made a turn, rounding the
orchard, and began the descent to a bridge. On the right a great
water-wheel, supplied with huge, scoop-shaped buckets, was lifting water
from the river to distribute it over a reclaimed section. The bays pranced
toward it suspiciously. "Now, now, Tuck," she admonished, "be a soldier."
The colt sidled gingerly. "Whoa, Nip, whoa!" and, rearing lightly, they
took the approach with a rush.

As they quieted and trotted evenly off the bridge, a large and brilliant
signboard set in an area of sage-brush challenged the eye. Miss Armitage
fluted a laugh.

"Buy one of these Choice Lots,"

she read, with charming, slightly mocking exaggeration.

"Buy to-day.

"To-morrow will see this Property the Heart of a City.

"Buy before the Prices Soar.

"Talk with Henderson Bailey.

"This surely is Hesperides Vale," she added.

The amusement went out of Tisdale's face. "Yes, madam, and your journey's
end. Probably the next post-box will announce the name of your friends."

She did not answer directly. She looked beyond the heads of the team to
the top of the valley, where two brown slopes parted like drawn curtains
and opened a blue vista of canyon closed by a lofty snow-peak. The sun had
more than fulfilled its morning promise of heat, but a soft breeze began
to pull from that white summit down the watercourse.

"I did not tell you I had friends in Hesperides Vale," she said at last.
Her eyes continued to search the far blue canyon, but her color heightened
at his quick glance of surprise, and she went on with a kind of
breathlessness.

"I--I have a confession to make. I--But hasn't it occurred to you, Mr.
Tisdale, that I might be interested in this land you are on your way to
see?"

His glance changed. It settled into his clear, calculating look of
appraisal. Under it her color flamed; she, turned her face farther away.
"No," he answered slowly, "No, that had not occurred to me."

"I should have told you at the beginning, but I thought, at first, you
knew. Afterward--but I am going to explain now," and she turned
resolutely, smiling a little to brave that look. "Mr. Morganstein had
promised, when he planned the trip to Portland, that he would run over
from Ellensburg to look the property up. He believed it might be feasible
to plat it into five-acre tracts to put on the market. Of course we knew
nothing of the difficulties of the road; we had heard it was an old stage
route, and we expected to