"Shore we've got to look out." The elder son grasped a tool and, scattering the children, who had been playing near the back corner, he began to work at the point designated.
The little children backed away with fixed, wondering, grave eyes.

The women moved their chairs, and huddled together as if waiting and listening.
Jean watched the rustlers until they passed out of his sight.

They had moved toward the sloping, brushy ground to the north and west of the cabins.
"Let me know when you get a hole in the back wall," said Jean, and he went through the kitchen and cautiously out another door to slip into a low-roofed, shed-like end of the rambling cabin.

This small space was used to store winter firewood.

The chinks between the walls had not been filled with adobe clay, and he could see out on three sides.