truth mighty hard, but it’s policy. Good mornin’, Miss Bayley.”

The new teacher, at last alone, put her hands to her head as though she felt dizzy. How rasping was Mrs. Twiggly’s voice! But a moment later she was thinking of the poor little children of that stranded Ophelia, and looked eagerly forward to her first meeting with them.

CHAPTER FOUR
GETTING ACQUAINTED

It was a perfect autumn day, and he who has not been in the Sierra Nevada mountains on a golden October morning has not as yet known the full joy of living.

Josephine Bayley had been advised to lock her door in order to keep out “snoopin’ Indians.” She had been shown through a field-glass a group of most dilapidated dwellings about a mile to the south and down in the creek-bottom. These dwellings could not be called wigwams; indeed, they were too nondescript really to be called anything. Some had a rough framework of saplings, with pine branches for a roof and walls; others were made of stones held together with mud, while still others were but shiftlessly erected tents, even discarded clothing having been used, and all were surrounded by rubbish and squalor. Thus the one-time picturesqueness of the Washoe Indian has degenerated.

“They’re curious and snoopin’, those Indians are, but harmless,” Mrs. Enterprise Twiggly had said, when advising Miss Bayley to keep her door locked while she was away.

The new teacher, lithe, dark, athletic, stepped springily down the mountain road, feeling as though she must sing with a lark that was somewhere over in a clump of murmuring pines. But the first note of the song died on her lips as she suddenly stopped and gazed ahead of her.

Had that stone in the road moved, or was it her imagination? She gazed fascinated. Was it about to uncoil and raise a protesting head? Gracious! What was it she had heard about rattlers? When they coiled, they could spring—how far—was it twice the length of their own bodies? Did one have to measure them to know how far away one could stand in safety? If they were straight out, one always had time to escape, for they had to coil to strike. But the large round stone that did look strangely like a coiled snake did not stir, not even when a smaller rock was thrown at it.

Miss Bayley, laughing at her own fears, looked down the cañon road ahead of her, where she beheld a little procession approaching. A light of recognition brightened her dark eyes. “Oh, I am so glad!” she thought. “Here come the children of Ophelia.”

A queer-looking group they made. There was a soft mouse-colored burro, and on it sat a truly beautiful little girl of eight years, holding in front of her a chubby four-year-old boy, who was beaming with delight. A tall, lank lad, with a staff in one hand, was guiding the beast of burden, while on the other side, with pride shining in her eyes, that were a warm golden-brown, walked the little mother of them all, Dixie Martin. She was carrying a basket that held their lunch and leading a very small, long-legged goat that had a red ribbon tied about its neck.

As they emerged from the dark cañon road into the full sunlight beyond the great old pines they beheld for the first time their new teacher. They knew at once that it must be she, and Ken snatched off his cap, while little Carolina, slipping from the back of the burro, made a graceful curtsy, just as her mother had trained her to do from babyhood. Dixie, too, had been trained, but she was a Martin, and did not take to polishing as readily as did Carol.

The new teacher hurried forward with hands outstretched. She actually forgot to examine the stones in the road that might be coiled snakes.

“Oh, you dear little pupils of mine!” she exclaimed. “You are the four Martins, aren’t you?”

“Yes, ma’am, we are,” was the chorused reply; and then it was that Miss Bayley recalled that even the best people in the South say “ma’am.”

Carolina, wishing to shine, stepped forward and said: “I’ll introduce us, shall I? This is my big sister, Dixie Martin, and our baby brother, Jimmy-Boy.” Then the small girl held herself proudly, as the mother had done, as she added, “His real name is James Haddington-Allen Martin, after our aunt who is blue-blooded in the South.”

There was a sudden flush in the freckled face of the older girl, and she hastened to say apologetically: “Miss Bayley, please pardon my little sister for saying that. I’ve told her time and again that when folks are truly blue-blooded it shows without their telling it.” Then she added, as she nodded toward the boy who stood waiting his turn, “This is our big brother, Ken, and I guess that’s all the introducing, unless Pegasus ought to be mentioned.”

“Pegasus?” the new teacher repeated as she gazed at the stolid little burro and marveled. “Pray, what do you kiddies know about Pegasus?” Even as she spoke she realized that much that was unusual might be expected from the children of Ophelia.

It was Dixie who said eagerly, “Oh, our beautiful mother wrote the loveliest poetry, and she used to say that the wonderful winged horse, Pegasus, carried her to the Land of Inspiration.”

Miss Bayley noticed that the small goat had not been introduced. Ken, believing that the moment for the presentation was at hand, took the leading-rope from his sister, and, stepping forward, he said, almost shyly: “Miss Bayley, teacher, we fetched along Star-White as your present. We thought maybe you’d like him for a pet.”

It had been said of Miss Josephine Bayley that she could rise to any occasion without evidencing surprise or dismay, and she surely did at this moment. Luckily, her practice-work on the East Side in New York had taught her to expect the most extraordinary gifts from her pupils.

The four pairs of eyes watched anxiously for a moment. Would “new teacher” like their present?

Their doubts were quickly put to flight, for Miss Josephine Bayley stooped and caressed the long-legged, rather startled kid as she said with a ring of real enthusiasm in her voice: “You dear Star-White, you’re as nice as you can be. I just know that I’m going to love you.” Then, rising, she held out a hand to the two who were nearest, but the others were included in her smiling glance as she said: “Thank you so much, dears. It was ever so kind of you to want to make me happy.” Then, a little helplessly, she appealed to the older boy as she asked, “What shall we do with Star-White now?”

“I’ll tie him up in the shed back o’ your cabin, Miss Bayley. He’ll be all right in there.”

The lad skipped ahead, the kid in his arms, but returned in an incredibly short time.

The procession had continued on its way, and Ken soon remarked, “There’s the schoolhouse, teacher, down the piney lane, and I think there’s folks waiting to see you.”

Miss Bayley turned and saw, back from the road and on a short lane, a log schoolhouse half hidden by great old pines. In front of it stood a very fine carriage drawn by two milk-white horses. At their heads a stocky man with a stubby red beard and a keen, alert, red-brown eye awaited her. He was the “board of education,” of that Miss Bayley was sure, while on the back seat of the vehicle, with her bonneted head held high, sat no less a personage than Mrs. Sethibald Archer, and at her side, also with her head held high, was a much-beruffled young girl, aged eight years, who was of course the prettiest and smartest