“Well, I’ll tell you.” Mrs. Bohm began the story with apparent reluctance, but her manner soon betrayed a certain zest. “You see, about four years ago Tex was workin’ for a man up on Crow Creek and took some cattle on to Omaha to sell for him. When he came back he never brought a cent of money, and told how he had been held up and robbed. Everybody believed it at first, then all to onct his family—they live over West—began to dress to kill, and Tex bought brass beds for every room in the house; then folks began to suspicion where he got the money, and he was sent to the Pen for two years.”

Poor old Tex! Who would ever have supposed a secret longing for brass beds would prove his undoing? I might have guessed horses or cards, but never brass beds. I almost felt the breath of tragedy. She seemed sweeping by.

Mrs. Bohm went on: “Tex’s mighty good to his family, though, and it most killed him when his wife went off with a Mexican sheep-herder while he was doin’ time. She’s back home now with the girls, but her and Tex’s separated. Ain’t it a fright the way women acts?”

“It certainly is,” I agreed, trying to reconcile my previous idea of convicts with having one for a cook. It was dreadfully confusing and disturbing. In spite of what I had just heard, I knew I trusted Tex. He would never steal from us, I felt sure. And my instinct told me he would be a true and loyal friend. There was no apparent excuse for what he had done, but he had paid for his moment of weakness more fully perhaps than anyone realized. I pondered over it.

Presently he came in, with a curious, troubled expression on his face. I gave him the orders, as usual, with no sign of having heard of the cloud under which he had lived for three miserable years. Our relations were re-established. I could see his relief.

We were still taking our meals in the kitchen, although the house was gradually being remodeled. It was Saturday evening, and we were expecting Owen home. There was an air of suppressed excitement among the men. One, and then another, bolted from the table and out of the door, returning in a shame-faced manner to explain that he “thought he heered somethin’.” Certainly Owen’s coming would never produce such a sensation, unless he was expected to arrive in an airship. I was more than ever mystified.

After the meal was over, there was such a general shaving—also in the kitchen—and such donning of red neckties, that I could not restrain my curiosity. I called Tex aside and asked him where they were going. He looked a little sheepish, as he replied:

“Why, we ain’t goin’ nowhere.” Then in a burst of confidence, “I don’t know as I’d orter tell you, but the fact is, you folks is goin’ to be surprised; all the folks ’round is goin’ to have a party here, and we’re expectin’ ’em.”

I gasped. A sudden suspicion flashed through my mind.

“Tex, did you plan this? What on earth shall I do?”

Tex saw I was really troubled. “Why, Mrs. Brook,” he said, “you don’t have to do nothin’. Just turn the house over to ’em, and along about midnight I’ll make some coffee—they’ll bring baskets.”

I was relieved to know that they only wanted the house, and would provide their own refreshments, for it was appalling to be an impromptu hostess to an entire community and to speculate upon the possibility of one small cold roast and chocolate cake satisfying a crowd of young people, after drives of thirty miles or more across the prairie.

“Me and the boys”—Tex spoke somewhat apologetically, as he started toward the door—“we kind a thought maybe you and Mr. Brook would like to get acquainted, seem’s how you’re goin’ to live here; but I guess we oughten to have did what we done.”

I felt ashamed of my momentary perturbation, as the force of that last sentence of Tex’s reached me. These men of the plains were as simple and sensitive as children about many things. They would really grieve if they felt this affair, planned solely on our account, gave us no pleasure. I hastened to reassure him.

“It was mighty nice of you men to think of it,” I said, cheerfully. “We do want to know the people in the country, and we are going to enjoy every moment. I was ‘surprised’ before the party began, that’s all.”

Tex went out satisfied, grinning broadly.

To my good fortune, Owen arrived before the guests came. I told him what was about to befall us. His expression was dubious. All he said was “Thunder.”

Owen and one of the men had been driving about the country all the week, buying horses suitable to turn in on a Government cavalry contract. The night before they had spent on the floor of a cold railroad station, wrapped up in their blankets, with a lighted lantern under the covering at their feet. Their sleep was somewhat broken, with either cremation or freezing pending that cold September night. Poor Owen! He was completely worn out. And now he had to go through a surprise party.

At eight o’clock, Tex, self-appointed master of ceremonies, ushered in the first arrivals. They were a tall, lean chap and two very much be-curled young misses. I made trials without number at conversation, but they could only be induced to say “Yes” and “No.”

From eight until ten they came,—ranchmen, cow-punchers, ex-cow-punchers running their own outfits, infant cow-punchers, girls and women, until kitchen and sitting room were filled to overflowing, and every chair and bench on the place in use. Among the last to arrive was a tall, languid Texan, accompanied by two languid, drab-colored women. They were presented to us as “Robert, Missus Reed and Maggie.” “Maggie,” I immediately concluded, was a sister, but not being quite certain, I sought enlightenment from Mrs. Bohm.

“She ain’t Reed’s sister,” she informed me in a low tone, “she’s his girl.”

“Oh, works for them, you mean?” I said, somewhat puzzled by the Reed connections.

“Works nothin’,” Mrs. Bohm replied, scornfully. “She’s got the next place to ’em and goes with ’em everywhere. Ella don’t seem to mind. I’d just call her Maggie’ if I was you,” and Mrs. Bohm departed to join a group of women near the door.

I looked over at the two with a new interest. They were chatting and laughing together, the “girl” and the wife seemingly on the best of terms, with no sign of rivalry for the tall Texan’s affections. Here was a situation fraught with latent possibilities that made me tremble, yet—“Ella don’t seem to mind.”

The kitchen had been converted into a ballroom by moving the table up against the wall and placing three chairs upon it. Unfortunately the sink and stove were fixtures, but everything else, including the bread jar, found a temporary resting place in the yard.

Old Bohm, with his fiddle under his arm, gingerly ascended the table first. Then another man followed with a similar instrument; and last came a youth with a mouth harp. No fatality having resulted from the musicians taking their seats, the dancing began.

The music, if such a combination of sounds can be dignified by that name, was such as to defy description. Never in the wildest flights of fancy could I have conceived of such execution and such sounds. The two men sawed their violins, and the third was purple in the face from his efforts on the mouth-harp; all were stamping time with their feet, and he of the harp was slapping his knee with his unoccupied hand.

Before every dance a council was held, after which each musician would play the tune decided upon, as best suited to his taste. Old Bohm tried to get to the end in the shortest time possible, while the second fiddler, taking things more seriously, finished four or five bars behind his companion. The harpist, not playing “second” to anything or anybody, had his own opinion as to how “A Hot Time in the Old Town” should go. With these independent views, the result was a series of the most discordant sounds that ever fell on mortal ears. However, music mattered little, for all had come to have a good time, and the “caller-out,” with both eyes shut tight and arms folded across his breast, was making himself heard above all other sounds.

“Birdie in the center and all hands around!” he commanded. Then fiddles and mouth harp began a wild jig, couples raced ’round and ’round, while “Birdie,” a blond and blushing maiden, stood patiently in the midst of the whirling circle, until the next order came:

“Crow” was a broad, heavy-set cow-puncher, wearing chaps, and in the endeavor to “run around agin,” I found my progress somewhat impeded by his spurs, which caught in my skirt and very nearly upset me.

All the riders wore their heavy boots and spurs, and it required real agility to avoid being stepped on or having one’s skirt torn to ribbons. I was devoutly thankful that chiffon and tulle ball gowns were not worn on ranches.

There was more to avoid than spurs. We had to dance about the kitchen and avoid the stove, the sink and the tabled musicians, to say nothing of the nails in the floor. But after a few hours’ practice, I began to feel qualified to waltz on top of the House of the Seven Gables, and avoid at least six of them.

Finally, the caller-out shouted loudly:

My partner obeyed every command with such vigor that when at last he led me to my seat I was panting and dizzy; nor had I quite recovered my breath when the music struck up again, and Tex led me forth.

The exertion of the first quadrille had been too much for his comfort, so he had dispensed with both collar and coat. His trousers and vest bore evidence of having seen many a round-up, and his shirt, which had once been white, was now multi-colored. In the wonderful red ascot tie which encircled his neck were stuck four scarf-pins, one above the other. There being nothing to hold the loop of the tie in place, it gradually worked up the back of his head, until its progress was stopped by the edge of a small skull-cap, which Tex wore as the crowning feature of his costume. The cap, tilted slightly to one side, gave him a rakish appearance, quite in contrast with his air of importance and responsibility.

I danced—my head fairly spins when I think how I danced—for, since the party was given in our honor, dance I must with every man who asked me.

Owen, not being a dancing man, made himself agreeable to the wall-flowers and the children, stealing upstairs about once an hour for a few moments’ nap on the bedroom floor. The beds themselves were occupied by sleeping infants, whose mothers were going through the intricate mazes of those dances below.

At one o’clock Tex began to make the coffee, whereupon the musicians descended from the table, and the expectant party sat down. But where were their baskets? My heart sank, as Tex approached holding a very small one. He informed me in a stage whisper it was all there was!

The basket contained a cake and one wee chick, evidently fried soon after leaving the shell. It was the smallest chicken I ever saw. I hastily produced our cake and roast, and then took one despairing look around at the forty individuals to be fed. I shall never be able to explain it, unless Tex had an Aladdin’s lamp concealed in his pocket, for cake, roast and chicken appeared to be inexhaustible, and the supply more than equaled the demand.

I was aroused from my contemplation of the miracle by a feminine voice, the speaker saying half to herself and half to me:

“It took me most two hours to iron Nell’s dress this mornin’, but I sure got a pretty ‘do’ on it.” Following her beaming glance, I found that it rested on a mass of ruffles, which adorned the dress of “Birdie” of that first quadrille. Just then the music began again, and I saw Ed Lay ask her to dance. I trusted, after all that work, the ‘do’ wouldn’t be undone by his spurs; still the effort had not been wasted, for this was the fifth time he had danced with her.

No doting mother could have taken more pride in the debut of an only child, than this work-worn sister whose eyes sparkled as they followed “Birdie’s” whirling figure held firmly by the encircling arm of the cow-puncher, and she murmured softly with a half sigh, “Ain’t it grand?” To me it was “grand” indeed, that even an embryo romance could bring a new light to those tired eyes.

It was six o’clock Sunday morning when one most thoughtful person suggested that “they’d orter be goin’”; and by seven the last guest had departed. Then Owen and I, weary and heavy-eyed, donned our wraps, climbed into the wagon, and started on a sixteen-mile drive to the railroad to meet his brother, who was coming from California to see “how we were making it.”

I was almost too tired to speak, but one thought was struggling for expression, and as we started up the first long hill, I had to say:

“Anyone who ever spoke of the ‘peace and quiet of ranch life’ lived in New York and dreamed about it. In twenty-four hours I have discovered that we have an ex-convict for a trusted cook, and have received as guests a man with his wife and resident affinity. We have had a surprise party and I have danced with all the blemished characters the country boasts of, until six o’clock in the morning of the Sabbath day, with never a qualm of conscience. What do you suppose has become of my moral standards?”

Owen was amused. He asked me, quizzically, what I thought they would be by the end of a year.

“Mercy!” I replied, “at the rate they are being overthrown, there won’t be enough left to consider, unless”—I thought a moment—“unless I can reconstruct a more enduring set from parts of the old.”