“Good-by! Good-by!” she whispered, trying to stifle her sobs.
Curious people were beginning to drift into the parlor.
The next moment there was the sound of an automobile outside and Evelyn was whisked off in the darkness.
“Dear, dear, dear,” ejaculated Miss Campbell “I am so upset! That exquisite young girl and that terrible giant creature of a father!”
“Her name was Evelyn, too. Wasn’t it queer?” observed Nancy.
“Evelyn, Evelyn,” they repeated.
“Evelyn Stone. Mr. Daniel Moore’s Evelyn Stone.”
In an instant they were all talking at once. It was Evelyn Stone. They recognized her now from the picture, although there was only reallya faint resemblance. What picture could do justice to such coloring? The auburn hair, the golden brown eyes and the blush that crept in and out of her face with her changing emotions. But it was she, they were sure of it. She had the same smile—the “snapshot smile.”
“If we had only recognized her sooner,” cried Billie. “We might have delivered the letter. We might have saved her from that great dragon of a father. We might have done dozens of things.”
They were deep in their thought when the stage drove up to the door with a great flourish and a man hastily dragged in several bags of mail.
Everybody gathered around the desk to wait for letters, and when the motor party had each received a package of mail, the first for many days, they hurried to their rooms to read the last news from home. Miss Campbell had half a dozen letters to engross her attention, and it was not until she had read the last word of every one that she opened a package covered with postmarks, showingit had been forwarded from place to place and had followed them over most of their route.
“My goodness gracious me,” she cried out in a loud astonished voice as she drew out the contents of the packet.
The girls dropped their letters and ran into her room.
“What is it?” they demanded breathlessly.
“My morocco pocket book with the fifty dollars, the one I lost——”
Miss Campbell could say no more. She was quite overcome and on the verge of tears. She handed a note to Billie to read aloud.
Dear Madam: (it ran)
I picked this pocketbook up in my field, though how it happened to be near a broken box kite I cannot tell you. I am sending it to the address on the visiting card and would be glad if you would notify me that you have received it.
Yours truly,
James Erdman,
Dealer in Vegetables, Poultry and Eggs.
“He is a very honest man,” exclaimed Miss Helen at last, when Billie had finished reading the note.
“And Peter Van Vechten——?” began Mary.
They all looked at each other silently.
“How glad I am he escaped,” cried Miss Campbell. “Never, never will I accuse anyone on circumstantial evidence again.”
“I am the one to apologize to him,” said Billie. “I insulted him.”
“All of us did, I think,” put in Elinor.
“We called him a thief,” added Nancy sadly.
“I was the one who cut the cords,” at last Mary volunteered in a small voice.
How they pummeled her and laughed.
“And never told, you sly minx!” they cried.
But Billie meant some day to apologize openly to Peter Van Vechten.
“King Borria Bungalee Boo,Was a man-eating African swell,His sigh was a hullaballoo,His whisper a horrible yell—Ahorrible, horrible yell!“Four subjects and all of them maleTo Borria doubled the knee,They were once on a far larger scale,But he’d eaten the balance, you see—Scaleand balance is punning, you see!
“Scale and balance is punning, you see!” roared the chorus.
Miss Campbell and the girls exchanged rather amazed glances.
They had drawn up in front of a long low rancho. It was quite dark, but from an insidecourt they could hear the tinkle of a banjo accompanying a deep baritone voice, with many other deep voices joining in the chorus. The singing went on:
“There was haughty Pish-Tush-Pooh-Bah,There was lumbering Doodle-Dum-Dey,Despairing Alack-a-Dey-AhAnd good little Tootle-Tum-Teh!Exemplary Tootle-Tum-Teh,”
rang the chorus.
“My dear, I don’t think we’d better try it,” said Miss Campbell. “It sounds very rough. I feel quite uneasy—it’s very much of an adventure at any rate.”
The truth is the five ladies had done an exceedingly reckless thing. Barney McGee had invited them to come and see a real ranch, and they had accepted his invitation. At first Miss Campbell had declined. It was rather too much to expect him to entertain five guests. Besides, how could he when he was not owner of theranch. He was part owner, he said. But if they preferred they could stop at Steptoe Lodge just as they could at an inn—engage rooms, that is. His cousin, Brek Steptoe and his wife often had boarders—people who came for their health.
Nebraska was filled with Easterners who were trying to gain health in the West, and the good State not only often gave them health but wealth too—fine strong bodies and work that paid.
Therefore the motorists had taken down detailed directions from Barney McGee, but they had not arrived at Steptoe Lodge as soon as they had expected. An exploded tire had caused a long delay. No doubt Mrs. Steptoe had given them up for the day now, for it was long after dark when they finally found themselves at the rancho.
A light streamed out from a door suddenly opened, and the voices in the court yard grew louder as the song progressed.
“There is musical Doh-Reh-Mi-Fah,There is the nightingale Doh-Reh-Mi-Fah.”
“Does Mr. McGee live here?” asked Billie timidly of a tall athletic looking young man who had opened the door. He was dressed in buckskin with high boots, a blue flannel shirt and a silk handkerchief knotted around his neck. The girls thought him quite the most picturesque person they had seen since they left home. Even in the darkness they could see the deep flush of embarrassment mount to his face.
“There is a Mr. McGee who lives here—yes,” he answered, choking with bashfulness.
“Will you ask him to come out at once, please,” said Miss Campbell, with a growing uneasiness that there might be some mistake.
But her fears were immediately allayed, for Barney himself came running around the side of the rancho.
“Ladies, I hope you’ll excuse me for not bein’ on the spot as soon as you arrived. I waited for you some hours on the door step. Tell the fellers to shut up, Jim, and stop starin’ there like a wooden injun. Call Rosina. Tell her the ladies have arrived.”
The place suddenly became as still as the grave, and by the time the Motor Maids and Miss Helen had alighted and been conducted into a cemented courtyard around which the house was built, after the Spanish style, there was not a person to be seen except Jim, who followed obediently with some of the luggage.
Rosina Steptoe, who had married Barney’s cousin, Brek Steptoe, now hurried into the room. She was a wiry little woman with a dark swarthy face, beady black eyes, black hair and a rather sweet expression which saved her from being really very ugly. The girls thought at first she might have some Spanish blood. Her manners were gracious and she shook hands with them cordially when Barney made the introductions.
“Will you come right in to supper?” she said, without asking them to go to their rooms. “We want to get through early because Barney is giving a dance for you to-night, and the people will be coming before we finish if we don’t hurry.”
“Dear, dear,” ejaculated Miss Campbell under her breath.
They had not counted on being entertained by the cowboy, and began to wonder what they had been drawn into.
Feeling very dusty and a little tired from their trip across the plains, they followed Mrs. Steptoe into one of the rooms opening on the court. It was a very large apartment with little furniture in it except a long table and the inevitable oak sideboard which always gave Billie the horrors. They afterwards learned that it was the pride of Mrs. Steptoe’s heart, and had been bought in the East at a great sacrifice.
Four men were waiting at the table: Barney McGee, Brek Steptoe, who was a handsome, middle aged man with a weather-beaten face; Tony Blackstone, whom the girls discovered presently was English. It was he who had done the singing they found; also he had good manners and was not at all bashful, but very quiet. Jim made the fourth man.
As they sat down at table, a Chinaman thrusthis head in the door and then disappeared. Mrs. Steptoe herself waited on them and the food was really much better than they had expected.
Nancy was seated next to Jim, who, when she was not looking, devoured her with his eyes, and when she turned to him, dropped his lids and flushed crimson as if he had been caught in a felony.
“We didn’t know there was to be a party,” she said to him innocently. “You see we aren’t traveling with much baggage. I’m afraid we can’t dress up properly.”
“Clothes don’t matter out here, Miss——” he began.
“Nancy,” she finished.
“Miss Nancy,” he repeated, and then said it over to himself as if the name pleased him mightily.
“People don’t come to see the clothes. It’s the dancing they want to see and—and——”
“And what?” she demanded.
“And the gir—the ladies. You see we don’thave many of them out here and they are all married.”
“Every girl is a belle in this part of the country, I suppose,” observed Nancy. “Even the ugly ones.”
Jim assented, regarding Nancy’s charming face as if he had never seen a girl before in all his life.
“And as for the pretty ones, Miss——”
“Nancy.”
“Miss Nancy, they are fairly worshipped.”
“Are there any pretty ones?” she asked.
“There weren’t until you came,” replied Jim almost in a whisper, and then dropped his knife on the floor. He stooped for so long to find it that Nancy thought he must have had a sudden attack of vertigo. She was sure of it when he finally lifted his crimson face.
“I think I have one pretty dress,” she said irrelevantly, looking into Jim’s eyes with just a ghost of a smile. “I think it would be nice to dress up a little. Don’t you?”
“I’m afraid I can’t,” muttered Jim. Then,once more, plucking up courage, he asked: “Can I have the first dance?”
In the meantime, Mr. Steptoe was explaining many things to Miss Campbell regarding the rounding up of cattle and life on the plains.
“There are no more real cowboys,” he said, “except in the Buffalo Bill Show. They are passing out. Barney here is about as good a representative of the class as there is.”
“And Tony,” suggested Barney.
“Tony is a good imitation but he’s not the real thing because he wasn’t born to it. Was you Tony?”
The man named Blackstone frowned.
“Birth has nothing to do with it,” he answered, and quickly changed the subject.
“He’s the younger son of an English lord,” whispered Steptoe, “but he don’t like to have it mentioned.”
It was rather surprising on the whole to see how polite these rough men were. Following Tony’s example, they stood up when the ladies filed out of the room, led by Rosina Steptoe.
Bedrooms in the Steptoe rancho were not luxurious apartments by any means. There were no bathrooms and only small ewers of water supplied the wants of the guests.
“I feel as if I had the yellow jaundice,” exclaimed Nancy, as she critically examined her features in a small wooden framed mirror back of the washstand. There was no dressing table.
“To the naked eye you appear to be perfectly healthy and normal,” replied Billie, “but I suppose Miss Nancy-Bell, you are taking notice with a view to dressing up, and for my part, I think we should go down just as we are. It’s a cowboy dance.”
There was a continuous argument about clothes between Nancy and Billie which Miss Campbell invariably had to settle. On this occasion Miss Campbell was for appearing as spectators at the dance and not as active guests. She had not counted on being entertained at the Lodge, and she was unable to conceal her misgivings.
“I think it would be very rude not to dress up,”cried Nancy hotly. “Mrs. Steptoe is going to wear a pink cotton crêpe. She told me she was, and they are all looking forward to seeing us in—well—something different than this.”
The other girls laughed teasingly.
“Anything to show off that new frock of yours, Nancy,” cried Billie. “Cowboys and Indians will do if you can’t find a better audience.”
Nancy was offended. She flushed hotly and her eyes filled with tears. She had very sensitive feelings somewhere hidden under her gay careless manner.
“Bless its heart! Are its feelings hurt?” exclaimed Billie, putting her arms around her friend’s neck and kissing her warmly. “I wouldn’t have gone fer to hurt its feelings for anything in the world. It shall wear its little folderols if it chooses, shan’t it, Cousin, and put on all its ribbons and laces.”
“Silly old tease,” said Nancy, laughing through her tears. “You’re just as anxious as anybody to dress up only you’re too proud to admit it becauseyou’re afraid people will think you are vain.”
“Go along with you, you foolish children, and get into your clothes,” here interrupted Miss Campbell. “If Nancy wants to appear in a party frock, I think it won’t do any harm to these poor isolated ranchmen.”
It so happened, therefore, that the girls, in another twenty minutes, for the first time since they had left Sevenoaks, the home of their friend, Daniel Moore, attired themselves in their prettiest gowns. Only simple muslin frocks, but with plenty of hand embroidery and lace insertions to make them fine, and ribbon bows to set them off.
Nancy, beguiling creature that she was, tied a pink satin ribbon around her curly hair, and the picture she made when she entered the dining room in her white dress with her floating ribbons and dainty little black patent leather pumps, was a sight Jim was not to forget in a hurry.
Elinor might have been a young princess whohad condescended to step out of the back door of her palace and mingle with her low subjects for a brief space. She held her head with its coronet braids slightly higher than usual in the strange company which now began to congregate.
She wore a straight white dress all fine tucks and embroidery without a sign of lace or ribbon to mar the effect of very elegant simplicity. Billie had tied around the smooth rolls of her light brown hair a blue velvet band to match the embroidery on her marquisette dress. She was a glowing picturesque figure, her face flushed with interest and enthusiasm. Mary, who always falls to the last in our descriptions, perhaps because she is so small and unassuming, wore a soft white mulle frock with a pale blue Roman sash knotted around her waist, a relic of her mother’s own girlhood.
You may imagine, I am sure, what a sensation our dainty young girls and Miss Campbell, in a beautiful gray silk, made on the rough company now assembled. There were subdued murmurs of surpriseand admiration. The few plain weather-beaten looking women who had driven miles across the plains for a glimpse of the Motor Maids, looked down hastily at their own pitiful attempts at finery, and ranchmen and cowboys craned their necks for a glimpse of the fair vision which had been vouchsafed them.
On a table at the far end of the room sat the two musicians, Mexicans. Each with a guitar and a fiddle. The kerosene lamps, hung against reflectors on the wall, cast a yellow glow on the scene so new to the travelers. Five chairs had been arranged in a row at the other end of the room as places of honor for the Eastern guests, who might have been five new prima donnas at the opera for the intense interest they excited.
The music now set up a whining jig tune. There was an embarrassed shuffling of feet for a moment, and clearing of throats. Presently two cowboys started to dancing the old fashioned polka together, and in a jiffy the whole company was whirling about the room madly. The five Easterners looked on for a while quite gravely.In the joy of the dance they had been quite forgotten.
Not quite forgotten, for Jim now appeared, handsome as a picture, with a new red silk handkerchief knotted around his neck, his black hair as smooth and slick as brush and water could make it.
“Are you willing to try it?” he asked, bowing before Nancy, who little knew what struggles between bashfulness and courage now rent his soul.
“I was wondering where you were,” she said smiling sweetly as she floated away with him like a soap bubble on a summer breeze.
Tony Blackstone then asked Elinor to dance, and she had condescended, comforting herself with the secret knowledge that he was the son of an English lord. Barney McGee had led forth Mary. And Mrs. Steptoe, having introduced her brother, whose name Billie had failed to catch, that young woman had permitted herself to be circled around once. But her partner did notplease her for some reason and she preferred to sit with Miss Helen and watch the dancers.
“Are you tired so soon?” he asked.
“No,” she answered, always truthful under the most trying circumstances, “but I don’t care to dance.”
The man flashed an angry glance at her and for the first time she looked in his face. Where had she seen those dark scowling eyes before?
“I didn’t catch your name,” she said. “I would like to introduce you to my cousin.”
“Hawkes,” he answered in an almost threatening tone of voice.
“Why, you are—” but she never finished the sentence for the man named Hawkes had abruptly turned away.
“Strange,” said Billie to herself, reflecting inwardly on the passing likenesses one sees everywhere. “But, no, it is impossible, for this man is very well dressed, better than any man in the room, I think, and besides he’s Rosina Steptoe’s brother.”
Breathless and flushed with exercise the other girls now dropped into their seats. The hot, crowded room, the dust raised by the shuffling of many feet on the floor and the strange company rather bewildered them. Only Nancy had really enjoyed the experience, because Jim was an excellent dancer; and he had guided her carefully through the mazes of the jigging two-step.
But there was to be further entertainment before they might be allowed to stroll out under the stars and breathe in the fresh air. A Mexican cowboy with a broad crimson sash around his waist, a border of bright-colored fringe edging the side of his trousers and jingling spurs on his high-heeled boots, danced a wild fandango to a Spanish tune with a throbbing accompaniment on the guitar, which seemed to grow faster and faster as he struck his heels on the floor.
Then the music stopped and two Indians appeared. One of them squatted on the floor and began beating monotonously on a small kind of a drum or tom-tom. The other Indian in full regalia began dancing slowly in a circle, stooping low as if he were hiding from his prey which he would presently pounce upon and destroy utterly. He was a barbaric and war-like figure and the girls unconsciously shrunk back as he danced by them. Gradually the dance grew wilder and the steps quicker. The Indian gave a strange bird-like cry, and for the fraction of a moment paused in front of Billie. With another cry that had a familiar sound he flashed a black glance of hatred into her face and was gone.
Again Billie thought she recognized a likeness. She turned her bewildered eyes downward, her face flushing with embarrassment. There in her lap was a long, grayish feather.
“What’s this for?” she demanded, turning to Barney McGee.
“I reckon it’s a complimentary souvenir for you, Miss Billie,” replied the ranchman. “It’sone of Hawkeseye’s jokes, a quill from a hawk’s wing.”
“Hawkeseye,” repeated Billie.
“Oh, yes, we call him that for fun. His name is Buckthorne Hawkes. He ain’t all Injun, you know. He’s really the Missus’ brother, but he can certainly fix himself up to look as much like a full-blooded Indian buck as if he had just come from the reservation.”
“Was he ever a peddler?” Billie asked.
Barney laughed.
“He’s a graduate of Carlyle University,” he answered. “He’s come out West to teach school.”
In the meantime, Elinor had been led by Tony Blackstone into the courtyard, where they sat down on a bench. Overhead the stars gleamed with incredible brilliancy, partly because the stars from a Western plain seem infinitely larger and grander than they do anywhere else, and partly because they gazed at them from the depths of a small dark courtyard.
“Perhaps Miss Campbell would not like to have me leave the—the ballroom,” said Elinor,not knowing how to designate the dining room in its present use.
“It’s only a step away,” said Tony Blackstone, “and we can’t talk in there very well. You remind me of—of an English girl I once knew, and it would be just common charity to talk to me a little.”
“Are you homesick, then?” asked Elinor.
“Sometimes. If anything happens to remind me of—of my other home.”
“Then you are not happy here?” the young girl demanded quickly, as if this were a confirmation of her suspicions.
“There are times when I am happy,” he said. “When I am riding at night across the plains on a horse that goes like the wind. It is wonderful then, especially when the moon is full. I can almost forget that I have an identity at such times.”
There was a long pause. Elinor hardly knew what to say, and she watched the young man gravely. That he was deeply moved by the memories her own face had conjured up she couldplainly see. His lips twitched convulsively and he clenched his hands as if he were trying to choke the thoughts that would rise in his mind. Why had he come away from home and lost himself in this distant place?
They sat thus for some time watching the stars silently. A sympathy had sprung up between them and they seemed to have known each other for a long time.
“What was her name?” she asked at last in a low voice.
“Elinor,” he burst out. “Elinor, the same as yours,” and he turned his face away.
Perhaps he was crying. Elinor never knew, although it seemed strange for a big splendid cowboy to shed tears.
“I’m so sorry for you,” she said kindly, and laid her hand on his arm, a great piece of condescension for her. “Touch-me-not” was a nick-name given her long ago by her friends.
“Oh, Elinor, Elinor,” he exclaimed, taking her hand in his, “if you could only understand what the sight of your face and the sound of yourvoice mean to me! If you could only know what I have lost by my folly, my wretched, miserable folly!”
“Aren’t you ever going back?” she asked, and she did not withdraw her hand.
“It’s too late now,” he said. “She hates me—they all hate me!”
“Are you sure?” she persisted.
“Perfectly certain.”
“Elinor, dear, I think you had better come back, now,” called Miss Campbell, who never let her girls out of her sight for long.
“Is Blackstone your real name?” Elinor asked as they paused before the door of the dancing room.
“My real name,” he replied, “is Algernon Blackstone de Willoughby Winston.”
Elinor repeated the names after him and buried them deep in her mind.
A Virginia reel was forming and Mrs. Steptoe has asked as an especial favor if the young ladies would not dance. Nancy had given her hand to Jim for the dance. It was the third time shehad bestowed this honor upon him, and with unconcealed joy he stood at the top of the line ready to lead off. Billie was dancing with Barney McGee. Mary had accepted Brek Steptoe as a partner and Elinor, with Algernon Blackstone de Willoughby Winston now joined the line.
There were only three or four other women including Mrs. Steptoe, and for the rest, cowboys and ranchmen danced together with perfect good nature.
How strange it seemed to Miss Campbell, her four girls dancing among these queer people. No wonder the other dancers forgot the figures of the reel while they drank in the picture of their fresh young faces. It was to them as if a garden of roses had suddenly sprung up in the desert.
“Down the center,” called the musician. “Now, right and left all around.”
The fiddle whined. The guitar thrummed passionately. Miss Campbell’s head was in a whirl.
“Ought we to have taken the risk of thisvisit?” she kept saying. “When one is traveling one must have experiences,” her thoughts continued. “Besides, what harm can come of it? They are rough, kindly people, and have taken so much trouble to give us this entertainment. But I really don’t care for all this noise and dust. I hope I shall never go to another one.”
The little lady leaned her head wearily against the wall and closed her eyes. An arm slipped around her waist. It was Elinor, who having danced her turn had quietly joined her. Her partner had disappeared in the courtyard.
The two women exchanged meaning glances. The noisy dance, the jingling spurs of the cowboys as the dancers came down the middle, and an occasional loud laugh did not appeal to Elinor either.
“We must excuse ourselves, dear,” Miss Campbell was saying, when suddenly the courtyard resounded with a loud cry.
“You insufferable, black-livered hound,” came the voice of Algernon Blackstone de Willoughby Winston, “if I catch you sneaking around hereagain with your knives, I’ll throw you out to the coyotes.”
The dance continued, and only one dancer dropped out. Either they had not heard the disturbance, or else such disturbances were too common to notice. It was, consequently, Rosina Steptoe alone, with face aflame and eyes snapping like two little wells of fire, who signed to her partner and approached the doorway. She was too angry to notice how near Miss Campbell and Elinor were sitting to the open door.
“Tony, how dare you speak to my brother like that,” she hissed into the court. “I told you before I wouldn’t have it.”
“Nonsense, Rosina, your brother deserves a good thrashing for his tricks. I just caught his arm as he was about to throw this dagger into the room.”
“It was only a little joke, Rosy,” whined her brother.
“Joke be hanged,” broke in the Englishman, “how dare you attempt to frighten these ladiesby such a joke. Try it again and I’ll keep my word.”
“Don’t you be so interferin’ with the Hawkes family,” cried Rosina shrilly.
Miss Campbell rose. The dance was just reaching a climax with its final right and left all round. She beckoned to the girls.
“If you don’t mind, Mrs. Steptoe, I think we’ll say good-night. We’ve had a long day. The entertainment has been most delightful.”
Rosina became humble under the gaze of the elegant little woman.
“I will show you to your rooms,” she said meekly.
They bade the company a general good night, and it was not long before they had locked themselves into their bedrooms, and following Miss Campbell’s instructions, had pushed the heaviest piece of furniture in the room against each door.
Steptoe Lodge in the morning was very different from Steptoe Lodge at night. The dark courtyard, full of shifting shadows, was now a clean and open space bright with new light.
Miss Campbell alone of the motor party had not slept well because she had been afraid to open her windows. She had cautioned the girls against opening their’s, but Billie had flatly rebelled.
“I cannot sleep in a vacuum, Cousin Helen, and if anyone were tall enough to crawl in the window, we could among us make enough noise to raise the roof off the house.”
But the night had been peaceful and the cheerfulness of the June morning with the sweet scents of the innumerable wild flowers which starred the plains, dispelled Miss Campbell’s fears.
Someone was singing in the courtyard, a song which Elinor knew and loved.
“Hark, hark, the lark from Heaven’s gate sings,And Phoebus ’gins arise,His steeds to water at those springsOn chaliced flowers that lies;And winking Mary-buds begin to ope their golden eyes:With everything that pretty is, my lady sweet, arise,Arise, arise.”
“It’s Mr. Wins——,” she broke off, “Mr. Blackstone, I mean.”
“Isn’t it strange that he should be here among these rough uneducated people,” observed Mary, thoughtfully. “Did he tell you anything about himself last night, Elinor?”
But Elinor kept her own counsel. She was not one to tell the secrets of others even to her own particular, intimate friends and she knew that what Algernon Blackstone de Willoughby Winston hadconfided to her the night before, he had meant for her ears alone.
A tap on the door, however, interrupted her guarded reply.
It was Barney McGee. Would any of the young ladies like a gallop on the plains before breakfast?
“I would, I would,” cried Billie, instantly in a state of joyous anticipation.
“Now, Billie, dear,” interrupted her cousin, “I am desperately afraid to have you ride one of those wild untamed horses. Remember those animals we saw in Buffalo Bill’s Show. They were Western horses, all of them, and they jumped around like so many contortionists.”
“We’ll give her the tamest beast in the stable, ma’am,” Barney assured her.
“Not one of those frightful bronco creatures, Barney, I hope?”
“No, no, ma’am, a gentle little Texas horse that goes like the wind and never balks or kicks——”
“How fast a wind, Barney? A cyclone?”
Barney laughed.
“He’s a first rate little horse, ma’am and any lady could ride him—who knows how to stick on,” he added in a lower voice.
But Barney knew he could trust Billie on a Texas pony, having seen her take a canter on his own lean animal.
“I haven’t any habit,” announced Billie.
“Rosina keeps this one for the ladies who stop here,” said Barney, disclosing a khaki divided skirt which had been in a bundle under his arm.
Ten minutes later, Billie was waiting at the long low shed which answered for a stable, while Barney led forth a small gray horse called Jocko. Two little impish devils peeped from the depths of Jocko’s eyes, but he flicked his tail lazily and lowered his head in a deceivingly humble manner.
Rosina was to ride with them. Miss Campbell would on no account permit Billie to ride unchaperoned on the plains, even with the trustworthy Barney as a companion.
The mistress of the rancho presently emergedfrom the stable, leading a small sorrel horse. She also wore divided skirts, and with one bound leapt into the saddle, a feat Billie had not expected from her awkward, rather dumpy appearance. But it was very evident Rosina enjoyed the sport. With a curious cry, not unlike that given by her brother, Blackthorn Hawkes, the night before, when he danced the Indian war dance, she flew over the plains, followed by Barney and Billie.
Never had Billie enjoyed anything so much as that wild morning ride. The air was cool and crisp. The sky intensely blue, and everywhere, as far as the eye could see, were the rolling purple prairies, dotted with wild flowers.
She forgot Miss Campbell, forgot her three friends, indeed her mind was filled only with the joy of the moment.
Perhaps an Arabian horse on the desert might outstrip him, but indeed Jocko’s feet seemed hardly to touch the earth as he skimmed along.
Soon he was ahead of the others. Billie looked back over her shoulder and saw Barneymaking wild gesticulations as the distance between them widened. But Jocko’s mouth was as hard as steel, and when the young girl began presently to draw him in, she made no more impression on him than the wind along the waste.
“Whoa, Jocko,” she cried. “Stop, stop, you little beast.”
On went Jocko, swifter than the wind, swifter than anything Billie had ever imagined. Leaning far over, like a jockey, she pressed her knees into his sides and held to his mane for dear life.
“Perhaps he will tire out,” she thought. “In the meantime, the best I can do is to stick on.”
Only once, did she give an upside-down, backward glance through the crook in her elbow, but her companions were nowhere in sight. Just how long Billie gripped the pony’s neck in this manner and kept her seat, she hardly knew. It might have been five minutes and it might have been thirty. She felt as a shooting star must feel as it flashes through the universe; a secret, blind exhilaration and an immense vacancy ofspace which seemed to surround her, and withal an overpowering fear.
Then there came a sudden and utterly unexpected halt. At the same moment she unconsciously loosened her grip on the horse’s mane. Head over heels she went, straight over the pony’s head, and lay huddled on the ground, limp and inert.
Jocko sniffed at her an instant and then turned and trotted away. The two little imps in his eyes had retired, and he was once more a mild-mannered demure gray pony.
Imagine yourself the one small human speck in a great vast wilderness of prairie and you can form a vague idea of Billie’s sensations when she opened her eyes.
Trying to collect her scattered senses, she pulled herself together and stood up. Her head swam and she had a shaky sensation in her knees.
“Let me see,” she said out loud in a puzzled voice. “Cousin Helen and the girls are—well where are they? And——Oh,” she cried, pressing her hands to her head as memory came backto her and she perceived herself to be alone on the plains. Then she looked about for the treacherous Jocko, but he had disappeared over the horizon.
When Billie’s blood had resumed its normal tempo and her head had ceased to throb, she began to walk in what she judged from the sun to be a Southerly direction. She walked for a long time but nowhere could she see signs of her friends.
“I might as well be a canoe in the middle of the ocean,” she said at length, sitting down on the ground in despair. “I don’t seem to get anywhere, and—Oh, dear, how hot and tired and thirsty and hungry I am!”
Once she tried calling, but her voice seemed to her only a small piping sound in the great emptiness.
“I declare, I feel about as large as a microscopic insect,” she exclaimed with a little sobbing laugh.
Then with a sudden resolution, she began to run.
“I won’t be lost,” she cried. “I won’t! I won’t! Haloo-oo-o, Barney—Rosina—where are you?”
Perhaps you have heard of the madness of people lost in a great forest or in the desert. It is a terrible growing fear which often turns into insanity unless it is held in check. Billie had heard of this madness. Her father had once told her of the sad case of a man lost in the Adirondacks who ran round and round in a circle, and when at last he was found, he was still running in a circle, completely out of his senses.
Checking her impulse to give way to this delirium, the young girl sat down and began to think.
“Now, Billie,” she said out loud, as if she were addressing some one else, “don’t go and make an idiot of yourself. Be silent and go quietly, or you’ll be a raving lunatic in five minutes. Of course the whole ranch will set out to find you as soon as they know you are actually lost. And of course they will find you. There can be no doubt of that. You are not going to die yet. You are far too young and strong and fond oflife and—and hungry,” she added with a little quaver in her voice.
But not again did Billie give way to the delirium of the lost. With her back to the sun she hurried on, not even a village of prairie dogs attracting her absorbed attention. As the sun began his afternoon course, she became conscious of an intense, unconquerable thirst. At first she fought against it, but at last she sat down and indulged in memories of spring water. All the cool bubbling wells she had ever seen came back to her mind. Memories of a little trickling brook on Seven League Island beside which she had once knelt and taken deep long draughts; then there was Cold Spring, where she had been on a picnic. What a spring that was! A perfect fountain of delicious clear water. She recalled a swim she had had in a mountain lake where the water was as clear as crystal and very cold. She had swallowed quite a mouthful when she dived off a rock, and she could still feel the coolness on her lips.
“But best of all,” she murmured, “best of allwas the water in that sunken barrel spring on Percy’s place. Oh, for a drop of it now,” she cried.
She lay down on the ground and pillowed her head on her arms. Through the tall grasses she could see someone still a great way off coming toward her so rapidly that the figure loomed larger and larger on the landscape. She sat up and waited.
“Here I am,” she heard herself calling. Then she laughed wildly. What she had taken for a dumpy squat lady in a bonnet trimmed with two pointed velvet bows, turned out to be a great stupid jackrabbit with ears as big as a mule’s, who leaped on his hind legs with incredible rapidity.
“Silly old thing,” exclaimed Billie irritably. “I thought you were a nice, kind, fat old person bringing me a glass of water.”
The truth is the rabbit did bear a striking resemblance to the janitress at West Haven High School.
Billie fell asleep and dreamed she was in afiery furnace calling to her father, when suddenly a delicious wetness touched her lips and a few drops of water trickled down her parched throat. She opened her eyes. Buckthorne Hawkes, Rosina’s brother, was leaning over her with a flask of water in his hand.
Was she still dreaming or did she hear him say:
“Next time you will buy an opal of me, eh?”
She opened her eyes again and looked into the face of the peddler who, ages back, had cursed them and their ancestors.
But old Mrs. Jack Rabbit had come back. There she was, dark and black and squat.
“Good day, Mrs. Jack Rabbit,” Billie called, “did you bring the water?” and then she went to sleep with a feeling of security and peace.
A heated argument was taking place.
“Go on, Hot Air Sue and mind your own business. You are too full of curiosity. I tell you I found this girl here. She had run away from home.”
“Umph! Umph! Hawkeseye big lie. Hawkeseye always big lie!”
“Woman, will you be quiet. Do you want to make big money. Father rich man, see? He pay big money to get girl back. Hot Air Sue make much gold. Hot Air Sue have necklace and fine new dress.”
“Umph! Umph!”
“If I promise to take you, will you keep quiet?”
“Umph! Umph!”
Billie’s wandering mind had returned to its dwelling place but she still kept her eyes closed even when she felt two strong arms lift her upand place her on a seat which seemed almost familiar. She half opened her eyes and looked through the lashes. She was in an automobile, but it was not the Comet.
“Get in, Sue. Sit here and hold her beside you. I’ll run the car.”
Evidently there were only two seats to the motor car. Billie was squeezed into a seat beside the woman and while the peddler, Indian, or whatever he was, was cranking up the machine she opened her eyes and looked straight into the little pig eyes of a fat Indian squaw.
“Shut eyes,” whispered Hot Air Sue and Billie promptly closed them again, feeling suddenly very wide awake and alert.
Presently they were moving smoothly and silently over the prairie. The automobile was a very fast one and the wind raised by the swift motion had a reviving, refreshing effect on the exhausted girl.
“Water and food,” she whispered into the ear of Hot Air Sue.
“Umph!” grunted the squaw. “Girl ver’ sick,”she said to Hawkes. “Must have water and bread.”
The man stopped the car and from under the seat drew forth a box of crackers and a bottle of water. Billie ate some of the crackers and drank deeply from a tin cup of the water. She never stopped to think of how clean the cup was or where the sandwich had come from.
Then she laid her head on the Indian woman’s breast and pretended to go back to sleep.
“Where going?” she heard Hot Air Sue ask.
“Across the border,” he said. “Into Colorado. We’ll get there by evening.”
The air was beginning to have a cool feeling. They had left the plains abruptly behind them and were nearing the mountains.
“I must get back tonight,” said Billie to herself. “Cousin Helen will die of heart failure if I don’t.”
Although her body was exhausted, her mind was clear and with her eyes closed, she was able to think connectedly and deeply. “I am being kidnapped,” her thoughts continued. “Hot AirSue is my friend and will save me if she possibly can. The trouble is we haven’t any money between us, I suppose.”
Once after a long time they stopped and Hawkes jumped out and examined one of the tires.
“Sue save young lady,” whispered the old Indian woman. “Sue not afraid. Don’t wake up.”
The man came and stood at the side of the car and looked into Billie’s face.
“Hot Air Sue good old girl,” he said. “Hot Air Sue won’t be sorry she helped Hawkeseye. Give me water bottle. Hawkeseye get water. Hot Air Sue look after girl. She mustn’t run away. No money, no girl.”
“Umph! umph!” grunted the woman. “Sue would get water for young chief, but Sue must hold girl.”
Hawkeseye took the bottle and started down to a spring which bubbled out of the rocks at the foot of a small precipice at one side of the road.
Billie watched him as he leaped nimbly from one rock to another. Then with one flying leapshe was out of the machine and had cranked it up. At the sound of the motor the man looked up quickly, dropped the bottle with a crash of broken glass and began to run up the cliff. It was a difficult place in which to turn, and Billie was obliged to go backward down a narrow road, but the young girl kept her head and moved the machine slowly and deliberately.
“Hawkeseye come runnin’,” said the Indian woman. “White girl hurry.”
Another moment and they were headed in the other direction, but Hawkeseye had reached them. With a bound he seized the back of the machine and was lifting himself on his elbows.
Instantly Hot Air Sue whipped out a knife which she had hidden somewhere in the depths of her shawl, and slashed him across the wrist. With a yell of fury the man fell backward and lay on the ground. Billie gave one glance over her shoulder. Never had she felt so deliberately and cruelly cold-blooded as at that moment. If Buckthorne Hawkes’ back had been broken she would have gone on just the same. But it wasnot broken, for a second glance showed him crawling to the side of the road.
“I’m at Steptoe Lodge. Do you know where that is?” she asked Hot Air Sue, who was regarding her efforts at running the motor car with stolid admiration.
“Steptoe Lodge thirty miles away.”
“Thirty miles? That’s nothing,” replied Billie cheerfully. “Is this the right road?”
“This is first right road. This road wrong later.”
“You mean we take another road that branches off from this?”
“Umph!”
“Will you tell me when we get to it?”
“Hot Air Sue tell everything. Hot Air Sue talk much. That’s why cowboys call her ‘Hot Air.’”
Billie laughed. Was it possible she had been dying of thirst in the desert only a few hours before, and here she was exhilarated and almost shouting with joy over her escape; riding with Hot Air Sue in a perfectly strange automobile.But was it perfectly strange? She leaned over and looked at the color as they sped along. It was gray. It was a racing car and it was built for two.
“Hawkeseye bad man. Hawkeseye call himself school-teacher. He bad Indian,” went on Sue. “He no teacher. He thief. He no Indian, either. He only half Indian. That’s why Hawkeseye bad man. All white or all red better.”
“Hawkeseye steals automobiles,” said Billie.
“Umph! Umph! His sisters, they spoil Hawkeseye. They work to send him to school and give him fine clothes.”
“Has he got another sister?”
“Hawkeseye got two sisters—Rosina and Maria.”
“The illustrious Hawkes family,” said Billie to herself. “Well-known in the West. I think the most dangerous member of that family had better be locked up.”
The first stars were just coming into view when Billie drew up in front of Steptoe Lodge, but in all that big ranch house only two humanbeings were there to greet her—Miss Helen Campbell and the Chinese cook.
Seizing a trumpet made of a cow’s horn the Chinaman rushed to the top of the house and blew half a dozen blasts that resounded over the prairie like the call of the wild huntsman, and in fifteen minutes from every direction horses and ponies bearing cowboy riders were dashing across the plains toward the Lodge. But far more amazing to Billie was the sight of her own red Comet hastening eagerly toward her, and at the wheel sat Mary, clever little pupil that she was, and in the back seat were Elinor and Nancy crying and calling and waving their handkerchiefs all at once.
Miss Campbell had been completely prostrated. She was in bed with a wet towel around her head and her eyes were red with weeping. Billie also was put to bed and fed by her devoted friends with hot soup and dry toast. She was more exhausted than she cared to admit, and it was Hot Air Sue, with her talent for inexhaustible conversation,who made explanations to the household of Steptoe Lodge.
The next morning two men arrived at the Lodge. They bore a warrant for the arrest of one, Buckthorne Hawkes, automobile thief. But Buckthorne Hawkes was not to be found. However, they confiscated the gray racing car, and the girls knew that Peter Van Vechten was once more in possession of his property.
The Comet had now a guide. No more excursions into the wilderness of the unknown for him. Timidly and cautiously he crept along as close to the tracks of the Union Pacific Railroad as the highway permitted, for they were about to go through the wild rugged country where rise the snow-capped ranges of the Rocky Mountains.
With a sigh of relief they said good-by to Steptoe Lodge.
“It was interesting, but uncomfortable,” Miss Campbell had said. For a whole day Billie’s experience had quite shaken Miss Campbell’s enthusiasm in the journey. It was not a permanent distaste, however. Having remained quietly in West Haven for a quarter of a century, the little woman was now possessed with a thirst for travel. She had developed into a high-toned Gypsy with a disposition to perpetual wandering.
The partings at Steptoe Lodge had some of them been quite moving; but not Rosina’s, who had bade them a chilly farewell. Her nature was a stormy one, a strange mixture of hot and cold, anger and humility, courage and fear.
“I don’t know whom she’s angriest with,” Billie had observed, “our ex-teacher, Maria, for putting her brother up to such lawless tricks or us because we were the victims.”
“I hope they catch him,” said Miss Campbell firmly. “I do, indeed, and shut him up in prison for a long, long time. Such dangerous characters ought not to be allowed to run at large.”
“They’ll catch him if Brek Steptoe has any influence,” put in Nancy. “Barney told me his cousin was never going to put up with Hawkeseye again. He had stood all he intended. Rosina was now to choose between them.”
“What is that you’re looking at, Nancy?” demanded Elinor, changing the subject.
Nancy blushed and laughed.
“A parting gift from Jim,” she replied.
Poor Jim had ridden for some miles beside the Comet and they had gone slowly in order to enjoy his company. Then, with a last hand-shake all around and a heart-breaking sigh, he stopped in the middle of the road, his sombrero in one hand and his horse’s reins in the other. And there he stood as still as a statue until the motor car was reduced to a small scarlet dot on the horizon. When he had shaken hands with Nancy, he thrust a small package into her lap. There were tears in Nancy’s eyes when she looked at the contents of the package, although her laugh rang out as merrily as her friends’ as she drew forth the hind foot of a jack rabbit mounted on a plaited loop of horsehair.
“Does he expect me to wear this thing around my neck,” she cried dangling the clumsy paw between her small thumb and forefinger.
“There’s a note,” said Mary, leaning over Nancy’s shoulder.
Nancy smiled again as she read the note, first to herself and then out loud:
“Dear Miss Nancy:
“I killed the rabbit in an Indian burying ground in the dark of the moon. The hair came from my horse’s tail. He’s a fine little animal, my horse. I love him best in the world next to—something else I like better. I wish it were a gold rabbit’s foot set in diamonds, but it’s a long ways here from a jewelry store, and this is the best I can do. I’ve had it a long time, and it’s brought me good luck at last, because I’ve met you. I hope it will bring you luck. Good-by. It’s the hardest good-by I ever had to say. If I ever strike a gold mine I’m coming East. Good-by again.
“Jim.”
“P. S.—Don’t forget me.”
“Poor, lonely soul!” exclaimed Miss Campbell, wiping the moisture from her eyes. “Where are his people, I wonder?”
“He hasn’t any,” answered Nancy. “His father was a miner and he died when Jim was a little boy. He’s worked in lumber camps and lived around like this all his life. I think he’svery gentlemanly, considering. He says Tony has taught him a lot. Jim is only eighteen, you know, although he looks much older.”
Deep down in her heart Miss Campbell made a resolution that she would like to do something very nice for Jim.
They slept that night at Cheyenne, which had once been a rude little frontier town, and was now a handsome city, and the next day pushed on toward Laramie. After riding hundreds of miles over level prairie grounds, the eyes become accustomed to wide stretches of landscape and the mind, too, takes a broader and more generous outlook on life. What is called “the peace of the plains” seems to brood over the traveler.
Our five motorists were filled with this quietude as they went Westward. All the difficulties of the trip and past dangers were forgotten. They were as peaceful as holy pilgrims journeying toward Mecca. At last, late in the afternoon, Billie suddenly stopped the car and pointed silently toward the setting sun. She had caught her first glimpse of the Rocky Mountains.
Far in the distance they lay, the first vague misty opalescent peaks of the great chain which divides the West into countries. They were only the earliest indications of the wild and beautiful scenery of Wyoming through which they were about to pass.
“And after Wyoming comes Utah,” observed Mary Price, thinking aloud.
“And in Utah comes Evelyn,” called Billie.
The girls thrilled at the thought of Evelyn. What might not have happened to her since she had been compelled to return to Utah.
“Perhaps her father has made her marry a Mormon,” suggested Mary in an awed tone of voice.
“Or shut her in a dungeon,” pursued Nancy, who had a vague idea such things might take place in this strange city.
“It’s like the story of the wicked king and the princess,” here put in Elinor, her thoughts running on royal blood as usual.
The girls smiled, but the notion was a disquieting one at any rate and Billie began silently tocalculate how long it would take before they could reach Salt Lake City, weather and Comet permitting.
“I wish—I wish——” she began, but the whistle of a locomotive interrupted her.
“It’s the express,” exclaimed one of the girls.
“It’s going to stop.”
“But there’s no station.”
“A man is flagging it, don’t you see. It’s the track walker, I suppose. Perhaps something is the matter ahead.”
A very tall man with a lean figure, broad shoulders and a flopping sombrero hat was, in fact, waving a red flag in front of the Western express, which slowed up and presently, almost opposite the motor car, came to a full stop. The Comet also paused and waited to see what was the trouble.
The engine was too far in front to hear the conversation between the engineer, who now thrust his head out of the window, and the individual with the flag. But what happened next was exceedingly strange. The flagman, castingaside his signal, followed the engineer down the track to the first coach, which was the baggage car, and presently emerged on the platform leading to the next coach.
And now the engineer was not alone. Several baggage men and train officials had joined him, and they walked with their arms held up in the air. So absorbed was the motor party with the strange actions of the train people that they failed at the moment to notice what the lean individual was carrying in his hand. Neither could they tell what was taking place in the first passenger coach, but as the train officials were herded across the platform, still with arms uplifted, they suddenly became aware that the pockets in their coats, trousers and waistcoats were turned wrong side out, and that the man who was driving them in front of him like a herd of cattle held a pistol in his right hand, on the barrel of which the sun shone brilliantly.
“Billie, Billie, go on as fast as you can go, they are train robbers,” whispered Miss Campbell hoarsely, almost bereft of her voice from fright.
Billie jumped out of the machine, wishing with all her heart that somebody would invent a motor car that wouldn’t need to be cranked up.
“Beggin’ your pardon, Miss, will you kindly stay where you are?” said a soft, drawling voice behind them.
They turned quickly and faced another broad-shouldered individual with a sombrero half covering his lean, sunburned face. His gray eyes twinkled with amusement when he saw their consternation.
“We won’t do no harm to you, ladies, except to ask you for a lift after this little business is over. Jes’ keep perfectly quiet and ask no questions, and we’ll tell you no lies.”
Somehow, Billie did not feel frightened at this gentle, humorous person.
“Suppose we don’t care to give you a lift,” she said, her hand on the cranking lever.
“That would be a pity, Miss,” answered the man coaxingly, “because,” he went on slowly, “you see——” his hand slipped in his hip pocket and drew out a small, dangerous-looking revolver.
“Billie, darling, don’t oppose the creature!” cried Miss Campbell in a strangled voice.
“Steady! steady!” said the man. “Don’t git nervous, lady. You’ll come through the ordeal as well as you ever was in your life. Jes’ draw in a bit.”
Never had the moments dragged so slowly as they did now. Through the car windows they could see men and women with arms uplifted. Was it possible that one man could rob fifty? No; not one. They perceived two confederates, who had sprung up from somewhere, followed behind with a pistol in each hand. An intense quiet seemed to hang over the place as the robbers went silently through the train, and at last emerged from the back. The herd of officials were now made to get out and walk toward the engine. The engineer was permitted to climb into his engine, the others climbed in anywhere after him. As the train began to get up steam a man called out:
“Good heavens! there’s an automobile full ofgirls. We can’t leave them at the mercy of these blackguards.”
“They’re confederates!” called another man.
“Confederates? Nonsense! Don’t you see that fellow has a pistol aimed at them?”
As the train started, the passenger ran back to the platform and jumped off. The next moment three train robbers and a young man without any hat surrounded the Comet:
“Now, don’t try any monkey business, young feller,” said the first robber, pointing his pistol at the passenger. “Jes’ stay right where you are. I don’t want to commit murder.”
“Put that pistol up, Jim Bowles. I’m not afraid of you or of any of your disreputable acquaintances. These ladies are friends of mine, and I intend to stay with them.”
The girls, who had huddled down in the car white and silent, took courage and looked up.
It was Daniel Moore who was speaking.
Miss Campbell gave a little tremulous cry like a child’s.
“Oh, Mr. Moore, I implore you not to leave us.”
“I mean what I say,” pursued Jim Bowles. “If you wanter be still breathing fresh air in another two minutes, stay where you are.”
Daniel Moore looked him calmly in the eye.
“Do you remember Christmas Eve at Silver Bow two years ago?” he asked.
The robber’s face was curiously twisted with emotion.
“Yes,” he replied.
“I cut you down,” said Daniel Moore. “You would have been strung up there yet if I hadn’t come back in time. The scar is still there, I see.”
He glanced at the man’s sinewy throat around which ran a deep red scar.
With one stride Jim Bowles reached the other side of the automobile and seized Mr. Moore’s hand.
“Wuz you the gennelman? Stranger, git in and take it easy. We won’t do no harm to these ladies. But we’d like to git a lift. I knowed youwuz a brave man as soon as I seen you, and no one kin ever say Jim Bowles forgits a favor.”
Daniel Moore climbed in behind with Miss Helen and the girls who huddled down somehow, while the robbers pressed themselves into the front and Billie started the machine.