"Then why in time don't they say so? Ain't they goin' to teach her to talk United States? I s'pose them things is all fine an' necessary fo' the female eddication but, dern me, if I can see where she's goin' to find time to eat an' sleep."
"It's been all-fired lonely with both you an' her gone," said Mormon. "An' the dawg ain't eat a mouthful, I don't believe. Mebbe you can coax him, Sandy. Set around an' howled like a sick coyote fo' fo'-five days—mostly nights. If the gel balks at all that line of stuff I'll stand back of her to quit an' come back to Three Star."
"An' have Jordan git her away an' put her under Plimsoll's guardeenship?"
"He c'udn't do that. Mirandy Bailey 'ud block him."
"He c'udn't do anything," said Sandy. "I got myse'f app'inted legal guardeen to Molly while we was in Santa Rosa, one day Barbara an' Molly was shoppin'. John Redding's lawyer fixed it up."
The months passed without especial incident at the Three Star. Sandy purchased a Champion Hereford bull for the herd out of the ranch share of the faro winnings. Other improvements were added, and the three partners seemed on the fair way to prosperity. Sandy's theory that better bred and better fed beef, bringing better prices, would pay, began to demonstrate itself slowly, though it would take three years before the get of the thoroughbred stock was ready for marketing.
Occasional letters came from Molly. Homesickness and unhappiness showed between the lines of the first epistles, despite her evident efforts to conceal them. Her ways were not the ways of the other girls who were developing a well poised personality through intellectual, moral, social and physical training. She apparently formed no friendships and it seemed that none were invited from her.
"But I'm going to stick with it till I get same as the rest—on the outside, anyway," she wrote. "I don't know how some of them work inside. It ain't like me. But I've started this and you-all want me to go through so I will, though I get lonesome as a sick cat for the ranch. I don't swear any more—I got into awful trouble for spilling my language one time—and I can spell pretty good without hunting up every word in the dictionary. I reckon I'm a hard filly to break but then I was haltered late. I don't think it would be allowed for me to have Grit, so you'll have to look out for him and not let him forget me. I hope you won't do that yourselves. Some of the other girls are nice enough. It will be all right soon as we get to understand each other. Don't think I'm starting out to buck or that I'm unhappy, because I'm not."
"If she's happy, I'm a Gila lizard," said Mormon. "What's the sense of havin' her miserable fo' the sake of a li'l' book learnin'. She's gettin' to spell so I can't make out what she's writin' about."
At last Molly wrote that she had made the basketball team and won honors and favors. She gained laurels for Corona in swimming and tennis, and life went more merrily. Mormon looked up tennis outfits in his mail catalogue and sent for a book on the game, which he soon abandoned.