At the most exciting moment came a voice which had to be obeyed:-- "Sam!" I ran, with my lasso in my hand, toward the house. "Sam, go right upstairs and wash your hands and face, and brush your hair. Leave that old rope outside,--don't bring it in here." That old rope! Before I could make any inquiries, any explanations, I was hustled in, rushed upstairs, forcibly cleaned, lacerated with Dr. Kaltblut's steel-pronged tomahawk (falsely called a hair-brush) and shoved downstairs again. Here, I was dragged--a whited sepulchre--into a front room, where sat a lady,--a perfect stranger to me, and _a little girl_. Toward the smaller and younger of these beings I was propelled. "Here, Alice, this is Sam. Sam, this is little Alice Remick, who is going to be your neighbor. I want you to be nice to her, and play with her this afternoon, and entertain her." The concentrated perfidy of it! The unmitigated baseness! What more could Lucrezia Borgia have contrived? Entertain her! Entertain this spindle-legged, pig-tailed creature who was sucking her thumb in lively embarrassment! Was I a dancing bear, or a mountebank, that I should be called upon to furnish amusement to _this_? Reflect that I had been called from high and mighty pursuits, that I was roping a gigantic and ferocious bull buffalo at the very moment when I was interrupted. That even as I stood there in the house the blackberry bushes were in danger from the rest of the herd, since the band of hunters had been deprived of one unerring hand and bold spirit. And all for the purpose of "entertaining" this hopeless product of civilization! There was just one thing to do, and that was to bolt out of the room without an instant's delay. I did so, but only succeeded in getting to the front door. This was locked, and in a second I had been recaptured. Then I was taken back to the room, where I had to stand the humiliation of hearing myself apologized for, in the presence of the little girl. "Why, I do not know what made him behave so! I never knew him to do anything like it before. Aren't you ashamed of yourself, Sam? Now, you must be polite to Alice, for she is a stranger. You'll do it to please me, Sam." This was certainly playing it pretty low down. I had been trapped by a combination of force and guile, and now an appeal was uttered in terms that made a refusal difficult, as well as useless. But what could I do with her? I had no experience with them, except very seldom, and then in groups. To have a lone specimen like this thrust upon me was simply preposterous. Many of the boys had sisters,--both Rob and Ed were provided for in that respect. Very little profit, that I could see, did they ever get out of them. When the sisters were older, they were simply additions to the household tyrants who thronged in every family. They assumed an air of authority; gave orders, administered punishments, and reported to higher quarters what they were pleased to consider serious misdemeanors.