CHAPTER II
After leaving the cañon where they had camped, Rob and Harriet drove through a region of utter desolation. The road wound about among crags and needles of granite that rose high into the air. Then came the flats—a stretch of meadow that lay sunken between the north and south watersheds—and after that a sharp plunge down a narrow trail cut in the face of the mountain to the bottom of Spring Creek cañon.
The snow-swollen stream filled most of the narrow floor of the cañon; the road was a succession of mudholes through which Rob forced the struggling horses. A thick wall of willows along the stream kept the travelers from seeing more than a few feet ahead; the gray walls of the gorge shut off the sunlight and echoed noisily to the shouting creek. To Harry that ride up the cañon was a nightmare of terrifying suspense. Then abruptly it ended; they were out on level ground, sunshine streamed along the valley below them, and across the prairie the Sawtooth Mountains stood shoulder to shoulder, with their summits radiant in the snowy splendor.
"At last!" sighed Harry.
"Not quite," Rob answered. "We go up a little before we reach the ranch. It's on the bench, close to the hills—not on the prairie down there. It's only five miles more."
Turning eastward presently, the road wound along the base of the hills, which were very low here, with only an occasional steep butte jutting out from the range. On the other side the ground fell away gradually to the prairie floor, which was brilliant with its hundreds of acres of young grain, plowed land, pasture, and sagebrush. Harriet was gazing down at the plains, when Rob's voice made her look around sharply.
"There! Now you can see the ranch."
"Trees!" she exclaimed.
"Yes, the only big grove of quaking asp left on this side of the prairie. Every one round here knows that big fellow at the top. There's a real stream, too. With those for a starter it won't take us long to make a home."