第79章

When Annixter returned to the harness room, he let himself into a clamour of masculine hilarity.Osterman had, indeed, made a marvellous "fertiliser," whiskey for the most part, diluted with champagne and lemon juice.The first round of this drink had been welcomed with a salvo of cheers.Hooven, recovering his spirits under its violent stimulation, spoke of "heving ut oudt mit Cudder, bei Gott," while Osterman, standing on a chair at the end of the room, shouted for a "few moments quiet, gentlemen," so that he might tell a certain story he knew.

But, abruptly, Annixter discovered that the liquors--the champagne, whiskey, brandy, and the like--were running low.This would never do.He felt that he would stand disgraced if it could be said afterward that he had not provided sufficient drink at his entertainment.He slipped out, unobserved, and, finding two of his ranch hands near the doorway, sent them down to the ranch house to bring up all the cases of "stuff" they found there.

However, when this matter had been attended to, Annixter did not immediately return to the harness room.On the floor of the barn a square dance was under way, the leader of the City Band calling the figures.Young Vacca indefatigably continued the rounds of the barn, paring candle after candle, possessed with this single idea of duty, pushing the dancers out of his way, refusing to admit that the floor was yet sufficiently slippery.The druggist had returned indoors, and leaned dejected and melancholy against the wall near the doorway, unable to dance, his evening's enjoyment spoiled.The gayly apparelled clerk from Bonneville had just involved himself in a deplorable incident.In a search for his handkerchief, which he had lost while trying to find his programme card, he had inadvertently wandered into the feed room, set apart as the ladies' dressing room, at the moment when Mrs.

Hooven, having removed the waist of Minna's dress, was relacing her corsets.There was a tremendous scene.The clerk was ejected forcibly, Mrs.Hooven filling all the neighbourhood with shrill expostulation.A young man, Minna's "partner," who stood near the feed room door, waiting for her to come out, had invited the clerk, with elaborate sarcasm, to step outside for a moment;and the clerk, breathless, stupefied, hustled from hand to hand, remained petrified, with staring eyes, turning about and about, looking wildly from face to face, speechless, witless, wondering what had happened.

But the square dance was over.The City Band was just beginning to play a waltz.Annixter assuring himself that everything was going all right, was picking his way across the floor, when he came upon Hilma Tree quite alone, and looking anxiously among the crowd of dancers.

"Having a good time, Miss Hilma?" he demanded, pausing for a moment.

"Oh, am I, JUST!" she exclaimed."The best time--but I don't know what has become of my partner.See! I'm left all alone--the only time this whole evening," she added proudly."Have you seen him--my partner, sir?I forget his name.I only met him this evening, and I've met SO many I can't begin to remember half of them.He was a young man from Bonneville--a clerk, I think, because I remember seeing him in a store there, and he wore the prettiest clothes!""I guess he got lost in the shuffle," observed Annixter.

Suddenly an idea occurred to him.He took his resolution in both hands.He clenched his teeth.

"Say! look here, Miss Hilma.What's the matter with you and Istealing this one for ourselves? I don't mean to dance.I don't propose to make a jumping-jack of myself for some galoot to give me the laugh, but we'll walk around.Will you?What do you say?"Hilma consented.

"I'm not so VERY sorry I missed my dance with that--that--little clerk," she said guiltily."I suppose that's very bad of me, isn't it?"Annixter fulminated a vigorous protest.

"I AM so warm!" murmured Hilma, fanning herself with her handkerchief; "and, oh! SUCH a good time as I have had! I was so afraid that I would be a wall-flower and sit up by mamma and papa the whole evening; and as it is, I have had every single dance, and even some dances I had to split.Oh-h!" she breathed, glancing lovingly around the barn, noting again the festoons of tri-coloured cambric, the Japanese lanterns, flaring lamps, and "decorations" of evergreen; "oh-h! it's all so lovely, just like a fairy story; and to think that it can't last but for one little evening, and that to-morrow morning one must wake up to the every-day things again!""Well," observed Annixter doggedly, unwilling that she should forget whom she ought to thank, "I did my best, and my best is as good as another man's, I guess."Hilma overwhelmed him with a burst of gratitude which he gruffly pretended to deprecate.Oh, that was all right.It hadn't cost him much.He liked to see people having a good time himself, and the crowd did seem to be enjoying themselves.What did SHEthink?Did things look lively enough?And how about herself--was she enjoying it?

Stupidly Annixter drove the question home again, at his wits' end as to how to make conversation.Hilma protested volubly she would never forget this night, adding:

"Dance! Oh, you don't know how I love it! I didn't know myself.

I could dance all night and never stop once!"Annixter was smitten with uneasiness.No doubt this "promenading" was not at all to her taste.Wondering what kind of a spectacle he was about to make of himself, he exclaimed:

"Want to dance now?"

"Oh, yes!" she returned.

They paused in their walk, and Hilma, facing him, gave herself into his arms.Annixter shut his teeth, the perspiration starting from his forehead.For five years he had abandoned dancing.Never in his best days had it been one of his accomplishments.