“Joe, I believe you’re a poet,” Lucy said.
“Well, if your poetry is as good as your coffee, Shakespeare will have to watch out,” Alice laughed.
Joe turned red again, and nearly dropped his stack of plates.
When he had the dishes washed and the fire-wood ready for morning, he found that the Ranger had built a big camp-fire in front of the tents, and placed some logs about it, to lean against, while sitting on the ground. Everybody was sitting in a ring, glad of the warmth now that the cold night chill was falling from the peaks—all but the two cowboys, who had disappeared.
“They’ve gone to the Sun Camp chalets, half a mile down the trail,” said Mills, when somebody asked where they were.
“And where’s Joe?” said Lucy. “Oh, there he is. Come on in the house, Joe, where it’s warm. Mr. Mills is going to tell us a bedtime story.”
She made room for Joe to sit beside her, and he sank down, weary and sore, for they had ridden twenty-two miles that day, and he had cooked for eleven hungry people.
“Now Mr. Mills—begin!” she commanded.
The poor Ranger turned red in his turn.
“Gosh,” he said, “I couldn’t tell a story. I don’t know any stories.”