Page:Ruth Fielding at Silver Ranch.djvu/130

120 Mrs. "Jule" Marvin, the young and buxom wife of the owner of the Two-Ten Ranch, caught Ike's hand and whispered loudly:

"I never suspected you was such a heartbreaker, Ike. Goodness me! you're dancing every dance, and with a new partner each time. I haven't got to be left out in the cold just because I'm married to Tom, I hope? He can't dance with that game leg, poor old man! You going to save a dance for me, Ike?"

"Suah's your bawn, honey!" responded the foreman, who was beginning to enjoy his prominence and had known Mrs. Jule for years. "The next one's yours if you say the word."

"You're my meat, then, Ike," declared the jolly Western matron, as she glided away with her present partner.

So there was a little rift in Ruth Fielding's scheme, for Ike danced next with the ranchman's wife. But that pleased the girl from the Red Mill and her fellow conspirators quite as well. Ike was no neglected male "wall-flower." Sally only skipped one dance; but she watched the big foreman with growing wonder.

A rest was due Helen anyway; and Bob Steele was at hand with his never-failing harmonica. "The heart-rending strains," as Madge termed the rather trying music from the mouth-organ, were sufficiently lively for most of the party, and