Part 10 (1/2)

”Where are you going with that towel?” Jane asked him.

The lad laughingly dived again into the packing trunk and brought out another. ”Let's go to the creek to wash,” he suggested. ”I haven't even seen it yet, and I'm ever so eager to feel that cold mountain water dash into my face.” Then in a low tone he whispered close to his sister's ear, ”The children have a surprise for us, Jane, and so let's be very much surprised and not disappoint them.”

Jane shrugged. To her, children and their ways had to be endured, but she took no interest in what they did or did not do. However, she accompanied her brother around the house.

She glanced at him with a sense of satisfaction, which was, as usual, prompted by selfishness. If Dan seemed so much better in one day, he might be so well by the end of a fortnight that she would not need to remain with him. If she were sure that all was to be well with him, she would return to Merry. The lad, not dreaming what her thoughts were, caught her hand boyishly. ”Oh, Jane,” he cried as he pointed ahead, ”can you believe it, Sister-pal, that is our very own mountain stream! Isn't it a beauty?”

The sunlight, falling between the pines, lighted the narrow, rus.h.i.+ng, whirling little mountain brook, which sparkled and seemed to sing for the very joy of being. Standing on its edge, Dan looked up the mountain along the course the brook had come. ”See,” he cried jubilantly, ”wherever the sunlight filters through, it gleams as though it were laughing. Dad said that it springs out just below the rim rock. Oh, I do hope by next week I will be able to climb up that high.”

Jane's glance followed her brother's up the rough, rocky mountain side and she shook her head. ”I'll never attempt it,” she decided, but Dan whirled, laughing defiance. ”I'm going to prophesy that you'll climb the rim rock before a fortnight is over.”

Then kneeling, he splashed the clear, cold water in his face and reached for the towel that Jane held. Then he implored her to do the same. With great reluctance she complied, and so cool and restful did she find it, that she actually smiled, almost with pleasure.

But Dan had the misfortune to say the wrong thing just then. ”I suppose this brook, or one like it, is all the mirror that the mountain girl, Meg Heger, has ever had,” he began, when he sensed a chill in his sister's reply.

”I certainly do not know, nor do I care.” Then she added, as an afterthought, ”And I shall never find out.”

CHAPTER XIV.

FRETFUL JANE

Luckily Dan had succeeded in changing his sister's thought before they returned to the cabin, and he vowed inwardly that he would never again mention Meg Heger, since Jane had taken such a strange dislike to her.

How one could dislike a girl one had barely seen was beyond his comprehension, but girls were hard to understand, all except Julie. She was just a wholesome, helpful little maid with a pug-nose that was always freckled.

”Now for the surprise!” Dan said as they neared the cabin.

”Well, I certainly hope it is something to eat,” Jane began, with little interest, but when the two children threw open the front door and she saw the table in the living-room close to the wide window with four places set, she delighted the little workers by announcing that it was the best sight she had beheld that day. Then, when Jane and Dan were seated, Julie and Gerry skipped to the kitchen and returned with as tempting a lunch as even Jane could have wished for. There was creamed tuna on toast and jam and a heaping plate of lettuce sandwiches and two of the Rockyford melons for which Colorado is famous. Then there was for each a gla.s.s of creamy milk.

”Great!” Dan exclaimed. ”I didn't know we were going to be able to get milk.”

Julie nodded eagerly. ”It comes from the Packard ranch, fresh to the inn every day, and Mrs. Bently said she would send us two quarts every time the stage comes up our road, which usually is three times a week. We can keep it cool as anything in the creek. Mrs. Bently told us how.”

”After lunch can we get out the guns, Dan?” Gerald asked when he had hungrily gulped down a sandwich.

”Why, I guess so,” the older boy laughed good naturedly. ”You aren't expecting a bear to find out this soon, are you, that we have some supplies that he might wish to devour?”

Julie looked anxiously toward the open door of the cabin. ”Don't you think maybe we'd better keep that door closed when we're eating?” she asked anxiously. ”You know Dad said he and mother were sitting right here where we are, maybe, one morning at breakfast, when mother looked up and there was an old grizzly standing in the open door. He had been around to the kitchen and had eaten up all the supplies he could find and he was hunting for more.”

Gerald chimed in with: ”It was lucky Dad kept his big gun always standing in the corner. I suppose it was right there, near you, Dan, so he could just grab it and shoot.”

The children were watching the door as though they expected at any minute that another grizzly might appear. Dan laughed at them. ”We might as well have stayed at home if we are going to stay in the cabin and keep the door closed,” he told them. ”I'm going to suggest that we put the table on that nice porch just outside of the kitchen. That will make an ideal outdoor dining-room, with a big pine tree back of it to shelter us from the sun. It will be handy to the kitchen, and, what is more, a bear simply could not scale up that wall beyond the ledge.” Then, very seriously, the older brother addressed the younger two. ”Julie, I don't want you or Gerald to go close to that cliff. It's too dangerous.”

Honest Gerald blurted in with, ”We did go once, Dan. We squirmed out on our tummies till we could look 'way down, and I tell you it made us dizzy. We won't ever want to do it again.”

After lunch the children announced that they would do up the dishes if Dan would give them a lesson in shooting the big gun when they were through. ”Well,” the older boy smilingly conceded, ”I'll try to teach you to handle the smaller gun; yes, both of you,” he a.s.sured Julie, who was making an effort to attract his attention by motions behind Jane's back.

”You really ought to both know how to use it. You might need to know how some time to protect yourselves.”

”What shall you do, Jane, while we are learning to shoot?” Julie inquired when the kitchen had again been tidied and the children were ready for their very first lesson with the small gun.

”Maybe Jane'll want to learn too,” Gerald suggested, but the older girl declared that she simply could not and would not touch one of the dreadful things.