Once within the cool shadows of the livingroom, Mrs. Herndon again
bethought herself to kiss her niece in a fresh glow of welcome, while
the latter sank into a convenient rocker and began enthusiastically
expressing her unbounded enjoyment of the West, and of the impressions
gathered during her journey. Suddenly the elder woman glanced about
and exclaimed, laughingly, "Why, I had completely forgotten. You have
not yet met your room-mate. Come out here, Naida; this is my niece,
Phoebe Spencer."
The girl thus addressed advanced, a slender, graceful figure dressed in
white, and extended her hand shyly. Miss Spencer clasped it warmly,
her eyes upon the flushed, winsome face.
"And is this Naida Gillis!" she cried. "I am so delighted that you are
still here, and that we are to be together. Aunt Lydia has written so
much about you that I feel as If we must have known each other for
years. Why, how pretty you are!"
Naida's cheeks were burning, and her eyes fell, but she had never yet
succeeded in conquering the blunt independence of her speech. "Nobody
else ever says so," she said, uneasily. "Perhaps it's the light."
Miss Spencer turned her about so as to face the window. "Well, you
are," she announced, decisively. "I guess I know; you 've got
magnificent hair, and your eyes are perfectly wonderful. You just
don't fix yourself up right; Aunt Lydia never did have any taste in
such things, but I 'll make a new girl out of you. Let's go upstairs;
I 'm simply dying to see our room, and get some of my dresses unpacked.
They must look perfect frights by this time."
They came down perhaps an hour later, hand in hand, and chattering like
old friends. The shades of early evening were already falling across
the valley. Herndon had returned home from his day's work, and had
brought with him the Rev. Howard Wynkoop for supper. Miss Spencer
viewed the young man with approval, and immediately became more than
usually vivacious in recounting the incidents of her long journey,
together with her early impressions of the Western country. Mr.
Wynkoop responded with an interest far from being assumed.
"I have found it all so strange, so unique, Mr. Wynkoop," she
explained. "The country is like a new world to me, and the people do
not seem at all like those of the East. They lead such a wild,
untrammelled life. Everything about seems to exhale the spirit of
romance; don't you find it so?"
He smiled at her enthusiasm, his glance of undisguised admiration on
her face. "I certainly recall some such earlier conception," he
admitted. "Those just arriving from the environment of an older
civilization perceive merely the picturesque elements; but my later
experiences have been decidedly prosaic."