"Bad as that?"
"Worse," grimly. "I ain't got educated words enough to describe her."
They had eaten by the light of the lantern, when they heard Kate coming.
She lifted the flap of the tent and smiled her friendly smile upon them.
"Goodness, but I'm glad I don't have to cook supper! I haven't had anything warm since morning."
Bowers stood with the broom in his hand, staring, while Kate removed her cap and jacket. Then he cast an evil look upon the deputy, a look which said, "You liar!"
As she made to get the food from the stove he interposed hastily: "You set down, Ma'am."
Lingle gave him a look which was equally significant, a jeering look which said ironically, "Woman hater!"
Bowers colored with pleasure when she lauded his "cowpuncher potatoes" and exclaimed over the biscuits.
When Kate had finished she looked from one to the other and beamed upon them impartially.
"It's nice to see people. I haven't seen any one for six weeks except Uncle Joe," wistfully. "I wish he had come back with you--it's so lonesome."
There was an immediate silence and then Bowers cleared his throat noisily.
"Night 'fore last was tol'able chilly in your wagon, I reckon?"
Her face sobered.
"It was--terrible! I couldn't sleep for the cold, and thinking about and pitying the stock on the range, and anybody that had to be out in it. I was glad Uncle Joe was safe in Prouty--there was no need for us both to be out here suffering."
Again there was silence, and once more Bowers came to the rescue with a feeble witticism, at which he himself laughed hollowly: "I hearn that a feller eatin' supper with a steel knife got his tongue froze to it, and they had a time thawin' him over the tea kettle."
Kate rose to clear away and wash the dishes, but Bowers motioned her to remain seated.
"You rest yourself, Ma'am. I was a pearl diver in a restauraw fer three months onct so I am, you might say, a professional."
"Uncle Joe and I take turns," Kate laughed, "for neither of us likes it."
"That's the best way," Bowers agreed, breaking the constrained silence which fell each time Mormon Joe's name was mentioned. "More pardners has fell out over dish-washin' and the throwin' of diamond hitches than any other causes."
When, to Kate's horror, Bowers had wiped off the top of the stove with the dishcloth and removed some lingering moisture from the inside of a frying pan with his elbow, she said, rising: "I'm up at four, so I go to bed early. You can sleep in Uncle Joe's tepee," to Lingle, "and you needn't get up for breakfast when we do. I suppose," to Bowers, "you'll want to start in to-morrow, so I'll go with you and show you the range we're feeding over." With a friendly good night she turned towards the entrance.