entle gallop, and then into a canter and from that to a walk.

"Well, now, you silly horse, I hope you feel that you're far enough
from danger," said Betty conversationally. "I'm sure I haven't the
slightest idea where we are. Bob and I have never ridden this far,
and from the looks of the country I don't think it is what the
geographies call 'densely populated'. Mercy, what a lonesome place!"

Clover had gone contentedly to cropping grass, and that reminded
Betty that she was hungry.

Far away she saw the outlines of oil derricks, but the horse seemed
to have taken her out of the immediate vicinity of the oil fields.
Not a house was in sight, not a moving person or animal. The
stillness was unbroken save for the hoarse call of a single bird
flying overhead.

Suddenly Betty's eyes widened in astonishment. She jerked up Clover's
head so sharply that that pampered pet shook it angrily. Why should
she be treated like that?

"The three hills!" gasped Betty. "Grandma Watterby's three hills!
'Joined together like hands' she always says, and right back of the
Saunders' house. Clover! do you suppose we've found the three hills
and Bob's aunts?"

Clover had no opinion to offer. She had been rudely torn from her
enjoyment of the herbage, and she resented that plainly. Betty,
however, was too excited to consider the subject of lunch, even
though a moment before she had been very hungry.

She turned the horse's head toward the three hills, and with every
step that brought her nearer the conviction grew that she had found
the Saunders' place. To be sure, she had seen nothing of a house as
yet, but, like the name of Saunders, three hills were not a common
phenomenon in Oklahoma, at least not within riding distance of the
oil fields.

"It's an awful long way," sighed Betty, when after half an hour's
riding, the hills seemed as far away as before. "I suppose the air is
so clear that they seemed nearer than they are. And I guess we came
the long way around. There must be a road from the Watterby farm that
cuts off some of the distance."

Betty did not worry about what Bob or the men at the wells might
be thinking. They knew her for a good rider, and Clover for a
comparatively easily managed horse. No one in the West considers a
good gallop anything serious, even when it assumes the proportions of
a runaway. Betty was sure that they would expect her to ride back
when Clover had had her run, and, barring a misstep, no harm wou