rnest slammed
the door shut and turned the button. "If Gustav tries to get back
through this, he'll lose his way, without fail," said Roger.

"How long do you suppose it'll last?" asked Ernest.

"The Lord knows! Have you got any tobacco with you?" Roger sat down on a
box of window glass and took out his pipe. For half an hour they sat
listening to the howl of the wind while Madam read.

"Evidently it doesn't intend to quit for a while," said Roger finally.
"Guess I'll make up my diary and write some letters. I understand now
why Dick was so insistent on this adobe. You take a look at the cook
tent and I'll see if the house tent is still standing while I get some
paper."

The wind increased in violence until long past noon. They retrieved some
canned stuff from the kitchen tent and ate it with their mouths full of
the sand that sifted through the cracks of the doors and windows. Madam
satisfied herself with crackers. It was very hot, even in the adobe.
About three o'clock Roger wiped the sweat out of his eyes and
paused--pipe poised:

"It's letting up, Ern," he said.

Ernest paused to listen. There was a perceptible lull in the uproar, and
the lull increased until at five o'clock they emerged from their
shelter. The air had miraculously cleared. The sky was a deep, rich
violet and the desert, lighted by the westering sun, was a beaten gold
and remodeled to unfamiliar lines. Well known cat's-claw and cactus
clumps had disappeared. A sand drift a foot in length covered the well
curb. A drift that touched the thatch lay against the east side of the
cook tent and had spilled within, half burying the tables and benches.
Within the living tent, sand lay thick on trunks and cots. But the tents
had withstood the day's siege, stolidly.

"Let's look at the absorber," said Roger, gloomily.

They plowed through a great billow of sand at the end of the engine
house. Ernest groaned. Two of the four by fours at the end of the great
trough had been undermined and had collapsed, carrying a great part of
the trough with it. The exposed part of the trough was filled with an
indiscriminate mixture of sand and asphaltum.

"My God! What a country!" cried Ernest.

"My God! What a pair of fools," returned Roger. "After all Dick's
warnings, why didn't we build for sand storms! Lend me a hand here,
Ern, with this four by four. My word! Where's Dick going? Hey, Dick!
What's your hurry?"

He might as well have hailed the setting sun.