saw on-cover in so as dun as the hide of an elephant When a curtain was dropped over the front opening of the wagon, Bobaday and Corinne knew that wo within on their chattels Here a tent was made of sheets and stretched doith the branch of an overhanging tree for a ridge-pole; and there horse-blankets were ht poles Within such covers
On a feagon tongues, or stretched easily before fires,in steady,stories, or in indifferent tones as if te each other to trades
The rain had entirely ceased, though the spongy ood sod was not pleasant to walk upon ”I guess,” said-aunt Corinne, ”we'd better go back”
”Well, we've seen consider'ble,” assented her nephew ”I guess we'd better”
So he faced about But quite near the scream of a child in mortal fear
CHAPTER XI THE DARKENED WAGON
Aunt Corinne and her nephew felt pierced by the cry Her hands gripped his jacket with a shock Robert Day turning took hold of his aunt's wrist to pinch her silent, but his efforts were too zealous and turned her fright to indignation
”I don't want ett!” whispered aunt Corinne, jerking away and thus breaking the circuit of comfort and protection which was supposed to flow from his jacket
”But listen,” hissed Robert
”I don't want to listen,” whispered aunt Corinne; ”I want to go back to our camp-fire”
”nobody can hurt us,” whispered her nephew, gathering boldness ”You stay here and let on I want to see what it was”
”If you stay a o and leave you,” reett don't want us off here by ourselves”
But Robert's hearing was concentrated upon the object tohich he e eyes became so prominent that they shone with some of the lustre of a cat's in the dark
Corinne took hold of the bushes in his absence
The as breathing sadly through the trees far off What if so to her, with all the wildness of its experience hanging around it? Oh, the woods was a good play-house, on sunshi+ny days, but not the best of homes, after all That must be why people built houses When the snow lay in a deep cake, showing only the two thu intervals ht, and when the air was so tense and cold you could hear the bark of a dog far off, Bobaday used to say he would love to live in the woods all the ti the air into his lungs when it seemed frozen to a solid Corinne re any winter exertion And what could be prettier, he said, than the woods after it sleeted all night, and hoar frost finished the job! Every tree would stand glittering in white powder, as if dressed for the grandest occasion, the twigs tipped with lace-work, and the lins Still this white dress was deadly cold to handle Aunt Corinne had often pressed her fingers into the velvet crust upon the trunks She did not like the winter woods, and hardly more did she like this rain-soaked place, and these broad, treacherous leaves that poured water down her neck in the humid dark
Bobaday pounced upon her with such force when he appeared once her than herself
He had not a word to say, but hitched his aunt to his jacket and drew her aith considerable haste They floundered over logs and ran against stuon with the hoops standing up like huge uncovered ribs, and the tents wherein their guardian slept after the fatigue of the day, all appeared wonderfully soon, considering the ti limit
Aunt Corinne huddled by the coals, and Bobaday sat down on the foot-chunk he had placed for his awning throne
”You better go to bed quick as ever you can,” he said
”I guess I ain't goin',” said aunt Corinne with indignant surprise, ”till you tell me somethin' about as up in the bushes I stayed still and let you look, and now you won't tell me!”