“That was before my time,” said Buck Ashley.
“The soldiers had abandoned the old fort when I came first into these parts.”
Meanwhile Dick Willoughby was clinking glasses with Jack Hover.
“There are some mighty pretty little senoritas hereabouts,” said Dick, “good American blood mixed with Spanish blood, you know, and all that. If a fellow could only find the right one—understand, I say the right one, Jack—he wouldn’t be losing any time in chasing after the old squaw’s secret gold mine or the White Wolf’s buried millions.”
Jack Rover laughed outright.
“I say, Dick, what are you reddening up about? Gee, if I had as fine a lead as you have staked out, I’d feel the same way. Ain’t that right, Buck?” Buck Ashley winked at Jack Rover and said: “If you mean who I think you mean, you sure are righter than right. I speak wide open and unrestrained when I give it as my opinion that Miss Merle Farnsworth is the finest specimen of young womanhood that I ever set eyes on, and I have seen some girls East as well as West. Take it from me, she is a jewel, she is a regular beauty rose. Yes,” he went on, “and too damned good for that young Thurston whelp, who hangs around tryin’ to act smart whenever she and that old duenna chaperon of hers comes here to trade. I’ll simply boot him out of the store one of these days.”
Dick Willoughby smiled in a satisfied way as he moved toward the door.
“Well, hold on, Dick,” called out Jack Rover, “don’t be in such a dangnation hurry. I’ll ride with you in a minute. I’ve just got this to say to you, Buck Ashley, that I like you better than ever for what you’ve said about Marshall Thurston. Even though I’m working for the Thurston outfit, I’m free to express my opinion that that young feller is about the meanest specimen of low-down humanity I’ve ever struck.”
“It’s a case of the second decadency, I suppose,” remarked Munson. “The worthless profligate, spawn of the rich old roué, Ben Thurston.”
“Such a drunken pup,” continued Rover, “aint’ good enough for a half-breed Indian, much less for the likes of the young ladies of La Siesta. Gee, if I thought there was one chance in a thousand for me with either of them, why goodbye to that placer gold mine ambition that’s eating my vitals, or to the planted millions of the White Wolf.”
As he spoke the last words, he followed Dick Willoughby into the open. Dick was standing by his pony.
“You’re superlatively in earnest, aren’t you?” he said as he laughed good-naturedly at the cowboy.
“You bet your life I’m in earnest,” replied Jack. “And if you don’t get busy with that love affair of yours, well, take it from me, you had better look out, for somebody will be picking the peach right from under your very nose. Well, so long, Dick; I’ve changed my mind; I’ll not ride with you. I’ll see to that bit of fence repairing up on the range. And who knows but I may find a sand-bar and a riffle sparkling with yellow gold?” He laughed like a big overgrown boy as he touched the rowel to his pony and galloped away across the valley.
CHAPTER IV—Back to the Soil
JACK ROVER is a great boy,” said Dick Willoughby to Lieutenant Munson as the two rode off at a leisurely pace toward the group of ranch buildings peeping through a clump of trees at the edge of the foothills.
“A type of Western character,” replied Munson, “that in a way is quite new to me. And yet, do you know, I rather like this Western atmosphere.”
“Like it!” exclaimed Dick. “Why, man, it is the atmosphere in which to live, move and have one’s being.”
They both laughed at his enthusiasm.
“Really,” continued Dick, soberly, “I would not live another year in New York City for all the property fronting on the Circle, the coming centre of old Gotham. Out here a man is a man for what he is worth. You grow bigger, you think broader thoughts, you are not confined to following precedents or taking orders from the man higher up.”
“Oh, I know,” replied Munson, “or at least I am beginning to understand something of what you mean. I have only been here ten days and I am already feeling loath to return to my post.”
“Ches,” exclaimed Dick, turning abruptly and facing his companion, “give it all up, old fellow, and come and live in this glorious country—California! There’s music in the very name. It is the land of sunshine, of fruits and flowers, and of pretty girls into the bargain.”
“You keep telling me of the pretty girls, but when am I to see them?” questioned Munson. “If you have any real senoritas who will cause a fellow to forsake his Eastern home and send in his resignation to army headquarters, let me get a peep at them.”
Again they both laughed, this time at the challenge in Munson’s words.
“All right,” said Dick, “you shall see them. And, by the way, don’t you remember that this is the very day we have arranged to call on Mrs. Darlington at the Rancho La Siesta? It is a beautiful place, this little rancho, and Mrs. Darlington you will find to be a most admirable woman. But just wait until you see Grace Darlington.”
“How about Miss Farnsworth?”
“Not for you, old man,” replied the other quickly, reddening at the temples. “Not as long as my name is Dick Willoughby—providing, you understand, always providing that I shall prove successful in my wooing.”
“Is it as bad as that, Dick?”
“Well,”—his laughing tone was only a mask to deeper feelings—“I cannot deny that I am pretty hard hit.”
“My, but you do whet my impatience,” said the lieutenant. “And I am about as anxious to be paying that afternoon call as I am to have my breakfast. I don’t know how you feel, Dick, but I’m as hungry as a lean coyote.” He paused a moment, then asked in a musing tone: “How far away is this wonderful La Siesta Rancho?”
“Oh, only about twenty miles.”
“Twenty miles! You speak of miles out here in the same way as we speak of city blocks back in New York. Surely it must be quite a farm.”
“Quite a farm? I should say! You musn’t confound our Californian ranchos with Eastern farms, old man. Why, this rancho of San Antonio covers over four hundred square miles of territory.”
“You astonish me.”
“La Siesta Rancho adjoins the great San Antonio possession and contains comparatively few acres, just under three thousand. But it surely is a beautiful little place, fixed up like a nobleman’s park in the old world. And then the ladies—”
“Aha, the ladies,” repeated Munson, doffing his hat in courtly fashion and smiling audaciously.
Dick touched the flank of his pony with his spur, and for a few miles they rode on at a quicker pace and in silence. Soon they were approaching the ranch buildings. On the outer edge was a little cottage, covered with vines and surrounded by fruit trees, the place which Dick Willoughby, the cattle foreman, had called “home” for the past five years.
After turning their horses into a corral, they passed by way of a broad verandah into a big room, roughly but comfortably furnished. Some logs were smouldering in the fireplace, and quickly started into a bright blaze when Dick kicked them together. The warmth was grateful, for while out of doors everything was now bathed in genial