CHAPTER III
ENTER PETER LEVINE
It is to be feared that the boys did not have as pleasant a time on thatSaturday afternoon motor drive as they had hoped to have. For, whereasthe girls should have showered their attentions upon them, the boys,they insisted upon talking about nothing but Gold Run Ranch, which wasthe name of the property left to Mrs. Nelson by her great uncle.
"You aren't very complimentary to us," Frank grumbled, as he hunchedhimself over the wheel of Mollie's car. "You seem mighty glad to go outto this forsaken old ranch where you won't see us for the whole summer."
"I guess we can stand it if you can," Mollie responded lightly, whichonly caused him to glower the more.
"Now I'll say Allen knew what he was doing when he studied law,"remarked Roy Anderson gloomily, as he glanced over his shoulder at youngAllen Washburn, who was driving Betty's neat little roadster with Bettyherself beside him. "He sure falls in soft on this job."
"Meaning, I suppose," drawled Grace, "that he will have the pleasure ofour company at Gold Run Ranch. Never mind, old boy, you needn't look sodreadfully gloomy. Have a chocolate and brace up."
"You give it to me," said Roy, laughing. Grace obediently popped a largejuicy one into his mouth. It may be remarked that after this performancehe really did look more cheerful.
"Anyway, we'll be back sometime, I suppose," said Mollie, continuing onthe subject that was uppermost in her mind.
"Yes, if we don't run away with some of those handsome cowboys," put inAmy, with a chuckle. "Betty says they abound around Gold Run Ranch."
The girls giggled, but Will looked fierce.
"You had better not," he said, and though his look was for all thegirls, Amy knew that the words were for her. She colored prettily andpromised with her eyes that she wouldn't.
Grace caught this by-play as she munched a chocolate grumpily. Adoringher brother Will as she did, she had always been a little jealous of hisfancy for Amy.
"Anyway, they don't have to be so silly in public," she told herselfresentfully. As she roused herself from her musing, she heard Molliesay, with a laugh:
"Don't be surprised if we come home with our pockets full of gold. Mrs.Nelson thinks there is some of it about there."
"Oh, are you still talking about that silly old ranch?" Grace broke inpetulantly. "I don't know why you are getting so excited about it whenthere is more than a chance that we sha'n't go at all."
"Hooray!" cried Frank, and stepped on the accelerator.
Mollie, beside him, turned to look at him coldly.
"I'm glad you feel that way about it, Frank Haley," she said primly."But I'm very sorry to say we don't."
"Now, I have put my foot in it," cried Frank ruefully, turning hisirresistible smile full upon her. "What shall I do to make up, Mollie?Hold your hand or something?"
His free hand closed over hers, but she snatched her own away withindignation that ended in a chuckle.
"Tend to your knitting," she warned him. "Didn't you see that we almostran over that dog?"
But however much they might joke about the possibility of their notrealizing their dreams for the summer, the Outdoor Girls were reallyworried about it, and the next few days were anxious ones for them.
Suppose Mrs. Nelson should yield to her husband's arguments and resolveto sell the ranch after all? For awhile it almost seemed as though shewere about to do this very thing, and the suspense nearly drove thegirls frantic.
Then something happened to turn the tide in their direction. And how thegirls afterwards blessed that loud-necktied, check-suited man!
It was Betty who came to the door to admit this angel in disguise, itbeing the hired girl's day out. Her first glance at the stranger servedto stamp him as one of those loud-voiced, flashily dressed personscommonly referred to as "sports," and at this first glance Betty took aviolent dislike to him.
However, being accustomed to treat every one with kindliness, she askedhim gravely whom he wished to see.
"Is Mrs. Nelson at home?" he asked ingratiatingly.
"Why, yes," hesitated Betty, then her natural courtesy getting thebetter of the dislike she felt for this person, she added politely:"Won't you come in? I will call mother."
With blandly murmured thanks the owner of the checked suit stepped overthe threshold, his eyes still on Betty to such an extent that she wasglad to be able to slip upstairs out of his sight.
"Mother," she explained hurriedly, finding that lady in her prettydressing room, "there's a horrid person downstairs who wants to see you.I don't like his looks, and if you don't want to see him I can tell himyou aren't at home----"
"Heavens, Betty, is he as bad as all that?" asked Mrs. Nelson, as sherose hastily and gave an automatic pat to her hair. "I hope he doesn'tsteal the silver. You shouldn't have left him alone, dear----" and withthese words she swept out of the room and down the stairs.
Betty heard her greet the man, and then slipped off to her own room andpicked up some half-finished embroidery.
"I hope he doesn't bother mother too much," she mused aloud. "I neversaw a more unpleasant looking person in my life. I wonder what he canwant, anyway."
It was fully half an hour later that she heard the closing doordownstairs that told her their unwelcome visitor had left. A minutelater her mother herself opened the door of Betty's room, looking sotroubled and unsettled that Betty jumped to her feet in quick alarm.
"Mother, did that man say anything to make you feel bad?" she cried."Because, if he did----"
"No, no, dear," said Mrs. Nelson, sinking into a chair, while her eyessought the window thoughtfully. "I am worried, that's all."
Betty drew a low chair over beside her mother, and, sitting down, tookMrs. Nelson's hand in both her own.
"Tell me, dear," she urged.
Mrs. Nelson drew her troubled gaze away from the window and looked atthe Little Captain intently.
"Betty," she said, "there is something strange about this Gold Run Ranchof ours. This man----"
"Yes?" prompted Betty, as her mother paused.
"This man who called this morning wanted to buy the ranch for a westernclient of his. It seems this client is willing to pay me my ownprice--within reasonable limits of course. He seemed so strangely eagerto make a deal with me----"
"Yes?" prompted Betty again, beginning to look worried herself.
"Well," continued Mrs. Nelson, "I decided then and there that Iwouldn't sell to anybody."
"Oh, Mother!" Betty was all eagerness now, "do you really mean it?"
"Yes, I do," said Mrs. Nelson, determination replacing uncertainty."There must be something unusual about Gold Run or John Josephs and thisman, too, wouldn't be so anxious to get it away from me. I am certainlynot going to let them drive me into selling, until I see my property atleast."
"Good for you, Mother!" cried Betty enthusiastically. "I've beenfearfully worried for fear you wouldn't see it that way. Did you tellthe man in the check suit that?"
"No, I didn't," said Mrs. Nelson, smiling as she pressed Betty's hand."Now you will see what a schemer your mother is, my dear. I told him Ihadn't definitely decided yet on any course, that I had already had avery good offer for my ranch, and that he would have to see AllenWashburn, our attorney. I wanted Allen to have a chance to size this manup and see if he has the same impression of him that I had."
"Mother," breathed Betty admiringly, "I think you are wonderful." Thenafter a little pause, she added shyly: "You really think a great dealof--of Allen's ability, don't you, Mother?"
"I do, dear," said Mrs. Nelson, stroking the brown head gently. Then sheadded with a hint of mischief in her voice: "Your father and I have cometo feel toward him almost as if he were our son."
"Oh--" murmured Betty, very faintly.
Two days went by--anxious ones for the girls. In the Nelson home, thistime in the pretty living room, Allen Washburn was now a guest.
"Well," Mrs. Nelson said, with more than a hint of eagerness in hervoice, "what did you think
of our loudly-dressed friend, Allen?"
"Was he as bad as Mrs. Nelson's description makes him out to be?" askedMr. Nelson, smiling genially through a cloud of cigar smoke.
Betty, in a corner of the lounge, was trying her best to be calm whileshe waited eagerly for Allen's reply.
"I don't know just how Mrs. Nelson described this fellow to you, I'msure," he answered, with a smiling glance toward Betty's mother. "ButI'm quite sure that she didn't say anything bad enough."
"Then you didn't like him either?" asked Mrs. Nelson quickly.
"I neither liked him nor trusted him," Allen replied decidedly, addingwith a wry smile: "He calls himself Peter Levine, but I'm willing towager about anything I have that that isn't his real name."
"You think he's a sharper then?" Mr. Nelson interjected.
"Yes, sir," responded Allen, his young face earnestly intent. "He looksto me like one of these confidence men who abound in the western boomtowns--men who can talk the other fellow into putting his last cent intosome 'sure thing.' 'Sure thing,'" he repeated disgustedly. "The onlysure thing about most of those schemes is the certainty of 'going bust'and losing every penny you have in the world."
"And yet," Mr. Nelson commented, "these sharpers, 'confidence men,' asyou call them, often manage to keep just within the law."
"Oh yes," said Allen, "they manage to keep the letter of thelaw--sometimes. But that is just a caution to save their own necks. It'sthe spirit of the law that they violate. But we are getting away fromthe point," he added, pulling himself up short with an apologetic smiletoward Mrs. Nelson. "We were speaking of this Peter Levine. My summingup of him is that he is entirely untrustworthy."
Mrs. Nelson shot a triumphant glance at her husband.
"You see?" she said. "I was sure Allen would agree with me."
"Of course I may be mistaken," Allen continued, rather hesitantly. "ButI have a very distinct impression, a sort of seventh sense we fellows inthe law game call it, that this Levine is in league with John Josephs,the man that offered you fifteen thousand for the ranch."
"Oh!" said Mrs. Nelson, startled. "How can you know that?"
"I don't know it," Allen told her. "I only suspect."
"Then what would you advise us to do?"
"Hold tight and not sell till you have had a chance to look matters overon the ground--not from a distance."
"Well," said Mr. Nelson rising resignedly and knocking the ashes fromhis cigar, "I suppose that settles it. I shall have to leave my businessto go to smash," he added, with a chuckle, "while I take my family intoa barbarous land where every second man you meet has designs on awell-filled pocketbook----"
But he got no further, for Betty had run over to him and turned himimperiously around till his smiling eyes looked down into her gleefulones.
"Daddy," she cried, "do you really mean it? We can all go to GoldRun--you and mother and the girls? We'll have to have the girls, youknow!" she ended on a pleading note.
"Oh yes, of course," said Mr. Nelson resignedly. "We will have to havethe girls."
It was a very radiant Betty who, a few minutes later, saw Allen Washburnto the door.
"And to think," she murmured, while Allen smiled down at her, "that Ididn't like that perfect angel, Peter Levine, at first. Why, I shouldhave welcomed him with open arms!"
"Why?" asked Allen, taken by surprise.
"Don't you know?" asked Betty, mischievously wide-eyed. "If he hadn'thappened along just when he did our glorious adventure would havedwindled into a might-have-been. Why, I could love him for it."
"Good-night, I'm going!" ejaculated Allen, and before Betty could gasphe had flung out of the door.
"Where are you going?" she called, laughter in her voice.
"To kill Peter Levine," growled a voice out of the darkness, and Betty,closing the door very softly, chuckled to herself.