“To meet _you_, I guess,” corrected Burton.
The old man looked at him quizzically. “Waal, Ah guess thet is more technically keerect,” he admitted. “Ah ain’t sayin’ she’s comin’ out particular to meet you _this trip_.”
There was an emphasis on the last words which Burton had not fathomed when a chestnut horse swung up beside the wagon, and a young girl, as brown and lithe as her beautiful mount, brought her gauntletted hand down with a resounding smack on Mr. McKay’s shoulder.
“Ho, Dad,” she cried, “you’re a sight for the angels.”
“Yep,” assented the old man, “fer my angel, Ah reckon that’s right.”
“I declare,” laughed the girl, “how you do learn those cunning speeches when you go to town! Tell me, now, who taught you that?”
“You’re gettin’ a bigger tease than ever, Kid. Tell me, how’s ever’thing goin’ on the farm?”
“Oh, that’s too big an order. I know I have been all right—fine—fit. But say, Dad, haven’t you forgotten something?”
“Waal, that might be, easy enough,” said the farmer, looking back and surveying the heavy load. “There’s the binder twine and the groceries and machine oil an’ the mail——”
“Dad, you’re a chump. Here you let me live in the wilderness, with nothing more exciting than bronchoes and mustangs, and when a real live—possibility—comes along you—you won’t even introduce me!” The sentence ended in a burst of mimic sobbing.
“Waal, by hang, one does sorta ferget his sassiety manners, usin’ ’em so little. This is my daughter Kid——”
“All right. Kath-er-een. Kate for short. Kid fer shorter. She allus gets shorter——”
But by this time the chestnut had flashed around to the other side of the wagon, and the girl had ridden up beside Burton.
“All right, Dad,” she interrupted. “I am sufficiently designated. Now tell me _his_ name.”
“Waal, thet’s just what Ah’m kinda killin’ time over. Ah did hear his name too, but hang me if Ah ain’t plumb fergot it.”
Burton looked up in the bright face now close by his side. “I find I must always assist your father in a case of this kind,” he said, smiling. “And as he does not appear to be much of a formalist—just call me Ray.”
“That sounds like starting in the middle of a book,” laughed the girl.
“The first chapters are only preliminary, anyway,” said Burton.
