Or perhaps"--his handsome face hardened
again--"perhaps you would prefer to take this child back where you
found it?"
"No--I--Oh, they'd tear me limb from limb!"
"Exactly."
Branch turned his head from side to side in desperation. He wet
his lips. "It's the youngest one I ever had anything to do with.
Maybe it isn't used to cow's milk," he ventured.
"Unfortunately that is the only kind I can offer it. Take care of
it until I find some way of notifying its people."
O'Reilly had looked on at his friend's embarrassment with
malicious enjoyment, but, realizing that Branch would undoubtedly
try to foist upon him the responsibility of caring for the baby,
he slipped away and rode over to where Captain Judson was engaged
in making a litter upon which to carry the sick prisoner they had
rescued from the jail. When he had apprised the artilleryman of
what Branch had found in his roll of purloined bedding the latter
smiled broadly.
"Serves him right," Judson chuckled. "We'll make him sit up nights
with it. Maybe it'll improve his disposition." More seriously he
explained: "This chap here is all in. I'm afraid we aren't going
to get him through."
Following Judson's glance, O'Reilly beheld an emaciated figure
lying in the shade of a near-by guava-bush. The man was clad in
filthy rags, his face was dirty and overgrown with a month's
beard; a pair of restless eyes stared unblinkingly at the brazen
sky.
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