Mrs. Belden, the fourth member of the party, a middle-aged, rather flabby
person, just being eased down from her horse, turned on Berrie with a
battery of questions. "Good Lord! Berrie McFarlane, what are you doing
over in this forsaken hole? Where's your dad? And where is Tony? If Cliff
had known you was over here he'd have come, too."
Berrie retained her self-possession. "Come in and get some coffee, and
we'll straighten things out."
Apparently Mrs. Belden did not know that Cliff and Berrie had quarreled,
for she treated the girl with maternal familiarity. She was a
good-natured, well-intentioned old sloven, but a most renowned tattler,
and the girl feared her more than she feared any other woman in the
valley. She had always avoided her, but she showed nothing of this
dislike at the moment.
Wayland drew the younger woman's attention by saying: "It's plain that
you, like myself, do not belong to these parts, Miss Moore."
"What makes you think so?" she brightly queried.
"Your costume is too appropriate. Haven't you noticed that the women who
live out here carefully avoid convenient and artistic dress? Now your
outfit is precisely what they should wear and don't."
This amused her. "I know, but they all say they have to wear out their
Sunday go-to-meeting clothes, whereas I can 'rag out proper.' I'm glad
you like my 'rig.'"
"When I look at you," he said, "I'm back on old Broadway at the Herald
Square Theater. The play is 'Little Blossom, or the Cowgirl's Revenge.'
The heroine has just come into the miner's cabin--"
"Oh, go 'long," she replied, seizing her cue and speaking in character,
"you're stringin' me."
"Not on your life! Your outfit is a peacherino," he declared. "I am glad
you rode by."
At the moment he was bent on drawing the girl's attention from Berrie,
but as she went on he came to like her. She said: "No, I don't belong
here; but I come out every year during vacation with my father. I love
this country. It's so big and wide and wild. Father has built a little
bungalow down at the lower mill, and we enjoy every day of our stay."
"You're a Smith girl," he abruptly asserted.
"What makes you think so?"
"Oh, there's something about you Smith girls that gives you dead away."
"Gives us away! I like that!"
"My phrase was unfortunate. I like Smith girls," he hastened to say; and
in five minutes they were on the friendliest terms--talking of mutual
acquaintances--a fact which both puzzled and hurt Berea. Their laughter
angered her, and whenever she glanced at them and detected Siona looking
into Wayland's face with coquettish simper, she was embittered. She was
glad when Moore came in and interrupted the dialogue.
Norcross did not relax, though he considered the dangers of
cross-examination almost entirely passed. In this he was mistaken, for no
sooner was the keen edge of Mrs. Belden's hunger dulled than her
curiosity sharpened.
"Where did you say the Supervisor was?" she repeated.
"The horses got away, and he had to go back after them," again responded
Berrie, who found the scrutiny of the other girl deeply disconcerting.
"When do you expect him back?"
"Any minute now," she replied, and in this she was not deceiving them,
although she did not intend to volunteer any information which might
embarrass either Wayland or herself.