The Little Doctor gurgled. This was a malady which had not been mentioned at the medical college.
“Where shall we set the tables, if we dance in the dining room?” she asked, having heard enough of the Beckmans for the present.
“Why, we won't set any tables. Folks always have a lap supper at ranch dances. At the su'prise on Mary—”
“What is a lap supper?”
“Well, my stars alive! Where under the shinin' sun was you brought up if yuh never heard of a lap supper? A lap supper is where folks set around the walls—or any place they can find—and take the plates on their laps and yuh pass 'em stuff. The san'wiches—”
“You do make such beautiful bread!” interrupted the Little Doctor, very sincerely.
“Well, I ain't had the best uh luck, lately, but I guess it does taste good after that bread yuh had when I come. Soggy was no name for—”
“Patsy made that bread,” interposed Miss Whitmore, hastily. “He had bad luck, and—”
“I guess he did!” sniffed the Countess, contemptuously. “As I told Mary when I come—”
“I wonder how many cakes we'll need?” Miss Whitmore, you will observe, had learned to interrupt when she had anything to say. It was the only course to pursue with anyone from Denson coulee.
The Countess, having finished her scrubbing, rose jerkily and upset the soap can, which rolled over and over down the steps, leaving a yellow trail as it went.
“Well, there, if that wasn't a bright trick uh mine? They say the more yuh hurry the less yuh'll git along, an' that's a sample. We'd ought t' have five kinds, an' about four uh each kind. It wouldn't do t' run out, er Mis' Beckman never would let anybody hear the last of it. Down t' Mary's—”
“Twenty cakes! Good gracious! I'll have to order my stock of medicine, for I'll surely have a houseful of patients if the guests eat twenty cakes.”
“Well, as the sayin' is: 'Patience an' perseverance can git away with most anything,'” observed the Countess, naively.
The Little Doctor retired behind her handkerchief.
“My stars alive, I do b'lieve my bread's beginnin' t' scorch!” cried the Countess, and ran to see. The Little Doctor followed her inside and sat down.
“We must make a list of the things we'll need, Louise. You—”
“Dell! Oh-h. Dell!” The voice of the Old Man resounded from the parlor.
“I'm in the kitchen!” called she, remaining where she was. He tramped heavily through the house to her.
“I'll send the rig in, t'morrow, if there's anything yuh want,” he remarked. “And if you'll make out a list uh dope, I'll send the order in t' the Falls. We've got plenty uh saws an' cold chisels down in the blacksmith shop—you can pick out what yuh want.” He dodged and grinned. “Got any cake, Countess?”
“Well, there ain't a thing cooked, hardly. I'm going t' bake up something right after dinner. Here's some sponge cake—but it ain't fit t' eat, hardly. I let Dell look in the oven, 'cause my han's was all over flour, an' she slammed the door an' it fell. But yuh can't expect one person t' know everything—an' too many han's can't make decent soup, as the sayin' is, an' it's the same way with cake.”
The Old Man winked at the Little Doctor over a great wedge of feathery delight. “I don't see nothing the matter with this—only it goes down too easy,” he assured the Countess between mouthfuls. “Fix up your list, Dell, and don't be afraid t' order everything yuh need. I'll foot the—”
The Old Man, thinking to go back to his work, stepped into the puddle of soft soap and sat emphatically down upon the top step, coasting rapidly to the bottom. A carpet slipper shot through the open door and landed in the dishpan; the other slipper disappeared mysteriously. The wedge of cake was immediately pounced upon by an investigative hen and carried in triumph to her brood.
“Good Lord!” J. G. struggled painfully to his feet. “Dell, who in thunder put that stuff there? You're a little too doggoned anxious for somebody t' practice on, seems t' me.” A tiny trickle of blood showed in the thin spot on his head.
“Are you hurt, J. G.? We—I spilled the soap.” The Little Doctor gazed solicitous, from the doorway.
“Huh! I see yuh spilled the soap, all right enough. I'm willin' to believe yuh did without no affidavit. Doggone it, a bachelor never has any such a man-trap around in a fellow's road. I've lived in Montana fourteen years, an' I never slipped up on my own doorstep till you got here. It takes a woman t' leave things around—where's my cake?”
“Old Specie took it down by the bunk house. Shall I go after it?”
“No, you needn't. Doggone it, this wading through ponds uh soft soap has got t' stop right here. I never had t' do it when I was baching, I notice.” He essayed, with the aid of a large splinter, to scrape the offending soap from his trousers.
“Certainly, you didn't. Bachelors never use soap,” retorted Della.
“Oh, they don't, hey? That's all you know about it. They don't use this doggoned, slimy truck, let me tell yuh. What d'yuh want, Chip? Oh, you've got t' grin, too! Dell, why don't yuh do something fer my head? What's your license good f er, I'd like t' know? You didn't see Dell's license, did yuh, Chip? Go and get it an' show it to him, Dell. It's good fer everything but gitting married—there ain't any cure for that complaint.”
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VII
Love and a Stomach Pump
An electrical undercurrent of expectation pervaded the very atmosphere of Flying U ranch. The musicians, two supercilious but undeniably efficient young men from Great Falls, had arrived two hours before and were being graciously entertained by the Little Doctor up at the house. The sandwiches stood waiting, the coffee was ready for the boiling water, and the dining-room floor was smooth as wax could make it.
For some reason unknown to himself, Chip was “in the deeps.” He even threatened to stop in the bunk house and said he didn't feel like dancing, but was brought into line by weight of numbers. He hated Dick Brown, anyway, for his cute, little yellow mustache that curled up at the ends like the tail of a drake. He had snubbed him all the way out from town and handled Dick's guitar with a recklessness that invited disaster. And the way Dick smirked when the Old Man introduced him to the Little Doctor—a girl with a fellow in the East oughtn't to let her eyes smile that way at a pin-headed little dude like Dick Brown, anyway. And he—Chip—had given, her a letter postmarked blatantly: “Gilroy, Ohio, 10:30 P. M.”—and she had been so taken up with those cussed musicians that she couldn't even thank him, and only just glanced at the letter before she stuck it inside her belt. Probably she wouldn't even read it till after the dance. He wondered if Dr. Cecil Granthum cared—oh, hell! Of COURSE he cared—that is, if he had any sense at all. But the Little Doctor—she wasn't above flirting, he noticed. If HE ever fell in love with a girl—which the Lord forbid—he'd take mighty good care she didn't get time to make dimples and smiles for some other fellow to go to heaven looking at.
There, that was her, laughing like she always laughed—it reminded him of pines nodding in a canyon and looking