Cash Markham's past could not have
been a blank; more likely it held too much of sorrow for the
salve of speech to lighten its hurt. There might have been a
child....
"Aw, come back here!" Bud commanded Lovin Child gruffly.
But Lovin Child was too busy. He had discovered in his circling
of Cash, the fanny buckles on Cash's high overshoes. He was
investigating them as he had investigated the line, with fingers
and with pink tongue, like a puppy. From the lowest buckle he
went on to the top one, where Cash's khaki trousers were tucked
inside with a deep fold on top. Lovin Child's small forefinger
went sliding up in the mysterious recesses of the fold until they
reached the flat surface of the knee. He looked up farther,
studying Cash's set face, sitting back on his little heels while
he did so. Cash tried to keep on staring into the fire, but in
spite of himself his eyes lowered to meet the upward look.
"Pik-k?" chirped Lovin Child, spreading his fingers over one
eye and twinkling up at Cash with the other.
Cash flinched again, wavered, swallowed twice, and got up so
abruptly that Lovin Child sat down again with a plunk. Cash
muttered something in his throat and rushed out into the wind and
the slow-falling tiny white flakes that presaged the storm.
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