"Yes."
"Hunters don't never wear good clothes." So Socky went on, presently,
as if apologizing to his own spirit for the personal appearance of his
uncle. "They git 'em all tore up by the bears an' panthers."
"That's how he got his pants tore," Sue suggested, thinking of his
condition that day they met him on the trail.
"Had a fight with a 'kunk," Socky answered, quickly. He had overheard
something of that adventure at Robin Lake.
They lay thinking a moment. Then up spoke the boy. "I wisht he had a
gold watch."
With Socky the ladder by which a man rose to greatness had many rounds.
The first was great physical strength, the next physical appearance; the
possession of a rifle and the sacred privilege of bathing the same in
bear's-oil was distinctly another; symbols of splendor, such as
watches, finger-rings, and the like, had their places in the ladder, and
qualities of imagination were not wholly disregarded.
Sue tried to think of something good to say--something, possibly, which
would explain her love. It was her first trial at analysis.
"He wouldn't hurt nobody," she suggested.
"He can carry a tree on his back"--so it seemed to Socky.
"He wouldn't let nothin' touch us," said Sue, still working the vein of
kindness which she had discovered.
"He's the most terrible powerful man in the world," Socky averred, and
unconsciously twisted the soft ear of Zeb until the latter gave a little
yelp of complaint.
"He can kill bears an' panthers an' deers an'--an' ketch fish," said
Sue.
"He could swaller a whale," Socky declared, as he thought of the story
of Jonah.
"Aunt Sinthy has got a hole in her shoe." The girl imparted this in a
whisper.
Both felt the back of Zeb and were silent for a little.
"She blubbers!" Socky exclaimed, with a slight touch of contempt in the
way he said it.
"Maybe she got her feet wet and Uncle Silas Spanked her."
"Big folks don't get spanked," the boy assured Sue.
"Do you like her?"