fles, and run up the steps.

"My!" sighed Pratt Sanderson in his soul. "Frances has got them all beat
in every little way. That's as sure as sure!"

CHAPTER XXIX

"THE PANHANDLE--PAST AND PRESENT"

Jackleg was in holiday attire. It was a raw Western settlement, it was
true; but there was more business ambition and public spirit in the
place than in half a dozen Eastern towns of its population.

The schoolhouse was a long, low structure, seating as many people as the
ordinary town hall. It was situated upon a flat bit of prairie on the
outskirts of the town. Rather, the town had grown from the schoolhouse
to the railroad station, on either side of a long, dusty street.
Railroads in the West do not go out of their way to touch immature
settlements. The settlements have to stretch tentacles out to the place
where the railroad company determines to build a station.

This was so at Jackleg, but it gave a long vista of Main Street from the
heart of the town to its outlying suburbs. This street was now gay with
flags and bunting, while there were many arches of colored electric
lights to burn at night.

Almost before the plans for the pageant had been formed, the business
men of Jackleg had subscribed a liberal sum to defray expenses. As the
plans for the entertainment progressed, and it was whispered about what
a really fine thing it was to be, more subscriptions rolled in.

But Captain Dan Rugley had deposited a guarantee with the Committee that
he would pay any debts over the subscriptions received, therefore
Frances and her helpers had gone ahead along rather lavish lines.

The end wall of the school building had been actually removed. The
framework of the wall was rearranged by the carpenters like the
proscenium arch of a stage, and a drop of canvas faced the spectators
where the teacher's desk and platform had been.

Behind the schoolhouse was a vacant lot. This had been surrounded with a
high board fence. The enclosure made the great stage for the spectacle
which the Jackleg people, the ranchers and farmers from around about,
and the visitors from Amarillo and other towns, had come to see.

At the back of this enclosure, or stage, was a big sheet, or screen, on
which moving pictures could be thrown. On a platform built outside, and
over the open end of the building, were two moving picture machines with
operators who had come on from California where some of the pictures had
been made by a very famou