The Argosy, Vol. 90 No. 1 — page 73: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

LITTLE BOSS sion of him. She had talked him up to the people on his land. Yet she was avoid- ing him with a success that was far from flattering. “Of course, she sees so clearly that big ranching—the old-time vast acreage, you know—cannot continue. The Big Ben is more than fortunate in having a fair kind of a river pretty much its own, as well as being in touch with the big dam. Sd she thinks the wise thing to do is to break the ranch into agricultural units as fast as pos- sible. In the end she thinks it will yield more to the acre besides giving more homes to people. She thinks Mr. Moore will eventually sell it off in farms. It’s a fine idea, isn’t it?” Moore did not answer. He stared off across the rolling plains to the peaks of the mountains. It was odd to hear the opinions of Miss Fleming quoted rather than those of her father. However, he knew how little Fleming talked, so it was natural that his daughter should be his mouthpiece. But there was no reason for her undertaking the same service for Benjamin Franklin Moore. Ben lifted his hat and left the woman who had so frankly imparted Fan’s ideas of his intention to sell the ranch off in farms. He was thoroughly put out. What right had Miss Fleming to assume so much? And where had she disappeared to? He knew that she had not been in the environs of Spotless Town or her radiant admirer must have said so. He reflected that he had not told who he was to the woman. Oh, well! Why-.should he? He had gained some information at least, if his ride had not brought him to Fan Fleming. Fan Fleming! He jogged along, dis- gruntled, trying to get past the fact that he could not wholly dislike her, angry as he was with her. She swung in the fore- ground of his mind with the free grace and the buoyant brightness of the yellow flowers he passed. He felt he might do some think- ing to the point if once he could get be- yond thinking of her. | He called his will into action. He sat up straight in the saddle and put his mare through her paces as if he had a grand stand filled with people to admire his effectiveness, He told himself that it would be a long OF BIG BEN, 67 time before he let her exert an influence over him as she did over the ranch folks. Then he reflected further, it promised to be a long time before she let him get near enough for any kind of an influence to act. What if he set about forcing her into the open, compelling her to defend what she so boldly planned on his land? He could make her argue for the ideas evident- ly dear to her. Wouldn’t she fight! She would blush and glow and blaze. That night after he had eaten and hoped for some interruption to his solitude, he turned out the lamp and sought the ve- randa. The big night with its soft breath crept clase about him. He stretched him- self on the floor of the veranda like a lazy, lonely boy. He heard the back door slam. Paleface had finished her work and was making: for her teepee. He was alone. He thought of it resentfully. Why couldn’t the manager’s daughter see in him what other girls had? Why didn’t she let him pass along the ave- nues he had tried to open into some kind of an acquaintance with her? | The poignant regret for his father came over him; it always did when he was lonely. They had been such wonderful pals. But why the deuce had his father built this com- fortable ranch-house so far from the com- panionable bunk-house where the single cowboys lodged? Suddenly he understood. His father never recovered from the grief of losing his wife. They had planned this house together. It was finished after her death. Ben knew that it was filled with tender and haunting thoughts of her. He thought of Rose Leonard. Would he some day get to care for her so that he would miss her for a lifetime if she were taken? But she slipped like a wraith from his mental grasp. Swaying with the grace of wind-swept grasses, with the golden glint of the sun on her brows and the blue of far- flung cloudless skies, Fan Fleming took her place. His fancy rioted about the delectable lit- tle figure; the strong, slim ankles in their brown leather puttees, the evenness of her breathing under the brown blouse with the perky little pockets delighted him. Then he breathed quicker, drifting to the oO cComicboo S CO