Belding's bounteous supper. Belding talked, the cowboys
talked more or less. Mrs. Belding put in a word now and then,
and Dick managed to find brief intervals when it was possible
for him to say yes or no. He observed gratefully that no one
round the table seemed to be aware of his enormous appetite.
After supper, having a favorable opportunity when for a
moment no one was at hand, Dick went out through the yard,
past the gardens and fields, and climbed the first knoll. From that
vantage point he looked out over the little hamlet, somewhat to
his right, and was surprised at its extent, its considerable number
of adobe houses. The overhanging mountains, ragged and darkening,
a great heave of splintered rock, rather chilled and affronted him.
Westward the setting sun gilded a spiked, frost-colored, limitless
expanse of desert. It awed Gale. Everywhere rose blunt, broken
ranges or isolated groups of mountains. Yet the desert stretched
away down between and beyond them. When the sun set and Gale
could not see so far, he felt a relief.
That grand and austere attraction of distance gone, he saw the
desert nearer at hand--the valley at his feet. What a strange gray,
somber place! There was a lighter strip of gray winding down
between darker hues. This he realized presently was the river
bed, and he saw how the pools of water narrowed and diminished
in size till they lost themselves in gray sand. This was the rainy
season, near its end, and here a little river struggled hopelessly,
forlornly to live in the desert.
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