“Yet you want to go back?”
“Yes, I want to go back—even if I can’t ride. I reckon I’ll have to drive.”
“You are not afraid to drive?”
“No; at least, I haven’t been here.”
Mrs. Clyde laughed. “I daresay our Woodford horses do seem a bit tame. I wish, dear, I had some real comfort to give you. Perhaps, in time—”
“I’m more afraid now than I was at first,” Blue Bonnet answered. She rose as Delia came in to light up. “I’m going to study mighty hard to-night, Grandmother. You’re going to have the star pupil for a granddaughter after this.”
When Blue Bonnet went up to bed that evening, she found a little bundle of letters, smelling of lavender, lying on her dressing-table.
Her first thought was to sit down and read them then and there; but, with a little resolute shake of the head, she made herself get quite ready for bed first; then, wrapping a gaily striped Mexican blanket about her, she curled herself up on the foot of her bed, the letters in her lap.
And so vivid were they, so dear and familiar the scenes they portrayed, that presently the girl had forgotten time and place, and was feeling the prairie wind on her face; seeing the swaying of the tall grass; hearing the sounds of the ranch life—rejoicing in the freedom of it all.
In one of the letters, she found a few dried blue bonnets—the letter in which her mother had written of her coming.—“And she is to be called Blue Bonnet, our little prairie flower, with her eyes just the color of the blue bonnets growing wild and thick in the prairie grass. Some day, you shall see her, Mother.”