A Girl of the Plains Country

								

people in the shows, that aren’t children, and never will be grown
up.”
Into the long talks which the two held together of an evening, Hilda
often introduced that hero who never had any other name than
The-Boy-On-The-Train.
“He knew most everything, Uncle Hank,” she once declared.
“I reckon so, honey,” assented Pearsall; but he seemed to Hilda not
sufficiently impressed. She sought in her recollection for definite
marvels to attribute to this favorite, and came hard up against that
trying fact we all meet, that you cannot communicate to another the
fascination you have experienced. It is something to be felt, not
put into words. Pressed thus, Hilda stated one day to Uncle Hank
that her hero could understand the language of birds. He accepted it
with much too great facility, reconciled thereto by the fact that a
person in Hilda’s book of fairy tales, which she had shown him
earlier in the evening, could do the same. But the statement kept
its author awake the greater part of the night, and a penitent,
small Hilda climbed up into his arms as soon as he sat down after
supper next evening and explained:
“Why, Uncle Hank, you know The-Boy-On-The-Train, he couldn’t
quite—what I said—understand all that the birds were talking about.”
“Couldn’t he, Pettie?” inquired Hank placidly.
“No,” said Hilda with solemnity. “He might just as well have, but he
couldn’t. He could just understand what people said; but—” The small
face flushed deeply; word forms rushed fluidly about in the stress
and flux of her emotion—“but he understanded that awful good.”
If Hilda had come to a group of children, The-Boy-On-The-Train
must have grown dim behind the stirring realities of actual
companionship. But in the lonely life that began for her now, he
filled in many an hour which might be otherwise forlorn. He did not
lose vividness. She saw him at that ranch he had spoken of, riding
the marvelous pony which would shake hands, perfecting himself in
those manly sports upon which he had casually touched, and which her
lively fancy was liberally providing for him. As time went on, he
grew of course; yet he remained delightfully a boy, her champion and
hero in the dream world which was always so real to the imaginative
child.
Meanwhile Pearsall, who had been for some time manager for a
non-resident owner, had only remained to go over tallies, count of
stock, and deliver to the purchaser the ranch and its appurtenances.
This work was done now, the details all complete, and upon an
evening Hank had brought his tally sheets and the mass of statements
and figures to young Van Brunt in the ranch office, where he sat
explaining the situation patiently to the other man.
It was past the children’s bedtime; Burch was asleep upstairs; but
the little girl had twice been sent from the room with an admonition
of increasing sharpness from her father. And still Pearsall could