her heart and
that which her mother had complained was her misfortune in not being
born a boy.

Time passed, while Helen watched and learned and dreamed. The train
stopped, at long intervals, at wayside stations where there seemed
nothing but adobe sheds and lazy Mexicans, and dust and heat. Bo awoke
and began to chatter, and to dig into the basket. She learned from the
conductor that Magdalena was only two stations on. And she was full of
conjectures as to who would meet them, what would happen. So Helen was
drawn back to sober realities, in which there was considerable zest.
Assuredly she did not know what was going to happen. Twice Riggs passed
up and down the aisle, his dark face and light eyes and sardonic smile
deliberately forced upon her sight. But again Helen fought a growing
dread with contemptuous scorn. This fellow was not half a man. It was
not conceivable what he could do, except annoy her, until she arrived
at Pine. Her uncle was to meet her or send for her at Snowdrop, which
place, Helen knew, was distant a good long ride by stage from Magdalena.
This stage-ride was the climax and the dread of all the long journey, in
Helen's considerations.

"Oh, Nell!" cried Bo, with delight. "We're nearly there! Next station,
the conductor said."

"I wonder if the stage travels at night," said Helen, thoughtfully.

"Sure it does!" replied the irrepressible Bo.

The train, though it clattered along as usual, seemed to Helen to fly.
There the sun was setting over bleak New Mexican bluffs, Magdalena was
at hand, and night, and adventure. Helen's heart beat fast. She
watched the yellow plains where the cattle grazed; their presence, and
irrigation ditches and cottonwood-trees told her that the railroad part
of the journey was nearly ended. Then, at Bo's little scream, she
looked across the car and out of the window to see a line of low, flat,
red-adobe houses. The train began to slow down. Helen saw children run,
white children and Mexican together; then more houses, and high upon a
hill an immense adobe church, crude and glaring, yet somehow beautiful.

Helen told Bo to put on her bonnet, and, performing a like office for
herself, she was ashamed of the trembling of her fingers. There were
bustle and talk in the car.

The train stopped. Helen peered out to see a straggling crowd of
Mexicans and Indians, all motionless and stolid, as if trains or nothing
else mattered. Next Helen saw a white man, and that was a r