It was something of this joy of living which was stirring now, lighting the girl's soft brown eyes with that tender whimsical smile which was never very far from them. She was resting after the early excitements of the day. It was her twenty-second birthday, and, in consequence, with so devoted a father, a day of no small importance. She had been warned by that solicitous parent to "go—an' have a sleep, so you don't peter right out when the fun gets good an' plenty." But Nan had no use for sleep just now. She had no use for anything that might rob her of one moment of the delight and excitement of the Calthorpe Cattle Week, as it was called. Therefore she undutifully abandoned herself to a pleasurable review of events whilst waiting for the next act in the day's play to begin.
And what a review it made in her understanding of the life about her. It was four years since her father and Jeff Masters had signed their partnership, and she knew that to-day, on the second day of the week, the triumph of the great "Obar" Ranch, which her father and Jeffrey Masters had so laboriously and patiently built up, was to be completed. Now, even while she sat there gazing from her window at the panorama of life passing up and down the broad expanse of Maple Avenue, the Council of the Western Union Cattle Breeders' Association was sitting for its annual conference and election of officers. And had she not already been confidentially warned that Jeff was to be the forthcoming year's president?
It was the crowning event in the long dreamed dreams of the two men whom she frankly admitted to herself were nearest and dearest to her. Why should she not admit it? Her father? Ah, yes, her father was the most perfect, kindly, sympathetic father that ever lived. And Jeff? A warm thrill swept through her heart and set it beating tumultuously. Jeff was her whole sum and substance of life itself.
Well enough she knew that no other bond than that of friendship existed between them; that no word had ever passed between them which might not have passed in the daily intercourse between brother and sister. But this did not cause her to shrink from the admission. Jeff was her whole horizon in life. There was no detail of her focus which was not occupied by the image of the man whom she regarded as the genius of their fortunes.
There were moments enough when she realized with something akin to dismay that Jeff and she were friends. But her gentle humor always served her at such moments. And there was always the lukewarm consolation that there was no other woman who had even a similar claim. Therefore she hugged her secret to herself, and only gazed upon it in such moments of happy dreaming as the present.
And just now they were happy moments. How could it be otherwise in a girl so healthy, and with such a depth of human feeling and with such a capacity for sheer enjoyment of the simple pleasures which came her way? What an evening yet confronted her in this brief week of holiday from the claims of the green-brown plains of summer. She must be ready at seven o'clock for the reception at the City Hall. She had a new gown for that particular event, which had, amongst others, been bought in New York. It had cost one hundred and thirty dollars, an unthinkable price it had seemed, but dismissed as something too paltry to be considered by the open-handed ranchman whom she claimed as father.
She was to assist Jeff and her father in receiving the guests, who would represent all the heads of their cattle world, and their friends, and their wives, and their daughters. And after that the banquet, which, since the inauguration of the Association, had always taken place, here at Aston's Hotel.
There would be speeches. Jeff would speak, and her father—no, she hoped he wouldn't speak. Her smile deepened. He had such a way of saying just what came into his funny, simple old head, and such a curious vocabulary. Then, after the banquet, the—Ball!
The girl emitted a deep ecstatic sigh. The ball! It was the crowning glory, and—she had a beautiful new gown for each event. It was a ravishing thought. Perhaps a mere man may be forgiven his lack of imagination in his appreciation of such perfect, unutterable delight. But Nan had no cloud to obscure her sun. The labor of dressing afresh, three times in one evening without a maid, except the questionable assistance of a hotel chambermaid, had no terrors for her—none whatever.
Her day-dreaming was interrupted by an immoderate thump on the door. She turned her head at once, her pretty dancing eyes alight with expectancy.