"I certainly haven't enough sentiment to make me rumple my best white dress with a clumsy old stick," Sarah replied. "I reckon it ought to have gone in with my shoes, but it's too late now. How you do fuss over that riding-skirt, Sarah!" "Well, if you want to know it, I've a lot of sentiment about that skirt. I wish I could take Comanche along, too." Here Blue Bonnet amazed Sarah by jumping up and giving her a hug. "Oh, Sarah, I do love you for saying that! If you had been reconciled to riding that same old poke you had last year I'd have been so--disgusted. Won't the livery-man in Woodford open his eyes when Miss Blake demands a 'horse with some go in him'--! The inhabitants of the town will get a few thrills too, I reckon." "Do you think it will be proper for us to ride there the way we ride here?" Sarah asked eagerly. "Astride? We'll make it proper! It's the only humane way, Uncle says--a side-saddle is a downright cruelty. And I don't see why a parson's daughter shouldn't set the fashion." "Then Ruth will get a chance to wear her riding-skirt after all--her heart will be stronger after a while. I've hated to ride when she couldn't, but she has insisted upon our going." "That's just like you, you unselfish old dear! But Ruth told me that it was the next best thing to riding herself, to see you on Comanche." "Did she?" asked Sarah; and then hid her face in the trunk so that Blue Bonnet should not see how pleased she was. They were to leave in the morning, and trunks were to be sent to the station this very afternoon. Already Uncle Joe was hovering about, rope in hand, waiting to give the final touch to the baggage. He had found it necessary to keep very busy these last few days. "We might have seen this coming," he said disconsolately to Mr. Ashe, as the latter sat smoking a solitary pipe on the front veranda. "Let young folks get runnin' with young folks, and they're never again contented alone." "It isn't _young_ folks that's taking Blue Bonnet this time, Joe." Mr. Ashe glanced in to where a silver head showed just inside the window. "_Her_ girl never went back to her from Texas, and I reckon it's only right she should have her share of Elizabeth's daughter." Uncle Joe looked sober. "You're right, Cliff." Then, as if determined to look on the bright side of things, "We'll have the boy for company." "Yes, and there'll be more letters. She'll tell him things she wouldn't be likely to write to two old fellows." And with this crumb of comfort the "two old fellows" were forced to content themselves. Blue Bonnet was up at daybreak next morning, and, sitting on the top rail of the pasture fence, watched the sun rise out of the prairie. Don and Solomon eyed her expectantly.