"Nolla, are you sarcastic about my education?" queried Mrs. Maynard, with dignity.
"Mercy, no! I only tried to show Bob the difference in present day methods and the past."
Mr. Maynard entered the room during Eleanor's reply, and smiled as he heard his youngest daughter's frank words. It was a keen pleasure to him to have one child fearless in thought and word. His son and elder daughter had been spoiled by fawning tutors and companions, so they had acquired the habit of white-washing facts to suit the needs. Eleanor had been too delicate to attend any expensive and fashionable seminary and, being taught by Anne Stewart while in Denver, had acquired many of Anne's splendid ways.
"Frederick, what do you know about this mountain resort you asked Anne
Stewart to write about?" asked Mrs. Maynard.
"Well, now that we are all together and have the time to talk this matter out, I will say my say," replied Mr. Maynard, seating himself and drawing Eleanor down beside him upon the divan.
"You remember the first year we were married—I had to visit Bear Forks to investigate a loan one of our clients at the bank asked us to make on a tract of timber-land? You wouldn't go with me when you heard we would have to camp out at night and ride horses over rough mountain-trails. That is the season you visited your school-friend in the East."
Mr. Maynard looked at his wife as he spoke and she nodded her head as if the memory was not pleasant to recall. Her husband smiled an enigmatical smile and continued his description.
"That is when I met Sam Brewster and his wife—they had been married about as long as we had, and their happy ranch-life struck me as being the most desirable existence I ever heard of."
Mrs. Maynard's lips curled in silent derision. She understood her husband's yearning for a simple life in place of the frivolous and empty excitement of the social career she had made for herself and family.
"The country about the sections I visited is beautiful and healthy, and as Nolla is ordered to a quiet, mountainous region for a time, I know of no place so suitable. Besides, Anne Stewart has been there, too, and she is wild over the place."