“Gad, Miss Fanny,” he said, ruefully, taking out his cheerful red camp handkerchief and wiping his moist brow, “I wonder what she’ll say to us when she comes back?”
“She’ll say ‘Thank you,’ if she has any gratitude,” said Mrs. Featherstone, severely. “Now I’ll go and get my nap!”
Ginger had said truly that she did not mind riding alone. Much as she liked and looked up to the doctor, she was not quite comfortable when she was alone with him; she found his keen eyes too searching, and she was always a little afraid he might say in his brisk fashion, “Now, then, Ginger, suppose you tell me all about it!”
It was a joy to ride Ted, to feel his great bulk and power beneath her, like a stout ship, like an eight-cylindered machine, and the afternoon was clear and jewel-bright. The inevitable after-luncheon languor left her when she drew rein on the first crest; the Ted horse had his second wind and they went on with smooth speed. Once, about midway of her trip, she figured, the horse stopped short, his ears twitching, his delicate nostrils distending; her heart quickened a beat at what she saw before her on the trail; lion’s tracks, positive, unmistakable; a big one, clearly. She leaned forward and patted the shining neck. “All right, Ted; I see it. Maybe we’ll get him!”
But the prints of the big pads left the trail abruptly and went off into the brush—for a hapless fawn, doubtless, and Ginger and the doctor’s horse went forward without adventure, until they espied, half an hour later, another horseman coming toward them; the Ranger, she thought, had ridden on from the spring, and she was sorry; it was, she remembered, the clearest and coldest water in all those mountains and she was thirsty and warm.
Immediately, however, she saw that the figure was that of a child on a small old horse. He kicked the animal into a livelier pace at sight of her, and saluted her graciously. “How do you do?” he said in a thin and piping voice. “I’m not the Ranger. I expect you thought I was, at first, didn’t you?—but I’m not. He’s waiting at Cold Spring. I’m his Scout, and I rode on alone to meet the doctor, because I’m not afraid of anything, hardly, and I ride everywhere alone, almost. Where is the doctor?”
“The doctor didn’t come,” said Ginger, smiling at him. She liked boys enormously, and this one was engaging. “He sent me instead to get the camp-fire permits.”
“Gee! He let you ride Ted, didn’t he? I guess you must be a pretty good rider.”
“Pretty good,” admitted Ginger, modestly.