He caught the swift look from under her lashes and smiled. "You are still laughing at me, yet that life at the capital would suit you well. You were meant for pleasant places, to hold your own among bright women and distinguished men. And I am eager to show what manner of woman the crude West can produce. My dear, you would outshine them all."
"Oh," she said, and clapped her hands an instant to her ears, "you need not practise those fine speeches on me, your success is assured; you will live in a whirl. And don't trouble about me, Uncle Silas; I'm not asking to come home. I—I only want you to go to the Land Office with me. I—I am going to—file a claim."
"You are what?"
"I am going to locate a homestead." And her voice tripped on the word.
"You are going to locate a homestead? You?"
"Oh, Uncle Silas,"—she rose and walked a few steps, then turned facing him with tilting chin and ruffled brows. "Why do you stand and frown like that at me? I'm not the first woman to take up Government land. Do you know of any reason why I shouldn't? I'm native born, and I'm twenty-one."
Lem cast an appreciative wink at the Judge, and, having reached familiar terms with the dish which Hop Sing had placed before him, he devoted himself to a second generous installment of Olympia oysters.
"But," said the Judge, "you are not going to improve that homestead like any settler? You do not intend to live there?"
"Yes," she answered, her voice again wavering, "I do. I am having the trail cut through to the schoolhouse now; Mose Laramie is doing it, and I have made a contract with him to cut the logs for my cabin. In payment he is to have the best gun I can find in Olympia. I want you to help me select it. But this is the piece,"—she paused to draw a township plat from her pocket. "It is all that's required; the soil is a good loam; a fairly level bottom-land at the foot of a great side-hill. And at the same time, I want to make a timber filing on the adjoining quarter up the slope. It is almost free of undergrowth except along the stream. There are some fine old trees. You see, too, the section is at the headwaters of the Des Chutes and I want to secure the water rights to these falls."
She was unmistakably in earnest and the incredulity in the Judge's face changed to dismay. He took the map and studied it. "I see," he said slowly, "I see." There was a brief silence, then his voice, that voice of the orator, took its pleading undernote. "Why will you do this thing? If you must create your own opportunities, there are other ways. Why, it is unbelievable. If ever there was a woman made for civilization, you are that one, yet you choose to bury yourself in the wilderness; to take up a claim in the heart of a jungle; to share the hardships of rough and ignorant pioneers."