After all, going away from home for the first time when you’re nearly seventeen is a thrilling business. Hilda was the sort to get joy even out of small things—and the change from the Three Sorrows to the Alamositas, though it was but from one great ranch to another, was not small.

The Marchbanks ranch, most often called the Flying M, for its brand, got its Spanish name of Alamositas, “little cottonwood,” from the number of those trees which grew tall all along the Juanajara River, which wound sluggishly through many of its pastures. At the Alamositas, headquarters was almost like a small village, with a big main house of adobe, two-story, built Spanish-fashion, around a court; numerous bunk-houses for the men who worked for the Marchbankses; manager’s quarters, a blacksmith shop and the ranch supply store; standing over across the trail, opposite the front gate; inviting all sorts of comers and goers.

Hilda was given a large upstairs room all to herself; it adjoined Maybelle’s, and she thought that would be nice, remembering vividly the plump little girl with whom she had played dolls in the tree roots on the lawn at the Sorrows. She found Maybelle Marchbanks still plump, and quite pretty; a year older than Hilda, she was very competent at all household matters, neat as wax, dressed quite like a young lady and with a great deal of ornament. She could ride, of course, but not as Hilda could, and she left the interests of the ranch to the men. She seemed to have forgotten all about that earlier time, and even when Hilda reminded her she was vague with:

“Oh, yes, I remember I was over in Lame Jones County once when I was a little girl—did I visit at your house?” It seemed to Hilda that so many interesting things had happened to this girl that it was perfectly natural she should have forgotten. For from the first morning when Miss Ferguson opened lessons, Hilda sensed the cross-pull that there was here. The lively interfering tide came right over from the store porch, where young fellows in bullion-trimmed sombreros, high-heeled boots and clanking spurs, were apt to be on hand to intercept the girls if one of them ran across on an errand. And there was always an errand, when Maybelle saw any one she liked there. Sometimes when she didn’t do that, one or more of the boys sauntered across to the ranch house, even looked in at the schoolroom window to say hello and ask when lessons would be over.

Miss Ferguson, the teacher, did the best she could. Hilda realized at once that here was some one who knew twice as much as Miss Belle or Miss Bobbie, who had taught Uncle Hank’s academy—a really good teacher from a well-known woman’s college in the East. But Mrs. Marchbanks didn’t seem to care how much the lessons were interrupted. It was almost as though she put greater emphasis on the girls having a good time. She had two lively, spoiled children of her own, Tod, the boy, seven, and Jinnie, five. Her immediate interest fastened upon Hilda’s looks. She had followed on to the room the first day, gone in with the two girls, sat down on the bed with Tod and Jinnie on each side of her, and gazed at the new member of her household with very admiring eyes.

“Hilda, dear—I’m going to call you Hilda, of course—you ought always to wear white.”

Hilda was pulling on a fresh blouse, making herself tidy for lunch.

“I don’t mean just a shirt-waist—a thin dress, with your arms showing through a little. They are too sunburned now—you’ve been careless with them—but I can soon take that off with buttermilk. I would just love to see you dressed in a thin white dress with a dark red flower in your hair.”

“Tod’s freckled like a hop-toad,” little red-headed Jinnie piped up, suddenly. “Muvver doesn’t take the freckles off of him with buttermilk. Could you, Muvver? Would they come off? I ast him once to let me scrub ’em off wiv sand—but he wouldn’t.”

“Tod’s freckles don’t matter, Baby,” Mrs. Marchbanks laughed. “Tod’s not a beautiful young lady like Hilda.”

“Oh—and I’m not a young lady—yet,” Hilda smiled and blushed, uncertain yet pleased.

“Well, I wasn’t prepared to find you quite so grown up, or so lovely,” Mrs. Marchbanks rose and gathered up her youngsters to go, “though Fayte told me you were a mighty pretty girl. You and Fayte are going to be great friends—aren’t you?”

Hilda didn’t know which way to look. Her confusion made Mrs. Marchbanks laugh, and she turned at the door to say, “You just wait till Fayte gets back; I’ll bet there’ll be a thin white dress found somewhere for you to wear, and a red flower for those dark curls.”

Maybelle, listening silently, had a curious air; dropping her eyelids half over her eyes in a way that kept you from seeing any expression they had in them, but she shut the door after her stepmother and turned the key.

“Ma’s silly about Fayte,” she said coolly. “Did you see him over at your place?” And when Hilda nodded, “I think he’s mighty good looking—but when I say that, I praise myself. Don’t you think we look alike, Hilda? I wish he was going to be at home now—we always have a lot more fun when he’s here.”

Hilda nodded inclusively. It seemed funny to know so much more than they seemed to about Fayte’s last visit to Lame Jones County. But, of course, she would never breathe a word of it to any one here on the Alamositas. She found herself, like Maybelle, a little sorry that Fayte wasn’t at home; it would have been interesting to see how he would meet her. She was pleased when Maybelle remarked, as they were going downstairs:

“Pa said he’d sent Fayte to Old Mexico to be gone a year—and I’ll bet Fayte’ll be back in a week. He and Pa are always having blow-ups. Ma smooths ’em over for him.”

It was some days later that Hilda came into the schoolroom one morning on an argument between Mrs. Marchbanks and the teacher.

“I want to earn my salary,” Miss Ferguson was saying. “Teaching Tod and Jinnie doesn’t amount to anything. Such young children oughtn’t to have more than a half hour in the morning, and I’m not a kindergarten teacher. But these girls—Hilda’s the kind that could take a fine education.”

“Pooh! Hilda Van Brunt’ll be taking a husband—that’s what she’ll be taking—maybe sooner than any one thinks.” It was almost as though Mrs. Marchbanks had seen her, and wanted her to hear—almost as though she were speaking to Hilda herself, as she finished, “A girl like that is bound to marry young. She’d better hurry up and have all the good time she can before then. You keep the lessons along, Miss Ferguson; the girls can learn enough, and enjoy themselves at the same time.”

Hilda stole away, rather startled. If Uncle Hank had any idea what sort of views Mrs. Marchbanks held, would he have sent her, Hilda, to New Mexico? Well, it was done, and as for enjoying herself—that was exactly what she would enjoy—herself. So, in those first days, when there were long rides up into the mountains, for which Mrs. Marchbanks provided the lunch, and saw no harm in the two girls having two cowboy escorts, the frequent little gayeties at the house itself where some young fellows brought over a guitar and sat on the porch, with Mrs. Marchbanks bringing out lemonade and little cakes for the lively company—Hilda was sure she was just enjoying herself. It was lovely to be admired. She couldn’t look into eyes that told her how pretty she was without her own eyes sparkling. Resentfully she thought of Pearse Masters, who practically called her a silly little girl and told her to stay in the schoolroom. Even Uncle Hank—well, he couldn’t quite have known how things were going to be over here. This wasn’t what he meant when he talked to her that night on the door-stone.

She took this first taste of a girl’s good time into that world of imagination which would always be hers, dreamed on it, as she always dreamed on the things that came to her; and she bloomed like a rose in the bellehood that was hers, for it was plain from the first that the new girl at the Alamositas carried all before her; Maybelle took second place.

Six weeks after she left the Sorrows, Uncle Hank came over. Hilda, wildly excited, rode in to Juan Chico, the little town where the railway station was, to meet him and ride out to the ranch with him. Only six weeks—and he caught his breath as he looked at her. What was the great change? The persistent flattery of Mrs. Marchbanks, Maybelle’s example, had made her more careful of her appearance, yet, even if he had been able to place this, it would not have accounted for the new light in her eyes, the new confidence in her manner. Riding out she talked to him almost altogether about her studies. She was perfectly sincere in that; Hilda had an eager mind, and she enjoyed the teaching of a woman who could show her that there was so much more in a mere education than she had ever thought. And when they got to the Alamositas it seemed just his little girl Hilda who introduced her Uncle Hank with a true child’s pride and delight to every member of the household, the cowpunchers, the very cats and dogs.

But there was no concealing from Uncle Hank’s keen eyes the position she had instantly taken among the young men visitors in the house. That evening on the porch was like other evenings; a lot of boys in to see them, Maybelle, after a little joking and talk, wandering away to a quiet corner of the court with one of the callers, but Hilda surrounded by a noisy, competitive group.

Mrs. Marchbanks, sitting beside Pearsall at the far end of the gallery, looked on approvingly. She seemed to expect equal pride and approval from the old man.

“Hilda’s a regular heart breaker, Mr. Pearsall,” she sighed.

“M-m,” grunted Uncle Hank, rather crusty, “I don’t know as I have much use for the heart-breaking business. I don’t want to see her’n broke.”

“Oh—Hilda’s heart is in no danger!” Mrs. Marchbanks laughed a little. “Look over there. Safety in numbers, Mr. Pearsall. You won’t have to be uneasy about Hilda’s heart till some one of them cuts all the others out.”

“I reckon you’re right.” Uncle Hank looked and smiled in spite of himself. Three young fellows and Hilda were disputing over the possibility of dancing in the court there, if two of the others, who looked sulkily on, would oblige with guitar and harmonica. His girl was all right, her eyes shining, her gay words flying, as the men quarreled heartily over who should have the first waltz with her when one of these reluctant idiots could be got to play a waltz. To Hank’s fond eyes she looked so very much alive in a world where so many are but half living—only going through the motions by a sort of formula—no wonder she was dangerously fascinating.

“And when my boy gets home,” Mrs. Marchbanks was going on beside him, “there’ll be another. Fayte will be frantic about Hilda.”

Hank was only stopping one day. Riding over to the station in the morning he had a final talk with Hilda, which seemed on the whole quite satisfactory, though again it gave him cause to smile.

“Of course, Uncle Hank,” she said demurely, “I understand that you didn’t mean for me to sit about on the porch with young men and play grown-up, the way I’m doing here. I didn’t really intend to, myself, but somehow it—it just seems to happen.”

She tilted her head on one side and looked across at the old man out of the corners of such liquid eyes, the up-curled lips were such threads of scarlet, as inquired of him how affairs of the heart were to be kept away from even a child of this mettle.

“I expect you do all right, Pettie. I haven’t a doubt that you never say a word you wouldn’t be willing for your Uncle Hank to hear,” he suggested, a bit slyly.

Hilda caught her breath. Then she glanced up swiftly and surprised a twinkle in his eyes.

“You know I don’t—or—or do!” in some confusion. “I get as silly as the rest of them. Foolishness is all you can talk—it’s all they want to hear. But, Uncle Hank,” thrusting her pony in beside his to grasp his hand, enforcing her argument by small tugs on it, “it’s lots of fun. I’m going to tell you something dreadful about myself. There were two of them that used to come here a great deal, and they were awfully good friends. Now they hardly speak to each other, and”—the voice dropping to an exultant, half-terrified whisper—“I did it.”

“Hilda—you little skeezicks!”

He swung onto the train; she waited and waved to him almost till it was out of sight, then rode rather soberly back to the Alamositas. She’d necessarily let him go without any hint that a great deal of her interest in the young fellows she played about with so freely was a hope that one of them—all of them—would carry the news of her conquests to another young fellow, Pearse Masters by name, who hadn’t cared enough about her to even suggest that they might write each other, since she was living in a house where he could not be a guest.

Uncle Hank’s visit changed nothing—he saw nothing to change. Hilda still studied fitfully, played ardently, endeared herself to her teacher—and apparently at the same time was endeared with more or less seriousness to six or eight of the young fellows about her. Mrs. Marchbanks had a knack for dress and ornament. She pulled Hilda’s hair down and did it over for her, teaching the girl all the little tricks that bring out beauty. Hilda, a beauty lover herself, caught these up easily. She’d never thought much about her own appearance. Aunt Val’s lectures said nothing about making herself attractive. Maybelle was the pink of neatness; not a bad example in that respect for any one to follow; if she used too much perfume and too many ornaments—why, you didn’t need to imitate her there. And Maybelle became interesting at once when she admitted that she’d met Pearse Masters several times at the big dances and picnics to which every one goes in the ranching country, and that she thought he was awfully good looking.

Hilda told herself that she had got over feeling bad about him; her friendship with Pearse was like a book that you shut and put away on a high shelf. She didn’t realize, herself, how many times she took that volume down and glanced into it with a good deal of regret, and that in spite of the fact that there were plenty of other volumes of the sort at hand, fairly begging her to read them.

And one experience was coming nearer, though she didn’t know it. One day of moving air and mild sun she had ridden over alone to a side caÑon of the small, sluggish Juanajara River, to get resurrection plants. Her saddle-bags were full of the strange, dry-looking balls which she would later put in water and see open out green and prosperous. When she got home Tod Marchbanks met her at the corral, full of importance over his news.

“My brother Fayte’s come back from Mexico,” he announced proudly. “An’ you ought to see the things! He brought me a hair bridle, an’ Jinnie lots of beads an’ such. Maybelle, he brought her joolry—Mex’can fildygree—an’ a scrape for Ma, an’ a sombrero for Pa that’s got a gre’ big silver snake round the crown. Hurry up—supper’s most ready.”

Now for the meeting with Fayte Marchbanks! She wondered how he would carry it off! He must know what they all suspected him of back at the Sorrows. While she was slipping out of her riding habit and getting washed, she decided that the new white dress would be the one to put on. She did her hair very carefully, a little dissatisfied at its plainness, but timid of adding ornament for fear of seeming to dress up for the new arrival. Then, when she was ready and passing Mrs. Marchbanks’s door, that lady looked out and said:

“Here’s a bunch of red geranium I saved for you, Hilda. It looks so well in your black hair.”

“Oh, thank you!” Hilda nestled the fiery blooms in the dark curls just above the ear. “That’s awfully good of you.” And the two went downstairs together.

They were late. Everybody was in the dining-room. Billy Grainger and two young men from Juan Chico were at the house for supper, but the first figure that caught Hilda’s eye as she entered the room she recognized instantly. There was no great change from the defiant, outlaw personality she remembered. He got up and came straight to her and was shaking hands before the colonel said:

“Of course, you young folks know each other?”

Mrs. Marchbanks, who had been talking to her stepson of Hilda’s beauty, her many charms and many admirers, gave him a triumphant glance as she saw the surprise with which he greeted the girl. He had laughed at her talk, remembering the slim tom-boy with a dust-streaked face and stringy hair who made that wild ride and brought his father up in time to stop his rustling operations.

“You can’t fool me with that sort of talk, mamma,” he had said. “Hilda Van Brunt’s no looker. Yes, yes—I know what you say about the ranch. Pretty is as pretty has, eh? She’ll be half owner of my grandfather’s ranch—the ranch that ought to have been mine. But she sure is not pretty, whatever you say.”

And Hilda? As she shook hands, there was the instant memory of having seen and overheard Fayte and his father in that bitter interview by the creekside. She was glad neither of them knew that she’d been there overhearing. When supper was done, and they were moving irregularly from the dining-room, Hilda found herself beside the returned prodigal.

“Don’t you want to come and sit on the porch a while?” He spoke in a low tone, apparently for her ear only.

“Shall we?” she asked, raising her voice. “Do you think it’s pleasanter outside than in the house, Mrs. Marchbanks?”

“Yes, dear, for you young folks,” the hostess said indulgently. “I’ve got to put Jinnie to bed.”

Hilda turned to Miss Ferguson, but the lady of the house made immediate demand on the governess for some trifling matter. Maybelle took occasion to secure both of the young men guests for herself; the three went down the steps and into the garden. Hilda found herself alone with Fayte, facing his half-quizzical smile, allowing him to bring a porch rocker for her, and sit down very close beside her.

“Well?” he prompted. One heavy black lock tossed down across his forehead, his long gray eyes shining in the dusk; he stared at her still with a look that was both questioning and mocking. “Say it—say it. You’ve got a bad opinion of me. You’ve been warned against me.” He laughed at the idea. “That day over at the Sorrows——”

“Oh, don’t let’s talk about that,” said Hilda nervously. “Let’s just forget about it.”

“Suits me,” said Fayte easily. “All the same, I’ve been wondering ever since if you were the only one that suspected—Say, Hilda, what did set you flying off to Tres PiÑos to warn dad that day?”

“Why—Uncle Hank sent me,” she said incautiously. “He thought, maybe—because——”

“Pearsall.” Fayte looked at her with narrowed eyes. “Then he was tipped off—as I thought—and there’s another score to even up with the JIC bunch.”

“No. No—you’re mistaken. Uncle Hank didn’t see any one from—from over here.”

“But you did.”

Hilda got to her feet, saying decidedly:

“If you will keep on talking about that—I’m going down where the others are.”

“Not yet.” Fayte rose too. They stood a moment. Tall, handsome, a man now, he was, after all, very much the same as the small boy who had blown her doll to pieces—and thought it was funny.

“I don’t want to quarrel,” she began, “but——”

“That’s all right,” Fayte laughed. “Good way to begin. Hilda, you’re going to like me a lot, before we’re done. You can’t get away from me. Better not try to. And you’re too pretty a girl to put on touch-me-not airs.”