Page:Frank Spearman--Whispering Smith.djvu/425

 see you! Tell me what has happened. Are you hurt?”

He stammered like a school-boy. “Nothing has happened. What’s this? Don’t cry; nothing at all has happened. I didn’t realize what a tramp I look or I shouldn’t have come. But I was only a mile away and I had heard nothing for four days from Medicine Bend. And how are you? Did your ride make you ill? No? By Heaven, you are a game girl. That was a ride! How are they all? Where’s your cousin? In town, is he? I thought I might get some news if I rode up, and oh, Miss Dicksie—jiminy! some coffee. But I’ve got only two minutes for it all, only two minutes; do you think Puss has any on the stove?”

Dicksie with coaxing and pulling got him into the kitchen, and Puss tumbled over herself to set out coffee and rolls. He showed himself ravenously hungry, and ate with a simple directness that speedily accounted for everything in sight. “You have saved my life. Now I am going, and thank you a thousand times. There, by Heaven, I’ve forgotten Wickwire! He is with me—waiting down in the cottonwoods at the fork. Could Puss put up a lunch I could take to him? He hasn’t had a scrap for twenty-four hours. But, Dicksie, your tramp is a hummer! I’ve tried to ride him down and wear him out and lose him, 399