Then, while the smiling, chatty couples began to file about the room, he scraped on his strings to tune up with a little organ played by a lively-eyed midget of a girl.
The music struck up, and the dancers began to swing around, taking their bumps, for the floor was crowded, with jolly good nature. It was a whirl of happy, glowing faces. The dancing, however, was far from rude. Many couples, indeed, glided over the rough floor with an ease that showed them to be no strangers to the art. Alta was especially graceful. She was electric with life, her sweet face lighted by bright eyes and rosy cheeks, her tripping toes keeping step to the music. Her well rounded form was trimly, daintily dressed in white, a rose-colored ribbon at her throat, and a spray of wild flowers airily caught in her hair. She was playful, but her play had in it a touch of pride, and her voice spoke culture. Her costume, too, had a dash of style that was lacking in the dresses of the other girls, who, though comely enough, had so bedecked themselves in showy ribbons and fluffy laces that they looked rather ungraceful.
Yet, though superior to them in most respects, Alta, from all outward appearances, was unconscious of it. She was just one with them. Everybody, from the nattiest cowboy to the shaggiest rancher, felt at home in her presence. Even the other girls, though they might have felt a twinge of jealousy at her popularity when they saw the boys, as always, in a cluster about her, had accepted her leadership; for everybody liked Alta Morgan, except Bud Nixon.
Ever since she had rebuked him for his forced and unwelcome attentions, he had carried an ugly heart toward the girl. The incident which provoked his anger had just recently occurred, and Bud was stubborn in his grudges.
When Alta first came as a little girl to her uncle’s ranch, Bud had been a kind of big brother to her. He was employed by Colonel Morgan; and with the other hands, he had taken delight in teaching her how to ride, to throw a lasso, and to drive the cattle. Alta responded with childlike good-fellowship, accepting his attentions with playful innocence. Bud thought of her as of a mere child at first; but when Alta, after two years at school, came back, no longer a romping little ranch girl but a young lady, beautiful in her budding womanhood, he fell an easy prey to her charms. Presuming on his former associations, he grew ardent toward the girl. Surprised and annoyed at this turn of affairs, Alta tried at first to avoid him; but since he worked at her uncle’s ranch, it was hard not to meet him often; and the worse she treated him, the more persistent he grew, forcing his love-making upon her until one day she compelled herself to face it out. Then she told him frankly that if he wanted to keep her friendship, he must stop his love nonsense.
“Friendship!” he blurted out; “I don’t want your friendship. If we can’t be more’n friends, we can’t be anything.”
“Well, Bud,” she said firmly, “we can’t be anything more.”
“You won’t have me, then?” he half demanded.
“Have you?” Alta’s tone showed more than she meant to reveal of her disgust.
Bud’s stupid pride was stung. “You damned flirt,” he snapped, “if you was a man I’d——”