Miss Abbie Carter Goodloe, novelist and short-story writer, was born at Versailles, Kentucky, in 1867. In 1883 she was graduated from the Girls' High School, Louisville; and in 1889 she received the degree of Bachelor of Science from Wellesley College. The next two years were spent in studying and traveling in Europe. On her return to the United States Miss Goodloe made her home at Louisville, of which city she has been a resident ever since. Her first book, Antinous (Philadelphia, 1891), a blank verse tragedy, was followed by College Girls (New York, 1895), an entertaining collection of short stories of college life. Miss Goodloe's first novel, Calvert of Strathore (New York, 1903), was set, for the most part, in the sunny land of France. At the Foot of the Rockies (New York, 1905), a group of short stories, is Miss Goodloe's best work so far. Several of the tales are of great merit and interest, one enthusiastic critic comparing them to Kipling's finest work. The author spent one glorious summer in Alberta, Canada, surrounded by the Northwest Mounted Police, Indians, Englishmen, Americans, and the romance of it all quite possessed her. These were the backgrounds for the eight stories which have won her wider fame than any of her other writings. A winter in Mexico furnished materials for her latest novel, The Star-Gazers (New York, 1910). The reader is presented to the late president of that revolutionary-ridden republic, Porfirio Diaz, together with the other celebrities of his country. The epistolary form of narration is adopted, and the result is not especially noteworthy. In no way does this work rank with At the Foot of the Rockies. The short-story is certainly Miss Goodloe's greatest gift, and in that field she should go far.

Bibliography. Anna Blanche McGill's excellent study in the Library of Southern Literature (Atlanta, 1909, v. v); Scribner's Magazine (January, April, 1910; July, 1911).

A COUNTESS OF THE WEST[54]

[From At the Foot of the Rockies (New York, 1905)]

She looked at the Honorable Arthur, abashed and weakly unhappy, and a wave of disgust swept over her. He was so big and stupid and irresolute. She would have liked him better if he had told her with brutal frankness that he no longer cared for her and wouldn't marry her. She had thought him grateful at least, and he wasn't even that. The affection he had inspired in her fell from her like a discarded garment. Suddenly she unfastened a button of her shirtwaist and drew from around her neck a little blue ribbon on which hung a seal ring. With a jerk she snapped the ribbon and slipped off the ring. She held it out to him.

"There," she said, cooly, "take it back to Rigby Park and give it to some fine English girl whom your father happens to know! I hope you'll enjoy your England. Montana's good enough for me!"

As she swept the Honorable Arthur with a scornful glance, she suddenly saw his jaw drop and a curious look spring into his eyes. Following the direction of his gaze she beheld two riders approaching at a hand gallop, a Mounted Police officer from Fort Macleod, whom she knew, and following briskly in his wake, a handsome Englishman of middle age. The hair about his temples was heavily tinged with white, but his complexion was as fresh and pink and white as a baby's, and he was most immaculately got up in riding things.

"It's the governor," she heard the Honorable Arthur whisper incredulously to himself.

The meeting between the two was cold and formal, after the fashion of the Anglo-Saxon male. Miss Ogden looked on in fascinated silence. The Earl of Rigby put up a single eyeglass and surveyed his son.

"By gad, my boy, I'm glad to see you again. You aren't looking any too fit, you know."

"Thanks, father—yes, I know it. When did you get here?"

"Just stepped off the train at Macleod two hours ago. Beastly train."

"Yes, isn't it? Howd'y do, Nevin?"

"Howd'y do, St. John? Howd'y do, Miss Ogden? Haven't seen you for a long while. May—may I—the Earl of Rigby, Miss Ogden."

The Earl of Rigby screwed his glass in again—it had fallen out when he had shaken his son's hand—and stared at the young woman before him.

"Awfully glad to meet you, I'm sure," he said, affably. "I—I had always understood that this country was an Eveless paradise. I'm glad to see I'm mistaken."

Miss Lily Ogden surveyed the Earl of Rigby imperturbably. Not one of the thrills which an hour before she would have supposed necessarily attendant on an introduction to a noble earl now disturbed her composure. Even his exaggeratedly polite compliment left her perfectly cool. He simply seemed to her an extremely handsome man, a good deal cleverer and stronger-looking than his son.

"This country wouldn't be a paradise at all without Miss Ogden," said Nevin, gallantly. "She's the best horsewoman in Port Highwood and she'll help St. John show you the country, my lord."

"Thanks, Captain Nevin." She smiled on him sweetly, showing the white, even teeth between the scarlet lips, and then she turned to the Earl of Rigby. "I shall be delighted to show you the country—specially as Mr. St. John is obliged to go away in two or three days."

"I should like nothing better," said the earl, with conviction.

"Have to go on the round-up," murmured the Honorable Arthur.

"That's hard luck," said Nevin, sympathetically. "Two weeks, I suppose."

"Yes—father'll have to stop for a bit at the Highwood House. I fancy he'll wish he were back in England!"

"Not if Miss Ogden will ride with me," observed the earl.

A curious light came into the girl's gray eyes.

"I could show your lordship a new trail every day for the two weeks, and at the end of the time I am sure you could not decide which to call the prettiest," she asserted.

"I dare say," assented the earl, eagerly; "but I would like to try."

"Oh, Miss Ogden will take good care of you," said Nevin. "And now, as you have two guides, if you will excuse me, I think I won't go on into Highwood. Your lordship's things will be sent over early in the morning. His lordship was so anxious to see you, St. John, that we couldn't even persuade him to mess with us to-night," he remarked, jocularly, to the Honorable Arthur. "And now I will turn back, I think. Good-bye!" He waved a gauntleted hand, and wheeling his horse set off at an easy canter for the fort.

A somewhat awkward constraint fell upon the three so left, which Miss Ogden dispelled by turning her horse toward Highwood, and riding on slightly ahead of the Honorable Arthur and his father. The earl gazed admiringly at her slim back.

"By gad, she's a beauty, Arthur, my deah boy, and she sits her horse perfectly."

"She's an American," remarked the young man, aggressively.

"She's beautiful enough to be English," retorted the earl, warmly. He spurred forward and rode at her right hand. The Honorable Arthur rather sulkily closed up on the left.

"I was just saying to Arthur, Miss Ogden, that he could go on the round-up and jolly welcome as long as you have promised to show me the country. I am most deeply interested in our Canadian possessions, you know," said the earl.

She shot him a glance from under the black lashes of her gray eyes which made the Earl of Rigby fairly gasp.

"I shall try my best to keep your lordship from being bored while Mr. St. John is away," she said, sweetly.

It was two weeks later, or to be perfectly exact, two weeks and four days later, that a half-breed was sent down to the Morgan round-up, twenty-five miles west of Calgary, with a telegram for St. John. The Honorable Arthur was so dirty, tired, dusty, and sunburnt that the half-breed had difficulty in picking him out from the rest of the dirty, tired, dusty, and sunburnt round-up crew.

The sight of the telegram filled the young man with an indefinable fear, and the paper fluttered in his trembling hand like a withered leaf on a windshaken bough.

"Meet the 2:40 from Macleod at Calgary. Will be on train. Most important.

Rigby."

His swollen tongue and parched lips got drier, his cracked and tanned skin paled as he read and reread the message. Suddenly a joyous thought came to him. "The old boy's relented sure, and wants me to go back with him," he told himself over and over. He thrust his few things into the one portmanteau he had brought with him and made such good time going the twenty-five miles into Calgary that he had been pacing up and down the station platform for ten minutes when the train pulled in.

The Earl of Rigby, who had been hanging over the vestibule rail of the observation car, swung himself lightly down and cordially grasped his son's hand. The Honorable Arthur was struck afresh by the good looks and youthfulness of his aristocratic father.

"By Jove, Arthur, I'm glad to see you got my telegram, and I'm glad you got here in time. What? No, you won't need your portmanteau. The truth is," he gave an infectious laugh, "the Countess of Rigby—she was Miss Lily Ogden until last night, my deah boy—and I are on our way to England, and we couldn't leave the country without seeing you again. Won't you step into the coach and speak to her?"