"I've got 'em myself," came the gruff tones again from the corner. "I reckon I'll manage without help. You'd better skip for the house—you'll catch cold likely."
"Why, it isn't cold—are you? I guess Aunty left a lunch for you. I'll go and warm the coffee."
She started, and then stopped.
"Say, did you get any letters for me?"
"No."
With a grumble about her ill-luck, she started back toward the house, the late arrival following a little ways behind with something over his shoulder. Once she looked back.
"I rather think Andrews gets on dignified drunks," she soliloquized; "he is walking pretty straight, anyway."
She set the coffee-pot on the coals and glanced at the bundle he had dropped just inside the door—it was nothing but a blanket and a saddle.
"Well, upon my word!" she began, and rose to her feet; but she did not say any more, for, in turning to vent her displeasure on Andrews, she was tongue-tied by the discovery that it was not he who had followed her from the stable.
"Genesee!" she breathed, in a tone a little above a whisper. "Alah mika chahko!"