“Poor mother, indeed!” echoed Mr. Hale, with something like a groan.
“Thank you for caring about it,” said Jessica, quickly touched by his ready sympathy. “But she says her life now must be to carry on all father’s work, and I shall help her. In that way it will be always as if he were still with us. Oh! see! That’s Stiffleg’s track! Ephraim Marsh has passed this way! Maybe I shall find him at the Winklers’ cabin! Would you mind hurrying, just a little bit?”
“I’ll do my best, little lady. But I’m a wretched horseman, I fear.”
“Oh! you’ll learn. If you would only let yourself be easy and comfortable. But, beg pardon, you do it this way–so stiff, with your hands all clinched. Your horse feels that something’s wrong, and that’s why he fidgets so. You should get Samson to show you how. He’s a magnificent rider. I’ll coax him to do some tricks for you, to-night, when we get through supper. I’m off. Just drop all care and let the horse do the work and–catch me if you can.”
As they approached the foothills they had dropped into a little hollow where the sandy ground was moist and retained an impression distinctly, and it was thus that Jessica’s keen eyes discovered the peculiar footprints of “Forty-niner’s” halting steed. But she quickly forgot these in the interest of the race she had started and was now bent upon nothing save beating Mr. Hale at the goal, the miner’s cabin.
“He has by far the better horse. He ought to win, but he shall not–he can’t. He mustn’t! Go, Buster! A taste of Elsa’s honey if you get there first!”
Bending forward the girl rested her cheek against the broncho’s neck and, as if the touch fired him with new ambition, he shot forward so swiftly that the question of winning was soon settled. However, Mr. Hale’s own pride was touched, and he put to the test the advice just given him, and with such good results that he, too, soon came in sight of a small house at the end of the trail, a dark hole in the mountain side, and a group of people eagerly surrounding his little guide.
Indeed, Elsa had already drawn the child upon her capacious lap, and was tenderly smoothing the tumbled curls with her hard hand, while she asked endless questions, yet waited for no answers.
Till, suddenly remembering, Lady Jess demanded:
“But have you seen our Ephraim? Is he here? Has he been here?”