“She’s got on Doris’s clothes,” explained Betty, “’cause she didn’t bring any of her own, and she’s our Aunty Penny.”
“No,” he said solemnly. “No, she ain’t! You’ve got it wrong side to. Her name is Penny Ante.”
“It isn’t either!” cried Betty angrily, with a stamp of her little foot.
“Uncle Kurt brought her here. She’s his company, so you’d better look out, Jo Gary!” warned Billy.
Jo made a mock gesture of alarm and shielded his face with his arm as if from an imaginary blow.
“Now, why didn’t you say so in the first place! My, ain’t it the luck for me that he won’t be sheriff when he comes back! He might have had me put in the lock-up.”
“I am not Mr. Walters’ company—not now,” explained Pen. “I came up here with him, to be sure, but Mrs. Kingdon has asked me to be her company until I am well. I have been ill.”
“Double ’scuse. And this is the best place in the world to get well. Some little old ranch, and Kurt Walters is some foreman.”
“Aren’t you foreman now?”
“When Kurt is here, I’m nothing but a cow-hand; when he is away, I’m only acting foreman. I’ll never be anything but just acting-something, I guess.”