“Come back, Miss Laller!” they bawled in a duet. “Us’ll be real nice gen’lemens!”
“No!” she said sharply, as she untied her horse and sprang into the buggy. “I done had enough rough-housin’ to last me a long time. I’s gwine back to Tickfall!”
Drenched with perspiration, his face as red as blood, Shirley Rouke mopped the sweat from his forehead and gazed inquiringly at Peter Pellet.
Peter was panting like a hot dog, but his eyes blazed in triumph.
“I got it all, Roukey!” he said.
V
READY—ACTION—GO!
Shirley Rouke and Peter Pellet sat upon the sun-slashed porch of the Tickfall hotel smoking their after-breakfast cigars.
The day was as clear and beautiful and buoyant as a soap bubble, and the Gulf breeze, sweeping across one hundred miles of forest, tasted salt upon their lips, and made music upon the fluted tree tops.
Rev. Vinegar Atts and Sour Sudds ploughed across the sandy street, and stepped upon the porch, where the men reclined in their chairs in lazy enjoyment of the hour.
“Mr. Rouke,” Vinegar began, “when is us gwine start takin’ our koodaks?”