She was driving herself when the thirty-five mile mark was passed, and she began to scan the distance eagerly for some sign of a structure. Yet she continued to see nothing except the monotonous expanse of gray sand in every direction. Tired as she was, she began to question the existence of such a shack as the woman had mentioned. How would it be possible, she thought, for a family to live in the desert, to own a shack only forty miles away from the place where the wagon was standing? Gradually as the speedometer crept on to the forty mark, her suspicions became verified; there was no structure of any sort within sight. Nevertheless she resolved to arouse the stranger and ask her for information.
She waited until they came to a station of the railroad—a lonely, forsaken building—and brought her car to a stop.
“Is this where you wanted to go?” she asked, leaning back and touching Mrs. Hook’s knee. “We have gone forty-three miles.”
The woman raised her head and looked about wearily.
“Land! No! This a’int half way! There must be somethin’ ailin’ your clock.”
“No there isn’t!” replied Marjorie. “How much farther is it?”
“Not so very far, I reckon. I’ll watch and tell you!”
With a tired sigh, Marjorie turned to the wheel again, and drove until her time was up. Then she resigned her place to the next in turn, and she to the next, until the darkness faded into a gray, and the gray into dawn. If the girls had not been so utterly worn-out, they might have been thrilled at the sight of the sunrise; as it was, they scarcely noticed it.
At six o’clock Lily stopped the big car.
“We’ll have to get some sleep!” she declared—“Before it gets too hot—or we’ll be dead!”