"You wouldn't be strong for stopping off out here?" the fat man put in genially. Hapgood shuddered.
And to Greek Conniston there came a sudden inspiration.
"Anyway," Roger Hapgood went on in his customary drawl, "I'm going to find out. It's little Roger to learn something about the prairie flower. I'll soon tell you who she is," he added, rising from his seat.
But he never did. For one thing, young Conniston was not there when Roger returned five minutes later, and it is extremely doubtful if Roger Hapgood would have told how his venture had fared. Being duly impressed with the fascination of his own debonair little person, and having the imagination of a cow, he had smirked his way to the girl, who now sat in the observation-car, and had begun on the weather.
"Dreadfully warm in this desert country, isn't it?" he said, with over-politeness and the smile which he knew to be irresistible.
The girl turned from gazing out the window, and her eyes met his, very clear and very much amused.
"Very warm," she smiled back at him. Even then he had a faint fear that she was not so much smiling as laughing. "The surprising thing is how well things keep, is it not?"
"Ah—yes," he murmured, not entirely confident, and still dropping into a chair at her side. "You mean—"
"How fresh some things keep!"
Roger Hapgood's pink little face went violently red.