We were trotting back along the bed of a small creek, on our way to Winds’ Hill, when Cecily suddenly stopped her horse. She had spotted something in the dirt of the low creek bed.

“Fossils,” she said. “That’s why I always ride in the creek, if there is a creek. Once I finish with the flora, I intend to go into the matter of fossils a good deal more thoroughly than I have so far.”

She dismounted and took a little pickax from her saddlebag; soon she was pecking at the bank of the little creek as happily as if she’d just found gold. My offer to help was crisply declined.

“Amateurs like you have ruined far too many fossil beds already.”

I was feeling rather tired. I thought I’d just take a nap while Cecily was at her work, so I stretched out on the warm prairie, hat over my eyes, and fell asleep almost at once.

I don’t know how long I slept—an hour, or perhaps two—but a puzzling strain of music brought me awake. It seemed to be harmonica music. Then the harmonica broke off and I heard Cecily’s lilting laugh. I opened my eyes and felt at once that my time sense must have become confused, for I thought I saw Rosy, my long-lost mule, grazing near Cecily’s thoroughbred.

Can’t be, I concluded, about to go back to sleep. But then the harmonica started again; I blinked a few times and looked again at the horses, and it was Rosy. She still even wore my saddle.

I sprang up and looked down the creek bed, only to see a sight that quite stunned me. A familiar 10-gauge shotgun was propped against the creek bank, and Lady Snow, looking very fair and fetching indeed, was tootling on a harmonica, now and then stopping to laugh lightly as she cast her reckless glances at the outlaw boy, Billy Bone.

12.

“Hello, Sippy,” Billy said. “Had your nap out?”

He looked as dirty and scrappy as ever, and his tone was a little cool. It was clear he would have been better pleased if I’d slept for a week while Cecily Snow gave him harmonica lessons.

The cool tone stung me a little, for I was as glad to see him as I had been to see Joe, but I soon saw it would be foolish to blame the boy. He had just been taken in hand by the most polished seductress in the West, and had already fallen in love. The appearance of an old fogey from Philadelphia could only detract from his bliss.

“Billy, it’s wonderful to see you,” I said, but he was looking with such awe at Cecily that I doubt he heard.

“It’s such a splendid day, I thought we’d have a little music,” Cecily said, and then she began to play that old, sad air “Barbara Allen.”