Dard sucked in his breath. That glance she had shot at him, had there been knowledge in it? But if she knew what lay in the barn—why wasn’t she heading the hue and cry to their refuge? Lotta Folley, he had never regarded her with any pleasure. In the early days, when they had first come to the farm, she had often visited them, watching Kathia, Dessie, with a kind of lumpish interest. She had talked little and what she said suggested that she was hardly more than a moron. He had been contemptuous of her, though he had never showed it.
“Pa didn’t come back las’ night,” she repeated, and now he was sure she knew—or suspected. What would she do? He couldn’t use the rifle—he couldn’t
Then he realized that she must have seen that weapon, seen and recognized it. He could offer no reasonable explanation for having it with him. Folley’s rifle was a treasure, it wouldn’t be in the hands of another—and surely not in the hands of Folley’s enemy—as long as Folley was alive.
Dard caught the past tense. So she did know! Now—what was she going to do?
“Pa hated lotsa things,” her eyes clipped away from his to Dessie. “Pa liked t’ hurt things.”
The words were spoken without emotion, in her usual dull tone.
“He wanted t’ hurt Dessie. He wanted t’ send her t’ a work camp. He said he was gonna. You better give me that there gun, Dard. If they find it with Pa they ain’t gonna look around for anybody that ran away.”
“But why?” he was shocked almost out of his suspicion.
“Nobody’s gonna send Dessie t’ no work camp,” she stated flatly. “Dessie—she’s special! Her ma was special, too. Once she made me a play baby. Pa-he found it an’ burned it up. You—you can take care of Dessie—you gotta take care of Dessie!” Her eyes met his again compellingly. “You gotta git away from here an’ take Dessie where none of them Peacemen are gonna find her. Give me Pa’s rifle an’ I’ll cover up.”
Driven to the last rags of his endurance Dard met that with the real truth.
“We can’t leave here yet—“
She cut him off. “Some one comin’ for you? Then Pa was right-your brother was a stinkman?”
Dard found himself nodding.
“All right,” she shrugged. “I can let you know if they come again. But you see to Dessie-mind that!”
“I’ll see to Dessie.” He held out the rifle and she took it from him before she pointed again to the packet.
“Give her that. I’ll try to git you some more-maybe tonight. If they think you got away they’ll bring dogs out from town. If they do—“ She shuffled her feet in the snow.
Then she stood the rifle against the hollow tree and unbuttoned the front of her jacket. Her hands, clumsy in mittens, unwound a heavy knitted scarf and tossed it to the child.
“You put that on you,” she ordered with some of the authority of a mother, or at least of an elder sister. “I’d leave you my coat, only they’d notice.” She picked up the rifle again. “Now I’ll put this here where it belongs an’ maybe they won’t go on huntin’.”
Speechless Dard watched her turn down trail, still at a loss to understand her actions. Was she really going to return that rifle to the barn—how could she, knowing the truth? And why?
He knelt to wind the scarf around Dessie’s head and shoulders. For some reason Folley’s daughter wanted to help them and he was beginning to realize that he needed all the aid he could get.
The packet Lotta had left contained such food as he had not seen in years—real bread, thick buttered slices of it, and a great hunk of fat pork. Dessie would not eat unless he shared it with her, and he took enough to flavor his own meal of the wretched fare they had brought with them. When they had finished he asked one of the questions which had been in his mind ever since Lotta’s amazing actions.
“Do you know Lotta well, Dessie?”
She ran her tongue around her greasy lips, collecting stray crumbs.
“Lotta came over often.”
“But I haven’t seen her since—–“ he stopped before mentioning Kathia’s death.
“She comes and talks to me when I am in the fields. I think she is afraid of you and—Daddy. She always brings me nice things to eat. She said that some day she wanted to give me a dress-a pink dress. I would very much like a pink dress, Dardie. I like Lotta—she is always good—inside she is good.”
Dessie smoothed down the ends of her new scarf.
“She is afraid of her Daddy. He is mean to her. Once he came when she was with me and he was very, very mad. He cut a stick with his knife and he hit her with it. She told me to run away quick and I did. He was a very bad man, Dardie. I was afraid of him, too. He won’t come after us?”
“NO!”
He persuaded Dessie to sleep again and when she awoke he knew that he must have rest himself and soon. Impressing upon her how much their lives depended on it, he told her to watch the tree and awaken him if anyone came.
It was sunset when he aroused from an uneasy, nightmare-haunted sleep. Dessie squatted quietly beside him, her small grave face turned to the trail. As he shifted his weight she glanced up.
“There was just a bunny,” she pointed to small betraying tracks. “But no people, Dard. Is—is there any bread left? I’m hungry.”
“Sure you are!” He crawled out of the shelter and stretched cramped limbs before unwrapping the remains of Lotta’s bounty.
In spite of her vaunted hunger Dessie ate slowly, as if savoring each crumb. The light was fading fast, although there were still red streaks in the sky. Tonight they must remain here—but tomorrow? If Lotta’s return of the rifle to the barn did not stop the search—then tomorrow the fugitives would have to take to the trail again.
“Is it going to snow again, Dardie?”
He studied the sky. “I don’t think so. I wish it would.”
“Why? When the snow is so deep, it’s hard to walk.”
He tried to explain. “Because when it snows, it is really warmer. Too cold a night . . .” he didn’t finish that sentence, but encircled Dessie with a tong arm and drew her back under the shelter with him. She wriggled about, settling herself more comfortably, then she jerked upright again.
“Someone’s coming!” her whisper was warm on his cheek.
He had heard that too, the faint creak of a foot on the icy coated snow. And his hand closed about the haft of his knife.
3. THE CLEFT DWELLERS
HE WAS A SMALL MAN, the newcomer, and Dard overtopped him by four inches or more. And that gave the boy confidence enough to pull out of the shelter. He watched the stranger come confidently on, as though he knew just how many steps lay between himself and some goal. His clothing, what could be seen of it in the fast deepening dusk, was as ragged and patched as Dard’s own. This was no landsman or Peaceman scout. Only one who did not hold all the important “confidence cards” would go about so unkempt. Which meant that he was an “unreliable,” almost as much an outlaw as a techneer or a scientist
The newcomer stopped abruptly in front of the tree. But he did not raise his hand to the hollow, instead he studied the tracks left by Lotta. But finally he shrugged and reached into the hole.
Dard moved and the other whirled in a half-crouch. There was the gleam of teeth in his bearded face, and another glint—of bare metal—in his hand.
But he made no sound and it was Dard who broke the quiet.
“I am Dard Nordis—“
“So?…” The single word was lengthened to approximate a reptile’s hiss.
And Dard sensed that he was facing a dangerous man, a menace far worse than Hew Folley or any of his brutal kind.
“Suppose you tell me what has happened?” the man added.
“Roundup raid-last night,” Dard returned laconically, his initial relief at the other’s coming considerably dampened. “We thought we had escaped. I came up to leave that message for Lars.” He motioned to the rag. “When I got back Lars was dead—killed by the neighbor who probably set them on us. So Dessie and I came here to wait for you.”
“Peacemen!” the man spat. “And Lars Nordis dead! That’s a bad piece of luck—bad.” He made no move to put away the gun he held. It resembled a hand stun gun, but certain peculiarities of the stub barrel suggested that it was more deadly a weapon than that.