do not make up for her Eastern comforts.
And so last year, as we made a good herd and there were no raids to
speak of, I came to New York to get a few luxuries for her. She wrote me
then to go to Paris and see the Exposition; so I went because I thought
she knew best, and that if I had seen the world a little I should be
nearer to her, and it would not be quite so hard for her out there. And
now she is ill, and--I am here!'

"He turned impatiently away to ask the quartermaster what we were doing
by the last log. The speed appeared to satisfy him, for he sat quietly
down again and told us how it was that Kitty had come to live with them.

"'For two years, you know'--assuming that we did know--'she spent
Saturdays at Trocalara, teaching our people how to read and write. They
were very rough at first--we all are out there--and did not care much;
but she interested them, and brought picture-books for the little ones,
and by and by she said she would come out on Sunday and we should have
church!' with a triumphant look at Hamilton and his Pan-Anglican
attendance. 'Yes, we had had a priest there before, but he was shot in a
row at Bowler's Paradise, and no one cared to apply for a new one.

"'Kitty came up to the ranch the first Sunday, and asked us to come with
her. We refused at first, but after a while, when we heard the singing,
we went down to the quarters, and found her sitting under one of the
trees with all the young ones clustered round her; and we waited there
and listened until we began to feel very sorry that we had played so
late at Bowler's the night before.

"'But Parker had been in luck, and he swore he would get her as fine a
piano as could be brought from the States (he was a half-Mexican by
birth) if she would sing like that for us at the ranch.

"'She stood up then, with all the young ones looking on in amazement,
the light and shade playing over her through the cool, dark leaves, and,
turning her large gray eyes full on Parker's face, said she would if we
would promise never to go to Bowler's again.

"'I think Parker expected her to refuse to come altogether, because we
had no women there, and we had heard the people in Junta talking of her
quiet, modest ways. But no, she never thought of herself: she only
thought of the nights at Bowler's, and wanted to save us from the end
she had seen often enough in two years in Junta. At any rate, the piano
came, and Parker had it sent as a sort of halfway measu