Code of the West. Zane Grey

then turned to Miss Stockwell with more of a serious consideration of the matter. “Miss Mary, I’m needin’ Serge an’ Boyd tomorrow, an’ so none of us can meet your sister. But shore any of the rest of my obligin’ an’ lady-killin’ outfit can get off for the day.”

      “Thank you, Enoch,” replied the teacher, and thus fortified by his permission, she turned again to the boys to inquire sweetly: “Now which one of you will do me this favor?”

      As her gaze surveyed them all collectively they remained mute, thoughtful, very far away; but when she singled out Pan Handle Ames to look directly at him, he drawled:

      “Miss Mary, air you forgettin’ how I drove you home from the school-house one day?”

      “Indeed I’m not!” returned Miss Stockwell, with a shudder. “Driving automobiles is not your forte.”

      “Wal, it shore ain’t. But all the same, I’d ’a’ got you home if the car had held together,” replied Pan Handle, and then settled back coolly to enjoy his cigarette. He knew he was out of the reckoning.

      Then it seemed incumbent upon the others to face Miss Stockwell, ready to answer her appealing and reproachful gaze, when it alighted upon each of them.

      Dick Thurman was the youngest of the boys, and he was still in school. “You know, teacher, I’d go, if it wasn’t for lessons. I’m behind now, you say, an’ father keeps me busy before an’ after school.”

      Lock Thurman was the dark-skinned, dark-eyed, and dark-haired member of the family, a young man of superb stature, and the quietest, shyest of all the clan.

      “Lock, please, won’t you go?” asked the teacher.

      He shook his head and dropped it, to hide his face. “I reckon I’m afeared of women,” he said.

      “Huh! Why don’t you say you’re afeared of thet there girl of yourn—Angie Bowers?” retorted his brother Wess.

      “I ain’t no more afeared of her than you are of her twin sister Aggie,” responded Lock.

      “Wal, when you cain’t tell which is Angie an’ which is Aggie—all the time mixin’ up your gurls—you oughta be scared. What’ll you do if you ever git married?” spoke up Serge.

      This might have led to another argument had not Miss Stockwell broken in upon them by appealing to Wess.

      “Teacher, I just hate to tell you I cain’t go for your sister,” replied Wess, in apparent deep sincerity. “I got a lot to do tomorrow, an’ shore need that day off Enoch said we could have. My saddle’s got to be mended, an’ my boots need half-solin’, an’ father’s at me to begin doctorin’ the dog’s feet—for we’ll be chasin’ bear soon—an’ mother wants a lot done—an’ I just cain’t go to Ryson. Ask Arizona there. He can leave off cuttin’ sorghum for tomorrow.”

      Thus directed, Miss Stockwell turned to the young man designated as Arizona. If he had another name she had never heard it. He was the only one of small stature in the group, a ruddy-faced, blinking-eyed rider, with a reputation for humor that his appearance belied.

      “Aw, Miss Stockwell, I’m ’most sick because I cain’t oblige you,” asserted this worthy, in the most regretful of voices. “But old Hennery gave me plumb orders to cut thet sorghum before it rains.”

      “Wal,” spoke up Wess, “it hasn’t rained for a month an’ it’ll go dry now till October.”

      “Nope. It’s a-goin’ to rain shore aboot day after tomorrer. See them hazy clouds flyin’ up from the southwest. Shore sign of storm. You get Con to go.”

      Con Casey, the comrade now referred to by Arizona, was a newcomer to the Thurman range, an Irishman only a few years in America and not long in the West. He was the most earnest and simple-minded of young men, and a source of vast amusement to his comrades. They liked him, though they made him the butt of their jokes and tricks.

      When the teacher appealed to Con he sat up, startled. His solemn freckled face lost its ruddy color, his big pale-blue eyes dilated and stared. There was no mistaking his sincerity or his fright.

      “My Gawd!” he ejaculated, in deep solemn tones, “Miss Stockwell, shure I niver was alone wit’ a woman in me loife.”

      The boys guffawed at this, and cast sly banter at him, but there was no doubt that they believed him.

      Miss Stockwell wore a manner of great anxiety which was really not in strict harmony with her true feelings. She was enjoying the situation hugely, and saw that it would probably work out exactly as she had hoped. Then what a climax on the morrow, when Georgiana appeared on the scene!

      Tim Matthews, another rider, added his ridiculous excuse to avoid meeting the teacher’s sister; and the last one, excepting Cal Thurman, nonchalantly made a statement that he was not very well and might soon be having the doctor from the village.

      At that Cal slouched up with all his five-foot-eleven of superb young manhood and surveyed his brothers and comrades in amused derision.

      “You’re a lot of boobs, I’ll tell the world,” he said.

      Miss Stockwell thrilled at this, and felt the imminence of something she had hoped for. This nineteen-year-old son of Henry Thurman’s was, in her opinion, the finest of the whole clan. He had all the hardiness, simplicity, and ruggedness of the Tonto natives, and somewhat more of intelligence and schooling. He seemed more modern and was fairly well read. Cal had spent his last year of school under Miss Stockwell and he had been a good student. His grandfather had been a Texan and a Rebel noted for his wild fiery temperament, which, according to family talk, Cal had inherited.

      “Teacher, I’ll be glad to go meet your sister,” he declared, turning to her. “I was only waitin’ to see how they’d wiggle out of it.”

      “Thank you, Cal. I’m certain you won’t be sorry,” replied the teacher, gratefully. She was indeed pleased, and now began to revolve in mind just how to prepare Cal for the advent of Georgiana. Certainly up to that moment it had not occurred to her to go on with the deception.

      “She’s to come on the stage from Globe?” inquired Cal, as he walked with Miss Stockwell toward the corral gate.

      “Yes. Tomorrow.”

      “What’ll I take—the buckboard or car?”

      The teacher thought that over a moment.

      “It’s an awful old clap-trap—that bundle of rusty iron,” observed the teacher, remembering her few experiences in the family automobile. “I don’t believe it’s as safe as the buckboard.”

      “Sure I’ll get her here safe,” replied Cal, with a laugh.

      By this time they had reached the corral gate, which he opened for her. Suddenly loud cries of mirth resounded from the boys back by the barn. The teacher turned with Cal to see what had occasioned them such amusement. Some of them were standing with their heads close together and were apparently conversing earnestly. Their very air intimated deviltry and secrecy.

      Cal gazed at them suspiciously, and a darker fire gleamed in his eyes. He had a smooth, almost beardless face, clear brown tan, and less of the leanness and craggy hardness that characterized his brothers’ features. He looked something better than handsome, the teacher thought.

      “Say, that outfit is up to tricks,” he muttered. And he pushed back his huge sombrero to run a sinewy hand through his brown hair.

      “Tricks?” echoed Miss Stockwell, vague. Had she better not divulge her own duplicity?

      “Sure. Just look at Tim. He’s plannin’ something now. He always wags his head that way when he’s . . . Aw, I can read their minds.”

      “What are they going to do?” inquired Miss Stockwell, curiously.

      “They’ll be in Ryson tomorrow when I meet your sister,” he answered,