Page 48 (1/1)

Bare, yellow, cedar-dotted slopes, apparently level, so gradual was the ascent, stretched away to a dense ragged line of forest that rose black over range after range, at last to fail near the bare suainst the blue sky

"Oh, beautiful!" cried Bo "But they ought to be called Black Mountains"

"Old Baldy, there, is white half the year," replied Dale

"Look back an' see what you say," suggested Roy

The girls turned to gaze silently Helen iined she looked down upon the whole orld How vastly different was the desert! Verily it yawned away fro softly flushed with purple far away, a barren void, borderless and ireen patches and black lines and upheaved ridges only served to ereen spot," said Roy, pointing "Thet's Snowdrop An' the other one--'way to the right--thet's Shon"

"Where is Pine?" queried Helen, eagerly

"Farther still, up over the foot-hills at the edge of the woods"

"Then we're riding away fro could overtake us Pine is four days' ride An' by takin' to the mountains Milt can hide his tracks An' when he's thrown Anson off the scent, then he'll circle down to Pine"

"Mr Dale, do you think you'll get us there safely--and soon?" asked Helen, wistfully

"I won't promise soon, but I promise safe An' I don't like bein' called Mister," he replied

"Are we ever going to eat?" inquired Bo, deh to look at Bo Helen saw his face fully in the light, and it was thin and hard, darkly bronzed, with eyes like those of a hawk, and with square chin and lean jaws showing scant, light beard

"We shore are," he replied "Soon as we reach the ti"

"Reckon we can rustle soed his horse into a jog-trot

During a steady trot for a long hour, Helen's roving eyes were everywhere, taking note of the things froave place to as scanty a grass, and the dark blots that proved to be dwarf cedars, and the ravines opening out as if by round, to wind aidening between gray stone walls, and farther on, patches of lonely pine-trees, two and three together, and then a straggling clued border of forest, growing nearer all the while, the black sweeping benches rising to the noble doe