Anyhow, this was a real spring-feeling day, and Rose and Ruth whooped with delight when their Dad told them they might ride out on the range with him and have a camp-fire lunch. Then they must ride straight back alone. They were used to that, however, and liked the excitement of riding alone across the mesa and down through the shallow cañon that brought them in sight of their home. The warm wave had swept most of the snow away, though there were streaks of it left in all the shaded spots. And oh, but the prairie wind was sweet as it blew into their faces. Pink-faced and laughing, they reined in their cow-ponies at the turn of the trail to wave farewell to Marmie, who stood at the open door flapping a dish-cloth in return. Dad let out a huge yell, and the dish-cloth flapped harder than ever. Then they set the broncos to loping, and soon even the cottonwoods had disappeared from sight behind the rocky shoulder that guarded the beginning of the cañon. A glorious morning they had of it. Dad let them race up on the mesa, timing them, while Jim and Hank, two of the boys, shouted cheers. Rose came in only the least bit ahead, and that was because Ruth had to swerve away from a prairie dog hole. And then the lunch! “Marmie knows what we can hold after riding all morning, doesn’t she, Dad,” grunted Ruth, surveying the wreck of tin cans, paper packages, chicken bones and sardine boxes which were the sole survivors of a sumptuous feast. “She sure does,” agreed Dad. “But how a pindling little thing like you can hold the half of what you’ve put away beats me.” “I’m not pindling,” asserted Ruth indignantly, throwing herself forthwith upon her father and belabouring him with both fists, in which exercise she was immediately joined by her sister, and what a grand scrimmage the three of them had. Finally they got Dad flat on the ground and both sat on him, panting but triumphant. When he suddenly sprang right up on his feet, sending them rolling, while he roared with delighted laughter. “I may be old and tuckered out but I can send you two spinning like tops,” he jeered. “Dad, you aren’t a bit old,” Rose declared anxiously. “You’re the youngest father in the world.” At that he laughed some more, and then told them they must set off for home or Marmie would be worried. The wind was blowing up colder as they rode back. But in their sheepskin coats they were cosy enough, and jogged along cheerily over the brown, dry grass. It was a six or seven mile ride, so they went easily, for they had ridden a lot that day. “Some little girls don’t ever ride,” Ruth said. “Wouldn’t it seem funny not to have any horses, and to walk whenever you went anywhere.” “They go in cars,” said Rose. “Electric cars, you know.” “I’d like to see a electric car,” Ruth returned, rather uncertainly. “It must be like magic, Rose.” Rose nodded. “But not so magic as our fairy.”