“Sure. Look at the way I worked like a horse, saving your life--and the cat's--and now leading you all over town to keep those nice white slippers clean! By rights, you oughtn't to dance with anybody else. But I ain't looking for real gratitude. Four or five waltzes is all I'll insist on, but--” His tone was lugubrious in the extreme. “Well, I'll waltz with you once--for saving the cat; and once for saving the slippers. For saving me, I'm not sure that I thank you.” Val stepped carefully over a muddy spot on the walk. “Mr. Burnett, you--really, you're an awfully queer man.” Kent walked to the next crossing and helped her over it before he answered her. “Yes,” he admitted soberly then, “I reckon you're right. I am--queer.” CHAPTER XIV. A WEDDING PRESENT Sunday it was, and Val had insisted stubbornly upon going back to the ranch; somewhat to her surprise, if one might judge by her face, Arline Hawley no longer demurred, but put up lunch enough for a week almost, and announced that she was going along. Hank would have to drive out, to bring back the team, and she said she needed a rest, after all the work and worry of that dance. Manley, upon whose account it was that Val was so anxious, seemed to have nothing whatever to say about it. He was sullenly acquiescent--as was perhaps to be expected of a man who had slipped into his old habits and despised himself for doing so, and almost hated his wife because she had discovered it and said nothing. Val was thankful, during that long, bleak ride over the prairie, for Arline's incessant chatter. It was better than silence, when the silence means bitter thoughts. “Now,” said Arline, moving excitedly in her seat when they neared Cold Spring Coulee, “maybe I better tell you that the folks round here has kinda planned a little su'prise for you. They don't make much of a showin' about bein' neighborly--not when things go smooth--but they're right there when trouble comes. It's jest a little weddin' present--and if it comes kinda late in the day, why, you don't want to mind that. My dance that I gave was a weddin' party, too, if you care to call it that. Anyway, it was to raise the money to pay for our present, as far as it went--and I want to tell you right now, Val, that you was sure the queen of the ball; everybody said you looked jest like a queen in a picture, and I never heard a word ag'inst your low-neck dress. It looked all right on _you_, don't you see? On me, for instance, it woulda been something fierce. And I'm real glad you took a hold and danced like you did, and never passed nobody up, like some woulda done. You'll be glad you did, now you know what it was for. Even danced with Polycarp Jenks--and there ain't hardly any woman but what'll turn _him_ down; I'll bet he tromped all over your toes, didn't he?” “Sometimes,” Val admitted. “What about the surprise you were speaking of, Mrs. Hawley?”