Fred Fearnot's New Ranch: and How He and Terry Managed ItShackleford, H. K. (Harvey King)
General
Fred Fearnot's New Ranch: and How He and Terry Managed It
Shackleford, H. K. (Harvey King)
Adventure stories; Ranch life -- Juvenile fiction; Young men -- Juvenile fiction
There were some cowboys in the store smoking and talking, but when they
heard the violin and flute they all rushed out and stood at the gate,
about forty feet away from the door, and listened, and there they stood,
quiet and silent, for upwards of an hour.
Then Terry took the flute and the girls saw that he could play equally
as well as Fred. Evelyn soon took up the guitar and accompanied him on
that instrument.
Then she handed the guitar to Fred and took the flute from Terry.
The girls soon saw that she was perfectly at home with any musical
instrument, and that the boys were, too.
Evelyn had the girls up with the sun the next morning. They were not in
the habit of starting the day so early, but she laughed at them and told
them they didn't know how to live.
She soon had them in the kitchen, where Jack had started a fire in the
range, and began giving them culinary lessons.
It was great fun for her, and also for Fred and Terry.
Some two or three days later Fred left the ranch, going up by the
passenger train, which was flagged for him to board it, and at Crabtree
he took a train for points a hundred miles east, where he hired a team
and driver to take him around among the ranches all through that
section. He spent a week inspecting cattle, buying them and having them
shipped down to the ranch.
Finally, in order to make up the order that he wanted, he had to drive
back to the railroad and go further eastward; so he was gone about ten
days. He paid for the cattle with checks on the bank at Crabtree, but in
some instances the cattlemen rode down to Crabtree to see whether or not
the checks were good before they would ship the cattle.
When Fred returned to the ranch he found the two girl visitors still
with Evelyn, and learned from them that they were willing to stay out
there just as long as Evelyn wished them to.
"You haven't gotten tired of the ranch yet?" he asked.
"No, indeed. We never enjoyed ourselves better away from home in our
lives. Mr. Olcott and Evelyn are undoubtedly the finest musicians we
ever heard. That piano is a grand instrument, and every evening, when
the weather is fine, the cowboys dance in the yard to their playing;
and, Mr. Fearnot, I really believe that every horse and cow and pig and
chicken on the ranch is in love with Evelyn Olcott, while she has such
influence over the cowboys that I believe she could make them do murder
at her command."
Fred laughed and said:
"Yes, she has that same influence over me, too."
The girls looked at Evelyn and laughed, and she remarked:
"Didn't I tell you that every sort of animal is susceptible to
kindness?"
"Why, do you mean to call Mr. Fearnot an animal?"
"Certainly. Every man and woman is just as much an animal as a horse or
cow is."
Both the girls opened their eyes wide and Evelyn and Fred and Terry
laughed heartily at them.
"Why, didn't you know that man is an animal?" Fred inquired.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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