"Well, anyhow," says I to myself, "she's saved a corpse," says I.

I learned afterward that he wasn't dead and that when Bonnie Bell reaches in and grabs him by the collar she tells him to keep still or she'll soak him over the head with the boat hook.

"We'll be in in a minute," says she to him. Of course I didn't know that then.

It seems like she didn't try to haul him plumb in, the waves running so high; and she run the engine with one hand and held on to him with the other, him dragging along at one side of the boat and getting a mouthful of water every once in a while. It wasn't very far off from our dock and pretty soon they come alongside.

"Grab him, Curly!" says she; so I grabbed him when she swung in and hauled him up.

He was wet all over and at first he seemed half mad. I seen who he was then—he was the Wisner's hired man.

"Why didn't you let me alone?" says he. "I'd 'a' got her all right pretty soon. You might have gone over too."

"What?" says she, scornful. "You're all right anyways, and you got no kick coming."

She stood up in her bathing clothes, wet as she could be, and part of her hair hanging down underneath her cap, and he looked at her kind of humble. And says he: "I thank you very much. Pardon me for what I said." Then he looks down at his clothes and seen they was wet, and he broke out laughing. "All to the candy!" says he. "My life saved for my country!" says he.

"There wasn't no sense in your going over," says Bonnie Bell, scolding him. "You was getting your mixture too rich and you clogged up your engine. You can't overfeed them two-cycles that way and get away with it."

"That wasn't the trouble at all," says he. "I caught my foot in the ignition wire and broke it off. Of course she couldn't run then; but I could of swum in from where I was and the boat would have drifted in."

"You would have got good and wet swimming in," says she, still scornful, "and you would have got pounded to pieces against the sea wall; that's what would have happened to you. Some folks," says she, "ain't fit to go out alone anyways."

And, so saying, she leaves us both, wet as she was in her bathing clothes, and runs on through the boathouse and up the steps. He stood looking after her, sober.

"Don't I know that!" says he, turning to me. "If it hadn't been for her it would have been all day with me. But I certainly thought she'd be over."

"It's a good thing Bonnie Bell could run that boat," says I.

"Bonnie Bell?" says he. "Is that her name? By Jove! Well now, by Jove! And what's your name?" says he.

"Wilson," says I. "They call me Curly for short."

"Curly?" says he. "That sounds sort of like a cowboy's name, don't it?"

"I never seen a cow camp yet where there wasn't some cowpuncher name Curly," says I.

"Cowpuncher! You wasn't ever one yourself, was you?" says he.

"I never was nothing else," says I.

Then he held out his hand.

"Shake!" says he. "Some folks gets what other folks wishes. Ain't it the truth?"

"What do you mean?" I ast him.

"Well," says he, "I always wanted to be a cowboy, yet I never did have a chance to go on a ranch."

"You're the gardener, ain't you?" says I, and he nods.

"That's all I get to do. Still, I may have a chance to do better sometime."

He was a right nice-looking fellow, clean shaved and his hair cut good, and his mustache cut right short. He looks down at his clothes now, but he didn't seem to care—acted like he had plenty more; and he laughed. He was wet, but he wasn't shivering. He come pretty near drowning but he wasn't scared. I rather liked him even if he was only a hired man like myself. He seemed sort of hardy.

"You know how she got me?" he ast me now. "She threw the loop of a rope over me, and if I hadn't got it in my hand I reckon she'd of choked me to death."

"She's a good roper," says I, "and she can ride as well as she can rope."

"Could you ever show me how to rope?" says he. "Would you?"

"Shore I'll show you sometime if we ever get a chance," says I. "I'll look round in our ranch room there in the house, and see if I can find a rope."

"Have you got a room in there like a ranch?" says he.

"Exacty like our old ranch," says I. "It's the main room out of the old Circle Arrow Ranch."

"Could she, now—would she help teach a fellow how to rope a drowning person?" says he. "That's what she done. She's a corker, ain't she?"

"She shore is," says I. "Her own folks mostly reserves the right to say that, though."

"I beg pardon," says he, and he got red again. "I know where I belong."

"Just kind of keep on knowing where you belong and where she belongs, son," says I—"it's two different propositions. I trust, my good man," says I to him, "that you understand I'm the foreman of the ranch."

"Don't it beat the world," says he to me after a while—us standing there still talking though he was wet as a rat—"how things is run? Sometimes it seems like we can't help ourselfs, and we all get into the wrong places trying to get into the right ones. Now I'd like to thank that lady; but I can't. She's wonderfully beautiful, isn't she—your mistress? I say now, Curly, you thank her for me, won't you?"

I felt rather savage towards anybody coming from the Wisner side of the fence, but someway this fellow was so decent, and he evident meant to be so square, that I couldn't hardly feel no way but friendly to him.

"You've been with your folks quite a while, ain't you?" says I after a while.

"Oh, yes; I suppose I'm kind of useful in the scheme some ways or they'd tie a can to me."

"In Millionaire Row, the way I figure it," says I to him, "the Wisners is the king bees?"

He nods.

"I'm afraid that's about the truth. At least that's the way they think it is—the old man and the old lady. Folks that don't swing in line with their ways they get froze out."

"Is that so?" says I, getting hot under the collar right away. "Well, let me tell you something: When it comes to playing any kind of freeze-out, where Old Man Wright is concerned, believe me, there's two sides to that game. Do you see?"

I looked straight at him, and I went on:

"Nobody ever seen Old Man Wright weaken in nothing he once begun. As for money, he can't be making less than a million a month or so right here in this town where he is now. He's one of them kind that does."

"I believe you," says he. "Was you saying that your folks used to own the Circle Arrow Ranch out in Wyoming?"

"Uh-huh; and I wisht we did right now."

"That's funny," says he. "And you sold it to a syndicate?"

"Uh-huh—damn 'em!"

"And Old Man Wisner was one of the silent partners and one of the biggest owners in that syndicate—colonization and irrigation. There ain't anything that he won't go against that there's money in, and he mostly wins," says he.

"Well, what do you know about that!" says I. "Us moving in here and living right next door to him—that's the funniest thing I ever did hear. They shore was on opposite sides of that game, wasn't they, them two folks? Well, Old Man Wisner got the worst of it—that's all. You can't raise nothing on that land except cows and he'll find it out. We got some of our deferred payments coming in, like enough; but it wouldn't surprise me if we got all that land back sometime, and I shore hope we do."

He kind of puckers up his mouth and puts his fingers on it.

"By Jove!" says he. "By Jove! Would you give me a job cowpunching, Curly?" says he.

"Not unless you could rope better then than you can now," says I. "And if you can't ride a horse any better than you can a boat I don't think you could earn your board."

He took it all right, and only laughed.

I went up through the boathouse and the garridge and up the back steps into the little portico—sort of storm door that's over the back door of our house where it looks out over the lake. If you'll believe me, there was Bonnie Bell standing there, all in her bathing clothes! She hadn't gone in yet.

"Has he gone, Curly?" says she.

"He has just went," says I. "What are you doing here, all wet? Why didn't you go in right away?"

"Is he all right, Curly?" says she, sort of rolling her hair up off her neck and into her rubber cap.

"Yes," says I; "he ain't hurt none."

"What were you talking about so long?" says she.

"A good many things—you, for instance," I says to her.

"What did he say?" she ast of me.

"Why, nothing much; only how sorry he was you saved his life."

"Sorry—why?"

"Well, it makes a man feel mighty mean to have a woman save his life."

"Did he say that?" she says to me. Now when Bonnie Bell smiles she sort of has a dimple here and there. She sort of smiled now. "What kept you out there so long? You two people was talking like two old women."

"Well," I says, "I was just promising to show him how to rope; he says he wants to learn."

"When are you going to show him, Curly?"

"Oh, sometime some morning, like enough, down there on the dock. He says he'll sneak over from his place, so no one will see him. I don't reckon your pa will mind my showing a young fellow how to rope—I'd like to feel a rope in my hand again anyhow. I expect before long he'll be wearing a wide hat and singing 'O, bury me not on the lone prairee!'"

"Curly," says she.

"What?"

"Did you find my rope in along with those in the big room? I forget whether I brought it along."

"Kid," says I, "if there's going to be any instruction to hired men on the rope or mouth organ or jew's-harp, or anything of that sort, it's me that gives it. I'm segundo on this ranch. Now you go on upstairs."

She had her hair all pushed back now under her cap, wet as it was, standing there fixing it. She was in her bathing clothes still and awful wet, but she didn't seem cold. She looked kind of pink and sort of happy; I don't know why. Lord, she was a fine-looking girl! There never was one handsomer than Bonnie Bell Wright.

"Kid, you heard me!" says I. "Go on upstairs now and get your clothes on. And you don't go out in that boat no more!"



VIII

HOW OLD MAN WRIGHT DONE BUSINESS

As the weather begun to get warmer and we got out-of-doors more, it was cheerfuller around our place. Bonnie Bell chirked up quite a bit. She used to sing some. It seemed like she was going to get used to living in town—not me; never!

But Old Man Wright didn't seem to worry none somehow. He was one of the sort that, put him down anywheres and he'd be busy at something. If he was set down on a sand bar beside a creek he'd reach around to find some sticks; and, first thing you know, he'd be building a house out of 'em—he just always was making things somehow. I never seen a man could size up a piece of country for what it would perduce better than him.

"Curly," says he to me one day when I was down in his new office and he was talking about making money, "there's different ways of getting rich," says he, "but only one system. Either get what a mighty few thinks they got to have—that's things for rich folks; or else get something that everybody has got to have whether they want it or not—that's things for poor folks. And when you're in the game you buy when things is low and sell when they is high. Nigh about every man you know plays the game just the other way around. That's why there's so many poor folks," says he. "Yet the game is plumb easy to beat when you know how, if making money is all you care about.

"For instance," says he, "when I bought that bunch of stock in the Lake Electric a while ago it was when nobody wanted it or let on they wanted it. Since then it has riz round fifteen or twenty points and it'll go higher. When I sold the Circle Arrow it was when them folks wanted it right bad. Between you and me, them people paid more for it than it was worth. I may buy it in some day when they don't want it no more."

"You reckon you ever will, Colonel?" says I, plumb happy to think of that.

"If I was alone in the world, with just you, I shorely would right off," says he, "no matter what it cost. With Bonnie Bell in the game, too, I don't know what I'll do nor when I'll do it.

"I don't have such a hard time here," he went on after a while. "For instance, just a few weeks ago I was reading in the papers about this war in Europe—which is a shame and a awful thing; and I hope it won't come here, though if it does you and me are in," says he. "Well, I seen how they make so much powder and sell it—smokeless powder. For that they have to use a awful lot of picric acid."

"What kind of acid?" says I. "Pickles?"

"I don't know," says he. "I wouldn't know it if it was on a plate—only I know they have to make smokeless powder out of it. So I bought all I could find laying round here or there—not very much; only two or three hundred thousand dollars' worth.

"Well," says he, stretching out his legs and yawning, "it's the same old story, Curly. I couldn't help it and I didn't mean to do it the least way in the world; but now this here picric acid—whatever it is—it's worth two or three times what it was just a little while ago. I cleaned up—oh, maybe two or three hundred thousand dollars on that. There ain't enough in these things to keep me very busy. I don't care for making money nohow, because it's so easy. If there was a real man's game now, I wouldn't mind mixing with it."

"Cows is something that folks has to have whether they are rich or poor," says I to him.

"Shore; and it's a good game too. If you look around you'll find that there is some things that everybody has got to use somehow, somewhere—wood, copper, oil, iron; things like that. You can't build houses and live in 'em unless you have some of them things. Everybody has to buy 'em in wholesale or in retail. I like to buy 'em a little farther back even than wholesale—when they are what you call raw resources.

"If you take things that's made up in packages you can sell them too, a little at a time, but slow. Some folks likes to trade that way; they got to have pictures—objects—right before 'em to believe their money's safe. That's a little slow for me and you, Curly. I like to take the goods before they are put up in packages and buy a lot of them—something that folks has got to have."

"That's where your game is weak, Colonel," says I. "For instance, you deal in cows on the hoof. That ain't respectable. When you cut up cows and hogs into sides, hams and sausage, then's when you get respectable. Ain't you got plenty proof of that? Look at them Wisners, for instance."

He snorts at that and ain't happy.

"Well, it's the truth," says I. "Look at us! We ain't nobody here. Old Man Wisner's the king bee of this here row of houses. We ain't one-two-ten in this race."

"Huh! Is that so? I'm running free, under a pull; and you can't kick. But then, we're having all the fun—not Bonnie Bell."

"I ain't having no fun worth speaking of myself," says I. "But she's doing well enough—she's disgusting healthy—sounder in wind and limb than anybody else in this town. And she's busy too; she's found a new kind of car that she says she's got to have. She says the Wisners bought one a little shinier than hers."

"Well, she can have whatever she wants. We are doing pretty well, seems like. I just went into a little speculation last week that will maybe pay for that new car."

"What's it about this time, Colonel?" I ast him.

"Well, it has something more to do with this here war. Whenever there is a war somebody makes money and everybody loses it. Now you see they're using a awful lot of sharpnel over there—bullets packed up in packages ready to be busted open. It takes a certain kind of lathe to turn them sharpnel, and there is only one kind of lathe in this country that does it faster than any other; and the people that makes sharpnel can't get enough of them. Well, I bought the control of that there lathe. Looking around not long ago, I found a little stove factory down in the sand hills; and I bought it and put a few of them lathes in there and started a little company.

"Besides, I control them lathes that goes into all the other factories where they make sharpnel. Shouldn't wonder if we'd run into a little money before long—enough to buy a car—five hundred thousand dollars or so. If they got to have sharpnel I suppose we might as well make 'em and make 'em good."

"Well, Colonel," says I, "I hope you'll find enough to do, so that one of these days you can be right comfortable."

"So do I," says he, and he sticks out his legs again, with his hands in his pockets. "But sometimes I almost lose heart about it. Things looks mighty sad to me, because I can't find no game that's interesting for to play."

"How about that running-for-alderman business?" says I.

"I'm looking that over," says he. "I know a good many of the fellows over on the west side of our ward. My freckles helps me some in that part of the ward. They can't look at freckles like mine and call me anything but a honest man. Our ward is in two parts, and a little wears silk socks and a good deal of it don't. Wisner, he's strong with them that does. He maybe ain't so strong with them that makes eight dollars a week. Maybe none of them works for Wisner, but plenty of other people that works for eight dollars a week does work for him."

"He shore makes plenty of money," says I. "I expect he's got more money than anybody in town."

"I'm willing to stack up a little money in this alderman game against him if I thought I'd get any fun out of it. I'm just marking time here, the way it is."

"Doing what?" I ast him.

"Making money and waiting."

"What for?" says I, not understanding.

"For some man," says he.

"What man?" I ast him, still not understanding.

"That's what I don't know. For some man that will make Bonnie Bell happy. But all the young men in a city talk alike and look alike and dress alike. I ain't seen more than one or two that was worth a cuss—not a one I thought was good enough for my girl. And yet it stands to reason that something will happen; and it might be any time. It makes me uneasy."

I couldn't see why more folks didn't come into our house, like they used to out on the Circle Arrow; and I said that.

"It's easy to see why they don't," says Old Man Wright, and he busts the glass top of his table with his fist. "It's plumb plain to see why. It's them Wisners has blocked our game. They coppered us from the start—that's what! We got in wrong at the start with them; we didn't kotow to them and they've always been expecting it."

"That puts us in pretty hard," says I.

"It wouldn't be hard for you or me, Curly," says he. "There ain't a game on earth that that pie-faced old hypocrite can play that I can't beat him at; I don't fear him no more than I like him. But when I see how easy it was for him and his folks to make my girl miserable—— It ain't on account of myself, Curly," says he, and he sweeps his hand over the desk and knocks every paper and everything else on the floor. "She's all I got," says he. "I loved her ma and I love her. Whatever goes against her happiness goes against me all the way through. And," says he, "I'll buck this here city game until some day I bust the bank!"

I left him setting there, sort of looking down at his feet, with his hands in his pockets and his legs stretched out. He wasn't happy none at all, though all the time he'd been hollering for some game that he couldn't beat.



IX

US AND THEIR FENCE

We went on thataway a good while into the summer and nothing much happened between us and our neighbors. Maybe once in a while our dog Peanut would get over in their back yard and scratch up their pansies. Peanut always liked to lay in fresh dirt, and he seemed to know instinctive which was our pansy beds and which was theirn. Their hired man only laughed when I seen him and apologized.

He used to come over once in a while, their hired man did, and meet me on the dock back of the boathouse, where I give him lessons in roping. I showed him a few things—how to let go when he got his rope straight, and to give hisself plenty of double back of the hondoo. We used to rope the snubbing posts where we tied the boats. Sometimes we'd practice for a hour or so and he begun to get on right well. We visited that way several days, usual of mornings.

"Don't the lady ever come down to the boats no more?" says he one time.

"No," says I. "Her pa's afraid she'll get drownded."

"Does she ever talk about saving the life of anybody?" he ast.

"No," I says; "she's used to such things. She don't take no account anyways of saving the life of a laboring man," says I. "It's nothing to her."

"Ain't it funny," says he, "how things work out sometimes? At first, you know, I thought she was one of your housemaids."

"You done what?" says I.

"Well, I don't deny it. When I first seen her in the yard, the time she chased that dog over, I thought she was one of the maids—you see, she had on a cap and a apern. I didn't know at all. The old lady thinks it yet."

"She's mighty kind-hearted, even with the lower classes," says I. "She even gives money to them people that play music in front of our house every morning. I wish they wouldn't."

"I wish she wouldn't do that," says he. "We have a awful time with that band. The old man said if he ever got to be alderman he'd get a ordinance through abolishing them off the streets. They play something fierce!" says he.

"Is he going to run for alderman?" says I. "I seen something in the papers about it."

"Well, yes; I believe he will—I heard him say he would."

"If he does," says I, "I reckon hell will pop in this ward."

"Why?" says he.

"Well, my boss is figuring he may run for alderman hisself—he's naturalized here now. He used to be sher'f out in Cody whenever he wanted to be. When he wants anything, seems like he can't hardly help getting it. It's a way he has."

He looks kind of thoughtful at that.

"Well, now," says he, "well now, what do you know about that! As you say, Curly, ain't that hell?"

He swore so easy and natural that I kind of liked him, and the way he taken up roping was to my thinking about the best of any tenderfoot I ever seen.

"What are they piling up them rocks along the side of the yard for, Jimmie?" I ast him after a while.

You see, there was several wagonloads of brick and stuff had been put in there that morning.

"I don't know," says he. "Something the old man ordered, I reckon. He's away right now. They don't always tell me about things as much as I think they might."

"I've often wondered they didn't fire you," says I.

"They can't," says he. "I told you I've got too much on 'em. They don't dast to fire me none at all. I defy 'em!" says he.

"Well, you better be a little careful," says I. "I've seen people felt that way about their boss before now, and right often they got the can. You better not get fired till you know a little bit more about roping and riding."

"Hush!" says he. "I think I heard someone over in our boathouse. Good-by! I'll come round again tomorrow morning."

He went on down the dock into their boathouse. I set down not far from the door, smoking and looking out over the lake. I heard someone in there begin to talk. It was him and Old Lady Wisner—I'd heard her before once in a while. I couldn't help hearing them if I'd wanted to, and I did want to.

"James," says she, "where have you been? I've been looking everywhere for you."

"Why, nowhere especial," says he carelesslike. "I was just over on the dock doing some roping stunts with Curly."

"I suppose you mean that red-headed, pigeon-toed brute that hangs around the Wrights' place," says she.

Say, when she said that I half riz up, for I shore was mad. I may be the way she said, but I don't allow no one else to say so. But she wasn't a man anyway; so I had to stand it. I read somewhere in a book it ain't correct to listen when folks don't know you're hearing them; but that didn't go with me no more, especial when people was talking about me and my hair and legs thataway. So I set down and listened some more.

"Well," says Jimmie, "I haven't ever noticed that at all. But he's a good scout and I like him," says he.

That made me feel just a little easier anyways.

"Well, it's no matter what you were doing over there," says she vicious. "You're not to have nothing more to do with such can-nye no more. Why can't you attend to your own business?"

"I'm just going to," says he. "You ain't ast my consent about mussing up my flower beds. What's all that rock and brick doing up in the yard?" Say, he was a sassy one!

"Since you ast me, I'll tell you. It's a fence we're going to build."

"A fence?" says he. "We got a perfectly good fence now."

"Oh, have we? Well, it ain't high enough to keep out our people from mixing with them can-nye." I wondered again what can-nye was. "I'll not have you talking with their maids."

"Is that so?" says he. "I hadn't noticed much of that going on lately," says he. "I wish it was."

"James!" says she, so mad she couldn't hardly speak. "James!" And about all she could do was to guggle in her throat and say: "James!"

"Well," says I to myself, "here's where he gets the can tied to him, all right. It don't stand to reason she'll allow that kind of talk."

Well now, they was talking about that fence. In two or three days it was easy enough to see what the Wisners was going to do: They was going to cut out the herd law and fence in their own range.

It wasn't a fence at all. It was a wall they built, day after day—a regular wall! Pretty soon it was up as high as our second-story window, and it keep on a-going. It took them weeks to finish it. When it was done it run clean from the sidewalk back to their boathouse. From our side, on the ground, you couldn't only see the top of their house, and from their side you couldn't only see the top of ours.

Well, anyway, the wall went up and we didn't stop it, because we couldn't. It was like we was living in two different worlds, with that wall between us, and that was the way they meant it. Nothing could cross from one side to the other. It was the coldest deal I ever seen one set of folks give another. And why? I couldn't figure why.

Bonnie Bell was right still and quiet. Old Man Wright he went around thoughtful for quite a while. He seen this was a insult put on him, but he didn't know what to do. At last he goes to Bonnie Bell one day, and says he:

"Sis, it's coming along kind of hot in the summer. How'd you like to go to White Sulphur or somewheres for a few months?" says he. "You're looking kind of pale now for the last few weeks," says he, "and I don't like to see it."

She turns and looks at him square in the eyes for a minute, and pointed out the window.

"With that thing going on?" says she. "I'll see them damned first!" says she.

That was the first time I ever heard Bonnie Bell cuss. I liked her for saying it, and so did her pa.

"It's a hard game we got to play, sis," says he; "but we'll play it."

She nods, and we let it go at that.

That fence ruined the street, as far as our end of it was concerned. Them that lived north of it could look on up the lake for quite a ways, but for more than a quarter of a mile down toward the park there couldn't nobody see down that part of the street at all. The papers got to talking about it, and some complaints was printed too. Old Man Wright he only sort of laughed. The papers made fun of the Wisners for building that fence—sort of treating the whole thing like a joke.

About now the campaign for alderman got busier. Old Man Wright printed a full page in all the papers, with a picture of hisself, and saying that J. W. Wright was running for alderman in that ward. Right opposite his full-page ad was about six or eight inches, with a smaller picture of Old Man Wisner with it; and he said that Mr. David Abraham Wisner begged to submit his name as a candidate for the sufferedges for alderman in that ward. I didn't know what sufferedges was at first, but I knew what my boss was out after—it was votes, and he was liable to get 'em.

From that time on the boss was busier than he had been before. He got better acquainted over on the west side of our ward. Sometimes he wouldn't get back till midnight, but he always come home under his own steam. In his office I saw all sorts of people. He seemed to take to this alderman business natural.

Anyways he was a hard man to buck in any kind of a game. He had his own idea all the time maybe about that fence in Millionaire Row. One day he taken a little pasear down the lake front toward the head of the park, where there was some vacant land below us. He was sizing things up. Two or three weeks after he told me he'd bought that tract—the whole works, clear down to the end of the park. I don't know what he paid for it, but it must have been a lot of money.

"You see," says he, "all them people up there north of us on the row they ain't got only a little bit of land for their houses. Me, I'm going to have a place with half a mile or so of ground to it. Bonnie Bell has got to have a place to herself for to raise crocuses and other flowers," says he, "and to cultivate her Boston dog."

It was kind of hard times right then and a good many men was out of work. Old Man Wright put a lot of 'em to work on his new Bonnie Bell Addition, as he called it. He dug it up and smoothed it down and laid it out, and planted it with trees and sodded it. And then, down at the far end of it, he just puts up a high wall like the Wisners', but 'way off from it. Then we dug down along the Wisner wall.

Folks used to go along and wonder what it was done for and who done it. And later on some folks farther up the drive allowed it was some kind of a new Italian garden and some of them begun to put up them walls too. It got right fashionable. The whole looks of that part of town was changed. But, while they had little bits of yards you couldn't swing a cat in, we had land enough to start a hay ranch if we had of wanted to.

"I can afford it," says Old Man Wright.

And by the time he had the improvements started the real-estate men come and pestered him to take at least three times as much money as he give for it.

"I may sell it sometime," says he, "but not now," says he. "I like it. My girl likes to raise crocuses, and what she likes she gets. We're going to raise plenty of crocuses and tulips and hollyhocks," says he.

It wouldn't be right to say Bonnie Bell didn't have no friends. Once there come quite a bunch of girls from out of town—girls she had knew in Smith's; and they had quite a visit. They tore up the house and for a week or so Bonnie Bell was right happy; but by and by they went away again. Then nobody come into our place, the sort we wanted to come.

There was one man come to call on us—it was Henderson, of our old hotel. We used to go down there and eat sometimes, and every time we done so he'd come to stand around. He couldn't keep his eyes off Bonnie Bell. I reckon he was about forty years old.

Now one day he come up to our house in the afternoon all dressed up, with a white flower in his coat and a high hat on, and shiny shoes, and he ast for Old Man Wright; and William showed him into the back parlor. I was setting in our ranch room, so I could hear what went on—I couldn't very well help it. I heard what Mr. Henderson said; so I knowed what brought him there all dressed up.

"Mr. Wright," says he, "I won't waste time. I'm used to doing business in a direct way. So today I come down—I come down—that is to say, I come today——" says he.

"Well, for a direct man, you're taking some time to say what you want to say," says Old Man Wright; "but maybe I can guess it if you can't say it. It's my girl you come to talk about?"

I didn't hear him say anything, but I guess he must have nodded.

"You want to ast me?" says Old Man Wright. "Why didn't you ast her?"

"I thought it better to see if you would consider me as a suitor, sir," says he. "It seemed a fairer thing."

"I don't know as a parent ought to consider any man that would ast him first," says Old Man Wright thoughtful; "but in some ways you're a good man, and square and successful."

"My profession—my business—being an innkeeper isn't exactly the highest form of business——"

"Hell! That's got nothing to do with it," says Old Man Wright. "I imagine my girl might marry most any kind of man if he was the right sort. But now let's figure on this, Mr. Henderson," says he, "because I like you. You're some older than she is."

"Yes," says he; "old enough to know a splendid woman like Miss Wright when I see her. In my business I've seen plenty that ain't."

"That's good," says Old Man Wright. "I like to hear you say that. I don't blame you for feeling the way you do. And I feel kind to you too, sir. You're the first man that ever said a kind word to me and my girl in this town. You're almost the last, as far as that goes. You're as good as us and we're as good as you, if it comes to that. But now let's figure a little further. The man that marries my girl, marries her—there ain't a-going to be no divorce. There may be a funeral if there's trouble, but there ain't going to be no divorce for Bonnie Bell. It's death that's going to part her and her husband. You see I got to be careful about her, don't you?"

"Yes, and you ought to be. I never felt my years as a handicap."

"They ain't, in business," says Old Man Wright. "But now look-a-here: As you live along together she'll be still young when you're pretty old. Take ten or fifteen years off of you and ten or fifteen thousand cocktails, and I'd say 'God bless you!' But the years and the cocktails is there permanent. You're kind of soft around the stomach, Mr. Henderson, I'm sorry to say. Ain't you making a mistake in wanting to marry my girl at all, sir?"

I don't reckon he was happy; yet he certainly was game.

"Mr. Wright," says he at last, "that's why I come to you first! I was conscious of them ten million cocktails—it's nearer ten million than ten thousand, I reckon, in my business. It seemed to me fairer to talk to you first. I'm not apt to forget her very soon—I'm not apt to look at any woman at all. I reckon I don't want to get married if I can't marry her. Maybe it ain't fair for a man at my time of life and way of life to think of marrying a girl like her. I reckon I been selfish. I reckon maybe you set me right."

"Where did you come from?" says Old Man Wright.

"The South," says he.

"I know that; but what state?"

"Kentucky," says he. "I been living here a great many years."

"You're a gentleman, Mr. Henderson," says Old Man Wright. "I wisht things wasn't just the way they are. But now, on the level, do you think we'd better say anything to Bonnie Bell at all about this here?"

Henderson must have thought it over quite a while. Then I heard him take a step or so. Maybe he picked up his hat. Maybe his cane knocked against a chair. Maybe they shook hands.

"I don't want to do anything that isn't best for her," says he at last. "I reckon maybe I ain't a good-enough man to marry her. I reckon maybe you're right, sir," says he.

Old Man Wright he don't talk no more for a little while. I heard them walk toward the door.

"No," says he at length. "Mr. Henderson, I don't reckon we'll say anything about this to Bonnie Bell after all. Good-by, sir. I wish I could ast you to come here often."

"Good-by," says he.

I seen him go down the walk after a while. He forgot all about his car waiting by the sidewalk and walked half a block before he come to. Of course, he couldn't come to see us no more after that.

As for me, I didn't have no friends either. Jimmie the hired man was about the only friend around there I cared much for, and now he was gone—fired, I supposed. Times got even lonesomer than ever.

Bonnie Bell come in the room where I was setting one day, and she set down on the lounge and put her chin in her hand and taken a look out the window. I ast her what was up.

"Well," says she, "I was just wondering about the seeds for them big flower beds we've been making," says she. "I'll be wanting to plant them next spring, at least. If I had some experienced man that knew about flowers now—"

"Why don't you go down to the park," says I, "and talk to some of them Dutch gardeners that raises the flower beds down there? They'll know all about them things," says I.

"Curly," says she, "you're only a cowpuncher, ain't you?"

"That's all," says I.

"Well, that accounts for you not having no sense at all," says she.



X

US BEING ALDERMAN

Really, that fence must of hurt the Wisners as bad as it done anybody else. Us having plenty of ground, our house wasn't built so close to the line as theirs was. The fence must of cut off more light for them than it did for us. Besides, when you looked at it from the street, unless you lived around there and knowed about it, you'd of thought it was us built that fence to spite them and not them to spite us.

Old Man Wright was running on what they called the Independent ticket that fall; there was three parties and the town was all tore up. Of course everybody knows there oughtn't to be but just two parties—Republicans and Democrats. Me being from Texas, original, I don't see why anybody should be anything but a Democrat; but Old Man Wright he had a way of picking out things.

Well, they held the election along in November. I might of knowed how it would come out. They ain't done counting all the Wright votes yet over in that ward of ours. At about half past six they'd had time enough to count all the sufferedges that Old Man Wisner taken down in the silk-stocking part of that ward.

At about half past three in the afternoon the papers come out with bulletins and says the ward was "conceded to Wright." I should say it was conceded! I conceded it, anyways, as soon as I knowed he wanted to run.

Well, sir, it was more like old times then than we'd seen since we moved in there—like the times when we was sher'f in the Yellow Bull country. The old man he come in a-laughing along about suppertime and under his own steam, and says he:

"Bonnie Bell, your pa is going to be high in the nation's councils right soon, because he is going to be alderman in one of the most important wards in this here town. I may be mayor some day; and when you're mayor you're due to chirk up and think of being president—if you are a humorist. Also, your pa is hungry. Please get Curly and me all the ham shanks and greens they is in the house.

"And, besides," says he when Bonnie Bell was going out, "pull the front door wide open tonight. Take the lock out and hide William where they can't any of my horny-handed friends find him. They'll be in here tonight, a bunch of them, to sort of celebrate our glorious victory. There may be several bands along in here—I hope and trust so. I shorely am fond of music and I like bands. Whenever I get elected sher'f or anything I want the band to play—all the bands they is."

Well, that was some night! I was glad for once we had come to Chicago, for there is more bands in a town that size than there is in Cody.

Old Man Wright he was more natural than I'd ever saw him for a long while. I don't know if it was quite fair the way he done, because it ain't held Christian to set on a man when he's down. But what he done was to get that Dutch band with five pieces that played in front of our house every morning—they come in first. He stations them at the side of the road right square in front of Old Man Wisner's house, and he tells them to play everything they knew and then play it all over again, and keep on playing. We was setting eating dinner, enjoying their music as much as we could, when the leader of the band comes in; and says he:

"Mein Herr, wir sind schon ausgeblasen."

"Is that so?" says Old Man Wright. "Well, have a drink, and go out and begin over again."

About now come the rest of the bands, six or eight or so, and back of them was the merry villagers. They filled up the whole street in front of our steps and in front of the Wisners, and up and down the row; and some of 'em stepped on Bonnie Bell's new tulip beds in the yard south of us.

"Unto them that hath is gave," says Old Man Wright, looking peaceful. "Like enough, most all the bands in this part of town'll be here before long. Pore old Dave Wisner, he don't seem to have no band; so I'll fix him up—he don't seem cheerful, with his blinds down thataway. Round up our bands, Curly," says he, "and line some of 'em up in front of his house on the other side of the street. Get some of 'em and stand 'em up on our side of his fence. Make a line of 'em back to the boathouse. Tell 'em to play—I ain't particular what they play. They don't even need to play the same piece unless they want to; but keep 'em busy—play everything they have and then repeat softly, and if they get tired feed 'em and give 'em something to drink. And tell Johnson, the precinct captain, when he comes about eight o'clock, to come on in with his friends, the whole gang—the door is open and there's no strings on it, and no strings on the new alderman."

Old Man Wisner must have been enjoying his life that evening while we was celebrating our being alderman. Bonnie Bell she didn't approve of this none, but she knowed that when her pa was in one sort of mood she'd better leave him alone and let him have his way—there wasn't no stopping him.

After a while Johnson, the precinct captain that had had this election in charge, he come in to have a talk with the new alderman, him and a lot more. There was a good many Swedes up in his ward, and plenty of these folks was blue-eyed and had yellow hair, and some of 'em had long whiskers. On the whole they carried their liquor pretty well, and they had plenty. Old Man Wright was in his shirt sleeves—rolled up so that his freckles would show—and he had two or three cases of red liquor, and not a cork in the room!

"So far as Sunday closing is concerned," says he, "it ain't Sunday yet."

They taken something with the new alderman and hollered for a speech.

"Men," says he, "we licked 'em like I said we would—only more. I don't ast any of you to show me how to make any more money, for I've got enough. We made this fight on the Lake Electric Ordinance. The intention of the other gang was to hold up all you people that has homes of your own. Every one of you has to use electric light. It's only right you ought to pay a fair price, but nothing more. Let me tell you that's all you're going to pay. I've bought into that company, and me and my bank crowd can run it. Let me tell you the prices will be right: don't you worry about that none at all. For once you'll get a square deal here; or if you don't, then elect some other man the next time."

"Hooray for our new alderman!" says Johnson, jumping up then.

They all jumps up too. They had their glasses in their hands—plenty of men standing there in our ranch room, rather big men with yellow whiskers, a good many.

About then Bonnie Bell she comes down the front stairs. She was all dressed up in silk, in a low-necked dress and a good many jewels on. You wouldn't hardly of thought it was her pa standing in his shirt sleeves in the room.

"Gentlemen," says Old Man Wright, "this is my daughter."

What them men did was not to compare them two at all. They just stood in line and every one of 'em raised his glass like she was a real queen; and they give her three cheers. Bonnie Bell she drops them a curtsy.

You see, them folks saw that, while we had the price and had the class, and could play some games, we was just folks. They felt all the time that they was just folks too. When you can play that game square and on the level, like Old Man Wright done, they can't beat you in politics.

Them people went away at last—even our little Dutch band, though they give up hard. The Wisner house was dark, while ours was all lit up—everything in it, including me, Curly. The papers said that the new alderman kept open house until a late hour. There was some truth in that—the door was open all night long.

At breakfast Old Man Wright was hungry, though he hadn't been to bed. He set, with his hands in his pockets, and looked out at Wisner's brick wall; and says he to me:

"This here is going to be a changed ward. I ain't in no man's vest pocket. I ain't done yet. This is just the beginning. But where's the kid, Curly?"

I went and found her. William was still hid somewhere—the night's doings had grieved him plenty. She come in and set down by her pa.

"Well, sis," says he, "you see your dad is getting some of them Better Things we come to Chicago after."

"Dad," says she, pushing back a little way from him and looking into his face, "tell me something."

"What is it, Honey?"

"The truth now—the truth."

"Yes, Honey."

"Did you sell out the Circle Arrow and come to town on account of me?"

He didn't speak at first.

"Yes, I did, Honey," says he at last. "I said I'd tell you the truth. That was why we sold the old ranch—so as you could come here. I wanted you to go as high as any American woman could go. We educated you for that—we brought you up for it, Curly and me."

"We didn't win, did we, dad?" says she, slow like. "How is it done, dad?"

"Gawd knows," he says. "Tell me, sis, if we pulled out of here and went to some other town, would you be better? How about Kansas City?"

"No," says she. "Our feet ain't headed that way. I won't quit, dad."

"You'll break your heart first, and your dad's?"

"Yes, if necessary."

"All to break into them sepulchers?"

"No," says she; "there's a lot of things worth while more than that. These brick-and-stone houses are the trenches. They may be hard to take. But back of them lies the country, and it's the country that's worth while. You found it—over on the other side of the ward. For me—don't mind if I haven't found it just yet."

"Ain't you happy, sis?" says he.

"No," says she, quiet like; "I'm not."

He pats her on the back.

"Get out of doors," says he. "Do something—work at something! Look upwards and outside, and don't get to looking inwards," says he. "That ain't the way. Think what's in the fields beyond."

"Life, dad," says she, slow; and it seemed to me like she was sad. "Life!"

"Life?" says he. "Sis, what do you mean? Tell your old dad, can't you?"

She told him, then. She put her haid down on his neck.

"Oh," says she, "it's all right for you two—you've got something to do—you can work and fight; but what can I do? What is there for me to do in all the world? And you tried so hard to make me happy!"

"And you ain't happy?" says her pa.

"Dad!" says she. "Dad!" And she went on crying down his neck.

Ain't women hell? I went on away.



XI

US AND THE FREEZE-OUT

More and more folks begun to talk about us and our place since we got to be alderman. Of course more and more people begun to come in and visit with us now; but not one from Millionaire Row, though, if I do say it, we had the best-looking place now in the whole row of houses.

It was one of Bonnie Bell's ideas to make one of them sunken gardens, which she said was always done in Italy.

"I'll tell you," says she; "we'll build our sunken garden right up against Old Man Wisner's wall. How would it do to plant a few ivy vines to run up the side of the wall, dad?" she ast her pa.

"Why, all right," says he; "but you be mighty careful not to plant any olive branches."

So Bonnie Bell and me we was busy quite a while making plans for this here sunken garden. We read all the books we could find; still, she wasn't happy.

"I need some skilled gardener in this," says she; "them Dutch down at the park are no good at all. I wonder where the Wisners' gardener went."

"That fellow wasn't so much," says I to Bonnie Bell.

"What makes you say that, Curly?" says she.

"Well, I heard him talking one morning and I didn't like it. For that matter, I didn't like the way he talked about you neither. I told him we couldn't have nothing to do with the lower classes—let alone now, when we're alderman, we couldn't do that. He was fired and he ought to of been."

"How did you come to know all this, Curly?" says she.

"I heard him down at the boathouse talking to Old Lady Wisner. I think we're mighty well shut of the whole bunch of them—though I will say he was learning to rope all right, and I could of made a cowhand out of him if I'd had time."

"What did she say, Curly?" she asked me then, "Did she really talk about us?"

"Yes, she did. She thought you was a hired girl. And she says we was can-nye, and he wasn't to mix with us. Can-nye—what is can-nye, Bonnie?" says I.

She got red in the face and was shore mad at something.

"Can-nye, eh!" says she. "Can-nye! So that's what she thinks we are."

"Well, that was before we was alderman," says I. "Maybe they think different now, whatever can-nye is. What is it, anyway?"

"It means something common, vulgar and low down, Curly," says she.

"That wasn't no bouquet, then, was it?" says I. "Well, I didn't think so then, though I never heard it called to nobody in my life. I made it plain, though, to that hired man that he didn't have no chance to break into our house."

"Did he want to come over, Curly?" she ast.

"Crazy to! He wanted to get a look in our ranch room. I told you he was hankering to be a cowpuncher."

"Well, why didn't you bring him over if he was trying to learn things you could teach him?"

"What! Me bring him in our place? I reckon not! Now look here, kid," says I, "you don't half know how good-looking you are."

"I'm not," says she. "I got a freckle right on my nose. It don't come off neither."

"Well, maybe one freckle or so," says I; "but that don't kill off your looks altogether. Let me tell you, when it comes to common people like him talking your name out in public, why, it don't go!" says I. "Besides, another thing"—I went on talking to her right plain. "Look at the money you'll come into sometime! He has got to show me a-plenty what right he had to say you was wonderfully beautiful. You are, kid—but what business was it of his?"

"He has been gone four months and eight days," says she, thoughtful.

"How do you know he has? Do you keep a calendar on folks like him?"

"No; I was just thinking," says she, "that if he was here I might ask him about my sunken garden."

"That would be fine, wouldn't it?" says I. "But then, come to think of it, he wasn't in favor of that fence hisself. He was right free-spoken; I'll say that for him."

"He didn't like that fence idea?"

"Of course he didn't. He knew it wasn't right."

"Well," says she, "I'm going to plant ivy on it. If it runs over the top of the wall and hangs down on their side I'm not going to try to stop it."

Now, why she said that I never could figure out at all. I suppose women is peacefuller than men.

The folks in the ward where we live at they allowed their new alderman was on the square. I reckon it must of been them freckles. There ain't no way of beating a man in politics that has freckles and that can carry his liquor. So by and by all the papers come out and begun to say maybe Mr. John William Wright would be a candidate for treasurer next election. That is about as high as you can get in city politics. Treasurers make a heap more than their salaries usual in any large town. The people don't seem to mind it neither.

Times out on the range wasn't so good now as they might of been. Them high benches along the mountains never was made for farming. The new settlers that had come in under our old patents, through this here Yellow Bull Colonization and Improvement Company, they was shore having hard sledding along of their having believed everything they seen in the papers. They'd allowed they was going into the Promised Land. It was—but it wasn't nothing else but a promise.

It was Old Man Wisner's fault really. Though, after his usual way in side lines, he never showed his hand, he was deep in that company hisself. It was him now that had to hold the thing together. The settlers got sore and some of them quit, and most of them didn't pay their second or third payments. Of course that didn't make no difference, so far as we was concerned, for the Yellow Bull Colonization and Improvement Company had to make their deferred payments just the same to us. But when the company's money run out, and they maybe had to assess the stockholders, some of the stockholders got almighty cold feet.

"Well, Colonel," says I, "I reckon we'll get back our ranch some of these days, won't we? I shore wish we would."

"So do I, Curly; but I'm afraid not," says he.

"Why not?" I ast him.

"Well, it's Old Man Wisner—that's the reason," says he. "You see, it's his money that they are working with now," says he. "Their new ditch has cost them more than four times what the engineer said it would—a ditch always does. They've been wasting the water, like grangers always do, and they're fighting among themselves. These States people has to learn how to farm all over again when they go out into that sort of country. As to them pore stockholders, I reckon you could buy them out right cheap; but, cheap or not, Old Man Wisner's in more than he ever thought he'd be," says he.

"Ain't you going to let the old man off on none of them deferred payments?" says I, grinning.

"I am, of course, Curly," says he, solemn. "Seeing what he has done for us, I'm just hankering for some chance of doing him a kindness!" says he.

I begun to believe that before this here game was all played there'd be some fur flying between them two old hes, neither of which was easy to make quit.



XII

US AND A ACCIDENTAL FRIEND

Bonnie Bell she was busy, after her little ways, fixing her garden or laying out her flower beds, or reading, or studying about pictures. She drove her electric brougham a good deal, riding around.

She was riding along one day in the park below our house when she seen a girl go riding by, with some others and a young man or two, on horseback, bouncing along bumpety-bump, rising up every jump as though the saddle hurt 'em. One of the girls was on a mean horse, but she was going pretty well and didn't seem to mind it. But this horse he taken a scare at a automobile that was letting off steam, and, first thing you know, up went the horse in front and the girl got a fall.

There wasn't any of them very good riders, and this horse, being a bad actor, scared the others. They all bolted off, not seeming to know that this girl had fell off. She lit on her head.

Bonnie Bell seen all this happen, and she gets out of her car on the keen lope and runs over to where the girl is and picks her up. Her and a policeman took her in Bonnie Bell's brougham. She didn't know nothing yet, being jolted some on the head.

Now that girl was pretty as a picture herself, with light hair and blue eyes, and kind of a big mouth. She was smiling even when she didn't know a thing. She was always smiling. She was dressed like she had lots of money; and she was fixed for riding—boots and some sort of pants.

Bonnie Bell couldn't bring her to and she concludes to take her home to our house. First thing I know, there she was outside, hollering for me.

"Come here quick, Curly!" says she. "Come help me carry her into the house."

So I helped her. The girl still had her quirt in her hand and she was kind of white.

"Who is she, Bonnie Bell?" says I; and she says she didn't know, and tells me to go and get a doctor.

But while I was getting William to telephone—I couldn't use them things much myself—the girl comes to, all right; and she sets up and rubs her head.

"Oh, what do you know about that!" says she. "He got me off. I thank you so much. Which way did he go?" she ast.

"He was headed to the riding-school barn," says Bonnie Bell, "the last I saw of him. Your friends were all going the same way. So I thought the best thing I could do was to bring you here till you felt better."

I don't reckon the girl was hurt bad, she being young; and such girls is tough.

"Well," says she, "it certainly was nice of you. And how am I to thank you?" She kissed Bonnie Bell then for luck. "You're nice," says she, "and I like you."

Bonnie Bell, if you'll believe me, was kind of timid and scared, with it being so long since any woman had said a kind word to her. She didn't hardly know what to say, at first, till the girl kissed her again.

"I am Katherine Kimberly," says she. "We live just above the park. Where is this?"

"This is just above the park too," says Bonnie Bell—"on the boulevard. This is Mr. John William Wright's place," says she, "and I'm Miss Wright. Can I serve some tea to you?" So she calls William.

When William brings in the tea them two set up and begun to talk right sociable. This here Kimberly girl she rubbed her head once in a while, but she wasn't hurt much along of having so much hair to fall on her head with. The tea fixed her all right.

"I hit my coco a jolt!" says she. "Gee! I was going some. I'll never ride that long-legged old giraffe again; he's nothing but a dog after all—not that I'm afraid, but I don't like him," says she. "Do you ride?"

"Would you like to come and see my horses?" says Bonnie Bell. "If you like horses——"

"Do I like them? I'm crazy over them! Can you ride?"

"Oh, some," says Bonnie Bell. "Curly says I can."

"Curly?" And she looks at me.

"He's our foreman," says Bonnie Bell. "Talk to him if you want to know about riding—he's a rider."

"I was once, ma'am," says I, "but not no more. I wouldn't get on a mean horse now for a thousand dollars. I'm scared of horses, ma'am; but she ain't"—meaning Bonnie Bell. "She still thinks she can ride any of 'em."

"Yes," says Bonnie Bell; "and, as far as that goes, if I could get you to come with me I would always ride a horse and not go in a car or boat."

"Boat?" says Miss Kimberly. "Oh, of course you have 'em too."

"Come down," says Bonnie Bell, "and you and I can look at my horses and boat and things. After that I'll take you home."

"Oh, may I go?" says this Katherine girl. "You see, I suppose I must get home before they tell mommah."

Well, she hadn't more than got out on our porch than she knew in a minute where she was. This was where she showed she was a lady born and a good girl too. She never let on beyond that first look—she seen she had been brought into the house of us can-nyes. This was the house with the wall, where nobody of the Row ever went.

"How lovely it is!" says she. "Do you know you have the nicest place on this whole street? It's tasteful. I like this little sunken garden—it's a dear! And see how the ivy grows on the wall! And over there's the boathouse. May I see your things?"

Now what she said last wasn't any bluff. It was just the girl in her talking to another girl. I seen Bonnie Bell give her another look, kind of asting like—she herself was free and friendly every way; but she hadn't been used to this right along lately. So she looks at this Katherine Kimberly right close for about half a second, till she seen she was on the square.

Then this Kimberly girl puts her arm round Bonnie Bell. That was the way them two went down to the boathouse—their arms around one another. When they come back, in about ten minutes or so, they was talking so fast neither one of them could of heard what the other was saying.

"Oh, my goodness!" says Katherine after a little. "I must be going home. It isn't far, you know."

"Yes; I know," says Bonnie Bell, quiet.

"And you said you'd take me home in your car?"

"And you want me to?" says Bonnie Bell, kind of funny.

"I wish you would—if you will. Of course I could walk."

"Does your head hurt now?" ast Bonnie Bell.

The girl looked at her straight. Then I knew she was on the square.

"No, it don't," says she; "but I'd like it if you would take me home in your car," says she. "I want you to come in and meet my mommah. We want to come down here if you'll let us, all of us. Will you let us? Will you let us, Bonnie?" says she.

Now, ain't it funny how much can happen quiet and easy? I expect more had happened for Bonnie Bell this last hour or so than had in a whole year before—and all by accident, like most good things comes to us. Not a woman in that block had ever called on Bonnie Bell and it didn't look like they ever would. We wasn't on the map—even me, that ain't got any brains at all, knowed that.

And yet I could tell that if Bonnie Bell Wright drove along the front of that block with Katherine Kimberly in her car, and they got off at the Kimberlys' and went in—and if the Kimberlys come up to our house, too—why, then I knowed we was on the map. I don't think Bonnie Bell cared. What was in her heart was mostly gladness at meeting some girl friend she could talk to right free.

Of course, living there so long, I couldn't help knowing some of the things along the Row. I knowed there was a sort of a fight there as to which was the queen of Millionaire Row, which was the same as being the queen of the society of this here city of Chicago. Either it was this Mrs. Henry D. Kimberly or else it was Mrs. David Abraham Wisner. The Kimberlys was in wholesale leather, while the Wisners was in wholesale beef and pork, and them things. Most everybody in the Row, it seemed to me, had something to do with a cow, one shape or another, except us—which, dealing with cows on the hoof, might of been said to be at the bottom of the whole game. But that ain't respectable, like I told you. Sausage or hides or leather is better—especial if wholesale.

Bonnie Bell was quiet. She taken up the collar of this Katherine girl and looks at the little pin she wore on it.

"What year was yours?" says she.

"Last June," says Katherine.

Then I seen they was both scholars of that same Old Man Smith, where Bonnie Bell had went to school. They had on some sort of pins so they knew each other, like Masons. Not having nothing better to do, they kissed each other again.

By the time Bonnie Bell had drove over to the Kimberlys' house folks had found Katherine's horse, but not her; so her ma was scared silly, natural enough. When she seen her long-lost daughter coming with Bonnie Bell, both of them able to walk and talk, she was right glad, and fell on the necks of both of them, weeping some.

"And who is this young lady," says she, meaning Bonnie Bell, "who has been so kind as to bring you home to your mother?"

And she smiled at Bonnie Bell, her being the second woman to do that in Chicago in two years. You see, if a girl is handsome women mostly hate her; the men don't—which is why.

"This is our neighbor, Miss Wright, mommah," says Katherine. "They live just below us a little way."

She got red in the face then, for everybody on the street there knew about us and the high fence; yet nobody knew us personal. But Katherine's ma was different from most of these other people. Besides, you only needed one good look at Bonnie Bell to see that she wasn't any common folks.

"She left Smith the year before I went in, mommah," says Katherine, "and she's in my sororyety; and she's been here ever since they built their fine house; and she's a dear and I love her." Katherine had a way of talking all in one breath, like a sprinter running a hundred yards flat. "I want you to love her, too," says she to her ma.

And then Old Lady Kimberly she taken Bonnie Bell in her arms and kissed her some more; and the kid, like enough, come near to spilling over then.

"Come right in and have a cup of tea," says she.

So they went into the house, and the Kimberlys' sad man, which was named William, too, brought them some tea. They didn't need it none, because they was full of it already; but women can hold plenty of tea. When they was drinking that and, like enough, all three of them talking at once, Katherine tells her ma all about how she got threw from her horse, and how Bonnie Bell saved her life and carried her home and took care of her, and now brought her back.

"Mommah, their place is lovely," says she. "They've all sorts of nice things and we're going to call as soon as Bonnie Bell will let us."

"Yes, indeed," says her ma, who was going to back any play her girl made.

"Bonnie Bell," says she—"that is a odd name and a very pretty one."

Bonnie Bell laughed at that.

"It's one my dad gave me," says she. "My real name is Mary Isabel. My dad always called me Bonnie Bell; and so did Curly."

"Curly?" says the old lady, not knowing who that was—me.

"Oh, Curly's a dear," says Katherine then. "He's a cowboy, or was when he was younger; but he isn't young now. And he can ride any sort of horse living, and rope things—I think he must be the stableman."

"Indeed he isn't," says Bonnie Bell. "He's our foreman."

They didn't know what that was, being city people; so she told them. Them Kimberlys couldn't see why they took me to the city when they didn't have no cows. I reckon they must of talked of me and Old Man Wright plenty—you see, Bonnie Bell told me of it like it happened. She told me what Katherine's ma wore and what their William looked like, and what sort of pictures was on the walls. Womanfolks can see more than a man and remember it better.

Well, sir, it wasn't any more than a week before Old Lady Kimberly drove up to our house in her car; and she come right up the walk herself and didn't send in any of them little cards that says: "Tag; you're It."

She come into our parlor, and our William went out and got Bonnie Bell for her, and them two must of had a regular visit, because Katherine's ma insisted on seeing our ranch room, which pleased her mighty much. She said she certainly was going to bring her husband over, because he would be crazy over it.

"Tell me," says she—"when can we come?"

"Why," says Bonnie Bell, "in a real ranch there isn't a time of the day or night when you can't come and be welcome. Everybody's welcome at a ranch, you know."

Old Lady Kimberly, she seemed kind of thoughtful over that; but she didn't say nothing about being slow starting. Says she:

"If you'd let us come we'd all be so glad to come and sit in your ranch room—it's new to us and we like it. I know my husband would like it very much. As for Katherine, I don't think I'll be able to keep her away after this."

Well, that afternoon, late, Katherine calls up on the telephone again—about the eighth time she had already that day—and she ast might her pa and ma and her come over that evening to see our ranch room. Of course Bonnie Bell told them to come.

"Well, what do you know, Curly?" says she to me. "This ain't according to Hoyle. Mrs. Kimberly ought to of waited till I returned her call, and till maybe one or the other of us had invited the other to a reception, or to a dinner or something."

"What's a reception?" says I.

"Something we never had yet, Curly," says she. "It's a place where people ain't happy; but there's plenty of 'em. Maybe tonight is the closest we've come to it."

Well, they all came that night, all three of 'em—twicet in one day, which was going pretty strong; and, like enough, something they hadn't never done before in all their lives.

"No you don't!" says Mrs. Kimberly when Bonnie Bell was going to take 'em into the parlor. "We're going right into the ranch room and sit there, all of us—mayn't we, please?"

So they come in and Old Man Kimberly he walked around and looked through the place; and he was like a kid.

"By golly, Wright!" says he. "I didn't know a alderman could have as much sense as this," says he. "This is the real goods," says he—"you can set down in one of those chairs and not break its legs off. And here's tobacco handy, and matches all over the place. Now over in the club all you get is a place to smoke and a big chair, and a fireplace to look into. Ain't a city a cold old place, John Wright?" says he.

"Well, you see," says Old Man Wright by and by—"you see, folks get to be pretty busy with one thing and another. I know they all mean right well," says he, "but they get so busy in a town like this they don't have time for anything."

That was about all that ever was said about our being neighbors on our street. Nobody apologized for not having done this or that. We just dropped in like we'd always been doing that way.

"Well, Alderman," says Old Man Kimberly after a time, "you certainly know how to live. I'm going to drop in here every day or so, evenings, because I can't get a match at the club without calling a boy, and here you can just reach out and get plenty."

"Come in as often as you like, neighbor," says my boss; and he fills his own pipe and passes the fine-cut.

Sometimes I think, after all, folks is a good deal alike inside, and what makes good in one place will in another. We used these people like we was all out on the Yellow Bull; and here was Old Man Kimberly feeling better than he had in two years and all of 'em glad to come back to our place. Which all happened right soon—and because of them two girls.

"Well," says Katherine's pa after a while, "if I had to choose I believe I'd rather be a ranchman out West than anything in the world. Tell me—what made you sell out and come East to live? Why couldn't you be content where you was at?"

"Well," says my boss, kind of smiling crooked out of the end of his mouth, "we come East to get some of the Better Things."

They looked then, both of 'em, over at the two young girls on the sofa. They was so busy talking they didn't know anybody was looking at 'em. When we was all quiet they both spoke out right at the same time. "I got mine at Madeleine's," Katherine was saying; and Bonnie Bell says: "We fry ours in butter." The Lord only knows what they'd been talking about; but it didn't make no difference.

Well, anyways, we all had quite a fine time, setting there in our ranch room, with the smoky mantelpiece and the old tables and chairs, and the sofa covered with a hide, where the two girls was setting.

By and by they all got up and said they had to go home. Old Man Kimberly he held out his hand to my boss, and they shook hands quite a while together, not saying very much.

"Will you come over some evening?" he ast Old Man Wright.

And he says:

"Shore!"

About then Katherine's ma was kissing Bonnie Bell some more—she seemed never to get tired of kissing Bonnie Bell. Then them two girls they walks off to the front door, their arms around each other. I seen 'em standing there under the light. By and by Katherine picks up Bonnie Bell's hand and looks it over, and there wasn't no rings on it.

"Are you engaged yet, Bonnie?" she ast.

Bonnie Bell kind of blushed at that.

"No," says she. "Are you?"

"No. Mommah says I'm too young," says she; "but then——"

"Yes," says Bonnie Bell; "but then——"

Old Man Wright he turns to me after they'd all went away.

"Well, Curly," says he, thoughtful, "I reckon we're coming on."

"Yes," says I; "but then——"



XIII

THEM AND THE RANGE LAW

When they all went home us three set quite a while in our ranch room, looking at the fire. It wasn't winter yet, but sometimes we lit the fire in the fireplace. Old Man Wright he seemed to be thinking of something, or trying to. At last he says:

"Sis, go get the fine-toothed comb and comb your pa's head—won't you, sis?" says he.

"Can't your barber do that for you?" ast she.

"He does; but no barber can really comb a alderman's head soothing," says he, "not like his own kid can. Now a alderman that's soothed proper might be induced to do almost anything, and combing him on his head is like scratching a pig along its back with a cob. You try it, kid; it might be perductive of a new car or something for you," says he.

So then she gets the comb and begins for to comb his head some, and he goes on talking with me. Evident he had something on his mind; that was the way he'd got used to think when something hard come up.

"Curly," says he to me after a while, "what would you say if we had a chance to buy in the Circle Arrow Ranch again?"

"I'd say it was the finest thing in the world," says I. "Them grangers ain't got a chance on earth. It takes a long course for to learn how to understand a cow's mind," says I.

"That's what they call sikeology in Smith," says Bonnie Bell.

"Well," says I, "you can't get no course in cow sikeology in no four years; it takes more than that on the range, like your pa and me done. They can't raise nothing out there in the Yellow Bull but cows, and they don't know how to raise them. Colonel," says I, "ain't them deferred payments deferring all right?"

"Some," says he. "They didn't pay nothing this year yet and it's way past due. Looks like there might be some trouble in there, don't it?"

"Well then," says Bonnie Bell, "where does that leave us? Look at this place; look at all our expense." She stopped combing then.

"Don't worry about that," says her pa. "We've made plenty of money other ways than that. For instance, I got a offer right now to sell out all our land below here toward the park for about three times what we paid for it. The Second Calvary Regiment wants to put up a barracks, or a armory or something, in there. Also, a French milliner wants in, just below here."

"What!" says Bonnie Bell. "That would ruin the whole Row. What do you mean by that?"

"Huh!" says her pa. "That's what they all say. Old Man Wisner was crazy when he heard something about it—he was going to get out a injunction. I hope he'll try it; for he can't. Seems like most of the things he's been trying on us he couldn't make go."

"Well, dad, I don't believe I'd like that barracks on our land either. Suppose we all think it over a little bit."

"All right," says he. "There may be other ways of having fun with Dave. I just thought of that one. Oh, well, I bought the lot north of them, and I'm thinking of putting a Old People's Home in there," says he. "Across the street from there I'm thinking of putting up a statue of Kaiser Wilhelm; some of my constituents they would come there Sunday and hold services," says he.

"Anything else you got on your mind, Colonel?" I ast him.

"Well, I just seen a chance to make a little speculation in a moving-picture company," says he. "I didn't put in much—only two, three hundred thousand dollars; but I didn't know but what it might make some money after a while. How would you like to be a actor man in our company, Curly?" says he. "The worst it could do would be to spoil a puncher that never was much good anyhow."

"No," says I; "it's too much like work."

"Well, we could make other pictures," says he, smiling contented. "For instance, we could set up two or three cameras right acrost the street from Old Man Wisner's 'most any morning. Then, when Old Man Wisner come out we could take his picture and show him how he looks when he has got a grouch. Or we could take a picture of the old lady getting in her car or getting out. Neither one of 'em has got much girlish figure now.

"Why, there's loads of pictures that we could take. If you didn't like to work much riding or anything in the movies," says he, "you could be taken leaning kind of careless on our gate and looking over the Wisners' fence—for instance, talking to their hired man.... Don't you dig my head no more, kid," says he. "I ain't no bomb-proof, like you think."

"Dad," says Bonnie Bell, "I ain't going to comb your head no more."

"Why?" says he.

"You're a mean and revengeful old man," says she. "It ain't right for us to treat our neighbors thataway," says she, "and I won't have it."

"I'm living up to my laws," says he, calm. "I've got to hand Wisner what he's trying to hand to me. You know the law that's been good enough for us. That's the range law."

"This ain't the range," says she.

"Ain't it?" says he. "This looks like a ranch house some. If you'll run your comb along over my dome, too, you'll find, unless I'm awful mistaken, something like the head of a cowman. Feel with your thumb good, Bonnie Bell," says he. "See if you can find any soft spot in there, like in a melon. See if you can find any place where it feels like I was going to lay down and let any yellow-livered son-of-a-gun try to ride me, and me not resent it," says he. "They started this and it's got to be finished—that's the law. Believe me, one way or the other, that old white-face over there is going to be a good oxen sometime, and he'll come up and feed outen my hand."

Bonnie Bell she quits combing and goes over and sets down on the lounge, and don't say nothing; nor me neither. We both knew about the old man when he started after anybody. He was that kind of a sher'f. It didn't look peaceful none to me what might happen now.

"Lock, stock and barrel?" says he to himself. "Lock, stock and barrel—that's the way we done. I dislike the color of their hair and eyes. Lock, stock and barrel," says he, "they got to settle! I don't want no truck with Dave Wisner, nor his old lady, nor their ox, nor their ass, nor their manservant, nor their maidservant, nor the stranger inside their gates—everything north of that fence is hostile to us and everything south of it is hostile to them. There's no crossing."

"Their maidservant and their manservant, dad?" says Bonnie Bell.

"You heard me!"

"What's their maidservant or their manservant got to do with it, dad?" ast she. She was setting on the lounge now, with the fine-tooth comb in her hand.

"He'd better not have nothing to do with it," said Old Man Wright. "Curly, you're foreman—see to it that not one of them crosses the line."

"All right, Colonel," says I; "orders is orders."



XIV

HOW THEIR HIRED MAN COME BACK

There was only one thing kept that armory from going up right on our flower beds. The weak side of Old Man Wright was, he couldn't help doing anything a woman ast him to do. This Katherine girl, one day she comes down to our place, with the paper in her hand, and she says to him:

"Look here, Colonel Wright," says she, "what's in the paper! Is that true?"

"If it ain't true," says he, "it may be before long."

"Why, Colonel Wright," says she, looking at him with her eyes wide open—and when she looked at you thataway couldn't no man help liking her—"I wisht you wouldn't do that, sir—please!" says she.

"Why not?" says he.

"Well," says she, "because."

He turns around and throws up both hands. He never said another word about it after that. But after a while the calvary regiment went somewheres else—on some more land he had bought, so it turned out. Nobody knew what changed his mind. It was Katherine, the first girl friend that Bonnie Bell had had in the city.

You see, Katherine used to come to our house regular now; her and Bonnie Bell was right thick together. One time Katherine come in quite excited.

"My brother Tom's coming back next week," says she. "Ain't that fine?"

"Is that so?" says Bonnie Bell. "I'd like to see him."

"Tom's going to live with us," says Katherine, "and be in the office downtown—unless he gets married, or something of that kind. I wisht he would. Now I wisht he would get engaged. I'd like to see how he'd act. You can't guess what I'd like!"

"No," says Bonnie Bell; "I can't."

"Well, he's awfully good-looking," says Katherine. "He hasn't got much sense though. He dances and can play a mandolin, and has been around the world a good bit. He's sweet-tempered, but he smokes too much. Sometimes of mornings he's cross. But you can't guess what I'd like!"

"No; I can't," says Bonnie Bell.

Then Katherine kissed her and taken her hands.

"Why," says she, "I'd like it awfully if you and Tom could hit it off together," says she. "I think it would be lovely—perfectly lovely! Then we'd be sisters, wouldn't we?" Bonnie Bell she blushed a-plenty.

"Why, how you talk!" says she. "I've never seen your brother yet and he's never seen me."

"I've told him you're lovely," says Katherine. "I'll bring him over sometime."

"I don't know how I could allow it after what you said," says Bonnie Bell; "but if he's as nice as you I'll jump right square down his throat. Could you ask me to do anything more than that?"

They giggled, then, and held hands, and ate candy and drank tea, and talked, both with their mouths full.

"Oh, look at the Wisners' new car!" says Katherine after a while, and she run to the window.

Their car was just coming in to the sidewalk at their curb now. From where I set I could see it. Their driver opened the door and Old Lady Wisner got out; then a young man. They both went out of sight right away around the fence—you couldn't see into their yard from where we set.

The girls by this time had got so sometimes they'd talk about the Wisners. Bonnie Bell says now:

"Why don't you call on the Wisners any more?"

"Oh, because," says Katherine. "We're friendly, of course, for the families have lived in here so long; but Mrs. Wisner and mommah haven't been very warm since the last Charity Ball business."

"I don't know about that," says Bonnie Bell.

"Oh, Lord! Yes," says Katherine. "They didn't speak for a while. You know, Honey, the Wisners are among our best people. But then, mommah's a Daughter of the Revolution and a Colonial Dame, and a Patriot Son, or something of the sort besides. Mrs. Wisner, she's only a Daughter and not a Dame; so she doesn't rank quite as high as mommah. Some said that she faked her ancestors when she come in too. Anyway, when she tried for the Dames they threw her down. Mommah was Regent or something of the Dames then too—not that I think mommah would do anything that isn't fair. But Old Lady Wisner got her back up then, and she's been hard to curry ever since. We don't try."

"Well," says Bonnie Bell, "isn't that strange? I thought everybody in the Row was friendly except—except——"

"Except the Wisners?" laughed Katherine. "But don't you worry. There's plenty of differences in the Row. They have their fallings out. You see, they all want to be leaders."

"I know," says Bonnie Bell. "In any pack train there always had to be one old gray critter, with the bell."

"That's it!" says Katherine. "Well now, all these leaders of our best people they want to carry the bell and go on ahead. That's what Mrs. Wisner wants—and maybe mommah, though she has a different way of doing things. Mommah's a dear! So are you, Honey; and I do wish Tom and you——"

"I was just wondering who it was got out of their car just now," says Bonnie Bell. "But the fence——"

"Ain't the ivy pretty on your side of your fence?" says Katherine.

Bonnie Bell stood in front of her and looked at her square.

"Look here, Kitty Kimberly, you're as sweet as can be and I love you, but don't try to keep up the bluff about that fence. They built it to keep us—to keep us——"

"Well, maybe," says Katherine. "But they can't."

"They built it to show us our place," says Bonnie Bell, brave as you like. "They didn't think that—they didn't know——"

"It was cruel," says Katherine, red in her face now, she was so mad about it. "I'm glad you mentioned that fence—I couldn't; but all my people said it was the meanest thing ever done. It was vulgar! It was low! That's what my mommah says. We were always sorry for you, but we didn't know how—— But, Honey, I'm glad you planted the ivy on it. It shows you're forgiving."

"We're not," says Bonnie Bell. "We're far from it—at least my dad. He's awful when you cross him. He won't quit—he'll never quit!"

"We all know that," says Katherine. "Everybody in the Row does."

"I don't know how much you know," says Bonnie Bell. "I don't know how much people have talked about us."

"Well, I can tell you one thing," says Katherine. "We heard some of the talk; and I want to say that it isn't favorable to the Wisners. There are others in town besides them. Tell me, Honey, aren't you all the way American?"

"Yes," says Bonnie Bell. "I can be a Daughter of the Revolution and a Colonial Dame, and a Patriot Son, and all the rest, so far as having ancestors is concerned."

"Could you?" says Katherine. "Then I rather guess you will!"

"We go back to the Carrolls a good deal, in Maryland," says Bonnie Bell. "You see, my mother married my father and went West, and out there we didn't pay much attention to such things. I didn't know they cared so much here. But my people were first settlers and builders, and always in the army and navy."

"How perfectly dear!" says Katherine. "We'll start you in as a Daughter; that'll make Old Lady Wisner mad, but she can't help it—mommah will take care of that. Then we'll make you a Dame next—that'll help things along. And when you're in two or three more of these Colonial businesses, where the Wisners can't get—well, then I'll be more comfortable, for one.

"I don't blame your poppah for feeling savage towards the Wisners," says she after a while. "Who're the Wisners anyways? Carrolls—huh! I guess that's about as good as coming from Iowa and carrying your dinner in a pail while you're getting your start selling sausage casings in a basket. I don't think a packer's much nohow. We're in leather.

"But, good-by," says she now. "I've got to go home. I've got to tell mommah to get those papers started. Pretty soon I'll bring Tom over."

Nothing much happened around our place for a little while. I didn't see nobody from the Wisners' and I didn't care to. Kind of from force of habit I used to walk up and down the line fence once in a while, just to have a eye on it. I done that one evening and walked back towards our garridge, for it seemed to me I heard some sort of noise down that way. It wasn't far from the end of the wall that was close to the lake. I set down and waited. It seemed to me like someone was trying to break a hole through the wall. I could hear it plunk, plunk, like someone was using a chisel or crowbar, soft and easy, like he didn't want to be heard. I waited to see what would happen.

By and by I seen a brick fall out on our side of the wall. I just picked it up and set there waiting to bust in the head of anybody that come through after the brick if he couldn't explain what he was about.

The fellow on the other side kept on working. He pulled bricks out on his side now. By and by I could see light through—it wasn't right dark in the yard yet. He pulled out the bricks and made quite a little hole close to the ground.

"Hello there!" says he, soft like. "Is that you, Curly?" says he.

"Who're you and what do you want?" says I.

"I am the hired man, Jimmie," says he. "I've come back."

"The hell you have!" says I. "Well, I can't talk to you. What made you come back? Where you been?"

"Out West," says he, "on the Circle Arrow Ranch."

"What's that!" says I. "What do you mean?"

"Just what I said. I've been working out there. I found I could rope a little and I didn't always fall off a horse. You see, the old man owns a lot in that company."

"Why didn't you tell me you was going out there?" says I. "And how come these folks to take you back?"

"They couldn't help it," he says. "I told you I had too much on them. You'd ought to see how things is going out there! They had to take me back."

"Well, what are you breaking a hole in our fence for?" says I. "Quit it! Do you want to get buried in a sunk garden, instead of on the lone prairee? Leave our fence alone."

"Your fence? It's our fence. Don't I know all about it? It was a damn shame, Curly."

"What business is it of yours?" says I to him.

"Well, I hate to see the family I work for make such fools of theirselfs." He was setting up close to the wall now, looking through. He went on talking: "If I put the bricks in again on my side, and you on yours, who'll know the hole's there?"

"We've got ivy on our side," says I. "It's green and 'most to the top of the wall. But I don't know now why you broke that hole through."

"Curly," says he, "I want to let Peanut through, so's he can have a good friendly fight with my dog once in a while. Sometimes I'll pull some of the bricks out. I reckon Peanut'll do the rest."

"Peanut'll not do no more visiting," says I; "and I've got orders not to have any sort of truck with anyone on your side of the fence."

He set quite a while quiet, and then says he:

"Is that so, Curly?" says he.

"It certainly is," I answered him. "When a thing starts, till it's settled you can't stop Old Man Wright. Sometimes he pays funeral expenses," says I, "but when anybody gets on the prod with him I never saw him show no sign of beginning to quit. He can't," says I; "none of them Wrights can."

"Do you mean they're all that way, Curly?"

"The whole kit of 'em, me included," says I, "and the servants within our gate, and our ox, and our hired girl, and all our hired men."

"Even the maidservant within your gates?" ast he of me.

"Shore!" says I. "Her especial and worst of any."

"But you don't take no hand in this war?" says he.

"That's just what I do," says I to him. "That's what a foreman's for. You'd better plug up that hole and stay on your own side of the fence."

He set quiet for a time and then he says:

"I'm darned if I do!"

"Good-by, Jimmie," says I.

"Oh, shucks!" says he. "I'll see you from time to time."

I didn't make no answer but to put the bricks back in the hole on our side.

Now for reasons of my own, not wanting to rile Old Man Wright, I didn't say nothing to him about this hole in the fence. Neither did I say anything to Bonnie Bell about the hired man having came back; because she was doing right well the last day or so, brighter and more cheerful than she had been. That, of course, was because of what Katherine'd told her about her brother Tom. Any girl likes to hear about a young man coming around, of course. Far as any of us could tell, Tom Kimberly might be all right.

Bonnie Bell now, all at once, she taken to wanting to go on the lake with her boat, and she insists our chauffore and her and me must go down and fix up the boat. We didn't none of us like it especial, but she said she hadn't been on the lake for so long she wanted to go once more before it got too cold.

I didn't know nothing about boats, but sometimes I'd go down to the boathouse and watch Bonnie Bell while she was tinkering with the engine or something. One day I went down to the boathouse about the middle of the afternoon, expecting to meet her out on the dock. All at once I hear voices out there, one of them hers. I stopped then, wondering who could of got on our dock.

There wasn't no way from the Wisners' yard to get on our dock now, because the door into their boathouse had been nailed up. The wall run clear down to their garridge, and their garridge faced onto the boathouse, which was lower down. The only way anybody could get on our dock from their place was to get in a boat and come round from the lake. Then it would of been easy.

I said I heard Bonnie Bell's voice. She was talking; who she was talking to, I didn't know.

"It's all wrong!" says she. "You are presuming too much. Of course I pulled you out of the lake—I would anybody; but your employers are not friends of ours. Even if they were you've no right in the world to speak to me."

Then I heard another voice. I knew it was Jimmie, their hired man. He spoke out and I heard him plain.

"I know I haven't," says he, "none in the world; but I've got to."

"You must not!" says she. "Go away!"

"I'll not," says he. "I can't help it! I tell you I can't help it."

Me being foreman, I reached around now to get hold of a brick or something. I couldn't help hearing what they said.

He'd been ordered off; yet here he was talking to Bonnie!



XV

THE COMMANDMENT THAT WAS BROKE

I stood close up to the boathouse door and was going to step out, but what the hired man was saying to Bonnie Bell was so nervy I had to stop. Besides, I wanted to hear what she'd say to show him his place.

"From the first minute I saw you," says he, "I couldn't help it. I swore then I'd meet you some day, and sometime——"

"Is this the way?" I heard her say, low.

"It's the only way I have," says he. "If there was a better, don't you think I'd take it? But what chance did I have? I had to make some way; I wouldn't of been any sort of man if I hadn't."

She must just of stood looking at him. I couldn't see.

"I had to find some way to tell you," says he. "What part have I had in this foolish squabble? Was that my fault? I'm only a servant now; but give me a chance to break out of that. Why, when I was out West——"

"Were you out West?" says she, sudden.

"Yes; in the Yellow Bull Valley, among the cowmen—among the real people. You came from that valley yourself."

"Yes, we did," says she; "and we'd far better of stayed there."

"You couldn't of stayed there," says he. "And besides, if you'd stayed there I'd never of met you, or you me."

"Indeed! Was that all my fortune—to meet the servant of my father's enemy?"

"It's all of mine! I'm not your enemy. But suppose now I went to your father and told him—what would he do?"

"He'd maybe kill you," says Bonnie Bell simply; "or else Curly would."

"I wouldn't blame either of them," says he. "I don't want to sneak around. I'm going away again——"

"What made you come back?" she says.

"Because I was sick in my heart. Because I thought I could look over once in a while and see you. But when I came back, here was this cursed fence and I couldn't see you any more. I thought I'd go mad. Maybe I have; I don't know."

"With or without the fence," says Bonnie Bell, "how could our circles cross, yours and mine?"

"Circles!" says he. "Circles! What are circles? I've heard this talk of circles all my life," says he. "I've seen it going on all around me. It's rot—rot! It's my misfortune to find one so far above me."

"My money?" says she, scornful. "I've a lot of it."

He didn't say a word to that for a long time.

"Did you really think that of me for a minute?" says he at last.

"You take it for granted that I've thought of you at all?" says she.

"I wouldn't of dared," says he—and it sounded like the truth, through the door. "Don't class me that way!"

"How can a girl tell?" says she. "Men talk like this to girls——"

"Have they talked to you? Who was it?"

"My social opportunities," says she slow and bitter-like, "seem to be confined to our neighbors' gardener."

"Don't!" says he. "Oh, don't! I don't want to see you hurt, even by your own tongue."

I never'd heard any man hand out any talk of this sort to any girl before. It was right interesting and I was glad I listened.

"How can a girl tell?" says she, like she was talking to herself.

"Shorely she can't tell all at once," he answers. "I'd never ask you to do more than wait. I'd want to go away and stay away till I could come in at your front door and be welcome," says he. "I wouldn't ask you to decide one thing now. But, as for me, I decided everything long ago."

She didn't say nothing.

"As to your money," says he after a while, "listen to me. Look at me—look close. Look into my eyes. Am I not honest? Tell me—if truth like mine can be mistaken for deceit, then what chance has any man on earth?"

She didn't answer, and he goes on like he had stepped up closer—I don't know but what he did.

"Look into my eyes," says he. "Look at me close. Maybe that'll help me some, for shorely you can see how much I——"

"Don't!" says she. "Don't!"

I don't believe she looked into his eyes at all.

"I wouldn't touch you," says he. "I wouldn't touch your hand—I wouldn't touch the hem of your garment. It wouldn't be right. It maybe ain't right for me to think of meeting you again; but it's right this once."

She didn't answer at all. He come to what seemed to trouble him.

"Is it the money?" he says again. "What's money if you've got nothing else?"

"Not much," says she; "not very much."

"I've not coveted it," says he. "It's another commandment I've broke. I've coveted that which was my neighbor's. I've coveted you—no more, so much! If you and I had a shack on the Yellow Bull out there, and forty acres to start with," says he, "out where the sun shines all the time, and the wind is sweet, and the mountains rise up around you——"

"Don't!" says she again. "Don't! Please go away—I can't stand that."

I couldn't stand it neither; so I opened the door.



XVI

HOW I WAS FOREMAN

They jumped apart—or farther apart—when I walked out. They wasn't holding hands, but she must of been looking at him and him at her.

"Miss Wright," says I, quiet—the first time I ever called her Miss Wright in all my life—"Miss Wright," says I, "come up to the house."

"Curly," says she, "oh, don't—don't!"

But she seen I didn't have no gun.

"Get across there quick!" says I to him.

"You overheard!" says he. "You overheard what I've been saying?"

"All of it," says I. "It was my business to. Of all the low-down things any man ever done in all his life, that's what you done now. I heard it all."

"Stop!" says he. "I won't stand that for a minute."

"You'll stand it for a lot longer than that," says I. "If you show this side the fence again I'll kill you!"

"Curly!" says he. "Why, Curly!"—like he was surprised. "Is it like that?"

"That's what it's like," says I. "Don't never doubt we can take care of our womenfolks. It's my own fault this has happened. I ought to of watched her closter. I ought never to of allowed you on our dock, let alone mixing with you. I thought you was more of a man than this," says I.

When I said that Bonnie Bell jumped and throwed her arms around my neck, and held on with both hands.

"Curly," says she, "stop! I'll not have this. Stop, I say!"

"You'll have this, and a lot more," says I to her, "till this thing is settled. Let me alone with him. Haven't your pa and me give up our lives for you? It's a fine trade you're trying to make; to trade us for a low-down coward like this. They built that fence, not us. Hell could freeze before your pa or me would ever cross it; but here you're talking the way you done with their hired man—that has sneaked around here to meet you."