“No,” Ted laughingly responded, giving him a push, “but he’s going to ‘set’ now,” and he threw himself down by Bill’s side. “I knew you fellows would guy me, but all the same I think this outfit’s great,” and he surveyed himself with infinite pride and satisfaction.
“It’s all right,” said Bill, taking in all the details of the resplendent costume, and looking up at Owen and me with twinkling eyes, “I like somethin’ a little gay myself; but round here where everything’s green, we won’t be able to tell you from a bunch of soap-weed,” and Ted good naturedly joined in the laugh at his own expense.
“Wouldn’t his Aunt Elizabeth die of heart-failure if she could see him now?” I asked Owen as we went into the house.
“She certainly would,” he answered, “but we’ll trust to luck and let Nature take its course.”
Everything, including Nature, took its course rapidly with Ted, and for the next few weeks wise prairie dogs, rabbits and rattle-snakes stayed in their holes. By the end of his stay that energetic young person had enough rattle-snake skins to provide belts and hat-bands for all of New York, and scores of live prairie-dogs he had trapped to be shipped to his aunt’s place in Newport.
I tried to picture the joy of Aunt Elizabeth and her neighbors when they found informal prairie-dog towns in the midst of their formal gardens. If life is measured by experiences, a few additional years were in store for Newport.
Bill taught Ted to shoot and he spent hours and a fortune shooting at old tin cans on a post before Bill finally consented to say:
“I’ve saw fellers do worse,” the sweetest praise that ever fell on mortal ears, judging by Ted’s expression.
And, then, Owen went to New Mexico to buy some sheep and Bohm came to sleep on a claim.
This claim was one over which Owen and Bohm had been having a controversy for months. It had been included in the sale of the ranch, and after one of our most important sheep camps had been built upon it, Owen discovered that Bohm could not give a deed to it, as he had not made final proof on the land.