Page:Caroline Lockhart--The full of the Moon.djvu/78

 no glimpse of Miss Spiser on the various rises in the road behind them.

Noting her disquietude, which evidenced itself in turning frequently, he assured her that there was no cause for alarm.

"She's always an hour or two after the fair," he declared humorously, "but she'll pike in by dark."

"Supposing she shouldn't; supposing something serious should happen to detain her?" Nan asked nervously.

"Well, what of it? Nothin' or nobody would eat you."

The long road over the mesa dropped abruptly into a gulch, in the bottom of which, where it widened into a small flat, was a cluster of adobe houses with a tiny general merchandise store rising in the center.

"The city of El Oro," explained Spiser; "also my post-office."

He drove to the high platform in front, and called.

A grizzled, deliberate old man came out finally with a handful of mail—the first individual, Nan thought, to make no undue haste when Spiser spoke.