ndle to you. How did
she look when she was your age?"

"I can't remember Eileen," said Linda, "when she was not exquisitely
dressed and thinking more about taking care of her shoes than anything
else in the world. I can't remember her when she was not curled, and
even when she was a tiny thing Mother put a dust of powder on her nose.
She said her skin was so delicate that it could not bear the sun. She
never could run or play or motor much or do anything, because she
has always had to be saved for the sole purpose of being exquisitely
beautiful. Talk about lilies of the field, that's what Eileen is! She
is an improvement on the original lily of the field--she's a lily of the
drawing room. Me, now, I'm more of a Joshua tree."

Donald Whiting laughed, as Linda intended that he should.

A minute afterward she slid the savory food from a skewer upon one of
the pie pans, tossed back the cover from the little table, stacked
some bread-and-butter sandwiches beside the meat and handed the pan to
Donald.

"Fall to," she said, "and prove that you're a man with an appreciative
tummy. Father used to be positively ravenous for this stuff. I like it
myself."

She slid the food from the second skewer to a pan for herself, settled
the fire to her satisfaction and they began their meal. Presently she
filled a cup from the bucket beside her and handed it to Donald. At the
same time she lifted another for herself.

"Here's to the barrel cactus," she said. "May the desert grow enough
of them so that we'll never lack one when we want to have a Saturday
picnic."

Laughingly they drank this toast; and the skewers were filled a second
time. When they could eat no more they packed away the lunch things,
buried the fire, took the axe and the field glasses, and started on a
trip of exploration down the canyon. Together they admired delicate
and exquisite ferns growing around great gray boulders. Donald tasted
hunters' rock leek, and learned that any he found while on a hunting
expedition would furnish a splendid substitute for water. Linda told him
of rare flowers she lacked and what they were like and how he would be
able to identify what she wanted in case he should ever find any when he
was out hunting or with his other friends. They peeped into the nesting
places of canyon wrens and doves and finches, and listened to the
exquisite courting songs of the birds whose hearts were almost bursting
with the exuberance of spring and the joy