Blue Bonnets Ranch Party | Page 7

Don Quixote will be off soon, hunting wind-mills?"
suggested Kitty, with a mocking glance at Alec, whose new gun was
the pride of his heart.
Alec deigned no reply.
"Look!" said Mrs. Clyde, softly, "--there goes the sun."
They followed her glance across the prairie that stretched away, green
and softly undulating, in front of the veranda, and watched the red disk
as it sank in a blaze of glory at the edge of the plain.
"Now you know," said Blue Bonnet, "why I felt like pushing back the
houses in Woodford--at first they just suffocated me."
Mrs. Clyde smiled with new understanding. "You probably agree with
our Massachusetts writer who complained that people in cities live too
close together and not near enough," she said, patting Blue Bonnet's
head as the girl, sitting on the step below her, leaned against her knee.
"Didn't you ever get lonesome here?" asked Debby, snuggling up to

Amanda. She had been brought up among houses.
"Lonesome?" echoed Blue Bonnet. "I never knew what lonesome
meant--till my first day in school!"
All too soon came bedtime.
"Where are we all to sleep?" Blue Bonnet asked Benita. It was like
Blue Bonnet not to give the matter a thought until beds were actually in
demand.
Benita led the way proudly. "The Señora will have the little Señora's
room," she said, throwing open the door of that long unused chamber.
Mrs. Clyde entered it with softened eyes.
"Señorita's own room is ready for her, and here is place for the others."
Benita proceeded to the very end of a long ell to a huge airy room,
seemingly all windows. It was Blue Bonnet's old nursery, and, next to
the living-room, the largest room in the house. Four single beds, one in
each corner, showed how Benita had solved the sleeping problem.
The girls gave a shout of delight; visions of bedtime frolics and long
talks after lights were out, sent them dancing about the place.
"I tell you what," announced Blue Bonnet, "--if you imagine I am going
off by myself when there's a sleeping-party like this going on, you're
mistaken. I say--" here she turned on Sarah, "--you've always wanted a
bed-room all to yourself; you told me so, one day. Well, here's your
chance--you're welcome to every inch of mine!"
Sarah, quite willing to confine her "parties" to daylight hours, accepted
the proposition eagerly. Maybe then she could get a peek at those
Spanish books.
"Are you sure you're willing to give it up?" she asked quite honestly.
And Blue Bonnet with an incredulous stare returned: "Are you quite
willing to give this up?"

"Perfectly!" exclaimed Sarah with such promptness that Blue Bonnet
dismissed her lurking suspicion that Sarah was just "being polite" and
accepted the exchange.
It was a happy Sarah who tucked herself away in a little bed all to
herself, in a dainty room destined to be her very own for two long
months. Four times happy was the quartet who shared the nursery. It
was a long time before they subsided. There were so many things to be
observed and discussed in that delightful place. Uncle Joe Terry had
had a hand in its arrangement, and now that worthy man would have
felt well repaid if he could have heard the gales of merriment over his
masterpieces of interior decoration.
In her childhood Blue Bonnet had been blessed--or afflicted--with more
dolls than ever fell to the lot of child before. Now the long-discarded
nursery-folk formed a frieze around the entire room, the poor darlings
being, like Blue-beard's wives, suspended by their hair. Every
nationality and every degree of mutilation was there represented, and
the effect was funny beyond description. On the broad mantel-shelf
over the stone fireplace reposed drums, merry-go-rounds, trumpets and
toy horses; while on the hearth was a tiny kitchen range bearing a
complete assortment of pots and pans of a most diminutive size. In
every available nook of the room stood doll-carriages, rocking-horses,
go-carts and fire-engines, each showing the scars of Blue Bonnet's
stormy childhood.
"I wish," cried Kitty, "that we weren't any of us a day over seven!"
While the girls were still making merry over her childhood treasures
Blue Bonnet slipped away. She had not had a word alone with Uncle
Cliff for days, and had exchanged only a hurried greeting with Uncle
Joe at the station. And there were such heaps of things to talk over!
She found them both on the veranda, enjoying the evening breeze that
came laden with sweet scents from off the prairie. Blue Bonnet clapped
her hands over Uncle Joe's eyes in her old madcap fashion.
"It's Blue Bon--er--Elizabeth, I mean," he guessed promptly.

"Wrong!" cried Blue Bonnet sternly. "Elizabeth Ashe was left behind
in Massachusetts, and only Blue Bonnet has come