Deserted | Page 2

white alkali-patches that chiefly
characterize Nevada, paint her as a leper."
"That's horrid! You need n't talk to me any more," she exclaimed
emphatically.
With this sort of chatter they had beguiled the time since leaving San
Francisco the morning of the day before. Acquaintances are indeed
made as rapidly on an overland train as on an ocean steamship, but

theirs had dated from the preceding winter, during which they had often
met in San Francisco. When Mr. Lombard heard that Miss Dwyer and
Mrs. Eustis, her invalid sister, were going East in April, he discovered
that he would have business to attend to in New York at about that time;
and oddly enough,--that is, if you choose to take that view of it,--when
the ladies came to go, it turned out that Lombard had taken his ticket
for the selfsame train and identical sleeping-car. The result of which
was that he had the privilege of handing Miss Dwyer in and out at the
eating-stations, of bringing Mrs. Eustis her cup of tea in the car, and of
sharing Miss Dwyer's seat and monopolizing her conversation when he
had a mind to, which was most of the time. A bright and congenial
companion has this advantage over a book, that he or she is an author
whom you can make discourse on any subject you please, instead of
being obliged to follow an arbitrary selection by another, as when you
commune with the printed page.
By way of peace-offering for his blasphemy in calling the Nevada
desert a leper, Lombard had embezzled a couple of chairs from the
smoking-room and carried them to the rear platform of the car, which
happened to be the last of the train, and invited Miss Dwyer to come
thither and see the scenery. Whether she had wanted to pardon him or
not, he knew very well that this was a temptation which she could not
resist, for the rear platform was the best spot for observation on the
entire train, unless it were the cowcatcher of the locomotive.
The April sun mingled with the frosty air like whiskey with ice-water,
producing an effect cool but exhilarating. As she sat in the door of the
little passage leading to the platform, she scarcely needed the shawl
which he wrapped about her with absurdly exaggerated solicitude. One
of the most unmistakable symptoms of the lover is the absorbing and
superfluous care with which he adjusts the wraps about the object of his
affections whether the weather be warm or cold: it is as if he thought he
could thus artificially warm her heart toward him. But Miss Dwyer did
not appear vexed, pretending indeed to be oblivious of everything else
in admiration of the spectacle before her.
The country stretched flat and bare as a table for fifty miles on either

side the track,--a distance looking in the clear air not over one fifth as
great. On every side this great plain was circled by mountains, the
reddish-brown sides of some of them bare to the summits, while others
were robed in folds of glistening snow and looked like white curtains
drawn part way up the sky. The whitey-gray of the alkali-patches, the
brown of the dry earth, and the rusty green of the sagebrush filled the
foreground, melting in the distance into a purple-gray. The wondrous
dryness and clearness of the air lent to these modest tints a tone and
dazzling brilliance that surprised the eye with a revelation of
possibilities never before suspected in them. But the mountains were
the greatest wonder. It was as if the skies, taking pity on their
nakedness, had draped their majestic shoulders in imperial purple,
while at this hour the westering sun tipped their pinnacles with gilt. In
the distance half a dozen sand-spouts, swiftly-moving white pillars,
looking like desert genii with too much "tanglefoot" aboard, were
careering about in every direction.
But as Lombard pointed out the various features of the scene to his
companion, I fear that his chief motive was less an admiration of
Nature that sought sympathy than a selfish delight in making her eyes
flash, seeing the color come and go in her cheeks, and hearing her
charming unstudied exclamations of pleasure,--a delight not unmingled
with complacency in associating himself in her mind with emotions of
delight and admiration. It is appalling, the extent to which spoony
young people make the admiration of Nature in her grandest forms a
mere sauce to their love-making. The roar of Niagara has been
notoriously utilized as a cover to unlimited osculation, and Adolphus
looks up at the sky-cleaving peak of Mont Blanc only to look down at
Angelina's countenance with a more vivid appreciation of its superior
attractions.
It was delicious, Lombard thought, sitting there with her on