Connie Carl at Rainbow Ranch

Copyright MCMXXXIX By
The Goldsmith Publishing Company
MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Contents
“I’ll take your luggage now, Miss,” said the colored porter politely. “We’ll be a-pullin’ into Red Gulch in five minutes.”
“Yes, I know,” replied the girl softly, without shifting her gaze from the window.
For the past hour Connie Carl had been watching the horizon beyond the flashing telegraph poles. A faint cloud-like blue line which represented New Mexico’s mountains—her mountains—had steadily moved closer. She was going home at last, home to Rainbow Ranch.
At first glance a stranger never would have taken Connie Carl for a Westerner. The girl was neatly dressed in a blue suit with gray suede slippers, and a wisp of auburn-red hair peeped from beneath her jaunty felt hat. She looked for all the world like a young lady who had just graduated from a stylish Eastern finishing school, which in truth, she had. But now, at sixteen, Connie Carl had returned to the prairie land she loved, to make her home once more at the place of her birth, Rainbow Ranch.
The train had slowed down for the station. Connie went quickly down the aisle, waiting in the vestibule until the train came to a full stop.
“Someone meetin’ you, Miss?” asked the porter as she slipped a coin into his hand. “This heah Red Gulch ain’t nothin’ but a wide place in the road.”
“Yes, I’ve wired ahead, so I’m sure someone will meet me,” said Connie with a smile. “Anyway, I’ve been here before.”
The porter set out the luggage on the platform. As the train pulled slowly away, Connie looked quickly about.