The bear fight and the runaway together so disturbed the minds of the
picnicking party in the canyon that nobody objected to the suggestion of
an early return to the ranch-house. Ruth was secretly much troubled in
her mind over the mysterious individual who had killed the bear. She had
not seen her rescuer's face; but she wondered if Mary Cox had seen it?
The girls never did get to the top of the natural bridge. Jib and the
boys in trying to trace the stranger had gone over the summit; but they
did not tarry to look around. The girls and Ricardo got supper,
immediately after which they set out on the return drive.
Jib insisted upon holding the lines over the backs of the team that had
run away--and he saw that Mary Cox rode in that vehicle, too. But The Fox
showed no vexation at this; indeed, she was very quiet all the way to
Silver Ranch. She was much unlike her usual snappy, sharp-tongued self.
But, altogether, the party arrived home in very good spirits. The
wonders of the wild country--so much different from anything the
Easterners had seen before--deeply impressed Ruth and her friends. The
routine work of the ranch, however, interested them more. Not only Tom
and Bob, but their sisters and the other girls, found the free,
out-of-door life of the range and corral a never-failing source of
delight.
Ruth herself was becoming a remarkably good horsewoman. Freckles carried
her many miles over the range and Jane Ann Hicks was scarcely more bold
on pony-back than was the girl from the Red Mill.
As for the cowboys of the Silver outfit, they admitted that the visitors
were "some human," even from a Western standpoint.
"Them friends o' yourn, Miss Jinny," Jimsey said, to Old Bill's niece,
"ain't so turrible 'Bawston' as some tenderfoots I've seen." ("Boston,"
according to Jimsey, spelled the ultra-East and all its "finicky" ways!)
"I'm plum taken with that Fielding gal--I sure am. And I believe old Ike,
here, is losin' his heart to her. Old Lem Dickson's Sally better bat her
eyes sharp or Ike'll go up in the air an' she'll lose him."
It was true that the foreman was less bashful with Ruth than with any of
the other girls. Ruth knew how to put him at his ease. Every spare hour
Bashful Ike had he put in teaching Ruth to improve her riding, and as
she was an early riser they spent a good many morning hours cantering
over the range before the rest of the young people were astir at Silver
Ranch.
It was on one of these rides that Bashful Ike "opened up" to Ruth upon
the subject of the red-haired school-teacher at the Crossing.
"I've jest plumb doted on that gal since she was knee-high to a Kansas
hopper-grass," the big puncher drawled. "An' she knows it well enough."
"Maybe she knows it too well?" suggested Ruth, wisely.
"Gosh!" groaned Ike. "I _gotter_ keep her reminded I'm on the job--say,
ain't I? Now, them candies you bought for me an' give to her--what do you
s'pose she did with 'em?"
"She ate them if she had right good sense," replied Ruth, with a smile.
"They were nice candies."
"I rid over to Lem's the next night," said Ike, solemnly, "an' that
leetle pink-haired skeezicks opened up that box o' sweetmeats on the
counter an' had all them lop-eared jack-rabbits that sits around her
pa's store o' nights he'pin' themselves out o' _my_ gift-box. Talk
erbout castin' pearls before swine!" continued Bashful Ike, in deep
disgust, "_that_ was suah flingin' jewels to the hawgs, all right. Them
'ombres from the Two-Ten outfit, an' from over Redeye way, was stuffin'
down them bonbons like they was ten-cent gumdrops. An' Sally never ate
a-one."
"She did that just to tease you," said Ruth, sagely.
"Huh!" grunted Ike. "I never laid out to hurt her feelin's none. Dunno
why she should give me the quirt. Why, I've been hangin' about her an'
tryin' to show her how much I think of her for years! She must know I
wanter marry her. An' I got a good bank account an' five hundred head o'
steers ter begin housekeepin' on."
"Does Sally know all that?" asked Ruth, slyly.
"Great Peter!" ejaculated Ike. "She'd oughter. Ev'rybody else in the
county does."
"But did you ever ask Sally right out to marry you?" asked the Eastern
girl.
"She never give me a chance," declared Ike, gruffly.
"Chance!" gasped Ruth, wanting to laugh, but being too kind-hearted to
do so. "What sort of a chance do you expect?"
"I never git to talk with her ten minutes at a time," grumbled Ike.
"But why don't you _make_ a chance?"
"Great Peter!" cried the foreman again. "I can't throw an' hawg-tie her,
can I? I never can git down to facts with her--she won't let me."
"If I were a great, big man," said Ruth, her eyes dancing, "I surely
wouldn't let a little wisp of a girl like Miss Dickson get away from
me--if I wanted her."
"How am I goin' to he'p it?" cried Ike, in despair. "She's jest as sassy
as a cat-bird. Ye can't be serious with her. She plumb slips out o' my
fingers ev'ry time I try to hold her."
"You are going to the dance at the schoolhouse, aren't you?" asked Ruth.
"I reckon."
"Can't you get her to dance with you? And when you're dancing can't you
ask her? Come right out plump with it."
"Why, when I'm a-dancin'," confessed Ike, "I can't think o' nawthin' but
my feet."
"Your feet?" cried Ruth.
"Yes, ma'am. They're so e-tar-nal big I gotter keep my mind on 'em all
the time, or I'll be steppin' on Sally's. An' if I trod on her jest
wunst--wal, that would suah be my finish with her. She ain't got that red
hair for nawthin'," concluded the woeful cowpuncher.
Ike was not alone at the Silver Ranch in looking forward to the party at
the schoolhouse. Every man who could be spared of the --X0 outfit
("Bar-Cross-Naught") planned to go to the Crossing Saturday night. Such
a rummaging of "war-bags" for fancy flannel shirts and brilliant ties
hadn't occurred--so Old Bill Hicks said--within the remembrance of the
present generation of prairie-dogs!
"Jest thinkin' about cavortin' among the gals about drives them 'ombres
loco," declared the ranchman. "Hi guy! here's even Jimsey's got a bran'
new shirt on."
"'Tain't nuther!" scoffed Bud. "Whar's your eyes, Boss? Don't you
reckernize that gay and festive shirt? Jimsey bought it 'way back when
Mis' Hills' twins was born."
"So it's as old as the Hills, is it?" grunted Mr. Hicks. "Wal, he ain't
worn it right frequent in this yere neck o' woods--that I'll swear to!
An' a purple tie with it--Je-ru-sha! Somebody'll take a shot at him in
that combination of riotin' colors--you hear me!"
The girls too were quite fluttered over the prospect of attending the
party. Helen had agreed to take her violin along and Bob offered to help
out with the music by playing his harmonica--an instrument without which
he never went anywhere, save to bed or in swimming!
"And I can't think of anything more utterly sad, Bobbie," declared his
sister, "than your rendition of 'the Suwanee River' on that same
mouth-organ. When it comes to your playing for square dances, I fear you
would give our Western friends much cause for complaint--and many of
them, I notice, go armed," she continued, significantly.
"Huh!" sniffed Bob. "I guess I don't play as bad as all that. Busy Izzy
could dance a jig to my playing."
"That's what I thought," responded Madge. "You're just about up to
playing jig-tunes on that old mouth-organ."
Just the same, Bob slipped the harmonica into his pocket. "You never can
tell what may happen," he grunted.
"It'll be something mighty serious, then, Bobbie, if it necessitates the
bringing forth of that instrument of torture," said his sister, bound to
have the last word.
At dusk the big automobile got away from Silver Ranch, surrounded by a
gang of wall-eyed ponies that looked on the rattling machine about as
kindly as they would have viewed a Kansas grain thrasher. The visitors
and Jane Ann all rode in the machine, for even Ruth's Freckles would
have turned unmanageable within sight and sound of that touring car.
"That choo-choo cart," complained Bud, the cowboy, "would stampede a
battalion of hoptoads. Whoa, you Sonny! it ain't goin' tuh bite yuh."
This to his own half-crazy mount. "Look out for your Rat-tail, Jimsey,
or that yere purple necktie will bite the dust, as they say in the
storybooks."
The hilarious party from Silver Ranch, however, reached the Crossing
without serious mishap. They were not the first comers, for there were
already lines of saddle ponies as well as many various "rigs" hitched
about Lem Dickson's store. The schoolhouse was lit brightly with
kerosene lamps, and there was a string of Chinese lanterns hung above
the doorway.
The girls, in their fresh frocks and furbelows, hastened over to the
schoolhouse, followed more leisurely by their escorts. Sally Dickson, as
chief of the committee of reception, greeted Jane Ann and her friends,
and made them cordially welcome, although they were all some years
younger than most of the girls from the ranches roundabout.
"If you Eastern girls can all dance, you'll sure help us out a whole
lot," declared the brisk little schoolmistress. "For if there's anything
I do dispise it's to see two great, hulking men paired off in a reel, or
a 'hoe-down.' And you brought your violin, Miss Cameron? That's fine!
You can play without music, I hope?"
Helen assured her she thought she could master the simple dance tunes to
which the assembly was used. There were settees ranged around the walls
for the dancers to rest upon, and some of the matrons who had come to
chaperone the affair were already ensconced upon these. There was a buzz
of conversation and laughter in the big room. The men folk hung about
the door as yet, or looked in at the open windows.
"Did that big gump, Ike Stedman, come over with you-all, Miss Fielding?"
Sally Dickson asked Ruth, aside. "Or did he know enough to stay away?"
"I don't believe Mr. Hicks could have kept him on the ranch to-night,"
replied Ruth, smiling. "He has promised to dance with me at least once.
Ike is an awfully nice man, I think--and so kind! He's taught us all to
ride and is never out of sorts, or too busy to help us out. We
'tenderfoots' are always getting 'bogged,' you know. And Ike is right
there to help us. We all like him immensely."
Sally looked at her suspiciously. "Humph!" said she. "I never expected
to hear that Bashful Ike was so popular."
"Oh, I assure you he is," rejoined Ruth, calmly. "He is developing into
quite a lady's man."
Miss Dickson snorted. Nothing else could explain her method of
emphatically expressing her disbelief. But Ruth was determined that the
haughty little schoolmistress should have her eyes opened regarding
Bashful Ike before the evening was over, and she proceeded to put into
execution a plan she had already conceived on the way over from Silver
Ranch.