Owen thanked me for the compliment and went out to the bunk house to interview Robert Reed, now in charge of the hay gang.
This Reed was an interesting fellow,—a natural leader of men, and so efficient that Owen had made him hay foreman.
When we had driven over to his claim to see him about working for us, Mrs. Reed came out to the buggy, wiping her hands on her apron.
“No, Bob ain’t home this morning,” she responded to Owen’s inquiry for her husband. “I reckon you’ll find him over ploughin’ for Maggie.” A statement made in the most matter-of-fact manner.
We drove over to another claim shack a mile or so from the Reeds’, where Bob was indeed ploughing for Maggie. To him, too, it was quite a matter of course.
The affinity problem in this country really appeared simple. Mrs. Reed evidently accepted Maggie as a natural factor in the situation, and her marital relations were not disturbed in the least, as long as Bob finished his own ploughing first. That woman was truly oriental in her cast of mind.
Maggie Lane’s mother and brother lived near at hand, also. One brother, Tom, was Reed’s constant companion. Altogether it was a perfectly harmonious arrangement.
The Lane family records were not quite clear. Acquaintance revealed that. They all seemed to have a penchant for leaving the straight and narrow path for the broad highway of individual choice. Obviously Maggie’s position did not affect her family, nor her social standing in the community.
Whenever I drove about the country without Owen, I took Charley with me on horseback. Gates were hard to open, and my team of horses was not thoroughly broken. Besides, there were always the possibilities of the unexpected on these lonely prairies. I called Charley my Knight of the Garter. When he knew in advance he was going with me, he went up to the bunkhouse “to slick up.” If it chanced to be summer, he emerged without a coat, his blue shirt sleeves held up by a pair of beribboned pink garters, a pair of heavy stamped leather cuffs on his wrists, and a heavy stamped leather collar holding his neck like a vise.
I suggested one morning that the collar might be uncomfortably warm. He met my objection with scorn.