Through a blur of tears, Susie read something of this in his face, and her hands dropped limply to her sides. Her appeal was useless.
It was not that Smith did not understand her feelings. He did--perfectly. He knew how deep a child's hurt is. He had been hurt himself, and the scar was still there. It was only that he did not care. He had lived through his hurt, and so would she. It was to his interest to stay, and first and always he considered Smith.
"You needn't say anything," Susie said slowly, and there was no more supplication in her voice. "I thought I knew you before, Smith, but I know you better now. When a white man is onery, he's meaner than an Injun, and that's the kind of a white man you are. I'll never forget this. I'll never forget that I've crawled to you, and you listened like a stone."
Smith answered in a voice that was not unkind--as he would have warned her of a sink-hole or a bad crossing:
"You can't buck me, Susie, and you'd better not try. You're game, but you're just a kid."
"Kids grow up sometimes;" and she turned away.
McArthur, strolling, while he enjoyed his pipe, came upon Susie lying face downward, her head pillowed on her arm, on a sand dune not far from the house. He thought she was asleep until she sat up and looked at him. Then he saw her swollen eyes.
"Yes, I'm sick here." She laid her hand upon her heart.
He sat down beside her and stroked the streaked brown hair timidly.
She felt the sympathy in his touch, and was quick to respond to it.
"Oh, pardner," she said, "I just feel awful!"
"Did _your_ mother ever go back on you, pardner?"
"It's terrible. I can't tell you hardly how it is; but it's like everybody that you ever cared for in the world had died. It's like standin' over a quicksand and feelin' yourself goin' down. It's like the dreams when you wake up screamin' and you have to tell yourself over and over it isn't so--except that I have to tell myself over and over it _is_ so."
"She worries when you are late getting home, or are not well."
"Yes, she's like that," she nodded. "Mother would fight for me like a bear with cubs if anybody would hurt me so she could see it, but the worst hurt--the kind that doesn't show--I guess she don't understand. Before now I could tell anybody that come on the ranch and wasn't nice to me to 'git,' and mother would back me up. Even yet I could tell you or Tubbs or Mr. Ralston to leave, and they'd have to go. But Smith?--no! He's come back to stay. And she'll let him stay, if she knows it will drive me away from home. Mother's Injun, and she can only read a little and write a little that my Dad taught her, and she wears blankets and moccasins, but I never was 'shamed of Mother before. If she marries Smith, what can I do? Where can I go? I could take my pack outfit and start out to hunt Dad's folks, but if Mother marries Smith, she'll need me after a while. Yet how can I stay? I feel sometimes like they was two of me--one was good and one was bad; and if Mother lets Smith turn me out, maybe all the bad in me would come to the top. But there's one thing I couldn't forget. Dad used to say to me lots of times when we were alone--oh, often he said it: 'Susie, girl, never forget you're a MacDonald!'"