"We're much obliged," Bert said, "but we'd better do the way Parker mentioned. Anyhow that was the agreement."
"Agreement?" Ophelia spoke with a questioning lift of her brows.
"Yes," Chuck said, evidently trying to relieve the embarrassment of Old Heck, Parker and Skinny who looked daggers at Bert when he spoke of an agreement, "Parker and Old Heck was to take turn about—"
"Bert meant," Parker interrupted hastily, "—he meant they—they had to agree not to loaf in this room before Old Heck would give them jobs on the Quarter Circle KT!"
"Yes," Old Heck added quickly, "that was the bargain on account of—of—getting it mussed up and everything and making too much work for Sing Pete to clean it up!"
Ophelia and Carolyn June looked curiously at each other as if they suspected some secret that had to do with their presence at the Quarter Circle KT.
Outside, the cowboys lounged on the porch or lay spread full length on the grass smoking their cigarettes, and silent. Each was busy with thoughts of his own. Carolyn June had been very impartial during the evening meal, distributing her smiles and little attentions freely among them all. Now she was sitting at the piano playing snatches of random melodies as they came to her mind, while Skinny sat stiffly on a high-backed chair at the corner of the instrument.
A drone of voices reached the ears of Parker and the cowboys as Old Heck, skilfully led on by Ophelia, told about the ranch, the Kiowa range and the traditions of western Texas.
"Can you play La Paloma?" Skinny asked as Carolyn June paused after running over a dainty and vivacious one-step, memories of which made her think of Hartville and the fashionable ballrooms where she had reigned as princess at least if not as queen, and which seemed now very far away.
"I'm afraid not—unless I have the music, but I'll try," she answered, and her fingers again sought the keys.