To frighten her subject away carelessly! It was the head crime in the
Bird Woman's category. She extended her hands as she arose, baked,
blistered, and dripping, and exclaimed: "Bless you, my children! Bless
you!" And it truly sounded as if she meant it.
"Why, why----" stammered the bewildered Angel.
Freckles hurried into the breach.
"You must be for blaming it every bit on me. I was thinking we got
Little Chicken's picture real good. I was so drunk with the joy of it I
lost all me senses and, 'Let's run tell the Bird Woman,' says I. Like a
fool I was for running, and I sort of dragged the Angel along."
"Oh Freckles!" expostulated the Angel. "Are you loony? Of course, it
was all my fault! I've been with her hundreds of times. I knew perfectly
well that I wasn't to let anything--NOT ANYTHING--scare her bird away!
I was so crazy I forgot. The blame is all mine, and she'll never forgive
me."
"She will, too!" cried Freckles. "Wasn't you for telling me that very
first day that when people scared her birds away she just killed them!
It's all me foolishness, and I'll never forgive meself!"
The Bird Woman plunged into the swale at the mouth of Sleepy Snake
Creek, and came wading toward them, with a couple of cameras and
dripping tripods.
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