with the letter still in her possession and her message still ungiven?
Never! Surely she was not afraid to stay long enough to send for him.
The woman who had fed them and sheltered them for the night would be her
protector. She would stay. There must be some woman of refinement and
culture somewhere near by to whom she could go for a few days until her
errand was performed; and what was her training in the hospital worth
if it did not give her some independence? Out here in the wild free West
women had to protect themselves. She could surely stay in the
uncomfortable quarters where she was for another day until she could get
word to the missionary. Then she could decide whether to proceed on her
journey alone to California, or to go back home. There was really no
reason why she should not travel alone if she chose; plenty of young
women did and, anyway, the emergency was not of her choosing. Amelia
Ellen would make herself sick fretting over her Burley, that was plain,
if she were detained even a few hours. Hazel came back to the nearly
demented Amelia Ellen with her chin tilted firmly and a straight little
set of her sweet lips which betokened stubbornness. The train came in a
brief space of time, and, weeping but firm, Amelia Ellen boarded it,
dismayed at the thought of leaving her dear young lady, yet stubbornly
determined to go. Hazel gave her the ticket and plenty of money, charged
the conductor to look after her, waved a brave farewell and turned back
to the desert alone.

A brief conference with the woman who had entertained them, who was also
the wife of the station agent, brought out the fact that the missionary
was not yet returned from his journey, but a message received from him a
few days before spoke of his probable return on the morrow or the day
after. The woman advised that the lady go to the fort where visitors
were always welcomed and where there were luxuries more fitted to the
stranger's habit. She eyed the dainty apparel of her guest enviously as
she spoke, and Hazel, keenly alive to the meaning of her look, realized
that the woman, like the missionary, had judged her unfit for life in
the desert. She was half determined to stay where she was until the
missionary's return, and show that she could adapt herself to any
surroundings, but she saw that the woman was anxious to have her gone.
It probably put her out to have a guest of another world than her own.

The woman told her that a trusty India