"There!" cried Blue Bonnet, "behold the 'casa' of the Blue Bonnet ranch!"
What they saw was a long, low, rambling house, with wide, hospitable verandas embowered in half-tropical vines. It had evidently started out as a one-roomed, Spanish 'adobe,' and, as the needs of the family demanded it, an ell had been added here, a room there, like cells in a bee-hive, until now it covered a good deal of territory, still keeping its one-storied, Mission-like character.
"Oh, Blue Bonnet—it's just what I wanted it to be," exclaimed Kitty. "It looks as if a fat, Spanish monk might come out of that door this very minute."
"Instead of which there is my dear old Benita, and Pancho and his wife and the children and—oh, everybody!" Blue Bonnet was bouncing up and down now with excitement.
Alec and the other two riders came up in a cloud of dust just as Miguel raced the mustangs up to the veranda steps, where all the ranch hands were gathered to greet the young Señorita.
"Señorita mia!" cried Benita, and Blue Bonnet leaped from the wheel straight into her old nurse's arms.
"And this is Grandmother, Benita," said Blue Bonnet, helping Mrs. Clyde from her place.
"The little Señora's mother—God bless you!" cried Benita in Spanish. Then, in spite of her stiff joints, she made a deep, old-fashioned curtsy.
Tears sprang to the eyes of the Eastern woman. "Thank you, Benita," she said. "My daughter always wrote lovingly of you."
"Blessed Señora!" breathed Benita fervently.