YELLOWSTONE NIGHTS
By HERBERT QUICK
AUTHOR OF "ALLADIN & CO.," "VIRGINIA OF THE AIR LANES," ETC.
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHER NEW YORK
Copyright 1911
The Bobbs-Merrill Company
YELLOWSTONE NIGHTS
CHAPTER I
It was August the third—and the rest of it. Being over Montana, and theRockies, the skies were just as described by Truthful James. In thelittle park between the N. P. Station and the entrance to YellowstonePark a stalwart young fellow and a fluffy, lacy, Paquined girl floatedfrom place to place with their feet seven or eight inches from theearth—or so it seemed. They disappeared behind some shrubbery and satdown on a bench, where the young man hugged the girl ferociously, andshe, with that patient endurance which is the wonder and glory ofwomanhood, suffered it uncomplainingly. In fact she reciprocated it.
Note that we said a moment ago that they disappeared. From whose gaze?Not from ours, for we saw them sit and—and what followed. Theirdisappearance was from the view of a slender man of medium height whowas off toward the station, inspecting the salvias, the phloxes, thecannas, the colei, the materials with which the walks were paved, andthe earth in the flower-beds. He looked the near things over with amagnifying-glass, and scrutinized the far landscape with field-glasses.When he removed his traveling cap, one saw that he was bald, though notso bald as he seemed—his weak and neutral hair blended so in color withthe neutral shades of his face and garb.
As he looked at things near and far, from the formal garden of thelittle park to the towering peak of Electric Mountain, which flew apennon of cloud off to the west, or Sepulcher Mountain, half lost in anunaccustomed haze to the south, but displaying above the blue itsenormous similitude of a grave, with the stone at head and foot, he madenotes in his huge pocket-book, and in making notes he approached closerand closer to the big boy and little girl on the bench. In fact, hestopped on the other side of the bush, and as the lovers kissed for thetenth time, at least, he stepped round toward them, peering into the topof the bushes, pencil poised to jot down the cause of the chirpingsound which had greeted his ears.
"I think I heard young birds in this bush," said he.
"You did," responded the young man, blushing.
"This park is full of them," said the girl, rather less embarrassed.
"Did you note the species?" queried he of the glasses. "I seem quiteunable to catch sight of them."
"They are turtle-doves," said the girl.
"Gulls!" said the man.
The girl giggled hysterically. The naturalist was protesting that gullsnever nest in such places, and the young man was becoming hopelesslyconfused, when a fourth figure joined the group. He was clad in garmentsof the commonest sort—but the girl was at once struck by the fact thathe wore a soft roll collar on his flannel shirt, and a huge red silkneckerchief. Moreover, he carried a long whip which he trailed after himin the grass.
"Local color at last!" she whispered to her lover. "I know we're goingto have a shooting or a cow-boy adventure!"
"Well," the new-comer said, "do you go with us, or not, Doc?"
"Go with you?" asked the ornithologist. "Go where?"
"Tour of the Park?" replied the man with the whip. "I'm having hard workto get a load."
"I think," said the person addressed, "that I can finish my inspectionof the Park on foot. It is, in fact, surprisingly small, and not at