e ranch, though little enough he saw of it,
being away over the world so much of the time. Mrs. Hale talked of her
own Journey across the Plains, a little girl, in the late Fifties, and,
like Mrs. Mortimer, knew all about the fight at Little Meadow, and the
tale of the massacre of the emigrant train of which Billy's father had
been the sole survivor.

"And so," Saxon concluded, an hour later, "we've been three years
searching for our valley of the moon, and now we've found it."

"Valley of the Moon?" Mrs. Hale queried. "Then you knew about it all the
time. What kept you so long?"

"No; we didn't know. We just started on a blind search for it. Mark Hall
called it a pilgrimage, and was always teasing us to carry long staffs.
He said when we found the spot we'd know, because then the staffs would
burst into blossom. He laughed at all the good things we wanted in our
valley, and one night he took me out and showed me the moon through
a telescope. He said that was the only place we could find such a
wonderful valley. He meant it was moonshine, but we adopted the name and
went on looking for it."

"What a coincidence!" Mrs. Hale exclaimed. "For this is the Valley of
the Moon."

"I know it," Saxon said with quiet confidence. "It has everything we
wanted."

"But you don't understand, my dear. This is the Valley of the Moon. This
is Sonoma Valley. Sonoma is an Indian word, and means the Valley of the
Moon. That was what the Indians called it for untold ages before the
first white men came. We, who love it, still so call it."

And then Saxon recalled the mysterious references Jack Hastings and
his wife had made to it, and the talk tripped along until Billy grew
restless. He cleared his throat significantly and interrupted.

"We want to find out about that ranch acrost the creek--who owns it, if
they'll sell, where we'll find 'em, an' such things."

Mrs. Hale stood up.

"We'll go and see Edmund," she said, catching Saxon by the hand and
leading the way.

"My!" Billy ejaculated, towering above her. "I used to think Saxon was
small. But she'd make two of you."

"And you're pretty big," the little woman smiled; "but Edmund is taller
than you, and broader-shouldered."

They crossed a bright hall, and found the big beautiful husband lying
back reading in a huge Mission rocker. Beside it was another tiny
child's chair of red-enameled rattan. Along the length of his thigh, the
head on his knee and directed toward a smold