among the angels, is goin’ to feel uneasy.  But Texas talks a heap about his lady vigilante in the freight-car.’  ‘Vigilante!’ I said; and I must have jumped, for they all asked where the lightning had struck.  And in fifteen minutes after writing you I’d hit the trail for Separ.  Oh, I figured things out on that ride!” (Mr. McLean here clapped me on the back.) “Got to Separ.  Got the sheriff’s address—­the sheriff that saw her that night they held up the locomotive.  Got him to meet me at Edgeford and make a big talk to the superintendent.  Made a big talk myself.  I said, ’Put that girl in charge of Separ, and the boys’ll quit shooting your water-tank.  But Tubercle can’t influence ’em.’  ‘Tubercle?’ says the superintendent.  ‘What’s that?’ And when I told him it was the agent, he flapped his two hands down on the chair arms each side of him and went to rockin’ up and down.  I said the agent was just a temptation to the boys to be gay right along, and they’d keep a-shooting.  ’You can choose between Tubercle and your tank,’ I said; ’but you’ve got to move one of ’em from Separ if yu’ went peace.’  The sheriff backed me up good, too.  He said a man couldn’t do much with Separ the way it was now; but a decent woman would be respected there, and the only question was if she could conduct the business.  So I spoke up about Shawhan, and when the whole idea began to soak into that superintendent his eyeballs jingled and he looked as wise as a work-ox.  ‘I’ll see her,’ says he.  And he’s going to see her.”

“Well,” said I, “you deserve success after thinking of a thing like that!  You’re wholly wasted punching cattle.  But she’s going to Chicago.  By eleven o’clock she will have passed by your superintendent.”

“Why, so she will!” said Lin, affecting surprise.

He baffled me, and he baffled Jessamine.  Indeed, his eagerness with her parcels, his assistance in checking her trunk, his cheerful examination of check and ticket to be sure they read over the same route, plainly failed to gratify her.

Her firmness about going was sincere, but she had looked for more dissuasion; and this sprightly abettal of her departure seemed to leave something vacant in the ceremonies She fell singularly taciturn during supper at the Hotel Brunswick, and presently observed, “I hope I shall see Mr. Donohoe.”

“Texas?” said Lin.  “I expect they’ll have tucked him in bed by now up at the ranch.  The little fellow is growing yet.”

“He can walk round a freight-car all night,” said Miss Buckner, stoutly.  “I’ve always wanted to thank him for looking after me.”

Mr. McLean smiled elaborately at his plate

“Well, if he’s not actually thinking he’ll tease me!” cried out Jessamine “Though he claims not to be foolish like Mr. Donohoe.  Why, Mr. McLean, you surely must have been young once!  See if you can’t remember!”

“Shucks!” began Lin.

But her laughter routed him.  “Maybe you didn’t notice you were young,” she said.  “But don’t you reckon perhaps the men around did?  Why, maybe even the girls kind o’ did!”