“Do I obsehve yu regyarding oweh ‘settleahs,’ called settleahs ’cause they nevah settle?” Hank laughed gently, as one who has made a joke meet for ladies.  “I’ve known whole famblies to bohn an’ raise right in one of them wagons; and tuhn out a mighty fine, endurin’ lot, too, this hyeh prospectin’ round afteh somethin’ they wouldn’t reco’nize if they met.  Gits to be a habit same as drink.  They couldn’t live in a house same as humans, not if yu filled their gyarden with nuggets an’ their well with apple-jack.”

Miss Carmichael looked attentive but said nothing.  In truth, she was more afraid of Hank, his obvious gallantry, and his grewsome tales of boots with legs in them than she was of the unknown terrors of Lost Trail.

“I believe that is my stage,” she said, as a red conveyance not unlike a circus wagon halted at some little distance from the trading-store.  And as she spoke she saw four of her companions of the breakfast-table heading towards the stage, each with a piece of her precious luggage.  Mary Carmichael was precipitated in a sudden panic; she had heard tales of the pranks of these playful Western squires—­a little gun-play to induce the terrified tenderfoot to put a little more spirit into his Highland fling, “by request.”  She remembered their merrymaking with Simpson at breakfast.  What did they intend to do with her belongings?  And as she remembered the little plaid sewing-bag that Aunt Adelaide had made for her—­ surreptitiously drying her tears in the mean time—­when she remembered that bag and the possibility of its being submitted to ignominy, she could have cried or done murder, she wasn’t sure which.

“Well, ‘pon my wohd, heah ah the boys with yo’ baggage.  How time du fly!”

“Oh!” she gasped, “what are they going to do with it?”

“Place it on the stage, awaitin’ yo’ ohdahs.”  And to her expression of infinite relief—­“Yo’ didn’t think any disrepec’ would be shown the baggage of a lady honorin’ this hyeh metropolis with her presence?”

She thanked the knights of the lariat the more warmly for her unjust suspicions.  They stowed away the luggage with the deft capacity of men who have returned to the primitive art of using their hands.  She climbed beside the driver on the box of the stage.  Lone Tooth Hank and the cow-punchers chivalrously raised their sombreros with a simultaneous spontaneity that suggested a flight of rockets.  The driver cracked his whip and turned the horses’ heads towards the billowing sea of foot-hills, and the last cable that bound Mary Carmichael to civilization was cut.

III

Leander And His Lady