toward the dim blue swamp land under the black lava mounds. Old Mount Shasta stood up majestically, snow-crowned and sunrise-flushed. The fresh keen air vibrated with sounds—honk of geese, song of spring birds, bawl of calf and low of cow. The pasture was alive with horses, cattle, pigs. Cocks were crowing, and out by the jumble of barns a cowboy whistled merrily.
Ina went downstairs and through the wide new hallway that connected with what had been the old house. Her father had made the mistake of erecting a large frame structure as an addition to the old half-log, half-stone house. It was significant that despite his rise in the ranching world he could not quite forsake his humble abode. And indeed he had his room and office there still. A kitchen had been added to the living room, which evidently, from the long tables and benches, was now a dining room for her father’s horde of cowboys.
Ina peeped into this dining room before she ventured farther. It was empty. Then she heard her mother in the kitchen. Ina ran through to surprise Mrs. Blaine helping the man-cook.
“Good morning, Mother. Where’s everybody?” cried Ina, gayly.
“Bless your heart, how you scared me!” ejaculated her mother, quite manifestly embarrassed. She was a large woman, gray-haired and somewhat hard-featured. “Nobody’s up yet, except me an’ your father.”
“Well! Why, Mother, Archie used to clean out the horse stalls, and Kate used to milk the cows!” retorted Ina, laughingly.
“They don’t any more,” replied Mrs. Blaine, shortly.
“I shall try, at least, to milk the cows.”
“Ina, your father didn’t give you a college education for that,” protested her mother, in vague alarm.
“But you used to milk cows and I’d never be above what you did,” said Ina, sweetly, and embraced her mother.
“Father has some big hopes for you, Ina,” returned Mrs. Blaine, dubiously. She did not quite know this long-lost, grown-up daughter. She seemed bewildered by circumstances of monumental importance, but which were unnatural.
“The cow-hands will be comin’ in for breakfast any minute,” she said. “You’d better go.”
“Why? I’d like to see them.”
“Your father said he’d not have any cowboys gallivantin’ round after you.”
“Indeed! But suppose I liked it,” retorted Ina, merrily. “You married dad when he was a cowboy.”
“But that was different, Ina.”
“I’d like to know how.”
“My child, I was a milkmaid on the Kansas farm where Hart Blaine was a hand. You’re the daughter of a rancher who will be a millionaire some day.”
“Mother, that last is very high-sounding, but it doesn’t impress me,” returned Ina, with seriousness. “Dad and I are going to have some arguments.”
“Ina, you were our most obedient child,” said Mrs. Blaine, divided between conjecture and doubt.
“I’ll still be, Mother dear—with reservations. And I’ll begin now by running off so the interesting cowboys will not get to see me, this time.”
Ina returned to the other part of the house, with a thoughtfulness edging into her happy mood. Her mother was plodding amid perplexities and complexities beyond her ken. The old simple hard-working farm life seemed to have been disrupted. Ina went to the sitting room, which she had explored yesterday and had found attractive in spite of its newness. There were some sticks of burning wood in the open fireplace. Ina liked that. A familiar fragrance, not experienced for a long time, assailed her nostrils. How warm and stirring the emotions it roused! Her girlhood again, trails and ponies and camp fires!
Ina curled up in a big chair before the fire, as she had been wont to do as a dreamy child, and was about to give herself up to the pleasure of retrospection when Dall came bounding in, pursued by Marvie. Sight of Ina interrupted hostilities. Dall was a gawky, growing girl of twelve and Marvie a handsome lad of fourteen, tow-headed and blue-eyed, as were all the Blaines except Ina. An animated conversation ensued, in which Dall reverted to her endless queries about college, Kansas, towns, and travel, while Marvie tried to tell about his horse and that on Saturday Ina must ride with him and go fishing.
In due time the oldest girl, Kate, came down wearing a dress rather unsuited to morning, Ina thought, and certainly not becoming. Kate Blaine was twenty-two, tall and spare, resembling her mother somewhat, but sharper of face and eye. She had not manifested any great delight in Ina’s return. Yesterday Ina had become aware of Kate’s close observance, flattering, yet somehow vaguely disconcerting. Ina’s consciousness had never been crossed by a thought other than loving all her people. She had been compelled to thrust something away from her mind.
“Marvie, you an’ Dall needn’t eat Ina,” said Kate, with a sniff. “She’s home for good. An’ ma says you’re to hurry up with breakfast, or be late for school.”
Ina followed them into the dining room, where Mrs. Blaine was waiting. It was a cheerful sunny room, well appointed, though elaborate for a rancher’s home.
“Where are dad and the boys?” asked Ina, as she seated herself.
“Bob an’ Fred have early breakfast with the cow-hands,” replied Mrs. Blaine, then added, reluctantly, “an’ sometimes your father does, too.”
Dall and Marvie sat one on each side of Ina, and she felt that they would save any situation for her. They were still too young to be greatly affected by whatever it was that had changed the elder Blaines. Ina sensed happily that she could bring much to her younger sister and brother. As for her mother and Kate, they began to force Ina to face the establishing of ideas that would be far from humorous.
“Ina, we ride in a buggy to school,” announced Dall, with just a hint of the importance so obvious in the others.
“I used to have to walk,” declared Ina. “Oh, maybe I don’t remember that long muddy road in the winter—dusty in summer!”
“Aw, I like the ridin’, but I hate the hitchin’ up,” said Marvie. “Say, Ina, paw lets me have the horse and buggy on Saturdays. Day after to-morrow is Saturday.”
“I’ll go anywhere with you,” replied Ina. “I want to ride horseback, too, Marvie. Has dad any saddle horses?”
“Say, where have your eyes been?” demanded the boy. “Pasture’s full of horses. So’s the corral and barn. An’ the cowboys tell me paw has ranches full of horses. He’s gone in with a big horse dealer, Less Setter, who has outfits all over the country. I’ve got two horses. Dall has a pony. Bob an’ Fred have a whole string. Just you tell paw you want California Red an’ see what happens.”
“Who’s California Red?” asked Ina, with interest. “Is he a cowboy or a horse?”
“He’s a wild stallion, the swiftest an’ beautifulest ever heard of. Red as fire! Too smart for all the wild-horse hunters. . . . Aw, Ina, I’d sure like to see you get California Red.”
“Marvie, you thrill me, but I want a tame horse, one I can saddle myself and ride and pet.”
“Wild mustangs make wonderful pets, once they’re broke proper.”
“Well, then, just for fun I’ll tell dad I want California Red, to see what happens.”
It was Kate who broke up this conversation and hurried Marvie and Dall to get ready for school. Ina went out with them, and made them let her ride as far as the end of the lane, to their immense delight.
The long lane had not changed. She remembered it, and the trees and rocks and bushes that bordered it. Facing back, she saw the green grove half hiding the white house, and the cluster of barns, new and old, and all around and beyond the wonderful level ranch land that had once been under water. Spring was keen in the morning air. Flocks of blackbirds swooped low and high. From somewhere came the honk of