"Well, what if he skipped out o' jail, an' what if he'd come here an' say, 'Kid, 'cause what I done fer yer dad, now you do somethin' fer me!'" Tess was trembling with excitement as she stood before her father. The generosity of her loving nature instinctively responded to his apparent need. She was instantly eager to show her love and loyalty. "I'd do it, Daddy!" she exploded. "I'd do it quick!" "But what if--if--if--if--it made ye lots of trouble an'--an'--mebbe some of yer friends--if they found it out--wouldn't think 'twere right?" A queer, obstinate expression lived a moment in the girl's eyes. Then she smiled. "I ain't got no friends who'd say it were wrong to help somebody what'd helped my darlin' old daddy." Skinner bent his heavy brows in a troubled frown over stern eyes. "But ye couldn't tell yer friends about it, kid," he cautioned. A mist shone around the girl's thick lashes. "Daddy, ye know I never blat things I hadn't ought to.... Slide yer arms 'round yer brat's neck, look 'er straight in the eye, an' tell 'er 'bout Andy; an' if she can help, she sure will." A noise in the vicinity of the cot gave Tessibel an involuntary start. She turned her head slowly and saw two feet protruding from under her bed. Clinging to Daddy Skinner, she watched, with widening lids, a dwarfed figure crawl slowly into full view, and Tess found herself staring into a pair of beautiful, boyish, blue eyes. A slow smile broke over the dwarf's face. "Yer brat's the right sort, Orn," he cried, in the sweetest tenor voice Tess ever heard. "Ye don't need to make her promise no more.... Her word air good's God's law." "So it air, Andy," replied Orn. "Tessibel, this air my friend, Andy Bishop, an' he were a good pal, as good as any man ever had." For one single, tensely-strung moment, Tessibel contemplated the ugly little figure and the upraised, appealing face. Then as a sudden sense of protection spurred her to immediate action, she sent back a welcoming smile. Two or three quick steps took her to the dwarf's side. "I air going' to help ye, Andy," she announced brokenly. "Ye was in prison fer life, wasn't ye, huh?" "Yep, an'--an' I broke out, kid.... An' I ain't able to tell how I done it." "Oh, never mind that!" soothed Tessibel. "Ye was lookin' in the window last night, wasn't ye?" The dwarf rolled his eyes at the squatter, then back to the girl. "Yep, that were me, but I didn't do no murder, brat; that air the main thing an' Sandy Letts lied when he told the jury I done it." "He said as how ye gunned Ebenezer Waldstricker's father, eh?" Tess interrupted. "Eb air the richest man in Ithaca, an' him an' his sister air been to Europe, but they come back early in the spring. I see 'em every Sunday at Hayt's when I go there to sing. He air goin' to marry Mr. Young's sister, Helen, an' he air gittin' some pink peach when he gets her, ye can bet on that."