Olive was in dismay. Here was a fresh cause for tribulation, for the saddle was new and expensive, and moreover it belonged to the Community. She would not have minded facing Ezra with a tale of any sort of disaster or loss, for she knew he would kiss her and pet her and say, “Never mind, darling, don’t grieve, it doesn’t matter two jack-straws.” But a community-saddle was quite another matter, and Olive shrank from the ordeal of community-anger at the loss of its saddle, and community-contempt for her carelessness in unsaddling on the prairie without putting the reins over her arm. She perceived now that anyone but a fool would have taken that simple precaution against disaster. “I’m not fit to live on the prairie,” sobbed Olive to herself. “My education is no use to me, and I have not got the wits of that boy-girl Willette. Diana, you idiot, why don’t you help me?” This reproach was addressed to the puppy, who was wallowing blissfully in the grass and thus refreshing herself after her scamper. Olive began to walk aimlessly up and down in the hope of stumbling on the saddle, and Diana began to do likewise, but with far more system. Diana’s researches were speedily crowned with success, and she soon sat down to an uninterrupted gnaw at the flap of the big Mexican saddle. Becoming at length aware of the disappearance of Diana, Olive called to her, and the puppy reared a mischievous face over the grass some twenty yards away. Going to the spot, Olive perceived the saddle and also the depredations of Diana’s sharp teeth upon the flap. She whipped the dog with a stirrup leather most ineffectually and then said: “What’s to be done now?” but Diana, feeling that her efforts had been badly rewarded, made no suggestions.