says they
are as happy as two Babes in Candyland.

"Oh, I've just thought--I _am_ doing something, although it may not
appeal to your masculine mind as anything worth mentioning. Mamma and I
are both at work on some beautiful embroidery for Betty. It is so fine
and intricate that we can only do a little at a time, but it is a labor
of love, like the touches the old monks used to put on their illuminated
missals. Nothing can be too fine and dainty for our dear Betty, and we
are counting the months until we can really claim her. Do you suppose
you will be back in the States by that time? I truly hope so. In the
meantime don't forget your old friends of the Wigwam days, and
especially, _this_ member of the House of Ware."

CHAPTER VII

A DESERT OF WAITING

It was so still on the porch where Mary and her mother sat sewing that
warm May afternoon that they could distinctly hear the Moredock
phonograph, playing some new records over and over. One of them was a
quick-step that the military band had often played at Fort Sam Houston,
and as Mary listened an intolerable longing for stir and excitement took
possession of her. She wanted to be back in the midst of people and
constantly changing scenes. She felt that she could not endure the
deadly monotony of Lone-Rock another day.

Usually she had much to say as they sat and sewed through the long still
afternoons, but to-day the music claimed her attention. It was very
pleasing at that distance, but it was disquieting in its effect. She
dropped her embroidery into her lap and sat looking out at the narrow
grass-grown road winding past the house and over the hill, and ending in
a narrow mountain path beyond.

"Mamma," she asked suddenly, in one of the pauses of the music, "were
any of our ancestors tramps or gypsies? Seems to me they must have been,
or I wouldn't feel the 'Call of the Road' so strongly. Don't you feel
it? As if it beckons and you _must_ break loose and follow, to find
what's waiting for you around the next turn?"

Mrs. Ware shook her head. "No," she said slowly. "I'm like the old
Israelites. When they came to Elim, with its wells and palm trees, they
were glad to camp there indefinitely. This is my Elim."

"I wonder, now," mused Mary, "if they really were satisfied. I don't
mean to be irreverent, but only last night I read that verse, '_Whether
it were two days or a month or a year that the cloud tarried upon the
tabernacle, the Children of Isra