Her Prairie Knight

by B. M. Bower

  CHAPTER 5. The Search for Dorman.

  "Oh, I say," began Sir Redmond, an hour after, when he happened to standclose to Beatrice for a few minutes, "where is Dorman? I fancied youbrought him along."

  "We didn't," Beatrice told him. "He only rode as far as the gate, whereDick left him, and started him back to the house."

  "Mary told me he came along. She and your mother were congratulatingeach other upon a quiet half-day, with you and Dorman off the placetogether. I'll wager their felicitations fell rather flat."

  Beatrice laughed. "Very likely. I know they were mourning because theirlace-making had been neglected lately. What with that trip to LostCanyon to-morrow, and to the mountains Friday, I'm afraid the lace willcontinue to suffer. What do you think of a round-up, Sir Redmond?"

  "It's deuced nasty," said he. "Such a lot of dust and noise. I fancy theworkmen don't find it pleasant."

  "Yes, they do; they like it," she declared. "Dick says a cowboy is neversatisfied off the range. And you mustn't call them workmen, Sir Redmond.They'd resent it, if they knew. They're cowboys, and proud of it. Theyseem rather a pleasant lot of fellows, on the whole. I have been talkingto one or two."

  "Well, we're all through here," Dick announced, riding up. "I'm goingto ride around by Keith's place, to see a horse I'm thinking of buying.Want to go along, Trix? Or are you tired?"

  "I'm never tired," averred his sister, readjusting a hat-pin andgathering up her reins. "I always want to go everywhere that you'll takeme, Dick. Consider that point settled for the summer. Are you coming,Sir Redmond?"

  "I think not, thank you," he said, not quite risen above his rebuff ofthe morning. "I told Mary I would be back for lunch."

  "I was wiser; I refused even to venture an opinion as to when I shouldbe back. Well, 'so-long'!"

  "You're learning the lingo pretty fast, Trix," Dick chuckled, when theywere well away from Sir Redmond. "Milord almost fell out of the saddlewhen you fired that at him. Where did you pick it up?"

  "I've heard you say it a dozen times since I came. And I don't care ifhe is shocked--I wanted him to be. He needn't be such a perfect bear;and I know mama and Miss Hayes don't expect him to lunch, without us. Hejust did it to be spiteful."

  "Jerusalem, Trix! A little while ago you said he was a dear! Youshouldn't snub him, if you want him to be nice to you."

  "I don't want him to be nice," flared Beatrice. "I don't care howhe acts. Only, I must say, ill humor doesn't become him. Not that itmatters, however."

  "Well, I guess we can get along without him, if he won't honor us withhis company. Here comes Keith. Brace up, sis, and be pleasant."

  Beatrice glanced casually at the galloping figure of Dick's neighbor,and frowned.

  "You mustn't flirt with Keith," Dick admonished gravely. "He's a goodfellow, and as square a man as I know; but you ought to know he's gotthe reputation of being a hard man to know. Lots of girls have triedto flirt and make a fool of him, and wound up with their feelings hurtworse than his were."

  "Is that a dare?" Beatrice threw up her chin with a motion Dick knew ofold.

  "Not on your life! You better leave him alone; one or the other of youwould get the worst of it, and I'd hate to see either of you feelingbad. As I said before, he's a bad man to fool with."

  "I don't consider him particularly dangerous--or interesting. He's nothalf as nice as Sir Redmond." Beatrice spoke as though she meant whatshe said, and Dick had no chance to argue the point, for Keith pulled upbeside them at that moment.

  Beatrice seemed inclined to silence, and paid more attention to thelandscape than she did to the conversation, which was mostly about rangeconditions, and the scanty water supply, and the drought.

  She was politely interested in Keith's ranch, and if she clungpersistently to her society manner, why, her society manner was verypleasing, if somewhat unsatisfying to a fellow fairly drunk with herwinsomeness. Keith showed her where she might look straight up thecoulee to her brother's ranch, two miles away, and when she wishedshe might see what they were doing up there, he went in and got hisfield-glass. She thanked him prettily, and impersonally, and focused theglass upon Dick's house--which gave Keith another chance to look at herwithout being caught in the act.

  "How plain everything is! I can see mama, out on the porch, and MissHayes." She could also see Sir Redmond, who had just ridden up, and wastalking to the ladies, but she did not think it necessary to mentionhim, for some reason; she kept her eyes to the glass, however, andappeared much absorbed. Dick rolled himself a cigarette and watched thetwo, and there was a twinkle in his eyes.

  "I wonder--Dick, I do think--I'm afraid--" Beatrice hadn't her societymanner now; she was her unaffected, girlish self; and she was growingexcited.

  "What's the matter?" Dick got up, and came and stood at her elbow.

  "They're acting queerly. The maids are running about, and the cook isout, waving a large spoon, and mama has her arm around Miss Hayes, andSir Redmond."

  "Let's see." Dick took the glass and raised it to his eyes for a minute."That's right," he said. "They're making medicine over something. Seewhat you make of it, Keith."

  Keith took the glass and looked through it. It was like a movingpicture; one could see, but one wanted the interpretation of sound.

  "We'd better ride over," he said quietly. "Don't worry, Miss Lansell;it probably isn't anything serious. We can take the short cut up thecoulee, and find out." He put the glass into its leathern case andstarted to the gate, where the horses were standing. He did not tellBeatrice that Miss Hayes had just been carried into the house ina faint, or that her mother was behaving in an undignified fashionstrongly suggesting hysterics. But Dick knew, from the look on his face,that it was serious. He hurried before them with long strides, leavingBeatrice, for the second time that morning, to the care of his neighbor.

  So it was Keith who held his hand down for the delicious pressure ofher foot, and arranged her habit with painstaking care, considering thehurry they were in. Dick was in the saddle, and gone, before Keith hadfinished, and Keith was not a slow young man, as a rule. They ran thetwo miles without a break, except twice, where there were gates toclose. Dick, speeding a furlong before, had obligingly left them open;and a stockman is hard pressed indeed--or very drunk--when he fails toclose his gates behind him. It is an unwritten law which becomes secondnature.

  Almost within sound of the place, Dick raced back and met them, and hisface was white.

  "It's Dorman!" he cried. "He's lost. They haven't seen him since weleft. You know, Trix, he was standing at the gate."

  Beatrice went white as Dick; whiter, for she was untanned. Anoverwhelming sense of blame squeezed her heart tight. Keith, seeing hershoulders droop limply, reined close, to catch her in his arms if therewas the slightest excuse. However, Beatrice was a healthy young woman,with splendid command of her nerves, and she had no intention offainting. The sickening weakness passed in a moment.

  "It's my fault," she said, speaking rapidly, her eyes seeking Dick's forcomfort. "I said 'yes' to everything he asked me, because I was thinkingof something else, and not paying attention. He was going to buy yourhorse, Mr. Cameron, and now he's lost!"

  This, though effective, was not particularly illuminating. Dick wanteddetails, and he got them--for Beatrice, having remorse to stir the dregsof memory, repeated nearly everything Dorman had said, even tellinghow the big, high pony put up his front hand, and he shaked it, and howDorman truly needed some little wheels on his feet.

  "Poor little devil," Keith muttered, with wet eyes.

  "He--he said you lived over there," Beatrice finished, pointing, asDorman had pointed--which was not toward the "Cross" ranch at all, butstraight toward the river.

  Keith wheeled Redcloud; there was no need to hear more. He took the hillat a pace which would have killed any horse but one bred to race overthis rough country. Near the top, the forced breathing of another horseat his heels made him look behind. It was Beatrice following, her eyeslike black stars. I do not kno
w if Keith was astonished, but I do knowthat he was pleased.

  "Where's Dick?" was all he said then.

  "Dick's going to meet the men--the cowboys. Sir Redmond went after them,when they found Dorman wasn't anywhere about the place."

  Keith nodded understandingly, and slowed to let her come alongside.

  "It's no use riding in bunches," he remarked, after a little. "On circlewe always go in pairs. We'll find him, all right."

  "We must," said Beatrice, simply, and shaded her eyes with her hand. Forthey had reached the top, and the prairie land lay all about them andbelow, lazily asleep in the sunshine.

  Keith halted and reached for his glass. "It's lucky I brought it along,"he said. "I wasn't thinking, at the time; I just slung it over myshoulder from habit."

  "It's a good habit, I think," she answered, trying to smile; but herlips would only quiver, for the thought of her blame tortured her. "Canyou see--anything?" she ventured wistfully.

  Keith shook his head, and continued his search. "There are so manylittle washouts and coulees, down there, you know. That's the troublewith a glass--it looks only on a level. But we'll find him. Don't youworry about that. He couldn't go far."

  "There isn't any real danger, is there?"

  "Oh, no," Keith said. "Except--" He bit his lip angrily.

  "Except what?" she demanded. "I'm not silly, Mr. Cameron--tell me."

  Keith took the glass from his eyes, looked at her, and paid her thecompliment of deciding to tell her, just as if she were a man.

  "Nothing, only--he might run across a snake," he said. "Rattlers."

  Beatrice drew her breath hard, but she was plucky. Keith thought hehad never seen a pluckier girl, and the West can rightfully boast bravewomen.

  She touched Rex with the whip. "Come," she commanded. "We must not standhere. It has been more than three hours."

  Keith put away the glass, and shot ahead to guide her.

  "We must have missed him, somewhere." The eyes of Beatrice were heavywith the weariness born of anxiety and suspense. They stood at the veryedge of the steep bluff which rimmed the river. "You don't think hecould have--" Her eyes, shuddering down at the mocking, blue-grayripples, finished the thought.

  "He couldn't have got this far," said Keith. "His legs would give out,climbing up and down. We'll go back by a little different way, andlook."

  "There's something moving, off there." Beatrice pointed with her whip.

  "That's a coyote," Keith told her; and then, seeing the look on herface: "They won't hurt any one. They're the rankest cowards on therange."

  "But the snakes--"

  "Oh, well, he might wander around for a week, and not run across one. Wewon't borrow trouble, anyway."

  "No," she agreed languidly. The sun was hot, and she had not hadanything to eat since early breakfast, and the river mocked her parchedthroat with its cool glimmer below. She looked down at it wistfully,and Keith, watchful of every passing change in her face, led her backto where a cold, little spring crept from beneath a rock; there, liftingher down, he taught her how to drink from her hand.

  For himself, he threw himself down, pushed back his hat, and dranklong and leisurely. A brown lock of hair, clinging softly together withmoisture, fell from his forehead and trailed in the clear water, andBeatrice felt oddly tempted to push it back where it belonged. Standingquietly watching his picturesque figure, she forgot, for the moment,that a little boy was lost among these peaceful, sunbathed hills; sheremembered only the man at her feet, drinking long, satisfying drafts,while the lock of hair floated in the spring.

  "Now we'll go on." He stood up and pushed back the wet lock, whichtrickled a tiny stream down his cheek, and settled his gray hat inplace.

  Again that day he felt her foot in his palm, and the touch went over himin thrills. She was tired, he knew; her foot pressed heavier than it hadbefore. He would have liked to take her in his arms and lift herbodily into the saddle, but he hardly dared think of such a blissfulproceeding.

  He set the pace slower, however, and avoided the steepest places, and hehalted often on the higher ground, to scan sharply the coulees. And sothey searched, these two, together, and grew to know each other betterthan in a month of casual meetings. And the grass nodded, and the windslaughed, and the stern hills looked on, quizzically silent. If they knewaught of a small boy with a wealth of yellow curls and white collar,they gave no sign, and the two rode on, always seeking hopefully.

  A snake buzzed sharply on a gravelly slope, and Keith, sending Beatriceback a safe distance, took down his rope and gave battle, beating thesinister, gray-spotted coil with the loop until it straightened andwas still. He dismounted then, and pinched off the rattles--nine,there were, and a "button"--and gave them to Beatrice, who handled themgingerly, and begged Keith to carry them for her. He slipped them intohis pocket, and they went on, saying little.

  Back near the ranch they met Dick and Sir Redmond. They exchanged sharplooks, and Dick shook his head.

  "We haven't found him--yet. The boys are riding circle around the ranch;they're bound to find him, some of them, if we don't."

  "You had better go home," Sir Redmond told her, with a note of authorityin his voice which set Keith's teeth on edge. "You look done to death;this is men's work."

  Beatrice bit her lip, and barely glanced at him. "I'll go--when Dormanis found. What shall we do now, Dick?"

  "Go down to the house and get some hot coffee, you two. We all snatcheda bite to eat, and you need it. After that, you can look along the southside of the coulee, if you like."

  Beatrice obediently turned Rex toward home, and Keith followed. Theranch seemed very still and lonesome. Some chickens were rolling in thedust by the gate, and scattered, cackling indignantly, when they rodeup. Off to the left a colt whinnied wistfully in a corral. Beatrice,riding listlessly to the house, stopped her horse with a jerk.

  "I heard--where is he?"

  Keith stopped Redcloud, and listened. Came a thumping noise, and a wail,not loud, but unmistakable.

  "Aunt-ie!"

  Beatrice was on the ground as soon as Keith, and together they ran tothe place--the bunk-house. The thumping continued vigorously; evidentlya small boy was kicking, with all his might, upon a closed door; it wasnot a new sound to the ears of Beatrice, since the arrival in Americaof her young nephew. Keith flung the door wide open, upsetting the smallboy, who howled.

  Beatrice swooped down upon him and gathered him so close she came nearchoking him. "You darling. Oh, Dorman!"

  Dorman squirmed away from her. "I los' one shiny penny, Be'trice--and Icouldn't open de door. Help me find my shiny penny."

  Keith picked him up and set him upon one square shoulder. "We'll takeyou up to your auntie, first thing, young man."

  "I want my one shiny penny. I want it!" Dorman showed symptoms ofhowling again.

  "We'll come back and find it. Your auntie wants you now, and grandmama."

  Beatrice, following after, was treated to a rather unusual spectacle;that of a tall, sun-browned fellow, with fringed chaps and brightlygleaming spurs, racing down the path; upon his shoulder, the wrigglingform of an extremely disreputable small boy, with cobwebs in his curls,and his once white collar a dirty rag streaming out behind.