he fell forward thinking to crawl on her
hands and knees. Her arms went into the mass to the shoulder.
Silently--without a word--but with horrible fear gripping her heart she
fought the sand. She sank deeper--slowly--steadily--surely. The hellish
stuff closed about her body to the waist. If she only had
something--anything--solid to hold to! She took off her hat, grasped the
edges of the brim, reached her arms out and tried to use the frail disk
of felt for a buoy. It held a moment then gradually settled below the
surface of the shifting, elusive substance. Again and again she lifted
the hat free from the sand and sought to place it so it would bear a
part at least of her weight. Her efforts were vain. The insidious mass
crept higher and higher on her body. She remembered reading that one
caught in the quicksand by his struggles only hastened his own
destruction. She tried to be perfectly still. In spite of all she was
sinking--sinking--the sand was engulfing her.

During all her struggles Carolyn June remained silent. She had not
thought to cry out. Somehow she could not realize that she was to die.
The sun was bright, the sky cloudless, the trees along the river-bank
barely swayed in a little breeze! How beautiful the world! How queer
that such a little distance away was the green grass of the meadow and
the firm black earth in which it was rooted and she--she was held fast
and helpless in the embrace of the deadly sand! Strange thoughts rushed
through her mind. She wondered what they would think at the ranch when
night came and she did not return. Would they know? Would they guess the
thing that had happened? Would the sand draw her down--down--until it
covered her so none would ever know where or how she died? She looked at
Old Blue. "Poor old fellow!" she whispered, "I am sorry--I didn't
know--it looked so white and firm and safe!" The sand was half-way up
the sides of the horse and he swayed his body in pathetic, futile
efforts to free himself.

A strange calm came over Carolyn June. So this was the end? She was to
die alone, horribly, in the treacherous sands of the Cimarron? Surely it
could not be--God would not let her die! She was so young! She had just
begun to live--She thought of Hartville, her father, the old friends.
How far away they seemed! How queer it was--she could not image in her
mind any of the familiar scenes, the face of her father or any of the
friends she had known so well! She tried to think