With a down sinking of her heart, and a homesickness quite too deep for tears, the “little Captain” leaned back and closed her eyes, while her fancy pictured that far-away Sobrante, lying bathed in sunshine and in a peacefulness so wholly in contrast to this dreadful city. Memories of her home recalled the fact that Ephraim, a part of her old world, was not with her now and that in the confusion of leaving the train she had quite forgotten him. This sent her upright again, startled and eager, to say:
“Why, Mr. Hale! How terrible! We’ve _forgotten_ ‘Forty-niner!’ we must go right back and get him!”
“Impossible. He should have been on the lookout for us and kept us in sight. Besides, if we did go back we couldn’t find him. New York crowds are always changing and he’d move on with the rest. Doubtless, he thinks it easy to overtake us anywhere here.”
Jessica was hurt. She could not realize how greatly tried the lawyer had been by many of her thoughtless actions during their long journey, nor how impatient he was now to be free from his care of her and away to his own household. His irritation was perfectly natural, and, secretly, he was extremely glad that they had thus easily lost the sharpshooter. It was a most satisfactory way out of the difficulty in appearing at Mrs. Dalrymple’s house with the veteran ranchman in train. That she would decline to receive Mr. Marsh, he was quite sure; in which case he would himself have been left with the old fellow upon his hands, to care for in some way till he could be expressed back to Sobrante. Yes, he was certainly relieved; but he did not enjoy the reproachful glance which his young charge bestowed upon him as he spoke. After a moment she asked:
“Will carriages take you anywhere you want to go, here in this big place? Can you hire one for money, just as in our dear Los Angeles, when Mr. Ninian got one to take us from one station to the other? Could a little girl hire one, herself?”
“Why, of course; but Jessica, dear child, get no silly notions into your head of running about this city alone--even in a public hack. Within a very few moments I shall hand you over to the care of your future guardian and you will have to be guided by her in everything. Nor need you worry about Ephraim. He’s an old campaigner, has a tongue to ask questions with, and this is a decent community. He’ll look out for himself well enough. There! A half-dozen more blocks and we shall have arrived!”