Marlowe Amy Bell - The Girl from Sunset Ranch: or, Alone in a Great City стр 7.

So she shook hands heartily with Dud Stone and let him ride away, never appearing to notice his rather wistful look. She was to see the time, however, when she would be very glad of a friend like Dud Stone in the great city.

Helen made her preparations for her trip to New York without any advice from another woman. To tell the truth she had little but riding habits which were fit to wear, save the house frocks which she wore around the ranch.

When she had gone to school in Denver, her father had sent a sum of money to the principal and that lady had seen that Helen was dressed tastefully and well. But all these garments she had outgrown.

To tell the truth, Helen had spent little of her time in studying the pictures in fashion magazines. In fact, there were no such books about Sunset Ranch.

The girl realized that the rough and ready frocks she possessed were not in style. There was but one store in Elberon, the nearest town, where ready-to-wear garments were sold. She went there and purchased the best they had; but they left much to be desired.

She got a brown dress to travel in, and a shirtwaist or two; but beyond that she dared not go. Helen was wise enough to realize that, after she arrived at her Uncle Starkweathers, it would be time enough to purchase proper raiment.

She dressed up in the new frock for the boys to admire, the evening before she left. Every man who could be spared from the range even as far as Creeping Ford came in to the party. They all admired Helen and were sorry to see her go away. Yet they gave her their best wishes.

Big Hen Billings rode part of the way to Elberon with her in the morning. She was going to send the strawberry roan back hitched behind the supply wagon. Her riding dress she would change in the station agents parlor for the new dress which was in the tray of her small trunk.

Keep yer eyes peeled, Snuggy, advised the old foreman, with gravity, when ye come up against that New York town. Taint like Elberon no, sir! Taint even like Helena.

Them folks in New York is rubbing up against each other so close, that it makes em moughty sharp yessir! Jumping Jehosaphat! I knowed a feller that went there onct and he lost ten dollars and his watch before hed been off the train an hour. They can do ye that quick!

I believe that fellow must have been you, Hen, declared Helen, laughing.

The foreman looked shamefaced. Wal, it were, he admitted. But they never got nothin more out o me. It was the hottest kind o summer weather an lemme tell yuh, it can be some hot in that mans town.

Wal, I had a sheepskin coat with me. I put it on, and I buttoned it from my throat-latch down to my boot-tops. Theyd had to pry a dollar out o my pocket with a crowbar, and I wouldnt have had a drink with the mayor of the city if hed invited me. No, sirree, sir!

Helen laughed again. Dont you fear for me, Hen. I shall be in the best of hands, and shall have plenty of friends around me. Ill never feel lonely in New York, I am sure.

I hope not. But, Snuggy, you know what to do if anything goes wrong. Just telegraph me. If you want me to come on, say the word

Why, Hen! How ridiculous you talk, she cried. Ill be with relatives.

Ya-as. I know, said the giant, shaking his head. But relatives aint like them thats knowed and loved yuh all yuh life. Dont forgit us out yere, Snuggy and if ye want anything His heart was evidently too full for further utterance. He jerked his ponys head around, waved his hand to the girl who likewise was all but in tears, and dashed back over the trail toward Sunset Ranch.

Helen pulled the Rose ponys head around and jogged on, headed east.

CHAPTER V

AT BOTH ENDS OF THE ROUTE

As Helen walked up and down the platform at Elberon, waiting for the east-bound Transcontinental, she looked to be a very plain country girl with nothing in her dress to denote that she was one of the wealthiest young women in the State of Montana.

Sunset Ranch was one of the few remaining great cattle ranches of the West. Her father could justly have been called a cattle king, only Prince Morrell was not the sort of man who likes to see his name in print.

Indeed, there was a good reason why Helens father had not wished to advertise himself. That old misfortune, which had borne so heavily upon his mind and heart when he came to die, had made him shrink from publicity.

However, business at Sunset Ranch had prospered both before and since Mr. Morrells death. The money had rolled in and the bank accounts which had been put under the administration of Big Hen Billings and the lawyer at Elberon, increased steadily.

Big Hen was a generous-handed administrator and guardian. Of course, the foreman of the ranch was, perhaps, not the best person to be guardian of a sixteen-year-old girl. He did not treat her, in regard to money matters, as the ordinary guardian would have treated a ward.

Big Hen didnt know how to limit a girls expenditures; but he knew how to treat a man right. And he treated Helen Morrell just as though she were a sane and responsible man.

Theres a thousand dollars in cash for you, Snuggy, he had said. I got it in soft money, for its a fac that they use that stuff a good deal in the East. Besides, the hard money would have made a good deal of a load for you to tote in them leetle war-bags of yourn.

But shall I ever need a thousand dollars? asked Helen, doubtfully.

Dont know. Cant tell. Sometimes ye need money when ye least expect it. Ye neednt tell anybody how much youve got. Only, its there and a full pocket is a mighty nice backin for anybody to have.

And if ye find any time ye want more, jest telegraph. Well send ye what they call a draft for all ye want. Cut a dash. Show em that the girl from Sunset Ranch is the real thing, Snuggy.

But she had only laughed at this. It never entered Helen Morrells mind that she should ever wish to cut a dash before her relatives in New York.

She had filed a telegram to Mr. Willets Starkweather, on Madison Avenue, before the train arrived, saying that she was coming. She hoped that her relatives would reply and she would get the reply en route.

When her father died, she had written to the Starkweathers. She had received a brief, but kindly worded note from Uncle Starkweather. And it had scarcely been time yet, so Helen thought, for Aunt Eunice or the girls to write.

But could Helen have arrived at the Madison Avenue mansion of Willets Starkweather at the same hour her message arrived and heard the familys comments on it, it is very doubtful if she would have swung herself aboard the parlor car of the Transcontinental, without the porters help, and sought her seat.

The Starkweathers lived in very good style, indeed. The mansion was one of several remaining in that section, all occupied by the very oldest and most elevated socially of New Yorks solid families. They were not people whose names appeared in the gossip columns of the papers to any extent; but to live in their neighborhood, and to meet them socially, was sufficient to insure ones welcome anywhere.

The Starkweather mansion had descended to Willets Starkweather with the money all from his great-uncle which had finally put the family upon its feet. When Prince Morrell had left New York under a cloud, his brother-in-law was a struggling merchant himself.

Now, in sixteen years, he had practically retired. At least, he was no longer in trade. He merely went to an office, or to his brokers, each day, and watched his investments and his real estate holdings.