CHAPTER 4. Beatrice Learns a New Language.
“D'you want to see the boys work a bunch of cattle, Trix?” Dick said to her, when she came down to where he was leaning against a high board fence, waiting for her.
“'Deed I do, Dicky—only I've no idea what you mean.”
“The boys are going to cut out some cattle we've contracted to the government—for the Indians, you know. They're holding the bunch over in Dry Coulee; it's only three or four miles. I've got to go over and see the foreman, and I thought maybe you'd like to go along.”
“There's nothing I can think of that I would like better. Won't it be fine, Sir Redmond?”
Sir Redmond did not say whether he thought it would be fine or not. He still had the white streak around his mouth, and he went through the gate and on to the house without a word—which was undoubtedly a rude thing to do. Sir Redmond was not often rude. Dick watched him speculatively until he was beyond hearing them. Then, “What have you done to milord, Trix?” he wanted to know.
“Nothing,” said Beatrice.
“Well,” Dick said, with decision, “he looks to me like a man that has been turned down—hard. I can tell by the back of his neck.”
This struck Beatrice, and she began to study the retreating neck of her suitor. “I can't see any difference,” she announced, after a brief scrutiny.
“It's rather sunburned and thick.”
“I'll gamble his mind is a jumble of good English oaths—with maybe a sprinkling of Boer maledictions. What did you do?”
“Nothing—unless, perhaps, he objects to being disciplined a bit. But I also object to being badgered into matrimony—even with Sir Redmond.”
“Even with Sir Redmond!” Dick whistled. “He's 'It,' then, is he?”
Beatrice had nothing to say. She walked beside Dick and looked at the ground before her.
“He doesn't seem a bad sort, sis, and the title will be nice to have in the family, if one cares for such things. Mother does. She was disappointed, I take it, that Wiltmar was a younger son.”
“Yes, she was. She used to think that Sir Redmond might get killed down there fighting the Boers, and then Wiltmar would be next in line. But he didn't, and it was Wiltmar who went first. And now oh, it's humiliating, Dick! To be thrown at a man's head—” Tears were not far from her voice just then.
“I can see she wants you to nab the title. Well, sis, if you don't care for the man—”
“I never said I didn't care for him. But I just can't treat him decently, with mama dinning that title in my ears day and night. I wish there wasn't any title. Oh, it's abominable! Things have come to that point where an American girl with money is not supposed to care for an Englishman, no matter how nice he may be, if he has a title, or the prospect of one. Every one laughs and thinks it's the title she wants; they'd think it of me, and they'd say it. They would say Beatrice Lansell took her half-million and bought her a lord. And, after a while, perhaps Sir Redmond himself would half-believe it—and I couldn't bear that! And so I am—unbearably flippant and—I should think he'd hate me!”
“So you reversed the natural order of things, and refused him on account of the title?” Dick grinned surreptitiously.
“No, I didn't—not quite. I'm afraid he's dreadfully angry with me, though. I do wish he wasn't such a dear.”
“You're the same old Trix. You've got to be held back from the trail you're supposed to take, or you won't travel it; you'll bolt the other way. If everybody got together and fought the notion, you would probably elope with milord inside a week. Mother means well, but she isn't on to her job a little bit. She ought to turn up her nose at the title.”
“No fear of that! I've had it before my eyes till I hate the very thought of it. I—I wish I could hate him.” Beatrice sighed deeply, and gave her hand to Dorman, who scurried up to her.
“I'll have the horses saddled right away,” said Dick, and left them.
“Where you going, Be'trice? You going to ride a horse? I want to, awf'lly.”
“I'm afraid you can't, honey; it's too far.” Beatrice pushed a yellow curl away from his eyes with tender, womanly solicitude.
“Auntie won't care, 'cause I'm a bother. Auntie says she's goin' to send for Parks. I don't want Parks; 'sides, Parks is sick. I want a pony, and some ledder towsers wis fringes down 'em, and I want some little wheels on my feet. Mr. Cam'ron says I do need some little wheels, Be'trice.”
“Did he, honey?”
“Yes, he did. I like Mr. Cam'ron, Be'trice; he let me ride his big, high pony. He's a berry good pony. He shaked hands wis me, Be'trice—he truly did.”
“Did he, hon?” Beatrice, I am sorry to say, was not listening. She was wondering if Sir Redmond was really angry with her—too angry, for instance, to go over where the cattle were. He really ought to go, for he had come West in the interest of the Eastern stockholders in the Northern Pool, to investigate the actual details of the work. He surely would not miss this opportunity, Beatrice thought. And she hoped he was not angry.
“Yes, he truly did. Mr. Cam'ron interduced us, Be'trice. He said, 'Redcloud, dis is Master Dorman Hayes. Shake hands wis my frien' Dorman.' And he put up his front hand, Be'trice, and nod his head, and I shaked his hand. I dess love that big, high pony, Be'trice. Can I buy him, Be'trice?”
“Maybe, kiddie.”
“Can I buy him wis my six shiny pennies, Be'trice?”
“Maybe.”
“Mr. Cam'ron lives right over that hill, Be'trice. He told me.”
“Did he, hon?”
“Yes, he did. He 'vited me over, Be'trice. He's my friend, and I've got to buy my big, high pony. I'll let you shake hands wis him, Be'trice. I'll interduce him to you. And I'll let you ride on his back, Be'trice. Do you want to ride on his back?”
“Yes, honey.”
Before Beatrice had time to commit herself they reached the house, and she let go Dorman's hand and hurried away to get into her riding-habit.
Dorman straightway went to find his six precious, shiny pennies, which Beatrice had painstakingly scoured with silver polish one day to please the little tyrant, and which increased their value many times—so many times, in fact, that he hid them every night in fear of burglars. Since he concealed them each time in a different place, he was obliged to ransack his auntie's room every morning, to the great disturbance of Martha, the maid, who was an order-loving person.
Martha appeared just when he had triumphantly pounced upon his treasure rolled up in the strings of his aunt's chiffon opera-bonnet.
“Mercy upon us, Master Dorman! Whatever have you been doing?”
“I want my shiny pennies,” said the young gentleman, composedly unwinding the roll, “to buy my big, high pony.”
“Naughty, naughty boy, to muss my lady's fine bonnet like that! Look at things scattered over the floor, and my lady's fine handkerchiefs and gloves—” Martha stopped and meditated whether she might dare to shake him.
Dorman was laboriously counting his wealth, with much wrinkling of stubby nose and lifting of eyebrows. Having satisfied himself that they were really all there, he deigned to look around, with a fine masculine disdain of woman's finery.
“Oh, dose old things!” he sniffed. “I always fordet where I put my shiny pennies. Robbers might find them if I put them easy places. I'm going to buy my big, high pony, and you can't shake his hand a bit, Martha.”
“Well, I'm sure I don't want to!” Martha snapped back at him, and went down on all fours to gather up the things he had thrown down. “Whatever Parks was thinking of, to go and get fever, when she was the only one that could manage you, I don't know! And me picking up after you till I'm fair sick!”
“I'm glad you is sick,” he retorted unfeelingly, and backed to the door. “I hopes you get sicker so your stummit makes you hurt. You can't ride on my big, high pony.”
“Get along with you and your high pony!” cried the exasperated Martha, threatening with a hairbrush. Dorman, his six shiny pennies held fast in his damp little fist, fled down the stairs and out into the sunlight.
Dick and Beatrice were just ready to ride away from the porch. “I want to go wis you, Uncle Dick.” Dorman had followed the lead of Beatrice, his divinity; he refused to say Richard, though grandmama did object to nicknames.
“Up you go, son. You'll be a cow-puncher yourself one of these days. I'll not let him fall, and this horse is gentle.” This last to satisfy Dorman's aunt, who wavered between anxiety and relief.
“You may ride to the gate, Dorman, and then you'll have to hop down and run back to your auntie and grandma. We're going too far for you to-day.” Dick gave him the reins to hold, and let the horse walk to prolong the joy of it.
Dorman held to the horn with one hand, to the reins with the other, and let his small body swing forward and back with the motion of the horse, in exaggerated imitation of his friend, Mr. Cameron. At the gate he allowed himself to be set down without protest, smiled importantly through the bars, and thrust his arm through as far as it would reach, that he might wave good-by. And his divinity smiled back at him, and threw him a kiss, which pleased him mightily.
“You must have hurt milord's feelings pretty bad,” Dick remarked. “I couldn't get him to come. He had to write a letter first, he said.”
“I wish, Dick,” Beatrice answered, a bit petulantly, “you would stop calling him milord.”
“Milord's a good name,” Dick contended. “It's bad enough to 'Sir' him to his face; I can't do it behind his back, Trix. We're not used to fancy titles out here, and they don't fit the country, anyhow. I'm like you—I'd think a lot more of him if he was just a plain, everyday American, so I could get acquainted enough to call him 'Red Hayes.' I'd like him a whole lot better.”
Beatrice was in no mood for an argument—on that subject, at least. She let Rex out and raced over the prairie at a gait which would have greatly shocked her mother, who could not understand why Beatrice was not content to drive sedately about in the carriage with the rest of them.
When they reached the round-up Keith Cameron left the bunch and rode out to meet them, and Dick promptly shuffled responsibility for his sister's entertainment to the square shoulders of his neighbor.
“Trix wants to wise up on the cattle business, Keith. I'll just turn her over to you for a-while, and let you answer her questions; I can't, half the time. I want to look through the bunch a little.”
Keith's face spoke gratitude, and spoke it plainly. The face of Beatrice was frankly inattentive. She was watching the restless, moving mass of red backs and glistening horns, with horsemen weaving in and out among them in what looked to her a perfectly aimless fashion—until one would wheel and dart out into the open, always with a fleeing animal lumbering before. Other horsemen would meet him and take up the chase, and he would turn and ride leisurely back into the haze and confusion. It was like a kaleidoscope, for the scene shifted constantly and was never quite the same.
Keith, secure in her absorption, slid sidewise in the saddle and studied her face, knowing all the while that he was simply storing up trouble for himself. But it is not given a man to flee human nature, and the fellow who could sit calmly beside Beatrice and not stare at her if the opportunity offered must certainly have the blood of a fish in his veins. I will tell you why.
Beatrice was tall, and she was slim, and round, and tempting, with the most tantalizing curves ever built to torment a man. Her hair was soft and brown, and it waved up from the nape of her neck without those short, straggling locks and thin growth at the edge which mar so many feminine heads; and the sharp contrast of shimmery brown against ivory white was simply irresistible. Had her face been less full of charm, Keith might have been content to gaze and gaze at that lovely hair line. As it was, his eyes wandered to her brows, also distinctly marked, as though outlined first with a pencil in the fingers of an artist who understood. And there were her lashes, dark and long, and curled up at the ends; and her cheek, with its changing, come-and-go coloring; her mouth, with its upper lip creased deeply in the middle—so deeply that a bit more would have been a defect—and with an odd little dimple at one corner; luckily, it was on the side toward him, so that he might look at it all he wanted to for once; for it was always there, only growing deeper and wickeder when she spoke or laughed. He could not see her eyes, for they were turned away, but he knew quite well the color; he had settled that point when he looked up from coiling his rope the day she came. They were big, baffling, blue-brown eyes, the like of which he had never seen before in his life—and he had thought he had seen every color and every shade under the sun. Thinking of them and their wonderful deeps and shadows, he got hungry for a sight of them. And suddenly she turned to ask a question, and found him staring at her, and surprised a look in his eyes he did not know was there.
For ten pulse-beats they stared, and the cheeks of Beatrice grew red as healthy young blood could paint them; Keith's were the same, only that his blood showed darkly through the tan. What question had been on her tongue she forgot to ask. Indeed, for the time, I think she forgot the whole English language, and every other—but the strange, wordless language of Keith's clear eyes.
And then it was gone, and Keith was looking away, and chewing a corner of his lip till it hurt. His horse backed restlessly from the tight-gripped rein, and Keith was guilty of kicking him with his spur, which did not better matters. Redcloud snorted and shook his outraged head, and Keith came to himself and eased the rein, and spoke remorseful, soothing words that somehow clung long in the memory of Beatrice.
Just after that Dick galloped up, his elbows flapping like the wings of a frightened hen.
“Well, I suppose you could run a cow outfit all by yourself, with the knowledge you've got from Keith,” he greeted, and two people became even more embarrassed than before. If Dick noticed anything, he must have been a wise young man, for he gave no sign.
But Beatrice had not queened it in her set, three seasons, for nothing, even if she was capable of being confused by a sweet, new language in a man's eyes. She answered Dick quietly.
“I've been so busy watching it all that I haven't had time to ask many questions, as Mr. Cameron can testify. It's like a game, and it's very fascinating—and dusty. I wonder if I might ride in among them, Dick?”
“Better not, sis. It isn't as much fun as it looks, and you can see more out here. There comes milord; he must have changed his mind about the letter.”
Beatrice did not look around. To see her, you would swear she had set herself the task of making an accurate count of noses in that seething mass of raw beef below her. After a minute she ventured to glance furtively at Keith, and, finding his eyes turned her way, blushed again and called herself an idiot. After that, she straightened in the saddle, and became the self-poised Miss Lansell, of New York.
Keith rode away to the far side of the herd, out of temptation; queer a man never runs from a woman until it is too late to be a particle of use. Keith simply changed his point of view, and watched his Heart's Desire from afar.
CHAPTER 5. The Search for Dorman.
“Oh, I say,” began Sir Redmond, an hour after, when he happened to stand close to Beatrice for a few minutes, “where is Dorman? I fancied you brought him along.”
“We didn't,” Beatrice told him. “He only rode as far as the gate, where Dick left him, and started him back to the house.”
“Mary told me he came along. She and your mother were congratulating each other upon a quiet half-day, with you and Dorman off the place together. I'll wager their felicitations fell rather flat.”
Beatrice laughed. “Very likely. I know they were mourning because their lace-making had been neglected lately. What with that trip to Lost Canyon to-morrow, and to the mountains Friday, I'm afraid the lace will continue to suffer. What do you think of a round-up, Sir Redmond?”
“It's deuced nasty,” said he. “Such a lot of dust and noise. I fancy the workmen don't find it pleasant.”
“Yes, they do; they like it,” she declared. “Dick says a cowboy is never satisfied off the range. And you mustn't call them workmen, Sir Redmond. They'd resent it, if they knew. They're cowboys, and proud of it. They seem rather a pleasant lot of fellows, on the whole. I have been talking to one or two.”
“Well, we're all through here,” Dick announced, riding up. “I'm going to ride around by Keith's place, to see a horse I'm thinking of buying. Want to go along, Trix? Or are you tired?”
“I'm never tired,” averred his sister, readjusting a hat-pin and gathering up her reins. “I always want to go everywhere that you'll take me, Dick. Consider that point settled for the summer. Are you coming, Sir Redmond?”
“I think not, thank you,” he said, not quite risen above his rebuff of the morning. “I told Mary I would be back for lunch.”
“I was wiser; I refused even to venture an opinion as to when I should be back. Well, 'so-long'!”
“You're learning the lingo pretty fast, Trix,” Dick chuckled, when they were well away from Sir Redmond. “Milord almost fell out of the saddle when you fired that at him. Where did you pick it up?”
“I've heard you say it a dozen times since I came. And I don't care if he is shocked—I wanted him to be. He needn't be such a perfect bear; and I know mama and Miss Hayes don't expect him to lunch, without us. He just did it to be spiteful.”
“Jerusalem, Trix! A little while ago you said he was a dear! You shouldn't snub him, if you want him to be nice to you.”
“I don't want him to be nice,” flared Beatrice. “I don't care how he acts. Only, I must say, ill humor doesn't become him. Not that it matters, however.”
“Well, I guess we can get along without him, if he won't honor us with his company. Here comes Keith. Brace up, sis, and be pleasant.”
Beatrice glanced casually at the galloping figure of Dick's neighbor, and frowned.
“You mustn't flirt with Keith,” Dick admonished gravely. “He's a good fellow, and as square a man as I know; but you ought to know he's got the reputation of being a hard man to know. Lots of girls have tried to flirt and make a fool of him, and wound up with their feelings hurt worse than his were.”
“Is that a dare?” Beatrice threw up her chin with a motion Dick knew of old.
“Not on your life! You better leave him alone; one or the other of you would get the worst of it, and I'd hate to see either of you feeling bad. As I said before, he's a bad man to fool with.”
“I don't consider him particularly dangerous—or interesting. He's not half as nice as Sir Redmond.” Beatrice spoke as though she meant what she said, and Dick had no chance to argue the point, for Keith pulled up beside them at that moment.
Beatrice seemed inclined to silence, and paid more attention to the landscape than she did to the conversation, which was mostly about range conditions, and the scanty water supply, and the drought.
She was politely interested in Keith's ranch, and if she clung persistently to her society manner, why, her society manner was very pleasing, if somewhat unsatisfying to a fellow fairly drunk with her winsomeness. Keith showed her where she might look straight up the coulee to her brother's ranch, two miles away, and when she wished she might see what they were doing up there, he went in and got his field-glass. She thanked him prettily, and impersonally, and focused the glass upon Dick's house—which gave Keith another chance to look at her without being caught in the act.
“How plain everything is! I can see mama, out on the porch, and Miss Hayes.” She could also see Sir Redmond, who had just ridden up, and was talking to the ladies, but she did not think it necessary to mention him, for some reason; she kept her eyes to the glass, however, and appeared much absorbed. Dick rolled himself a cigarette and watched the two, and there was a twinkle in his eyes.
“I wonder—Dick, I do think—I'm afraid—” Beatrice hadn't her society manner now; she was her unaffected, girlish self; and she was growing excited.
“What's the matter?” Dick got up, and came and stood at her elbow.
“They're acting queerly. The maids are running about, and the cook is out, waving a large spoon, and mama has her arm around Miss Hayes, and Sir Redmond.”
“Let's see.” Dick took the glass and raised it to his eyes for a minute. “That's right,” he said. “They're making medicine over something. See what you make of it, Keith.”
Keith took the glass and looked through it. It was like a moving picture; one could see, but one wanted the interpretation of sound.
“We'd better ride over,” he said quietly. “Don't worry, Miss Lansell; it probably isn't anything serious. We can take the short cut up the coulee, and find out.” He put the glass into its leathern case and started to the gate, where the horses were standing. He did not tell Beatrice that Miss Hayes had just been carried into the house in a faint, or that her mother was behaving in an undignified fashion strongly suggesting hysterics. But Dick knew, from the look on his face, that it was serious. He hurried before them with long strides, leaving Beatrice, for the second time that morning, to the care of his neighbor.
So it was Keith who held his hand down for the delicious pressure of her foot, and arranged her habit with painstaking care, considering the hurry they were in. Dick was in the saddle, and gone, before Keith had finished, and Keith was not a slow young man, as a rule. They ran the two miles without a break, except twice, where there were gates to close. Dick, speeding a furlong before, had obligingly left them open; and a stockman is hard pressed indeed—or very drunk—when he fails to close his gates behind him. It is an unwritten law which becomes second nature.
Almost within sound of the place, Dick raced back and met them, and his face was white.
“It's Dorman!” he cried. “He's lost. They haven't seen him since we left. You know, Trix, he was standing at the gate.”
Beatrice went white as Dick; whiter, for she was untanned. An overwhelming sense of blame squeezed her heart tight. Keith, seeing her shoulders droop limply, reined close, to catch her in his arms if there was the slightest excuse. However, Beatrice was a healthy young woman, with splendid command of her nerves, and she had no intention of fainting. The sickening weakness passed in a moment.
“It's my fault,” she said, speaking rapidly, her eyes seeking Dick's for comfort. “I said 'yes' to everything he asked me, because I was thinking of something else, and not paying attention. He was going to buy your horse, Mr. Cameron, and now he's lost!”
This, though effective, was not particularly illuminating. Dick wanted details, and he got them—for Beatrice, having remorse to stir the dregs of memory, repeated nearly everything Dorman had said, even telling how the big, high pony put up his front hand, and he shaked it, and how Dorman truly needed some little wheels on his feet.
“Poor little devil,” Keith muttered, with wet eyes.
“He—he said you lived over there,” Beatrice finished, pointing, as Dorman had pointed—which was not toward the “Cross” ranch at all, but straight toward the river.
Keith wheeled Redcloud; there was no need to hear more. He took the hill at a pace which would have killed any horse but one bred to race over this rough country. Near the top, the forced breathing of another horse at his heels made him look behind. It was Beatrice following, her eyes like black stars. I do not know if Keith was astonished, but I do know that he was pleased.
“Where's Dick?” was all he said then.
“Dick's going to meet the men—the cowboys. Sir Redmond went after them, when they found Dorman wasn't anywhere about the place.”
Keith nodded understandingly, and slowed to let her come alongside.
“It's no use riding in bunches,” he remarked, after a little. “On circle we always go in pairs. We'll find him, all right.”
“We must,” said Beatrice, simply, and shaded her eyes with her hand. For they had reached the top, and the prairie land lay all about them and below, lazily asleep in the sunshine.
Keith halted and reached for his glass. “It's lucky I brought it along,” he said. “I wasn't thinking, at the time; I just slung it over my shoulder from habit.”
“It's a good habit, I think,” she answered, trying to smile; but her lips would only quiver, for the thought of her blame tortured her. “Can you see—anything?” she ventured wistfully.
Keith shook his head, and continued his search. “There are so many little washouts and coulees, down there, you know. That's the trouble with a glass—it looks only on a level. But we'll find him. Don't you worry about that. He couldn't go far.”
“There isn't any real danger, is there?”
“Oh, no,” Keith said. “Except—” He bit his lip angrily.
“Except what?” she demanded. “I'm not silly, Mr. Cameron—tell me.”
Keith took the glass from his eyes, looked at her, and paid her the compliment of deciding to tell her, just as if she were a man.
“Nothing, only—he might run across a snake,” he said. “Rattlers.”
Beatrice drew her breath hard, but she was plucky. Keith thought he had never seen a pluckier girl, and the West can rightfully boast brave women.
She touched Rex with the whip. “Come,” she commanded. “We must not stand here. It has been more than three hours.”
Keith put away the glass, and shot ahead to guide her.
“We must have missed him, somewhere.” The eyes of Beatrice were heavy with the weariness born of anxiety and suspense. They stood at the very edge of the steep bluff which rimmed the river. “You don't think he could have—” Her eyes, shuddering down at the mocking, blue-gray ripples, finished the thought.
“He couldn't have got this far,” said Keith. “His legs would give out, climbing up and down. We'll go back by a little different way, and look.”
“There's something moving, off there.” Beatrice pointed with her whip.
“That's a coyote,” Keith told her; and then, seeing the look on her face: “They won't hurt any one. They're the rankest cowards on the range.”
“But the snakes—”
“Oh, well, he might wander around for a week, and not run across one. We won't borrow trouble, anyway.”
“No,” she agreed languidly. The sun was hot, and she had not had anything to eat since early breakfast, and the river mocked her parched throat with its cool glimmer below. She looked down at it wistfully, and Keith, watchful of every passing change in her face, led her back to where a cold, little spring crept from beneath a rock; there, lifting her down, he taught her how to drink from her hand.
For himself, he threw himself down, pushed back his hat, and drank long and leisurely. A brown lock of hair, clinging softly together with moisture, fell from his forehead and trailed in the clear water, and Beatrice felt oddly tempted to push it back where it belonged. Standing quietly watching his picturesque figure, she forgot, for the moment, that a little boy was lost among these peaceful, sunbathed hills; she remembered only the man at her feet, drinking long, satisfying drafts, while the lock of hair floated in the spring.
“Now we'll go on.” He stood up and pushed back the wet lock, which trickled a tiny stream down his cheek, and settled his gray hat in place.
Again that day he felt her foot in his palm, and the touch went over him in thrills. She was tired, he knew; her foot pressed heavier than it had before. He would have liked to take her in his arms and lift her bodily into the saddle, but he hardly dared think of such a blissful proceeding.
He set the pace slower, however, and avoided the steepest places, and he halted often on the higher ground, to scan sharply the coulees. And so they searched, these two, together, and grew to know each other better than in a month of casual meetings. And the grass nodded, and the winds laughed, and the stern hills looked on, quizzically silent. If they knew aught of a small boy with a wealth of yellow curls and white collar, they gave no sign, and the two rode on, always seeking hopefully.
A snake buzzed sharply on a gravelly slope, and Keith, sending Beatrice back a safe distance, took down his rope and gave battle, beating the sinister, gray-spotted coil with the loop until it straightened and was still. He dismounted then, and pinched off the rattles—nine, there were, and a “button”—and gave them to Beatrice, who handled them gingerly, and begged Keith to carry them for her. He slipped them into his pocket, and they went on, saying little.
Back near the ranch they met Dick and Sir Redmond. They exchanged sharp looks, and Dick shook his head.
“We haven't found him—yet. The boys are riding circle around the ranch; they're bound to find him, some of them, if we don't.”
“You had better go home,” Sir Redmond told her, with a note of authority in his voice which set Keith's teeth on edge. “You look done to death; this is men's work.”
Beatrice bit her lip, and barely glanced at him. “I'll go—when Dorman is found. What shall we do now, Dick?”
“Go down to the house and get some hot coffee, you two. We all snatched a bite to eat, and you need it. After that, you can look along the south side of the coulee, if you like.”
Beatrice obediently turned Rex toward home, and Keith followed. The ranch seemed very still and lonesome. Some chickens were rolling in the dust by the gate, and scattered, cackling indignantly, when they rode up. Off to the left a colt whinnied wistfully in a corral. Beatrice, riding listlessly to the house, stopped her horse with a jerk.
“I heard—where is he?”
Keith stopped Redcloud, and listened. Came a thumping noise, and a wail, not loud, but unmistakable.
“Aunt-ie!”
Beatrice was on the ground as soon as Keith, and together they ran to the place—the bunk-house. The thumping continued vigorously; evidently a small boy was kicking, with all his might, upon a closed door; it was not a new sound to the ears of Beatrice, since the arrival in America of her young nephew. Keith flung the door wide open, upsetting the small boy, who howled.
Beatrice swooped down upon him and gathered him so close she came near choking him. “You darling. Oh, Dorman!”
Dorman squirmed away from her. “I los' one shiny penny, Be'trice—and I couldn't open de door. Help me find my shiny penny.”
Keith picked him up and set him upon one square shoulder. “We'll take you up to your auntie, first thing, young man.”
“I want my one shiny penny. I want it!” Dorman showed symptoms of howling again.
“We'll come back and find it. Your auntie wants you now, and grandmama.”
Beatrice, following after, was treated to a rather unusual spectacle; that of a tall, sun-browned fellow, with fringed chaps and brightly gleaming spurs, racing down the path; upon his shoulder, the wriggling form of an extremely disreputable small boy, with cobwebs in his curls, and his once white collar a dirty rag streaming out behind.
CHAPTER 6. Mrs. Lansell's Lecture.
When the excitement had somewhat abated, and Miss Hayes was convinced that her idol was really there, safe, and with his usual healthy appetite, and when a messenger had been started out to recall the searchers, Dorman was placed upon a chair before a select and attentive audience, and invited to explain, which he did.
He had decided to borrow some little wheels from the bunkhouse, so he could ride his big, high pony home. Mr. Cameron had little wheels on his feet, and so did Uncle Dick, and all the mens. (The audience gravely nodded assent.) Well, and the knob wasn't too high when he went in, but when he tried to open the door to go out, it was away up there! (Dorman measured with his arm.) And he fell down, and all his shiny pennies rolled and rolled. And he looked and looked where they rolled, and when he counted, one was gone. So he looked and looked for the one shiny penny till he was tired to death. And so he climbed up high, into a funny bed on a shelf, and rested. And when he was rested he couldn't open the door, and he kicked and kicked, and then Be'trice came, and Mr. Cam'ron.
“And you said you'd help me find my one penny,” he reminded Keith, blinking solemnly at him from the chair. “And I want to shake hands wis your big, high pony. I'm going to buy him wis my six pennies. Be'trice said I could.”
Beatrice blushed, and Keith forgot where he was, for a minute, looking at her.
“Come and find my one shiny penny,” Dorman commanded, climbing down. “And I want Be'trice to come. Be'trice can always find things.”
“Beatrice cannot go,” said his grandmother, who didn't much like the way Keith hovered near Beatrice, nor the look in his eyes. “Beatrice is tired.”
“I want Be'trice!” Dorman set up his everyday howl, which started the dogs barking outside. His guardian angel attempted to soothe him, but he would have none of her; he only howled the louder, and kicked.
“There, there, honey, I'll go. Where's your hat?”
“Beatrice, you had better stay in the house; you have done quite enough for one day.” The tone of the mother suggested things.
“It is imperative,” said Beatrice, “for the peace and the well-being of this household, that Dorman find his penny without delay.” When Beatrice adopted that lofty tone her mother was in the habit of saying nothing—and biding her time. Beatrice was so apt, if mere loftiness did not carry the day, to go a step further and flatly refuse to obey. Mrs. Lansell preferred to yield, rather than be openly defied.
So the three went off to find the shiny penny—and in exactly thirty-five minutes they found it. I will not say that they could not have found it sooner, but, at any rate, they didn't, and they reached the house about two minutes behind Dick and Sir Redmond, which did not improve Sir Redmond's temper to speak of.
After that, Keith did not need much urging from Dick to spend the rest of the afternoon at the “Pool” ranch. When he wanted to, Keith could be very nice indeed to people; he went a long way, that afternoon, toward making a friend of Miss Hayes; but Mrs. Lansell, who was one of those women who adhere to the theory of First Impressions, in capitals, continued to regard him as an incipient outlaw, who would, in time and under favorable conditions, reveal his true character, and vindicate her keen insight into human nature. There was one thing which Mrs. Lansell never forgave Keith Cameron, and that was the ruin of her watch, which refused to run while she was in Montana.
That night, when Beatrice was just snuggling down into the delicious coolness of her pillow, she heard someone rap softly, but none the less imperatively, on her door. She opened one eye stealthily, to see her mother's pudgy form outlined in the feeble moonlight.
“Beatrice, are you asleep?”
Beatrice did not say yes, but she let her breath out carefully in a slumbrous sigh. It certainly sounded as if she were asleep.
“Be-atrice!” The tone, though guarded, was insistent.
The head of Beatrice moved slightly, and settled back into its little nest, for all the world like a dreaming, innocent baby.
If she had not been the mother of Beatrice, Mrs. Lansell would probably have gone back to her room, and continued to bide her time; but the mother of Beatrice had learned a few things about the ways of a wilful girl. She went in, and closed the door carefully behind her. She did not wish to keep the whole house awake. Then she went straight to the bed, laid hand upon a white shoulder that gleamed in the moonlight, and gave a shake.
“Beatrice, I want you to answer me when I speak.”
“M-m—did you—m-m—speak, mama?” Beatrice opened her eyes and closed them, opened them again for a minute longer, yawned daintily, and by these signs and tokens wandered back from dreamland obediently.
Her mother sat down upon the edge of the bed, and the bed creaked. Also, Beatrice groaned inwardly; the time of reckoning was verily drawing near. She promptly closed her eyes again, and gave a sleepy sigh.
“Beatrice, did you refuse Sir Redmond again?”
“M-m—were you speaking—mama?”
Mrs. Lansell, endeavoring to keep her temper, repeated the question.
Beatrice began to feel that she was an abused girl. She lifted herself to her elbow, and thumped the pillow spitefully.
“Again? Dear me, mama! I've never refused him once!”
“You haven't accepted him once, either,” her mother retorted; and Beatrice lay down again.
“I do wish, Beatrice, you would look at the matter in a sensible light I'm sure I never would ask you to marry a man you could not care for. But Sir Redmond is young, and good-looking, and has birth and breeding, and money—no one can accuse him of being a fortune-hunter, I'm sure. I was asking Richard to-day, and he says Sir Redmond holds a large interest in the Northern Pool, and other English investors pay him a salary, besides, to look after their interests. I wouldn't be surprised if the holdings of both of you would be sufficient to control the business.”
Beatrice, not caring anything for business anyway, said nothing.
“Any one can see the man's crazy for you. His sister says he never cared for a woman before in his life.”
“Of course,” put in Beatrice sarcastically. “His sister followed him down to South Africa, and all around, and is in a position to know.”
“Any one can see he isn't a lady's man.”
“No—” Beatrice smiled reminiscently; “he certainly isn't.”
“And so he's in deadly earnest. And I'm positive he will make you a model husband.”
“Only think of having to live, all one's life, with a model husband!” shuddered Beatrice hypocritically.
“Be-atrice! And then, it's something to marry a title.”
“That's the worst of it,” remarked Beatrice.
“Any other girl in America would jump at the chance. I do believe, Beatrice, you are hanging back just to be aggravating. And there's another thing, Beatrice. I don't approve of the way this Keith Cameron hangs around you.”
“He doesn't!” denied Beatrice, in an altogether different tone. “Why, mama!”
“I don't approve of flirting, Beatrice, and you know it. The way you gadded around over the hills with him—a perfect stranger—was disgraceful; perfectly disgraceful. You don't know any thing about the fellow, whether he's a fit companion or not—a wild, uncouth cowboy—”
“He graduated from Yale, a year after Dick. And he was halfback, too.”
“That doesn't signify,” said her mother, “a particle. I know Miss Hayes was dreadfully shocked to see you come riding up with him, and Sir Redmond forced to go with Richard, or ride alone.”
“Dick is good company,” said Beatrice. “And it was his own fault. I asked him to go with us, when Dick and I left the cattle, and he wouldn't. Dick will tell you the same. And after that I did not see him until just before we—I came home, Really, mama, I can't have a leading-string on Sir Redmond. If he refuses to come with me, I can hardly insist.”
“Well, you must have done something. You said something, or did something, to make him very angry. He has not been himself all day. What did you say?”
“Dear me, mama, I am not responsible for all Sir Redmond's ill-humor.”
“I did not ask you that, Beatrice.”
Beatrice thumped her pillow again. “I don't remember anything very dreadful, mama. I—I think he has indigestion.”
“Be-atrice! I do wish you would try to conquer that habit of flippancy. It is not ladylike. And I warn you, Sir Redmond is not the man to dangle after you forever. He will lose patience, and go back to England without you—and serve you right! I am only talking for your own good, Beatrice. I am not at all sure that you want him to leave you alone.”
Beatrice was not at all sure, either. She lay still, and wished her mother would stop talking for her good. Talking for her good had meant, as far back as Beatrice could remember, saying disagreeable things in a disagreeable manner.
“And remember, Beatrice, I want this flirting stopped.”
“Flirting, mama?” To hear the girl, you would think she had never heard the word before.
“That's what I said, Beatrice. I shall speak to Richard in the morning about this fellow Cameron. He must put a stop to his being here two-thirds of the time. It is unendurable.”
“He and Dick are chums, mama, and have been for years. And to-morrow we are going to Lost Canyon, you know, and Mr. Cameron is to go along. And there are several other trips, mama, to which he is already invited. Dick cannot recall those invitations.”
“Well, it must end there. Richard must do something. I cannot see what he finds about the fellow to like—or you, either, Beatrice. Just because he rides like a—a wild Indian, and has a certain daredevil way—”
“I never said I liked him, mama,” Beatrice protested, somewhat hastily. “I—of course, I try to treat him well—”
“I should say you did!” exploded her mother angrily. “You would be much better employed in trying to treat Sir Redmond half as well. It is positively disgraceful, the way you behave toward him—as fine a man as I ever met in my life. I warn you, Beatrice, you must have more regard for propriety, or I shall take you back to New York at once. I certainly shall.”
With that threat, which she shrewdly guessed would go far toward bringing this wayward girl to time, Mrs. Lansell got up off the bed, which creaked its relief, and groped her way to her own room.
The pillow of Beatrice received considerable thumping during the next hour—a great deal more, in fact, than it needed. Two thoughts troubled her more than she liked. What if her mother was right, and Sir Redmond lost patience with her and went home? That possibility was unpleasant, to say the least. Again, would he give her up altogether if she showed Dick she was not afraid of Keith Cameron, for all his good looks, and at the same time taught that young man a much-needed lesson? The way he had stared at her was nothing less than a challenge and Beatrice was sorely tempted.