The prostrate humorist revived. Susie's jeers had the effect of a bucket of ice-water, for he had not been aware that this blot upon his escutcheon--the disgraceful epoch in his life when he had earned honest money herding sheep--was known. "My enthusiasm runs away with me when I get upon this subject," said McArthur, in blushing apology to the group. "I am sorry that I have bored you." "No bore a-tall," declared Old Man Rulison magnanimously. "You cut loose whenever you feel like it: we kin stand it as long as you kin." After McArthur had gone to his pneumatic mattress in the patent tent pitched near the bunk-house, Ralston said to Susie: "You and the bug-hunter are great friends, aren't you?" "You bet! We're pardners. Anybody that gets funny with him has got me to fight." "Oh, it's like that, is it?" Ralston laughed. "We've got secrets--the bug-hunter and me." "You're rather young for secrets, Susie." "Nobody's too young for secrets," she declared. "Haven't you any?" "Sure," Ralston nodded. "I like you," Susie whispered impulsively. "Let's swap secrets." He looked at her and wished he dared. He would have liked to tell her of his mission, to ask her help; for he realized that, if she chose, no one could help him more. Like Smith, he recognized that quality in her they each called "gameness," and even more than Smith he appreciated the commingling of Scotch shrewdness and Indian craft. He believed Susie to be honest; but he had believed many things in the past which time had not demonstrated to be facts. No, the chance was too great to take; for should she prove untrustworthy or indiscreet, his mission would be a failure. So he answered jestingly: "My secrets are not for little girls to know." Susie gave him a quick glance. "Oh, you don't look as though you had that kind," and turned away. Ralston felt somehow that he had lost an opportunity. He could not rid himself of the feeling the entire evening; and he made up his mind to cultivate Susie's friendship. But it was too late; he had made a mistake not unlike Dora's. Susie had felt herself rebuffed, and, like the Schoolmarm, Ralston had laughed at her with his eyes. It was a great thing--a really sacred thing to Susie--this secret that she had offered him. The telling of it to McArthur had been so delightful an experience that she yearned to repeat it, but now she meant never to tell any one else. Any way, McArthur was her "pardner," and it was enough that he should know. So it came about that afterwards, when Ralston sought her company and endeavored to learn something of the workings of her mind, he found the same barrier of childish reserve which had balked Dora, and no amount of tact or patience seemed able to break it down.