Carley
climbed it now with beating heart and mingled emotions. A thousand times
already that day, it seemed, she had turned to gaze up at the noble
white-clad peaks. They were closer now, apparently looming over her, and
she felt a great sense of peace and protection in the thought that they
would always be there. But she had not yet seen the desert that had haunted
her for a year. When she reached the summit of the knoll and gazed out
across the open space it seemed that she must stand spellbound. How green
the cedared foreground--how gray and barren the downward slope--how
wonderful the painted steppes! The vision that had lived in her memory
shrank to nothingness. The reality was immense, more than beautiful,
appalling in its isolation, beyond comprehension with its lure and strength
to uplift.
But the superintendent drew her attention to the business at hand.
Carley had planned an L-shaped house of one story. Some of her ideas
appeared to be impractical, and these she abandoned. The framework was up
and half a dozen carpenters were lustily at work with saw and hammer.
"We'd made better progress if this house was in an ordinary place,"
explained Hoyle. "But you see the wind blows here, so the framework had to
be made as solid and strong as possible.
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