They had reached a high point, and Dixie had clambered up on a peak of rocks, that she might have a wider vision. Shading her eyes from the glare of the sun, she looked down into the valley.
“Surely there is something coming,” she called gleefully to the waiting teacher. “I can see it moving among the pine trees.” Then, clapping her hands, she added joyfully: “It is the stage! It’s out in the clearing, and now it’s beginning to climb. I do believe it will pass here in half an hour or so.”
Miss Bayley pressed her hand on her heart to try to still its rapid beating. “I can’t understand it at all,” she thought, “but I seem to feel sure that some one is coming on the stage, some one whom I shall be glad to see.” Never before had a half hour seemed so long to the two who spent the time searching for flowers among the rocks. Only a few, blue as the sky, had been found, when Dixie stood suddenly alert, listening. “Hear that rumble?” she sang out. “It’s the stage just around Old Indian Rock.” She pointed to an outjutting boulder below them at the turn in the cañon road. Breathlessly they waited. There were four passengers in the coach, and one was an elderly woman, who, handsomely dressed, sat very erect, and the expression on her proud, aristocratic face assured the two by the roadside that, whoever she might be, the errand that had brought her to the mountains was most displeasing to her.
The elderly stage-driver waved the hand that held the whip, and beamed down good-naturedly. The young teacher and Dixie smiled and nodded, but although the occupants of the coach must have seen them, they were not at all interested.
The girl heard Miss Bayley sigh. “Dear teacher,” she said softly, “won’t you come on down to our cabin for supper? There is to be cottage cheese that you like so much, with nice yellow cream on it.”
Dixie was convinced that her companion had been expecting some one who had not come.
Josephine Bayley laughed merrily. “You dear little tempter,” she said, “of course I’ll go.” And so hand in hand they descended the trail that led under the great old pines and down to the picturesque log cabin.
Although it was but five o’clock, the little mother at once began to prepare the evening meal. Ken and Jimmy-Boy were out milking the goat, and Carol was over at the Valley Ranch.
“May I set the table?” the teacher inquired.
Dixie nodded. “Let’s use the kept-for-company dishes to-night,” she suggested.