Lovin Child's small forefinger went sliding up in the mysterious recesses of the fold until they reached the flat surface of the knee.

He looked up farther, studying Cash's set face, sitting back on his little heels while he did so.

Cash tried to keep on staring into the fire, but in spite of himself his eyes lowered to meet the upward look.
"Pik-k ?" chirped Lovin Child, spreading his fingers over one eye and twinkling up at Cash with the other.
Cash flinched again, wavered, swallowed twice, and got up so abruptly that Lovin Child sat down again with a plunk.

Cash muttered something in his throat and rushed out into the wind and the slow-falling tiny white flakes that presaged the storm.
Until the door slammed shut Lovin Child looked after him, scowling, his eyes a blaze of resentment.

He brought his palms together with a vicious slap, leaned over, and bumped his forehead deliberately and painfully upon the flat rock hearth, and set up a howl that could have been heard for three city blocks..