The Fighting Shepherdess Part 7

"But I don't know how to dance," she said almost tearfully.

"You don't?" incredulously. He had thought every girl in the world knew how to dance. "Never mind," he a.s.sured her, "I can teach you in a few lessons."

So it was settled, and they talked of other things, laughing merrily, frequently, while Mormon Joe and Teeters discussed with some gravity the fact that it had been several months since the latter had been able to get his wages from Toomey.

"I think he's workin' on borried capital and they're shuttin' down on him," Teeters conjectured. "His 'Old Man,'" he nodded toward Hughie, "has got consider'ble tied up in the Outfit, I've an idea. Anyhow, if I git beat out of my money after the way Toomey's high-toned it over me--"

He cast a significant look at a fist with particularly prominent knuckles.

"You hang on a while," Mormon Joe cautioned. "You may be boss of the Scissor Outfit yet--stranger things have been waiting around the corner."

Teeters s.h.i.+fted his weight in the saddle.

"Say," he confessed in some embarra.s.sment, "a sperrit told me somethin'

like that only day 'fore yisterday. I was settin' in a circle over to Mis' Taylor's and an Injun chief named 'Starlight' spelled out on the table that all kinds of honor and worldly power was comin' to me. It makes me feel cur'ous, hearin' you say it--like they was somethin' in it."

Mormon Joe smiled quizzically but made no comment; perhaps he suspected that the privilege of touching fingers with Miss Maggie Taylor while waiting for the spirits to "take holt" had as much to do with Teeters'

interest in the unseen world as the messages he received from it. He asked:

"You remember what I said at the Boosters' Club the other night?"

"I ain't apt to fergit it anyways soon," replied Teeters, dryly, "seein'

as 'Tinhorn' riz and put it to a vote as to whether they should tar and feather you or jest naturally freeze you out."

"The truth is acid," he laughed. "It's a fact though, Teeters, that this country's chief a.s.set is its climate, and," with his quizzical smile, "this Scissor Outfit would make a fine dude-ranch."

Kate did not tell Mormon Joe of her invitation until the sheep were bedded for the night, the supper dishes out of the way and they were sitting, as was their custom, on two boxes watching the stars and talking while Mormon Joe smoked his pipe.

"Our company this morning made me forget to tell you how well you handled the gate; it was a clean cut." Mormon Joe added in obvious pride, "You're the best sheepman in the country, Katie, bar none."

"Then I wish you'd listen to me and buy some of those Rambouillets and grade up our herd."

"We're doing all right," he returned, indifferently.

"Anybody would know you didn't like sheep."

"They're a means to an end; they keep me in the hills out of mischief and furnish a living for us both."

"I wonder that you haven't more ambition, Uncle Joe."

"That died and was buried long ago. The little that I have left is for you. I want you to have the benefit of what I have learned from books and life; I want you to be happy--I can't say that I'm interested in anything beyond that."

She threw him a kiss.

"You're too good to be true almost." Then, with a quite inexplicable diffidence she faltered, "Uncle Joe, that--that boy asked me to go to a dance."

He turned his head quickly and asked with a sharp note in his voice:

"Where?"

"In Prouty."

"Do you want to go?"

"I can't tell you how much!" she cried eagerly. "I can hardly believe it is me--I--invited to a dance. I've never been out in the evening in all my life. I don't know a single woman and may be I'll never have such a chance again to get acquainted and make friends."

"I didn't know that you had been lonely, Katie," he said after a silence.

"Just sometimes," she admitted.

"You said you didn't want to go to Prouty again because the children bleated at you the last time you were in."

"But that was long ago--a year--they wouldn't do that now--they're older, and, besides, there are others who have sheep. We're not the only ones any more. But," with a quaver in her voice, "don't you want me to go, Uncle Joe?"

"I don't want you to put yourself in a position to get hurt."

"What--what would anybody hurt me for?" she asked, wide-eyed.

His answer to the question was a shrug. Then, as though to himself, "They may be bigger than I give them credit for."

He had not refused to let her go, but he had chilled her enthusiasm somewhat so they were silent for a time, each occupied with his own thoughts.

As Mormon Joe, with his hands clasped about his knee, his pipe dead in his mouth, sat motionless in the starlight, he ceased to be conscious of the beauty of the night, of the air that touched his face, soft and cool as the caress of a gentle woman, of the moist sweet odors of bursting buds and tender shoots--he was thinking only that the child who had run into his arms for safety had come to be the center of the universe to him. He could not imagine life without her. He had mended her manners, corrected her speech, bought her books of study to which she had diligently applied herself in the long hours while she herded sheep, and nothing else in life had given him so much pleasure as to watch her mind develop and her taste improve.

Anybody that would hurt her! Instinctively his hands clenched. Aloud he said:

"Go to your party, Katie, and I hope with all my heart it will be everything you antic.i.p.ate."

CHAPTER IV

DISILLUSIONMENT

It was the most ambitious affair that had been attempted in Prouty--this function at the Prouty House. The printed invitations had made a deep impression; besides, wild rumors were flying about as to the elaborate costumes that were to be worn by the socially prominent.

It was whispered that Mrs. Abram Pantin, wife of the wealthy capitalist from Keokuk, now "settled in their midst," was to be seen in electric blue silk with real lace collar and cuffs; while Mrs. Sudds, wife of a near-governor, who had moved to Prouty from another part of the state, was to appear in her lansdowne wedding dress. Mrs. Myron Neifkins, too, if report could be believed, was to be gowned in peach-blow satin worked in French knots.

He was a dull clod indeed who could not feel the tremors in the air that momentous Sat.u.r.day and by night there was not tying s.p.a.ce at any hitching rack.

If the ball loomed so large to the townfolks, it may be a.s.sumed that Kate's antic.i.p.ation was no less. As a matter of fact, she could scarcely sleep for thinking of it. She did not know much about G.o.d--Mormon Joe was not religious--but she felt vaguely that she must have Him to thank for this wonderful happiness. It was the most important happening since she had run, terrified, from home that black night three years ago.

There had not been a night since Hughie had given her the invitation that she had not lain awake for hours staring at the stars with a smile on her lips as she visualized situations. She saw herself dividing dances as belles did in books, taking her part in lively conversations, the center of merry groups. Oh, no, life would never be the same again; she was certain of it.

Hughie had kept his word and ridden over several times to teach her the steps, and they had practised them on the hard-trodden ground in front of the cook tent, where the dust could be kept down by frequent sprinkling. If the waltz and the polka and schottische sent her blood racing under such adverse conditions, what must it be like on a real floor with real music, she asked herself ecstatically. These dancing lessons were provocative of much merriment and teasing from the Toomeys.

While Hugh did not resent it or defend Kate, he did not join in their ridicule of her. She was "green," he could not deny that, yet not in the sense the Toomeys meant. Nave, ingenuous, he felt were better words.

She knew nothing of social usages, and she was without a suspicion of the coquetry that he looked for in girls before they had begun to do up their hair. She spoke with startling frankness upon subjects which he had been taught were taboo. He admired and was accustomed to soft, helpless, clinging femininity, and it grated upon him to see Kate at the woodpile swinging an axe in a matter-of-fact way.