Page:Caroline Lockhart--The Fighting Shepherdess.djvu/41

 " Except," darkly, " this climate isn't healthy for sheep."

" Perhaps," gently, " Tm the best judge of that"

" You'll keep on going, if you follow my advice." The tone was a threat.

" I hardly ever take advice that's given unasked."

" Well — you'd better take this."

The sheepherder looked at him speculatively, with no trace of resentment in his mild eyes.

" Let me see," reflectively. ** It generally takes an easterner who comes west to show us how to raise stock from three to five years to go broke. I believe I'll stick around a while ; I may be able to pick up something cheap a little later."

A burst of ringing laughter interrupted this unexpected dash between the strangers. It was clear that the lack of harmony did not extend to their young companions, for the lad and the girl seemed deeply interested in each other as their ponies grazed with heads together. The immediate cause of their laughter was the boy's declaration that when he came to see the girl he intended to wear petticoats.

When their merriment had subsided, she demanded:

" Don't you like my overalls? "

He looked her over critically — at her face with the frank Gray eyes and the vivid red of health glowing through the tan; at the long flat braid of fair hair, which hung below the cantle of the saddle ; at her slender bare feet thrust through the stirrups.

"You'd look pretty in anything," he responded gallantly.

She detected the evasion and persisted :

" But you think I'd look nicer in dresses, don't you? "

Embarrassed, he responded hesitatingly: