The Lonesome Trail and Other Stories | Page 7

"Don't get off," she commanded. "I can mount alone--and you'll have to
carry the box. It's going to be awkward, but you would have me go."
Weary took the box and prudently remained in the saddle. Glory,
having the man he did for master, was unused to the flutter of women's
skirts so close, and rolled his eyes till the whites showed all round.
Moreover, he was not satisfied with that big, white thing in Weary's
arms.
He stood quite still, however, until the schoolma'am was settled to her
liking in the saddle, and had tucked her skirt down over the toe of her
right foot. He watched the proceeding with much interest--as did

Weary--and then walked sedately from the yard, through the pebbly
creek and up the slope beyond. He heard Weary give a sigh of relief at
his docility, and straightway thrust his nose between his white front feet,
and proceeded to carry out certain little plans of his own. Weary, taken
by surprise and encumbered by the box, could not argue the point; he
could only, in range parlance, "hang and rattle."
"Oh," cried Miss Satterly, "if he's going to act like that, give me the
box."
Weary would like to have done so, but already he was half way to the
gate, and his coat was standing straight out behind to prove the speed of
his flight. He could not even look back. He just hung tight to the box
and rode.
The little gray was no racer, but his wind was good; and with urging he
kept the fleeing Glory in sight for a mile or so. Then, horse and rider
were briefly silhouetted against the sunset as they topped a distant hill,
and after that the schoolma'am rode by faith.
At the gate which led into the big Flying U field she overtook them.
Glory, placid as a sheep, was nibbling a frayed end of the rope which
held the gate shut, and Weary, the big box balanced in front of him
across the saddle, was smoking a cigarette.
"Well," greeted Miss Satterly breathlessly, and rather tartly, "only for
you having my dress, I'd have gone straight back home. Do brothers
always act like this?"
"Search me," said Weary, shaking his head. "Anyway, yuh better talk
to Glory about it. He appears to be running this show. When I rode out
to your place, I didn't have any bit in his mouth at all. Coming back,
I've got one of Joe Meeker's teething rings, that wouldn't hold a pet
turkey. But we're going to the dance, Miss Satterly. Don't you worry
none about that."
Miss Satterly laughed and rode ahead of them. "I'm going," she
announced firmly. "It's leap year, and I think I can rustle a partner if
you decide to sit and look through that gate all night."
"You'll need your pretty dress. Glory ain't much used to escorting
young ladies, but he's a gentleman; we're coming, all right."
It was strange, perhaps, that Glory should miss the chance of proving
his master a liar, but he nevertheless ambled decorously to Dry Lake
and did nothing more unseemly than nipping occasionally at the neck

of the little gray.
That is how Weary learned that large, brown eyes do not look sidelong
at a man after the manner of long, heavy-lidded blue ones; and that,
also, is how he came to throw up his head and deny to himself and his
world that he ever was shy of women.

PART TWO
Weary rode stealthily around the corner of the little, frame
school-house and was not disappointed. The schoolma'am was sitting
unconventionally upon the doorstep, her shoulder turned to him and her
face turned to the trail by which a man naturally would be supposed to
approach the place. Her hair was shining darkly in the sun and the
shorter locks were blowing about her face in a downright tantalizing
fashion; they made a man want to brush them back and kiss the spot
they were caressing so wantonly. She was humming a tune softly to
herself. Weary caught the words, sung absently, under her breath:
"Didn't make no blunder--yuh couldn't confuse him. A perfect wonder,
yuh had to choose him!"
The schoolma'am was addicted to coon songs of the period.
She seemed to be very busy about something and Weary, craning his
neck to see over her shoulder, wondered what. Also, he wished he
knew what she was thinking about, and he hoped her thoughts were not
remote from himself. Just then Glory showed unmistakable and
malicious intentions of sneezing, and Weary, catching a glimpse of
something in Miss Satterly's hand, hastened to make his presence
known.
"I hope yuh aren't limbering up that weapon of destruction on my
account, Schoolma'am," he observed mildly.