Feng, understanding perfectly the curious mixture of pidgin and Chinook, vanished soft-footed. They entered the living room of the bungalow.
"Stretch out and be comfy while he's rustling it," said Casey, indicating a couch. He himself fell into a huge wicker chair, flung his hat carelessly at the table, and reached for a cigar box.
Sheila dropped on the couch with a satisfied sigh, stretching her arms above her head, her hands clasped, every muscle of her relaxing. The comparative coolness, the quiet, the soft cushions were good after a day in the saddle. Down there on the Coldstream the strict proprieties did not trouble them. If any one had suggested to Sheila McCrae that she was imprudent in visiting a bachelor's ranch unchaperoned, she would have been both amazed and indignant. And it would have been unsafe to hint at such a thing to Casey Dunne. Indeed, the desirability of a chaperon never occurred to either of them; which was, after all, the best guarantee of the superfluity of that mark of an advanced civilization.
But in a moment Sheila was on her feet, arranging, straightening. "You're awfully untidy, Casey!" she said.
Indeed her comment was justified. The long table in the centre of the room was a litter of newspapers, magazines, old letters, pipes, and tobacco. Odd tools—a hammer, a file, a wrench, and a brad awl—mingled with them. On top of the medley lay a heavy revolver, with the cylinder swung out and empty, a box of cartridges, a dirty rag, and an oil can. In one corner stood half a dozen rifles and shotguns. From a set of antlers on the wall depended a case of binoculars, a lariat, and a pair of muddy boots. The last roused Sheila's indignation.
"Whatever do you hang up boots in your sitting room for?" she demanded.
"Why, you see," he explained, "they were wet, and I hung 'em up to dry. I guess I forgot 'em. It's not the right place, that's a fact." He rose, took down the offending footgear, and tossed them through the open door into the next room. They thumped on the floor, and Sheila was not placated.
"That's just as bad. Why, they were covered with dried mud, and now it's all over the floor. You're shockingly careless. Don't you know that that makes work?"
"For Feng, you mean. That's what I pay him for—only he doesn't do it."
But she shook her head, brushing the excuse aside as trifling, unsatisfactory. "It's a bad habit. I pity your wife, Casey."