“Sure,” said Hanson confidently and looking at her in some surprise.

Pearl laughed.  “Oh, Lolita!” she cried; “a tenderfoot is sure funny.  The chances are, Mr. Hanson, that if you started to walk around those dunes you’d never get back.  Goodness! ain’t that mirage pretty?”

The desert, which had lain vast, dun-colored and unbroken before their eyes, had vanished; instead, a sapphire sea sparkled in the sunshine, its white-capped waves breaking upon the beach.  Upon one side of it spread a city with white domes and fairy towers, and palm trees uplifting their graceful fronds among them.

Hanson rubbed his eyes and looked again.  It was the first time that he had ever seen one of these miracles of illusion, and he became so absorbed in it that he failed to notice that some one else had entered the gate and was making a leisurely progress toward the house.

It was Bob Flick, and Rudolf Hanson could not repress a slight scowl at this unexpected appearance of one whom he was constrained to regard as more or less of an enemy, and certainly this morning as a blot upon the landscape.

Without a smile, but politely enough, Flick greeted him, after speaking to Pearl, who looked at the newcomer with a sort of resigned resentfulness.  Lolita, however, made up what was lacking in cordiality.  With a loud squawk of welcome she flew to Flick’s shoulder, uttering gutteral and incoherent expressions doubtless meant to convey endearment.

“Call Mom, Bob,” commanded Pearl lazily, and Flick obediently stepped inside of the door in search of Mrs. Gallito.  She must have been near at hand, for she and Flick emerged before the manager could do more than give Pearl a glance of eloquent disappointment, which she returned with teasing mockery.

Mrs. Gallito had evidently been making a toilet, and it is to be regretted for her own sake that she might not have reserved all of her appearances for the evening, for this brilliant desert sunshine was pitiless in revealing those artificial aids with which she strove to recreate and hold her vanished youth and bloom.

Bob Flick she evidently regarded as a matter of course, but at the sight of Hanson she showed unmistakable pleasure.

“Hughie told me you were here,” she said, sitting down beside him and patting somewhat anxiously the mass of canary-colored puffs on the back of her head; “and I been hurrying to get out before you got away.”

“I wouldn’t have thought of going before you came,” Hanson assured her.  She smiled and bridled a little, evidently well pleased.

“Has Pearl told you that her Pop’ll probably be down to-day?” she leaned across Hanson to speak to Flick.

“No, is that so?” he asked in his smooth, pleasant tones.

“Where are the mines that Mr. Gallito is interested in?” asked Hanson, determined to keep in the conversation.

“Up in Colina.”  It was Mrs. Gallito that spoke.