begin work at dawn," said Roger, with a sigh. "Every minute
counts, old man."

About nine o'clock Charley came panting down the trail.

"Felicia must come home at once," she cried. "There's a big sand storm
coming. Dick is getting the stock under cover as fast as he can."

The men dropped their tools hurriedly and looked up the valley. A great
gray cloud was approaching so rapidly that as they gazed they caught the
sound of its increasing roar. The sky, which had been sapphire of an
unusual translucence that morning, turned all in a moment to a sullen
red gray. There was a dry rattle of lizards and horned toads scuttling
into the roots of grease wood and cactus.

"You mustn't try to go home, Charley," exclaimed Roger.

"But I must! Dick and his alfalfa! He _can't_ be alone!"

But Dick was destined to spend the day in solitude. With a very Niagara
of sound the sand storm struck the camp. Charley and Felicia ran for
the living tent where the men shortly joined them. They closed the flaps
and settled to a day of discomfort. The engine house would have been
more comfortable than the tent but it was too cumbered with machinery
now to be used as a sitting room. There was no work that could be done
indoors. The heat was stifling, a hundred and six the thermometer over
the washstand trunk reported. The tent rocked and bellied, bellied and
flapped with reverberations like drum-beats. Felicia was frightened at
first and hid her head in Charley's lap. Charley herself was
white-lipped, less, Ernest thought, from fear of the storm than from
that vague apprehension about Dick that never seemed to leave her.

For a time Roger sat scowling with impatience, then Felicia's fear moved
him and calling the child to him he began to tell her of the old
swimming pool. The others listened and laughed and when Felicia begged
for more, Gustav told a charming tale of his own Bavarian childhood. And
he and Ernest sang together some tender folk songs which Felicia
insisted on learning. While Gustav and Ernest undertook this pleasant
task Charley and Roger talked.

At Charley's request, Roger brought out his blue prints and explained
the plant to her. He felt his impatience lifting as he talked.
Explaining his work always seemed to increase his critical vision. New
ideas came flooding, and he pulled out his note book, feeling that after
all the day was not entirely wasted.

So, in spite of the bitter taste of alkali in their mouths and its s