He thought of
Mary with almost a touch of impatience. What did the woman want
that was so necessary as to send a man to town after a day on
the ice? Jimmy would be dog tired when he got home. Dannie
decided to hurry, and do the feeding and get in the wood before
he began to skin the rats.
He found walking uncertain. He plunged into unsuspected hollows,
and waded drifts, so that he was panting when he reached the
lane. From there he caught the gray curl of smoke against the sky
from one of two log cabins side by side at the top of the
embankment, and he almost ran toward them. Mary might think they
were late at the traps, and be out doing the feeding, and it
would be cold for a woman.
On reaching his own door, he dropped the rat bags inside, and
then hurried to the yard of the other cabin. He gathered a big
load of wood in his arms, and stamping the snow from his feet,
called "Open!" at the door. Dannie stepped inside and filled the
empty box. With smiling eyes he turned to Mary, as he brushed the
snow and moss from his sleeves.
"Nothing but luck to-day," he said. "Jimmy took elivin fine skins
frae his traps before he started to town, and I got five more
that are his, and I hae eight o' my own."
Mary looked such a dream to Dannie, standing there all pink and
warm and tidy in her fresh blue dress, that he blinked and
smiled, half bewildered.
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