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“Say! I’ll sing a song over him, if you’ll wait a minute. I know two whole verses of ‘Bill Bailey,’ and the chorus to ‘Good Old Summertime.’ I can shuffle the two together and make a full deck. I believe they’d go fine together.

“Say, you never heard me sing, did yuh? It’s worth waiting for–only yuh want to hang tight to something when I start. Come on–I’ll let you be the mourner.”

Since Miss Satterly had been taking steps quite regularly while Weary was speaking, she was now several rods away–and she had, more than ever, the appearance of not hearing him and of not wanting to hear.

“Say, Tee-e-cher!”

The schoolma’am refused to stop, or to turn her head a fraction of an inch, and Weary’s face sobered a little. It was the first time that inimitable “Tee-e-cher” of his had failed to bring the smile back into the eyes of Miss Satterly. He looked after her dubiously. Her shoulders were thrown well back and her feet pressed their imprint firmly into the yellow dust of the trail. In a minute she would be quite out of hearing.

Weary got up, took a step and grasped Glory’s trailing bridle-rein and hurried after her much faster than Glory liked and which he reproved with stiffened knees and a general pulling back on the reins.

“Say! You wouldn’t get mad at a little thing like that, would yuh?” expostulated Weary, when he overtook her. “You know I didn’t mean anything, Girlie.”

“I do not consider it a little thing,” said the schoolma’am, icily.

Thus rebuffed, Weary walked silently beside her up the hill–silently, that is, save for the subdued jingling of his spurs. He was beginning to realize that there was an uncomfortable, heavy feeling in his chest, on the side where his heart was. Still, he was of a hopeful nature and presently tried again.

“How many times must I say I’m sorry, Schoolma’am? You don’t look so pretty when you’re mad; you’ve got dimples, remember, and yuh ought to give ’em a chance. Let’s sit down on this rock while I square myself. Come on.” His tone was wheedling in the extreme.

Miss Satterly, not replying a word, kept straight on up the hill; and Weary, sighing heavily, followed.

“Don’t you want to ride Glory a ways? He’s real good, to-day. He put in the whole of yesterday working out all the cussedness that’s been accumulating in his system for a week, so he’s dead gentle. I’ll lead him, for yuh.”

“Thank you,” said Miss Satterly. “I prefer to walk.”

Weary sighed again, but clung to his general hopefulness, as was his nature. It took a great deal to rouse Weary; perhaps the schoolma’am was trying to find just how much.

“Say, you’d a died laughing if you’d seen old Glory yesterday; he liked to scared Slim plumb to death. We were working in the big corral and Slim got down on one knee to fix his spur. Glory saw him kneel down, and gave a running jump and went clear over Slim’s head. Slim hit for the closest fence, and he never looked back till he was clean over on the other side. Mamma! I was sure amused. I thought Glory had done about everything there was to do–but I tell yuh, that horse has got an imagination that will make him famous some day.”

For the first time since the day of his spectacular introduction to her, Miss Satterly displayed absolutely no interest in the eccentricities of Glory. Slowly it began to dawn upon Weary that she did not intend to thaw that evening. He glanced at her sidelong, and his eyes had a certain gleam that was not there five minutes before. He swung along beside her till they reached the top of the hill, fell behind without a word and mounted Glory.