Part 10 (2/2)
Nan had kept Rhoda so busy helping behind the tea table that the Western girl did not realize at once how the character of the party had changed. And shrewd Nan had got Rhoda to talking, too.
A query or two about Rose Ranch, something about the Navaho blanket Nan and her chum had bought for their couch--before she knew it the girl from the West was eagerly describing her home, and telling more in ten minutes about her life before she had come to Lakeview Hall than she had related to anybody in all the weeks she had been here.
”Rose Ranch must be a great place,” sighed Bess longingly.
”A beautiful country?” suggested Amelia.
”Magnificent views all around us,” Rhoda agreed softly. ”A range of hills to the southeast that we call the Blue b.u.t.tes. Many mesas on their tops, you know, on which the ancient Indian peoples used to till their gardens. There was a city of Cliff Dwellers not fifty miles from our house.”
”Sounds awf'ly interesting,” declared Laura.
”And winding through the Blue b.u.t.tes is the old Spanish Trail. Up from Mexico by that trail came the Spanish Conquistadors, they say,” Rhoda went on, quite excited herself now, in telling of her home and its surroundings.
”And I s'pose there's an electric car line running through those hills now--on the Spanish Trail, I mean?” laughed Laura.
”Well, no. We're not quite as far advanced as that,” the Western girl said, good-naturedly enough. ”But we don't have any Indian scares nowadays. The Indians used to ride through that gap in the Blue b.u.t.tes years ago. Now it's only Mexican bandits.”
”Never!” gasped Bess, sitting up suddenly.
”You don't mean it?” from Grace and Lillie in unison.
”You're just spoofing us, aren't you, Rhoda?” drawled Amelia Boggs.
”No, no. We do have Mexican bandits. There is Lobarto. He is no myth.”
”Fancy!” exclaimed one of the other girls. ”A live bandit!”
”Very much so,” said Rhoda. ”He has made us a lot of trouble, this Lobarto; although it has been six years since he came into our neighborhood last. He drove off a band of father's horses at that time. But our boys got after him so quick and chased him so hard that they say he took less back to Mexico with him than be brought over the border.”
”What does that mean?” asked Bess quickly.
”Why, he brought with him a lot of plunder, they say,” Rhoda explained, ”and he could not carry it back.”
”Then your folks got the plunder?” inquired Nan.
”Not exactly! Lobarto hid it. But our boys got back the horses. And they killed several of Lobarto's gang.”
”Mercy! Just listen to her!” cried Laura excitedly. ”Why! I was just making believe about your coming from the wild and woolly West; and you really do!”
”Not very woolly around Rose Ranch,” said Rhoda grimly. ”Father does not approve of sheep. The nesters make us trouble enough, without having sheepmen.”
”What are 'nesters'?” asked Amelia.
”I guess you'd call 'em 'squatters' farther East. We don't like them on the ranges. They are small farmers who come and take up quarter sections of the open lands and fence them in.”
”But is there really a treasure buried on Rose Ranch?” asked Nan, much more interested in this than she wished the others to observe.
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