“I guess you ain’t any different from most men,” she answered, weakly sympathetic, “but you see Pearl has her notions, and they’re mighty strong ones.  It’s the way she’s been brought up,” this with some pride.  “You see, me and her pop started out with the idea that we wasn’t going to have the Pearl live one of those hand to mouth lives that we’d seen girls in the circus that didn’t have much training or much ability live.  We saw right from the first that she was awful smart and awful pretty, and her Pop he had the knack of making money and holding on to it.  Well, when he saw that she had her head set on the stage and we couldn’t keep her off it, it’s in her blood, you see, why her Pop says:  ’Well, there’s one thing, till she’s of age, legal, on or off the stage, she’s going to have a mother’s care and a father showing up every now and then unexpected.’  He’s got awful Spanish ideas, you know.  ’I don’t want her kept innocent,’ he says.  ’My Lord, no.  It’s the innocent ones that have got to pay, and pay big in a world of bad knowledge where ignorance is not forgave and is punished worse than any crime.  Let her see the seamy side,’ he says, ’she’s no fool.  Let her see what those who thinks to live easy and gives themselves away easy gets.’

“And Pearl saw right off.  You see, she ain’t so soft-hearted like me,” again she wiped the furtive tear from her eye.  “Pearl’s hard.  She ain’t no conscience about some things.  She’ll lead a man on and on, when she don’t care beans for him, and take all he’ll give her, not money, you know, but awful handsome presents.  I’ve seen her let some poor boy that was crazy about her blow in all the dust that he’d saved for a year.  Oh, yes, she’s like her father in more’n one way, both awful ambitious and terrible fond of making money.  Why,” she added naively, “I’ve seen Pearl look at a bank note like I never saw her look at a love letter.”

“Well, she won’t make much money up in those mountains, not dancing, anyway,” he laughed briefly and unmirthfully.

“It surprised me a lot, her going,” admitted Mrs. Gallito; “she hates the mountains.”

“Then she won’t stay long,” put in Hanson quickly.

Mrs. Gallito was uncertain about this.  “But,” she confided presently, “she took on awful to her father and Bob Flick.  I didn’t dare come out, but I heard her through the door there.  ‘Where can I go,’ she cried, ‘where he won’t come?’ And she kept on saying she’d got to go somewhere where you would never find her, because she didn’t dare trust herself, and she cried right out:  ‘I love him, I love him.’”

With these words, the confirmation of his hope, Hanson’s blithe self-confidence returned.  He threw back his head and straightened his shoulders, the light of an exultant purpose flashing in the steel of his eye.  “Pleasant for Bob!” he remarked in vindictive satisfaction; but as he had still an end to gain, he did not permit his mind to gloat long upon the agreeable picture Mrs. Gallito’s words had suggested.