"Why, yes. I think it would be good fun, though I don't believe there _is_ any Gold King claim. I believe it's just an excuse for your loafing around, for you certainly never spent much time on it."
"It's the finest thing ever," Harry assured her with a laugh. "I'll show you."
The Kid stood stock-still in consternation.
"Oh!" cried he, when he could get his voice, "and how about our hunt?"
"You come along with us," invited Cheyenne Harry good-naturedly. "It's good hunting all the way."
But the Kid knew better. This heedless climbing and loud talking would be quite different from the careful attention necessary for the destruction of the wily "chicken" or experienced squirrel. He looked very sad.
"Yes, come on," urged Molly; "we'll get something over in 'Teepee.'"
The Kid shook his head, unable to trust himself to speak. Cheyenne Harry turned away a little impatiently.
"I'm sorry," continued Molly with hesitation. "I think you'd like it. But we've had quite a hunt already, haven't we? And we can go another time."
She joined Cheyenne Harry. Peter stood looking first at the Kid, then at the two retreating forms. He was plainly undecided. Molly's gingham dress fluttered for the last time before she turned the corner of a bowlder. Peter suddenly made up his worried mind. The Kid was left alone.
He sat down on a rock, and rested his chin in his hands, and looked away across the valley to the peak of Tom Custer. A tiny white cloud was sailing down the wind. He watched it until, swirling, it dissolved into the currents of air. Far back in the forest of pines a little breeze rustled, faint as a whisper: then it crept nearer, ever waxing in strength, until, with a murmur as of a throng of people, it passed overhead, and vanished with a last sigh in the distance. The Kid listened attentively to the birth and death of the voice. A squirrel directly above him broke into a rattling torrent of chattering rage. The Kid sat, his chin in his hands, looking out over the valley with unseeing eyes, his little rifle resting idly against his knee. The moments passed by, one after the other, distinct, like the ticks of a great clock.
A soft muzzle nosed its way gently between his wrists. He looked down. Peter's homely, gray-whiskered face with the pathetic eyes looked up into his own. The Kid flung both arms about the dog's coarse-furred neck, and burst into a passion of tears.