“No, no. I knit no more, forever, is it? Not I. Why the reason? The more one earns the more one may lose. Yes, yes, indeed. Yes.”
“That’s the true word,” Mrs. Benton had replied; “and so being you’ve no yarn to worry you, nor no mistress to see, off to bed, I say, and don’t you dast to get sick on my hands, I warn you!”
So Elsa had obeyed the command, glad enough to rest and be idle for a time. Aunt Sally had seen to it that the visitor was kept duly alarmed concerning her red-and-yellow condition, nor had she given the permission to arise when Wolfgang and Otto arrived from their fruitless visit to El Desierto. They found the place crowded with returning searchers, and joyfully hailed the good news of Jessica’s safety. But when there was added to this the information that their own property had been found, they demanded to be taken to Elsa, and it was their visit to her room which had sent her afield, half-clad, and with thought for nothing but her lost treasure.
Even now, husband and son joined their entreaties to hers, though Samson soon brought them to hear reason, and to withdraw from public for the present, asking, indignantly:
“Have you folks lost all your manners, as well as your dollars, up there on the foothill? The idee of a woman screeching her lungs out afore all the ranchers in Southern Californy! Your money? Well, what of it? If it’s found, it’ll be give to you, and if it isn’t you ain’t the first feller’s been robbed. Besides, can’t you smell? Don’t you know that you’re interruptin’ the prettiest spread ever was seen at old Sobrante? Like chicken? Like roast pig? Like hot biscuit and plum sess? Then go wash your face, and make your folks fix up and come enjoy yourself. So far as I hear, it’s old Pedro holds the cash, and you might as well try to move the Sierras as him, if he ain’t ready to move. At this present writin’ he’s set himself guard over that scalliwag, Ferd, and I ain’t envying him his job, I ain’t. Hurry up, there won’t be anything but necks and drumsticks left for you laggards.”
Thus admonished and reassured, Wolfgang hurried his family away to prepare for the feast, and the interruption they had caused to the proceedings at the horse block effectually relieved Mrs. Trent from an immediate answer to an awkward question, so she said:
“Come, daughter. I see by Aunt Sally’s manner that she wishes the people would begin to eat. Every pair of hands, that belongs to us, must help in serving these kind neighbors who have flocked to our aid. Some of them have forty good miles to ride before they sleep, and they must be fed first. I’ll stand by the head table yonder, and name them, 62 and do you, for whom they left their business, wait upon them yourself. That will show them your gratitude, and give them honor due.”
So it was, and to every dish she brought, the little captain added a graceful word of thanks, which seasoned the food better than even Aunt Sally’s wondrous skill had done; and many an encomium did the child hear, in return, of that lost father who had made himself so well-beloved in all that countryside.
When all was over and done, when the last “neighbor” had ridden homeward, when everybody had had his fill, and more than his fill of good things, and the rudely constructed tables had been removed from the wide lawn, came Aunt Sally, beaming with happiness, and glanced over the scene, till there broke from her lips the wondering question: