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The free and easy life of the Big House went on in its frictionless way Dick worked Grahaes frorove strayed in for wordy dinners--and wordy evenings, except when Paula played for the, and other valley towns, continued to drop in unexpectedly, but never to the confusion of Oh Joy and the house boys, who, seat a score of unexpected guests to a perfect dinner And there were even nights--rare ones--when only Dick and Graham and Paula sat at dinner, and when, afterward, the two men yarned for an hour before an early bed, while she played soft things to herself or disappeared earlier than they

But one , when the Watsons and Masons and Wombolds arrived in force, Grahae table was ht the quick expression of pleasure in her eyes at sight of hiht movement as if to rise, which did not escape his notice any more than did her quiet mastery of the impulse that left her seated

She was ih it was little enough he had seen of her, he thought, as he talked whatever cas with her Now one and now another song he tried with her, subduing his high baritone to her light soprano with such success as to win cries ofto be out again over the world with Dick," she told him in a pause "If we could only start to-morrow! But Dick can't start yet He's in too deep with too many experiments and adventures on the ranch here Why, what do you think he's up to now? As if he did not have enough on his hands, he's going to revolutionize the sales end, or, at least, the California and Pacific Coast portion of it, bythe buyers come to the ranch"

"But they do do that," Graham said "The first man I met here was a buyer from Idaho"

"Oh, but Dick means as an institution, you know--to make them come en masse at a stated tih he says he will bait them with a bit of that to excite interest It will be an annual fair, to last three days, in which he will be the only exhibitor He's spending half his ar is his sales er, and Mr Pitts his showman"