“Don’t you like it?” he asked.
“I love it! It’s so big, and beautiful, in spite of its dreadfulness; it’s so positive!” Helen was sitting on the ground, her hands in her lap, her eyes turned toward the far mountains. Gard considered her words.
“Positive:” he repeated, thoughtfully, “Yes: it’s sure that. There ain’t any half-way place,” he added, drawing a deep breath. “A man, he gets big, or he gets little, living in it.”
“Oh!” cried she; “you must have been a long time in the desert to find that out!”
She went on, with youthful, unconscious arrogance: “I’ve lived here all my life; but I never realized that until after I came back from college this last time.”
“Have you been here long?” she added.
“I haven’t been ’round the level much,” Gard answered, and after a pause he added:
“I’ve been in the mountains most of the time.”
“Then you must have been prospecting: I hope you struck pay dirt?”
“I did.”