partly because the black, silhouetted figures awed her, somewhat,
and partly because she wished to give Daddy Dan a gay surprise, that
Joan did not run to him. And then, in the darkness, she heard Satan
munching the dried grass, and the squeak and rattle as the saddle was
drawn off and hung up, scraping against the rock.

"What you been doin', Bart?" queried the voice of Daddy Dan, and the
last of Joan's fears fell from her as she listened. "You act kind of
worried. If you been runnin' rabbits all day and got your pads full of
thorns I'll everlastin'ly treat you rough."

The wolf-dog whined.

"Well, speak up. What you want? Want me over there?"

It would have been a trifle unearthly to most people, but Joan knew
the ways of Daddy Dan with Satan and Black Bart. She lay quite still,
shivering with pleasure as the footsteps approached her. Then a match
scratched--she saw by the blue spurt of flame that he was lighting a
pine torch, then whirling it until the flame ate down to the pitchy
knot. He held it above his head, and now she saw him plainly: the light
cascaded over his shoulders, glowed on his eyes, and then puffed out
sidewise in a draught.

Joan was upon her feet, and running toward him with a cry of joy, until
she remembered that he was not to be approached like her mother. There
were never any bear-hugs from him, no caresses, not much laughter. She
stopped barely in time, and stood with her fingers interlaced, staring
up at him, half delighted, half afraid. She read his mind by microscopic
changes in his eyes and lips.

"Munner sent me."

That was wrong, she saw at once.

"And Bart brought me." Much better, now. "And oh, Daddy Dan, I've been
lonesome for you!"

He continued to stare at her for another moment, and even Joan could not
tell whether he were angry or indifferent or pleased.

"Well," he murmured at length, "I guess you're hungry, Joan?"

She knew it was complete acceptance, and she could hardly keep from a
shout of happiness. Daddy Dan had a great aversion to sudden outcries.

"I guess I am," said Joan.

Chapter XX. Discipline

He made the preparation for supper with such easy speed that everything
seemed to be done by magic hands. When Joan's mother cooked supper there
was always much rattling of the stove, then the building of the fire, a
long preparation of food, and another interval when things steamed and
sizzled on the fire. There followed the setting of the table, and then