o seated herself in one of the two unoccupied chairs was
not of the far West. Her complexion alone testified to this fact, for the
fineness and whiteness of it were conspicuous in a country where the
winter's wind and burning suns of summer tan the skins of men and women
alike until they resemble leather in color and in texture. Had this young
woman possessed no other good feature, her markedly fine complexion alone
would have saved her from plainness. But her thick brown hair, glossy, and
growing prettily about her temples, was equally attractive to the men who
had been used to seeing only the straight, black hair of the Indian women,
and Susie's sun-bleached pigtail, which, as Meeteetse took frequent
occasion to remind her, looked like a hair-cinch. Her eyes, set rather too
far apart for beauty, were round, with pupils which dilated until they all
but covered the blue iris; the eyes of an emotional nature, an imaginative
mind. Her other features, though delicate, were not exceptional, but the
_tout ensemble_ was such that her looks would have been considered above
the average even in a country where pretty girls were plentiful. In her
present surroundings, and by contrast with the womenfolk about her, she
was regarded as the most beautiful of her sex. Her manner, reserved to the
point of stiffness, and paralyzing, as it did, the glibbest masculine
tongue among them, was also looked upon as the acme of perfection and all
that was desirable in young ladyhood; each individual humbly admitting
that while he never before had met a real lady, he knew one when he saw
her.

The young woman returned McArthur's bow with a friendly smile, his action
having at once placed him as being "different." Noting the fact, the
grub-liners resolved not to be outdone in future in a mere matter of
bows.

While nearly every arm was outstretched with an offer of food, Susie
leaned forward and whispered ostentatiously behind her hand to Smith:

"Don't you make any cracks. That's the Schoolmarm."

"I've been around the world some," Smith replied curtly.

"The south side of Billings ain't the world."

It was only a random shot, as she did not know Billings or any other town
save by hearsay, but it made a bull's-eye. Susie knew it by the startled
look which she surprised from him, and Smith could have throttled her as
she snickered.

"Mister McArthur and Mister Tubbs, I'll make you acquainted with Miss
Marshall."

With elaborate formality