Shouts of laughter checked her flushed animation.

“Of course I’m not going to sneak out all alone and pot your old pig,” said Duane; “I’ll find one for myself on some other mountain——­”

“But I want you to shoot with me!” she exclaimed in dismay.  “I wanted you to see me stalk this boar and mark him down, and have you kill him.  Oh, Duane, that was the fun.  I’ve been saving him, I really have.  Miller knows that I had a shot once—­a pretty good one—­and wouldn’t take it.  I killed a four-year near Hurryon instead, just to save that one——­”

“You’re the finest little sport in the land!” said Duane, “and we are just tormenting you.  Of course I’ll go with you, but I’m blessed if I pull trigger on that gentleman pig——­”

“You must!  I’ve saved him.  Scott, make him say he will!  Kathleen, this is really too annoying!  A girl plans and plans and pictures to herself the happiness and surprise she’s going to give a man, and he’s too stupid to comprehend——­”

“Meaning me!” observed Duane.  “But I leave it to you, Scott; a man can’t do such a thing decently——­”

“Oh, you silly people,” laughed Kathleen; “you may never again see that boar.  Denman, keeper at Northgate when Mr. Atwood owned the estate, told me that everybody had been after that boar and nobody ever got a shot at him.  Which,” she added, “does not surprise me, as there are some hundred square miles of mountain and forest on this estate, and Scott is lazy and aging very fast.”

“By the way, Sis, you say you got a four-year near The Green Pass?”

She nodded, busy with her bon-bon.

“Was it exciting?” asked Duane, secretly eaten up with pride over her achievements and sportsmanship.

“No, not very.”  She went on with her bon-bon, then glanced up at her brother, askance, like a bad child afraid of being reported.

“Old Miller is so fussy,” she said—­“the old, spoilt tyrant!  He is really very absurd sometimes.”

“Oho!” said Scott suspiciously, “so Miller is coming to me again!”

“He—­I’m afraid he is.  Did you,” appealing to Kathleen, “ever know a more obstinate, unreasoning old man——­”

“Geraldine!  What did you do!” she exclaimed.

“Yes,” said Scott, annoyed, “what the deuce have you been up to now?  Miller is perfectly right; he’s an old hunter and knows his business, and when he comes to me and complains that you take fool risks, he’s doing his duty!”

He turned to Duane: 

“That idiot girl,” he said, nodding toward his abashed sister, “knocked over a boar last month, ran up to look at his tusks, and was hurled into a snowdrift by the beast, who was only creased.  He went for Miller, too, and how he and my sister ever escaped without a terrible slashing before Geraldine shot the brute, nobody knows....  There’s his head up there—­the wicked-looking one over the fireplace.”

“That’s not good sportsmanship,” said Duane gravely.