“Lookin’ for my uncle,” explained Jim, serenely. “Rich old codger from the State o’ Pennsylvaney some’ers. Ain’t got nobody but me left.” “Aw, come off! What you givin’ us?” But Jim only winked and slouched off, prime for more adventures. He was enjoying himself hugely,—when he was not thinking of petticoats. CHAPTER V AT THE BON AMI Unlike most of those who ride much, her escort was a fast walker. Louise had trouble in keeping up with him, though she had always considered herself a good pedestrian. But Jim Munson was laboring under strange embarrassment. He was red-facedly conscious of the attention he was attracting striding up the inclined street from the station in the van of the prettiest and most thoroughbred girl who had struck Velpen this long time. Not that he objected to attention under normal conditions. Not he! He courted it. His chief aim in life seemed to be to throw the limelight of publicity, first, on the Three Bars ranch, as the one and only in the category of ranches, and to be connected with it in some way, however slight, the unquestioned aim and object of existence of every man, woman, and child in the cattle country; secondly, on Paul Langford, the very boss of bosses, whose master mind was the prop and stay of the Northwest, if not of all Christendom; and lastly upon himself, the modest, but loyal servitor in this Paradise on earth. But girls were far from normal conditions. There were no women at the Three Bars. There never had been any woman at the Three Bars within the memory of man. To be sure, Williston’s little girl had sometimes ridden over on an errand, but she didn’t count. This—this was the real thing, and he didn’t know just how to deal with it. He needed time to enlarge his sight to this broadened horizon. He glanced with nonchalance over his shoulder. After all, she was only a girl, and not such a big one either. She wore longer skirts than Williston’s girl, but he didn’t believe she was a day older. He squared about immediately, and what he had meant to say he never said, on account of an unaccountable thickening of his tongue. Presently, he bolted into a building, which proved to be the Bon Ami, a restaurant under the direct supervision of the fat, voluble, and tragic Mrs. Higgins, where the men from the other side of the river had right of way and unlimited credit. “What’ll you have?” he asked, hospitably, the familiar air of the Bon Ami bringing him back to his accustomed self-confident swagger.