Behind them, beautiful Fairlands lay, half lost, in its wilderness of trees and flowers.  Immediately in the foreground, a large tract of unimproved land brought the wild grasses and plants to their very feet.  Beyond these acres—­upon which there were no trees—­the orange groves were massed in dark green blocks and squares; with, here and there, thin rows of palms; clumps of peppers; or tall, plume-like eucalyptus; to mark the roads and the ranch homes.  Beyond this—­and rising, seemingly, out of the groves—­the San Bernardinos heaved their mighty masses into the sky.  It was almost dark.  The city’s lamps were lighted.  The outlines of grove and garden were fast being lost in the deepening dusk.  The foothills, with the lower spurs and ridges of the mountains, were softly modeled in dark blue against the deeper purple of the canyons and gorges.  Upon the cloudless sky that was lighted with clearest saffron, the lines of the higher crests were sharply drawn; while the lonely, snow-capped peaks,—­ten thousand feet above the darkening valley below,—­catching the last rays of the sun, glowed rose-pink—­changing to salmon—­deepening into mauve—­as the light failed.

Aaron King broke the silence by drawing a long breath—­as one who could find no words to express his emotions.

Conrad Lagrange spoke sadly; “And to think that there are,—­in this city of ten thousand,—­probably, nine thousand nine hundred and ninety people who never see it.”

With a short laugh, the young man said, “It makes my fingers fairly itch for my palette and brushes—­though it’s not at all my sort of thing.”

The other turned toward him quickly.  “You are an artist?”

“I had just completed my three years study abroad when mother’s illness brought me home.  I was fortunate enough to get one on the line, and they say—­over there—­that I had a good chance.  I don’t know how it will go here at home.”  There was a note of anxiety in his voice.

“What do you do?”

“Portraits.”

[Illustration:  A curious expression of baffling quizzing half pathetic and wholly cynical interrogation]

With his face again toward the mountains, the novelist said thoughtfully, “This West country will produce some mighty artists, Mr. King.  By far the greater part of this land must remain, always, in its primitive naturalness.  It will always be easier, here, than in the city crowded East, for a man to be himself.  There is less of that spirit which is born of clubs and cliques and clans and schools—­with their fine-spun theorizing, and their impudent assumption that they are divinely commissioned to sit in judgment.  There is less of artistic tea-drinking, esthetic posing, and soulful talk; and more opportunity for that loneliness out of which great art comes.  The atmosphere of these mountains and deserts and seas inspires to a self-assertion, rather than to a clinging fast to the traditions and culture of others—­and what, after all, is a great artist, but one who greatly asserts himself?”