The Border Legion

The long ride had left her hot, dusty, scratched, with tangled hair

and torn habit. She went over to her saddle, which Kells had removed

from her pony, and, opening the saddlebag, she took inventory of her

possessions. They were few enough, but now, in view of an unexpected

and enforced sojourn in the wilds, beyond all calculation of value.

And they included towel, soap, toothbrush, mirror and comb and

brush, a red scarf, and gloves. It occurred to her how seldom she

carried that bag on her saddle, and, thinking back, referred the

fact to accident, and then with honest amusement owned that the

motive might have been also a little vanity. Taking the bag, she

went to a flat stone by the brook and, rolling up her sleeves,

proceeded to improve her appearance. With deft fingers she rebraided

her hair and arranged it as she had worn it when only sixteen. Then,

resolutely, she got up and crossed over to where Kells was

unpacking.

"I'll help you get supper," she said.

He was on his knees in the midst of a jumble of camp duffle that had

been hastily thrown together. He looked up at her--from her shapely,

strong, brown arms to the face she had rubbed rosy.

"Say, but you're a pretty girl!"

He said it enthusiastically, in unstinted admiration, without the

slightest subtlety or suggestion; and if he had been the devil

himself it would have been no less a compliment, given spontaneously

to youth and beauty.

"I'm glad if it's so, but please don't tell me," she rejoined,

simply.

Then with swift and business-like movements she set to helping him

with the mess the inexperienced pack-horse had made of that

particular pack. And when that was straightened out she began with

the biscuit dough while he lighted a fire. It appeared to be her

skill, rather than her willingness, that he yielded to. He said very

little, but he looked at her often. And he had little periods of

abstraction. The situation was novel, strange to him. Sometimes Joan

read his mind and sometimes he was an enigma. But she divined when

he was thinking what a picture she looked there, on her knees before

the bread-pan, with flour on her arms; of the difference a girl

brought into any place; of how strange it seemed that this girl,

instead of lying a limp and disheveled rag under a tree, weeping and

praying for home, made the best of a bad situation and unproved it

wonderfully by being a thoroughbred.

Presently they sat down, cross-legged, one on each side of the

tarpaulin, and began the meal. That was the strangest supper Joan

ever sat down to; it was like a dream where there was danger that

tortured her; but she knew she was dreaming and would soon wake up.

Kells was almost imperceptibly changing. The amiability of his face

seemed to have stiffened. The only time he addressed her was when he

offered to help her to more meat or bread or coffee. After the meal

was finished he would not let her wash the pans and pots, and

attended to that himself.