"Hello!" said Milt.

"Hel-lo!" said Claire.

"How dee do," said Mr. Boltwood.

"This is so nice! Where's your car? I hope nothing's happened," glowed

Claire.

"No. It's back here from the road a piece. Camp there tonight. Reason I

stopped---- Struck me you've never done any mountain driving, and

there's some pretty good climbs in the Park; slick road, but we go up to

almost nine thousand feet. And cold mornings. Thought I'd tip you off to

some driving tricks--if you'd like me to."

"Oh, of course. Very grateful----"

"Then I'll tag after you tomorrow, and speak my piece."

"So jolly you're going through the Park."

"Yes, thought might as well. What the guide books call 'Wonders of

Nature.' Only wonder of nature I ever saw in Schoenstrom was my friend

Mac trying to think he was soused after a case of near-beer. Well----

See you tomorrow."

Not once had he smiled. His tone had been impersonal. He vaulted the

fence and tramped away.

When they drove out of town, in the morning, they found Milt waiting by

the road, and he followed them till noon. By urgent request, he shared a

lunch, and lectured upon going down long grades in first or second

speed, to save brakes; upon the use of the retarded spark and the

slipped clutch in climbing. His bug was beside the Gomez in the line-up

at the Park gate, when the United States Army came to seal one's

firearms, and to inquire on which mountain one intended to be killed by

defective brakes. He was just behind her all the climb up to Mammoth Hot

Springs.

When she paused for water to cool the boiling radiator, the bug panted

up, and with the first grin she had seen on his face since Dakota Milt

chuckled, "The Teal is a grand car for mountains. Aside from

overheating, bum lights, thin upholstery, faulty ignition, tissue-paper

brake-bands, and this-here special aviation engine, specially built for

a bumble-bee, it's what the catalogues call a powerful brute!"

Claire and her father stayed at the chain of hotels through the Park.

Milt was always near them, but not at the hotels. He patronized one of

the chains of permanent camps.

The Boltwoods invited him to dinner at one hotel, but he refused and---* * * * * Because he was afraid that Claire would find him intrusive, Milt was

grave in her presence. He couldn't respond either to her enthusiasm

about canyon and colored pool--or to her rage about the tourists who,

she alleged, preferred freak museum pieces to plain beauty; who never

admired a view unless it was labeled by a signpost and megaphoned by a

guide as something they ought to admire--and tell the Folks Back Home

about.

When she tried to express this social rage to Milt he merely answered

uneasily, "Yes, I guess there's something to that."




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