Penny of Top Hill Trail

by Belle Kanaris Maniates

  CHAPTER IV

  As on the day previous, Pen awoke at an early hour. She lay quiet for amoment, sensing to the full the deliciousness of being cosily submerged insoft, warm coverings that protected her from the crisp, keen hill-windsthat were sweeping into her room.

  "The air smells as if it came right off the snow," she thought, as shedrew on some fur-bound slippers and wrapped herself in a Navajo blanketthat was on the footrail of her bed. Then she crossed the room, climbed upon the big seat under the casement window and looked out.

  It was not the thrilling beauty of the covey of pink-lined dawn-cloudsthat made her eyes grow round, big and bright; that brought a faint flushto her cheeks; a quick intake of breath. It was something much moremundane that held her attention--the superb spectacle of Kurt Walters,mounted. The lean, brown horseman sat on his saddle as easily as though itwere a cushion in a rocking chair. He was talking to three or fourcattlemen and apparently paying no attention to his cavorting steed exceptthat occasionally and casually his firm hands brought the plunging animalto earth.

  "He's to the saddle born," thought the girl admiringly. "He ought to stayon a horse. If I'd seen him yesterday on horseback, he wouldn't have hadto _take_ me. I'd have flown to him."

  He gave a last command to one of the men, as he turned to ride away.

  "All right, boss," was the reply, as the men dispersed to their variousstations of duty.

  Suddenly and psychologically the eyes of the rider were lifted to thecasement window. Pen waved her hand airily toward him, the movementloosening the gayly striped blanket which fell from her shoulders. TheIndian-brown of his face reddened darkly; a gleam came into his steel-grayeyes. He made a military motion toward his hat brim with his whip and thenrode swiftly away, without the backward and upward look which she wasexpecting.

  "The boss is a bashful boss," she thought, with a lazy little pout, as sheshook off the blanket, flung her slippers free and went back to bed.

  "He's good to look at, but oh, you comfortable cot!"

  When next she awoke, it was near the breakfast hour.

  "I'm glad I'm not the last one down," she said, as she came into thedining-room and noticed Kurt's vacant chair.

  "Oh, but you are!" Betty hastened to say. "Uncle Kurt's gone away for awhole week, hasn't he, father?"

  "When did he go, Louis?" asked Mrs. Kingdon in surprise.

  "A message came for him late last night," explained her husband. "Thesheriff has unexpectedly returned, and Kurt has to be in town for a weekto settle up all the red tape routine for his release; and besides, thetrial of So Long Sam has been called, and he'll have to attend."

  Pen had a sense as of something lifted.

  "A reprieve for a week, and I can have a beautiful time with nobody nighto hinder," she thought. "I had a narrow escape from a real sheriff. Luckis with me, and no mistake!"

  "You will feel lost without Kurt at the helm, won't you, Louis?" askedMrs. Kingdon. "And Jo away, too."

  "Westcott returned Jo this morning. Simpson has delayed his trip to Canadafor a few days."

  "That is good news. Of course Jo hasn't Kurt's efficiency, but he gets onwell with the men."

  "They say," remarked Francis sagely, "that Jo is always 'right there.'"

  "So is Uncle Kurt!" exclaimed Betty indignantly.

  "You don't get me, Betty," said her brother loftily, "but it's no useexplaining to a girl."

  Pen had been a most attentive and eager listener to this conversation.

  "I am sorry I didn't know Kurt was going to town," said Mrs. Kingdon toPen, "for we could have sent him for some things for you."

  "What kind of things?" asked Betty curiously.

  "I came without my luggage," explained Pen glibly, "but I can trim outclothes as easily as I can animals, and if you have any stray pieces ofcloth I can very quickly duplicate what I am now wearing."

  "We have quantities of material," said Mrs. Kingdon. "I seem to have amania for buying it, and there my interest in new garments ceases. Agathais a fine seamstress, so we'll have you outfitted in no time."

  "Wouldn't you like to motor over the place, Miss Pen?" invited Kingdon asthey rose from the table. Smiling understandingly at her look of alarm, headded: "I don't mean in the car Kurt brought you up in yesterday."

  "Uncle Kurt made it all himself--out of parts he bought," boastedFrancis.

  "Dear me!" said Pen ruefully. "I wish he hadn't bought so many parts, orelse left some of them out."

  "It's a fine car!" declared Francis in tone of rebuke.

  "I like it better than ours," said Billy. "We helped make it."

  "I throw up my hands," said Kingdon. "Only the loyalty of a child wouldhave the courage to defend such a car."

  In a long, luxurious limousine the entire family made the rounds of theranch to show Pen the squadrons of cattle browsing by the creek,thoroughbred horses inclosed in a pasture of many miles, thesmaller-spaced farmyard, the buildings, bunk-houses and "Kurt's Kabin," asa facetious cowboy had labeled the office where the foreman made out thepay rolls and transacted the business affairs of the ranch.

  "I think you have seen it all, now," said Kingdon, as he turned the carinto the driveway that led homeward.

  "Oh, no!" cried Billy. "She hasn't seen Jo yet. There he is at the messhouse."

  "Of course, you must see Jo, Miss Pen," said Kingdon. "I'll drop you andthe kiddies here and you can call on him. I have an idea he will be moreJo-like if my wife and I are not present."

  The car stopped near a long low building, and Pen with the children gotout of the car.

  "Jo-o-o!" chorused the trio.

  From the house came Jo, whom the men had nicknamed the "human spider," forhis arms and legs were the thinnest of his species. He was saved frombeing grotesque, however, by a certain care-free grace, a litheness ofmovement. He had greenish-blue eyes that were set far apart and crinkledwhen they laughed--as ever and oft they did. His features were irregular,his hair unruly, but there was a lovable appeal in the roguish eyes andthe charm of humor in a mouth that lifted upward at the corners.

  "Halloa, kindergarten!" he called in a jovial tenor. "Who's your littleold sister?"

  "She isn't our sister," denied Francis with dignified mien. "She's a younglady."

  "Honest?" he asked in amused tone, looking down at the girl whose eyeswere hidden by long-lashed, down-turned lids. "How young now?"

  Then his dancing eyes grew suddenly quiet and amazed, as her lasheslifted. He read a warning in her glance.

  "Jo," she said gravely and meaningly, "I am _Penelope Lamont_, and I am ayoung lady--out of my teens."

  "'Scuse," he answered seriously, "but you don't dress it."

  "She's got on Doris's clothes," explained Betty, "'cause she didn't bringany of her own, and she's our Aunty Penny."

  "No," he said solemnly. "No, she ain't! You've got it wrong side to. Hername is Penny Ante."

  "It isn't either!" cried Betty angrily, with a stamp of her little foot.

  "Uncle Kurt brought her here. She's his company, so you'd better look out,Jo Gary!" warned Billy.

  Jo made a mock gesture of alarm and shielded his face with his arm as iffrom an imaginary blow.

  "Now, why didn't you say so in the first place! My, ain't it the luck forme that he won't be sheriff when he comes back! He might have had me putin the lock-up."

  "I am not Mr. Walters' company--not now," explained Pen. "I came up herewith him, to be sure, but Mrs. Kingdon has asked me to be her companyuntil I am well. I have been ill."

  "Double 'scuse. And this is the best place in the world to get well. Somelittle old ranch, and Kurt Walters is some foreman."

  "Aren't you foreman now?"

  "When Kurt is here, I'm nothing but a cow-hand; when he is away, I'm onlyacting foreman. I'll never be anything but just acting-something, Iguess."

  "Kurt Walters was only acting sheriff."

  "That's so. We seem to be mostly actingers or actorines," he allowed."Say!" turning ferociously to
Francis, "what business has a boy lookinglike an owl? Loosen up, and have some pep!"

  The boy's fair face flushed.

  "It's none of your business how I look, Jo Gary!"

  "Wow! Now you're talking. We can't fight before a lady, though."

  "Cook says you look like a wishbone, Jo," taunted Billy, coming to hisbrother's defense.

  "She did, did she? Well, the cook can hang me over her door, andthen--I'll kiss her."

  "I'll tell her, and she won't dance with you to-night."

  "If you do," threatened Jo, "I won't tell you where there are four little,new kittens what haven't got their peepers opened yet."

  "Oh, where, Jo? We'll not tell her. Please, Jo!" pleaded Betty.

  "I choose to name them," said Francis. "Tell, Jo."

  "I'll not tell, unless you get your little new playmate here to promise mea dance to-night."

  "Are you really going to have a dance to-night?" asked the girl eagerly.

  "Sure thing we are. Right here in this mess hall, and--" looking at herfixedly, he added slowly, "you can dance, too,--with me."

  "Oh!" she cried, her eyes shining. "It will seem so beautiful--to danceagain. What do they dance up here--fox trot?"

  "We dance any old thing the music tells us to."

  "Same as they do in--Chicago?" she asked demurely.

  "Now tell us where the kittens are," demanded Betty.

  "Follow me, little Black and Tan."

  In her excitement Betty forgot to resent Jo's pet appellation for her.

  He led the way to a corner of the tool-house.

  Reposing in a nest made of pieces of carpet lined with soft flannel, werefour puffballs of maltese which were quickly gathered and garnered by Penand the children, while the mother-cat looked on with proud butapprehensive eyes.

  "Who fixed them such a nice bed?" asked Francis.

  "Your Uncle Kurt. But they tell me he rode away at first crack ofdaybreak, so he didn't see them."

  "And they'll have their eyes open before he gets back, maybe!" lamentedFrancis.

  "Perhaps," put in Jo, "he'll get his eyes opened wide while he's gone.Then he and the kits can meet on equal terms."

  "He'll miss the dance, too," said Betty sorrowfully.

  "Whom do you men dance with?" asked Pen.

  "Well, there's Betty here stays up for three dances anyway, and there'sMrs. Kingdon, and Ag, and the cook, and the other girl--and everythingelse failing, we make Gene Dossey play gal."

  "What music do you have?"

  "We've got two of the finest fiddlers that ever drew a bow. Sleepy Sandyand Jakey Fourr. Say, Billy Kingdon, if you squeeze that kitten so hard,its eyes'll bust open before the nine-day limit. Put them all down now, ortheir ma'll have a kitnip fit."

  "I choose to name them," said Francis. "Uncle Sam is this biggest one; theone with white on is General Joffre, and the little one is King Georgeand--"

  "Hold on there!" cried Jo. "Uncle Sam and General J. goes all right, allright; but there ain't room for another gent's name. You'll have to changeKing George to Georgette."

  "I won't have her named Georgette!" said Betty. "Her name is Fairy Queen,and that other one is--"

  "It's my turn!" said Billy. "Mine's going to be named Mewtral."

  "You mean Neutral," corrected Francis scathingly.

  "No; he's said it," declared Jo. "She's mewtralled all the morning. Shedon't seem to like her boarding house. Now, all you kidlets run to thekitchen and ask cook for a cup of milk and a clean rag. I'll force-feedMewtral, 'cause she's a little suffragette. Don't hurry back too fast."

  The children went with alacrity and returned in the same way; but Pen andJo improved the opportunity for conversation without the three interestedlisteners.

  "Here, Jo," said Billy, handing over the milk when they had returned."Let's see you feed Mewtral. She must be hungry."

  "If she were me," said Jo, whose eyes were shining, "she'd be too happy toeat."

  He fed the kitten and then tried in vain to obtain further converse withPen alone, but the children out-maneuvered all his efforts and finally Pentook them back to the house.

  "When?" half whispered Jo, as they were leaving.

  "When Mrs. Kingdon says," she murmured in reply.

  She turned back for another glance. He was standing, cap in hand, with theair of a conqueror.

  "What's the verdict on Jo?" asked Kingdon.

  "Jo's inimitable," she replied lightly.

  "Wait until you dance with him," he said. "Jo dances his way into everygirl's heart."

  "I can believe that."

  "He's one of those sunny-hearted fellows that people take to be shallow,but under the surface brightness there's a tolerably deep current. And henever nurses a grudge. If anyone should stick a knife in Jo, he'd onlymake a question mark of his eyebrow and give a wondering smile."

  "What I can't understand," said Pen, "is why the children don't likehim."

  "He plagues us all the time," complained Betty.

  "It's very odd, though," commented Kingdon, meditatively, and with atwinkle in his eye, "how you do like to be plagued. You are always taggingat his heels. I think you must be coquetting with Jo."

  "He's so different with them from Kurt," said Mrs. Kingdon. "Kurt is sopatient and so sweet with children. He understands them."

  "Kurt," said Pen, "seems to be like some things that are too good foreveryday use. He should be laid away on a shelf for Sundays." Then,meeting Mrs. Kingdon's wondering eyes, she added with a little flush:"That isn't true--and it's unkind! I don't really mean it."

  "We are all ready for our sewing bee," observed Mrs. Kingdon, smiling."What shall we begin on?"

  "I'm wondering," said Pen meditatively, "if I hadn't better rig upsomething evening-like for the dance to-night. If you could let me borrowa white muslin curtain, I could easily rig it up into an impromptu dancefrock."

  "Jo said he knew a man who turned an automobile into a lamp post," saidBetty.

  "Oh, Betty!" laughed Pen, "maybe there is hope for a sinner to be turnedinto a saint."

  "We won't have to resort to curtains," said Mrs. Kingdon. "I have a whitesatin skirt that is too short for me, and you can fashion a waist from apiece of white muslin."

  "And Doris left her white slippers that were too short for her," remindedBetty.

  "To think," meditated Pen presently as she deftly cut out a waist, "thatthe thief should be making evening clothes, when it was only but yesterdayshe was booked for bars instead of balls."