“Let’s call this Camp Expectancy,” said Polly, the next morning, when they were ready to move on. “It is our first base of action in a way, and we ought to name every camp so as to remember it.”
So Camp Expectancy it was, and the next one they found was so delightful that they decided it must be called Camp Delight. And the last camp was Camp Regret. Three nights they spent here, in the great, silent mountains. And three days of fishing in the clear mountain streams, and enjoying the freshly-cooked trout afterwards. Every day they had game of some sort, but no bear showed up, and the girls were secretly just as well pleased. These were happy, restful days. At first the constant riding in the saddle tired them in spite of their long practice, but the three days rest at Camp Regret fitted them for the home trip.
“Oh, dear,” sighed Ted. “It’s just an aggravation staying such a little while. I wish I were grown up. I think I’d take up a government claim, and settle out here.”
“We’d welcome you,” Mr. Murray said heartily. “If ever a beautiful, healthy State needed good settlers it’s our Wyoming.”
“And we’d come and visit you every summer, Ted,” promised Sue, happily. “Wouldn’t it be fun?”
“It sounds like fun, but you’d find out there was work to be done before you got through,” laughed Mr. Murray. “There’s a lot of Easterners come out and take up claims, and think that’s the end of it. Free land, and plenty of game. Then they find out the difference when they have to prove up their land, and work it, and pay for irrigation. But it’s a great hopper. It sure sifts the grain from the chaff. Only the people with hope and grit and good intentions stick to their claims, and win out.”
Once, away up in the timber belt, they came on a nester and his family, building their first house. All the family were helping. There was the wife up on a ladder, helping fit cross beams, and two boys were sawing planks. Even a little three-year-old girl had her apron full of nails, holding them up for her father to take what he needed.
“Coming along, eh, neighbor?” said Mr. Murray, and the stalwart young homesteader smiled cheerfully.
“We’ll raise the pine tree on the chimney the first of September, God willing!”
“That’s the spirit that’s making our western states grow like their own pines,” said the old rancher, as they drove on, after a good drink of fresh water at the spring near the new home. “The pioneer days are still with us, mother, and for those who love the land of promise, the pillar of fire and the cloud wait on the border to lead them forward. By jiminetty, it makes the blood stir, even in my old veins, to hear that hammer and saw in the woods.”