The Rim of the Desert

by Ada Woodruff Anderson

With this she rose. "We are ready to go out to the Orchards, Mr. Bailey. Mr. Banks and I are going to change places with the bride and groom." Then from her silk bag, she brought forth a bunch of keys which she gave to Geraldine. "Nukui is going to stay to clear away," she explained, "and bring our car home. And when you have finished making your plans, and want to go down to see the newspaper office, he will show you a nice short cut through the park."

So again the mayor's chocolate six-passenger car threaded the park and emerged this time on a straight, broad thoroughfare through Hesperides Vale. "This," said Bailey, turning from the town, "is the Alameda. They motor from Wenatchee and beyond to try it. It's a pretty good road, but in a year or two, when these shade trees come into full leaf, it will be something to show."

There were tufts on most of them now and on the young fruit trees that ran in geometrical designs on either side, covering the levels that last year had been overgrown with sage. As these infant orchards dropped behind and the Wenatchee range loomed near, Cerberus detached from the other peaks; but it was no longer a tawny monster on guard; its contour was broken by many terraces, luxuriant with alfalfa and planted with trees.

"Why," exclaimed Mrs. Weatherbee, "there is the gap. Then, this must be the mountain—it reminded me once of a terrible, crouching, wild beast— but it has changed."

"Yes, ma'am," responded Banks, "she's looking tamer now. The peaches have taken right hold, and those fillers of strawberries are hurrying on the green. But you give 'em three years or maybe four, and take 'em in blossom time,—my, you won't know this old mountain then."

A drive, cross-cutting the bold front, led to the level beneath the summit, where rose the white walls and green gables of Annabel's home, but they rounded the mountain into the smaller vale. "This," said the mayor, with culminating pride, "is Weatherbee Orchards. It shows what money, in the right hands, can do."

A soft breeze came down over the ridge as they ascended; the flume, that followed the contour of the roadway, gurgled pleasantly. Everywhere along the spillways alfalfa spread thriftily, or strawberry plants sent out new tendrils. All growing things were more advanced in that walled pocket than in the outer vale; the arid gulf had become a vast greenhouse. Cerberus no longer menaced. Even the habitation of the goat-woman, that had been the central distraction of the melancholy picture, was obliterated. In all that charming landscape there was no discordant note to break the harmony.

The car doubled the curve at the top of the bench and ran smoothly between breadths of green lawn, bordered by nodding narcissus, towards the house, which was long and low, with a tiled roof and cream-colored walls that enclosed a patio. A silence fell over the company. As they alighted, every one waited, looking expectantly at Beatriz Weatherbee. The music of a fountain fluted from the court, and she went forward, listening. Her face was no longer inscrutable; it shone with a kind of inner illumination. But when she saw the slender column of spray and the sparkling basin, with a few semi-tropical plants grouped on the curb, a cactus, a feathery palm in a quaint stone pot, she turned, and her eyes sought Elizabeth's. "It is all like the old hacienda where grandfather was born, and mother, and"— her voice broke—"Only that had adobe walls," she finished. "It is like— coming home."

"It is simply marvelous," replied Elizabeth, and she added abruptly, looking at the prospector: "Mr. Banks, you are a problem beyond me."

"It looks all right, doesn't it?" the little man beamed. "Likely it would about suit Dave. And I was able to stand the investment. My, yes, now your brother has bought out the Annabel, what I spent wouldn't cut any figure. But," and his glance moved to the woman who had profited by the venture, "I'll likely get my money back."