Page:Caroline Lockhart--The Fighting Shepherdess.djvu/195

 second look convinced him, and he not only let out a bloodcurdling yell of welcome, but inadvertently slackened the lines that had been taut as fiddle strings over the backs of the horses. The leaders jumped over "the Innocent Bystander" before he had time to use his pickhandle, reared and fell on their backs, where they lay kicking the harness to pieces.

"You miser'ble horse-stealin', petty larceny, cacherobbin'—" just in time Teeters remembered that there were ladies present and curtailed his greeting to Hughie Disston. "Why didn't you let me know you was comin'? " he ended.

"Wanted to surprise you, Teeters," said Disston, dropping the bags he carried.

"Yo shore done it!" replied Teeters emphatically, casting an eye at the writhing mass of horses. "It'll take me an hour or more to patch that harness!"

"In that event," said the guest from Canton, Ohio, with a relief that was unmistakable, "it were better, perhaps, that we should go to the hotel and wait for you."

"It were," replied Teeters. "It's that big yella building' with the red trimmin's." He pointed toward the town with his fringed and beaded gauntlet. " I'll be along directly, and if I kin, I'll stop and git you."

"Isn't he a character!" exclaimed a lady in an Alpine hat, delightedly.

Teeters wrapped the lines around the brake and descended leisurely.

"Set on their heads, Old Timers"—to the volunteers who were endeavoring to disentangle the struggling horses—and shook hands with Disston.

"This is Mrs. Rathburn and Miss Rathburn, Clarence—"