"Bandits!" sneered Bill. "Your eyesight is piercing. Them's _girls_."
The traveler apologized. "My eyes aren't very good," he said, hurriedly.
He was, however, quite justified in his mistake, for both riders wore
wide-rimmed sombreros and rode astride at a furious pace, bandanas
fluttering, skirts streaming, and one was calling in shrill command, "OH,
BILL!"
As they neared the gate the driver drew up with a word of surprise. "Why,
howdy, girls, howdy!" he said, with an assumption of innocence. "Were you
wishin' fer to speak to me?"
"Oh, shut up!" commanded one of the girls, a round-faced, freckled romp.
"You know perfectly well that Berrie is going home to-day--we told you
all about it yesterday."
"Sure thing!" exclaimed Bill. "I'd forgot all about it."
"Like nothin'!" exclaimed the maid. "You've been countin' the hours till
you got here--I know you."
Meanwhile her companion had slipped from her horse. "Well, good-by,
Molly, wish I could stay longer."
"Good-by. Run down again."
"I will. You come up."
The young passenger sprang to the ground and politely said: "May I help
you in?"
Bill stared, the girl smiled, and her companion called: "Be careful,
Berrie, don't hurt yourself, the wagon might pitch."
The youth, perceiving that he had made another mistake, stammered an
apology.
The girl perceived his embarrassment and sweetly accepted his hand. "I am
much obliged, all the same."
Bill shook with malicious laughter. "Out in this country girls are
warranted to jump clean over a measly little hack like this," he
explained.
The girl took a seat in the back corner of the dusty vehicle, and Bill
opened conversation with her by asking what kind of a time she had been
having "in the East."
"Fine," said she.
"Did ye get as far back as my old town?"
"What town is that, Bill?"
"Oh, come off! You know I'm from Omaha."
"No, I only got as far as South Bend."
The picture which the girl had made as she dashed up to the pasture gate
(her hat-rim blown away from her brown face and sparkling eyes), united
with the kindliness in her voice as she accepted his gallant aid, entered
a deep impression on the tourist's mind; but he did not turn his head to
look at her--perhaps he feared Bill's elbow quite as much as his
guffaw--but he listened closely, and by listening learned that she had
been "East" for several weeks, and also that she was known, and favorably
known, all along the line, for whenever they met a team or passed a ranch
some one called out, "Hello, Berrie!" in cordial salute, and the men, old
and young, were especially pleased to see her.
[Illustration: THE GIRL BEHIND HIM WAS A WONDROUS PART OF THIS WILD
AND UNACCOUNTABLE COUNTRY]
Meanwhile the stage rose and fell over the gigantic swells like a tiny
boat on a monster sea, while the sun blazed ever more fervently from the
splendid sky, and the hills glowed with ever-increasing tumult of color.
Through this land of color, of repose, of romance, the young traveler
rode, drinking deep of the germless air, feeling that the girl behind him
was a wondrous part of this wild and unaccountable country.
He had no chance to study her face again till the coach rolled down the
hill to "Yancy's," where they were to take dinner and change horses.
Yancy's ranch-house stood on the bank of a fine stream which purled--in
keen defiance of the hot sun--over a gravel bed, so near to the mountain
snows that their coolness still lingered in the ripples. The house, a
long, low, log hut, was fenced with antlers of the elk, adorned with
morning-glory vines, and shaded by lofty cottonwood-trees, and its green
grass-plat--after the sun-smit hills of the long morning's ride--was very
grateful to the Eastern man's eyes.
With intent to show Bill that he did not greatly fear his smiles, the
youth sprang down and offered a hand to assist his charming
fellow-passenger to alight; and she, with kindly understanding, again
accepted his aid--to Bill's chagrin--and they walked up the path side by
side.
"This is all very new and wonderful to me," the young man said in
explanation; "but I suppose it's quite commonplace to you--and Bill."
"Oh no--it's home!"
"You were born here?"
"No, I was born in the East; but I've lived here ever since I was three
years old."
"By East you mean Kansas?"
"No, Missouri," she laughed back at him.
She was taller than most women, and gave out an air of fine unconscious
health which made her good to see, although her face was too broad to be
pretty. She smiled easily, and her teeth were white and even. Her hand he
noticed was as strong as steel and brown as leather. Her neck rose from
her shoulders like that of an acrobat, and she walked with the sense of
security which comes from self-reliant strength.
She was met at the door by old lady Yancy, who pumped her hand up and
down, exclaiming: "My stars, I'm glad to see ye back! 'Pears like the
country is just naturally goin' to the dogs without you. The dance last
Saturday was a frost, so I hear, no snap to the fiddlin', no gimp to the
jiggin'. It shorely was pitiful."
Yancy himself, tall, grizzled, succinct, shook her hand in his turn.
"Ma's right, girl, the country needs ye. I'm scared every time ye go away
fer fear some feller will snap ye up."
She laughed. "No danger. Well, how are ye all, anyway?" she asked.
"All well, 'ceptin' me," said the little old woman. "I'm just about able
to pick at my vittles."
"She does her share o' the work, and half the cook's besides,"
volunteered Yancy.
"I know her," retorted Berrie, as she laid off her hat. "It's me for a
dip. Gee, but it's dusty on the road!"
The young tourist--he signed W. W. Norcross in Yancy's register--watched
her closely and listened to every word she spoke with an intensity of
interest which led Mrs. Yancy to say, privately:
"'Pears like that young 'lunger' ain't goin' to forgit you if he can help
it."
"What makes you think he's a 'lunger'?"
"Don't haf to think. One look at him is enough."
Thereafter a softer light--the light of pity--shone in the eyes of the
girl. "Poor fellow, he does look kind o' peaked; but this climate will
bring him up to the scratch," she added, with optimistic faith in her
beloved hills.
A moment later the down-coming stage pulled in, loaded to the side-lines,
and everybody on it seemed to know Berea McFarlane. It was hello here and
hello there, and how are ye between, with smacks from the women and open
cries of "pass it around" on the part of the men, till Norcross marveled
at the display.
"She seems a great favorite," he observed to Yancy.
"Who--Berrie? She's the whole works up at Bear Tooth. Good thing she
don't want to go to Congress--she'd lay Jim Worthy on the shelf."
Berea's popularity was not so remarkable as her manner of receiving it.
She took it all as a sort of joke--a good, kindly joke. She shook hands
with her male admirers, and smacked the cheeks of her female friends with
an air of modest deprecation. "Oh, you don't mean it," was one of her
phrases. She enjoyed this display of affection, but it seemed not to
touch her deeply, and her impartial, humorous acceptance of the courtship
of the men was equally charming, though this was due, according to
remark, to the claims of some rancher up the line.
She continued to be the theme of conversation at the dinner-table and yet
remained unembarrassed, and gave back quite as good as she received.
"If I was Cliff," declared one lanky admirer, "I'd be shot if I let you
out of my sight. It ain't safe."