“I can see the color of it in your eyes,” the boy told her, and a sudden admiration in his own dark eyes caused Dora to think that Dick was really seeing her for the first time.
It was lilac dusk when the small car drove along the lane of cottonwood trees and stopped at one side of the Bar N ranch house.
Mrs. Newcomb’s round pleasant face looked out of a kitchen window, then her apron-covered person appeared in the open side door. Her arms were held out to welcome Mary.
“My dear, my dear,” she said tenderly, “how glad I am that you blew over to Bar N.”
“We almost literally did blow over,” Mary laughingly replied. “That is, we were running away from a sand storm.” Then, suddenly serious, she asked, “Oh, Aunt Molly, may I use your telephone at once? Dad doesn’t know that I’m here and he will be expecting us back for supper.”
“Of course, dear. You know where it is, in the living-room.” Then, when Mary had skipped away, Dora following her, Mrs. Newcomb asked, “Has there been a sand storm in the valley? I hadn’t heard about it.”
Jerry was about to drive the small car around to the old barn and so Dick replied, “Yes, Mrs. Newcomb. That’s what Jerry called it. We first saw it on the other side of the range back of Gleeson. Later we saw it far away to the south. It didn’t cross this part of the valley at all, but Jerry thought we’d better not try the Gleeson road.”
“He was wise. I hope the wires aren’t down.”
The good woman’s anxiety was quickly ended by the reappearance of the girls. “All’s well!” Mary announced. Then to Dick, “Your mother answered the phone. She said that they had heard the roaring and had seen some dust in the air but that the storm had passed around our tableland.”
“Well, you girls had quite an adventure and perhaps a narrow escape as well.” Little did Mrs. Newcomb realize that she was repeating the phrase they had so often used that day. “Now, Mary, you take your friend to the spare room and get ready for supper. Your Uncle Henry will be in from riding the range pronto, and starved as a lean wolf, no doubt. He’s been gone since sun-up and he won’t take along what he ought for his mid-lunch.”