"But, mamma," said Nelly, "I think I'll stay here. If he should wake up, he would feel so lonely here; and he can't get out of the hay."
"Thank you, dear: that is very kind of you," replied Mrs. March. And, as she went out of the barn, she said to herself, "What a kind, thoughtful child Nelly is. She really is like a little woman."
Mrs. March could not find her husband and Billy anywhere; so she sat down on the door-step of the house to wait for them. She looked up and down the beautiful valley: it seemed a great deal more than thirty miles long. The mountains at the south end of it looked blue and hazy; the great Sangre di Christo Mountains, which made the western wall, looked very near; the snow on them shone so brightly it dazzled Mrs. March's eyes to look at it. After a time, she got up from the door-step and walked round to the north side of the house.
"Oh, there is Nelly's mountain!" she said. There stood Pike's Peak, in full sight, to the northeast. It looked so grand and so high at first, Mrs. March did not know it. This, too, had a great deal of snow on it, and there were white clouds floating round the top; it was the grandest sight in the whole view. There were no other houses near; she could see only a few in the valley; and she could not see Rosita at all. The road down which they had come seemed to end very soon among the hills.
"We shall not have much more to do with neighbors here than in the Pass," thought Mrs. March. "But I do not care for that. One could never be lonely with these mountains to look at."
"Well, mum, here's the little feller's clo'es," said Billy, coming up at this moment, with Rob's clothes hanging in a limp wet bundle over his arm. "Now I'll jest make a rousin' fire back here, 'n' you'll be astonished to see how quick they'll dry. I've washed 'em in about five hundred waters,—that medder mud's the meanest stuff to stick ye ever see,—but they'll be dry in no time now."
"Mamma!" called Nelly, from the barn; "Rob's awake. He wants to get up: he says he won't lie here another minute."
"I'll show him his clo'es," said Billy. "I guess that'll convince him," and Billy carried the wet bundle into the barn. Shouts of laughter followed, and in a minute more Billy came out again, shaking all over with laughter. "I jest offered 'em to him," said he, "'n' told him he could get up 'n' put 'em on ef he wanted to; but I rayther thought he'd better let 'em dry some fust."
"What did he say?" asked Mrs. March.
"He wanted to know how long it would take 'em to dry 'n' I told him the best part of an hour; 'twill be some longer'n that, but I couldn't pretend to be exact to a minnit, 'n' he laid back on the hay 'n' sez he: 'You tell my mamma to come right here 'n' finish that story she was a tellin'."