Waiting no more explanations,they swarmed against the locomotive,and McLean pulled himself up on the step.The loud talking fell at a stroke to let business go on,and in this silence came the noise of a sliding-door.At that I looked,and they all looked,and stood harmless,like children surprised.For there on the threshold of the freight-car,with the interior darkness behind her,and touched by the headlight's diverging rays,stood Jessamine Buckner.
"Will you gentlemen do me a favor?"said she."Strangers,maybe,have no right to ask favors,but I reckon you'll let that pass this time.For I'm real sleepy!"She smiled as she brought this out."I've been four days and nights on the cars,and to-morrow I've got to stage to Buffalo.You see I'll not be here to spoil your fun to-morrow night,and I want boys to be boys just as much as ever they can.Won't you put it off till to-morrow night?"In their amazement they found no spokesman;but I saw Lin busy among them,and that some word was passing through their groups.After the brief interval of stand-still they began silently to get on their horses,while the looming engine glowed and pumped its breath,and the sheriff and engineer remained as they were.
"Good-night,lady,"said a voice among the moving horsemen,but the others kept their abashed native silence;and thus they slowly filed away to the corrals.The figures,in their loose shirts and leathern chaps,passed from the dimness for a moment through the cone of light in front of the locomotive,so that the metal about them made here and there a faint,vanishing glint;and here and there in the departing column a bold,half-laughing face turned for a look at the girl in the doorway,and then was gone again into the dimness.
The sheriff in the cab took off his hat to Miss Buckner,remarking that she should belong to the force;and as the bell rang and the engine moved,off popped young Billy Lusk from his cow-catcher.With an exclamation of horror she sprang down,and Mr.McLean appeared,and,with all a parent's fright and rage,held the boy by the arm grotesquely as the sheriff steamed by.
"I ain't a-going to chase it,"said young Billy,struggling.
"I've a mind to cowhide you,"said Lin.
But Miss Buckner interposed."Oh,well,"said she,"next time;if he does it next time.It's so late to-night!You'll not frighten us that way again if he lets you off?"she asked Billy.
"No,"said Billy,looking at her with interest."Father 'd have cowhided me anyway,I guess,"he added,meditatively.
"Do you call him father?"
"Ah,father's at Laramie,"said Billy,with disgust."He'd not stop for your asking.Lin don't bother me much.""You quit talking and step up there!"ordered his guardian."Well,m'm,Iguess yu'can sleep good now in there."
"If it was only an 'L.and N.'I'd not have a thing against it!
Good-night,Mr.McLean;good-night,young Mr.--""I'm Billy Lusk.I can ride Chalkeye's pinto that bucked Honey Wiggin.""I am sure you can ride finely,Mr.Lusk.Maybe you and I can take a ride together.Pleasant dreams!"She nodded and smiled to him,and slid her door to;and Billy considered it,remarking:"I like her.What makes her live in a car?"But he was drowsing while I told him;and I lifted him up to Lin,who took him in his own blankets,where he fell immediately asleep.One distant whistle showed how far the late engine had gone from us.We left our car open,and I lay enjoying the cool air.Thus was I drifting off,when I grew aware of a figure in the door.It was Lin,standing in his stockings and not much else,with his pistol.He listened,and then leaped down,light as a cat.I heard some repressed talking,and lay in expectancy;but back he came,noiseless in his stockings,and as he slid into bed I asked what the matter was.He had found the Texas boy,Manassas Donohoe,by the girl's car,with no worse intention than keeping a watch on it."So I gave him to understand,"said Lin,"that I had no objection to him amusing himself playing picket-line,but that I guessed I was enough guard,and he would find sleep healthier for his system."After this I went to sleep wholly;but,waking once in the night,thought I heard some one outside,and learned in the morning from Lin that the boy had not gone until the time came for him to join his outfit at the corrals.And I was surprised that Lin,the usually good-hearted,should find nothing but mirth in the idea of this unknown,unthanked young sentinel."Sleeping's a heap better for them kind till they get their growth,"was his single observation.
But when Separ had dwindled to toys behind us in the journeying stage Itold Miss Jessamine,and although she laughed too,it was with a note that young Texas would have liked to hear;and she hoped she might see him upon her return,to thank him.
"Any Jack can walk around all night,"said Mr.McLean,disparagingly.
"Well,then,and I know a Jack who didn't,"observed the young lady.
This speech caused her admirer to be full of explanations;so that when she saw how readily she could perplex him,and yet how capable and untiring he was about her comfort,helping her out or tucking her in at the stations where we had a meal or changed horses,she enjoyed the hours very much,in spite of their growing awkwardness.
But oh,the sparkling,unbashful Lin!Sometimes he sat himself beside her to be close,and then he would move opposite,the better to behold her.
Never,except once long after (when sorrow manfully borne had still further refined his clay),have I heard Lin's voice or seen his look so winning.No doubt many a male bird cares nothing what neighbor bird overhears his spring song from the top of the open tree,but I extremely doubt if his lady-love,even if she be a frank,bouncing robin,does not prefer to listen from some thicket,and not upon the public lawn.
