“Nobody knows this place but me. Nobody can find you. I’ll bring you food—I can bring plenty—even if you have to stay for days and days. I’ll get the coffee now—just wait.” She hurried out, threaded the passage swiftly, went up the stairs into the kitchen—and came upon Uncle Hank standing talking to Sam Kee! Why did she not rush to him with news of the lad in the cellar? He had given money, as well as shelter, to that other fugitive—the one the boys had hidden in the bunk house that time—the one that had killed a man. Was it only an unwillingness to share her responsibility and her joy in that responsibility? Hank had never seen the castle-lady dress which she now carelessly exposed to his view. It made him smile, as he asked: “What you up to, Pettie, all rigged out that-a-way? Playin’ lady?” She stiffened at the kindly patronage of the tone. “Yes, I’m playing,” she said briefly. A furtive look went to the candle and cup of hot coffee which Sam Kee had prepared and set on the table, according to the bargain made and ratified with him. She got away from Uncle Hank, just how, she could not afterward remember; details of this sort escape from persons of her temperament. As a matter of fact, she had made up her mind to be a little severe with the old man if he was too inquisitive. But, fortunately for him, he was busy, his thoughts were elsewhere, and so he escaped this severity, and she got downstairs with the coffee before it cooled. When Hilda got back she found that the boy had opened the shutter under the woodbine, and stood there looking at something he held in his hand. “Oh—ought you?” Hilda asked. “Yes. It’s all right. When I was out there, and spoke to you, I couldn’t see a thing till I came right up and put my face against the vines. What does this mean, Hilda?” She saw now that he held a letter-head of the ranch; printed at the top was: “Ranch of the Three Sorrows, Lame Jones County, Texas, Henry J. Pearsall, Mgr.” “Is—is that man here—now?” “He isn’t in the house—but he will come—at dinner time, I guess,” Hilda spoke falteringly; her responsibility for the fugitive had been sweet; but, of course, he’d rather depend on Uncle Hank than on a small girl. “I’ll tell him about you when he comes, if you want me to,” she finished in a diminished voice. There was a long silence between them, of a quality curiously embarrassing to Hilda. She felt ready to cry. “Don’t you want me to tell Uncle Hank?” The boy looked bewildered. “Is that your father’s brother? It isn’t any one that was with you coming out here?” “He’s not my real uncle. It’s—you know—the manager.” She pointed to the sheet he still held. “He’d be just the same as papa. He’d do anything that papa would do.” She broke off, noting how reluctant he seemed. “I’ll not tell him—or anybody—if you’d rather not,” she said—and felt a guilty thrill of rapture as he responded: “Well—for the present—maybe it would be better.”