She no longer plucked the bluebells to press to her face, but leaned
to them. Every blade of gramma grass, with its shining bronze-tufted seed
head, had significance for her. The scents of the desert began to have
meaning for her. She sensed within her the working of a great leveling
process through which supreme happiness would come.
June! The rich, thick, amber light, like a transparent reflection from
some intense golden medium, seemed to float in the warm air. The sky became
an azure blue. In the still noontides, when the bees hummed drowsily and
the flies buzzed, vast creamy-white columnar clouds rolled up from the
horizon, like colossal ships with bulging sails. And summer with its rush
of growing things was at hand.
Carley rode afar, seeking in strange places the secret that eluded her.
Only a few days now until she would ride down to Oak Creek Canyon! There
was a low, singing melody of wind in the cedars. The earth became too
beautiful in her magnified sight. A great truth was dawning upon her--that
the sacrifice of what she had held as necessary to the enjoyment of life--
that the strain of conflict, the labor of hands, the forcing of weary body,
the enduring of pain, the contact with the earth--had served somehow to
rejuvenate her blood, quicken her pulse, intensify her sensorial faculties,
thrill her very soul, lead her into the realm of enchantment.
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