back from the recollection of limousine cars and Cousin Gene of
Philadelphia.

"No, I have only been here a short time myself, and the country is
almost as new to me as it is to you," Laura Macpherson replied.

"Oh, it is _such_ an awful place!" Jerry continued. "Everywhere and
everywhere one can see nothing but great sand-waves all over the land.
They have almost buried the palisades that protect the railroad. It just
seemed like the Red Sea dividing to let the Israelites go through, only
this was red-hot sand held back to let the train pass through a deep
rift. And to-day the wind had filled up the tracks so it couldn't go
through until the sand was cleaned out. There is only one kind of shrub,
a spiny looking thing, growing anywhere on all those useless acres. It
is a perfectly horrid country! Why was such land ever made?" Jerry
turned to York with the question.

"I can't tell you," York said, "but there are some good things here."

"Yes, there is my claim," Jerry broke in. "It's all I have left, you
know. Cousin Gene tried to persuade me it would be better off without
me, but I'm sure it must need the owner's oversight to make it really
profitable. There was no record, in settling up the estate, of its
having produced any income at all. I certainly need the income now.
Taking care of myself is a new experience for me."

All the vivacity and hopefulness of youth was in her words. But the
dreamy expression on her face that came and went with her moods soon
returned.

"Cousin Gene Wellington is not my real cousin, you know. He is Uncle
Darby's relative, not Aunt Jerry's. He is an artist, but without any
income right now, like myself. Both of us have to learn how to go alone,
you see, but I'm not going back to Philadelphia now, no matter what Aunt
Jerry Darby may say."

This was no appeal for sympathy. Taking care of oneself seemed easy
enough to Lesa Swaim's child, to whom the West promised only one grand
romantic adventure. There was something, too, in the tone in which she
pronounced the name of Gene Wellington that seemed to set it off from
every other name. And she pronounced it often enough to trouble York
Macpherson. No other name came so easily and so frequently and frankly
to her lips.

"We hope you will like the West. The Sage Brush isn't so bad when you
get acclimated to its moods," York assured her. "But don't expect too
much at first, nor too definite a way of securing an income."

Only Laura Mac