Mother turned gaily in the road ahead. “Who is talking about me?” she called.
Priscilla frisked on to join her, and Henry fell back to a confidential exchange with Laura. “Beau wouldn’t be so bad if he could forget for a minute that he owned the earth and had a mortgage on the solar 84 system. But when he tries to snub Bruce—gee, that gets me!”
“Aren’t you twanging the G string rather often lately, Hal?—Stannard can’t snub Bruce. Bruce isn’t the kind of fellow to be snubbed.”
“Just the same, it makes me sick to think anybody’s a cousin to me that would try it.”
Laura switched back to the main subject. “We didn’t ask them up here as extra farm hands, you know.”
“Bull’s-eye,” said Henry, and grinned.
What she did not know failed to trouble Elliott. She read on in lonely peace through the afternoon. At a most exciting point the telephone rang. Four, that was the Cameron call. Elliott went into the house and took down the receiver.
“Mr. Robert Cameron’s,” she said pleasantly.
“S-say!” stuttered a high, sharp voice, “my little b-b-boys have let your c-c-cows 85 out o’ the p-p-pasture. I’ll g-give ’em a t-t-trouncin’, but ’t won’t git your c-c-cows back. They let ’em out the G-G-Garrett Road, and your medder gate’s open. Jim B-B-Blake saw it this mornin’! Why the man didn’t shut it, I d-d-dunno. You’ll have to hurry to save your medder.”
“But,” gasped Elliott, “I don’t understand! You say the cows—”