She made a little curtsey and shook hands in the limp manner of childhood. Roger smiled at her, and sat down.
"Ernest, what was the size of the glass you and Dr. Austin were finally able to get?"
"Eight by twelve. Felicia, tell Mr. Moore where you're going."
"Out to live with Charley and Dick," said the child obediently.
"Have they been there long?" asked Roger, lighting his pipe.
"Ever since Mother died. They left me with Aunt May. But now I'm going out to be with Charley. Dear, dearest Charley, that's what Aunt May says."
"Charley must be your favorite brother," commented Roger, a trifle absentmindedly as he tried to define the disconcerting attraction Felicia had for him.
"Ho! How silly you are!" laughed the little girl. "Charley's my big only sister. Her whole name is Charlotte Emerson Preble and she looks just like me. Aunt May says so."
"Preble!" exclaimed both the men.
"Charley Preble!" Roger went on. "Ern, don't you remember the pretty little girl who used to play with us?"
"Of course I do. That's why Felicia has been puzzling us so. We were just kids, but seems to me Charley looked exactly as she does."
"Did sister Charley ever talk to you about Eagle's Wing?" asked Roger.
"I don't recollect Charley. She went out to take care of Dick when I was so little. Charley's awful good. She'll take such care of me as never was on sea or land. Aunt May says so. And I'll love her more than I do God."
"Was Dick sick? I remember him as a big, husky boy, don't you, Ern?"
Ernest shook his head. "I don't remember him. You were the one who used to go out to Prebles' to play."
"Dicky was sick," Felicia piped on. "Dicky's like Dad. He'll never amount to much, Aunt May says."
"Look at the queer kind of cactus we're beginning to pass, Felicia," interrupted Roger, hastily.
Felicia leaned against his knee. No little girl ever had done so before and Roger looked at her curiously.
"The desert's awful homely, isn't it?" she said.
"It certainly is," agreed Ernest, lighting a fresh cigar.
For a moment the three stared at the unending wastes of brown and gray-green, belled over by a cloudless sapphire sky.
"Homely and hot, but I don't care as long as I'm where Charley is. I don't remember her, but I know how I'm going to feel about her." Here she took a long look into Roger's gray eyes. "I guess I'd like to sit in your lap," she suggested.
Roger lifted her to his knees and she settled back comfortably in the hollow of his arm. A flooding sense of tenderness surprised him into silence.