DICK'S SICKNESS
All day Monday, Roger and his two helpers sweated to prepare for the
plant's first trial. Roger would let no one touch the engine but
himself, but Ernest and Gustav puttered with the condenser and the pump
and at dawn started the oil circulating through the absorber. All day
long the burning desert sun poured its heat through the glass into the
oil which caught and imprisoned it for Roger's purpose, until the
storage pit was full. Roger had set the time of trial as nine o'clock in
the evening in order to prove the night as well as the day power of his
plant. The Prebles appeared shortly before the hour.
"Everything O. K.?" asked Dick, with a creditable effort at being
off-hand.
"One never knows till afterward," replied Roger. "Come into the engine
house. No room for you, Peter, old man."
There were three "bugs" lighted over the engine. Ernest and Gustav were
both smoking violently. Dick was chewing gum. Elsa and Charley said
nothing but watched every movement on the part of the men.
"Come here, Felicia," said Roger, biting at his cold pipe. "You see this
little valve? All right. Now, as I've told you many times, I hope that
when you turn this, that the sun which shone to-day will turn the big
fly wheel round. When I give the wheel a twist, you turn the valve clear
over."
"Yes, Roger," replied Felicia, her little fingers quivering as she
grasped the valve.
"Now!" exclaimed Roger, tugging at the fly-wheel.
There was a moment's breathless silence. Then very slowly and sedately,
the fly wheel began to revolve, gathered speed and shortly was chugging
away steadily. A little cheer rose from Roger's audience. He grinned.
"Now Ern, let's throw in the pump." A belt, connecting the engine with
the pump outside, was quickly slipped in place. The engine slowed down.
But a moment later the sound of water pouring over the condenser pipes
was heard above the chugging of the engine and pump.
Gustav and Ernest fell on each other's necks. "It works!" squealed
Felicia. "It works and I helped make it, I did." Peter, his head as far
in at one of the windows as a very short neck would carry it, brayed.
Roger watched the pressure gauge and scratched his head thoughtfully.
Charley and Felicia slipped outside to inspect the pump, and Charley
called: "Does anybody smell anything?" At the same moment Felicia
shrieked.
"Oh! oh, Roger! There's a terrible leak out here!"
Roger shut off the engine and followed by the others, he darted to the
condenser. The odor of sulphur dioxide filled the night.
"By Jove, it's big enough to lose my charge!" groaned Roger. "Bring
bugs, everybody."
Felicia, "bug" and oil can in hand, was running over the pipes at the
top before the others had arrived.
"Here it is, Roger! Oh, an awful one. There!"
The leak was in a pipe joint at the top of the stack. The odor grew
almost unbearable. For half an hour the men wrestled with it, turn
about, and at last succeeded in stopping it. Other minor leaks occurred
but all were located and controlled. Finally Roger announced all safe
and lighted his pipe. In the flash of the match, his face showed tense
and dripping with sweat, his eyes bloodshot from the gas fumes.
"Darn the leaks!" exclaimed Elsa.
"Well, it's what we'll have to expect as long as I can't afford to buy
bent pipe or an acetylene welding outfit," said Roger. "But after all,
the leaks are the least of my troubles."
"What is troubling you?" asked Charley quickly.
"There isn't as much power there as my calculations had indicated there
would be."
"I told you that you were running pretty close on your absorption area,"
exclaimed Ernest. "You see your temperature readings have been lower
right along down here than that table we had up in the laboratory for
this region."
"But I don't want to increase the absorption area in order to get more
power. It's a clumsy solution. It makes the plant too large and too high
priced. The solution to the problem lies in making that engine more
efficient." Roger sighed.
"Now don't change your engine design, Roger!" cried Ernest. "That is a
peach and has been for years."
"Yes, I know," replied Roger. "But there's a possibility that you and
the Dean and I have been too complacent about that engine."
"Gee, but you're a regular pessimist, Rog!" exclaimed Dick.
"No, I'm not. No inventor is. I'm just open minded. And don't think I'm
blue, either. If I weren't so heckled and worried by the time and money
element I'd be having the time of my life. Wouldn't I, Felicia, honey?"
There was no answer. Felicia, with the oil can hugged tight against her
middy, was curled up on the work bench, fast asleep.
"Well, it seems to me I'd better take my family home," said Dick.
"Where's the rest of my harem? Elsa! Charley! Come with papa."
By eleven o'clock the camp was quiet. Roger prowled about the condenser
a bit, covered the engine with canvas and then went to bed. It had been
a hard day and none of the three men were wakened by the smell of
sulphur dioxide that began to hang over the camp at midnight. The dawn
wind blew most of it away, but when Gustav rose to get breakfast, he
sniffed suspiciously and called Roger. They traced a leak in the lower
tier. Half the charge had evaporated during the night.
"At least two weeks before we get more and a chunk out of the precious
grub money," groaned Ernest at breakfast.
"Patience! Patience!" exclaimed Gustav. "I'll start to Archer's Spring
mit the empty drums to-morrow."
Roger, who had been bolting his breakfast in silence, suddenly set down
his coffee cup. Patience! He had told Charley that he was a patient man.
Yet every muscle of his body at the moment was twitching with
impatience. He acknowledged this to himself, then said aloud:
"No use getting nervous, boys, I'm not. You get the new charge, Gustav.
I'll leave that in your hands and think no more about it. I'm going over
my heat tables again."
"I'll help you check over," said Ernest.
"If you don't mind I'd rather grind for a few days on it alone. I can
think better that way. Then I'll go over the results with you."
"All right," returned Ernest, with his usual good nature. "Gustav and
I'll offer our services to Dick to-day on his new field. Do increase
your absorbing area, Roger!"
Roger shook his head. "That's an awkward and expensive solution. The
answer's in the engine!"
He began to figure on an old envelope. When this was covered, he
continued his calculations on the margin of an old newspaper spread over
the work house table. Long after Gustav and Ernest had gone about their
day's business Elsa found him here, sweating in the stifling glare from
the sun and sand, hair disheveled, shirt open at the throat. Elsa looked
almost cool in comparison in her soft white blouse and one of Charley's
khaki skirts.
"Well, Roger," she exclaimed, "hasn't your cook the decency to wash the
breakfast dishes for you?"
"It does look rotten, doesn't it?" said Roger, staring vaguely around
the kitchen. "But the cook seems to be on a strike and I forgot to clean
things up."
"If you'll get out of the way, I'll do it." Elsa began to roll up her
sleeves.
"It's too hot now. Wait until late afternoon," suggested Roger, glancing
from his papers out to the yellow waves of heat dancing from sand to
deep blue of sky.
"I can stand the heat if Charley can," returned Elsa. "She's baking
bread and cookies. The thermometer on the porch says 112 deg.. I should
judge that it was about 190 deg. in her kitchen. Rog, do you know that she's
a highly educated girl? Why do you suppose she's throwing her life away
down here, cut off from everything?"
Roger looked up from his figures with a little sigh of resignation.
"What did you say, Elsa?"
Elsa smiled but repeated her inquiry.
"She's not wasting her life," replied Roger. "This is really a superb
country and she takes to pioneering like a fine boy. This is about the
last big adventure there is in America, this desert pioneering."
"Like a boy!" sniffed Elsa. "Roger, you're hopeless! She's just the most
womanly woman I ever met--and one of the saddest. She's got some trouble
on her mind."
"Aw shucks, Elsa! Don't try to make Charley out temperamental. She's not
and that's why she's such a pal to us fellows. Wholesome and clean-cut
and direct, that's Charley."
"Oh, well, have it your own way, stupid! Only, go on over to the living
tent while I clean up here." This with a curious glance at Roger's
preoccupied eyes; those fine, steady, clear-seeing eyes, that saw so
much and so little of life.
"Just one thing more, Roger," she said. He paused in the doorway and
looked at her with a smile. "Yes, ma'am."
"Ernest told me on the way out about your money troubles. I don't want
you to worry about the cost of keeping me. I can pay my way. I had to
come against Papa's wishes, of course, but I had my own little chunk of
savings and Mamma had a little. And I just made up my mind I was going
to get away from home for a while if it was the last act of my life. And
I know I can do lots of things to make you all comfortable."
"I'm as glad as I can be to have you here, Elsa. And after all you folks
have done for me, it makes me sick not to be able to do everything for
you. But I swear I'm right up against it. Some day I'll make it all up
to you and Ern. See if I don't. If you can keep homesick old Ern bucked
up you'll be doing your bit. Your father need have had no fear. Ern'll
be back in the University when this is done contented to teach the rest
of his life."
"I know it. And how about you, Roger?"
"Me? Oh, I've struck my gait down here. I'm going to follow heat
problems round the world, see if I don't."
He looked off over the desert with a glow in his face that the girl
never had seen there before. She gave a wistful little sigh, and began
to unroll the kitchen apron she had brought under her arm.
"Run along while I try to make the place fit for white people to live
in," she said.
It was a comfort to have a woman about the camp. The three men testified
to this at supper time as they ate the meal she had prepared in an
immaculate kitchen. That evening after Roger had taken Elsa back up to
the ranch, Ernest decided he would accompany Gustav into Archer's to get
some khaki for Elsa and to endeavor to locate some sulphur dioxide by
telegraph. Elsa announced that although she would sleep and take
breakfast at the ranch she would spend the day at the Plant as
housekeeper.
It was perhaps four o'clock the next afternoon, that Roger, at work in
the engine house, saw Felicia half running, half plodding through the
sand. Elsa, sewing in the living tent, saw her at the same time.
"What can they mean by letting her come out in this awful heat?" she
called to Roger.
Roger made no reply but shouted to Felicia, "Don't run, child! It's too
hot!"
Felicia's answer was to quicken her pace. With a sudden sense of
apprehension Roger went to meet her. Felicia was sobbing when he reached
her. He lifted her in his arms.
"What is it, sweetheart?"
Felicia was almost beyond words. "Dicky--he's--sick again! And--he
yelled at me--and slapped me, and he knocked Charley over with his fist.
And I ran away--to you--"
Roger's lips stiffened. Elsa had joined them and as he set Felicia down,
he said hurriedly, "Take her into the tent. Cool her down gradually.
Keep her there till I come."
And he set off as fast as he dared in the burning sun. As he neared the
ranch house, he could hear Dick's incoherent shouts and as he ran up the
trail, Dick appeared on the porch.
"Get out of here, Roger!" he roared, thickly.
Roger ran up the steps. "Where's Charley?"
Dick planted himself belligerently in the doorway, "Get out!" Roger
moved slowly toward him. A heavy odor of cologne enveloped Dick. A quick
surmise flashed over Roger.
"Felicia needs Charley, Dick, I've got to fetch her."
"Get out!" repeated Dick sullenly. He gave a lunge toward Roger and
Roger met him with a quick undercut on the jaw that laid Dick flat. He
dragged him down the trail to the seed and tool shack, where he turned
the heavy button on the door. Then he ran into the house.
Charley lay on the floor, her hair in disorder about her. Roger, with an
oath, stooped over her, then ran for a cup of water and bathed her face.
In a moment she opened her eyes. Roger's own eyes were black with
excitement but he met her puzzled gaze with a twisted smile.
"There you are, Charley! Where are you hurt?"
She did not answer but struggled to rise and Roger putting an arm under
her shoulder helped her to her feet where she leaned dizzily against
him, for a moment, shoulder to shoulder.
"Where's Felicia, Roger?"
"Safe with Elsa at the Plant. Sit down here on the couch, Charley. Where
did Dick strike you?"
"He--he--where is he, Roger?" clinging suddenly to Roger's hand as he
laid her back on the couch.
"Locked in the tool house. Charley, you _must_ tell me what happened so
I can help you."
"Why--he--he pushed me backward and I must have hit something when I
fell. The back of my head is very sore and my head aches terribly--and
I'm a little sick at my stomach."
"Let me see your head," said Roger peremptorily. He parted the mass of
bronze brown hair, wondering even in his anger and pity at its softness
and thickness. It was not difficult to locate the great lump at the base
of the skull.
"He might have killed you if it hadn't been for your hair. The skin
isn't broken. Be still, Charley, till I get a basin of water and a
towel."
He was back in a moment and sitting down on the edge of the couch, he
attempted to bathe the swelling. But Charley groaned in agony at the
first touch, so he gave that up and bathed her face and wrist awkwardly
but very gently.
"I guess it's my turn to say 'Poor Child,'" Roger murmured.
The quick tears sprang to Charley's eyes. At this moment Dick gave an
incoherent shout. Charley gripped Roger's hand.
"It's all right," he said. "He can't get out, the whelp!"
"Roger! Don't hurt him. Promise me you won't hurt him!"
"Hurt him!" Roger burst forth. "How can you be so foolish! He ought to
be beaten within an inch of his life. He's gotten drunk on cologne!"
"Roger, he's never been this bad before. He's been growing slowly better
all these years. He never struck me before."
"And you've been living with a drunkard all these years who might have
killed you. You knew this, yet you let little Felicia come to you. How
could you do it?" Roger paced up and down the floor.
Charley looked at him piteously, but he went on, his voice growing
louder.
"You must know that a periodic drunkard is the worst kind and almost
never cured. I thought you were unafraid of truth, but you've been
living just like a sentimental woman, after all."
Charley raised her hands and dropped them as if in despair. "I promised
mother I'd never leave him. And he's put up a fight. Oh, you'll never
know what a fight! And I love him. He's a dear when he's not drinking."
Dick roared again and Roger stared at Charley's sick white face.
"Promise me you won't hurt him, Roger."
"How can I promise when I know if I get another glimpse of him I'll
break every bone in his carcass?"
Again Charley dropped her hands with that despairing gesture. "Then how
can I help fearing your dreadful temper as much as I do Dick's drinking?
What difference is there?"
Roger jumped as if she had struck him. "You can't mean that! You're sick
and unstrung and don't know what you're saying. I'll go after Ern."
"I have to mean it," insisted Charley wearily, "after seeing you that
time with Gustav."
"I'm not like Dick!" shouted Roger. "I wouldn't touch a woman or a
child!"
"How do you know you wouldn't?" asked Charley.
A sudden burning recollection of the little boy who had struck his
mother's hand from his shoulder flashed through Roger's mind. He groaned
and dropped his head. Charley did not speak and for some moments Roger
did not move. Then he came over to the couch and said quietly:
"I'll not hurt Dick. Where did he get the cologne, Charley?"
"He must have found it in Elsa's room. I didn't know she had it, or I'd
have put it away. And now, every one will know! Oh, Roger, must they all
know?"
"I don't see how it can be helped. But you can be sure none of us will
say more than has to be said. Charley, I'm going to get Peter and take
you down to the Plant for the night. You need absolute rest and quiet
and you can't get it so near Dick."
"And Dick?"
"Dick must fend for himself in the tool shack. I'll put a canteen of
water and a blanket in there and by morning he'll be ready for
conversation."
"But he won't be. Drink makes him terribly sick. His stomach is very
bad. That's why I always say it's stomach trouble. He ought to be taken
care of to-night."
"He'll stay where he is and by himself," said Roger, grimly. "When I
have a temper fit the next time, you can do the same by me. Lord, I'm
glad Elsa is here! You lie quiet while I go milk."
When he had put the milk away he found that Charley had braided her hair
but was still very white and shaken. Dick's shouts and curses floated in
at the open door. Roger tied the little bundle of night things she had
made up to the saddle and helped her to mount. She swayed dizzily and he
put a strong, steadying arm about her. They made their way very slowly
and Roger heaved a sigh of relief when they were finally beyond ear
shot of poor Dick.
Elsa met them a short distance from the camp. "Hello, Charley," she
said. "Felicia has just fallen asleep."
Roger nodded and at the living-tent door, helped Charley from the
saddle. "Get this patient to sleep too, Elsa, if you can."
Elsa's eyes filled with tears as she looked at Charley. "You poor dear,"
she said, "come and let me take care of you."
One touch of a woman's sympathy, after her starved years, was too much
for Charley. She burst into deep drawn sobs. Elsa, motioning Roger away,
put her arm about the girl and led her into the tent.
Roger paced up and down in the sand for a while, listening to the low
despairing sobs from the tent. Then he unsaddled Peter and put a huge
bottle of water to heat. He had heard somewhere that women took great
comfort in a cup of tea.
Roger passed rather a restless night. He had put Elsa's cot which she
never had used, in the living tent so that Elsa could be close to her
two patients, and himself put in the night in Gustav's shack which was
built against the kitchen tent.
It was early July and the summer's heat was at its height. Three times
between midnight and dawn Roger scratched a match and looked at the
thermometer. It never registered below 118 deg.. Even the night wind did not
rise. The silence of the desert was complete as though torridity had
overwhelmed every other aspect of nature. The stars were magnificent and
for an hour or so, hoping to find the air outside cooler, Roger put a
blanket on the work bench near the condenser and lay there, his face to
the sky.
He wanted to keep his mind fastened lucidly on his engine problem, but
he found it impossible to put away the events of the day. Dick's bestial
voice, Charley's white, proud face, little Felicia's clinging arms,
Charley's sobs from the living tent and her bitter words concerning his
temper. These words he pondered unwillingly for some time, following
with his eye the constellations of the Great Bear. Finally he rolled on
his face with a groan. Perhaps she was right. God knew though that he'd
fought the red demon within him. After a time he rolled back. Felicia
had not wakened for her supper. She had slept straight through. It was a
great pity, he thought, that she should have seen Dick drunk, that she
should have seen him knock Charley down. He wondered if there were any
way he could make her forget it. Then with a deep flush in the starlight
he wished to God she had not seen him lose his temper like a fool.
Felicia! tender, high strung little Felicia!
At last when the stars were growing dim, Roger fell asleep. He rose at
sunrise, and went up to the ranch. Dick was lying on the adobe floor of
the tent house, evidently very sick and very cross.
"How'd I come in here? Send Charley to me!" he snarled.
"I will, like thunder, you drunken bum! You did your best to beat up
both of your sisters. I'm going to keep them at the Sun Plant until some
new arrangement can be made. The best I can do for you is to leave this
door open. Fend for yourself, hang you!" And Roger walked off to do the
milking.
When he had finished milking he glanced in at the open door of the tool
house. Dick lay where Roger had left him, staring with eyes of feverish
agony at the roof above his head. Roger, without a word, went back to
the plant. To his relief, Felicia appeared at the breakfast table, very
hungry and quite herself. But Charley was not able to get up. It seemed
as if the long years of strain had culminated in yesterday's events, and
that Charley had no will-power left.
The girl lay on Ernest's cot, the tent flap lifted beside her, with no
apparent desire save to stare at the desert dancing in heat waves
against the sky. What thoughts were passing behind those quiet brown
eyes, no one knew.
It was mid-morning when Roger went in to see her. He pulled a box up
beside the cot. "Well, old dear," he said. "How is the head?"
Charley smiled. "Sore and aching, but better than during the night. I am
so tired and that's very unusual. I'm always so strong."
Roger nodded. "It was a bad knock, to leave you senseless for half an
hour. I suspect you ought to take pretty good care of yourself for
several days. I've been talking with Elsa and she thinks you ought to
stay here for a few days. And I do too. Don't worry about Dick. I saw
him this morning and he'll be himself by sundown. And I've promised
Elsa I won't see him again until after she does."
Charley eyed Roger's long brown face as if taking in the full
significance of all he had said. Then she gave a little sigh of relief.
"If I could rest here in this peaceful tent, just for a day or two."
"The tent's all right at night, but I've moved Gustav's cot into the
engine house, and I'm going to help you over there. It's ten degrees
cooler than here. Elsa and Felicia are established there and I won't
disturb you for I'm drawing, which act is noiseless."
In a dim corner of the adobe engine house in Gustav's cot Charley spent
the day. Elsa, when she was not playing housekeeper sat beside her with
her sewing and Felicia visited between the cot and Roger's drawing
board.
Once when Charley seemed to be in an uneasy sleep, Felicia asked Roger,
"Is Charley very sick?"
"Not really sick at all, chicken. She's just tired. She's worked too
hard for you and Dick."
Felicia stared at him with her innocent, speculative gaze so like
Charley's, yet so unlike.
"Can't we live here with you, instead of up at the ranch, Roger? I know
Charley would like it better."
"You can stay and make us a visit, anyhow. Then we'll see."
At sunset, after the dishes were finished and Charley had moved back to
the living tent for the night, Elsa went up to the ranch house. She was
gone a long time. Charley was dozing and Felicia asleep. Roger prowled
up and down the camp closely followed by Peter until he could bear the
suspense no longer. A sudden fear that Dick might have discovered more
liquor somewhere started him along the ranch trail. He met Elsa just as
the afterglow disappeared and the parching night came down like a star
dotted curtain. She came trudging through the sand as if she were tired.
"It does seem as if I'd wilt with the heat," she exclaimed. "You
needn't have worried about me, Roger. Dick came back with me till we saw
you."
"He did, huh! Then he's neither drunk nor dead?"
"Rog! Don't say such awful things about the poor fellow."
"Poor fellow! You didn't see Charley lying on the floor as I did. Well,
what has he to say for himself?"
"He's in an awful state of mind. He was trying to cook some supper when
I got there. He'd succeeded in milking. When he saw me, he gasped. 'Is
Charley sick?' and dropped the kettle of water he was lifting."
"I told him just what you had seen and what an exhausted state Charley's
nerves seemed to be in. He just stood and took it looking like a sick
cat. When I had finished he asked what you had said and I told him and
he sort of groaned, 'You women should have let Roger beat me to death.
Why did you interfere?' Poor Dick!"
Elsa drew a long breath and was silent for a moment before she began
again. "He's in a most awful frame of mind. He's like a man who knows he
has fits of insanity and feels perfectly helpless to prevent them. He
cried and cried while he told me how he had fought drink. I never knew
any one could suffer so. He's much more to be pitied than Charley."
"Huh! Women!" grunted Roger. "Why, he's just the usual thing in drunks,
you little ninny. What's he going to do?"
"Well, I want Charley to give him one more chance."
"I thought so! Well, he doesn't get it."
"But, Roger, you can't prevent it. And he's not going into Archer's
Springs again. He's going to let us do his errands. That's where the
trouble has been."
"Except when he drinks cologne."
"What makes you so hard, Roger?"
"I saw Charley lying where Dick had knocked her down. And I felt little
Felicia almost in convulsions from fear. Let him keep out of my sight
until I can forget that."
"Of course, all I can do is to advise, anyhow," said Elsa. "Dick is
coming down in the morning and take his medicine. He insists on it. He's
a fine man, Roger, in many ways."
"You've not seen him drunk," returned Roger. "Commend me to a woman
every time for sentimentality."
"There are other weaknesses men have than drunkenness that their
sentimentality helps women to endure, aren't there, Roger?" asked Elsa
quietly. Roger dropped Elsa's arm and left her without a word.
He was at work in the engine house, the next morning when Dick came
slowly down the trail and was led by Elsa into the living tent. Then she
went off to the cook tent with Felicia. Roger, working with strained
concentration on his engine, heard on the one side the low murmur of
Dick's and Charley's voices and on the other Felicia's occasional happy
laugh above Elsa's little songs. After perhaps an hour, Dick came out
and went to the cook tent and in a moment Felicia came flying into the
engine house and threw her arms around Roger.
"I won't stay where Dicky is," she panted. "I won't!"
The child was trembling violently. Roger sat down and held her to his
heart.
"Dick won't hurt you, honey, now. It's only when he's sick."
Felicia shuddered. "He slapped me and he knocked Charley over with his
fist and in the night I dream about it. I am going to live with you. You
won't get mad again like you did with Gustav, will you, Roger?"
Roger bowed his forehead on the soft bronze brown head that rested so
confidently on his breast.
"You do love poor old Roger, don't you, sweetheart?" he asked, brokenly.
As if she sensed some secret pain, Felicia turned and put her arms about
him and kissed him softly on the lips. "I love you as much as I do
Charley. Don't send me back to Dicky, dearest Roger."
"I won't." Roger's lips tightened grimly.
Charley came out to lunch that noon, looking much stronger.
"I'm so grateful to you, Roger and Elsa," she said, "and after I've
helped with the dishes, if you'll loan me Peter, we'll go home."
Roger dropped his knife and fork, then looked at Felicia. "Felicia, you
know Roger's trunk? Well, if you'll run to the living tent and open the
trunk and take all the things out of it, at the very bottom you'll find
some Christmas cake Elsa made last year. Then put all the things back
carefully and bring the cake here."
Felicia gave an ecstatic "Oh, Roger!" and disappeared. Roger turned to
Charley.
"I'm going to say one more thing. Do you realize fully that in living
with Dick you jeopardize both yours and Felicia's lives?"
"Oh, no, Roger! He never touched us before. It was the poison in that
cologne."
Roger shrugged his shoulders.
"How can you be so hard?" pleaded Charley. "Dick's my own flesh and
blood. It might have been I instead of Dick with this appetite. You're
hard, Roger."
"I'm not hard. I'm disappointed. I didn't think you were a
sentimentalist."
"I wonder," exclaimed Elsa, "how women will ever get time to vote when
it takes all their time to make men endurable to live with. My word! I'm
glad I haven't one of the critters!"
She said this with such heartfelt sincerity that Charley laughed and
Roger joined her. By the time Felicia came running back with the
Christmas cake, the atmosphere was considerably lighter.
"We're going home, Felicia! Aren't you glad I'm well again?" said
Charley. "And haven't the Sun Planters been kind?"
Felicia whitened under her tan.
"Oh, but, Charley, I'm not going. I don't have to, do I, Roger? I'm so
afraid of Dicky. He slapped me twice, Charley, and he knocked you over
with his fist. Oh, let me stay with Roger!"
Charley gasped. "Oh, Felicia! Felicia! Oh, my little Felicia!"
Roger spoke quickly. "Why not let her stay for a little visit, Charley?
I'll finish Elsa's tent this afternoon and she can share that with Elsa,
till her nerves become normal."
"But I'm going up to stay with Charley," said Elsa; "that's part of the
cure."
"Then let her stay alone. She'll be safe and happy with me," replied
Roger. "Dick deserves punishment."
Charley looked at Roger, then at Felicia. "I think that's a good idea,"
she said, slowly.
And so when Ernest and Gustav came home that night, they found Felicia
watching the camp fire beside Roger, and after she was asleep in her
tent, they heard the whole story. Ernest was indignant at the thought of
Elsa's staying on at the ranch.
"I am going to be firm with her in the morning," he said.
But Elsa's firmness was greater than Ernest's and shortly the two
households had settled down and Dick was gradually reinstated in every
one's good graces but Roger's. Felicia stayed on for a week, to the joy
of the three camp mates who spoiled her outrageously. Then one Saturday
evening Dick came down and he and Felicia had a long talk, at the end of
which Felicia said good-by to Roger, Ernest and Gustav, and returned to
the ranch, quite happily.