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Updated: May 27, 2025
"I'm sure you and Lord Ralles will be company enough for each other," she predicted, giving me a flash of her eyes which showed them full of suppressed merriment, even while her face was grave. In spite of her prediction, the moment she was gone Lord Ralles and I pulled apart about as quickly as a yard-engine can split a couple of cars.
I don't think Miss Cullen liked Lord Ralles's comments on American courage any better than I did, for she said, "Can't you take Lord Ralles and Captain Ackland into the service of the K. & A., Mr. Gordon, as a special guard?" "The K. & A. has never had a robbery yet, Miss Cullen," I replied, "and I don't think that it ever will have." "Why not?" she asked.
We found Frederic and "Captain" Hance just dismounting at the Rock Cabin, and I told the former he was in custody for the present, and asked him where Miss Cullen and Lord Ralles were. He told me they were just behind; but I wasn't going to take any risks, and, ordering the deputy to look after Cullen, I went on down the trail. I couldn't resist calling back "How's your respiration, Mr. Cullen?"
"It's been all I could do to control myself in his presence, I have come so utterly to hate and despise him," she added. "I don't wonder," growled Lord Ralles. "My only surprise is " With that they passed out of hearing again, leaving me fairly desperate with shame, grief, and, I'm afraid, with anger. I felt at once guilty and yet wronged.
Before the meal was over I came to the conclusion that Lord Ralles was in love with Miss Cullen, for he kept making low asides to her; and from the fact that she allowed them, and indeed responded, I drew the conclusion that he was a lucky beggar, feeling, I confess, a little pang that a title was going to win such a nice American girl.
After my previous conclusion, my surprise can be judged when at the farther end I found the two Britishers and Albert Cullen, standing there in the most exposed position possible. I joined them, muttering to myself something about Providence and fools. "Aw," drawled Cullen, "here's Mr. Gordon, just too late for the sport, by Jove." "Well," bragged Lord Ralles, "we've had a hand in this deal, Mr.
Lord Ralles wasn't much mollified by my explanation. "You're too much in a hurry, my man," he growled, speaking to me as if I were a servant. "Be a bit more careful in the future." I think I should have retorted for his manner was enough to make a saint mad if Miss Cullen hadn't spoken. "You tried to help me, Mr. Gordon, and I am deeply grateful for that," she said.
I smiled a little, and remarked to myself, "I think I can make good my boast that I would catch the robbers; but whether the Cullens will like my doing it, I question. What is more, Lord Ralles will owe me a bottle." Then I thought of Madge, and didn't feel as pleased over my success as I had felt a moment before.
We rode into camp a pretty gloomy crowd, and those of the party waiting for us there were not much better; but when Lord Ralles dismounted and showed up in his substitute for trousers there was a general shout of laughter. Even Miss Cullen had to laugh for a moment. And as his lordship bolted for his tent, I said to myself, "Honors are easy."
Camp was already there, and as I took this fact in I saw Frederic and his lordship pulled through the doorway of my car by the cowboys and dragged out on the platform beside me. The reports were now in Lord Ralles's hands. "That's what we want, boys," cried Camp. "Those letters." "Take your hands off me," said Lord Ralles, coolly, "and I'll give them to you."
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