Hetty nodded. “Yes,” she said. “Still, you told me you didn’t like him. It’s Clavering. Now, I wonder what he put those things on for—he doesn’t wear them very often—and whether he knew my father wasn’t here.”
Clavering would probably have attracted the attention of most young women just then, for he had dressed himself in the fashion the prairie stockriders were addicted to, as he did occasionally, perhaps because he knew it suited him. He had artistic perceptions, and could adapt himself harmoniously to his surroundings, and he knew Hetty’s appreciation of the picturesque. His sallow face showed clean cut almost to feminine refinement under the wide hat, and the blue shirt which clung about him displayed his slender symmetry. It was, however, not made of flannel, but apparently of silk, and the embroidered deerskin jacket which showed the squareness of his shoulders, was not only daintily wrought, but had evidently cost a good many dollars. His loose trousers and silver spurs were made in Mexican fashion: but the boldness of the dark eyes, and the pride that revealed itself in the very pose of the man, redeemed him from any taint of vanity.
He sat still until a hired man came up, then swung himself from the saddle, and in another few moments had entered the room with his wide hat in his hand.
“You find us alone,” said Hetty. “Are you astonished?”
“I am content,” said Clavering. “Why do you ask me?”
“Well,” said Hetty naïvely, “I fancied you must have seen my father on the prairie, and could have stopped him if you had wanted to.”
There was a little flash in Clavering’s dark eyes that was very eloquent. “The fact is, I did. Still, I was afraid he would want to take me along with him.”
Hetty laughed. “I am growing up,” she said. “Three years ago you wouldn’t have wasted those speeches on me. Well, you can sit down and talk to Flora.”
Clavering did as he was bidden. “It’s a time-honoured question,” he said. “How do you like this country?”
“There’s something in its bigness that gets hold of one,” said Miss Schuyler. “One feels free out here on these wide levels in the wind and sun.”