her letters for about two years. He's done spoke for, Lahoma,
staked out, as a fellow might say, and squatted on."

Lahoma looked at him in breathless interest. "A girl out in the
big world? Completely civilized, I reckon! Was she as old as I
am?"

"Why, honey!" Brick exclaimed uneasily, "YOU ain't got no age at
all, to speak of! What are you but a mere child? This young man
is talking about them as has got up to be old enough to think of
sweethearting--something respectable in YEARS."

"And how old does a sweetheart have to be?" demanded Lahoma with
some displeasure. "I feel old enough for anything, and Wilfred
doesn't look any older than the knight standing guard in THE
TALISMAN. Besides, look at David Copperfield and Little Em'ly."

"That was child's work," retorted Brick.

"I was afraid of this," growled Bill Atkins restlessly.

Wilfred laughed out. "Don't worry. My eastern girl is at least
nineteen years old, and so thoroughly civilized that she thinks this
part of the world is still overrun with Indians and buffaloes. She
wouldn't live out here for a fortune, and she wouldn't marry a man
back East without one--that's why I'm here. I didn't have the
fortune."

"Does she LOVE you, Wilfred?" Her voice was so soft, her eyes were
so big, that Bill uttered a smothered groan, and even Brick sat up.