, but your hands couldn't stand this, and those gloves would be ribbons
in half an hour."

"They are heavier than they look; besides, there are the shops at
Wenatchee!" As if this settled the matter she said: "But we must change
places. Now." She slipped into his seat as he rose, and took the reins
dexterously, with a tightening grip, in her hands. "Whoa, whoa, Nip!" Her
voice deepened a little. "Steady, Tuck, steady! That's right; be a man."
There was another silent interval while he watched her handling of the
team, then, "I did not know there could be a pair in all the world so like
Pedro and Don Jose," she said, and the exhilaration softened in her face.
"They were my ponies given me the birthday I was seventeen. A long time
ago--" she sighed and flashed him a side-glance, shaking her head--"but I
shall never forget. We lived in San Francisco, and my father and I tried
them that morning in Golden Gate park. The roads were simply perfect, and
the sea beach at low tide was like a hardwood floor. After that we drove
for the week-end to Monterey, then through the redwoods to Santa Cruz and
everywhere." She paused reminiscently. "Those California hotels are fine.
They pride themselves on their orchestras, and wherever we went, we found
friends to enjoy the dancing evenings after table d'hote. That was in the
winter, but it was more delightful in the spring. We drove far south then,
through Menlo Park and Palo Alto, where the great meadows were vivid with
alfalfa, and fields on fields were yellow with poppies or blue with
lupine; on and on into the peach and almond country. I can see those
blossoming orchards now; the air was flooded with perfume."

Her glance moved from the horses out over the sage-covered levels, and the
contrast must have dropped like a curtain on her picture, for the light in
her face died. Tisdale's look followed the road up from the plain and
rested on the higher country; his eyes gathered their far-seeing gaze. He
had been suddenly reminded of Weatherbee. It was in those California
orchards he had spent his early life. He had known that scent of the
blossoming almond; those fields of poppies and lupine had been his
playground when he was a child. It was at the university at Palo Alto that
he had taken his engineering course; and it was at one of those gay
hotels, on a holiday and through some fellow student, he had met the woman
who had spoiled his life.

The moment passed. One of the horses broke