"I hardly ever did, it seems.… Dad, the day was something to face," she said.
"Ah-huh! It's like getting up to work. Lenore, the biggest duty of life is to hide your troubles.… Dorn looks like a human bein' this mornin'. The kids have won him. I reckon he needs that sort of cheer. Let them have him. Then after a while you fetch him out to the wheat-field. Lenore, our harvestin' is half done. Every day I've expected some trick or deviltry. But it hasn't come yet."
"Are any of the other ranchers having trouble?" she inquired.
"I hear rumors of bad work. But facts told by ranchers an' men who were here only yesterday make little of the rumors. All that burnin' of wheat an' timber, an' the destruction of machines an' strikin' of farm-hands, haven't hit Golden Valley yet. We won't need any militia here, you can bet on that."
"Father, it won't do to be over-confident," she said, earnestly. "You know you are the mark for the I.W.W. sabotage. If you are not careful—any moment—"
Lenore paused with a shudder.
"Lass, I'm just like I was in the old rustlin' days. An' I've surrounded myself with cowboys like Jake an' Bill, an' old hands who pack guns an' keep still, as in the good old Western days. We're just waitin' for the I.W.W.'s to break loose."
"Then what?" queried Lenore.
"Wal, we'll chase that outfit so fast it'll be lost in dust," he replied.
"But if you chase them away, it 'll only be into another state, where they'll make trouble for other farmers. You don't do any real good."