The world was very far away, behind the
violet rim of mountains, and she was just a speck in the desert. Her high
laced boots were heavy, and the dust settled in the creases around her
slim ankles, that could be perfectly fascinating in silken hose and
dainty slippers. Her khaki skirt, of the divided kind much affected by
tourists, had lost two big, pearl buttons, and she had no others to
replace them. Her shirt-waist had its collar turned inside for coolness,
and the hollow of her neck was sun-blistered and beginning to peel. Also
her nose and her neck at the sides were showing a disposition to grow new
skin for old. So much had the desert sun done for her.
But there was something else which the desert had done, something which
Helen May did not fully realize. It had put a clear, steady look into her
eyes in place of the glassy shine of fever. It was beginning to fill out
that hollow in her neck, so that it no longer showed the angular ends of
her collar bones. It had put a resilient quality into her walk, firmness
into the poise of her head. It had made it physically possible, for
instance, for Helen May to trudge out into the wild to hunt nine goats
that had strayed from the main band.
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