When the kindly old ranchman considered her a wall-flower and came and begged her to “give him a whirl,” Sue had to break through her “icy reserve.”
Although they did not dance the more modern dances, she found that Captain Rugley knew his steps and was as light on his feet as a man half his age.
“I have given Mr. Rheumatism the time of his life to-night!” declared the owner of the Bar-T brand. “That’s what I told Frances I would do.”
And Captain Rugley suffered no ill effects from the dance, as was shown by his appearance here at the Jackleg schoolhouse to-night, when the canvas curtain slowly rolled up to reveal first the painted curtain behind it, on which was a picture of the meeting of Cortez and the Aztec princes soon after the Conqueror’s arrival in Mexico.
The school teacher read the prologue, and the spectators settled down to listen and to see. His explanation of what was to follow was both concise and well written, and the whisper went around:
“And she’s only a girl! Yes, Miss Rugley wrote it all.”
Sue sniffed. The teacher stepped back into the shadow and the painted curtain rolled up.
There was a gasp of amazement when the audience saw what was revealed behind the painted sheet. One of the moving picture machines was already running, and on the great screen was thrown a representation of the staked plains of the Panhandle as they were in the days before the white man ever saw them.
Far, far away appeared a band of painted and feather-bedecked Indians, riding their mustangs, and sweeping down toward the immediate foreground of the picture with a vividness that was almost startling.
Into that foreground was drifting a herd of buffaloes. They started, the bulls giving the signal as the enemy approached, and the end of that section was the scampering of the great, hairy beasts, with the Indians in full chase, brandishing their spears.