Mrs. Thomas made no effort to refute this last aspersion. Instead, she
began to weep loudly and unrestrainedly. "Bob Martin says in his letter
that he hopes I'm havin' a pleasant time," she sobbed. "He don't know
the loneliness, not to say the danger, of being snowed up in these
mountains with a woman that ain't got no more feelin' than to skin you
alive whenever she's a mind to. I ain't afraid of gentlemen, even
husbands, but sometimes when you get to jawin' me, Sadie, with a gun in
your hand, it makes my poor heart go like that, an' I crawl all over
with goose-flesh."

Fortunately, the thaws continued, and if no great quantity of snow fell
between now and then, the first passenger train was scheduled to run
through on the day that Pearl would dance, but Bob Flick, by some method
known to himself, had succeeded in making his journey on the engine, and
thus arrived at Gallito's cabin several days before he was expected,
looking a little more worn than usual and faintly anxious, an expression
which speedily disappeared as he saw the radiant health and spirits of
Pearl. As for her, she was unfeignedly glad to see him.

"I sure have worried a lot about you this winter, Pearl," he said to her
that evening as they two sat a little apart from the rest, Gallito,
José, Hugh and Seagreave, who all clustered about the fire, while Pearl,
as usual, had drawn her chair within the warm gloom of the pine-scented
shadow.

"Ain't you silly!" She looked up at him with her heart-shattering,
adorable smile.

"I am always about you," he said. "You're all I think of, Pearl, night
and day."