Uncle Hank was not ignorant! Ignorant, yourself, Miss or Madam Ohio! Could it be possible that she, Hilda, alone of them all was aware that he knew more than anybody else in the world? Why, you starched-up lady with your gold spectacles and shiny slippers, it would need a lifetime’s toil for you to come into half his stored wisdom concerning coyotes and why they howl; touching prairie dogs, wild mustangs, cactus, jack rabbits, trail-herds, boggy fords, relating to “when we were down on the Pecos,” or “one spring on the Canadian,” or, “when cows stampede.” Uncle Hank was beautiful too. No one living had such eyes as those blue ones of his; his smile was as the very rays of the sun; his voice; his touch—! Hilda knew that sometimes children had to get along without relatives and without parents; but that any little girl could possibly face existence without some sort of Uncle Hank was beyond her powers of belief. Supposing that she—even in her own proper and insignificant person—should lead these glib scoffers to Uncle Hank’s trunk, lift the lid and show them where his Sunday suit lay? If that did not convict them of shallow judgments, surely the bottle of cologne would do the trick. It was imported, so Uncle Hank said; and to Hilda’s thinking its possession was better than a patent of nobility. Hilda’s secret court of justice and the visit came to an end about the same time. The ladies, who never knew what they’d been through in the little girl’s mind, came out into the hall; the buckboard that was to carry two of them, the ponies for the others, were at the door. Hilda rose, made her bow and said her good-bys in that queer, artificial tone that pleased her aunt. Burchie had stood solid on his two feet; not a word out of him; just a pink fist up, methodically wiping off kisses—and Aunt Val let him. She and the ladies even exchanged pitying glances over the top of his head. But Hilda knew that Burch heard all they said perfectly, and could have talked well enough if he’d wanted to—and surely Aunt Val knew it. Grown-ups—all but Uncle Hank—were dreadfully puzzling. Finally Hilda had led little brother away, given him his bread and milk, put him to bed, and now had come back to her evening perch on the door-stone where she always watched for Uncle Hank.