y joined Kit at the window.

"Isn't this gorgeous!" Kit's breath came almost in gasps, so excited
was she at the spectacle. "Now you never saw anything as gorgeous as
that in the way of a sunset over the Hudson. Own up, Bet, you know you
haven't!"

"No, Kit, this is magnificent. Do you have this every day?"

"Almost," she answered.

The mountains caught the glow and turned to purple and rose, and deep
shadows of blue, and sometimes a bare mountain side shone out like gold.

Shirley had pointed her camera toward it, then put it away, saying, "It
won't look like anything in black and white."

"I am going to try and make a sketch of it," said Bet as she flew back
to her room for her note book and colors. "But if I painted it that
way, no one would believe it. It's too vivid, too spectacular!" she
sighed.

Kit often tried to sketch when Bet was at it, but this morning she was
too excited to settle down. She walked about the car like a restless
animal.

She was glad when Sam announced an early breakfast. Not that she was
hungry, but it put in time and that was good. The hour to wait until
they reached Benito was one of the longest she had ever known.

"The next station is ours!" called the Judge. "Everybody ready!"

But Kit was already standing at the door, her suitcase beside her.

Kit had tears in her eyes. It wasn't often that she gave way, but when
the train pulled into the station, the tears were running down her
cheeks.

The Judge's car came to a stop at last at the siding of the station.
Benito was a typical desert settlement, the very last link with
civilization. For beyond the three squat adobe shacks, lay the sandy,
cactus-dotted land that stretched far out in every direction to the
rising foothills that skirted the rugged peaks.

"Oh, girls!" cried Bet. "Isn't this wonderful?"

"Yes, just like the movies. I've seen it dozens of times, and I almost
expect to see the villain and the handsome cowboy ride up this very
minute!" laughed Joy.

"Kit, come here!" called Bet.

But Kit was missing from the group. Her arms were thrown about a
tanned, alert little woman. What she was saying the girls could not
hear, but they could guess.

Finally she broke loose and with a wave of her arm she cried: "Come on,
girls, it's Mum!"

CHAPTER IV

_THE DESERT_

It was not the strange country that interested The Merriweather Girls
at the moment of their arrival, but an old friend.

A t