It stopped.
"If you run away again," warned Kate, her voice pitched high and trembling,
"munner will whip harder, and put you in a dark place for a long, long
time."
Still there was not a sound of the child's voice, not even the pulse of
stifled weeping. Presently the door opened and Kate stood there.
"Go out in the kitchen and tell Li to give you breakfast. Naughty girls
can't eat with munner."
Through the door came Joan, her little round face perfectly white,
perfectly expressionless. She did not cringe, passing her mother; she
walked steadily across the room, rose on tip-toe to open the kitchen door,
and disappeared through it. Kate dropped into a chair, shaking.
"Out!" whispered Buck to Lee Haines. "Beat it. I got to talk alone." And as
soon as Haines obeyed, Buck sat down close to the girl. She was twisting
and untangling her fingers in a dumb agony.
"What has he done to her, Buck? What has he done?"
It was a maxim with Buck that talk is to woman what swearing is to man; it
is a safety valve, and therefore he waited in silence until the first rush
of her grief had passed.
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