though he didn’t look well. I told him you weren’t fond of strangers and had little time to give them, but that I thought you’d make him welcome. Indeed, there’s nowhere else for him to go, since his horse is lame and we so far from everybody. He lost his trail, he said. Was I right?”
Then his shadow fell across the sun-lighted floor and Jessica faced about. With a whisk of the saucepan, in which she was scrambling eggs, she added: “Well, right or wrong, here he is!” But she was talking to empty air, for her mother had disappeared.
CHAPTER IV
AN INTERRUPTED SUPPER
The young ranchwoman placed her pan in safety and ran out upon that north porch, where the table was already spread, to meet the visitor.
“Oh! I’m glad you’ve gotten here all safe. How did you do it? It’s a long walk for those who aren’t used to it. Even for those who are, too. Did you ride your horse? Was he better?”
She rattled off her questions without waiting for replies and to give him time to recover his breath, which he seemed to have lost. Then she poured him a glass of milk and urged him to drink it, with the remark:
“That’s Blandina’s own. She’s the house-cow. You’ll find it delicious. Don’t you?”
“It’s fine milk,” answered the other, cautiously; “but, if it isn’t too much trouble, a bit of ice would improve it.”
“Ice? Why, where could I get ice? Sometimes, in the winter, a little forms along the arroyo, but now–I’m very sorry, indeed. I’d be so glad to get it if I could.”
Mr. Hale swallowed the sickeningly warm liquid with a gulp and hastened to apologize.
“It wouldn’t be good for me if you could. My compliments to your house-cow, and I’m very grateful for my refreshment. You have a beautiful home.”
“Haven’t we? The prettiest in the world, I guess. My father thought so and my mother loves it. So do we all, but to her it is dearest. Because, you see, father and she have made it all it is. Please, just let me move your chair nearer the edge of the porch. So. Now, look away off to the east. Father said there could be no view more uplifting. He wished everybody who had to live in cities could see it. He knew it would make them better men.”
Magnificent though it was, Mr. Hale found his small hostess more interesting than the view.
“Your father–” he began, questioningly.
“Isn’t here, now. He passed heavenward a year ago. Since then nothing seems just the same, and dear mother is often sad and troubled. You know she wants to carry on all father’s experiments, she doesn’t want his ‘life work to be wasted,’ she says, and Antonio isn’t able to get as much money as he used to be. She tries so bravely not to let it fret her, and I don’t see where she is. She was in the kitchen with me. We were getting dinner because Wun Lung, the cook, cut his hand, and Pasqual isn’t to be trusted. Of course, he’s a good enough boy, can make beds and such things, but–cook! One must be very dainty to do that. My mother can cook deliciously! She taught herself everything and the why of it. When she and father came here they lived in that tiny adobe away at the end of the second row. Do you see it? By the old corridor. Their table was a packing box and they had just a little camping outfit. Now there’s all this.”
Jessica Trent’s sweet face glowed with loving pride in her fair home, but this was as nothing of the tenderness which filled her eyes as they now caught sight of a tall woman in black coming over the garden path.
“There she is, my mother!”
Mr. Hale rose as the lady drew near and one glance showed him what model “Lady Jess” had chosen as a type of that “perfect” breeding to which the little maid aspired. The mistress of Sobrante was a real gentlewoman, even though her gown was of cheapest print and her surroundings those of an isolated western ranch. Her daughter ran to cast a clinging, yet protecting, arm about her, and proudly turning toward their guest, presented:
“My mother, Mrs. Trent, Mr. –” and smiling waited for him to finish the sentence.
“Hale. I had forgotten to mention my name before, even though we have chatted so cosily. Permit me, madam.”
The card he offered bore the inscription:
“Mr. Morris Hale, Attorney at Law, 156 Broadway, New York.”
Watchful Jessica saw her mother’s face pale, while into her native cordiality of manner crept that slight hauteur with which she regarded the most objectionable of “tourists.” This, then, was one such, and the girl was sorry. She had liked the stranger so much and was already planning pleasant entertainment for him; but if her dear did not approve of him her own opinion went for naught.
Yet it was only the statement of the gentleman’s business that had caused Mrs. Trent’s momentary coldness, for at that time, though her daughter did not know this, the mere suggestion of law or lawyers disturbed her. But she was quick to feel the possible injustice of her fear and to atone for it by a deeper cordiality.
“You have come just in time to share our dinner, Mr. Hale, and we’ll not wait any longer for laggards. I was looking for the children. Jessie, dear, have you seen them?”
“Not since breakfast, mother. But they can’t be far away, for there’s Scruff yonder, trying to get into the alfalfa.”
“Antonio hasn’t come up, either, since the plucking. I wish he would while the food is fresh. If you’ll–”
“We needn’t wait for him, because I met him riding toward the foothills, as I came home. He’s probably off to the mines and that means an all-day’s trip. But I’ll help you dish up, and seek the boys, though they don’t often need seeking at mealtime. You sit right down with Mr. Hale, dear, and I’ll serve you. Pasqual can bring in the tureen, and I hope the eggs aren’t spoiled by waiting.”
“Is Scruff that mottled burro poking his nose through that fence?” asked the guest.
“Yes. He belongs to my little son, Ned, who shares him with his playmate, Luis. An inseparable trio, usually.”
“Then I’m the cause of their present separation. I rode that animal down from old Pedro’s cabin and at his advice,” Mr. Hale described his meeting with the two small lads, the fright they had given him, and his own desertion of them. “Though now I’m ashamed to recall how readily I consigned them to a tramp I was unwilling to take myself. I wish I’d brought them with me. We could have used Scruff’s back, turn and turn about.”
“Oh how could they! One misstep and they’d have been killed.”
“What is it, mother?” asked Jessica, seeing the lady’s hand shake so that she could scarcely serve the soup which formed the chief dish of their plain dinner.
“Only another prank of those terrifying children. Bound themselves–or had help to bind–and rode Scruff bareback up the canyon! They’re always ‘playing Indian,’ and I wish they’d never heard of one. It’s that Ferd eggs them on. He ‘dares’ them and–Excuse me, Mr. Hale. Mothers are anxious people. Try some of Jessie’s scramble, please. She is just learning to cook and likes to be appreciated.”
“But I didn’t see them, as I went up or down. They must have taken the long road around by the north end. Where the old Digger village is,” observed Jessie.
“A forbidden route. It’s to be hoped they’ll follow the shortest road home. If they’re not here in an hour one of the men must go to fetch them.”
Jessica laughed and kissed her mother.
“Don’t you worry, dear, and do, please, eat your dinner. Aren’t those children always having hairbreadth escapes, and are they ever hurt? Pedro’ll send them down in a hurry. He knows his mistress and her ways, and wouldn’t let her be troubled if he could help it. They’ll get no dinner at Pedro’s, and dinner is something they’ve never missed yet. Hark! Aren’t going to miss now! Listen. They’re fighting along home in their regular fashion. By the sound they’ve about got to prickly-pear hedge.