Ted Strongs Motor Car | Page 5

the station, particularly when I wrote
you that I was coming this morning. I'm real mad." But her smiling face
belied the statement.
"You didn't say when you were coming," said big Ben, who was the
first to reach the carriage step and was helping Mrs. Graham to descend.
"If we had taken your general statement that you were coming, to meet
you at the station we would have camped right there forever. Never can
tell about your movements, young lady."
"But I did write that I was coming this morning, and to meet us and
take breakfast with us in the Butte."
"We didn't get that letter. When did you write?"

"Last night."
"That's good. Always take time by the fetlock. We'll get that letter
some time to-morrow. Why didn't you wait and write us to meet you
after you got here?"
"Saucy as ever, Ben. But we're positively starved. Hello, Song!" she
called to the Chinese cook, who was standing on the veranda grinning
like a heathen idol, "got anything good to eat?"
"Yes, missee, plenty good glub. Mebbeso you likee some fried ham and
eggs?" said Song, shaking hands with himself and bowing low.
"Ham and eggs! No! Positively, no! I'll be turning into a ham and egg if
I get any more of it. That's all the cook at the ranch knows how to do.
Anything else?"
"Yes, missee. Plenty paltlidge, what Misto Ted shootee lesterday. I
cookee you some plenty quick."
"All right, Song, cook us some partridges."
The boys stood around in a group of admiring servitors waiting to carry
Stella's hand bag and gun and saddle and other things with which she
was burdened.
Suddenly she looked toward the porch.
"Who's that?" she asked breathlessly, pointing to a little girl who stood
shyly beside a post looking on.
"Why, that's Lilian," said Ted. "I didn't know you were up yet," he
called to the little girl. "Come here, dear, and see Stella. You haven't
forgotten Stella, have you?"
"If it isn't Lilian!" cried Stella, rushing toward the child with wide-open
arms and folding her within them.
"I wouldn't have known you, honey," said Stella. "What have you boys
been doing to her? She's improved so much. Where did you get all
these clothes, and who takes care of her?"
"Isn't she a little beauty?" asked Ted Strong proudly, patting the head of
the blushing little girl.
"But how did you do it?" persisted Stella.
"Oh, I went over and saw Mrs. Bingham, the major's wife, at the fort,
and asked her to come and advise us what to do. She came and was
delighted with Lilian, and promised to oversee her wardrobe. She was
going down to Omaha, and when she returned she had a trunk full of
things for Lil. She also brought a colored woman to look after her, and

Mirandy has proved a blessing and a treasure."
"But the clothes didn't make themselves."
"No, and none of us made them, either, although Bud said he could sew,
and insisted upon trying. He cut up several yards of cloth, and at the
end of the week, when we saw the product of his needle, he narrowly
escaped lynching. If Lilian had not interceded for Uncle Bud, of whom
she is very fond, I'm afraid we'd have no little Buddy now. No, we sent
down to Omaha for a dressmaker and boarded her in town until she had
Lil all fixed up, as becomes the heiress of the La Garita Mines."
"Whose idea is this way of making the things?" demanded Stella, who
was looking Lilian over with critical eyes.
"Oh, we all had a finger in it. I sent away for a lot of fashion magazines
and things of that sort, and we sat up nights as a board of strategy and
picked out the sort of thing we wanted, and I reckon there isn't a
better-dressed kid in the State."
"I agree with you. Well, Ted Strong, you're a constant wonder to me.
Where in the world did you learn to do all the things you do so well?"
"The honeyed flatterer. Quit your joshing, Stella; hand it to Ben. He
likes it, and the thicker it is the more he can stand of it."
"Hello! Breakfast!" called Song from the veranda, and they all trooped
back to the living room to finish breakfast and talk about the things
they had passed through, and to lay plans for the coming round-up
festivities.
After breakfast Ted and Stella went out to the corral to look at the
saddle stock.
"Why, there's old 'Calamity Jane,'" cried Stella, as a bay pony came
trotting across the corral and put its velvet nose in the hand she held
out.
"Jane knows you, all right," said Ted.