Not that he objected to attention under normal conditions. Not he! He courted it. His chief aim in life seemed to be to throw the limelight of publicity, first, on the Three Bars ranch, as the one and only in the category of ranches, and to be connected with it in some way, however slight, the unquestioned aim and object of existence of every man, woman, and child in the cattle country; secondly, on Paul Langford, the very boss of bosses, whose master mind was the prop and stay of the Northwest, if not of all Christendom; and lastly upon himself, the modest, but loyal servitor in this Paradise on earth. But girls were far from normal conditions. There were no women at the Three Bars. There never had been any woman at the Three Bars within the memory of man. To be sure, Williston’s little girl had sometimes ridden over on an errand, but she didn’t count. This—this was the real thing, and he didn’t know just how to deal with it. He needed time to enlarge his sight to this broadened horizon.
He glanced with nonchalance over his shoulder. After all, she was only a girl, and not such a big one either. She wore longer skirts than Williston’s girl, but he didn’t believe she was a day older. He squared about immediately, and what he had meant to say he never said, on account of an unaccountable thickening of his tongue.
Presently, he bolted into a building, which proved to be the Bon Ami, a restaurant under the direct supervision of the fat, voluble, and tragic Mrs. Higgins, where the men from the other side of the river had right of way and unlimited credit.
“What’ll you have?” he asked, hospitably, the familiar air of the Bon Ami bringing him back to his accustomed self-confident swagger.
“Might I have some tea and toast, please?” said Louise, sinking into a chair at the nearest table, with two startling yet amusing thoughts rampant in her brain. One was, that she wished Aunt Helen could have seen her swinging along in the wake of this typical “bold and licentious” man, and calmly and comfortably sitting down to a cosy little supper for two at a public eating house; the other startling thought was to the effect that the invitation was redolent with suggestiveness, and she wondered if she was not expected to say, “A whiskey for me, please.”
“Guess you kin,” answered Jim, wonder in his voice at the exceeding barrenness of the order. “Mrs. Higgins, hello there, Mrs. Higgins! I say, there, bring on some tea and toast for the lady!”
“Where is the Three Bars?” asked Louise, her thoughts straying to the terrors of a fifteen-mile drive through a strange and uncanny country with a stranger and yet more uncanny man. She had accepted him without question. He was part and parcel with the strangeness of her new position. But the suddenness of the transition from idle conjecture to startling reality had raised her proud head and she looked this new development squarely in the face without outward hint of inward perturbation.
“Say, where was you raised?” asked Jim, with tolerant scorn, between huge mouthfuls of boiled pork and cabbage, interspersed with baked potatoes, hot rolls, and soggy dumplings, shovelled in with knife, fork, or spoon. He occasionally anticipated dessert by making a sudden sortie into the quarter of an immense custard pie, hastening the end by means of noisy draughts of steaming coffee. Truly, the Three Bars connection had the fat of the land at the Bon Ami.
“Why, it’s the Three Bars that’s bringin’ you here. Didn’t you know that? There’s nary a man in the hull country with backbone enough to keep him off all-fours ’ceptin’ Paul Langford. Um. You just try once to walk over the Boss, will you? Lord! What a grease spot you’d make!”
“Mr. Gordon isn’t being walked over, is he?” asked Louise, finished with her tea and toast and impatient to be off.