But there would always be a limp in his gait, and always his right hind-foot would leave a peculiar mark in the trail.
These two weeks of helplessness were an education in Peter's life and were destined to leave their mark upon him always.

He learned to know Jolly Roger, not alone from seeing events, but through an intuitive instinct that grew swiftly somewhere in his shrewd head.

This instinct, given widest scope in these weeks of helplessness, developed faster than any other in him, until in the end, he could judge Jolly Roger's humor by the sound of his approaching footsteps.

Never was there a waking hour in which he was not fighting to comprehend the mystery of the change that had come over his life.

He knew that Nada was gone, and each day that passed put her farther away from him, yet he also sensed the fact that Jolly Roger went to her, and when the outlaw returned to the cabin Peter was filled with a yearning hope that Nada was returning with him.
But gradually Peter came to think less about Nada, and more about Jolly Roger, until at last his heart beat with a love for this man which was greater than all other things in his world.