A Summer in a Canyon | Page 7

said Mrs.
Howard. 'I thought we could take two days for the journey, sleeping at
the Burtons' ranch on the way. The doctor says that if she can get
strength enough to bear the ride, the open-air life will do her good, even
if she does nothing but lie in the hammock.'
'And be waited upon by six willing slaves,' added Polly.

'And be fed on canned corned beef and tomato stew,' laughed Bell.
'Not a bit of it,' said Margery. 'Hop Yet is a splendid cook, if he has
anything to cook, and we'll feed her on broiled titbits of baby venison,
goat's milk, wild bees' honey, and cunning little mourning doves,
roasted on a spit.'
'Good gracious,' cried Bell, 'what angels' food! only I would as soon
devour a pet canary as a mourning dove. But to think that I've been
trying to diet for a week in order to get intimate with suffering and
privation! Polly came to stay with me one night, and we slept on the
floor, with only a blanket under us, and no pillow; it was perfectly
horrid. Polly dreamed that her grandfather ate up her grandmother, and
I that Dicky stabbed the Jersey calf with a pickle-fork.'
'Horrors!' ejaculated Margery; 'that's a pleasant prospect for your future
bedfellows. I hope the gophers won't make you nervous, gnawing and
scratching in the straw; I got used to them last summer. But we really
must go, darling,' and she stooped to kiss Elsie good- bye.
'Well, I suppose you ought,' she answered. 'But remember you are to
start from this gate; Aunt Truth has promised me the fun of seeing you
out of sight.'
The girls went out at a side door, and joined the boys, who were busily
at work cleaning their guns on the broad western porch.
'How are you coming on?' questioned Polly.
'Oh, finely,' answered Jack, who always constituted himself chief
spokesman, unless driven from the rostrum by some one possessed of a
nimbler tongue. 'I only hope your feminine togs are in half as good
order.'
'We take no baggage to speak of,' said Bell, loftily. 'Papa has cut us
down to the very last notch, and says the law allows very few pounds
on this trip.'

'The less the better,' quoth Geoff, cheerily; 'then you'll have to polish up
your mental jewels.'
'Which you consider imitation, I suppose,' sniffed Polly.
'Perish the thought!' cried Jack. 'But, speaking of mental jewels, you
should see the arrangements Geoff has made for polishing his. He has
actually stuck in six large volumes, any one of which would be a
remedy for sleeplessness. What are you going to study, Miss Pol-y-
on-o-mous Oliver?'
'Now, Jack, let us decide at once whether you intend to be respectful or
not. I don't propose to expose myself to your nonsense for two months
unless you make me good promises.'
'Why, that wasn't disrespectful. It is my newest word, and it simply
means having many titles. I'm sure you have more than most people.'
'Very well, then! I'll overlook the irreverence this time, and announce
that I shall not take anything whatever to read, but simply reflect upon
what I know already.'
'That may last for the first week,' said Bell, slyly, 'but what will you do
afterward?'
'I'll reflect upon what you don't know,' retorted Polly. 'That will easily
occupy me two months.'
Fortunately, at the very moment this stinging remark was made, Phil
Noble dashed up to the front gate, flung his bridle over the
hitching-post, and lifted his hat from a very warm brow.
'Hail, chief of the commissary department!' cried Geoffrey, with mock
salute. 'Have you despatched the team?'
'Yes; everything is all right,' said Phil, breathlessly, delivering himself
of his information in spasmodic bursts of words. 'Such a lot of work it
was! here's the list. Pancho will dump them on the ground and let us

settle them when we get there. Such a load! You should have seen it!
Hardly room for him to sit up in front with the Chinaman. Just hear
this,' and he drew a large document from what Polly called 'a
back-stairs pocket.'
'Forty cans corned beef, four guns, three Dutch cheeses, pickles,
fishing-tackle, flour, bacon, three bushels onions, crate of dishes, Jack's
banjo, potatoes, Short History of the English People, cooking utensils,
three hair pillows, box of ginger-snaps, four hammocks, coffee,
cartridges, sugar, Macaulay's Essays, Pond's extract, sixteen hams,
Bell's guitar, pop-corn, molasses, salt, St. Jacob's Oil, Conquest of
Mexico, sack of almonds, flea-powder, and smoked herring. Whew! I
packed them all myself.'
'In precisely that order?' questioned Polly.
'In precisely that order, Miss Oliver,' returned Phil, urbanely. 'Any one
who feels that said packing might be improved upon has only to mount
the fleet Arabian yonder' (the