from The Eagles Heart (1900)
ON THE WING
When Harold arose the next morning his cheeks were still red with the touch of the wind and sun and he looked like a college student just entering upon a vacation. His grace and dignity of bearing set him apart from the rough workmen with whom he ate, and he did not exchange a single word with anyone but the landlord. As soon as breakfast was over he went out into the town.
Roseville had only one street, and it was not difficult to learn that Pratt had not yet appeared upon the scene. It was essentially a prairie village; no tree broke the smooth horizon line. A great many emigrants were in motion, and their white-topped wagons suggested the sails of minute craft on the broad ocean as they came slowly up the curve to the East and fell away down the slope to the West. To all of these Harold applied during the days that followed, but received no offer which seemed to promise so well as that of Mr. Pratt, so he waited. At last he came, a tall, sandy-bearded fellow, who walked beside a four-horse team drawing two covered wagons tandem. Behind him straggled a bunch of bony cattle and some horses, herded by a girl and a small boy. The girl rode a mettlesome little pony, sitting sidewise on a man's saddle.
"Wal—I d'n know," the old man replied in answer to Harold's question. "I did 'low fer to get some help, but Jinnie she said she'd bring 'em along fer fifty cents a day, an' she's boss, stranger. If she's sick o' the job, why, I'll make out with ye. Jinnie, come here."
Jinnie rode up, eyeing the stranger sharply. "What's up, Dad?"
"Here's another young fellow after your job."
"Well, if he'll work cheap he can have it," replied the girl promptly. "I don't admire to ride in this mud any longer."
Pratt smiled. "I reckon that lets you in, stranger, ef we can come to terms. We ain't got any money to throw away, but we'll do the best we kin."
"I'll tell you what you do. You turn that pony and saddle over to me when we get through, and I'll call it square."
"Well, I reckon you won't," said the girl, throwing back her sunbonnet as if in challenge. "That's my pony, and nobody gets him without blood, and don't you forget it, sonny."
She was a large-featured girl, so blonde as to be straw-colored, even to the lashes of her eyes, but her teeth were very white, and her lips a vivid pink. She had her father's humorous smile, and though her words were bluff, her eyes betrayed that she liked Harold at once.
Harold smiled back at her. "Well, I'll take the next best, that roan there."
The boy burst into wild clamor: "Not by a darn sight, you don't. That's my horse, an' no sucker like you ain't goin' to ride him, nuther."
"Why don't you ride him?" asked Harold.
