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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Out of the Depths, by Robert Ames Bennet,
+Illustrated by George Brehm
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Out of the Depths
+       A Romance of Reclamation
+
+
+Author: Robert Ames Bennet
+
+
+
+Release Date: June 15, 2009  [eBook #29131]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OUT OF THE DEPTHS***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Roger Frank and the Project Gutenberg Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustrations.
+      See 29131-h.htm or 29131-h.zip:
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/29131/29131-h/29131-h.htm)
+      or
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/29131/29131-h.zip)
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+      The author consistently refers to a handgun as a "Colt's."
+      This is a Colt's revolver, though the word "revolver" is
+      not used.
+
+
+
+
+
+OUT OF THE DEPTHS
+
+A Romance of Reclamation
+
+by
+
+ROBERT AMES BENNET
+
+Author of "Out of the Primitive," "The Shogun's Daughter,"
+"Which One," Etc.
+
+With Illustrations by George Brehm
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: It was a wild race [_Page 32_]]
+
+
+
+
+Chicago
+A. C. McClurg & Co.
+1913
+
+Copyright
+A. C. McClurg & Co.
+1913
+
+Published March, 1913
+
+Copyrighted in Great Britain
+
+Press of the Vail Company
+Coshocton, U. S. A.
+
+
+
+
+TO
+
+"THE SONS OF MARTHA"
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+ CHAPTER                                                          PAGE
+      I. Deep Caņon                                                  1
+     II. A Yearling Sold                                             9
+    III. Queen of What?                                             20
+     IV. Downhill and Up                                            32
+      V. Into the Depths                                            39
+     VI. A Test of Caliber                                          52
+    VII. The Chance of Reclamation                                  68
+   VIII. A Man's Size Horse                                         81
+     IX. The Snake                                                  93
+      X. Coming Events                                             110
+     XI. Self-Defense                                              125
+    XII. The Meeting                                               138
+   XIII. The Other Lady's Husband                                  148
+    XIV. A Descent                                                 162
+     XV. Levels and Slants                                         176
+    XVI. Metal and Mettle                                          185
+   XVII. A Shot in the Dusk                                        197
+  XVIII. On the Brink                                              207
+    XIX. The Plotters                                              218
+     XX. Indian Shoes                                              232
+    XXI. Madonna Dolorosa                                          244
+   XXII. A Real Wolf                                               254
+  XXIII. The Temptation                                            268
+   XXIV. Blind Love                                                280
+    XXV. The Descent Into Hell                                     291
+   XXVI. In the Gloom                                              303
+  XXVII. Lower Depths                                              315
+ XXVIII. Light in the Darkness                                     327
+   XXIX. The Climber                                               339
+    XXX. Lurking Beasts                                            349
+   XXXI. Confessions                                               357
+  XXXII. Over the Brink                                            366
+ XXXIII. Friends in Need                                           374
+  XXXIV. Reclamation                                               388
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+                                                                  PAGE
+
+ It was a wild race                                     _Frontispiece_
+
+ It sounded its shrill, menacing rattle                            106
+
+ "You have something to tell me--your voice--your
+ eyes--"                                                           286
+
+ Another desperate clutch at the rope--still another               328
+
+
+
+
+OUT OF THE DEPTHS
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+DEEP CAŅON
+
+
+The hunter was riding leisurely up the steep mountain side above Dry
+Mesa. On such an ascent most city men would have preferred to climb
+afoot. But there was a month's layer of tan on the hunter's handsome,
+supercilious face. He balanced himself lightly on his flat English
+saddle, and permitted the wiry little cow pony to pick the best path
+over the ledges and up the stiff slopes between the scattered pines.
+
+In keeping with his saddle, the hunter wore English riding breeches
+and leggins. Otherwise he was dressed as a Texas cowboy of the past
+generation. His sombrero was almost Mexican in its size and
+ornateness. But his rifle was of the latest American pattern, and in
+place of the conventional Colt's he carried an automatic pistol. As
+his horse patiently clambered with him up towards the top of the
+escarpment the man gazed indolently about between half-closed eyelids
+and inhaled the smoke from an unbroken "chain" of gilt-tipped
+cigarettes.
+
+The pony scrambled up the last ledges and came to a halt on the rim of
+High Mesa. It had been a long, hard climb. Tough as he was and
+mountain bred, the beast's rough coat was lathered with sweat and his
+flanks were heaving. The hunter's gaze roamed carelessly over the
+hilly pine-clad plateau of the upper mesa, while he took a nip of
+brandy from a silver-cased flask and washed it down with a drink of
+the tepid water in his canteen.
+
+Having refreshed himself, he touched a patent lighter to another
+cigarette, chose a direction at random, and spurred his pony into a
+canter. The beast held to the pace until the ascent of a low but steep
+ridge brought him down to a walk. With the change of gait the hunter
+paused in the act of lighting a fresh cigarette, to gaze up at the
+sapphire sky. The air was reverberating with a muffled sound like
+distant thunder. Yet the crystal-clear dome above him showed no trace
+of a cloud all across from the magnificent snowy ranges on the east
+and north to the sparsely wooded mountains and sage-gray mesas to the
+south and west.
+
+"Can't be thunder," he murmured--"no sign of a storm. Must be a
+stream. Ah! cool, fresh water!"
+
+The sharp-roweled spurs goaded the pony up over the round of the ridge
+as fast as he could scramble. At the top he broke into a lope and
+raced headlong down the other side of the ridge through the tall
+brush. The reverberating sound of water was clearer but still muffled
+and distant.
+
+The rider let his reins hang slack and recklessly dug in his spurs.
+The pony leaped ahead with still greater speed and burst out of the
+brush on to a narrow open slope that led down to the brink of a caņon.
+The hunter saw first the precipice on the far side of the yawning
+chasm--then the near edge, seemingly, to his startled gaze, right
+under his horse's forefeet. He was dashing straight at the frightful
+abyss.
+
+A yell of terror burst from his lips, and he sought to fling himself
+backwards and sideways out of the saddle. His instinctive purpose was
+to fall to the ground and clutch the grass tufts. But in the same
+moment that he tried to throw himself off, the nimble pony swerved to
+the left so abruptly that the man's effort served only to keep himself
+balanced on the saddle. Had he remained erect or flung himself to the
+other side he must have been hurled off and down over the precipice.
+
+Nor was the danger far from past. Carried on down the slope by the
+momentum of their headlong rush, the plunging pony "skidded" to the
+very brink of the precipice. Though the man shrank down and sought to
+avert his face, he caught a glimpse of the black depths below them as,
+snorting with fear, the pony wrenched himself around on the rim shelf
+of the edge.
+
+For an instant--an instant that was an age of sickening suspense to
+his rider--the pony toppled. But before the man could shriek out his
+horror, the agile beast had recovered his balance and was scrambling
+around, away from the edge. He plunged a few yards up the slope, and
+stopped, wheezing and blowing.
+
+The man flung the reins over the pony's head and slipped to the
+ground. For a minute or longer he lay outstretched, limp and
+white-faced. When he looked up, the pony was stolidly cropping a tuft
+of grass. Beasts are not often troubled with imagination. The hunter
+remembered his brandy flask. After two long pulls at its contents, the
+vivid coloring began to return to his cheeks.
+
+He rose to his feet and walked down to a ledge on the brink of the
+precipice with an air of bravado. But when he looked over into the
+chasm, he quickly shrank back and crouched on his hands and knees.
+Before again peering over he stretched himself out flat on the level
+ledge and grasped an out-jutting point of rock.
+
+Beneath his dizzy eyes the precipitous sides of the caņon dropped away
+seemingly into the very bowels of the earth,--far down in sheer
+unbroken walls of black rock for hundreds and thousands of feet. He
+flattened closer to the rock on which he lay, and sought to pierce
+with his gaze the blue-black shadows of the stupendous rift. Every
+nerve in his body tingled; his ankles ached with the exquisite pain of
+that overpowering sight.
+
+The chasm was so narrow and its depth so great that only in one place
+did the noonday sun strike down through its gloomy abyss to the
+bottom. At that single spot he could distinguish the foam and flash of
+the rushing waters, but elsewhere his only evidence of the sunken
+torrent beneath him was the ceaseless reverberations that came rolling
+up out of the depths.
+
+"_Mon Dieu!_" he muttered. "To think I came so near--!... Must be what
+they call Deep Caņon."
+
+He crept away from the brink. As he rose to his feet his trembling
+fingers automatically placed a cigarette between his lips and applied
+the patent lighter. Soothed by the narcotic, he stood gazing across at
+the far side of the caņon while he sucked in and slowly exhaled the
+smoke. With the last puff he touched a fresh cigarette to the butt of
+the first, thrust it between his lips, and snipped the cork stub over
+the edge into the caņon.
+
+"There you are--take that!" he mocked the abyss.
+
+As he turned away he drew out an extremely thin gold watch. The
+position of the hour hand brought a petulant frown to his white
+forehead. He hastened to mount his pony. Short as had been the rest,
+the wiry little animal had regained his wind and strength. Stung by
+the spurs, he plunged up the side of the ridge and loped off along
+its level top, parallel with the caņon.
+
+The hunter drew his rifle from its saddle sheath and began to
+scrutinize the country before him in search of game. A pair of
+weather-beaten antlers so excited him that he even forgot to maintain
+his chain of cigarettes. His dark eyes shone bright and eager and his
+full red lips grew tense in resolute lines that completely altered the
+previous laxity of his expression.
+
+He had covered nearly a mile when he was rewarded for his alertness by
+a glimpse of a large animal in the chaparral thicket before him. He
+drew rein to test the wind in approved book hunter fashion. There was
+not a breath of air stirring. The mesa lay basking in the dry, hot
+stillness of the July afternoon. He set the safety catch of his rifle,
+ready for instant firing, stretched himself flat on his pony's neck,
+and started on.
+
+The animal in the thicket moved slowly to the right, as if grazing. At
+frequent intervals the hunter caught glimpses of its roan side, but
+could not see its head or the outline of its body. At seventy-five
+yards, fearful that his game might take fright and bolt, he turned his
+horse sideways, and slipped down to aim his rifle across the saddle.
+It was his first deer. He waited, twitching and quivering with "buck
+fever."
+
+Part of the fore quarters of the animal became visible to his excited
+gaze through a small gap in the screening bushes. The muzzle of his
+rifle wobbled all around the mark. Unable to steady it, he caught the
+sights as they wavered into line, and pulled the trigger.
+
+The report of the shot was followed by a loud _bawl_ and a violent
+crashing in the thicket. There could be no doubt that the animal had
+been hit and was seeking to escape. It was running across the top of
+the ridge towards the caņon. The hunter sprang around the head of his
+pony and threw up his rifle, which had automatically reloaded itself.
+As it came to his shoulder, the wounded animal burst out of cover. It
+was a yearling calf.
+
+But the sportsman knew that he had shot a deer, and a deer was all he
+saw. He was now fairly shaking with the "fever." His finger crooked
+convulsively on the automatic firing lever. Instantly a stream of
+bullets began to pour from the wildly wavering muzzle, and empty
+shells whirred up from the ejector like hornets.
+
+Before the hunter could realize what was happening, his magazine was
+exhausted, the last cartridge fired, and the shell flipped out. But he
+paid no heed to this. His eyes were on the fleeing calf. His
+cartridges were smokeless. Through the slight haze above his rifle
+muzzle he saw the animal pitch forward and fall heavily upon the round
+of the ridge. It did not move.
+
+Tugging at the bridle to quicken his horse's pace, he hastened forward
+to examine his game. He was still so excited that he was almost upon
+the outstretched carcass before he noticed the odd scar on its side.
+He bent down and saw that the mark was a cattle brand seared on the
+hide with a hot iron.
+
+His first impulse was to jump on his pony and ride off. He was about
+to set his foot in the stirrup when the apprehensive glance with which
+he was peering around shifted down to the caņon. His gaze traveled
+back from the near edge of the chasm, up the two hundred yards of
+slope, and rested on the yearling as though estimating its weight.
+
+It was a fat, thoroughbred Hereford. He could not lift it on his pony,
+and he had no rope to use as a drag-line. He shook his head. But the
+pause had given him time to recover from his panic. He shrugged his
+shoulders, drew a silver-handled hunting knife, and awkwardly set
+about dressing his kill.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+A YEARLING SOLD
+
+
+Three riders came galloping along the ridge towards the hunter. At
+sight of his pony the grizzled cowman in the lead signed to his
+companions and came to a sudden stop behind a clump of service-berry
+bushes. The others swerved in beside him, the bowlegged young puncher
+on the right with his hand at his hip.
+
+"Jumping Jehosaphat!" he exulted. "We shore have got him, Mr. Knowles,
+the blasted--" His thin lips closed tight to shut in the oath as he
+turned his gaze on the lovely flushed face of the girl beside him.
+When his cold gray eyes met hers they lighted with a glow like that of
+fire through ice.
+
+"You better stay here, Miss Chuckie," he advised. "We're going to cure
+that rustler."
+
+"But, Kid, what if--No, no! wait!" she cried at sight of his drawn
+Colt's. "Daddy, stop him! The man may not be a rustler."
+
+"You heard the shooting," answered the cowman.
+
+"Yes, but he may have been after a deer," answered the girl, lifting
+her lithe figure tiptoe in the stirrups of her man's saddle to peer
+over the bushes.
+
+"Deer?" rejoined the puncher. "Who'd be deer-hunting in July?"
+
+"Then a bear. He fired fast enough," remarked the girl.
+
+"Not much chance of that round here," said the cowman. "Still, it
+might be. At any rate, Kid, this time I want you to wait for me to ask
+questions _before_ you cut loose."
+
+"If he don't try any funny business," qualified the puncher.
+
+"Course," assented Knowles. "Chuckie, you best stay back here."
+
+"Oh, no, Daddy. There's only one man and between you and Kid--"
+
+"_Sho!_ Come on, then, if you're set on it. Kid, you circle to the
+right."
+
+The puncher wheeled his horse and rode off around the chaparral. The
+girl and Knowles, after a short wait, advanced upon the hunter. They
+were soon within a few yards of him and in plain view. His pony
+stopped browsing and raised its head to look at them. But the man was
+stooped over, with his face the other way, and the incessant,
+reverberating roar of the caņon muffled the tread of their horses on
+the dusty turf.
+
+The puncher crashed through the corner of the thicket and pulled up on
+the top of the slope immediately opposite the hunter. The latter
+sprang to his feet. The puncher instantly covered him with his
+long-barreled revolver and snapped tersely: "Hands up!"
+
+"My--ante!" gasped the hunter. "A--a road agent!"
+
+But he did not throw up his hands. With the rash bravery of
+inexperience, he dropped his knife and snatched out his automatic
+pistol. On the instant the puncher's big revolver roared. The pistol
+went spinning out of the hunter's hand. Through the smoke of the shot
+the puncher leveled his weapon.
+
+"Put up your hands!--put them up!" screamed the girl, urging her horse
+forward.
+
+The hunter obeyed, none too soon. For several moments he stood rigid,
+glaring half dazed at the revolver muzzle and the cool hard face
+behind it. Then slowly he twisted about to see who it was had warned
+him. The girl had ridden up within a few feet.
+
+"You--you _tenderfoot_!" she flung at him. "Are you locoed? Hadn't you
+any more sense than to do that? Why, if Daddy hadn't told Mr. Gowan to
+wait--"
+
+"You shore would have got yours, you--rustler!" snapped the puncher.
+"It was you, though, Miss Chuckie--your being here."
+
+"But he's not a rustler, Kid," protested the girl. "Where are your
+eyes? Look at his riding togs. If they're not tenderfoot, howling
+tenderfoot--!"
+
+"Just the same, honey, he's shot a yearling," said Knowles, frowning
+at the culprit. "Suppose you let me do the questioning."
+
+"Ah--pardon me," remarked the hunter, rebounding from apprehension to
+easy assurance at sight of the girl's smile. "I would prefer to be
+third-degreed by the young lady. Permit me to salute the Queen of the
+Outlaws!"
+
+He bent over the fingers of one hand to raise his silver-banded
+sombrero by its high peak. It left his head--and a bullet left the
+muzzle of the puncher's revolver. A hole appeared low down in the side
+of the sombrero.
+
+"That'll do, Kid," ordered the cowman. "No more hazing, even if he is
+a tenderfoot."
+
+"Tenderfoot?" replied Gowan, his mouth like a straight gash across his
+lean jaws. "How about his drawing on me--and how about your yearling?
+That bullet went just where it ought to 've gone with his hat down on
+his head."
+
+There was no jesting even of the grimmest quality in the puncher's
+look and tone. He was very cool and quiet--and his Colt's was leveled
+for another shot.
+
+The hunter thrust up his hands as high as he could reach.
+
+"You--you surely can't intend to murder me!" he stammered, staring from
+the puncher to the cowman. "I'll pay ransom--anything you ask! Don't let
+him shoot me! I'm Lafayette Ashton--I'll pay thousands--anything! My
+father is George Ashton, the great financier!"
+
+"New York?" queried Knowles.
+
+"No, no, Chicago! He--If only you'll write to him!"
+
+The girl burst into a ringing laugh. "Oh!" she cried, the moment she
+could speak, "Oh, Daddy! don't you see? He really thinks we're a bunch
+of wild and woolly bandits!"
+
+The hunter looked uncertainly from her dimpled face to Gowan's ready
+revolver. Turning sharply about to the cowman, he caught him in a
+reluctant grin. With a sudden spring, he placed the girl between
+himself and the scowling puncher. Behind this barrier of safety he
+swept off his hat and bowed to the girl with an exaggerated display of
+politeness that hinted at mockery.
+
+"So it's merely a cowboy joke," he said. "I bend, not to the Queen of
+the Outlaws, but to the Princess of the Cows!"
+
+Her dimples vanished. She looked over his head with the barest shade
+of disdain in her expression.
+
+"The joke came near to being on us," she said. "Kid, put up your gun.
+A tenderfoot who has enough nerve and no more sense than to draw when
+you have the drop on him, you've hazed him enough."
+
+Gowan sullenly reloaded his Colt's and replaced it in its holster.
+
+"That's right," said Knowles; but he turned sharply upon the offender.
+"Look here, Mr. Ashton, if that's your name--there's still the matter
+of this yearling. Shooting stock in a cattle country isn't any
+laughing matter."
+
+"But, I say," replied the hunter, "I didn't know it was your cow,
+really I didn't."
+
+"Doesn't make any difference whose brand was on the calf. Even if it
+had been a maverick--"
+
+"But that's it!" interrupted Ashton. "I didn't see the brand--only
+glimpses of the beast in the chaparral. I thought it a deer until
+after it fell and I came up to look."
+
+"You shore did," jeered Gowan. "That's why you was hurrying to yank
+off the hide. No chance of proving a case on you with the brand down
+in Deep Caņon."
+
+"Indeed no," replied Ashton, drawing a trifle closer to the girl's
+stirrup. "You are quite wrong--quite. I was dressing the animal to
+take it to my camp. Because I had mistaken it for a deer was no reason
+why I should leave it to the coyotes."
+
+"What business you got hunting deer out of season?" questioned
+Knowles.
+
+"Pardon me, but are you the game warden?" asked Ashton, with a
+supercilious smile.
+
+"Never you mind about that," rejoined the cowman. "Just you answer my
+question."
+
+Ashton shrugged, and replied in a bored tone: "I fail to see that it
+is any of your affair. But since you are so urgent to learn--I prefer
+to enjoy my sport before the rush of the open season."
+
+"Don't you know it's against the law?" exclaimed the girl.
+
+"Ah--as to that, a trifling fine--" drawled the hunter, again
+shrugging.
+
+"Humph!" grunted Knowles. "A fine might get you off for deer. Shooting
+stock, though, is a penitentiary offense--when the criminal is lucky
+enough to get into court."
+
+"Criminal!" repeated Ashton, flushing. "I have explained who I am. My
+father could buy out this entire cattle country, and never know it.
+I'll do it myself, some day, and turn the whole thing into a game
+preserve."
+
+"When you do," warned Gowan, "you'd better hunt a healthier climate."
+
+"What we're concerned with now," interposed Knowles, "is this
+yearling."
+
+"The live or the dead one, Daddy?" asked the girl, her cheeks
+dimpling.
+
+"What d'you--Aw--_haw! haw! haw!_--The live or the dead one! Catch
+that, Kid? The live or the dead one! _Haw! haw! haw!_"
+
+The cowman fairly roared with laughter. Neither of the young men
+joined in his hilarious outburst. Gowan waited, cold and unsmiling.
+Ashton stiffened with offended dignity.
+
+"I told you that the shooting of the animal was unintentional," he
+said. "I shall settle the affair by paying you the price usually asked
+for veal."
+
+"You will?" said the cowman, looking down at the indignant tenderfoot
+with a twinkle in his mirth-reddened eyes. "Well, we don't usually
+sell veal on the range. But I'll let you have this yearling at cutlet
+prices. Fifty dollars is the figure."
+
+"Why, Daddy," interrupted the girl, "half that would be--"
+
+"On the hoof, yes; but he's buying dressed veal," broke in the cowman,
+and he smiled grimly at the culprit. "Fifty dollars is cheap for a
+deer hunter who goes round shooting up the country out of season. He
+can take his choice--pay for his veal or make a trip to the county
+seat."
+
+"That's talking, Mr. Knowles," approved Gowan. "We'll corral him at
+Stockchute in that little log calaboose. He'll have a peach of a time
+talking the jury out of sending him up for rustling."
+
+"This is an outrage--rank robbery!" complained Ashton. "Of course you
+know I will pay rather than be inconvenienced by an interruption of
+my hunting." He thrust his slender hand into his pocket, and drew it
+out empty.
+
+"Dead broke!" jeered Gowan.
+
+Ashton shrugged disdainfully. "I have money at my camp. If that is not
+enough to pay your blackmail, my valet has gone back to the railway
+with my guide for a remittance of a thousand dollars, which must have
+come on a week ago."
+
+"Your camp is at the waterhole on Dry Fork," stated Knowles. "Saw a
+big smoke over there--tenderfoot's fire. Well, it's only five miles,
+and we can ride down that way. We'll go to your camp."
+
+"Ye-es?" murmured Ashton, his ardent eyes on the girl. "Miss--er--Chuckie,
+it is superfluous to remark that I shall vastly enjoy a cross-country
+ride with you."
+
+"Oh, really!" she replied.
+
+Heedless of her ironical tone, he turned a supercilious glance on
+Knowles. "Yes, and at the same time your papa and his hired man can
+take advantage of the opportunity to deliver my veal."
+
+"What's that?" growled the cowman, flushing hotly.
+
+But the girl burst into such a peal of laughter that his scowl relaxed
+to an uncertain smile.
+
+"Well, what's the joke, honey?" he asked.
+
+"Oh! oh! oh!" she cried, her blue eyes glistening with mirthful
+tears. "Don't you see he's got you, Daddy? You didn't sell him his
+meat on the hoof. You've got to dress and deliver his cutlets."
+
+"By--James!" vowed Gowan. "Before I'll butcher for such a knock-kneed
+tenderfoot I'll see him, in--"
+
+"Hold your hawsses, Kid," put in Knowles. "The joke's on me. You go on
+and look for that bunch of strays, if you want to. But I'm not going
+to back up when Chuckie says I'm roped in."
+
+Gowan looked fixedly at Ashton and the girl, swore under his breath,
+and swung to the ground. He came down beside the calf with the
+waddling step of one who has lived in the saddle from early childhood.
+Knowles joined him, and they set to work on the calf without paying
+any farther heed to the tenderfoot.
+
+Ashton, after fastidiously wiping his hands on a wisp of grass, placed
+his hunting knife in his belt and his rifle in its saddle sheath. He
+next picked up his pistol, but after a single glance at the side
+plate, smashed in by Gowan's first shot, he dropped the ruined weapon
+and rather hurriedly mounted his pony.
+
+The girl had faced away from the partly butchered carcass. As Ashton
+rode around alongside, her pony started to walk away. Instead of
+reining in, she glanced demurely at Ashton, and called over her
+shoulder: "Daddy, we'll be riding on ahead. You and Kid have the
+faster hawsses."
+
+"All right," acquiesced Knowles, without pausing in his work.
+
+Gowan said nothing; but he glanced up at the jaunty back of the
+tenderfoot with a look of cold enmity.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+QUEEN OF WHAT?
+
+
+Heedless of the men behind him, Ashton rode off with his ardent gaze
+fixed admiringly upon his companion. The more he looked at her the
+more astonished and gratified he was to have found so charming a girl
+in this raw wilderness.
+
+As a city man, he might have considered the healthy color that glowed
+under the tan of her cheeks a trifle too pronounced, had it not been
+offset by the delicate mold of her features. Her eyes were as blue as
+alpine forget-me-nots.
+
+Though she sat astride and the soft coils of her chestnut hair were
+covered with a broad-brimmed felt hat, he was puzzled to find that
+there really was nothing of the Wild West cowgirl in her costume and
+bearing. Her modest gray riding dress was cut in the very latest
+style. If her manner differed from that of most young ladies of his
+acquaintance, it was only in her delightful frankness and total
+absence of affectation. Yet she could not be a city girl on a visit,
+for she sat her horse with the erect, long-stirruped, graceful,
+yielding seat peculiar to riders of the cattle ranges.
+
+"Do you know," he gave voice to his curiosity, as she directed their
+course slantingly down the ridge away from Deep Caņon, "I am simply
+dying to learn, Miss Chuckie--"
+
+"Perhaps you had better make it 'Miss Knowles,'" she suggested, with a
+quiet smile that checked the familiarity of his manner.
+
+"Ah, yes--pardon me!--'Miss Knowles,' of course," he murmured. "But,
+you know, so unusual a name--"
+
+"You mean Chuckie?" she asked. "It formerly was quite common in the
+West--was often used as a nickname. My real name is Isobel. I
+understand that Chuckie comes from the Spanish Chiquita."
+
+"Chiquita!" he exclaimed. "But that is not a regular name. It is only
+a term of endearment, like Nina. And you say Chuckie comes from
+Chiquita? Chiquita--dear one!"
+
+His large dark eyes glowed at her brilliant with audacious admiration.
+Her color deepened, but she replied with perfect composure: "You see
+why I prefer to be addressed as 'Miss Knowles'--by you."
+
+"Yet you permitted that common cowpuncher to call you Miss Chuckie."
+
+The girl smiled ironically. "For one thing, Mr. Ashton, I have known
+Kid Gowan over eight years, and, for another, he is hardly a _common_
+cowpuncher."
+
+"He looks ordinary enough to me."
+
+"Well, well!" she rallied. "I should have thought that even to the
+innocent gaze of a tenderfoot--Let me hasten to explain that the
+common or garden variety of cowshepherd is to be distinguished in many
+respects from his predecessor of the Texas trail."
+
+"Texas trail?" he rejoined. "Now I know you're trying to string me.
+This Gowan can't be much older than I am."
+
+The girl dropped her bantering tone, and answered soberly: "He is only
+twenty-five, and yet he is a full generation older than you. He was
+born and raised in a cow camp. He is one of the few men of the type
+that remain to link the range of today with the vanished world of the
+cattle frontier."
+
+"Yet you say that the fellow is only my age?"
+
+"In years, yes. But in type he belongs to the generation that is
+past--the generation of longhorns, long drives, long Colt's, and short
+lives; of stampedes, and hats like yours, badmen, and Injins."
+
+"Surely you cannot mean that this--You called him 'Kid.'"
+
+"Kid Gowan," she confirmed. "Yes, he holds to the old traditions even
+in that. There are six notches on the hilt of his 'gun,' if you count
+the two little ones he nicked for his brace of Utes."
+
+"What! He is a real Indian fighter, like Kit Carson?"
+
+"Oh, no, it was merely a band of hide hunters that came over the line
+from Utah, and Mr. Gowan helped the game warden run them back to their
+reservation."
+
+"He actually killed two of them?"
+
+"Yes," replied the girl, her gravity deepening to a concerned frown.
+"The worst of it is that I'm not altogether certain it was necessary.
+Men out here, as a rule, think much too little of the life of an
+Indian."
+
+"Ah!" murmured Ashton. "Two Indians. But didn't you speak of six
+notches?"
+
+"Six," confirmed the girl, her brow partly clearing. "The others were
+different. Three were rustlers. The sheriff's posse overtook them.
+Both sides were firing. Kid circled around and shot three. He happened
+to have a long-range rifle. Daddy says they threw up their hands when
+the first one fell; but Kid explained to me that he was too far away
+to see it."
+
+"Ah!" murmured Ashton the second time, and he put up his hand to the
+hole in the front of his sombrero.
+
+"The last was two years ago," went on the girl. "There was a dispute
+over a maverick. Kid was tried and acquitted on his plea of
+self-defense. There were no witnesses. He claimed that the other man
+drew first. Two empty shells were found in the other man's revolver,
+and only one in Kid's. That cleared him."
+
+Ashton took off his hat and stared at the holes where the heavy
+forty-four bullet had gone in and gone out. He was silent.
+
+"You see, poor Kid has been unfortunate," remarked the girl, as she
+headed her pony down over the edge of the mesa. "That time with the
+rustlers, all the posse were firing, and he just happened to be the
+one that got the best aim; and the time with the Indians, I'm sure he
+did not shoot to kill. It just happened that way. He told me so
+himself."
+
+Ashton ran his tongue over his lip. "Yes--I suppose so," he muttered.
+
+"Kid has all the good qualities and only a few of the faults of the
+old-time cowboys," went on the girl. "He is almost fiercely loyal to
+Daddy's interests. That's why he led a raid on a sheep outfit, four
+years ago, when almost half of a large flock were run over into Deep
+Caņon--poor innocent beasts! Daddy was furious with Kid; but there was
+no legal proof as to who were members of the attacking party, and the
+sheep were destroying our range. All of Daddy's cattle would have
+starved."
+
+"He was not punished?" murmured Ashton.
+
+"Daddy could not be expected to discharge him, could he, when Kid did
+it to save our range? You see, it was just because he was so very
+loyal. You must not think from these things that he--It is true he is
+suspicious of strangers, but he always has been very kind and gentle
+to me. I am very fond of him."
+
+"You are?" exclaimed Ashton, stirred from his uneasy depression. "I
+should hardly have thought him the kind to interest a girl like you."
+
+"Really?" she bantered. "Why not? I have lived on the range ever since
+I was fourteen."
+
+He stared at her incredulously. "Since you were fourteen?"
+
+"For nine years," she added, smiling at his astonishment.
+
+"But--it can't be," he protested, his eyes on her stylish costume. "At
+least, not all the time."
+
+She nodded at him encouragingly. "So you _can_ see--a little. Nearly
+all my winters have been spent in Denver, except one in Europe."
+
+"Europe?" he repeated.
+
+"We didn't cross in a cattle boat," she flashed back at him, dimpling
+mischievously. "Nor did I go as the Queen of the Rancho, or of the
+Roundup, or even of the Wild and Woolly Outlaw Band."
+
+He flushed with mortification. "I am only too well aware, Miss
+Knowles, how you must regard me."
+
+"Oh, I do not regard you at all--as yet," she bantered. "But of course
+I could not expect you to know that Daddy's sister is one of the
+Sacred Thirty-six."
+
+"Sacred--? Is that one of the orders of nuns?"
+
+"None whatever," she punned. In the same moment she drew a most
+solemn looking face. "My deah Mistah Ashton, I will have you to
+understand my reference was to that most select coterie which
+comprises Denver's Real Society."
+
+"Indeed!" he said, with a subtle alteration in his tone and manner.
+"You say that your aunt is one of--"
+
+"My aunt by adoption," she corrected.
+
+"Adoption?"
+
+"I am not Daddy's natural daughter. He adopted me," explained the girl
+in her frank way.
+
+"Yes?" asked Ashton, plainly eager to learn more of her history.
+
+Without seeming to observe this, she adroitly balked his curiosity--"So,
+you see, Daddy's sister is only my aunt by adoption. Still, she has been
+very, very good to me; though I love Daddy and this free outdoor
+life so much that I insist on coming back home every spring."
+
+"Ah, yes, I see," he replied. "Really, Miss Knowles, you must think me
+a good deal of a dub."
+
+"Oh, well, allowances should be made for a tenderfoot," she bantered.
+
+"At least I recognized your queenliness, even if at first I did
+mistake what you were queen of," he thrust back.
+
+"So you still insist I'm a queen? Of what, pray?"
+
+"Of Hearts!" he answered with fervor.
+
+His daring was rewarded with a lovely blush. But she was only
+momentarily disconcerted.
+
+"I am not so sure of that," she replied. "Though it's not Queen of
+Spades, because I do not have to work; and it can't be Diamonds,
+because Daddy is no more than comfortably well to do--only six
+thousand head of stock. But as for Hearts--No, I'm sure it must be
+Clubs; I do so love to knock around. Really, if ever they break up
+this range, it will break my heart same time."
+
+"Break up the range? How do you mean?"
+
+"Put it under irrigation and turn it into orchards and farms, as they
+have done so many places here on the Western Slope. You know, Colorado
+apples and peaches are fast becoming famous even in Europe."
+
+"I do not wonder, not in the least--if I am to judge from a certain
+sample of the Colorado peach," he ventured.
+
+This time she did not blush. "I am quite serious, Mr. Ashton," she
+reproved him. "Daddy owns only five sections. The rest of his range is
+public land. If settlers should come in and homestead it, he would
+have to quit the cattle business. You cannot realize how fearfully we
+are watching the irrigation projects--all the Government reclamation
+work, and the private dams, too. There seems to be no water that can
+be put on Dry Mesa, yet the engineers are doing such wonderful things
+these days."
+
+Ashton straightened on his saddle. "That is quite true, Miss Knowles.
+You know, I myself am an engineer."
+
+"Oh!" she exclaimed in dismay. "You, an engineer? Have you come here
+to see if our mesa can be irrigated?"
+
+"No, indeed, no, I shall not do that," he replied. "I have not the
+slightest thought of such a project. I am merely out for sport."
+
+She eyed him uncertainly. "But--We get all the reports--There is an
+Ashton connected with that wonderful Zariba Dam, just being finished
+in Arizona."
+
+"That is my father. He is interested in it with a Mr. Leslie. They are
+financing the project. But I have nothing to do with it, nothing
+whatever, I assure you. The engineer is another man, a fellow
+named--"
+
+He paused as if unable to remember. The girl looked at him with a
+shade of disappointment in her clear eyes.
+
+"A Mr. Blake--Thomas Blake," she supplied the name. "I thought you
+might have known him."
+
+"Ah--Blake?" he murmured hesitatingly. "Why, yes, I did at one time
+have somewhat of an acquaintance with him."
+
+"You did?" she cried, her eyes brilliant with excitement. "Oh, tell
+me! I--" She faltered under his surprised stare, and went on rather
+lamely: "You see, I--we have been immensely interested in the Zariba
+Dam. The reports all describe it as an extraordinary work of
+engineering. And so we have been curious to learn something about the
+engineer."
+
+"But if you're so opposed to irrigation projects?" he thrust.
+
+"That makes no difference," she parried. "We--Daddy and I--cannot but
+admire such a remarkable engineer."
+
+Ashton shrugged. "The dam was a big thing. I fail to see why you
+should admire Blake just because he happened to blunder on the idea
+that solved the difficulty."
+
+"You do not like him," she said with frank directness.
+
+He hesitated and looked away. When he replied it was with evident
+reluctance: "No, I do not. He is--You would hardly admire him
+personally, even though he did bully Genevieve Leslie into marrying
+him."
+
+"He is married?" exclaimed the girl.
+
+"No wonder you are surprised," said Ashton. "It was the most amazing
+thing imaginable--she the daughter of H. V. Leslie, one of our
+wealthiest financiers, and he a rough, uncouth drunkard."
+
+"Drunkard?" almost screamed the girl. "No, no, not drunkard! I cannot
+believe it!"
+
+"He certainly was one until just before Genevieve married him,"
+insisted Ashton. "I hear he has managed to keep sober since."
+
+"O-o-oh!" sighed Miss Isobel, making no effort to conceal her vast
+relief. She attempted a smile. "I am so glad to hear that he is all
+right now. Of course he must be!... You say he married an heiress?"
+
+"She is worth three millions in her own right, and Leslie is as daft
+over him as she is. Leslie and my father are the ones who backed him
+on the Zariba Dam."
+
+"How interesting! And I suppose Mr. Blake is a Western man. So many of
+the best engineers come from the West."
+
+Ashton looked at her suspiciously. He could not make out her interest
+in Blake. She apparently had come to regard the engineer as a sort of
+hero. Yet why should she continue to inquire about him, now that she
+knew he was a married man?
+
+"I'm sure I cannot tell you," he replied, somewhat stiffly. "The
+fellow seems to have come from nowhere. Had it not been for an
+accident, he would never have got within speaking distance of
+Genevieve, but they happened to be shipwrecked together alone--on the
+coast of Africa."
+
+"Wrecked?--shipwrecked? How perfectly glorious!"
+
+"I wouldn't mind it myself--with you!" he flashed back.
+
+"I might," she bantered. "This Mr. Blake, I imagine, was hardly a
+tenderfoot."
+
+"No, he was a roughneck," muttered Ashton.
+
+"You do not like him," she remarked the second time.
+
+"Why should I, a low fellow like that? I've heard that he even brags
+that he started in the Chicago slums."
+
+The girl put her hand to her bosom. "In the--the Chicago slums!" she
+half whispered.
+
+"No wonder you are surprised," said Ashton. "Anyone would presume
+that he would keep such a disgrace to himself. It shows what he
+is--absolutely devoid of good taste."
+
+"Is he--What does he look like?" she eagerly inquired.
+
+Ashton shrugged. "Pardon me. I prefer not to talk any more about the
+fellow."
+
+Miss Isobel checked her curiosity. "Very well, Mr. Ashton." She looked
+around, and suddenly flourished her leathern quirt. "Look--there are
+Kid and Daddy trying to head us. Come on, if you want a race. I'm
+going to beat them down to Dry Fork."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+DOWNHILL AND UP
+
+
+The lash of the quirt fell with a swish on the flank of the girl's
+pony. He did not wait for a second hint, but started down the steep
+slope "on the jump." Before Ashton realized what was happening, his
+own horse was following at the same breakneck pace.
+
+Down plunged the two ponies--down, down, down the sharply pitched
+mountain side, leaping logs and stones, crashing through brush,
+scrambling or slithering stiff-legged down rock slides. It was a wild
+race, a race that would have been utterly foolhardy with any other
+horses than these mountain bred cow ponies. A single misstep would
+have sent horse and rider rolling for yards, unless sooner brought up
+against tree or rock.
+
+Most of the color had left Ashton's cheeks, but his full lips were set
+in resolute lines. His gaze alertly took in the ground before his
+horse and at the same time the girl's graceful, swaying figure.
+Fortunately he knew enough to let his horse pick his own way. But such
+a way as it was! Had not the two animals been as surefooted as goats
+and as quick as cats, both must have pitched head over heels, not
+once, but a score of times.
+
+They had leaped down over numbers of rocks and logs and ledges, and
+the girl had not cast back a single glance to see if Ashton was
+following. But as they plunged down an open slope she suddenly twisted
+about and flung up a warning hand.
+
+"Here's a jump!" she cried--as though they had not been jumping every
+few yards since the beginning of that mad descent.
+
+Hardly had she faced about again when her pony leaped and dropped with
+her clear out of sight. Ashton gasped and started to draw rein. He was
+too late. Three strides brought his horse to a ledge fully six feet
+high. The beast leaped over the edge without making the slightest
+effort to check himself.
+
+Ashton uttered a startled cry, but poised himself for the shock with
+the cleverness of a skillful rider. His pony landed squarely, and at
+once started on again as if nothing unusual had happened.
+
+The girl was already racing down the lower slope, which was more
+moderate, or rather, less immoderate than that above the ledge. She
+looked around and waved her hand gayly when she saw that Ashton had
+kept his seat.
+
+The salute so fired him that he gave his pony the spur and dashed
+recklessly down to overtake her. At last he raced alongside and a
+little past her. She looked at his overridden pony and drew rein.
+
+"Hold on," she said. "Better pull up a bit. You don't want to blow
+your hawss. 'Tisn't everyone can take that jump as neatly as he did."
+
+"But the others?" he panted--"they'll beat us!"
+
+"They cut down to the right. It's nothing to worry about if they do
+head us. They've got the best hawsses. We'll jog the rest of the
+way."
+
+"Of course," he hastened to agree, "if you prefer."
+
+"I'd prefer to lope uphill and down, but--" she nodded towards his
+pony's heaving flanks--"no use riding a willing hawss to death."
+
+"No danger of that with this old nag. He's tough as a mule," Ashton
+assured her, though he followed her example by pulling his mount in to
+a walk.
+
+"A mule knows enough to balk when he's got enough," she informed him.
+
+He did not reply. With the lessening of his excitement habit sent his
+hand to his open packet of cigarettes. He had not smoked since before
+shooting the calf. As they came down into the shallow valley between
+the foot of the mesa and a parallel line of low rocky hills he could
+wait no longer. His lighter was already half raised to the gilt-tipped
+cigarette when it was checked by etiquette. He bowed to the girl as a
+matter of form.
+
+"Ah, pardon me--if you have no objections," he said.
+
+"I have," was her unexpected reply.
+
+"Er--what?" he asked, his finger on the spring of the lighter.
+
+"You inquired if I have any objections," she answered. "I told you the
+truth. I dislike cigarettes most intensely."
+
+"But--but--" he stammered, completely taken aback, "don't your cowboys
+all smoke?"
+
+"Not cigarettes--where I ever see them," she said.
+
+"And cigars or pipes?" he queried.
+
+"One has to concede something to masculine weakness," she sighed.
+
+"Unfortunately I have no cigars with me, not even at my camp, and a
+pipe is so slow," he complained.
+
+"Oh, pray, do not deprive yourself on my account," she said. "You'll
+find the cut between those two hills about as short a way to your camp
+as this one, if you prefer your cigarettes to my company."
+
+"Crool maid!" he reproached, not altogether jestingly. He even looked
+across at the gap through the hills to which she was pointing. Then he
+saw the disdain in her blue eyes. He took the cigarette from his lips,
+eyed it regretfully, and flung it away with a petulant fillip.
+
+"There!" he said. Meeting her amused smile, he added in the injured
+tone of a spoiled child. "You don't realize what a compliment that
+is."
+
+"What?--abstaining for a half hour or so? If I asked you to break off
+entirely, and you did it, I would consider that a real compliment."
+
+"I should say so!"
+
+"But I am by no means sure that I would care to ask you," she
+bantered.
+
+"You're not? Why, may I inquire?"
+
+"I do not like to make useless requests."
+
+"Useless!" he exclaimed, his self-esteem stung by her raillery. "Do
+you think I cannot quit smoking them?"
+
+"I think you do not care to try."
+
+Impulsively he snatched out a package of his expensive cigarettes and
+tossed it over his shoulder. Another and another and still others
+followed in rapid succession, until he had exhausted his supply.
+
+"How's that?" he demanded her approval.
+
+"Well, it's not so bad for a start-off," she answered with an absence
+of enthusiasm that dashed him from his pose of self-abnegation.
+
+"You don't realize what that means," he complained.
+
+"It means, jilt Miss Nicotine in haste, and repent at leisure."
+
+"You're ragging me! You ought to be particularly nice to me. I did it
+for you."
+
+"Thanks awfully. But I didn't ask you to do it, you know."
+
+"Oh, now, that's hardly--when I did it because of what you said."
+
+"Well, then, I promise to be nice to you until events do us part. That
+will be in about five minutes. Over there is Dry Fork Gulch. The
+waterhole is just down around this hill."
+
+Ashton took his ardent gaze off the girl's face long enough to glance
+to his left. He recognized the tremendous gorge in the face of the
+mountain side that he had tried to ascend the previous day. It ran in
+with a moderately inclined bottom for nearly a mile, and then scaled
+up to the top of High Mesa in steep slopes and sheer ledges.
+
+His eyes followed the dry gravelly creek bed around to the right, and
+he nodded: "Yes, my camp is just over the corner of those crags. But
+surely, Miss Knowles, you will not end our acquaintance there."
+
+She met his appealing look with a level glance. "Seriously, Mr.
+Ashton, don't you think you had better move camp to another section?
+It seems to me you have done quite enough unseasonable deer hunting."
+
+Without waiting for him to reply, she urged her horse into a lope. His
+own mount was too jaded for a quick start. When he overtook the girl
+she had rounded the craggy hill on their right and was in sight of a
+scattered grove of boxelders below a dike of dark colored trap rock
+that outcropped across the bed of the creek.
+
+Above the natural dam made by this dike the valley was bedded up with
+sand and large gravel washed down by the torrential rush of spring
+freshets. Below it the same wild floods, leaping down in a twenty-foot
+fall, had gouged out a pothole so wide and deep that it was never
+empty of water even in the driest seasons.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+INTO THE DEPTHS
+
+
+At the top of the bank made by the dike the girl pointed with her
+quirt down to the rock-rimmed pool edge where a pair of riders were
+just swinging out of their saddles.
+
+"Hello, Daddy! We're coming, Kid," she called, and she turned to
+explain to Ashton. "They came around the other end of the hills; a
+longer way but better going. How's this? Thought you said you were
+camped here."
+
+"Yes, of course. Don't you see the tent? It's right there among
+the--Why, what--where is it?" cried Ashton, gaping in blank
+amazement.
+
+"We'll soon see," replied the girl.
+
+Their horses were scrambling down the short steep slope to the pool,
+where the other horses were drinking their fill of the cool water. The
+two men watched Ashton's approach, Knowles with an impassive gaze,
+Gowan with cold suspicion in his narrowed eyes.
+
+"Well, honey," asked the cowman, "did you have him pulling leather?"
+
+"No, and I didn't lose him, either," she replied, with a mischievous
+glance at Gowan. "I took that jump-off where the white-cheeked steer
+broke its neck. He took it after me without pulling leather."
+
+"Huh!" grunted the puncher. "Mr. Tenderfoot shore is some rider. We're
+waiting for him now to ride around and find that camp where we were to
+deliver his veal."
+
+Ashton stared with a puzzled, half-dazed expression from the tentless
+trees beside him to the fore and hind quarters of veal wrapped in
+slicker raincoats and fastened on back of the men's saddles.
+
+"Well?" demanded Knowles. "Thought you said you were camped here."
+
+"I am--that is, I--My tent was right there between those two trees,"
+said Ashton. "You see, there are the twigs and leaves I had my valet
+collect for my bed."
+
+"Shore--valleys are great on collecting beds of leaves and sand and
+bowlders," observed Gowan.
+
+"There's his fireplace," said the girl, wheeling her horse through a
+clump of wild rosebushes. "Yes, and he's right about the tent, too. It
+is a bed. Here's a dozen cigarette boxes and--What's this, Mr. Ashton!
+Looks as if someone had left a note for you."
+
+"A note?" he muttered, slipping to the ground.
+
+He ran over to the spot to which she was pointing. On a little pile of
+stones, in front of where his tent had been pitched, a piece of
+coarse wrapping paper covered with writing was fluttering in the light
+breeze. He snatched it up and read the note with fast-growing
+bewilderment.
+
+"What is it?" sympathetically questioned the girl, quick to see that
+he was in real trouble.
+
+He did not answer. He did not even realize that she had spoken. With
+feverish haste he caught up an opened envelope that had lain under the
+paper. Drawn by his odd manner, Knowles and Gowan came over to stare
+at him. He had torn a letter from the envelope. It was in typewriting
+and covered less than a page, yet he gaped at it, reading and
+re-reading the lines as if too dazed to be able to comprehend their
+meaning.
+
+Slowly the involved sentences burned their way into his consciousness.
+As his bewilderment cleared, his concern deepened to dismay, and from
+dismay to consternation. His jaw dropped slack, his face whitened, the
+pupils of his eyes dilated.
+
+"What is it? What's the matter?" exclaimed the girl.
+
+"Matter?"--His voice was hoarse and strained. He crumpled the letter
+in a convulsive grasp--"Matter? I'm ruined!--ruined! God!"
+
+Knowles and the girl were both silent before the despair in the young
+man's face. Gowan was more obtuse or else less considerate.
+
+"Shore, you're plumb busted, partner," he ironically condoled. "Your
+whole outfit has flown away on the wings of the morning. Hope you
+won't tell us the pay for your veal has vamoosed with the rest."
+
+"Oh, Kid, for shame!" reproved the girl. "Of course Daddy won't ask
+for any pay--now."
+
+Ashton burst into a jangling high-pitched laugh.
+
+"No, no! there's still my pony and saddle and rifle and watch!" he
+cried, half hysterically. "Take them! strip me! Here's my hat, too! I
+paid forty-five dollars for it--silver band." He flung it on the
+ground. "There's a hole in it--I wish the hole were through my head!"
+
+"Now, now, look here, son. Keep a stiff upper lip," said Knowles.
+"Don't act like you're locoed. It's all right about that veal, as
+Chuckie says, and you oughtn't to make such a fuss over the loss of a
+camp outfit."
+
+"Camp outfit?" shrilled Ashton. "If that were all! if that were all!
+What shall I do? Lost--all lost!--father--all! Ruined! Oh, my God!
+What shall I do? Oh, my God! Oh--" Anguish and despair choked the cry
+in his throat. He collapsed in a huddled, quivering heap.
+
+"_Sho!_ It can't be as bad as that, can it?" condoled the cowman.
+
+"Go away!" sobbed the prostrated man. "Go away! Take my pony--all!
+Only leave me!"
+
+"If ever I saw a fellow plumb locoed!" muttered Gowan, half
+awe-struck.
+
+"Maybe he'll come to his senses if we leave him," suggested Knowles.
+He took a step towards Ashton. "All right, son, we'll go. But we'll
+leave you half that veal, and we won't take your hawss. D'you want
+help in looking for your outfit?"
+
+Ashton shook his downbent head.
+
+"Well, if you want to let the thieves get away with it, that's your
+own lookout. You'd better strike back to the railroad."
+
+"Go away! Leave me!" moaned Ashton.
+
+"Gone to smash--clean busted!" commented Gowan, as he turned about to
+go to his horse, his spurs jingling gayly.
+
+Knowles followed him, shaking his head. The girl had been gazing at
+Ashton with an expression that varied from sympathetic commiseration
+to contemptuous pity. As her adopted father and Gowan mounted, she
+rode over to them.
+
+"Go on," she said. "I'll overtake you as soon as I've watered my
+hawss."
+
+"You're not going to speak to that kettle of mush again, Miss
+Chuckie," remonstrated Gowan.
+
+"Yes, I am, Kid, and you know you wouldn't stop me if you could. He
+needs it. I'm glad you smashed his pistol. A rifle is not so handy."
+
+Knowles stared over the bushes at the huddled figure on the ground.
+"Look here, Chuckie, you can't mean that?"
+
+"Yes," she insisted. "He is ready to do it right now, unless someone
+throws him a rope and hauls him out of the slough."
+
+"Lot of fuss over a tenderfoot you never saw before today," grumbled
+Gowan.
+
+"That's not like you, Kid," she reproached. "Besides, you don't want
+the trouble of digging a grave. It would have to be deep, to keep out
+the coyotes. Daddy, you're forgetting the veal."
+
+"So I am," agreed the cowman. "Ride on, Kid. You'll be carrying most
+weight."
+
+The puncher reluctantly wheeled his horse and started down the bank of
+the dry stream. Knowles unfastened the hind quarters of veal from
+behind the cantle of his saddle, lifted them into a fork of one of the
+low trees, and rode off after Gowan, folding up his blood-stained
+slicker.
+
+The girl at once slipped from her pony and walked quietly around to
+the drooping, despairing man.
+
+"Mr. Ashton," she softly began, "they have gone. I have stayed to find
+out if there is anything I can do."
+
+She paused for him to reply. His shoulders quivered, but he remained
+silent. She went on soothingly: "You are all unstrung. The shock was
+too sudden. It must have been a terrible one! Won't you tell me about
+it? Perhaps that will make you feel better."
+
+"As if anything could when I am ruined, utterly ruined!" he moaned.
+
+"But how? Please tell me," she urged.
+
+Slowly he raised his haggard face and looked up at her. There could be
+no question but that she was full of sincere sympathy and concern for
+him. Her eyes shone upon him with all the motherly tenderness that any
+good woman, however young, has in her heart for those who suffer.
+
+"It's all in this--this letter," he muttered brokenly. "Expected my
+remittance in it--Got ruin! ruin!"
+
+"It had been opened," suggested the girl. "Perhaps those who took your
+outfit also took your remittance money."
+
+"No, there wasn't any--not a cent! My valet had my written instructions
+to open it and cash the money orders--that weren't there! He and the
+guide--they came back. The letter had told them all, all! I was not
+here. They took the outfit--the money--divided it. Left that note--they
+had no more use for me.... Ruined! utterly ruined!"
+
+"But if you wish us to run them down?"
+
+"No--good riddance! What they took is less than what I owed them.
+Ungrateful scoundrels!"
+
+"That's it!" approved the girl. "Get up your spunk. Cuss, if you like.
+Rip loose, good and hard. It will ease you off."
+
+"It's no use," he groaned, slumping back into his posture of abject
+dejection.
+
+"Oh, come, now!" she encouraged. "You're a young, healthy man. What if
+you have been bucked off this time? There are lots other hawsses in
+Life's corral."
+
+He hung his head lower.
+
+She went on, in an altered tone: "Mr. Ashton, it is evident you have
+been bred as a gentleman. I wish you to give me your word that you
+will not put an end to yourself."
+
+There was a prolonged pause. At last he stirred as if uneasy under her
+steady gaze. He could not see her eyes, yet he seemed to feel them.
+Twice he started to speak, but checked himself and hesitated. The
+third time he muttered a reluctant, "I--will not."
+
+"Good! I have your word," she replied. "I must go now. When you've
+shaken yourself together a bit, come down to the ranch. You ride down
+Dry Fork to the junction, and then three miles up Plum Creek. Daddy'll
+be glad to put you up a few days until you can think of what to do to
+get a new start. Good-by!"
+
+She went back to her horse as lightfooted and graceful as an antelope.
+But he did not look up after her, nor did he respond to her cordial
+parting. For a long time after she rode away he continued to crouch as
+she had left him, motionless, almost torpid with the immensity of his
+loss.
+
+The sun sank lower and lower. It touched the skyline of High Mesa and
+dipped below. The shadow of twilight fell upon Dry Fork and the
+waterhole. The man shivered and, as if afraid that the darkness would
+rush upon him, hastily opened his clenched hand and smoothed out the
+crumpled letter.
+
+To his bloodshot eyes, the accusing words seemed to glare up at him in
+letters of fire:
+
+  Sir:
+
+  We have been instructed by our client, Mr. George Ashton, to
+  inform you that he has at last learned the full particulars of
+  the manner in which you obtained possession of the plans of Mr.
+  Thomas Blake, C.E., drawn by him for the competition on the then
+  projected Michamac bridge; how you copied said plans and
+  destroyed the originals, and was awarded the construction of
+  said bridge on said copied plans presented by you as of your own
+  device and invention; that you were awarded and did enjoy the
+  office of Resident Engineer of said bridge during a period
+  covering the greater part of the construction thereof, and
+  received the full salary of said office, to and until said Blake
+  took charge of said bridge, which had been imperilled by your
+  incompetence; and said Blake, against your strenuous objections
+  and opposition and at great personal risk, saved said bridge
+  from destruction.
+
+  Wherefore, because of the disgrace which you have, by reason of
+  the aforesaid actions and conduct, brought upon his name, and
+  because of various and sundry acts of disobedience, as well as
+  your life of frivolity and dissipation,--our client has
+  instructed us to inform you, that he has cut you off from him
+  absolutely; that he has drawn a new will wherein the amount of
+  your legacy is fixed at the sum of one ($1.00) dollar; that he
+  will no longer make you an allowance in any sum whatever; that
+  he no longer regards you as his son; that any communication
+  addressed to him by you, either directly or indirectly, will not
+  be received or read by him; and that he absolutely refuses to
+  see you or to grant you a personal interview.
+
+                                                Respectfully, etc.
+
+The signature was that of his father's confidential lawyers, and
+below, to the left, lest there be no possibility of misunderstanding,
+were his name and address in full: "Mr. Lafayette Ashton, Stockchute,
+Colorado."
+
+Again he bent over with his head on his breast and the letter clutched
+convulsively in his slender palm.
+
+A bloodcurdling yell brought him to his feet with a sudden leap. He
+still did not know the difference between the cry of a coyote and the
+deeper note of a timber wolf. He hastily started a fire, and ran to
+fetch his rifle from the saddle sheath. The pony was quietly munching
+a wisp of grass as best he could with the bit in his mouth. The
+unconcern of the beast reassured his master, who, however, filled the
+magazine of his rifle before offsaddling.
+
+Having hobbled the pony for the night, Ashton laid the rifle on the
+rim of the pool, stripped, and dived in. He went down like a plummet,
+reckless of the danger of striking some upjutting ledge. He may have
+forgotten for the moment his word to the girl, or he may have
+considered that it did not prevent him from courting death by
+accident.
+
+But, deeply as he dived, he failed to reach bottom. He came up,
+puffing and blowing, and swam swiftly around the pool before
+scrambling out to dress. The combined effect of the vigorous exercise,
+the grateful coolness of the water, and the riddance of the day's dust
+and sweat brought him ashore in a far less morbid frame of mind. Going
+up the bank, he pulled the hind quarters of veal from the tree and
+sliced off three or four ragged strips with his knife. After washing
+them, he put them to broil over his smoky fire of green twigs. The
+"cutlets" came off, one half raw and the other half burned to a crisp.
+But he had not eaten since the early forenoon. He devoured the mess
+without salt, ravenously. He topped off with the scant swallow of
+brandy left in his flask.
+
+Stimulated by the food and drink, he set about gathering a large heap
+of wood. Three or four coyotes had approached his camp, attracted by
+the scent of the calf meat. With the fading of twilight into night
+they came in closer, making such a racket with their yelping and
+wailing that he thought himself surrounded by a pack of ravenous
+wolves.
+
+He could not see how his pony was unconcernedly grazing within a few
+yards of one of the cowardly beasts. Had the wistful singers been
+timber wolves, the animal soon would have come hobbling in near the
+fire; but Ashton did not know that. He flung on brush and crouched
+down near the blaze, rifle in hand, peering out into the blackness.
+Every moment he expected to hear that terrible cry of which he had
+read, the death-scream of a horse, and then to hear the crunching of
+bones between the jaws of the ferocious wolves.
+
+He had spent the previous night alone in camp, peacefully sleeping.
+But then the yells of the beasts of darkness had been far away, and
+the walls of his tent had shut him in from the wild. Tonight his
+nerves had been shattered by the terrible blow of his father's
+repudiation. Worst of all, he had no tobacco with which to soothe
+them.
+
+His dread of the supposed wolf pack in a way eased the anguish of
+his ruin by diverting his mind. But the lack of cigarettes served
+only to put a more frightful strain on his overwrought nerves. He
+felt it first in a vague discomfort that set his hands to groping
+automatically through his pockets. The absence of the usual box
+roused his consciousness, with a dismayed start, to the realization
+that he was absolutely without his soothing drug. The absconding
+guide and valet had taken the large store he had in camp, and, to
+please Miss Knowles, he had flung away all that were left in his
+pockets.
+
+From vague fumbling he instantly concentrated his mind on an eager
+search for a packet that might have been overlooked, either in his
+pockets or around the camp. He could find none, nor even a single
+cigarette. His nerves were now clamoring wildly for their soothing
+poison. So great was the strain that it began to affect his mind. He
+fancied that the wolf pack was closing in to attack him. Twice he
+fired his rifle at imaginary eyes out in the darkness.
+
+All the time the craving for nicotine increased in intensity, until he
+was half frantic. Midnight found him, torch in hand, crawling around
+on the ground where his tent had been pitched, hunting for cigarette
+stubs. He had only to look close in order to find any number. Most
+were no more than cork tips, but some had at least one puff left in
+them, and a few had been only half smoked.
+
+Beside the bed he came upon almost a handful, close together. By this
+time his jangled nerves were "toning down." He became conscious of
+great weariness. He stretched out on his leafy bed, and with his head
+pillowed on his arm, luxuriously sucked in the drugging smoke.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+A TEST OF CALIBER
+
+
+When he opened his eyes the sun was beating down into his face. He had
+slept far into the morning. He stood up to stare around. His horse was
+cropping the grass near the lower side of the grove. There was no sign
+of any wolves. He walked over to his fireplace. The fire had burned to
+ashes hours ago. He started a fresh one with his patent lighter, and
+turned to where he had left the veal. It was gone.
+
+He went a few steps farther, and found a bone gnawed clean of every
+shred of meat and gristle. A fox is a far less cunning thief than a
+coyote. The quantity of calf meat had alone saved his saddle and
+bridle, and even at that, one of the bridle reins was slashed and the
+stirrup leathers were gnawed. He looked from the white bone to the
+saddle, and ripped out a half dozen vigorous Anglo-Saxon oaths. It was
+not nice, but the explosion argued a far healthier frame of mind than
+either his morbid hysteria of the previous afternoon or his frenzy of
+the night.
+
+After the outburst of anger had spent itself, he realized that he was
+hungry. The feeling became acute when he remembered that he had
+absolutely nothing on hand to eat. He hastened to saddle up. As he was
+about to mount he paused to look uncertainly up the trail on which he
+had thrown away the cigarettes. While he stood vacillating, his hand
+went to his hip pocket and drew out the silver-cased brandy flask. He
+looked at it, and its emptiness reminded him that he was thirsty. He
+went down to the pool for a drink. Having filled his flask, he
+returned up the bank and sprang into the saddle.
+
+His horse, in fine fettle after the night's rest and grazing, started
+off on the jump, cow pony fashion. Ashton gave him his head, and the
+horse bore him at a steady lope down along the stream, crossing over
+to the other bank of the dry bed, of his own volition, when the going
+became too rough on the near side. The direction of the railway was
+now off across the sagebrush flats to Ashton's right, but he allowed
+his horse to continue on down the creek. About four miles from the
+waterhole he approached a bunch of grazing cattle. He drew rein and
+walked his horse past them, looking for a herder. There was none in
+sight. The animals were on their home range. He rode on down the creek
+at a canter.
+
+A mile farther on, as he neared another scattered bunch of cattle,
+something thwacked the dry ground a little in front and to the left of
+him, throwing up a splash of sand and dust. His pony snorted and
+leaped ahead at a quickened pace.
+
+Ashton turned to look back at the spot--and instinctively ducked as a
+bullet pinged past his ear so close that he felt the windage on his
+cheek. He did not lack quickness of perception. He glanced up the open
+slope to his left, and grasped the fact that someone was shooting at
+him with a rifle from the crest of the ridge half a mile distant.
+
+Instantly he flung himself flat on his pony's neck and dug in his
+spurs. The pony bounded forward with a suddenness that spoiled the aim
+of the third bullet. It whined past over the beast's haunches. The
+fourth shot, best aimed of all, smashed the silver brandy flask in
+Ashton's hip pocket. Had he been upright in the saddle, the
+steel-jacketed bullet must have pierced him through the waist.
+
+With a yell of terror, he flattened himself still closer to his pony's
+neck and dug in his spurs at every jump. The beast was already going
+at a pace that would have won most quarter-mile sprints. Just after
+the fourth shot he swept in among the scattered bunch of cattle,
+running at his highest speed. Still Ashton swung his sharp-roweled
+spurs. He knew that the range of a high-power rifle is well over a
+mile.
+
+To his vast surprise, the shooting ceased the moment he raced into
+line with the first steer. The short respite gave him time to recover
+his wits.
+
+As the pony sprinted clear of the last steer in the bunch, a fifth
+bullet ranged close down over Ashton's head. He pulled hard on the
+right rein and leaned the same way. The sixth shot burned the skin on
+the pony's hip as he swerved suddenly towards the edge of the creek
+channel. He made a wild leap out over the edge of the cut bank and
+came plunging down on a gravel bar. At once he started to race along
+the dry stream bed. But instead of spurring, Ashton now tugged at the
+bridle.
+
+The pony swung to the left and came to a halt close in under the bank.
+Ashton cautiously straightened from his crouch. When erect he was just
+high enough to see over the edge of the bank. Looking back and up the
+ridge, he saw the figure of a man clearly outlined against the sky.
+His lips closed in resolute lines; his dark eyes flashed. Jerking out
+his rifle, he set the sight for fifteen hundred yards, and began
+firing at the would-be murderer as coolly and steadily as a marksman.
+
+Before he had pulled the trigger the third time the man leaped
+sideways and knelt to return his fire. At once Ashton gripped his
+rifle still more firmly and drew back the automatic lever. The
+crackling discharge was like the fire of a miniature Maxim gun. Puffs
+of dust spouted up all around the man on the ridge crest. He sprang to
+his feet and ran back out of sight, jumping from side to side like an
+Indian.
+
+"Ho!" shouted Ashton. "He's running! I made him run!"
+
+He sat up very erect in his saddle, staring defiantly at the place
+where the murderer had disappeared.
+
+"The coward! I made him run!" he exulted.
+
+He shifted his grip on his rifle, and the heat of the barrel reminded
+him that he had emptied the magazine. He reloaded the weapon to its
+fullest capacity, and stood up in his stirrups to stare at the ridge
+crest. The murderer did not reappear. Ashton's exultance gave place to
+disappointment. He was more than ready to continue the duel.
+
+He rode down the creek, searching for a place to ascend the cut bank.
+But by the time he came to a slope he had cooled sufficiently to
+realize the foolishness of bravado. Not unlikely the murderer was
+lying back out of sight, ready to shoot him when he came up out of the
+creek. He reflected, and decided that the going was quite good enough
+in the bottom of the creek bed. He rode on down the channel, over the
+gravel bars, at an easy canter.
+
+After a half mile the bank became so low and the creek bed so sandy
+that he turned up on to the dry sod. As he did so he kept his eye
+warily on the now distant ridge. But no bullet came pinging down after
+him.
+
+Instead, he heard the thud of galloping hoofs, and twisted about just
+in time to see a rider top a rise a short distance in front of him.
+He snapped down his breech sight and faced the supposed assailant with
+the rifle ready at his shoulder. Almost as quickly he lowered the
+weapon and snatched off his sombrero in joyful salute. The rider was
+Miss Knowles.
+
+She waved back gayly and cantered up to him, her lovely face aglow
+with cordial greeting.
+
+"Good noon!" she called. "So you have come at last? But better late
+than never."
+
+"How could I help coming?" he gallantly exclaimed.
+
+"I see. The coyotes stole your cutlets, and you were hungry," she
+bantered, as she came alongside and whirled her horse around to ride
+with him down the creek.
+
+"How did you guess?" he asked.
+
+"I know coyotes," she replied. "They're the worst--" She stopped
+short, gazing at the bleeding flanks of his pony. "Oh, Mr. Ashton! how
+could you? I did not think you so cruel!"
+
+"Cruel?" he repeated, twisting about to see what she meant. "Ah, you
+refer to the spurring. But I simply couldn't help it, you know. There
+was a bandit taking pot shots at me as I passed the ridge back
+there."
+
+"A bandit--on Dry Mesa?" she incredulously exclaimed.
+
+"Yes; he pegged at me eight or nine times."
+
+The girl smiled. "You probably heard one of the punchers shooting at a
+coyote."
+
+"No," he insisted, flushing under her look. "The ruffian was shooting
+at me. See here."
+
+He put his hand to his left hip pocket, one side of which had been
+torn out. From it he drew his brandy flask.
+
+"That was done by the third or fourth shot," he explained. "Do you
+wonder I was flat on my pony's neck and spurring as hard as I could?"
+
+The girl took the flask from his outstretched hand and looked it over
+with keen interest. In one side of the silver case was a small, neat
+hole. Opposite it half of the other side had been burst out as if by
+an explosion within. She took off the silver cap, shook out the
+shattered glass of the inner flask, and looked again at the small
+hole.
+
+"A thirty-eight," she observed.
+
+"Pardon me," he replied. "I fail to--Ah, yes; thirty-eight caliber,
+you mean."
+
+"It is I who must ask pardon," she said in frank apology. "Your rifle
+is a thirty-two. I heard a number of shots, ending with the rattle of
+an automatic. Thought you were after another deer."
+
+He could afford to smile at the merry thrust and the flash of dimples
+that accompanied it.
+
+"At least it wasn't a calf this time," he replied. "Nor was it a doe.
+But it may have been a buck."
+
+"Indian?" she queried, with instant perception of his play on the
+word.
+
+"I didn't see any war plumes," he admitted.
+
+"War plumes? Oh, that _is_ a joke!" she exclaimed. She chanced to look
+down at the shattered flask, and her merriment vanished. "But this
+isn't any joke. Didn't you see the man who was shooting at you?"
+
+"Yes, after I jumped my pony down into the creek. Perhaps the bandit
+thought he had tumbled us both. He stood up on top the ridge, until I
+cut loose and made him run."
+
+"He ran?"
+
+Ashton's eyes sparkled at the remembrance, and his chest began to
+expand. Then he met the girl's clear, direct gaze, and answered
+modestly: "Well, you see, when I had got down behind the bank our
+positions were reversed. He was the one in full view. It's curious,
+though, Miss Knowles--shooting at that poor calf, under the impression
+it was a deer, I simply couldn't hold my rifle steady, while--"
+
+"No wonder, if it was your first deer," put in the girl. "We call it
+buck fever."
+
+"Yes, but wouldn't you have thought my first bandit--Why, I couldn't
+have aimed at him more steadily if I had been made of cast iron."
+
+"Guess he had made you fighting mad," she bantered; but under her
+seeming levity he perceived a change in her manner towards him
+immensely gratifying to his humbled self-esteem.
+
+"At first I was just a trifle apprehensive--" He hesitated, and
+suddenly burst out with a candid confession--"No, not a trifle!
+Really, I was horribly frightened!"
+
+This was more than the girl had hoped from him. She nodded and smiled
+in open approval. "You had a good right to be frightened. I don't
+blame you for spurring that way. Look. It wasn't only one shot that
+came close. There's a neat hair brand on your hawss's hip that wasn't
+there yesterday."
+
+"Must have been the shot just before we took the bank," said Ashton,
+twisting about to look at the streak cut by the bullet. "The first was
+the only other one that didn't go higher."
+
+"But what did the man look like?" questioned Miss Isobel. "I can't
+imagine who--Can it be that your guide has a grudge against you on
+account of his pay?"
+
+"I wouldn't have thought it possible before yesterday, though he was a
+surly fellow and inclined to be insolent."
+
+"All such men are apt to be with tenderfeet," she remarked, permitting
+herself a half twinkle of her sweet eyes. "But I should have thought
+yours would have kept on going. Whatever you may have owed him, he had
+no right to steal your outfit. He must be a real badman, if it's true
+he is the party who did this shooting."
+
+"I shouldn't be at all surprised," agreed Ashton. In her concern over
+him she looked so charming that he would have agreed if she had told
+him the moon was made of green cheese.
+
+She shook her head thoughtfully, and went on: "I can't imagine even
+one of our badmen trying to murder you that way. Their usual course
+would be to come up to you, face to face, pick a quarrel, and beat you
+to it on the draw. But whoever the cowardly scoundrel is, we'll turn
+out the boys, and either run him down or out of the country."
+
+"If it's my guide, he probably is running already."
+
+"I hope so," replied the girl.
+
+"You do! Don't you want him punished?" exclaimed Ashton.
+
+"Of course, but you see I don't want Kid to--to cut another notch on
+his Colt's."
+
+"I must say, I cannot see how that--"
+
+"You could if you realized how kind and good he has been to me all
+these years. Do you know, when I first came West, I couldn't tell a
+jackrabbit from a burro. Daddy had told me that each had big ears, and
+I got them mixed. And actually I didn't know the off from the nigh
+side of a hawss!"
+
+"But we--er--have horses and riding-schools in the East," put in
+Ashton.
+
+She parried the indirect question without seeming to notice it. "You
+proved that yesterday, coming down from High Mesa. I felt sure I would
+have you pulling leather."
+
+"Pulling leather?" he asked. "You see, I own to my tenderfootness."
+
+"Grabbing your saddle to hold yourself on," she explained. Before he
+could reply, she rose in her stirrups and pointed ahead with her
+quirt. "Look, that's the top of the biggest haystack, up by the
+feed-sheds. You'll see the buildings in half a minute."
+
+Unheeded by Ashton, she had guided him off to the left, away from Dry
+Fork, across the angle above its junction with Plum Creek. They were
+now coming up over the divide between the two streams. Ashton failed
+to locate the haystack until its two mates and the long, half-open
+shelter-sheds came into view.
+
+A moment later he was looking at the horse corral and the group of log
+ranch houses. Below and beyond them the scattered groves of Plum Creek
+stretched away up across the mesa--green bouquets on the slender
+silver ribbon of the creek's midsummer rill.
+
+"Well?" she asked. "What do you think of my home?"
+
+"Your summer home," he suggested.
+
+"No, my real home," she insisted. "Auntie couldn't be nicer or fonder
+than she is; but her house is a residence, not a home, even to her.
+Anyway, here, where I have Daddy and Kid--I do so hope you and Kid
+will become friends."
+
+"Since you wish it, I shall try to do my part. But it is a matter that
+might take time, and--" he smiled ruefully and concluded with seeming
+irrelevance--"I have no home."
+
+She gazed at him with the look of tender motherly sympathy that he had
+been too distraught to really feel the previous day. "Do not say that,
+Mr. Ashton! Though a ranch house is hardly the kind of home to which
+you are accustomed, you will find that we range folks retain the
+old-fashioned Western ideas of hospitality."
+
+"My dear Miss Knowles!" he exclaimed with ardent gallantry, "the mere
+thought of being under the same sky with you--"
+
+"Don't, please," she begged. "This _is_ the blue sky we are under, not
+a stuccoed ceiling."
+
+"Well, I really meant it," he protested, greatly dashed.
+
+"Kid often says nice things to me. But he speaks with his hands," she
+remarked.
+
+"Deaf and dumb alphabet?" he queried wonderingly.
+
+"Hardly," she answered, dimpling under his puzzled gaze. "Actions
+speak louder than words, you know."
+
+"Ah!" he murmured, and his look indicated that she had given him food
+for thought.
+
+They were now cantering down the long easy slope towards the ranch
+buildings. The girl's quick eye perceived a horseman riding towards
+the ranch from one of the groves up Plum Creek.
+
+"There's Kid coming in," she remarked. "He went out early this morning
+after a big wolf that had killed a calf. He reported last evening that
+he found the carcass over near the head of Plum Creek. A wolf that
+gets to killing calves this time of year is a pretty costly neighbor.
+Daddy told Kid to go out and try to get him."
+
+"I'm glad you didn't let him get _this_ calf-killer," observed
+Ashton.
+
+"Oh, as soon as we saw your tenderfoot riding togs--!" she rejoined.
+"Seriously, though, you must not mind if the men poke a little fun at
+you. Most of them are more farmhands than cowboys, but Kid will be apt
+to lead off. I do so want you to be agreeable to Kid. He is almost a
+member of the family, not a hired man."
+
+"I shall try to be agreeable to him," replied Ashton, a trifle
+stiffly.
+
+The puncher had seen them probably before they saw him. He was riding
+at a pace that brought him to the horse corral a few moments ahead of
+them. When they came up he nodded carelessly in response to Ashton's
+studiously polite greeting, "Good day, Mr. Gowan," and turned to
+loosen the cinch of his saddle.
+
+"You've been riding some," remarked the girl, looking at the puncher's
+heaving, lathered horse.
+
+"Jumped that wolf--ran him," replied Gowan, as he lifted off his
+saddle and deftly tossed it up on the top rail of the corral.
+
+"You're in luck," congratulated Miss Isobel. She explained to Ashton:
+"The cattlemen in this county pay fifteen dollars for wolf scalps.
+That's in addition to the state bounty."
+
+Ashton sprang off to offer her his hand. But she was on the ground as
+soon as he. Gowan stared at him between narrowed lids, and replied to
+the girl somewhat shortly: "I didn't get him this time, Miss
+Chuckie."
+
+"You didn't? That's too bad! You don't often miss. I wish you had been
+with me, to run down the scoundrel who tried to murder Mr. Ashton."
+
+Gowan burst into the harsh, strained laughter of one who seldom gives
+way to mirth. He checked himself abruptly and cast a hostile look at
+Ashton. "By--James, Miss Chuckie, you don't mean to say you let a
+tenderfoot string you?"
+
+"How about this?" asked the girl. She held out the silver flask, which
+she had not returned to Ashton.
+
+Gowan gave it a casual glance, and answered almost jeeringly: "Easy
+enough for him to set it up and plug it--if he didn't get too far
+away."
+
+"His rifle is a thirty-two. This was done by a thirty-eight," she
+replied.
+
+"Thirty-eight?" he repeated. "Let's see." He took the flask from her,
+drew a rifle cartridge from his belt, and fitted the steel-jacketed
+bullet into the clean, small hole. "You're right, Miss Chuckie. It
+shore was a thirty-eight." He turned sharply on Ashton. "Where'd it
+happen? Who was it?"
+
+"Over on that dry stream," answered Ashton. "Unfortunately the fellow
+was too far away for me to be able to describe him."
+
+"But we think it may have been his guide," explained the girl.
+
+"Guide?" muttered Gowan, staring intently at Ashton.
+
+"Yes. You see, if he was mean enough to help steal Mr. Ashton's
+outfit, he--"
+
+"Shore, I savvy!" exclaimed the puncher. "I'll rope a couple of fresh
+hawsses, and go out with Mr. Ashton after the two-legged wolf."
+
+"That's like you, Kid! But you must wait at least until you've both
+had dinner. Mr. Ashton, I'm sure, is half starved."
+
+"Me, too, Miss Chuckie. But you know I'd rather eat a wolf or a
+rustler or even a daring desperado than sinkers and beans, any day."
+
+"You'll come in with us and see what Daddy has to say about it," the
+girl insisted.
+
+She started to loosen her saddle-cinch. Gowan handed back the silver
+flask, and stripping off saddle and bridle from her horse, placed them
+on the rail beside his own. Ashton waited, as if expecting a like
+service. The puncher started off beside Miss Isobel without looking at
+him. Ashton flushed hotly, and hastened to do his own unsaddling.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE CHANCE OF RECLAMATION
+
+
+Beyond the bunkhouse, which was the nearest building to the corral,
+stood the low but roomy log structure of the main ranch house. As
+Ashton came around the front corner, close behind Gowan and the girl,
+Knowles rose from his comfortable chair in the rustic porch, knocked
+out the half burned contents of his pipe and extended a freckled,
+corded hand to the stranger.
+
+"Howdy, Mr. Ashton! Glad to see you!" he said with hearty hospitality.
+"Hope you've come to ease up our lonesomeness by a month or two's
+visit."
+
+"Why, I--You're too kind, really!" replied Ashton, his voice quavering
+and breaking at the unexpected cordiality of the welcome. "If you--I
+shall take advantage of your generous offer. You see, I'm rather in a
+box, owing to my--" He caught himself up, and tightened his slackening
+lip. "But you'll pardon me if I ask you to let me do something in
+return for your hospitality."
+
+"We don't sell our hospitality on the range," brusquely replied the
+cowman.
+
+"Oh, no, no, I did not mean--I could not pay a penny. I'm utterly
+destitute--a--a pauper!" A spasm of bitter despair contorted his
+handsome face.
+
+Knowles and the girl hastily looked away from him, that they might not
+see him in his weakness. But he rallied and forced a rather unsteady
+laugh at himself. "You see, I haven't quite got used to it yet. I've
+always had money. I never really had to work. Now I must learn to earn
+a living. It's very good of you, Mr. Knowles, but--there's that veal.
+If only you'll let me work out what I owe you."
+
+"You don't owe me a cent for the yearling," gruffly replied the
+cowman. "Don't know what I could put you at, anyway."
+
+"Might use him to shoo off the rattlers and jackrabbits from in front
+the mowing machine," suggested Gowan.
+
+"Mr. Ashton can ride," interposed the girl, with a friendliness of
+tone that brought Gowan to a thin-lipped silence.
+
+"That's something," said Knowles, gazing speculatively at the slim
+aristocratic figure of the tenderfoot. "You're not built for pitching
+hay, but like as not you have the makings of a puncher. Ever throw a
+rope?"
+
+"Never. I shall start practicing the art--at once."
+
+"No, not until you and Kid have had dinner," gayly contradicted the
+girl. "We've had ours. But Yuki always has something ready. Kid, if
+you'll show Mr. Ashton where to wash, I'll tell Yuki."
+
+She darted through the open doorway into the house. At a curt nod from
+Gowan, Ashton followed him around to the far side of the house,
+leaving Knowles in the act of hastily reloading his pipe. Under a
+lean-to that covered a door in the side of the house was a barrel of
+water and a bench with two basins. On a row of pegs above hung a
+number of towels, all rumpled but none dirty.
+
+Gowan pointed to a box of unused towels, and proceeded to lather and
+wash himself. Ashton took a towel, and after rinsing out the second
+washbasin, made as fastidious a toilet as the scant conveniences of
+the place would permit. There were combs and a fairly good mirror
+above the soap shelf. Gowan went in by the side door, without waiting
+for his companion. Ashton presently followed him, having looked in
+vain for a razor to rid himself of his two days' growth of beard.
+
+The long table told him that he had entered the ranch mess-hall, or
+rather, dining-room. Though the table was covered with oilcloth and
+the rough-hewn logs of the outer walls were lime-plastered only in the
+chinks, the seats were chairs instead of benches, and between the gay
+Mexican _serape_ drapes of the clean windows hung several well-done
+water color landscapes, appropriately framed in unbarked pine. On the
+oiled deal floor were scattered half a dozen Navajo rugs.
+
+Gowan had taken a seat at one end of the table. As Ashton sat down at
+the neatly laid place opposite him, a silent, smiling, deft-handed Jap
+came in from the kitchen with a heaping trayful of dishes. For the
+most part, the food was ordinary ranch fare, but cooked with the skill
+of a _chef_. The exceptions were the fresh milk and delicious unsalted
+butter. On most cattle ranches, the milk comes from "tin cows" and the
+butter from oleomargarine tubs.
+
+The two diners were well along in their meal, eating as earnestly and
+as taciturnly as the Jap served, when Miss Isobel came in with her
+father. The girl had dressed for the afternoon in a gown of the latest
+style, whose quiet color and simple lines harmonized perfectly with
+her surroundings. She smiled impartially at puncher, tenderfoot, and
+Jap.
+
+"Thank you, Yuki. I see you did not keep our hungry hunters
+waiting.--Mr. Ashton, I have told Daddy about that shooting."
+
+"It's a mighty strange happening. You might tell us the full
+particulars," said Knowles.
+
+Ashton at once gave a fairly accurate account of the affair. He could
+hardly exaggerate the peril he had incurred, and the touch of
+exultance with which he described his defeat of the murderer was quite
+pardonable in a tenderfoot.
+
+"Strange--mighty strange. Can't understand it," commented the cowman
+when Ashton had finished his account.
+
+"It shore is, Mr. Knowles," added Gowan. "The only thirty-eight on the
+ranch is mine. That seems to clear our people."
+
+"Of course! It could not possibly be any of our people!" exclaimed the
+girl.
+
+"Mr. Ashton thinks it might have been his guide," went on Gowan.
+
+"His guide? What caliber was his rifle?" shrewdly queried the cowman.
+
+"Why, I--really I cannot remember," answered Ashton. "I know it was of
+a larger bore than mine, but that is all."
+
+"Um-m," considered Knowles. "Looks rather like he's the man. Can't
+think of anyone else. Trouble is, if he was laying in wait for you,
+his horse would be fresh. Must have covered a right smart bit of
+territory by now."
+
+"I'll go out and take a look at his tracks," said Gowan, rising with a
+readiness that brought a nod of approval from his employer.
+
+"You'll be careful, Kid," cautioned the girl, with a shade of concern
+in her tone.
+
+"He'll keep his eye open, Chuckie," reassured her father. "It's the
+other fellow wants to be careful, if he hasn't already vamoosed. Hey,
+Kid?"
+
+"I'll get him, if I get the chance," laconically replied Gowan,
+looking from the girl to Ashton with the characteristic straightening
+of his lips that marked the tensing of his emotions.
+
+As he left the room Miss Isobel smiled and nodded to Ashton. "You see
+how friendly he is, in spite of his cold manner to strangers. I
+thought he had taken a dislike to you, yet you saw how readily he
+offered to go out after your assailant."
+
+"More likely it's because he thinks it would discredit us to let such
+a scoundrel get away," differed her father. "However, he'll leave you
+alone, Mr. Ashton, if you stay with us as a guest, and will only haze
+you a bit, if you insist upon joining our force."
+
+"You mean, working for you? I must insist on that," said Ashton, with
+an eager look at the girl. "If only I can do well enough to be
+employed right along!"
+
+The cowman grunted, and winked solemnly at his daughter. "Yes, I can
+understand your feeling that way. How about the winter, though? You
+mayn't like it over here so well then."
+
+Ashton flushed and laughed at the older man's shrewdness; hesitated,
+and confessed candidly: "No, I should prefer Denver in winter."
+
+Miss Isobel blushed in adorable payment of his compliment, but thrust
+back at him: "We bar cowboys in the Sacred Thirty-six."
+
+He winced. Her stroke had pierced into his raw wound.
+
+"Oh!--oh!" she breathlessly exclaimed. "I didn't mean to--Oh, I'm so
+sorry!"
+
+He dashed the tears from his eyes. "No, you--don't apologize! It's
+only that I'm--Please don't fancy I'm a baby! You see, when a fellow
+has always lived high--on top, you know--and then to have everything
+go out from under him without warning!"
+
+"Keep a stiff upper lip, son," advised Knowles. "You'll pull through
+all right. It isn't everyone in your fix that would be asking for
+work."
+
+Ashton laughed a trifle unsteadily. "It's very kind of you to say
+that, Mr. Knowles. I--I wish a steady position, winter as well as
+summer."
+
+"How about Denver?" asked Knowles.
+
+"That can wait," replied Ashton. He met the girl's smile of approval,
+and rallied fully. "Yes, that can wait--and so can I."
+
+Again the girl blushed, but she found a bantering rejoinder: "With you
+and Kid and Daddy all waiting for me to come home, I suppose I'll have
+to cut the season short."
+
+"The winters here are like those you read about up at the North
+Pole," the cowman informed Ashton. "But we get our sunshine back along
+in the spring."
+
+"Oh, Daddy! you're a poet!" cried his daughter, flinging her arm
+around his sunburnt neck.
+
+"Wish I were one!" enviously sighed Ashton. The cowman gave him a look
+that brought him to his feet. "Mr. Knowles," he hastened to ask, "if
+you'll kindly tell me what my work is to be this afternoon."
+
+The older man's frown relaxed. "Did you come out here from Stockchute?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Think you could find your way back?"
+
+"Why, yes; though we wandered all around--But surely, Mr. Knowles,
+you'll not require me--"
+
+"I want a man to ride over with some letters and fetch the mail. I'll
+need Gowan for work you can't do. Chuckie was to have gone; but I
+can't let her now, until we're more sure about that man who shot at
+you."
+
+"I see."
+
+"Well, have you got the nerve, in case the man is loose over that
+way?"
+
+Ashton's eyes flashed. "I'll go! Perhaps I'll get another crack at the
+scoundrel."
+
+"Keep cool. It's ninety-nine chances in the hundred he's on the run
+and'll keep going all week."
+
+"Shall I start now? As we came by a very roundabout way--We went first
+in the opposite direction, and then skirted High Mesa down from the
+mountains. So, you see, I may have a little difficulty--"
+
+"No you won't. There's our wagon trail. Even if you got off that, all
+you'd have to do would be to keep headed for Split Peak. That's right
+in line with Stockchute. But you'll not start till morning. I haven't
+got all my letters written. That'll give you all day to go and come.
+It's only twenty-five miles over there. Chuckie, you show this new
+puncher of ours over the place, while I write those letters."
+
+"I'll start teaching him how to throw a rope," volunteered the girl.
+
+She led the way out through a daintily furnished front room, in which
+Ashton observed an upright piano and other articles of culture that he
+would never have expected to come upon in this remote section. In
+passing, the girl picked up a wide-brimmed lacy hat.
+
+Once outside, she first took Ashton for a walk up Plum Creek to where
+half a dozen men were at work with a mowing machine and horse rakes
+making hay of the rich bunch-grass.
+
+"Daddy feeds all he can in winter," she explained. "The spring when I
+first came back from Denver I cried so over the starving cattle that
+he promised to always afterwards cut and stack all the hay he could.
+And he has found it pays to feed well. We would put a lot of land into
+oats, but, as you see, there's not enough water in the creek."
+
+"That's where an irrigation system would come in," remarked Ashton.
+
+"Oh, I hope you don't think it possible to water our mesa!" she cried.
+"I told you how it would break up our range."
+
+"I assure you, I don't think at all," he replied. "I'm not a
+reclamation engineer--never specialized on hydraulics."
+
+She flashed an odd look at him. "You never? But Mr. Blake--that
+wonderful engineer of the Zariba Dam--he would know, wouldn't he?"
+
+"I--suppose he would--that is, if he--" Ashton hesitated, and
+exclaimed, "But that's just it!"
+
+"What?" she asked.
+
+"Why, to--to have him come here. He's the luckiest for blundering on
+ways to do things," muttered Ashton. He added with growing bitterness:
+"Yes, if there's any way at all to do it, you'd have him flooding your
+whole range--deluging it. He's got all those millions to back him."
+
+"You do not like him," said the girl. She looked off towards High
+Mesa, her face glowing with suppressed excitement. "No doubt you are
+right--as to his ability. But--don't you see?--if it can be done, it
+is bound to be done sooner or later. All the time Daddy and I--and
+Kid, too--are living under this constant dread that it may be
+possible. But if such an engineer as--as Mr. Blake came and looked
+over the situation and told us we needn't fear--don't you see how--?"
+
+"You don't mean that you--?" Ashton, in turn, left his question
+unfinished and averted his face.
+
+"Yes," she answered. "I'm sure it will be best to put an end to this
+uncertainty. So I believe I shall send for--for Mr. Blake."
+
+"But--why for--for him--in particular?" he stammered.
+
+"I am sorry you dislike him," she said, regaining her composure when
+she saw that he too was agitated.
+
+He did not reply. She tactfully changed the subject. By the time they
+had circled around, back to the half open feed-sheds, he was gayly
+chatting with her on music and the drama. When they came down to the
+horse corral she proceeded to lecture him on the duties of a cowboy
+and showed him how to hold and throw a rope. Under her skillful
+tuition, he at last learned the knack of casting an open noose.
+
+Evening was near when they returned to the house. As before, they
+caught Knowles in the front porch contentedly puffing at his pipe. He
+dropped it down out of sight. The girl shook her finger at him, nodded
+to Ashton, and went indoors. Immediately the cowman put his pipe back
+into his mouth and drew another from his pocket, together with an
+unopened sack of tobacco.
+
+"Smoke?" he asked.
+
+Ashton's eyes gleamed. In the girl's presence he had been able to
+restrain the fierce craving that had tortured him since dinner. Now it
+so overmastered him that he almost snatched the pipe and tobacco out
+of the cowman's hand. The latter gravely shook his head.
+
+"Got it that bad, have you?" he deplored.
+
+Ashton could not answer until his pipe was well under way.
+
+"I'm--I'm breaking off," he replied. "Haven't had a cigarette all
+day--nor anything else. A-ah!"
+
+"Glad you like it," said Knowles. "A pipe is all right with this kind
+of tobacco. You can't inhale it like you can cigarettes, unless you
+want to strangle."
+
+"I shall break off entirely as soon as I can," asserted Ashton.
+
+"Well," considered Knowles, "I'm not saying you can't or won't. It's
+mighty curious what a young fellow can do to please a pretty girl.
+Just the same, I'd say from the color of Kid's fingers that he hasn't
+forgotten how to roll a fat Mexican _cigaretto_.--Hello! 'Talk of the
+devil--' Here he comes now."
+
+Gowan came around the corner of the house, his spurs jingling. His
+eyes were as cold and his face as emotionless as usual.
+
+"Well?" asked Knowles. "Have a seat."
+
+"Didn't get him," reported Gowan, dropping into a chair. "Near as I
+could make out, he cut straight across for the railroad, on the
+jump."
+
+"Then it must have been that guide!" exclaimed Ashton.
+
+"Looks that way," added Knowles. "Glad of it. We won't see him again,
+unless you want to notify the sheriff, when you ride over tomorrow."
+
+"No, oh, no. I am satisfied to be rid of him."
+
+"If he don't come back," remarked Gowan.
+
+"He won't," predicted Knowles.
+
+"Well, not for a time maybe," agreed Gowan.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+A MAN'S SIZE HORSE
+
+
+At dusk the sonorous boom of a Japanese gong gave warning of the
+approach of the supper hour. A few minutes later a second booming
+summoned all in to the meal. Miss Isobel sat at one end of the table;
+her father at the other. Along the sides were the employés, Ashton and
+Gowan at the corners nearest the girl. A large coal oil lamp with an
+artistic shade cast a pink light on the clean white oilcloth of the
+table and the simple tasteful table service.
+
+Yuki, the silent Jap, served all with strict impartiality, starting
+with the mistress of the house and going around the table in regular
+succession, either one way or the other. The six rough-appearing
+haymakers used their knives with a freedom to which Ashton was
+unaccustomed, but their faces were clean, their behavior quiet, and
+their occasional remarks by no means inapt.
+
+After the meal they wished Miss Knowles a pleasant "Good-night," and
+left for the bunkhouse. But Ashton and Gowan, at the smiling
+invitation of the girl, followed her into the front room. Knowles
+came in a few minutes later and, with scarcely a glance at the young
+people, settled down beside a tableful of periodicals and magazines to
+study the latest Government report on the reclamation service.
+
+Ashton had entered the "parlor" under the impression that here he
+would have Gowan at a disadvantage. To his surprise, the puncher
+proved to be quite at ease; his manners were correct and his
+conversation by no means provincial. A moment's reflection showed
+Ashton that this could not well be otherwise, in view of the young
+fellow's intimacy with Miss Chuckie Isobel.
+
+Another surprise was the discovery that Gowan had a remarkably good
+ear for music and knew even more than the girl about the masters and
+their works. There was a player attachment to the piano, and the girl
+and Gowan had a contest, playing the same selections in turn, to see
+which could get the most expression by means of the mechanical
+apparatus. If anything, the girl came out second best. At least she
+said so; but Ashton would not admit it.
+
+Between times the three chatted on a thousand and one topics, the girl
+always ready to bubble over with animation and merriment. She bestowed
+her dimpled smiles on both her admirers with strict impartiality and
+as impartially stimulated each to his best with her tact and gay
+wit.
+
+At nine o'clock sharp Knowles closed his report and rose from his
+comfortable seat.
+
+"Time to turn in, boys. Coal oil costs more than sunlight," he
+announced, in the flat tone of a standing joke. "We'll take a jog down
+creek to the Bar-Lazy-J ranch, first thing tomorrow, Kid.--Ashton,
+you'd better start off in the cool, before sunup. Here's my bunch of
+letters, case I might forget them."
+
+He handed over half a dozen thinly padded envelopes. Gowan was already
+at the door, hat in hand.
+
+"Good night, Mr. Knowles. Good night, Miss Chuckie. Pleasant dreams!"
+he said.
+
+"Same to you, Kid!" replied the girl.
+
+"May I give and receive the same?" asked Ashton.
+
+"Of course," she answered. "But wait a moment, please. I've some
+letters to go, myself, if you'll kindly take them with Daddy's."
+
+As she darted into a side room, Knowles stepped out after Gowan. When
+the girl returned, Ashton took the letters that she held out to him
+and deliberately started to tie them in a packet with those of her
+father. His sole purpose was to prolong his stay to the last possible
+moment. But inadvertently his eye caught the name "Blake" on one of
+the envelopes. His smile vanished; his jaw dropped.
+
+"Why, Mr. Ashton, what is the matter?" said the girl.
+
+"I--I beg your pardon," he replied. "I did not realize that--But it's
+too absurd--it can't be! You did not mean what you said this
+afternoon. It can't be you're writing to that man to come here."
+
+"I am," she replied.
+
+"But you can't--you must not. He's the very devil for doing impossible
+things. He'll be sure to turn loose a flood on you--drown you
+out--destroy your range!"
+
+"If it can be done, the sooner we know it the better," she argued.
+"Daddy says little, but it is becoming a monomania with him--the
+dread. I wish to put an end to his suspense. Besides, if--if this Mr.
+Blake is as remarkable as you and the reports say he is, it will be
+interesting to meet him. My only fear is that so great an engineer
+will not think it worth while to come to this out-of-the-way
+section."
+
+"The big four-flusher!" muttered Ashton.
+
+"How you must dislike him! It makes me all the more curious to see
+him."
+
+"Does your father know about this letter?" queried Ashton.
+
+"You forget yourself, sir," she said.
+
+Meeting her level gaze, he flushed crimson with mortification. He
+stood biting his lip, unable to speak.
+
+She went on coldly: "I do not ask you to tell me the cause of your
+hatred for Mr. Blake. I assume that you are a gentleman and will not
+destroy my letter. But even if you should do so, it would mean only a
+short delay. I shall write him again if I receive no reply to this."
+
+Ashton's flush deepened. "I did not think you could be so hard. But--I
+presume I deserved it."
+
+"Yes, you did," she agreed, with no lessening of her coldness.
+
+"I see you will not accept an apology, Miss Knowles. However, I give
+you my word that I will deliver your letter to the postmaster at
+Stockchute."
+
+He started out, very stiff and erect. As he passed through the doorway
+she suddenly relented and called after him: "Good night, Mr. Ashton!
+Pleasant dreams!"
+
+He wheeled and would have stepped back to reply had not Knowles spoken
+to him from the darkness at the end of the porch: "This way, Ashton.
+Kid is waiting to show you to the bunkhouse. You'll find a clean bunk
+and new blankets. I've also issued you corduroy pants and a pair of
+leather chaps from the commissary. Those city riding togs aren't
+hardly the thing on the range. There's a spare saddle, if you want to
+change off from yours."
+
+"Thank you for the other things; but I prefer my own saddle," replied
+Ashton.
+
+He now perceived the dim form of Gowan starting off in the starlight,
+and followed him to the bunkhouse. The other men were already in
+their beds, fast asleep and half of them snoring. Gowan silently lit a
+lantern and showed the tenderfoot to an unoccupied bunk in the far
+corner of the rough but clean building. After a curt request for
+Ashton to blow out the lantern when through with the light, he
+withdrew, to tumble into a bunk near the door.
+
+Ashton removed twice as many garments as had the puncher, and slipped
+in between his fresh new blankets, after several minutes spent in
+finding out how to extinguish the lantern. For some time he lay
+listening. He had often read of the practical jokes that cowboys are
+supposed always to play on tenderfeet. But the steady concert of the
+snoring sleepers was unbroken by any horseplay. Presently he, too,
+fell asleep.
+
+He was wakened by a general stir in the bunkhouse. Day had not yet
+come, but by the light of a lantern near the door he could see his
+fellow employés passing out. He dressed as hastily as he could in his
+gloomy corner, putting on his new trousers and the stiff leather
+chapareras in place of his breeches and leggings. Gowan came in,
+glanced at him with a trace of surprise, and went out with the
+lantern.
+
+Ashton followed to the house and around into the side porch. The other
+men were making their morning toilets by lantern light, each drying
+face and hands on his own towel. Ashton and Gowan waited their turn
+at the basins, and together went into the lamplit dining-room, where
+the Jap cook was serving bacon, coffee, and hot bread. Ashton lingered
+over his meal, hoping to see Miss Isobel. But neither she nor her
+father appeared.
+
+Gowan had gone out with the other men. Presently he came back to the
+side door and remarked in almost a friendly tone: "Your hawss is ready
+whenever you are, Ashton."
+
+"Thanks," said Ashton, rising. "The poor old brute must be rather
+stiff after the spurring I gave him yesterday."
+
+Gowan did not reply. He had gone out again. Somewhat nettled, Ashton
+hastened after him. Dawn had come. The gray light in the east was
+brightening to an exquisite pink. The clear twilight showed the
+puncher waiting at the front of the house beside a saddled horse. A
+glance showed Ashton that the saddle and bridle were his own, but that
+the horse was a big, rawboned beast.
+
+"That's not my pony," he said.
+
+"This here Rocket hawss ain't _any_ pony," agreed Gowan. "He's a man's
+size hawss. Ain't afraid you'll drop too far when you fall off, are
+you?"
+
+"You're trying to get me on a bucking bronco!" said Ashton,
+suspiciously eying the bony, wild-eyed brute.
+
+"He's no outlaw," reassured Gowan. "Most all our hawsses are liable
+to prance some when they've et too many rattlers. But Miss Chuckie
+said you can ride."
+
+"I can," said Ashton, tightening the thong of his sombrero down across
+the back of his head and buttoning his coat.
+
+"Roped this Rocket hawss for you because Mr. Knowles wants his mail by
+sundown," remarked Gowan. "He shore can travel some when he feels like
+it. Don't know as you'll need your spurs. Here's a five-spot Mr.
+Knowles said to hand you by way of advance. Thought you might want to
+refresh yourself over at Stockchute. Wouldn't rather have another
+saddle and bridle, would you?"
+
+"Kindly thank Mr. Knowles for me," said Ashton, pocketing the five
+dollar bill. "No--the horse is hard-mouthed, but I prefer my own
+saddle and bridle."
+
+He drew his rifle from its sheath, wiped the dew from the butt, and
+tested the mechanism. The horse cocked his ears, but stood motionless
+while the rifle was taken out and replaced. Ashton picked up the reins
+from the ground and threw them over the horse's head. The beast did
+not swing around, but his ewe neck straightened and his entire body
+stiffened to a peculiar rigidity.
+
+Ashton tested the tightness of his saddle girth, and paused to gaze at
+the closed front door of the house. Aside from his saddle and
+burlesque sombrero, he looked every inch a puncher, both in dress and
+in bearing. But Miss Isobel missed the effect of his new _ensemble_.
+She missed also the interesting spectacle of his mounting.
+
+If he had never ridden a cow pony he would have been thrown and
+dragged the instant he put his foot in the narrow metal stirrup. The
+horse was watching him alertly, every muscle tense. Ashton smiled
+confidently, spoke to the beast in a quiet tone, and pulled on the off
+rein. The horse bent his head to the pull, for the moment off his
+guard. In a twinkling Ashton had his foot in the stirrup and was up in
+the saddle. His toe slipped into the other stirrup as the horse jumped
+sideways.
+
+The leap was tremendous, but it failed to unseat Ashton. It was
+instantly followed by other wild jumps--whirling forward and sidelong
+leaps, interspersed with frantic plunging and rearing. Gowan looked
+on, agape with amazement. The tenderfoot stuck fast on his flat little
+saddle and only once pulled leather. Rocket was not a star bucker, but
+he had thrown more than one half-baked cowboy.
+
+Finding that he could not unseat his rider, the beast suddenly gave
+over his plunging, and bolted at furious speed down the smooth slope
+towards Plum Creek. Before they had gone half a furlong Ashton
+realized that he was on a blooded horse of unusual speed and a
+runaway. He could not hope to pull down so tough-mouthed a beast with
+his ordinary curb. The best he could do was to throw all his weight on
+the right rein. Unable altogether to resist the steady tug at his
+head, the racing horse gradually swerved until he was headed across
+the mesa towards the jagged, snow-streaked twin crests of Split Peak.
+
+Horse and rider were still in the curve of their swift flight when
+Isobel Knowles came out into the porch, yawning behind her plump,
+sunbrowned hand. A glance at Gowan cut the yawn short. She looked
+alertly afield and at once caught sight of the runaway.
+
+"Kid!--O-oh!" she cried. "Mr. Ashton!--on Rocket!"
+
+Gowan spun about to her with a guilty start, but answered almost
+glibly: "You said he could ride, Miss Chuckie."
+
+"He'll--he'll be killed!--Daddy!"
+
+Knowles stepped out through the doorway, cocking his big blue-barreled
+Colt's. Gowan hastily pointed towards the runaway. Knowles looked, and
+dropped the revolver to his side. "What's up?" he growled.
+
+"Kid--he--he put Mr. Ashton on Rocket!" breathlessly answered his
+daughter.
+
+"Sorry to contradict you, Miss Chuckie," said Gowan. "He put himself
+on."
+
+"He's on yet," dryly commented the cowman. "May be something to that
+boy, after all."
+
+"But, Daddy!--"
+
+"Now, just stop fussing yourself, honey. He and Rocket are going
+smooth as axlegrease and bee-lining for Stockchute. How did the hawss
+start off?--skittish?"
+
+"Enough to make the tenderfoot pull leather," said Gowan.
+
+"If he stuck at all, with that fool saddle--!" rejoined Knowles.
+"Don't you worry, honey. He sure can fork a hawss--that tenderfoot."
+
+"Oh, yes," the girl sighed with relief. "If Rocket started off
+bucking, and he kept his seat, of course it's all right. See him take
+that gully!"
+
+"You sure gave me a start, honey, calling out that way.--Well, Kid,
+it's about time we were off. I'll get my hat."
+
+Gowan stepped nearer the girl as her father went inside. "I'll leave
+it to the tenderfoot to tell you, Miss Chuckie. He'll have to own up I
+gave him fair warning. Told him he wouldn't need his spurs, and asked
+if he'd have another bit and saddle; but it wasn't any use. He's the
+kind that won't take advice."
+
+"I know you meant it as a joke, Kid. You did not realize the danger of
+his narrow stirrups. Had he been caught in mounting or had he been
+thrown, he would almost certainly have been dragged. And for you to
+give him our one ugly hawss!"
+
+"You said he could ride," the puncher defended himself.
+
+"I'll forgive you for your joke--if he comes back safe," she
+qualified, without turning her gaze from the now distant horse and
+rider.
+
+Gowan started for the corral, the slight waddle of his bowlegged gait
+rather more pronounced than usual. When Knowles came out with his hat,
+the runaway was well up on the divide towards Dry Fork. Rocket was
+justifying his name.
+
+In a few seconds the flying horse and rider had disappeared down the
+far slope. The girl followed her father and Gowan to the corral, and
+after they had ridden off, she roped and saddled one of the three
+horses in the corral. She mounted and was off on the jump, riding
+straight for the nearest point on the summit of the divide.
+
+As, presently, she came up towards the top of the rise, she gazed
+anxiously ahead towards Dry Fork. Before she could see over the bend
+down to the creek channel, she caught sight of a cloud of dust far out
+on the mesa beyond the stream. She smiled with relief and wheeled
+about to return. The tenderfoot had safely crossed the stream bed. He
+would have Rocket well in hand before they came to rough country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE SNAKE
+
+
+Early in the afternoon, having nothing else to do, Isobel again
+saddled up and started off towards Dry Fork. Her intention was to ride
+out on the road to Stockchute and meet Ashton, if he was not too
+late.
+
+As she rode up one side of the divide, a hat appeared over the bend of
+the other side. She could not mistake the high peak of that comic
+opera sombrero. Ashton was almost back to the ranch. Her first thought
+was that he had gone part way, and given up the trip. The big sombrero
+bobbed up and down in an odd manner. She guessed the cause even before
+Ashton's head and body appeared, rising and falling rhythmically. She
+stared as Rocket swept up into view, covering the ground with a
+long-strided trot.
+
+Ashton waved to her. She waved back. A few moments later they were
+close together. As she spun her pony around, he pulled in his horse to
+a walk, patting the beast's neck and speaking to him caressingly.
+
+"Back already?" she asked. "Surely, you've not been to Stockchute--Yes,
+you have!" Her experienced eye was taking in every indication of his
+horse's condition. "He's been traveling; but you've handled him well."
+
+"He's grand!" said Ashton. "Been putting him through his paces. I
+suppose he is your father's best mount."
+
+"Daddy and Kid ride him when they're in a hurry or there's no other
+horse handy."
+
+"You can't mean--? Then perhaps I can have him again occasionally."
+
+"You like him, really?"
+
+"All he needs is a little management," replied Ashton, again patting
+the horse's lean neck.
+
+"If you wish to take him in hand, I'll assign him to you. No one else
+wants him."
+
+"As your rural deliveryman's mount--" began Ashton. He stopped to show
+the bulging bag slung under his arm. "Here's the mail. Do you wish
+your letters now?"
+
+"Thank you, no."
+
+"Here is this, however," he said, handing her a folded slip of paper.
+
+She opened it and looked at the writing inside. It was a receipt from
+the postmaster at Stockchute to Lafayette Ashton for certain letters
+delivered for mailing. The address of the letter to Thomas Blake was
+given in full. The girl colored, bit her lip, and murmured
+contritely: "You have turned the tables on me. I deserved it!"
+
+"Please don't take it that way!" he begged. "My purpose was merely to
+assure you the letter was mailed. After all, I am a stranger, Miss
+Knowles."
+
+"No, not now," she differed.
+
+"It's very kind of you to say it! Yet it's just as well for me to
+start off with no doubts in your mind, in view of the fact that in two
+or three weeks--"
+
+"Yes?" she asked, as he hesitated.
+
+"I--Your father will hardly keep me more than two weeks, unless--unless
+I make good," he answered.
+
+"I guess you needn't worry about that," she replied, somewhat
+ambiguously.
+
+He shrugged. "It is very good of you to say it, Miss Knowles. I know I
+shall fail. Can you expect anyone who has always lived within touch of
+millions, one who has spent more in four years at college than all
+this range is worth--He cut my allowance repeatedly, until it was only
+a beggarly twenty-five thousand."
+
+"Twenty-five thousand dollars!" exclaimed Isobel. "You had all that
+to--to throw away in a single year?"
+
+"He cut me down to it the last year--a mere bagatelle to what I had
+all the time I was at college and Tech.," replied Ashton, his eyes
+sparkling at the recollection. "He wished me to get in thick with the
+New Yorkers, the sons of the Wall Street leaders. He gave me leave to
+draw on him without limit. I did what he wished me to do,--I got in
+with the most exclusive set. Ah-h!--the way I made the dollars fly!
+Before I graduated I was the acknowledged leader. What's more, I led
+my class, too--when I chose."
+
+"When you chose!" she echoed. "And now what are you going to do?"
+
+The question punctured his reminiscent elation. He sagged down in his
+saddle. "I don't know," he answered despondently. "_Mon Dieu!_ To come
+down to this--a common laborer for wages--after _that_! When I think
+of it--when I think of it!"
+
+"You are not to think of it again!" she commanded with kindly
+severity. "What you are to remember all the time is that you are now a
+man and honestly earning your own living, and no longer a--a leech
+battening on the sustenance produced by others."
+
+He winced. "Was that my fault?"
+
+"No, it was your father's. I marvel that he did not utterly ruin
+you."
+
+"He has! In his last will he cuts me off with only a dollar."
+
+"So that was it?--And you think that ruined you? I say it saved you!"
+she went on with the same kindly severity. "You were a parasite. Now
+the chance is yours to prove that you have the makings of a man. You
+have started to prove it. You shall not stop proving it. You are not
+going to be a quitter."
+
+"No!" he declared, straightening under her bright gaze. "I will not
+quit. I will try my best to make good as long as the chance is given
+me."
+
+"Now you're talking!" she commended him breezily.
+
+"How could I do otherwise when you asked me?" he replied with a grave
+sincerity far more complimentary than mere gallantry.
+
+She colored with pleasure and began to tell him of the cattle and
+their ways.
+
+When they reached the corral she complimented him in turn by allowing
+him to offsaddle her horse. They walked on down to the house and
+seated themselves in the porch. As he opened the bag of mail for her
+she noticed that her hand was empty and turned to look back towards
+the corral.
+
+"Your receipt from the postmaster," she remarked; "I must have dropped
+it."
+
+He sprang up. "If you wish to keep it, I shall go back and find it for
+you."
+
+"No, oh, no; unless you want it yourself," she replied.
+
+"Not I. The matter is closed, thanks to your kindness," he declared,
+again seating himself.
+
+He was right, in so far as they were concerned. Yet the matter was
+not closed. That evening, when Knowles and Gowan returned from their
+day of range riding, the younger man noticed a crumpled slip of paper
+lying against the foot of the corral post below the place where he
+tossed up his saddle. He picked it up and looked to see if it was of
+any value. An oath burst from his thin-drawn lips.
+
+"Shut up, Kid!" remonstrated Knowles. "I'm no more squeamish than
+most, but you know I don't like any cussing so near Chuckie."
+
+"Look at this!" cried Gowan--"Enough to make anybody cuss!"
+
+He thrust out the slip of paper close before his employer's eyes.
+Knowles took it and read it through with deliberate care.
+
+"Well?" he said. "It's a receipt from the postmaster to Ashton for
+those letters I sent over by him. What of it?"
+
+"_Your_ letters?" asked Gowan, taken aback. "Did you write that one
+what is most particularly mentioned, the one to that big engineer
+Blake?"
+
+"No. What would I be doing, writing to him or any engineer? They're
+just the people I don't want to have any doings with."
+
+"Then if you didn't write him, who did?" questioned Gowan, his mouth
+again tightening.
+
+"Why, I reckon you'll have to do your own guessing, Kid--unless it
+might be Ashton did it."
+
+"That's one leg roped," said Gowan. "Can you guess why he'd be writing
+to that engineer?"
+
+"Lord, no. He may have the luck to know him. Mr. Blake is a mighty big
+man, judging from all accounts; but money stands for a lot in the
+cities and back East, and Ashton's father is one of the richest men in
+Chicago. I looked it up in the magazine that told about his helping to
+back the Zariba Dam project."
+
+"That's another leg noosed--on the second throw," said Gowan. "Another
+try or two, and we'll have the skunk ready for hog-tying."
+
+"How's that?" exclaimed the cowman. "You've got something up your
+sleeve."
+
+"No, it's that striped skunk that's doing the crooked playing,"
+snapped Gowan. "Can't you savvy his game? It's all a frame-up--his
+sending off his guide and outfit, so's to let on to you he'd been
+busted up and kicked out by his dad. You take him in to keep his
+pretty carcass from the coyotes--which has saved them from being
+poisoned."
+
+"Now, look here, Kid, only trouble about you you're too apt to go off
+at half-cock. This young fellow may not be--"
+
+"He shore is a snake, Mr. Knowles, and this receipt proves it on him,"
+broke in the puncher. "Ain't you taken him into your employ?--ain't
+you treated him like he was a man?"
+
+"Well, 'tisn't every busted millionaire would have asked for work, and
+he seems to mean it."
+
+"Just a bluff! You don't savvy the game yet. Busted millionaire--_bah!_
+He's the coyote of that bunch of reclamation wolves. He comes out here
+to sneak around and get the lay of things. We happen to catch him
+rustling. To save his cussed carcass, he lets out about who his dad
+is. Course he couldn't know we'd got all the reports on that Zariba
+Dam and who backed the engineer, nor that we'd know all about Blake."
+
+"Well?" asked Knowles, frowning.
+
+"So he works us for suckers,--worms in here with us where he can learn
+all about you and your holdings; ropes a job with you, and gets off
+his report to that engineer Blake, first time he rides over to town."
+
+"Is that all your argument?" asked Knowles.
+
+"Ain't it enough?" rejoined Gowan. "Ain't he and that bunch all in
+cahoots together? Ain't this sneaking cuss's dad either the partner or
+the boss of Blake? Ain't Blake engaged in reclamation projects? You
+shore see all that. What follows?--It's all a frame-up, I tell you.
+Young Ashton comes out here as a sort of forerider for his concern;
+finds out what his people want to know, and now he's sent in his
+report to Blake. Next thing happens, Blake'll be turning up with a
+surveying outfit."
+
+Knowles scratched his head. "Hum-m-m--You sure put up a mighty stiff
+argument, Kid. I'm not so sure, though.... Um-m-m--Strikes me some of
+your knots might be tighter. First place, there wasn't any play-acting
+about the way the boy went plumb to pieces there at the waterhole.
+Next place, a man like his father, that's piled up a mint of money,
+isn't going to send out his son as forerider in a hostile country.
+Lastly, I've read a lot more about that engineer Blake than you have,
+and I've sized him up as a man who won't do anything that isn't square
+and open."
+
+"Maybe he ain't in on the dirty side of the deal," admitted Gowan.
+"How about this letter, though?"
+
+"Just a friendly writing, like as not," answered the cowman. "No,
+Kid--only trouble with you is you're too anxious over the interests of
+Dry Mesa range. I appreciate it, boy, and so does Chuckie. But that's
+no reason for you to take every newcomer for a wolf 'til he proves
+he's only a dog."
+
+"You won't do anything?" asked the puncher.
+
+"What d'you want me to do?"
+
+"Fire him--run him off Dry Mesa," snapped Gowan.
+
+"Sorry I can't oblige you, Kid," replied Knowles. "You mean well, but
+you'll have to make a better showing before I'll turn adrift any man
+that seems to be trying to make good."
+
+Gowan looked down. After a brief pause he replied with unexpected
+submissiveness: "All right, Mr. Knowles. You're the boss. Reckon you
+know best. I don't savvy these city folks."
+
+"Glad you admit it," said Knowles. "You're all wrong in sizing him up
+that way. I've a notion he's got a lot of good in him, spite of his
+city rearing. I wouldn't object, though, if you wanted to test him out
+with a little harmless hazing, long as you didn't go too far."
+
+"No," declined Gowan. "I've got my own notion of what he is. There's
+just one way to deal with skunks, and that is, don't fool with them."
+
+The cowman accepted this as conclusive. But when, a little later,
+Ashton met Gowan at the supper table he was rendered uneasy by the
+cold glint in the puncher's gray eyes. As nothing was said about the
+postmaster's receipt, he could conjecture no reason for the look other
+than that Gowan was planning to render him ridiculous with some cowboy
+trick.
+
+Isobel had assured him with utmost confidence that the testing of his
+horsemanship by means of Rocket had been intended only as a practical
+joke, and that Gowan would never have permitted him to mount the horse
+had he considered it at all dangerous. Yet the fellow might next
+undertake jokes containing no element of physical peril and
+consequently all the more humiliating unless evaded.
+
+In apprehension of this, the tenderfoot lay awake most of that night
+and fully half of the next. His watch was fruitless. Each night Gowan
+and the other men left him strictly alone in his far dark corner of
+the bunkhouse. In the daytime the puncher was studiously polite to him
+during the few hours that he was not off on the range.
+
+The third evening, after supper, Gowan handed Isobel the horny,
+half-flattened rattles of an unusually large rattlesnake.
+
+"What is it? Do you wish me to guess his length?" she asked, evidently
+surprised that he should fetch her so commonplace an object. "I make
+it four feet."
+
+"You're three inches short," he replied.
+
+"Well, what about it?" she inquired.
+
+"Nothing--only I just happened to get him up near the bunkhouse, Miss
+Chuckie. Thought I'd tell you, in case he has a mate around."
+
+"We must all look sharp. You, too, Mr. Ashton. They are more apt to
+strike without warning, this time of year."
+
+"I know," remarked Ashton. "It's before they cast their old skin, and
+it makes them blind."
+
+"Too early for that," corrected Knowles. "I figure it's the long spell
+of the summer's heat. Gets on their nerves, same as with us."
+
+"They shore are mighty like some humans," observed Gowan. "Look at the
+way they like to snuggle up in your blankets on a cool night.
+Remember how I used to carry a hair rope on spring round-up?"
+
+"I remember that they used to crawl into the bunkhouse before the
+floor was laid," said Isobel. She smiled at Ashton. "That was the Dry
+Mesa reptilian age. I first learned to handle a 'gun' shooting at
+rattlers. There were so many we had to make it a rule to kill everyone
+we could. But there hasn't been one killed so near the house for
+years."
+
+"They often go in pairs. This one, though, may have been a lone
+stray," added Gowan. He looked at his employer. "Talking about strays,
+guess I'd best go out in the morning and head back that Bar-Lazy-J
+bunch. I can take an iron along and brand those two calves, same
+trip."
+
+Knowles nodded and returned to his Government report. The two young
+men and Isobel began an evening's entertainment at the piano. Ashton
+enjoyed himself immensely. Though so frank and unconstrained in
+manner, the girl was as truly refined as the most fastidiously reared
+ladies of the East.
+
+At the end of the delightful evening he withdrew with Gowan to the
+bunkhouse, reluctant to leave, yet aglow with pleasure. Isobel had so
+charmed him that he lay in his bunk forgetful of all else than her
+limpid blue eyes and dimpled cheeks. But after his two nights of
+broken rest he could not long resist the heaviness that pressed
+together his eyelids. He fell asleep, smiling at the recollection of
+the girl's gracious, "Good-night and pleasant dreams!"
+
+With such a kindly wish from her, his dreams certainly should have
+been heavenly. Yet he began the night by sinking into so profound a
+sleep that he had no dreams whatever. When at last he did rouse to the
+dream-state of consciousness, it was not to enjoy any pleasant fantasy
+of music and flowers.
+
+He was lying in Deep Caņon, down at the very bottom of those gloomy
+depths. About him was an awful stillness. The river of the abyss was
+no longer roaring. It had risen up, up, up to the very rim of the
+precipices--and all the tremendous weight of its waters was above him,
+bearing down upon him, smothering him, crushing in his chest! He
+sought to shriek, and found himself dumb.
+
+Suddenly an Indian stood over him, a gigantic Indian with feet set
+upon his breast. The red giant was a medicine man, for he clashed and
+rattled an enormous gourd full of bowlders.
+
+The rattle sounded sharper, shriller, more vibrant in the ears of the
+rousing sleeper. His eyelids fluttered, rose a little way, and snapped
+wide apart. His eyes, bared of their covers, glared in utter horror of
+that which they saw. Their pupils dilated, their balls bulged as if
+about to burst from the sockets.
+
+The weight was still on his chest,--a weight far more to be dreaded
+than a caņon full of water or the foot of an Indian Titan. It was a
+weight of living, quivering coils. Above those coils, clearly
+illuminated in the full daylight that streamed through the open door
+of the bunkhouse, there upreared a hideous gaping maw, set with four
+slender curved fangs of dazzling whiteness.
+
+The snake's eyes, green as emeralds, glared down into the face of the
+man with such intense malignancy that they seemed to stream forth a
+cold evil light. Fortunately he was paralyzed with fright. The
+slightest movement would have caused that fanged maw to lash down into
+his face.
+
+Something partly obscured the light in the doorway. Ashton was too
+terrified to heed. But the snake was more sensitive to the change in
+the light. Without altering the deadly poise of its head, it again
+sounded its shrill, menacing rattle. The shadow passed and the light
+streamed in as before. The rattling ceased. There followed a pause of
+a few seconds' duration--To the man every second was an age-long
+period of horror.
+
+A faint metallic click came from across the room. Slight as was the
+sound, the irritated snake again set its rattle to quivering. The
+triangular head flattened back for the delayed stroke at the ashen
+face of the man. The billowing coils stiffened--the stroke started. In
+the same instant came a report that to the strained ears of the man
+sounded like the crashing roar of a cannon.
+
+[Illustration: It sounded its shrill, menacing rattle]
+
+The head and forepart of the snake's body shot alongside his face,
+writhing in swift convulsions. The first touch of its cold scales
+against his cheek broke the spell of horror that had bound him. He
+jerked his head aside, and flung out his left hand to push the hideous
+thing from him. As his fingers thrust away the nearest coil, the head
+flipped around on its half-severed neck, and the deadly jaws
+automatically gaped and snapped together. Two of the dripping poison
+fangs struck in the cushion of flesh on the outer edge of Ashton's
+hand. With a shriek, he flung the dying snake on the floor and put the
+wounded hand to his mouth.
+
+"He struck you!" cried the voice of Isobel, "but only on the hand,
+thank goodness! Wait, I'll fix it. Lie still."
+
+She came swiftly across the room, thrusting a long-barreled automatic
+pistol into its holster under a fold of her skirt. Her other hand drew
+out a locket that was suspended in her bosom.
+
+"Whiskey! I'm bitten!" panted Ashton, sucking frantically at his
+wounds. "Quick! I'm bitten. Give me whiskey!"
+
+"Steady, steady," she reassured. "It's not bad--only on your hand.
+Give it to me. Here's something a thousand times better than
+whiskey--permanganate."
+
+While speaking, she caught up his neckerchief from the head of the
+bunk and knotted it about the wrist of the wounded hand tightly enough
+to check the circulation.
+
+"Now hold it steady," she directed. "Won't have to use a knife. You
+tore open the holes when you jerked off the horrid thing."
+
+Obedient but still sweating with fear, he held up the bleeding hand.
+She had opened her locket, in which were a number of small,
+dark-purple crystals. Two of the larger ones she thrust lengthwise as
+deeply as she could into the little slits gashed by the fangs. Another
+large and two small crystals were all that she could force into the
+openings.
+
+"There!" she cheerily exclaimed. "That will kill the poison in short
+order, and will not hurt you a particle. It's the best thing there is
+to cheat rattlers,--just cheap, ordinary permanganate of potash. If
+people only had sense enough always to carry a few crystals, no one
+would ever die of rattlesnake bites."
+
+"I've--I've heard that whiskey--" began Ashton.
+
+"Yes, and far more victims die from the whiskey than from the bites,"
+rejoined Isobel.
+
+"But a stimulant--"
+
+"Stimulant, then heart depressant--first up, then down--that's
+alcohol. No, you'll get only one poison, the snake's, this time. So
+don't worry. You'll soon be all right. Even had you been struck in the
+face, quick action with permanganate would have saved you."
+
+He shuddered. "Ah!... But if you had not come!"
+
+"It was fortunate, wasn't it?" she remarked. "I did not know you were
+in here. I was going up to the corral and heard the rattle as I came
+past. It was so faint that I might not have noticed it, had not Kid
+told of killing the rattler yesterday."
+
+Ashton stared fearfully at his blackening hand. Isobel smiled and
+began to unknot the neckerchief.
+
+"There is nothing to fear," she insisted. "That is due only to lack of
+circulation. You'll soon be all right. Come up to the house as soon as
+you can and get two or three cups of coffee. I'll tell Yuki."
+
+She hastened out. When he had made sure that the still writhing snake
+was far over on the floor, he slipped from his bunk and dressed as
+quickly as was possible without the use of his numbed hand. Shirt,
+trousers, boots--he stopped for no more, but hurried after Isobel.
+Whether because of the effects of the poison or merely as the reaction
+of the shock, he felt faint and dizzy. Several cups of hot strong
+coffee, however, went far towards restoring him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+COMING EVENTS
+
+
+Knowles had gone with Gowan to cut out and drive back the stray cattle
+belonging to the adjoining range. They returned during the regular
+supper hour. The cowman washed quickly and hastened in to the table.
+Gowan, however, loitered just outside the door, fastening and
+refastening his neckerchief. He entered the dining-room while Isobel
+was in the midst of telling her father about the snake.
+
+"Did you hear, Kid?" she asked, when she finished her vivid account.
+
+"Yes, Miss Chuckie. I was slicking-up close 'longside the door. I
+heard all you told," he replied as he took his seat at the corner next
+to the animated girl. "We shore have got one mighty lucky tenderfoot
+on this range."
+
+"Indeed, yes!" exclaimed Ashton. "Had not Miss Chuckie chanced to be
+passing as the monster rattled--You know, she says that she might not
+have heeded it but for your killing the other snake yesterday. That
+put her on the alert."
+
+The puncher stared across the table at the city man with a coldly
+speculative gaze. "You shore are a lucky tenderfoot," he repeated.
+"'Tain't every fellow gets that close to a rattler this time of year
+and comes out of it as easy as you have. All I can see is you're kind
+of pale yet around the gills."
+
+Ashton held up his bandaged left hand. "Ah, but I have also this
+memento of the occasion. It is far from a pleasant one, I assure
+you."
+
+"Feels 'most as bad as a bee sting, don't it?" ironically condoled the
+puncher.
+
+"What I can't make out," interposed Knowles, "is how that rattler got
+up into Mr. Ashton's bunk."
+
+Gowan again stared across at the tenderfoot, this time with unblinking
+solemnity. "Can't say, Mr. Knowles," he replied. "Except it might be
+that desperado guide of his came around in the night and brought him
+Mr. Rattler for bedfellow."
+
+"Oh, Kid!" remonstrated Isobel. "It's not a joking matter!"
+
+"No, you're dead right, Miss Chuckie," he agreed. "There shore ain't
+any joke about it."
+
+"Ah, but perhaps I can make one," gayly dissented Ashton. "Had you not
+interfered, Miss Chuckie, the poor snake would have taken one bite,
+and then curled up and died. I'm so charged with nicotine, you know."
+
+Neither Isobel nor the puncher smiled at this ancient witticism. But
+Knowles burst into a hearty laugh, which was caught up and reënforced
+by the hitherto silent haymakers.
+
+"By--James! Ashton, you'll do!" declared the cowman, wiping his eyes.
+"When a tenderfoot can let off a joke like that on himself it's a sure
+sign he's getting acclimated. Yes, you'll make a puncher, some day."
+
+Ashton smiled with gratification, and looked at Isobel in eager-eyed
+appeal for the confirmation of the statement. She smiled and nodded.
+
+Upon his return from his remarkable ride to town she had assured him
+that he need not worry. Her present kindly look and the words of her
+father might have been expected to remove his last doubts. Such in
+fact was the result for the remainder of the evening.
+
+But that night the new employé must have given much anxious thought to
+the question of his future and his great need to "make good." The
+liveliness of his concern was shown by his behavior during the next
+two weeks. His zeal for work astonished Knowles quite as much as his
+efforts to be agreeable to his fellow employés gratified Miss Isobel.
+He charmed the Japanese cook with his praise of the cooking, he
+flattered the haymakers with his interest in their opinions. Towards
+the girl and her father he was impeccably respectful.
+
+Within ten days he was "Lafe" to everybody except Gowan and the Jap.
+The latter addressed him as "Mistah Lafe"; Gowan kept to the
+noncommittal "Ashton." The puncher had become more taciturn than ever,
+but missed none of the home evenings in the parlor. He watched Ashton
+with catlike closeness when Isobel was present, and seemed puzzled
+that the interloper refrained from courting her.
+
+"Don't savvy that tenderfoot," he remarked one day to Knowles. "All
+his talk about his dad being a multimillionaire--Acted like it at the
+start-off. Came down to this candidate-for-office way of comporting
+himself. It ain't natural."
+
+"Not when he's on the same range with Chuckie?" queried the cowman,
+his eyes twinkling. "Why don't you ever go into Stockchute and paint
+the town red?"
+
+"That's another thing," insisted Gowan. "He started in with Miss
+Chuckie brash as all hell. Now he acts towards her like I feel."
+
+"That's natural. He soon found out she's a lady."
+
+"No, it ain't natural, Mr. Knowles--not in him, it ain't. Nor it ain't
+natural for him to be so all-fired polite to everybody, nor his
+pestering you to find work for him."
+
+"And it's not natural for a tenderfoot to gentle a hawss like Rocket
+the way he's done already," rallied Knowles. "That crazy hawss follows
+him about like a dog."
+
+"Yes; Ashton feeds him sugar, like he does the rest of you," rejoined
+the puncher. "It ain't natural in his brand of tenderfoot--Bound to
+ride out, if there's any riding to do; bound to fuss and stew around
+the corral; bound to help with the haying; bound to help haul the
+water; bound to practice with his rope every moment he ain't doing
+something else. Can't tell me there ain't a nigger in that woodpile."
+
+"Now, don't go to hunting out any more mares' nests, Kid," admonished
+Knowles. "He's just a busted millionaire, that's all; and he's proving
+he realizes it. Guess the smash scared him. He's afraid he can't make
+good. Chuckie says he thinks I'll turn him adrift if he doesn't hustle
+enough to earn his salt."
+
+"Why not fire him anyway? You don't need him, and you won't need him,"
+argued the puncher.
+
+"Well, he helps keep Chuckie entertained. With you and him both on the
+place, she might conclude to stay over the winter, this year."
+
+Gowan's mouth straightened to a thin slit. "Better send her to Denver
+right off."
+
+"Look here, Kid," reproved the cowman. "You've had your chance, and
+you've got it yet. I've never interfered with you, and I'm not going
+to with him. It's for Chuckie to pick the winner. Like as not it'll be
+some man in town, for all I know. She has the say. Whether he wears a
+derby or a sombrero, she's to have her own choice. I don't care if
+he's a millionaire or a busted millionaire or a bronco buster,
+provided he's a man, and provided I'm sure he'll treat her right."
+
+Gowan lapsed into a sullen silence.
+
+Mounted as before on Rocket, Ashton had already made a second trip to
+Stockchute for mail, returning almost as quickly as on his wild first
+ride. Monday of his third week at the ranch he was sent on his third
+trip. As before, he started at dawn. But this time he did not come
+racing back early enough for a belated noon meal as he had on each of
+the previous occasions.
+
+By mid-afternoon Isobel began to grow uneasy. Remarkable as had been
+the efforts of his new rider's training, there was the not improbable
+chance that Rocket had reverted to his ugly tricks. She shuddered as
+she pictured the battered corpse of the city man dragging over the
+rocks and through the brush, with a foot twisted fast in one of the
+narrow iron stirrups.
+
+Her father and Gowan were off on their usual work of inspecting the
+bunches of cattle scattered about the range. The other men were as
+busy as ever mowing more hay and hauling in that which was cured. She
+was alone at the ranch with the Jap. At four o'clock she saddled her
+best horse and rode out towards Dry Fork. She hoped to sight Ashton
+from the divide. But there was no sign of any horseman out on the
+wide stretch of sagebrush flats.
+
+She rode down to Dry Fork, crossed over the sandy channel, and started
+on at a gallop along the half-beaten road that wound away through the
+sagebrush towards the distant Split Peak. An hour found her nearing
+the piņon clad hills on the far side of Dry Mesa, with still no sign
+of Ashton.
+
+By this time she had worked herself into a fever of excitement and
+dread. Her relief was correspondingly great when at last she saw him
+coming towards her around the bend of the nearest hill. But his horse
+was walking and he was bent over in the saddle as if injured or
+greatly fatigued. Puzzled and again apprehensive, she urged her pony
+to sprinting speed.
+
+When he heard the approaching hoofs Ashton looked up as if startled.
+But he did not wave to her or raise his sombrero. As she came racing
+up she scrutinized his dejected figure for wounds or bruises. There
+was nothing to indicate that he had been either shot or thrown. His
+sullen look when she drew up beside him not unnaturally changed her
+anxiety to vexation.
+
+"What made you so slow?" she queried. "You know how eager I am for the
+mail each time. You might as well have ridden your own hawss."
+
+"It--has come," he muttered.
+
+"What?" she demanded.
+
+"The letter from him."
+
+"Him?" echoed the girl, trying hard to cover her confusion with a look
+of surprise.
+
+His dejection deepened as he observed her heightened color and the
+light in her eyes. "Yes, from him," he mumbled.
+
+"Oh, you mean Mr. Blake, I suppose," she replied. Lightly as she
+spoke, she could not suppress the quiver of eagerness in her voice.
+"If you will kindly give it to me now."
+
+He drew out a letter, not from among the other mail in his pouch, but
+from his pocket. Her look of surprise showed that she was struck with
+the oddness of this. She was too excited, however, to consider what
+might be its meaning. She tore open the letter and read it swiftly.
+Her sparkling eyes and glowing cheeks when she looked up served only
+to increase Ashton's gloom.
+
+"So the fellow is coming," he groaned. "What else could I have
+expected?"
+
+The girl held out the open letter to him. It was in typewriting,
+addressed from Chicago, and read:--
+
+  Dear Madam:
+
+  In reply to your letter of inquiry regarding an inspection to
+  determine the feasibility of irrigating certain lands in your
+  vicinity--my fee for personal inspection and opinion would be
+  $50. per day and expenses, if I came as consulting engineer.
+  However, I am about to make a trip to Colorado. If you can
+  furnish good ranch fare for my wife, son, and self as guests,
+  will look over your situation without charge. Wife wishes to
+  rough-it, but must have milk and eggs. Will leave servants in
+  car at Stockchute, where we shall expect a conveyance to meet us
+  Thursday, the 25th inst., if terms agreeable.
+
+                                       Respectfully yours,
+                                                   THOMAS BLAKE.
+
+Ashton crumpled the letter in his clenched hand as he had crumpled the
+letter from his father's lawyers.
+
+"He is coming! he really is coming!" he gasped. "Thursday--only three
+days! Genevieve too!"
+
+"And his son!" cried Isobel, too excited to heed the dismay in her
+companion's look and tone. "He and his family, too, as my guests!"
+
+"Yes," said Ashton bitterly. "And what of it when he floods you off
+your cattle range? By another year or two, the irrigation farmers will
+be settling all over this mesa, thick as flies."
+
+"Oh, no; it is probable that Mr. Blake will find there is no chance to
+water Dry Mesa," she replied, in a tone strangely nonchalant
+considering her former expressions of apprehension. She drew the
+crumpled letter from his relaxing fingers, and smoothed it out for a
+second reading.
+
+"'Wife, son, and self,'" she quoted. "Son? How old is he?"
+
+"I don't know. They've been married nearly two years," muttered
+Ashton.
+
+"Then it's a baby!--oh! oh! how lovely!" shrieked the girl. "And its
+mamma wants to rough it! She shall have every egg and chicken on the
+place--and gallons of cream! We shall take the skim milk."
+
+Still Ashton failed to enthuse. "To them that have, shall be given,
+and from him who has lost millions shall be taken all that's left!" he
+gibed.
+
+"No, we'll still have the skim milk," she bantered, refusing to notice
+his cynical bitterness.
+
+"I'm a day laborer!" he went on, still more bitterly. "I'm afraid of
+losing even my skim milk--And two weeks ago I thought myself certain
+of three times the millions that he will get when her father dies!"
+
+"No use crying over spilt milk, or spilt cream, either!" she replied.
+
+The note of sympathetic concern under her raillery brought a glimmer
+of hopefulness into his moody eyes.
+
+"If I did not think your father will drive me away!" he murmured.
+
+"Why should he?" she asked.
+
+"Because when Blake comes--" Ashton paused and shifted to a question.
+"Will you tell your father about their coming?"
+
+"Of course. I did not tell him about writing, because it would only
+have increased his suspense. But now--Let's hurry back!"
+
+A cut of her quirt set her pony into a lope. Rocket needed no urging.
+He followed and maintained a position close behind the galloping pony
+without breaking out of his rangy trot. Occasionally Isobel flung back
+a gay remark over her shoulder. Ashton did not respond. He rode after
+her, silent and depressed, his eyes fixed longingly on her graceful
+form, ever fleeing forward before him as he advanced.
+
+Once clear of the sagebrush, she drew rein for him to come up. They
+rode side by side across Dry Fork and over the divide. When they
+stopped at the corral she would have unsaddled her pony had he not
+begged leave to do her the service. As reward, she waited until he
+could accompany her to the house.
+
+They found her father and Gowan resting in the cool porch after a
+particularly hard day's ride. The puncher was strumming soft melodies
+on a guitar. Knowles was peering at his report of the Reclamation
+Service, held to windward of a belching cloud of pipe smoke. His
+daughter darted to him regardless of the offending incense.
+
+"Oh, Daddy!" she cried. "What do you think! Mr. Blake is coming to
+visit us!"
+
+"Blake?" repeated the cowman, staring blankly over his pipe.
+
+"Yes, Mr. Blake, the engineer--the great Thomas Blake of the Zariba
+Dam."
+
+"By--James!" swore Gowan, dropping his guitar and springing up to
+confront Ashton with deadly menace in his cold eyes. "This is what
+comes of nursing scotched rattlers! This here tenderfoot skunk has
+been foreriding for that engineer! I warned you, Mr. Knowles! I told
+you he had sent for him to come out here and cut up our range with his
+damned irrigation schemes!"
+
+"I send for Blake--I?" protested Ashton. He burst into a discordant
+laugh.
+
+"Laugh, will you?" said Gowan, dropping his hand to his hip.
+
+The girl flung herself before him. "Stop! stop, Kid! Are you locoed?
+He had nothing to do with it. I myself sent for Mr. Blake."
+
+"_You!_" cried Gowan.
+
+The cowman slowly stood up, his eyes fixed on the girl in an
+incredulous stare. "Chuckie," he half whispered, "you couldn't ha'
+done it. You're--you're dreaming, honey!"
+
+"No. Listen, Daddy! It's been growing on you so--your fear that we'll
+lose our range. I thought if Mr. Blake came and told you it can't be
+done--Don't you see?"
+
+"What if he finds it can?" huskily demanded Knowles.
+
+"He can't. I'm sure he can't. If he builds a reservoir, where could he
+get enough water to fill it? The watershed above us is too small. He
+couldn't impound more than three thousand acre feet of flood waters
+at the utmost."
+
+"How about the whole river going to waste, down in Deep Caņon?"
+queried her father.
+
+"Heavens, Mr. Knowles! How would he ever get a drop of water out of
+that awful chasm?" exclaimed Ashton. "I looked down into it. The river
+is thousands of feet down. It must be way below the level of Dry
+Mesa."
+
+"I'm not so sure about that," replied the cowman. "Holes are mighty
+deceiving."
+
+"Well, what if it ain't so deep as the mesa?" argued Gowan, for once
+half in accord with Ashton. "It shore is deep enough, ain't it? Even
+allowing that this man Blake is the biggest engineer in the U.S.,
+how's he going to pump that water up over the rim of the caņon? The
+devil himself couldn't do it."
+
+"If I am mistaken regarding the depth, that is, if the river really is
+higher than the mesa," remarked Ashton, "there is the possibility that
+it might be tapped by a tunnel through the side of High Mesa. But even
+if it is possible, it still is quite out of the question. The cost
+would be prohibitive."
+
+"You see, Daddy!" exclaimed Isobel. "Lafe knows. He's an engineer
+himself."
+
+"How's that?" growled her father, frowning heavily at Ashton. "You
+never told me you're an engineer."
+
+"I told Miss Chuckie the first day I met her," explained Ashton. "Ever
+since then I've been so busy trying to be something else--"
+
+"Shore you have!" jeered Gowan.
+
+"But about Mr. Blake, Daddy?" interposed Isobel. "I'm certain he'll
+find that no irrigation project is possible; and if _he_ says so, you
+will be able to give up worrying about it."
+
+"So that's your idea," he replied. "Of course, honey, you meant well.
+But he's a pretty big man, according to all the reports. What if he--"
+The cowman stopped, unable to state the calamity he dreaded.
+
+"Yes, what if?" bravely declared his daughter. "Isn't it best to know
+the worst, and have it over?"
+
+"Well--I don't know but what you're right, honey."
+
+"It's your say, Mr. Knowles," put in Gowan. "If you want the
+tenderfeet on your range, all right. If you don't, I'll engage to head
+back any bunch of engineers agoing, and I don't care whether they're
+dogies or longhorns."
+
+"There is to be no surveying party," explained Isobel. "Mr. Blake is
+coming to visit us with his wife and baby. Here is his letter."
+
+"Hey?" ejaculated Knowles. He read the letter with frowning
+deliberation, and passed it on to Gowan. "Well, he seems to be square
+enough. Guess we'll have to send over for him, honey, long as you
+asked him to come."
+
+"Oh, you will, Daddy!" she cried. She gave him a delicious kiss and
+cuddled against his shoulder coaxingly. "You'll let me go over in the
+buckboard for them, won't you?"
+
+"Kind of early in the season for you to begin hankering after city
+folks," he sought to tease her.
+
+"But think of the baby!" she exclaimed as excitedly as a little girl
+over the prospect of a doll. "A baby on our ranch! I simply must see
+it at the earliest possible moment! Besides, it will look better for
+our hospitality for me to meet Mrs. Blake at the train, since
+she--That's something I meant to ask you, Lafe. What does Mr. Blake
+mean by saying they will leave the servants in the car?"
+
+"I presume they are traveling in Mr. Leslie's private car, and will
+have it sidetracked at Stockchute," answered Ashton.
+
+"_Whee-ew!_" ejaculated Knowles. "Private car! And we're supposed to
+feed them!"
+
+"It is just because of the change we will give them that they are
+coming out here," surmised Isobel. "Look at the letter again. Mr.
+Blake expressly writes that his wife wishes to rough-it. Of course she
+cannot know what real roughing-it means. But if she is coming to us
+without a maid, we shall like her as much as--as Mr. Blake."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+SELF-DEFENSE
+
+
+Nothing more was said about the trip to town until late Wednesday
+evening. As Knowles slammed shut his book and the young men rose to
+withdraw to the bunkhouse, he asked Gowan casually: "Got those harness
+hawsses in the corral?"
+
+"Brought 'em in this afternoon. Greased the buckboard and overhauled
+the harness. Everything's in shape," answered the puncher.
+
+Knowles merely nodded. Yet in the morning, immediately after the usual
+early breakfast, Gowan went up to the corral and returned driving a
+lively pair of broncos to the old buckboard. Ashton happened to come
+around the house as Knowles stepped from the front door. The cowman
+was followed by his daughter, attired in a new riding habit and a
+fashionable hat with a veil.
+
+"You're just in time, Lafe," said Knowles. "Saddle a couple of hawsses
+and follow Chuckie to town. I misdoubt that seat is cramped for three,
+and a baby to boot."
+
+"But I--it looks quite wide to me," said Ashton, flushing and drawing
+back.
+
+"You know the size of Blake and his lady--I don't," replied the
+cowman. "Just the same, I want you to go along with Chuckie. There's
+not a puncher in this section would harm her, drunk or sober; but the
+fellows that come in and go out on the railroad are sometimes another
+sort."
+
+"Of course I--if necessary," stammered Ashton. "Yet may I ask you to
+excuse me? In the event of trouble, Mr. Gowan, you know--"
+
+"Great snakes!" called Gowan from the buckboard. "Needn't ask _me_ to
+go, twice!"
+
+"Can't spare you today," said Knowles, his keen eyes fixed on Ashton
+in unconcealed amazement.
+
+It was inconceivable. For the first time in his career as an employé,
+the tenderfoot was attempting to evade a duty,--a duty that comprised
+a fifty-mile ride in company with Miss Isobel Knowles!
+
+The girl looked at Ashton with a perfect composure that betrayed no
+trace of her feelings.
+
+"I'm sure there's no reason whatever why Lafe should go, if he does
+not wish to," she remarked. "Any of my hawsses will lead to the
+buckboard."
+
+"He's going to town with you," said Knowles, his jaw setting hard with
+stubborn determination.
+
+"Why, of course, Mr. Knowles, if you really think it necessary,"
+reluctantly acquiesced Ashton. He put his hand into his pocket,
+shrugged, and asked in a hesitating manner: "May I request--I have
+only a small amount left from that five dollars. If you consider there
+are any wages owing me--Going to town, you know."
+
+"Lord!" said the cowman. "So that's what you stuck on. 'Fraid of
+running out of change with a lady along. Here's the balance of your
+first month's wages, and more, if you want it."
+
+He drew out a fat wallet and began counting out banknotes.
+
+"Oh, no, not so many," said Ashton. "I wish only what you consider as
+owing to me now."
+
+"You'll take an even hundred," ordered Knowles, forcing the money on
+him. "A man doesn't feel just right in town unless he's well heeled.
+Only don't show more than a ten at a time in the saloon."
+
+"You have chosen me to act as your daughter's escort," replied
+Ashton.
+
+Quick to catch the inference of his remark, Isobel flashed him a look
+of approval, but called banteringly as she darted out to the
+buckboard: "Better move, if you expect to get near enough to escort
+me, this side of Stockchute."
+
+Gowan sprang down to hand her into the buckboard. She took the reins
+from him and spoke to the fidgetting broncos. They plunged forward and
+started off on a lope. Ashton perceived that she did not intend to
+wait for him. He caught Gowan's look of mingled exultance and envy,
+and dashed for the corral. Rocket was outside, but at his call trotted
+to meet him, whinnying for his morning's lump of sugar. Ashton flung
+on saddle and bridle, and slipped inside the corral to rope his own
+pony. Haste made him miss the two first throws. At last he noosed the
+pony, and slapped on the girl's saddle and bridle.
+
+As he raced off, pounding the pony with his rope to keep him alongside
+Rocket, Knowles waved to him from the house. He had saddled up in less
+than twice the time that Gowan could have done it,--which was a record
+for a tenderfoot. He waved back, but his look was heavy despite the
+excitement of the pursuit.
+
+He expected to overtake Isobel in a few minutes. This he could have
+done had he been able to give Rocket free rein. But he had to hold
+back for the slower-gaited pony. Also, the girl had more of a start
+than he had at first realized, and she did her best to hold the
+handicap. Hitched to the light buckboard, her young broncos could have
+run a good part of the way to Stockchute. She was far out on the flat
+before she at last tired of the wild bumping over ruts and sagebrush
+roots, and pulled her horses down to a walk.
+
+"I could have kept ahead clear across to the hills," she flung back at
+him as he galloped up.
+
+"You shouldn't have been so reckless!" he reproached. "Every moment
+I've been dreading to see you bounced out."
+
+"That's the fun of it," she declared, her cheeks aglow and eyes
+sparkling with delight.
+
+"But the road is so rough!" he protested. "Wouldn't it be easier for
+you to ride my pony? He's like a rocking-chair."
+
+"No," she refused. But she smiled, by no means ill pleased at his
+solicitude for her comfort. She halted the broncos, and said
+cordially: "Tie the saddle hawsses to the back rail, and pile in. We
+may as well be sociable."
+
+He hastened to accept the invitation. She moved over to the left side
+of the seat and relinquished the lines to him. With most young ladies
+this would have been a matter-of-course proceeding; from so
+accomplished a horsewoman it was a tactful compliment. He appreciated
+it at its full value, and his mood lightened. They rattled gayly
+along, on across the flats, up and down among the piņon clad hills,
+and through the sage and greasewood of the valleys.
+
+He had thought the country a desolate wilderness; but now it seemed
+a Garden of Eden. Never had the girl's loveliness been more
+intoxicating, never had her manner to him been more charming and
+gracious. He could not resist the infection of her high spirits. For
+the greater part of the trip he gave himself over to the delight of
+her merry eyes and dimpling, rosy cheeks, her adorable blushes and
+gay repartee.
+
+All earthly journeys and joys have an ending. The buckboard creaked up
+over the round of the last and highest hill, and they came in sight of
+the little shack town down across the broad valley. Though five miles
+away, every house, every telegraph pole, even the thin lines of the
+railroad rails appeared through the dry clear air as distinct as a
+miniature painting. Miles beyond, on the far side of the valley,
+uprose the huge bulk of Split Peak, with its white-mantled shoulders
+and craggy twin peaks.
+
+But neither Ashton nor Isobel exclaimed on this magnificent view of
+valley and peak. Each fell silent and gazed soberly down at the dozen
+scattered shacks that marked the end of their outward trip. Rapidly
+the gravity of Ashton's face deepened to gloom and from gloom to
+dejection. The horses would have broken into a lope on the down grade.
+He held them to a walk.
+
+Chancing to gaze about and see his face, the girl started from her
+bright-eyed daydream. "Why, Lafe! what is it?" she inquired. "You look
+as you did the other day, when you brought the mail."
+
+"It's--everything!" he muttered.
+
+"As what?" she queried.
+
+He shrugged hopelessly, hesitated, and drew out the roll of bills
+forced on him by Knowles. "Tell me, please, just how much of this is
+mine, at your father's usual rate of wages, and deducting the real
+value of that calf."
+
+"Why, I can't just say, offhand," she replied. "But why should you--"
+
+"I shall tell you as soon as--but first--" He drew out his watch.
+"This cost me two hundred and fifty dollars. It is the only thing I
+have worth trading. Would you take it in exchange for Rocket and the
+balance of this hundred dollars over and above what is due me?"
+
+"Why--no, of course, I wouldn't think of such a thing. It would be
+absurd, cheating yourself that way. Anyhow, Rocket is your horse to
+ride, as long as you wish to."
+
+"But I would like him for my own. How about trading him for my pony
+and the wages due me?"
+
+"Well, that wouldn't be an unfair bargain. Your hawss is the best cow
+pony of the two."
+
+"It is very kind of you to agree, Miss Chuckie! Here is all the
+money; and here is the watch. I wish you to accept it from me as
+a--memento."
+
+"Mr. Ashton!" she exclaimed, indignantly widening the space between
+them as much as the seat would permit.
+
+"Please!" he begged. "Don't you understand? I am going away."
+
+"Going away?" she echoed.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"But--why?"
+
+"Because he is coming."
+
+"Mr. Blake?"
+
+"Yes. I cannot stay after he--"
+
+"But why not? Has he injured you? Are you afraid of him?"
+
+"No. I'm afraid that you--" Ashton's voice sank to a whisper--"that
+you will believe what he--what they will say against me."
+
+"Oh!" she commented, her expression shifting swiftly from sympathetic
+concern to doubt.
+
+He caught the change in her look and tone, and flushed darkly.
+
+"There are sometimes two sides to a story," he muttered.
+
+"Tell me your side now," she suggested, with her usual directness.
+
+His eyes fell before her clear honest gaze. His flush deepened. He
+hung his head, biting his twisted lip. After several moments he began
+to speak in a hesitating broken murmur:
+
+"I've always been--wild. But I graduated from Tech.--not at the foot
+of my class. My father--always busy piling up millions--never a word
+or thought for me, except when I overspent my allowance. I was in
+a--fast set. My father--threatened me. I had to make good. I took a
+position in old Leslie's office--Genevieve's father. I--"
+
+He paused, licked his lips, hesitated, and abruptly went on again,
+this time speaking with almost glib facility: "There was an engineers'
+contest for a projected bridge over Michamac Strait. I started to draw
+plans, that I might enter the contest, but I did not finish in time.
+The plans of the other engineers were all rejected. I continued to
+work on mine. After the contest I happened to pick up a piece of torn
+plan out of the office wastebasket, and it gave me a suggestion how to
+improve the central span of my bridge."
+
+"Yes?" asked the girl, her interest deepening.
+
+He again licked his lips, hesitated, and continued: "There was no
+name on that torn plan--nothing to indicate to whom it had belonged.
+So I used it--that is, the suggestion I got from it, and was awarded
+the bridge on my plans. This made me the Resident Engineer of the
+bridge, and I had it almost completed when this man Blake came back
+from Africa after Genevieve, and claimed that I had--had stolen his
+plans of the bridge. It seems they were lost in Mr. Leslie's office.
+He claimed he had handed them in to me for the contest. But so had
+all the other contestants, and their plans were not lost. It may have
+been that one of the doorkeepers tore his plans up, out of
+revenge. Blake was a very rough brute of a fellow at that time. He
+quarreled with the doorkeeper because the man would not admit him
+to see Mr. Leslie--threatened to smash him. Afterwards he accused
+Mr. Leslie of stealing his plans."
+
+"Oh, no, no! he couldn't have done that! He can't be that kind of a
+man!" protested Isobel.
+
+"It's true! Even he will not deny it. Old Leslie thought him
+crazy--then. It was different when he came back and accused me! He had
+been shipwrecked with Genevieve. They were alone together all those
+weeks, and so one can--" Ashton checked himself. "No, you must not
+think--He saved her. When they came back he claimed the bridge as his
+own--those lost plans."
+
+"His plans? So that was it! And you--?"
+
+"Of course they believed him. What was my word against his with
+Genevieve and Leslie. Leslie's consulting engineer was an old pal of
+Blake's. So of course I--I'll say though that Blake agreed to put it
+that I had only borrowed his idea of the central span."
+
+"That was generous of him, if he really believed--"
+
+"Did he?--did Genevieve? Do they believe it now? You see why I must go
+away."
+
+"I don't any such thing," rejoined the girl.
+
+"You don't?" he exclaimed. "When they are coming here, believing I
+did it! They must believe it, all of them! And my father--after all
+this time--They agreed not to tell him. Yet he has found out. That
+letter, up at the waterhole--it was from his lawyers. He had cut me
+off--branded me as an outcast."
+
+"Without waiting to hear your side--without asking you to explain? How
+unjust! how unfair!" cried Isobel.
+
+Ashton winced. "I--I told you I--my record was against me. But I was
+his son--he had no right to brand me as a--a thief! My valet read the
+letter. He must have told the guide--the scoundrels!"
+
+Tears of chagrin gathered in the young man's dark eyes. He bit his lip
+until the blood ran.
+
+"O-o-oh!" sighed the girl. "It's all been frightfully unjust! You
+haven't had fair play! I shall tell Mr. Blake."
+
+"No, not him!--not him!" Ashton's voice was almost shrill. "All I wish
+is to slip away, before they see me."
+
+"You don't mean, run away?" she said, quietly placing her little
+gauntlet-gloved hand on his arm. "You're not going to run away,
+Lafe."
+
+"What else?" he asked, his eyes dark with bitter despair. "Would you
+have me return, to be booted off the range when they tell your
+father?"
+
+"Just wait and see," she replied, gazing at him with a reassuring
+smile. "You've proved yourself a right smart puncher--for a
+tenderfoot. You're in the West, the good old-style West, where it's a
+man's present record that counts; not what he has been or what he has
+done. No, you're not going to run. You're going to face it out--and
+going to stay to learn your new profession of puncher and--_man_!"
+
+"But they will not wish to associate with me."
+
+"Yes, they will," she predicted. "I shall see to that."
+
+He took heart a little from her cheery, positive assurance. "Well, if
+you insist, I shall not go until they show--"
+
+"They'll not recognize you at first. That will give me a chance to
+speak before they can say anything disagreeable. I'm sure Mr. Blake
+will understand."
+
+"But--Genevieve?"
+
+"If she married him when he was as rough as you say, and if he agrees
+to let bygones be bygones, you need have no fear of Mrs. Blake. Only
+be sure to go into raptures over the baby. Tell her it's the perfect
+image of its father."
+
+"What if it isn't?" objected Ashton gloomily.
+
+She dimpled. "One must allow for the difference in age; and there's
+always some resemblance--each must have a mouth and eyes and ears and
+a nose."
+
+He caught himself on the verge of laughter. Her eyes were fixed upon
+him, pure and honest and dancing with mirth. A sudden flood of
+crimson swept up his face from his bristly, tanned chin to his white
+forehead. He averted his gaze from hers.
+
+"You're _good_!" he choked out. "I don't deserve--But I can't go--when
+you tell me to stay!"
+
+"Of course you can't," she lightly rejoined. "Look! There's the train
+coming. Push on the lines!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE MEETING
+
+
+A word started the horses into a lope. The buckboard was whirled along
+over the last two miles to Stockchute in a wild race against the
+train. The steam horse won. It had sidetracked the private car
+attached to the rear of the last pullman and was puffing away
+westward, when Ashton guided his running team in among the crude
+shacks of the town. He swung around at a more moderate pace towards
+the big chute for cattle-loading, and fetched up a few yards out from
+the rear step of the private car.
+
+An assiduous porter had already swung down with a box step. A big,
+square-faced, square-framed man of twenty-eight or thirty stepped out
+into the car vestibule. He sprang to the ground as Miss Knowles
+stepped from the buckboard. She had lowered her veil, but it failed to
+mask the extreme brilliancy of her eyes and her quick changes of
+color. Her face, flushed from the excitement of the race into town,
+went white when she first saw the man in the vestibule; flushed again
+when he sprang down; again paled; and, last of all, glowed radiantly
+as she advanced to meet him.
+
+He hastened to her, baring his big head of its Panama, and staring at
+her fashionable hat and dress in frank surprise.
+
+"Mr. Blake!" she murmured.
+
+At the sound of her voice he started and fixed his light blue eyes on
+her veiled face with a keen glance. She turned pale and as quickly
+blushed, as if embarrassed by his scrutiny.
+
+"Excuse me!" he apologized. "You are Miss Knowles?"
+
+"Yes," she murmured.
+
+"Knowles?" he repeated, half to himself. "Strange! Haven't I met you
+before?"
+
+"In Denver?" she suggested. "I spend my winters in Denver. But there
+was one in Europe."
+
+"No, it wouldn't be either. You must excuse me, Miss Knowles. There
+was something about your voice and face--rather threw me off my
+balance. If you'll kindly overlook the bungling start-off! I'm greatly
+pleased to meet you. My wife will be, too. May I ask you to step
+aboard the car?--No, here she is now."
+
+A graceful, rather small lady, dressed with elegant simplicity, had
+come out into the car vestibule.
+
+"Jenny, here's Miss Knowles now," said Blake. "She came to meet us
+herself."
+
+"That was very good of you, Miss Knowles," said the lady, as the two
+advanced towards her. "We are very glad to meet you. Will you not
+come up out of the sun?"
+
+The white-uniformed porter promptly stood at attention. Blake as
+promptly offered his hand. The girl accepted his assistance and
+mounted the car steps with an absence of awkwardness instantly noted
+by Mrs. Blake. That lady held out a somewhat thin white hand as Isobel
+drew off her gauntlet gloves. But she did not stop with the light firm
+handclasp. Lifting the girl's veil, she kissed her full on her coral
+lips.
+
+"We shall be friends," she stated, a smile in her hazel eyes.
+
+"I hope so," murmured the girl, blushing with delight. "The only
+question is whether you will like me."
+
+Mrs. Blake patted the plump, sunbrowned hand that she had not yet
+relinquished. She was little if any older than the girl, but her air
+was that of matronly wisdom. "My dear, can you doubt it? I was
+prepared to like even the kind of young woman my husband told me to
+expect."
+
+"Bronco Bess, Queen of the Cattle Camp," suggested the girl, dimpling.
+"Wait till you see me rope and hogtie a steer."
+
+Mrs. Blake smiled, and looked across at Ashton, who sat motionless
+under the shadow of his big sombrero, his face half averted from the
+car.
+
+"I've a real surprise for you," said the girl. "Mr. Blake, if I may
+tell it to you also."
+
+Blake swung up the steps, hat in hand. "It can't be half as pleasant
+as the surprise you've already given us," he said.
+
+"I fear not," she replied, with a quick change to gravity. She looked
+earnestly into their faces. "Still, I hope--yes, I really believe it
+will please you when you consider it. But first, I want to tell you
+that out here it's our notion that a man should be rated according to
+his present life, and not blamed for his past mistakes."
+
+"Certainly not!" agreed Mrs. Blake, with a swift glance at her
+husband. "If a man has mounted to a higher level, he should be upheld,
+not dragged down again."
+
+"That's good old-style Western fair play," added Blake.
+
+"I'm so glad you take it that way!" said Isobel. "A young man utterly
+ruined in fortune--partly at least through his own fault--came to us
+and asked to be hired. He has been a hard worker and a gentleman. His
+name is Lafayette Ashton."
+
+"Ashton?" said Blake, his face as impassive as a granite mask.
+
+"Yes. He has told me all about the bridge. He wished to go away,
+because he thought you and Mrs. Blake would not like to meet him. I
+told him you would be willing to let bygones be bygones, and help him
+start off with a new tally card."
+
+"Lafayette Ashton working--as a cowboy!" murmured Mrs. Blake.
+
+"He is still a good deal of a tenderfoot. But he is learning fast; and
+work!--the way he pesters Daddy to find him something to do!"
+
+"He certainly must be a changed man," dryly commented Blake.
+
+"_Cherchez la femme_," said his wife.
+
+"Mrs. Blake!" protested the girl, blushing.
+
+"What's that?" he asked.
+
+"'Find the woman,'" explained Mrs. Blake.
+
+"That's easy," he said, fixing his twinkling eyes on the rosy-faced
+girl.
+
+"But I'm sure it has not been because of me--at least not altogether,"
+she qualified with her uncompromising honesty.
+
+"I wouldn't blame him even if it was altogether," said Blake.
+
+"Then you will be willing to overlook your past trouble with him?"
+
+"Since you say he has straightened out--yes."
+
+"That's good of you! That's what I expected of you!" exclaimed the
+girl. "That is he, in the buckboard."
+
+Without a word, Blake started down the car steps.
+
+"Bring him here at once, Tom," said Mrs. Blake.
+
+Her husband went up beside the motionless figure in the buckboard and
+held out his hand. "Glad to meet you, Ashton," he said with
+matter-of-fact heartiness. "Jenny wants you to come to her. We're not
+ready to start, as we were not certain we would be met."
+
+"Miss--Mrs. Blake wishes me to come!" mumbled Ashton.
+
+"Yes," said Blake, gripping the other's hesitatingly extended hand.
+
+Ashton flushed darkly. "But I--I can't leave the horses," he replied.
+
+Blake signed to the porter, who hastened forward. "Hold the lines for
+this gentleman, Sam."
+
+Ashton reluctantly gave the lines into the mulatto's sallow hands and
+stepped from the buckboard. His head hung forward as he followed
+Blake. But at the foot of the steps he removed his sombrero and forced
+himself to look up. Isobel was smiling down at him encouragingly. He
+looked from her to Mrs. Blake, his handsome face crimson with shame.
+
+"How do you do, Lafayette?" Mrs. Blake greeted him with quiet
+cordiality. "This is a pleasant surprise."
+
+"Yes--yes, indeed! I--yes, very!" he stammered, so embarrassed that he
+would have stuck at the foot of the steps had not Blake started him up
+with a vigorous boost.
+
+Mrs. Blake gave him her hand. "You look so strong and hearty!" she
+remarked. "It speaks well for the fare Miss Knowles provides."
+
+"Oh, that credit is due our Jap chef," laughed the girl. "I can cut
+out a cow from the herd better than I can bone a chop. But the butter
+and eggs and cream that are awaiting you--Which reminds me that we've
+yet to see It."
+
+"It?" asked Blake.
+
+"Yes, him--the _baby_!"
+
+"Oh, you dear girl!" cooed Mrs. Blake. "Come in and see him."
+
+Isobel followed her into the car. Blake nodded to Ashton. But the
+younger man shrank away from the door.
+
+"If you'll kindly excuse me," he muttered. "It would remind me too
+much of--the time when--No, I'd rather not."
+
+"Of course," assented Blake with ready understanding. "How do you like
+this country? I went through here once on a railway survey. It's rare
+good luck--this chance to visit Miss Knowles. Jenny is a little run
+down, as you see."
+
+"I shall trust that her visit to this locality will soon quite restore
+her," remarked Ashton.
+
+"It will. The doctors said Maine; I said Colorado. It has done you no
+end of good. You are looking particularly fine and fit."
+
+"It has helped me--in more ways than one," murmured Ashton.
+
+"Glad to hear you say it!" responded Blake in hearty approval.
+
+Ashton turned from him as Isobel appeared in the doorway, cuddling a
+lusty, rosy-cheeked baby. The mother hovered close behind her.
+
+"Look at him!" jeered Blake with heavily feigned derision. "Did you
+ever see such a big, fat, lubberly--"
+
+"Yes, look at him, Lafe," said the girl, stepping out into the
+vestibule. "He is only a yearling, but isn't he just the perfect image
+of his father?"
+
+Ashton burst into a ringing laugh, but abruptly checked himself at
+sight of the sober face of the young mother. "I--I beg pardon!" he
+stammered. "I--she--Miss Knowles--that is what she told me to tell you
+about him."
+
+"And you didn't play up worth a little bit, Lafe!" complained the
+girl.
+
+It was Blake's turn to laugh. "You--!" he accused. "Schemed to frame
+up a case on us did you!"
+
+His wife smiled faintly, not altogether certain that an aspersion had
+not been cast upon her chuckling son.
+
+"But it's partly true, really," remarked Ashton, peering at the baby's
+big pale-blue eyes.
+
+Blake burst into a hilarious roar. But Mrs. Blake now beamed upon
+Ashton. "Then you, too, see the resemblance, Lafayette! Isn't it
+wonderful, and he so young? His name is Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie
+Blake.--Now, my dear, if you please, I shall take him in. We must be
+preparing to start, if it is so long a drive."
+
+"Do let me hold him until you and Mr. Blake are ready," begged the
+girl.
+
+"I am not quite sure that--You will be careful not to drop him? He is
+tremendously strong, and he squirms," dubiously assented the fond
+mother. "Come, Tom. We must not keep Miss Knowles waiting."
+
+Blake disappeared with her into the luxuriously furnished car.
+
+"Isn't he a dear?" cooed the girl, clasping the baby to her bosom and
+kissing his chubby clenched hands. He stared up into her glowing face
+with his round light-blue eyes. "Thomas Blake!--Tom Blake!" she
+whispered.
+
+Ashton did not heed the words. He was gazing too intently at the girl
+and the child. His eyes glistened with a wonderment and longing so
+exquisitely intense that it was like a pain. The girl sank down in one
+of the cane chairs and laid the baby on his back. He kicked and
+gurgled, seized one of his upraised feet and thrust a pink big toe in
+between his white milk teeth.
+
+"That's more than you can do, Lafe!" challenged the girl.
+
+She glanced up, dimpling with merriment,--met the adoration in his
+eyes, and looked down, blushing. He attempted to speak, but the words
+choked into an incoherent sound like a sob. He jumped from the car and
+hurried to take the lines from the porter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+THE OTHER LADY'S HUSBAND
+
+
+Miss Knowles did not seem to observe Ashton's deflection. She remained
+worshipfully downbent over the wriggling, chuckling baby until its
+parents reappeared.
+
+Mrs. Blake had changed to an easy and serviceable dress of plain,
+strong material. The skirt, cut to walking length, showed that
+her feet and ankles were protected by a pair of absurdly small
+laced boots. Her husband had shifted to an equally serviceable
+costume--flannel shirt, broad-brimmed felt hat, and surveyor's
+boots.
+
+"Crossing the plains we packed a trunk with what we considered most
+necessary," said Mrs. Blake, as she took the baby. "It is not a large
+one, and in addition there is only my satchel and the level and the
+lunch my maid is putting up for us."
+
+"There is room for more, if you wish," replied Isobel. "But we can
+send over here for anything you need, any time."
+
+"You're not going to let us really rough-it!" complained Mrs. Blake,
+as her husband swung her to the ground. "Were it not for Thomas
+Herbert--"
+
+"--We'd go to Africa again and eat lions," Blake completed the
+sentence. "Wait, though--we may have a chance at mountain lions."
+
+The porter had gone to help a manservant fetch the trunk from the
+other end of the car. Isobel untied the saddle horses from the rear of
+the buckboard. The trunk was lifted in, and Blake lashed it on,
+together with his level rod and tripod, using Ashton's lariat.
+
+"Level is in the trunk," he explained, in response to Ashton's look of
+inquiry. "I suppose we ride."
+
+"I think it will be better if Lafe drives," objected Isobel. "I am so
+reckless, and you don't know the road, as he does. The only thing is
+Rocket--Lafe has about trained him out of his tricks. But I should
+warn you that the hawss has been rather vicious."
+
+"Tom will ride him," confidently stated Mrs. Blake.
+
+Her husband took the bridle reins of the big horse and mounted him
+with the agility of a cowboy. For a moment Rocket stood motionless.
+Then, whether because of Blake's weight or the fact that he was a
+stranger, all the beast's newly acquired docility vanished. He began
+to plunge and buck even more violently than when first mounted by
+Ashton.
+
+Half a hundred Stockchuteites--all the residents of the town and
+several floaters--had come down to inspect the palatial private car
+and its passengers. At Rocket's first leap these highly interested
+spectators broke into a murmur of joyful anticipation. They were about
+to see the millionaire tenderfoot pull leather.
+
+Yet somehow the event failed to transpire. Blake sat the flat saddle
+as if glued fast to it. His knees and legs were crushing against the
+sides of the leaping, whirling beast with the firmness of an iron
+vise. He held both hands upraised, away from the "leather."
+
+Presently Rocket's efforts began to flag. Instead of seeking to quiet
+the frantic beast, Blake began to whoop and to strike him with his
+hat. Thus taunted, Rocket resorted to his second trick. He took the
+bit in his teeth and started to bolt. The crowd scattered before
+the rush of the runaway. But they need not have moved. Blake
+reached down on each side of the beast's outstretched neck and
+pulled. Tough-mouthed as he was, Rocket could not resist that
+powerful grip. His head was drawn down and backwards until his trumpet
+nostrils blew against his deep chest. After half a dozen wild plunges,
+he was forced to a stand, snorting but subdued.
+
+"That's some riding, Miss Chuckie!" called the burly sheriff of the
+county. "Your guest forks a hawss like a buster."
+
+The girl rode forward beside Blake, her face radiant. She paid him the
+highest of compliments by taking his riding as a matter of course; but
+in her eyes was a look strangely like that of his wife's fond gaze,--a
+look of pride at his achievement, rather than admiration.
+
+"We'll ride ahead of the team to keep clear of the dust," she
+remarked.
+
+He twisted about and saw that Ashton was starting to drive after them.
+His wife's elderly maid was waving her handkerchief from one of the
+car windows. The porter and the manservant stood at attention. He
+exchanged a nod and smile with his wife, patted Rocket's arched neck
+and clicked to him to start.
+
+"This is great, Miss Knowles!" he said. "I did not look for such fun,
+first crack out of the box. And--if you don't mind my saying it--it's
+such a jolly surprise your being what you are."
+
+The girl blushed with pleasure. "I--we have been so eager to meet
+you," she murmured. She added hurriedly, "On account of your wonderful
+work as an engineer, you know."
+
+"I wouldn't have suspected Ashton of bragging for me," he replied.
+
+"Oh, he--he says you have a remarkable knack of hitting on the
+solution of problems. But it's in the engineering journals and reports
+that we've read about your work. Perhaps that is why you thought we
+had met before. After reading about you so much, I felt that I already
+knew you, and so my manner, you know--"
+
+He shook his head at this seemingly ingenuous explanation. "No, there
+is something about your voice and face--" His eyes clouded with
+the grief of a painful memory; his head sank forward until his square
+chin touched his broad chest. He muttered brokenly: "But that's
+impossible.... Anyway--better for them they died--better than to
+live after...."
+
+Behind her veil the girl's face became deathly white. He raised his
+head and looked at her with a wistful gleam of hope. She had averted
+her face from him and was gazing off at the hills with dim unseeing
+eyes.
+
+"Pardon me, Miss Knowles," he said, "but do you mind if I ask what is
+your first name?"
+
+She hesitated almost imperceptibly before replying: "I am called
+Chuckie--Chuckie Knowles. Doesn't that sound cowgirlish? We always
+have a chuck-wagon on the round-ups, you know. But it's a name that
+used to be quite common in the West."
+
+"Yes, it comes from the Spanish Chiquita," he said. He repeated the
+word with the soft caressing Spanish accent, "_Che-keé-tah!_"
+
+A flood of scarlet swept up into the girl's pallid face, and slowly
+subsided to her normal rich coloring. After a short silence she asked
+in a conventional tone: "I suppose you are glad to get away from
+Chicago. The last papers we received say that the East is sweltering
+in one of those smothery heat waves."
+
+"It's the humidity and close air that kills," said Blake. "I ought to
+know. I lived for years in the slums."
+
+"Oh, you--you really speak of it--openly!" the girl exclaimed.
+
+"What of it?" he asked, astonished in turn at her lack of tact.
+
+"Nothing--nothing," she hastened to disclaim. "Only I know--have read
+about the dreadful conditions in the Chicago slums. It is--it must be
+so painful to recall them--That was so rude of me to--"
+
+"Not at all," he interrupted. To cover her evident confusion he held
+up his white hand in the scorching sunrays and commented jovially:
+"Talk about Eastern heat--this is a hundred and five Fahrenheit at the
+very least! A-a-ah!" He drew in a deep breath of the dry pure air.
+"This is something like! When you get your land under ditch, you'll
+have a paradise."
+
+"Oh, but you do not understand," she replied. "We want you to find out
+and tell us that Dry Mesa _cannot_ be watered. Irrigation would break
+up Daddy's range and put him out of business. It is just what we do
+not want."
+
+"I see," said Blake, with instant comprehension of the situation.
+
+"I know it cannot be done. But there are so many reclamation projects,
+and Daddy has read and read about them until he almost has a bee in
+his bonnet."
+
+"Yet you sent for me--an engineer."
+
+"Because I knew that when _you_ told him our mesa couldn't be watered,
+he would stop worrying. You know, you are quite a hero with us. We
+have read all about your wonderful work."
+
+Blake's pale eyes twinkled. "So I'm a hero. Will you dynamite my
+pedestal if I figure out a way to water your range?"
+
+She flashed him a troubled glance, but rallied for a quick rejoinder:
+"Even you can't pump the water out of Deep Caņon, and Plum Creek is
+only a trickle most of the year."
+
+"I see you want me to make my report as dry as I can write it," he
+bantered.
+
+"No," she replied, suddenly serious. "We wish the exact truth, though
+we hope you'll find it dry."
+
+"Then you are to blame if the matter does not figure out your way," he
+warned her. "You've given me a problem. If there is any possible way
+for me to irrigate your mesa, I am bound to try my best to work it
+out. Hadn't you better head me off before I start in? At present I
+haven't the remotest desire to do this except to comply with your
+wishes."
+
+"It's as I told Daddy," she said. "If there really is a way, the
+sooner we know it the better. It is the uncertainty that is bothering
+Daddy. If your report is for us, all well and good; if against us, he
+will stand up and fight and forget about worrying."
+
+"Fight?" asked Blake.
+
+"Fight the project, fight against the formation of any irrigation
+district. He owns five sections. The reservoir might have to be on his
+patented land. He'd fight fair and square and hard--to the last
+ditch!"
+
+"Isn't that a Dutchman's saying?" asked Blake humorously.
+
+The girl's tense face relaxed, and she burst out in a ringing laugh.
+She shifted the conversation to less serious subjects, and they
+cantered along together, laughing and chatting like old friends.
+
+By this time Ashton and Mrs. Blake had gradually come to the same
+stage of pleasant comradeship. Ashton had started the drive in a
+sullen mood, his manner half resentful and wholly embarrassed. Of this
+the lady was tactfully oblivious. Avoiding all allusion to the
+catastrophe that had befallen him, she told him the latest news of the
+mutual friends and acquaintances in whom ordinarily he would have been
+expected to be interested.
+
+She even spoke casually of his father. His face contracted with pain,
+but he showed no bitterness against the parent who had disowned him.
+After that her graciousness towards him redoubled. With Isobel for
+excuse, she gradually shifted the conversation to ranch life and his
+employment as cowboy. In many subtle ways she conveyed to him her
+admiration of the manner in which he had turned over a new leaf and
+was making a clean fresh start in life.
+
+After delicately intimating her feelings, she at once turned to less
+personal topics. The last traces of his embarrassment and moodiness
+left him, and he began to talk quite at his ease, though with a
+certain reserve that she attributed to the vast change in his
+fortunes. In return for her kindness, he repaid her by showing a real
+interest in Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie Blake.
+
+That young man spent his time chuckling and crowing and kicking, until
+overcome with sleep. Two hours out from Stockchute he awoke and
+vociferously demanded nourishment. Promptly the party was brought to a
+halt. They were among the piņons on one of the hillsides. While the
+baby took his dinner, Isobel laid out the lunch and the men burned
+incense in the guise of a pair of Havana cigars produced by Blake.
+
+The lunch might have been put up in the kitchen of a first-class
+metropolitan hotel. The fruit was the most luscious that money could
+buy; the sandwiches and cake would have tempted a sated epicure; the
+mineral water had come out of an ice chest so nearly frozen that it
+was still refreshingly cool. But--what was rather odd for a lunch
+packed in a private car--it included no wine or whiskey or liqueur.
+Blake caught Ashton's glance, and smiled.
+
+"You see I'm still on the waterwagon," he remarked. "I've got a
+permanent seat. There have been times when it looked as if I might be
+jolted off, but--"
+
+"But there's never been the slightest chance of that!" put in his
+wife. She looked at Isobel, her soft eyes shining with love and pride.
+"Once he gets a grip on anything, he never lets go."
+
+"Oh, I can believe that!" exclaimed the girl with an enthusiasm that
+brought a shadow into the mobile face of Ashton.
+
+"A man can't help holding on when he has something to hold on for,"
+said Blake, gazing at his wife and baby.
+
+"That's true!" agreed Ashton, his eyes on the dimpled face of Isobel.
+
+Refreshed by the delicious meal, the party prepared to start on. But
+they did not travel as before. While Ashton was considerately washing
+out the dusty nostrils of the horses with water from his canteen,
+Isobel decided to drive with Mrs. Blake. Declaring that it would be
+like old times to sit a cowboy saddle, the big engineer lengthened the
+girl's stirrup leathers and swung on to the pony. This left Rocket to
+his owner.
+
+At first Ashton seemed inclined to be stiff with his new road-mate.
+But as they jogged along, side by side, over the hills and across the
+sagebrush flats, Blake restricted his talk to impersonal topics and
+spared his companion from any allusion to their past difficulties.
+Throughout the ride, however, the two men maintained a certain reserve
+towards each other, and at no time approached the cordial intimacy
+that developed between the girl and Mrs. Blake before the end of their
+first mile together.
+
+After telling merrily about her dual life as summer cowgirl and winter
+society maiden, Isobel drifted around, by seemingly casual association
+of ideas, to the troublesome question of irrigation on Dry Mesa, and
+from that to Blake and his work as an engineer.
+
+"I do so hope Mr. Blake finds that there is no project practicable,"
+she went on. "He has warned me that if there seems to be any chance to
+work out an irrigation scheme on our mesa he is bound to try to do
+it."
+
+"And he would do it," added Mrs. Blake with quiet confidence.
+
+"Then I hope and pray he will find there is no chance, because Daddy
+would have to oppose him. That would be such a pity! He and I have
+read so much about Mr. Blake's work that we have come to regard him as
+our--as one of our heroes."
+
+Mrs. Blake smiled. It was very apparent, despite the quietness and
+repression of her high-bred manner, that she was very much in love
+with her husband.
+
+The girl continued in a meekly deferential tone: "So you will not mind
+my worshiping him. He is a hero, a real hero! Isn't he?"
+
+The words were spoken with an earnestness and sincerity that won Mrs.
+Blake to a like candor. "You are quite right," she said. "Lafayette
+may have told you how Mr. Blake and I were wrecked on the most savage
+coast of Africa. He saved me from wild beasts and tropical storms,
+from fever and snakes,--from death in a dozen horrible forms. Then,
+when he had saved me--and won me, he gave me up until he could prove
+to himself that he was worthy of me."
+
+"He did?" cried the girl. "But of course!--of course!"
+
+"Yet that was nothing to the next proof of his strength and manhood,"
+went on the proud wife. "He destroyed a monster more frightful than
+any lion or tropical snake--he overcame the curse of drink that had
+come down to him from--one of his parents."
+
+"From--from his--" whispered the girl, her averted face white and
+drawn with pain.
+
+Mrs. Blake had bent over to kiss the forehead of her sleeping baby and
+did not see. "If only all parents knew what terrible misfortunes,
+what tortures, their transgressions are apt to bring upon their
+innocent children!" she murmured.
+
+"He told me that he won his way up out of the--the slums," said
+Isobel. "It must be some men fail to do that because they have
+relatives to drag them down--their families."
+
+"It seems hard to say it, yet I do not know but that you are right, my
+dear," agreed Mrs. Blake. "Strong men, if unhampered, have a chance to
+fight their way up out of the social pit. But women and girls, even
+when they escape the--the worst down there, can hardly hope ever to
+attain--And of course those that fall!--Our dual code of morality is
+hideously unjust to our sex, yet it still is the code under which we
+live."
+
+The girl drew in a deep, sighing breath. Her eyes were dark with
+anguish. Yet she forced a gay little laugh. "Aren't we solemn
+sociologists! All we are concerned with is that _he_ has won his way
+up, and there's no one ever to drag him down or disgrace him; and--and
+you won't be jealous if I set him up on a pedestal and bring incense
+to him on my bended knees."
+
+"Only you must give Thomas Herbert his share at the same time,"
+stipulated the mother.
+
+The girl burst into prolonged and rather shrill laughter that passed
+the bounds of good breeding. Her emotion was so unrestrained that when
+she looked about at her surprised companion her face was flushed and
+her eyes were swimming with tears.
+
+"Please, oh, do please forgive me!" she begged with a humility as
+immoderate as had been her laughter. "I--I can't tell you why, but--"
+
+"Say no more, my dear," soothed Mrs. Blake. "You are merely a bit
+hysterical. Perhaps the excitement of our coming, after your months of
+lonely ranch life--"
+
+"You're so good!" sighed the girl. "Yes, it was due to--your coming.
+But now the worst is over. I'll not shock you again with any more such
+outbursts."
+
+She smiled, and began to talk of other things, with somewhat unsteady
+but persistent gayety.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+A DESCENT
+
+
+When the party arrived at the ranch, the girl hostess took Mrs. Blake
+to rest in the clean, simply furnished room provided for the visitors.
+Blake, after carrying in their trunk single-handed, went to look
+around at the ranch buildings in company with Ashton.
+
+On returning to the house, the two found Knowles and Gowan in the
+parlor with the ladies. Isobel had already introduced them to Mrs.
+Blake and also to her son. That young man was sprawled, face up, in
+the cowman's big hands, crowing and valiantly clutching at his bristly
+mustache.
+
+Gowan sat across from him, perfectly at ease in the presence of the
+city lady. But, with his characteristic lack of humor, he was unmoved
+by the laughable spectacle presented by his employer and the baby, and
+his manner was both reserved and watchful.
+
+At sight of Blake, Isobel called to her father in feigned alarm: "Look
+out, Daddy! Better stop hazing that yearling. Here comes his sire."
+
+Knowles gave the baby back to its half-fearful mother, and rose to
+greet his guest with hospitable warmth: "Howdy, Mr. Blake! I'm
+downright glad to meet you. Hope you've found things comfortable and
+homelike."
+
+"Too much so," asserted Blake, his eyes twinkling. "We came out
+expecting to rough-it."
+
+"Well, your lady won't know the difference," remarked Knowles.
+
+"You're quite mistaken, Daddy, really," interposed his daughter. "She
+and Mr. Blake were wrecked in Africa and lived on roast leopards.
+We'll have to feed them on mountain lions and bobcats."
+
+"If you mean that, Miss Chuckie," put in Gowan, "I can get a bobcat in
+time for dinner tomorrow."
+
+The girl led the general outburst of laughter over this serious
+proposal. "Oh! oh! Kid! You'll be the death of me!--Yet I sent you a
+joke-book last Christmas!"
+
+"Couldn't see anything funny in it," replied the puncher. "I haven't
+lost it, though. It came from you."
+
+To cover the girl's blush at this blunt disclosure of sentiment, Mrs.
+Blake somewhat formally introduced her husband to the puncher. He
+shook Blake's hand with like formality and politeness. But as their
+glances met, his gray eyes shone with the same cold suspicion with
+which he had regarded Ashton at their first meeting. Before that look
+the engineer's friendly eyes hardened to disks of burnished steel,
+and his big fist released its cordial grip of the other's small, bony
+hand. He gave back hostility for hostility with the readiness of a
+born fighter. Gowan was the first to look away.
+
+The incident passed so swiftly that only Knowles observed the outflash
+of enmity. His words indicated that he had anticipated the puncher's
+attitude. He addressed Blake seriously: "Kid has been with us ever
+since he was a youngster and has always made my interests his own.
+Chuckie has been telling us what you said about putting through any
+project you once started."
+
+Blake nodded. "Yes. That is why I suggested to Miss Knowles that she
+call off the agreement under which I came on this visit. We shall
+gladly pay board, and I'll merely knock around; or, if you prefer,
+we'll leave you and go back tomorrow morning."
+
+"No, Daddy, no! we can't allow our guests to leave, when they've only
+just come!" protested Isobel.
+
+"As for any talk about board," added her father, "you ought to know
+better, Mr. Blake."
+
+"My apology!" admitted Blake. "I've been living in the East."
+
+"That explains," agreed the cowman. "Even as far east as Denver--I've
+got a sister there; lives up beyond the Capitol. But I've talked with
+other men there from over this way. They all agree you might as well
+look for good cow pasture behind a sheep drive as for hospitality in a
+city. Sometimes you can get what you want, and all times you're sure
+to get a lot of attention you don't want--if you have money to
+spend."
+
+"That's true. But about my going ahead here?" inquired Blake. "Say the
+word, and I put irrigation on the shelf throughout our visit."
+
+Knowles shook his head thoughtfully. "No, I reckon Chuckie is right.
+We'd best learn just how we stand."
+
+"What if I work out a practical project? There's any amount of good
+land on your mesa. The lay of it and the altitude ought to make it
+ideal for fruit. If I see that the proposition is feasible, I shall be
+bound to put water on all of your range that I can. I am an
+engineer,--I cannot let good land and water go to waste."
+
+"The land isn't going to waste," replied Knowles. "It's the best
+cattle range in this section, and it's being used for the purpose
+Nature intended. As for the water, Chuckie has figured out there isn't
+more than three thousand acre feet of flood waters that can be
+impounded off the watershed above us. That wouldn't pay for building
+any kind of a dam."
+
+"And the devil himself couldn't pump the water up out of Deep Caņon,"
+put in Gowan.
+
+"The devil hasn't much use for science," said Blake. "It has almost
+put him out of business. So he is not apt to be well up on modern
+engineering."
+
+"Then you think you can do what the devil can't?" demanded Knowles.
+
+"I can try. Unless you wish to call off the deal, I shall ride around
+tomorrow and look over the country. Maybe that will be sufficient to
+show me there is no chance for irrigation, or, on the contrary, I may
+have to run levels and do some figuring."
+
+"Then perhaps you will know by tomorrow night?" exclaimed Isobel.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well, that's something," said the cowman. "I'll take you out first
+thing in the morning.--Lafe, show Mr. Blake the wash bench. There goes
+the first gong."
+
+When, a little later, all came together again at the supper table,
+nothing more was said about the vexed question of irrigation. Isobel
+had made no changes in her table arrangements other than to have a
+plate laid for Mrs. Blake beside her father's and another for Blake
+beside her own.
+
+The employés were too accustomed to Miss Chuckie to be embarrassed by
+the presence of another lady, and Blake put himself on familiar terms
+with them by his first remarks. If his wealthy high-bred wife was
+surprised to find herself seated at the same table with common
+workmen, she betrayed no resentment over the situation. Her perfect
+breeding was shown in the unaffected simplicity of her manner, which
+was precisely the same to the roughest man present as to her hostess.
+
+Even had there been any indications of uncongeniality, they must have
+been overcome by the presence of Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie Blake.
+The most unkempt, hard-bitten bachelor present gazed upon the majesty
+of babyhood with awed reverence and delight. The silent Jap
+interrupted his serving to fetch a queer rattle of ivory balls carved
+out one within the other. This he cleansed with soap, peroxide and hot
+water, in the presence of the honorable lady mother, before presenting
+it to her infant with much smiling and hissing insuckings of breath.
+
+After supper all retired at an early hour, out of regard for the
+weariness of Mrs. Blake.
+
+When she reappeared, late the next morning, she learned that Knowles,
+Gowan and her husband had ridden off together hours before. But Isobel
+and Ashton seemed to have nothing else to do than to entertain the
+mother and child. Mrs. Blake donned one of the girl's divided skirts
+and took her first lesson in riding astride. There was no sidesaddle
+at the ranch, but there was a surefooted old cow pony too wise and
+spiritless for tricks, and therefore safe even for a less experienced
+horsewoman than was Mrs. Blake.
+
+Knowles and Gowan and the engineer returned so late that they found
+all the others at the supper table. Blake's freshly sunburnt face was
+cheerful. Gowan's expression was as noncommittal as usual. But the
+cowman's forehead was furrowed with unrelieved suspense.
+
+"Oh, Mr. Blake!" exclaimed Isobel. "Don't tell us your report is
+unfavorable."
+
+"Afraid I can't say, as yet," he replied. "We've covered the ground
+pretty thoroughly for miles along High Mesa and Deep Caņon. If the
+annual precipitation here is what I estimate it from what your father
+tells me, it would be possible to put in a drainage and reservoir
+system that would store four thousand acre feet. Except as an
+auxiliary system, however, it would cost too much to be practicable.
+As for Deep Caņon--" He turned to his wife. "Jenny, whatever else
+happens, I must get you up to see that caņon. It's almost as grand and
+in some ways even more wonderful than the Caņon of the Colorado."
+
+"Then I must see it, by all means," responded Mrs. Blake. "I shall
+soon be able to ride up to it, Isobel assures me."
+
+"Within a few days," said the girl. "But, Mr. Blake, pardon me--How
+about the water in the caņon? You surely see no way to lift it out
+over the top of High Mesa?"
+
+"I'm sorry, but I can't even guess what can be done until I have run a
+line of levels and found the depth of the caņon. I tried to estimate
+it by dropping in rocks and timing them, but we couldn't see them
+strike bottom."
+
+"A line of levels? Will it take you long?"
+
+"Maybe a week; possibly more. If I had a transit as well as my level,
+it would save time. However, I can make out with the chain and compass
+I brought."
+
+"Mr. Blake is to start running his levels in the morning," said
+Knowles. "Lafe, I'd like you to help him as his rodman, if you have no
+objections. As you've been an engineer, you can help him along faster
+than Kid.--You said one would do, Mr. Blake; but if you need more,
+take all the men you want. The sooner this thing is settled, the
+better it will suit me."
+
+"The sooner the better, Daddy!" agreed Isobel, "that is, if our guests
+promise to not hurry away."
+
+"We shall stay at least a month, if you wish us to," said Mrs. Blake.
+
+"Two months would be too short!--And the sooner we are over with this
+uncertainty--Lafe, you'll do your utmost to help Mr. Blake, won't
+you?"
+
+"Yes, indeed; anything I can," eagerly responded Ashton.
+
+Gowan's face darkened at sight of the smile with which the girl
+rewarded the tenderfoot. Yet instead of sulking, he joined in the
+evening's entertainment of the guests with a zeal that agreeably
+surprised everyone. His guitar playing won genuine praise from the
+Blakes, though both were sophisticated and critical music lovers.
+
+Somewhat earlier than usual he rose to go, with the excuse that he
+wished to consult Knowles about some business with the owner of the
+adjoining range. The cowman went out with him, and did not return. An
+hour later Ashton took reluctant leave of Isobel, and started for the
+bunkhouse. Half way across he was met by his employer, who stopped
+before him.
+
+"Everybody turning in, Lafe?"
+
+"Not at my suggestion, though," replied Ashton.
+
+"Reckon not. Mr. Blake and his lady are old friends of yours, I take
+it."
+
+"Mrs. Blake is," stated Ashton, with a touch of his former arrogance.
+"We made mud-pies together, in a hundred thousand dollar dooryard."
+
+"Humph!" grunted Knowles. "And her husband?"
+
+The darkness hid Ashton's face, but his voice betrayed the sudden
+upwelling of his bitterness: "I never heard of him until he--until a
+little over three years ago. I wish to Heaven he hadn't taken part in
+that bridge contest!"
+
+"How's that?" asked Knowles in a casual tone.
+
+"Nothing--nothing!" Ashton hastened to disclaim. "You haven't been
+talking with Miss Chuckie about me, have you, Mr. Knowles?"
+
+"No. Why?"
+
+"It was only that I explained to her how I came to be ruined--to lose
+my fortune. You see, the circumstances are such that I cannot very
+well say anything against Blake; yet he was the cause--it was owing to
+something he did that I lost all--everything--millions! Curse him!"
+
+"You've appeared friendly enough towards him," remarked Knowles.
+
+"Yes, I--I promised Miss Chuckie to try to forget the past. But when I
+think of what I lost, all because of him--"
+
+"So-o!" considered the cowman. "Maybe there's more in what Kid says
+than I thought. He's been cross-questioning Blake all day. You know
+how little Kid is given to gab. But from the time we started off he
+kept after Blake like he was cutting out steers at the round-up."
+
+"Blake isn't the kind you could get to tell anything against himself,"
+asserted Ashton.
+
+"Well, that may be. All his talk today struck me as being straightforward
+and outspoken. But Kid has been drawing inferences. He keeps hammering
+at it that Blake must be in thick with his father-in-law, and that all
+millionaires round-up their money in ways that would make a rustler go
+off and shoot himself."
+
+"Business is business," replied Ashton with all his old cynicism.
+"I'll not say that H. V. Leslie is crooked, but I never knew of his
+coming out of a deal second best."
+
+"Well, at any rate, it's white of Blake to tell us beforehand what he
+intends to do if he sees a chance of a practical project."
+
+"Has he told you everything?" scoffed Ashton.
+
+"How about his offer to drop the whole matter and not go into it at
+all?" rejoined Knowles.
+
+Ashton hesitated to reply. For one thing, he was momentarily
+nonplused, and, for another, the Blakes had treated him as a
+gentleman. But a fresh upwelling of bitterness dulled his conscience
+and sharpened his wits.
+
+"It may have been to throw you off your guard," he said. "Blake is
+deep, and he has had old Leslie to coach him ever since he married
+Genevieve. He could have laid his plans,--looked over the ground, and
+found out just what are your rights here,--all without your suspecting
+him."
+
+"Well, I'm not so sure--"
+
+"Have you told him what lands you have deeds to?"
+
+"No, but if he knows as much about the West as I figure he does, he
+can guess it. Fence every swallow of get-at-able water to be found on
+my range this time of year, and you won't have to dig a posthole off
+of land I hold in fee simple. Plum Creek sinks just below where Dry
+Fork junctions."
+
+"But you can't have _all_ the water?" exclaimed Ashton incredulously.
+
+"Yes, every drop to be found outside Deep Caņon this time of year.
+There's my seven and a half mile string of quarter-sections blanketing
+Plum Creek from the springs to down below Dry Fork, and five
+quarter-sections covering all the waterholes. That makes up five
+sections. A bunch of tenderfeet came in here, years ago, and preëmpted
+all the quarter-sections with water on them. Got their patents from
+the government. Then the Utes stampeded them clean out of the country,
+and I bought up their titles at a fair figure."
+
+"And you own even that splendid pool up where I had my camp?"
+
+"Everything wet on this range that a cow or hawss can get to, this
+time of year."
+
+Ashton considered, and advised craftily: "Don't tell him this. Does
+Miss Chuckie know it?"
+
+"She knows I have five sections, and that most of it is on Plum Creek.
+I don't think anything has ever been said to her about the waterholes.
+But why not tell Blake?"
+
+"Don't you see? Even if he finds a way to get at the water in Deep
+Caņon, he will first have to bore his tunnel. He and his construction
+gang must have water to drink and for their engines while they are
+carrying out his plans. You can lie low, and, when the right time
+comes, get out an injunction against their trespassing on your land."
+
+"Say, that's not a bad idea. The best I could figure was that they
+might need one of my waterholes for a reservoir site. But why not call
+him when he first takes a hand?" asked Knowles.
+
+"No, you should not show your cards until you have to," replied
+Ashton. "With all Leslie's money against you, it might be hard to get
+your injunction if they knew of your plans. But if you wait until they
+have their men, machinery and materials on the ground, you will have
+them where they must buy you out at your own terms."
+
+"By--James!" commented Knowles. "Talk about business sharps!"
+
+"I was in Leslie's office for a time," explained Ashton. "Your
+interests are Miss Chuckie's interests. I'm for her--first, last, and
+all the time."
+
+"Um-m-m. Then I guess I can count on you as sure as on Gowan."
+
+"You can. I am going to try my best to win your daughter, Mr. Knowles.
+She's a lady--the loveliest girl I ever met."
+
+"No doubt about that. What's more, she's got grit and brains. That's
+why I tell you now, as I've told Kid, it's for her to decide on the
+man she's going to make happy. If he's square and white, that's all I
+ask."
+
+"About my helping Blake with his levels," Ashton rather hastily
+changed the subject. "I am in your employ--and so is he, for that
+matter. Don't you think I have a right to keep you posted on all his
+plans?"
+
+"Well--yes. But he as much as says he will tell them himself."
+
+"Perhaps he will, and perhaps he won't, Mr. Knowles. I've told you
+what Leslie is like; and Blake is his son-in-law."
+
+"Well, I'm not so sure. You and Kid, between you, have shaken my
+judgment of the man. It can't do any harm to watch him, and I'll be
+obliged to you for doing it. If it comes to a fight against him and
+the millions of backing he has, I want a fair deal and--But, Lord!
+what if we're making all this fuss over nothing? It doesn't stand to
+reason that there's any way to get the water out of Deep Caņon."
+
+"Wait a week or so," cautioned Ashton. "In my opinion, Blake already
+sees a possibility."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+LEVELS AND SLANTS
+
+
+At sunrise the next morning Blake screwed his level on its tripod and
+set up the instrument about a hundred yards away from the ranch house.
+Ashton held the level rod for him on a spike driven into the foot of
+the nearest post of the front porch. Blake called the spike a
+bench-mark. For convenience of determining the relative heights of the
+points along his lines of levels, he designated this first "bench" in
+his fieldbook as "elevation 1,000."
+
+From the porch he ran the line of level "readings" up the slope to the
+top of the divide between Plum Creek and Dry Fork and from there
+towards the waterhole on Dry Fork. At noon Isobel and Mrs. Blake drove
+out to them in the buckboard, bringing a hot meal in an improvised
+fireless-cooker.
+
+"And we came West to rough-it!" groaned Blake, his eyes twinkling.
+
+"You can camp at the waterhole where Lafe did, and I'll send Kid out
+for that bobcat," suggested the girl. "You could roast him, hair and
+all."
+
+"What! roast Gowan?" protested Blake. "Let me tell you, Miss
+Chuckie--you and my wife and Ashton may like him that much, but I
+don't!"
+
+"You need not worry, Mr. Tenderfoot," the girl flashed back at him.
+"Whenever it comes to a hot time, Kid always gets in the first fire,
+without waiting to be told."
+
+"Don't I know it?" exclaimed Ashton. "Maybe you haven't noticed this
+hole in my hat, Mrs. Blake. He put a bullet through it."
+
+"But it's right over your temple, Lafayette!" replied Mrs. Blake.
+
+"Lafe was lifting his some-berero to me, and Kid did it to haze
+him--only a joke, you know," explained Isobel. "Of course Lafe was in
+no danger. It was different, though, when somebody--we think it was
+his thieving guide--took several rifle shots at him. Tell them about
+it, Lafe."
+
+Ashton gave an account of the murderous attack, more than once
+checking himself in a natural tendency to embellish the exciting
+details.
+
+"Oh! What if the man should come back and shoot at us?" shuddered Mrs.
+Blake, drawing her baby close in her arms.
+
+"No fear of that," asserted Isobel. "Kid found that he had fled
+towards the railroad. That proves it must have been the guide. He
+would never dare come back after such a crime."
+
+"If he should, I always carry my rifle, as you see," remarked Ashton;
+adding, with a touch of bravado, "I made him run once, and I would
+again."
+
+"I'm glad Miss Chuckie is sure he will not come back," said Blake. "I
+don't fancy anyone shooting at me that way."
+
+"Timid Mr. Blake!" teased the girl. "Genevieve has been telling me how
+you faced a lion with only a bow and arrow."
+
+"Had to," said Blake. "He'd have jumped on me if I had turned or
+backed off.--Speaking about camping at that waterhole, I believe we'll
+do it, Ashton, if it's the same thing to you. It would save the time
+that would be lost coming and going to the ranch."
+
+"Save time?" repeated Isobel. "Then of course we'll bring out a tent
+and camp kit for you tomorrow. Genevieve and I can ride or drive up to
+the waterhole each day, to picnic with you."
+
+"It will be delightful," agreed Mrs. Blake.
+
+"You ride on ahead and wait for us in the shade," said her husband.
+"We'll knock off for the day when we reach that dolerite dike above
+the waterhole.--If you are ready, Ashton, we'll peg along."
+
+He started off to set up his level as briskly as at dawn, though the
+midday sun was so hot that he had to shade the instrument with his
+handkerchief to keep the air-bubble from outstretching its scale. His
+wife and the girl drove on up Dry Fork to the waterhole.
+
+Mrs. Blake was outstretched on her back, fast asleep, and Isobel was
+playing with the baby under the adjoining tree, when at last the
+surveyors came up on the other side of the creek and ended their day's
+run with the establishment of a bench-mark on the top of the dike
+above the pool. Blake seemed as fresh as in the morning. He took a
+moderate drink of water dipped up in the brim of his hat, and without
+wakening his wife, sat down beside her to "figure up" his fieldbook.
+
+Ashton had come down to the pool panting from heat and exertion. It
+was the first time that he had walked more than half a mile since
+coming to the ranch, for he had immediately fallen into the cowboy
+practice of saddling a horse to go even short distances. He had his
+reward for his work when, having soused his hot head in the pool and
+drunk his fill, he came up to rest in the shade of Isobel's tree. Very
+considerately the baby fell asleep. To avoid disturbing him and his
+mother, the young couple talked in low tones and half whispers very
+conducive to intimacy.
+
+Ashton did his utmost to improve his opportunity. Without openly
+speaking his love, he allowed it to appear in his every look and
+intonation. The girl met the attack with banter and raillery and
+adroit shiftings of the conversation whenever his ardent inferences
+became too obvious. Yet her evasion and her teasing could not always
+mask her maidenly pleasure over his adoration of her loveliness, and
+an occasional blush betrayed to him that his wooing was not
+altogether unwelcome.
+
+He was in the seventh heaven when Mrs. Blake awoke from her
+health-giving sleep and her husband closed his fieldbook. The girl
+promptly dashed her suitor back to earth by dropping him for the
+engineer.
+
+"Mr. Blake! You can't have figured it out already?" she exclaimed.
+"What do you find?"
+
+"Only an 'if,' Miss Chuckie," he answered. "If water can be stored or
+brought by ditch to this elevation, practically all Dry Mesa can be
+irrigated. Our bench-mark there on the dike is more than two hundred
+feet above that spike we drove into your porch post."
+
+"Is that all you've found out today?"
+
+"All for today," said Blake. "I could have left this line of levels
+until later, but I thought I might as well get through with them."
+
+"You would not have run them if you had thought they would be
+useless," she stated, perceiving the point with intuitive acuteness.
+
+"I like to clean up my work as I go along," he replied. "If you wish
+to know, I have thought of a possible way to get water enough for the
+whole mesa. It depends on two 'ifs.' I shall be certain as to one of
+them within the next two days. The other is the question of the depth
+of Deep Caņon. If I had a transit, I could determine that by a
+vertical angle,--triangulation. As it is, I probably shall have to go
+down to the bottom."
+
+"Go down to the bottom of Deep Caņon?" cried the girl.
+
+"Yes," he answered in a matter-of-course tone. "A big ravine runs
+clear down to the bottom, up beyond where your father said you first
+met Ashton. I think it is possible to get down that gulch.--Suppose we
+hitch up? We'll make the ranch just about supper-time."
+
+Ashton hastened to bring in the picketed horses. When they were
+harnessed Isobel fetched the sleeping baby and handed him to his
+mother; but she did not take the seat beside her.
+
+"You drive, Lafe," she ordered. "I'm going to ride behind with Mr.
+Blake. It's such fun bouncing."
+
+All protested in vain against this odd whim. The girl plumped herself
+in on the rear end of the buckboard and dangled her slender feet with
+the gleefulness of a child.
+
+"Mr. Blake will catch me if I go to jolt off," she declared.
+
+The engineer nodded with responsive gayety and seated himself beside
+her. As the buckboard rattled away over the rough sod, they made as
+merry over their jolts and bounces as a pair of school-children on a
+hayrack party.
+
+Mrs. Blake sought to divert Ashton from his disappointment, but he
+had ears only for the laughing, chatting couple behind him. The fact
+that Blake was a married man did not prevent the lover from giving way
+to jealous envy. Chancing to look around as he warned the hilarious
+pair of a gully, he saw the girl grasp Blake's shoulder. Natural as
+was the act, his envy flared up in hot resentment. Except on their
+drive to Stockchute, she had always avoided even touching his hand
+with her finger tips; yet now she clung to the engineer with a grasp
+as familiar as that of an affectionate child. Nor did she release her
+clasp until they were some yards beyond the gully.
+
+Mrs. Blake had seen not only the expression that betrayed Ashton's
+anger but also the action that caused it. She raised her fine
+eyebrows; but meeting Ashton's significant glance, she sought to pass
+over the incident with a smile. He refused to respond. All during the
+remainder of the drive he sat in sullen silence. Genevieve bent over
+her baby. Behind them the unconscious couple continued in their
+mirthful enjoyment of each other and the ride.
+
+When the party reached the ranch, the girl must have perceived
+Ashton's moroseness had she not first caught sight of her father. He
+was standing outside the front porch, his eyes fixed upon the corner
+post in a perplexed stare.
+
+"Why, Daddy," she called, "what is it? You look as you do when playing
+chess with Kid."
+
+"Afraid it's something that'll annoy Mr. Blake," replied the cowman.
+
+"What is it?" asked Blake, who was handing his wife from the
+buckboard.
+
+As the engineer faced Knowles, Gowan sauntered around the far corner
+of the house. At sight of the ladies he paused to adjust his
+neckerchief.
+
+"Can't understand it, Mr. Blake," said the cowman. "Somebody has
+pulled out that spike you drove in here this morning."
+
+"Pulled the spike?" repeated Gowan, coming forward to stare at the
+post. "That shore is a joke. The Jap's building a new henhouse. Must
+be short of nails."
+
+"That's so," said Knowles. "I forgot to order them for him. I'm mighty
+sorry, Mr. Blake. But of course the little brown cuss didn't know what
+he was meddling with."
+
+"Jumping Jehosaphat!" ejaculated Gowan. "That shore is mighty hard
+luck! I reckon pulling that spike turns your line of levels adrift
+like knocking out the picket-pin of an uneasy hawss."
+
+Blake burst into a hearty laugh. "That's a fine metaphor, Mr. Gowan.
+But it does not happen to fit the case. It would not matter if the
+spike-hole had been pulled out and the post along with it, so far as
+concerns this line of levels."
+
+"It wouldn't?" muttered Gowan, his lean jaw dropping slack. He
+glowered as if chagrined at the engineer's laughter at his mistake.
+
+Without heeding the puncher's look, Blake began to tell Knowles the
+result of his day's work. While he was speaking, they went into the
+house after his wife and the girl, leaving Gowan and Ashton alone.
+Equally sullen and resentful, the rivals exchanged stares of open
+hostility. Ashton pointed a derisive finger at the spike-hole in the
+post.
+
+"'Hole ... and the post along with it!'" he repeated Blake's words.
+"On bridge work it might have caused some trouble. But a preliminary
+line of levels--_Mon Dieu_! A Jap should have known better--or even a
+yap!" With a supercilious shrug, he swung back into the buckboard and
+drove up to the corral.
+
+Gowan's right hand had dropped to his hip. Slowly it came up and
+joined the other hand in rolling a thick Mexican cigarette. But the
+puncher did not light his "smoke." He looked at the spike-hole in the
+post, scowled, and went back around the house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+METAL AND METTLE
+
+
+At dawn Blake and Ashton drove up to the waterhole on Dry Fork with
+their camp equipment. There they left the outfit in the buckboard and
+proceeded with the line of levels on up the creek bed into the gorge
+from which it issued.
+
+For more than a mile they carried the levels over the bowlders of the
+gradually sloping bottom of that stupendous gash in the mountain side.
+So far the work was fairly easy. At last, however, they came to the
+place where the bed of the gulch suddenly tilted upward at a sharp
+angle and climbed the tremendous heights to the top of High Mesa in
+sheer ascents and cliff-like ledges. Blake established a bench-mark at
+the foot of the acclivity, and came forward beside Ashton to peer up
+the Titanic chute between the dizzy precipices. From where they stood
+to the head of the gulch was fully four thousand feet.
+
+"What do you think of it?" asked the engineer.
+
+"I think this is where your line ends," answered Ashton, and he rolled
+a cigarette. He had been anything but agreeable since their start from
+the ranch.
+
+"We of course can't go up with the level and rod," said Blake, smiling
+at the absurdity of the suggestion. "Still, we might possibly chain it
+to the top."
+
+Ashton shrugged. "I fail to see the need of risking my neck to climb
+this goat stairway."
+
+"Very well," agreed Blake, ignoring his companion's ill humor. "Kindly
+take back the level and get out the chain."
+
+Ashton started off without replying. Blake looked at the young man's
+back with a regretful, half-puzzled expression. But he quickly
+returned to the business in hand. He laid the level rod on a rock and
+inclined it at the same steep pitch as the uptilt of the gorge bottom.
+Over the lower end of this he held a plumb bob, and took the angle
+between the perpendicular line of the bob-string and the inclined line
+of the rod with a small protractor that he carried in his notebook.
+The angle measured over fifty degrees from the horizontal.
+
+Having thus determined the angle of inclination, the engineer picked a
+likely line of ascent and started to climb the gulch chute. He went up
+in rapid rushes, with the ease and surefootedness of a coolheaded,
+steel-muscled climber. He stopped frequently, not because of weariness
+or of lack of breath, but to test the structure and hardness of the
+rocks with a small magnifying glass and the butt of his pocket knife.
+
+At last, nearly a thousand feet up, his ascent was stopped by a sheer
+hundred-foot cliff. He had seen it beetling above him and knew
+beforehand that he could not hope to scale such a precipice; yet he
+clambered up to it, still examining the rock with minute care. As he
+walked across the waterworn shelf at the foot of the sheer cliff, his
+eye was caught by a wide seam of quartz in the side wall of the
+gulch.
+
+Going on over to the vein, he looked at it in several places through
+his magnifying glass. Everywhere little yellow specks showed in the
+semi-translucent quartz. He drew back across the gorge to examine the
+trend of the vein. It ran far outward and upward, and in no place was
+it narrower than where it disappeared under the bed of the gorge.
+
+His lips pursed in a prolonged, soundless whistle. But he did not
+linger. Immediately after he had estimated the visible length and dip
+of the seam, he began his descent. Arriving at the foot without
+accident, he picked up the level rod and swung away down the gulch.
+
+He saw nothing of Ashton until he had come all the distance down
+across the valley to the dike above the pool. His assistant was in the
+grove below, assiduously helping Miss Knowles to erect a tent that the
+girl had improvised from a tarpaulin. Genevieve and Thomas Herbert
+were interesting themselves in the contents of the kit-box. The two
+ladies had ridden up to the camp on horseback, Isobel carrying the
+baby.
+
+When Blake came striding down to them, the girl left Ashton and ran
+to meet him, her eyes beaming with affectionate welcome.
+
+"What has kept you so long?" she called. "Lafe says the gulch is
+absolutely unclimbable. I could have told you so, beforehand."
+
+"You are right. I tried it, but had to quit," replied Blake, engulfing
+her outstretched hand in his big palm.
+
+When he would have released her, she caught his fingers and held fast,
+so that they came down to his wife hand in hand. Oblivious of Ashton's
+frown, the girl dimpled at Mrs. Blake.
+
+"Here he is, Genevieve," she said. "We have him corralled for the rest
+of the morning."
+
+"Sorry," replied Blake, stooping to pick up his chuckling son. "We
+can't knock off now."
+
+"But if you cannot continue your levels?" asked his wife. "From what
+Lafayette told us, we thought you would not start in again until after
+lunch."
+
+"No more levels until tomorrow," said Blake. "But I must settle one of
+my big 'ifs' by night. To do it, Ashton and I will have to go up on
+High Mesa and measure a line. There's still two hours till noon. We'll
+borrow your saddle ponies, Miss Chuckie, and start at once, if Jenny
+will put us up a bite of lunch."
+
+"Immediately, Tom," assented Mrs. Blake, delighted at the opportunity
+to serve her big husband.
+
+"When shall we take Genevieve to see the caņon?" asked the girl. "I am
+sure she can ride up safely on old Buck."
+
+"We have only the two saddle horses today," replied Blake. "If our
+measurement settles that 'if' one way, I shall start a line of levels
+up the mountain tomorrow morning, if the other way, any irrigation
+project is out of the question, and we shall go up to the caņon merely
+as a sightseeing party."
+
+"Ah!" sighed the girl. "'If!' 'if'--I do so hope it turns out to be
+the last one!"
+
+Blake looked at her with a quizzical smile. "Perhaps you would not,
+Miss Chuckie, if you could see all the results of a successful water
+system."
+
+"You mean, turning our range into farms for hundreds of irrigationists,"
+she replied. "I suppose I am selfish, but I am thinking of what it
+would mean to Daddy. Just consider how it will affect us. For years
+this land has been our own for miles and miles!"
+
+"Well, we shall see," said Blake, his eyes twinkling.
+
+"Yes, indeed!" she exclaimed. "Lafe, if you'll help me saddle up and
+help Mr. Blake rush up to do that measuring, I'll--I'll be ever so
+grateful!"
+
+Though all the more resentful at Blake over having to leave her
+company, Ashton eagerly sprang forward to help the girl saddle the
+ponies. When they were ready, she filled his canteen for him and took
+a sip from it "for luck." Genevieve had packed an ample lunch in a
+gamebag, along with her husband's linked steel-wire surveyor's chain.
+
+Ten minutes after Blake's arrival, he handed the baby to its mother
+and swung into the saddle. Ashton had already mounted, fired by a kind
+glance from the girl's forget-me-not eyes. In his zeal, he led the way
+at a gallop around the craggy hill and across the intervening valley
+to the escarpment of High Mesa. Had not Blake checked him, he would
+have forced the pace on up the mountain side.
+
+"Hold on," called the engineer. "We want to make haste slowly. That
+buckskin you're on isn't so young as he has been, and my pony has to
+lug around two hundred pounds. We'll get back sooner by being
+moderate. Besides you don't wish to knock up old Buck. He is about the
+only one of these jumpy cow ponies that is safe for Jenny."
+
+"That's so," admitted Ashton. "Suppose you set the pace."
+
+He stopped to let Blake pass him, and trailed behind up the mountain
+side. He had headed into a draw. The engineer at once turned and began
+zigzagging up the steep side of the ridge that thrust out into the
+valley between the draw and the gulch of Dry Fork. At the stiffest
+places he jumped off and led his pony. None too willingly, Ashton
+followed the example set by his companion. There were some places
+where he could not have avoided so doing--ledges that the old
+buckskin, despite his years of mountain service, could hardly scramble
+up under an empty saddle.
+
+Long before they reached the point of the ridge, Ashton was panting
+and sweating, and his handsome face was red from exertion and anger.
+But his indignation at being misguided up so difficult a line of
+ascent received a damper when he reached the lower end of the ridge
+crest. Blake, who had waited patiently for him to clamber up the last
+sharp slope, gave him a cheerful nod and pointed to the long but
+fairly easy incline of the ridge crest.
+
+"In mountain climbing, always take your stiffest ground first, when
+you can," he said. "We can jog along pretty fast now."
+
+They mounted and rode up the ridge, much of the time at a jog trot.
+Before long they came to the top of High Mesa, and galloped across to
+one of the ridges that lay parallel with Deep Caņon. Climbing the
+ridge, they found themselves looking over into a ravine that ran down
+to the right to join another ravine from the opposite direction, at
+the head of Dry Fork Gulch. Blake turned and rode to the left along
+the ridge, until he found a place where they could cross the ravine.
+The still air was reverberating with the muffled roar of Deep Caņon.
+
+From the ridge on the other side of the ravine, they could look down
+between the scattered pines to the gaping chasm of the stupendous
+caņon. But Blake rode to the right along the summit of the ridge until
+they came opposite the head of Dry Fork Gulch. Here he flung the reins
+over his pony's head, and dismounted. Ashton was about to do the same
+when he caught sight of a wolf slinking away like a gray shadow up the
+farther ravine. He reached for his rifle, and for the first time
+noticed that he had failed to bring it along. In his haste to start
+from camp he had left it in the tent.
+
+"_Sacre!_" he petulantly exclaimed. "There goes twenty-five dollars!"
+
+"How's that?" asked Blake. He looked and caught a glimpse of the wolf
+just as it vanished. "Why don't you shoot?"
+
+"Left my rifle in camp, curse the luck!"
+
+"Keep cool," advised Blake. "It's only twenty-five dollars, and you
+might have missed anyway."
+
+"Not with my automatic," snapped Ashton. "You needn't sneer about the
+money. You've seen times when you'd have been glad of a chance at half
+the amount."
+
+"That's true," gravely agreed the engineer. "What's more, I realize
+that it is far harder for you than it ever was for me. I want to tell
+you I admire the way you have stood your loss."
+
+"You do?" burst out the younger man. "I want to tell _you_ I don't
+admire the way you ruined me--babbling to my father--when you
+promised to keep still! You sneak!"
+
+Blake looked into the other's furious face with no shade of change in
+his grave gaze. "I have never said a word to your father against you,"
+he declared.
+
+"Then--then how, after all this time--?" stammered Ashton, even in his
+anger unable to disbelieve the engineer's quiet statement. He was
+disconcerted only for the moment. Again he flared hotly: "But if you
+didn't, old Leslie must have! It's all the same!"
+
+"No, it is not the same," corrected Blake. "As for my father-in-law,
+if he said anything about--the past, I feel sure it was not with
+intention to hurt your interests."
+
+"Hurt my interests! You know I am utterly ruined!"
+
+"On the contrary, I know you are not ruined. You have lost a large
+allowance, and a will has been made cutting you off from a great many
+millions that you expected to inherit. But you have landed square on
+your feet; you have a pretty good job, and you are stronger and
+healthier than you were."
+
+"If you break up Mr. Knowles' range with your irrigation schemes, I
+stand to lose my job. You know that."
+
+"If the project proves to be feasible, I shall offer you a position on
+the works," said Blake.
+
+"You needn't try to bribe me!" retorted Ashton. "I'm working for Mr.
+Knowles."
+
+"Well, he directed you to help me with this survey," replied the
+engineer, with imperturbable good nature. "The next move is to chain
+across to the caņon."
+
+He pulled his surveyor's chain from the bag and descended the ridge to
+an out-jutting rock above the head of the tremendous gorge in the
+mountain side. Ashton followed him down. Blake handed him the front
+end of the chain.
+
+"You lead," he said. "I'll line you, as I know where to strike the
+nearest point on the caņon."
+
+Ashton sullenly started up the ridge, and the measurement began. As
+Blake required only a rough approximation, they soon crossed the ridge
+and chained down through the trees to the edge of Deep Caņon. Ashton
+was astonished at the shortness of the distance. The caņon at this
+point ran towards the mesa escarpment as if it had originally intended
+to drive through into Dry Fork Gulch, but twisted sharp about and
+curved back across the plateau. Even Blake was surprised at the
+measurement. It was only a little over two thousand feet.
+
+"Noticed this place when out with Mr. Knowles and Gowan," he remarked,
+gazing down into the abyss with keen appreciation of its awful
+grandeur. "They told me it is the nearest that the caņon comes to the
+edge of the mesa, until it breaks out, thirty or forty miles down."
+
+"How--how about that 'if' you said this measurement would settle?"
+asked Ashton.
+
+"What's the time?"
+
+Ashton looked at his watch, frowning over the evasive reply. "It's
+two-ten."
+
+"I'll figure on the proposition while we eat lunch," said Blake. "I
+can answer you better regarding that 'if' when I have done some
+calculating. Luckily I climbed up to examine the rock in the gulch."
+He smiled quizzically at his companion. "You were right as to its
+being unclimbable; but I found out even more than I expected."
+
+Ashton silently took the bag from him and arranged the lunch and his
+canteen on a rock under a pine. The engineer figured and drew little
+diagrams in his fieldbook while he ate his sandwiches. Ashton had half
+drained the canteen on the way up the mountain. Before sitting down
+Blake had rinsed out his mouth and taken a few swallows of water.
+After eating, he started to take another drink, noticed his
+companion's hot dry face, and stopped after a single sip.
+
+"Guess you need it more than I do," he remarked, as he rose to his
+feet. "Time to start. I wish to go around and down the mountain on the
+other side of the gulch."
+
+"How about the--the 'if'?" inquired Ashton.
+
+"Killed," answered Blake. "There now is only one left. If that comes
+out the same way, Dry Mesa will have good cause to change its name."
+
+"You can tunnel through from the gulch to the caņon?" exclaimed
+Ashton.
+
+"Yes; and I shall do so--if Deep Caņon is not too deep."
+
+"I hope it is a thousand feet below Dry Mesa!" said Ashton.
+
+"In the circumstances," Blake replied to the fervent declaration, "I
+am glad to hear you say it."
+
+Ashton stared, but could detect no sarcasm in the other's smile of
+commendation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+A SHOT IN THE DUSK
+
+
+They returned to their grazing ponies, and at once started the descent
+of the mountain, after crossing the ravine where they had seen the
+wolf. Blake chose a route that brought them down into the valley above
+the waterhole shortly before five o'clock. They cantered the remaining
+distance along the wide, gravelly wash of the creek bed to the dike.
+
+Looking down from the dike, they saw that Knowles and Gowan had come
+up the creek and were waiting for them in company with the ladies.
+Ashton set spurs to his horse and dashed across above the pool, to
+descend the slope to the party. Blake descended on the other side, to
+water his horse and slake his own thirst.
+
+To Ashton's chagrin, Isobel joined Genevieve in hastening to meet the
+engineer. He rode down beside the two men and jumped off to follow the
+ladies. But Gowan sprang before him.
+
+"Hold on," he said. "Mr. Knowles wants your report."
+
+"If you'll oblige us, Lafe," added the cowman. "I'm pretty much worked
+up."
+
+"You have cause to be!" replied Ashton. "He says the only question
+left is whether the water in the caņon is not at too low a level. We
+measured across from the creek gulch to the caņon. A tunnel is
+practicable, he says."
+
+"Through all that mountain?" scoffed Gowan. "It's solid rock, clean
+through. It would take him a hundred years to burrow a hole like
+that."
+
+"You know nothing of engineering and its tools. We now have electric
+drills that will eat into granite like cheese," condescendingly
+explained Ashton.
+
+"Think I don't know that? But just you try to figure out how he's
+going to get his electricity for his drills," retorted Gowan.
+
+Without stopping for his disconcerted rival to reply, he turned his
+back on him and started towards Isobel. The girl was running up from
+the pool, her face almost pitiful with disappointment.
+
+"Oh, Daddy!" she called, "Mr. Blake says that if the water in the
+caņon--"
+
+"Needn't tell me, honey. I know already," broke in her father,
+hastening to meet her.
+
+She flung her arms about his neck, and sobbed brokenly: "I'm--I'm so
+sorry for you, D-Daddy!"
+
+"There, there now!" he soothed, awkwardly patting her back. "'Tisn't
+like you to cry before you're hurt."
+
+"No, no--you! not me. It doesn't matter about me!"
+
+"Doesn't it, though! But I'm not hurt either, as yet. It's a long ways
+from being a sure thing."
+
+"All the way down to the bottom of Deep Caņon!" put in Ashton.
+
+"And then some!" added Gowan. "I've hit on another 'if,' Miss
+Chuckie."
+
+"You have? Oh, Kid, tell us!"
+
+"It's this: How's he going to get electricity to dig his tunnel?"
+
+Blake was coming up from the pool, with his baby in one arm and his
+wife clinging fondly to the other. He met the coldly exultant glance
+of Gowan, and smiled.
+
+"The only question regarding the power is one of cost, Mr. Gowan," he
+said. "There is no coal near enough to be hauled. But gasolene is not
+bulky. If there was water power to generate electricity, a tunnel
+could be bored at half the cost I have figured. The point is that
+there is no water power available, nor will there be until the tunnel
+is finished."
+
+"What! You talk about finishing the tunnel? Didn't you say it is still
+uncertain about the water?" demanded Knowles.
+
+"I was merely explaining to Mr. Gowan," replied Blake. "The question
+he raised is one of the factors in our problem as to whether an
+irrigation project is practicable. We now know that we have the land
+for it, the tunnel site, the reservoir site--" he pointed to the
+valley above the dike--"and I have figured that the cost of
+construction would not be excessive. All that remains is to determine
+if we have the water. I have already explained that this will require
+a descent into the caņon."
+
+"You say that that will decide it, one way or the other?" queried
+Knowles, his forehead creased with deep lines of foreboding.
+
+"Yes," replied Blake. "I regret that you feel as you do about it.
+Consider what it would mean to hundreds, yes, thousands of people, if
+this mesa were watered. I assure you that you, too, would benefit by
+the project."
+
+"I don't care for any such benefit, Mr. Blake. I've been a cowman for
+twenty-five years. I want to keep my range until the time comes for me
+to take the long trail."
+
+"It would be hard to change," agreed the engineer. "However, the point
+now is to find what Deep Caņon has to tell us."
+
+"You still think you can go down it?"
+
+"Yes, if I have ropes, a two-pound hammer, and some iron pins;
+railroad spikes and picket-pins would do."
+
+"Going to rope the rocks and pull them up for steps?" asked Gowan.
+
+"I shall need two or three hundred feet of half-inch manila," said
+Blake, ignoring the sarcasm.
+
+"They may have it at Stockchute," said Knowles. "Kid, you can drive
+over with the wagon and fetch Mr. Blake all the rope and other things
+he wants. I can't stand this waiting much longer."
+
+"There will be no time lost," said Blake. "It will take Ashton and me
+all of tomorrow to carry a line of levels up the mountain."
+
+"Why need you do that, Tom?" asked his wife.
+
+"Yes, why, if all that's left is to go down into the caņon?" added
+Isobel, dabbing the tears from her wet eyes.
+
+Ashton thrust in an answer before Blake could speak. "We must see how
+high the upper mesa is above this one, Miss Chuckie, and then compare
+the difference of altitude with the depth of the caņon, to see whether
+its bottom is above or below the bottom of the gulch."
+
+"Oh--measure up and then down, to see which way is longest," said
+Genevieve.
+
+"Sorry, ma'am," broke in Knowles. "We'll have to be starting now to
+get home by dark. If you think you can trust me with that young man,
+I'd like the honor of packing him all the way in. I've toted calves
+for miles, so I guess I can hold onto a baby if I use both hands."
+
+"You shall have him!" replied Genevieve, smiling like a daughter as
+she met the look in his grave eyes. "Tom, give Thomas to Mr.
+Knowles--when he is safe in the saddle."
+
+Even Gowan cracked a smile at this cautious qualification. He hastened
+to bring Isobel's horse and hold him for her--which gave Ashton the
+opportunity to help her mount. Both services were needless, but she
+rewarded each eager servitor with a dimpled smile. When Blake handed
+the baby up to Knowles, his wife, untroubled by mock modesty, gave him
+a loving kiss. He lifted her bodily into the saddle, and she rode off
+with her three companions.
+
+Isobel, however, wheeled within the first few yards, and came back for
+a parting word: "You can expect us quite early tomorrow. We will
+overtake you on your way up the mountain. I wish Genevieve to see the
+caņon. Good night--Pleasant dreams!"
+
+She had addressed Ashton, but her last smile was for Blake, and it was
+undisguisedly affectionate. As she loped away after the others, Ashton
+frowned, and, picking up his rifle, started off up the valley. Blake
+was staring after the girl with a wondering look. He turned to cast a
+quizzical glance at the back of the resentful lover.
+
+When the latter had disappeared around the hill, the engineer took the
+frying pan and walked up into the creek bed above the dike. After
+going some distance over the gravel bars, he came to a place where
+the swirl of the last freshet had gouged a hole almost to bedrock.
+Scooping a panful of sand and gravel from the bottom of the hole, he
+went back and squatted down beside the pool within easy reach of the
+water.
+
+He picked the larger pebbles from the pan, added water, and began to
+swirl the contents around with a circular motion. Each turn flirted
+some of the sand and water over the pan's beveled edge. Every little
+while he renewed the water. At last the pan's contents were reduced to
+a half dozen, irregular, dirty, little lumps and a handful of "black
+sand" in which gleamed numbers of yellow particles.
+
+Blake put the nuggets into his pocket and threw the rest out into the
+pool. He returned to the tent and sat down to re-check his level-book
+and his calculations on the approximate cost of the tunnel. Sundown
+found him still figuring; but when twilight faded into dusk, he put
+away his fieldbook and started a fire for supper.
+
+He was in the act of setting on a pan of bacon when, without the
+slightest warning, a bullet cut the knot of the loose neckerchief
+under his downbent chin. In the same instant that he heard the ping of
+the shot he pitched sideways and flattened himself on the ground with
+the chuck-box between him and the fire. A roll and a quick crawl took
+him into the underbrush beyond the circle of firelight. No second
+bullet followed him in his amazingly swift movements. He lay
+motionless, listening intently, but no sound broke the stillness of
+the evening except the distant wail of a coyote and the hoot of an
+owl.
+
+Half an hour passed, and still the engineer waited. The dusk deepened
+into darkness. At last a heavy footfall sounded up on the dike. Blake
+rose, and slipping silently to the tent, groped about until he found a
+heavy iron picket-pin.
+
+Someone came down the slope and kicked his way petulantly through the
+bushes to the dying fire. He threw on an armful of brush. The light of
+the up-blazing flame showed Ashton standing beside the chuck-box,
+rifle in hand. But he dropped the weapon to pick up the overturned
+frying pan, which lay at his feet.
+
+"Hello, Blake!" he sang out irritably. "I supposed you'd have supper
+waiting. Haven't turned in this early, have you?"
+
+"No," replied Blake, and he came forward, carelessly swinging the
+picket-pin. "Thought I saw a coyote sneaking about, and tried to trick
+him into coming close enough for me to nail him with this pin."
+
+"With that!" scoffed Ashton. "But it would do as well as my rifle. I
+took a shot at a wolf, and then the mechanism jammed. I can't get it
+to work."
+
+"You fired a shot?" asked Blake.
+
+"Yes. Was it too far off for you to hear? I circled all around these
+hills."
+
+"No, I heard it," replied Blake, looking close into the other's sullen
+face. "You may not have been as far away as you thought."
+
+"I was far enough," grumbled Ashton. "I've walked till I'm hungry as a
+shark."
+
+"Do you realize that you want to be careful how you shoot with these
+high-power rifles?" asked Blake. "They carry a mile or more."
+
+"I've carried mine more than that, and _it_ won't carry an inch,"
+complained Ashton. "Wish you would see if you can fix it, while I get
+on some bacon."
+
+Blake took his scrutinizing gaze from his companion's face, and picked
+up the rifle. Ashton showed plainly that he was tired and hungry and
+very irritable, but there was no trace of guilt in his look or manner.
+While he hurriedly prepared supper, Blake took apart the mechanism of
+the rifle. He discovered the trouble at once.
+
+"This is easy," he said. "Nothing broken--just a screw loose. Have you
+been monkeying with the parts, to see how they work?"
+
+"No; I don't care a hang how they work. What gets me is that they
+didn't work!"
+
+"Queer, then, how this screw got loose," said Blake as he tightened it
+with the blade of his pocket knife. "It sets tight enough. Of course
+it might have come from the factory a bit loose, and jarred out with
+the firing; but neither seems probable."
+
+"Is it all right now?" queried Ashton.
+
+"Yes.--Seems to me someone _must_ have loosened this screw."
+
+"What's the difference how it happened, if it will not happen again?"
+irritably replied Ashton. "Guess this bacon is fried enough. Let's
+eat."
+
+Blake recoupled the rifle, emptied the magazine, tested the mechanism,
+refilled the magazine, and joined his ravenous companion in his
+ill-cooked meal.
+
+Immediately after eating, Ashton flung himself down in the tent. A few
+minutes later Blake crept in beside him and struck a match. The young
+man had already fallen into the deep slumber of utter physical and
+mental relaxation. Blake went outside and listened to the wailing of
+the coyotes. Difficult as it was to determine the direction of their
+mournful cries, he at last satisfied himself that they were circling
+entirely around the camp.
+
+A watchdog could not have indicated with greater certainty that there
+was no other wild beast or any human being lurking near the waterhole.
+Blake crept back into the tent and was soon fast asleep beside his
+companion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+ON THE BRINK
+
+
+Early to bed, early to rise. The two men were up at dawn. During the
+night the coyotes had sneaked into the camp. But Blake had fastened
+the food in the chuck-box and slung everything gnawable up in the
+branches out of reach of the sly thieves.
+
+At sunrise the two started out on their day's work, Ashton carrying
+his rifle and canteen and the level rod, Blake with the level and a
+bag containing their lunch and a two-quart sirup-can of water.
+
+"We'll run a new line from the dike bench, around the hill and across
+the valley the way we rode out yesterday," said the engineer, as they
+climbed the slope above the waterhole. "That will give us a check by
+cross-tying to the line of the creek levels where it runs into the
+gulch."
+
+"Can't you trust to the accuracy of your own work?" asked Ashton with
+evident intent to mortify.
+
+Blake smiled in his good-natured way. "You forget the first rule of
+engineering. Always check when you can, then re-check and check
+again.--Now, if you'll kindly give me a reading off that bench."
+
+Ashton complied, though with evident ill will. He had wakened in good
+spirits, but was fast returning to his sullenness of the previous day.
+He took his time in going from the bench-mark to the first turning
+point. Blake moved up past him with inspiring briskness, but the
+younger man kept to his leisurely saunter. In rounding the corner of
+the hill twice as much time was consumed as was necessary.
+
+When they came to the last turn at the foot of the rocky slope, where
+the line struck out across the valley towards the foot of the mountain
+side, Ashton paused to roll a cigarette before holding his rod for the
+reading. Small as was the incident, it was particularly aggravating to
+an engineer. The reading would have taken only a moment, and he could
+then have rolled his cigarette and smoked it while Blake was moving
+past him for the next "set up." Instead, he deliberately kept Blake
+waiting until the cigarette had been rolled and lighted.
+
+Blake "pulled up" his level and started forward, his face impassive.
+Ashton leaned jauntily on the rod, sucked in a mouthful of smoke, and
+raising his cigarette, flicked the ash from the tip with his little
+finger. At the same instant a bullet from the crags above him pierced
+the crown of his hat. He pitched forward on his face, rolled half
+over, and lay quiet.
+
+Most men would have been dumfounded by the frightful suddenness of the
+occurrence--the shot and the instant fall of Ashton. It was like a
+stroke of lightning out of a clear sky. Blake did not stand gaping
+even for a moment. As Ashton's senseless body struck the ground, he
+sprang sideways and bent to lay down his instrument, with the
+instinctive carefulness of an old railroad surveyor. A swift rush
+towards Ashton barely saved him from the second bullet that came
+pinging down from the hill crest. It burned across the back of his
+shoulder.
+
+Heedless of the blood spurting from the wound in the side of Ashton's
+head, Blake snatched up the automatic rifle and fired at a point
+between two knobs of rock on the hill crest. Promptly a hat appeared,
+then an arm and a rifle. It might have been expected that a bullet
+would have instantly followed; yet the assassin was strangely
+deliberate about getting his aim. Blake did not wait for him. He began
+to fire as fast as the automatic ejector and reloader set the rifle
+trigger. Three bullets sped up at the assassin before he had time to
+drop back out of sight.
+
+Blake started up the hillside, his pale eyes like white-hot steel. He
+was in a fury, but it was the cold fury of a man too courageous for
+reckless bravado. He went up the hill as an Apache would have charged,
+dodging from cover to cover and, wherever possible, keeping in line
+with a rock or tree in his successive rushes. At every brief stop he
+scanned the ridge crest for a sign of his enemy. But the assassin did
+not show himself. For all that Blake could tell, he might be waiting
+for a sure shot, or he might be lying with a bullet through his
+brain.
+
+To avoid suicidal exposure, the engineer was compelled to veer off to
+the right in his ascent. He reached the ridge crest without a shot
+having been fired at him. Leaping suddenly to his feet, he scrambled
+up to the flat top of a high crag, from which he could peer down upon
+the others. The natural embrazure from which the assassin had fired
+was exposed to his view; but the place was empty. He looked cautiously
+about at the many huge bowlders behind which a hundred men might have
+been crouching unseen by him, advantageous as was his position. To
+flush the assassin would require a bold rush over and around the
+rocks.
+
+Blake set his powerful jaw and gathered himself together for the leap
+down from his crag. At that moment his alert eye caught a glimpse of a
+swiftly moving object on the mesa at the foot of the far side of the
+hill. It was a horse and rider racing out of sight around the bend of
+a ridge point.
+
+Blake whipped the rifle to his shoulder. But the cowardly fugitive had
+disappeared. He lowered the rifle and started back down the hill
+faster than he had come up. Leaping like a goat, sliding, rushing--he
+raced to the bottom in a direct line for Ashton.
+
+The victim lay as he had fallen, his head ghastly red with blood,
+which was still oozing from his wound. Blake dropped down beside the
+flaccid body and tore open the front of the silk shirt. He thrust in
+his hand. For some moments he was baffled by the violent throbbing of
+his own pulse. Then, at last, he detected a heartbeat, very feeble and
+slow yet unmistakable.
+
+He turned Ashton on his side, and washing away the blood with water
+from the canteen, examined the wound with utmost carefulness. The
+bullet had pierced the scalp and plowed a furrow down along the side
+of the skull, grazing but not penetrating the bone.
+
+"Only stunned.... Mighty close, though," muttered Blake. He looked at
+the ashen face of the wounded man and added apprehensively, "Too
+close!... Concussion--"
+
+Hastily he knotted a compress bandage made of handkerchiefs and
+neckerchiefs around the bleeding head, and stretching Ashton flat
+on his back, began to pump his arms up and down as is done in
+resuscitating a drowned person. After a time Ashton's face began
+to lose its deathly pallor. His heart beat less feebly; he drew in a
+deep sighing breath, and stared up dazedly at Blake, with slowly
+returning consciousness.
+
+"I'll smoke all I please and when I please," he murmured in a
+supercilious drawl.
+
+Blake dashed his face with the cupful of water still left in the
+canteen. The wounded man flushed with quick anger and attempted to
+rise.
+
+"What--what you--How dare you?" he spluttered, only to sink back with
+a groan, "My head! O-o-oh! You've smashed my head!"
+
+"You're in luck that your head _wasn't_ smashed," replied Blake. "It
+was a bullet knocked you over."
+
+"Bullet?" echoed Ashton.
+
+"Yes. Scoundrel up on the hill tried to get us both."
+
+"Up on the hill?" Ashton twisted his head about, in alarm, to look at
+the hill crest. "But if he--He may shoot again."
+
+"Not this time. I went up for him. He went down faster, other side the
+hill. Saw him on the run. The sneaking--" Blake closed his lips on the
+word. After a moment his grimness relaxed. "Came back to start your
+funeral. Found you'd cheated the undertaker. How do you feel now?"
+
+"I believe I--" began Ashton, again trying to raise himself, only to
+sink back as before. "My head!--What makes me so weak?"
+
+"Don't worry," reassured Blake. "It's only a scalp wound. You are weak
+from the shock and a little loss of blood. I'll get you a drink from
+my can, and then tote you into camp. You'll be all right in a day or
+two."
+
+He fetched the can of water from his bag, which he had dropped beside
+the level. Ashton drank with the thirstiness of one who has lost
+blood. When at last his thirst was quenched, he glanced up at Blake
+with a look of half reluctant apology.
+
+"I said something about your striking me," he murmured. "I did not
+understand--did not realize I had been shot. You see, just before--"
+
+"That's all right," broke in Blake. "I owe you a bigger apology. Last
+evening, while you were out hunting, someone took a shot at me. It
+must have been this same sneaking skunk. I thought it was you."
+
+"You thought I could try to--to shoot you?" muttered Ashton.
+
+"Yes. There's the old matter of the bridge, and you seem to think I am
+responsible for what your father has done. But after you came in, I
+soon concluded that you had fired towards the camp unintentionally."
+
+"If you had asked," explained Ashton, "I was around at the far end of
+these hills, nearly two miles from the camp, when I shot at the wolf
+and the rifle went wrong."
+
+"That was a fortunate occurrence--your going out and seeing the wolf;"
+said Blake. "If you hadn't taken that shot, we would not have known
+your rifle was out of gear. My first bullet merely made the sneak rise
+up to pot me. If the rapidity of the next three shots hadn't rattled
+him, I believe he would have potted me, instead of running."
+
+"So that was it?" exclaimed Ashton. "Do you know, I believe it must be
+the same scoundrel who attacked me the first day I rode down Dry
+Fork. No doubt he remembered how I ripped loose at him with the
+automatic-catch set."
+
+"Your thieving guide?" said Blake. "But why should he try to kill
+me?"
+
+"I'm sure I don't know," murmured Ashton. "Another drink, please."
+
+"I shall tote you back to camp, and--No, I'll lay you over there in
+the shade and go up to see if he is in sight."
+
+Picking up the wounded man as easily as if he had been a child, the
+engineer carried him over under a tree, fetched him the can of water,
+and for the second time climbed the rocky hillside. Scaling his
+lookout crag, he surveyed the country below him. A mile down the creek
+two riders were coming up towards the waterhole at an easy canter. He
+surmised that they were his wife and Miss Knowles.
+
+Their approach brought a shade of anxiety into his strong face. He
+swept the landscape with his glance. A little cloud of dust far out on
+the mesa towards Split Peak caught his eye. He looked at it
+steadfastly under his hand, and drew a deep breath of relief as he
+made out a fleeing horse and rider.
+
+He descended to Ashton, and taking him up pick-a-back, swung away for
+the camp with long, swift strides. Before he had gone half the
+distance, he felt Ashton's arms loosening their clasp of his neck. He
+caught him as he sank in a swoon. Without a moment's hesitation, he
+slung his senseless burden up on his shoulder like a sack of meal, and
+hastened on faster than before.
+
+Swiftly as he walked, the ladies reached the camp before him. When he
+came to the top of the dike slope, his wife had dismounted and Isobel
+was handing down the baby to her. As the girl slipped out of the
+saddle she looked up the slope. With a startled cry, she darted to
+meet Blake.
+
+Quick to forestall her alarm, he called in a gasping shout: "Not
+serious--not serious!"
+
+"Oh, Tom--Mr. Blake!" she cried. "What has happened?"
+
+"Scalp wound--faint--blood loss," Blake panted in terse answer.
+
+"He is wounded? O-o-oh!" She ran up and looked fearfully at the
+bloodsoaked bandages across Ashton's hanging head.
+
+Blake staggered on down the slope without pausing. Genevieve had
+started to meet him. But at her husband's panting explanation, she
+laid the baby on the nearest soft spot of earth and darted to the
+kit-chest. She was opening a "first aid" box when Blake crashed
+through the bushes and sank down with his burden under the first
+tree.
+
+Genevieve hastened towards the men, calling to her companion: "Water,
+Chuckie--that pail by the fireplace."
+
+The girl flew to fetch a bucket of water from the pool.
+
+Blake was peering anxiously down into Ashton's white face.
+"Didn't--know--but--that--" he panted.
+
+"No," reassured his wife. "He will soon be all right."
+
+She drew the unconscious man flat on his back and held a bottle of
+ammonia to his nostrils. The powerful stimulant revived him just as
+the girl came running back with the water. He opened his eyes, and the
+first object they rested upon was her anxious pitiful face. He smiled
+and whispered gallantly: "Don't be afraid. I'm all right--now!"
+
+"Then I'll drink first," said Blake.
+
+He took a deep draught from the pail, doused a hatful of water over
+his hot head and face, and stretched out to cool off. Genevieve,
+assisted by the deeply concerned girl, took the handkerchief bandage
+from Ashton's head and washed the wound with an antiseptic solution.
+She then clipped away the hair from the edges and drew the scalp
+together with a number of stitches.
+
+In this last the hardy cowgirl was unable to help. She clasped
+Ashton's hand convulsively and sat shuddering. Ashton smiled up into
+her tender pitying eyes. Genevieve had numbed his wound with cocaine.
+He was quite satisfied with the situation.
+
+Another antiseptic washing and a compress of sterilized cotton bound
+on with surgical bandages completed the operation. Then, when it was
+all over with, the young mother, who had gone through everything with
+the aplomb and deftness of a surgeon, quietly sank back in a faint. On
+the instant Blake was reaching for the ammonia bottle.
+
+A whiff restored his wife to consciousness. She opened her eyes, and
+smiling at her weakness, sought to rise. He held her down with gentle
+force and ordered her to lie quiet.
+
+"I shall fetch Tommy," he added. "We'll all take a _siesta_ until
+noon."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE PLOTTERS
+
+
+When Blake came back with the baby, Isobel begged him for a full
+account of how Ashton had been wounded. In relating the affair he
+sought to minimize the danger that he had incurred, and he omitted all
+mention of the bullet shot at him the previous evening. But his
+account was frequently interrupted by exclamations from his wife and
+Isobel.
+
+At the end he dwelt strongly on the cowardly haste of the assassin's
+flight; only to be met by a shrewdly anxious rejoinder from the girl:
+"He ran away after he attacked Lafe the other time. He will come back
+again!"
+
+"Oh, Tom!" cried Genevieve--"if he does!"
+
+"We will get him, that is all there is to it," replied her husband.
+"What do you say to that, Ashton?"
+
+"We will not have the chance," said Ashton. "I don't believe he has
+nerve enough to try it the third time. But if he should--"
+
+"No, no! I hope he keeps running forever!" fervently wished Isobel.
+"Don't you realize how close a miss that was, Lafe?--and the other
+time, too?"
+
+"I like having one Miss close," he punned.
+
+The girl blushed, but failed to show any sign of resentment.
+
+Blake looked significantly at his wife. "Don't know but what I've
+changed my mind about a _siesta_," he remarked. "Here's Tommy gone to
+sleep just when I wanted to fight him. Do you think Miss Chuckie can
+keep him and Ashton from running away if I go to bring in the level?"
+
+"You say you had started to run the line of levels across to the
+mountain?" she asked.
+
+"Yes.... This little pleasantry has knocked us out of a day's work and
+you out of your trip to the caņon."
+
+"But why couldn't I rod for you?" she suggested. "I noticed Lafayette
+the other day. It seems easier than golfing."
+
+"It is."
+
+"Then I shall do it. A good walk is exactly what I need."
+
+"Genevieve!" hastily appealed Isobel. "Surely you'll not go off and
+leave me--us!"
+
+"Thomas is asleep, and Lafayette needs to be quiet," was the demure
+reply. "Come, Tom. We'll run the levels over to the foot of the
+mountain, at least."
+
+With a reproachful glance at the smiling couple, the girl slipped over
+to put Thomas Herbert between herself and Ashton. Blake found another
+bag and can, which last he filled with water from the bucket.
+Genevieve put on the cowboy hat that she had borrowed at the ranch,
+and sprang up to join him.
+
+He paused for a question: "How about leaving the rifle?"
+
+Isobel put her hand to a fold in her skirt and drew out her
+long-barreled automatic pistol. "I can do as well or better with
+this," she answered.
+
+"What a wicked looking thing!" exclaimed Genevieve. "Surely, dear, you
+do not shoot it?"
+
+"Shoot it!" put in Ashton. "Hasn't she told you about saving me from a
+rattler?"
+
+"She did?"
+
+"Yes," he replied, and he told about the rattlesnake in the
+bunkhouse.
+
+"But I ought to have shot quicker," Isobel explained, when he
+finished. "I missed the head, though I aimed at it."
+
+"The way we've left Thomas about on the ground!" exclaimed Genevieve.
+"Are there any of the horrid things around here? Is that why you carry
+the pistol?"
+
+"No, no, don't be afraid. We've killed them out here, long ago,
+because of the cattle. I carry my pistol on the chance of killing
+wolves. They're dreadfully harmful to the calves and colts, you
+know."
+
+"Good for you," praised Blake, as he picked up the rifle. "Well, we're
+off."
+
+He started away, hand in hand with his wife. They were soon at the top
+of the dike slope and almost dancing along over the dry turf. It was
+months since they had been alone together in the open, and they were
+still deeper in love than at the time of their marriage--if that were
+possible.
+
+They soon reached the place where the shooting had occurred. Here they
+picked up the lunch bag, Ashton's canteen and his hat, now punctured
+with another bullet hole; and at once started to carry the line of
+levels out across the valley. A few words of instruction made an
+efficient rodwoman of Genevieve, so that they soon reached the foot of
+the ridge up which her husband had led Ashton the previous day. Here
+he established a bench-mark, and turned along the base of the
+escarpment to the mouth of Dry Fork Gully, where he checked the line
+of levels that had been run up the bed of the creek.
+
+"Good work--less than three tenths difference, and all that I am
+concerned about is an error in feet," he commented. "It's getting
+along towards noon. We'll go up the gulch, and eat our lunch in the
+shade. This place is almost as much of a sight as the caņon."
+
+Genevieve more than agreed with her husband's opinion when he led her
+up into the stupendous gorge and the walls of rock began to tower on
+each side ever steeper and loftier.
+
+"Oh, I do not see how anything can be so grand, so awesome as this!"
+she cried, gazing up the precipices. "It makes me positively giddy to
+look at such heights!"
+
+"Better stop off for a while," advised Blake. "We are almost to where
+the bottom tilts skyward. You can stargaze while we are eating lunch.
+It's rougher along here. We can get on faster this way."
+
+He picked her up in his arms as though she were a feather, and carried
+her on up the gulch to the foot of the Titanic chute. Here, resting on
+a flat rock in the cool semi-twilight of the gorge bottom, they ate
+their lunch and talked with as much zest as if they were still new
+acquaintances.
+
+"Those awful cliffs!" she murmured, lowering her gaze from the
+colossal walls above her. "I cannot bear to look at them any longer.
+They overpower me!"
+
+"Wait till you look down into the caņon," replied her husband. "In
+some ways it is more tremendous than the Grand Caņon of the
+Colorado--the width is so much narrower in proportion to the depth."
+
+"What makes these frightful chasms?--earthquakes?"
+
+"Water," he replied.
+
+"Water? Not all these hundreds and thousands of feet cut down through
+the solid rock!"
+
+"Every foot," he insisted. "Think of water flowing along in the
+same bed and always washing sand and gravel and even bowlders
+downstream--grind, grind, grind, through the centuries and hundreds of
+centuries."
+
+"But there is no water here, Tom."
+
+"Not now, and no chance of any this time of year, else I wouldn't
+have brought you in here. A sudden heavy June rain up above there
+would pour down a torrent that would drown us before we could run
+three hundred yards. Imagine a flood roaring down that bumpy
+shoot-the-chutes."
+
+"I can't! It's too terrifying. Is that the way it will be if you get
+the water and dig the tunnel?"
+
+"No. At this end, the tunnel may terminate any place from down here to
+a thousand feet up, but in any event far below the top. I hope it
+proves to be well up. The greater the drop to the level of the mesa,
+the more turbines could be put in to generate electricity."
+
+"That sounds so inspiring! But, Dear--" Genevieve looked at her
+husband with a shade of anxiety--"even if this project is feasible, do
+you feel you should carry it through?"
+
+"You mean on account of Miss Chuckie and her father," he replied. "I
+have considered their side of the matter, and even at the first I saw
+how--Listen, Sweetheart. No one knows better than you that I'm an
+engineer to the very marrow of my bones. My work in life is to
+construct,--to harness the forces of nature and compel them to serve
+mankind; and to save waste--waste material, waste energy--and put it
+to use."
+
+"Don't I know, Tom!"
+
+"Well, then," he went on, "in the bottom of Deep Caņon is a
+river--waste waters down there beyond the reach of this rich but
+waterless land, down in the gloom, doing no good to anything or
+anybody, frittering away their energy on barren rocks. Why, it's as
+bad as the way Ashton, with all the good qualities we now see he has
+in him--the way he dissipated his strength and his brains and his
+father's money."
+
+"Ah, Dear! wasn't it a splendid thing when he was thrown out of his
+rut of wastefulness?"
+
+"Otherwise known as the primrose path, or the great white way," added
+Blake. "It certainly was a throw out. I'm as pleased as I am
+astonished that he seems to have landed squarely on his feet."
+
+"What a marvelous change it has made in him!" exclaimed Genevieve.
+"Sometimes I hardly can believe it really is Lafayette. He is so
+serious and manly."
+
+"Good thing he has changed," replied Blake. "If Miss Chuckie hadn't
+told us he had made a clean breast of that bridge, I should begin to
+feel worried about--Do you know, Sweetheart, it's the strangest thing
+in the world the way I feel towards that girl. It's not because she is
+so lovely. Of course I enjoy her beauty, but that's not it. If Tommy
+were a girl and grown up--that's how I feel."
+
+"She is a very dear, sweet girl."
+
+"So are several of your friends--our friends," said Blake. "This is
+different. The very first day we met her, there was something about
+her voice and face--seemed as though I already knew her."
+
+"She knew you, through what she had read of you. She warned me, in
+that frank, charming way of hers, that you were a hero to her and I
+must not mind if she worshiped you openly."
+
+Blake laughed pleasedly. "Isn't she the greatest! And the way she
+chums with me! Wonder if that is what makes Ashton so sore at me? The
+idiot! Can't he see the difference?"
+
+"Lovers always are blind," said Genevieve.
+
+"I'm not," he rejoined, his eyes, as he gazed down into hers, as blue
+and tender as Isobel's.
+
+The young wife blushed deliciously and rewarded him with a kiss.
+
+"But about Chuckie?" she returned to the previous question. "You were
+going to tell me--"
+
+"I am going to tell you something you will think is very fanciful--and
+it is! Do you know why I am so taken with that girl? It's because
+she reminds me of my sisters--what they might have grown to be!...
+God!--" he bent over with his face in his shaking hands--"God! If only
+they had gone any other way than--the way they did!"
+
+"My poor dear boy!" soothed his wife, her hand on his downbent head.
+"Let us trust that they are in a happier world, a world where sorrow
+and pain--"
+
+"If only I could believe that!" he groaned.
+
+Genevieve waited a few moments and with quiet tactfulness sought to
+divert him from his grief: "If Chuckie reminds you of them, Dear--"
+
+"She might be either--only Mary, the older one, had dark brown eyes.
+But Belle's were blue like Chuckie's."
+
+"What a pure blue her eyes are--the sweet true girl! Why can't you
+regard her as your sister, and--and give over further thought of this
+irrigation project?"
+
+Blake looked up, completely diverted. "You little schemer! So that's
+what you've been working around to?"
+
+"But why not?" she insisted.
+
+"I'll tell you. It is because I am so fond of Chuckie that I am
+determined to get water on Dry Mesa, if it is possible."
+
+"But--"
+
+"To make use of those waste waters," he explained; "to turn this dusty
+semi-desert into a garden; and to benefit Chuckie by doubling the
+value of her father's property."
+
+"How could that be, when the farmers would divide up his range?"
+
+"He owns five sections, Chuckie told me. What are they worth now? But
+with water on them, even without a single tree planted, they would
+sell as orchard land for more than all his herd; and he would still
+have his cattle. He could sell them to the settlers for more than what
+he now gets shipping them over the range."
+
+"I begin to see, Tom. I might have known it."
+
+"I'm telling you, of course. We're to keep it from them as a happy
+surprise, because it may not come off. There's still the question
+whether the water in the caņon--"
+
+"But if it is! How delightful it will be to help Mr. Knowles and
+Chuckie, besides, as you say, turning this desert into a garden!"
+
+"That valley is a natural reservoir site to hold flood waters,"
+continued the engineer. "All that's needed is a dam built across the
+narrow place above the waterhole, with the dike for foundation. I
+would build it of rock from the tunnel, run down on a gravity tram."
+
+"You've worked it all out?"
+
+"Not all, only the general scheme. If the tunnel comes through high
+enough up here, we shall be able to manufacture cheap electricity to
+sell. Just think of our settlers plowing by electricity, and their
+wives cooking on electric stoves."
+
+"You humorous boy!"
+
+"No, I mean it. There's another thing--I wouldn't whisper it even to
+you if you weren't my partner as well as my wife. I have reason to
+believe the creek bed above the dike is a rich placer. I've planned to
+take Knowles and Ashton in on that discovery--Gowan, too, if Knowles
+asks it."
+
+"A placer?"
+
+"Yes, placer mine--gold washed down in the creek bed. But it's a small
+thing compared with another discovery I've made. Up there--" Blake
+pointed up the steep ledges that he had climbed--"I found a bonanza."
+
+"Bonanza? What is that, pray?"
+
+"A mint, a John D. bank account, a--Guess?"
+
+"A gold mine! Oh, Tom, how romantic!"
+
+"Yes; it's free-milling quartz. We can mill it ourselves, and not have
+to pay tribute to the Smelting Trust. That's romance--or at least
+sounds like it. You will pay for all the development work, in return
+for one-third share. I shall take a third, as the discoverer, and
+Chuckie gets the remaining third as grub-staker."
+
+"As what?"
+
+"She is staking us with grub--food and supplies. If she had not sent
+for me to come and look over the situation, I should not have been
+here to stumble on this mine. So she gets a share."
+
+"I'm glad, glad, Tom! Isn't it nice to be able to do fine things for
+others? I'm so glad for Chuckie's sake, because, if Lafayette keeps on
+as he is doing now, he may win his father's forgiveness."
+
+"What has that to do with Chuckie?"
+
+"You and I know what she is, Dear; yet if she had no money, his father
+might insist on regarding her as a mere farm girl. He is as--as
+snobbish as I was when we were flung ashore by the storm, there in
+Mozambique."
+
+"I fail to see that it matters any to Chuckie what Ashton senior
+thinks."
+
+"Of course you don't see. You're as blind as when I--" the lady
+blushed--"as when I had to fling myself at you to make you see. The
+dear girl is as deeply in love with Lafayette as he is with her."
+
+"No? She doesn't show it. How can you tell?"
+
+"You know that Mr. Gowan is desperately in love with her."
+
+"That stands to reason. He couldn't help but be. Can't say I like
+the fellow. He may be all right, though. Must have some good
+qualities--Chuckie seems to be very fond of him."
+
+"As fond as if he were a brother. No; Lafayette is to be the happy
+man--unless he backslides. We must help him."
+
+Blake nodded. "That's another thing that hangs on this project. If it
+proves to be feasible, I can give Ashton a chance to make good as an
+engineer. I used to think he must have bought his C.E. Now I see he
+has the makings."
+
+"He can be brilliant when he chooses. If only he were not so--so
+scatter-brained."
+
+"What he needed was a jolt heavy enough to shake him together. It
+seems as though his father gave it to him."
+
+"That shock, and being picked up by Chuckie," agreed Genevieve.
+
+"We'll help her keep him braced until the cement sets," said her
+husband. "It's even worse to let brains go to waste than water."
+
+"Far worse! What is the good of all your engineering--of all the
+machinery, yes, and all the culture of civilization, if not to uplift
+men and women? May the next generation work for the uplifting of all
+mankind, both materially and spiritually!"
+
+"We might make a try at it ourselves," said Blake. "As for the future,
+I know it will not be your fault if our member of the next generation
+fails to do his share of uplift work."
+
+The young mother placed her hand on her bosom, and sprang up. "We
+should be going back, Dear. Thomas will be wakening."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+INDIAN SHOES
+
+
+They returned along the shadowy bottom of the great gorge to the
+glaring sunshine of the open creek bed, where they had left the rod
+and level. Blake placed both upon one of his broad shoulders, and gave
+his wife the unencumbered arm to assist her somewhat hurried pace.
+
+As they approached the dike her hasty steps quickened to a run. She
+darted ahead down to the camp. Thomas Herbert Vincent was vociferating
+for his dinner. Blake followed at a walk. He was only a father.
+
+When he came down to the trees he found Isobel and Ashton alone. The
+girl's manner was constrained and her color higher than usual. Ashton,
+comfortably outstretched on a blanket with her saddle for pillow,
+frowned petulantly at the intruder. But Isobel sprang up and came to
+meet Blake, unable to conceal her relief.
+
+"I was so glad to see Genevieve," she said. "You came back just in
+time."
+
+"How's that?" asked Blake, his eyes twinkling.
+
+She blushed, but quickly recovered from her confusion to dimple and
+cast a teasing glance at Ashton. "Baby woke up," she answered. "You
+may not know it, but babies cry when they fail to get what they
+want."
+
+"He's getting what he wants--I'm not!" complained Ashton.
+
+"I--I must see if Genevieve needs anything," murmured the girl, and
+she fled to the tent.
+
+"I need you!" Ashton called after her without avail.
+
+"How're you feeling?" inquired Blake.
+
+Ashton's frown deepened to a scowl.
+
+"Didn't mean how you feel towards me," added Blake. "I can guess that.
+My reference was to your head."
+
+"I'm all right," snapped Ashton. "Needn't worry. I'm still weak and
+dizzy, but I shall be quite able to do my work tomorrow."
+
+"That's fine," said the engineer, with insistent good humor. "However,
+if you feel at all shaky in the morning, I can perhaps get Gowan, or
+maybe Miss Chuckie would like to--"
+
+"No!" broke in Ashton. "She shall not! I will do it, I tell you."
+
+"Very well," said Blake. He put down the level and rod, but retained
+the rifle. "Tell the ladies I shall be back before long. I am going
+to look for something I forgot this morning."
+
+Without waiting for the other's reply, he returned up the dike slope
+and around the bend of the hill to where Ashton had been shot. That
+for which he was looking was not here, for he at once turned and
+started up the hill. He climbed direct to the place where the assassin
+had lain in wait.
+
+The bare ledge told Blake nothing, but from a crevice nearby he picked
+out two long thirty-eight caliber rifle shells. He put them into his
+pocket and went over to scan the mesa from the top of his lookout
+crag. He could see no sign of the fugitive murderer. Down below the
+mesa side of the hill, however, he saw a man riding up the bank of Dry
+Fork, and recognized him as Knowles.
+
+Trained to alert observation by years of life on the range, the cowman
+had already perceived Blake. He wheeled aside and rode towards the
+hill when the engineer waved his hat and began to descend. The two met
+at the foot of the rugged slope.
+
+"Howdy, Mr. Blake," greeted the cowman, "I thought I'd just ride up to
+see how things are coming along."
+
+"Not so fast as they might, Mr. Knowles. We have stopped for
+repairs."
+
+"Haven't broken your level?"
+
+"No. Ashton is laid up for the day with a scalp wound. We were shot
+at this morning from up there--other side of the crest."
+
+"Shot at, and Lafe hit?"
+
+"Not seriously, though it could not well have been a closer shave. He
+says he will be all right by tomorrow," said Blake, and he gave the
+bald details of the occurrence in a few words.
+
+Knowles listened without comment, his leathery face stolid, but his
+eyes glinting. When Blake had finished, he remarked shortly: "Must be
+the same man. Let's see those shells."
+
+Blake handed over the two empty cartridge shells.
+
+"Thirty-eight," confirmed Knowles. "Same as were fired at Lafe before.
+Kid and Chuckie showed me how a thirty-eight fitted the hole in Lafe's
+silver flask. About where did the snake crawl down the hill?"
+
+"Not far from here. He could not have gone any considerable distance
+along the top or side. He was down and riding away when I reached the
+crags, and I had not lost much time coming up the other side."
+
+"It'll take an Indian to make out his tracks on this dry ground,"
+remarked the cowman. "We'll try a look, though, at his hawss's hoof
+prints. Just keep behind, if you don't mind."
+
+He threw the reins over the head of his horse, and dismounted, to walk
+slowly along the more level ground at the foot of the slope. Blake
+followed, as he had requested, but scrutinizing the ground with a
+gaze no less keenly observant than that of his companion.
+
+"Mighty queer," said Knowles, after they had carried their examination
+over a hundred yards. "Either he came down more slanting or else--"
+
+"What do you make of this?" Blake interrupted, bending over a blurred
+round print in the dust between two grass tufts.
+
+"_Sho!_" exclaimed the cowman as he peered at the mark. "That's why,
+of course."
+
+"Indian shoes," said Blake.
+
+"You've seen a thing or two. You're no tenderfoot," remarked Knowles.
+
+"I have myself shrunk rawhide shoes on horses' hoofs when short of
+iron shoes," Blake explained. "This would make a hard trail to run
+down without hounds."
+
+The cowman straightened and looked at his companion, his weather-beaten
+face set in quiet resolve.
+
+"I know what's better than hounds," he said. "This is one badman who
+has played his game once too often. I'm going to run him down if it
+takes all year and all the men in the county. There's a couple of Ute
+bucks being held in the jail at Stockchute, to be tried for hunting
+deer. I'm going to get the loan of them. The sheriff will turn out
+with a posse, and we'll trail that snake, if it takes us clear over
+into Utah."
+
+"We'll have a fair chance to get him with Ute trackers," agreed
+Blake.
+
+Knowles shook his head. "Unless you're particular to come along, Mr.
+Blake, I'd like you and Lafe to keep on with this survey. I've been
+worrying over the chance of losing my range, till it's got on my
+nerves."
+
+"Certainly, Mr. Knowles. I shall go ahead in the morning, if Ashton is
+able to rod. It will be best, I suppose, for my wife and Miss Chuckie
+to remain close at the ranch until you make sure where this trail
+leads."
+
+"No; he's a snake, but the Indian shoes prove he's Western--He won't
+strike at the ladies. Another thing, I'm going to give you Kid for
+guard."
+
+"He may prefer to join the posse."
+
+"Of course he'll prefer that. You can count on Kid Gowan when it comes
+to a man hunt. He'll stay, though, all right. I don't want Mrs. Blake
+to think she has to stop indoors. With Kid on the lookout around your
+camp, the ladies can feel free to come and go any time between sunup
+and sundown, and you and Lafe can do what you want. There won't be any
+more shooting, unless it's by Kid."
+
+"Very well," said Blake. "I'm not anxious to play hide and seek with a
+man who shoots and runs. When can we expect the rope and spikes?"
+
+"That's another thing," replied Knowles. "Kid can be packing them and
+your camp outfit up to the caņon while you and Lafe are running your
+line of levels. He ought to be home by now. He was gone when the men
+turned out this morning. Soon as I get back I'll send him up to camp
+with you. He can bring along Rocket, to be ready for a chase,
+providing we can find the brute. Queer about that hawss. Wanted to
+ride him this morning. Found he'd got out and gone off the way he used
+to before Lafe gentled him."
+
+While talking, the two men had returned to the cowman's horse and
+started around the hill to the camp. They found Isobel and Genevieve
+and the baby all engaged in entertaining Ashton. Knowles briefly
+congratulated the wounded man, and led his pony down to the pool for a
+drink. Blake had seated himself beside his wife. She handed the baby
+to him, and remarking that she also wished to drink, she followed
+Knowles.
+
+The cowman smiled at her reassuringly. "You're not afraid of any more
+shooting, ma'am, are you?" he asked. "I've told your husband that Kid
+is to come up to keep guard. He will stay right along, unless that
+scoundrel is trailed down sooner."
+
+"Then I shall have no fear, Mr. Knowles."
+
+"You needn't, and you and Chuckie can come and go just the same as
+ever. I don't want your visit spoiled. It's a great treat to all of us
+to have you with us."
+
+"And to my husband and myself to be your guests! I have quite fallen
+in love with your daughter, Mr. Knowles. If you'll permit me to say
+it, you are very fortunate to have so lovely and lovable a girl."
+
+"Don't I know it, ma'am!"
+
+"So beautiful--and her character as beautiful as her face. How you
+must prize her!"
+
+"Prize her!" repeated Knowles, his usual stolid face aglow with pride
+and tenderness. "Why, ma'am, I couldn't hold her more in liking if she
+was my own flesh and blood!"
+
+Genevieve suddenly bent down to hide the intense emotion that had
+struck the color from her face. Yet after a moment's pause, she spoke
+in a composed, almost casual tone: "Then Chuckie is not your own
+daughter?"
+
+"Not in the way you mean. Hasn't she told you? I adopted her."
+
+"I see," remarked Genevieve, with a show of polite interest. "But of
+course, taking her when a young infant, she has always thought of you
+as her own father."
+
+"No--what I can't get over is that she feels that way, and I feel the
+same to her, though I never saw or heard of her till she was going on
+fourteen."
+
+"Ah!" Genevieve could no longer suppress her agitation. "Then she
+is--I'm sure that she must be--You said she came from the East, from
+Chicago?"
+
+"No, ma'am! I didn't say where she came from," curtly replied the
+cowman.
+
+The shock of his brusqueness restored the lady to her usual quiet
+composure. Looking up into his face, she found it as blank and
+impenetrable as a cement wall.
+
+"You must pardon me," she murmured. "I myself am a Chicago girl, so
+you must see how natural it is for me to hope that so sweet and
+beautiful a girl as Chuckie came from my city."
+
+"Chuckie is my daughter," stated Knowles in a flat tone.
+
+"If you will kindly permit me to explain. My husband--"
+
+"Chuckie is my daughter, legally adopted," repeated the cowman. "You
+can see what she is like. If that is not enough, ma'am, I can't
+prevent you from declining our hospitality, though we'd be mighty
+sorry to have you and your husband leave."
+
+The tears started into Genevieve's hazel eyes. "Mr. Knowles! how could
+you think for a moment that I--that we--"
+
+"Excuse me, ma'am!" he hastened to apologize. "I didn't mean to hurt
+your feelings. You see, I'm kind of prejudiced along some lines. I've
+been bred up to the Western idea that it isn't just etiquette to ask
+about people's antecedents. Real Western, I mean. Our city folks are
+nearly as bad as you Easterners over family trees. As if a child isn't
+as much descended from its mother's maternal grandmother as from its
+father's paternal grandfather!"
+
+Genevieve smiled at this adroit diversion of the subject by the
+seemingly simple Westerner, and replied: "My father's and mother's
+parents were farm people. My husband worked his way up out of the
+Chicago slums."
+
+"He did?" The cowman could not conceal his astonishment. He looked
+curiously into the lady's high-bred face. "Well, now, that sure is
+something to be right proud of--not that I'd have exactly expected you
+to think so. If you'll excuse me, ma'am, I'm more surprised at the way
+you feel about it than that he was able to do such a big thing."
+
+"No one is responsible for what he is born. But we are at least partly
+entitled to the credit or discredit of what we become," she observed.
+
+"That's good American doctrine, ma'am--Western American!" approved
+Knowles.
+
+"It should apply to women as well as men," she stated.
+
+"It ought," he dryly replied, and he jerked up the head of his pawing
+horse. "Here, you! I guess it's high time we were starting in, ma'am.
+Kid may think he's to lay over at the ranch until morning. We want to
+get him out here before dusk. I don't reckon there's any show of that
+snake coming back tonight, but it's as well to be on the safe side."
+
+He walked up the slope towards the others, unbuckling his cartridge
+belt as he went.
+
+"Sling on your saddle, honey," he called to his daughter.
+
+The girl sprang up from beside Ashton and ran to fetch her own and
+Genevieve's picketed ponies. Her father held out his belt and revolver
+to the engineer.
+
+"Here's my Colt's, Mr. Blake," he said. "I have another at home. You
+won't need it, but I may as well leave it. We're going to lope in now,
+so as to hustle Kid out to you before night. Just swap me that
+yearling for my gun. It wouldn't seem natural not to be toting
+something that can make a noise."
+
+"Thomas never cries unless he needs attention," Genevieve sought to
+defend her infant.
+
+"Yes, ma'am. It's a good thing he knows that much already. You have to
+make yourself heard to get what you want in the world generally, as
+well as in hostleries and eating-houses."
+
+Blake buckled on the cartridge belt, with its holstered revolver, and
+went to help saddle the ponies. Ashton watched him and Isobel
+narrowly. He was far from pleased with the familiarity of their talk
+and manner towards one another. Twice the girl put her hand on Blake's
+arm.
+
+In marked contrast to this affectionate intimacy, Isobel was distrait
+and hurried when she came to take leave of the wounded man. He had
+risen to his feet, and she could not ignore his proffered hand. But
+she avoided his gaze and quickly withdrew her fingers from his warm
+clasp to hurry off.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+MADONNA DOLOROSA
+
+
+Blake was cooking supper when, shortly before sunset, Gowan drove up
+to the waterhole, with a pony in lead behind the heavy wagon. Leaving
+the wagon with the rope and other articles of his load on the far side
+of the creek bed, he watered and picketed the horses, and came across
+to the tent with his rifle and a roll of blankets.
+
+"Howdy, Mr. Blake. Got here in time for supper, I see," he remarked as
+he unburdened himself. "Met Mr. Knowles and the ladies down near the
+ranch. They told me about the shooting." He faced about to stare at
+Ashton's bandaged head. "They told me you came mighty near getting
+yours. You shore are a lucky tenderfoot."
+
+Ashton shrugged superciliously. "The worst of it is the additional
+hole in my hat. I see you have a new one. Is that the latest style on
+the range?"
+
+"Stetson, brand A-1.," replied the puncher. "How does it strike you,
+Mr. Blake?--and my new shirt? Having a dude puncher on our range kind
+of stirred up my emulosity. They don't have real cowboy attire like
+his at an ordinary shorthorn cow town like Stockchute--but I did the
+best I could."
+
+Blake made no response to this heavy badinage. He set the supper on
+the chuck-box, and laconically said: "Come and get it."
+
+"Might have known you've been on round-up," remarked Gowan, with an
+insistent sociability oddly at variance with his usual taciturn
+reserve. "According to Miss Chuckie, you're some rider, and according
+to Mr. Knowles, you can shoot. I wouldn't mind hearing from you direct
+about that shooting this morning."
+
+Blake recounted the affair still more briefly than he had told it to
+Knowles.
+
+"That shore was a mighty close shave," commented the puncher. "But you
+haven't said what the fellow looked like."
+
+"He wore ordinary range clothes," replied Blake. "I couldn't see him
+behind the rocks, and caught only a glimpse of him as he went around
+the ridge. His horse was much the same build and color as Rocket."
+
+The puncher stared at Ashton with his cold unblinking eyes. "You shore
+picked out a Jim Dandy guide, Mr. Tenderfoot. According to this, it
+looks mighty like he's gone and turned hawss thief. Mr. Knowles says
+your Rocket hawss has vamoosed. If he's moving to Utah under your
+ex-guide, it'll take some lively posse to head him. What d'you say,
+Mr. Blake?"
+
+"I think the man is apt soon to come to the end of his rope--after
+dropping through a trap door," said the engineer.
+
+Gowan looked at him between narrowed eyelids, and paused with upraised
+coffee cup to reply: "A man that has shown the nerve this one has
+won't let anyone get close enough to rope him."
+
+"It will be either that or a bullet, before long," predicted Blake.
+"The badman is getting to be rather out of date."
+
+"Maybe a bullet," admitted Gowan. "Never any rope, though, for his
+kind.--Guess I'll turn in. It's something of a drive over to
+Stockchute and back with the wagon, and I got up early. You and Ashton
+might go on watch until midnight, and turn me out for the rest of the
+night."
+
+"Very well," agreed Blake.
+
+The puncher stretched out on his blankets under a tree, a few yards
+from the tent. Ashton took the dishes down to sand-scour them at the
+pool, while Blake saw that everything damageable was disposed safe
+from the knife-like fangs of the coyotes.
+
+"How about keeping watch?" asked Ashton, when he returned with the
+cleansed dishes. "Shall I take first or second?"
+
+"Neither," answered Blake. "You will need all the sleep and rest you
+can get. Tomorrow may be a hard day. Turn in at once."
+
+"If you insist," acquiesced Ashton. "I still am rather weak and
+dizzy." He went to the tent and disappeared.
+
+Blake took the lantern and strolled across to the wagon, to look at
+the numerous articles brought by Gowan. He set the lantern over in the
+wagon bed on top of what seemed to be a heap of empty oat sacks, while
+he overhauled the load. It included three coils of rope of a hundred
+feet each, a keg of railroad spikes, two dozen picket-pins, two heavy
+hammers, a pick and shovel, and a crowbar.
+
+The last three articles had not been ordered by Blake. The puncher had
+brought them along, apparently with a hazy idea that the descent of
+the caņon would be something on the order of mining. There were also
+in the wagon two five-gallon kerosene cans to use in carrying water up
+the mountain, a sack of oats, Gowan's saddle, and two packsaddles.
+
+In shifting one of the packsaddles to get at the hammers, Blake
+knocked it against the sack on which the lantern had been set. The
+lantern suddenly fell over on its side. Blake reached in to pick it
+up, and perceived that the sack was rising in a mound. He caught up
+one of the hammers, and held it poised for a stroke. From the sack
+came a muffled rattle. The hammer descended in a smashing blow.
+
+The sack rose and fell as if something under it was squirming about
+convulsively. But to Blake's surprise it did not fall aside and
+disclose that which was making the violent movement. The squirming
+lessened. He grasped an outer corner of the sack and jerked it upward.
+It failed to flip into the air. The lower part sagged heavily. The
+squirmer was inside and--the mouth of the sack was tied fast.
+
+Blake looked at it thoughtfully. After some moments, he placed the
+sack where it had lain at first, and upset the keg of spikes on top of
+it. He then carefully examined Gowan's saddle; but it told him
+nothing. He shook his head doubtfully, and returned to camp.
+
+Going quietly around to Gowan, he set down the lantern close before
+the puncher's face and stopped to light a cigar. Gowan stirred
+restlessly and rolled half over, but did not open his eyes. Blake
+smoked his cigar, extinguished the lantern, and quietly stretched out
+on the edge of the sleeper's blankets. In a few moments he, too, was
+asleep.
+
+About two o'clock Gowan stirred and rolled over, pulling at his
+blankets. Instantly Blake was wide awake. The puncher mumbled, drew
+the blankets closer about him, and lay quiet. Blake went into the tent
+and dozed on his own blankets until roused by the chill of dawn. He
+went down for a plunge in the pool, and was dressed and back at the
+fireplace, cooking breakfast, when Gowan started up out of his heavy
+slumber.
+
+"Yes, it's getting along about that time," Blake called to him
+cheerfully. "You might turn out Ashton. He has made as good a night of
+it as you have."
+
+Gowan had been staring at the dawn, his lean jaw slack. As Blake
+spoke, he snapped his mouth shut and came over to confront the
+engineer. "You agreed to call me at midnight," he said.
+
+"My apology!" politely replied Blake. "I know how you must feel about
+it. But I hope you will excuse me. I saw that you, like Ashton, needed
+a full night's sleep, and so did not disturb you."
+
+The puncher looked away and muttered: "I'm responsible for you to Mr.
+Knowles. He sent me here to guard you."
+
+"That is true. Of course you will say it's owing to no fault of mine
+that we have come through the night safely. Well, we have a big day's
+work before us. May I ask you to call Ashton? Breakfast is ready."
+
+At this the puncher sullenly went to rouse the sleeper. Ashton came
+out rubbing his eyes; but after a dip in the pool, he declared himself
+restored by his long sleep and ready for a day's work. During the
+night his bandage had come loose. He would have tossed it away, but
+Blake insisted upon re-dressing the wound. He did so with as much
+skill and almost as much gentleness as had his wife.
+
+When Blake and Ashton left the camp, the puncher was leading the
+horses across to load their first packs. The two levelmen walked
+briskly up the valley, carrying only enough food and water to last
+themselves until evening, when Gowan was to have the camp moved to the
+top of High Mesa.
+
+Beginning from his bench-mark at the foot of the mountain, Blake
+carried the level line slantingly up the ridge side. The work was slow
+and tedious, since the telescope of the level could never be on a
+horizontal line either higher or lower respectively than the top and
+bottom of the thirteen-foot rod. This necessitated setting-up the
+instrument every few feet during the steepest part of the ascent.
+
+They saw nothing of Gowan, who had chosen a more roundabout but easier
+trail. At midmorning, however, they were overtaken by Genevieve and
+Isobel and Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie Blake. Knowles had started
+for Stockchute to seek the aid of the sheriff and his Indian
+prisoners. The ladies divided the ascent into several stages, riding
+ahead of the surveyors and resting in the shade of a rock or pine
+until the men had passed them.
+
+Near noon, when the levels had been carried up close to the top of
+High Mesa, Gowan rode down to the party to inquire where the new camp
+was to be pitched.
+
+"I've brought up a lot this trip," he stated. "I can fetch the rest by
+sundown, if I don't have to meander all over the mesa with these first
+packs."
+
+"Where did you leave the packhorses?" asked Blake.
+
+"Up along the caņon where Ashton shot his yearling deer," answered the
+puncher. "It's about half way between that gulch where you say you're
+going down and the bend across from the head of Dry Fork Gulch."
+
+"We'll camp there," decided Blake. "It is on the shortest trail to
+that gulch, and you'll not have time to get your second load farther
+before dark."
+
+The puncher started back. But Isobel, who had come riding up with
+Genevieve, called out to stop him: "Wait, Kid. It is almost noon. You
+must take lunch with us."
+
+"Can't leave those hawsses standing with the packs, Miss Chuckie, if
+they're to make another trip today," he replied.
+
+"Suppose you unload them and come back along the edge of the caņon?"
+suggested Blake. "We shall knock off soon and all go over to give my
+wife her first look at the caņon. We can eat lunch there together."
+
+To this Gowan nodded a willing assent, and he jogged away, with a half
+smile on his thin lips. But that which pleased him had precisely the
+opposite effect on Ashton. He did not fancy sharing the companionship
+and attention of Miss Knowles with the puncher. As this interference
+with his happiness was due to Blake, he showed a petulant resentment
+towards the engineer that won him the girl's sympathetic concern. She
+attributed his fretfulness to his wound. Blake made the same mistake.
+
+"You've done quite enough for the morning, Ashton, with that head of
+yours," he said. "We're over the worst now, and can easily run on up
+to the camp this afternoon. We shall knock off for a siesta."
+
+"Needn't try to make out I'm a baby!" snapped Ashton.
+
+"Leave your rod here," went on Blake, disregarding the other's
+irascibility. "I'll take the level. It may enable us to see the bottom
+of the caņon."
+
+He started on up the slope beside his wife's pony. Ashton was somewhat
+mollified when he saw Isobel linger for him to walk beside her horse.
+She was carrying the baby, who, regardless of scenic attractions, had
+fallen asleep during the long climb from the lower mesa. The sight of
+the child clasped to her bosom awakened all that was highest in his
+nature. Concern over his wound had sobered her usual gay vivacity to a
+look of motherly tenderness.
+
+"Do you know," he murmured during a pause in their conversation, "you
+make me think of pictures of the Madonna!"
+
+"Lafe!" she protested, blushing and as quickly paling. "You should not
+say such a thing. It is lovely--a beautiful thing to tell me; but--but
+I do not deserve it!"
+
+"Madonna!--my Madonna!" he murmured in ardent adoration.
+
+"Oh, please! when I've asked you not to!" she implored. "It is not
+right! I--I am not!--" Tears glistened in her soft eyes. She bent over
+to suppress a sob that might have awakened the sleeping infant.
+
+Ashton gazed up at her, wonder and contrition mingling with his
+deepening adoration. "Forgive me, Miss Chuckie! But I meant it--I feel
+it! I never before felt this way towards any girl!... I know I have no
+right to say anything now. I am a pennyless adventurer, a disgraced,
+disinherited son, a mere cowpuncher apprentice; but if, by next
+spring, I shall have--"
+
+"Oh, see. They're getting such a long way ahead of us!" exclaimed the
+girl, urging her pony to a faster gait.
+
+The animal started forward with a suddenness that left Ashton behind.
+He made no effort to regain his position beside the girl's stirrup.
+Instead, he lagged farther and farther in the rear, his face crimson
+with mortification and anger. As his chagrin deepened, his flush
+became almost feverish and there was a suggestion of wildness in his
+flashing eyes. It was as though his passion was intensifying some
+injury to his brain caused by the concussion of the bullet on his
+skull.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+A REAL WOLF
+
+
+When the loiterer came over the second ridge into view of the booming
+chasm in the top of the plateau, he saw the others down near the
+brink. The baby had been laid on a soft bed of pine needles, and Blake
+was leading the ladies down to look over into the abyss, one on each
+arm.
+
+Ashton's chagrin flared into jealous hate. He felt certain that the
+girl was quite capable of strolling along the extreme edge of the
+precipice without a trace of giddiness. Yet now she was clinging to
+Blake even more closely than was Genevieve. There was more than
+apprehension in the clasp of her little brown hand on the engineer's
+shoulder. Her cheek brushed his sleeve.
+
+The anger of the onlooker was so intense that he did not see Gowan
+riding towards him from the left. The puncher dismounted and came
+forward, his cold gaze fixed on Ashton's face.
+
+"So you're beginning to savvy it, too," he remarked.
+
+Ashton confronted him, vainly attempting to mask his telltale look
+and color with a show of hauteur. "I never discuss personal matters
+with acquaintances of your stamp," he said.
+
+"That's too bad," coolly deplored Gowan. "Maybe you've heard the
+saying about cutting off your nose to spite your face."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"If you want to go it alone, I can't stop you," replied the puncher.
+"Needn't think I'm sucking around you for any favors or friendship. If
+this was my range, I would run you off it so fast you'd reach
+Stockchute with your tongue hanging out like a dog's. That's how much
+I like you."
+
+"The feeling is fully reciprocated, I assure you," rejoined Ashton.
+
+"All right. Now what're we going to do about him?--each play a lone
+hand, or make it pardners for this deal?"
+
+"I--fail to understand," hesitated Ashton.
+
+"No, you don't," jeeringly contradicted the puncher. "It's a
+three-cornered fight. You see it now, even if you have been too big a
+fool to see it before. We can settle ours after. But I'm free to own
+up to it that you're a striped skunk if you won't work with me first
+to get rid of him. Look at him now--and him married!"
+
+Ashton's flush deepened to purple. "Married!--yes, married!" he choked
+out.
+
+"Right alongside his wife, too!" Gowan thrust the goad deeper. "You'd
+think even that brand of skunk would have more decency. Not that his
+wife is any friend of mine, like she is yours. But for a man with such
+a wife and baby ... with Miss Chuckie! The--"
+
+Gowan ended with a string of oaths so virulent that even Ashton's
+half-mad anger was checked.
+
+"You may be--er--I fear that we--Perhaps it's not so bad as it
+appears!" he stammered.
+
+"_Bah!_" disgustedly sneered the puncher, and he strode on ahead,
+leaving Ashton torn between rage and doubt and terror of his own
+furious jealousy.
+
+The others continued to stand on a flat ledge that here formed the lip
+of the caņon. Genevieve was trembling with awed delight. Her husband
+and the girl appeared more calm, but they were drinking in the
+grandeur of the tremendous gorge below them with no less intense
+appreciation of its gloomy vastness.
+
+Upstream, to their left, the precipices jutted so far out from each
+wall of the caņon that they overlapped, a thousand or fifteen hundred
+feet from the top. But downstream the upper part of the chasm flared
+to a width that permitted the noonday sun to penetrate part way down
+through the blue-black shadows.
+
+"O-o-o-oh!" sighed Genevieve, for the tenth time, and she clung
+tighter than ever to the strong arm of her husband. "Isn't it
+fearfully, fearfully delightful? It makes the soles of my feet tingle
+to look at it!"
+
+"That tickly feeling!" exclaimed Isobel. "I often ride up here to the
+caņon, I do so love to feel that way! Only with me it's like ants
+crawling up and down my back."
+
+"O-o-o-oh!" again sighed Genevieve. "It--it so overpowers one!"
+
+"It's sure some caņon," admitted her husband. "That French artist Doré
+ought to have seen it."
+
+"If only we had a copy of Dante's Inferno to read here on the brink!"
+she whispered.
+
+"It always reminds me of Coleridge's poem," murmured Isobel, and she
+quoted in an awed whisper:
+
+                 Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
+                 Through caverns measureless to man,
+                 Down to the sunless sea.
+
+"Fortunately for us, this is a caņon, not a string of measureless
+caverns," said Blake. "It can be measured, one way or another. If I
+had a transit, I could calculate the depth at any point where the
+water shows--triangulate with a vertical angle. But it would cause a
+long delay to send on for a transit. We shall first try to chain down
+at that gulch break."
+
+Genevieve shrank back from the verge of the precipice and drew the
+others after her.
+
+"Dear!" she exclaimed, "I did not dream it was so fearful. One has to
+see to realize! You will not go down--promise me you will not go
+down!"
+
+"Now, now, little woman," reproached Blake. "What's become of my
+partner?"
+
+"But baby--? If you should leave him fatherless!"
+
+"Better that than for him to have a father who is a quitter! Just
+wait, Sweetheart. That break looks much less overwhelming than these
+sheer cliffs. You know I shall not attempt anything foolhardy. If it
+is not possible to get down without too great risk, I shall give it up
+and send for a transit."
+
+"Oh, will you?" exclaimed Isobel, hardly less apprehensive than his
+wife. "Why not wait anyway until you can send for your transit?"
+
+"Because I cannot triangulate the bottom within half a mile upstream
+from where the tunnel would have to be located. That roar and the
+wildness of the water wherever we can see it is proof that it is
+flowing down a heavy grade. At the point where I triangulated it might
+be above the level of Dry Mesa, and way below the mesa here at the
+tunnel site."
+
+"You could triangulate at the first place where the bottom can be
+seen, beyond here," suggested Genevieve.
+
+"Suppose it proved to be lower than Dry Mesa, wouldn't that still
+leave us up in the air?" he asked. "Like this--"
+
+He pulled out his notebook and drew a rough sketch.
+
+[Transcriber's Note: an illustration showing "Elevation of bench-mark
+at foot of chute in Dry Fork Gulch" appears in the text here.]
+
+"I see, Dear," said his wife. "When do you plan to go down?"
+
+"Tomorrow morning."
+
+"Can you wait until we come up from the ranch?"
+
+"Yes. Mr. Knowles will no doubt be back by then. He can bring you out
+early."
+
+"We shall come early, anyway," said Isobel.
+
+"Of course!" added Genevieve. She drew a deep breath. "I shall see the
+place before you attempt to descend."
+
+Her husband nodded reassuringly and looked around to where Gowan and
+Ashton stood waiting, several yards from one another.
+
+"About lunch time, isn't it?" he remarked. "Mr. Gowan will wish to be
+starting soon to bring up his second load."
+
+At the suggestion, the ladies hastened to spread out their own lunch
+and the one brought by Blake. When called by Isobel, Gowan came
+forward to join the party, with rather less than his usual reserve in
+his speech and manner.
+
+Ashton was the last to seat himself on the springy cushion of brown
+pine needles, and he sat throughout the meal in moody silence. Blake
+and the ladies attributed this to the fatigue of working through the
+long hot morning while suffering from his unhealed wound. He repulsed
+the sympathetic attentions of the Blakes. But he could not long
+continue to resist the kindly concern of the girl. After lunch she
+made him lie down in the shade while she bathed his wound with a good
+part of the small supply of water remaining in the canteens.
+
+Gowan had been asking questions about the work. Blake explained at
+some length why he considered it necessary not only to descend into
+the caņon but to carry the line of levels down along the bed of the
+subterranean stream to this point opposite Dry Fork Gulch. When Isobel
+drew apart with Ashton the puncher did not look at them, though his
+eyes narrowed to slits and his mouth straightened.
+
+"You shore have nerve to tackle it, Mr. Blake," he commented.
+"Everything alive that I know of that's ever gone down into Deep Caņon
+hasn't ever come up again, except it had wings."
+
+"We'll prove that the rule has an exception," replied Blake, smiling
+away the reawakened apprehension of his wife.
+
+Gowan shook his head doubtfully, and strolled down the slope to peer
+into the caņon. The level was directly in his path, set up firmly on
+its tripod, about six feet from the brink. The puncher stopped beside
+it to squint through the telescope.
+
+"You'll have one--peach of a time seeing anything through this
+contraption down there," he remarked. "I can't see even right here in
+the sun."
+
+"The telescope is out of focus," explained Blake. "Turn that screw on
+the side." Gowan twisted a protruding thumbscrew. "Not that--the one
+above it," directed Blake.
+
+"Can't stop to fool now," replied the puncher. "I've got to hustle
+along."
+
+He started hastily around between the level and the precipice. The toe
+of his boot struck hard against the iron toe of the outer tripod-leg.
+He stumbled and sprawled forward on his hands and knees. Behind him
+the instrument toppled over towards the brink.
+
+Genevieve cried out in alarm at Gowan's fall. Her husband sprang to
+the rescue--not of the puncher, but of the level. It had crashed down
+with its head to the chasm, and was sliding out over the brink. Blake
+barely caught it by the tip of one of the legs as it swung up for the
+plunge. He drew it back and set it up to see what damage had been done
+to the head. Gowan watched him, tight-lipped.
+
+"This is luck!" exclaimed the engineer, after a swift examination.
+"Nothing broken--only knocked out of adjustment. I can fix that in
+half an hour. She struck with the telescope turned sideways. You must
+have set the clamp screw."
+
+The puncher's face darkened. "Wish the--infernal machine had gone
+plumb down to hell!" he growled. "It came near tripping me over the
+edge."
+
+"My apology," said Blake. "I spraddled the tripod purposely to keep it
+from being upset."
+
+"Oh, Kid, you've hurt yourself," called Isobel, as the puncher began
+to wrap a kerchief about his hand. "Come here and let me bandage it."
+
+"No," he replied. "Two babies are enough for you to coddle at one
+time. I've got to hit out."
+
+He turned his back on Blake and hurried up to his horse. The engineer
+followed as far as the nearest tree, where he set up the instrument in
+the shade and began to adjust it.
+
+"Good thing she has platinum crosshairs," he said to Ashton. "A fall
+like that would have been certain to break the old-style spiderweb
+hairs."
+
+Ashton did not reply. He was absorbed in a murmured conversation with
+Isobel. Blake completed the adjustments of the level and stretched out
+beside his wife to play with his gurgling son. A half hour of this
+completed the two hours that he had set apart for the noon rest. He
+placed the baby back in his wife's lap and stood up to stretch his
+powerful frame.
+
+"How about it, Ashton?" he inquired. "Think you feel fit to rod this
+afternoon? Don't hesitate to say no, if that's the right answer. I
+expect my wife and Miss Chuckie, between them, can help me carry the
+line as far as the camp."
+
+"I can do it alone," interposed the girl. "Let them both stay here and
+rest all afternoon."
+
+"No, Miss Chuckie. I can and shall do my work," insisted Ashton,
+springing up with unexpected briskness for one who had appeared so
+fatigued. "It is you and Mrs. Blake who must stay here to rest--unless
+you wish to keep us company."
+
+"Might we not go to the new camp and put it in order?" suggested
+Genevieve.
+
+"What if that outlaw should come sneaking back?" objected Ashton. "It
+seems to me you should keep with us."
+
+"He would not trouble us," replied Isobel.
+
+"Yet if he should? Anyway, Blake and I saw a wolf up here the other
+day."
+
+"A real wolf! Where?"
+
+"Yes," answered Blake. "Over in the ravine the other side of the head
+of Dry Fork Gulch."
+
+"He may attack you," argued Ashton.
+
+The girl laughed. "You're still a tenderfoot to think a wolf wouldn't
+know better than that. Wish he didn't! It would mean the saving of a
+half dozen calves this winter." She flashed out her long-barreled
+automatic pistol and knocked a cone from the tree above Blake's head
+with a swiftly aimed shot.
+
+Blake caught the cone as it fell and looked at the bullet hole through
+its center. "Unless that was an accident, I should call it some
+shooting," he remarked.
+
+"Accident!" she called back. "Stand sideways and see what happens to
+your cigar."
+
+"No, thanks. I'll take your word for it. Just lit this one, and I've
+only a few left. By by, Tommy! Don't let the wolves eat mamma and the
+poor little cowlady!"
+
+He picked up the level and started off at a swinging stride. Ashton
+followed several paces behind. His face was sullen and heavy, but in
+their merriment over Blake's banter, the ladies failed to observe his
+expression.
+
+They rested for a while longer. Then, after venturing down for another
+awed look into the abyss, they rode along, parallel with the
+stupendous rift, to the place selected for the new camp. As Gowan had
+brought up the tent in one of the first packs, the ladies pitched it
+on the level top of the ridge.
+
+"This is real camping!" delightedly exclaimed Genevieve, as they set
+to gathering leafy twigs for bedding and dry branches for fuel. "How I
+wish we could stay all night!"
+
+"We can, if you wish," replied Isobel.
+
+"Can we, really?"
+
+"Our men often sleep out in the open, this time of year. We shall take
+the tent for ourselves. Won't it be fun! But will Thomas be all
+right?"
+
+"I can manage with what I have until tomorrow afternoon."
+
+"How long do you think they will be down in the caņon?" the girl
+inquired.
+
+Genevieve shuddered. "I wish I could tell! If only Tom finds that he
+cannot get down at all, how thankful I shall be!"
+
+"And--Lafe!" murmured the girl.
+
+"It is possible that they may be unable to do it in one day," went on
+Genevieve apprehensively--"Down, down into those dreadful depths, and
+then along the river, all the way to where the tunnel is to be, and
+back again, and then up the awful cliffs! Surely they cannot finish in
+one day! Of course they will succeed--Tom can do anything, _anything_!
+Yet how I dread the very thought--!"
+
+"We must prepare to stay right here on High Mesa until they do
+finish!" declared Isobel. "It will be impossible to go back to the
+ranch tomorrow if they are still in that frightful place! Kid will
+have to take the hawsses down to the waterhole. He shall go on home,
+and tomorrow morning fetch us cream and eggs and everything you need.
+They will have to be told at the ranch; and if Daddy has returned, he
+will come up to help and be with us."
+
+"You dear girl! The more I think of this terrible descent, the more I
+dread it. I feel a presentiment that--But I must try to be brave and
+not interfere with Tom's work! It will be a great comfort to have your
+father with us."
+
+"Daddy will surely come if he has returned. Isn't he kind and good? He
+couldn't have done more to make me happy if he had been my own real
+father!"
+
+Genevieve smiled into the girl's glowing face. "Yes, dear. Yet I am
+far from surprised, since _you_ are the daughter he wished to make
+happy. I was more surprised to have him tell me you were adopted. You
+have never said a word about it."
+
+"I--you see, I did not happen to," confusedly murmured the girl.
+
+"Chuckie Knowles is not your real name," Genevieve gently reproached
+her.
+
+"No, it is the pet name Daddy gave me. My real one is--Isobel."
+
+"Isobel--?"
+
+"Yes. Daddy's sister, in Denver, always calls me that. But here on the
+ranch--"
+
+"Isobel--?" repeated Genevieve, with a rising inflection.
+
+The color ebbed from the girl's face, but she answered steadily:
+"Chuckie--Isobel--Knowles. I am Daddy's daughter. I have no other
+father."
+
+"Is-o-bel--Is-o-bel," Genevieve intoned the name musically. "It has a
+beautiful sound. I had a friend at school--Isabella--but we always
+called her Belle."
+
+The girl suddenly faced away from her companion, and darted to meet
+Blake and Ashton, who were bringing the line of levels up over the
+ridge.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+THE TEMPTATION
+
+
+When the ladies explained their plans for remaining in camp on High
+Mesa, Blake gave a ready assent.
+
+"All right, Jenny. It'll be something like old times. Can't scare you
+up any lions or fever, leopards or cyclones; but you may see that
+wolf."
+
+"I should welcome all savage Africa if it would rid us of this awful
+caņon!" replied his wife.
+
+"Won't you please give it up?" begged Isobel. "I am to blame for your
+coming here. If anything should happen to you, I--I could never
+forgive myself--never!"
+
+Blake looked at the two lovely, anxious faces before him, and smiled
+gravely. "There you go again, and you have yet to see that gulch. But
+even if you find that it looks dangerous, you wouldn't want me to let
+a little risk interfere with my work, would you? Think of the fools
+who climb the highest and steepest mountains just for sport. I am
+going down there because it is necessary."
+
+"But is it?" the girl half sobbed.
+
+"Someone must do it, sooner or later," he replied, and he took his
+wife's hand in his big palm. "Come, little woman, speak up. Do you
+want your husband to be a shirker and quitter?"
+
+"Of course not, Tom. Yet one should be reasonable."
+
+"I have had enough experience in climbing to know not to attempt the
+impossible, Sweetheart," he assured her. "The worst looking places are
+not always the most dangerous. I promise you to take only reasonable
+risks."
+
+"Have we time enough to look at the place this afternoon?" she
+inquired.
+
+Blake glanced at the sun, and nodded. "The riding is good. We can get
+back long before dark. Ashton, you had better stretch out and rest."
+
+"No, I shall go with you," replied Ashton, his lips set in as firm
+lines as Blake's.
+
+"You cannot go, Lafe, unless you agree to ride my pony," said Isobel.
+
+"I'm not going to have Gowan call me a baby again," he objected.
+
+"You will need all your strength tomorrow," predicted Blake.
+
+"You must ride," insisted Isobel.
+
+"Very well--to please you," he agreed. "We shall take turns."
+
+Blake again looked at the sun. "As long as we are going, we may as
+well carry forward the line of levels. We can take long turns nearly
+all the way, so there will be little delay."
+
+"And I shall rod for you!" delightedly exclaimed Isobel.
+
+"Only part of the time," qualified Ashton with a sharpness that the
+others attributed to his zeal to serve her.
+
+He filled his canteen from one of the cans of water brought up by
+Gowan, and rinsed out the mouths and nostrils of the thirsty ponies.
+This done, he and Genevieve mounted, and the party started off on a
+route parallel with the caņon, which here trended back away from the
+edge of the plateau.
+
+They soon came to where the surface of the mesa was slashed with
+gulleys and ravines, all running down into the caņon. Blake swung away
+from the caņon, in order to head the worst of these ravines or to
+cross them where they were less precipitous. Presently, however, he
+struck in again towards the great rift along the flank of a high
+barren ridge. At last he led over the ridge and down to the side of a
+very large ravine where it pitched into the caņon at an angle little
+less steep than the descent of Dry Fork Gulch.
+
+The line of levels, as Blake had foretold, had been an easy one to
+run. It was stopped on the corner of a shelf of rock that jutted out
+above the gorge. Having provided a soft nest for the baby, the four
+went out on the shelf and peered down the dizzy slope into the black
+shadows of the depths.
+
+The two ladies drew back shuddering. Blake looked about at them and
+seeing their troubled faces, sought to quiet their dread.
+
+"You have not looked close enough," he said. "With spikes and ropes,
+the worst of this will be comparatively easy. There are ledges and
+crevices all the way down. You cannot see the lower half. When I was
+here with Gowan and Mr. Knowles, the sun was shining to the bottom.
+The lower half of the descent is much less steep than this you see."
+
+Genevieve smiled trustfully. "Oh, if you say it is safe, Tom!"
+
+"We shall take down the rope and all the spikes we can carry," he
+explained in further reassurance. "At the worst places a spike and a
+piece of the rope will not only let us down safely, but can be left
+for our ascent."
+
+"Then it will be all right!" sighed Isobel.
+
+"For him--yes!" broke in Ashton, his voice harsh and strained. He was
+cringing back, white-faced, from the edge of the gulch.
+
+"Why, Lafe!" exclaimed the girl. "If Tom--Mr. Blake goes down, surely
+you can't mean that you--"
+
+"He's used to climbing--I'm not!" Ashton sought to excuse himself.
+
+"Oh, very well," she said. "Of course it is not right to ask you to do
+it if you suffer from vertigo. I shall ask Kid to take your place. If
+he refuses, Daddy will do it."
+
+"That may mean delay," remarked Blake. "If that scoundrel really is
+headed for Utah, your father may not be back for several days. Yet he
+asked me to settle this matter as soon as possible."
+
+"Then, if Kid will not go down with you, I shall," declared the girl,
+her blue eyes flashing.
+
+"No, no indeed, dear!" protested Genevieve. "It is simply impossible!
+You shall not do it!"
+
+"I shall, unless Kid--"
+
+"You shall not ask him!" interposed Ashton, his pale face suddenly
+flushing a hot red. "I am going down!"
+
+"You will, Lafayette?" cried Genevieve. "That is very brave and--and
+kind of you!"
+
+"But if you have no experience in climbing?" objected Isobel in a tone
+that transmuted the young man's angry flush into a glow of delight.
+
+"Don't inexperienced climbers go up the Alps with guides?" he
+nonchalantly replied. "I can trust Blake to get me safe to the bottom.
+He will need me in his business."
+
+"Good for you, Lafe!" commended Blake.
+
+It was the first time that he had ever addressed Ashton so familiarly.
+He accompanied it with the proffer of his hand. But Ashton did not
+look at him. He was basking in the frankly admiring gaze of Miss
+Knowles.
+
+The party returned in the same manner that they had come out, for
+Isobel firmly refused to permit Ashton to walk. Blake allowed her to
+set the pace, and she chose such a rapid one that they reached camp a
+full half hour before sunset.
+
+A few minutes later, as they were sitting down to a hastily prepared
+supper, Gowan appeared with the second load from the lower camp. Blake
+and Ashton sprang up to loosen the packs of the sweating, panting
+horses. The puncher swung down from his saddle, not to assist them,
+but to remonstrate with Isobel.
+
+"Been expecting to meet you, all the way up, Miss Chuckie," he said.
+"Ain't you staying too late? You won't get home before long after
+dark."
+
+"Mrs. Blake and I are not going down tonight, Kid," replied the girl,
+and she explained the change of plans.
+
+Gowan listened attentively, though without commenting either by look
+or word. When she had quite finished, he asked a single question:
+"Think your Daddy won't mind, Miss Chuckie?"
+
+"He will understand that we simply can't leave here until Lafe
+and--Mr. Blake are safe up out of the caņon."
+
+"All right. You're the boss," he acquiesced. "Just write out a list
+of what you want. I'll take all the hawsses down to the waterhole, and
+go on to the ranch. You can look for me back at sunup. The moon rises
+between three and four."
+
+"Genevieve, will you make out the list? Sit down and eat, Kid."
+
+"Well, just a snack, Miss Chuckie. Wouldn't stop for that if the
+hawsses didn't know the trail well enough to go down in the dark."
+
+"Have you seen any sign of the murderer?" inquired Ashton.
+
+Gowan drained the cup of scalding hot coffee handed to him by Isobel,
+and answered jeeringly: "Don't worry, Tenderfoot. He won't try to get
+you tonight. If he came back today, he saw me around. If he comes back
+tonight, he won't think of climbing High Mesa to look for you."
+
+Blake came to the puncher with a list written by himself and his wife
+on a leaf from his fieldbook. Gowan folded it in his hatband, washed
+down the last mouthful of bread and ham that he had been bolting, and
+went to shift his saddle to Isobel's pony, the youngest and freshest
+of the horses. In two minutes he was riding away down the ridge,
+willingly followed by the four other horses. They knew as well as he
+that they were returning to the waterhole.
+
+As the campers again sat down to their supper Isobel paused with the
+coffeepot upraised. "Genevieve," she inquired, "did you put cream on
+the list?"
+
+"Why, no, my dear. It did not occur to me."
+
+"Nor may it to Yuki. He will be sure to send eggs and butter, but
+unless he thinks to save tonight's cream--I'll run and tell Kid."
+
+Ashton sprang up ahead of her. "I'll catch him," he said, and sprinted
+down the ridge.
+
+Racing around a thicket of scrub oak, he caught sight of Gowan more
+than an eighth of a mile ahead. He whistled repeatedly. At last Gowan
+twisted about in the saddle, and drew rein. He did not turn back, but
+made Ashton come all the way to him.
+
+"Well, what's wanted?" he demanded.
+
+"Cream," panted Ashton. "Miss Chuckie says--tell Yuki."
+
+"Shore pop, I'll bring all there is," replied Gowan. Ashton started
+back. "Hold on," said the puncher. "I want to say something to you,
+and here's the chance."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"About him. I want you to keep a mighty close watch tonight."
+
+"But you said that the murderer would not--"
+
+"_Bah!_ What does he count in this deal? It's this engineer. I've been
+chewing it over all afternoon. Miss Chuckie is as innocent and
+trusting as a lamb, spite of her winterings in Denver, and she's
+plumb locoed over him, reading so much about him in the reports."
+
+"Still, it does not necessarily follow--"
+
+"Don't it, though!" broke in the puncher. "Guess you didn't find it
+any funnier than I did seeing her hanging onto his shoulder."
+
+"Curse him!" cried Ashton, his jealousy flaring at the remembrance.
+
+"Now you're talking!" approved Gowan. "That shows you like her like I
+do. You're not going to stand for her losing her fortune."
+
+"Her fortune?"
+
+"By his flooding us off our range."
+
+"Ah--as for that, I have been thinking it over. She told me Mr.
+Knowles owns five sections. If water is put on them--Western Colorado
+fruit lands are very valuable, you know."
+
+"That's a lie. Water can't make five sections worth a range
+like ours. But supposing it could--" the puncher leaned towards
+Ashton, his eyes glaring with the cold malignancy of a striking
+rattlesnake's--"supposing it could, how about us letting her
+lose her good name?"
+
+"Good God!" gasped Ashton. "It can't come to that!"
+
+"Can't it? can't it? Where's your eyes? And him a married man! The--"
+Gowan cursed horribly.
+
+"You really believe it!" cried Ashton, convinced by the other's
+outburst.
+
+"Believe it? I know it!" declared Gowan. "If you thought half as much
+of her as I do--"
+
+"I do!--not half, but a hundred times more!"
+
+"Yes, you do?"
+
+"I swear it! I'd do anything for her!"
+
+"Except save her from him."
+
+"No, no! How can I? Tell me how!"
+
+The puncher bent nearer to the half-frenzied man. "You're going down
+that gulch with him. Suppose a spike gets knocked out or a rope breaks
+or a loose rock gets pushed over?"
+
+"God!" cried Ashton, putting his hands over his eyes. "That would be
+murder!"
+
+"_Bah!_ You'd make a dog sick! Willing to do anything for her--except
+save her from him! And nothing to it but just an accident that's just
+as like as not to happen anyway."
+
+"But--murder!" shudderingly muttered Ashton.
+
+"Murder a skunk," sneered Gowan. "If saving her from him isn't a case
+of justifiable homicide, what is? Don't you get the idea? Just a
+likely accident, down there where nobody can see."
+
+Ashton dropped his hands, half clenched, to his sides. Beads of cold
+sweat were gathering and running down his drawn face.
+
+"I can't!" he whispered. "I--I can't!"
+
+"Not if I agree to get out of the way and give you clear running?"
+tempted Gowan.
+
+"You would?"
+
+"Yes. You see how much I like her. You rid her of him, and I'll let
+you have her for doing it."
+
+Ashton shuddered.
+
+"Think it over--and watch him mighty close tonight," advised the
+tempter.
+
+A red flush leaped into Ashton's face. Gowan struck his spurs into his
+horse's flank and loped away.
+
+Ashton stood motionless. The puncher disappeared down the mountain
+side. The twilight faded and darkness closed down about the tortured
+man. He stood there motionless, his convulsed face alternately
+flushing and paling, his eyes now clouding, now burning with rage and
+hate.
+
+When at last he returned to the camp he kept beyond the circle of
+firelight. Hurriedly he rolled up in his blankets for the night,
+muttering something about his head and his need of rest for the next
+day's work. The others accepted the explanation without question. They
+formed a cheerful domestic group about the fire from which he was shut
+out by his passion.
+
+The ladies withdrew into the tent at an early hour. Blake strolled
+around the camp until after nine o'clock, but finally came with his
+blankets and companionably rolled up near Ashton. He was soon fast
+asleep. But Ashton lay tossing until after midnight. Weariness at
+last weighed down the lids of his hot eyes and numbed his tortured
+brain. He sank into a feverish sleep haunted with evil dreams.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+BLIND LOVE
+
+
+At sunrise the harassed dreamer awoke to find Gowan gazing down at him
+somberly.
+
+"You--you here?" he exclaimed, starting up on his elbow. "What is--" He
+checked himself and muttered brokenly, "I've been dreaming--horrible
+nightmares."
+
+"He's down there overhauling his outfit," said Gowan. "Hope you've
+thought the matter over."
+
+"My answer must be the same. I cannot do it, I cannot!" replied
+Ashton. He spoke hurriedly, as if afraid to linger on the thought.
+
+"You can't--not to save her and have me give her to you?" asked
+Gowan.
+
+Ashton clenched his hands and bent over in an agony of doubt and
+indecision.
+
+"You devil!" he groaned.
+
+"What! Because I'm willing to give her up, in order to see her
+saved?"
+
+"Why don't you shoot him, if you're so anxious?" queried Ashton.
+
+"And hang for it," retorted the puncher. "You can do it with an
+accident, and no risk. Anyway, that'll make things easier for his
+wife--to have him meet a natural death. Won't be anything said about
+why he was taken off. She hasn't begun to suspect what's going on
+between him and--"
+
+Gowan paused, looked at the tent, and concluded: "I've done my part. I
+won't say any more. But just you remember what I've told you. You
+won't run any risk. Mr. Knowles hasn't come back yet. There'll be only
+them and me along, and we won't be able to see you do it. Just
+remember what it will mean to her--just remember that--when you get
+him where a shove or a loosened spike--Savvy?"
+
+He went to loosen the diamond hitch of the packs that he had brought
+with him from the ranch. Ashton sank back and lay brooding until the
+girl came from the tent and called to inquire how he felt. Too
+wretched to care about his appearance, he rose and went over to her.
+
+"Oh!" she exclaimed at sight of his haggard face. "You are ill!"
+
+"Only an attack of indigestion and loss of sleep--something I often
+have," he lied. "A cup of coffee will set me up. Don't worry. I'm
+strong--head doesn't bother me at all this morning, except a numb
+feeling inside."
+
+"I shall dress the wound at once, while the coffee is boiling," she
+replied.
+
+He would have objected. She silenced him with a look that acted on his
+chafed spirit like oil upon a burn. Her kind, almost tender voice and
+the soft touch of her fingers on his head soothed his anguish and
+seemed to counteract the poison instilled by Gowan. He began to doubt
+the puncher and the witness of his own eyes.
+
+When Blake and his wife came to breakfast, Ashton was so cheerful that
+they hardly noticed the traces of haggardness that yet lingered in his
+face. Blake at once centered the attention of all by explaining his
+plans for the exploration of the caņon. In addition to the surveyor's
+chain, a hammer, and the rope and spikes,--which were to be used only
+in making the descent,--he and Ashton were to carry the level and rod
+and a quantity of food. At the suggestion of Isobel, he agreed to take
+her father's revolver and fire it at intervals, on the chance that the
+watchers above might see the flash of the shots and so be able to
+follow the progress of the explorers down in the depths.
+
+Genevieve quickly thought out signals to be given in response. If at
+night, a torch was to be cast down into the chasm; if in the daytime,
+a white flag, made of a sheet sent by Yuki, was to be waved out over
+the brink. As the explorers might become confused in the gloom of the
+caņon bottom, the point of the bend opposite Dry Fork Gulch was to be
+marked by a beacon fire built on the verge of the caņon wall.
+
+Blake had already arranged everything that he and Ashton were to take
+down with them. Immediately after breakfast the outfit was fastened on
+the packhorses, together with food, water and blankets for those who
+were to remain on the heights. The ladies were determined to keep
+above the explorers at all points where the rim of the caņon could be
+approached. Gowan was to fetch and carry for them and take the horses
+down to the pool for water at night.
+
+Within half an hour after breakfast the party was jogging away from
+camp, fully equipped for the great undertaking. Gowan was afoot. His
+horse, as well as the regular pack animals, was heavily loaded with
+stores. He walked with Isobel, who had insisted that Ashton should
+ride her pony. Blake strode along at his wife's stirrup, carrying his
+son in a clasp as tender as it was strong.
+
+The engineer was the only cheerful member of the party. Even Thomas
+Herbert, that best tempered of babies, was peevish and fretful. He was
+instinctively reflexing the suppressed nervousness and anxiety of his
+mother. Gowan and Ashton were as gloomy in look and speech as the
+shadowy depths of the caņon. Isobel bravely sought to respond to
+Blake's confidence in the favorable outcome of the survey; but her
+smile, like Genevieve's, was forced and her eyes were troubled.
+
+They reached the point of attack as the rays of the morning sun were
+beginning to strike down into the side gorge. This was as Blake had
+planned. He at once began to direct the preparations for the descent,
+himself doing the lion's share of the work.
+
+A long detour to a point higher up the ravine offered an easy descent
+of its bottom to the place where it pitched steeply into the caņon.
+Blake preferred to take a short cut down the almost vertical side of
+the gulch. The three pieces of rope, each a hundred feet long, were
+knotted together and used to lower a grass-padded package containing
+all the equipment of the explorers except the level. The bundle was
+lodged on a broad shelf of rock, over two hundred and fifty feet
+down.
+
+"Our first measurement," remarked Blake, as he subtracted from three
+hundred feet the length of the line left above the edge of the cliff.
+He jotted down the remainder in his notebook, and nodded to Ashton,
+who, with Gowan and Isobel, was holding the end of the rope. "You see
+why I had Mr. Gowan bring gloves and chaps and your leggins. We will
+make the line fast around that rock, and follow our outfit."
+
+Ashton stared, slack jawed. "Really, you cannot mean--?"
+
+"Yes. Why not?" asked Blake. "There's nothing to a slide like this
+except the look of it."
+
+"Oh, Tom!" breathlessly cried Genevieve. "Are you sure--quite sure!"
+
+"Sure I'm sure, little woman," he replied. "There's not the slightest
+danger. This is a new manila rope, and the package, with all those
+spikes in it, weighs as much as I do. That gives us a sure test."
+
+"I might have known!" she sighed her relief.
+
+"Still it does look a bit stiff for a start-off," he admitted. "If
+Lafe prefers, he can go around and come down the ravine bed. I shall
+slide the line and be getting the outfit in shape for shooting the
+chutes."
+
+"How about the rope?" asked Isobel.
+
+"You are to drop it to me as soon as I get down and stand from under,"
+directed Blake. He examined with minute care the loop and knot with
+which Gowan and Isobel had made the rope fast around the point of
+rock. Having satisfied himself that the knot was perfectly secure, he
+turned to his wife and opened his arms. "Now, Sweetheart! Wish us good
+luck and a quick journey!"
+
+Gowan and Ashton drew back and looked away as Genevieve flung herself
+on her husband's broad chest, unable to restrain her tears.
+
+"Now, now, little woman," he soothed, patting her shoulder. "There's
+nothing to be afraid of, and you know it."
+
+"If--if only we could see you down there!" she sobbed.
+
+"You will, part of the time, with your glasses. And you'll be sure to
+see the flash of some of my shots. That's all that I'm worrying
+about--you'll be skirting along the caņon rim. Promise me you'll not
+go near the edge except where the footing is perfectly safe."
+
+"Yes, Dear. I shall have Thomas to remind me to be careful. But you?"
+
+"I shall have the thought of you both to keep me from being rash.
+Remember that."
+
+"You will not be rash, I know," she answered, smiling up at him
+bravely. "You will go and come back to us soon. Now kiss me and
+Thomas. I shall not detain you from your work."
+
+"Spoken like my partner," he quietly praised her.
+
+Both by tone and manner he was plainly seeking to ease the parting to
+the calmness of an ordinary farewell. His wife responded to this,
+outwardly at least. Not so Isobel. From the moment he had turned to
+Genevieve, the girl had betrayed a rapidly increasing agitation.
+
+He went to kiss his baby, who had fallen asleep during the last half
+mile of the trip and lay sprawled in the shade of a bowlder. As he
+came back, Genevieve lingered beside the child, as if half fearful of
+watching her husband begin his dizzy descent of the rope.
+
+Isobel was standing close to the verge, her bosom heaving with
+quick-drawn breaths, her excited face flushing and paling in rapid
+alternation. Blake had pulled on his left glove, but had kept his
+right hand bare for her. As he held it out he looked up from the taut
+rope at his feet and saw her excessively agitated face.
+
+[Illustration: "You have something to tell me--your voice--your eyes--"]
+
+"Why, Miss Chuckie!" he remonstrated, "you're not going to break down
+now. You see how Jenny takes it. There's nothing to fear."
+
+"Oh, but, Tom!" she panted, "you--you don't understand! you don't
+know! It's not merely the danger! It's the dreadful thought that if
+you--if you should not--come back--and I hadn't told you!"
+
+"Told me?" he echoed in hushed wonderment as her anguished soul looked
+out at him through her wide eyes and he sensed the first vague
+foreshadowing of the truth. "You have something to tell me--your
+voice!--your eyes!--"
+
+"You see it! You know me!" she gasped, and she flung herself into his
+arms. Straining herself to him in half frantic ecstasy, she murmured
+in a broken whisper: "Yes! I am--am Belle! It is wicked and selfish to
+tell you; but to have you go down there without first--I could not
+bear it! Yet I--I shall not drag you down--disgrace you. Never that!
+I'll go away!... Oh, Tom! dear Tom!"
+
+He had stood dumfounded by the revelation of her identity. At first he
+could not speak; hardly could he think. His eyes stared into hers with
+a dazed look. But before she could finish her impassioned declaration
+of self-abnegation he roused from his bewilderment, and his great
+arms closed about her quivering body. He crushed her to him and
+pressed his lips upon her white forehead.
+
+"Belle!--poor little Belle!... But why? Tell me why? All this time,
+and you never showed by a single word or look!"
+
+"I did!" she sought to defend herself from the tender reproach. "I
+did, but I--I was afraid to tell."
+
+"Afraid?"
+
+The girl's face flamed scarlet with shame. She sought to draw away
+from him. "Let me go, Tom! oh, please, let me go! I am a selfish,
+wicked girl! I have done it! I have done it! Now there is no help for
+it! She must be told--all!"
+
+"All?" he questioned.
+
+"Yes, all, Tom! I cannot deny Mary! She saved me! I believe she is in
+Heaven. She could not help doing what she did. She could not help it,
+Tom--and she saved me! I must give you up--go away; but I can never,
+never deny my sister!"
+
+Blake swung half around with the quivering girl, and looked over her
+downbent head at his wife. Genevieve stood almost within arm's-length
+of them. He met her gaze, and immediately pushed the girl out towards
+her.
+
+"Listen, Belle," he said. "It is all right. Here is Jenny waiting for
+you. She understands."
+
+Gowan, watching rigid and tense-lipped, with his hand clenched on the
+hilt of his half-drawn Colt's, was astonished to see Mrs. Blake step
+forward and clasp Isobel in her arms. But Ashton did not see the
+strange act that checked the puncher's vengeful shot. While the girl
+was yet clinging to Blake, he had turned and fled along the edge of
+the ravine, for the moment stark mad with rage and despair.
+
+He rushed off without a cry, and the others were themselves far too
+surcharged with emotion to heed his going until he had disappeared
+around a turn in the ravine. When at last, almost spent with exertion,
+he staggered up a ridge to glare back at those from whom he had fled,
+his bloodshot eyes could perceive only three figures on the brink of
+the gorge. They were kneeling to look over into the ravine.
+
+His thoughts were still in a wild whirl, but the heat of his mad rage
+had passed and left him in a cold fury. He instantly comprehended that
+Blake had swung over the edge and was descending the rope down the
+almost sheer face of the ravine wall.
+
+Now was the time! A touch of a knife-edge to the rope, and the girl
+would be saved. Would Gowan think of it?... Of course he would
+think of it. But he would not do it. He would leave the deed to be
+done by the man to whom he had relinquished Miss Chuckie. It was
+for that man to save her--to destroy the tempter and break the
+spell of fascination that was drawing her over the brink of a pit
+far deeper than any earthly caņon. He, Lafayette Ashton--not
+Gowan--was the man. He must save her--down there in the depths, where
+no eye could see.
+
+[Transcriber's Note: Map of High Mesa and Dry Mesa with place of
+descent and other landmarks shown appears here.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+THE DESCENT INTO HELL
+
+
+Dangling like a spider on its thread, with a twist of the rope
+around one of his legs, Blake had gone down into the ravine, hand
+under hand, with the agility of a sailor. The tough leather of his
+chapareras prevented the rope from chafing the leg around which it
+slipped, and he managed with his free foot to fend himself off from
+the sharp-cornered ledges of the cliff side. In this he was less
+concerned for himself than for his level, which he carried in a sling,
+high up between his shoulders.
+
+He was soon safe at the lower end of the rope, on the shelf beside the
+bundled outfit. He waved his hat to the down-peering watchers, and
+climbed a few yards up the ravine, to creep in under an overhanging
+rock. A few moments later the loosened rope came sliding down the
+steep descent, the last length whipping from ledge to ledge with a
+velocity that made it hiss through the air.
+
+Blake was not disturbed by this proof of the cumulative speed of
+falling bodies. He came down and coolly set about his preparations for
+the descent of the gorge bottom. He unlashed the bundle and divided
+its contents. This done, he took a vertical measurement by going out
+towards the caņon along a horizontal shelf on the side wall of the
+gorge, until he could drop his surveying chain down the sheer
+precipice to a shelf almost a hundred feet below him.
+
+Unaware of Ashton's mistake and furious flight, the engineer was
+proceeding with his work in the expectation that he would soon be
+joined by his assistant. He was not disappointed. As he returned along
+the shelf, after entering the measurement in his notebook, Ashton came
+bounding and scrambling down the ravine bottom at reckless speed. He
+fetched up on the verge of the break, purple-faced and panting. His
+mouth twitched nervously and there was a wild look in his dark eyes.
+But Blake attributed all to the excitement and exertion of the
+headlong rush down the ravine.
+
+"No need for you to have hurried so, Lafe," he said. "I suppose you
+had to go farther around than I thought would be necessary. But I'd
+rather you had kept me waiting an hour than for you to have chanced
+spraining an ankle."
+
+"Yes, you need me in your business!" scoffed Ashton.
+
+"Your employer's business," rejoined the engineer. He straightened up
+from the packs that he was lashing together and gazed gravely at his
+scowling assistant. "See here, Mr. Ashton, this is no time for you to
+raise a row. We shall have quite enough else to think about from now
+on, until we are up again out of the caņon."
+
+"I've enough to think about--and more!" muttered Ashton.
+
+"Understand? I'm not asking anything of you for myself," said Blake.
+"You are doing this survey for your employer."
+
+"I'm here because of _her_!" retorted the younger man. "I'm here to
+make it certain that no harm is to come to _her_!"
+
+Blake smiled. "Good for you! I hardly thought you were here for the
+fun of it. You are going to prove to us that you have the makings.
+We're both working for her, Lafe. I don't mind telling you now that I
+am planning to do something big for her." He looked up the ravine
+wall, his eyes aglow with tenderness. "Belle! dear little Belle! To
+think that after all these years--"
+
+"Shut up!" cried Ashton. "Stop that! stop it, and get to work! I know
+what you're planning to do! Don't talk to me!"
+
+Blake stared in astonishment. "Didn't think you were so sore over that
+old affair. I told you I had nothing to do about your father's--"
+
+"Don't talk to me! don't talk to me!" frantically cried Ashton. "You
+ruined me! Now her!"
+
+"Lord! If you're as sore as all that!" rejoined Blake, his eyes
+hardening. "Look here, Mr. Ashton, we'll settle this when we get up
+on top again. Meantime, I shall do my work, and I shall see to it that
+you do yours. Understand?"
+
+"Get busy, then! I shall do _my_ work!" snarled Ashton.
+
+Blake pointed to one of the three bundles that he had tied together.
+"There's half the grub, the tripod and the rod. I can manage the rest.
+I've dropped a measurement to the foot of the first incline."
+
+He swung one of the other bundles on his back, under the level. The
+third, which was made up of railroad spikes and picket-pins, he sent
+rolling down the steep slope, tied to one end of the rope. He had
+driven a spike into a crevice of the rock. Hooking the other end of
+the rope over its head with an open loop, he grasped the line and
+started to walk down the gorge bottom. As he descended he dragged the
+loose lengths of rope after him.
+
+Ashton stood rigid, staring at the spike and loop. If the loop should
+slip or the spike pull out, he need only climb back out of the
+ravine--to her. But Blake's work was not the kind to slip or pull out.
+The watcher looked at the powerful figure backing rapidly down that
+roof-like pitch. One of the toes of the level tripod under the taut
+loop would easily pry the rope off the spike-head. He turned his pack
+around to get at the tripod--and paused to look upwards at the three
+tiny faces peering down over the brink of the cliff.
+
+He slung the pack over his shoulder and grasped the rope to follow his
+leader, who had come to the narrow shelf from which another
+measurement must be taken. He made the descent no less rapidly and
+easily than had the engineer. He was naturally agile, and now he was
+too full of his purpose to have any thought of vertigo. Yet quickly as
+he followed, when he reached the shelf he found that Blake had already
+lowered the bundle of spikes over the cliff below and was reënforcing
+with a spike a picket-pin that he had driven deep into a crevice.
+
+"Drop over the chain at that point," curtly ordered the engineer.
+"Think you can climb back up this slope without the rope?"
+
+"Yes," answered Ashton, still more curtly.
+
+Blake lifted the line and sent up it a wave that carried to the upper
+end and flipped the loop from the spike-head. He jerked the freed end
+down to him and knotted it securely to the picket-pin, while Ashton
+was making the third vertical measurement. He then lowered everything
+except the level in loops of the line, and wrapped a strip of canvas
+around the line where it bent over the sharp edge of the cliff.
+
+Ashton laconically reported the measurement. Blake noted it in his
+book, and promptly swung himself out over the edge of the cliff.
+Again his assistant looked at the fastening of the rope; again he
+looked upwards at the three tiny down-peering faces; and again he
+followed his leader. The sun was glaring directly down into the gorge.
+Later they would descend into the shadows where no eye could perceive
+from above the loosening of the rope.
+
+Blake cut off the line at the foot of the cliff and left it dangling.
+They would require it for their ascent. Another Titan step took fifty
+feet more of the rope.
+
+There followed a series of steep pitches, which they descended like
+the first, unlooping the rope from spike-head after spike-head. The
+only real difficulty of this part of the descent was the tedious task
+of carrying the vertical measurement down the slopes at places where
+even Blake could not find footing to climb out horizontally on either
+wall of the gorge to obtain a clear drop.
+
+Always, as they descended, the engineer scanned the rocks both above
+and below, calculating where the gorge bottom could be reascended
+without a line. Whenever he considered the incline too smooth or too
+steep for safe footing, he drove in spikes near enough together to be
+successively lassoed from below with a length of line.
+
+Had not the nature and condition of the rock provided frequent faults
+and crevices that permitted the driving of spikes, the descent must
+soon have become impracticable. But the engineer invariably found
+some chink in which to hammer a spike with his powerful blows. As,
+time after time, he overcame difficulties so great that his companion
+could perceive no possible solution, Ashton began to feel himself
+struggling against a feeling of reluctant admiration.
+
+All his hate could not blind him to the extraordinary mental and
+physical efficiency displayed by the engineer. Never once did the
+steely muscles permit a slip or false step, never once did the cool
+brain miscalculate the next most advantageous movement.
+
+They were now so deep that Blake had to shout his infrequent
+directions, to be heard above the booming reverberations of the caņon.
+Half way down they came to a forty-foot cliff. Blake made his
+preparations, and swung over the edge. Here was an opportunity. Ashton
+instantly bent over the knot of the rope.
+
+Close before his eyes he saw the clearly outlined shadow of his head.
+He hesitated and straightened on his knees to stare up at the top of
+the gorge. He could no longer discern the three down-peering faces,
+but he knew that they were still there. And the sunrays still pierced
+down to him between the walls of the gorge. The shadows were farther
+down, in the lower depths. He must follow and wait.
+
+When he slid to the foot of the cliff, Blake silently cut off the
+rope. There was still nearly a hundred and fifty feet left for them
+to use below. But they went down more than a thousand feet before they
+again had need of it. As Blake had foretold, the lower half of the
+descent was far less precipitous than the upper. In places the
+vertical measurements were carried down by rod readings, the level
+being set without its tripod on the points of rock where the previous
+readings had been taken. At other places Blake marked out horizontal
+points ahead on the gorge wall, and climbed to them with the chain.
+
+All the time the reverberations of the caņon were becoming louder.
+Dark shadows began to gather along one wall of the gorge. The sun was
+no longer directly in line with the ravine, and they were now far down
+in the lower depths. Ashton's knees were beginning to tremble with
+weakness. They had brought no water, for they were descending to the
+river. The torment of thirst was added to the torment of his hate. He
+began to look with fierce eagerness for the opportunity to do his
+work--to accomplish the deed for which he had descended into this
+inferno. Then he could go up again, out of the roaring, reverberating
+hell about him, away from the burning hell within him.
+
+The shadows were creeping out at him from the side of the gorge. The
+sunshine was going--it was flickering away up the opposite precipices.
+Now it had gone. All the gorge was somber with shadows. And below were
+the blue-black depths of the caņon bottom. Dread crept in upon his
+smoldering hate to sweep across its white-hot coals with chill gusts
+of fear.
+
+But now they were come to another sheer cliff--the last in the
+descent. From its foot the gorge bottom inclined easily down the final
+three hundred feet to its mouth, where the river of the deep roared
+past along the caņon bed, its foam flashing silvery white through the
+gloom.
+
+Here at last was the opportunity for which he had waited--here down in
+these dark shadows where no eye could see--here where no shriek or cry
+could pierce up to the outer world of light and sunshine through the
+wild uproar of the angry waters. He awaited the moment, aflame with
+pent-up fury, shivering with cold dread.
+
+Blake dropped his chain from the cliff-edge and took the last vertical
+measurement--fifty-three feet. He smiled. The hardest part of the work
+was almost accomplished. He swung over the edge.
+
+Ashton flung himself on his knees beside the triple knot that held the
+line fast to its spike. This time he did not hesitate, but began to
+tug at the rope end with fierce eagerness. He loosened one knot. The
+next was harder to unfasten. Blake had tied it with utmost secureness.
+At last it yielded to the tugging of his gloved fingers. He started to
+loosen the third knot. Suddenly the taut line slackened. With a
+stifled cry of rage, he paused to peer over the edge. Blake had
+slipped down the line so rapidly that he was already at the foot of
+the cliff.
+
+Reaching back, Ashton jerked the rope from the spike-head, to cast it
+down on the engineer. A glimpse of the flashing water in the caņon
+bottom gave momentary check to his vengeful impulse. If only he had a
+drink of that cool water! He was parched; his lips were cracking; in
+his mouth was the taste of dust. Must he stay up here on the dry rock
+while Blake went on down beside the foaming river to drink his fill?
+
+As he paused, a doubt clutched his heart in an icy grip. All the
+way down that devil's stairway he had been witness to Blake's
+extraordinary resourcefulness and tremendous strength. What if he
+should find a way to clamber up the precipices? He had lowered
+everything before descending. There was nothing to fling down upon
+him--no loose rock or stone to topple over and crush him.
+
+Chilled by that doubt, Ashton hesitated, his hands alternately
+tightening and relaxing their grip on the rope. What if the man should
+contrive to escape? There seemed no bounds to his ingenuity.... No, he
+must be followed on down into the caņon and destroyed, else he would
+escape--he would come up out of this inferno, like the demon he was,
+and destroy _her_. He must be followed!... And the water--the cool,
+refreshing water!
+
+His thirst now seized upon Ashton with terrible intensity. Rage, no
+less than the laborious exertion of the descent, had dried up his body
+with its feverish fire. Almost maddened with the torment of his
+craving, he looped the rope on the spike-head with reckless haste and
+slid down over the edge of the cliff.
+
+As the line tautened with his weight it gave several inches, but he
+was too nearly frantic to heed. He slipped down it so swiftly that the
+strands burned his hands through the tough palms of his gloves. In a
+few moments his feet were on a level with Blake's head. He clutched
+the rope tighter to check his fall. An instant later he dropped
+heavily on the rock shelf at the cliff foot, and the rope came
+swishing down after him.
+
+"God!" shouted Blake. Involuntarily he flung back his head and stared
+up the great gorge to the faraway heights where were waiting his wife
+and child.
+
+But Ashton neither paused nor looked upward. Rebounding from his fall,
+he rushed down the slope to the river, with a gasping cry--"Water!
+water!"
+
+For a time the engineer stood as if stunned, his big fists clenched,
+his broad chest heaving laboriously. Yet he was far too well seasoned
+in desperate adventure to give way to despair. Soon he rallied. He
+lowered his gaze from the heights to examine the cliff and the
+adjoining walls of the gorge. All were alike sheer and unscalable. The
+lines about his big mouth hardened with grim determination. He picked
+up the rope and began winding it about his mid-body above the
+low-buckled cartridge belt.
+
+He arranged the coils with such care that he did not notice the
+condition of the end of the line until he had drawn in over eighty
+feet. Then at last he saw. Though he had not forgotten to wrap the
+line with canvas where it passed over the cliff edge, he had thought
+the strands must have been frayed through on a sharp corner of rock.
+Instead, he found himself staring at the clean-cut string-wrapped rope
+end that he had knotted to the spike.
+
+For several moments he stood looking at it, his forehead creased in
+thought. What had become of the knot?... He could think of only one
+solution to the puzzle. He turned and gazed down through the gloom at
+the dim figure crouched beside the edge of the swirling water.
+
+"Locoed," he said pityingly--"Locoed.... Poor devil!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+IN THE GLOOM
+
+
+When the engineer came down to the river, Ashton still crouched low,
+his dripping head close over the water, as if he was afraid even to
+look away from it. Blake rinsed out his mouth and stood up to sip
+slowly from his hat, while looking about at the awesome spectacle of
+the caņon bottom.
+
+His first glance was at the swift-flowing stream. His eyes brightened
+and the furrows in his forehead smoothed away. The river was not as
+formidable as its tumult and foam had threatened. It could be
+descended by wading at the places where ledges and bowlders along the
+base of the caņon walls failed to afford safe footing. He glanced up
+the stupendous precipices at the blue-black ribbon of sky, but only
+for a moment. His present thought was not of escape from the depths.
+
+He bent over to grip the crouching man by the shoulder and lift him to
+his feet. Ashton writhed about and glared at him like a trapped wolf.
+
+"Let go!" he snarled. "It was an accident! I didn't mean to do it!"
+
+"Of course not," replied Blake, releasing his grip but standing close
+that he might not have to shout. "It's all right, old man--my fault.
+The knot slipped."
+
+"You own it! You own it's your fault!" cried Ashton. "You've brought
+me down here into this hell-pit! We can't get out! Lost! All your
+fault--yours!"
+
+He made a frantic snatch and jerked the revolver from Blake's holster.
+The engineer caught his wrist in an iron grasp and wrenched the weapon
+from him.
+
+"None of that, old man," he admonished with a cool sternness that
+chilled the frenzy of the other like a dash of ice water. "You're here
+to do your work, and you're going to do it. Understand?"
+
+"My work!" repeated Ashton wildly.
+
+"Yes, your work," commanded Blake, his face as hard as iron. "We're
+going to survey Deep Caņon down to the tunnel site. Your work is to
+carry rod. Do you get that?"
+
+"Down the caņon?--deeper!"
+
+"We can't get back up here. There's a place down there beyond the
+tunnel site where perhaps we can make it up the caņon wall."
+
+"A place where we--?" shrilled Ashton. "A place--Good God! and you
+stand here doing nothing!"
+
+He whirled to spring out into the swirling water. Blake was still
+swifter in his movements. He caught the fugitive by the arm and
+dragged him back.
+
+"Wait!" he commanded. "We must first carry the levels down to the
+tunnel site. You hear that? Stick by me, and I'll pull you through.
+Try to run, and, by God, I'll shoot you like a dog!"
+
+The captive glared into the steel-white eyes of the engineer, anger
+overcoming his panicky fear.
+
+"Let go!" he panted. "Don't worry! I'll do my work--I'll do my work!"
+
+"If you don't, you'll never get out of this caņon," grimly rejoined
+Blake. He released his hold, and started up the slope, with a curt
+order: "Come along. We can rod down the slope."
+
+Ashton followed him, silent and morose. The instrument was screwed to
+its tripod, and a line of levels from the foot of the last vertical
+measurement was carried down the slope to the caņon. The last rod
+reading was on a ledge, three feet above the water, at the corner of
+the gorge. Blake considered the reading worthy of permanent record.
+They had measured all the many hundreds of feet down from the top of
+High Mesa to these profound depths. With his two-pound hammer and one
+of the few remaining spikes, he chiseled a cross deep in the surface
+of the black rock.
+
+That mark of the engineer-captain, scouting before the van of man's
+Nature-conquering army, was the sign of the first human beings that
+had ever descended alive to the bottom of Deep Caņon.
+
+When he had cut the cross, Blake took out his Colt's, and, gazing up
+the heights, began to fire at slow intervals. Confined between the
+walls of gorge and caņon, each report of the heavy revolver crashed
+out above the tumult of the river and ran echoing and reechoing up the
+stupendous precipices. Yet long before they reached the rim of those
+towering walls they blurred away and merged and were lost in the
+ceaseless reverberations of the waters.
+
+Blake well knew that this would happen. But he also knew that the
+flash of the shot would be distinctly discernible in the gloom of the
+abyss. As he fired, he scanned the verge of the uppermost precipices.
+After the fourth shot he ceased firing and flung up his hand to point
+at the heights.
+
+"Look!" he shouted. "They see! There is the flag!"
+
+Ashton stared up with wide, feverish eyes. From an out-jutting point
+of rock on the lofty rim he saw a tiny white dot waving to and fro
+against the blue-black sky. The watchers above had seen the flash of
+the revolver shots and were fluttering the white flag in responsive
+signal. Though on the world above the sun beat down its full
+mid-afternoon flood of light, the two men in the abyss could see stars
+twinkling in the dark sky around the waving fleck of white.
+
+Blake fired two shots in quick succession, the agreed signal that told
+the flag was seen. He then calmly seated himself and began to add
+together the vertical measurements taken during the descent of the
+gorge. But Ashton groaned and flung himself face downward on the rough
+stone.
+
+Blake soon finished his sum in addition, and the result brought a
+smile to his serious face. He checked the figures with painstaking
+carefulness, and nodded, fully satisfied. Replacing book and pencil in
+the deep pocket of his shirt, he opened one of the packages of food.
+When he had laid out enough for a hearty meal, he looked at Ashton.
+The prostrate man had not stirred.
+
+"Come, Lafe," he called encouragingly. "Time to eat."
+
+Ashton lay still and made no response.
+
+Blake raised his voice--"Come! You're not going to quit. You're going
+to eat. You must keep your strength to fight your way through and up
+out of here--to _her_!"
+
+Ashton sullenly rose and came to sit down on the rock beside the
+outspread food. He was silent, but he ate even more heartily than his
+companion. When they had finished, Blake swung his pack and level on
+his shoulder, fired one shot, and stepped out into the swift but
+shallow river. Wading as far downstream as he could see to read the
+rod in the twilight of the depths, he set up the tripod of his
+instrument on a rock and took the reading given him by Ashton.
+
+The survey of the caņon itself had begun. Unappalled by the awful
+height of the mighty precipices on either side, undaunted by the
+uncertainty of escape, heedless of the gloom of the deep, of the
+tumult and rush and chill of the icy waters, the engineer boldly
+advanced to the attack of this abysmal stronghold of Primeval Nature,
+his square jaw set in grim determination to wrest from these hitherto
+inviolate depths that which he sought to learn. Whatever might follow,
+he must and would unlock the secret of the hidden waters. Afterwards
+might come death by slow starvation or the quick dashing down from
+some half-scaled precipice. That mattered not now. First must the
+engineer perform his work,--first must he execute the task that he had
+set himself for the conquest of the chasm that was likely to prove his
+tomb.
+
+Vastly different in purpose, yet no less resolute than the engineer,
+Ashton joined zealously in the grim battle with the abyss--for battle
+it soon proved to be. Only in places was the subterranean river
+shallow and easy to wade. More often it foamed in wild fury down steep
+rapids, to fling itself over ledges into black pools; or, worst of
+all, it swirled deep and arrowy-swift between fanged rocks where the
+channel narrowed.
+
+Wading, swimming, leaping from rock to rock, scrambling up and down
+the steep precipice foot, creeping along narrow shelves,--stubbornly
+the explorers fought their way deeper through that wild passage.
+Chilled by the icy waters and bruised by many a slip on loose stones
+and wet, water-polished rocks, ever they carried the line of levels
+down alongside the torrent, crossing over and back from side to side,
+twisting and turning with the twists and bends of the chasm. And at
+every stand Blake jotted down the rod readings in his half-soaked book
+with his pencil and figured the elevation of each turning point before
+"pulling up" his instrument to move on downstream to the next "set
+up."
+
+At the end of every half hour he fired a single shot to signal their
+progress in the depths to the watchers above. But never once did he
+stop to look up for the flag. Occasionally he was required to help
+Ashton through or over some unusually difficult passage. For the most
+part, however, each fought his own way. The odds were not altogether
+in favor of the older man. He was hampered by the care of the
+instrument, which must be shielded from all blows or falls. The rod,
+on the contrary, served as a staff and support to Ashton, alike in the
+water and on the rocks.
+
+Some time before sunset the waning light in the caņon bottom became so
+dim that Blake was compelled to cease work. He took a last reading on
+a broad shelf of rock well above the surface of the water, joined
+Ashton on the shelf, and began firing the revolver at five-minute
+intervals. After the fifth shot he at last perceived the white dot of
+the flag far above on the opposite brink of the chasm. He fired two
+shots in quick succession, and calmly sat down to open one of the
+soaked packages of food.
+
+Ashton did not wait to be bidden to supper. He fell to on the food and
+ate ravenously. Blake did not check him, though he himself took little
+and carefully gathered up and returned to the package every scrap of
+food left at the end of the meal. As Ashton lay back on the rock he
+squirmed from side to side and groaned. His bruises were so numerous
+that he could not find a comfortable position.
+
+"Cheer up!" grimly quoted Blake. "The worst is yet to come."
+
+He stretched himself out on the rock-shelf and, regardless of the
+sullen resistance of the younger man, drew him into his arms. Chilled
+to the marrow by his frequent icy drenchings, Ashton was shivering in
+the cold wind which came down the caņon with the approach of night.
+But Blake's massive body and limbs were aglow with abundant vitality.
+Warmed and sheltered from the wind, the exhausted man relaxed like a
+child in the strong arms of his companion and quickly sank into the
+deep slumber of overtaxed nature.
+
+Blake lay awake until the narrow strip of sky that showed between the
+vast walls of rock deepened to an inky blackness thickly sprinkled
+with scintillating stars. The light of a watchfire flamed red far
+above on the opposite rim of the chasm wall. To the man below it was
+like the glow of human love in the chill darkness of the Unknown. With
+a gesture of reverent passion and adoration, he put his fingers to his
+lips and flung a kiss up out of the abyss. Then he, too, relaxed on
+the hard rock and sank into heavy sleep.
+
+Ashton was the first to waken. The wind had changed, and he was roused
+by the different note in the ceaseless roar of the river. He stared up
+at the star-jeweled sky. It was still intensely black; yet the gloom
+of the depths was lessened by a vague pale illumination, a faint
+shadow of light that might have been the ghost of a dead day. He
+thought it was the gray dawn, and sought to roll over on his rock bed
+away from the sheltering embrace of Blake. The engineer was still deep
+in profound slumber. His big arm slipped laxly from across the moving
+man's breast.
+
+The change of position wrung a groan from Ashton. Every muscle in his
+body was cramped, every bruise stiff and sore. Not until he had turned
+and twisted for several moments was he able to rise to his feet. The
+vague ghost light about him brightened. He gazed upwards. He did not
+notice the tiny flame of the fire that told of the anxious watchers
+above. Out over the monstrous black wall of the abyss was drifting a
+burnished silver-white disk.
+
+"The moon!" he groaned. "Only the moon! To wait here--with him!--with
+him!"
+
+He looked down at the big form of the sleeping man, and suddenly all
+his pent-up rage burst its bounds. It poured through his veins in
+streams of fire. He stared about in fierce eagerness in search of a
+weapon. Blake lay upon the hilt of the revolver; the level rod lacked
+weight and balance. But the heavy hammer--a blow on the upturned
+temple of the sleeper!--
+
+With the cunning stealth of madness, Ashton took up the hammer and
+crept around back of Blake's head. He straightened on his knees, and
+peered down at the calm, powerful face of the engineer.
+
+What if he was a veritable Samson, this conqueror of caņons? Where now
+was his power? Sleep had bound fast his steel muscles, had numbed his
+indomitable will and locked his keen intellect in the black prison of
+unconsciousness.
+
+The avenger hovered over him, gloating. Now at last was come the
+opportunity--the perfect opportunity, down in these uttermost depths,
+in the secret night time. The world above slept--and he slept. Never
+should he waken from that sleep; never should he rouse up in his evil
+strength to escape out of the abyss and bring ruin to her!
+
+Lightly the hammer swung over and downward, measuring the curve of the
+stroke. It lifted and poised. Again it swung down; and again it lifted
+and poised. The blow must be certain--there must not be the slightest
+chance of missing.
+
+Each time the heavy steel head stopped a full two inches short of the
+upturned temple--but each time its shadow fell across the eyes of the
+sleeper. He stirred. The hammer whirled up, gripped in both hands of
+the kneeling man. The sleeper turned flat on his back, with his face
+full to the light. A quiver ran through the tense muscles of the
+avenger. Had the eyes of the sleeper opened, had their lids so much as
+fluttered, the hammer must have crashed down.
+
+But it was the sleeper's lips that moved. As it were by a miracle of
+acuteness, the tense nerves of the other's ear caught the whispered
+words through the roaring of the river--"_Jenny! Son!_"
+
+The hammer hurled away out into the swirl of the foam-flecked waters.
+The avenger flung himself about, face downward on the rock.
+
+"God!" he sobbed, in an agony of remorse. "Forgive me, God! I cannot
+do it! I am weak--unfit!... Not even to save her!--not even to save
+her!"
+
+He writhed in the anguish of his love and rage and self-abasement. He
+had failed; he was too weak to do the deed. But God--Would God permit
+that evil should befall her?
+
+He struggled to his feet and flung up his quivering hands to moon and
+stars and black sky in passionate invocation--"O God! You say that
+vengeance is Yours; that You will repay! Take me, if You will--I give
+myself! Only destroy him too! Save her! save her!"
+
+Again Blake stirred, and this time he opened his eyes. Ashton had sunk
+down in a huddled silent heap. Blake gazed up at the watchfire on the
+heights, smiled, and turned over to again fall asleep.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+LOWER DEPTHS
+
+
+Beetling precipices shut off the direct light of the moonbeams and
+left the abyss again in dense darkness long before the coming of the
+laggard dawn. Blake slept on, storing up strength for the renewal of
+the battle. Yet even he could not outsleep the reluctant lingering of
+night. He awoke while the tiny flame of the watchfire still flickered
+bright against the inky darkness of the sky.
+
+Ashton had fallen into a fitful doze. The engineer stood up and
+silently groped his way to and fro on the shelf of rock, stretching
+and limbering his cramped muscles. He wasted no particle of energy;
+the moment he had relieved his stiffness he stretched out again. He
+lay contemplating that flame of love on the heights until it faded
+against the lessening blackness of the sky and the rays of the morning
+sun began to angle down the upper precipices.
+
+He rose to take out two portions of food from the single pack in which
+he had bound up all the provisions. The portion for Ashton was small;
+his own was smaller. He roused the dozing man and placed the larger
+share of food in his hand.
+
+"Don't drop it," he cautioned. "That's all I can let you have. We must
+go on rations until we can see a way out of this hole."
+
+Ashton ate his meager breakfast without replying. The fire within him
+had burned to ashes. He was cold and dull and dispirited. He had
+failed. He would have been willing to sit and brood, and wait for God
+to answer his prayer.--But his waiting was not to be an inert
+lingering in the place where he had failed.
+
+The moment the down-creeping daylight so lessened the gloom of the
+depths that Blake could take rod readings, he plunged over into the
+stream, with a curtly cheerful command for Ashton to prepare to
+follow. Too dejected even to resist, the younger man silently obeyed.
+When Blake signaled to him through the dimness, he held the rod on the
+last turning-point of the previous day, and lowered himself from the
+shelf down into the stream.
+
+The evening before, the water at this point had come up to his waist.
+It was now only knee-deep. His surprise was so great that in passing
+Blake he broke his sullen silence to remark the fact and ask what
+could have caused the change.
+
+"Melting of the snow on the high range," the engineer shouted in
+explanation. "Takes time for it to run down the caņon all these miles.
+River probably still falling. Will begin to rise about noon. Faster
+we get along now, the easier it will be. Hustle!"
+
+Ashton responded mechanically to the will of his commander. For the
+time being his own will was almost paralyzed. The reaction from his
+long-sustained rage had left him dazed and nerveless. He had sunk into
+a state of fatalistic indifference. He moved quickly downstream from
+turning-point to turning-point, driven by Blake's will, but with a
+heedless recklessness that all Blake's warnings could not check.
+
+Within the first hour he twice stumbled and went under while wading
+deep reaches of the river, and once he fell from a ledge, bruising
+himself severely and knocking a splinter from the rod. Half an hour
+later he lost his footing in descending a swift and narrow place that
+would have been impassable at high water. Had not Blake been below him
+he would never have come out alive.
+
+The engineer leaped in and dragged the drowning man to safety, after a
+desperate struggle with the torrent. But in the wild swirl, both the
+food-pack and the rod went adrift. The moment he had rescued his
+companion, Blake rushed away downstream, leaping like a goat from rock
+to rock. He at last overtook the rod, caught in the eddy of a pool. Of
+the pack he could find no trace. He returned to Ashton and silently
+handed him the rod.
+
+There was no need for him to admonish. The loss of all the food and
+the narrowness of his escape had sobered the younger man. He resumed
+his work with a cautious swiftness of movement that avoided all
+needless risks yet never hesitated to encounter and rush through the
+dangers that could not be avoided. In this he copied Blake.
+
+All the time they were advancing down the angry torrent, deeper and
+deeper into its secret stronghold,--creeping, crawling, leaping,
+wading, swimming--step by step, turn after turn, wresting from the
+abyss that which the engineer was resolved to learn, even though he
+should learn, only to perish.
+
+The day advanced. Steadfastly they struggled on down the bed of the
+river, twisting and crossing over with the winding course of the
+chasm; now between beetling precipices that shut out all sight of the
+blue-black sky; now in more open stretches where the Titanic walls
+swung apart and the glorious hot sun rays pierced down into the very
+depths to warm their drenched bodies and lighten their heavy spirits.
+
+Ashton had long since lost all count of time. His watch had been
+smashed in his first fall of the day. But Blake seemed to have an
+intuitive sense of time. At fairly regular intervals he fired a shot
+to tell the watchers above the extent of their progress. Sometimes the
+answering flag-signal could be seen waving from the rim of the caņon.
+But in many places those above could not come near the brink to look
+over.
+
+The approach of midday found the bruised and weary fighters
+struggling through one of the narrowest reaches of the caņon. The
+precipices jutted out so far that the lower depths seemed more
+cavern than chasm, and the river swirled deep and swift between
+sheer, narrow walls. Twice Ashton was swept past what should have
+been the next turning-point, and Blake, unable to see the figures on
+the rod, had to guess at his readings.
+
+At last the precipices swung apart and showed the sky at a twist in
+the caņon's course that was the sharpest of all the turns the
+explorers had as yet encountered. As Blake came wading down past
+Ashton, along the inner curve of the bend, he stopped and pointed
+skywards. Ashton raised his drooping head and peered up at the rim of
+the opposite wall. From the brink a dense column of green-wood smoke
+was rising into the indigo sky.
+
+"One more set-up," shouted Blake.
+
+Three minutes later he took a reading on the water and on a point of
+rock at the angle of the caņon-side around which the river swung in
+its sharp curve. Three more minutes, and the two battered fighters
+stood together on the last bench of that tremendous line of levels,
+with torn and rent clothing, sodden, gaping boots, bodies bruised from
+head to foot--bleeding, weary, but victorious! They had finished the
+work that Blake had set out to do.
+
+He held up the now-soaked notebook for Ashton to see the last penciled
+elevation on the wet paper.
+
+"Two thousand, forty-five!" he shouted. "Over five hundred feet above
+that bench in Dry Greek Gulch! Water, electricity!--Dry Mesa shall be
+a garden!"
+
+Ashton stared moodily into the exultant face of the engineer.
+
+"Are you sure of that?" he asked. "How do you know that God will let
+you climb up out of this hell of stone and water?"
+
+"There's the saying, 'God helps those who help themselves,'" replied
+Blake. "I'm going to put up the best fight I can. If that doesn't win
+out, I shall at least have the satisfaction of not having quit. If you
+wish to pray, do so. The sooner we start the better. From now on, the
+water will be rising."
+
+"I prayed last night," said Ashton. He added somberly, "And now we are
+both going to the devil."
+
+"No," said Blake, with no less earnestness. "There is no devil--there
+is no room for a devil in all the universe. What man calls evil is
+ignorance,--his ignorance of those primeval forces of nature which he
+has yet to chain; his ignorance of those higher qualities in his own
+nature which, if known, would prevent him from wronging others and
+would enable him to bring happiness to himself and others."
+
+"You say that!" cried Ashton. "You can mock! You do not believe in
+hell!"
+
+Blake smiled grimly. "What do you call this?--But you mean a hell
+hereafter. I believe this: If, when we pass into the Unknown, we
+continue to exist as individual consciousnesses, then we carry with us
+the heaven and the hell that we have each upbuilt for ourselves."
+
+"God will not let you escape," stated Ashton. "You will pass from this
+hell of water into the hell of fire and brimstone."
+
+"Have it your own way," said Blake. "I lived one summer in Death
+Valley. The other place can't be much hotter."
+
+He climbed up the ledges and planted the level firmly on its tripod
+above the high-water mark of the spring floods. He called down to
+Ashton: "Hate to leave the old monkey up here; but it will serve as a
+memento of our present visit, when we come down again to locate the
+tunnel head."
+
+"How can it be that we shall ever come down again?" replied Ashton.
+"It is impossible--for we shall never go up."
+
+Blake jumped down the ledges to him and pointed to the column of smoke
+on the lofty heights.
+
+"Look there," he said. "That is where we are going, if there is any
+possible way to go. An optimist would stand here and wait, certain
+that wings would soon sprout for him to fly up; a pessimist would sit
+down and quit. An optimist is a fool; a pessimist is a worse fool."
+
+"And which are you?" asked Ashton.
+
+"I am neither. I am a meliorist. I am going to face the facts, and
+then fight for all I'm worth. What's more, you're going to do the
+same. Come! We've still got some clothes left, the rod for you to use
+as a staff, this rope, the revolver, and seventeen cartridges. It's
+fortunate we have any. We've got to signal that we are going on down
+the caņon, instead of back up."
+
+"We may as well stay and die here. But since you prefer to keep
+moving, I have no objections," said Ashton, with ironical politeness.
+
+Blake promptly stepped into the water and led the way to the next
+shelf of rock. Here he fired a shot. Going a few yards farther along
+the rocks, he fired again. Three times he fired, at intervals of two
+minutes. Then the white dot of the flag appeared on the precipice
+brink directly up across from him.
+
+"Once more, and we're sure they understand," he said.
+
+Advancing a full hundred yards on down the caņon, he fired the fourth
+shot. Very soon the fleck of white flaunted on the rim a little way
+beyond them.
+
+"They understand!" cried Blake. "Trust Jenny to use her head! Now
+catch your breath and tighten up. We're going to move!"
+
+He started, and Ashton followed close behind. It was the same rough,
+fierce game of leaping, crawling, wading, swimming,--battling with the
+river, the rocks, the ledges. But now they were no longer checked and
+halted by the alternate stoppings for set-ups and turning-points, and
+no longer was Blake encumbered with the care of the level. There was
+nothing now to hinder or delay them except the natural obstacles of
+their wild path down the bed of the torrent.
+
+Blake could give all his thought to picking the best and quickest way
+through rapids and falls, over the water-washed rocks and along the
+side ledges. And he could give all his great strength to helping his
+companion past the hard places. In return Ashton gave such help as he
+could to the engineer, many times when a steadying hand or the
+outstretched rod rendered easier a descent or the fording of some
+swift mill race in the stream.
+
+At the end of the first quarter-mile Blake had fired a shot, and again
+at the second quarter. After that he waited longer intervals. He
+considered it advisable to husband the few remaining cartridges.
+
+The river was now rapidly rising. But every inch of added depth found
+the two fugitives much farther down the caņon. In two hours they
+advanced thrice the distance that they had covered in the same time
+before noon, and this despite the increasing depth and force of the
+river.
+
+The pace was so hot that Ashton was beginning to stumble and slip, but
+Blake kept by him and helped him along by word and deed. He asserted
+and repeated a dozen times over, that they were nearing the place
+where an ascent of the precipices might be possible. At last they
+rounded a turn in the winding chasm, and Blake was able to point to a
+break in the sheer wall on the Dry Mesa side, where the precipices
+were set back one above the other in a Cyclopean stepladder and their
+steeply-pitched faces were rough with crevices and shelves.
+
+"Look!" he cried. "There's the place--there's our ladder up from hell
+to heaven!"
+
+Ashton soon lowered his weary head. He stared dully downstream to
+where a fifty-foot cliff extended across from side to side of the
+caņon like a dam.
+
+"Part of the wall slid in," he stated with the simplicity of one who
+is nearing exhaustion.
+
+"That shall be our bridge to the ladder," shouted Blake. "It's all
+sheer cliff along here at the foot of the break, but the ledges run
+down sideways to the top of the cross cliff. We shall soon be lying up
+there, high and dry, getting our second wind for the run up the
+ladder."
+
+The engineer spoke confidently, and felt what he spoke. But as they
+struggled on down the turbulent stream to the cross cliff, the light
+left his face. From wall to wall of the caņon the great mass of fallen
+rock stretched across the bottom in a sheer-faced barrier, broken only
+by a tunnel barely large enough to suck in the swelling volume of the
+river.
+
+Blake came down close to the intake, scanning every foot of the cliff
+face for a scalable break or crevice. There was none to be found. He
+climbed along the cliff foot to a low shelf beside the roaring tunnel,
+and stood staring at the opening in deep thought. Even while he
+looked, the swelling volume of the river filled the tunnel to its
+roof. Blake peered at the fresh watermark twenty feet up the face of
+the cliff, and bent down beside Ashton, who had stretched out to rest
+on the shelf of rock.
+
+"There's only one thing to it, old man," he said. "We must dive
+through that tunnel."
+
+"Through that hole?" gasped Ashton. "No! I've done enough. I shall
+stay here."
+
+"To drown like a rat in a rainwater barrel!" rejoined Blake. "Look at
+that watermark. The tunnel is now running full. Inside a quarter-hour
+the river will be up over this ledge. It will keep rising till it
+reaches that mark, and it will not fall until after low water."
+
+"What do I care?" said Ashton hopelessly. "Go to the devil your own
+way. I'd rather drown here than in that underground hole. Leave me
+alone."
+
+Blake considered a full half minute, looked up the cliff face, and
+replied: "Perhaps it's as well. I shall do the best I can. But first I
+want to tell you I've wiped out all that past affair. You are another
+person from that Lafayette Ashton. We stand here almost face to face
+with the Unknown. One or both of us may soon go out into the Darkness.
+As we may never meet again, I wish to tell you that you have proved
+yourself, even more than I hoped when I saw you come rushing down the
+ravine to join me. You have proved yourself a man. Good-by."
+
+He held out his hand. But Ashton turned his face to the wall of rock
+and was silent. After a time he heard the sound of Blake's worn heels
+on the outer end of the shelf. His ears, attuned to the ceaseless
+tumult of the waters, caught the click of the protruded heel-nail
+heads. There was a brief pause--then the plunge. He looked about
+quickly and saw Blake's hands vanish in the down-sucking eddy where
+the swollen waters drew into the now hidden intake of the tunnel.
+
+A cry of horror burst from his heaving chest. Blake had gone--Blake
+the iron-limbed, iron-hearted man. He had conquered the river--and now
+the wild waters had seized him and were mauling and smashing and
+crushing him in the terrible mill of the cavern. Beyond that
+underground passage, it might be miles away, the victor would fling up
+on some fanged rock a shapeless mass that once had been a man.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+LIGHT IN THE DARKNESS
+
+
+Ashton again turned his face to the rock and groaned. God had answered
+his prayer. Now must he pay the price. If only he could force himself
+to lie still while the rising waters brimmed up over the ledge and up
+over his head and face. He was tired--tired! It would be so peaceful
+to lie and rest under the quiet waters.
+
+But the first ripple that crept over the surface of the shelf brought
+him to his feet with the chill of its icy touch. He climbed to a shelf
+higher up and again stretched himself full length on the rock. To lie
+still and rest was heavenly.... It was too good to last. The water
+crept after him up the ledge. This time he could climb no higher.
+
+He sat erect and waited, still resting, until the flood rose to his
+chin. Then he stood up, leaning on the battered level rod. The water
+rose after him, creeping with relentless stealth from his thigh to his
+waist, from his waist to his chest. It would soon be lapping at his
+throat, and then--he must begin to swim. Life was far stronger within
+him than he had thought. His strength had come back. Blake was right.
+A man should fight. He should hold fast to hope, and fight to the very
+last.
+
+Something swept from side to side along the face of the cliff above
+him. It tapped the rock close over his head. He looked up and saw a
+rope. He could not see over the rounded brink of the cliff, but he had
+no need. There was a rescuer above him who knew his desperate
+situation. Could it be Blake? Surely not! He must have perished in the
+frightful vortex of the tunnel.
+
+The rope swung lower. Now it was within reach. Ashton made a clutch as
+it swept over him and caught its end. He gave a tug. At once the line
+slackened down to him. He felt something in his palm, twisted between
+the rope strands. He looked and saw that it was a piece of folded
+paper. He opened it and found written a terse sentence in Blake's bold
+clear hand:
+
+                      Tie rod to line and climb.
+
+Why should he tie the splintered level rod to the rope? Of what
+possible use could it be in climbing the precipices? But even while
+Ashton asked himself the questions he obeyed Blake's directions. The
+water lapped up over his chin as he tied the knot. He pulled heavily
+on the rope. It gave a little way, and then tautened. He reached up
+and began to climb, hand over hand, with desperate speed.
+
+[Illustration: Another desperate clutch at the rope--still another]
+
+Thirty feet above the water his strength was almost outspent, but he
+struggled to raise himself one more time, and then another. To pause
+meant to slip back and perish. Another upward heave. The rope here
+bent in over the rounding cliff. Hardly could he force his fingers
+between it and the rock. Yet if only he could get his knee up on the
+sharp slope! He heaved again, his face purple with exertion, the veins
+swelling out on his forehead as if about to burst.
+
+At last! his knee was up and braced against the rock. Another
+desperate clutch at the rope--another heave--still another. The cliff
+edge was rounding back. Every upward hitch was easier than the one
+before. Now he was scrambling up on toes and knees; now he could rise
+to his feet.
+
+The line led across a waterworn ledge and downward. Ashton peered
+over, and saw the senseless body of Blake wedged against the other
+side of the ledge. About it, close below the arms, the line was
+knotted fast.
+
+Ashton stared wonderingly at the still, white face of the unconscious
+man. It was covered with cold sweat. A peculiar twist in the sprawling
+left leg caught his attention. He looked--and understood. Panting with
+exertion, he staggered down the ledges of the lower side of the
+barrier to where the river burst furiously out of the mouth of the
+tunnel.
+
+Hurled by that mad torrent from the darkness of the gorged cavern
+straight upon a line of rocks, all Blake's strength and quickness had
+not enabled him to save himself from injury. Yet he had crept up those
+rough ledges, dragging his shattered leg. Atrocious as must have been
+his agony, he had crept all the way to the top, had written the note,
+and flung down the rope to rescue his companion.
+
+There was no vessel in which Ashton could carry water. He had no hat,
+his boots were full of holes, he must use his hands in scrambling back
+up the ledges. He stripped off his tattered flannel shirt, dipped it
+in a swirling eddy, and started back as fast as he could climb.
+
+Blake still lay unconscious. Ashton straightened out the twisted leg,
+and knelt to bathe the big white face with an end of the dripping
+garment. After a time the eyelids of the prostrate man fluttered and
+lifted, and the pale blue eyes stared upward with returning
+consciousness.
+
+"I'm here!" cried Ashton. "Do you see? You saved me!"
+
+"Colt's gone," muttered Blake. "But cartridges--fire."
+
+"You mean, fire the cartridges to let them know where we are? How can
+I do it without the revolver?"
+
+"No, build a fire," replied the engineer. He raised a heavy hand to
+point towards the high end of the barrier. "Driftwood up there. Bring
+it down. I'll light it."
+
+"Light it--how?" asked Ashton incredulously.
+
+"Get it," ordered Blake.
+
+Ashton hurried across the crest of the barrier to where it sloped up
+and merged in the precipice foot. The mass of rock that formed the
+barrier had fallen out of the face of the lower part of the caņon
+wall, leaving a great hollow in the rock. But above the hollow the
+upper precipices beetled out and rose sheer, on up the dizzy heights
+to the verge of the chasm. Contrasted with this awesome undermined
+wall, the broken, steeple-sloped precipices adjoining it on the
+upstream side looked hopefully scalable to Ashton. He marked out a
+line of shelves and crevices running far up to where the full sunlight
+smiled on the rock.
+
+But Blake had told him to fetch wood for a fire, that they might
+signal the watchers on the heights. He hastened up over the rocks to
+the heaps of logs and branches stranded on the high end of the barrier
+by the freshets. Every year the river, swollen by the spring rains,
+brimmed over the top of this natural dam.
+
+Yet not all the heaps lying on the ledges were driftwood. As Ashton
+approached, he was horrified to see that the largest and highest
+situated piles were nothing else than masses of bones. Drawn by a
+gruesome fascination, he climbed up to the nearest of the ghastly
+heaps. The loose ribs and vertebræ scattered down the slope seemed to
+him the size of human ribs and vertebræ. He shuddered as they crunched
+under his tread.
+
+Then he saw a skull with spiral-curved horns. He looked up the caņon
+wall, and understood. The high-heaped bones were the skeletons of
+sheep. In a flash, he remembered Isobel's account of Gowan, that first
+day up there on the top of the mesa. Not only had the puncher killed
+six men; he had, together with other violent men of the cattle ranges,
+driven thousands of sheep over into the caņon--and this was the
+place.
+
+Sick with horror and loathing, Ashton ran to snatch up an armful of
+the smaller driftwood and hurry back down to the center of the
+barrier. He found Blake lying white and still. But beside him were
+three cartridges from which the bullets had been worked out. At the
+terse command of the engineer, Ashton ground one of the older and
+drier pieces of wood to minute fragments on a rock.
+
+Blake emptied the powder from one of the cartridges into the little
+pile of splinters, and holding the edge of another shell against a
+corner of the rock, tapped the cap with a stone. At the fifth stroke
+the cap exploded. The loosened powder of the cartridge flared out into
+the powder-sprinkled tinder. Soon a fire of the dry, half-rotted
+driftwood was blazing bright and almost smokeless in the twilight of
+the depths.
+
+"Now haul up the rod," directed Blake, and he lay back to bask in the
+grateful warmth.
+
+Ashton drew up the level rod and came back over the ledge. He found
+that the engineer had freed himself from the last coils of the rope
+and was unraveling the end that had been next his body. But his eyes
+were upturned to the heights.
+
+"Look--the flag!" he said.
+
+"Already?" exclaimed Ashton.
+
+"Yes. No doubt one of them has been waiting on that out-jutting
+point.--Now, if you'll break the rod. We've got to get my leg into
+splints."
+
+The crude splints were soon ready. For bandages there were strips from
+the tattered shirts of both men. Unraveled rope-strands, burnt off in
+the fire, served to lash all together. Beads of cold sweat gathered
+and rolled down Blake's white face throughout the cruel operation. Yet
+he endured every twist and pull of the broken limb without a groan.
+When at last the bones were set to his satisfaction and the leg lashed
+rigid to the splints, he even mustered a faint smile.
+
+"That beats an amputation," he declared. "Now if you can help me up
+under the cliff, where you can plant the fire against a back-log--I
+want to dry out and do some planning while you're climbing up for
+help. I've an idea we can put in a dynamo down here, with turbines in
+the intake and in the mouth of the tunnel--carry a wire up over the
+top of the mesa and down into the gulch. Understand? All the electric
+power we want to drive the tunnel, and very cheap."
+
+"My God!" gasped Ashton. "You can lie here--here--maimed, already
+starving--and can plan like that?"
+
+"Why not? No fun thinking of my leg, is it? As for the rest, you're
+going up to report the situation. They'll soon manage to yank me out
+of this blessed hole."
+
+Ashton's face darkened. "But that's the question," he rejoined. "Am I
+going to go up? Am I going to try to go up?"
+
+Blake looked at him with a steady, unflinching gaze. "There's
+something queer about all this. Isn't it time you explained? When the
+rope came off that last cliff in the gorge and I saw that you had
+untied it before sliding down, I thought you were off your head. And
+two or three times today, too. But since we landed here--"
+
+"Your broken leg," interrupted Ashton--"it made me forget. You had
+saved me with the rope. I had to help you. Now I see how foolish I
+have been. I should have left you to lie here, and flung myself back
+over into the water."
+
+"Why?" calmly queried Blake.
+
+"Why! You ask why?" cried Ashton, his eyes ablaze with excitement, his
+whole body quivering. "Can't you see? Are you blind? What do I care
+about myself if I can save her from you? I shall not try to escape.
+You shall never go up there to work her harm!"
+
+"Harm her? You mean put through this irrigation project?"
+
+"No!" shouted Ashton. "Don't lie and pretend, you hypocrite! You know
+what I mean! You know she could not hide how you were enticing her!"
+
+Blake stared in utter astonishment. Then, regardless of his leg, he
+sat up and said quietly: "I see. I thought you must have understood
+when she told me, there at the last moment before we started. She is
+my sister."
+
+"Sister!" scoffed Ashton. "You liar! You have no sister. Your sisters
+died years ago. Genevieve told me."
+
+"That was what I told her. I believed it true. But it was not true.
+Belle did not die--God! when I think of that! It has helped me through
+this fight--it helped me crawl up here with that leg dangling. Good
+God! To think of Jenny waiting for me up there, and Son, and little
+Belle too--little Belle whom all these years I thought dead!"
+
+Ashton stood as if turned to stone. "Belle--you call her Belle? She
+told me--Chuckie only a nickname!" he stammered. "Adopted--her real
+name Isobel!"
+
+"We always called her Belle--Baby Belle! She was the youngest," said
+Blake.
+
+"But why--why did you not--tell me?"
+
+"I did not know. She did--she knew from the first, there at
+Stockchute. I see it now. Even before that, she must have guessed it.
+Yes, I see all now. She sent for me to come out here, because she
+thought I might be her brother."
+
+"You did not tell me!" reproached Ashton, his face ghastly. "How was I
+to know?"
+
+"I tell you, I did not know," repeated Blake. "At first--yes, all
+along--there was something about her voice and face--But she had
+changed so much, and all these years--eight, nine years--I had thought
+her dead. She gave me no sign--only that friendliness. I did not know
+until the very last moment, there on the edge of the ravine. I thought
+you saw it; that you heard her tell me. It seemed to me everybody must
+have heard."
+
+"I was running away--I could not bear it. I think I must have been
+crazy for a time. If only I had heard! My God! if only I had heard!"
+
+"Well, you know now," said Blake. "What's done is done. The question
+now is, what are you going to do next?"
+
+Instantly Ashton's drooping figure was a-quiver with eagerness.
+
+"You wish first to be taken up near the driftwood," he exclaimed.
+"Let me lift you. Don't be afraid to put your weight on me. Hurry! We
+must lose no time!"
+
+Blake was already struggling up. Ashton strained to help him rise
+erect on his sound leg. Braced and half lifted by the younger man, the
+engineer hobbled and hopped along the barrier crest and up its sloping
+side. His trained eye picked out a great weather-seasoned pine log
+lying directly beneath the outermost point of the caņon rim. An object
+dropped over where the flag still flecked against the indigo sky,
+would have fallen straight down to the log, unless deflected by the
+prong of a ledge that jutted out twelve hundred feet from the top.
+
+"Here," panted Blake, regardless of the great pile of skeletons heaped
+on the far end of the log. "This place--right below them! Go
+back--bring fire and rope."
+
+Ashton ran back to fetch the rope and a dozen blazing sticks.
+Driftwood was strewn all around. In a minute he had a fire started
+against the butt end of the log. He began to gather a pile of fuel.
+But Blake checked him with a cheerful--"That's enough, old man. I can
+manage now. Take the rope, and go."
+
+When Ashton had coiled the rope over his shoulder and under the
+opposite arm, he came and stood before his prostrate companion. His
+face was scarlet with shame.
+
+"I have been a fool--and worse," he said. "I doubted her. I am utterly
+unfit to live. If I were alone down here, I would stay and rot. But
+you are her brother. If it is possible to get up there, I am going
+up."
+
+"You are going up!" encouraged Blake. "You will make it. Give my love
+to them. Tell them I'm doing fine."
+
+He held out his hand.
+
+"No," said Ashton. "I'd give anything if I could grip hands with you.
+But I cannot. You are her brother. I am unfit to touch your hand."
+
+He turned and ran up the precipice-foot to the first steep ascent of
+the steeple-sloped break in the wall of the abyss.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+THE CLIMBER
+
+
+A day of anxiety, only partly relieved by those tiny flashes of light
+so far, far down in the awful depths; then the long night of ceaseless
+watching. Neither Genevieve nor Isobel had been able to sleep during
+those hours when no flash signaled up to them from the abysmal
+darkness.
+
+Then at last, a full hour after dawn on the mesa top, the down-peering
+wife had caught the flash that told of the renewal of the exploration.
+As throughout the previous day, Gowan brought the ladies food and
+whatever else they needed. Only the needs of the baby had power to
+draw its mother away from the caņon edge. Isobel moved always along
+the giddy verge wherever she could cling to it, following the unseen
+workers in the depths.
+
+On his first trip to the ranch, the puncher had brought Genevieve's
+field glasses--an absurdly small instrument of remarkable power. Three
+times the first day and twice the second morning she and Isobel had
+the joy of seeing their loved ones creeping along the abyss bottom at
+places where the sun pierced down through the gloom. They missed
+other chances because the caņon edge was not everywhere so easily
+approachable.
+
+Many times the flash of Blake's revolver passed unseen by them.
+Sometimes they had been forced away from the brink; sometimes the
+depths were cut off from their view by juttings of the vast walls. Yet
+now and again one or the other caught a flash that marked the advance
+of the explorers.
+
+Towards midday a last flash was seen by both above the turn where the
+caņon curved to run towards Dry Fork Gulch. Between this point and the
+sharp bend opposite the gulch the precipices overhung the caņon
+bottom. Carrying the baby, the two hastened to the bend, to heap up
+and light a great beacon fire of green wood.
+
+Gowan followed with the ponies, cool, silent and efficient. From the
+first he had seldom looked over into the caņon. His part was to serve
+Miss Chuckie and her friend, and wait. Like Ashton, he had failed to
+surmise the real significance of that tender parting between Blake and
+Isobel. His look had betrayed boundless amazement when he saw the wife
+of the man take the sobbing girl into her arms and comfort her. But he
+had spoken no word of inquiry; and every moment since, both ladies had
+been too utterly absorbed in their watch to talk to him of anything
+else.
+
+At last the exploration was nearing the turning point. Genevieve and
+Isobel lay on the edge of the precipice near the beacon fire, peering
+down for the flash that would tell of the last rod reading.
+
+Slowly the minutes dragged by, and no welcome signal flashed through
+the dark shadows. The usual interval between shots had passed. Still
+no signal. They waited and watched, with fast-mounting apprehension.
+Could the brave ones down in those fearsome depths have failed almost
+in sight of the goal? or could misfortune have overtaken them in that
+narrow, cavernous reach of the chasm so close to their objective
+point?
+
+At last--"There! there it is!"
+
+Together the two watchers saw the flash, and together they shrieked
+the glad discovery.
+
+Genevieve rose to go to her crying baby. Before she could silence him,
+Isobel screamed to her: "Another shot!--farther downstream! What can
+it mean?"
+
+Genevieve put down the still-sobbing baby and ran again to the verge
+of the precipice. Two minutes after the second flash there came a
+third, a few yards still farther along the caņon.
+
+"They have changed their plans. They are going downstream," said
+Genevieve.
+
+She caught up the long pole of the flag and ran to thrust it out
+opposite the point where she had seen the flash.
+
+Gowan was preparing for the return trip up along the caņon to the
+starting point. At Isobel's call, he silently turned the ponies about
+the other way and followed the excited watchers. As he did so, the
+girl perceived a fourth flash in the abyss, a hundred yards farther
+downstream. She hastened with the flag to a point a little beyond the
+place.
+
+When Genevieve had quieted the baby and overtaken Isobel, the latter
+was ready with a question: "You know Tom so well. Why is he going on
+down? He said that he would at once return after reaching the place
+where the head of the tunnel is to be."
+
+"He must have seen the beacon," replied Genevieve. "He could not have
+mistaken that. Something has forced him to change his plans. It may be
+they were swept down some place in the river that he knows they cannot
+re-ascend."
+
+"Oh! do not say it!" sobbed the girl. "If they cannot get back--oh!
+what will they do? How will they ever escape?"
+
+"Is there no other place?" asked Genevieve. "Think, dear. Is there no
+break in these terrible precipices?"
+
+"There's a place where the wall slopes back--but steep, oh, so steep!
+Yet it is barely possible--" The girl's voice sank, and she glanced
+about at Gowan. "It is just this side of where more than five thousand
+sheep were driven over into the caņon. That was four years ago. I
+have never since been able to go near the place."
+
+"Tom said that he rode all along the caņon for miles. You say it may
+be possible to climb up at that place. He must have seen it, and he
+has remembered it."
+
+"Then you think--?"
+
+"I know that if it is possible for anyone to climb the wall, Tom will
+climb it--and he will bring up Lafayette with him."
+
+"Dear Genevieve! You are so strong! so full of hope!"
+
+"Not hope, dear. It is trust. I know Tom better than you. That is
+all."
+
+"Another flash!" cried Isobel. "So soon, yet all that long way from
+the last! They are traveling far faster!"
+
+"Yes, they have finished with the levels," divined Genevieve. "We must
+hasten."
+
+Isobel called the news to the silent puncher, and all moved along to
+overtake the hurrying fugitives below. Though both parties went so
+much faster, Blake's frequent shots kept the anxious watchers above in
+closer touch than at any time before.
+
+At last they came to that Cyclopean ladder of precipices, rising one
+above the other in narrow steps, and all inclined at a giddy pitch far
+steeper than any house roof. Yet for a long way down them the field
+glasses showed their surfaces wrinkled with shelves and projecting
+ledges and creased with faults and crevices.
+
+The party went past this semi-break in the sheer wall, and halted on
+the out-jutting point of the rim where the luckless flock of sheep had
+been driven over to destruction. No reference was made to that
+ruthless slaughter of innocents. Gowan calmly set about preparing a
+camp. The ladies lay down to watch in the shade of a frost-cracked
+rock on the verge of the wall.
+
+Already the time had come and gone for the regular signal of the
+revolver shot. The watchers began to grow apprehensive. Still their
+straining eyes saw no flash in the depths. A half hour passed. Their
+apprehension deepened to dread. An hour--they were white with terror.
+
+Suddenly a tiny red spot appeared--not a flash that came and went like
+lightning, but a flame that remained and grew larger.
+
+"A fire!" cried Isobel. "They have halted and built a fire."
+
+Genevieve brought the flag and thrust it out over the edge. The inner
+end of the pole she wedged in a crevice of the split rock.
+
+"They have stopped to rest," she said. "It may be that Lafayette is
+worn out. But soon I trust they will be coming up."
+
+She looked through her glasses. The fire was burning its brightest.
+She discerned the prostrate figure beside the ledge. She watched it
+fixedly. Soon another figure appeared in the circle of firelight. It
+bent over the first, doing something with pieces of stick.
+
+"Look," whispered Genevieve, handing the glasses to her companion,
+"Tom is hurt. Lafayette is binding his leg. It is broken or badly
+strained.--Oh! will your father never come?"
+
+"Tom hurt? It can't be--no, no!" protested Isobel. But she too looked
+and saw. After a time she added breathlessly: "It can't be so bad!
+Lafe is helping him to rise.... They are starting this way--to the
+foot of the wall! They will be climbing up!"
+
+"But if his leg is injured!" differed Genevieve.
+
+Again they waited. Presently the fire scattered, and a streak of flame
+traveled across the caņon to a point beneath them. Soon the red spot
+of a new fire glowed in the shadows so directly under them that a
+pebble dropped from their fingers must have grazed down the precipices
+and fallen into the flames.
+
+After several minutes of alternate peering through the glasses,
+Genevieve handed them back to Isobel for the third time, and rose to
+go to her baby.
+
+"It is Tom alone," she said, divining the truth. "Lafayette has helped
+him to the best place they could find, and now he is coming up to us
+for help."
+
+When she had fed the baby and soothed him to sleep, she laid out
+bandages and salve, set a full coffeepot on the fire started by Gowan,
+and examined the cream and eggs brought back by the puncher on his
+second night trip to the ranch.
+
+Nearly an hour had passed when Isobel called in joyous excitement: "I
+see him! I see him! Down there where the sunlight slants on the rocks.
+Oh! how bravely! how swiftly he climbs!"
+
+Genevieve went to take the glasses and look. Several moments were lost
+before she could locate the tiny figure creeping up that stairway of
+the giants. But, once she had fixed the glasses upon him, she could
+see him clearly. Isobel had well expressed it when she said that he
+was climbing swiftly and bravely. Running along shelves, clambering
+ledges, following up the crevices that offered the best foothold, the
+tattered climber fought his dizzy way upwards, upwards, ever upwards!
+
+Rarely, after some particularly hard scramble, he flung himself down
+on a shelf or on one of the steps of the Titanic ladder, to rest and
+summon energy for another upward rush. His good fortune seemed as
+marvelous as his endurance and daring. He never once slipped and never
+once had to turn back from an ascent. As if guided by instinct or
+divine intuition, he chose always the safest, the least difficult, the
+most continuously scalable way on all that perilous pitch.
+
+So swift an ascent was beyond the ordinary powers of man. It could
+have been made only by a maniac or by one to whom great passion had
+given command of those latent forces of the body that enable the
+maniac to fling strong men about like children. Long before the
+climber reached the top of that terrible ladder, his hands were torn
+and bleeding, the tattered garments were half rent from his limbs and
+body, his eyes were sunk deep in their sockets.
+
+Yet ever he climbed, ledge above ledge, crevice after crevice, until
+at last only one steep pitch rose above him. A rope came sliding down
+the rock. A voice--the sweetest voice in all the wide world of
+sunshine and life--called to him. It sounded very far away, farther
+than the bounds of reality, yet he heard and obeyed. He slipped the
+loop of the rope down over his shoulders and about his heaving
+forebody. Then suddenly his labor was lightened. His leaden body
+became winged. It floated upwards.
+
+When he came to himself, a bitter refreshing wetness was soothing his
+parched mouth and black swollen tongue; gentle fingers were spreading
+balm on his torn hands; the loveliest face of earth or heaven was
+downbent over him, its tender blue eyes brimming with tears of
+compassion and love. Softly his head and shoulders were raised, and
+hot coffee was poured down his throat as fast as he could swallow.
+
+He half roused from his daze. The swollen, cracked lips moved in
+faintly muttered words: "Leg broken--sends love--doing fine--project
+feasible--irrigation--no food--must rest--go down again."
+
+The eyes of the two ministering angels met. Genevieve bent down and
+pressed her lips to the purple, swollen-veined forehead. The heavy
+lids closed over the sunken eyes; but before he lapsed into the torpid
+sleep of exhaustion that fell upon him, the two succeeded in feeding
+him several spoonfuls of raw egg beaten in cream. He then sank into
+utter unconsciousness.
+
+Flaccid and inert as a corpse, he lay outstretched on the grassy slope
+while they bound up the cuts and bruises on his naked arms and
+shoulders and cut the broken, gaping boots from his bruised feet. His
+legs, doubly protected by the tough leather chapareras and thick
+riding leggins, had fared less cruelly than his arms, but his knees
+were raw and bleeding where the chaps had worn through on the rocks.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+LURKING BEASTS
+
+
+The moment that he had helped haul the climber to safety Gowan had
+ridden away with the horses to the camp. He now came jogging back with
+the tent and all else that they had not been carrying with them in
+their skirting of the caņon edge. He unloaded the packs and hastened
+to pitch the tent.
+
+As he was finishing, Isobel called to him sharply. "What are you doing
+there, Kid? That can wait. Come here."
+
+"Yes, Miss Chuckie," he replied with ready obedience. But when he came
+down the slope to the little group, his mouth was like a thin gash
+across his lean jaws. He stared coldly at Ashton between narrowed
+lids. "Want me to help tote him up by the fire?" he asked.
+
+"No!" she replied. "It is Tom! He is down there--his leg broken--and
+no food! You must go down to him."
+
+"Go down?" queried the puncher. "What good would that do? I couldn't
+help him with that climb. He weighs a good two hundred."
+
+"You can take food down to him and let him know that help is coming.
+You must!"
+
+Gowan looked sullenly at the unconscious man. "Sorry, Miss Chuckie.
+It's no go. I ain't a mountain sheep."
+
+"But _he_ came up!"
+
+"That's different. It's a sight easier going up cliffs than climbing
+down. No, you'll have to excuse me, Miss Chuckie."
+
+The girl flamed with indignant anger. "You coward! You saw him come
+up, after all that time down in those fearful depths--after fighting
+his way all those miles along the terrible river--yet you dare not go
+down! You coward! you quitter!"
+
+The puncher's face turned a sickly yellow, and he seemed to shrink in
+on himself. His voice sank to a husky whisper: "You can say that, Miss
+Chuckie! Any man say it, he'd be dead before now. If you want to know,
+I've got a mighty good reason for not wanting to go down. It ain't
+that I'm afraid. You can bank on that. It's something else. I'll go
+quick enough--but it's got to be on one condition. You've got to
+promise to marry me."
+
+"_Marry you?_"
+
+"Yes. You know how I've felt towards you all these years. Promise to
+marry me, and I'll go to hell and back for you. I'll do anything for
+you. I'll save him!"
+
+"You cur! You'd force me to bargain myself to you!" she cried, fairly
+beside herself with righteous fury. "I thought you a man! You cur--you
+cowardly cur!"
+
+Gowan turned from her and walked rapidly away along the caņon edge,
+his head hunched between his shoulders, his hands downstretched at his
+thighs, the fingers crooked convulsively.
+
+"Oh!" gasped Genevieve. "You've driven him away! Call him back! We
+need him! He must go for help!"
+
+The words shocked the girl out of her rash anger. Her flushed face
+whitened with fear. "Kid!" she screamed. "Come back, Kid! You must go
+to the ranch--bring the men!"
+
+The cry of appeal should have brought him back to her on the run. It
+pierced high above the booming reverberations of the caņon. Yet he
+paid no heed. He neither halted nor paused nor even looked back. If
+anything, he hurried away faster than before.
+
+"Kid! dear Kid! forgive me! Come back and help us!" shrieked the
+girl.
+
+He kept on down along the caņon rim, his chin sunk on his breast, his
+downstretched hands bent like claws. She ran a little way after him;
+only to flutter back again, wringing her hands, distracted. "What
+shall we do? what shall we do?"
+
+"Be quiet, dear--be quiet!" urged Genevieve. "You've driven him away.
+We must do the best we can. You must go yourself. I can stay and
+watch--"
+
+"No, no!" cried Isobel. "The way he looked at Lafe!--I dare not go! He
+may come back--and I not here!"
+
+She knelt to place her trembling hand on Ashton's forehead.
+
+Genevieve looked at the setting sun. "There is no time to lose," she
+said. "Saddle my horse while I nurse Baby. I cannot take him with me
+down the mountain, in the dark."
+
+"Genevieve! You dare go--at night?"
+
+"Someone must bring help, else Tom--all alone down in that dreadful
+chasm--!"
+
+"But you may lose the way! I will go!"
+
+"No, no, you must stay, Belle. I saw his eyes. He may come back. I
+could not protect Lafayette, but you--There is no other way. I must
+leave Baby, and go."
+
+Wondering at the courage of the young mother, Isobel ran to saddle the
+oldest of the picketed horses. He was the slowest of them all, but he
+was surefooted and steady and very wise. When she brought him down the
+ridge, Genevieve placed the newly fed baby in her arms and went with
+the glasses to peer down the sheer precipices. There in the blackness
+so far beneath her the glowing fire illuminated an outstretched form.
+It was her husband, lying flat on his back and gazing up at the
+heights. Almost she could fancy that he saw her as she saw him.
+
+But she did not linger. Time was too precious. She dropped him a kiss,
+and ran to spring upon the waiting pony. She did not pause even to
+kiss the big-eyed baby. The thirsty pony needed no urging to start at
+a lively jog up the slope of the first ridge. As he topped the crest
+and broke into a lope the sun dipped below the western edge of High
+Mesa. A few seconds later horse and rider disappeared from Isobel's
+anxious gaze down the far side of the ridge.
+
+"Old Buck knows the trail," murmured the girl. "He knows he is headed
+for the waterhole. Yet if--if he _should_ lose the trail!"
+
+A spasm of fear sent her hand to the pistol hilt under the fold of her
+skirt and twisted her head about. She glared along the caņon rim.
+Gowan was still striding away from her. She watched him fixedly, her
+hand clutched fast on the hilt of her pistol, until he disappeared
+around a mass of rocks.
+
+The whinnying of the horses after their companion at last drew her
+attention. They had not been watered since the previous evening.
+Cuddling close the frightened baby, the girl fetched a basin and one
+of the water cans, to sponge out the dusty nostrils of the animals and
+give each two or three swallows.
+
+Then, when she had soothed the fretful child to sleep, she laid him in
+a snug nest of blankets between a rock and a fallen tree, and went to
+watch beside Ashton. He lay as she had left him, in a stupor of sleep
+and exhaustion.
+
+Gradually the twilight faded. Stars began to twinkle in the cloudless
+sky. She watched and waited while the dusk deepened. When she could
+barely see objects a few yards away, she stooped over the unconscious
+man and, putting out all her supple young strength, half dragged, half
+carried him up the slope to a hiding place that she had chosen, in
+under an overhanging ledge. There she spread pine needles and blankets
+on the soft mold and lifted him upon them, so that nothing hard should
+press against his wounds.
+
+The fire had burned low. It was a full hundred yards away from the
+hiding place. She went to replenish it and take a hasty look down at
+that outstretched form in the depths. But soon she stole back to the
+sleeping man under the rock, going, as she had come, by a roundabout
+way in the darkness.
+
+Night settled down close and dense over the plateau. The girl crouched
+beside the sleeper, her eyes peering out into the blackness, the drawn
+pistol ready in her hand. She could see only a few feet in the dim
+starlight. But her ears, accustomed to the dull monotone of the
+booming caņon, heard every sound--the click of the horses' hoofs, even
+the munching of the nearest one, the hoot of the owls that flitted
+overhead, the distant yelps and wails of coyotes.
+
+An hour passed, two hours--a third. She crept around to replenish the
+fire. When she returned she heard the baby fretting. Swiftly she
+groped her way to him and carried him to the hiding place, to quiet
+his outcry. He sucked in a little of the beaten egg and cream that she
+had ready for Ashton. It satisfied his hunger, and he fell asleep,
+clasped against her soft warm bosom. She crouched down with him in her
+lap, her right hand again clasped on the pistol hilt, ready for the
+expected attack.
+
+She waited as before, silent, motionless, every sense alert. Another
+hour dragged by, and another. Midnight passed. Suddenly, on the ridge
+slope above her, one of the horses snorted and plunged. She raised the
+pistol. The horse became quiet. But something came gliding around the
+rocks, a low form vaguely outlined in the darkness. It might have been
+a creeping man. It turned towards the hiding place. The girl found
+herself looking into a pair of glaring eyes. She thrust out the
+pistol, with her forefinger pointing along the barrel. The darkness
+was too deep for her to aim by the sights.
+
+Before she could press the trigger, the beast bounded away, with a
+snarl far deeper, far more ferocious than any coyote could have
+uttered. The girl did not fire. The wolf had seen the glint of her
+pistol barrel and had fled. He would not return. But she shuddered and
+drew the sleeping baby close as she thought of what might have
+happened had she left him alone in the nest between the rock and the
+tree.
+
+The precious, helpless child! He was of her own blood, the son of her
+strong, splendid brother ... of her brother, lying down there in those
+awful depths, helpless--in agony!...
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+CONFESSIONS
+
+
+A groping hand touched her arm; bandaged fingers sought to feel who
+she was. Behind her sounded a drowsy incoherent murmur. The snarl of
+the wolf had roused the sleeper from his torpor.
+
+"Hush--hush!" she whispered. "It is all well. I am here by you. Lie
+still."
+
+"Isobel!" he murmured. "Isobel!"
+
+"Yes, dear!" she soothed. "I am here. Rest--go to sleep again. All is
+well."
+
+"All is--?" He roused a little more. "You say--Then he is safe! They
+have brought him up--out of that hell!"
+
+She could not lie outright. "He will soon be safe. By morning help
+will have come to us. As soon as the men can see to go down, they will
+descend for him. They will bring him up the way that you have shown
+us!"
+
+Her voice quivered with pride of what he had done. She drew up his
+hand and pressed her lips tenderly upon the bandages.
+
+Had the caress been a burn, he could not have more quickly snatched
+the hand away. He sought to rise, and struck his head against the
+overhanging rock.
+
+"Where am I? Let me out!" he said.
+
+"No, you must not! Lie still! You must not!" she remonstrated.
+
+"Lie still?" he repeated. "Lie still! with him down there--alone!"
+
+"But it is night--midnight. It will be hours before even the moon
+rises."
+
+"And he down there--alone! Help me make ready. I am going down to
+him."
+
+"Going down? But you cannot! It is midnight!"
+
+"There is a lantern. I shall take that. It will be easier than in the
+daytime, for I shall not see those sickening precipices below."
+
+He sought to creep out past her. She clutched his arm.
+
+"No, no! do not go! There is no need! Wait until they come. You have
+done your share--far more than your share! Wait!"
+
+"I cannot," he replied. "I must go down to him. I have no right to be
+up here, and he still down there."
+
+"You must!" she urged, clinging tighter to his arm. "You may fall. I
+am afraid! I cannot bear it! Do not go! Stay with me--say that you
+will stay with me--dearest!"
+
+"Good God!" he cried, tearing himself away from her, "To let you say
+it--say it to me!"
+
+"Dearest!" she repeated. "Dearest, do not go! There is no need! I
+cannot bear it! Do not go!"
+
+"No need? My God! When I could fling myself over, if it were not for
+him! To have let you say it--to me--to a liar! thief! murderer!"
+
+"Dearest!" she whispered. "Hush! You are delirious--you do not
+know--"
+
+"It is you who do not know!" he cried. "But you shall--everything--all
+my cowardly baseness!" The confession burst from him in a torrent of
+self-denunciation--"That trip to town, when we went to fetch them, I
+lied to you about those bridge plans. It was not true that I found
+them. He handed them to me. He took no receipt. I looked at them and
+saw how wonderful they were. I stole them. My father had threatened to
+cast me off if I did not do something worth while. I was desperate. So
+I stole your brother's plans. I copied them--"
+
+"You know about Tom!" she interrupted. "But of course. You saw me tell
+him, there at the ravine."
+
+"I saw you put your arms about his neck and kiss him; but I did not
+hear--I did not see the truth. I believed--that is the worst of it
+all--I believed it possible that you--_you_--!... That devil Gowan....
+But that is no excuse. Had I not already doubted you.... And I went
+down--down into hell, with only one purpose--to make certain that he
+never should come up again!"
+
+"Dear Christ!" whispered the girl--"Dear Christ! He has gone mad!"
+
+"No, Isobel," he said, his voice slow and dead with the calm of utter
+despair, "I am not mad. I have never been mad except for a little
+while after you put your arms about his neck. No--For years I was a
+fool, a profligate fool, wasting my life as I wasted all those
+thousands of dollars that I had not earned. I turned thief--a
+despicable sneak thief. At last the dirty crime found me out. I
+received a small share of the punishment that I deserved. Then you
+took me in--without question--treated me as a man. God knows I tried
+to be one!"
+
+"You were!--you are!" she broke in. "This is all a mistake--a cruel,
+hideous mistake!"
+
+"I tried to go," he went on unflinchingly. "You urged me to stay. I
+was weak. I could not force myself to leave you."
+
+"Because--because!" she murmured.
+
+"All the more reason why I should have gone," he replied. "But I was
+weak, unfit. I lied to you and won your pity. You gave me the chance
+to stay and prove myself what I am. Down there, when he told me what I
+should have guessed--what I must have guessed had not my own baseness
+blinded me to the truth--when he told me he was your brother, I saw
+myself, my real self,--my shriveled, black, hellish soul. Now you see
+why I must go down again. I can never make reparation for what I have
+done. But I can at least go down to him."
+
+"You take all the blame on yourself!" she protested. "What if I had
+confessed my secret, there at the first, when Tom sprang down from the
+car and I knew him."
+
+"If you had told, then I should not have been tempted to doubt you,
+and I should have gone on, it might have been forever, with that lie
+and that theft between us--and I should not have been forced to see,
+as I now see, my absolute unworthiness of you."
+
+"Of me!" she cried shrilly, and she burst into wild hysterical
+laughter. It broke off as abruptly as it began. "Unworthy of me--of
+me? the daughter of a drunken mother, the sister of a girl who--" A
+sob choked her. She went on desperately: "You have told me all. But
+I--do you not wonder why I kept silent--why I denied Mary by my
+silence? You say you sought to harm Tom--down there. You did not know
+he was my brother. You thought he would harm me. Is it not so?"
+
+"I doubted you!"
+
+"Why? Because I failed to tell the truth. I feared to hurt him--to
+make trouble between him and his rich, high-bred wife. As if I should
+not have known better the moment I saw Genevieve! Dear sister! she
+knows all. But you--Either I should have spoken, or I should have
+hidden all my fondness for him. But I could not hide my love for
+him--and I was ashamed to tell."
+
+"Ashamed--you?"
+
+"We lived in the slums. They told me my father was a big man, a man
+such as Tom is now. He was a railroad engineer. He was killed when I
+was a baby. Then we sank into the slums. My mother--she died when I
+was twelve. There was then only Mary and I and Tom. He could make only
+a little, working at odd jobs. Mary and I worked in a factory. Even
+she was under age. When I was going on fourteen there came a terrible
+winter when thousands were out of work. We almost starved."
+
+"You--starved!" murmured Ashton. "Starved! And I was starting in at
+college, flinging away money!"
+
+"Tom tried to force people to let him work," the girl went on
+drearily. "He was violent. They put him in jail. Soon Mary and I had
+nothing left. There was no work for us. We had sold everything that
+anyone would buy. The rent was overdue. They turned us out--on the
+streets.... I was too young; but Mary.... She found a place where I
+could stay. They were decent people, but hard....
+
+"The weather was bitterly cold. She was taken sick. When the people
+with whom I was staying heard what she had done, they refused to help.
+I begged in the street. I was very small and thin. The--the beasts did
+not trouble me. Then, when Mary was very sick, I met Daddy. I begged
+from him. He did not give me a nickel and pass on. He stopped and made
+me talk--he made me take him to Mary.
+
+"He had her moved to the best hospital.... It was too late.... I also
+had pneumonia. They said I would die. But Daddy brought me home just
+as soon as I could be moved. The railroad was then a hundred miles
+from Dry Mesa. But he kept me wrapped in furs, and all the way he
+carried me in his arms. Do you wonder why I love him so?... That is
+all. You see now why I shrank from telling--why I denied Mary."
+
+"She is in Heaven," said Ashton--"in Heaven, where some day you will
+go. But I--I--" She could see no more than the vague blotch of his
+white face in the darkness, but his voice told her the anguish of his
+look. "He was right--your brother. He told me that we always take with
+us the heaven or the hell that we each have made for ourselves.... I
+have lost you.... You know now why I am going down to do the little
+that I can do."
+
+"You are going down?" she asked wonderingly. "You still say that you
+are going down? Yet I have told you about--Mary!"
+
+"If you were she, I still would be utterly unfit to look you in the
+face. I shall go to the camp for the lantern. There were other gloves
+and some of my clothing."
+
+"They are all here."
+
+"Show me where they are, and get ready the lantern and bandages and a
+sack of food."
+
+"You are going down," she acquiesced. "You are going to Tom. And you
+are coming up with him--to me!"
+
+"That is too much. I doubted you. Where are those things? He is
+waiting down there alone."
+
+"Here is his child, my nephew," she said. "Hold him while I go for
+what you need. Here is my pistol. The man who shot you, who twice
+tried to murder you--he is somewhere up here. He will not harm me. But
+you--If he comes creeping in on you here, shoot him as you would shoot
+a coyote."
+
+"The man who shot me? He is up here?"
+
+"You have seen him every day since that first day I met you," replied
+the girl. "His name is Gowan."
+
+"_Gowan?_"
+
+"Kid Gowan, murderer! I saw his eyes as he looked at you, lying down
+there on the brink. Then I knew."
+
+"But--if he--Where is Genevieve? I cannot go and leave you alone."
+
+"You can--you must! He is a coward. He dare not follow you down that
+terrible place. No harm will come to me if you are gone. But if he
+comes back and finds you--do you not see that if he kills you, he must
+also kill me? But in the morning, when the others come--Oh, why
+hasn't Daddy come? All this long time since you went down into the
+depths, and he not with us! If only he were here!"
+
+"Genevieve?" again inquired Ashton.
+
+"She has gone. She started down the mountain for help when Kid went
+away. I'm so afraid for you, dear! He may be creeping back now--he may
+be waiting already, close by here, in the darkness. But if he has not
+heard our voices, he will go first to where you came up, and then to
+the tent. Keep quiet until I return. Wait; here is cream and egg.
+Drink it all."
+
+When he had drained the bowl that she held to his lips, she crept
+away. Ashton sat still, the warm, soft little body of the sleeping
+baby in his arms, the pistol in his bandaged right hand. In her
+excitement Isobel had forgotten his bound fingers. If Gowan had come
+on him then, he would have put the baby back in under the rock, and
+faced the puncher's revolver with a smile. What had he now to live
+for? He had lost her. She had not yet grasped the baseness of what he
+had thought and done. As soon as she realized ... And he could never
+forgive himself.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+OVER THE BRINK
+
+
+Isobel came back to him, noiselessly gliding around through the
+darkness. She set down the bundle she was carrying, and hung blankets
+over the entrance of the little cave. She then lighted the lantern. He
+held out his bound hands. She unbound them enough for him to use his
+fingers, and taking the baby and the pistol, crouched down, with her
+ear close to the screening blankets, while he exchanged his tattered
+clothes for those she had brought to him.
+
+There were also his change of boots and a pair of Blake's gauntlet
+gloves, into which he was able to force his slender fingers without
+removing the remaining bandages. Isobel had already bound up into a
+kind of knapsack the food and clothing and first-aid package that he
+was to take down to her injured brother. He slung it upon his back,
+and whispered that he was ready.
+
+She nestled the baby in the warm blankets on which he had lain,
+wrapped a blanket about the lantern, and led him cautiously down to
+the brink of the chasm. Dark as was the night about them, it was
+bright compared with the intense blackness of that profound abyss.
+The girl caught his arm and shrank back from the edge.
+
+"You will not fall? you are certain you will not fall?" she
+whispered.
+
+"I cannot fall," he answered with calm conviction. "He needs me. I am
+going down to him. Besides, it will be easier with the lantern than if
+I could see below."
+
+"Do not uncover the light until you are down over the edge.--Wait!"
+
+She stooped to knot the rope that he had brought up from the depths,
+to the lariats with which he had been dragged up the last ledges. She
+looped the end about his waist.
+
+"There," she said. "I shall at least be able to help you down the
+first fifty yards."
+
+"God bless you and keep you! Good-by!" he murmured in a choking voice,
+and he hastily crept down to slip over the first ledge of that
+night-shrouded Cyclopean ladder.
+
+"Lafe!" she whispered. "Surely you do not mean to go without first
+telling me--I cannot let you go until--If you should fall! Wait,
+dearest! Kiss me--tell me that you--Oh, if you should fall!"
+
+"I will not fall; I cannot. Good-by!"
+
+The dim white blotch of his face disappeared below the verge. The line
+jerked through the girl's hands. She clutched it with frantic
+strength and flung herself back with her feet braced against a point
+of rock. After a moment of tense straining, the rope slackened, and
+his voice came up to her over the ledge: "Pay out, please. It's all
+right. I've found a crevice."
+
+She eased off on the line a few inches at a time, but always keeping
+it taut and always holding herself braced for a sudden jerk. At last
+the end came into her hand. She had to lie out on the rim-rock and
+call down to him. He called back in a tone of quiet assurance. The
+line slackened. He had cast it loose. The lantern glowed out in the
+blackness and showed him standing on a narrow shelf.
+
+As Isobel bent lower to gaze at him, a frightful scream rang out above
+the booming of the caņon. It was a shriek such as a woman would utter
+in mortal fear. The girl drew back from the verge, her hair stiffening
+with horror. Could it be possible that Genevieve had lost her way and
+was wandering back to camp, and that Gowan--
+
+Again the fearful scream pierced the air. Isobel looked quickly across
+towards the far side of the caņon. She could see nothing, but she drew
+in a deep sigh of relief. The second cry had told her that it was only
+a mountain lion, over on the other brink of the chasm.
+
+When she again looked down at Ashton he was descending a crevice with
+a rapidity that brought her heart into her mouth. Yet there was no
+hurry in his quick movements, and every little while he paused on a
+shelf to peer at the steep slope immediately below him. Soon the
+circle of lantern light became smaller and dimmer to the anxious
+watcher above. Steadily it waned until all she could see was a little
+point of light far down in the darkness--and always it grew smaller
+and fainter.
+
+Lying there with her bosom pressed against the hard stone, her
+straining eyes fixed on that lessening point of light, she had lost
+all count of time. Her whole soul was in her eyes, watching, watching,
+watching lest that tiny light should suddenly shoot down like a meteor
+and vanish in the darkness. Many times it disappeared, but never in
+swift downward flight, and always it reappeared.
+
+Not until the moon came gliding up above the lofty white crests of the
+snowy range did she think of aught else than that speck of light and
+of him who was bearing it down into the black depths. But the glint of
+moonlight on a crystalline stone broke her steadfast gaze. Before she
+could again fix it on the faint point of lantern light a sound that
+had been knocking at the threshold of her consciousness at last made
+itself heard. It was an intermittent clinking as of steel on stone.
+
+She looked around, thinking that one of the horses was walking along
+the ridge slope with a loose shoe. But all were standing motionless in
+the moonlight, dozing. Again she heard the click, and this time she
+located the direction from which it came. She looked at the split rock
+on the edge of the sheer drop. From beside it she had peered down
+through the field glasses at the outstretched form of her brother, far
+beneath in the caņon bottom.
+
+The sound came from that rock. She stared at the side of the
+frost-split fragment with dilated eyes. The crack between the loose
+outer bowlder and the main mass showed very black and wide in the
+moonlight. Could it be possible that it had widened--that it was
+slipping over? And her brother down there beneath it!...
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+By setting wedge-shaped stones in the top of the cleft rock and prying
+with the crowbar, Gowan had gradually canted the top of the loose
+outer bowlder towards the edge of the precipice. It had only to topple
+forward in order to plunge down the caņon wall. He was working as
+silently as he could, but with a fierce eagerness that caused an
+occasional slip of the crowbar on the rock.
+
+Although the great block of stone weighed over two tons, its base was
+small and rounded, and the mass behind it gave him leverage for his
+bar. Every inch that he pried it forward, the stones slipped farther
+down into the widening crack and held the vantage he had gained.
+Already the bowlder had been pushed out at the top many inches. It
+was almost balanced. The time had come to see if he could not pry it
+over with a single heave.
+
+He did not propose to fall over after the rock. He turned his face to
+the brink, set the end of the bar in the crevice, and braced himself
+to heave backwards on the outer end. He put his weight on it and
+pulled. He could feel the rock give--the top was moving outward. A
+little more, and it must topple over.
+
+Close behind him spoke a voice so hoarse and low-pitched with horror
+that it sounded like a man's--"Drop that bar! drop it!"
+
+With the swiftness of a wolf, he bounded sideways along the rim-rock.
+In the same lightning movement, he whirled face about and whipped his
+Colt's from its holster. His finger was crooking against the trigger
+before he saw who it was that confronted him. The hammer fell in the
+same instant that he twitched the muzzle up and sideways. The heavy
+bullet scorched the girl's cheek.
+
+Above the crashing report rose a wild cry, "Miss Chuckie--God!"
+
+Through the blinding, stinging powder-smoke she saw him stagger
+backwards as if to flee from what he thought he had done. His foot
+went down over the sharp edge. He flung up his hands and dropped into
+the abyss.
+
+She did not shriek. She could not. Her tongue clove to the roof of
+her mouth. Her heart stopped beating. She crumpled down and lay
+gasping. But the fascination of horror spurred her to struggle to her
+knees and creep over to peer down from the place where he had fallen.
+
+Beneath her was only blank, utter darkness. No sound came up out of
+the deep except only that ceaseless reverberation of the hidden river.
+Twelve hundred feet down, the falling man had struck glancingly upon
+the smooth side of an out-jutting rock and his crushed body had been
+flung far out and sideways. It plunged into the rapids below the
+barrier and was borne away down the caņon. But this the girl could not
+have seen even in midday.
+
+She looked for the red star of the distant fire where she knew her
+brother was lying. She could not see it. The point upon which the
+falling man had struck shut off her view. The other side of the split
+rock was where she and Genevieve had looked down through the glasses
+and seen Blake. She failed to realize the difference in the change of
+position. Her horror deepened. She thought that Gowan had hurled
+straight down to the bottom with all the terrific velocity of that
+sheer drop, and that he had plunged upon the fire and upon the dear
+form outstretched beside it, to crush and mangle and be crushed and
+mangled. The thought was too frightful for human endurance.
+
+A long time she lay in a swoon, her head on the very edge of the
+brink. It was the wailing of the hungry, frightened baby that at last
+called her back to life and action. She dragged herself up around to
+the hiding place. The neglected baby was not easy to quiet. The cream
+had soured. There was nothing that she could give him except water.
+All the eggs that were left she had put in the knapsack that Ashton
+was carrying down to her brother. The baby now showed the full reflex
+of his mother's long hours of anxiety and fear. He fretted and cried
+and would not be comforted.
+
+The chill of approaching dawn forced her to rebuild the outburnt fire.
+The warm glow and the play of the flames diverted the child and hushed
+his outcry. Holding him so that he might continue to watch the dancing
+tongues of fire, the girl sat motionless, going over and over again in
+her mind all that had occurred since the tattered, bleeding,
+purple-faced climber had come straining up out of the depths.... It
+could not have happened--it was all a hideous dream.... Would they
+never come? Must she sit here forever--alone!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII
+
+FRIENDS IN NEED
+
+
+Because of the moonlight she did not heed the graying of the east. But
+the whinnying of the picketed horses roused her from the apathy of
+misery into which she had sunk. She stood up and looked along the
+ridge. A small roundish object appeared above the crest--then others.
+They rose quickly--the heads of riders spurring their horses up the
+far side of the ridge.
+
+Singly, in pairs, in groups, the rescuers burst up into view and came
+loping down to her, shouting and waving. In the lead rode her father
+and the sheriff; in the midst Genevieve, between two attendant young
+punchers. In all, there were nearly two dozen eager, resolute men,
+everyone an admiring friend of Miss Chuckie, everyone zealous to serve
+her and hers.
+
+The girl stood waiting beside the fire. She had tried to run to meet
+them and found that she could not move. The suddenness of their coming
+after all that fearful night of waiting seemed to numb her limbs.
+
+They rushed down upon her, waving, shouting questions. Her father, on
+Rocket, was the first to reach her. He sprang off and ran to put his
+arm about her quivering shoulders.
+
+"Honey! it's all right now!" he assured her. "We're here with
+everything that's needed. We'll soon yank him up out of that hole!"
+
+The baby, frightened by the rush and tumult of the off-leaping riders,
+began to scream. Someone took him from the girl's arms and handed him
+to his mother as she was lifted down out of her saddle. Isobel pressed
+her face against her father's sweaty breast.
+
+"Hold on, Miss Chuckie!" sang out one of the men. "Don't let go yet.
+Where's Gowan--Kid Gowan?"
+
+She shuddered convulsively, yet managed to reply: "He--was trying
+to--to roll the rock down. Tom, my brother, is right below it. I heard
+and came to see. His back was to me. I could not shoot--I could not
+raise my pistol. When I spoke, he whirled and shot at me. He--"
+
+"Kid--shot at you?" cried Knowles. "At you? 'Tain't possible!"
+
+"He didn't mean to. He fired before he saw who I was. Then he saw. He
+forgot everything--everything except that he had shot at me. He backed
+off--there--over the edge!"
+
+A sudden hush fell on the excited crowd. One man went to peer down
+from the place to which the girl had pointed. He came back softly.
+"Same place where the last bunch of sheep went over," he said. "Rest
+of us were pretty sick--ready to quit. He kept after them until the
+last ewe jumped. Said they'd gone to hell, where they belonged."
+
+"He's the one that's gone there!" said the sheriff. "Look at the way
+this bowlder is pried loose, ready to roll over! Once heard tell that
+his real dad was Billie the Kid. Some of you mayn't have heard tell of
+Billie. He was the coldest blooded, promiscuous murderer of them days
+when we used to drive from Texas to Montana and the boys used to
+shoot-up towns and each other just for fun. Well, this Kid Gowan has
+got Billie's eyes and slit mouth. Can't say I ever took to him, but
+seeing as how he was a crack-up puncher and Wes Knowles' foreman--"
+
+"That's it! I can't understand it--Kid has been almost like a son to
+me all these years!" complained Knowles perplexedly. He explained to
+his daughter. "You're wondering why I didn't come sooner, honey. Those
+Utes had been let go. We had to follow them up a long ways. When we
+got them back and put them on that trail from the waterhole, they
+found it led straight across the flats to where the horses and wagon
+had stood. There the tracks of the Indian shoes ended, and the tracks
+of shod hoofs led off into the brush. We followed them all the way
+'round to the lower waterhole and up the lower creek to the ranch, and
+there they took us right to Rocket's heels. The Jap said Kid had his
+saddle in the wagon when he came back from town, and he had a new hat.
+Mr. Blake did some hot shooting at that assassin on the hill. So,
+putting two and two together--"
+
+"Oh, Daddy, I know--I knew when I saw him look at Lafe!"
+
+"The--" Knowles choked back the epithet. "Yes, Mrs. Blake told us
+about that--and about her husband! Jumping Jehosaphat! Think of his
+being your brother! You must have been plumb locoed, to keep still
+about that! Why didn't you tell us, honey?--leastways me, your
+Daddy!"
+
+"I--I--But about Genevieve? Tell me. You could have come sooner if
+she--Was she lost? I was sure that pony--"
+
+"Better have given her a fast one. It came on so dark before he was
+half down the mountain that she was knocked out of the saddle by a
+branch. He went on down to the waterhole. She tried to catch
+him--couldn't. Got lost and wandered all around before she got down to
+the waterhole and caught him. We had got to the ranch at dusk, and all
+the posse had turned in for the night. She came loping down the divide
+just after moonrise. We started as soon as we could rake up all the
+picket-pins and rope. Wanted Mrs. Blake to wait and come on later; but
+talk about grit! We simply couldn't make her stay behind."
+
+Isobel thrust herself free from her father's arms and darted out
+through the circle of rugged, earnest-faced punchers and cowmen to
+where Genevieve lay resting with the baby clasped to her bosom.
+
+"Dear! you poor dear!" she murmured, kneeling to stroke the head of
+the weary young mother.
+
+"I shall soon be rested," replied Genevieve. "How about Tom? Have you
+kept watch of him? Has he moved?"
+
+The girl shrank back, unable to face her sister-in-law's eager look.
+
+"No--I--The fire--it--it disappeared, and I could not see."
+
+Genevieve smiled, and the reddening dawn lent a trace of color to her
+pale face. "It was a good sign. He could not have been suffering so
+much. He must have slept, and the fire died down."
+
+"Oh! you think that was it?" sighed Isobel. "I feared--"
+
+She did not say what it was she had feared. As she paused Genevieve
+looked up into her agitated face and asked quickly: "But Lafayette? Is
+he still sleeping?"
+
+"Yes, where's Lafe, honey?" inquired Knowles. "We'll have to roust him
+out to tell us just what way he came up."
+
+"Haven't I told you?" cried Isobel, her head still in a whirl of
+conflicting emotions. Then, as tersely and quietly as her father would
+have related it, she told the bald facts of how Ashton had been
+wakened by the snarl of the wolf, how he had insisted upon going back
+to help her brother, and how he had gone down into the darkness, the
+pack and lantern slung over his shoulder.
+
+"By--James!" vowed Knowles, when she had finished. "Any man on the
+Western Slope say that boy's not acclimated, he'd better look for
+another climate himself."
+
+"Gentleman," the sheriff addressed the exclaiming crowd, "you heard
+tell what the little lady had to say about her husband and this Lafe
+Ashton going down into Deep Caņon, where no man ever went before. Now
+Miss Chuckie has told us again how Ashton climbed up here, where no
+man in this section had a notion anything short of a mountain sheep
+could climb. Well, what does the gritty kid do but turn round and
+climb down again--in the dark, mind you! They're down there now, both
+of them--down in the bottom of Deep Caņon. We called them tenderfeet,
+that day when Mr. Blake honored our county seat by sidetracking his
+palatial car. Boys, down there in that hole are the two nerviest men I
+ever heard tell about. One of 'em has a broken leg. The other has
+broke the trail for us. I ask for volunteers to go down with me and
+yank 'em up out of there. Gentlemen, who offers?"
+
+Instantly the crowd surged forward. Every man shouted, whooped,
+struggled to thrust himself ahead of the others and force the
+acceptance of his services on the sheriff.
+
+"Hold on, boys!" he remonstrated. "Just hold your hawsses. I didn't
+ask for a stampede. You can't all go down. Last man over might get in
+a hurry to catch the first, and start a manslide."
+
+"I vote we set a thirty-year limit," put in one of the younger
+punchers.
+
+This raised a clamor of dissent from the older men.
+
+"Tell you what," shouted another. "Let Miss Chuckie cut out the lucky
+ones."
+
+"That's the ticket--Now you're talking!" Every man shouted approval,
+and fell silent as Isobel sprang up from beside Genevieve.
+
+"Friends!" she exclaimed, her eyes radiant, "it's such times as these
+that makes life grand! I believe six of you would be enough, but I'll
+make it ten. First, I'm going to bar everyone who has a wife or
+children."
+
+"That doesn't include me, honey," hastily protested her father.
+
+"Then you come in the next--none over thirty-five nor under twenty."
+
+A groan arose from some of the youngsters, but the older men took
+their disappointment in stolid silence. She went on with calm
+decisiveness: "Now those of you that have done any considerable
+mountain climbing afoot this summer, please step this way."
+
+Two members of a recently disbanded surveying party, four punchers who
+had tried their luck at prospecting on the snowy range, and three wild
+horse hunters sprang forward in response to the request.
+
+"That's enough," said the sheriff. "I've got to own up to being forty.
+But I'm leading this here posse, and I'll eat my hat if I can't
+outclimb anything on two legs in this county. String out your ropes,
+boys, and pass over all them picket-pins. We'll need a purchase now
+and again, I figure, hauling up Mr. Blake. Hustle! Here's the sun
+clean up."
+
+Under the brusquely jovial directions of their leader, the lucky nine
+divested themselves of spurs and cartridge belts, tied themselves to
+the line at intervals of several feet, and promptly started down the
+dizzy ledges. The others helped them during the first fifty yards of
+descent with the line that Isobel had drawn up after it had been cast
+loose by Ashton. They then gathered along the brink, enviously
+watching the descent of their companions into the shadowy abyss.
+
+Genevieve came to where Isobel and her father crouched beside the
+others. "Thomas will not let me put him down, Belle," she said. "I see
+you left the glasses beside the rock. If Lafayette has reached the
+bottom safely--"
+
+"If--safely!" echoed Isobel. "Daddy, you look--quick, please!"
+
+Knowles hastened to skirt along the brink to where the little field
+glasses lay at the near side of the split rock. The two followed him,
+Genevieve smiling with pleasant anticipation, Isobel trembling with
+doubt and dread. The cowman stretched out on the rim shelf and peered
+over.
+
+"Um-m-m," he muttered. "Can't see anything down there. Too dark yet."
+
+"Look straight below you," said Genevieve.
+
+"Hey?--Uh! By--James! Well, if that ain't a picture now! These sure
+are mighty fine little glasses, ma'am. I can see 'em plain as day."
+
+"Them?--you say 'them,' Daddy?" cried Isobel.
+
+"Sure. Come and look for yourself. Guess Lafe is fixing Mr. Blake's
+leg.--Which reminds me, honey, that before we left the ranch, Mrs.
+Blake had me send for that lunger sawbones that's come to live at
+Stockchute. He'll be here, I figure, before or soon after the boys get
+Mr. Blake up into God's sunshine."
+
+"Brother Tom, Daddy--you mean my Brother Tom!" joyfully corrected the
+girl as she took the glasses.
+
+"Well, you've got to give me time to chew on it, honey. It's come too
+sudden for me to take it all in." He stood up and gazed gravely at the
+smiling mother and her comforted baby. "Hum-m-m. Then that yearling is
+my Chuckie's own blood nephew. Well, ma'am, what do _you_ think of it,
+if I may ask?"
+
+"Can't you make it 'Jenny,' Uncle Wes?" asked Genevieve.
+
+He stared at her blankly. "But I didn't adopt him, ma'am--only her."
+
+"He is the brother of your dear daughter, and I am his wife. Come
+now," she coaxed, "you must admit that brings me near enough to call
+you 'Uncle Wes.'"
+
+"You've got me, ma'am--Jenny. I give in, I throw up the fight. That
+irrigation project now--Chuckie's brother can have anything of mine he
+asks for. Only there's one thing--you've got to make that yearling say
+'Granddad' when he talks to me."
+
+"O-oh!" cooed Genevieve. "To think you feel that way towards him! Of
+course he shall say it. And I--Will you not allow me to make it
+'Daddy'?"
+
+He could not resist her enticingly upturned lips. He brushed down his
+bristly mustache, and bent over awkwardly, to kiss his new daughter.
+
+"Thought you were one of those super-high-toned ladies, m'm--Jenny,"
+he remarked.
+
+The cultured child of millions smiled up at him reproachfully. "What!
+after I have been with you so long, Daddy? But it's true there was a
+time--before Tom taught me that men cannot be judged by mere polish
+and veneer, or the lack of polish and veneer."
+
+Isobel, all her doubts and fears allayed, had risen from the
+precipice's edge in time to hear Genevieve's reply. She added eagerly:
+"Nor should men be judged by what they have been if they have become
+something else--if they have climbed up--up out of the depths!"
+
+"Belle! dear Sister Belle! Then he has proved it to you? Oh, I am so
+glad for you! He has proved to you that he has climbed--to the
+heights."
+
+"To the very heights! I must tell Daddy. Give me Thomas. See, he is
+fast asleep, the poor abused little darling! Go and watch them, and
+our climbers. They are going down like a string of mountain sheep."
+
+Genevieve placed the baby in his aunt's outstretched arms and went to
+look into the abyss through the field glasses. Isobel drew her father
+away, out of earshot of the down-peering group of men. She stopped
+behind the tent, which Gowan had pitched part way up the slope of the
+ridge.
+
+"You want to talk with me about Lafe, honey?" surmised Knowles, as the
+girl started to speak and hesitated.
+
+Her cheeks flamed scarlet, but she raised her shyly lowered eyes and
+looked up at him with a clear, direct gaze. "Yes, Daddy. He--he loves
+me, and I--love him."
+
+"That so?" said Knowles. His eyes contracted. It was his only betrayal
+of the wrench she had given the tender heart within his tough
+exterior. "Well, I figured it was bound to come some day. I've been
+lucky not to lose you any time the last four years."
+
+"You--you do not say anything about him, Daddy."
+
+"Haven't you cut him out of the herd?" he dryly replied. "That's
+enough for me, long as I know he's your choice and is square."
+
+"He has nothing; he is very poor."
+
+"He's got the will to work. He'll get there, with you pushing on the
+reins. That's how I size him up."
+
+"But, Daddy, he told me he had been bad, very bad."
+
+Knowles searched the girl's face, with a sudden up-leaping of
+concern--that vanished as quickly before what he saw in her clear
+eyes.
+
+"Might have expected it of you, honey. You stand by him. You've got
+sense enough to know what it means when a man thinks enough of a girl
+to tell her the wrong things he has done. I was wild, too, when I was
+a youngster. There was a girl I thought enough of to tell. She wasn't
+your kind, honey. It came near sending me to the devil for good. You
+know better. No girl ought to be fool enough to hitch up with a man to
+reform him. But if he has already taken a brace and straightened the
+kinks out of himself, that's different."
+
+"He has come up, Daddy--out of the depths."
+
+Knowles only half caught her meaning. "Sure he climbed up. That proves
+he has the grit and the nerve. He had proved that even better, going
+down at the other place. Put any man down there, and he'd make a try
+to get out. No, the real test was his going back down again. He might
+have come up just for himself. But going down again--that's the proof
+of what's in him; that's what proves he's white!"
+
+"Dear Daddy!... But I'm afraid. He thinks he has been too bad ever
+to--to marry me. I'm so afraid he'll go away and leave me!"
+
+The cowman straightened up, his eyes glinting with righteous
+indignation.
+
+"What! Go 'way and leave you?--when you want him to stay? By--James!
+He's going to stay! Don't you worry, honey. He's going to stay, if I
+have to rope and hogtie him for you!"
+
+The girl stared into the frowning face of her father. There was no
+twinkle in the corner of his eyes. He was absolutely serious. For the
+first time in over two days her dimples flashed. Her eyes sparkled
+with merriment. Her lips parted. But she checked the gay laugh before
+it could burst out.
+
+"Oh!" she reproached herself. "How could I? And they still down
+there--and Tom suffering!"
+
+"Tom?" repeated Knowles. "Thomas Blake--your brother! That's why you
+got me started reading all those reports and engineering journals.
+You guessed it."
+
+"It did not seem possible. Yet I could not help hoping."
+
+"Things do happen our way--sometimes," qualified Knowles. "Mrs.
+Blake--Jenny--says Lafe brought up word that the project can be put
+through. I meant to fight. But now--he is your brother, and he has
+done something no man ever before thought could be done--he has
+surveyed Deep Caņon. He has me beat. I've told Mrs.--Jenny straight
+out."
+
+"I know he will do what is right by you, dear, dear Daddy."
+
+"He's your brother, honey. That settles it."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV
+
+RECLAMATION
+
+
+Even with the mutual assistance that they could give one another, and
+with the certain knowledge that the descent was possible, the rescuers
+had no easy task following the trail "broken" by Ashton. Their very
+numbers prevented them from going down as fast as he had gone. On the
+other hand, those on the upper part of the life-line could steady
+their companions over ledges and down the steeper crevices, while the
+leaders helped the ones who followed by hammering footholds in the
+rock and at the very worst places driving in picket-pins to hold the
+extra ropes brought down for the purpose.
+
+Still, Deep Caņon was Deep Caņon--the ladder it offered was a ladder
+of Titans. Many long hours of waiting passed after the rescuing party
+disappeared among the shadows less than a third of the way down the
+steep-sloping precipices, before they came struggling upwards again
+into view of the anxious watchers on the brink. The sun had circled
+well over into the western sky.
+
+There was yet a thousand feet for the rescuers to clamber, hauling
+and pushing up in their midst the heavy body of the injured engineer.
+All during the first half of the ascent Blake had made the task as
+easy as he could by the strenuous exertion of the great strength still
+left in his arms and his sound leg. But at last the bandages that
+bound his broken leg had chafed in two on the rough ledges; and even
+his iron nerve had not long been able to withstand the torture of the
+twisting break.
+
+He now dangled helpless in the sling by which they had secured him.
+Half the time he was mercifully unconscious; the other half his jaw
+was set rigid and his lips were compressed to stifle his groans of
+agony. Whenever possible Ashton climbed beside him, striving to ease
+the roughness of the ascent.
+
+A full hour before they reached the top, the thin-faced consumptive
+surgeon arrived from Stockchute with his splints and medical case.
+Waited upon by Isobel and Genevieve, he was fully recovered from the
+exertion of his ride when at last the panting rescuers came toiling up
+to the brink.
+
+Eager hands dragged the unconscious engineer to the top and carried
+him to where the surgeon sat waiting. A few of the watchers lingered
+to help the rescuers over the rim; then they, too, hurried away to see
+if Blake had survived that terrible ascent. For the last two hundred
+feet he had looked like a dead man. There was no cheering. Deep Caņon
+had been conquered; but it was yet to be seen whether the victory had
+not been won at a disastrous cost.
+
+The sheriff and his nine men sank down on the grassy slope, gasping,
+outspent. Ashton collapsed in their midst. He was more than outspent;
+he was utterly exhausted. The instant he had seen Blake lifted over
+the rim-rock, he had given way to the strain of his frightful
+exertions. When a man sent by Isobel came hurrying to the rescuers
+with water and coffee, Ashton was unable to move or speak. The man had
+to hold him up and pour the coffee down his throat.
+
+One by one, the sheriff and the others staggered up and went to join
+the silent group about Blake. No one left that circle of watchers.
+They were waiting for the result of the surgeon's efforts to
+resuscitate the unconscious man. It was a desperate fight. But the
+surgeon had won a place in the forefront of his profession before the
+white plague had driven him from New York to this health-giving
+wilderness. He knew all the latest, most wonderful methods of
+resuscitation. And he had for assistants two who loved and were loved
+by his patient.
+
+When at last the announcement was made that the engineer had come out
+of his swoon and probably would live, the sheriff and all the members
+of the posse not employés of Knowles prepared to ride down to Plum
+Creek ranch for the night. The cowman ordered his men to go down with
+the party, to water the horses and bring back food and water for the
+camp. The surgeon had said that his patient could not be moved for
+many days.
+
+But before the party rode off, each man, from the sheriff to the
+youngest of the punchers, came to where Ashton was still lying on the
+grass, and took his limp hand in theirs. They did not grip it, for the
+tattered glove and shredded bandages were wet with blood; nor did they
+put into speech what they thought of him. A gruff word or two of
+fellowship and parting was all they gave him. Yet he saw and knew that
+he had won his place among these reddest blooded of all red-blooded
+men.
+
+When one of his fellow employés came to him, leading Rocket, he sought
+to summon strength enough to rise, but found that he could not even
+turn on his side. He had driven his body to superhuman efforts. He
+must now pay the price. At his request, he was lifted up on Rocket,
+but he could not hold up his head, much less his body. They laid him
+again on the grass, and told Knowles his condition, before they rode
+off.
+
+The cowman fetched the surgeon, who felt the pulse of the exhausted
+man, gave him a pellet, and hastened back to Blake. In a few moments
+Ashton's feeble, racing pulse became calm and slow, the wild whirl of
+his thoughts lulled. He sank into profound slumber.
+
+When he awoke the sun of another day was just clearing the great white
+peaks of the snowy range. He was outstretched on a soft bed of
+blankets spread over a thick layer of pine needles. Above his face
+sloped the roof of a small tent. He had been cared for--but there was
+no one watching at his bedside. He thought he understood, and smiled
+in bitter resignation.
+
+When he moved, racking pains shot through his stiff muscles. Only the
+renewed life that surged through his veins enabled him to turn and
+twist and bend until the pains subsided to a dull aching and he was
+able to command his limbs. His hands were swathed fast in bandages. He
+tore them off with his teeth until the fingers were free enough for
+use. After much effort, he succeeded in forcing his swollen feet into
+his boots.
+
+In the midst Yuki, the Jap cook, appeared before the low entrance of
+the tent and sank down on his knees to set a trayful of food beside
+the occupant. He hissed a pleasant, "Good morning, Mistah Lafe!" and
+was gone before Ashton could reply. The aroma of hot coffee and the
+savory smell of chicken broth forced Ashton to forget all else than
+that he was famished. Besides the coffee and broth, there was a nogg
+of eggs and thick cream slightly flavored with whiskey. He drank one
+liquid after the other with the greediness of a starving man; nor did
+he stop until he had drained the last drop of all three. He could have
+followed with a hearty meal of solids, but the fluids were enough to
+stimulate him to renewed energy.
+
+He crept out of his tent and looked around. Up where they had carried
+Blake from the precipices stood a larger tent. Near it, under a
+low-growing pine, the surgeon lay rolled in a blanket, fast asleep.
+Some distance away, in the other direction, Yuki and two of the ranch
+hands were building a stone fireplace. Beyond them were picketed three
+horses, the nearest of which was Rocket.
+
+Ashton stood up and started rapidly towards the big rawboned horse.
+Within a few yards, however, his pace slackened. He faltered and
+stopped to look back at the larger tent. After a pause, he turned
+about and slowly approached the tent.
+
+As he drew near he heard a murmur of voices barely distinguishable
+above the booming of the caņon. Again he faltered and stopped and
+stood hesitating. The open front of the tent faced at right angles to
+his line of approach. As he hesitated, he saw Isobel's head appear,
+veiled in the loose meshes of her chestnut hair. She looked about
+towards him, and drew back with a startled little cry.
+
+He turned away to go to Rocket. A quick heavy step sounded behind him.
+Knowles had sprung out of the tent and was striding to overtake the
+retreating man.
+
+"Hold on, Lafe," he ordered. "Where you going?"
+
+Ashton faced him with quiet resolution. His eyes were dark with
+misery, but his once lax mouth was strangely like Blake's in its firm
+full lines.
+
+"There's only one thing for me to do, Mr. Knowles," he replied. "I am
+going away. Your daughter will understand why."
+
+"How're you going?" asked the cowman, his face impassive.
+
+"I traded with Miss--Miss Knowles for Rocket. Didn't she ever tell
+you?"
+
+"Don't matter if she did. Rocket wasn't her hawss to trade."
+
+"Then, unless my pony is up here, I shall walk down as far as the
+ranch," said Ashton. He added with bitter humiliation: "It's well I
+have learned about Rocket in time. I've done enough, without adding
+horse thief to the list. I would have started at once, but I could not
+leave until I had asked about Mr. Blake. I wished to thank him for all
+that he has done for me."
+
+"All that he--!" echoed Knowles. "If you want to know, it was a mighty
+narrow squeak. But we pulled him through. He's awake now and says he's
+doing fine. He wants to talk to you."
+
+"I should like very much to do as he wishes, Mr. Knowles, but
+I--cannot bear to--meet her. You may realize that it is hard enough at
+best."
+
+"_Sho!_ If that's all," readily reassured the cowman, "I'll ask
+Chuckie to go out and hide in the bushes."
+
+"But I could not allow that, you know."
+
+"Then I figure you've got to come anyhow. Can't let you go off without
+saying good-by to him and Jenny."
+
+"Jenny?" repeated Ashton.
+
+"It's all in the family now," explained Knowles. "Tom has been telling
+us how he's got that irrigation project all figured out in his head.
+He was saying what he and Jenny had planned to do for us even before
+Chuckie let out her secret. Come on and hear the rest."
+
+"I fear I must ask you to excuse me, Mr. Knowles. I--"
+
+"No, you don't," rejoined the cowman. "After what you've done you
+can't make me believe you're afraid of anything. You'll come and face
+it out before you go."
+
+The misery in Ashton's eyes deepened, and his lips tightened.
+
+"Very well. Since you put it that way, I shall do as you wish, sir."
+
+When he followed Knowles around to the door of the tent, Isobel, who
+was hastily braiding her loose hair, drew back into the far corner and
+averted her face from him. But Genevieve met him with a radiant smile
+and motioned him to kneel down beside her husband.
+
+Blake, with one thick arm crooked about his sleeping son, lay with his
+eyes closed. His big square face was drawn and pallid, but there was a
+smile lurking in the corners of his mouth. As Ashton knelt beside him
+he looked up and lifted his free hand.
+
+"You wouldn't take it--down there," he said.
+
+Ashton flushed. "You know why."
+
+"You'll take it now," said Blake, with quiet confidence.
+
+"I will. I am going away," replied Ashton as he held out his bandaged
+hand.
+
+The big palm closed over it in a clasp as gentle as it was strong.
+
+"No, Lafe. I've got hold of you now. I can't let you go. I need you in
+my business. We're organizing the Belle Mesa Irrigation and
+Development Company.--How do you like my new name for Dry Mesa? Mr.
+Knowles puts in the reservoir site in exchange for water on his other
+land, a tenth share in the company, and a royalty of half the gold we
+placer out of the reservoir bed. As Jenny is to put up all the
+capital, she and I will take the lion's share. That will leave a tenth
+for you and a tenth for Belle."
+
+Ashton sought to draw his hand away. "It is very good of you, Mr.
+Blake. But I cannot accept--"
+
+"Yes, you can. You can't help yourself. Besides, I've an idea a man
+always does better by his work when he has a stake in the undertaking.
+You're to be our Resident Engineer, you know."
+
+"Resident Engineer?" repeated Ashton, paling and flushing. "Mr. Blake,
+I--I--It's impossible that you can mean--"
+
+"Make it 'Tom'! You'll have to brush up on mining engineering, too.
+There's the bonanza."
+
+"Oh, yes, Tom!" exclaimed Genevieve. "Tell him about the gold mine."
+
+"I was going to keep still about it till I had the apex located," he
+said. He looked full at Ashton. "But there's no one here that the
+secret will not be as safe with as it is with me. Besides, it's all in
+the family. I found the vein a thousand feet up the chute of Dry Fork
+Gulch. We will name it the Genevieve Lode. There are six of us here,
+counting Tommy. Each of us gets a sixth interest."
+
+Ashton was now pale. "Mr. Blake--Tom, I cannot! If I were fit to stay
+and work for you--as an axman--anything!--"
+
+Blake's eyes twinkled. "Then your sixth will have to go to Belle."
+
+"Mine too, Tom," hastily put in Knowles.
+
+Blake looked down solemnly at his youthful heir. "Hear that, Tommy?
+Guess we'll have to pull out, too, and make it half and half to the
+ladies." He looked up at Ashton with a swift change from mock to real
+gravity. "We've got to begin by installing a turbine power-plant down
+here. Where will I find another engineer with nerve enough to go down
+these cliffs? I need you, Lafe."
+
+"I am very sorry, Tom." Ashton drew his hand from Blake's wearied
+clasp, and rose.
+
+Isobel slipped past him and stood with her arms outstretched across
+the entrance of the tent. There was a dimple in each of her blushing
+cheeks; her eyes were radiant with tenderness and love.
+
+"No, you can't get away!" she declared. "Don't you see how we've got
+you corralled?"
+
+"That's what," confirmed Knowles. "I promised her to rope and hogtie
+you if you made a break."
+
+Ashton was gazing into the girl's eyes, his own shining with reverent
+adoration.
+
+"Isobel?" he whispered.
+
+"Let us go up on the ridge and look out over our mesa," she murmured.
+
+"Wait a moment, dear," interposed Genevieve. "Lafayette, I wish to
+tell you that as soon as Tom and I return to Chicago, we shall go to
+your father. I feel certain that when he hears--"
+
+"No, no!" begged Ashton. "You must wait. Promise that you will wait. I
+have only begun to make a beginning. Wait until I see if I can--" He
+straightened and looked at Isobel, his head well up, his eyes as
+resolute as his mouth. "Wait until I have proved what I am."
+
+"Come," said Isobel. "We're going to look at our dry mesa that we are
+to reclaim and make into a garden with the waste waters of the
+depths."
+
+
+
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+<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Out of the Depths, by Robert Ames Bennet</title>
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+<h1 class="pg">The Project Gutenberg eBook, Out of the Depths, by Robert Ames Bennet,
+Illustrated by George Brehm</h1>
+<pre>
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at <a href = "http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a></pre>
+<p>Title: Out of the Depths</p>
+<p>       A Romance of Reclamation</p>
+<p>Author: Robert Ames Bennet</p>
+<p>Release Date: June 15, 2009  [eBook #29131]</p>
+<p>Language: English</p>
+<p>Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1</p>
+<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OUT OF THE DEPTHS***</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h3 class="pg">E-text prepared by Roger Frank<br />
+    and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br />
+    (http://www.pgdp.net)</h3>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<table summary="transcriber notes" style='margin:1em 1em; width:auto; border:1px solid; color:#778899; padding:5px;'>
+<tr><td>
+<p style='font-size:small; color:#303030; text-align:left;'>Transcriber&#8217;s Note:<br /><br />
+The author consistently refers to a handgun
+as a &#8220;Colt&#8217;s.&#8221; This is a Colt&#8217;s revolver, though the word &#8220;revolver&#8221; is not used.</p>
+</td></tr>
+</table>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+
+<h1>OUT OF THE DEPTHS</h1>
+<hr class='pb' />
+<div class='figtag'>
+<a name='linki_1' id='linki_1'></a>
+</div>
+<div class='figcenter'>
+<img src='images/depths-001.jpg' alt='' title='' width='414' height='616' /><br />
+<p class='caption'>
+It was a wild race [<i>Page 32</i>]<br />
+</p>
+</div>
+<hr class='pb' />
+<p class='tp' style='margin-bottom:25px;font-size:2.2em;margin-top:20px;'>Out of the Depths</p>
+<p class='tp' style='margin-bottom:60px;'>A ROMANCE OF RECLAMATION</p>
+<p class='tp' >BY</p>
+<p class='tp' style='font-size:1.2em;margin-bottom:10px;'>ROBERT AMES BENNET</p>
+<p class='tp' style='font-size:smaller;margin-bottom:60px;'>AUTHOR OF &#8220;OUT OF THE PRIMITIVE,&#8221; &#8220;THE SHOGUN&#8217;S<br />DAUGHTER,&#8221; &#8220;WHICH ONE,&#8221; ETC.</p>
+<p class='tp' style='font-size:smaller;'>WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY</p>
+<p class='tp' style='font-size:1.2em;'>GEORGE BREHM</p>
+
+<div style='margin:25px auto; text-align:center;'>
+<img alt='emblem' src='images/depths-emb.png' />
+</div>
+
+<p class='tp' >CHICAGO</p>
+<p class='tp' >A. C. McCLURG &amp; CO.</p>
+<p class='tp' style='font-size:smaller;margin-bottom:20px;'>1913</p>
+<hr class='pb' />
+<p class='tp' style='margin-top:20px;font-variant:small-caps;'><span class='smcap'>Copyright</span></p>
+<p class='tp' style='font-variant:small-caps;'>A. C. McCLURG &amp; CO.</p>
+<p class='tp' >1913</p>
+<hr class='p10' />
+<p class='tp' >Published March, 1913</p>
+<hr class='p10' />
+<p class='tp' style='margin-bottom:60px;'>Copyrighted in Great Britain</p>
+<p class='tp' style='font-size:smaller;margin-bottom:20px;'>PRESS OF THE VAIL COMPANY<br />COSHOCTON, U. S. A.</p>
+<hr class='pb' />
+<p style='margin-left:0.0em; margin-right:0.0em; text-align:center'>TO<br />
+<br />
+&#8220;THE SONS OF MARTHA&#8221;<br /></p>
+<hr class='pb' />
+<h3>CONTENTS</h3>
+<table border='0' cellpadding='2' cellspacing='0' summary='Contents' style='margin:1em auto;'>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'><span style='font-size:small'>CHAPTER</span></td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='right'><span style='font-size:small'>PAGE</span></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>I.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Deep Caņon</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_I_DEEP_CAON'>1</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>II.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Yearling Sold</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_II_A_YEARLING_SOLD'>9</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>III.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Queen of What?</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_III_QUEEN_OF_WHAT'>20</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>IV.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Downhill and Up</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_IV_DOWNHILL_AND_UP'>32</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>V.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Into the Depths</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_V_INTO_THE_DEPTHS'>39</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>VI.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Test of Caliber</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_VI_A_TEST_OF_CALIBER'>52</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>VII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Chance of Reclamation</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_VII_THE_CHANCE_OF_RECLAMATION'>68</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>VIII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Man&#8217;s Size Horse</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_VIII_A_MANS_SIZE_HORSE'>81</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>IX.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Snake</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_IX_THE_SNAKE'>93</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>X.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Coming Events</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_X_COMING_EVENTS'>110</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XI.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Self-Defense</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XI_SELFDEFENSE'>125</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Meeting</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XII_THE_MEETING'>138</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XIII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Other Lady&#8217;s Husband</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XIII_THE_OTHER_LADYS_HUSBAND'>148</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XIV.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Descent</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XIV_A_DESCENT'>162</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XV.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Levels and Slants</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XV_LEVELS_AND_SLANTS'>176</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XVI.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Metal and Mettle</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XVI_METAL_AND_METTLE'>185</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XVII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Shot in the Dusk</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XVII_A_SHOT_IN_THE_DUSK'>197</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XVIII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>On the Brink</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XVIII_ON_THE_BRINK'>207</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XIX.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Plotters</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XIX_THE_PLOTTERS'>218</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XX.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Indian Shoes</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XX_INDIAN_SHOES'>232</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXI.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Madonna Dolorosa</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXI_MADONNA_DOLOROSA'>244</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>A Real Wolf</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXII_A_REAL_WOLF'>254</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXIII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Temptation</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXIII_THE_TEMPTATION'>268</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXIV.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Blind Love</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXIV_BLIND_LOVE'>280</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXV.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Descent Into Hell</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXV_THE_DESCENT_INTO_HELL'>291</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXVI.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>In the Gloom</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXVI_IN_THE_GLOOM'>303</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXVII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Lower Depths</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXVII_LOWER_DEPTHS'>315</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXVIII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Light in the Darkness</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXVIII_LIGHT_IN_THE_DARKNESS'>327</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXIX.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>The Climber</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXIX_THE_CLIMBER'>339</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXX.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Lurking Beasts</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXX_LURKING_BEASTS'>349</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXXI.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Confessions</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXXI_CONFESSIONS'>357</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXXII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Over the Brink</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXXII_OVER_THE_BRINK'>366</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXXIII.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Friends in Need</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXXIII_FRIENDS_IN_NEED'>374</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XXXIV.</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left' style='padding-right:4em;'><span class='smcap'>Reclamation</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#CHAPTER_XXXIV_RECLAMATION'>388</a></td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+<hr class='pb' />
+<h3>ILLUSTRATIONS</h3>
+<table border='0' cellpadding='2' cellspacing='0' summary='Illustrations' style='margin:1em auto;'>
+<col style='width:75%;' />
+<col style='width:25%;' />
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'></td>
+  <td valign='top' align='right'><span style='font-size:small'>PAGE</span></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'>It was a wild race</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#linki_1'><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'>It sounded its shrill, menacing rattle</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#linki_2'>106</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'>&#8220;You have something to tell me&ndash;&ndash;your voice&ndash;&ndash;your eyes&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#linki_4'>286</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'>Another desperate clutch at the rope&ndash;&ndash;still another</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#linki_6'>328</a></td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+<hr class='pb' />
+<h2>OUT OF THE DEPTHS</h2>
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_1' name='page_1'></a>1</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_I_DEEP_CAON' id='CHAPTER_I_DEEP_CAON'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER I</h2>
+<h3>DEEP CA&Ntilde;ON</h3>
+</div>
+<p>The hunter was riding leisurely up the steep mountain
+side above Dry Mesa. On such an ascent
+most city men would have preferred to climb afoot.
+But there was a month&#8217;s layer of tan on the hunter&#8217;s
+handsome, supercilious face. He balanced himself
+lightly on his flat English saddle, and permitted the
+wiry little cow pony to pick the best path over the
+ledges and up the stiff slopes between the scattered
+pines.</p>
+<p>In keeping with his saddle, the hunter wore English
+riding breeches and leggins. Otherwise he was
+dressed as a Texas cowboy of the past generation.
+His sombrero was almost Mexican in its size and ornateness.
+But his rifle was of the latest American
+pattern, and in place of the conventional Colt&#8217;s he carried
+an automatic pistol. As his horse patiently clambered
+with him up towards the top of the escarpment
+the man gazed indolently about between half-closed
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_2' name='page_2'></a>2</span>
+eyelids and inhaled the smoke from an unbroken
+&#8220;chain&#8221; of gilt-tipped cigarettes.</p>
+<p>The pony scrambled up the last ledges and came to
+a halt on the rim of High Mesa. It had been a long,
+hard climb. Tough as he was and mountain bred, the
+beast&#8217;s rough coat was lathered with sweat and his
+flanks were heaving. The hunter&#8217;s gaze roamed carelessly
+over the hilly pine-clad plateau of the upper
+mesa, while he took a nip of brandy from a silver-cased
+flask and washed it down with a drink of the
+tepid water in his canteen.</p>
+<p>Having refreshed himself, he touched a patent
+lighter to another cigarette, chose a direction at random,
+and spurred his pony into a canter. The beast
+held to the pace until the ascent of a low but steep
+ridge brought him down to a walk. With the change
+of gait the hunter paused in the act of lighting a fresh
+cigarette, to gaze up at the sapphire sky. The air
+was reverberating with a muffled sound like distant
+thunder. Yet the crystal-clear dome above him
+showed no trace of a cloud all across from the magnificent
+snowy ranges on the east and north to the
+sparsely wooded mountains and sage-gray mesas to the
+south and west.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t be thunder,&#8221; he murmured&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;no sign of a
+storm. Must be a stream. Ah! cool, fresh water!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The sharp-roweled spurs goaded the pony up over
+the round of the ridge as fast as he could scramble.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_3' name='page_3'></a>3</span>
+At the top he broke into a lope and raced headlong
+down the other side of the ridge through the tall
+brush. The reverberating sound of water was clearer
+but still muffled and distant.</p>
+<p>The rider let his reins hang slack and recklessly dug
+in his spurs. The pony leaped ahead with still greater
+speed and burst out of the brush on to a narrow open
+slope that led down to the brink of a ca&ntilde;on. The
+hunter saw first the precipice on the far side of the
+yawning chasm&ndash;&ndash;then the near edge, seemingly, to
+his startled gaze, right under his horse&#8217;s forefeet. He
+was dashing straight at the frightful abyss.</p>
+<p>A yell of terror burst from his lips, and he sought
+to fling himself backwards and sideways out of the
+saddle. His instinctive purpose was to fall to the
+ground and clutch the grass tufts. But in the same
+moment that he tried to throw himself off, the nimble
+pony swerved to the left so abruptly that the man&#8217;s
+effort served only to keep himself balanced on the saddle.
+Had he remained erect or flung himself to the
+other side he must have been hurled off and down over
+the precipice.</p>
+<p>Nor was the danger far from past. Carried on
+down the slope by the momentum of their headlong
+rush, the plunging pony &#8220;skidded&#8221; to the very brink
+of the precipice. Though the man shrank down and
+sought to avert his face, he caught a glimpse of the
+black depths below them as, snorting with fear, the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_4' name='page_4'></a>4</span>
+pony wrenched himself around on the rim shelf of
+the edge.</p>
+<p>For an instant&ndash;&ndash;an instant that was an age of sickening
+suspense to his rider&ndash;&ndash;the pony toppled. But
+before the man could shriek out his horror, the agile
+beast had recovered his balance and was scrambling
+around, away from the edge. He plunged a few yards
+up the slope, and stopped, wheezing and blowing.</p>
+<p>The man flung the reins over the pony&#8217;s head and
+slipped to the ground. For a minute or longer he
+lay outstretched, limp and white-faced. When he
+looked up, the pony was stolidly cropping a tuft of
+grass. Beasts are not often troubled with imagination.
+The hunter remembered his brandy flask.
+After two long pulls at its contents, the vivid coloring
+began to return to his cheeks.</p>
+<p>He rose to his feet and walked down to a ledge on
+the brink of the precipice with an air of bravado. But
+when he looked over into the chasm, he quickly shrank
+back and crouched on his hands and knees. Before
+again peering over he stretched himself out flat on the
+level ledge and grasped an out-jutting point of rock.</p>
+<p>Beneath his dizzy eyes the precipitous sides of the
+ca&ntilde;on dropped away seemingly into the very bowels
+of the earth,&ndash;&ndash;far down in sheer unbroken walls of
+black rock for hundreds and thousands of feet. He
+flattened closer to the rock on which he lay, and sought
+to pierce with his gaze the blue-black shadows of the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_5' name='page_5'></a>5</span>
+stupendous rift. Every nerve in his body tingled; his
+ankles ached with the exquisite pain of that overpowering
+sight.</p>
+<p>The chasm was so narrow and its depth so great
+that only in one place did the noonday sun strike down
+through its gloomy abyss to the bottom. At that
+single spot he could distinguish the foam and flash of
+the rushing waters, but elsewhere his only evidence of
+the sunken torrent beneath him was the ceaseless reverberations
+that came rolling up out of the depths.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Mon Dieu!</i>&#8221; he muttered. &#8220;To think I came so
+near&ndash;&ndash;!... Must be what they call Deep Ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He crept away from the brink. As he rose to his
+feet his trembling fingers automatically placed a cigarette
+between his lips and applied the patent lighter.
+Soothed by the narcotic, he stood gazing across at the
+far side of the ca&ntilde;on while he sucked in and slowly
+exhaled the smoke. With the last puff he touched a
+fresh cigarette to the butt of the first, thrust it between
+his lips, and snipped the cork stub over the edge into
+the ca&ntilde;on.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There you are&ndash;&ndash;take that!&#8221; he mocked the abyss.</p>
+<p>As he turned away he drew out an extremely thin
+gold watch. The position of the hour hand brought
+a petulant frown to his white forehead. He hastened
+to mount his pony. Short as had been the rest, the
+wiry little animal had regained his wind and strength.
+Stung by the spurs, he plunged up the side of the ridge
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_6' name='page_6'></a>6</span>
+and loped off along its level top, parallel with the
+ca&ntilde;on.</p>
+<p>The hunter drew his rifle from its saddle sheath
+and began to scrutinize the country before him in
+search of game. A pair of weather-beaten antlers so
+excited him that he even forgot to maintain his chain
+of cigarettes. His dark eyes shone bright and eager
+and his full red lips grew tense in resolute lines that
+completely altered the previous laxity of his expression.</p>
+<p>He had covered nearly a mile when he was rewarded
+for his alertness by a glimpse of a large animal
+in the chaparral thicket before him. He drew rein to
+test the wind in approved book hunter fashion. There
+was not a breath of air stirring. The mesa lay basking
+in the dry, hot stillness of the July afternoon. He
+set the safety catch of his rifle, ready for instant firing,
+stretched himself flat on his pony&#8217;s neck, and started on.</p>
+<p>The animal in the thicket moved slowly to the right,
+as if grazing. At frequent intervals the hunter caught
+glimpses of its roan side, but could not see its head or
+the outline of its body. At seventy-five yards, fearful
+that his game might take fright and bolt, he turned
+his horse sideways, and slipped down to aim his rifle
+across the saddle. It was his first deer. He waited,
+twitching and quivering with &#8220;buck fever.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Part of the fore quarters of the animal became visible
+to his excited gaze through a small gap in the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_7' name='page_7'></a>7</span>
+screening bushes. The muzzle of his rifle wobbled
+all around the mark. Unable to steady it, he caught
+the sights as they wavered into line, and pulled the
+trigger.</p>
+<p>The report of the shot was followed by a loud <i>bawl</i>
+and a violent crashing in the thicket. There could be
+no doubt that the animal had been hit and was seeking
+to escape. It was running across the top of the ridge
+towards the ca&ntilde;on. The hunter sprang around the
+head of his pony and threw up his rifle, which had
+automatically reloaded itself. As it came to his shoulder,
+the wounded animal burst out of cover. It was a
+yearling calf.</p>
+<p>But the sportsman knew that he had shot a deer,
+and a deer was all he saw. He was now fairly shaking
+with the &#8220;fever.&#8221; His finger crooked convulsively
+on the automatic firing lever. Instantly a
+stream of bullets began to pour from the wildly wavering
+muzzle, and empty shells whirred up from the
+ejector like hornets.</p>
+<p>Before the hunter could realize what was happening,
+his magazine was exhausted, the last cartridge
+fired, and the shell flipped out. But he paid no heed
+to this. His eyes were on the fleeing calf. His cartridges
+were smokeless. Through the slight haze
+above his rifle muzzle he saw the animal pitch forward
+and fall heavily upon the round of the ridge. It
+did not move.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_8' name='page_8'></a>8</span></p>
+<p>Tugging at the bridle to quicken his horse&#8217;s pace, he
+hastened forward to examine his game. He was still
+so excited that he was almost upon the outstretched
+carcass before he noticed the odd scar on its side. He
+bent down and saw that the mark was a cattle brand
+seared on the hide with a hot iron.</p>
+<p>His first impulse was to jump on his pony and ride
+off. He was about to set his foot in the stirrup when
+the apprehensive glance with which he was peering
+around shifted down to the ca&ntilde;on. His gaze traveled
+back from the near edge of the chasm, up the two
+hundred yards of slope, and rested on the yearling as
+though estimating its weight.</p>
+<p>It was a fat, thoroughbred Hereford. He could
+not lift it on his pony, and he had no rope to use as a
+drag-line. He shook his head. But the pause had
+given him time to recover from his panic. He
+shrugged his shoulders, drew a silver-handled hunting
+knife, and awkwardly set about dressing his kill.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_9' name='page_9'></a>9</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_II_A_YEARLING_SOLD' id='CHAPTER_II_A_YEARLING_SOLD'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER II</h2>
+<h3>A YEARLING SOLD</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Three riders came galloping along the ridge towards
+the hunter. At sight of his pony the
+grizzled cowman in the lead signed to his companions
+and came to a sudden stop behind a clump of service-berry
+bushes. The others swerved in beside him, the
+bowlegged young puncher on the right with his hand
+at his hip.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jumping Jehosaphat!&#8221; he exulted. &#8220;We shore
+have got him, Mr. Knowles, the blasted&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; His
+thin lips closed tight to shut in the oath as he turned
+his gaze on the lovely flushed face of the girl beside
+him. When his cold gray eyes met hers they lighted
+with a glow like that of fire through ice.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You better stay here, Miss Chuckie,&#8221; he advised.
+&#8220;We&#8217;re going to cure that rustler.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But, Kid, what if&ndash;&ndash;No, no! wait!&#8221; she cried
+at sight of his drawn Colt&#8217;s. &#8220;Daddy, stop him!
+The man may not be a rustler.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You heard the shooting,&#8221; answered the cowman.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, but he may have been after a deer,&#8221; answered
+the girl, lifting her lithe figure tiptoe in the stirrups
+of her man&#8217;s saddle to peer over the bushes.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_10' name='page_10'></a>10</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Deer?&#8221; rejoined the puncher. &#8220;Who&#8217;d be deer-hunting
+in July?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then a bear. He fired fast enough,&#8221; remarked
+the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not much chance of that round here,&#8221; said the
+cowman. &#8220;Still, it might be. At any rate, Kid, this
+time I want you to wait for me to ask questions <i>before</i>
+you cut loose.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If he don&#8217;t try any funny business,&#8221; qualified the
+puncher.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Course,&#8221; assented Knowles. &#8220;Chuckie, you best
+stay back here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, no, Daddy. There&#8217;s only one man and between
+you and Kid&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Sho!</i> Come on, then, if you&#8217;re set on it. Kid,
+you circle to the right.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The puncher wheeled his horse and rode off around
+the chaparral. The girl and Knowles, after a short
+wait, advanced upon the hunter. They were soon
+within a few yards of him and in plain view. His
+pony stopped browsing and raised its head to look at
+them. But the man was stooped over, with his face
+the other way, and the incessant, reverberating roar
+of the ca&ntilde;on muffled the tread of their horses on the
+dusty turf.</p>
+<p>The puncher crashed through the corner of the
+thicket and pulled up on the top of the slope immediately
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_11' name='page_11'></a>11</span>
+opposite the hunter. The latter sprang to his
+feet. The puncher instantly covered him with his
+long-barreled revolver and snapped tersely: &#8220;Hands
+up!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My&ndash;&ndash;ante!&#8221; gasped the hunter. &#8220;A&ndash;&ndash;a road
+agent!&#8221;</p>
+<p>But he did not throw up his hands. With the rash
+bravery of inexperience, he dropped his knife and
+snatched out his automatic pistol. On the instant the
+puncher&#8217;s big revolver roared. The pistol went spinning
+out of the hunter&#8217;s hand. Through the smoke
+of the shot the puncher leveled his weapon.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Put up your hands!&ndash;&ndash;put them up!&#8221; screamed
+the girl, urging her horse forward.</p>
+<p>The hunter obeyed, none too soon. For several
+moments he stood rigid, glaring half dazed at the
+revolver muzzle and the cool hard face behind it.
+Then slowly he twisted about to see who it was had
+warned him. The girl had ridden up within a few
+feet.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&ndash;&ndash;you <i>tenderfoot</i>!&#8221; she flung at him. &#8220;Are
+you locoed? Hadn&#8217;t you any more sense than to do
+that? Why, if Daddy hadn&#8217;t told Mr. Gowan to
+wait&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You shore would have got yours, you&ndash;&ndash;rustler!&#8221;
+snapped the puncher. &#8220;It was you, though, Miss
+Chuckie&ndash;&ndash;your being here.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_12' name='page_12'></a>12</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;But he&#8217;s not a rustler, Kid,&#8221; protested the girl.
+&#8220;Where are your eyes? Look at his riding togs. If
+they&#8217;re not tenderfoot, howling tenderfoot&ndash;&ndash;!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just the same, honey, he&#8217;s shot a yearling,&#8221; said
+Knowles, frowning at the culprit. &#8220;Suppose you let
+me do the questioning.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah&ndash;&ndash;pardon me,&#8221; remarked the hunter, rebounding
+from apprehension to easy assurance at sight of
+the girl&#8217;s smile. &#8220;I would prefer to be third-degreed
+by the young lady. Permit me to salute the Queen of
+the Outlaws!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He bent over the fingers of one hand to raise his
+silver-banded sombrero by its high peak. It left his
+head&ndash;&ndash;and a bullet left the muzzle of the puncher&#8217;s
+revolver. A hole appeared low down in the side of
+the sombrero.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;ll do, Kid,&#8221; ordered the cowman. &#8220;No
+more hazing, even if he is a tenderfoot.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tenderfoot?&#8221; replied Gowan, his mouth like a
+straight gash across his lean jaws. &#8220;How about his
+drawing on me&ndash;&ndash;and how about your yearling?
+That bullet went just where it ought to &#8217;ve gone with
+his hat down on his head.&#8221;</p>
+<p>There was no jesting even of the grimmest quality
+in the puncher&#8217;s look and tone. He was very cool and
+quiet&ndash;&ndash;and his Colt&#8217;s was leveled for another shot.</p>
+<p>The hunter thrust up his hands as high as he could
+reach.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_13' name='page_13'></a>13</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You&ndash;&ndash;you surely can&#8217;t intend to murder me!&#8221;
+he stammered, staring from the puncher to the cowman.
+&#8220;I&#8217;ll pay ransom&ndash;&ndash;anything you ask! Don&#8217;t
+let him shoot me! I&#8217;m Lafayette Ashton&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;ll
+pay thousands&ndash;&ndash;anything! My father is George
+Ashton, the great financier!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;New York?&#8221; queried Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no, Chicago! He&ndash;&ndash;If only you&#8217;ll write
+to him!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl burst into a ringing laugh. &#8220;Oh!&#8221; she
+cried, the moment she could speak, &#8220;Oh, Daddy!
+don&#8217;t you see? He really thinks we&#8217;re a bunch of
+wild and woolly bandits!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The hunter looked uncertainly from her dimpled
+face to Gowan&#8217;s ready revolver. Turning sharply
+about to the cowman, he caught him in a reluctant grin.
+With a sudden spring, he placed the girl between himself
+and the scowling puncher. Behind this barrier of
+safety he swept off his hat and bowed to the girl with
+an exaggerated display of politeness that hinted at
+mockery.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So it&#8217;s merely a cowboy joke,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I bend,
+not to the Queen of the Outlaws, but to the Princess
+of the Cows!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her dimples vanished. She looked over his head
+with the barest shade of disdain in her expression.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The joke came near to being on us,&#8221; she said.
+&#8220;Kid, put up your gun. A tenderfoot who has enough
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_14' name='page_14'></a>14</span>
+nerve and no more sense than to draw when you have
+the drop on him, you&#8217;ve hazed him enough.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan sullenly reloaded his Colt&#8217;s and replaced it
+in its holster.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s right,&#8221; said Knowles; but he turned
+sharply upon the offender. &#8220;Look here, Mr. Ashton,
+if that&#8217;s your name&ndash;&ndash;there&#8217;s still the matter of
+this yearling. Shooting stock in a cattle country isn&#8217;t
+any laughing matter.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But, I say,&#8221; replied the hunter, &#8220;I didn&#8217;t know
+it was your cow, really I didn&#8217;t.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Doesn&#8217;t make any difference whose brand was on
+the calf. Even if it had been a maverick&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But that&#8217;s it!&#8221; interrupted Ashton. &#8220;I didn&#8217;t
+see the brand&ndash;&ndash;only glimpses of the beast in the
+chaparral. I thought it a deer until after it fell and
+I came up to look.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You shore did,&#8221; jeered Gowan. &#8220;That&#8217;s why
+you was hurrying to yank off the hide. No chance of
+proving a case on you with the brand down in Deep
+Ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Indeed no,&#8221; replied Ashton, drawing a trifle closer
+to the girl&#8217;s stirrup. &#8220;You are quite wrong&ndash;&ndash;quite.
+I was dressing the animal to take it to my camp. Because
+I had mistaken it for a deer was no reason why
+I should leave it to the coyotes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What business you got hunting deer out of season?&#8221;
+questioned Knowles.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_15' name='page_15'></a>15</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Pardon me, but are you the game warden?&#8221; asked
+Ashton, with a supercilious smile.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Never you mind about that,&#8221; rejoined the cowman.
+&#8220;Just you answer my question.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton shrugged, and replied in a bored tone: &#8220;I
+fail to see that it is any of your affair. But since you
+are so urgent to learn&ndash;&ndash;I prefer to enjoy my sport
+before the rush of the open season.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t you know it&#8217;s against the law?&#8221; exclaimed
+the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah&ndash;&ndash;as to that, a trifling fine&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; drawled the
+hunter, again shrugging.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Humph!&#8221; grunted Knowles. &#8220;A fine might get
+you off for deer. Shooting stock, though, is a penitentiary
+offense&ndash;&ndash;when the criminal is lucky enough
+to get into court.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Criminal!&#8221; repeated Ashton, flushing. &#8220;I have
+explained who I am. My father could buy out this
+entire cattle country, and never know it. I&#8217;ll do it
+myself, some day, and turn the whole thing into a
+game preserve.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;When you do,&#8221; warned Gowan, &#8220;you&#8217;d better
+hunt a healthier climate.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What we&#8217;re concerned with now,&#8221; interposed
+Knowles, &#8220;is this yearling.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The live or the dead one, Daddy?&#8221; asked the
+girl, her cheeks dimpling.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What d&#8217;you&ndash;&ndash;Aw&ndash;&ndash;<i>haw! haw! haw!</i>&ndash;&ndash;The
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_16' name='page_16'></a>16</span>
+live or the dead one! Catch that, Kid? The live or
+the dead one! <i>Haw! haw! haw!</i>&#8221;</p>
+<p>The cowman fairly roared with laughter. Neither
+of the young men joined in his hilarious outburst.
+Gowan waited, cold and unsmiling. Ashton stiffened
+with offended dignity.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I told you that the shooting of the animal was
+unintentional,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I shall settle the affair by
+paying you the price usually asked for veal.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You will?&#8221; said the cowman, looking down at the
+indignant tenderfoot with a twinkle in his mirth-reddened
+eyes. &#8220;Well, we don&#8217;t usually sell veal on the
+range. But I&#8217;ll let you have this yearling at cutlet
+prices. Fifty dollars is the figure.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, Daddy,&#8221; interrupted the girl, &#8220;half that
+would be&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;On the hoof, yes; but he&#8217;s buying dressed veal,&#8221;
+broke in the cowman, and he smiled grimly at the culprit.
+&#8220;Fifty dollars is cheap for a deer hunter who
+goes round shooting up the country out of season. He
+can take his choice&ndash;&ndash;pay for his veal or make a trip
+to the county seat.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s talking, Mr. Knowles,&#8221; approved Gowan.
+&#8220;We&#8217;ll corral him at Stockchute in that little log calaboose.
+He&#8217;ll have a peach of a time talking the jury
+out of sending him up for rustling.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;This is an outrage&ndash;&ndash;rank robbery!&#8221; complained
+Ashton. &#8220;Of course you know I will pay rather than
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_17' name='page_17'></a>17</span>
+be inconvenienced by an interruption of my hunting.&#8221;
+He thrust his slender hand into his pocket, and drew
+it out empty.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dead broke!&#8221; jeered Gowan.</p>
+<p>Ashton shrugged disdainfully. &#8220;I have money at
+my camp. If that is not enough to pay your blackmail,
+my valet has gone back to the railway with my
+guide for a remittance of a thousand dollars, which
+must have come on a week ago.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Your camp is at the waterhole on Dry Fork,&#8221;
+stated Knowles. &#8220;Saw a big smoke over there&ndash;&ndash;tenderfoot&#8217;s
+fire. Well, it&#8217;s only five miles, and we
+can ride down that way. We&#8217;ll go to your camp.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ye-es?&#8221; murmured Ashton, his ardent eyes on
+the girl. &#8220;Miss&ndash;&ndash;er&ndash;&ndash;Chuckie, it is superfluous to
+remark that I shall vastly enjoy a cross-country ride
+with you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, really!&#8221; she replied.</p>
+<p>Heedless of her ironical tone, he turned a supercilious
+glance on Knowles. &#8220;Yes, and at the same
+time your papa and his hired man can take advantage
+of the opportunity to deliver my veal.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s that?&#8221; growled the cowman, flushing
+hotly.</p>
+<p>But the girl burst into such a peal of laughter that
+his scowl relaxed to an uncertain smile.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, what&#8217;s the joke, honey?&#8221; he asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh! oh! oh!&#8221; she cried, her blue eyes glistening
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_18' name='page_18'></a>18</span>
+with mirthful tears. &#8220;Don&#8217;t you see he&#8217;s got you,
+Daddy? You didn&#8217;t sell him his meat on the hoof.
+You&#8217;ve got to dress and deliver his cutlets.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;By&ndash;&ndash;James!&#8221; vowed Gowan. &#8220;Before I&#8217;ll
+butcher for such a knock-kneed tenderfoot I&#8217;ll see
+him, in&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hold your hawsses, Kid,&#8221; put in Knowles. &#8220;The
+joke&#8217;s on me. You go on and look for that bunch
+of strays, if you want to. But I&#8217;m not going to back
+up when Chuckie says I&#8217;m roped in.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan looked fixedly at Ashton and the girl, swore
+under his breath, and swung to the ground. He came
+down beside the calf with the waddling step of one
+who has lived in the saddle from early childhood.
+Knowles joined him, and they set to work on the calf
+without paying any farther heed to the tenderfoot.</p>
+<p>Ashton, after fastidiously wiping his hands on a
+wisp of grass, placed his hunting knife in his belt and
+his rifle in its saddle sheath. He next picked up his
+pistol, but after a single glance at the side plate,
+smashed in by Gowan&#8217;s first shot, he dropped the
+ruined weapon and rather hurriedly mounted his pony.</p>
+<p>The girl had faced away from the partly butchered
+carcass. As Ashton rode around alongside, her pony
+started to walk away. Instead of reining in, she
+glanced demurely at Ashton, and called over her
+shoulder: &#8220;Daddy, we&#8217;ll be riding on ahead. You
+and Kid have the faster hawsses.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_19' name='page_19'></a>19</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;All right,&#8221; acquiesced Knowles, without pausing
+in his work.</p>
+<p>Gowan said nothing; but he glanced up at the jaunty
+back of the tenderfoot with a look of cold enmity.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_20' name='page_20'></a>20</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_III_QUEEN_OF_WHAT' id='CHAPTER_III_QUEEN_OF_WHAT'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER III</h2>
+<h3>QUEEN OF WHAT?</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Heedless of the men behind him, Ashton rode
+off with his ardent gaze fixed admiringly upon
+his companion. The more he looked at her the more
+astonished and gratified he was to have found so
+charming a girl in this raw wilderness.</p>
+<p>As a city man, he might have considered the healthy
+color that glowed under the tan of her cheeks a trifle
+too pronounced, had it not been offset by the delicate
+mold of her features. Her eyes were as blue as alpine
+forget-me-nots.</p>
+<p>Though she sat astride and the soft coils of her
+chestnut hair were covered with a broad-brimmed felt
+hat, he was puzzled to find that there really was nothing
+of the Wild West cowgirl in her costume and bearing.
+Her modest gray riding dress was cut in the
+very latest style. If her manner differed from that
+of most young ladies of his acquaintance, it was only
+in her delightful frankness and total absence of affectation.
+Yet she could not be a city girl on a visit, for
+she sat her horse with the erect, long-stirruped, graceful,
+yielding seat peculiar to riders of the cattle ranges.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_21' name='page_21'></a>21</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Do you know,&#8221; he gave voice to his curiosity, as
+she directed their course slantingly down the ridge
+away from Deep Ca&ntilde;on, &#8220;I am simply dying to learn,
+Miss Chuckie&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Perhaps you had better make it &#8216;Miss Knowles,&#8217;&#8221;
+she suggested, with a quiet smile that checked the familiarity
+of his manner.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah, yes&ndash;&ndash;pardon me!&ndash;&ndash;&#8216;Miss Knowles,&#8217; of
+course,&#8221; he murmured. &#8220;But, you know, so unusual
+a name&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You mean Chuckie?&#8221; she asked. &#8220;It formerly
+was quite common in the West&ndash;&ndash;was often used as
+a nickname. My real name is Isobel. I understand
+that Chuckie comes from the Spanish Chiquita.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Chiquita!&#8221; he exclaimed. &#8220;But that is not a
+regular name. It is only a term of endearment, like
+Nina. And you say Chuckie comes from Chiquita?
+Chiquita&ndash;&ndash;dear one!&#8221;</p>
+<p>His large dark eyes glowed at her brilliant with
+audacious admiration. Her color deepened, but she
+replied with perfect composure: &#8220;You see why I
+prefer to be addressed as &#8216;Miss Knowles&#8217;&ndash;&ndash;by you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yet you permitted that common cowpuncher to
+call you Miss Chuckie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl smiled ironically. &#8220;For one thing, Mr.
+Ashton, I have known Kid Gowan over eight years,
+and, for another, he is hardly a <i>common</i> cowpuncher.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He looks ordinary enough to me.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_22' name='page_22'></a>22</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, well!&#8221; she rallied. &#8220;I should have
+thought that even to the innocent gaze of a tenderfoot&ndash;&ndash;Let
+me hasten to explain that the common
+or garden variety of cowshepherd is to be distinguished
+in many respects from his predecessor of the
+Texas trail.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Texas trail?&#8221; he rejoined. &#8220;Now I know you&#8217;re
+trying to string me. This Gowan can&#8217;t be much older
+than I am.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl dropped her bantering tone, and answered
+soberly: &#8220;He is only twenty-five, and yet he is a full
+generation older than you. He was born and raised
+in a cow camp. He is one of the few men of the type
+that remain to link the range of today with the vanished
+world of the cattle frontier.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yet you say that the fellow is only my age?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;In years, yes. But in type he belongs to the generation
+that is past&ndash;&ndash;the generation of longhorns,
+long drives, long Colt&#8217;s, and short lives; of stampedes,
+and hats like yours, badmen, and Injins.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Surely you cannot mean that this&ndash;&ndash;You called
+him &#8216;Kid.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Kid Gowan,&#8221; she confirmed. &#8220;Yes, he holds to
+the old traditions even in that. There are six notches
+on the hilt of his &#8216;gun,&#8217; if you count the two little
+ones he nicked for his brace of Utes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What! He is a real Indian fighter, like Kit
+Carson?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_23' name='page_23'></a>23</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, no, it was merely a band of hide hunters that
+came over the line from Utah, and Mr. Gowan helped
+the game warden run them back to their reservation.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He actually killed two of them?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; replied the girl, her gravity deepening to
+a concerned frown. &#8220;The worst of it is that I&#8217;m
+not altogether certain it was necessary. Men out
+here, as a rule, think much too little of the life of an
+Indian.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah!&#8221; murmured Ashton. &#8220;Two Indians. But
+didn&#8217;t you speak of six notches?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Six,&#8221; confirmed the girl, her brow partly clearing.
+&#8220;The others were different. Three were rustlers.
+The sheriff&#8217;s posse overtook them. Both sides were
+firing. Kid circled around and shot three. He happened
+to have a long-range rifle. Daddy says they
+threw up their hands when the first one fell; but Kid
+explained to me that he was too far away to see it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah!&#8221; murmured Ashton the second time, and he
+put up his hand to the hole in the front of his sombrero.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The last was two years ago,&#8221; went on the girl.
+&#8220;There was a dispute over a maverick. Kid was
+tried and acquitted on his plea of self-defense. There
+were no witnesses. He claimed that the other man
+drew first. Two empty shells were found in the
+other man&#8217;s revolver, and only one in Kid&#8217;s. That
+cleared him.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_24' name='page_24'></a>24</span></p>
+<p>Ashton took off his hat and stared at the holes
+where the heavy forty-four bullet had gone in and
+gone out. He was silent.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You see, poor Kid has been unfortunate,&#8221; remarked
+the girl, as she headed her pony down over
+the edge of the mesa. &#8220;That time with the rustlers,
+all the posse were firing, and he just happened to be
+the one that got the best aim; and the time with the
+Indians, I&#8217;m sure he did not shoot to kill. It just
+happened that way. He told me so himself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton ran his tongue over his lip. &#8220;Yes&ndash;&ndash;I suppose
+so,&#8221; he muttered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Kid has all the good qualities and only a few of
+the faults of the old-time cowboys,&#8221; went on the girl.
+&#8220;He is almost fiercely loyal to Daddy&#8217;s interests.
+That&#8217;s why he led a raid on a sheep outfit, four years
+ago, when almost half of a large flock were run over
+into Deep Ca&ntilde;on&ndash;&ndash;poor innocent beasts! Daddy
+was furious with Kid; but there was no legal proof as
+to who were members of the attacking party, and the
+sheep were destroying our range. All of Daddy&#8217;s
+cattle would have starved.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He was not punished?&#8221; murmured Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Daddy could not be expected to discharge him,
+could he, when Kid did it to save our range? You
+see, it was just because he was so very loyal. You
+must not think from these things that he&ndash;&ndash;It is true
+he is suspicious of strangers, but he always has been
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_25' name='page_25'></a>25</span>
+very kind and gentle to me. I am very fond of him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You are?&#8221; exclaimed Ashton, stirred from his
+uneasy depression. &#8220;I should hardly have thought
+him the kind to interest a girl like you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Really?&#8221; she bantered. &#8220;Why not? I have
+lived on the range ever since I was fourteen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He stared at her incredulously. &#8220;Since you were
+fourteen?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;For nine years,&#8221; she added, smiling at his astonishment.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&ndash;&ndash;it can&#8217;t be,&#8221; he protested, his eyes on her
+stylish costume. &#8220;At least, not all the time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She nodded at him encouragingly. &#8220;So you <i>can</i>
+see&ndash;&ndash;a little. Nearly all my winters have been spent
+in Denver, except one in Europe.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Europe?&#8221; he repeated.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We didn&#8217;t cross in a cattle boat,&#8221; she flashed back
+at him, dimpling mischievously. &#8220;Nor did I go as
+the Queen of the Rancho, or of the Roundup, or even
+of the Wild and Woolly Outlaw Band.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He flushed with mortification. &#8220;I am only too
+well aware, Miss Knowles, how you must regard me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, I do not regard you at all&ndash;&ndash;as yet,&#8221; she
+bantered. &#8220;But of course I could not expect you to
+know that Daddy&#8217;s sister is one of the Sacred Thirty-six.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sacred&ndash;&ndash;? Is that one of the orders of nuns?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;None whatever,&#8221; she punned. In the same moment
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_26' name='page_26'></a>26</span>
+she drew a most solemn looking face. &#8220;My
+deah Mistah Ashton, I will have you to understand
+my reference was to that most select coterie which
+comprises Denver&#8217;s Real Society.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Indeed!&#8221; he said, with a subtle alteration in his
+tone and manner. &#8220;You say that your aunt is one
+of&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My aunt by adoption,&#8221; she corrected.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Adoption?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am not Daddy&#8217;s natural daughter. He adopted
+me,&#8221; explained the girl in her frank way.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes?&#8221; asked Ashton, plainly eager to learn more
+of her history.</p>
+<p>Without seeming to observe this, she adroitly
+balked his curiosity&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;So, you see, Daddy&#8217;s sister is
+only my aunt by adoption. Still, she has been very,
+very good to me; though I love Daddy and this free
+outdoor life so much that I insist on coming back home
+every spring.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah, yes, I see,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;Really, Miss
+Knowles, you must think me a good deal of a dub.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, well, allowances should be made for a tenderfoot,&#8221;
+she bantered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;At least I recognized your queenliness, even if
+at first I did mistake what you were queen of,&#8221; he
+thrust back.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So you still insist I&#8217;m a queen? Of what, pray?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of Hearts!&#8221; he answered with fervor.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_27' name='page_27'></a>27</span></p>
+<p>His daring was rewarded with a lovely blush. But
+she was only momentarily disconcerted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am not so sure of that,&#8221; she replied. &#8220;Though
+it&#8217;s not Queen of Spades, because I do not have to
+work; and it can&#8217;t be Diamonds, because Daddy is no
+more than comfortably well to do&ndash;&ndash;only six thousand
+head of stock. But as for Hearts&ndash;&ndash;No, I&#8217;m sure
+it must be Clubs; I do so love to knock around.
+Really, if ever they break up this range, it will break
+my heart same time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Break up the range? How do you mean?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Put it under irrigation and turn it into orchards
+and farms, as they have done so many places here on
+the Western Slope. You know, Colorado apples and
+peaches are fast becoming famous even in Europe.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I do not wonder, not in the least&ndash;&ndash;if I am to
+judge from a certain sample of the Colorado peach,&#8221;
+he ventured.</p>
+<p>This time she did not blush. &#8220;I am quite serious,
+Mr. Ashton,&#8221; she reproved him. &#8220;Daddy owns only
+five sections. The rest of his range is public land.
+If settlers should come in and homestead it, he would
+have to quit the cattle business. You cannot realize
+how fearfully we are watching the irrigation projects&ndash;&ndash;all
+the Government reclamation work, and the
+private dams, too. There seems to be no water that
+can be put on Dry Mesa, yet the engineers are doing
+such wonderful things these days.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_28' name='page_28'></a>28</span></p>
+<p>Ashton straightened on his saddle. &#8220;That is quite
+true, Miss Knowles. You know, I myself am an engineer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh!&#8221; she exclaimed in dismay. &#8220;You, an engineer?
+Have you come here to see if our mesa can be
+irrigated?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, indeed, no, I shall not do that,&#8221; he replied.
+&#8220;I have not the slightest thought of such a project. I
+am merely out for sport.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She eyed him uncertainly. &#8220;But&ndash;&ndash;We get all
+the reports&ndash;&ndash;There is an Ashton connected with
+that wonderful Zariba Dam, just being finished in
+Arizona.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That is my father. He is interested in it with
+a Mr. Leslie. They are financing the project. But
+I have nothing to do with it, nothing whatever, I assure
+you. The engineer is another man, a fellow
+named&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>He paused as if unable to remember. The girl
+looked at him with a shade of disappointment in her
+clear eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;A Mr. Blake&ndash;&ndash;Thomas Blake,&#8221; she supplied the
+name. &#8220;I thought you might have known him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah&ndash;&ndash;Blake?&#8221; he murmured hesitatingly.
+&#8220;Why, yes, I did at one time have somewhat of an
+acquaintance with him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You did?&#8221; she cried, her eyes brilliant with excitement.
+&#8220;Oh, tell me! I&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; She faltered under
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_29' name='page_29'></a>29</span>
+his surprised stare, and went on rather lamely: &#8220;You
+see, I&ndash;&ndash;we have been immensely interested in the
+Zariba Dam. The reports all describe it as an extraordinary
+work of engineering. And so we have
+been curious to learn something about the engineer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But if you&#8217;re so opposed to irrigation projects?&#8221;
+he thrust.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That makes no difference,&#8221; she parried. &#8220;We&ndash;&ndash;Daddy
+and I&ndash;&ndash;cannot but admire such a remarkable
+engineer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton shrugged. &#8220;The dam was a big thing. I
+fail to see why you should admire Blake just because
+he happened to blunder on the idea that solved the
+difficulty.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You do not like him,&#8221; she said with frank directness.</p>
+<p>He hesitated and looked away. When he replied
+it was with evident reluctance: &#8220;No, I do not. He
+is&ndash;&ndash;You would hardly admire him personally, even
+though he did bully Genevieve Leslie into marrying
+him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He is married?&#8221; exclaimed the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No wonder you are surprised,&#8221; said Ashton. &#8220;It
+was the most amazing thing imaginable&ndash;&ndash;she the
+daughter of H. V. Leslie, one of our wealthiest financiers,
+and he a rough, uncouth drunkard.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Drunkard?&#8221; almost screamed the girl. &#8220;No,
+no, not drunkard! I cannot believe it!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_30' name='page_30'></a>30</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;He certainly was one until just before Genevieve
+married him,&#8221; insisted Ashton. &#8220;I hear he has managed
+to keep sober since.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;O-o-oh!&#8221; sighed Miss Isobel, making no effort to
+conceal her vast relief. She attempted a smile. &#8220;I
+am so glad to hear that he is all right now. Of course
+he must be!... You say he married an heiress?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;She is worth three millions in her own right, and
+Leslie is as daft over him as she is. Leslie and my
+father are the ones who backed him on the Zariba
+Dam.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How interesting! And I suppose Mr. Blake is a
+Western man. So many of the best engineers come
+from the West.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton looked at her suspiciously. He could not
+make out her interest in Blake. She apparently had
+come to regard the engineer as a sort of hero. Yet
+why should she continue to inquire about him, now
+that she knew he was a married man?</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m sure I cannot tell you,&#8221; he replied, somewhat
+stiffly. &#8220;The fellow seems to have come from nowhere.
+Had it not been for an accident, he would
+never have got within speaking distance of Genevieve,
+but they happened to be shipwrecked together
+alone&ndash;&ndash;on the coast of Africa.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Wrecked?&ndash;&ndash;shipwrecked? How perfectly glorious!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_31' name='page_31'></a>31</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I wouldn&#8217;t mind it myself&ndash;&ndash;with you!&#8221; he
+flashed back.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I might,&#8221; she bantered. &#8220;This Mr. Blake, I
+imagine, was hardly a tenderfoot.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, he was a roughneck,&#8221; muttered Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You do not like him,&#8221; she remarked the second
+time.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why should I, a low fellow like that? I&#8217;ve
+heard that he even brags that he started in the Chicago
+slums.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl put her hand to her bosom. &#8220;In the&ndash;&ndash;the
+Chicago slums!&#8221; she half whispered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No wonder you are surprised,&#8221; said Ashton.
+&#8220;Anyone would presume that he would keep such a
+disgrace to himself. It shows what he is&ndash;&ndash;absolutely
+devoid of good taste.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is he&ndash;&ndash;What does he look like?&#8221; she eagerly
+inquired.</p>
+<p>Ashton shrugged. &#8220;Pardon me. I prefer not to
+talk any more about the fellow.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Miss Isobel checked her curiosity. &#8220;Very well,
+Mr. Ashton.&#8221; She looked around, and suddenly
+flourished her leathern quirt. &#8220;Look&ndash;&ndash;there are
+Kid and Daddy trying to head us. Come on, if you
+want a race. I&#8217;m going to beat them down to Dry
+Fork.&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_32' name='page_32'></a>32</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_IV_DOWNHILL_AND_UP' id='CHAPTER_IV_DOWNHILL_AND_UP'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV</h2>
+<h3>DOWNHILL AND UP</h3>
+</div>
+<p>The lash of the quirt fell with a swish on the flank
+of the girl&#8217;s pony. He did not wait for a second
+hint, but started down the steep slope &#8220;on the
+jump.&#8221; Before Ashton realized what was happening,
+his own horse was following at the same breakneck
+pace.</p>
+<p>Down plunged the two ponies&ndash;&ndash;down, down, down
+the sharply pitched mountain side, leaping logs and
+stones, crashing through brush, scrambling or slithering
+stiff-legged down rock slides. It was a wild race,
+a race that would have been utterly foolhardy with
+any other horses than these mountain bred cow ponies.
+A single misstep would have sent horse and rider rolling
+for yards, unless sooner brought up against tree
+or rock.</p>
+<p>Most of the color had left Ashton&#8217;s cheeks, but his
+full lips were set in resolute lines. His gaze alertly
+took in the ground before his horse and at the same
+time the girl&#8217;s graceful, swaying figure. Fortunately
+he knew enough to let his horse pick his own way.
+But such a way as it was! Had not the two animals
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_33' name='page_33'></a>33</span>
+been as surefooted as goats and as quick as cats, both
+must have pitched head over heels, not once, but a
+score of times.</p>
+<p>They had leaped down over numbers of rocks and
+logs and ledges, and the girl had not cast back a single
+glance to see if Ashton was following. But as they
+plunged down an open slope she suddenly twisted
+about and flung up a warning hand.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Here&#8217;s a jump!&#8221; she cried&ndash;&ndash;as though they had
+not been jumping every few yards since the beginning
+of that mad descent.</p>
+<p>Hardly had she faced about again when her pony
+leaped and dropped with her clear out of sight. Ashton
+gasped and started to draw rein. He was too
+late. Three strides brought his horse to a ledge fully
+six feet high. The beast leaped over the edge without
+making the slightest effort to check himself.</p>
+<p>Ashton uttered a startled cry, but poised himself
+for the shock with the cleverness of a skillful rider.
+His pony landed squarely, and at once started on again
+as if nothing unusual had happened.</p>
+<p>The girl was already racing down the lower slope,
+which was more moderate, or rather, less immoderate
+than that above the ledge. She looked around and
+waved her hand gayly when she saw that Ashton had
+kept his seat.</p>
+<p>The salute so fired him that he gave his pony the
+spur and dashed recklessly down to overtake her. At
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_34' name='page_34'></a>34</span>
+last he raced alongside and a little past her. She
+looked at his overridden pony and drew rein.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hold on,&#8221; she said. &#8220;Better pull up a bit.
+You don&#8217;t want to blow your hawss. &#8217;Tisn&#8217;t everyone
+can take that jump as neatly as he did.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But the others?&#8221; he panted&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;they&#8217;ll beat us!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They cut down to the right. It&#8217;s nothing to
+worry about if they do head us. They&#8217;ve got the
+best hawsses. We&#8217;ll jog the rest of the way.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course,&#8221; he hastened to agree, &#8220;if you prefer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;d prefer to lope uphill and down, but&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; she
+nodded towards his pony&#8217;s heaving flanks&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;no use
+riding a willing hawss to death.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No danger of that with this old nag. He&#8217;s tough
+as a mule,&#8221; Ashton assured her, though he followed
+her example by pulling his mount in to a walk.</p>
+<p>&#8220;A mule knows enough to balk when he&#8217;s got
+enough,&#8221; she informed him.</p>
+<p>He did not reply. With the lessening of his excitement
+habit sent his hand to his open packet of cigarettes.
+He had not smoked since before shooting the
+calf. As they came down into the shallow valley between
+the foot of the mesa and a parallel line of low
+rocky hills he could wait no longer. His lighter was
+already half raised to the gilt-tipped cigarette when
+it was checked by etiquette. He bowed to the girl as
+a matter of form.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_35' name='page_35'></a>35</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah, pardon me&ndash;&ndash;if you have no objections,&#8221; he
+said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I have,&#8221; was her unexpected reply.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Er&ndash;&ndash;what?&#8221; he asked, his finger on the spring
+of the lighter.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You inquired if I have any objections,&#8221; she answered.
+&#8220;I told you the truth. I dislike cigarettes
+most intensely.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&ndash;&ndash;but&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; he stammered, completely taken
+aback, &#8220;don&#8217;t your cowboys all smoke?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not cigarettes&ndash;&ndash;where I ever see them,&#8221; she
+said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And cigars or pipes?&#8221; he queried.</p>
+<p>&#8220;One has to concede something to masculine weakness,&#8221;
+she sighed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Unfortunately I have no cigars with me, not even
+at my camp, and a pipe is so slow,&#8221; he complained.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, pray, do not deprive yourself on my account,&#8221;
+she said. &#8220;You&#8217;ll find the cut between those two hills
+about as short a way to your camp as this one, if you
+prefer your cigarettes to my company.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Crool maid!&#8221; he reproached, not altogether jestingly.
+He even looked across at the gap through the
+hills to which she was pointing. Then he saw the
+disdain in her blue eyes. He took the cigarette from
+his lips, eyed it regretfully, and flung it away with a
+petulant fillip.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There!&#8221; he said. Meeting her amused smile, he
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_36' name='page_36'></a>36</span>
+added in the injured tone of a spoiled child. &#8220;You
+don&#8217;t realize what a compliment that is.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What?&ndash;&ndash;abstaining for a half hour or so? If
+I asked you to break off entirely, and you did it, I
+would consider that a real compliment.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I should say so!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But I am by no means sure that I would care to
+ask you,&#8221; she bantered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re not? Why, may I inquire?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I do not like to make useless requests.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Useless!&#8221; he exclaimed, his self-esteem stung by
+her raillery. &#8220;Do you think I cannot quit smoking
+them?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I think you do not care to try.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Impulsively he snatched out a package of his expensive
+cigarettes and tossed it over his shoulder.
+Another and another and still others followed in rapid
+succession, until he had exhausted his supply.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How&#8217;s that?&#8221; he demanded her approval.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, it&#8217;s not so bad for a start-off,&#8221; she answered
+with an absence of enthusiasm that dashed him from
+his pose of self-abnegation.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t realize what that means,&#8221; he complained.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It means, jilt Miss Nicotine in haste, and repent
+at leisure.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re ragging me! You ought to be particularly
+nice to me. I did it for you.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_37' name='page_37'></a>37</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Thanks awfully. But I didn&#8217;t ask you to do it,
+you know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, now, that&#8217;s hardly&ndash;&ndash;when I did it because
+of what you said.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, then, I promise to be nice to you until events
+do us part. That will be in about five minutes. Over
+there is Dry Fork Gulch. The waterhole is just down
+around this hill.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton took his ardent gaze off the girl&#8217;s face long
+enough to glance to his left. He recognized the tremendous
+gorge in the face of the mountain side that
+he had tried to ascend the previous day. It ran in
+with a moderately inclined bottom for nearly a mile,
+and then scaled up to the top of High Mesa in steep
+slopes and sheer ledges.</p>
+<p>His eyes followed the dry gravelly creek bed
+around to the right, and he nodded: &#8220;Yes, my camp
+is just over the corner of those crags. But surely,
+Miss Knowles, you will not end our acquaintance
+there.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She met his appealing look with a level glance.
+&#8220;Seriously, Mr. Ashton, don&#8217;t you think you had better
+move camp to another section? It seems to me
+you have done quite enough unseasonable deer hunting.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Without waiting for him to reply, she urged her
+horse into a lope. His own mount was too jaded for
+a quick start. When he overtook the girl she had
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_38' name='page_38'></a>38</span>
+rounded the craggy hill on their right and was in sight
+of a scattered grove of boxelders below a dike of dark
+colored trap rock that outcropped across the bed of
+the creek.</p>
+<p>Above the natural dam made by this dike the valley
+was bedded up with sand and large gravel washed
+down by the torrential rush of spring freshets. Below
+it the same wild floods, leaping down in a twenty-foot
+fall, had gouged out a pothole so wide and deep that
+it was never empty of water even in the driest seasons.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_39' name='page_39'></a>39</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_V_INTO_THE_DEPTHS' id='CHAPTER_V_INTO_THE_DEPTHS'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER V</h2>
+<h3>INTO THE DEPTHS</h3>
+</div>
+<p>At the top of the bank made by the dike the girl
+pointed with her quirt down to the rock-rimmed
+pool edge where a pair of riders were just swinging
+out of their saddles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hello, Daddy! We&#8217;re coming, Kid,&#8221; she called,
+and she turned to explain to Ashton. &#8220;They came
+around the other end of the hills; a longer way but
+better going. How&#8217;s this? Thought you said you
+were camped here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, of course. Don&#8217;t you see the tent? It&#8217;s
+right there among the&ndash;&ndash;Why, what&ndash;&ndash;where is
+it?&#8221; cried Ashton, gaping in blank amazement.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll soon see,&#8221; replied the girl.</p>
+<p>Their horses were scrambling down the short steep
+slope to the pool, where the other horses were drinking
+their fill of the cool water. The two men watched
+Ashton&#8217;s approach, Knowles with an impassive gaze,
+Gowan with cold suspicion in his narrowed eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, honey,&#8221; asked the cowman, &#8220;did you have
+him pulling leather?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, and I didn&#8217;t lose him, either,&#8221; she replied,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_40' name='page_40'></a>40</span>
+with a mischievous glance at Gowan. &#8220;I took that
+jump-off where the white-cheeked steer broke its neck.
+He took it after me without pulling leather.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Huh!&#8221; grunted the puncher. &#8220;Mr. Tenderfoot
+shore is some rider. We&#8217;re waiting for him now to
+ride around and find that camp where we were to
+deliver his veal.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton stared with a puzzled, half-dazed expression
+from the tentless trees beside him to the fore and
+hind quarters of veal wrapped in slicker raincoats and
+fastened on back of the men&#8217;s saddles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well?&#8221; demanded Knowles. &#8220;Thought you
+said you were camped here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am&ndash;&ndash;that is, I&ndash;&ndash;My tent was right there
+between those two trees,&#8221; said Ashton. &#8220;You see,
+there are the twigs and leaves I had my valet collect
+for my bed.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shore&ndash;&ndash;valleys are great on collecting beds of
+leaves and sand and bowlders,&#8221; observed Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s his fireplace,&#8221; said the girl, wheeling her
+horse through a clump of wild rosebushes. &#8220;Yes,
+and he&#8217;s right about the tent, too. It is a bed.
+Here&#8217;s a dozen cigarette boxes and&ndash;&ndash;What&#8217;s this,
+Mr. Ashton! Looks as if someone had left a note
+for you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;A note?&#8221; he muttered, slipping to the ground.</p>
+<p>He ran over to the spot to which she was pointing.
+On a little pile of stones, in front of where his tent
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_41' name='page_41'></a>41</span>
+had been pitched, a piece of coarse wrapping paper
+covered with writing was fluttering in the light breeze.
+He snatched it up and read the note with fast-growing
+bewilderment.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What is it?&#8221; sympathetically questioned the girl,
+quick to see that he was in real trouble.</p>
+<p>He did not answer. He did not even realize that
+she had spoken. With feverish haste he caught up an
+opened envelope that had lain under the paper.
+Drawn by his odd manner, Knowles and Gowan came
+over to stare at him. He had torn a letter from the
+envelope. It was in typewriting and covered less than
+a page, yet he gaped at it, reading and re-reading the
+lines as if too dazed to be able to comprehend their
+meaning.</p>
+<p>Slowly the involved sentences burned their way into
+his consciousness. As his bewilderment cleared, his
+concern deepened to dismay, and from dismay to consternation.
+His jaw dropped slack, his face whitened,
+the pupils of his eyes dilated.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What is it? What&#8217;s the matter?&#8221; exclaimed the
+girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Matter?&#8221;&ndash;&ndash;His voice was hoarse and strained.
+He crumpled the letter in a convulsive grasp&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;Matter?
+I&#8217;m ruined!&ndash;&ndash;ruined! God!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Knowles and the girl were both silent before the
+despair in the young man&#8217;s face. Gowan was more
+obtuse or else less considerate.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_42' name='page_42'></a>42</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Shore, you&#8217;re plumb busted, partner,&#8221; he ironically
+condoled. &#8220;Your whole outfit has flown away on
+the wings of the morning. Hope you won&#8217;t tell us the
+pay for your veal has vamoosed with the rest.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Kid, for shame!&#8221; reproved the girl. &#8220;Of
+course Daddy won&#8217;t ask for any pay&ndash;&ndash;now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton burst into a jangling high-pitched laugh.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no! there&#8217;s still my pony and saddle and rifle
+and watch!&#8221; he cried, half hysterically. &#8220;Take them!
+strip me! Here&#8217;s my hat, too! I paid forty-five
+dollars for it&ndash;&ndash;silver band.&#8221; He flung it on the
+ground. &#8220;There&#8217;s a hole in it&ndash;&ndash;I wish the hole
+were through my head!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now, now, look here, son. Keep a stiff upper lip,&#8221;
+said Knowles. &#8220;Don&#8217;t act like you&#8217;re locoed. It&#8217;s
+all right about that veal, as Chuckie says, and you
+oughtn&#8217;t to make such a fuss over the loss of a camp
+outfit.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Camp outfit?&#8221; shrilled Ashton. &#8220;If that were
+all! if that were all! What shall I do? Lost&ndash;&ndash;all
+lost!&ndash;&ndash;father&ndash;&ndash;all! Ruined! Oh, my God! What
+shall I do? Oh, my God! Oh&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; Anguish and
+despair choked the cry in his throat. He collapsed in
+a huddled, quivering heap.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Sho!</i> It can&#8217;t be as bad as that, can it?&#8221; condoled
+the cowman.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Go away!&#8221; sobbed the prostrated man. &#8220;Go
+away! Take my pony&ndash;&ndash;all! Only leave me!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_43' name='page_43'></a>43</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;If ever I saw a fellow plumb locoed!&#8221; muttered
+Gowan, half awe-struck.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Maybe he&#8217;ll come to his senses if we leave him,&#8221;
+suggested Knowles. He took a step towards Ashton.
+&#8220;All right, son, we&#8217;ll go. But we&#8217;ll leave you half
+that veal, and we won&#8217;t take your hawss. D&#8217;you want
+help in looking for your outfit?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton shook his downbent head.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, if you want to let the thieves get away with
+it, that&#8217;s your own lookout. You&#8217;d better strike back
+to the railroad.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Go away! Leave me!&#8221; moaned Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Gone to smash&ndash;&ndash;clean busted!&#8221; commented
+Gowan, as he turned about to go to his horse, his spurs
+jingling gayly.</p>
+<p>Knowles followed him, shaking his head. The girl
+had been gazing at Ashton with an expression that
+varied from sympathetic commiseration to contemptuous
+pity. As her adopted father and Gowan mounted,
+she rode over to them.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Go on,&#8221; she said. &#8220;I&#8217;ll overtake you as soon as
+I&#8217;ve watered my hawss.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re not going to speak to that kettle of mush
+again, Miss Chuckie,&#8221; remonstrated Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, I am, Kid, and you know you wouldn&#8217;t stop
+me if you could. He needs it. I&#8217;m glad you smashed
+his pistol. A rifle is not so handy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Knowles stared over the bushes at the huddled figure
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_44' name='page_44'></a>44</span>
+on the ground. &#8220;Look here, Chuckie, you can&#8217;t mean
+that?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; she insisted. &#8220;He is ready to do it right
+now, unless someone throws him a rope and hauls him
+out of the slough.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lot of fuss over a tenderfoot you never saw
+before today,&#8221; grumbled Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s not like you, Kid,&#8221; she reproached. &#8220;Besides,
+you don&#8217;t want the trouble of digging a grave.
+It would have to be deep, to keep out the coyotes.
+Daddy, you&#8217;re forgetting the veal.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So I am,&#8221; agreed the cowman. &#8220;Ride on, Kid.
+You&#8217;ll be carrying most weight.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The puncher reluctantly wheeled his horse and
+started down the bank of the dry stream. Knowles
+unfastened the hind quarters of veal from behind the
+cantle of his saddle, lifted them into a fork of one of
+the low trees, and rode off after Gowan, folding up
+his blood-stained slicker.</p>
+<p>The girl at once slipped from her pony and walked
+quietly around to the drooping, despairing man.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Ashton,&#8221; she softly began, &#8220;they have gone.
+I have stayed to find out if there is anything I can do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She paused for him to reply. His shoulders quivered,
+but he remained silent. She went on soothingly:
+&#8220;You are all unstrung. The shock was too sudden.
+It must have been a terrible one! Won&#8217;t you tell me
+about it? Perhaps that will make you feel better.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_45' name='page_45'></a>45</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;As if anything could when I am ruined, utterly
+ruined!&#8221; he moaned.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But how? Please tell me,&#8221; she urged.</p>
+<p>Slowly he raised his haggard face and looked up at
+her. There could be no question but that she was full
+of sincere sympathy and concern for him. Her eyes
+shone upon him with all the motherly tenderness that
+any good woman, however young, has in her heart for
+those who suffer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s all in this&ndash;&ndash;this letter,&#8221; he muttered
+brokenly. &#8220;Expected my remittance in it&ndash;&ndash;Got
+ruin! ruin!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It had been opened,&#8221; suggested the girl. &#8220;Perhaps
+those who took your outfit also took your remittance
+money.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, there wasn&#8217;t any&ndash;&ndash;not a cent! My valet
+had my written instructions to open it and cash the
+money orders&ndash;&ndash;that weren&#8217;t there! He and the
+guide&ndash;&ndash;they came back. The letter had told them all,
+all! I was not here. They took the outfit&ndash;&ndash;the
+money&ndash;&ndash;divided it. Left that note&ndash;&ndash;they had no
+more use for me.... Ruined! utterly ruined!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But if you wish us to run them down?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&ndash;&ndash;good riddance! What they took is less
+than what I owed them. Ungrateful scoundrels!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s it!&#8221; approved the girl. &#8220;Get up your
+spunk. Cuss, if you like. Rip loose, good and hard.
+It will ease you off.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_46' name='page_46'></a>46</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s no use,&#8221; he groaned, slumping back into his
+posture of abject dejection.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, come, now!&#8221; she encouraged. &#8220;You&#8217;re a
+young, healthy man. What if you have been bucked
+off this time? There are lots other hawsses in Life&#8217;s
+corral.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He hung his head lower.</p>
+<p>She went on, in an altered tone: &#8220;Mr. Ashton,
+it is evident you have been bred as a gentleman. I
+wish you to give me your word that you will not put
+an end to yourself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>There was a prolonged pause. At last he stirred as
+if uneasy under her steady gaze. He could not see
+her eyes, yet he seemed to feel them. Twice he
+started to speak, but checked himself and hesitated.
+The third time he muttered a reluctant, &#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;will
+not.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good! I have your word,&#8221; she replied. &#8220;I
+must go now. When you&#8217;ve shaken yourself together
+a bit, come down to the ranch. You ride down Dry
+Fork to the junction, and then three miles up Plum
+Creek. Daddy&#8217;ll be glad to put you up a few days
+until you can think of what to do to get a new start.
+Good-by!&#8221;</p>
+<p>She went back to her horse as lightfooted and graceful
+as an antelope. But he did not look up after her,
+nor did he respond to her cordial parting. For a long
+time after she rode away he continued to crouch as she
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_47' name='page_47'></a>47</span>
+had left him, motionless, almost torpid with the immensity
+of his loss.</p>
+<p>The sun sank lower and lower. It touched the skyline
+of High Mesa and dipped below. The shadow
+of twilight fell upon Dry Fork and the waterhole.
+The man shivered and, as if afraid that the darkness
+would rush upon him, hastily opened his clenched hand
+and smoothed out the crumpled letter.</p>
+<p>To his bloodshot eyes, the accusing words seemed to
+glare up at him in letters of fire:</p>
+<p style='margin-left:1.0em; margin-right:2.0em; '><i>Sir</i>:</p>
+<p style='margin-left:1.0em; margin-right:2.0em; '>We have been instructed by our client, Mr. George
+Ashton, to inform you that he has at last learned the
+full particulars of the manner in which you obtained
+possession of the plans of Mr. Thomas Blake, C.E.,
+drawn by him for the competition on the then projected
+Michamac bridge; how you copied said plans and destroyed
+the originals, and was awarded the construction
+of said bridge on said copied plans presented by
+you as of your own device and invention; that you
+were awarded and did enjoy the office of Resident Engineer
+of said bridge during a period covering the
+greater part of the construction thereof, and received
+the full salary of said office, to and until said Blake
+took charge of said bridge, which had been imperilled
+by your incompetence; and said Blake, against your
+strenuous objections and opposition and at great personal
+risk, saved said bridge from destruction.</p>
+<p style='margin-left:1.0em; margin-right:2.0em; '>Wherefore, because of the disgrace which you have,
+by reason of the aforesaid actions and conduct, brought
+upon his name, and because of various and sundry acts
+of disobedience, as well as your life of frivolity and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_48' name='page_48'></a>48</span>
+dissipation,&ndash;&ndash;our client has instructed us to inform
+you, that he has cut you off from him absolutely; that
+he has drawn a new will wherein the amount of your
+legacy is fixed at the sum of one ($1.00) dollar; that
+he will no longer make you an allowance in any sum
+whatever; that he no longer regards you as his son;
+that any communication addressed to him by you,
+either directly or indirectly, will not be received or
+read by him; and that he absolutely refuses to see you
+or to grant you a personal interview.</p>
+<p style='margin-left:1.0em; margin-right:2.0em; text-align:right'>Respectfully, etc.<br /></p>
+<p>The signature was that of his father&#8217;s confidential
+lawyers, and below, to the left, lest there be no possibility
+of misunderstanding, were his name and address
+in full: &#8220;Mr. Lafayette Ashton, Stockchute, Colorado.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Again he bent over with his head on his breast and
+the letter clutched convulsively in his slender palm.</p>
+<p>A bloodcurdling yell brought him to his feet with a
+sudden leap. He still did not know the difference
+between the cry of a coyote and the deeper note of a
+timber wolf. He hastily started a fire, and ran to
+fetch his rifle from the saddle sheath. The pony was
+quietly munching a wisp of grass as best he could with
+the bit in his mouth. The unconcern of the beast
+reassured his master, who, however, filled the magazine
+of his rifle before offsaddling.</p>
+<p>Having hobbled the pony for the night, Ashton laid
+the rifle on the rim of the pool, stripped, and dived in.
+He went down like a plummet, reckless of the danger
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_49' name='page_49'></a>49</span>
+of striking some upjutting ledge. He may have forgotten
+for the moment his word to the girl, or he may
+have considered that it did not prevent him from courting
+death by accident.</p>
+<p>But, deeply as he dived, he failed to reach bottom.
+He came up, puffing and blowing, and swam swiftly
+around the pool before scrambling out to dress. The
+combined effect of the vigorous exercise, the grateful
+coolness of the water, and the riddance of the day&#8217;s
+dust and sweat brought him ashore in a far less morbid
+frame of mind. Going up the bank, he pulled the
+hind quarters of veal from the tree and sliced off three
+or four ragged strips with his knife. After washing
+them, he put them to broil over his smoky fire of green
+twigs. The &#8220;cutlets&#8221; came off, one half raw and the
+other half burned to a crisp. But he had not eaten
+since the early forenoon. He devoured the mess without
+salt, ravenously. He topped off with the scant
+swallow of brandy left in his flask.</p>
+<p>Stimulated by the food and drink, he set about
+gathering a large heap of wood. Three or four coyotes
+had approached his camp, attracted by the scent of
+the calf meat. With the fading of twilight into night
+they came in closer, making such a racket with their
+yelping and wailing that he thought himself surrounded
+by a pack of ravenous wolves.</p>
+<p>He could not see how his pony was unconcernedly
+grazing within a few yards of one of the cowardly
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_50' name='page_50'></a>50</span>
+beasts. Had the wistful singers been timber wolves,
+the animal soon would have come hobbling in near the
+fire; but Ashton did not know that. He flung on
+brush and crouched down near the blaze, rifle in hand,
+peering out into the blackness. Every moment he
+expected to hear that terrible cry of which he had read,
+the death-scream of a horse, and then to hear the
+crunching of bones between the jaws of the ferocious
+wolves.</p>
+<p>He had spent the previous night alone in camp,
+peacefully sleeping. But then the yells of the beasts
+of darkness had been far away, and the walls of his
+tent had shut him in from the wild. Tonight his
+nerves had been shattered by the terrible blow of
+his father&#8217;s repudiation. Worst of all, he had no
+tobacco with which to soothe them.</p>
+<p>His dread of the supposed wolf pack in a way eased
+the anguish of his ruin by diverting his mind. But
+the lack of cigarettes served only to put a more frightful
+strain on his overwrought nerves. He felt it first
+in a vague discomfort that set his hands to groping
+automatically through his pockets. The absence of
+the usual box roused his consciousness, with a dismayed
+start, to the realization that he was absolutely
+without his soothing drug. The absconding guide
+and valet had taken the large store he had in camp,
+and, to please Miss Knowles, he had flung away all
+that were left in his pockets.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_51' name='page_51'></a>51</span></p>
+<p>From vague fumbling he instantly concentrated his
+mind on an eager search for a packet that might have
+been overlooked, either in his pockets or around the
+camp. He could find none, nor even a single cigarette.
+His nerves were now clamoring wildly for
+their soothing poison. So great was the strain that it
+began to affect his mind. He fancied that the wolf
+pack was closing in to attack him. Twice he fired his
+rifle at imaginary eyes out in the darkness.</p>
+<p>All the time the craving for nicotine increased in
+intensity, until he was half frantic. Midnight found
+him, torch in hand, crawling around on the ground
+where his tent had been pitched, hunting for cigarette
+stubs. He had only to look close in order to find any
+number. Most were no more than cork tips, but some
+had at least one puff left in them, and a few had been
+only half smoked.</p>
+<p>Beside the bed he came upon almost a handful, close
+together. By this time his jangled nerves were &#8220;toning
+down.&#8221; He became conscious of great weariness.
+He stretched out on his leafy bed, and with his head
+pillowed on his arm, luxuriously sucked in the drugging
+smoke.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_52' name='page_52'></a>52</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_VI_A_TEST_OF_CALIBER' id='CHAPTER_VI_A_TEST_OF_CALIBER'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER VI</h2>
+<h3>A TEST OF CALIBER</h3>
+</div>
+<p>When he opened his eyes the sun was beating
+down into his face. He had slept far into the
+morning. He stood up to stare around. His horse
+was cropping the grass near the lower side of the
+grove. There was no sign of any wolves. He
+walked over to his fireplace. The fire had burned to
+ashes hours ago. He started a fresh one with his
+patent lighter, and turned to where he had left the
+veal. It was gone.</p>
+<p>He went a few steps farther, and found a bone
+gnawed clean of every shred of meat and gristle. A
+fox is a far less cunning thief than a coyote. The
+quantity of calf meat had alone saved his saddle and
+bridle, and even at that, one of the bridle reins was
+slashed and the stirrup leathers were gnawed. He
+looked from the white bone to the saddle, and ripped
+out a half dozen vigorous Anglo-Saxon oaths. It was
+not nice, but the explosion argued a far healthier
+frame of mind than either his morbid hysteria of the
+previous afternoon or his frenzy of the night.</p>
+<p>After the outburst of anger had spent itself, he
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_53' name='page_53'></a>53</span>
+realized that he was hungry. The feeling became
+acute when he remembered that he had absolutely
+nothing on hand to eat. He hastened to saddle up.
+As he was about to mount he paused to look uncertainly
+up the trail on which he had thrown away the
+cigarettes. While he stood vacillating, his hand went
+to his hip pocket and drew out the silver-cased brandy
+flask. He looked at it, and its emptiness reminded
+him that he was thirsty. He went down to the pool
+for a drink. Having filled his flask, he returned up
+the bank and sprang into the saddle.</p>
+<p>His horse, in fine fettle after the night&#8217;s rest and
+grazing, started off on the jump, cow pony fashion.
+Ashton gave him his head, and the horse bore him at
+a steady lope down along the stream, crossing over to
+the other bank of the dry bed, of his own volition,
+when the going became too rough on the near side.
+The direction of the railway was now off across the
+sagebrush flats to Ashton&#8217;s right, but he allowed his
+horse to continue on down the creek. About four
+miles from the waterhole he approached a bunch of
+grazing cattle. He drew rein and walked his horse
+past them, looking for a herder. There was none in
+sight. The animals were on their home range. He
+rode on down the creek at a canter.</p>
+<p>A mile farther on, as he neared another scattered
+bunch of cattle, something thwacked the dry ground
+a little in front and to the left of him, throwing up a
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_54' name='page_54'></a>54</span>
+splash of sand and dust. His pony snorted and
+leaped ahead at a quickened pace.</p>
+<p>Ashton turned to look back at the spot&ndash;&ndash;and instinctively
+ducked as a bullet pinged past his ear so
+close that he felt the windage on his cheek. He did
+not lack quickness of perception. He glanced up the
+open slope to his left, and grasped the fact that someone
+was shooting at him with a rifle from the crest of
+the ridge half a mile distant.</p>
+<p>Instantly he flung himself flat on his pony&#8217;s neck
+and dug in his spurs. The pony bounded forward
+with a suddenness that spoiled the aim of the third
+bullet. It whined past over the beast&#8217;s haunches.
+The fourth shot, best aimed of all, smashed the silver
+brandy flask in Ashton&#8217;s hip pocket. Had he been
+upright in the saddle, the steel-jacketed bullet must
+have pierced him through the waist.</p>
+<p>With a yell of terror, he flattened himself still
+closer to his pony&#8217;s neck and dug in his spurs at every
+jump. The beast was already going at a pace that
+would have won most quarter-mile sprints. Just after
+the fourth shot he swept in among the scattered bunch
+of cattle, running at his highest speed. Still Ashton
+swung his sharp-roweled spurs. He knew that the
+range of a high-power rifle is well over a mile.</p>
+<p>To his vast surprise, the shooting ceased the moment
+he raced into line with the first steer. The short
+respite gave him time to recover his wits.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_55' name='page_55'></a>55</span></p>
+<p>As the pony sprinted clear of the last steer in the
+bunch, a fifth bullet ranged close down over Ashton&#8217;s
+head. He pulled hard on the right rein and leaned
+the same way. The sixth shot burned the skin on
+the pony&#8217;s hip as he swerved suddenly towards the
+edge of the creek channel. He made a wild leap out
+over the edge of the cut bank and came plunging down
+on a gravel bar. At once he started to race along the
+dry stream bed. But instead of spurring, Ashton now
+tugged at the bridle.</p>
+<p>The pony swung to the left and came to a halt close
+in under the bank. Ashton cautiously straightened
+from his crouch. When erect he was just high enough
+to see over the edge of the bank. Looking back and
+up the ridge, he saw the figure of a man clearly outlined
+against the sky. His lips closed in resolute
+lines; his dark eyes flashed. Jerking out his rifle, he
+set the sight for fifteen hundred yards, and began
+firing at the would-be murderer as coolly and steadily
+as a marksman.</p>
+<p>Before he had pulled the trigger the third time the
+man leaped sideways and knelt to return his fire. At
+once Ashton gripped his rifle still more firmly and
+drew back the automatic lever. The crackling discharge
+was like the fire of a miniature Maxim gun.
+Puffs of dust spouted up all around the man on the
+ridge crest. He sprang to his feet and ran back out
+of sight, jumping from side to side like an Indian.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_56' name='page_56'></a>56</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Ho!&#8221; shouted Ashton. &#8220;He&#8217;s running! I
+made him run!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He sat up very erect in his saddle, staring defiantly
+at the place where the murderer had disappeared.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The coward! I made him run!&#8221; he exulted.</p>
+<p>He shifted his grip on his rifle, and the heat of the
+barrel reminded him that he had emptied the magazine.
+He reloaded the weapon to its fullest capacity,
+and stood up in his stirrups to stare at the ridge crest.
+The murderer did not reappear. Ashton&#8217;s exultance
+gave place to disappointment. He was more than
+ready to continue the duel.</p>
+<p>He rode down the creek, searching for a place to
+ascend the cut bank. But by the time he came to a
+slope he had cooled sufficiently to realize the foolishness
+of bravado. Not unlikely the murderer was
+lying back out of sight, ready to shoot him when he
+came up out of the creek. He reflected, and decided
+that the going was quite good enough in the bottom
+of the creek bed. He rode on down the channel,
+over the gravel bars, at an easy canter.</p>
+<p>After a half mile the bank became so low and the
+creek bed so sandy that he turned up on to the dry
+sod. As he did so he kept his eye warily on the now
+distant ridge. But no bullet came pinging down after
+him.</p>
+<p>Instead, he heard the thud of galloping hoofs, and
+twisted about just in time to see a rider top a rise a
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_57' name='page_57'></a>57</span>
+short distance in front of him. He snapped down his
+breech sight and faced the supposed assailant with the
+rifle ready at his shoulder. Almost as quickly he
+lowered the weapon and snatched off his sombrero in
+joyful salute. The rider was Miss Knowles.</p>
+<p>She waved back gayly and cantered up to him, her
+lovely face aglow with cordial greeting.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good noon!&#8221; she called. &#8220;So you have come at
+last? But better late than never.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How could I help coming?&#8221; he gallantly exclaimed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I see. The coyotes stole your cutlets, and you
+were hungry,&#8221; she bantered, as she came alongside
+and whirled her horse around to ride with him down
+the creek.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How did you guess?&#8221; he asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know coyotes,&#8221; she replied. &#8220;They&#8217;re the
+worst&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; She stopped short, gazing at the bleeding
+flanks of his pony. &#8220;Oh, Mr. Ashton! how could
+you? I did not think you so cruel!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Cruel?&#8221; he repeated, twisting about to see what
+she meant. &#8220;Ah, you refer to the spurring. But I
+simply couldn&#8217;t help it, you know. There was a
+bandit taking pot shots at me as I passed the ridge
+back there.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;A bandit&ndash;&ndash;on Dry Mesa?&#8221; she incredulously
+exclaimed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes; he pegged at me eight or nine times.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_58' name='page_58'></a>58</span></p>
+<p>The girl smiled. &#8220;You probably heard one of the
+punchers shooting at a coyote.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No,&#8221; he insisted, flushing under her look. &#8220;The
+ruffian was shooting at me. See here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He put his hand to his left hip pocket, one side of
+which had been torn out. From it he drew his
+brandy flask.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That was done by the third or fourth shot,&#8221; he
+explained. &#8220;Do you wonder I was flat on my pony&#8217;s
+neck and spurring as hard as I could?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl took the flask from his outstretched hand
+and looked it over with keen interest. In one side of
+the silver case was a small, neat hole. Opposite it
+half of the other side had been burst out as if by an
+explosion within. She took off the silver cap, shook
+out the shattered glass of the inner flask, and looked
+again at the small hole.</p>
+<p>&#8220;A thirty-eight,&#8221; she observed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Pardon me,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;I fail to&ndash;&ndash;Ah, yes;
+thirty-eight caliber, you mean.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It is I who must ask pardon,&#8221; she said in frank
+apology. &#8220;Your rifle is a thirty-two. I heard a
+number of shots, ending with the rattle of an automatic.
+Thought you were after another deer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He could afford to smile at the merry thrust and the
+flash of dimples that accompanied it.</p>
+<p>&#8220;At least it wasn&#8217;t a calf this time,&#8221; he replied.
+&#8220;Nor was it a doe. But it may have been a buck.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_59' name='page_59'></a>59</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Indian?&#8221; she queried, with instant perception of
+his play on the word.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t see any war plumes,&#8221; he admitted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;War plumes? Oh, that <i>is</i> a joke!&#8221; she exclaimed.
+She chanced to look down at the shattered
+flask, and her merriment vanished. &#8220;But this isn&#8217;t
+any joke. Didn&#8217;t you see the man who was shooting
+at you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, after I jumped my pony down into the creek.
+Perhaps the bandit thought he had tumbled us both.
+He stood up on top the ridge, until I cut loose and
+made him run.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He ran?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton&#8217;s eyes sparkled at the remembrance, and his
+chest began to expand. Then he met the girl&#8217;s clear,
+direct gaze, and answered modestly: &#8220;Well, you
+see, when I had got down behind the bank our positions
+were reversed. He was the one in full view.
+It&#8217;s curious, though, Miss Knowles&ndash;&ndash;shooting at
+that poor calf, under the impression it was a deer, I
+simply couldn&#8217;t hold my rifle steady, while&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No wonder, if it was your first deer,&#8221; put in the
+girl. &#8220;We call it buck fever.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, but wouldn&#8217;t you have thought my first
+bandit&ndash;&ndash;Why, I couldn&#8217;t have aimed at him more
+steadily if I had been made of cast iron.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Guess he had made you fighting mad,&#8221; she bantered;
+but under her seeming levity he perceived a
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_60' name='page_60'></a>60</span>
+change in her manner towards him immensely gratifying
+to his humbled self-esteem.</p>
+<p>&#8220;At first I was just a trifle apprehensive&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; He
+hesitated, and suddenly burst out with a candid confession&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;No,
+not a trifle! Really, I was horribly
+frightened!&#8221;</p>
+<p>This was more than the girl had hoped from him.
+She nodded and smiled in open approval. &#8220;You had
+a good right to be frightened. I don&#8217;t blame you for
+spurring that way. Look. It wasn&#8217;t only one shot
+that came close. There&#8217;s a neat hair brand on your
+hawss&#8217;s hip that wasn&#8217;t there yesterday.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Must have been the shot just before we took the
+bank,&#8221; said Ashton, twisting about to look at the
+streak cut by the bullet. &#8220;The first was the only
+other one that didn&#8217;t go higher.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But what did the man look like?&#8221; questioned Miss
+Isobel. &#8220;I can&#8217;t imagine who&ndash;&ndash;Can it be that
+your guide has a grudge against you on account of his
+pay?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I wouldn&#8217;t have thought it possible before yesterday,
+though he was a surly fellow and inclined to be
+insolent.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All such men are apt to be with tenderfeet,&#8221; she
+remarked, permitting herself a half twinkle of her
+sweet eyes. &#8220;But I should have thought yours would
+have kept on going. Whatever you may have owed
+him, he had no right to steal your outfit. He must
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_61' name='page_61'></a>61</span>
+be a real badman, if it&#8217;s true he is the party who did
+this shooting.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shouldn&#8217;t be at all surprised,&#8221; agreed Ashton.
+In her concern over him she looked so charming that
+he would have agreed if she had told him the moon
+was made of green cheese.</p>
+<p>She shook her head thoughtfully, and went on:
+&#8220;I can&#8217;t imagine even one of our badmen trying to
+murder you that way. Their usual course would be
+to come up to you, face to face, pick a quarrel, and
+beat you to it on the draw. But whoever the cowardly
+scoundrel is, we&#8217;ll turn out the boys, and either
+run him down or out of the country.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If it&#8217;s my guide, he probably is running already.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I hope so,&#8221; replied the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You do! Don&#8217;t you want him punished?&#8221; exclaimed
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course, but you see I don&#8217;t want Kid to&ndash;&ndash;to
+cut another notch on his Colt&#8217;s.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I must say, I cannot see how that&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You could if you realized how kind and good he
+has been to me all these years. Do you know, when I
+first came West, I couldn&#8217;t tell a jackrabbit from a
+burro. Daddy had told me that each had big ears,
+and I got them mixed. And actually I didn&#8217;t know
+the off from the nigh side of a hawss!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But we&ndash;&ndash;er&ndash;&ndash;have horses and riding-schools in
+the East,&#8221; put in Ashton.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_62' name='page_62'></a>62</span></p>
+<p>She parried the indirect question without seeming
+to notice it. &#8220;You proved that yesterday, coming
+down from High Mesa. I felt sure I would have you
+pulling leather.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Pulling leather?&#8221; he asked. &#8220;You see, I own to
+my tenderfootness.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Grabbing your saddle to hold yourself on,&#8221; she
+explained. Before he could reply, she rose in her
+stirrups and pointed ahead with her quirt. &#8220;Look,
+that&#8217;s the top of the biggest haystack, up by the feed-sheds.
+You&#8217;ll see the buildings in half a minute.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Unheeded by Ashton, she had guided him off to the
+left, away from Dry Fork, across the angle above its
+junction with Plum Creek. They were now coming
+up over the divide between the two streams. Ashton
+failed to locate the haystack until its two mates and
+the long, half-open shelter-sheds came into view.</p>
+<p>A moment later he was looking at the horse corral
+and the group of log ranch houses. Below and
+beyond them the scattered groves of Plum Creek
+stretched away up across the mesa&ndash;&ndash;green bouquets
+on the slender silver ribbon of the creek&#8217;s midsummer
+rill.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well?&#8221; she asked. &#8220;What do you think of my
+home?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Your summer home,&#8221; he suggested.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, my real home,&#8221; she insisted. &#8220;Auntie
+couldn&#8217;t be nicer or fonder than she is; but her house
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_63' name='page_63'></a>63</span>
+is a residence, not a home, even to her. Anyway,
+here, where I have Daddy and Kid&ndash;&ndash;I do so hope
+you and Kid will become friends.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Since you wish it, I shall try to do my part. But
+it is a matter that might take time, and&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; he
+smiled ruefully and concluded with seeming irrelevance&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;I
+have no home.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She gazed at him with the look of tender motherly
+sympathy that he had been too distraught to really
+feel the previous day. &#8220;Do not say that, Mr. Ashton!
+Though a ranch house is hardly the kind of
+home to which you are accustomed, you will find that
+we range folks retain the old-fashioned Western ideas
+of hospitality.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My dear Miss Knowles!&#8221; he exclaimed with
+ardent gallantry, &#8220;the mere thought of being under
+the same sky with you&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t, please,&#8221; she begged. &#8220;This <i>is</i> the blue
+sky we are under, not a stuccoed ceiling.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I really meant it,&#8221; he protested, greatly
+dashed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Kid often says nice things to me. But he speaks
+with his hands,&#8221; she remarked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Deaf and dumb alphabet?&#8221; he queried wonderingly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hardly,&#8221; she answered, dimpling under his
+puzzled gaze. &#8220;Actions speak louder than words,
+you know.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_64' name='page_64'></a>64</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah!&#8221; he murmured, and his look indicated that
+she had given him food for thought.</p>
+<p>They were now cantering down the long easy slope
+towards the ranch buildings. The girl&#8217;s quick eye
+perceived a horseman riding towards the ranch from
+one of the groves up Plum Creek.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s Kid coming in,&#8221; she remarked. &#8220;He
+went out early this morning after a big wolf that had
+killed a calf. He reported last evening that he found
+the carcass over near the head of Plum Creek. A
+wolf that gets to killing calves this time of year is a
+pretty costly neighbor. Daddy told Kid to go out
+and try to get him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m glad you didn&#8217;t let him get <i>this</i> calf-killer,&#8221;
+observed Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, as soon as we saw your tenderfoot riding
+togs&ndash;&ndash;!&#8221; she rejoined. &#8220;Seriously, though, you
+must not mind if the men poke a little fun at you.
+Most of them are more farmhands than cowboys, but
+Kid will be apt to lead off. I do so want you to be
+agreeable to Kid. He is almost a member of the
+family, not a hired man.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall try to be agreeable to him,&#8221; replied Ashton,
+a trifle stiffly.</p>
+<p>The puncher had seen them probably before they
+saw him. He was riding at a pace that brought him
+to the horse corral a few moments ahead of them.
+When they came up he nodded carelessly in response
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_65' name='page_65'></a>65</span>
+to Ashton&#8217;s studiously polite greeting, &#8220;Good day,
+Mr. Gowan,&#8221; and turned to loosen the cinch of his
+saddle.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ve been riding some,&#8221; remarked the girl,
+looking at the puncher&#8217;s heaving, lathered horse.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jumped that wolf&ndash;&ndash;ran him,&#8221; replied Gowan,
+as he lifted off his saddle and deftly tossed it up on
+the top rail of the corral.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re in luck,&#8221; congratulated Miss Isobel. She
+explained to Ashton: &#8220;The cattlemen in this county
+pay fifteen dollars for wolf scalps. That&#8217;s in addition
+to the state bounty.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton sprang off to offer her his hand. But she
+was on the ground as soon as he. Gowan stared at
+him between narrowed lids, and replied to the girl
+somewhat shortly: &#8220;I didn&#8217;t get him this time,
+Miss Chuckie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You didn&#8217;t? That&#8217;s too bad! You don&#8217;t often
+miss. I wish you had been with me, to run down the
+scoundrel who tried to murder Mr. Ashton.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan burst into the harsh, strained laughter of
+one who seldom gives way to mirth. He checked
+himself abruptly and cast a hostile look at Ashton.
+&#8220;By&ndash;&ndash;James, Miss Chuckie, you don&#8217;t mean to say
+you let a tenderfoot string you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How about this?&#8221; asked the girl. She held out
+the silver flask, which she had not returned to Ashton.</p>
+<p>Gowan gave it a casual glance, and answered almost
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_66' name='page_66'></a>66</span>
+jeeringly: &#8220;Easy enough for him to set it up and
+plug it&ndash;&ndash;if he didn&#8217;t get too far away.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;His rifle is a thirty-two. This was done by a
+thirty-eight,&#8221; she replied.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thirty-eight?&#8221; he repeated. &#8220;Let&#8217;s see.&#8221; He
+took the flask from her, drew a rifle cartridge from
+his belt, and fitted the steel-jacketed bullet into the
+clean, small hole. &#8220;You&#8217;re right, Miss Chuckie.
+It shore was a thirty-eight.&#8221; He turned sharply on
+Ashton. &#8220;Where&#8217;d it happen? Who was it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Over on that dry stream,&#8221; answered Ashton.
+&#8220;Unfortunately the fellow was too far away for me
+to be able to describe him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But we think it may have been his guide,&#8221; explained
+the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Guide?&#8221; muttered Gowan, staring intently at
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. You see, if he was mean enough to help
+steal Mr. Ashton&#8217;s outfit, he&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shore, I savvy!&#8221; exclaimed the puncher. &#8220;I&#8217;ll
+rope a couple of fresh hawsses, and go out with Mr.
+Ashton after the two-legged wolf.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s like you, Kid! But you must wait at least
+until you&#8217;ve both had dinner. Mr. Ashton, I&#8217;m sure,
+is half starved.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Me, too, Miss Chuckie. But you know I&#8217;d
+rather eat a wolf or a rustler or even a daring desperado
+than sinkers and beans, any day.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_67' name='page_67'></a>67</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll come in with us and see what Daddy has
+to say about it,&#8221; the girl insisted.</p>
+<p>She started to loosen her saddle-cinch. Gowan
+handed back the silver flask, and stripping off saddle
+and bridle from her horse, placed them on the rail
+beside his own. Ashton waited, as if expecting a like
+service. The puncher started off beside Miss Isobel
+without looking at him. Ashton flushed hotly, and
+hastened to do his own unsaddling.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_68' name='page_68'></a>68</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_VII_THE_CHANCE_OF_RECLAMATION' id='CHAPTER_VII_THE_CHANCE_OF_RECLAMATION'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER VII</h2>
+<h3>THE CHANCE OF RECLAMATION</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Beyond the bunkhouse, which was the nearest
+building to the corral, stood the low but roomy
+log structure of the main ranch house. As Ashton
+came around the front corner, close behind Gowan
+and the girl, Knowles rose from his comfortable chair
+in the rustic porch, knocked out the half burned contents
+of his pipe and extended a freckled, corded hand
+to the stranger.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Howdy, Mr. Ashton! Glad to see you!&#8221; he
+said with hearty hospitality. &#8220;Hope you&#8217;ve come to
+ease up our lonesomeness by a month or two&#8217;s visit.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, I&ndash;&ndash;You&#8217;re too kind, really!&#8221; replied
+Ashton, his voice quavering and breaking at the unexpected
+cordiality of the welcome. &#8220;If you&ndash;&ndash;I shall
+take advantage of your generous offer. You see, I&#8217;m
+rather in a box, owing to my&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; He caught himself
+up, and tightened his slackening lip. &#8220;But you&#8217;ll
+pardon me if I ask you to let me do something in return
+for your hospitality.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We don&#8217;t sell our hospitality on the range,&#8221;
+brusquely replied the cowman.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_69' name='page_69'></a>69</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, no, no, I did not mean&ndash;&ndash;I could not pay a
+penny. I&#8217;m utterly destitute&ndash;&ndash;a&ndash;&ndash;a pauper!&#8221; A
+spasm of bitter despair contorted his handsome face.</p>
+<p>Knowles and the girl hastily looked away from him,
+that they might not see him in his weakness. But he
+rallied and forced a rather unsteady laugh at himself.
+&#8220;You see, I haven&#8217;t quite got used to it yet.
+I&#8217;ve always had money. I never really had to work.
+Now I must learn to earn a living. It&#8217;s very good of
+you, Mr. Knowles, but&ndash;&ndash;there&#8217;s that veal. If only
+you&#8217;ll let me work out what I owe you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t owe me a cent for the yearling,&#8221; gruffly
+replied the cowman. &#8220;Don&#8217;t know what I could put
+you at, anyway.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Might use him to shoo off the rattlers and jackrabbits
+from in front the mowing machine,&#8221; suggested
+Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Ashton can ride,&#8221; interposed the girl, with a
+friendliness of tone that brought Gowan to a thin-lipped
+silence.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s something,&#8221; said Knowles, gazing speculatively
+at the slim aristocratic figure of the tenderfoot.
+&#8220;You&#8217;re not built for pitching hay, but like
+as not you have the makings of a puncher. Ever
+throw a rope?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Never. I shall start practicing the art&ndash;&ndash;at
+once.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, not until you and Kid have had dinner,&#8221; gayly
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_70' name='page_70'></a>70</span>
+contradicted the girl. &#8220;We&#8217;ve had ours. But Yuki
+always has something ready. Kid, if you&#8217;ll show Mr.
+Ashton where to wash, I&#8217;ll tell Yuki.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She darted through the open doorway into the
+house. At a curt nod from Gowan, Ashton followed
+him around to the far side of the house, leaving
+Knowles in the act of hastily reloading his pipe. Under
+a lean-to that covered a door in the side of the
+house was a barrel of water and a bench with two
+basins. On a row of pegs above hung a number of
+towels, all rumpled but none dirty.</p>
+<p>Gowan pointed to a box of unused towels, and proceeded
+to lather and wash himself. Ashton took a
+towel, and after rinsing out the second washbasin,
+made as fastidious a toilet as the scant conveniences
+of the place would permit. There were combs and a
+fairly good mirror above the soap shelf. Gowan
+went in by the side door, without waiting for his companion.
+Ashton presently followed him, having
+looked in vain for a razor to rid himself of his two
+days&#8217; growth of beard.</p>
+<p>The long table told him that he had entered the
+ranch mess-hall, or rather, dining-room. Though the
+table was covered with oilcloth and the rough-hewn
+logs of the outer walls were lime-plastered only in
+the chinks, the seats were chairs instead of benches,
+and between the gay Mexican <i>serape</i> drapes of the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_71' name='page_71'></a>71</span>
+clean windows hung several well-done water color
+landscapes, appropriately framed in unbarked pine.
+On the oiled deal floor were scattered half a dozen
+Navajo rugs.</p>
+<p>Gowan had taken a seat at one end of the table.
+As Ashton sat down at the neatly laid place opposite
+him, a silent, smiling, deft-handed Jap came in from
+the kitchen with a heaping trayful of dishes. For the
+most part, the food was ordinary ranch fare, but
+cooked with the skill of a <i>chef</i>. The exceptions were
+the fresh milk and delicious unsalted butter. On most
+cattle ranches, the milk comes from &#8220;tin cows&#8221; and
+the butter from oleomargarine tubs.</p>
+<p>The two diners were well along in their meal, eating
+as earnestly and as taciturnly as the Jap served,
+when Miss Isobel came in with her father. The girl
+had dressed for the afternoon in a gown of the latest
+style, whose quiet color and simple lines harmonized
+perfectly with her surroundings. She smiled impartially
+at puncher, tenderfoot, and Jap.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thank you, Yuki. I see you did not keep our
+hungry hunters waiting.&ndash;&ndash;Mr. Ashton, I have told
+Daddy about that shooting.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s a mighty strange happening. You might
+tell us the full particulars,&#8221; said Knowles.</p>
+<p>Ashton at once gave a fairly accurate account of the
+affair. He could hardly exaggerate the peril he had
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_72' name='page_72'></a>72</span>
+incurred, and the touch of exultance with which he
+described his defeat of the murderer was quite pardonable
+in a tenderfoot.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Strange&ndash;&ndash;mighty strange. Can&#8217;t understand
+it,&#8221; commented the cowman when Ashton had finished
+his account.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It shore is, Mr. Knowles,&#8221; added Gowan. &#8220;The
+only thirty-eight on the ranch is mine. That seems to
+clear our people.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course! It could not possibly be any of our
+people!&#8221; exclaimed the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Ashton thinks it might have been his guide,&#8221;
+went on Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;His guide? What caliber was his rifle?&#8221;
+shrewdly queried the cowman.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, I&ndash;&ndash;really I cannot remember,&#8221; answered
+Ashton. &#8220;I know it was of a larger bore than mine,
+but that is all.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Um-m,&#8221; considered Knowles. &#8220;Looks rather like
+he&#8217;s the man. Can&#8217;t think of anyone else. Trouble
+is, if he was laying in wait for you, his horse would be
+fresh. Must have covered a right smart bit of territory
+by now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll go out and take a look at his tracks,&#8221; said
+Gowan, rising with a readiness that brought a nod of
+approval from his employer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll be careful, Kid,&#8221; cautioned the girl, with
+a shade of concern in her tone.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_73' name='page_73'></a>73</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;ll keep his eye open, Chuckie,&#8221; reassured her
+father. &#8220;It&#8217;s the other fellow wants to be careful,
+if he hasn&#8217;t already vamoosed. Hey, Kid?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll get him, if I get the chance,&#8221; laconically replied
+Gowan, looking from the girl to Ashton with the
+characteristic straightening of his lips that marked the
+tensing of his emotions.</p>
+<p>As he left the room Miss Isobel smiled and nodded
+to Ashton. &#8220;You see how friendly he is, in spite of
+his cold manner to strangers. I thought he had taken
+a dislike to you, yet you saw how readily he offered to
+go out after your assailant.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;More likely it&#8217;s because he thinks it would discredit
+us to let such a scoundrel get away,&#8221; differed
+her father. &#8220;However, he&#8217;ll leave you alone, Mr.
+Ashton, if you stay with us as a guest, and will only
+haze you a bit, if you insist upon joining our force.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You mean, working for you? I must insist on
+that,&#8221; said Ashton, with an eager look at the girl.
+&#8220;If only I can do well enough to be employed right
+along!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The cowman grunted, and winked solemnly at his
+daughter. &#8220;Yes, I can understand your feeling that
+way. How about the winter, though? You mayn&#8217;t
+like it over here so well then.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton flushed and laughed at the older man&#8217;s
+shrewdness; hesitated, and confessed candidly: &#8220;No,
+I should prefer Denver in winter.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_74' name='page_74'></a>74</span></p>
+<p>Miss Isobel blushed in adorable payment of his compliment,
+but thrust back at him: &#8220;We bar cowboys
+in the Sacred Thirty-six.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He winced. Her stroke had pierced into his raw
+wound.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh!&ndash;&ndash;oh!&#8221; she breathlessly exclaimed. &#8220;I
+didn&#8217;t mean to&ndash;&ndash;Oh, I&#8217;m so sorry!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He dashed the tears from his eyes. &#8220;No, you&ndash;&ndash;don&#8217;t
+apologize! It&#8217;s only that I&#8217;m&ndash;&ndash;Please
+don&#8217;t fancy I&#8217;m a baby! You see, when a fellow has
+always lived high&ndash;&ndash;on top, you know&ndash;&ndash;and then to
+have everything go out from under him without warning!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Keep a stiff upper lip, son,&#8221; advised Knowles.
+&#8220;You&#8217;ll pull through all right. It isn&#8217;t everyone in
+your fix that would be asking for work.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton laughed a trifle unsteadily. &#8220;It&#8217;s very kind
+of you to say that, Mr. Knowles. I&ndash;&ndash;I wish a
+steady position, winter as well as summer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How about Denver?&#8221; asked Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That can wait,&#8221; replied Ashton. He met the
+girl&#8217;s smile of approval, and rallied fully. &#8220;Yes, that
+can wait&ndash;&ndash;and so can I.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Again the girl blushed, but she found a bantering
+rejoinder: &#8220;With you and Kid and Daddy all waiting
+for me to come home, I suppose I&#8217;ll have to cut
+the season short.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The winters here are like those you read about up
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_75' name='page_75'></a>75</span>
+at the North Pole,&#8221; the cowman informed Ashton.
+&#8220;But we get our sunshine back along in the spring.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Daddy! you&#8217;re a poet!&#8221; cried his daughter,
+flinging her arm around his sunburnt neck.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Wish I were one!&#8221; enviously sighed Ashton.
+The cowman gave him a look that brought him to his
+feet. &#8220;Mr. Knowles,&#8221; he hastened to ask, &#8220;if you&#8217;ll
+kindly tell me what my work is to be this afternoon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The older man&#8217;s frown relaxed. &#8220;Did you come
+out here from Stockchute?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Think you could find your way back?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, yes; though we wandered all around&ndash;&ndash;But
+surely, Mr. Knowles, you&#8217;ll not require me&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I want a man to ride over with some letters and
+fetch the mail. I&#8217;ll need Gowan for work you can&#8217;t
+do. Chuckie was to have gone; but I can&#8217;t let her
+now, until we&#8217;re more sure about that man who shot
+at you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I see.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, have you got the nerve, in case the man is
+loose over that way?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton&#8217;s eyes flashed. &#8220;I&#8217;ll go! Perhaps I&#8217;ll
+get another crack at the scoundrel.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Keep cool. It&#8217;s ninety-nine chances in the hundred
+he&#8217;s on the run and&#8217;ll keep going all week.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shall I start now? As we came by a very roundabout
+way&ndash;&ndash;We went first in the opposite direction,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_76' name='page_76'></a>76</span>
+and then skirted High Mesa down from the mountains.
+So, you see, I may have a little difficulty&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No you won&#8217;t. There&#8217;s our wagon trail. Even
+if you got off that, all you&#8217;d have to do would be to
+keep headed for Split Peak. That&#8217;s right in line
+with Stockchute. But you&#8217;ll not start till morning. I
+haven&#8217;t got all my letters written. That&#8217;ll give you
+all day to go and come. It&#8217;s only twenty-five miles
+over there. Chuckie, you show this new puncher of
+ours over the place, while I write those letters.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll start teaching him how to throw a rope,&#8221;
+volunteered the girl.</p>
+<p>She led the way out through a daintily furnished
+front room, in which Ashton observed an upright piano
+and other articles of culture that he would never have
+expected to come upon in this remote section. In
+passing, the girl picked up a wide-brimmed lacy hat.</p>
+<p>Once outside, she first took Ashton for a walk up
+Plum Creek to where half a dozen men were at work
+with a mowing machine and horse rakes making hay
+of the rich bunch-grass.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Daddy feeds all he can in winter,&#8221; she explained.
+&#8220;The spring when I first came back from Denver I
+cried so over the starving cattle that he promised to
+always afterwards cut and stack all the hay he could.
+And he has found it pays to feed well. We would put
+a lot of land into oats, but, as you see, there&#8217;s not
+enough water in the creek.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_77' name='page_77'></a>77</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s where an irrigation system would come
+in,&#8221; remarked Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, I hope you don&#8217;t think it possible to water
+our mesa!&#8221; she cried. &#8220;I told you how it would
+break up our range.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I assure you, I don&#8217;t think at all,&#8221; he replied.
+&#8220;I&#8217;m not a reclamation engineer&ndash;&ndash;never specialized
+on hydraulics.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She flashed an odd look at him. &#8220;You never?
+But Mr. Blake&ndash;&ndash;that wonderful engineer of the
+Zariba Dam&ndash;&ndash;he would know, wouldn&#8217;t he?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;suppose he would&ndash;&ndash;that is, if he&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; Ashton
+hesitated, and exclaimed, &#8220;But that&#8217;s just it!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What?&#8221; she asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, to&ndash;&ndash;to have him come here. He&#8217;s the
+luckiest for blundering on ways to do things,&#8221; muttered
+Ashton. He added with growing bitterness:
+&#8220;Yes, if there&#8217;s any way at all to do it, you&#8217;d have
+him flooding your whole range&ndash;&ndash;deluging it. He&#8217;s
+got all those millions to back him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You do not like him,&#8221; said the girl. She looked
+off towards High Mesa, her face glowing with suppressed
+excitement. &#8220;No doubt you are right&ndash;&ndash;as
+to his ability. But&ndash;&ndash;don&#8217;t you see?&ndash;&ndash;if it can be
+done, it is bound to be done sooner or later. All the
+time Daddy and I&ndash;&ndash;and Kid, too&ndash;&ndash;are living under
+this constant dread that it may be possible. But if
+such an engineer as&ndash;&ndash;as Mr. Blake came and looked
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_78' name='page_78'></a>78</span>
+over the situation and told us we needn&#8217;t fear&ndash;&ndash;don&#8217;t
+you see how&ndash;&ndash;?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t mean that you&ndash;&ndash;?&#8221; Ashton, in turn,
+left his question unfinished and averted his face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; she answered. &#8220;I&#8217;m sure it will be best to
+put an end to this uncertainty. So I believe I shall
+send for&ndash;&ndash;for Mr. Blake.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&ndash;&ndash;why for&ndash;&ndash;for him&ndash;&ndash;in particular?&#8221; he
+stammered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am sorry you dislike him,&#8221; she said, regaining
+her composure when she saw that he too was agitated.</p>
+<p>He did not reply. She tactfully changed the subject.
+By the time they had circled around, back to the half
+open feed-sheds, he was gayly chatting with her on
+music and the drama. When they came down to the
+horse corral she proceeded to lecture him on the duties
+of a cowboy and showed him how to hold and throw
+a rope. Under her skillful tuition, he at last learned
+the knack of casting an open noose.</p>
+<p>Evening was near when they returned to the house.
+As before, they caught Knowles in the front porch contentedly
+puffing at his pipe. He dropped it down out
+of sight. The girl shook her finger at him, nodded to
+Ashton, and went indoors. Immediately the cowman
+put his pipe back into his mouth and drew another from
+his pocket, together with an unopened sack of tobacco.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Smoke?&#8221; he asked.</p>
+<p>Ashton&#8217;s eyes gleamed. In the girl&#8217;s presence he
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_79' name='page_79'></a>79</span>
+had been able to restrain the fierce craving that had
+tortured him since dinner. Now it so overmastered
+him that he almost snatched the pipe and tobacco out
+of the cowman&#8217;s hand. The latter gravely shook his
+head.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Got it that bad, have you?&#8221; he deplored.</p>
+<p>Ashton could not answer until his pipe was well under
+way.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;m breaking off,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;Haven&#8217;t
+had a cigarette all day&ndash;&ndash;nor anything else. A-ah!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Glad you like it,&#8221; said Knowles. &#8220;A pipe is all
+right with this kind of tobacco. You can&#8217;t inhale it
+like you can cigarettes, unless you want to strangle.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall break off entirely as soon as I can,&#8221; asserted
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well,&#8221; considered Knowles, &#8220;I&#8217;m not saying you
+can&#8217;t or won&#8217;t. It&#8217;s mighty curious what a young fellow
+can do to please a pretty girl. Just the same, I&#8217;d
+say from the color of Kid&#8217;s fingers that he hasn&#8217;t forgotten
+how to roll a fat Mexican <i>cigaretto</i>.&ndash;&ndash;Hello!
+&#8216;Talk of the devil&ndash;&ndash;&#8217; Here he comes now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan came around the corner of the house, his
+spurs jingling. His eyes were as cold and his face as
+emotionless as usual.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well?&#8221; asked Knowles. &#8220;Have a seat.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Didn&#8217;t get him,&#8221; reported Gowan, dropping into
+a chair. &#8220;Near as I could make out, he cut straight
+across for the railroad, on the jump.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_80' name='page_80'></a>80</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Then it must have been that guide!&#8221; exclaimed
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Looks that way,&#8221; added Knowles. &#8220;Glad of it.
+We won&#8217;t see him again, unless you want to notify the
+sheriff, when you ride over tomorrow.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, oh, no. I am satisfied to be rid of him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If he don&#8217;t come back,&#8221; remarked Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He won&#8217;t,&#8221; predicted Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, not for a time maybe,&#8221; agreed Gowan.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_81' name='page_81'></a>81</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_VIII_A_MANS_SIZE_HORSE' id='CHAPTER_VIII_A_MANS_SIZE_HORSE'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER VIII</h2>
+<h3>A MAN&#8217;S SIZE HORSE</h3>
+</div>
+<p>At dusk the sonorous boom of a Japanese gong
+gave warning of the approach of the supper hour.
+A few minutes later a second booming summoned all
+in to the meal. Miss Isobel sat at one end of the
+table; her father at the other. Along the sides were
+the employ&eacute;s, Ashton and Gowan at the corners nearest
+the girl. A large coal oil lamp with an artistic
+shade cast a pink light on the clean white oilcloth of
+the table and the simple tasteful table service.</p>
+<p>Yuki, the silent Jap, served all with strict impartiality,
+starting with the mistress of the house and going
+around the table in regular succession, either one way
+or the other. The six rough-appearing haymakers
+used their knives with a freedom to which Ashton was
+unaccustomed, but their faces were clean, their behavior
+quiet, and their occasional remarks by no means
+inapt.</p>
+<p>After the meal they wished Miss Knowles a pleasant
+&#8220;Good-night,&#8221; and left for the bunkhouse. But Ashton
+and Gowan, at the smiling invitation of the girl,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_82' name='page_82'></a>82</span>
+followed her into the front room. Knowles came in
+a few minutes later and, with scarcely a glance at the
+young people, settled down beside a tableful of periodicals
+and magazines to study the latest Government report
+on the reclamation service.</p>
+<p>Ashton had entered the &#8220;parlor&#8221; under the impression
+that here he would have Gowan at a disadvantage.
+To his surprise, the puncher proved to be quite at
+ease; his manners were correct and his conversation by
+no means provincial. A moment&#8217;s reflection showed
+Ashton that this could not well be otherwise, in view
+of the young fellow&#8217;s intimacy with Miss Chuckie Isobel.</p>
+<p>Another surprise was the discovery that Gowan had
+a remarkably good ear for music and knew even more
+than the girl about the masters and their works.
+There was a player attachment to the piano, and the
+girl and Gowan had a contest, playing the same selections
+in turn, to see which could get the most expression
+by means of the mechanical apparatus. If anything,
+the girl came out second best. At least she said so; but
+Ashton would not admit it.</p>
+<p>Between times the three chatted on a thousand and
+one topics, the girl always ready to bubble over with
+animation and merriment. She bestowed her dimpled
+smiles on both her admirers with strict impartiality and
+as impartially stimulated each to his best with her
+tact and gay wit.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_83' name='page_83'></a>83</span></p>
+<p>At nine o&#8217;clock sharp Knowles closed his report and
+rose from his comfortable seat.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Time to turn in, boys. Coal oil costs more than
+sunlight,&#8221; he announced, in the flat tone of a standing
+joke. &#8220;We&#8217;ll take a jog down creek to the Bar-Lazy-J
+ranch, first thing tomorrow, Kid.&ndash;&ndash;Ashton,
+you&#8217;d better start off in the cool, before sunup.
+Here&#8217;s my bunch of letters, case I might forget them.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He handed over half a dozen thinly padded envelopes.
+Gowan was already at the door, hat in hand.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good night, Mr. Knowles. Good night, Miss
+Chuckie. Pleasant dreams!&#8221; he said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Same to you, Kid!&#8221; replied the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;May I give and receive the same?&#8221; asked Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course,&#8221; she answered. &#8220;But wait a moment,
+please. I&#8217;ve some letters to go, myself, if you&#8217;ll
+kindly take them with Daddy&#8217;s.&#8221;</p>
+<p>As she darted into a side room, Knowles stepped
+out after Gowan. When the girl returned, Ashton
+took the letters that she held out to him and deliberately
+started to tie them in a packet with those
+of her father. His sole purpose was to prolong his
+stay to the last possible moment. But inadvertently
+his eye caught the name &#8220;Blake&#8221; on one of the envelopes.
+His smile vanished; his jaw dropped.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, Mr. Ashton, what is the matter?&#8221; said
+the girl.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_84' name='page_84'></a>84</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;I beg your pardon,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;I did not
+realize that&ndash;&ndash;But it&#8217;s too absurd&ndash;&ndash;it can&#8217;t be!
+You did not mean what you said this afternoon. It
+can&#8217;t be you&#8217;re writing to that man to come here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am,&#8221; she replied.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But you can&#8217;t&ndash;&ndash;you must not. He&#8217;s the very
+devil for doing impossible things. He&#8217;ll be sure to
+turn loose a flood on you&ndash;&ndash;drown you out&ndash;&ndash;destroy
+your range!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If it can be done, the sooner we know it the better,&#8221;
+she argued. &#8220;Daddy says little, but it is becoming
+a monomania with him&ndash;&ndash;the dread. I wish
+to put an end to his suspense. Besides, if&ndash;&ndash;if this
+Mr. Blake is as remarkable as you and the reports say
+he is, it will be interesting to meet him. My only
+fear is that so great an engineer will not think it worth
+while to come to this out-of-the-way section.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The big four-flusher!&#8221; muttered Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How you must dislike him! It makes me all the
+more curious to see him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Does your father know about this letter?&#8221; queried
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You forget yourself, sir,&#8221; she said.</p>
+<p>Meeting her level gaze, he flushed crimson with
+mortification. He stood biting his lip, unable to
+speak.</p>
+<p>She went on coldly: &#8220;I do not ask you to tell me
+the cause of your hatred for Mr. Blake. I assume
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_85' name='page_85'></a>85</span>
+that you are a gentleman and will not destroy my letter.
+But even if you should do so, it would mean only
+a short delay. I shall write him again if I receive no
+reply to this.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton&#8217;s flush deepened. &#8220;I did not think you could
+be so hard. But&ndash;&ndash;I presume I deserved it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, you did,&#8221; she agreed, with no lessening of
+her coldness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I see you will not accept an apology, Miss
+Knowles. However, I give you my word that I will
+deliver your letter to the postmaster at Stockchute.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He started out, very stiff and erect. As he passed
+through the doorway she suddenly relented and called
+after him: &#8220;Good night, Mr. Ashton! Pleasant
+dreams!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He wheeled and would have stepped back to reply
+had not Knowles spoken to him from the darkness at
+the end of the porch: &#8220;This way, Ashton. Kid is
+waiting to show you to the bunkhouse. You&#8217;ll find
+a clean bunk and new blankets. I&#8217;ve also issued you
+corduroy pants and a pair of leather chaps from the
+commissary. Those city riding togs aren&#8217;t hardly the
+thing on the range. There&#8217;s a spare saddle, if you
+want to change off from yours.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thank you for the other things; but I prefer my
+own saddle,&#8221; replied Ashton.</p>
+<p>He now perceived the dim form of Gowan starting
+off in the starlight, and followed him to the bunkhouse.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_86' name='page_86'></a>86</span>
+The other men were already in their beds,
+fast asleep and half of them snoring. Gowan silently
+lit a lantern and showed the tenderfoot to an unoccupied
+bunk in the far corner of the rough but clean
+building. After a curt request for Ashton to blow out
+the lantern when through with the light, he withdrew,
+to tumble into a bunk near the door.</p>
+<p>Ashton removed twice as many garments as had the
+puncher, and slipped in between his fresh new blankets,
+after several minutes spent in finding out how to
+extinguish the lantern. For some time he lay listening.
+He had often read of the practical jokes that
+cowboys are supposed always to play on tenderfeet.
+But the steady concert of the snoring sleepers was unbroken
+by any horseplay. Presently he, too, fell
+asleep.</p>
+<p>He was wakened by a general stir in the bunkhouse.
+Day had not yet come, but by the light of a lantern
+near the door he could see his fellow employ&eacute;s passing
+out. He dressed as hastily as he could in his
+gloomy corner, putting on his new trousers and the
+stiff leather chapareras in place of his breeches and
+leggings. Gowan came in, glanced at him with a
+trace of surprise, and went out with the lantern.</p>
+<p>Ashton followed to the house and around into the
+side porch. The other men were making their morning
+toilets by lantern light, each drying face and hands
+on his own towel. Ashton and Gowan waited their
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_87' name='page_87'></a>87</span>
+turn at the basins, and together went into the lamplit
+dining-room, where the Jap cook was serving bacon,
+coffee, and hot bread. Ashton lingered over his meal,
+hoping to see Miss Isobel. But neither she nor her
+father appeared.</p>
+<p>Gowan had gone out with the other men. Presently
+he came back to the side door and remarked in
+almost a friendly tone: &#8220;Your hawss is ready whenever
+you are, Ashton.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thanks,&#8221; said Ashton, rising. &#8220;The poor old
+brute must be rather stiff after the spurring I gave him
+yesterday.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan did not reply. He had gone out again.
+Somewhat nettled, Ashton hastened after him.
+Dawn had come. The gray light in the east was
+brightening to an exquisite pink. The clear twilight
+showed the puncher waiting at the front of the house
+beside a saddled horse. A glance showed Ashton that
+the saddle and bridle were his own, but that the horse
+was a big, rawboned beast.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s not my pony,&#8221; he said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This here Rocket hawss ain&#8217;t <i>any</i> pony,&#8221; agreed
+Gowan. &#8220;He&#8217;s a man&#8217;s size hawss. Ain&#8217;t afraid
+you&#8217;ll drop too far when you fall off, are you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re trying to get me on a bucking bronco!&#8221;
+said Ashton, suspiciously eying the bony, wild-eyed
+brute.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s no outlaw,&#8221; reassured Gowan. &#8220;Most all
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_88' name='page_88'></a>88</span>
+our hawsses are liable to prance some when they&#8217;ve
+et too many rattlers. But Miss Chuckie said you can
+ride.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can,&#8221; said Ashton, tightening the thong of his
+sombrero down across the back of his head and buttoning
+his coat.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Roped this Rocket hawss for you because Mr.
+Knowles wants his mail by sundown,&#8221; remarked
+Gowan. &#8220;He shore can travel some when he feels
+like it. Don&#8217;t know as you&#8217;ll need your spurs.
+Here&#8217;s a five-spot Mr. Knowles said to hand you by
+way of advance. Thought you might want to refresh
+yourself over at Stockchute. Wouldn&#8217;t rather have
+another saddle and bridle, would you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Kindly thank Mr. Knowles for me,&#8221; said Ashton,
+pocketing the five dollar bill. &#8220;No&ndash;&ndash;the horse is
+hard-mouthed, but I prefer my own saddle and bridle.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He drew his rifle from its sheath, wiped the dew
+from the butt, and tested the mechanism. The horse
+cocked his ears, but stood motionless while the rifle
+was taken out and replaced. Ashton picked up the
+reins from the ground and threw them over the horse&#8217;s
+head. The beast did not swing around, but his ewe
+neck straightened and his entire body stiffened to a
+peculiar rigidity.</p>
+<p>Ashton tested the tightness of his saddle girth, and
+paused to gaze at the closed front door of the house.
+Aside from his saddle and burlesque sombrero, he
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_89' name='page_89'></a>89</span>
+looked every inch a puncher, both in dress and in bearing.
+But Miss Isobel missed the effect of his new
+<i>ensemble</i>. She missed also the interesting spectacle
+of his mounting.</p>
+<p>If he had never ridden a cow pony he would have
+been thrown and dragged the instant he put his foot in
+the narrow metal stirrup. The horse was watching
+him alertly, every muscle tense. Ashton smiled confidently,
+spoke to the beast in a quiet tone, and pulled
+on the off rein. The horse bent his head to the pull,
+for the moment off his guard. In a twinkling Ashton
+had his foot in the stirrup and was up in the saddle.
+His toe slipped into the other stirrup as the horse
+jumped sideways.</p>
+<p>The leap was tremendous, but it failed to unseat
+Ashton. It was instantly followed by other wild
+jumps&ndash;&ndash;whirling forward and sidelong leaps, interspersed
+with frantic plunging and rearing. Gowan
+looked on, agape with amazement. The tenderfoot
+stuck fast on his flat little saddle and only once pulled
+leather. Rocket was not a star bucker, but he had
+thrown more than one half-baked cowboy.</p>
+<p>Finding that he could not unseat his rider, the beast
+suddenly gave over his plunging, and bolted at furious
+speed down the smooth slope towards Plum Creek.
+Before they had gone half a furlong Ashton realized
+that he was on a blooded horse of unusual speed and
+a runaway. He could not hope to pull down so tough-mouthed
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_90' name='page_90'></a>90</span>
+a beast with his ordinary curb. The best he
+could do was to throw all his weight on the right rein.
+Unable altogether to resist the steady tug at his head,
+the racing horse gradually swerved until he was
+headed across the mesa towards the jagged, snow-streaked
+twin crests of Split Peak.</p>
+<p>Horse and rider were still in the curve of their swift
+flight when Isobel Knowles came out into the porch,
+yawning behind her plump, sunbrowned hand. A
+glance at Gowan cut the yawn short. She looked
+alertly afield and at once caught sight of the runaway.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Kid!&ndash;&ndash;O-oh!&#8221; she cried. &#8220;Mr. Ashton!&ndash;&ndash;on
+Rocket!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan spun about to her with a guilty start, but
+answered almost glibly: &#8220;You said he could ride,
+Miss Chuckie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;ll&ndash;&ndash;he&#8217;ll be killed!&ndash;&ndash;Daddy!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Knowles stepped out through the doorway, cocking
+his big blue-barreled Colt&#8217;s. Gowan hastily
+pointed towards the runaway. Knowles looked, and
+dropped the revolver to his side. &#8220;What&#8217;s up?&#8221; he
+growled.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Kid&ndash;&ndash;he&ndash;&ndash;he put Mr. Ashton on Rocket!&#8221;
+breathlessly answered his daughter.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sorry to contradict you, Miss Chuckie,&#8221; said
+Gowan. &#8220;He put himself on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s on yet,&#8221; dryly commented the cowman.
+&#8220;May be something to that boy, after all.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_91' name='page_91'></a>91</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;But, Daddy!&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now, just stop fussing yourself, honey. He and
+Rocket are going smooth as axlegrease and bee-lining
+for Stockchute. How did the hawss start off?&ndash;&ndash;skittish?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Enough to make the tenderfoot pull leather,&#8221;
+said Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If he stuck at all, with that fool saddle&ndash;&ndash;!&#8221; rejoined
+Knowles. &#8220;Don&#8217;t you worry, honey. He sure
+can fork a hawss&ndash;&ndash;that tenderfoot.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, yes,&#8221; the girl sighed with relief. &#8220;If Rocket
+started off bucking, and he kept his seat, of course it&#8217;s
+all right. See him take that gully!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You sure gave me a start, honey, calling out that
+way.&ndash;&ndash;Well, Kid, it&#8217;s about time we were off. I&#8217;ll
+get my hat.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan stepped nearer the girl as her father went
+inside. &#8220;I&#8217;ll leave it to the tenderfoot to tell you,
+Miss Chuckie. He&#8217;ll have to own up I gave him fair
+warning. Told him he wouldn&#8217;t need his spurs, and
+asked if he&#8217;d have another bit and saddle; but it
+wasn&#8217;t any use. He&#8217;s the kind that won&#8217;t take advice.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know you meant it as a joke, Kid. You did not
+realize the danger of his narrow stirrups. Had he
+been caught in mounting or had he been thrown, he
+would almost certainly have been dragged. And for
+you to give him our one ugly hawss!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_92' name='page_92'></a>92</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You said he could ride,&#8221; the puncher defended
+himself.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll forgive you for your joke&ndash;&ndash;if he comes back
+safe,&#8221; she qualified, without turning her gaze from the
+now distant horse and rider.</p>
+<p>Gowan started for the corral, the slight waddle of
+his bowlegged gait rather more pronounced than
+usual. When Knowles came out with his hat, the runaway
+was well up on the divide towards Dry Fork.
+Rocket was justifying his name.</p>
+<p>In a few seconds the flying horse and rider had
+disappeared down the far slope. The girl followed
+her father and Gowan to the corral, and after they had
+ridden off, she roped and saddled one of the three
+horses in the corral. She mounted and was off on the
+jump, riding straight for the nearest point on the
+summit of the divide.</p>
+<p>As, presently, she came up towards the top of the
+rise, she gazed anxiously ahead towards Dry Fork.
+Before she could see over the bend down to the creek
+channel, she caught sight of a cloud of dust far out on
+the mesa beyond the stream. She smiled with relief
+and wheeled about to return. The tenderfoot had
+safely crossed the stream bed. He would have Rocket
+well in hand before they came to rough country.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_93' name='page_93'></a>93</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_IX_THE_SNAKE' id='CHAPTER_IX_THE_SNAKE'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER IX</h2>
+<h3>THE SNAKE</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Early in the afternoon, having nothing else to do,
+Isobel again saddled up and started off towards
+Dry Fork. Her intention was to ride out on the road
+to Stockchute and meet Ashton, if he was not too
+late.</p>
+<p>As she rode up one side of the divide, a hat appeared
+over the bend of the other side. She could
+not mistake the high peak of that comic opera sombrero.
+Ashton was almost back to the ranch. Her
+first thought was that he had gone part way, and
+given up the trip. The big sombrero bobbed up and
+down in an odd manner. She guessed the cause even
+before Ashton&#8217;s head and body appeared, rising and
+falling rhythmically. She stared as Rocket swept up
+into view, covering the ground with a long-strided
+trot.</p>
+<p>Ashton waved to her. She waved back. A few
+moments later they were close together. As she spun
+her pony around, he pulled in his horse to a walk, patting
+the beast&#8217;s neck and speaking to him caressingly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Back already?&#8221; she asked. &#8220;Surely, you&#8217;ve
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_94' name='page_94'></a>94</span>
+not been to Stockchute&ndash;&ndash;Yes, you have!&#8221; Her
+experienced eye was taking in every indication of his
+horse&#8217;s condition. &#8220;He&#8217;s been traveling; but you&#8217;ve
+handled him well.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s grand!&#8221; said Ashton. &#8220;Been putting him
+through his paces. I suppose he is your father&#8217;s best
+mount.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Daddy and Kid ride him when they&#8217;re in a hurry
+or there&#8217;s no other horse handy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You can&#8217;t mean&ndash;&ndash;? Then perhaps I can have
+him again occasionally.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You like him, really?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All he needs is a little management,&#8221; replied Ashton,
+again patting the horse&#8217;s lean neck.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you wish to take him in hand, I&#8217;ll assign him to
+you. No one else wants him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;As your rural deliveryman&#8217;s mount&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; began
+Ashton. He stopped to show the bulging bag slung
+under his arm. &#8220;Here&#8217;s the mail. Do you wish
+your letters now?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thank you, no.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Here is this, however,&#8221; he said, handing her a
+folded slip of paper.</p>
+<p>She opened it and looked at the writing inside. It
+was a receipt from the postmaster at Stockchute to
+Lafayette Ashton for certain letters delivered for
+mailing. The address of the letter to Thomas Blake
+was given in full. The girl colored, bit her lip, and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_95' name='page_95'></a>95</span>
+murmured contritely: &#8220;You have turned the tables
+on me. I deserved it!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Please don&#8217;t take it that way!&#8221; he begged. &#8220;My
+purpose was merely to assure you the letter was
+mailed. After all, I am a stranger, Miss Knowles.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, not now,&#8221; she differed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s very kind of you to say it! Yet it&#8217;s just as
+well for me to start off with no doubts in your mind,
+in view of the fact that in two or three weeks&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes?&#8221; she asked, as he hesitated.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;Your father will hardly keep me more than
+two weeks, unless&ndash;&ndash;unless I make good,&#8221; he answered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I guess you needn&#8217;t worry about that,&#8221; she replied,
+somewhat ambiguously.</p>
+<p>He shrugged. &#8220;It is very good of you to say it,
+Miss Knowles. I know I shall fail. Can you expect
+anyone who has always lived within touch of millions,
+one who has spent more in four years at college
+than all this range is worth&ndash;&ndash;He cut my allowance
+repeatedly, until it was only a beggarly twenty-five
+thousand.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Twenty-five thousand dollars!&#8221; exclaimed Isobel.
+&#8220;You had all that to&ndash;&ndash;to throw away in a single
+year?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He cut me down to it the last year&ndash;&ndash;a mere
+bagatelle to what I had all the time I was at college
+and Tech.,&#8221; replied Ashton, his eyes sparkling at the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_96' name='page_96'></a>96</span>
+recollection. &#8220;He wished me to get in thick with
+the New Yorkers, the sons of the Wall Street leaders.
+He gave me leave to draw on him without limit. I
+did what he wished me to do,&ndash;&ndash;I got in with the
+most exclusive set. Ah-h!&ndash;&ndash;the way I made the
+dollars fly! Before I graduated I was the acknowledged
+leader. What&#8217;s more, I led my class, too&ndash;&ndash;when
+I chose.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;When you chose!&#8221; she echoed. &#8220;And now what
+are you going to do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The question punctured his reminiscent elation.
+He sagged down in his saddle. &#8220;I don&#8217;t know,&#8221; he
+answered despondently. &#8220;<i>Mon Dieu!</i> To come
+down to this&ndash;&ndash;a common laborer for wages&ndash;&ndash;after
+<i>that</i>! When I think of it&ndash;&ndash;when I think of it!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You are not to think of it again!&#8221; she commanded
+with kindly severity. &#8220;What you are to remember
+all the time is that you are now a man and honestly
+earning your own living, and no longer a&ndash;&ndash;a leech
+battening on the sustenance produced by others.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He winced. &#8220;Was that my fault?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, it was your father&#8217;s. I marvel that he did
+not utterly ruin you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He has! In his last will he cuts me off with only
+a dollar.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So that was it?&ndash;&ndash;And you think that ruined you?
+I say it saved you!&#8221; she went on with the same kindly
+severity. &#8220;You were a parasite. Now the chance is
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_97' name='page_97'></a>97</span>
+yours to prove that you have the makings of a man.
+You have started to prove it. You shall not stop
+proving it. You are not going to be a quitter.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No!&#8221; he declared, straightening under her bright
+gaze. &#8220;I will not quit. I will try my best to make
+good as long as the chance is given me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now you&#8217;re talking!&#8221; she commended him
+breezily.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How could I do otherwise when you asked me?&#8221;
+he replied with a grave sincerity far more complimentary
+than mere gallantry.</p>
+<p>She colored with pleasure and began to tell him of
+the cattle and their ways.</p>
+<p>When they reached the corral she complimented him
+in turn by allowing him to offsaddle her horse. They
+walked on down to the house and seated themselves
+in the porch. As he opened the bag of mail for her
+she noticed that her hand was empty and turned to
+look back towards the corral.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Your receipt from the postmaster,&#8221; she remarked;
+&#8220;I must have dropped it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He sprang up. &#8220;If you wish to keep it, I shall
+go back and find it for you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, oh, no; unless you want it yourself,&#8221; she replied.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not I. The matter is closed, thanks to your kindness,&#8221;
+he declared, again seating himself.</p>
+<p>He was right, in so far as they were concerned.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_98' name='page_98'></a>98</span>
+Yet the matter was not closed. That evening, when
+Knowles and Gowan returned from their day of range
+riding, the younger man noticed a crumpled slip of
+paper lying against the foot of the corral post below
+the place where he tossed up his saddle. He picked
+it up and looked to see if it was of any value. An
+oath burst from his thin-drawn lips.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shut up, Kid!&#8221; remonstrated Knowles. &#8220;I&#8217;m no
+more squeamish than most, but you know I don&#8217;t like
+any cussing so near Chuckie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look at this!&#8221; cried Gowan&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;Enough to make
+anybody cuss!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He thrust out the slip of paper close before his employer&#8217;s
+eyes. Knowles took it and read it through
+with deliberate care.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well?&#8221; he said. &#8220;It&#8217;s a receipt from the postmaster
+to Ashton for those letters I sent over by him.
+What of it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Your</i> letters?&#8221; asked Gowan, taken aback.
+&#8220;Did you write that one what is most particularly
+mentioned, the one to that big engineer Blake?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. What would I be doing, writing to him or
+any engineer? They&#8217;re just the people I don&#8217;t want
+to have any doings with.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then if you didn&#8217;t write him, who did?&#8221; questioned
+Gowan, his mouth again tightening.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, I reckon you&#8217;ll have to do your own guessing,
+Kid&ndash;&ndash;unless it might be Ashton did it.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_99' name='page_99'></a>99</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s one leg roped,&#8221; said Gowan. &#8220;Can you
+guess why he&#8217;d be writing to that engineer?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lord, no. He may have the luck to know him.
+Mr. Blake is a mighty big man, judging from all accounts;
+but money stands for a lot in the cities and
+back East, and Ashton&#8217;s father is one of the richest
+men in Chicago. I looked it up in the magazine that
+told about his helping to back the Zariba Dam project.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s another leg noosed&ndash;&ndash;on the second
+throw,&#8221; said Gowan. &#8220;Another try or two, and we&#8217;ll
+have the skunk ready for hog-tying.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How&#8217;s that?&#8221; exclaimed the cowman. &#8220;You&#8217;ve
+got something up your sleeve.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, it&#8217;s that striped skunk that&#8217;s doing the
+crooked playing,&#8221; snapped Gowan. &#8220;Can&#8217;t you
+savvy his game? It&#8217;s all a frame-up&ndash;&ndash;his sending
+off his guide and outfit, so&#8217;s to let on to you he&#8217;d been
+busted up and kicked out by his dad. You take him in
+to keep his pretty carcass from the coyotes&ndash;&ndash;which
+has saved them from being poisoned.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now, look here, Kid, only trouble about you
+you&#8217;re too apt to go off at half-cock. This young fellow
+may not be&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He shore is a snake, Mr. Knowles, and this receipt
+proves it on him,&#8221; broke in the puncher. &#8220;Ain&#8217;t
+you taken him into your employ?&ndash;&ndash;ain&#8217;t you treated
+him like he was a man?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_100' name='page_100'></a>100</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, &#8217;tisn&#8217;t every busted millionaire would have
+asked for work, and he seems to mean it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just a bluff! You don&#8217;t savvy the game yet.
+Busted millionaire&ndash;&ndash;<i>bah!</i> He&#8217;s the coyote of that
+bunch of reclamation wolves. He comes out here to
+sneak around and get the lay of things. We happen
+to catch him rustling. To save his cussed carcass, he
+lets out about who his dad is. Course he couldn&#8217;t
+know we&#8217;d got all the reports on that Zariba Dam
+and who backed the engineer, nor that we&#8217;d know all
+about Blake.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well?&#8221; asked Knowles, frowning.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So he works us for suckers,&ndash;&ndash;worms in here with
+us where he can learn all about you and your holdings;
+ropes a job with you, and gets off his report to
+that engineer Blake, first time he rides over to town.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is that all your argument?&#8221; asked Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ain&#8217;t it enough?&#8221; rejoined Gowan. &#8220;Ain&#8217;t he
+and that bunch all in cahoots together? Ain&#8217;t this
+sneaking cuss&#8217;s dad either the partner or the boss of
+Blake? Ain&#8217;t Blake engaged in reclamation projects?
+You shore see all that. What follows?&ndash;&ndash;It&#8217;s all a
+frame-up, I tell you. Young Ashton comes out here
+as a sort of forerider for his concern; finds out what
+his people want to know, and now he&#8217;s sent in his report
+to Blake. Next thing happens, Blake&#8217;ll be
+turning up with a surveying outfit.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Knowles scratched his head. &#8220;Hum-m-m&ndash;&ndash;You
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_101' name='page_101'></a>101</span>
+sure put up a mighty stiff argument, Kid. I&#8217;m not so
+sure, though.... Um-m-m&ndash;&ndash;Strikes me some of
+your knots might be tighter. First place, there wasn&#8217;t
+any play-acting about the way the boy went plumb to
+pieces there at the waterhole. Next place, a man like
+his father, that&#8217;s piled up a mint of money, isn&#8217;t
+going to send out his son as forerider in a hostile
+country. Lastly, I&#8217;ve read a lot more about that
+engineer Blake than you have, and I&#8217;ve sized him up
+as a man who won&#8217;t do anything that isn&#8217;t square and
+open.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Maybe he ain&#8217;t in on the dirty side of the deal,&#8221;
+admitted Gowan. &#8220;How about this letter, though?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just a friendly writing, like as not,&#8221; answered the
+cowman. &#8220;No, Kid&ndash;&ndash;only trouble with you is
+you&#8217;re too anxious over the interests of Dry Mesa
+range. I appreciate it, boy, and so does Chuckie.
+But that&#8217;s no reason for you to take every newcomer
+for a wolf &#8217;til he proves he&#8217;s only a dog.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You won&#8217;t do anything?&#8221; asked the puncher.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What d&#8217;you want me to do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Fire him&ndash;&ndash;run him off Dry Mesa,&#8221; snapped
+Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sorry I can&#8217;t oblige you, Kid,&#8221; replied Knowles.
+&#8220;You mean well, but you&#8217;ll have to make a better
+showing before I&#8217;ll turn adrift any man that seems to
+be trying to make good.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan looked down. After a brief pause he replied
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_102' name='page_102'></a>102</span>
+with unexpected submissiveness: &#8220;All right,
+Mr. Knowles. You&#8217;re the boss. Reckon you know
+best. I don&#8217;t savvy these city folks.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Glad you admit it,&#8221; said Knowles. &#8220;You&#8217;re all
+wrong in sizing him up that way. I&#8217;ve a notion he&#8217;s
+got a lot of good in him, spite of his city rearing. I
+wouldn&#8217;t object, though, if you wanted to test him out
+with a little harmless hazing, long as you didn&#8217;t go
+too far.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No,&#8221; declined Gowan. &#8220;I&#8217;ve got my own notion
+of what he is. There&#8217;s just one way to deal
+with skunks, and that is, don&#8217;t fool with them.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The cowman accepted this as conclusive. But
+when, a little later, Ashton met Gowan at the supper
+table he was rendered uneasy by the cold glint in the
+puncher&#8217;s gray eyes. As nothing was said about the
+postmaster&#8217;s receipt, he could conjecture no reason for
+the look other than that Gowan was planning to render
+him ridiculous with some cowboy trick.</p>
+<p>Isobel had assured him with utmost confidence that
+the testing of his horsemanship by means of Rocket
+had been intended only as a practical joke, and that
+Gowan would never have permitted him to mount the
+horse had he considered it at all dangerous. Yet the
+fellow might next undertake jokes containing no element
+of physical peril and consequently all the more
+humiliating unless evaded.</p>
+<p>In apprehension of this, the tenderfoot lay awake
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_103' name='page_103'></a>103</span>
+most of that night and fully half of the next. His
+watch was fruitless. Each night Gowan and the other
+men left him strictly alone in his far dark corner of
+the bunkhouse. In the daytime the puncher was
+studiously polite to him during the few hours that he
+was not off on the range.</p>
+<p>The third evening, after supper, Gowan handed
+Isobel the horny, half-flattened rattles of an unusually
+large rattlesnake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What is it? Do you wish me to guess his
+length?&#8221; she asked, evidently surprised that he should
+fetch her so commonplace an object. &#8220;I make it four
+feet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re three inches short,&#8221; he replied.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, what about it?&#8221; she inquired.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Nothing&ndash;&ndash;only I just happened to get him up
+near the bunkhouse, Miss Chuckie. Thought I&#8217;d tell
+you, in case he has a mate around.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We must all look sharp. You, too, Mr. Ashton.
+They are more apt to strike without warning, this time
+of year.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know,&#8221; remarked Ashton. &#8220;It&#8217;s before they
+cast their old skin, and it makes them blind.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Too early for that,&#8221; corrected Knowles. &#8220;I
+figure it&#8217;s the long spell of the summer&#8217;s heat. Gets
+on their nerves, same as with us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They shore are mighty like some humans,&#8221; observed
+Gowan. &#8220;Look at the way they like to
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_104' name='page_104'></a>104</span>
+snuggle up in your blankets on a cool night. Remember
+how I used to carry a hair rope on spring round-up?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I remember that they used to crawl into the bunkhouse
+before the floor was laid,&#8221; said Isobel. She
+smiled at Ashton. &#8220;That was the Dry Mesa reptilian
+age. I first learned to handle a &#8216;gun&#8217; shooting
+at rattlers. There were so many we had to make it
+a rule to kill everyone we could. But there hasn&#8217;t
+been one killed so near the house for years.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They often go in pairs. This one, though, may
+have been a lone stray,&#8221; added Gowan. He looked
+at his employer. &#8220;Talking about strays, guess I&#8217;d
+best go out in the morning and head back that Bar-Lazy-J
+bunch. I can take an iron along and brand
+those two calves, same trip.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Knowles nodded and returned to his Government
+report. The two young men and Isobel began an
+evening&#8217;s entertainment at the piano. Ashton enjoyed
+himself immensely. Though so frank and unconstrained
+in manner, the girl was as truly refined as
+the most fastidiously reared ladies of the East.</p>
+<p>At the end of the delightful evening he withdrew
+with Gowan to the bunkhouse, reluctant to leave, yet
+aglow with pleasure. Isobel had so charmed him
+that he lay in his bunk forgetful of all else than her
+limpid blue eyes and dimpled cheeks. But after his
+two nights of broken rest he could not long resist the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_105' name='page_105'></a>105</span>
+heaviness that pressed together his eyelids. He fell
+asleep, smiling at the recollection of the girl&#8217;s gracious,
+&#8220;Good-night and pleasant dreams!&#8221;</p>
+<p>With such a kindly wish from her, his dreams certainly
+should have been heavenly. Yet he began the
+night by sinking into so profound a sleep that he had
+no dreams whatever. When at last he did rouse to
+the dream-state of consciousness, it was not to enjoy
+any pleasant fantasy of music and flowers.</p>
+<p>He was lying in Deep Ca&ntilde;on, down at the very bottom
+of those gloomy depths. About him was an
+awful stillness. The river of the abyss was no longer
+roaring. It had risen up, up, up to the very rim of
+the precipices&ndash;&ndash;and all the tremendous weight of its
+waters was above him, bearing down upon him,
+smothering him, crushing in his chest! He sought to
+shriek, and found himself dumb.</p>
+<p>Suddenly an Indian stood over him, a gigantic Indian
+with feet set upon his breast. The red giant was
+a medicine man, for he clashed and rattled an enormous
+gourd full of bowlders.</p>
+<p>The rattle sounded sharper, shriller, more vibrant
+in the ears of the rousing sleeper. His eyelids fluttered,
+rose a little way, and snapped wide apart. His
+eyes, bared of their covers, glared in utter horror of
+that which they saw. Their pupils dilated, their balls
+bulged as if about to burst from the sockets.</p>
+<p>The weight was still on his chest,&ndash;&ndash;a weight far
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_106' name='page_106'></a>106</span>
+more to be dreaded than a ca&ntilde;on full of water or the
+foot of an Indian Titan. It was a weight of living,
+quivering coils. Above those coils, clearly illuminated
+in the full daylight that streamed through the
+open door of the bunkhouse, there upreared a hideous
+gaping maw, set with four slender curved fangs of
+dazzling whiteness.</p>
+<p>The snake&#8217;s eyes, green as emeralds, glared down
+into the face of the man with such intense malignancy
+that they seemed to stream forth a cold evil light.
+Fortunately he was paralyzed with fright. The
+slightest movement would have caused that fanged
+maw to lash down into his face.</p>
+<p>Something partly obscured the light in the doorway.
+Ashton was too terrified to heed. But the snake was
+more sensitive to the change in the light. Without
+altering the deadly poise of its head, it again sounded
+its shrill, menacing rattle. The shadow passed and
+the light streamed in as before. The rattling ceased.
+There followed a pause of a few seconds&#8217; duration&ndash;&ndash;To
+the man every second was an age-long period of
+horror.</p>
+<p>A faint metallic click came from across the room.
+Slight as was the sound, the irritated snake again set
+its rattle to quivering. The triangular head flattened
+back for the delayed stroke at the ashen face of the
+man. The billowing coils stiffened&ndash;&ndash;the stroke
+started. In the same instant came a report that to the
+strained ears of the man sounded like the crashing
+roar of a cannon.</p>
+<div class='figtag'>
+<a name='linki_2' id='linki_2'></a>
+</div>
+<div class='figcenter'>
+<img src='images/depths-002.jpg' alt='' title='' width='411' height='610' /><br />
+<p class='caption'>
+It sounded its shrill, menacing rattle<br />
+</p>
+</div>
+<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_107' name='page_107'></a>107</span></div>
+<p>The head and forepart of the snake&#8217;s body shot
+alongside his face, writhing in swift convulsions. The
+first touch of its cold scales against his cheek broke the
+spell of horror that had bound him. He jerked his
+head aside, and flung out his left hand to push the
+hideous thing from him. As his fingers thrust away
+the nearest coil, the head flipped around on its half-severed
+neck, and the deadly jaws automatically gaped
+and snapped together. Two of the dripping poison
+fangs struck in the cushion of flesh on the outer edge
+of Ashton&#8217;s hand. With a shriek, he flung the dying
+snake on the floor and put the wounded hand to his
+mouth.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He struck you!&#8221; cried the voice of Isobel, &#8220;but
+only on the hand, thank goodness! Wait, I&#8217;ll fix it.
+Lie still.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She came swiftly across the room, thrusting a long-barreled
+automatic pistol into its holster under a fold
+of her skirt. Her other hand drew out a locket that
+was suspended in her bosom.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Whiskey! I&#8217;m bitten!&#8221; panted Ashton, sucking
+frantically at his wounds. &#8220;Quick! I&#8217;m bitten.
+Give me whiskey!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Steady, steady,&#8221; she reassured. &#8220;It&#8217;s not bad&ndash;&ndash;only
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_108' name='page_108'></a>108</span>
+on your hand. Give it to me. Here&#8217;s something
+a thousand times better than whiskey&ndash;&ndash;permanganate.&#8221;</p>
+<p>While speaking, she caught up his neckerchief from
+the head of the bunk and knotted it about the wrist
+of the wounded hand tightly enough to check the circulation.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now hold it steady,&#8221; she directed. &#8220;Won&#8217;t
+have to use a knife. You tore open the holes when
+you jerked off the horrid thing.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Obedient but still sweating with fear, he held up
+the bleeding hand. She had opened her locket, in
+which were a number of small, dark-purple crystals.
+Two of the larger ones she thrust lengthwise as
+deeply as she could into the little slits gashed by the
+fangs. Another large and two small crystals were
+all that she could force into the openings.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There!&#8221; she cheerily exclaimed. &#8220;That will kill
+the poison in short order, and will not hurt you a particle.
+It&#8217;s the best thing there is to cheat rattlers,&ndash;&ndash;just
+cheap, ordinary permanganate of potash. If
+people only had sense enough always to carry a few
+crystals, no one would ever die of rattlesnake bites.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;ve heard that whiskey&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; began Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, and far more victims die from the whiskey
+than from the bites,&#8221; rejoined Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But a stimulant&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_109' name='page_109'></a>109</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Stimulant, then heart depressant&ndash;&ndash;first up, then
+down&ndash;&ndash;that&#8217;s alcohol. No, you&#8217;ll get only one
+poison, the snake&#8217;s, this time. So don&#8217;t worry.
+You&#8217;ll soon be all right. Even had you been struck
+in the face, quick action with permanganate would
+have saved you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He shuddered. &#8220;Ah!... But if you had not
+come!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It was fortunate, wasn&#8217;t it?&#8221; she remarked. &#8220;I
+did not know you were in here. I was going up to
+the corral and heard the rattle as I came past. It was
+so faint that I might not have noticed it, had not Kid
+told of killing the rattler yesterday.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton stared fearfully at his blackening hand.
+Isobel smiled and began to unknot the neckerchief.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There is nothing to fear,&#8221; she insisted. &#8220;That
+is due only to lack of circulation. You&#8217;ll soon be
+all right. Come up to the house as soon as you can
+and get two or three cups of coffee. I&#8217;ll tell Yuki.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She hastened out. When he had made sure that
+the still writhing snake was far over on the floor, he
+slipped from his bunk and dressed as quickly as was
+possible without the use of his numbed hand. Shirt,
+trousers, boots&ndash;&ndash;he stopped for no more, but hurried
+after Isobel. Whether because of the effects of the
+poison or merely as the reaction of the shock, he felt
+faint and dizzy. Several cups of hot strong coffee,
+however, went far towards restoring him.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_110' name='page_110'></a>110</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_X_COMING_EVENTS' id='CHAPTER_X_COMING_EVENTS'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER X</h2>
+<h3>COMING EVENTS</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Knowles had gone with Gowan to cut out and
+drive back the stray cattle belonging to the adjoining
+range. They returned during the regular
+supper hour. The cowman washed quickly and hastened
+in to the table. Gowan, however, loitered just
+outside the door, fastening and refastening his neckerchief.
+He entered the dining-room while Isobel
+was in the midst of telling her father about the snake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did you hear, Kid?&#8221; she asked, when she finished
+her vivid account.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, Miss Chuckie. I was slicking-up close
+&#8217;longside the door. I heard all you told,&#8221; he replied
+as he took his seat at the corner next to the animated
+girl. &#8220;We shore have got one mighty lucky
+tenderfoot on this range.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Indeed, yes!&#8221; exclaimed Ashton. &#8220;Had not
+Miss Chuckie chanced to be passing as the monster
+rattled&ndash;&ndash;You know, she says that she might not
+have heeded it but for your killing the other snake
+yesterday. That put her on the alert.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The puncher stared across the table at the city man
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_111' name='page_111'></a>111</span>
+with a coldly speculative gaze. &#8220;You shore are a
+lucky tenderfoot,&#8221; he repeated. &#8220;&#8217;Tain&#8217;t every fellow
+gets that close to a rattler this time of year and
+comes out of it as easy as you have. All I can see
+is you&#8217;re kind of pale yet around the gills.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton held up his bandaged left hand. &#8220;Ah, but
+I have also this memento of the occasion. It is far
+from a pleasant one, I assure you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Feels &#8217;most as bad as a bee sting, don&#8217;t it?&#8221;
+ironically condoled the puncher.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What I can&#8217;t make out,&#8221; interposed Knowles, &#8220;is
+how that rattler got up into Mr. Ashton&#8217;s bunk.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan again stared across at the tenderfoot, this
+time with unblinking solemnity. &#8220;Can&#8217;t say, Mr.
+Knowles,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;Except it might be that desperado
+guide of his came around in the night and
+brought him Mr. Rattler for bedfellow.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Kid!&#8221; remonstrated Isobel. &#8220;It&#8217;s not a
+joking matter!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, you&#8217;re dead right, Miss Chuckie,&#8221; he agreed.
+&#8220;There shore ain&#8217;t any joke about it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah, but perhaps I can make one,&#8221; gayly dissented
+Ashton. &#8220;Had you not interfered, Miss Chuckie, the
+poor snake would have taken one bite, and then curled
+up and died. I&#8217;m so charged with nicotine, you
+know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Neither Isobel nor the puncher smiled at this ancient
+witticism. But Knowles burst into a hearty laugh,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_112' name='page_112'></a>112</span>
+which was caught up and re&euml;nforced by the hitherto
+silent haymakers.</p>
+<p>&#8220;By&ndash;&ndash;James! Ashton, you&#8217;ll do!&#8221; declared the
+cowman, wiping his eyes. &#8220;When a tenderfoot can
+let off a joke like that on himself it&#8217;s a sure sign he&#8217;s
+getting acclimated. Yes, you&#8217;ll make a puncher,
+some day.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton smiled with gratification, and looked at Isobel
+in eager-eyed appeal for the confirmation of the
+statement. She smiled and nodded.</p>
+<p>Upon his return from his remarkable ride to town
+she had assured him that he need not worry. Her
+present kindly look and the words of her father might
+have been expected to remove his last doubts. Such
+in fact was the result for the remainder of the evening.</p>
+<p>But that night the new employ&eacute; must have given
+much anxious thought to the question of his future and
+his great need to &#8220;make good.&#8221; The liveliness of
+his concern was shown by his behavior during the next
+two weeks. His zeal for work astonished Knowles
+quite as much as his efforts to be agreeable to his
+fellow employ&eacute;s gratified Miss Isobel. He charmed
+the Japanese cook with his praise of the cooking, he
+flattered the haymakers with his interest in their opinions.
+Towards the girl and her father he was impeccably
+respectful.</p>
+<p>Within ten days he was &#8220;Lafe&#8221; to everybody except
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_113' name='page_113'></a>113</span>
+Gowan and the Jap. The latter addressed him
+as &#8220;Mistah Lafe&#8221;; Gowan kept to the noncommittal
+&#8220;Ashton.&#8221; The puncher had become more taciturn
+than ever, but missed none of the home evenings in
+the parlor. He watched Ashton with catlike closeness
+when Isobel was present, and seemed puzzled that
+the interloper refrained from courting her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t savvy that tenderfoot,&#8221; he remarked one
+day to Knowles. &#8220;All his talk about his dad being
+a multimillionaire&ndash;&ndash;Acted like it at the start-off.
+Came down to this candidate-for-office way of comporting
+himself. It ain&#8217;t natural.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not when he&#8217;s on the same range with Chuckie?&#8221;
+queried the cowman, his eyes twinkling. &#8220;Why don&#8217;t
+you ever go into Stockchute and paint the town red?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s another thing,&#8221; insisted Gowan. &#8220;He
+started in with Miss Chuckie brash as all hell. Now
+he acts towards her like I feel.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s natural. He soon found out she&#8217;s a
+lady.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, it ain&#8217;t natural, Mr. Knowles&ndash;&ndash;not in him,
+it ain&#8217;t. Nor it ain&#8217;t natural for him to be so all-fired
+polite to everybody, nor his pestering you to find
+work for him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And it&#8217;s not natural for a tenderfoot to gentle a
+hawss like Rocket the way he&#8217;s done already,&#8221; rallied
+Knowles. &#8220;That crazy hawss follows him about like
+a dog.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_114' name='page_114'></a>114</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes; Ashton feeds him sugar, like he does the
+rest of you,&#8221; rejoined the puncher. &#8220;It ain&#8217;t natural
+in his brand of tenderfoot&ndash;&ndash;Bound to ride out, if
+there&#8217;s any riding to do; bound to fuss and stew
+around the corral; bound to help with the haying;
+bound to help haul the water; bound to practice with
+his rope every moment he ain&#8217;t doing something else.
+Can&#8217;t tell me there ain&#8217;t a nigger in that woodpile.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now, don&#8217;t go to hunting out any more mares&#8217;
+nests, Kid,&#8221; admonished Knowles. &#8220;He&#8217;s just a
+busted millionaire, that&#8217;s all; and he&#8217;s proving he
+realizes it. Guess the smash scared him. He&#8217;s
+afraid he can&#8217;t make good. Chuckie says he thinks
+I&#8217;ll turn him adrift if he doesn&#8217;t hustle enough to earn
+his salt.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why not fire him anyway? You don&#8217;t need him,
+and you won&#8217;t need him,&#8221; argued the puncher.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, he helps keep Chuckie entertained. With
+you and him both on the place, she might conclude to
+stay over the winter, this year.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan&#8217;s mouth straightened to a thin slit. &#8220;Better
+send her to Denver right off.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look here, Kid,&#8221; reproved the cowman.
+&#8220;You&#8217;ve had your chance, and you&#8217;ve got it yet.
+I&#8217;ve never interfered with you, and I&#8217;m not going
+to with him. It&#8217;s for Chuckie to pick the winner.
+Like as not it&#8217;ll be some man in town, for all I know.
+She has the say. Whether he wears a derby or a
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_115' name='page_115'></a>115</span>
+sombrero, she&#8217;s to have her own choice. I don&#8217;t care
+if he&#8217;s a millionaire or a busted millionaire or a
+bronco buster, provided he&#8217;s a man, and provided
+I&#8217;m sure he&#8217;ll treat her right.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan lapsed into a sullen silence.</p>
+<p>Mounted as before on Rocket, Ashton had already
+made a second trip to Stockchute for mail, returning
+almost as quickly as on his wild first ride. Monday
+of his third week at the ranch he was sent on his third
+trip. As before, he started at dawn. But this time
+he did not come racing back early enough for a belated
+noon meal as he had on each of the previous occasions.</p>
+<p>By mid-afternoon Isobel began to grow uneasy.
+Remarkable as had been the efforts of his new rider&#8217;s
+training, there was the not improbable chance that
+Rocket had reverted to his ugly tricks. She shuddered
+as she pictured the battered corpse of the city
+man dragging over the rocks and through the brush,
+with a foot twisted fast in one of the narrow iron
+stirrups.</p>
+<p>Her father and Gowan were off on their usual work
+of inspecting the bunches of cattle scattered about the
+range. The other men were as busy as ever mowing
+more hay and hauling in that which was cured. She
+was alone at the ranch with the Jap. At four o&#8217;clock
+she saddled her best horse and rode out towards Dry
+Fork. She hoped to sight Ashton from the divide.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_116' name='page_116'></a>116</span>
+But there was no sign of any horseman out on the
+wide stretch of sagebrush flats.</p>
+<p>She rode down to Dry Fork, crossed over the sandy
+channel, and started on at a gallop along the half-beaten
+road that wound away through the sagebrush
+towards the distant Split Peak. An hour found her
+nearing the pi&ntilde;on clad hills on the far side of Dry
+Mesa, with still no sign of Ashton.</p>
+<p>By this time she had worked herself into a fever
+of excitement and dread. Her relief was correspondingly
+great when at last she saw him coming towards
+her around the bend of the nearest hill. But his
+horse was walking and he was bent over in the saddle
+as if injured or greatly fatigued. Puzzled and again
+apprehensive, she urged her pony to sprinting speed.</p>
+<p>When he heard the approaching hoofs Ashton
+looked up as if startled. But he did not wave to her
+or raise his sombrero. As she came racing up she
+scrutinized his dejected figure for wounds or bruises.
+There was nothing to indicate that he had been either
+shot or thrown. His sullen look when she drew up
+beside him not unnaturally changed her anxiety to
+vexation.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What made you so slow?&#8221; she queried. &#8220;You
+know how eager I am for the mail each time. You
+might as well have ridden your own hawss.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&ndash;&ndash;has come,&#8221; he muttered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What?&#8221; she demanded.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_117' name='page_117'></a>117</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;The letter from him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Him?&#8221; echoed the girl, trying hard to cover her
+confusion with a look of surprise.</p>
+<p>His dejection deepened as he observed her heightened
+color and the light in her eyes. &#8220;Yes, from
+him,&#8221; he mumbled.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, you mean Mr. Blake, I suppose,&#8221; she replied.
+Lightly as she spoke, she could not suppress the quiver
+of eagerness in her voice. &#8220;If you will kindly give it
+to me now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He drew out a letter, not from among the other
+mail in his pouch, but from his pocket. Her look of
+surprise showed that she was struck with the oddness
+of this. She was too excited, however, to consider
+what might be its meaning. She tore open the letter
+and read it swiftly. Her sparkling eyes and glowing
+cheeks when she looked up served only to increase
+Ashton&#8217;s gloom.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So the fellow is coming,&#8221; he groaned. &#8220;What
+else could I have expected?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl held out the open letter to him. It was in
+typewriting, addressed from Chicago, and read:&ndash;&ndash;</p>
+<p style='margin-left:1.0em; margin-right:2.0em; '><i>Dear Madam</i>:</p>
+<p style='margin-left:1.0em; margin-right:2.0em; '>In reply to your letter of inquiry regarding an inspection
+to determine the feasibility of irrigating certain
+lands in your vicinity&ndash;&ndash;my fee for personal
+inspection and opinion would be $50. per day and
+expenses, if I came as consulting engineer. However,
+I am about to make a trip to Colorado. If you can
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_118' name='page_118'></a>118</span>
+furnish good ranch fare for my wife, son, and self as
+guests, will look over your situation without charge.
+Wife wishes to rough-it, but must have milk and eggs.
+Will leave servants in car at Stockchute, where we
+shall expect a conveyance to meet us Thursday, the
+25th inst., if terms agreeable.</p>
+<p style='margin-left:1.0em; margin-right:2.0em; text-align:right'><span style='margin-right: 3.125em;'>Respectfully yours,</span><br />
+<span style='margin-right: 1.0em;'><span class='smcap'>Thomas Blake</span>.</span><br /></p>
+<p>Ashton crumpled the letter in his clenched hand as
+he had crumpled the letter from his father&#8217;s lawyers.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He is coming! he really is coming!&#8221; he gasped.
+&#8220;Thursday&ndash;&ndash;only three days! Genevieve too!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And his son!&#8221; cried Isobel, too excited to heed the
+dismay in her companion&#8217;s look and tone. &#8220;He and
+his family, too, as my guests!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; said Ashton bitterly. &#8220;And what of it
+when he floods you off your cattle range? By another
+year or two, the irrigation farmers will be settling all
+over this mesa, thick as flies.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, no; it is probable that Mr. Blake will find
+there is no chance to water Dry Mesa,&#8221; she replied,
+in a tone strangely nonchalant considering her former
+expressions of apprehension. She drew the crumpled
+letter from his relaxing fingers, and smoothed it out
+for a second reading.</p>
+<p>&#8220;&#8216;Wife, son, and self,&#8217;&#8221; she quoted. &#8220;Son? How
+old is he?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know. They&#8217;ve been married nearly two
+years,&#8221; muttered Ashton.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_119' name='page_119'></a>119</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Then it&#8217;s a baby!&ndash;&ndash;oh! oh! how lovely!&#8221;
+shrieked the girl. &#8220;And its mamma wants to rough
+it! She shall have every egg and chicken on the place&ndash;&ndash;and
+gallons of cream! We shall take the skim
+milk.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Still Ashton failed to enthuse. &#8220;To them that
+have, shall be given, and from him who has lost millions
+shall be taken all that&#8217;s left!&#8221; he gibed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, we&#8217;ll still have the skim milk,&#8221; she bantered,
+refusing to notice his cynical bitterness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m a day laborer!&#8221; he went on, still more bitterly.
+&#8220;I&#8217;m afraid of losing even my skim milk&ndash;&ndash;And
+two weeks ago I thought myself certain of three
+times the millions that he will get when her father
+dies!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No use crying over spilt milk, or spilt cream,
+either!&#8221; she replied.</p>
+<p>The note of sympathetic concern under her raillery
+brought a glimmer of hopefulness into his moody eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If I did not think your father will drive me
+away!&#8221; he murmured.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why should he?&#8221; she asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Because when Blake comes&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; Ashton paused
+and shifted to a question. &#8220;Will you tell your father
+about their coming?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course. I did not tell him about writing, because
+it would only have increased his suspense. But
+now&ndash;&ndash;Let&#8217;s hurry back!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_120' name='page_120'></a>120</span></p>
+<p>A cut of her quirt set her pony into a lope. Rocket
+needed no urging. He followed and maintained a
+position close behind the galloping pony without
+breaking out of his rangy trot. Occasionally Isobel
+flung back a gay remark over her shoulder. Ashton
+did not respond. He rode after her, silent and depressed,
+his eyes fixed longingly on her graceful form,
+ever fleeing forward before him as he advanced.</p>
+<p>Once clear of the sagebrush, she drew rein for him
+to come up. They rode side by side across Dry Fork
+and over the divide. When they stopped at the corral
+she would have unsaddled her pony had he not
+begged leave to do her the service. As reward, she
+waited until he could accompany her to the house.</p>
+<p>They found her father and Gowan resting in the
+cool porch after a particularly hard day&#8217;s ride. The
+puncher was strumming soft melodies on a guitar.
+Knowles was peering at his report of the Reclamation
+Service, held to windward of a belching cloud of pipe
+smoke. His daughter darted to him regardless of
+the offending incense.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Daddy!&#8221; she cried. &#8220;What do you think!
+Mr. Blake is coming to visit us!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Blake?&#8221; repeated the cowman, staring blankly
+over his pipe.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, Mr. Blake, the engineer&ndash;&ndash;the great
+Thomas Blake of the Zariba Dam.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;By&ndash;&ndash;James!&#8221; swore Gowan, dropping his guitar
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_121' name='page_121'></a>121</span>
+and springing up to confront Ashton with deadly
+menace in his cold eyes. &#8220;This is what comes of
+nursing scotched rattlers! This here tenderfoot
+skunk has been foreriding for that engineer! I
+warned you, Mr. Knowles! I told you he had sent
+for him to come out here and cut up our range with
+his damned irrigation schemes!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I send for Blake&ndash;&ndash;I?&#8221; protested Ashton. He
+burst into a discordant laugh.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Laugh, will you?&#8221; said Gowan, dropping his hand
+to his hip.</p>
+<p>The girl flung herself before him. &#8220;Stop! stop,
+Kid! Are you locoed? He had nothing to do with
+it. I myself sent for Mr. Blake.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>You!</i>&#8221; cried Gowan.</p>
+<p>The cowman slowly stood up, his eyes fixed on the
+girl in an incredulous stare. &#8220;Chuckie,&#8221; he half
+whispered, &#8220;you couldn&#8217;t ha&#8217; done it. You&#8217;re&ndash;&ndash;you&#8217;re
+dreaming, honey!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. Listen, Daddy! It&#8217;s been growing on you
+so&ndash;&ndash;your fear that we&#8217;ll lose our range. I thought
+if Mr. Blake came and told you it can&#8217;t be done&ndash;&ndash;Don&#8217;t
+you see?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What if he finds it can?&#8221; huskily demanded
+Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He can&#8217;t. I&#8217;m sure he can&#8217;t. If he builds a
+reservoir, where could he get enough water to fill it?
+The watershed above us is too small. He couldn&#8217;t
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_122' name='page_122'></a>122</span>
+impound more than three thousand acre feet of flood
+waters at the utmost.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How about the whole river going to waste, down
+in Deep Ca&ntilde;on?&#8221; queried her father.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Heavens, Mr. Knowles! How would he ever get
+a drop of water out of that awful chasm?&#8221; exclaimed
+Ashton. &#8220;I looked down into it. The river is
+thousands of feet down. It must be way below the
+level of Dry Mesa.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not so sure about that,&#8221; replied the cowman.
+&#8220;Holes are mighty deceiving.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, what if it ain&#8217;t so deep as the mesa?&#8221;
+argued Gowan, for once half in accord with Ashton.
+&#8220;It shore is deep enough, ain&#8217;t it? Even allowing
+that this man Blake is the biggest engineer in the U.S.,
+how&#8217;s he going to pump that water up over the rim
+of the ca&ntilde;on? The devil himself couldn&#8217;t do it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If I am mistaken regarding the depth, that is, if
+the river really is higher than the mesa,&#8221; remarked
+Ashton, &#8220;there is the possibility that it might be tapped
+by a tunnel through the side of High Mesa. But
+even if it is possible, it still is quite out of the question.
+The cost would be prohibitive.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You see, Daddy!&#8221; exclaimed Isobel. &#8220;Lafe
+knows. He&#8217;s an engineer himself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How&#8217;s that?&#8221; growled her father, frowning
+heavily at Ashton. &#8220;You never told me you&#8217;re an
+engineer.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_123' name='page_123'></a>123</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I told Miss Chuckie the first day I met her,&#8221; explained
+Ashton. &#8220;Ever since then I&#8217;ve been so busy
+trying to be something else&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shore you have!&#8221; jeered Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But about Mr. Blake, Daddy?&#8221; interposed Isobel.
+&#8220;I&#8217;m certain he&#8217;ll find that no irrigation project is
+possible; and if <i>he</i> says so, you will be able to give
+up worrying about it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So that&#8217;s your idea,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;Of course,
+honey, you meant well. But he&#8217;s a pretty big man,
+according to all the reports. What if he&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; The
+cowman stopped, unable to state the calamity he
+dreaded.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, what if?&#8221; bravely declared his daughter.
+&#8220;Isn&#8217;t it best to know the worst, and have it over?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well&ndash;&ndash;I don&#8217;t know but what you&#8217;re right,
+honey.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s your say, Mr. Knowles,&#8221; put in Gowan.
+&#8220;If you want the tenderfeet on your range, all right.
+If you don&#8217;t, I&#8217;ll engage to head back any bunch of
+engineers agoing, and I don&#8217;t care whether they&#8217;re
+dogies or longhorns.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There is to be no surveying party,&#8221; explained Isobel.
+&#8220;Mr. Blake is coming to visit us with his wife
+and baby. Here is his letter.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hey?&#8221; ejaculated Knowles. He read the letter
+with frowning deliberation, and passed it on to Gowan.
+&#8220;Well, he seems to be square enough. Guess we&#8217;ll
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_124' name='page_124'></a>124</span>
+have to send over for him, honey, long as you asked
+him to come.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, you will, Daddy!&#8221; she cried. She gave him
+a delicious kiss and cuddled against his shoulder coaxingly.
+&#8220;You&#8217;ll let me go over in the buckboard for
+them, won&#8217;t you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Kind of early in the season for you to begin
+hankering after city folks,&#8221; he sought to tease her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But think of the baby!&#8221; she exclaimed as excitedly
+as a little girl over the prospect of a doll. &#8220;A baby
+on our ranch! I simply must see it at the earliest
+possible moment! Besides, it will look better for our
+hospitality for me to meet Mrs. Blake at the train,
+since she&ndash;&ndash;That&#8217;s something I meant to ask you,
+Lafe. What does Mr. Blake mean by saying they
+will leave the servants in the car?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I presume they are traveling in Mr. Leslie&#8217;s
+private car, and will have it sidetracked at Stockchute,&#8221;
+answered Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Whee-ew!</i>&#8221; ejaculated Knowles. &#8220;Private car!
+And we&#8217;re supposed to feed them!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It is just because of the change we will give them
+that they are coming out here,&#8221; surmised Isobel.
+&#8220;Look at the letter again. Mr. Blake expressly
+writes that his wife wishes to rough-it. Of course
+she cannot know what real roughing-it means. But
+if she is coming to us without a maid, we shall like her
+as much as&ndash;&ndash;as Mr. Blake.&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_125' name='page_125'></a>125</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XI_SELFDEFENSE' id='CHAPTER_XI_SELFDEFENSE'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XI</h2>
+<h3>SELF-DEFENSE</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Nothing more was said about the trip to town
+until late Wednesday evening. As Knowles
+slammed shut his book and the young men rose to
+withdraw to the bunkhouse, he asked Gowan casually:
+&#8220;Got those harness hawsses in the corral?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Brought &#8217;em in this afternoon. Greased the
+buckboard and overhauled the harness. Everything&#8217;s
+in shape,&#8221; answered the puncher.</p>
+<p>Knowles merely nodded. Yet in the morning, immediately
+after the usual early breakfast, Gowan
+went up to the corral and returned driving a lively
+pair of broncos to the old buckboard. Ashton
+happened to come around the house as Knowles
+stepped from the front door. The cowman was followed
+by his daughter, attired in a new riding habit
+and a fashionable hat with a veil.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re just in time, Lafe,&#8221; said Knowles.
+&#8220;Saddle a couple of hawsses and follow Chuckie to
+town. I misdoubt that seat is cramped for three,
+and a baby to boot.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_126' name='page_126'></a>126</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;But I&ndash;&ndash;it looks quite wide to me,&#8221; said Ashton,
+flushing and drawing back.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know the size of Blake and his lady&ndash;&ndash;I
+don&#8217;t,&#8221; replied the cowman. &#8220;Just the same, I want
+you to go along with Chuckie. There&#8217;s not a
+puncher in this section would harm her, drunk or
+sober; but the fellows that come in and go out on
+the railroad are sometimes another sort.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course I&ndash;&ndash;if necessary,&#8221; stammered Ashton.
+&#8220;Yet may I ask you to excuse me? In the event of
+trouble, Mr. Gowan, you know&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Great snakes!&#8221; called Gowan from the buckboard.
+&#8220;Needn&#8217;t ask <i>me</i> to go, twice!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t spare you today,&#8221; said Knowles, his keen
+eyes fixed on Ashton in unconcealed amazement.</p>
+<p>It was inconceivable. For the first time in his
+career as an employ&eacute;, the tenderfoot was attempting
+to evade a duty,&ndash;&ndash;a duty that comprised a fifty-mile
+ride in company with Miss Isobel Knowles!</p>
+<p>The girl looked at Ashton with a perfect composure
+that betrayed no trace of her feelings.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m sure there&#8217;s no reason whatever why Lafe
+should go, if he does not wish to,&#8221; she remarked.
+&#8220;Any of my hawsses will lead to the buckboard.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s going to town with you,&#8221; said Knowles, his
+jaw setting hard with stubborn determination.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, of course, Mr. Knowles, if you really think
+it necessary,&#8221; reluctantly acquiesced Ashton. He put
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_127' name='page_127'></a>127</span>
+his hand into his pocket, shrugged, and asked in a hesitating
+manner: &#8220;May I request&ndash;&ndash;I have only a
+small amount left from that five dollars. If you consider
+there are any wages owing me&ndash;&ndash;Going to
+town, you know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lord!&#8221; said the cowman. &#8220;So that&#8217;s what you
+stuck on. &#8217;Fraid of running out of change with a
+lady along. Here&#8217;s the balance of your first month&#8217;s
+wages, and more, if you want it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He drew out a fat wallet and began counting out
+banknotes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, no, not so many,&#8221; said Ashton. &#8220;I wish only
+what you consider as owing to me now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll take an even hundred,&#8221; ordered Knowles,
+forcing the money on him. &#8220;A man doesn&#8217;t feel
+just right in town unless he&#8217;s well heeled. Only don&#8217;t
+show more than a ten at a time in the saloon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You have chosen me to act as your daughter&#8217;s escort,&#8221;
+replied Ashton.</p>
+<p>Quick to catch the inference of his remark, Isobel
+flashed him a look of approval, but called banteringly
+as she darted out to the buckboard: &#8220;Better move,
+if you expect to get near enough to escort me, this side
+of Stockchute.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan sprang down to hand her into the buckboard.
+She took the reins from him and spoke to
+the fidgetting broncos. They plunged forward and
+started off on a lope. Ashton perceived that she did
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_128' name='page_128'></a>128</span>
+not intend to wait for him. He caught Gowan&#8217;s look
+of mingled exultance and envy, and dashed for the
+corral. Rocket was outside, but at his call trotted
+to meet him, whinnying for his morning&#8217;s lump of
+sugar. Ashton flung on saddle and bridle, and slipped
+inside the corral to rope his own pony. Haste made
+him miss the two first throws. At last he noosed
+the pony, and slapped on the girl&#8217;s saddle and bridle.</p>
+<p>As he raced off, pounding the pony with his rope to
+keep him alongside Rocket, Knowles waved to him
+from the house. He had saddled up in less than
+twice the time that Gowan could have done it,&ndash;&ndash;which
+was a record for a tenderfoot. He waved
+back, but his look was heavy despite the excitement of
+the pursuit.</p>
+<p>He expected to overtake Isobel in a few minutes.
+This he could have done had he been able to give
+Rocket free rein. But he had to hold back for the
+slower-gaited pony. Also, the girl had more of a
+start than he had at first realized, and she did her
+best to hold the handicap. Hitched to the light buckboard,
+her young broncos could have run a good part
+of the way to Stockchute. She was far out on the
+flat before she at last tired of the wild bumping over
+ruts and sagebrush roots, and pulled her horses down
+to a walk.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I could have kept ahead clear across to the hills,&#8221;
+she flung back at him as he galloped up.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_129' name='page_129'></a>129</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You shouldn&#8217;t have been so reckless!&#8221; he reproached.
+&#8220;Every moment I&#8217;ve been dreading to
+see you bounced out.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s the fun of it,&#8221; she declared, her cheeks
+aglow and eyes sparkling with delight.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But the road is so rough!&#8221; he protested.
+&#8220;Wouldn&#8217;t it be easier for you to ride my pony?
+He&#8217;s like a rocking-chair.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No,&#8221; she refused. But she smiled, by no means
+ill pleased at his solicitude for her comfort. She
+halted the broncos, and said cordially: &#8220;Tie the
+saddle hawsses to the back rail, and pile in. We may
+as well be sociable.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He hastened to accept the invitation. She moved
+over to the left side of the seat and relinquished the
+lines to him. With most young ladies this would have
+been a matter-of-course proceeding; from so accomplished
+a horsewoman it was a tactful compliment.
+He appreciated it at its full value, and his mood lightened.
+They rattled gayly along, on across the flats,
+up and down among the pi&ntilde;on clad hills, and through
+the sage and greasewood of the valleys.</p>
+<p>He had thought the country a desolate wilderness;
+but now it seemed a Garden of Eden. Never had the
+girl&#8217;s loveliness been more intoxicating, never had her
+manner to him been more charming and gracious.
+He could not resist the infection of her high spirits.
+For the greater part of the trip he gave himself over
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_130' name='page_130'></a>130</span>
+to the delight of her merry eyes and dimpling, rosy
+cheeks, her adorable blushes and gay repartee.</p>
+<p>All earthly journeys and joys have an ending. The
+buckboard creaked up over the round of the last and
+highest hill, and they came in sight of the little shack
+town down across the broad valley. Though five
+miles away, every house, every telegraph pole, even
+the thin lines of the railroad rails appeared through
+the dry clear air as distinct as a miniature painting.
+Miles beyond, on the far side of the valley, uprose
+the huge bulk of Split Peak, with its white-mantled
+shoulders and craggy twin peaks.</p>
+<p>But neither Ashton nor Isobel exclaimed on this
+magnificent view of valley and peak. Each fell silent
+and gazed soberly down at the dozen scattered shacks
+that marked the end of their outward trip. Rapidly
+the gravity of Ashton&#8217;s face deepened to gloom and
+from gloom to dejection. The horses would have
+broken into a lope on the down grade. He held them
+to a walk.</p>
+<p>Chancing to gaze about and see his face, the girl
+started from her bright-eyed daydream. &#8220;Why,
+Lafe! what is it?&#8221; she inquired. &#8220;You look as you
+did the other day, when you brought the mail.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s&ndash;&ndash;everything!&#8221; he muttered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;As what?&#8221; she queried.</p>
+<p>He shrugged hopelessly, hesitated, and drew out the
+roll of bills forced on him by Knowles. &#8220;Tell me,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_131' name='page_131'></a>131</span>
+please, just how much of this is mine, at your father&#8217;s
+usual rate of wages, and deducting the real value of
+that calf.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, I can&#8217;t just say, offhand,&#8221; she replied.
+&#8220;But why should you&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall tell you as soon as&ndash;&ndash;but first&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; He
+drew out his watch. &#8220;This cost me two hundred and
+fifty dollars. It is the only thing I have worth trading.
+Would you take it in exchange for Rocket and
+the balance of this hundred dollars over and above
+what is due me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why&ndash;&ndash;no, of course, I wouldn&#8217;t think of such
+a thing. It would be absurd, cheating yourself that
+way. Anyhow, Rocket is your horse to ride, as long
+as you wish to.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But I would like him for my own. How about
+trading him for my pony and the wages due me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, that wouldn&#8217;t be an unfair bargain. Your
+hawss is the best cow pony of the two.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It is very kind of you to agree, Miss Chuckie!
+Here is all the money; and here is the watch. I wish
+you to accept it from me as a&ndash;&ndash;memento.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Ashton!&#8221; she exclaimed, indignantly widening
+the space between them as much as the seat would
+permit.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Please!&#8221; he begged. &#8220;Don&#8217;t you understand?
+I am going away.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Going away?&#8221; she echoed.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_132' name='page_132'></a>132</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&ndash;&ndash;why?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Because he is coming.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Blake?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. I cannot stay after he&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But why not? Has he injured you? Are you
+afraid of him?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. I&#8217;m afraid that you&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; Ashton&#8217;s voice
+sank to a whisper&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;that you will believe what he&ndash;&ndash;what
+they will say against me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh!&#8221; she commented, her expression shifting
+swiftly from sympathetic concern to doubt.</p>
+<p>He caught the change in her look and tone, and
+flushed darkly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There are sometimes two sides to a story,&#8221; he
+muttered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tell me your side now,&#8221; she suggested, with her
+usual directness.</p>
+<p>His eyes fell before her clear honest gaze. His
+flush deepened. He hung his head, biting his twisted
+lip. After several moments he began to speak in a
+hesitating broken murmur:</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve always been&ndash;&ndash;wild. But I graduated from
+Tech.&ndash;&ndash;not at the foot of my class. My father&ndash;&ndash;always
+busy piling up millions&ndash;&ndash;never a word or
+thought for me, except when I overspent my allowance.
+I was in a&ndash;&ndash;fast set. My father&ndash;&ndash;threatened
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_133' name='page_133'></a>133</span>
+me. I had to make good. I took a position in
+old Leslie&#8217;s office&ndash;&ndash;Genevieve&#8217;s father. I&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>He paused, licked his lips, hesitated, and abruptly
+went on again, this time speaking with almost glib facility:
+&#8220;There was an engineers&#8217; contest for a projected
+bridge over Michamac Strait. I started to draw
+plans, that I might enter the contest, but I did not
+finish in time. The plans of the other engineers were
+all rejected. I continued to work on mine. After
+the contest I happened to pick up a piece of torn plan
+out of the office wastebasket, and it gave me a suggestion
+how to improve the central span of my
+bridge.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes?&#8221; asked the girl, her interest deepening.</p>
+<p>He again licked his lips, hesitated, and continued:
+&#8220;There was no name on that torn plan&ndash;&ndash;nothing to
+indicate to whom it had belonged. So I used it&ndash;&ndash;that
+is, the suggestion I got from it, and was awarded
+the bridge on my plans. This made me the Resident
+Engineer of the bridge, and I had it almost completed
+when this man Blake came back from Africa after
+Genevieve, and claimed that I had&ndash;&ndash;had stolen his
+plans of the bridge. It seems they were lost in Mr.
+Leslie&#8217;s office. He claimed he had handed them in to
+me for the contest. But so had all the other contestants,
+and their plans were not lost. It may have been
+that one of the doorkeepers tore his plans up, out of
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_134' name='page_134'></a>134</span>
+revenge. Blake was a very rough brute of a fellow
+at that time. He quarreled with the doorkeeper because
+the man would not admit him to see Mr. Leslie&ndash;&ndash;threatened
+to smash him. Afterwards he accused
+Mr. Leslie of stealing his plans.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, no, no! he couldn&#8217;t have done that! He
+can&#8217;t be that kind of a man!&#8221; protested Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s true! Even he will not deny it. Old Leslie
+thought him crazy&ndash;&ndash;then. It was different when he
+came back and accused me! He had been shipwrecked
+with Genevieve. They were alone together all those
+weeks, and so one can&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; Ashton checked himself.
+&#8220;No, you must not think&ndash;&ndash;He saved her. When
+they came back he claimed the bridge as his own&ndash;&ndash;those
+lost plans.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;His plans? So that was it! And you&ndash;&ndash;?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course they believed him. What was my word
+against his with Genevieve and Leslie. Leslie&#8217;s consulting
+engineer was an old pal of Blake&#8217;s. So of
+course I&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;ll say though that Blake agreed to put
+it that I had only borrowed his idea of the central
+span.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That was generous of him, if he really believed&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did he?&ndash;&ndash;did Genevieve? Do they believe it
+now? You see why I must go away.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t any such thing,&#8221; rejoined the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t?&#8221; he exclaimed. &#8220;When they are
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_135' name='page_135'></a>135</span>
+coming here, believing I did it! They must believe
+it, all of them! And my father&ndash;&ndash;after all this time&ndash;&ndash;They
+agreed not to tell him. Yet he has found
+out. That letter, up at the waterhole&ndash;&ndash;it was from
+his lawyers. He had cut me off&ndash;&ndash;branded me as an
+outcast.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Without waiting to hear your side&ndash;&ndash;without asking
+you to explain? How unjust! how unfair!&#8221; cried
+Isobel.</p>
+<p>Ashton winced. &#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;I told you I&ndash;&ndash;my record
+was against me. But I was his son&ndash;&ndash;he had no right
+to brand me as a&ndash;&ndash;a thief! My valet read the letter.
+He must have told the guide&ndash;&ndash;the scoundrels!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Tears of chagrin gathered in the young man&#8217;s dark
+eyes. He bit his lip until the blood ran.</p>
+<p>&#8220;O-o-oh!&#8221; sighed the girl. &#8220;It&#8217;s all been frightfully
+unjust! You haven&#8217;t had fair play! I shall
+tell Mr. Blake.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, not him!&ndash;&ndash;not him!&#8221; Ashton&#8217;s voice was
+almost shrill. &#8220;All I wish is to slip away, before they
+see me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t mean, run away?&#8221; she said, quietly
+placing her little gauntlet-gloved hand on his arm.
+&#8220;You&#8217;re not going to run away, Lafe.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What else?&#8221; he asked, his eyes dark with bitter
+despair. &#8220;Would you have me return, to be booted
+off the range when they tell your father?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just wait and see,&#8221; she replied, gazing at him with
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_136' name='page_136'></a>136</span>
+a reassuring smile. &#8220;You&#8217;ve proved yourself a right
+smart puncher&ndash;&ndash;for a tenderfoot. You&#8217;re in the
+West, the good old-style West, where it&#8217;s a man&#8217;s
+present record that counts; not what he has been or
+what he has done. No, you&#8217;re not going to run.
+You&#8217;re going to face it out&ndash;&ndash;and going to stay to
+learn your new profession of puncher and&ndash;&ndash;<i>man</i>!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But they will not wish to associate with me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, they will,&#8221; she predicted. &#8220;I shall see to
+that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He took heart a little from her cheery, positive assurance.
+&#8220;Well, if you insist, I shall not go until
+they show&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They&#8217;ll not recognize you at first. That will give
+me a chance to speak before they can say anything disagreeable.
+I&#8217;m sure Mr. Blake will understand.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&ndash;&ndash;Genevieve?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If she married him when he was as rough as you
+say, and if he agrees to let bygones be bygones, you
+need have no fear of Mrs. Blake. Only be sure to
+go into raptures over the baby. Tell her it&#8217;s the perfect
+image of its father.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What if it isn&#8217;t?&#8221; objected Ashton gloomily.</p>
+<p>She dimpled. &#8220;One must allow for the difference
+in age; and there&#8217;s always some resemblance&ndash;&ndash;each
+must have a mouth and eyes and ears and a nose.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He caught himself on the verge of laughter. Her
+eyes were fixed upon him, pure and honest and dancing
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_137' name='page_137'></a>137</span>
+with mirth. A sudden flood of crimson swept up his
+face from his bristly, tanned chin to his white forehead.
+He averted his gaze from hers.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re <i>good</i>!&#8221; he choked out. &#8220;I don&#8217;t deserve&ndash;&ndash;But
+I can&#8217;t go&ndash;&ndash;when you tell me to
+stay!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course you can&#8217;t,&#8221; she lightly rejoined.
+&#8220;Look! There&#8217;s the train coming. Push on the
+lines!&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_138' name='page_138'></a>138</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XII_THE_MEETING' id='CHAPTER_XII_THE_MEETING'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XII</h2>
+<h3>THE MEETING</h3>
+</div>
+<p>A word started the horses into a lope. The
+buckboard was whirled along over the last two
+miles to Stockchute in a wild race against the train.
+The steam horse won. It had sidetracked the private
+car attached to the rear of the last pullman and was
+puffing away westward, when Ashton guided his running
+team in among the crude shacks of the town. He
+swung around at a more moderate pace towards the
+big chute for cattle-loading, and fetched up a few yards
+out from the rear step of the private car.</p>
+<p>An assiduous porter had already swung down with
+a box step. A big, square-faced, square-framed man
+of twenty-eight or thirty stepped out into the car vestibule.
+He sprang to the ground as Miss Knowles
+stepped from the buckboard. She had lowered her
+veil, but it failed to mask the extreme brilliancy of her
+eyes and her quick changes of color. Her face, flushed
+from the excitement of the race into town, went white
+when she first saw the man in the vestibule; flushed
+again when he sprang down; again paled; and, last of
+all, glowed radiantly as she advanced to meet him.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_139' name='page_139'></a>139</span></p>
+<p>He hastened to her, baring his big head of its
+Panama, and staring at her fashionable hat and dress
+in frank surprise.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Blake!&#8221; she murmured.</p>
+<p>At the sound of her voice he started and fixed his
+light blue eyes on her veiled face with a keen glance.
+She turned pale and as quickly blushed, as if embarrassed
+by his scrutiny.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Excuse me!&#8221; he apologized. &#8220;You are Miss
+Knowles?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; she murmured.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Knowles?&#8221; he repeated, half to himself.
+&#8220;Strange! Haven&#8217;t I met you before?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;In Denver?&#8221; she suggested. &#8220;I spend my
+winters in Denver. But there was one in Europe.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, it wouldn&#8217;t be either. You must excuse me,
+Miss Knowles. There was something about your
+voice and face&ndash;&ndash;rather threw me off my balance. If
+you&#8217;ll kindly overlook the bungling start-off! I&#8217;m
+greatly pleased to meet you. My wife will be, too.
+May I ask you to step aboard the car?&ndash;&ndash;No, here she
+is now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A graceful, rather small lady, dressed with elegant
+simplicity, had come out into the car vestibule.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jenny, here&#8217;s Miss Knowles now,&#8221; said Blake.
+&#8220;She came to meet us herself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That was very good of you, Miss Knowles,&#8221; said
+the lady, as the two advanced towards her. &#8220;We
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_140' name='page_140'></a>140</span>
+are very glad to meet you. Will you not come up out
+of the sun?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The white-uniformed porter promptly stood at attention.
+Blake as promptly offered his hand. The
+girl accepted his assistance and mounted the car steps
+with an absence of awkwardness instantly noted by
+Mrs. Blake. That lady held out a somewhat thin
+white hand as Isobel drew off her gauntlet gloves.
+But she did not stop with the light firm handclasp.
+Lifting the girl&#8217;s veil, she kissed her full on her coral
+lips.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We shall be friends,&#8221; she stated, a smile in her
+hazel eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I hope so,&#8221; murmured the girl, blushing with delight.
+&#8220;The only question is whether you will like
+me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Mrs. Blake patted the plump, sunbrowned hand that
+she had not yet relinquished. She was little if any
+older than the girl, but her air was that of matronly
+wisdom. &#8220;My dear, can you doubt it? I was prepared
+to like even the kind of young woman my husband
+told me to expect.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Bronco Bess, Queen of the Cattle Camp,&#8221; suggested
+the girl, dimpling. &#8220;Wait till you see me rope
+and hogtie a steer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Mrs. Blake smiled, and looked across at Ashton,
+who sat motionless under the shadow of his big sombrero,
+his face half averted from the car.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_141' name='page_141'></a>141</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve a real surprise for you,&#8221; said the girl.
+&#8220;Mr. Blake, if I may tell it to you also.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake swung up the steps, hat in hand. &#8220;It can&#8217;t
+be half as pleasant as the surprise you&#8217;ve already given
+us,&#8221; he said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I fear not,&#8221; she replied, with a quick change to
+gravity. She looked earnestly into their faces.
+&#8220;Still, I hope&ndash;&ndash;yes, I really believe it will please you
+when you consider it. But first, I want to tell you that
+out here it&#8217;s our notion that a man should be rated
+according to his present life, and not blamed for his
+past mistakes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Certainly not!&#8221; agreed Mrs. Blake, with a swift
+glance at her husband. &#8220;If a man has mounted to a
+higher level, he should be upheld, not dragged down
+again.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s good old-style Western fair play,&#8221; added
+Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m so glad you take it that way!&#8221; said Isobel.
+&#8220;A young man utterly ruined in fortune&ndash;&ndash;partly at
+least through his own fault&ndash;&ndash;came to us and asked
+to be hired. He has been a hard worker and a gentleman.
+His name is Lafayette Ashton.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ashton?&#8221; said Blake, his face as impassive as a
+granite mask.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. He has told me all about the bridge. He
+wished to go away, because he thought you and Mrs.
+Blake would not like to meet him. I told him you
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_142' name='page_142'></a>142</span>
+would be willing to let bygones be bygones, and help
+him start off with a new tally card.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lafayette Ashton working&ndash;&ndash;as a cowboy!&#8221; murmured
+Mrs. Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He is still a good deal of a tenderfoot. But he
+is learning fast; and work!&ndash;&ndash;the way he pesters
+Daddy to find him something to do!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He certainly must be a changed man,&#8221; dryly commented
+Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Cherchez la femme</i>,&#8221; said his wife.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mrs. Blake!&#8221; protested the girl, blushing.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s that?&#8221; he asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;&#8216;Find the woman,&#8217;&#8221; explained Mrs. Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s easy,&#8221; he said, fixing his twinkling eyes on
+the rosy-faced girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But I&#8217;m sure it has not been because of me&ndash;&ndash;at
+least not altogether,&#8221; she qualified with her uncompromising
+honesty.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I wouldn&#8217;t blame him even if it was altogether,&#8221;
+said Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then you will be willing to overlook your past
+trouble with him?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Since you say he has straightened out&ndash;&ndash;yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s good of you! That&#8217;s what I expected of
+you!&#8221; exclaimed the girl. &#8220;That is he, in the buckboard.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Without a word, Blake started down the car steps.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Bring him here at once, Tom,&#8221; said Mrs. Blake.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_143' name='page_143'></a>143</span></p>
+<p>Her husband went up beside the motionless figure
+in the buckboard and held out his hand. &#8220;Glad to
+meet you, Ashton,&#8221; he said with matter-of-fact heartiness.
+&#8220;Jenny wants you to come to her. We&#8217;re not
+ready to start, as we were not certain we would be
+met.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Miss&ndash;&ndash;Mrs. Blake wishes me to come!&#8221; mumbled
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; said Blake, gripping the other&#8217;s hesitatingly
+extended hand.</p>
+<p>Ashton flushed darkly. &#8220;But I&ndash;&ndash;I can&#8217;t leave the
+horses,&#8221; he replied.</p>
+<p>Blake signed to the porter, who hastened forward.
+&#8220;Hold the lines for this gentleman, Sam.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton reluctantly gave the lines into the mulatto&#8217;s
+sallow hands and stepped from the buckboard. His
+head hung forward as he followed Blake. But at the
+foot of the steps he removed his sombrero and forced
+himself to look up. Isobel was smiling down at him
+encouragingly. He looked from her to Mrs. Blake,
+his handsome face crimson with shame.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How do you do, Lafayette?&#8221; Mrs. Blake greeted
+him with quiet cordiality. &#8220;This is a pleasant surprise.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes&ndash;&ndash;yes, indeed! I&ndash;&ndash;yes, very!&#8221; he stammered,
+so embarrassed that he would have stuck at
+the foot of the steps had not Blake started him up with
+a vigorous boost.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_144' name='page_144'></a>144</span></p>
+<p>Mrs. Blake gave him her hand. &#8220;You look so
+strong and hearty!&#8221; she remarked. &#8220;It speaks well
+for the fare Miss Knowles provides.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, that credit is due our Jap chef,&#8221; laughed the
+girl. &#8220;I can cut out a cow from the herd better than
+I can bone a chop. But the butter and eggs and cream
+that are awaiting you&ndash;&ndash;Which reminds me that
+we&#8217;ve yet to see It.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It?&#8221; asked Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, him&ndash;&ndash;the <i>baby</i>!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, you dear girl!&#8221; cooed Mrs. Blake. &#8220;Come
+in and see him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Isobel followed her into the car. Blake nodded to
+Ashton. But the younger man shrank away from the
+door.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you&#8217;ll kindly excuse me,&#8221; he muttered. &#8220;It
+would remind me too much of&ndash;&ndash;the time when&ndash;&ndash;No,
+I&#8217;d rather not.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course,&#8221; assented Blake with ready understanding.
+&#8220;How do you like this country? I went
+through here once on a railway survey. It&#8217;s rare
+good luck&ndash;&ndash;this chance to visit Miss Knowles. Jenny
+is a little run down, as you see.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall trust that her visit to this locality will soon
+quite restore her,&#8221; remarked Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It will. The doctors said Maine; I said Colorado.
+It has done you no end of good. You are looking
+particularly fine and fit.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_145' name='page_145'></a>145</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;It has helped me&ndash;&ndash;in more ways than one,&#8221; murmured
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Glad to hear you say it!&#8221; responded Blake in
+hearty approval.</p>
+<p>Ashton turned from him as Isobel appeared in the
+doorway, cuddling a lusty, rosy-cheeked baby. The
+mother hovered close behind her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look at him!&#8221; jeered Blake with heavily feigned
+derision. &#8220;Did you ever see such a big, fat, lubberly&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, look at him, Lafe,&#8221; said the girl, stepping
+out into the vestibule. &#8220;He is only a yearling, but
+isn&#8217;t he just the perfect image of his father?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton burst into a ringing laugh, but abruptly
+checked himself at sight of the sober face of the young
+mother. &#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;I beg pardon!&#8221; he stammered. &#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;she&ndash;&ndash;Miss
+Knowles&ndash;&ndash;that is what she told me
+to tell you about him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And you didn&#8217;t play up worth a little bit, Lafe!&#8221;
+complained the girl.</p>
+<p>It was Blake&#8217;s turn to laugh. &#8220;You&ndash;&ndash;!&#8221; he accused.
+&#8220;Schemed to frame up a case on us did
+you!&#8221;</p>
+<p>His wife smiled faintly, not altogether certain that
+an aspersion had not been cast upon her chuckling
+son.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But it&#8217;s partly true, really,&#8221; remarked Ashton,
+peering at the baby&#8217;s big pale-blue eyes.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_146' name='page_146'></a>146</span></p>
+<p>Blake burst into a hilarious roar. But Mrs. Blake
+now beamed upon Ashton. &#8220;Then you, too, see the
+resemblance, Lafayette! Isn&#8217;t it wonderful, and he
+so young? His name is Thomas Herbert Vincent
+Leslie Blake.&ndash;&ndash;Now, my dear, if you please, I shall
+take him in. We must be preparing to start, if it is
+so long a drive.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do let me hold him until you and Mr. Blake are
+ready,&#8221; begged the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am not quite sure that&ndash;&ndash;You will be careful
+not to drop him? He is tremendously strong,
+and he squirms,&#8221; dubiously assented the fond mother.
+&#8220;Come, Tom. We must not keep Miss Knowles
+waiting.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake disappeared with her into the luxuriously
+furnished car.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Isn&#8217;t he a dear?&#8221; cooed the girl, clasping the
+baby to her bosom and kissing his chubby clenched
+hands. He stared up into her glowing face with his
+round light-blue eyes. &#8220;Thomas Blake!&ndash;&ndash;Tom
+Blake!&#8221; she whispered.</p>
+<p>Ashton did not heed the words. He was gazing
+too intently at the girl and the child. His eyes
+glistened with a wonderment and longing so exquisitely
+intense that it was like a pain. The girl sank down in
+one of the cane chairs and laid the baby on his back.
+He kicked and gurgled, seized one of his upraised feet
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_147' name='page_147'></a>147</span>
+and thrust a pink big toe in between his white milk
+teeth.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s more than you can do, Lafe!&#8221; challenged
+the girl.</p>
+<p>She glanced up, dimpling with merriment,&ndash;&ndash;met the
+adoration in his eyes, and looked down, blushing. He
+attempted to speak, but the words choked into an incoherent
+sound like a sob. He jumped from the car
+and hurried to take the lines from the porter.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_148' name='page_148'></a>148</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XIII_THE_OTHER_LADYS_HUSBAND' id='CHAPTER_XIII_THE_OTHER_LADYS_HUSBAND'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIII</h2>
+<h3>THE OTHER LADY&#8217;S HUSBAND</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Miss Knowles did not seem to observe Ashton&#8217;s
+deflection. She remained worshipfully
+downbent over the wriggling, chuckling baby until its
+parents reappeared.</p>
+<p>Mrs. Blake had changed to an easy and serviceable
+dress of plain, strong material. The skirt, cut to
+walking length, showed that her feet and ankles were
+protected by a pair of absurdly small laced boots.
+Her husband had shifted to an equally serviceable costume&ndash;&ndash;flannel
+shirt, broad-brimmed felt hat, and
+surveyor&#8217;s boots.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Crossing the plains we packed a trunk with what
+we considered most necessary,&#8221; said Mrs. Blake, as
+she took the baby. &#8220;It is not a large one, and in addition
+there is only my satchel and the level and the
+lunch my maid is putting up for us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There is room for more, if you wish,&#8221; replied Isobel.
+&#8220;But we can send over here for anything you
+need, any time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re not going to let us really rough-it!&#8221; complained
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_149' name='page_149'></a>149</span>
+Mrs. Blake, as her husband swung her to the
+ground. &#8220;Were it not for Thomas Herbert&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;&ndash;&ndash;We&#8217;d go to Africa again and eat lions,&#8221; Blake
+completed the sentence. &#8220;Wait, though&ndash;&ndash;we may
+have a chance at mountain lions.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The porter had gone to help a manservant fetch
+the trunk from the other end of the car. Isobel untied
+the saddle horses from the rear of the buckboard.
+The trunk was lifted in, and Blake lashed it on, together
+with his level rod and tripod, using Ashton&#8217;s
+lariat.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Level is in the trunk,&#8221; he explained, in response
+to Ashton&#8217;s look of inquiry. &#8220;I suppose we ride.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I think it will be better if Lafe drives,&#8221; objected
+Isobel. &#8220;I am so reckless, and you don&#8217;t know the
+road, as he does. The only thing is Rocket&ndash;&ndash;Lafe
+has about trained him out of his tricks. But I should
+warn you that the hawss has been rather vicious.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tom will ride him,&#8221; confidently stated Mrs.
+Blake.</p>
+<p>Her husband took the bridle reins of the big horse
+and mounted him with the agility of a cowboy. For
+a moment Rocket stood motionless. Then, whether
+because of Blake&#8217;s weight or the fact that he was a
+stranger, all the beast&#8217;s newly acquired docility vanished.
+He began to plunge and buck even more
+violently than when first mounted by Ashton.</p>
+<p>Half a hundred Stockchuteites&ndash;&ndash;all the residents
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_150' name='page_150'></a>150</span>
+of the town and several floaters&ndash;&ndash;had come down to
+inspect the palatial private car and its passengers. At
+Rocket&#8217;s first leap these highly interested spectators
+broke into a murmur of joyful anticipation. They
+were about to see the millionaire tenderfoot pull
+leather.</p>
+<p>Yet somehow the event failed to transpire. Blake
+sat the flat saddle as if glued fast to it. His knees
+and legs were crushing against the sides of the leaping,
+whirling beast with the firmness of an iron vise.
+He held both hands upraised, away from the
+&#8220;leather.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Presently Rocket&#8217;s efforts began to flag. Instead
+of seeking to quiet the frantic beast, Blake began to
+whoop and to strike him with his hat. Thus taunted,
+Rocket resorted to his second trick. He took the bit
+in his teeth and started to bolt. The crowd scattered
+before the rush of the runaway. But they need not
+have moved. Blake reached down on each side of
+the beast&#8217;s outstretched neck and pulled. Tough-mouthed
+as he was, Rocket could not resist that powerful
+grip. His head was drawn down and backwards
+until his trumpet nostrils blew against his deep chest.
+After half a dozen wild plunges, he was forced to a
+stand, snorting but subdued.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s some riding, Miss Chuckie!&#8221; called the
+burly sheriff of the county. &#8220;Your guest forks a
+hawss like a buster.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_151' name='page_151'></a>151</span></p>
+<p>The girl rode forward beside Blake, her face radiant.
+She paid him the highest of compliments by taking
+his riding as a matter of course; but in her eyes
+was a look strangely like that of his wife&#8217;s fond gaze,&ndash;&ndash;a
+look of pride at his achievement, rather than admiration.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll ride ahead of the team to keep clear of the
+dust,&#8221; she remarked.</p>
+<p>He twisted about and saw that Ashton was starting
+to drive after them. His wife&#8217;s elderly maid was
+waving her handkerchief from one of the car windows.
+The porter and the manservant stood at attention.
+He exchanged a nod and smile with his wife, patted
+Rocket&#8217;s arched neck and clicked to him to start.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This is great, Miss Knowles!&#8221; he said. &#8220;I did
+not look for such fun, first crack out of the box.
+And&ndash;&ndash;if you don&#8217;t mind my saying it&ndash;&ndash;it&#8217;s such a
+jolly surprise your being what you are.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl blushed with pleasure. &#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;we have
+been so eager to meet you,&#8221; she murmured. She
+added hurriedly, &#8220;On account of your wonderful work
+as an engineer, you know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I wouldn&#8217;t have suspected Ashton of bragging
+for me,&#8221; he replied.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, he&ndash;&ndash;he says you have a remarkable knack
+of hitting on the solution of problems. But it&#8217;s in
+the engineering journals and reports that we&#8217;ve read
+about your work. Perhaps that is why you thought
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_152' name='page_152'></a>152</span>
+we had met before. After reading about you so
+much, I felt that I already knew you, and so my manner,
+you know&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>He shook his head at this seemingly ingenuous explanation.
+&#8220;No, there is something about your voice
+and face&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; His eyes clouded with the grief of a
+painful memory; his head sank forward until his square
+chin touched his broad chest. He muttered brokenly:
+&#8220;But that&#8217;s impossible.... Anyway&ndash;&ndash;better for
+them they died&ndash;&ndash;better than to live after....&#8221;</p>
+<p>Behind her veil the girl&#8217;s face became deathly
+white. He raised his head and looked at her with a
+wistful gleam of hope. She had averted her face
+from him and was gazing off at the hills with dim
+unseeing eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Pardon me, Miss Knowles,&#8221; he said, &#8220;but do you
+mind if I ask what is your first name?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She hesitated almost imperceptibly before replying:
+&#8220;I am called Chuckie&ndash;&ndash;Chuckie Knowles. Doesn&#8217;t
+that sound cowgirlish? We always have a chuck-wagon
+on the round-ups, you know. But it&#8217;s a name
+that used to be quite common in the West.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, it comes from the Spanish Chiquita,&#8221; he said.
+He repeated the word with the soft caressing Spanish
+accent, &#8220;<i>Che-ke&eacute;-tah!</i>&#8221;</p>
+<p>A flood of scarlet swept up into the girl&#8217;s pallid
+face, and slowly subsided to her normal rich coloring.
+After a short silence she asked in a conventional tone:
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_153' name='page_153'></a>153</span>
+&#8220;I suppose you are glad to get away from Chicago.
+The last papers we received say that the East is
+sweltering in one of those smothery heat waves.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s the humidity and close air that kills,&#8221; said
+Blake. &#8220;I ought to know. I lived for years in the
+slums.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, you&ndash;&ndash;you really speak of it&ndash;&ndash;openly!&#8221; the
+girl exclaimed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What of it?&#8221; he asked, astonished in turn at her
+lack of tact.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Nothing&ndash;&ndash;nothing,&#8221; she hastened to disclaim.
+&#8220;Only I know&ndash;&ndash;have read about the dreadful conditions
+in the Chicago slums. It is&ndash;&ndash;it must be so
+painful to recall them&ndash;&ndash;That was so rude of me
+to&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not at all,&#8221; he interrupted. To cover her evident
+confusion he held up his white hand in the scorching
+sunrays and commented jovially: &#8220;Talk about Eastern
+heat&ndash;&ndash;this is a hundred and five Fahrenheit at
+the very least! A-a-ah!&#8221; He drew in a deep breath
+of the dry pure air. &#8220;This is something like! When
+you get your land under ditch, you&#8217;ll have a paradise.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, but you do not understand,&#8221; she replied.
+&#8220;We want you to find out and tell us that Dry Mesa
+<i>cannot</i> be watered. Irrigation would break up
+Daddy&#8217;s range and put him out of business. It is just
+what we do not want.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_154' name='page_154'></a>154</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I see,&#8221; said Blake, with instant comprehension of
+the situation.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know it cannot be done. But there are so many
+reclamation projects, and Daddy has read and read
+about them until he almost has a bee in his bonnet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yet you sent for me&ndash;&ndash;an engineer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Because I knew that when <i>you</i> told him our mesa
+couldn&#8217;t be watered, he would stop worrying. You
+know, you are quite a hero with us. We have read
+all about your wonderful work.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake&#8217;s pale eyes twinkled. &#8220;So I&#8217;m a hero.
+Will you dynamite my pedestal if I figure out a way
+to water your range?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She flashed him a troubled glance, but rallied for
+a quick rejoinder: &#8220;Even you can&#8217;t pump the water
+out of Deep Ca&ntilde;on, and Plum Creek is only a trickle
+most of the year.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I see you want me to make my report as dry as I
+can write it,&#8221; he bantered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No,&#8221; she replied, suddenly serious. &#8220;We wish
+the exact truth, though we hope you&#8217;ll find it dry.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then you are to blame if the matter does not
+figure out your way,&#8221; he warned her. &#8220;You&#8217;ve
+given me a problem. If there is any possible way for
+me to irrigate your mesa, I am bound to try my best
+to work it out. Hadn&#8217;t you better head me off before
+I start in? At present I haven&#8217;t the remotest
+desire to do this except to comply with your wishes.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_155' name='page_155'></a>155</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s as I told Daddy,&#8221; she said. &#8220;If there really
+is a way, the sooner we know it the better. It is the
+uncertainty that is bothering Daddy. If your report
+is for us, all well and good; if against us, he will stand
+up and fight and forget about worrying.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Fight?&#8221; asked Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Fight the project, fight against the formation of
+any irrigation district. He owns five sections. The
+reservoir might have to be on his patented land.
+He&#8217;d fight fair and square and hard&ndash;&ndash;to the last
+ditch!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Isn&#8217;t that a Dutchman&#8217;s saying?&#8221; asked Blake
+humorously.</p>
+<p>The girl&#8217;s tense face relaxed, and she burst out in
+a ringing laugh. She shifted the conversation to less
+serious subjects, and they cantered along together,
+laughing and chatting like old friends.</p>
+<p>By this time Ashton and Mrs. Blake had gradually
+come to the same stage of pleasant comradeship.
+Ashton had started the drive in a sullen mood, his
+manner half resentful and wholly embarrassed. Of
+this the lady was tactfully oblivious. Avoiding all
+allusion to the catastrophe that had befallen him, she
+told him the latest news of the mutual friends and
+acquaintances in whom ordinarily he would have been
+expected to be interested.</p>
+<p>She even spoke casually of his father. His face contracted
+with pain, but he showed no bitterness against
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_156' name='page_156'></a>156</span>
+the parent who had disowned him. After that her
+graciousness towards him redoubled. With Isobel for
+excuse, she gradually shifted the conversation to ranch
+life and his employment as cowboy. In many subtle
+ways she conveyed to him her admiration of the manner
+in which he had turned over a new leaf and was
+making a clean fresh start in life.</p>
+<p>After delicately intimating her feelings, she at once
+turned to less personal topics. The last traces of his
+embarrassment and moodiness left him, and he began
+to talk quite at his ease, though with a certain reserve
+that she attributed to the vast change in his fortunes.
+In return for her kindness, he repaid her by showing a
+real interest in Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie Blake.</p>
+<p>That young man spent his time chuckling and crowing
+and kicking, until overcome with sleep. Two
+hours out from Stockchute he awoke and vociferously
+demanded nourishment. Promptly the party was
+brought to a halt. They were among the pi&ntilde;ons on
+one of the hillsides. While the baby took his dinner,
+Isobel laid out the lunch and the men burned incense
+in the guise of a pair of Havana cigars produced by
+Blake.</p>
+<p>The lunch might have been put up in the kitchen of
+a first-class metropolitan hotel. The fruit was the
+most luscious that money could buy; the sandwiches
+and cake would have tempted a sated epicure; the mineral
+water had come out of an ice chest so nearly
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_157' name='page_157'></a>157</span>
+frozen that it was still refreshingly cool. But&ndash;&ndash;what
+was rather odd for a lunch packed in a private car&ndash;&ndash;it
+included no wine or whiskey or liqueur. Blake
+caught Ashton&#8217;s glance, and smiled.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You see I&#8217;m still on the waterwagon,&#8221; he remarked.
+&#8220;I&#8217;ve got a permanent seat. There have
+been times when it looked as if I might be jolted off,
+but&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But there&#8217;s never been the slightest chance of
+that!&#8221; put in his wife. She looked at Isobel, her soft
+eyes shining with love and pride. &#8220;Once he gets a
+grip on anything, he never lets go.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, I can believe that!&#8221; exclaimed the girl with
+an enthusiasm that brought a shadow into the mobile
+face of Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;A man can&#8217;t help holding on when he has something
+to hold on for,&#8221; said Blake, gazing at his wife
+and baby.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s true!&#8221; agreed Ashton, his eyes on the
+dimpled face of Isobel.</p>
+<p>Refreshed by the delicious meal, the party prepared
+to start on. But they did not travel as before. While
+Ashton was considerately washing out the dusty nostrils
+of the horses with water from his canteen, Isobel
+decided to drive with Mrs. Blake. Declaring that it
+would be like old times to sit a cowboy saddle, the big
+engineer lengthened the girl&#8217;s stirrup leathers and
+swung on to the pony. This left Rocket to his owner.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_158' name='page_158'></a>158</span></p>
+<p>At first Ashton seemed inclined to be stiff with his
+new road-mate. But as they jogged along, side by
+side, over the hills and across the sagebrush flats, Blake
+restricted his talk to impersonal topics and spared his
+companion from any allusion to their past difficulties.
+Throughout the ride, however, the two men maintained
+a certain reserve towards each other, and at no time
+approached the cordial intimacy that developed between
+the girl and Mrs. Blake before the end of their
+first mile together.</p>
+<p>After telling merrily about her dual life as summer
+cowgirl and winter society maiden, Isobel drifted
+around, by seemingly casual association of ideas, to the
+troublesome question of irrigation on Dry Mesa, and
+from that to Blake and his work as an engineer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I do so hope Mr. Blake finds that there is no
+project practicable,&#8221; she went on. &#8220;He has warned
+me that if there seems to be any chance to work out
+an irrigation scheme on our mesa he is bound to try to
+do it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And he would do it,&#8221; added Mrs. Blake with quiet
+confidence.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then I hope and pray he will find there is no
+chance, because Daddy would have to oppose him.
+That would be such a pity! He and I have read so
+much about Mr. Blake&#8217;s work that we have come to
+regard him as our&ndash;&ndash;as one of our heroes.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_159' name='page_159'></a>159</span></p>
+<p>Mrs. Blake smiled. It was very apparent, despite
+the quietness and repression of her high-bred manner,
+that she was very much in love with her husband.</p>
+<p>The girl continued in a meekly deferential tone:
+&#8220;So you will not mind my worshiping him. He is a
+hero, a real hero! Isn&#8217;t he?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The words were spoken with an earnestness and sincerity
+that won Mrs. Blake to a like candor. &#8220;You
+are quite right,&#8221; she said. &#8220;Lafayette may have told
+you how Mr. Blake and I were wrecked on the most
+savage coast of Africa. He saved me from wild beasts
+and tropical storms, from fever and snakes,&ndash;&ndash;from
+death in a dozen horrible forms. Then, when he had
+saved me&ndash;&ndash;and won me, he gave me up until he could
+prove to himself that he was worthy of me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He did?&#8221; cried the girl. &#8220;But of course!&ndash;&ndash;of
+course!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yet that was nothing to the next proof of his
+strength and manhood,&#8221; went on the proud wife.
+&#8220;He destroyed a monster more frightful than any lion
+or tropical snake&ndash;&ndash;he overcame the curse of drink
+that had come down to him from&ndash;&ndash;one of his
+parents.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;From&ndash;&ndash;from his&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; whispered the girl, her
+averted face white and drawn with pain.</p>
+<p>Mrs. Blake had bent over to kiss the forehead of
+her sleeping baby and did not see. &#8220;If only all parents
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_160' name='page_160'></a>160</span>
+knew what terrible misfortunes, what tortures,
+their transgressions are apt to bring upon their innocent
+children!&#8221; she murmured.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He told me that he won his way up out of the&ndash;&ndash;the
+slums,&#8221; said Isobel. &#8220;It must be some men fail
+to do that because they have relatives to drag them
+down&ndash;&ndash;their families.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It seems hard to say it, yet I do not know but that
+you are right, my dear,&#8221; agreed Mrs. Blake. &#8220;Strong
+men, if unhampered, have a chance to fight their way
+up out of the social pit. But women and girls, even
+when they escape the&ndash;&ndash;the worst down there, can
+hardly hope ever to attain&ndash;&ndash;And of course those
+that fall!&ndash;&ndash;Our dual code of morality is hideously
+unjust to our sex, yet it still is the code under which we
+live.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl drew in a deep, sighing breath. Her eyes
+were dark with anguish. Yet she forced a gay little
+laugh. &#8220;Aren&#8217;t we solemn sociologists! All we are
+concerned with is that <i>he</i> has won his way up, and
+there&#8217;s no one ever to drag him down or disgrace him;
+and&ndash;&ndash;and you won&#8217;t be jealous if I set him up on a
+pedestal and bring incense to him on my bended knees.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Only you must give Thomas Herbert his share at
+the same time,&#8221; stipulated the mother.</p>
+<p>The girl burst into prolonged and rather shrill
+laughter that passed the bounds of good breeding.
+Her emotion was so unrestrained that when she looked
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_161' name='page_161'></a>161</span>
+about at her surprised companion her face was flushed
+and her eyes were swimming with tears.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Please, oh, do please forgive me!&#8221; she begged
+with a humility as immoderate as had been her laughter.
+&#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;I can&#8217;t tell you why, but&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Say no more, my dear,&#8221; soothed Mrs. Blake.
+&#8220;You are merely a bit hysterical. Perhaps the excitement
+of our coming, after your months of lonely ranch
+life&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re so good!&#8221; sighed the girl. &#8220;Yes, it was
+due to&ndash;&ndash;your coming. But now the worst is over.
+I&#8217;ll not shock you again with any more such outbursts.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She smiled, and began to talk of other things, with
+somewhat unsteady but persistent gayety.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_162' name='page_162'></a>162</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XIV_A_DESCENT' id='CHAPTER_XIV_A_DESCENT'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIV</h2>
+<h3>A DESCENT</h3>
+</div>
+<p>When the party arrived at the ranch, the girl
+hostess took Mrs. Blake to rest in the clean,
+simply furnished room provided for the visitors.
+Blake, after carrying in their trunk single-handed, went
+to look around at the ranch buildings in company with
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>On returning to the house, the two found Knowles
+and Gowan in the parlor with the ladies. Isobel had
+already introduced them to Mrs. Blake and also to her
+son. That young man was sprawled, face up, in the
+cowman&#8217;s big hands, crowing and valiantly clutching at
+his bristly mustache.</p>
+<p>Gowan sat across from him, perfectly at ease in the
+presence of the city lady. But, with his characteristic
+lack of humor, he was unmoved by the laughable
+spectacle presented by his employer and the baby, and
+his manner was both reserved and watchful.</p>
+<p>At sight of Blake, Isobel called to her father in
+feigned alarm: &#8220;Look out, Daddy! Better stop
+hazing that yearling. Here comes his sire.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Knowles gave the baby back to its half-fearful
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_163' name='page_163'></a>163</span>
+mother, and rose to greet his guest with hospitable
+warmth: &#8220;Howdy, Mr. Blake! I&#8217;m downright
+glad to meet you. Hope you&#8217;ve found things comfortable
+and homelike.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Too much so,&#8221; asserted Blake, his eyes twinkling.
+&#8220;We came out expecting to rough-it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, your lady won&#8217;t know the difference,&#8221; remarked
+Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re quite mistaken, Daddy, really,&#8221; interposed
+his daughter. &#8220;She and Mr. Blake were wrecked in
+Africa and lived on roast leopards. We&#8217;ll have to
+feed them on mountain lions and bobcats.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you mean that, Miss Chuckie,&#8221; put in Gowan,
+&#8220;I can get a bobcat in time for dinner tomorrow.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl led the general outburst of laughter over
+this serious proposal. &#8220;Oh! oh! Kid! You&#8217;ll be
+the death of me!&ndash;&ndash;Yet I sent you a joke-book last
+Christmas!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Couldn&#8217;t see anything funny in it,&#8221; replied the
+puncher. &#8220;I haven&#8217;t lost it, though. It came from
+you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>To cover the girl&#8217;s blush at this blunt disclosure of
+sentiment, Mrs. Blake somewhat formally introduced
+her husband to the puncher. He shook Blake&#8217;s hand
+with like formality and politeness. But as their
+glances met, his gray eyes shone with the same cold suspicion
+with which he had regarded Ashton at their
+first meeting. Before that look the engineer&#8217;s
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_164' name='page_164'></a>164</span>
+friendly eyes hardened to disks of burnished steel, and
+his big fist released its cordial grip of the other&#8217;s small,
+bony hand. He gave back hostility for hostility with
+the readiness of a born fighter. Gowan was the first
+to look away.</p>
+<p>The incident passed so swiftly that only Knowles
+observed the outflash of enmity. His words indicated
+that he had anticipated the puncher&#8217;s attitude. He
+addressed Blake seriously: &#8220;Kid has been with us
+ever since he was a youngster and has always made
+my interests his own. Chuckie has been telling us what
+you said about putting through any project you once
+started.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake nodded. &#8220;Yes. That is why I suggested to
+Miss Knowles that she call off the agreement under
+which I came on this visit. We shall gladly pay board,
+and I&#8217;ll merely knock around; or, if you prefer, we&#8217;ll
+leave you and go back tomorrow morning.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, Daddy, no! we can&#8217;t allow our guests to leave,
+when they&#8217;ve only just come!&#8221; protested Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;As for any talk about board,&#8221; added her father,
+&#8220;you ought to know better, Mr. Blake.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My apology!&#8221; admitted Blake. &#8220;I&#8217;ve been living
+in the East.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That explains,&#8221; agreed the cowman. &#8220;Even as
+far east as Denver&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;ve got a sister there; lives up
+beyond the Capitol. But I&#8217;ve talked with other men
+there from over this way. They all agree you might
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_165' name='page_165'></a>165</span>
+as well look for good cow pasture behind a sheep drive
+as for hospitality in a city. Sometimes you can get
+what you want, and all times you&#8217;re sure to get a
+lot of attention you don&#8217;t want&ndash;&ndash;if you have money
+to spend.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s true. But about my going ahead here?&#8221;
+inquired Blake. &#8220;Say the word, and I put irrigation
+on the shelf throughout our visit.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Knowles shook his head thoughtfully. &#8220;No, I
+reckon Chuckie is right. We&#8217;d best learn just how
+we stand.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What if I work out a practical project? There&#8217;s
+any amount of good land on your mesa. The lay of
+it and the altitude ought to make it ideal for fruit.
+If I see that the proposition is feasible, I shall be bound
+to put water on all of your range that I can. I am
+an engineer,&ndash;&ndash;I cannot let good land and water go to
+waste.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The land isn&#8217;t going to waste,&#8221; replied Knowles.
+&#8220;It&#8217;s the best cattle range in this section, and it&#8217;s
+being used for the purpose Nature intended. As for
+the water, Chuckie has figured out there isn&#8217;t more
+than three thousand acre feet of flood waters that can
+be impounded off the watershed above us. That
+wouldn&#8217;t pay for building any kind of a dam.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And the devil himself couldn&#8217;t pump the water
+up out of Deep Ca&ntilde;on,&#8221; put in Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The devil hasn&#8217;t much use for science,&#8221; said
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_166' name='page_166'></a>166</span>
+Blake. &#8220;It has almost put him out of business. So
+he is not apt to be well up on modern engineering.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then you think you can do what the devil can&#8217;t?&#8221;
+demanded Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can try. Unless you wish to call off the deal,
+I shall ride around tomorrow and look over the country.
+Maybe that will be sufficient to show me there
+is no chance for irrigation, or, on the contrary, I may
+have to run levels and do some figuring.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then perhaps you will know by tomorrow night?&#8221;
+exclaimed Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, that&#8217;s something,&#8221; said the cowman.
+&#8220;I&#8217;ll take you out first thing in the morning.&ndash;&ndash;Lafe,
+show Mr. Blake the wash bench. There goes the first
+gong.&#8221;</p>
+<p>When, a little later, all came together again at the
+supper table, nothing more was said about the vexed
+question of irrigation. Isobel had made no changes
+in her table arrangements other than to have a plate
+laid for Mrs. Blake beside her father&#8217;s and another
+for Blake beside her own.</p>
+<p>The employ&eacute;s were too accustomed to Miss Chuckie
+to be embarrassed by the presence of another lady,
+and Blake put himself on familiar terms with them by
+his first remarks. If his wealthy high-bred wife was
+surprised to find herself seated at the same table with
+common workmen, she betrayed no resentment over
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_167' name='page_167'></a>167</span>
+the situation. Her perfect breeding was shown in the
+unaffected simplicity of her manner, which was precisely
+the same to the roughest man present as to her hostess.</p>
+<p>Even had there been any indications of uncongeniality,
+they must have been overcome by the presence of
+Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie Blake. The most unkempt,
+hard-bitten bachelor present gazed upon the
+majesty of babyhood with awed reverence and delight.
+The silent Jap interrupted his serving to fetch a queer
+rattle of ivory balls carved out one within the other.
+This he cleansed with soap, peroxide and hot water,
+in the presence of the honorable lady mother, before
+presenting it to her infant with much smiling and hissing
+insuckings of breath.</p>
+<p>After supper all retired at an early hour, out of regard
+for the weariness of Mrs. Blake.</p>
+<p>When she reappeared, late the next morning, she
+learned that Knowles, Gowan and her husband had
+ridden off together hours before. But Isobel and Ashton
+seemed to have nothing else to do than to entertain
+the mother and child. Mrs. Blake donned one of the
+girl&#8217;s divided skirts and took her first lesson in riding
+astride. There was no sidesaddle at the ranch, but
+there was a surefooted old cow pony too wise and
+spiritless for tricks, and therefore safe even for a less
+experienced horsewoman than was Mrs. Blake.</p>
+<p>Knowles and Gowan and the engineer returned so
+late that they found all the others at the supper table.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_168' name='page_168'></a>168</span>
+Blake&#8217;s freshly sunburnt face was cheerful. Gowan&#8217;s
+expression was as noncommittal as usual. But the
+cowman&#8217;s forehead was furrowed with unrelieved suspense.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Mr. Blake!&#8221; exclaimed Isobel. &#8220;Don&#8217;t tell
+us your report is unfavorable.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Afraid I can&#8217;t say, as yet,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;We&#8217;ve
+covered the ground pretty thoroughly for miles along
+High Mesa and Deep Ca&ntilde;on. If the annual precipitation
+here is what I estimate it from what your father
+tells me, it would be possible to put in a drainage and
+reservoir system that would store four thousand acre
+feet. Except as an auxiliary system, however, it would
+cost too much to be practicable. As for Deep Ca&ntilde;on&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;
+He turned to his wife. &#8220;Jenny, whatever else
+happens, I must get you up to see that ca&ntilde;on. It&#8217;s
+almost as grand and in some ways even more wonderful
+than the Ca&ntilde;on of the Colorado.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then I must see it, by all means,&#8221; responded Mrs.
+Blake. &#8220;I shall soon be able to ride up to it, Isobel
+assures me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Within a few days,&#8221; said the girl. &#8220;But, Mr.
+Blake, pardon me&ndash;&ndash;How about the water in the
+ca&ntilde;on? You surely see no way to lift it out over
+the top of High Mesa?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m sorry, but I can&#8217;t even guess what can be done
+until I have run a line of levels and found the depth
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_169' name='page_169'></a>169</span>
+of the ca&ntilde;on. I tried to estimate it by dropping in
+rocks and timing them, but we couldn&#8217;t see them strike
+bottom.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;A line of levels? Will it take you long?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Maybe a week; possibly more. If I had a transit
+as well as my level, it would save time. However, I
+can make out with the chain and compass I brought.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Blake is to start running his levels in the
+morning,&#8221; said Knowles. &#8220;Lafe, I&#8217;d like you to help
+him as his rodman, if you have no objections. As
+you&#8217;ve been an engineer, you can help him along
+faster than Kid.&ndash;&ndash;You said one would do, Mr. Blake;
+but if you need more, take all the men you want. The
+sooner this thing is settled, the better it will suit me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The sooner the better, Daddy!&#8221; agreed Isobel,
+&#8220;that is, if our guests promise to not hurry away.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We shall stay at least a month, if you wish us to,&#8221;
+said Mrs. Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Two months would be too short!&ndash;&ndash;And the
+sooner we are over with this uncertainty&ndash;&ndash;Lafe,
+you&#8217;ll do your utmost to help Mr. Blake, won&#8217;t you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, indeed; anything I can,&#8221; eagerly responded
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>Gowan&#8217;s face darkened at sight of the smile with
+which the girl rewarded the tenderfoot. Yet instead
+of sulking, he joined in the evening&#8217;s entertainment of
+the guests with a zeal that agreeably surprised everyone.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_170' name='page_170'></a>170</span>
+His guitar playing won genuine praise from the
+Blakes, though both were sophisticated and critical
+music lovers.</p>
+<p>Somewhat earlier than usual he rose to go, with the
+excuse that he wished to consult Knowles about some
+business with the owner of the adjoining range. The
+cowman went out with him, and did not return. An
+hour later Ashton took reluctant leave of Isobel, and
+started for the bunkhouse. Half way across he was
+met by his employer, who stopped before him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Everybody turning in, Lafe?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not at my suggestion, though,&#8221; replied Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Reckon not. Mr. Blake and his lady are old
+friends of yours, I take it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mrs. Blake is,&#8221; stated Ashton, with a touch of his
+former arrogance. &#8220;We made mud-pies together, in
+a hundred thousand dollar dooryard.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Humph!&#8221; grunted Knowles. &#8220;And her husband?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The darkness hid Ashton&#8217;s face, but his voice betrayed
+the sudden upwelling of his bitterness: &#8220;I
+never heard of him until he&ndash;&ndash;until a little over three
+years ago. I wish to Heaven he hadn&#8217;t taken part
+in that bridge contest!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How&#8217;s that?&#8221; asked Knowles in a casual tone.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Nothing&ndash;&ndash;nothing!&#8221; Ashton hastened to disclaim.
+&#8220;You haven&#8217;t been talking with Miss Chuckie
+about me, have you, Mr. Knowles?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_171' name='page_171'></a>171</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;No. Why?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It was only that I explained to her how I came to
+be ruined&ndash;&ndash;to lose my fortune. You see, the circumstances
+are such that I cannot very well say anything
+against Blake; yet he was the cause&ndash;&ndash;it was owing
+to something he did that I lost all&ndash;&ndash;everything&ndash;&ndash;millions!
+Curse him!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ve appeared friendly enough towards him,&#8221;
+remarked Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, I&ndash;&ndash;I promised Miss Chuckie to try to forget
+the past. But when I think of what I lost, all because
+of him&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So-o!&#8221; considered the cowman. &#8220;Maybe there&#8217;s
+more in what Kid says than I thought. He&#8217;s been
+cross-questioning Blake all day. You know how little
+Kid is given to gab. But from the time we started off
+he kept after Blake like he was cutting out steers at
+the round-up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Blake isn&#8217;t the kind you could get to tell anything
+against himself,&#8221; asserted Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, that may be. All his talk today struck me
+as being straightforward and outspoken. But Kid has
+been drawing inferences. He keeps hammering at it
+that Blake must be in thick with his father-in-law, and
+that all millionaires round-up their money in ways that
+would make a rustler go off and shoot himself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Business is business,&#8221; replied Ashton with all his
+old cynicism. &#8220;I&#8217;ll not say that H. V. Leslie is
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_172' name='page_172'></a>172</span>
+crooked, but I never knew of his coming out of a deal
+second best.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, at any rate, it&#8217;s white of Blake to tell us
+beforehand what he intends to do if he sees a chance of
+a practical project.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Has he told you everything?&#8221; scoffed Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How about his offer to drop the whole matter and
+not go into it at all?&#8221; rejoined Knowles.</p>
+<p>Ashton hesitated to reply. For one thing, he was
+momentarily nonplused, and, for another, the Blakes
+had treated him as a gentleman. But a fresh upwelling
+of bitterness dulled his conscience and sharpened
+his wits.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It may have been to throw you off your guard,&#8221; he
+said. &#8220;Blake is deep, and he has had old Leslie to
+coach him ever since he married Genevieve. He could
+have laid his plans,&ndash;&ndash;looked over the ground, and
+found out just what are your rights here,&ndash;&ndash;all without
+your suspecting him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I&#8217;m not so sure&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have you told him what lands you have deeds
+to?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, but if he knows as much about the West as I
+figure he does, he can guess it. Fence every swallow
+of get-at-able water to be found on my range this time
+of year, and you won&#8217;t have to dig a posthole off of
+land I hold in fee simple. Plum Creek sinks just below
+where Dry Fork junctions.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_173' name='page_173'></a>173</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;But you can&#8217;t have <i>all</i> the water?&#8221; exclaimed Ashton
+incredulously.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, every drop to be found outside Deep Ca&ntilde;on
+this time of year. There&#8217;s my seven and a half mile
+string of quarter-sections blanketing Plum Creek from
+the springs to down below Dry Fork, and five quarter-sections
+covering all the waterholes. That makes up
+five sections. A bunch of tenderfeet came in here,
+years ago, and pre&euml;mpted all the quarter-sections with
+water on them. Got their patents from the government.
+Then the Utes stampeded them clean out of
+the country, and I bought up their titles at a fair
+figure.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And you own even that splendid pool up where I
+had my camp?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Everything wet on this range that a cow or hawss
+can get to, this time of year.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton considered, and advised craftily: &#8220;Don&#8217;t
+tell him this. Does Miss Chuckie know it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;She knows I have five sections, and that most of
+it is on Plum Creek. I don&#8217;t think anything has ever
+been said to her about the waterholes. But why not
+tell Blake?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t you see? Even if he finds a way to get at
+the water in Deep Ca&ntilde;on, he will first have to bore his
+tunnel. He and his construction gang must have water
+to drink and for their engines while they are carrying
+out his plans. You can lie low, and, when the right
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_174' name='page_174'></a>174</span>
+time comes, get out an injunction against their trespassing
+on your land.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Say, that&#8217;s not a bad idea. The best I could figure
+was that they might need one of my waterholes for a
+reservoir site. But why not call him when he first takes
+a hand?&#8221; asked Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, you should not show your cards until you have
+to,&#8221; replied Ashton. &#8220;With all Leslie&#8217;s money against
+you, it might be hard to get your injunction if they
+knew of your plans. But if you wait until they have
+their men, machinery and materials on the ground, you
+will have them where they must buy you out at your
+own terms.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;By&ndash;&ndash;James!&#8221; commented Knowles. &#8220;Talk
+about business sharps!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I was in Leslie&#8217;s office for a time,&#8221; explained Ashton.
+&#8220;Your interests are Miss Chuckie&#8217;s interests.
+I&#8217;m for her&ndash;&ndash;first, last, and all the time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Um-m-m. Then I guess I can count on you as sure
+as on Gowan.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You can. I am going to try my best to win your
+daughter, Mr. Knowles. She&#8217;s a lady&ndash;&ndash;the loveliest
+girl I ever met.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No doubt about that. What&#8217;s more, she&#8217;s got
+grit and brains. That&#8217;s why I tell you now, as I&#8217;ve
+told Kid, it&#8217;s for her to decide on the man she&#8217;s going
+to make happy. If he&#8217;s square and white, that&#8217;s all
+I ask.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_175' name='page_175'></a>175</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;About my helping Blake with his levels,&#8221; Ashton
+rather hastily changed the subject. &#8220;I am in your employ&ndash;&ndash;and
+so is he, for that matter. Don&#8217;t you think
+I have a right to keep you posted on all his plans?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well&ndash;&ndash;yes. But he as much as says he will tell
+them himself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Perhaps he will, and perhaps he won&#8217;t, Mr.
+Knowles. I&#8217;ve told you what Leslie is like; and Blake
+is his son-in-law.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I&#8217;m not so sure. You and Kid, between
+you, have shaken my judgment of the man. It can&#8217;t do
+any harm to watch him, and I&#8217;ll be obliged to you for
+doing it. If it comes to a fight against him and the
+millions of backing he has, I want a fair deal and&ndash;&ndash;But,
+Lord! what if we&#8217;re making all this fuss over
+nothing? It doesn&#8217;t stand to reason that there&#8217;s any
+way to get the water out of Deep Ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Wait a week or so,&#8221; cautioned Ashton. &#8220;In my
+opinion, Blake already sees a possibility.&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_176' name='page_176'></a>176</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XV_LEVELS_AND_SLANTS' id='CHAPTER_XV_LEVELS_AND_SLANTS'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XV</h2>
+<h3>LEVELS AND SLANTS</h3>
+</div>
+<p>At sunrise the next morning Blake screwed his
+level on its tripod and set up the instrument about
+a hundred yards away from the ranch house. Ashton
+held the level rod for him on a spike driven into
+the foot of the nearest post of the front porch. Blake
+called the spike a bench-mark. For convenience of
+determining the relative heights of the points along his
+lines of levels, he designated this first &#8220;bench&#8221; in his
+fieldbook as &#8220;elevation 1,000.&#8221;</p>
+<p>From the porch he ran the line of level &#8220;readings&#8221;
+up the slope to the top of the divide between Plum
+Creek and Dry Fork and from there towards the waterhole
+on Dry Fork. At noon Isobel and Mrs. Blake
+drove out to them in the buckboard, bringing a hot meal
+in an improvised fireless-cooker.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And we came West to rough-it!&#8221; groaned Blake,
+his eyes twinkling.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You can camp at the waterhole where Lafe did,
+and I&#8217;ll send Kid out for that bobcat,&#8221; suggested the
+girl. &#8220;You could roast him, hair and all.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What! roast Gowan?&#8221; protested Blake. &#8220;Let
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_177' name='page_177'></a>177</span>
+me tell you, Miss Chuckie&ndash;&ndash;you and my wife and Ashton
+may like him that much, but I don&#8217;t!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You need not worry, Mr. Tenderfoot,&#8221; the girl
+flashed back at him. &#8220;Whenever it comes to a hot
+time, Kid always gets in the first fire, without waiting
+to be told.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t I know it?&#8221; exclaimed Ashton. &#8220;Maybe
+you haven&#8217;t noticed this hole in my hat, Mrs. Blake.
+He put a bullet through it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But it&#8217;s right over your temple, Lafayette!&#8221; replied
+Mrs. Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lafe was lifting his some-berero to me, and Kid
+did it to haze him&ndash;&ndash;only a joke, you know,&#8221; explained
+Isobel. &#8220;Of course Lafe was in no danger. It was
+different, though, when somebody&ndash;&ndash;we think it was
+his thieving guide&ndash;&ndash;took several rifle shots at him.
+Tell them about it, Lafe.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton gave an account of the murderous attack,
+more than once checking himself in a natural tendency
+to embellish the exciting details.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh! What if the man should come back and shoot
+at us?&#8221; shuddered Mrs. Blake, drawing her baby close
+in her arms.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No fear of that,&#8221; asserted Isobel. &#8220;Kid found
+that he had fled towards the railroad. That proves it
+must have been the guide. He would never dare come
+back after such a crime.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If he should, I always carry my rifle, as you see,&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_178' name='page_178'></a>178</span>
+remarked Ashton; adding, with a touch of bravado,
+&#8220;I made him run once, and I would again.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m glad Miss Chuckie is sure he will not come
+back,&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;I don&#8217;t fancy anyone shooting
+at me that way.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Timid Mr. Blake!&#8221; teased the girl. &#8220;Genevieve
+has been telling me how you faced a lion with only a
+bow and arrow.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Had to,&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;He&#8217;d have jumped on me
+if I had turned or backed off.&ndash;&ndash;Speaking about
+camping at that waterhole, I believe we&#8217;ll do it, Ashton,
+if it&#8217;s the same thing to you. It would save the
+time that would be lost coming and going to the ranch.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Save time?&#8221; repeated Isobel. &#8220;Then of course
+we&#8217;ll bring out a tent and camp kit for you tomorrow.
+Genevieve and I can ride or drive up to the waterhole
+each day, to picnic with you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It will be delightful,&#8221; agreed Mrs. Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You ride on ahead and wait for us in the shade,&#8221;
+said her husband. &#8220;We&#8217;ll knock off for the day when
+we reach that dolerite dike above the waterhole.&ndash;&ndash;If
+you are ready, Ashton, we&#8217;ll peg along.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He started off to set up his level as briskly as at
+dawn, though the midday sun was so hot that he had
+to shade the instrument with his handkerchief to keep
+the air-bubble from outstretching its scale. His wife
+and the girl drove on up Dry Fork to the waterhole.</p>
+<p>Mrs. Blake was outstretched on her back, fast asleep,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_179' name='page_179'></a>179</span>
+and Isobel was playing with the baby under the adjoining
+tree, when at last the surveyors came up on the
+other side of the creek and ended their day&#8217;s run with
+the establishment of a bench-mark on the top of the
+dike above the pool. Blake seemed as fresh as in
+the morning. He took a moderate drink of water
+dipped up in the brim of his hat, and without wakening
+his wife, sat down beside her to &#8220;figure up&#8221; his
+fieldbook.</p>
+<p>Ashton had come down to the pool panting from
+heat and exertion. It was the first time that he had
+walked more than half a mile since coming to the
+ranch, for he had immediately fallen into the cowboy
+practice of saddling a horse to go even short distances.
+He had his reward for his work when, having soused
+his hot head in the pool and drunk his fill, he came up
+to rest in the shade of Isobel&#8217;s tree. Very considerately
+the baby fell asleep. To avoid disturbing him and
+his mother, the young couple talked in low tones and
+half whispers very conducive to intimacy.</p>
+<p>Ashton did his utmost to improve his opportunity.
+Without openly speaking his love, he allowed it to
+appear in his every look and intonation. The girl
+met the attack with banter and raillery and adroit shiftings
+of the conversation whenever his ardent inferences
+became too obvious. Yet her evasion and her teasing
+could not always mask her maidenly pleasure over his
+adoration of her loveliness, and an occasional blush betrayed
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_180' name='page_180'></a>180</span>
+to him that his wooing was not altogether unwelcome.</p>
+<p>He was in the seventh heaven when Mrs. Blake
+awoke from her health-giving sleep and her husband
+closed his fieldbook. The girl promptly dashed her
+suitor back to earth by dropping him for the engineer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Blake! You can&#8217;t have figured it out already?&#8221;
+she exclaimed. &#8220;What do you find?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Only an &#8216;if,&#8217; Miss Chuckie,&#8221; he answered. &#8220;If
+water can be stored or brought by ditch to this elevation,
+practically all Dry Mesa can be irrigated. Our
+bench-mark there on the dike is more than two hundred
+feet above that spike we drove into your porch
+post.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is that all you&#8217;ve found out today?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All for today,&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;I could have left
+this line of levels until later, but I thought I might as
+well get through with them.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You would not have run them if you had thought
+they would be useless,&#8221; she stated, perceiving the point
+with intuitive acuteness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I like to clean up my work as I go along,&#8221; he replied.
+&#8220;If you wish to know, I have thought of a
+possible way to get water enough for the whole mesa.
+It depends on two &#8216;ifs.&#8217; I shall be certain as to one
+of them within the next two days. The other is the
+question of the depth of Deep Ca&ntilde;on. If I had a
+transit, I could determine that by a vertical angle,&ndash;&ndash;triangulation.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_181' name='page_181'></a>181</span>
+As it is, I probably shall have to go
+down to the bottom.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Go down to the bottom of Deep Ca&ntilde;on?&#8221; cried
+the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; he answered in a matter-of-course tone. &#8220;A
+big ravine runs clear down to the bottom, up beyond
+where your father said you first met Ashton. I think
+it is possible to get down that gulch.&ndash;&ndash;Suppose we
+hitch up? We&#8217;ll make the ranch just about supper-time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton hastened to bring in the picketed horses.
+When they were harnessed Isobel fetched the sleeping
+baby and handed him to his mother; but she did not
+take the seat beside her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You drive, Lafe,&#8221; she ordered. &#8220;I&#8217;m going to
+ride behind with Mr. Blake. It&#8217;s such fun bouncing.&#8221;</p>
+<p>All protested in vain against this odd whim. The
+girl plumped herself in on the rear end of the buckboard
+and dangled her slender feet with the gleefulness
+of a child.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Blake will catch me if I go to jolt off,&#8221; she
+declared.</p>
+<p>The engineer nodded with responsive gayety and
+seated himself beside her. As the buckboard rattled
+away over the rough sod, they made as merry over
+their jolts and bounces as a pair of school-children on
+a hayrack party.</p>
+<p>Mrs. Blake sought to divert Ashton from his disappointment,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_182' name='page_182'></a>182</span>
+but he had ears only for the laughing,
+chatting couple behind him. The fact that Blake was
+a married man did not prevent the lover from giving
+way to jealous envy. Chancing to look around as he
+warned the hilarious pair of a gully, he saw the girl
+grasp Blake&#8217;s shoulder. Natural as was the act, his
+envy flared up in hot resentment. Except on their
+drive to Stockchute, she had always avoided even
+touching his hand with her finger tips; yet now she
+clung to the engineer with a grasp as familiar as that
+of an affectionate child. Nor did she release her clasp
+until they were some yards beyond the gully.</p>
+<p>Mrs. Blake had seen not only the expression that
+betrayed Ashton&#8217;s anger but also the action that caused
+it. She raised her fine eyebrows; but meeting Ashton&#8217;s
+significant glance, she sought to pass over the incident
+with a smile. He refused to respond. All during the
+remainder of the drive he sat in sullen silence. Genevieve
+bent over her baby. Behind them the unconscious
+couple continued in their mirthful enjoyment of
+each other and the ride.</p>
+<p>When the party reached the ranch, the girl must
+have perceived Ashton&#8217;s moroseness had she not first
+caught sight of her father. He was standing outside
+the front porch, his eyes fixed upon the corner post
+in a perplexed stare.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, Daddy,&#8221; she called, &#8220;what is it? You
+look as you do when playing chess with Kid.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_183' name='page_183'></a>183</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Afraid it&#8217;s something that&#8217;ll annoy Mr. Blake,&#8221;
+replied the cowman.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What is it?&#8221; asked Blake, who was handing his
+wife from the buckboard.</p>
+<p>As the engineer faced Knowles, Gowan sauntered
+around the far corner of the house. At sight of the
+ladies he paused to adjust his neckerchief.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t understand it, Mr. Blake,&#8221; said the cowman.
+&#8220;Somebody has pulled out that spike you drove in
+here this morning.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Pulled the spike?&#8221; repeated Gowan, coming forward
+to stare at the post. &#8220;That shore is a joke.
+The Jap&#8217;s building a new henhouse. Must be short
+of nails.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s so,&#8221; said Knowles. &#8220;I forgot to order
+them for him. I&#8217;m mighty sorry, Mr. Blake. But
+of course the little brown cuss didn&#8217;t know what he
+was meddling with.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jumping Jehosaphat!&#8221; ejaculated Gowan. &#8220;That
+shore is mighty hard luck! I reckon pulling that
+spike turns your line of levels adrift like knocking out
+the picket-pin of an uneasy hawss.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake burst into a hearty laugh. &#8220;That&#8217;s a fine
+metaphor, Mr. Gowan. But it does not happen to
+fit the case. It would not matter if the spike-hole had
+been pulled out and the post along with it, so far as
+concerns this line of levels.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It wouldn&#8217;t?&#8221; muttered Gowan, his lean jaw
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_184' name='page_184'></a>184</span>
+dropping slack. He glowered as if chagrined at the
+engineer&#8217;s laughter at his mistake.</p>
+<p>Without heeding the puncher&#8217;s look, Blake began to
+tell Knowles the result of his day&#8217;s work. While he
+was speaking, they went into the house after his wife
+and the girl, leaving Gowan and Ashton alone.
+Equally sullen and resentful, the rivals exchanged stares
+of open hostility. Ashton pointed a derisive finger at
+the spike-hole in the post.</p>
+<p>&#8220;&#8216;Hole ... and the post along with it!&#8217;&#8221; he repeated
+Blake&#8217;s words. &#8220;On bridge work it might
+have caused some trouble. But a preliminary line of
+levels&ndash;&ndash;<i>Mon Dieu</i>! A Jap should have known better&ndash;&ndash;or
+even a yap!&#8221; With a supercilious shrug, he
+swung back into the buckboard and drove up to the
+corral.</p>
+<p>Gowan&#8217;s right hand had dropped to his hip. Slowly
+it came up and joined the other hand in rolling a thick
+Mexican cigarette. But the puncher did not light his
+&#8220;smoke.&#8221; He looked at the spike-hole in the post,
+scowled, and went back around the house.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_185' name='page_185'></a>185</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XVI_METAL_AND_METTLE' id='CHAPTER_XVI_METAL_AND_METTLE'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XVI</h2>
+<h3>METAL AND METTLE</h3>
+</div>
+<p>At dawn Blake and Ashton drove up to the waterhole
+on Dry Fork with their camp equipment.
+There they left the outfit in the buckboard and proceeded
+with the line of levels on up the creek bed into
+the gorge from which it issued.</p>
+<p>For more than a mile they carried the levels over
+the bowlders of the gradually sloping bottom of that
+stupendous gash in the mountain side. So far the work
+was fairly easy. At last, however, they came to the
+place where the bed of the gulch suddenly tilted upward
+at a sharp angle and climbed the tremendous
+heights to the top of High Mesa in sheer ascents and
+cliff-like ledges. Blake established a bench-mark at
+the foot of the acclivity, and came forward beside Ashton
+to peer up the Titanic chute between the dizzy
+precipices. From where they stood to the head of
+the gulch was fully four thousand feet.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you think of it?&#8221; asked the engineer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I think this is where your line ends,&#8221; answered Ashton,
+and he rolled a cigarette. He had been anything
+but agreeable since their start from the ranch.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_186' name='page_186'></a>186</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;We of course can&#8217;t go up with the level and rod,&#8221;
+said Blake, smiling at the absurdity of the suggestion.
+&#8220;Still, we might possibly chain it to the top.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton shrugged. &#8220;I fail to see the need of risking
+my neck to climb this goat stairway.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Very well,&#8221; agreed Blake, ignoring his companion&#8217;s
+ill humor. &#8220;Kindly take back the level and get out
+the chain.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton started off without replying. Blake looked
+at the young man&#8217;s back with a regretful, half-puzzled
+expression. But he quickly returned to the business
+in hand. He laid the level rod on a rock and inclined
+it at the same steep pitch as the uptilt of the gorge bottom.
+Over the lower end of this he held a plumb bob,
+and took the angle between the perpendicular line of
+the bob-string and the inclined line of the rod with a
+small protractor that he carried in his notebook. The
+angle measured over fifty degrees from the horizontal.</p>
+<p>Having thus determined the angle of inclination, the
+engineer picked a likely line of ascent and started to
+climb the gulch chute. He went up in rapid rushes,
+with the ease and surefootedness of a coolheaded, steel-muscled
+climber. He stopped frequently, not because
+of weariness or of lack of breath, but to test the structure
+and hardness of the rocks with a small magnifying
+glass and the butt of his pocket knife.</p>
+<p>At last, nearly a thousand feet up, his ascent was
+stopped by a sheer hundred-foot cliff. He had seen
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_187' name='page_187'></a>187</span>
+it beetling above him and knew beforehand that he
+could not hope to scale such a precipice; yet he clambered
+up to it, still examining the rock with minute
+care. As he walked across the waterworn shelf at the
+foot of the sheer cliff, his eye was caught by a wide
+seam of quartz in the side wall of the gulch.</p>
+<p>Going on over to the vein, he looked at it in several
+places through his magnifying glass. Everywhere
+little yellow specks showed in the semi-translucent
+quartz. He drew back across the gorge to examine
+the trend of the vein. It ran far outward and upward,
+and in no place was it narrower than where it
+disappeared under the bed of the gorge.</p>
+<p>His lips pursed in a prolonged, soundless whistle.
+But he did not linger. Immediately after he had estimated
+the visible length and dip of the seam, he began
+his descent. Arriving at the foot without accident,
+he picked up the level rod and swung away down the
+gulch.</p>
+<p>He saw nothing of Ashton until he had come all
+the distance down across the valley to the dike above
+the pool. His assistant was in the grove below,
+assiduously helping Miss Knowles to erect a tent that
+the girl had improvised from a tarpaulin. Genevieve
+and Thomas Herbert were interesting themselves in
+the contents of the kit-box. The two ladies had ridden
+up to the camp on horseback, Isobel carrying the baby.</p>
+<p>When Blake came striding down to them, the girl
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_188' name='page_188'></a>188</span>
+left Ashton and ran to meet him, her eyes beaming with
+affectionate welcome.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What has kept you so long?&#8221; she called. &#8220;Lafe
+says the gulch is absolutely unclimbable. I could have
+told you so, beforehand.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You are right. I tried it, but had to quit,&#8221; replied
+Blake, engulfing her outstretched hand in his
+big palm.</p>
+<p>When he would have released her, she caught his
+fingers and held fast, so that they came down to his
+wife hand in hand. Oblivious of Ashton&#8217;s frown, the
+girl dimpled at Mrs. Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Here he is, Genevieve,&#8221; she said. &#8220;We have him
+corralled for the rest of the morning.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sorry,&#8221; replied Blake, stooping to pick up his
+chuckling son. &#8220;We can&#8217;t knock off now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But if you cannot continue your levels?&#8221; asked his
+wife. &#8220;From what Lafayette told us, we thought you
+would not start in again until after lunch.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No more levels until tomorrow,&#8221; said Blake.
+&#8220;But I must settle one of my big &#8216;ifs&#8217; by night. To
+do it, Ashton and I will have to go up on High Mesa
+and measure a line. There&#8217;s still two hours till noon.
+We&#8217;ll borrow your saddle ponies, Miss Chuckie, and
+start at once, if Jenny will put us up a bite of lunch.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Immediately, Tom,&#8221; assented Mrs. Blake, delighted
+at the opportunity to serve her big husband.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_189' name='page_189'></a>189</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;When shall we take Genevieve to see the ca&ntilde;on?&#8221;
+asked the girl. &#8220;I am sure she can ride up safely on
+old Buck.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We have only the two saddle horses today,&#8221; replied
+Blake. &#8220;If our measurement settles that &#8216;if&#8217;
+one way, I shall start a line of levels up the mountain
+tomorrow morning, if the other way, any irrigation
+project is out of the question, and we shall go up to
+the ca&ntilde;on merely as a sightseeing party.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah!&#8221; sighed the girl. &#8220;&#8216;If!&#8217; &#8216;if&#8217;&ndash;&ndash;I do so
+hope it turns out to be the last one!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake looked at her with a quizzical smile. &#8220;Perhaps
+you would not, Miss Chuckie, if you could see
+all the results of a successful water system.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You mean, turning our range into farms for hundreds
+of irrigationists,&#8221; she replied. &#8220;I suppose I am
+selfish, but I am thinking of what it would mean to
+Daddy. Just consider how it will affect us. For
+years this land has been our own for miles and miles!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, we shall see,&#8221; said Blake, his eyes twinkling.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, indeed!&#8221; she exclaimed. &#8220;Lafe, if you&#8217;ll
+help me saddle up and help Mr. Blake rush up to do
+that measuring, I&#8217;ll&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;ll be ever so grateful!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Though all the more resentful at Blake over having
+to leave her company, Ashton eagerly sprang forward
+to help the girl saddle the ponies. When they were
+ready, she filled his canteen for him and took a sip
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_190' name='page_190'></a>190</span>
+from it &#8220;for luck.&#8221; Genevieve had packed an ample
+lunch in a gamebag, along with her husband&#8217;s linked
+steel-wire surveyor&#8217;s chain.</p>
+<p>Ten minutes after Blake&#8217;s arrival, he handed the
+baby to its mother and swung into the saddle. Ashton
+had already mounted, fired by a kind glance from
+the girl&#8217;s forget-me-not eyes. In his zeal, he led the
+way at a gallop around the craggy hill and across the
+intervening valley to the escarpment of High Mesa.
+Had not Blake checked him, he would have forced the
+pace on up the mountain side.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hold on,&#8221; called the engineer. &#8220;We want to
+make haste slowly. That buckskin you&#8217;re on isn&#8217;t so
+young as he has been, and my pony has to lug around
+two hundred pounds. We&#8217;ll get back sooner by being
+moderate. Besides you don&#8217;t wish to knock up old
+Buck. He is about the only one of these jumpy cow
+ponies that is safe for Jenny.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s so,&#8221; admitted Ashton. &#8220;Suppose you set
+the pace.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He stopped to let Blake pass him, and trailed behind
+up the mountain side. He had headed into a draw.
+The engineer at once turned and began zigzagging up
+the steep side of the ridge that thrust out into the valley
+between the draw and the gulch of Dry Fork. At the
+stiffest places he jumped off and led his pony. None
+too willingly, Ashton followed the example set by his
+companion. There were some places where he could
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_191' name='page_191'></a>191</span>
+not have avoided so doing&ndash;&ndash;ledges that the old buckskin,
+despite his years of mountain service, could hardly
+scramble up under an empty saddle.</p>
+<p>Long before they reached the point of the ridge,
+Ashton was panting and sweating, and his handsome
+face was red from exertion and anger. But his indignation
+at being misguided up so difficult a line of
+ascent received a damper when he reached the lower
+end of the ridge crest. Blake, who had waited patiently
+for him to clamber up the last sharp slope, gave
+him a cheerful nod and pointed to the long but fairly
+easy incline of the ridge crest.</p>
+<p>&#8220;In mountain climbing, always take your stiffest
+ground first, when you can,&#8221; he said. &#8220;We can jog
+along pretty fast now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They mounted and rode up the ridge, much of the
+time at a jog trot. Before long they came to the top
+of High Mesa, and galloped across to one of the ridges
+that lay parallel with Deep Ca&ntilde;on. Climbing the
+ridge, they found themselves looking over into a
+ravine that ran down to the right to join another ravine
+from the opposite direction, at the head of Dry Fork
+Gulch. Blake turned and rode to the left along the
+ridge, until he found a place where they could cross
+the ravine. The still air was reverberating with the
+muffled roar of Deep Ca&ntilde;on.</p>
+<p>From the ridge on the other side of the ravine, they
+could look down between the scattered pines to the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_192' name='page_192'></a>192</span>
+gaping chasm of the stupendous ca&ntilde;on. But Blake
+rode to the right along the summit of the ridge until
+they came opposite the head of Dry Fork Gulch.
+Here he flung the reins over his pony&#8217;s head, and dismounted.
+Ashton was about to do the same when he
+caught sight of a wolf slinking away like a gray shadow
+up the farther ravine. He reached for his rifle, and
+for the first time noticed that he had failed to bring
+it along. In his haste to start from camp he had left
+it in the tent.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Sacre!</i>&#8221; he petulantly exclaimed. &#8220;There goes
+twenty-five dollars!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How&#8217;s that?&#8221; asked Blake. He looked and
+caught a glimpse of the wolf just as it vanished. &#8220;Why
+don&#8217;t you shoot?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Left my rifle in camp, curse the luck!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Keep cool,&#8221; advised Blake. &#8220;It&#8217;s only twenty-five
+dollars, and you might have missed anyway.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not with my automatic,&#8221; snapped Ashton.
+&#8220;You needn&#8217;t sneer about the money. You&#8217;ve seen
+times when you&#8217;d have been glad of a chance at half
+the amount.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s true,&#8221; gravely agreed the engineer.
+&#8220;What&#8217;s more, I realize that it is far harder for you
+than it ever was for me. I want to tell you I admire
+the way you have stood your loss.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You do?&#8221; burst out the younger man. &#8220;I want
+to tell <i>you</i> I don&#8217;t admire the way you ruined me&ndash;&ndash;babbling
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_193' name='page_193'></a>193</span>
+to my father&ndash;&ndash;when you promised to keep
+still! You sneak!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake looked into the other&#8217;s furious face with no
+shade of change in his grave gaze. &#8220;I have never
+said a word to your father against you,&#8221; he declared.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then&ndash;&ndash;then how, after all this time&ndash;&ndash;?&#8221; stammered
+Ashton, even in his anger unable to disbelieve
+the engineer&#8217;s quiet statement. He was disconcerted
+only for the moment. Again he flared hotly: &#8220;But
+if you didn&#8217;t, old Leslie must have! It&#8217;s all the
+same!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, it is not the same,&#8221; corrected Blake. &#8220;As
+for my father-in-law, if he said anything about&ndash;&ndash;the
+past, I feel sure it was not with intention to hurt your
+interests.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hurt my interests! You know I am utterly
+ruined!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;On the contrary, I know you are not ruined. You
+have lost a large allowance, and a will has been made
+cutting you off from a great many millions that you expected
+to inherit. But you have landed square on your
+feet; you have a pretty good job, and you are stronger
+and healthier than you were.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you break up Mr. Knowles&#8217; range with your
+irrigation schemes, I stand to lose my job. You know
+that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If the project proves to be feasible, I shall offer
+you a position on the works,&#8221; said Blake.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_194' name='page_194'></a>194</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You needn&#8217;t try to bribe me!&#8221; retorted Ashton.
+&#8220;I&#8217;m working for Mr. Knowles.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, he directed you to help me with this survey,&#8221;
+replied the engineer, with imperturbable good nature.
+&#8220;The next move is to chain across to the ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He pulled his surveyor&#8217;s chain from the bag and descended
+the ridge to an out-jutting rock above the head
+of the tremendous gorge in the mountain side. Ashton
+followed him down. Blake handed him the front
+end of the chain.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You lead,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I&#8217;ll line you, as I know
+where to strike the nearest point on the ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton sullenly started up the ridge, and the measurement
+began. As Blake required only a rough approximation,
+they soon crossed the ridge and chained
+down through the trees to the edge of Deep Ca&ntilde;on.
+Ashton was astonished at the shortness of the distance.
+The ca&ntilde;on at this point ran towards the mesa escarpment
+as if it had originally intended to drive through
+into Dry Fork Gulch, but twisted sharp about and
+curved back across the plateau. Even Blake was surprised
+at the measurement. It was only a little over
+two thousand feet.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Noticed this place when out with Mr. Knowles and
+Gowan,&#8221; he remarked, gazing down into the abyss with
+keen appreciation of its awful grandeur. &#8220;They told
+me it is the nearest that the ca&ntilde;on comes to the edge
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_195' name='page_195'></a>195</span>
+of the mesa, until it breaks out, thirty or forty miles
+down.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How&ndash;&ndash;how about that &#8216;if&#8217; you said this measurement
+would settle?&#8221; asked Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s the time?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton looked at his watch, frowning over the
+evasive reply. &#8220;It&#8217;s two-ten.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll figure on the proposition while we eat lunch,&#8221;
+said Blake. &#8220;I can answer you better regarding that
+&#8216;if&#8217; when I have done some calculating. Luckily I
+climbed up to examine the rock in the gulch.&#8221; He
+smiled quizzically at his companion. &#8220;You were right
+as to its being unclimbable; but I found out even more
+than I expected.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton silently took the bag from him and arranged
+the lunch and his canteen on a rock under a pine. The
+engineer figured and drew little diagrams in his fieldbook
+while he ate his sandwiches. Ashton had half
+drained the canteen on the way up the mountain. Before
+sitting down Blake had rinsed out his mouth and
+taken a few swallows of water. After eating, he
+started to take another drink, noticed his companion&#8217;s
+hot dry face, and stopped after a single sip.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Guess you need it more than I do,&#8221; he remarked, as
+he rose to his feet. &#8220;Time to start. I wish to go
+around and down the mountain on the other side of
+the gulch.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_196' name='page_196'></a>196</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;How about the&ndash;&ndash;the &#8216;if&#8217;?&#8221; inquired Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Killed,&#8221; answered Blake. &#8220;There now is only
+one left. If that comes out the same way, Dry Mesa
+will have good cause to change its name.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You can tunnel through from the gulch to the
+ca&ntilde;on?&#8221; exclaimed Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes; and I shall do so&ndash;&ndash;if Deep Ca&ntilde;on is not too
+deep.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I hope it is a thousand feet below Dry Mesa!&#8221;
+said Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;In the circumstances,&#8221; Blake replied to the fervent
+declaration, &#8220;I am glad to hear you say it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton stared, but could detect no sarcasm in the
+other&#8217;s smile of commendation.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_197' name='page_197'></a>197</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XVII_A_SHOT_IN_THE_DUSK' id='CHAPTER_XVII_A_SHOT_IN_THE_DUSK'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XVII</h2>
+<h3>A SHOT IN THE DUSK</h3>
+</div>
+<p>They returned to their grazing ponies, and at
+once started the descent of the mountain, after
+crossing the ravine where they had seen the wolf.
+Blake chose a route that brought them down into the
+valley above the waterhole shortly before five o&#8217;clock.
+They cantered the remaining distance along the wide,
+gravelly wash of the creek bed to the dike.</p>
+<p>Looking down from the dike, they saw that Knowles
+and Gowan had come up the creek and were waiting for
+them in company with the ladies. Ashton set spurs to
+his horse and dashed across above the pool, to descend
+the slope to the party. Blake descended on the other
+side, to water his horse and slake his own thirst.</p>
+<p>To Ashton&#8217;s chagrin, Isobel joined Genevieve in
+hastening to meet the engineer. He rode down beside
+the two men and jumped off to follow the ladies. But
+Gowan sprang before him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hold on,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Mr. Knowles wants your
+report.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you&#8217;ll oblige us, Lafe,&#8221; added the cowman.
+&#8220;I&#8217;m pretty much worked up.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_198' name='page_198'></a>198</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You have cause to be!&#8221; replied Ashton. &#8220;He
+says the only question left is whether the water in the
+ca&ntilde;on is not at too low a level. We measured across
+from the creek gulch to the ca&ntilde;on. A tunnel is practicable,
+he says.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Through all that mountain?&#8221; scoffed Gowan.
+&#8220;It&#8217;s solid rock, clean through. It would take him
+a hundred years to burrow a hole like that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know nothing of engineering and its tools.
+We now have electric drills that will eat into granite
+like cheese,&#8221; condescendingly explained Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Think I don&#8217;t know that? But just you try to
+figure out how he&#8217;s going to get his electricity for his
+drills,&#8221; retorted Gowan.</p>
+<p>Without stopping for his disconcerted rival to reply,
+he turned his back on him and started towards
+Isobel. The girl was running up from the pool, her
+face almost pitiful with disappointment.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Daddy!&#8221; she called, &#8220;Mr. Blake says that if
+the water in the ca&ntilde;on&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Needn&#8217;t tell me, honey. I know already,&#8221; broke
+in her father, hastening to meet her.</p>
+<p>She flung her arms about his neck, and sobbed
+brokenly: &#8220;I&#8217;m&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;m so sorry for you, D-Daddy!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There, there now!&#8221; he soothed, awkwardly patting
+her back. &#8220;&#8217;Tisn&#8217;t like you to cry before you&#8217;re
+hurt.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_199' name='page_199'></a>199</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no&ndash;&ndash;you! not me. It doesn&#8217;t matter about
+me!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Doesn&#8217;t it, though! But I&#8217;m not hurt either, as
+yet. It&#8217;s a long ways from being a sure thing.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All the way down to the bottom of Deep Ca&ntilde;on!&#8221;
+put in Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And then some!&#8221; added Gowan. &#8220;I&#8217;ve hit on
+another &#8216;if,&#8217; Miss Chuckie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You have? Oh, Kid, tell us!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s this: How&#8217;s he going to get electricity to
+dig his tunnel?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake was coming up from the pool, with his baby
+in one arm and his wife clinging fondly to the other.
+He met the coldly exultant glance of Gowan, and
+smiled.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The only question regarding the power is one of
+cost, Mr. Gowan,&#8221; he said. &#8220;There is no coal near
+enough to be hauled. But gasolene is not bulky. If
+there was water power to generate electricity, a tunnel
+could be bored at half the cost I have figured. The
+point is that there is no water power available, nor will
+there be until the tunnel is finished.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What! You talk about finishing the tunnel?
+Didn&#8217;t you say it is still uncertain about the water?&#8221;
+demanded Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I was merely explaining to Mr. Gowan,&#8221; replied
+Blake. &#8220;The question he raised is one of the factors
+in our problem as to whether an irrigation project is
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_200' name='page_200'></a>200</span>
+practicable. We now know that we have the land for
+it, the tunnel site, the reservoir site&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; he pointed to
+the valley above the dike&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;and I have figured that
+the cost of construction would not be excessive. All
+that remains is to determine if we have the water. I
+have already explained that this will require a descent
+into the ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You say that that will decide it, one way or the
+other?&#8221; queried Knowles, his forehead creased with
+deep lines of foreboding.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; replied Blake. &#8220;I regret that you feel as
+you do about it. Consider what it would mean to
+hundreds, yes, thousands of people, if this mesa were
+watered. I assure you that you, too, would benefit
+by the project.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t care for any such benefit, Mr. Blake.
+I&#8217;ve been a cowman for twenty-five years. I want to
+keep my range until the time comes for me to take
+the long trail.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It would be hard to change,&#8221; agreed the engineer.
+&#8220;However, the point now is to find what Deep Ca&ntilde;on
+has to tell us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You still think you can go down it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, if I have ropes, a two-pound hammer, and
+some iron pins; railroad spikes and picket-pins would
+do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Going to rope the rocks and pull them up for
+steps?&#8221; asked Gowan.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_201' name='page_201'></a>201</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall need two or three hundred feet of half-inch
+manila,&#8221; said Blake, ignoring the sarcasm.</p>
+<p>&#8220;They may have it at Stockchute,&#8221; said Knowles.
+&#8220;Kid, you can drive over with the wagon and fetch
+Mr. Blake all the rope and other things he wants.
+I can&#8217;t stand this waiting much longer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There will be no time lost,&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;It will
+take Ashton and me all of tomorrow to carry a line
+of levels up the mountain.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why need you do that, Tom?&#8221; asked his wife.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, why, if all that&#8217;s left is to go down into the
+ca&ntilde;on?&#8221; added Isobel, dabbing the tears from her
+wet eyes.</p>
+<p>Ashton thrust in an answer before Blake could
+speak. &#8220;We must see how high the upper mesa is
+above this one, Miss Chuckie, and then compare the
+difference of altitude with the depth of the ca&ntilde;on, to
+see whether its bottom is above or below the bottom
+of the gulch.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh&ndash;&ndash;measure up and then down, to see which
+way is longest,&#8221; said Genevieve.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sorry, ma&#8217;am,&#8221; broke in Knowles. &#8220;We&#8217;ll have
+to be starting now to get home by dark. If you think
+you can trust me with that young man, I&#8217;d like the
+honor of packing him all the way in. I&#8217;ve toted
+calves for miles, so I guess I can hold onto a baby
+if I use both hands.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You shall have him!&#8221; replied Genevieve, smiling
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_202' name='page_202'></a>202</span>
+like a daughter as she met the look in his grave eyes.
+&#8220;Tom, give Thomas to Mr. Knowles&ndash;&ndash;when he is
+safe in the saddle.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Even Gowan cracked a smile at this cautious qualification.
+He hastened to bring Isobel&#8217;s horse and hold
+him for her&ndash;&ndash;which gave Ashton the opportunity to
+help her mount. Both services were needless, but she
+rewarded each eager servitor with a dimpled smile.
+When Blake handed the baby up to Knowles, his wife,
+untroubled by mock modesty, gave him a loving kiss.
+He lifted her bodily into the saddle, and she rode off
+with her three companions.</p>
+<p>Isobel, however, wheeled within the first few yards,
+and came back for a parting word: &#8220;You can expect
+us quite early tomorrow. We will overtake you
+on your way up the mountain. I wish Genevieve to
+see the ca&ntilde;on. Good night&ndash;&ndash;Pleasant dreams!&#8221;</p>
+<p>She had addressed Ashton, but her last smile was
+for Blake, and it was undisguisedly affectionate. As
+she loped away after the others, Ashton frowned, and,
+picking up his rifle, started off up the valley. Blake
+was staring after the girl with a wondering look. He
+turned to cast a quizzical glance at the back of the
+resentful lover.</p>
+<p>When the latter had disappeared around the hill,
+the engineer took the frying pan and walked up into
+the creek bed above the dike. After going some distance
+over the gravel bars, he came to a place where the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_203' name='page_203'></a>203</span>
+swirl of the last freshet had gouged a hole almost
+to bedrock. Scooping a panful of sand and gravel
+from the bottom of the hole, he went back and squatted
+down beside the pool within easy reach of the water.</p>
+<p>He picked the larger pebbles from the pan, added
+water, and began to swirl the contents around with a
+circular motion. Each turn flirted some of the sand
+and water over the pan&#8217;s beveled edge. Every little
+while he renewed the water. At last the pan&#8217;s contents
+were reduced to a half dozen, irregular, dirty,
+little lumps and a handful of &#8220;black sand&#8221; in which
+gleamed numbers of yellow particles.</p>
+<p>Blake put the nuggets into his pocket and threw
+the rest out into the pool. He returned to the tent
+and sat down to re-check his level-book and his calculations
+on the approximate cost of the tunnel. Sundown
+found him still figuring; but when twilight faded
+into dusk, he put away his fieldbook and started a
+fire for supper.</p>
+<p>He was in the act of setting on a pan of bacon when,
+without the slightest warning, a bullet cut the knot of
+the loose neckerchief under his downbent chin. In the
+same instant that he heard the ping of the shot he
+pitched sideways and flattened himself on the ground
+with the chuck-box between him and the fire. A roll
+and a quick crawl took him into the underbrush beyond
+the circle of firelight. No second bullet followed
+him in his amazingly swift movements. He lay
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_204' name='page_204'></a>204</span>
+motionless, listening intently, but no sound broke the
+stillness of the evening except the distant wail of a
+coyote and the hoot of an owl.</p>
+<p>Half an hour passed, and still the engineer waited.
+The dusk deepened into darkness. At last a heavy
+footfall sounded up on the dike. Blake rose, and
+slipping silently to the tent, groped about until he
+found a heavy iron picket-pin.</p>
+<p>Someone came down the slope and kicked his way
+petulantly through the bushes to the dying fire. He
+threw on an armful of brush. The light of the up-blazing
+flame showed Ashton standing beside the
+chuck-box, rifle in hand. But he dropped the weapon
+to pick up the overturned frying pan, which lay at his
+feet.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hello, Blake!&#8221; he sang out irritably. &#8220;I supposed
+you&#8217;d have supper waiting. Haven&#8217;t turned in
+this early, have you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No,&#8221; replied Blake, and he came forward, carelessly
+swinging the picket-pin. &#8220;Thought I saw a
+coyote sneaking about, and tried to trick him into coming
+close enough for me to nail him with this pin.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;With that!&#8221; scoffed Ashton. &#8220;But it would do
+as well as my rifle. I took a shot at a wolf, and then
+the mechanism jammed. I can&#8217;t get it to work.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You fired a shot?&#8221; asked Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. Was it too far off for you to hear? I
+circled all around these hills.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_205' name='page_205'></a>205</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;No, I heard it,&#8221; replied Blake, looking close into
+the other&#8217;s sullen face. &#8220;You may not have been
+as far away as you thought.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I was far enough,&#8221; grumbled Ashton. &#8220;I&#8217;ve
+walked till I&#8217;m hungry as a shark.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do you realize that you want to be careful how
+you shoot with these high-power rifles?&#8221; asked Blake.
+&#8220;They carry a mile or more.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve carried mine more than that, and <i>it</i> won&#8217;t
+carry an inch,&#8221; complained Ashton. &#8220;Wish you would
+see if you can fix it, while I get on some bacon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake took his scrutinizing gaze from his companion&#8217;s
+face, and picked up the rifle. Ashton showed
+plainly that he was tired and hungry and very irritable,
+but there was no trace of guilt in his look or
+manner. While he hurriedly prepared supper, Blake
+took apart the mechanism of the rifle. He discovered
+the trouble at once.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This is easy,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Nothing broken&ndash;&ndash;just
+a screw loose. Have you been monkeying with the
+parts, to see how they work?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No; I don&#8217;t care a hang how they work. What
+gets me is that they didn&#8217;t work!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Queer, then, how this screw got loose,&#8221; said Blake
+as he tightened it with the blade of his pocket knife.
+&#8220;It sets tight enough. Of course it might have come
+from the factory a bit loose, and jarred out with the
+firing; but neither seems probable.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_206' name='page_206'></a>206</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Is it all right now?&#8221; queried Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&ndash;&ndash;Seems to me someone <i>must</i> have loosened
+this screw.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s the difference how it happened, if it will
+not happen again?&#8221; irritably replied Ashton. &#8220;Guess
+this bacon is fried enough. Let&#8217;s eat.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake recoupled the rifle, emptied the magazine,
+tested the mechanism, refilled the magazine, and joined
+his ravenous companion in his ill-cooked meal.</p>
+<p>Immediately after eating, Ashton flung himself
+down in the tent. A few minutes later Blake crept in
+beside him and struck a match. The young man had
+already fallen into the deep slumber of utter physical
+and mental relaxation. Blake went outside and listened
+to the wailing of the coyotes. Difficult as it was to
+determine the direction of their mournful cries, he at
+last satisfied himself that they were circling entirely
+around the camp.</p>
+<p>A watchdog could not have indicated with greater
+certainty that there was no other wild beast or any
+human being lurking near the waterhole. Blake crept
+back into the tent and was soon fast asleep beside his
+companion.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_207' name='page_207'></a>207</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XVIII_ON_THE_BRINK' id='CHAPTER_XVIII_ON_THE_BRINK'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XVIII</h2>
+<h3>ON THE BRINK</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Early to bed, early to rise. The two men were
+up at dawn. During the night the coyotes had
+sneaked into the camp. But Blake had fastened the
+food in the chuck-box and slung everything gnawable
+up in the branches out of reach of the sly thieves.</p>
+<p>At sunrise the two started out on their day&#8217;s work,
+Ashton carrying his rifle and canteen and the level rod,
+Blake with the level and a bag containing their lunch
+and a two-quart sirup-can of water.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll run a new line from the dike bench, around
+the hill and across the valley the way we rode out
+yesterday,&#8221; said the engineer, as they climbed the slope
+above the waterhole. &#8220;That will give us a check by
+cross-tying to the line of the creek levels where it runs
+into the gulch.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t you trust to the accuracy of your own
+work?&#8221; asked Ashton with evident intent to mortify.</p>
+<p>Blake smiled in his good-natured way. &#8220;You forget
+the first rule of engineering. Always check when
+you can, then re-check and check again.&ndash;&ndash;Now, if
+you&#8217;ll kindly give me a reading off that bench.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_208' name='page_208'></a>208</span></p>
+<p>Ashton complied, though with evident ill will. He
+had wakened in good spirits, but was fast returning
+to his sullenness of the previous day. He took his
+time in going from the bench-mark to the first turning
+point. Blake moved up past him with inspiring briskness,
+but the younger man kept to his leisurely saunter.
+In rounding the corner of the hill twice as much time
+was consumed as was necessary.</p>
+<p>When they came to the last turn at the foot of the
+rocky slope, where the line struck out across the valley
+towards the foot of the mountain side, Ashton paused
+to roll a cigarette before holding his rod for the reading.
+Small as was the incident, it was particularly aggravating
+to an engineer. The reading would have
+taken only a moment, and he could then have rolled
+his cigarette and smoked it while Blake was moving
+past him for the next &#8220;set up.&#8221; Instead, he deliberately
+kept Blake waiting until the cigarette had been
+rolled and lighted.</p>
+<p>Blake &#8220;pulled up&#8221; his level and started forward,
+his face impassive. Ashton leaned jauntily on the rod,
+sucked in a mouthful of smoke, and raising his cigarette,
+flicked the ash from the tip with his little finger.
+At the same instant a bullet from the crags above
+him pierced the crown of his hat. He pitched forward
+on his face, rolled half over, and lay quiet.</p>
+<p>Most men would have been dumfounded by the
+frightful suddenness of the occurrence&ndash;&ndash;the shot and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_209' name='page_209'></a>209</span>
+the instant fall of Ashton. It was like a stroke of
+lightning out of a clear sky. Blake did not stand
+gaping even for a moment. As Ashton&#8217;s senseless body
+struck the ground, he sprang sideways and bent to lay
+down his instrument, with the instinctive carefulness of
+an old railroad surveyor. A swift rush towards Ashton
+barely saved him from the second bullet that came
+pinging down from the hill crest. It burned across
+the back of his shoulder.</p>
+<p>Heedless of the blood spurting from the wound in
+the side of Ashton&#8217;s head, Blake snatched up the automatic
+rifle and fired at a point between two knobs of
+rock on the hill crest. Promptly a hat appeared, then
+an arm and a rifle. It might have been expected that
+a bullet would have instantly followed; yet the assassin
+was strangely deliberate about getting his aim. Blake
+did not wait for him. He began to fire as fast as the
+automatic ejector and reloader set the rifle trigger.
+Three bullets sped up at the assassin before he had
+time to drop back out of sight.</p>
+<p>Blake started up the hillside, his pale eyes like white-hot
+steel. He was in a fury, but it was the cold fury
+of a man too courageous for reckless bravado. He
+went up the hill as an Apache would have charged,
+dodging from cover to cover and, wherever possible,
+keeping in line with a rock or tree in his successive
+rushes. At every brief stop he scanned the ridge crest
+for a sign of his enemy. But the assassin did not
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_210' name='page_210'></a>210</span>
+show himself. For all that Blake could tell, he might
+be waiting for a sure shot, or he might be lying with
+a bullet through his brain.</p>
+<p>To avoid suicidal exposure, the engineer was compelled
+to veer off to the right in his ascent. He
+reached the ridge crest without a shot having been
+fired at him. Leaping suddenly to his feet, he scrambled
+up to the flat top of a high crag, from which he
+could peer down upon the others. The natural embrazure
+from which the assassin had fired was exposed
+to his view; but the place was empty. He looked cautiously
+about at the many huge bowlders behind which
+a hundred men might have been crouching unseen by
+him, advantageous as was his position. To flush the
+assassin would require a bold rush over and around
+the rocks.</p>
+<p>Blake set his powerful jaw and gathered himself together
+for the leap down from his crag. At that moment
+his alert eye caught a glimpse of a swiftly
+moving object on the mesa at the foot of the far side
+of the hill. It was a horse and rider racing out of
+sight around the bend of a ridge point.</p>
+<p>Blake whipped the rifle to his shoulder. But the
+cowardly fugitive had disappeared. He lowered the
+rifle and started back down the hill faster than he had
+come up. Leaping like a goat, sliding, rushing&ndash;&ndash;he
+raced to the bottom in a direct line for Ashton.</p>
+<p>The victim lay as he had fallen, his head ghastly
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_211' name='page_211'></a>211</span>
+red with blood, which was still oozing from his wound.
+Blake dropped down beside the flaccid body and tore
+open the front of the silk shirt. He thrust in his hand.
+For some moments he was baffled by the violent throbbing
+of his own pulse. Then, at last, he detected a
+heartbeat, very feeble and slow yet unmistakable.</p>
+<p>He turned Ashton on his side, and washing away
+the blood with water from the canteen, examined the
+wound with utmost carefulness. The bullet had
+pierced the scalp and plowed a furrow down along the
+side of the skull, grazing but not penetrating the bone.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Only stunned.... Mighty close, though,&#8221; muttered
+Blake. He looked at the ashen face of the
+wounded man and added apprehensively, &#8220;Too close!...
+Concussion&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>Hastily he knotted a compress bandage made of
+handkerchiefs and neckerchiefs around the bleeding
+head, and stretching Ashton flat on his back, began to
+pump his arms up and down as is done in resuscitating a
+drowned person. After a time Ashton&#8217;s face began to
+lose its deathly pallor. His heart beat less feebly;
+he drew in a deep sighing breath, and stared up dazedly
+at Blake, with slowly returning consciousness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll smoke all I please and when I please,&#8221; he murmured
+in a supercilious drawl.</p>
+<p>Blake dashed his face with the cupful of water still
+left in the canteen. The wounded man flushed with
+quick anger and attempted to rise.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_212' name='page_212'></a>212</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;What&ndash;&ndash;what you&ndash;&ndash;How dare you?&#8221; he
+spluttered, only to sink back with a groan, &#8220;My head!
+O-o-oh! You&#8217;ve smashed my head!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re in luck that your head <i>wasn&#8217;t</i> smashed,&#8221;
+replied Blake. &#8220;It was a bullet knocked you over.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Bullet?&#8221; echoed Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. Scoundrel up on the hill tried to get us
+both.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Up on the hill?&#8221; Ashton twisted his head about,
+in alarm, to look at the hill crest. &#8220;But if he&ndash;&ndash;He
+may shoot again.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not this time. I went up for him. He went
+down faster, other side the hill. Saw him on the run.
+The sneaking&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; Blake closed his lips on the word.
+After a moment his grimness relaxed. &#8220;Came back to
+start your funeral. Found you&#8217;d cheated the undertaker.
+How do you feel now?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I believe I&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; began Ashton, again trying to raise
+himself, only to sink back as before. &#8220;My head!&ndash;&ndash;What
+makes me so weak?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t worry,&#8221; reassured Blake. &#8220;It&#8217;s only a
+scalp wound. You are weak from the shock and a
+little loss of blood. I&#8217;ll get you a drink from my
+can, and then tote you into camp. You&#8217;ll be all right
+in a day or two.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He fetched the can of water from his bag, which he
+had dropped beside the level. Ashton drank with the
+thirstiness of one who has lost blood. When at last
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_213' name='page_213'></a>213</span>
+his thirst was quenched, he glanced up at Blake with
+a look of half reluctant apology.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I said something about your striking me,&#8221; he murmured.
+&#8220;I did not understand&ndash;&ndash;did not realize I
+had been shot. You see, just before&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s all right,&#8221; broke in Blake. &#8220;I owe you
+a bigger apology. Last evening, while you were out
+hunting, someone took a shot at me. It must have
+been this same sneaking skunk. I thought it was
+you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You thought I could try to&ndash;&ndash;to shoot you?&#8221;
+muttered Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. There&#8217;s the old matter of the bridge, and
+you seem to think I am responsible for what your
+father has done. But after you came in, I soon concluded
+that you had fired towards the camp unintentionally.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you had asked,&#8221; explained Ashton, &#8220;I was
+around at the far end of these hills, nearly two miles
+from the camp, when I shot at the wolf and the rifle
+went wrong.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That was a fortunate occurrence&ndash;&ndash;your going out
+and seeing the wolf;&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;If you hadn&#8217;t
+taken that shot, we would not have known your rifle
+was out of gear. My first bullet merely made the
+sneak rise up to pot me. If the rapidity of the next
+three shots hadn&#8217;t rattled him, I believe he would have
+potted me, instead of running.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_214' name='page_214'></a>214</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;So that was it?&#8221; exclaimed Ashton. &#8220;Do you
+know, I believe it must be the same scoundrel who attacked
+me the first day I rode down Dry Fork. No
+doubt he remembered how I ripped loose at him with
+the automatic-catch set.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Your thieving guide?&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;But why
+should he try to kill me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m sure I don&#8217;t know,&#8221; murmured Ashton.
+&#8220;Another drink, please.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall tote you back to camp, and&ndash;&ndash;No, I&#8217;ll
+lay you over there in the shade and go up to see if he
+is in sight.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Picking up the wounded man as easily as if he had
+been a child, the engineer carried him over under a
+tree, fetched him the can of water, and for the second
+time climbed the rocky hillside. Scaling his lookout
+crag, he surveyed the country below him. A mile
+down the creek two riders were coming up towards the
+waterhole at an easy canter. He surmised that they
+were his wife and Miss Knowles.</p>
+<p>Their approach brought a shade of anxiety into his
+strong face. He swept the landscape with his glance.
+A little cloud of dust far out on the mesa towards
+Split Peak caught his eye. He looked at it steadfastly
+under his hand, and drew a deep breath of relief as he
+made out a fleeing horse and rider.</p>
+<p>He descended to Ashton, and taking him up pick-a-back,
+swung away for the camp with long, swift
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_215' name='page_215'></a>215</span>
+strides. Before he had gone half the distance, he felt
+Ashton&#8217;s arms loosening their clasp of his neck. He
+caught him as he sank in a swoon. Without a moment&#8217;s
+hesitation, he slung his senseless burden up on
+his shoulder like a sack of meal, and hastened on faster
+than before.</p>
+<p>Swiftly as he walked, the ladies reached the camp
+before him. When he came to the top of the dike
+slope, his wife had dismounted and Isobel was handing
+down the baby to her. As the girl slipped out of
+the saddle she looked up the slope. With a startled
+cry, she darted to meet Blake.</p>
+<p>Quick to forestall her alarm, he called in a gasping
+shout: &#8220;Not serious&ndash;&ndash;not serious!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Tom&ndash;&ndash;Mr. Blake!&#8221; she cried. &#8220;What
+has happened?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Scalp wound&ndash;&ndash;faint&ndash;&ndash;blood loss,&#8221; Blake panted
+in terse answer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He is wounded? O-o-oh!&#8221; She ran up and
+looked fearfully at the bloodsoaked bandages across
+Ashton&#8217;s hanging head.</p>
+<p>Blake staggered on down the slope without pausing.
+Genevieve had started to meet him. But at her husband&#8217;s
+panting explanation, she laid the baby on the
+nearest soft spot of earth and darted to the kit-chest.
+She was opening a &#8220;first aid&#8221; box when Blake crashed
+through the bushes and sank down with his burden under
+the first tree.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_216' name='page_216'></a>216</span></p>
+<p>Genevieve hastened towards the men, calling to her
+companion: &#8220;Water, Chuckie&ndash;&ndash;that pail by the
+fireplace.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl flew to fetch a bucket of water from the
+pool.</p>
+<p>Blake was peering anxiously down into Ashton&#8217;s
+white face. &#8220;Didn&#8217;t&ndash;&ndash;know&ndash;&ndash;but&ndash;&ndash;that&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; he
+panted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No,&#8221; reassured his wife. &#8220;He will soon be all
+right.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She drew the unconscious man flat on his back and
+held a bottle of ammonia to his nostrils. The powerful
+stimulant revived him just as the girl came running
+back with the water. He opened his eyes, and the
+first object they rested upon was her anxious pitiful
+face. He smiled and whispered gallantly: &#8220;Don&#8217;t
+be afraid. I&#8217;m all right&ndash;&ndash;now!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then I&#8217;ll drink first,&#8221; said Blake.</p>
+<p>He took a deep draught from the pail, doused a
+hatful of water over his hot head and face, and
+stretched out to cool off. Genevieve, assisted by the
+deeply concerned girl, took the handkerchief bandage
+from Ashton&#8217;s head and washed the wound with an
+antiseptic solution. She then clipped away the hair
+from the edges and drew the scalp together with a
+number of stitches.</p>
+<p>In this last the hardy cowgirl was unable to help.
+She clasped Ashton&#8217;s hand convulsively and sat shuddering.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_217' name='page_217'></a>217</span>
+Ashton smiled up into her tender pitying eyes.
+Genevieve had numbed his wound with cocaine. He
+was quite satisfied with the situation.</p>
+<p>Another antiseptic washing and a compress of sterilized
+cotton bound on with surgical bandages completed
+the operation. Then, when it was all over
+with, the young mother, who had gone through everything
+with the aplomb and deftness of a surgeon,
+quietly sank back in a faint. On the instant Blake
+was reaching for the ammonia bottle.</p>
+<p>A whiff restored his wife to consciousness. She
+opened her eyes, and smiling at her weakness, sought
+to rise. He held her down with gentle force and ordered
+her to lie quiet.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall fetch Tommy,&#8221; he added. &#8220;We&#8217;ll all
+take a <i>siesta</i> until noon.&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_218' name='page_218'></a>218</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XIX_THE_PLOTTERS' id='CHAPTER_XIX_THE_PLOTTERS'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIX</h2>
+<h3>THE PLOTTERS</h3>
+</div>
+<p>When Blake came back with the baby, Isobel
+begged him for a full account of how Ashton
+had been wounded. In relating the affair he sought
+to minimize the danger that he had incurred, and he
+omitted all mention of the bullet shot at him the
+previous evening. But his account was frequently interrupted
+by exclamations from his wife and Isobel.</p>
+<p>At the end he dwelt strongly on the cowardly haste
+of the assassin&#8217;s flight; only to be met by a shrewdly
+anxious rejoinder from the girl: &#8220;He ran away after
+he attacked Lafe the other time. He will come back
+again!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Tom!&#8221; cried Genevieve&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;if he does!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We will get him, that is all there is to it,&#8221; replied
+her husband. &#8220;What do you say to that, Ashton?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We will not have the chance,&#8221; said Ashton. &#8220;I
+don&#8217;t believe he has nerve enough to try it the third
+time. But if he should&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no! I hope he keeps running forever!&#8221;
+fervently wished Isobel. &#8220;Don&#8217;t you realize how
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_219' name='page_219'></a>219</span>
+close a miss that was, Lafe?&ndash;&ndash;and the other time,
+too?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I like having one Miss close,&#8221; he punned.</p>
+<p>The girl blushed, but failed to show any sign of
+resentment.</p>
+<p>Blake looked significantly at his wife. &#8220;Don&#8217;t
+know but what I&#8217;ve changed my mind about a <i>siesta</i>,&#8221;
+he remarked. &#8220;Here&#8217;s Tommy gone to sleep just
+when I wanted to fight him. Do you think Miss
+Chuckie can keep him and Ashton from running away
+if I go to bring in the level?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You say you had started to run the line of levels
+across to the mountain?&#8221; she asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.... This little pleasantry has knocked us
+out of a day&#8217;s work and you out of your trip to the
+ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But why couldn&#8217;t I rod for you?&#8221; she suggested.
+&#8220;I noticed Lafayette the other day. It seems easier
+than golfing.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It is.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then I shall do it. A good walk is exactly what
+I need.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Genevieve!&#8221; hastily appealed Isobel. &#8220;Surely
+you&#8217;ll not go off and leave me&ndash;&ndash;us!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thomas is asleep, and Lafayette needs to be
+quiet,&#8221; was the demure reply. &#8220;Come, Tom. We&#8217;ll
+run the levels over to the foot of the mountain, at
+least.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_220' name='page_220'></a>220</span></p>
+<p>With a reproachful glance at the smiling couple, the
+girl slipped over to put Thomas Herbert between herself
+and Ashton. Blake found another bag and can,
+which last he filled with water from the bucket.
+Genevieve put on the cowboy hat that she had borrowed
+at the ranch, and sprang up to join him.</p>
+<p>He paused for a question: &#8220;How about leaving
+the rifle?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Isobel put her hand to a fold in her skirt and drew
+out her long-barreled automatic pistol. &#8220;I can do
+as well or better with this,&#8221; she answered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What a wicked looking thing!&#8221; exclaimed Genevieve.
+&#8220;Surely, dear, you do not shoot it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shoot it!&#8221; put in Ashton. &#8220;Hasn&#8217;t she told you
+about saving me from a rattler?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;She did?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; he replied, and he told about the rattlesnake
+in the bunkhouse.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But I ought to have shot quicker,&#8221; Isobel explained,
+when he finished. &#8220;I missed the head,
+though I aimed at it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The way we&#8217;ve left Thomas about on the
+ground!&#8221; exclaimed Genevieve. &#8220;Are there any of
+the horrid things around here? Is that why you
+carry the pistol?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no, don&#8217;t be afraid. We&#8217;ve killed them out
+here, long ago, because of the cattle. I carry my pistol
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_221' name='page_221'></a>221</span>
+on the chance of killing wolves. They&#8217;re dreadfully
+harmful to the calves and colts, you know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good for you,&#8221; praised Blake, as he picked up
+the rifle. &#8220;Well, we&#8217;re off.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He started away, hand in hand with his wife. They
+were soon at the top of the dike slope and almost dancing
+along over the dry turf. It was months since
+they had been alone together in the open, and they
+were still deeper in love than at the time of their marriage&ndash;&ndash;if
+that were possible.</p>
+<p>They soon reached the place where the shooting had
+occurred. Here they picked up the lunch bag, Ashton&#8217;s
+canteen and his hat, now punctured with another
+bullet hole; and at once started to carry the line of
+levels out across the valley. A few words of instruction
+made an efficient rodwoman of Genevieve, so that
+they soon reached the foot of the ridge up which her
+husband had led Ashton the previous day. Here he
+established a bench-mark, and turned along the base
+of the escarpment to the mouth of Dry Fork Gully,
+where he checked the line of levels that had been run
+up the bed of the creek.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good work&ndash;&ndash;less than three tenths difference,
+and all that I am concerned about is an error in feet,&#8221;
+he commented. &#8220;It&#8217;s getting along towards noon.
+We&#8217;ll go up the gulch, and eat our lunch in the shade.
+This place is almost as much of a sight as the ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_222' name='page_222'></a>222</span></p>
+<p>Genevieve more than agreed with her husband&#8217;s
+opinion when he led her up into the stupendous gorge
+and the walls of rock began to tower on each side ever
+steeper and loftier.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, I do not see how anything can be so grand,
+so awesome as this!&#8221; she cried, gazing up the precipices.
+&#8220;It makes me positively giddy to look at such
+heights!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Better stop off for a while,&#8221; advised Blake. &#8220;We
+are almost to where the bottom tilts skyward. You
+can stargaze while we are eating lunch. It&#8217;s rougher
+along here. We can get on faster this way.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He picked her up in his arms as though she were a
+feather, and carried her on up the gulch to the foot
+of the Titanic chute. Here, resting on a flat rock
+in the cool semi-twilight of the gorge bottom, they
+ate their lunch and talked with as much zest as if they
+were still new acquaintances.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Those awful cliffs!&#8221; she murmured, lowering her
+gaze from the colossal walls above her. &#8220;I cannot
+bear to look at them any longer. They overpower
+me!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Wait till you look down into the ca&ntilde;on,&#8221; replied
+her husband. &#8220;In some ways it is more tremendous
+than the Grand Ca&ntilde;on of the Colorado&ndash;&ndash;the width
+is so much narrower in proportion to the depth.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What makes these frightful chasms?&ndash;&ndash;earthquakes?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_223' name='page_223'></a>223</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Water,&#8221; he replied.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Water? Not all these hundreds and thousands
+of feet cut down through the solid rock!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Every foot,&#8221; he insisted. &#8220;Think of water flowing
+along in the same bed and always washing sand
+and gravel and even bowlders downstream&ndash;&ndash;grind,
+grind, grind, through the centuries and hundreds of
+centuries.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But there is no water here, Tom.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not now, and no chance of any this time of year,
+else I wouldn&#8217;t have brought you in here. A sudden
+heavy June rain up above there would pour down a
+torrent that would drown us before we could run three
+hundred yards. Imagine a flood roaring down that
+bumpy shoot-the-chutes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can&#8217;t! It&#8217;s too terrifying. Is that the way it
+will be if you get the water and dig the tunnel?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. At this end, the tunnel may terminate any
+place from down here to a thousand feet up, but in
+any event far below the top. I hope it proves to be
+well up. The greater the drop to the level of the
+mesa, the more turbines could be put in to generate
+electricity.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That sounds so inspiring! But, Dear&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; Genevieve
+looked at her husband with a shade of anxiety&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;even
+if this project is feasible, do you feel you should
+carry it through?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You mean on account of Miss Chuckie and her
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_224' name='page_224'></a>224</span>
+father,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;I have considered their side
+of the matter, and even at the first I saw how&ndash;&ndash;Listen,
+Sweetheart. No one knows better than you
+that I&#8217;m an engineer to the very marrow of my bones.
+My work in life is to construct,&ndash;&ndash;to harness the forces
+of nature and compel them to serve mankind; and to
+save waste&ndash;&ndash;waste material, waste energy&ndash;&ndash;and put
+it to use.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t I know, Tom!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, then,&#8221; he went on, &#8220;in the bottom of Deep
+Ca&ntilde;on is a river&ndash;&ndash;waste waters down there beyond the
+reach of this rich but waterless land, down in the
+gloom, doing no good to anything or anybody, frittering
+away their energy on barren rocks. Why, it&#8217;s as
+bad as the way Ashton, with all the good qualities we
+now see he has in him&ndash;&ndash;the way he dissipated his
+strength and his brains and his father&#8217;s money.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah, Dear! wasn&#8217;t it a splendid thing when he was
+thrown out of his rut of wastefulness?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Otherwise known as the primrose path, or the
+great white way,&#8221; added Blake. &#8220;It certainly was a
+throw out. I&#8217;m as pleased as I am astonished that
+he seems to have landed squarely on his feet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What a marvelous change it has made in him!&#8221;
+exclaimed Genevieve. &#8220;Sometimes I hardly can believe
+it really is Lafayette. He is so serious and
+manly.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good thing he has changed,&#8221; replied Blake.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_225' name='page_225'></a>225</span>
+&#8220;If Miss Chuckie hadn&#8217;t told us he had made a clean
+breast of that bridge, I should begin to feel worried
+about&ndash;&ndash;Do you know, Sweetheart, it&#8217;s the strangest
+thing in the world the way I feel towards that girl.
+It&#8217;s not because she is so lovely. Of course I enjoy
+her beauty, but that&#8217;s not it. If Tommy were a girl
+and grown up&ndash;&ndash;that&#8217;s how I feel.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;She is a very dear, sweet girl.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So are several of your friends&ndash;&ndash;our friends,&#8221;
+said Blake. &#8220;This is different. The very first day
+we met her, there was something about her voice and
+face&ndash;&ndash;seemed as though I already knew her.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;She knew you, through what she had read of you.
+She warned me, in that frank, charming way of hers,
+that you were a hero to her and I must not mind if she
+worshiped you openly.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake laughed pleasedly. &#8220;Isn&#8217;t she the greatest!
+And the way she chums with me! Wonder if that
+is what makes Ashton so sore at me? The idiot!
+Can&#8217;t he see the difference?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lovers always are blind,&#8221; said Genevieve.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not,&#8221; he rejoined, his eyes, as he gazed
+down into hers, as blue and tender as Isobel&#8217;s.</p>
+<p>The young wife blushed deliciously and rewarded
+him with a kiss.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But about Chuckie?&#8221; she returned to the previous
+question. &#8220;You were going to tell me&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am going to tell you something you will think
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_226' name='page_226'></a>226</span>
+is very fanciful&ndash;&ndash;and it is! Do you know why I am
+so taken with that girl? It&#8217;s because she reminds me
+of my sisters&ndash;&ndash;what they might have grown to be!...
+God!&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; he bent over with his face in his shaking
+hands&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;God! If only they had gone any other
+way than&ndash;&ndash;the way they did!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My poor dear boy!&#8221; soothed his wife, her hand
+on his downbent head. &#8220;Let us trust that they are in
+a happier world, a world where sorrow and pain&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If only I could believe that!&#8221; he groaned.</p>
+<p>Genevieve waited a few moments and with quiet
+tactfulness sought to divert him from his grief: &#8220;If
+Chuckie reminds you of them, Dear&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;She might be either&ndash;&ndash;only Mary, the older one,
+had dark brown eyes. But Belle&#8217;s were blue like
+Chuckie&#8217;s.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What a pure blue her eyes are&ndash;&ndash;the sweet true
+girl! Why can&#8217;t you regard her as your sister, and&ndash;&ndash;and
+give over further thought of this irrigation
+project?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake looked up, completely diverted. &#8220;You little
+schemer! So that&#8217;s what you&#8217;ve been working
+around to?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But why not?&#8221; she insisted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll tell you. It is because I am so fond of
+Chuckie that I am determined to get water on Dry
+Mesa, if it is possible.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_227' name='page_227'></a>227</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;To make use of those waste waters,&#8221; he explained;
+&#8220;to turn this dusty semi-desert into a garden;
+and to benefit Chuckie by doubling the value of her
+father&#8217;s property.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How could that be, when the farmers would divide
+up his range?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He owns five sections, Chuckie told me. What
+are they worth now? But with water on them, even
+without a single tree planted, they would sell as
+orchard land for more than all his herd; and he would
+still have his cattle. He could sell them to the settlers
+for more than what he now gets shipping them
+over the range.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I begin to see, Tom. I might have known it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m telling you, of course. We&#8217;re to keep it
+from them as a happy surprise, because it may not
+come off. There&#8217;s still the question whether the
+water in the ca&ntilde;on&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But if it is! How delightful it will be to help
+Mr. Knowles and Chuckie, besides, as you say, turning
+this desert into a garden!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That valley is a natural reservoir site to hold
+flood waters,&#8221; continued the engineer. &#8220;All that&#8217;s
+needed is a dam built across the narrow place above
+the waterhole, with the dike for foundation. I would
+build it of rock from the tunnel, run down on a gravity
+tram.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ve worked it all out?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_228' name='page_228'></a>228</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Not all, only the general scheme. If the tunnel
+comes through high enough up here, we shall be able
+to manufacture cheap electricity to sell. Just think
+of our settlers plowing by electricity, and their wives
+cooking on electric stoves.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You humorous boy!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, I mean it. There&#8217;s another thing&ndash;&ndash;I
+wouldn&#8217;t whisper it even to you if you weren&#8217;t my
+partner as well as my wife. I have reason to believe
+the creek bed above the dike is a rich placer. I&#8217;ve
+planned to take Knowles and Ashton in on that discovery&ndash;&ndash;Gowan,
+too, if Knowles asks it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;A placer?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, placer mine&ndash;&ndash;gold washed down in the
+creek bed. But it&#8217;s a small thing compared with another
+discovery I&#8217;ve made. Up there&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; Blake
+pointed up the steep ledges that he had climbed&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;I
+found a bonanza.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Bonanza? What is that, pray?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;A mint, a John D. bank account, a&ndash;&ndash;Guess?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;A gold mine! Oh, Tom, how romantic!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes; it&#8217;s free-milling quartz. We can mill it ourselves,
+and not have to pay tribute to the Smelting
+Trust. That&#8217;s romance&ndash;&ndash;or at least sounds like it.
+You will pay for all the development work, in return
+for one-third share. I shall take a third, as the discoverer,
+and Chuckie gets the remaining third as
+grub-staker.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_229' name='page_229'></a>229</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;As what?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;She is staking us with grub&ndash;&ndash;food and supplies.
+If she had not sent for me to come and look over the
+situation, I should not have been here to stumble on
+this mine. So she gets a share.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m glad, glad, Tom! Isn&#8217;t it nice to be able to
+do fine things for others? I&#8217;m so glad for Chuckie&#8217;s
+sake, because, if Lafayette keeps on as he is doing
+now, he may win his father&#8217;s forgiveness.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What has that to do with Chuckie?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You and I know what she is, Dear; yet if she had
+no money, his father might insist on regarding her as
+a mere farm girl. He is as&ndash;&ndash;as snobbish as I was
+when we were flung ashore by the storm, there in
+Mozambique.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I fail to see that it matters any to Chuckie what
+Ashton senior thinks.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course you don&#8217;t see. You&#8217;re as blind as
+when I&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; the lady blushed&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;as when I had to fling
+myself at you to make you see. The dear girl is as
+deeply in love with Lafayette as he is with her.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No? She doesn&#8217;t show it. How can you tell?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know that Mr. Gowan is desperately in love
+with her.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That stands to reason. He couldn&#8217;t help but be.
+Can&#8217;t say I like the fellow. He may be all right,
+though. Must have some good qualities&ndash;&ndash;Chuckie
+seems to be very fond of him.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_230' name='page_230'></a>230</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;As fond as if he were a brother. No; Lafayette
+is to be the happy man&ndash;&ndash;unless he backslides. We
+must help him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake nodded. &#8220;That&#8217;s another thing that hangs
+on this project. If it proves to be feasible, I can give
+Ashton a chance to make good as an engineer. I used
+to think he must have bought his C.E. Now I see
+he has the makings.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He can be brilliant when he chooses. If only he
+were not so&ndash;&ndash;so scatter-brained.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What he needed was a jolt heavy enough to shake
+him together. It seems as though his father gave it
+to him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That shock, and being picked up by Chuckie,&#8221;
+agreed Genevieve.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll help her keep him braced until the cement
+sets,&#8221; said her husband. &#8220;It&#8217;s even worse to let
+brains go to waste than water.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Far worse! What is the good of all your engineering&ndash;&ndash;of
+all the machinery, yes, and all the culture
+of civilization, if not to uplift men and women? May
+the next generation work for the uplifting of all mankind,
+both materially and spiritually!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We might make a try at it ourselves,&#8221; said Blake.
+&#8220;As for the future, I know it will not be your fault if
+our member of the next generation fails to do his share
+of uplift work.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_231' name='page_231'></a>231</span></p>
+<p>The young mother placed her hand on her bosom,
+and sprang up. &#8220;We should be going back, Dear.
+Thomas will be wakening.&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_232' name='page_232'></a>232</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XX_INDIAN_SHOES' id='CHAPTER_XX_INDIAN_SHOES'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XX</h2>
+<h3>INDIAN SHOES</h3>
+</div>
+<p>They returned along the shadowy bottom of the
+great gorge to the glaring sunshine of the open
+creek bed, where they had left the rod and level.
+Blake placed both upon one of his broad shoulders,
+and gave his wife the unencumbered arm to assist her
+somewhat hurried pace.</p>
+<p>As they approached the dike her hasty steps quickened
+to a run. She darted ahead down to the camp.
+Thomas Herbert Vincent was vociferating for his
+dinner. Blake followed at a walk. He was only a
+father.</p>
+<p>When he came down to the trees he found Isobel
+and Ashton alone. The girl&#8217;s manner was constrained
+and her color higher than usual. Ashton, comfortably
+outstretched on a blanket with her saddle for pillow,
+frowned petulantly at the intruder. But Isobel
+sprang up and came to meet Blake, unable to conceal
+her relief.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I was so glad to see Genevieve,&#8221; she said. &#8220;You
+came back just in time.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_233' name='page_233'></a>233</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;How&#8217;s that?&#8221; asked Blake, his eyes twinkling.</p>
+<p>She blushed, but quickly recovered from her confusion
+to dimple and cast a teasing glance at Ashton.
+&#8220;Baby woke up,&#8221; she answered. &#8220;You may not
+know it, but babies cry when they fail to get what they
+want.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s getting what he wants&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;m not!&#8221; complained
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;I must see if Genevieve needs anything,&#8221;
+murmured the girl, and she fled to the tent.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I need you!&#8221; Ashton called after her without
+avail.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How&#8217;re you feeling?&#8221; inquired Blake.</p>
+<p>Ashton&#8217;s frown deepened to a scowl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Didn&#8217;t mean how you feel towards me,&#8221; added
+Blake. &#8220;I can guess that. My reference was to your
+head.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m all right,&#8221; snapped Ashton. &#8220;Needn&#8217;t
+worry. I&#8217;m still weak and dizzy, but I shall be quite
+able to do my work tomorrow.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s fine,&#8221; said the engineer, with insistent
+good humor. &#8220;However, if you feel at all shaky in
+the morning, I can perhaps get Gowan, or maybe Miss
+Chuckie would like to&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No!&#8221; broke in Ashton. &#8220;She shall not! I will
+do it, I tell you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Very well,&#8221; said Blake. He put down the level
+and rod, but retained the rifle. &#8220;Tell the ladies I shall
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_234' name='page_234'></a>234</span>
+be back before long. I am going to look for something
+I forgot this morning.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Without waiting for the other&#8217;s reply, he returned
+up the dike slope and around the bend of the hill to
+where Ashton had been shot. That for which he was
+looking was not here, for he at once turned and started
+up the hill. He climbed direct to the place where the
+assassin had lain in wait.</p>
+<p>The bare ledge told Blake nothing, but from a
+crevice nearby he picked out two long thirty-eight
+caliber rifle shells. He put them into his pocket and
+went over to scan the mesa from the top of his lookout
+crag. He could see no sign of the fugitive murderer.
+Down below the mesa side of the hill, however, he saw
+a man riding up the bank of Dry Fork, and recognized
+him as Knowles.</p>
+<p>Trained to alert observation by years of life on the
+range, the cowman had already perceived Blake. He
+wheeled aside and rode towards the hill when the engineer
+waved his hat and began to descend. The two
+met at the foot of the rugged slope.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Howdy, Mr. Blake,&#8221; greeted the cowman, &#8220;I
+thought I&#8217;d just ride up to see how things are coming
+along.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not so fast as they might, Mr. Knowles. We
+have stopped for repairs.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Haven&#8217;t broken your level?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. Ashton is laid up for the day with a scalp
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_235' name='page_235'></a>235</span>
+wound. We were shot at this morning from up there&ndash;&ndash;other
+side of the crest.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shot at, and Lafe hit?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not seriously, though it could not well have been
+a closer shave. He says he will be all right by tomorrow,&#8221;
+said Blake, and he gave the bald details of the
+occurrence in a few words.</p>
+<p>Knowles listened without comment, his leathery
+face stolid, but his eyes glinting. When Blake had
+finished, he remarked shortly: &#8220;Must be the same
+man. Let&#8217;s see those shells.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake handed over the two empty cartridge shells.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thirty-eight,&#8221; confirmed Knowles. &#8220;Same as
+were fired at Lafe before. Kid and Chuckie showed
+me how a thirty-eight fitted the hole in Lafe&#8217;s silver
+flask. About where did the snake crawl down the
+hill?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not far from here. He could not have gone any
+considerable distance along the top or side. He was
+down and riding away when I reached the crags, and
+I had not lost much time coming up the other side.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;ll take an Indian to make out his tracks on this
+dry ground,&#8221; remarked the cowman. &#8220;We&#8217;ll try a
+look, though, at his hawss&#8217;s hoof prints. Just keep
+behind, if you don&#8217;t mind.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He threw the reins over the head of his horse, and
+dismounted, to walk slowly along the more level
+ground at the foot of the slope. Blake followed, as
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_236' name='page_236'></a>236</span>
+he had requested, but scrutinizing the ground with a
+gaze no less keenly observant than that of his companion.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mighty queer,&#8221; said Knowles, after they had carried
+their examination over a hundred yards. &#8220;Either
+he came down more slanting or else&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you make of this?&#8221; Blake interrupted,
+bending over a blurred round print in the dust between
+two grass tufts.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Sho!</i>&#8221; exclaimed the cowman as he peered at the
+mark. &#8220;That&#8217;s why, of course.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Indian shoes,&#8221; said Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ve seen a thing or two. You&#8217;re no tenderfoot,&#8221;
+remarked Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I have myself shrunk rawhide shoes on horses&#8217;
+hoofs when short of iron shoes,&#8221; Blake explained.
+&#8220;This would make a hard trail to run down without
+hounds.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The cowman straightened and looked at his companion,
+his weather-beaten face set in quiet resolve.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know what&#8217;s better than hounds,&#8221; he said.
+&#8220;This is one badman who has played his game once
+too often. I&#8217;m going to run him down if it takes all
+year and all the men in the county. There&#8217;s a couple
+of Ute bucks being held in the jail at Stockchute, to be
+tried for hunting deer. I&#8217;m going to get the loan of
+them. The sheriff will turn out with a posse, and we&#8217;ll
+trail that snake, if it takes us clear over into Utah.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_237' name='page_237'></a>237</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll have a fair chance to get him with Ute
+trackers,&#8221; agreed Blake.</p>
+<p>Knowles shook his head. &#8220;Unless you&#8217;re particular
+to come along, Mr. Blake, I&#8217;d like you and Lafe
+to keep on with this survey. I&#8217;ve been worrying over
+the chance of losing my range, till it&#8217;s got on my
+nerves.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Certainly, Mr. Knowles. I shall go ahead in the
+morning, if Ashton is able to rod. It will be best, I
+suppose, for my wife and Miss Chuckie to remain close
+at the ranch until you make sure where this trail leads.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No; he&#8217;s a snake, but the Indian shoes prove he&#8217;s
+Western&ndash;&ndash;He won&#8217;t strike at the ladies. Another
+thing, I&#8217;m going to give you Kid for guard.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He may prefer to join the posse.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course he&#8217;ll prefer that. You can count on
+Kid Gowan when it comes to a man hunt. He&#8217;ll stay,
+though, all right. I don&#8217;t want Mrs. Blake to think
+she has to stop indoors. With Kid on the lookout
+around your camp, the ladies can feel free to come and
+go any time between sunup and sundown, and you and
+Lafe can do what you want. There won&#8217;t be any more
+shooting, unless it&#8217;s by Kid.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Very well,&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;I&#8217;m not anxious to
+play hide and seek with a man who shoots and runs.
+When can we expect the rope and spikes?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s another thing,&#8221; replied Knowles. &#8220;Kid
+can be packing them and your camp outfit up to the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_238' name='page_238'></a>238</span>
+ca&ntilde;on while you and Lafe are running your line of
+levels. He ought to be home by now. He was gone
+when the men turned out this morning. Soon as I get
+back I&#8217;ll send him up to camp with you. He can bring
+along Rocket, to be ready for a chase, providing we
+can find the brute. Queer about that hawss.
+Wanted to ride him this morning. Found he&#8217;d got
+out and gone off the way he used to before Lafe
+gentled him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>While talking, the two men had returned to the cowman&#8217;s
+horse and started around the hill to the camp.
+They found Isobel and Genevieve and the baby all
+engaged in entertaining Ashton. Knowles briefly congratulated
+the wounded man, and led his pony down to
+the pool for a drink. Blake had seated himself beside
+his wife. She handed the baby to him, and remarking
+that she also wished to drink, she followed Knowles.</p>
+<p>The cowman smiled at her reassuringly. &#8220;You&#8217;re
+not afraid of any more shooting, ma&#8217;am, are you?&#8221; he
+asked. &#8220;I&#8217;ve told your husband that Kid is to come
+up to keep guard. He will stay right along, unless
+that scoundrel is trailed down sooner.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then I shall have no fear, Mr. Knowles.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You needn&#8217;t, and you and Chuckie can come and
+go just the same as ever. I don&#8217;t want your visit
+spoiled. It&#8217;s a great treat to all of us to have you
+with us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And to my husband and myself to be your guests!
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_239' name='page_239'></a>239</span>
+I have quite fallen in love with your daughter, Mr.
+Knowles. If you&#8217;ll permit me to say it, you are very
+fortunate to have so lovely and lovable a girl.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t I know it, ma&#8217;am!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So beautiful&ndash;&ndash;and her character as beautiful as
+her face. How you must prize her!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Prize her!&#8221; repeated Knowles, his usual stolid
+face aglow with pride and tenderness. &#8220;Why, ma&#8217;am,
+I couldn&#8217;t hold her more in liking if she was my own
+flesh and blood!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Genevieve suddenly bent down to hide the intense
+emotion that had struck the color from her face. Yet
+after a moment&#8217;s pause, she spoke in a composed, almost
+casual tone: &#8220;Then Chuckie is not your own
+daughter?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not in the way you mean. Hasn&#8217;t she told you?
+I adopted her.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I see,&#8221; remarked Genevieve, with a show of polite
+interest. &#8220;But of course, taking her when a young
+infant, she has always thought of you as her own
+father.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&ndash;&ndash;what I can&#8217;t get over is that she feels that
+way, and I feel the same to her, though I never saw or
+heard of her till she was going on fourteen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah!&#8221; Genevieve could no longer suppress her
+agitation. &#8220;Then she is&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;m sure that she must
+be&ndash;&ndash;You said she came from the East, from
+Chicago?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_240' name='page_240'></a>240</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;No, ma&#8217;am! I didn&#8217;t say where she came from,&#8221;
+curtly replied the cowman.</p>
+<p>The shock of his brusqueness restored the lady to
+her usual quiet composure. Looking up into his face,
+she found it as blank and impenetrable as a cement
+wall.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You must pardon me,&#8221; she murmured. &#8220;I myself
+am a Chicago girl, so you must see how natural
+it is for me to hope that so sweet and beautiful a girl
+as Chuckie came from my city.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Chuckie is my daughter,&#8221; stated Knowles in a flat
+tone.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you will kindly permit me to explain. My husband&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Chuckie is my daughter, legally adopted,&#8221; repeated
+the cowman. &#8220;You can see what she is like. If that
+is not enough, ma&#8217;am, I can&#8217;t prevent you from declining
+our hospitality, though we&#8217;d be mighty sorry to
+have you and your husband leave.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The tears started into Genevieve&#8217;s hazel eyes.
+&#8220;Mr. Knowles! how could you think for a moment
+that I&ndash;&ndash;that we&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Excuse me, ma&#8217;am!&#8221; he hastened to apologize.
+&#8220;I didn&#8217;t mean to hurt your feelings. You see, I&#8217;m
+kind of prejudiced along some lines. I&#8217;ve been bred
+up to the Western idea that it isn&#8217;t just etiquette to
+ask about people&#8217;s antecedents. Real Western, I
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_241' name='page_241'></a>241</span>
+mean. Our city folks are nearly as bad as you Easterners
+over family trees. As if a child isn&#8217;t as much
+descended from its mother&#8217;s maternal grandmother as
+from its father&#8217;s paternal grandfather!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Genevieve smiled at this adroit diversion of the subject
+by the seemingly simple Westerner, and replied:
+&#8220;My father&#8217;s and mother&#8217;s parents were farm people.
+My husband worked his way up out of the Chicago
+slums.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He did?&#8221; The cowman could not conceal his astonishment.
+He looked curiously into the lady&#8217;s high-bred
+face. &#8220;Well, now, that sure is something to be
+right proud of&ndash;&ndash;not that I&#8217;d have exactly expected
+you to think so. If you&#8217;ll excuse me, ma&#8217;am, I&#8217;m
+more surprised at the way you feel about it than that
+he was able to do such a big thing.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No one is responsible for what he is born. But
+we are at least partly entitled to the credit or discredit
+of what we become,&#8221; she observed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s good American doctrine, ma&#8217;am&ndash;&ndash;Western
+American!&#8221; approved Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It should apply to women as well as men,&#8221; she
+stated.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It ought,&#8221; he dryly replied, and he jerked up the
+head of his pawing horse. &#8220;Here, you! I guess
+it&#8217;s high time we were starting in, ma&#8217;am. Kid may
+think he&#8217;s to lay over at the ranch until morning. We
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_242' name='page_242'></a>242</span>
+want to get him out here before dusk. I don&#8217;t reckon
+there&#8217;s any show of that snake coming back tonight,
+but it&#8217;s as well to be on the safe side.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He walked up the slope towards the others, unbuckling
+his cartridge belt as he went.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sling on your saddle, honey,&#8221; he called to his
+daughter.</p>
+<p>The girl sprang up from beside Ashton and ran to
+fetch her own and Genevieve&#8217;s picketed ponies. Her
+father held out his belt and revolver to the engineer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Here&#8217;s my Colt&#8217;s, Mr. Blake,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I have
+another at home. You won&#8217;t need it, but I may as
+well leave it. We&#8217;re going to lope in now, so as to
+hustle Kid out to you before night. Just swap me that
+yearling for my gun. It wouldn&#8217;t seem natural not
+to be toting something that can make a noise.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thomas never cries unless he needs attention,&#8221;
+Genevieve sought to defend her infant.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, ma&#8217;am. It&#8217;s a good thing he knows that
+much already. You have to make yourself heard to
+get what you want in the world generally, as well as in
+hostleries and eating-houses.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake buckled on the cartridge belt, with its holstered
+revolver, and went to help saddle the ponies.
+Ashton watched him and Isobel narrowly. He was
+far from pleased with the familiarity of their talk and
+manner towards one another. Twice the girl put her
+hand on Blake&#8217;s arm.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_243' name='page_243'></a>243</span></p>
+<p>In marked contrast to this affectionate intimacy,
+Isobel was distrait and hurried when she came to take
+leave of the wounded man. He had risen to his feet,
+and she could not ignore his proffered hand. But she
+avoided his gaze and quickly withdrew her fingers from
+his warm clasp to hurry off.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_244' name='page_244'></a>244</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXI_MADONNA_DOLOROSA' id='CHAPTER_XXI_MADONNA_DOLOROSA'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXI</h2>
+<h3>MADONNA DOLOROSA</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Blake was cooking supper when, shortly before
+sunset, Gowan drove up to the waterhole, with a
+pony in lead behind the heavy wagon. Leaving the
+wagon with the rope and other articles of his load on
+the far side of the creek bed, he watered and picketed
+the horses, and came across to the tent with his rifle
+and a roll of blankets.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Howdy, Mr. Blake. Got here in time for supper,
+I see,&#8221; he remarked as he unburdened himself. &#8220;Met
+Mr. Knowles and the ladies down near the ranch.
+They told me about the shooting.&#8221; He faced about
+to stare at Ashton&#8217;s bandaged head. &#8220;They told me
+you came mighty near getting yours. You shore are
+a lucky tenderfoot.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton shrugged superciliously. &#8220;The worst of it
+is the additional hole in my hat. I see you have a new
+one. Is that the latest style on the range?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Stetson, brand A-1.,&#8221; replied the puncher. &#8220;How
+does it strike you, Mr. Blake?&ndash;&ndash;and my new shirt?
+Having a dude puncher on our range kind of stirred
+up my emulosity. They don&#8217;t have real cowboy attire
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_245' name='page_245'></a>245</span>
+like his at an ordinary shorthorn cow town like Stockchute&ndash;&ndash;but
+I did the best I could.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake made no response to this heavy badinage.
+He set the supper on the chuck-box, and laconically
+said: &#8220;Come and get it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Might have known you&#8217;ve been on round-up,&#8221; remarked
+Gowan, with an insistent sociability oddly at
+variance with his usual taciturn reserve. &#8220;According
+to Miss Chuckie, you&#8217;re some rider, and according to
+Mr. Knowles, you can shoot. I wouldn&#8217;t mind hearing
+from you direct about that shooting this morning.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake recounted the affair still more briefly than he
+had told it to Knowles.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That shore was a mighty close shave,&#8221; commented
+the puncher. &#8220;But you haven&#8217;t said what the fellow
+looked like.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He wore ordinary range clothes,&#8221; replied Blake.
+&#8220;I couldn&#8217;t see him behind the rocks, and caught only
+a glimpse of him as he went around the ridge. His
+horse was much the same build and color as Rocket.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The puncher stared at Ashton with his cold unblinking
+eyes. &#8220;You shore picked out a Jim Dandy guide,
+Mr. Tenderfoot. According to this, it looks mighty
+like he&#8217;s gone and turned hawss thief. Mr. Knowles
+says your Rocket hawss has vamoosed. If he&#8217;s moving
+to Utah under your ex-guide, it&#8217;ll take some lively
+posse to head him. What d&#8217;you say, Mr. Blake?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I think the man is apt soon to come to the end of
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_246' name='page_246'></a>246</span>
+his rope&ndash;&ndash;after dropping through a trap door,&#8221; said
+the engineer.</p>
+<p>Gowan looked at him between narrowed eyelids, and
+paused with upraised coffee cup to reply: &#8220;A man
+that has shown the nerve this one has won&#8217;t let anyone
+get close enough to rope him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It will be either that or a bullet, before long,&#8221; predicted
+Blake. &#8220;The badman is getting to be rather
+out of date.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Maybe a bullet,&#8221; admitted Gowan. &#8220;Never any
+rope, though, for his kind.&ndash;&ndash;Guess I&#8217;ll turn in. It&#8217;s
+something of a drive over to Stockchute and back with
+the wagon, and I got up early. You and Ashton might
+go on watch until midnight, and turn me out for the rest
+of the night.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Very well,&#8221; agreed Blake.</p>
+<p>The puncher stretched out on his blankets under a
+tree, a few yards from the tent. Ashton took the
+dishes down to sand-scour them at the pool, while
+Blake saw that everything damageable was disposed
+safe from the knife-like fangs of the coyotes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How about keeping watch?&#8221; asked Ashton, when
+he returned with the cleansed dishes. &#8220;Shall I take
+first or second?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Neither,&#8221; answered Blake. &#8220;You will need all
+the sleep and rest you can get. Tomorrow may be a
+hard day. Turn in at once.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you insist,&#8221; acquiesced Ashton. &#8220;I still am
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_247' name='page_247'></a>247</span>
+rather weak and dizzy.&#8221; He went to the tent and disappeared.</p>
+<p>Blake took the lantern and strolled across to the
+wagon, to look at the numerous articles brought by
+Gowan. He set the lantern over in the wagon bed on
+top of what seemed to be a heap of empty oat sacks,
+while he overhauled the load. It included three coils
+of rope of a hundred feet each, a keg of railroad spikes,
+two dozen picket-pins, two heavy hammers, a pick and
+shovel, and a crowbar.</p>
+<p>The last three articles had not been ordered by
+Blake. The puncher had brought them along, apparently
+with a hazy idea that the descent of the ca&ntilde;on
+would be something on the order of mining. There
+were also in the wagon two five-gallon kerosene cans
+to use in carrying water up the mountain, a sack of oats,
+Gowan&#8217;s saddle, and two packsaddles.</p>
+<p>In shifting one of the packsaddles to get at the hammers,
+Blake knocked it against the sack on which the
+lantern had been set. The lantern suddenly fell over
+on its side. Blake reached in to pick it up, and perceived
+that the sack was rising in a mound. He caught
+up one of the hammers, and held it poised for a stroke.
+From the sack came a muffled rattle. The hammer
+descended in a smashing blow.</p>
+<p>The sack rose and fell as if something under it was
+squirming about convulsively. But to Blake&#8217;s surprise
+it did not fall aside and disclose that which was making
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_248' name='page_248'></a>248</span>
+the violent movement. The squirming lessened. He
+grasped an outer corner of the sack and jerked it upward.
+It failed to flip into the air. The lower part
+sagged heavily. The squirmer was inside and&ndash;&ndash;the
+mouth of the sack was tied fast.</p>
+<p>Blake looked at it thoughtfully. After some moments,
+he placed the sack where it had lain at first, and
+upset the keg of spikes on top of it. He then carefully
+examined Gowan&#8217;s saddle; but it told him nothing.
+He shook his head doubtfully, and returned to
+camp.</p>
+<p>Going quietly around to Gowan, he set down the
+lantern close before the puncher&#8217;s face and stopped to
+light a cigar. Gowan stirred restlessly and rolled half
+over, but did not open his eyes. Blake smoked his
+cigar, extinguished the lantern, and quietly stretched
+out on the edge of the sleeper&#8217;s blankets. In a few
+moments he, too, was asleep.</p>
+<p>About two o&#8217;clock Gowan stirred and rolled over,
+pulling at his blankets. Instantly Blake was wide
+awake. The puncher mumbled, drew the blankets
+closer about him, and lay quiet. Blake went into the
+tent and dozed on his own blankets until roused by the
+chill of dawn. He went down for a plunge in the pool,
+and was dressed and back at the fireplace, cooking
+breakfast, when Gowan started up out of his heavy
+slumber.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, it&#8217;s getting along about that time,&#8221; Blake
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_249' name='page_249'></a>249</span>
+called to him cheerfully. &#8220;You might turn out Ashton.
+He has made as good a night of it as you have.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan had been staring at the dawn, his lean jaw
+slack. As Blake spoke, he snapped his mouth shut and
+came over to confront the engineer. &#8220;You agreed to
+call me at midnight,&#8221; he said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;My apology!&#8221; politely replied Blake. &#8220;I know
+how you must feel about it. But I hope you will excuse
+me. I saw that you, like Ashton, needed a full
+night&#8217;s sleep, and so did not disturb you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The puncher looked away and muttered: &#8220;I&#8217;m
+responsible for you to Mr. Knowles. He sent me here
+to guard you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That is true. Of course you will say it&#8217;s owing
+to no fault of mine that we have come through the
+night safely. Well, we have a big day&#8217;s work before
+us. May I ask you to call Ashton? Breakfast is
+ready.&#8221;</p>
+<p>At this the puncher sullenly went to rouse the
+sleeper. Ashton came out rubbing his eyes; but after
+a dip in the pool, he declared himself restored by his
+long sleep and ready for a day&#8217;s work. During the
+night his bandage had come loose. He would have
+tossed it away, but Blake insisted upon re-dressing the
+wound. He did so with as much skill and almost as
+much gentleness as had his wife.</p>
+<p>When Blake and Ashton left the camp, the puncher
+was leading the horses across to load their first packs.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_250' name='page_250'></a>250</span>
+The two levelmen walked briskly up the valley, carrying
+only enough food and water to last themselves until
+evening, when Gowan was to have the camp moved to
+the top of High Mesa.</p>
+<p>Beginning from his bench-mark at the foot of the
+mountain, Blake carried the level line slantingly up
+the ridge side. The work was slow and tedious, since
+the telescope of the level could never be on a horizontal
+line either higher or lower respectively than the top
+and bottom of the thirteen-foot rod. This necessitated
+setting-up the instrument every few feet during the
+steepest part of the ascent.</p>
+<p>They saw nothing of Gowan, who had chosen a more
+roundabout but easier trail. At midmorning, however,
+they were overtaken by Genevieve and Isobel and
+Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie Blake. Knowles had
+started for Stockchute to seek the aid of the sheriff and
+his Indian prisoners. The ladies divided the ascent
+into several stages, riding ahead of the surveyors and
+resting in the shade of a rock or pine until the men had
+passed them.</p>
+<p>Near noon, when the levels had been carried up
+close to the top of High Mesa, Gowan rode down to
+the party to inquire where the new camp was to be
+pitched.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve brought up a lot this trip,&#8221; he stated. &#8220;I
+can fetch the rest by sundown, if I don&#8217;t have to
+meander all over the mesa with these first packs.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_251' name='page_251'></a>251</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Where did you leave the packhorses?&#8221; asked
+Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Up along the ca&ntilde;on where Ashton shot his yearling
+deer,&#8221; answered the puncher. &#8220;It&#8217;s about half way
+between that gulch where you say you&#8217;re going down
+and the bend across from the head of Dry Fork
+Gulch.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll camp there,&#8221; decided Blake. &#8220;It is on the
+shortest trail to that gulch, and you&#8217;ll not have time
+to get your second load farther before dark.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The puncher started back. But Isobel, who had
+come riding up with Genevieve, called out to stop him:
+&#8220;Wait, Kid. It is almost noon. You must take
+lunch with us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t leave those hawsses standing with the packs,
+Miss Chuckie, if they&#8217;re to make another trip today,&#8221;
+he replied.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Suppose you unload them and come back along the
+edge of the ca&ntilde;on?&#8221; suggested Blake. &#8220;We shall
+knock off soon and all go over to give my wife her first
+look at the ca&ntilde;on. We can eat lunch there together.&#8221;</p>
+<p>To this Gowan nodded a willing assent, and he
+jogged away, with a half smile on his thin lips. But
+that which pleased him had precisely the opposite effect
+on Ashton. He did not fancy sharing the companionship
+and attention of Miss Knowles with the puncher.
+As this interference with his happiness was due to
+Blake, he showed a petulant resentment towards the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_252' name='page_252'></a>252</span>
+engineer that won him the girl&#8217;s sympathetic concern.
+She attributed his fretfulness to his wound. Blake
+made the same mistake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ve done quite enough for the morning, Ashton,
+with that head of yours,&#8221; he said. &#8220;We&#8217;re over
+the worst now, and can easily run on up to the camp
+this afternoon. We shall knock off for a siesta.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Needn&#8217;t try to make out I&#8217;m a baby!&#8221; snapped
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Leave your rod here,&#8221; went on Blake, disregarding
+the other&#8217;s irascibility. &#8220;I&#8217;ll take the level. It may
+enable us to see the bottom of the ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He started on up the slope beside his wife&#8217;s pony.
+Ashton was somewhat mollified when he saw Isobel
+linger for him to walk beside her horse. She was
+carrying the baby, who, regardless of scenic attractions,
+had fallen asleep during the long climb from the lower
+mesa. The sight of the child clasped to her bosom
+awakened all that was highest in his nature. Concern
+over his wound had sobered her usual gay vivacity to
+a look of motherly tenderness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do you know,&#8221; he murmured during a pause in
+their conversation, &#8220;you make me think of pictures of
+the Madonna!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lafe!&#8221; she protested, blushing and as quickly
+paling. &#8220;You should not say such a thing. It is
+lovely&ndash;&ndash;a beautiful thing to tell me; but&ndash;&ndash;but I do
+not deserve it!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_253' name='page_253'></a>253</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Madonna!&ndash;&ndash;my Madonna!&#8221; he murmured in
+ardent adoration.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, please! when I&#8217;ve asked you not to!&#8221; she
+implored. &#8220;It is not right! I&ndash;&ndash;I am not!&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;
+Tears glistened in her soft eyes. She bent over to suppress
+a sob that might have awakened the sleeping
+infant.</p>
+<p>Ashton gazed up at her, wonder and contrition
+mingling with his deepening adoration. &#8220;Forgive me,
+Miss Chuckie! But I meant it&ndash;&ndash;I feel it! I never
+before felt this way towards any girl!... I know I
+have no right to say anything now. I am a pennyless
+adventurer, a disgraced, disinherited son, a mere cowpuncher
+apprentice; but if, by next spring, I shall
+have&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, see. They&#8217;re getting such a long way ahead
+of us!&#8221; exclaimed the girl, urging her pony to a faster
+gait.</p>
+<p>The animal started forward with a suddenness that
+left Ashton behind. He made no effort to regain his
+position beside the girl&#8217;s stirrup. Instead, he lagged
+farther and farther in the rear, his face crimson with
+mortification and anger. As his chagrin deepened, his
+flush became almost feverish and there was a suggestion
+of wildness in his flashing eyes. It was as though
+his passion was intensifying some injury to his brain
+caused by the concussion of the bullet on his skull.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_254' name='page_254'></a>254</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXII_A_REAL_WOLF' id='CHAPTER_XXII_A_REAL_WOLF'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXII</h2>
+<h3>A REAL WOLF</h3>
+</div>
+<p>When the loiterer came over the second ridge
+into view of the booming chasm in the top of
+the plateau, he saw the others down near the brink.
+The baby had been laid on a soft bed of pine needles,
+and Blake was leading the ladies down to look over
+into the abyss, one on each arm.</p>
+<p>Ashton&#8217;s chagrin flared into jealous hate. He felt
+certain that the girl was quite capable of strolling
+along the extreme edge of the precipice without a trace
+of giddiness. Yet now she was clinging to Blake even
+more closely than was Genevieve. There was more
+than apprehension in the clasp of her little brown hand
+on the engineer&#8217;s shoulder. Her cheek brushed his
+sleeve.</p>
+<p>The anger of the onlooker was so intense that he
+did not see Gowan riding towards him from the left.
+The puncher dismounted and came forward, his cold
+gaze fixed on Ashton&#8217;s face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So you&#8217;re beginning to savvy it, too,&#8221; he remarked.</p>
+<p>Ashton confronted him, vainly attempting to mask
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_255' name='page_255'></a>255</span>
+his telltale look and color with a show of hauteur. &#8220;I
+never discuss personal matters with acquaintances of
+your stamp,&#8221; he said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s too bad,&#8221; coolly deplored Gowan. &#8220;Maybe
+you&#8217;ve heard the saying about cutting off your nose
+to spite your face.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you mean?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you want to go it alone, I can&#8217;t stop you,&#8221; replied
+the puncher. &#8220;Needn&#8217;t think I&#8217;m sucking
+around you for any favors or friendship. If this was
+my range, I would run you off it so fast you&#8217;d reach
+Stockchute with your tongue hanging out like a dog&#8217;s.
+That&#8217;s how much I like you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The feeling is fully reciprocated, I assure you,&#8221;
+rejoined Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right. Now what&#8217;re we going to do about
+him?&ndash;&ndash;each play a lone hand, or make it pardners
+for this deal?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;fail to understand,&#8221; hesitated Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, you don&#8217;t,&#8221; jeeringly contradicted the puncher.
+&#8220;It&#8217;s a three-cornered fight. You see it now, even
+if you have been too big a fool to see it before. We
+can settle ours after. But I&#8217;m free to own up to it
+that you&#8217;re a striped skunk if you won&#8217;t work with
+me first to get rid of him. Look at him now&ndash;&ndash;and
+him married!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton&#8217;s flush deepened to purple. &#8220;Married!&ndash;&ndash;yes,
+married!&#8221; he choked out.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_256' name='page_256'></a>256</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Right alongside his wife, too!&#8221; Gowan thrust the
+goad deeper. &#8220;You&#8217;d think even that brand of skunk
+would have more decency. Not that his wife is any
+friend of mine, like she is yours. But for a man with
+such a wife and baby ... with Miss Chuckie!
+The&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan ended with a string of oaths so virulent that
+even Ashton&#8217;s half-mad anger was checked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You may be&ndash;&ndash;er&ndash;&ndash;I fear that we&ndash;&ndash;Perhaps
+it&#8217;s not so bad as it appears!&#8221; he stammered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Bah!</i>&#8221; disgustedly sneered the puncher, and he
+strode on ahead, leaving Ashton torn between rage and
+doubt and terror of his own furious jealousy.</p>
+<p>The others continued to stand on a flat ledge that
+here formed the lip of the ca&ntilde;on. Genevieve was
+trembling with awed delight. Her husband and the
+girl appeared more calm, but they were drinking in the
+grandeur of the tremendous gorge below them with no
+less intense appreciation of its gloomy vastness.</p>
+<p>Upstream, to their left, the precipices jutted so far
+out from each wall of the ca&ntilde;on that they overlapped,
+a thousand or fifteen hundred feet from the top. But
+downstream the upper part of the chasm flared to a
+width that permitted the noonday sun to penetrate part
+way down through the blue-black shadows.</p>
+<p>&#8220;O-o-o-oh!&#8221; sighed Genevieve, for the tenth time,
+and she clung tighter than ever to the strong arm of
+her husband. &#8220;Isn&#8217;t it fearfully, fearfully delightful?
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_257' name='page_257'></a>257</span>
+It makes the soles of my feet tingle to look at
+it!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That tickly feeling!&#8221; exclaimed Isobel. &#8220;I often
+ride up here to the ca&ntilde;on, I do so love to feel that way!
+Only with me it&#8217;s like ants crawling up and down my
+back.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;O-o-o-oh!&#8221; again sighed Genevieve. &#8220;It&ndash;&ndash;it
+so overpowers one!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s sure some ca&ntilde;on,&#8221; admitted her husband.
+&#8220;That French artist Dor&eacute; ought to have seen it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If only we had a copy of Dante&#8217;s Inferno to read
+here on the brink!&#8221; she whispered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It always reminds me of Coleridge&#8217;s poem,&#8221; murmured
+Isobel, and she quoted in an awed whisper:</p>
+<table style='margin: auto' summary=''><tr><td>
+<p style='margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0;'>
+Where Alph, the sacred river, ran<br />
+Through caverns measureless to man,<br />
+Down to the sunless sea.</p>
+</td></tr></table>
+<p>&#8220;Fortunately for us, this is a ca&ntilde;on, not a string of
+measureless caverns,&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;It can be measured,
+one way or another. If I had a transit, I could
+calculate the depth at any point where the water shows&ndash;&ndash;triangulate
+with a vertical angle. But it would
+cause a long delay to send on for a transit. We shall
+first try to chain down at that gulch break.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Genevieve shrank back from the verge of the precipice
+and drew the others after her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dear!&#8221; she exclaimed, &#8220;I did not dream it was
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_258' name='page_258'></a>258</span>
+so fearful. One has to see to realize! You will not
+go down&ndash;&ndash;promise me you will not go down!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now, now, little woman,&#8221; reproached Blake.
+&#8220;What&#8217;s become of my partner?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But baby&ndash;&ndash;? If you should leave him fatherless!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Better that than for him to have a father who is
+a quitter! Just wait, Sweetheart. That break looks
+much less overwhelming than these sheer cliffs. You
+know I shall not attempt anything foolhardy. If it is
+not possible to get down without too great risk, I shall
+give it up and send for a transit.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, will you?&#8221; exclaimed Isobel, hardly less apprehensive
+than his wife. &#8220;Why not wait anyway
+until you can send for your transit?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Because I cannot triangulate the bottom within
+half a mile upstream from where the tunnel would
+have to be located. That roar and the wildness of
+the water wherever we can see it is proof that it is
+flowing down a heavy grade. At the point where I
+triangulated it might be above the level of Dry Mesa,
+and way below the mesa here at the tunnel site.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You could triangulate at the first place where the
+bottom can be seen, beyond here,&#8221; suggested Genevieve.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Suppose it proved to be lower than Dry Mesa,
+wouldn&#8217;t that still leave us up in the air?&#8221; he asked.
+&#8220;Like this&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_259' name='page_259'></a>259</span></p>
+<p>He pulled out his notebook and drew a rough
+sketch.</p>
+<div class='figtag'>
+<a name='linki_3' id='linki_3'></a>
+</div>
+<div class='figcenter'>
+<img src='images/depths-003.jpg' alt='' title='' width='192' height='68' /><br />
+</div>
+<p>&#8220;I see, Dear,&#8221; said his wife. &#8220;When do you plan
+to go down?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tomorrow morning.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can you wait until we come up from the ranch?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. Mr. Knowles will no doubt be back by
+then. He can bring you out early.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We shall come early, anyway,&#8221; said Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course!&#8221; added Genevieve. She drew a deep
+breath. &#8220;I shall see the place before you attempt to
+descend.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her husband nodded reassuringly and looked
+around to where Gowan and Ashton stood waiting,
+several yards from one another.</p>
+<p>&#8220;About lunch time, isn&#8217;t it?&#8221; he remarked. &#8220;Mr.
+Gowan will wish to be starting soon to bring up his
+second load.&#8221;</p>
+<p>At the suggestion, the ladies hastened to spread out
+their own lunch and the one brought by Blake. When
+called by Isobel, Gowan came forward to join the party,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_260' name='page_260'></a>260</span>
+with rather less than his usual reserve in his speech and
+manner.</p>
+<p>Ashton was the last to seat himself on the springy
+cushion of brown pine needles, and he sat throughout
+the meal in moody silence. Blake and the ladies attributed
+this to the fatigue of working through the long
+hot morning while suffering from his unhealed wound.
+He repulsed the sympathetic attentions of the Blakes.
+But he could not long continue to resist the kindly concern
+of the girl. After lunch she made him lie down
+in the shade while she bathed his wound with a good
+part of the small supply of water remaining in the canteens.</p>
+<p>Gowan had been asking questions about the work.
+Blake explained at some length why he considered it
+necessary not only to descend into the ca&ntilde;on but to
+carry the line of levels down along the bed of the subterranean
+stream to this point opposite Dry Fork
+Gulch. When Isobel drew apart with Ashton the
+puncher did not look at them, though his eyes narrowed
+to slits and his mouth straightened.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You shore have nerve to tackle it, Mr. Blake,&#8221; he
+commented. &#8220;Everything alive that I know of that&#8217;s
+ever gone down into Deep Ca&ntilde;on hasn&#8217;t ever come up
+again, except it had wings.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll prove that the rule has an exception,&#8221; replied
+Blake, smiling away the reawakened apprehension
+of his wife.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_261' name='page_261'></a>261</span></p>
+<p>Gowan shook his head doubtfully, and strolled
+down the slope to peer into the ca&ntilde;on. The level was
+directly in his path, set up firmly on its tripod, about
+six feet from the brink. The puncher stopped beside
+it to squint through the telescope.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll have one&ndash;&ndash;peach of a time seeing anything
+through this contraption down there,&#8221; he remarked.
+&#8220;I can&#8217;t see even right here in the sun.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The telescope is out of focus,&#8221; explained Blake.
+&#8220;Turn that screw on the side.&#8221; Gowan twisted a
+protruding thumbscrew. &#8220;Not that&ndash;&ndash;the one above
+it,&#8221; directed Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t stop to fool now,&#8221; replied the puncher.
+&#8220;I&#8217;ve got to hustle along.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He started hastily around between the level and the
+precipice. The toe of his boot struck hard against the
+iron toe of the outer tripod-leg. He stumbled and
+sprawled forward on his hands and knees. Behind
+him the instrument toppled over towards the brink.</p>
+<p>Genevieve cried out in alarm at Gowan&#8217;s fall. Her
+husband sprang to the rescue&ndash;&ndash;not of the puncher,
+but of the level. It had crashed down with its head
+to the chasm, and was sliding out over the brink.
+Blake barely caught it by the tip of one of the legs as
+it swung up for the plunge. He drew it back and set
+it up to see what damage had been done to the head.
+Gowan watched him, tight-lipped.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This is luck!&#8221; exclaimed the engineer, after a
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_262' name='page_262'></a>262</span>
+swift examination. &#8220;Nothing broken&ndash;&ndash;only knocked
+out of adjustment. I can fix that in half an hour. She
+struck with the telescope turned sideways. You must
+have set the clamp screw.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The puncher&#8217;s face darkened. &#8220;Wish the&ndash;&ndash;infernal
+machine had gone plumb down to hell!&#8221; he
+growled. &#8220;It came near tripping me over the edge.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My apology,&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;I spraddled the
+tripod purposely to keep it from being upset.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Kid, you&#8217;ve hurt yourself,&#8221; called Isobel, as
+the puncher began to wrap a kerchief about his hand.
+&#8220;Come here and let me bandage it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;Two babies are enough for
+you to coddle at one time. I&#8217;ve got to hit out.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He turned his back on Blake and hurried up to his
+horse. The engineer followed as far as the nearest
+tree, where he set up the instrument in the shade and
+began to adjust it.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good thing she has platinum crosshairs,&#8221; he said
+to Ashton. &#8220;A fall like that would have been certain
+to break the old-style spiderweb hairs.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton did not reply. He was absorbed in a murmured
+conversation with Isobel. Blake completed the
+adjustments of the level and stretched out beside his
+wife to play with his gurgling son. A half hour of
+this completed the two hours that he had set apart for
+the noon rest. He placed the baby back in his wife&#8217;s
+lap and stood up to stretch his powerful frame.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_263' name='page_263'></a>263</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;How about it, Ashton?&#8221; he inquired. &#8220;Think
+you feel fit to rod this afternoon? Don&#8217;t hesitate to
+say no, if that&#8217;s the right answer. I expect my wife
+and Miss Chuckie, between them, can help me carry
+the line as far as the camp.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can do it alone,&#8221; interposed the girl. &#8220;Let
+them both stay here and rest all afternoon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, Miss Chuckie. I can and shall do my work,&#8221;
+insisted Ashton, springing up with unexpected briskness
+for one who had appeared so fatigued. &#8220;It is
+you and Mrs. Blake who must stay here to rest&ndash;&ndash;unless
+you wish to keep us company.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Might we not go to the new camp and put it in
+order?&#8221; suggested Genevieve.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What if that outlaw should come sneaking back?&#8221;
+objected Ashton. &#8220;It seems to me you should keep
+with us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He would not trouble us,&#8221; replied Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yet if he should? Anyway, Blake and I saw a
+wolf up here the other day.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;A real wolf! Where?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; answered Blake. &#8220;Over in the ravine the
+other side of the head of Dry Fork Gulch.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He may attack you,&#8221; argued Ashton.</p>
+<p>The girl laughed. &#8220;You&#8217;re still a tenderfoot to
+think a wolf wouldn&#8217;t know better than that. Wish
+he didn&#8217;t! It would mean the saving of a half dozen
+calves this winter.&#8221; She flashed out her long-barreled
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_264' name='page_264'></a>264</span>
+automatic pistol and knocked a cone from the tree
+above Blake&#8217;s head with a swiftly aimed shot.</p>
+<p>Blake caught the cone as it fell and looked at the
+bullet hole through its center. &#8220;Unless that was an
+accident, I should call it some shooting,&#8221; he remarked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Accident!&#8221; she called back. &#8220;Stand sideways
+and see what happens to your cigar.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, thanks. I&#8217;ll take your word for it. Just
+lit this one, and I&#8217;ve only a few left. By by, Tommy!
+Don&#8217;t let the wolves eat mamma and the poor little
+cowlady!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He picked up the level and started off at a swinging
+stride. Ashton followed several paces behind. His
+face was sullen and heavy, but in their merriment over
+Blake&#8217;s banter, the ladies failed to observe his expression.</p>
+<p>They rested for a while longer. Then, after venturing
+down for another awed look into the abyss, they
+rode along, parallel with the stupendous rift, to the
+place selected for the new camp. As Gowan had
+brought up the tent in one of the first packs, the ladies
+pitched it on the level top of the ridge.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This is real camping!&#8221; delightedly exclaimed
+Genevieve, as they set to gathering leafy twigs for bedding
+and dry branches for fuel. &#8220;How I wish we
+could stay all night!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We can, if you wish,&#8221; replied Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can we, really?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_265' name='page_265'></a>265</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Our men often sleep out in the open, this time of
+year. We shall take the tent for ourselves. Won&#8217;t it
+be fun! But will Thomas be all right?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can manage with what I have until tomorrow
+afternoon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How long do you think they will be down in the
+ca&ntilde;on?&#8221; the girl inquired.</p>
+<p>Genevieve shuddered. &#8220;I wish I could tell! If
+only Tom finds that he cannot get down at all, how
+thankful I shall be!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And&ndash;&ndash;Lafe!&#8221; murmured the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It is possible that they may be unable to do it in
+one day,&#8221; went on Genevieve apprehensively&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;Down,
+down into those dreadful depths, and then
+along the river, all the way to where the tunnel is to
+be, and back again, and then up the awful cliffs!
+Surely they cannot finish in one day! Of course they
+will succeed&ndash;&ndash;Tom can do anything, <i>anything</i>! Yet
+how I dread the very thought&ndash;&ndash;!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We must prepare to stay right here on High Mesa
+until they do finish!&#8221; declared Isobel. &#8220;It will be
+impossible to go back to the ranch tomorrow if they
+are still in that frightful place! Kid will have to take
+the hawsses down to the waterhole. He shall go on
+home, and tomorrow morning fetch us cream and eggs
+and everything you need. They will have to be told
+at the ranch; and if Daddy has returned, he will come
+up to help and be with us.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_266' name='page_266'></a>266</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You dear girl! The more I think of this terrible
+descent, the more I dread it. I feel a presentiment
+that&ndash;&ndash;But I must try to be brave and not interfere
+with Tom&#8217;s work! It will be a great comfort to have
+your father with us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Daddy will surely come if he has returned. Isn&#8217;t
+he kind and good? He couldn&#8217;t have done more to
+make me happy if he had been my own real father!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Genevieve smiled into the girl&#8217;s glowing face.
+&#8220;Yes, dear. Yet I am far from surprised, since <i>you</i>
+are the daughter he wished to make happy. I was
+more surprised to have him tell me you were adopted.
+You have never said a word about it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;you see, I did not happen to,&#8221; confusedly
+murmured the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Chuckie Knowles is not your real name,&#8221; Genevieve
+gently reproached her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, it is the pet name Daddy gave me. My real
+one is&ndash;&ndash;Isobel.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Isobel&ndash;&ndash;?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. Daddy&#8217;s sister, in Denver, always calls me
+that. But here on the ranch&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Isobel&ndash;&ndash;?&#8221; repeated Genevieve, with a rising inflection.</p>
+<p>The color ebbed from the girl&#8217;s face, but she answered
+steadily: &#8220;Chuckie&ndash;&ndash;Isobel&ndash;&ndash;Knowles. I
+am Daddy&#8217;s daughter. I have no other father.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is-o-bel&ndash;&ndash;Is-o-bel,&#8221; Genevieve intoned the name
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_267' name='page_267'></a>267</span>
+musically. &#8220;It has a beautiful sound. I had a friend
+at school&ndash;&ndash;Isabella&ndash;&ndash;but we always called her
+Belle.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl suddenly faced away from her companion,
+and darted to meet Blake and Ashton, who were bringing
+the line of levels up over the ridge.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_268' name='page_268'></a>268</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXIII_THE_TEMPTATION' id='CHAPTER_XXIII_THE_TEMPTATION'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIII</h2>
+<h3>THE TEMPTATION</h3>
+</div>
+<p>When the ladies explained their plans for remaining
+in camp on High Mesa, Blake gave a ready
+assent.</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right, Jenny. It&#8217;ll be something like old
+times. Can&#8217;t scare you up any lions or fever, leopards
+or cyclones; but you may see that wolf.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I should welcome all savage Africa if it would rid
+us of this awful ca&ntilde;on!&#8221; replied his wife.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Won&#8217;t you please give it up?&#8221; begged Isobel.
+&#8220;I am to blame for your coming here. If anything
+should happen to you, I&ndash;&ndash;I could never forgive myself&ndash;&ndash;never!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake looked at the two lovely, anxious faces before
+him, and smiled gravely. &#8220;There you go again, and
+you have yet to see that gulch. But even if you find
+that it looks dangerous, you wouldn&#8217;t want me to let
+a little risk interfere with my work, would you?
+Think of the fools who climb the highest and steepest
+mountains just for sport. I am going down there because
+it is necessary.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But is it?&#8221; the girl half sobbed.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_269' name='page_269'></a>269</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Someone must do it, sooner or later,&#8221; he replied,
+and he took his wife&#8217;s hand in his big palm. &#8220;Come,
+little woman, speak up. Do you want your husband to
+be a shirker and quitter?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course not, Tom. Yet one should be reasonable.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I have had enough experience in climbing to know
+not to attempt the impossible, Sweetheart,&#8221; he assured
+her. &#8220;The worst looking places are not always the
+most dangerous. I promise you to take only reasonable
+risks.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have we time enough to look at the place this
+afternoon?&#8221; she inquired.</p>
+<p>Blake glanced at the sun, and nodded. &#8220;The riding
+is good. We can get back long before dark.
+Ashton, you had better stretch out and rest.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, I shall go with you,&#8221; replied Ashton, his lips
+set in as firm lines as Blake&#8217;s.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You cannot go, Lafe, unless you agree to ride my
+pony,&#8221; said Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not going to have Gowan call me a baby
+again,&#8221; he objected.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You will need all your strength tomorrow,&#8221; predicted
+Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You must ride,&#8221; insisted Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Very well&ndash;&ndash;to please you,&#8221; he agreed. &#8220;We
+shall take turns.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake again looked at the sun. &#8220;As long as we are
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_270' name='page_270'></a>270</span>
+going, we may as well carry forward the line of levels.
+We can take long turns nearly all the way, so there
+will be little delay.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And I shall rod for you!&#8221; delightedly exclaimed
+Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Only part of the time,&#8221; qualified Ashton with a
+sharpness that the others attributed to his zeal to serve
+her.</p>
+<p>He filled his canteen from one of the cans of water
+brought up by Gowan, and rinsed out the mouths and
+nostrils of the thirsty ponies. This done, he and
+Genevieve mounted, and the party started off on a
+route parallel with the ca&ntilde;on, which here trended back
+away from the edge of the plateau.</p>
+<p>They soon came to where the surface of the mesa
+was slashed with gulleys and ravines, all running down
+into the ca&ntilde;on. Blake swung away from the ca&ntilde;on,
+in order to head the worst of these ravines or to cross
+them where they were less precipitous. Presently,
+however, he struck in again towards the great rift
+along the flank of a high barren ridge. At last he led
+over the ridge and down to the side of a very large
+ravine where it pitched into the ca&ntilde;on at an angle little
+less steep than the descent of Dry Fork Gulch.</p>
+<p>The line of levels, as Blake had foretold, had been
+an easy one to run. It was stopped on the corner of
+a shelf of rock that jutted out above the gorge. Having
+provided a soft nest for the baby, the four went
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_271' name='page_271'></a>271</span>
+out on the shelf and peered down the dizzy slope into
+the black shadows of the depths.</p>
+<p>The two ladies drew back shuddering. Blake
+looked about at them and seeing their troubled faces,
+sought to quiet their dread.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You have not looked close enough,&#8221; he said.
+&#8220;With spikes and ropes, the worst of this will be comparatively
+easy. There are ledges and crevices all the
+way down. You cannot see the lower half. When I
+was here with Gowan and Mr. Knowles, the sun was
+shining to the bottom. The lower half of the descent
+is much less steep than this you see.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Genevieve smiled trustfully. &#8220;Oh, if you say it is
+safe, Tom!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We shall take down the rope and all the spikes
+we can carry,&#8221; he explained in further reassurance.
+&#8220;At the worst places a spike and a piece of the rope
+will not only let us down safely, but can be left for our
+ascent.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then it will be all right!&#8221; sighed Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;For him&ndash;&ndash;yes!&#8221; broke in Ashton, his voice harsh
+and strained. He was cringing back, white-faced,
+from the edge of the gulch.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, Lafe!&#8221; exclaimed the girl. &#8220;If Tom&ndash;&ndash;Mr.
+Blake goes down, surely you can&#8217;t mean that
+you&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s used to climbing&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;m not!&#8221; Ashton
+sought to excuse himself.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_272' name='page_272'></a>272</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, very well,&#8221; she said. &#8220;Of course it is not
+right to ask you to do it if you suffer from vertigo. I
+shall ask Kid to take your place. If he refuses, Daddy
+will do it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That may mean delay,&#8221; remarked Blake. &#8220;If
+that scoundrel really is headed for Utah, your father
+may not be back for several days. Yet he asked me to
+settle this matter as soon as possible.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then, if Kid will not go down with you, I shall,&#8221;
+declared the girl, her blue eyes flashing.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no indeed, dear!&#8221; protested Genevieve. &#8220;It
+is simply impossible! You shall not do it!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall, unless Kid&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You shall not ask him!&#8221; interposed Ashton, his
+pale face suddenly flushing a hot red. &#8220;I am going
+down!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You will, Lafayette?&#8221; cried Genevieve. &#8220;That
+is very brave and&ndash;&ndash;and kind of you!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But if you have no experience in climbing?&#8221; objected
+Isobel in a tone that transmuted the young man&#8217;s
+angry flush into a glow of delight.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t inexperienced climbers go up the Alps with
+guides?&#8221; he nonchalantly replied. &#8220;I can trust Blake
+to get me safe to the bottom. He will need me in his
+business.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good for you, Lafe!&#8221; commended Blake.</p>
+<p>It was the first time that he had ever addressed
+Ashton so familiarly. He accompanied it with the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_273' name='page_273'></a>273</span>
+proffer of his hand. But Ashton did not look at him.
+He was basking in the frankly admiring gaze of Miss
+Knowles.</p>
+<p>The party returned in the same manner that they
+had come out, for Isobel firmly refused to permit Ashton
+to walk. Blake allowed her to set the pace, and
+she chose such a rapid one that they reached camp a
+full half hour before sunset.</p>
+<p>A few minutes later, as they were sitting down to a
+hastily prepared supper, Gowan appeared with the second
+load from the lower camp. Blake and Ashton
+sprang up to loosen the packs of the sweating, panting
+horses. The puncher swung down from his saddle, not
+to assist them, but to remonstrate with Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Been expecting to meet you, all the way up, Miss
+Chuckie,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Ain&#8217;t you staying too late?
+You won&#8217;t get home before long after dark.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mrs. Blake and I are not going down tonight,
+Kid,&#8221; replied the girl, and she explained the change of
+plans.</p>
+<p>Gowan listened attentively, though without commenting
+either by look or word. When she had quite
+finished, he asked a single question: &#8220;Think your
+Daddy won&#8217;t mind, Miss Chuckie?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He will understand that we simply can&#8217;t leave here
+until Lafe and&ndash;&ndash;Mr. Blake are safe up out of the
+ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right. You&#8217;re the boss,&#8221; he acquiesced.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_274' name='page_274'></a>274</span>
+&#8220;Just write out a list of what you want. I&#8217;ll take all
+the hawsses down to the waterhole, and go on to the
+ranch. You can look for me back at sunup. The
+moon rises between three and four.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Genevieve, will you make out the list? Sit down
+and eat, Kid.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, just a snack, Miss Chuckie. Wouldn&#8217;t stop
+for that if the hawsses didn&#8217;t know the trail well
+enough to go down in the dark.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have you seen any sign of the murderer?&#8221; inquired
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>Gowan drained the cup of scalding hot coffee handed
+to him by Isobel, and answered jeeringly: &#8220;Don&#8217;t
+worry, Tenderfoot. He won&#8217;t try to get you tonight.
+If he came back today, he saw me around. If he
+comes back tonight, he won&#8217;t think of climbing High
+Mesa to look for you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake came to the puncher with a list written by
+himself and his wife on a leaf from his fieldbook.
+Gowan folded it in his hatband, washed down the last
+mouthful of bread and ham that he had been bolting,
+and went to shift his saddle to Isobel&#8217;s pony, the youngest
+and freshest of the horses. In two minutes he
+was riding away down the ridge, willingly followed by
+the four other horses. They knew as well as he that
+they were returning to the waterhole.</p>
+<p>As the campers again sat down to their supper Isobel
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_275' name='page_275'></a>275</span>
+paused with the coffeepot upraised. &#8220;Genevieve,&#8221;
+she inquired, &#8220;did you put cream on the list?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, no, my dear. It did not occur to me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Nor may it to Yuki. He will be sure to send
+eggs and butter, but unless he thinks to save tonight&#8217;s
+cream&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;ll run and tell Kid.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton sprang up ahead of her. &#8220;I&#8217;ll catch him,&#8221;
+he said, and sprinted down the ridge.</p>
+<p>Racing around a thicket of scrub oak, he caught
+sight of Gowan more than an eighth of a mile ahead.
+He whistled repeatedly. At last Gowan twisted about
+in the saddle, and drew rein. He did not turn back,
+but made Ashton come all the way to him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, what&#8217;s wanted?&#8221; he demanded.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Cream,&#8221; panted Ashton. &#8220;Miss Chuckie says&ndash;&ndash;tell
+Yuki.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shore pop, I&#8217;ll bring all there is,&#8221; replied Gowan.
+Ashton started back. &#8220;Hold on,&#8221; said the puncher.
+&#8220;I want to say something to you, and here&#8217;s the
+chance.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What is it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;About him. I want you to keep a mighty close
+watch tonight.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But you said that the murderer would not&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Bah!</i> What does he count in this deal? It&#8217;s this
+engineer. I&#8217;ve been chewing it over all afternoon.
+Miss Chuckie is as innocent and trusting as a lamb,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_276' name='page_276'></a>276</span>
+spite of her winterings in Denver, and she&#8217;s plumb
+locoed over him, reading so much about him in the
+reports.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Still, it does not necessarily follow&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t it, though!&#8221; broke in the puncher. &#8220;Guess
+you didn&#8217;t find it any funnier than I did seeing her
+hanging onto his shoulder.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Curse him!&#8221; cried Ashton, his jealousy flaring at
+the remembrance.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now you&#8217;re talking!&#8221; approved Gowan. &#8220;That
+shows you like her like I do. You&#8217;re not going to
+stand for her losing her fortune.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Her fortune?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;By his flooding us off our range.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ah&ndash;&ndash;as for that, I have been thinking it over.
+She told me Mr. Knowles owns five sections. If
+water is put on them&ndash;&ndash;Western Colorado fruit lands
+are very valuable, you know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s a lie. Water can&#8217;t make five sections
+worth a range like ours. But supposing it could&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;
+the puncher leaned towards Ashton, his eyes glaring
+with the cold malignancy of a striking rattlesnake&#8217;s&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;supposing
+it could, how about us letting her lose her
+good name?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good God!&#8221; gasped Ashton. &#8220;It can&#8217;t come to
+that!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t it? can&#8217;t it? Where&#8217;s your eyes? And him
+a married man! The&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; Gowan cursed horribly.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_277' name='page_277'></a>277</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You really believe it!&#8221; cried Ashton, convinced
+by the other&#8217;s outburst.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Believe it? I know it!&#8221; declared Gowan. &#8220;If
+you thought half as much of her as I do&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I do!&ndash;&ndash;not half, but a hundred times more!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, you do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I swear it! I&#8217;d do anything for her!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Except save her from him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no! How can I? Tell me how!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The puncher bent nearer to the half-frenzied man.
+&#8220;You&#8217;re going down that gulch with him. Suppose
+a spike gets knocked out or a rope breaks or a loose
+rock gets pushed over?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;God!&#8221; cried Ashton, putting his hands over his
+eyes. &#8220;That would be murder!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Bah!</i> You&#8217;d make a dog sick! Willing to do
+anything for her&ndash;&ndash;except save her from him! And
+nothing to it but just an accident that&#8217;s just as like as
+not to happen anyway.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&ndash;&ndash;murder!&#8221; shudderingly muttered Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Murder a skunk,&#8221; sneered Gowan. &#8220;If saving
+her from him isn&#8217;t a case of justifiable homicide, what
+is? Don&#8217;t you get the idea? Just a likely accident,
+down there where nobody can see.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton dropped his hands, half clenched, to his
+sides. Beads of cold sweat were gathering and running
+down his drawn face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can&#8217;t!&#8221; he whispered. &#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;I can&#8217;t!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_278' name='page_278'></a>278</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Not if I agree to get out of the way and give you
+clear running?&#8221; tempted Gowan.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You would?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. You see how much I like her. You rid
+her of him, and I&#8217;ll let you have her for doing it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton shuddered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Think it over&ndash;&ndash;and watch him mighty close tonight,&#8221;
+advised the tempter.</p>
+<p>A red flush leaped into Ashton&#8217;s face. Gowan
+struck his spurs into his horse&#8217;s flank and loped away.</p>
+<p>Ashton stood motionless. The puncher disappeared
+down the mountain side. The twilight faded
+and darkness closed down about the tortured man.
+He stood there motionless, his convulsed face alternately
+flushing and paling, his eyes now clouding, now
+burning with rage and hate.</p>
+<p>When at last he returned to the camp he kept beyond
+the circle of firelight. Hurriedly he rolled up
+in his blankets for the night, muttering something
+about his head and his need of rest for the next day&#8217;s
+work. The others accepted the explanation without
+question. They formed a cheerful domestic group
+about the fire from which he was shut out by his passion.</p>
+<p>The ladies withdrew into the tent at an early hour.
+Blake strolled around the camp until after nine o&#8217;clock,
+but finally came with his blankets and companionably
+rolled up near Ashton. He was soon fast asleep.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_279' name='page_279'></a>279</span>
+But Ashton lay tossing until after midnight. Weariness
+at last weighed down the lids of his hot eyes and
+numbed his tortured brain. He sank into a feverish
+sleep haunted with evil dreams.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_280' name='page_280'></a>280</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXIV_BLIND_LOVE' id='CHAPTER_XXIV_BLIND_LOVE'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIV</h2>
+<h3>BLIND LOVE</h3>
+</div>
+<p>At sunrise the harassed dreamer awoke to find
+Gowan gazing down at him somberly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&ndash;&ndash;you here?&#8221; he exclaimed, starting up on
+his elbow. &#8220;What is&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; He checked himself and
+muttered brokenly, &#8220;I&#8217;ve been dreaming&ndash;&ndash;horrible
+nightmares.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s down there overhauling his outfit,&#8221; said
+Gowan. &#8220;Hope you&#8217;ve thought the matter over.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My answer must be the same. I cannot do it, I
+cannot!&#8221; replied Ashton. He spoke hurriedly, as if
+afraid to linger on the thought.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You can&#8217;t&ndash;&ndash;not to save her and have me give
+her to you?&#8221; asked Gowan.</p>
+<p>Ashton clenched his hands and bent over in an agony
+of doubt and indecision.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You devil!&#8221; he groaned.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What! Because I&#8217;m willing to give her up, in
+order to see her saved?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why don&#8217;t you shoot him, if you&#8217;re so anxious?&#8221;
+queried Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And hang for it,&#8221; retorted the puncher. &#8220;You
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_281' name='page_281'></a>281</span>
+can do it with an accident, and no risk. Anyway,
+that&#8217;ll make things easier for his wife&ndash;&ndash;to have him
+meet a natural death. Won&#8217;t be anything said about
+why he was taken off. She hasn&#8217;t begun to suspect
+what&#8217;s going on between him and&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan paused, looked at the tent, and concluded:
+&#8220;I&#8217;ve done my part. I won&#8217;t say any more. But
+just you remember what I&#8217;ve told you. You won&#8217;t
+run any risk. Mr. Knowles hasn&#8217;t come back yet.
+There&#8217;ll be only them and me along, and we won&#8217;t
+be able to see you do it. Just remember what it will
+mean to her&ndash;&ndash;just remember that&ndash;&ndash;when you get
+him where a shove or a loosened spike&ndash;&ndash;Savvy?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He went to loosen the diamond hitch of the packs
+that he had brought with him from the ranch. Ashton
+sank back and lay brooding until the girl came from
+the tent and called to inquire how he felt. Too
+wretched to care about his appearance, he rose and
+went over to her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh!&#8221; she exclaimed at sight of his haggard face.
+&#8220;You are ill!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Only an attack of indigestion and loss of sleep&ndash;&ndash;something
+I often have,&#8221; he lied. &#8220;A cup of coffee
+will set me up. Don&#8217;t worry. I&#8217;m strong&ndash;&ndash;head
+doesn&#8217;t bother me at all this morning, except a numb
+feeling inside.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall dress the wound at once, while the coffee is
+boiling,&#8221; she replied.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_282' name='page_282'></a>282</span></p>
+<p>He would have objected. She silenced him with a
+look that acted on his chafed spirit like oil upon a
+burn. Her kind, almost tender voice and the soft
+touch of her fingers on his head soothed his anguish
+and seemed to counteract the poison instilled by Gowan.
+He began to doubt the puncher and the witness of his
+own eyes.</p>
+<p>When Blake and his wife came to breakfast, Ashton
+was so cheerful that they hardly noticed the traces
+of haggardness that yet lingered in his face. Blake at
+once centered the attention of all by explaining his
+plans for the exploration of the ca&ntilde;on. In addition
+to the surveyor&#8217;s chain, a hammer, and the rope and
+spikes,&ndash;&ndash;which were to be used only in making the
+descent,&ndash;&ndash;he and Ashton were to carry the level and
+rod and a quantity of food. At the suggestion of Isobel,
+he agreed to take her father&#8217;s revolver and fire it
+at intervals, on the chance that the watchers above
+might see the flash of the shots and so be able to follow
+the progress of the explorers down in the depths.</p>
+<p>Genevieve quickly thought out signals to be given
+in response. If at night, a torch was to be cast down
+into the chasm; if in the daytime, a white flag, made of
+a sheet sent by Yuki, was to be waved out over the
+brink. As the explorers might become confused in
+the gloom of the ca&ntilde;on bottom, the point of the bend
+opposite Dry Fork Gulch was to be marked by a beacon
+fire built on the verge of the ca&ntilde;on wall.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_283' name='page_283'></a>283</span></p>
+<p>Blake had already arranged everything that he and
+Ashton were to take down with them. Immediately
+after breakfast the outfit was fastened on the packhorses,
+together with food, water and blankets for
+those who were to remain on the heights. The ladies
+were determined to keep above the explorers at all
+points where the rim of the ca&ntilde;on could be approached.
+Gowan was to fetch and carry for them and take the
+horses down to the pool for water at night.</p>
+<p>Within half an hour after breakfast the party was
+jogging away from camp, fully equipped for the great
+undertaking. Gowan was afoot. His horse, as well
+as the regular pack animals, was heavily loaded with
+stores. He walked with Isobel, who had insisted that
+Ashton should ride her pony. Blake strode along at
+his wife&#8217;s stirrup, carrying his son in a clasp as tender
+as it was strong.</p>
+<p>The engineer was the only cheerful member of the
+party. Even Thomas Herbert, that best tempered of
+babies, was peevish and fretful. He was instinctively
+reflexing the suppressed nervousness and anxiety of his
+mother. Gowan and Ashton were as gloomy in look
+and speech as the shadowy depths of the ca&ntilde;on. Isobel
+bravely sought to respond to Blake&#8217;s confidence in
+the favorable outcome of the survey; but her smile,
+like Genevieve&#8217;s, was forced and her eyes were
+troubled.</p>
+<p>They reached the point of attack as the rays of the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_284' name='page_284'></a>284</span>
+morning sun were beginning to strike down into the
+side gorge. This was as Blake had planned. He at
+once began to direct the preparations for the descent,
+himself doing the lion&#8217;s share of the work.</p>
+<p>A long detour to a point higher up the ravine offered
+an easy descent of its bottom to the place where it
+pitched steeply into the ca&ntilde;on. Blake preferred to
+take a short cut down the almost vertical side of the
+gulch. The three pieces of rope, each a hundred feet
+long, were knotted together and used to lower a grass-padded
+package containing all the equipment of the
+explorers except the level. The bundle was lodged
+on a broad shelf of rock, over two hundred and fifty
+feet down.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Our first measurement,&#8221; remarked Blake, as he
+subtracted from three hundred feet the length of the
+line left above the edge of the cliff. He jotted down
+the remainder in his notebook, and nodded to Ashton,
+who, with Gowan and Isobel, was holding the end of
+the rope. &#8220;You see why I had Mr. Gowan bring
+gloves and chaps and your leggins. We will make
+the line fast around that rock, and follow our outfit.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton stared, slack jawed. &#8220;Really, you cannot
+mean&ndash;&ndash;?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. Why not?&#8221; asked Blake. &#8220;There&#8217;s nothing
+to a slide like this except the look of it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Tom!&#8221; breathlessly cried Genevieve. &#8220;Are
+you sure&ndash;&ndash;quite sure!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_285' name='page_285'></a>285</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Sure I&#8217;m sure, little woman,&#8221; he replied.
+&#8220;There&#8217;s not the slightest danger. This is a new
+manila rope, and the package, with all those spikes in
+it, weighs as much as I do. That gives us a sure test.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I might have known!&#8221; she sighed her relief.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Still it does look a bit stiff for a start-off,&#8221; he
+admitted. &#8220;If Lafe prefers, he can go around and
+come down the ravine bed. I shall slide the line and
+be getting the outfit in shape for shooting the chutes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How about the rope?&#8221; asked Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You are to drop it to me as soon as I get down
+and stand from under,&#8221; directed Blake. He examined
+with minute care the loop and knot with which Gowan
+and Isobel had made the rope fast around the point
+of rock. Having satisfied himself that the knot was
+perfectly secure, he turned to his wife and opened his
+arms. &#8220;Now, Sweetheart! Wish us good luck and
+a quick journey!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan and Ashton drew back and looked away as
+Genevieve flung herself on her husband&#8217;s broad chest,
+unable to restrain her tears.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now, now, little woman,&#8221; he soothed, patting her
+shoulder. &#8220;There&#8217;s nothing to be afraid of, and you
+know it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If&ndash;&ndash;if only we could see you down there!&#8221; she
+sobbed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You will, part of the time, with your glasses.
+And you&#8217;ll be sure to see the flash of some of my shots.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_286' name='page_286'></a>286</span>
+That&#8217;s all that I&#8217;m worrying about&ndash;&ndash;you&#8217;ll be skirting
+along the ca&ntilde;on rim. Promise me you&#8217;ll not go
+near the edge except where the footing is perfectly
+safe.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, Dear. I shall have Thomas to remind me
+to be careful. But you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall have the thought of you both to keep me
+from being rash. Remember that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You will not be rash, I know,&#8221; she answered, smiling
+up at him bravely. &#8220;You will go and come back
+to us soon. Now kiss me and Thomas. I shall not
+detain you from your work.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Spoken like my partner,&#8221; he quietly praised her.</p>
+<p>Both by tone and manner he was plainly seeking to
+ease the parting to the calmness of an ordinary farewell.
+His wife responded to this, outwardly at least.
+Not so Isobel. From the moment he had turned to
+Genevieve, the girl had betrayed a rapidly increasing
+agitation.</p>
+<p>He went to kiss his baby, who had fallen asleep
+during the last half mile of the trip and lay sprawled
+in the shade of a bowlder. As he came back, Genevieve
+lingered beside the child, as if half fearful of watching
+her husband begin his dizzy descent of the rope.</p>
+<p>Isobel was standing close to the verge, her bosom
+heaving with quick-drawn breaths, her excited face
+flushing and paling in rapid alternation. Blake had
+pulled on his left glove, but had kept his right hand
+bare for her. As he held it out he looked up from
+the taut rope at his feet and saw her excessively agitated
+face.</p>
+<div class='figtag'>
+<a name='linki_4' id='linki_4'></a>
+</div>
+<div class='figcenter'>
+<img src='images/depths-004.jpg' alt='' title='' width='412' height='610' /><br />
+<p class='caption'>
+&#8220;You have something to tell me&ndash;&ndash;your voice&ndash;&ndash;your eyes&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;<br />
+</p>
+</div>
+<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_287' name='page_287'></a>287</span></div>
+<p>&#8220;Why, Miss Chuckie!&#8221; he remonstrated, &#8220;you&#8217;re
+not going to break down now. You see how Jenny
+takes it. There&#8217;s nothing to fear.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, but, Tom!&#8221; she panted, &#8220;you&ndash;&ndash;you don&#8217;t
+understand! you don&#8217;t know! It&#8217;s not merely the danger!
+It&#8217;s the dreadful thought that if you&ndash;&ndash;if you
+should not&ndash;&ndash;come back&ndash;&ndash;and I hadn&#8217;t told you!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Told me?&#8221; he echoed in hushed wonderment as
+her anguished soul looked out at him through her wide
+eyes and he sensed the first vague foreshadowing of
+the truth. &#8220;You have something to tell me&ndash;&ndash;your
+voice!&ndash;&ndash;your eyes!&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You see it! You know me!&#8221; she gasped, and she
+flung herself into his arms. Straining herself to him
+in half frantic ecstasy, she murmured in a broken whisper:
+&#8220;Yes! I am&ndash;&ndash;am Belle! It is wicked and
+selfish to tell you; but to have you go down there without
+first&ndash;&ndash;I could not bear it! Yet I&ndash;&ndash;I shall not
+drag you down&ndash;&ndash;disgrace you. Never that! I&#8217;ll
+go away!... Oh, Tom! dear Tom!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He had stood dumfounded by the revelation of her
+identity. At first he could not speak; hardly could he
+think. His eyes stared into hers with a dazed look.
+But before she could finish her impassioned declaration
+of self-abnegation he roused from his bewilderment,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_288' name='page_288'></a>288</span>
+and his great arms closed about her quivering
+body. He crushed her to him and pressed his lips
+upon her white forehead.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Belle!&ndash;&ndash;poor little Belle!... But why? Tell
+me why? All this time, and you never showed by a
+single word or look!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I did!&#8221; she sought to defend herself from the
+tender reproach. &#8220;I did, but I&ndash;&ndash;I was afraid to
+tell.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Afraid?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl&#8217;s face flamed scarlet with shame. She
+sought to draw away from him. &#8220;Let me go, Tom!
+oh, please, let me go! I am a selfish, wicked girl! I
+have done it! I have done it! Now there is no help
+for it! She must be told&ndash;&ndash;all!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All?&#8221; he questioned.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, all, Tom! I cannot deny Mary! She saved
+me! I believe she is in Heaven. She could not help
+doing what she did. She could not help it, Tom&ndash;&ndash;and
+she saved me! I must give you up&ndash;&ndash;go away;
+but I can never, never deny my sister!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake swung half around with the quivering girl,
+and looked over her downbent head at his wife. Genevieve
+stood almost within arm&#8217;s-length of them. He
+met her gaze, and immediately pushed the girl out towards
+her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Listen, Belle,&#8221; he said. &#8220;It is all right. Here
+is Jenny waiting for you. She understands.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_289' name='page_289'></a>289</span></p>
+<p>Gowan, watching rigid and tense-lipped, with his
+hand clenched on the hilt of his half-drawn Colt&#8217;s, was
+astonished to see Mrs. Blake step forward and clasp
+Isobel in her arms. But Ashton did not see the strange
+act that checked the puncher&#8217;s vengeful shot. While
+the girl was yet clinging to Blake, he had turned and
+fled along the edge of the ravine, for the moment
+stark mad with rage and despair.</p>
+<p>He rushed off without a cry, and the others were
+themselves far too surcharged with emotion to heed
+his going until he had disappeared around a turn in
+the ravine. When at last, almost spent with exertion,
+he staggered up a ridge to glare back at those
+from whom he had fled, his bloodshot eyes could perceive
+only three figures on the brink of the gorge.
+They were kneeling to look over into the ravine.</p>
+<p>His thoughts were still in a wild whirl, but the heat
+of his mad rage had passed and left him in a cold
+fury. He instantly comprehended that Blake had
+swung over the edge and was descending the rope down
+the almost sheer face of the ravine wall.</p>
+<p>Now was the time! A touch of a knife-edge to
+the rope, and the girl would be saved. Would Gowan
+think of it?... Of course he would think of it. But
+he would not do it. He would leave the deed to be
+done by the man to whom he had relinquished Miss
+Chuckie. It was for that man to save her&ndash;&ndash;to destroy
+the tempter and break the spell of fascination
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_290' name='page_290'></a>290</span>
+that was drawing her over the brink of a pit far deeper
+than any earthly ca&ntilde;on. He, Lafayette Ashton&ndash;&ndash;not
+Gowan&ndash;&ndash;was the man. He must save her&ndash;&ndash;down
+there in the depths, where no eye could see.</p>
+<div class='figtag'>
+<a name='linki_5' id='linki_5'></a>
+</div>
+<div class='figcenter'>
+<img src='images/depths-005.jpg' alt='' title='' width='364' height='563' /><br />
+</div>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_291' name='page_291'></a>291</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXV_THE_DESCENT_INTO_HELL' id='CHAPTER_XXV_THE_DESCENT_INTO_HELL'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXV</h2>
+<h3>THE DESCENT INTO HELL</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Dangling like a spider on its thread, with a
+twist of the rope around one of his legs, Blake
+had gone down into the ravine, hand under hand, with
+the agility of a sailor. The tough leather of his
+chapareras prevented the rope from chafing the leg
+around which it slipped, and he managed with his free
+foot to fend himself off from the sharp-cornered ledges
+of the cliff side. In this he was less concerned for
+himself than for his level, which he carried in a sling,
+high up between his shoulders.</p>
+<p>He was soon safe at the lower end of the rope, on
+the shelf beside the bundled outfit. He waved his hat
+to the down-peering watchers, and climbed a few yards
+up the ravine, to creep in under an overhanging rock.
+A few moments later the loosened rope came sliding
+down the steep descent, the last length whipping from
+ledge to ledge with a velocity that made it hiss through
+the air.</p>
+<p>Blake was not disturbed by this proof of the cumulative
+speed of falling bodies. He came down and
+coolly set about his preparations for the descent of the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_292' name='page_292'></a>292</span>
+gorge bottom. He unlashed the bundle and divided
+its contents. This done, he took a vertical measurement
+by going out towards the ca&ntilde;on along a horizontal
+shelf on the side wall of the gorge, until he
+could drop his surveying chain down the sheer precipice
+to a shelf almost a hundred feet below him.</p>
+<p>Unaware of Ashton&#8217;s mistake and furious flight, the
+engineer was proceeding with his work in the expectation
+that he would soon be joined by his assistant. He
+was not disappointed. As he returned along the shelf,
+after entering the measurement in his notebook, Ashton
+came bounding and scrambling down the ravine
+bottom at reckless speed. He fetched up on the verge
+of the break, purple-faced and panting. His mouth
+twitched nervously and there was a wild look in his
+dark eyes. But Blake attributed all to the excitement
+and exertion of the headlong rush down the ravine.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No need for you to have hurried so, Lafe,&#8221; he
+said. &#8220;I suppose you had to go farther around than
+I thought would be necessary. But I&#8217;d rather you had
+kept me waiting an hour than for you to have chanced
+spraining an ankle.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, you need me in your business!&#8221; scoffed Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Your employer&#8217;s business,&#8221; rejoined the engineer.
+He straightened up from the packs that he was lashing
+together and gazed gravely at his scowling assistant.
+&#8220;See here, Mr. Ashton, this is no time for you to raise
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_293' name='page_293'></a>293</span>
+a row. We shall have quite enough else to think about
+from now on, until we are up again out of the ca&ntilde;on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve enough to think about&ndash;&ndash;and more!&#8221; muttered
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Understand? I&#8217;m not asking anything of you for
+myself,&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;You are doing this survey for
+your employer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m here because of <i>her</i>!&#8221; retorted the younger
+man. &#8220;I&#8217;m here to make it certain that no harm is
+to come to <i>her</i>!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake smiled. &#8220;Good for you! I hardly thought
+you were here for the fun of it. You are going to
+prove to us that you have the makings. We&#8217;re both
+working for her, Lafe. I don&#8217;t mind telling you now
+that I am planning to do something big for her.&#8221; He
+looked up the ravine wall, his eyes aglow with tenderness.
+&#8220;Belle! dear little Belle! To think that after
+all these years&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shut up!&#8221; cried Ashton. &#8220;Stop that! stop it,
+and get to work! I know what you&#8217;re planning to
+do! Don&#8217;t talk to me!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake stared in astonishment. &#8220;Didn&#8217;t think you
+were so sore over that old affair. I told you I had
+nothing to do about your father&#8217;s&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t talk to me! don&#8217;t talk to me!&#8221; frantically
+cried Ashton. &#8220;You ruined me! Now her!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lord! If you&#8217;re as sore as all that!&#8221; rejoined
+Blake, his eyes hardening. &#8220;Look here, Mr. Ashton,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_294' name='page_294'></a>294</span>
+we&#8217;ll settle this when we get up on top again. Meantime,
+I shall do my work, and I shall see to it that you
+do yours. Understand?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Get busy, then! I shall do <i>my</i> work!&#8221; snarled
+Ashton.</p>
+<p>Blake pointed to one of the three bundles that he
+had tied together. &#8220;There&#8217;s half the grub, the tripod
+and the rod. I can manage the rest. I&#8217;ve dropped
+a measurement to the foot of the first incline.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He swung one of the other bundles on his back,
+under the level. The third, which was made up of
+railroad spikes and picket-pins, he sent rolling down
+the steep slope, tied to one end of the rope. He had
+driven a spike into a crevice of the rock. Hooking the
+other end of the rope over its head with an open
+loop, he grasped the line and started to walk down
+the gorge bottom. As he descended he dragged the
+loose lengths of rope after him.</p>
+<p>Ashton stood rigid, staring at the spike and loop.
+If the loop should slip or the spike pull out, he need
+only climb back out of the ravine&ndash;&ndash;to her. But
+Blake&#8217;s work was not the kind to slip or pull out. The
+watcher looked at the powerful figure backing rapidly
+down that roof-like pitch. One of the toes of the level
+tripod under the taut loop would easily pry the rope
+off the spike-head. He turned his pack around to get
+at the tripod&ndash;&ndash;and paused to look upwards at the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_295' name='page_295'></a>295</span>
+three tiny faces peering down over the brink of the
+cliff.</p>
+<p>He slung the pack over his shoulder and grasped
+the rope to follow his leader, who had come to the
+narrow shelf from which another measurement must be
+taken. He made the descent no less rapidly and easily
+than had the engineer. He was naturally agile, and
+now he was too full of his purpose to have any thought
+of vertigo. Yet quickly as he followed, when he
+reached the shelf he found that Blake had already lowered
+the bundle of spikes over the cliff below and was
+re&euml;nforcing with a spike a picket-pin that he had driven
+deep into a crevice.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Drop over the chain at that point,&#8221; curtly ordered
+the engineer. &#8220;Think you can climb back up this slope
+without the rope?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; answered Ashton, still more curtly.</p>
+<p>Blake lifted the line and sent up it a wave that
+carried to the upper end and flipped the loop from the
+spike-head. He jerked the freed end down to him
+and knotted it securely to the picket-pin, while Ashton
+was making the third vertical measurement. He then
+lowered everything except the level in loops of the line,
+and wrapped a strip of canvas around the line where
+it bent over the sharp edge of the cliff.</p>
+<p>Ashton laconically reported the measurement.
+Blake noted it in his book, and promptly swung himself
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_296' name='page_296'></a>296</span>
+out over the edge of the cliff. Again his assistant
+looked at the fastening of the rope; again he looked
+upwards at the three tiny down-peering faces; and again
+he followed his leader. The sun was glaring directly
+down into the gorge. Later they would descend into
+the shadows where no eye could perceive from above
+the loosening of the rope.</p>
+<p>Blake cut off the line at the foot of the cliff and left
+it dangling. They would require it for their ascent.
+Another Titan step took fifty feet more of the rope.</p>
+<p>There followed a series of steep pitches, which they
+descended like the first, unlooping the rope from spike-head
+after spike-head. The only real difficulty of this
+part of the descent was the tedious task of carrying
+the vertical measurement down the slopes at places
+where even Blake could not find footing to climb out
+horizontally on either wall of the gorge to obtain a
+clear drop.</p>
+<p>Always, as they descended, the engineer scanned
+the rocks both above and below, calculating where the
+gorge bottom could be reascended without a line.
+Whenever he considered the incline too smooth or too
+steep for safe footing, he drove in spikes near enough
+together to be successively lassoed from below with a
+length of line.</p>
+<p>Had not the nature and condition of the rock provided
+frequent faults and crevices that permitted the
+driving of spikes, the descent must soon have become
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_297' name='page_297'></a>297</span>
+impracticable. But the engineer invariably found some
+chink in which to hammer a spike with his powerful
+blows. As, time after time, he overcame difficulties
+so great that his companion could perceive no possible
+solution, Ashton began to feel himself struggling
+against a feeling of reluctant admiration.</p>
+<p>All his hate could not blind him to the extraordinary
+mental and physical efficiency displayed by the engineer.
+Never once did the steely muscles permit a slip or
+false step, never once did the cool brain miscalculate
+the next most advantageous movement.</p>
+<p>They were now so deep that Blake had to shout
+his infrequent directions, to be heard above the booming
+reverberations of the ca&ntilde;on. Half way down they
+came to a forty-foot cliff. Blake made his preparations,
+and swung over the edge. Here was an opportunity.
+Ashton instantly bent over the knot of the
+rope.</p>
+<p>Close before his eyes he saw the clearly outlined
+shadow of his head. He hesitated and straightened
+on his knees to stare up at the top of the gorge. He
+could no longer discern the three down-peering faces,
+but he knew that they were still there. And the sunrays
+still pierced down to him between the walls of
+the gorge. The shadows were farther down, in the
+lower depths. He must follow and wait.</p>
+<p>When he slid to the foot of the cliff, Blake silently
+cut off the rope. There was still nearly a hundred
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_298' name='page_298'></a>298</span>
+and fifty feet left for them to use below. But they
+went down more than a thousand feet before they
+again had need of it. As Blake had foretold, the
+lower half of the descent was far less precipitous than
+the upper. In places the vertical measurements were
+carried down by rod readings, the level being set without
+its tripod on the points of rock where the previous
+readings had been taken. At other places Blake
+marked out horizontal points ahead on the gorge wall,
+and climbed to them with the chain.</p>
+<p>All the time the reverberations of the ca&ntilde;on were
+becoming louder. Dark shadows began to gather
+along one wall of the gorge. The sun was no longer
+directly in line with the ravine, and they were now far
+down in the lower depths. Ashton&#8217;s knees were beginning
+to tremble with weakness. They had brought
+no water, for they were descending to the river. The
+torment of thirst was added to the torment of his hate.
+He began to look with fierce eagerness for the opportunity
+to do his work&ndash;&ndash;to accomplish the deed for
+which he had descended into this inferno. Then he
+could go up again, out of the roaring, reverberating
+hell about him, away from the burning hell within him.</p>
+<p>The shadows were creeping out at him from the
+side of the gorge. The sunshine was going&ndash;&ndash;it was
+flickering away up the opposite precipices. Now it had
+gone. All the gorge was somber with shadows. And
+below were the blue-black depths of the ca&ntilde;on bottom.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_299' name='page_299'></a>299</span>
+Dread crept in upon his smoldering hate to sweep
+across its white-hot coals with chill gusts of fear.</p>
+<p>But now they were come to another sheer cliff&ndash;&ndash;the
+last in the descent. From its foot the gorge bottom
+inclined easily down the final three hundred feet
+to its mouth, where the river of the deep roared past
+along the ca&ntilde;on bed, its foam flashing silvery white
+through the gloom.</p>
+<p>Here at last was the opportunity for which he had
+waited&ndash;&ndash;here down in these dark shadows where no
+eye could see&ndash;&ndash;here where no shriek or cry could
+pierce up to the outer world of light and sunshine
+through the wild uproar of the angry waters. He
+awaited the moment, aflame with pent-up fury, shivering
+with cold dread.</p>
+<p>Blake dropped his chain from the cliff-edge and took
+the last vertical measurement&ndash;&ndash;fifty-three feet. He
+smiled. The hardest part of the work was almost accomplished.
+He swung over the edge.</p>
+<p>Ashton flung himself on his knees beside the triple
+knot that held the line fast to its spike. This time
+he did not hesitate, but began to tug at the rope end
+with fierce eagerness. He loosened one knot. The
+next was harder to unfasten. Blake had tied it with
+utmost secureness. At last it yielded to the tugging
+of his gloved fingers. He started to loosen the third
+knot. Suddenly the taut line slackened. With a
+stifled cry of rage, he paused to peer over the edge.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_300' name='page_300'></a>300</span>
+Blake had slipped down the line so rapidly that he was
+already at the foot of the cliff.</p>
+<p>Reaching back, Ashton jerked the rope from the
+spike-head, to cast it down on the engineer. A glimpse
+of the flashing water in the ca&ntilde;on bottom gave momentary
+check to his vengeful impulse. If only he had
+a drink of that cool water! He was parched; his lips
+were cracking; in his mouth was the taste of dust.
+Must he stay up here on the dry rock while Blake went
+on down beside the foaming river to drink his fill?</p>
+<p>As he paused, a doubt clutched his heart in an icy
+grip. All the way down that devil&#8217;s stairway he had
+been witness to Blake&#8217;s extraordinary resourcefulness
+and tremendous strength. What if he should find a
+way to clamber up the precipices? He had lowered
+everything before descending. There was nothing to
+fling down upon him&ndash;&ndash;no loose rock or stone to topple
+over and crush him.</p>
+<p>Chilled by that doubt, Ashton hesitated, his hands
+alternately tightening and relaxing their grip on the
+rope. What if the man should contrive to escape?
+There seemed no bounds to his ingenuity.... No,
+he must be followed on down into the ca&ntilde;on and destroyed,
+else he would escape&ndash;&ndash;he would come up
+out of this inferno, like the demon he was, and destroy
+<i>her</i>. He must be followed!... And the water&ndash;&ndash;the
+cool, refreshing water!</p>
+<p>His thirst now seized upon Ashton with terrible intensity.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_301' name='page_301'></a>301</span>
+Rage, no less than the laborious exertion of
+the descent, had dried up his body with its feverish
+fire. Almost maddened with the torment of his craving,
+he looped the rope on the spike-head with reckless
+haste and slid down over the edge of the cliff.</p>
+<p>As the line tautened with his weight it gave several
+inches, but he was too nearly frantic to heed. He
+slipped down it so swiftly that the strands burned his
+hands through the tough palms of his gloves. In a
+few moments his feet were on a level with Blake&#8217;s
+head. He clutched the rope tighter to check his fall.
+An instant later he dropped heavily on the rock shelf
+at the cliff foot, and the rope came swishing down after
+him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;God!&#8221; shouted Blake. Involuntarily he flung
+back his head and stared up the great gorge to the faraway
+heights where were waiting his wife and child.</p>
+<p>But Ashton neither paused nor looked upward. Rebounding
+from his fall, he rushed down the slope to the
+river, with a gasping cry&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;Water! water!&#8221;</p>
+<p>For a time the engineer stood as if stunned, his big
+fists clenched, his broad chest heaving laboriously.
+Yet he was far too well seasoned in desperate adventure
+to give way to despair. Soon he rallied. He
+lowered his gaze from the heights to examine the cliff
+and the adjoining walls of the gorge. All were alike
+sheer and unscalable. The lines about his big mouth
+hardened with grim determination. He picked up the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_302' name='page_302'></a>302</span>
+rope and began winding it about his mid-body above
+the low-buckled cartridge belt.</p>
+<p>He arranged the coils with such care that he did
+not notice the condition of the end of the line until
+he had drawn in over eighty feet. Then at last he
+saw. Though he had not forgotten to wrap the line
+with canvas where it passed over the cliff edge, he had
+thought the strands must have been frayed through on
+a sharp corner of rock. Instead, he found himself
+staring at the clean-cut string-wrapped rope end that
+he had knotted to the spike.</p>
+<p>For several moments he stood looking at it, his forehead
+creased in thought. What had become of the
+knot?... He could think of only one solution to
+the puzzle. He turned and gazed down through the
+gloom at the dim figure crouched beside the edge of
+the swirling water.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Locoed,&#8221; he said pityingly&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;Locoed.... Poor
+devil!&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_303' name='page_303'></a>303</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXVI_IN_THE_GLOOM' id='CHAPTER_XXVI_IN_THE_GLOOM'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVI</h2>
+<h3>IN THE GLOOM</h3>
+</div>
+<p>When the engineer came down to the river, Ashton
+still crouched low, his dripping head close
+over the water, as if he was afraid even to look away
+from it. Blake rinsed out his mouth and stood up to
+sip slowly from his hat, while looking about at the
+awesome spectacle of the ca&ntilde;on bottom.</p>
+<p>His first glance was at the swift-flowing stream. His
+eyes brightened and the furrows in his forehead
+smoothed away. The river was not as formidable as
+its tumult and foam had threatened. It could be descended
+by wading at the places where ledges and
+bowlders along the base of the ca&ntilde;on walls failed to
+afford safe footing. He glanced up the stupendous
+precipices at the blue-black ribbon of sky, but only for
+a moment. His present thought was not of escape
+from the depths.</p>
+<p>He bent over to grip the crouching man by the shoulder
+and lift him to his feet. Ashton writhed about
+and glared at him like a trapped wolf.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let go!&#8221; he snarled. &#8220;It was an accident! I
+didn&#8217;t mean to do it!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_304' name='page_304'></a>304</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course not,&#8221; replied Blake, releasing his grip
+but standing close that he might not have to shout.
+&#8220;It&#8217;s all right, old man&ndash;&ndash;my fault. The knot
+slipped.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You own it! You own it&#8217;s your fault!&#8221; cried
+Ashton. &#8220;You&#8217;ve brought me down here into this
+hell-pit! We can&#8217;t get out! Lost! All your fault&ndash;&ndash;yours!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He made a frantic snatch and jerked the revolver
+from Blake&#8217;s holster. The engineer caught his wrist
+in an iron grasp and wrenched the weapon from him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;None of that, old man,&#8221; he admonished with a
+cool sternness that chilled the frenzy of the other like
+a dash of ice water. &#8220;You&#8217;re here to do your work,
+and you&#8217;re going to do it. Understand?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My work!&#8221; repeated Ashton wildly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, your work,&#8221; commanded Blake, his face as
+hard as iron. &#8220;We&#8217;re going to survey Deep Ca&ntilde;on
+down to the tunnel site. Your work is to carry rod.
+Do you get that?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Down the ca&ntilde;on?&ndash;&ndash;deeper!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We can&#8217;t get back up here. There&#8217;s a place down
+there beyond the tunnel site where perhaps we can make
+it up the ca&ntilde;on wall.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;A place where we&ndash;&ndash;?&#8221; shrilled Ashton. &#8220;A
+place&ndash;&ndash;Good God! and you stand here doing nothing!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He whirled to spring out into the swirling water.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_305' name='page_305'></a>305</span>
+Blake was still swifter in his movements. He caught
+the fugitive by the arm and dragged him back.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Wait!&#8221; he commanded. &#8220;We must first carry
+the levels down to the tunnel site. You hear that?
+Stick by me, and I&#8217;ll pull you through. Try to run,
+and, by God, I&#8217;ll shoot you like a dog!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The captive glared into the steel-white eyes of the
+engineer, anger overcoming his panicky fear.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let go!&#8221; he panted. &#8220;Don&#8217;t worry! I&#8217;ll do my
+work&ndash;&ndash;I&#8217;ll do my work!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you don&#8217;t, you&#8217;ll never get out of this ca&ntilde;on,&#8221;
+grimly rejoined Blake. He released his hold, and
+started up the slope, with a curt order: &#8220;Come along.
+We can rod down the slope.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton followed him, silent and morose. The instrument
+was screwed to its tripod, and a line of levels
+from the foot of the last vertical measurement was
+carried down the slope to the ca&ntilde;on. The last rod
+reading was on a ledge, three feet above the water,
+at the corner of the gorge. Blake considered the reading
+worthy of permanent record. They had measured
+all the many hundreds of feet down from the top
+of High Mesa to these profound depths. With his
+two-pound hammer and one of the few remaining
+spikes, he chiseled a cross deep in the surface of the
+black rock.</p>
+<p>That mark of the engineer-captain, scouting before
+the van of man&#8217;s Nature-conquering army, was the sign
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_306' name='page_306'></a>306</span>
+of the first human beings that had ever descended alive
+to the bottom of Deep Ca&ntilde;on.</p>
+<p>When he had cut the cross, Blake took out his Colt&#8217;s,
+and, gazing up the heights, began to fire at slow intervals.
+Confined between the walls of gorge and
+ca&ntilde;on, each report of the heavy revolver crashed out
+above the tumult of the river and ran echoing and reechoing
+up the stupendous precipices. Yet long before
+they reached the rim of those towering walls they
+blurred away and merged and were lost in the ceaseless
+reverberations of the waters.</p>
+<p>Blake well knew that this would happen. But he
+also knew that the flash of the shot would be distinctly
+discernible in the gloom of the abyss. As he fired, he
+scanned the verge of the uppermost precipices. After
+the fourth shot he ceased firing and flung up his hand
+to point at the heights.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look!&#8221; he shouted. &#8220;They see! There is the
+flag!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton stared up with wide, feverish eyes. From
+an out-jutting point of rock on the lofty rim he saw
+a tiny white dot waving to and fro against the blue-black
+sky. The watchers above had seen the flash of
+the revolver shots and were fluttering the white flag
+in responsive signal. Though on the world above the
+sun beat down its full mid-afternoon flood of light,
+the two men in the abyss could see stars twinkling in the
+dark sky around the waving fleck of white.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_307' name='page_307'></a>307</span></p>
+<p>Blake fired two shots in quick succession, the agreed
+signal that told the flag was seen. He then calmly
+seated himself and began to add together the vertical
+measurements taken during the descent of the gorge.
+But Ashton groaned and flung himself face downward
+on the rough stone.</p>
+<p>Blake soon finished his sum in addition, and the result
+brought a smile to his serious face. He checked
+the figures with painstaking carefulness, and nodded,
+fully satisfied. Replacing book and pencil in the deep
+pocket of his shirt, he opened one of the packages of
+food. When he had laid out enough for a hearty
+meal, he looked at Ashton. The prostrate man had
+not stirred.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Come, Lafe,&#8221; he called encouragingly. &#8220;Time to
+eat.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton lay still and made no response.</p>
+<p>Blake raised his voice&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;Come! You&#8217;re not going
+to quit. You&#8217;re going to eat. You must keep
+your strength to fight your way through and up out of
+here&ndash;&ndash;to <i>her</i>!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton sullenly rose and came to sit down on the
+rock beside the outspread food. He was silent, but
+he ate even more heartily than his companion. When
+they had finished, Blake swung his pack and level on
+his shoulder, fired one shot, and stepped out into the
+swift but shallow river. Wading as far downstream
+as he could see to read the rod in the twilight of the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_308' name='page_308'></a>308</span>
+depths, he set up the tripod of his instrument on a
+rock and took the reading given him by Ashton.</p>
+<p>The survey of the ca&ntilde;on itself had begun. Unappalled
+by the awful height of the mighty precipices on
+either side, undaunted by the uncertainty of escape,
+heedless of the gloom of the deep, of the tumult and
+rush and chill of the icy waters, the engineer boldly
+advanced to the attack of this abysmal stronghold of
+Primeval Nature, his square jaw set in grim determination
+to wrest from these hitherto inviolate depths
+that which he sought to learn. Whatever might follow,
+he must and would unlock the secret of the hidden
+waters. Afterwards might come death by slow
+starvation or the quick dashing down from some half-scaled
+precipice. That mattered not now. First must
+the engineer perform his work,&ndash;&ndash;first must he execute
+the task that he had set himself for the conquest of the
+chasm that was likely to prove his tomb.</p>
+<p>Vastly different in purpose, yet no less resolute than
+the engineer, Ashton joined zealously in the grim battle
+with the abyss&ndash;&ndash;for battle it soon proved to be.
+Only in places was the subterranean river shallow and
+easy to wade. More often it foamed in wild fury
+down steep rapids, to fling itself over ledges into black
+pools; or, worst of all, it swirled deep and arrowy-swift
+between fanged rocks where the channel narrowed.</p>
+<p>Wading, swimming, leaping from rock to rock,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_309' name='page_309'></a>309</span>
+scrambling up and down the steep precipice foot, creeping
+along narrow shelves,&ndash;&ndash;stubbornly the explorers
+fought their way deeper through that wild passage.
+Chilled by the icy waters and bruised by many a
+slip on loose stones and wet, water-polished rocks, ever
+they carried the line of levels down alongside the torrent,
+crossing over and back from side to side, twisting
+and turning with the twists and bends of the chasm.
+And at every stand Blake jotted down the rod readings
+in his half-soaked book with his pencil and figured
+the elevation of each turning point before &#8220;pulling
+up&#8221; his instrument to move on downstream to the next
+&#8220;set up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>At the end of every half hour he fired a single shot
+to signal their progress in the depths to the watchers
+above. But never once did he stop to look up for the
+flag. Occasionally he was required to help Ashton
+through or over some unusually difficult passage. For
+the most part, however, each fought his own way.
+The odds were not altogether in favor of the older
+man. He was hampered by the care of the instrument,
+which must be shielded from all blows or falls. The
+rod, on the contrary, served as a staff and support to
+Ashton, alike in the water and on the rocks.</p>
+<p>Some time before sunset the waning light in the
+ca&ntilde;on bottom became so dim that Blake was compelled
+to cease work. He took a last reading on a broad
+shelf of rock well above the surface of the water,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_310' name='page_310'></a>310</span>
+joined Ashton on the shelf, and began firing the revolver
+at five-minute intervals. After the fifth shot he
+at last perceived the white dot of the flag far above
+on the opposite brink of the chasm. He fired two
+shots in quick succession, and calmly sat down to open
+one of the soaked packages of food.</p>
+<p>Ashton did not wait to be bidden to supper. He
+fell to on the food and ate ravenously. Blake did not
+check him, though he himself took little and carefully
+gathered up and returned to the package every scrap
+of food left at the end of the meal. As Ashton lay
+back on the rock he squirmed from side to side and
+groaned. His bruises were so numerous that he could
+not find a comfortable position.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Cheer up!&#8221; grimly quoted Blake. &#8220;The worst is
+yet to come.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He stretched himself out on the rock-shelf and, regardless
+of the sullen resistance of the younger man,
+drew him into his arms. Chilled to the marrow by his
+frequent icy drenchings, Ashton was shivering in the
+cold wind which came down the ca&ntilde;on with the approach
+of night. But Blake&#8217;s massive body and limbs
+were aglow with abundant vitality. Warmed and
+sheltered from the wind, the exhausted man relaxed
+like a child in the strong arms of his companion and
+quickly sank into the deep slumber of overtaxed nature.</p>
+<p>Blake lay awake until the narrow strip of sky that
+showed between the vast walls of rock deepened to an
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_311' name='page_311'></a>311</span>
+inky blackness thickly sprinkled with scintillating stars.
+The light of a watchfire flamed red far above on the
+opposite rim of the chasm wall. To the man below
+it was like the glow of human love in the chill darkness
+of the Unknown. With a gesture of reverent
+passion and adoration, he put his fingers to his lips and
+flung a kiss up out of the abyss. Then he, too, relaxed
+on the hard rock and sank into heavy sleep.</p>
+<p>Ashton was the first to waken. The wind had
+changed, and he was roused by the different note in the
+ceaseless roar of the river. He stared up at the star-jeweled
+sky. It was still intensely black; yet the gloom
+of the depths was lessened by a vague pale illumination,
+a faint shadow of light that might have been the
+ghost of a dead day. He thought it was the gray
+dawn, and sought to roll over on his rock bed away
+from the sheltering embrace of Blake. The engineer
+was still deep in profound slumber. His big arm
+slipped laxly from across the moving man&#8217;s breast.</p>
+<p>The change of position wrung a groan from Ashton.
+Every muscle in his body was cramped, every bruise
+stiff and sore. Not until he had turned and twisted
+for several moments was he able to rise to his feet.
+The vague ghost light about him brightened. He
+gazed upwards. He did not notice the tiny flame of
+the fire that told of the anxious watchers above. Out
+over the monstrous black wall of the abyss was drifting
+a burnished silver-white disk.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_312' name='page_312'></a>312</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;The moon!&#8221; he groaned. &#8220;Only the moon!
+To wait here&ndash;&ndash;with him!&ndash;&ndash;with him!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He looked down at the big form of the sleeping man,
+and suddenly all his pent-up rage burst its bounds. It
+poured through his veins in streams of fire. He stared
+about in fierce eagerness in search of a weapon. Blake
+lay upon the hilt of the revolver; the level rod lacked
+weight and balance. But the heavy hammer&ndash;&ndash;a blow
+on the upturned temple of the sleeper!&ndash;&ndash;</p>
+<p>With the cunning stealth of madness, Ashton took
+up the hammer and crept around back of Blake&#8217;s head.
+He straightened on his knees, and peered down at the
+calm, powerful face of the engineer.</p>
+<p>What if he was a veritable Samson, this conqueror
+of ca&ntilde;ons? Where now was his power? Sleep had
+bound fast his steel muscles, had numbed his indomitable
+will and locked his keen intellect in the black
+prison of unconsciousness.</p>
+<p>The avenger hovered over him, gloating. Now at
+last was come the opportunity&ndash;&ndash;the perfect opportunity,
+down in these uttermost depths, in the secret night
+time. The world above slept&ndash;&ndash;and he slept. Never
+should he waken from that sleep; never should he
+rouse up in his evil strength to escape out of the abyss
+and bring ruin to her!</p>
+<p>Lightly the hammer swung over and downward,
+measuring the curve of the stroke. It lifted and
+poised. Again it swung down; and again it lifted and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_313' name='page_313'></a>313</span>
+poised. The blow must be certain&ndash;&ndash;there must not
+be the slightest chance of missing.</p>
+<p>Each time the heavy steel head stopped a full two
+inches short of the upturned temple&ndash;&ndash;but each time
+its shadow fell across the eyes of the sleeper. He
+stirred. The hammer whirled up, gripped in both
+hands of the kneeling man. The sleeper turned flat
+on his back, with his face full to the light. A quiver
+ran through the tense muscles of the avenger. Had
+the eyes of the sleeper opened, had their lids so much
+as fluttered, the hammer must have crashed down.</p>
+<p>But it was the sleeper&#8217;s lips that moved. As it were
+by a miracle of acuteness, the tense nerves of the
+other&#8217;s ear caught the whispered words through the
+roaring of the river&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;<i>Jenny! Son!</i>&#8221;</p>
+<p>The hammer hurled away out into the swirl of the
+foam-flecked waters. The avenger flung himself
+about, face downward on the rock.</p>
+<p>&#8220;God!&#8221; he sobbed, in an agony of remorse.
+&#8220;Forgive me, God! I cannot do it! I am weak&ndash;&ndash;unfit!...
+Not even to save her!&ndash;&ndash;not even to save
+her!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He writhed in the anguish of his love and rage and
+self-abasement. He had failed; he was too weak to do
+the deed. But God&ndash;&ndash;Would God permit that evil
+should befall her?</p>
+<p>He struggled to his feet and flung up his quivering
+hands to moon and stars and black sky in passionate
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_314' name='page_314'></a>314</span>
+invocation&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;O God! You say that vengeance is
+Yours; that You will repay! Take me, if You will&ndash;&ndash;I
+give myself! Only destroy him too! Save her!
+save her!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Again Blake stirred, and this time he opened his eyes.
+Ashton had sunk down in a huddled silent heap.
+Blake gazed up at the watchfire on the heights, smiled,
+and turned over to again fall asleep.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_315' name='page_315'></a>315</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXVII_LOWER_DEPTHS' id='CHAPTER_XXVII_LOWER_DEPTHS'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVII</h2>
+<h3>LOWER DEPTHS</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Beetling precipices shut off the direct light of
+the moonbeams and left the abyss again in dense
+darkness long before the coming of the laggard dawn.
+Blake slept on, storing up strength for the renewal of
+the battle. Yet even he could not outsleep the reluctant
+lingering of night. He awoke while the tiny
+flame of the watchfire still flickered bright against the
+inky darkness of the sky.</p>
+<p>Ashton had fallen into a fitful doze. The engineer
+stood up and silently groped his way to and fro on the
+shelf of rock, stretching and limbering his cramped
+muscles. He wasted no particle of energy; the moment
+he had relieved his stiffness he stretched out again.
+He lay contemplating that flame of love on the heights
+until it faded against the lessening blackness of the sky
+and the rays of the morning sun began to angle down
+the upper precipices.</p>
+<p>He rose to take out two portions of food from the
+single pack in which he had bound up all the provisions.
+The portion for Ashton was small; his own was
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_316' name='page_316'></a>316</span>
+smaller. He roused the dozing man and placed the
+larger share of food in his hand.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t drop it,&#8221; he cautioned. &#8220;That&#8217;s all I can
+let you have. We must go on rations until we can see
+a way out of this hole.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton ate his meager breakfast without replying.
+The fire within him had burned to ashes. He was cold
+and dull and dispirited. He had failed. He would
+have been willing to sit and brood, and wait for God
+to answer his prayer.&ndash;&ndash;But his waiting was not to be
+an inert lingering in the place where he had failed.</p>
+<p>The moment the down-creeping daylight so lessened
+the gloom of the depths that Blake could take rod readings,
+he plunged over into the stream, with a curtly
+cheerful command for Ashton to prepare to follow.
+Too dejected even to resist, the younger man silently
+obeyed. When Blake signaled to him through the
+dimness, he held the rod on the last turning-point of
+the previous day, and lowered himself from the shelf
+down into the stream.</p>
+<p>The evening before, the water at this point had come
+up to his waist. It was now only knee-deep. His
+surprise was so great that in passing Blake he broke
+his sullen silence to remark the fact and ask what could
+have caused the change.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Melting of the snow on the high range,&#8221; the engineer
+shouted in explanation. &#8220;Takes time for it to
+run down the ca&ntilde;on all these miles. River probably
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_317' name='page_317'></a>317</span>
+still falling. Will begin to rise about noon. Faster
+we get along now, the easier it will be. Hustle!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton responded mechanically to the will of his
+commander. For the time being his own will was almost
+paralyzed. The reaction from his long-sustained
+rage had left him dazed and nerveless. He had sunk
+into a state of fatalistic indifference. He moved
+quickly downstream from turning-point to turning-point,
+driven by Blake&#8217;s will, but with a heedless recklessness
+that all Blake&#8217;s warnings could not check.</p>
+<p>Within the first hour he twice stumbled and went
+under while wading deep reaches of the river, and once
+he fell from a ledge, bruising himself severely and
+knocking a splinter from the rod. Half an hour later
+he lost his footing in descending a swift and narrow
+place that would have been impassable at high water.
+Had not Blake been below him he would never have
+come out alive.</p>
+<p>The engineer leaped in and dragged the drowning
+man to safety, after a desperate struggle with the torrent.
+But in the wild swirl, both the food-pack and
+the rod went adrift. The moment he had rescued his
+companion, Blake rushed away downstream, leaping
+like a goat from rock to rock. He at last overtook
+the rod, caught in the eddy of a pool. Of the pack he
+could find no trace. He returned to Ashton and silently
+handed him the rod.</p>
+<p>There was no need for him to admonish. The loss
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_318' name='page_318'></a>318</span>
+of all the food and the narrowness of his escape had
+sobered the younger man. He resumed his work with
+a cautious swiftness of movement that avoided all
+needless risks yet never hesitated to encounter and rush
+through the dangers that could not be avoided. In
+this he copied Blake.</p>
+<p>All the time they were advancing down the angry
+torrent, deeper and deeper into its secret stronghold,&ndash;&ndash;creeping,
+crawling, leaping, wading, swimming&ndash;&ndash;step
+by step, turn after turn, wresting from the abyss that
+which the engineer was resolved to learn, even though
+he should learn, only to perish.</p>
+<p>The day advanced. Steadfastly they struggled on
+down the bed of the river, twisting and crossing over
+with the winding course of the chasm; now between
+beetling precipices that shut out all sight of the blue-black
+sky; now in more open stretches where the Titanic
+walls swung apart and the glorious hot sun rays
+pierced down into the very depths to warm their
+drenched bodies and lighten their heavy spirits.</p>
+<p>Ashton had long since lost all count of time. His
+watch had been smashed in his first fall of the day.
+But Blake seemed to have an intuitive sense of time.
+At fairly regular intervals he fired a shot to tell the
+watchers above the extent of their progress. Sometimes
+the answering flag-signal could be seen waving
+from the rim of the ca&ntilde;on. But in many places those
+above could not come near the brink to look over.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_319' name='page_319'></a>319</span></p>
+<p>The approach of midday found the bruised and
+weary fighters struggling through one of the narrowest
+reaches of the ca&ntilde;on. The precipices jutted out so far
+that the lower depths seemed more cavern than chasm,
+and the river swirled deep and swift between sheer,
+narrow walls. Twice Ashton was swept past what
+should have been the next turning-point, and Blake, unable
+to see the figures on the rod, had to guess at his
+readings.</p>
+<p>At last the precipices swung apart and showed the
+sky at a twist in the ca&ntilde;on&#8217;s course that was the sharpest
+of all the turns the explorers had as yet encountered.
+As Blake came wading down past Ashton, along the
+inner curve of the bend, he stopped and pointed skywards.
+Ashton raised his drooping head and peered
+up at the rim of the opposite wall. From the brink a
+dense column of green-wood smoke was rising into the
+indigo sky.</p>
+<p>&#8220;One more set-up,&#8221; shouted Blake.</p>
+<p>Three minutes later he took a reading on the water
+and on a point of rock at the angle of the ca&ntilde;on-side
+around which the river swung in its sharp curve.
+Three more minutes, and the two battered fighters
+stood together on the last bench of that tremendous
+line of levels, with torn and rent clothing, sodden, gaping
+boots, bodies bruised from head to foot&ndash;&ndash;bleeding,
+weary, but victorious! They had finished the
+work that Blake had set out to do.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_320' name='page_320'></a>320</span></p>
+<p>He held up the now-soaked notebook for Ashton to
+see the last penciled elevation on the wet paper.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Two thousand, forty-five!&#8221; he shouted. &#8220;Over
+five hundred feet above that bench in Dry Greek Gulch!
+Water, electricity!&ndash;&ndash;Dry Mesa shall be a garden!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton stared moodily into the exultant face of the
+engineer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Are you sure of that?&#8221; he asked. &#8220;How do you
+know that God will let you climb up out of this hell of
+stone and water?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s the saying, &#8216;God helps those who help
+themselves,&#8217;&#8221; replied Blake. &#8220;I&#8217;m going to put up
+the best fight I can. If that doesn&#8217;t win out, I shall
+at least have the satisfaction of not having quit. If
+you wish to pray, do so. The sooner we start the better.
+From now on, the water will be rising.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I prayed last night,&#8221; said Ashton. He added
+somberly, &#8220;And now we are both going to the
+devil.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No,&#8221; said Blake, with no less earnestness.
+&#8220;There is no devil&ndash;&ndash;there is no room for a devil in
+all the universe. What man calls evil is ignorance,&ndash;&ndash;his
+ignorance of those primeval forces of nature which
+he has yet to chain; his ignorance of those higher qualities
+in his own nature which, if known, would prevent
+him from wronging others and would enable him to
+bring happiness to himself and others.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_321' name='page_321'></a>321</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You say that!&#8221; cried Ashton. &#8220;You can mock!
+You do not believe in hell!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake smiled grimly. &#8220;What do you call this?&ndash;&ndash;But
+you mean a hell hereafter. I believe this: If,
+when we pass into the Unknown, we continue to exist
+as individual consciousnesses, then we carry with us
+the heaven and the hell that we have each upbuilt for
+ourselves.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;God will not let you escape,&#8221; stated Ashton.
+&#8220;You will pass from this hell of water into the hell of
+fire and brimstone.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have it your own way,&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;I lived
+one summer in Death Valley. The other place can&#8217;t
+be much hotter.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He climbed up the ledges and planted the level firmly
+on its tripod above the high-water mark of the spring
+floods. He called down to Ashton: &#8220;Hate to leave
+the old monkey up here; but it will serve as a memento
+of our present visit, when we come down again to locate
+the tunnel head.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How can it be that we shall ever come down
+again?&#8221; replied Ashton. &#8220;It is impossible&ndash;&ndash;for we
+shall never go up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake jumped down the ledges to him and pointed
+to the column of smoke on the lofty heights.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look there,&#8221; he said. &#8220;That is where we are going,
+if there is any possible way to go. An optimist
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_322' name='page_322'></a>322</span>
+would stand here and wait, certain that wings would
+soon sprout for him to fly up; a pessimist would sit
+down and quit. An optimist is a fool; a pessimist is a
+worse fool.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And which are you?&#8221; asked Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am neither. I am a meliorist. I am going to
+face the facts, and then fight for all I&#8217;m worth.
+What&#8217;s more, you&#8217;re going to do the same. Come!
+We&#8217;ve still got some clothes left, the rod for you to
+use as a staff, this rope, the revolver, and seventeen
+cartridges. It&#8217;s fortunate we have any. We&#8217;ve got
+to signal that we are going on down the ca&ntilde;on, instead
+of back up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We may as well stay and die here. But since you
+prefer to keep moving, I have no objections,&#8221; said Ashton,
+with ironical politeness.</p>
+<p>Blake promptly stepped into the water and led the
+way to the next shelf of rock. Here he fired a shot.
+Going a few yards farther along the rocks, he fired
+again. Three times he fired, at intervals of two minutes.
+Then the white dot of the flag appeared on the
+precipice brink directly up across from him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Once more, and we&#8217;re sure they understand,&#8221; he
+said.</p>
+<p>Advancing a full hundred yards on down the ca&ntilde;on,
+he fired the fourth shot. Very soon the fleck of white
+flaunted on the rim a little way beyond them.</p>
+<p>&#8220;They understand!&#8221; cried Blake. &#8220;Trust Jenny
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_323' name='page_323'></a>323</span>
+to use her head! Now catch your breath and tighten
+up. We&#8217;re going to move!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He started, and Ashton followed close behind. It
+was the same rough, fierce game of leaping, crawling,
+wading, swimming,&ndash;&ndash;battling with the river, the rocks,
+the ledges. But now they were no longer checked and
+halted by the alternate stoppings for set-ups and turning-points,
+and no longer was Blake encumbered with
+the care of the level. There was nothing now to
+hinder or delay them except the natural obstacles of
+their wild path down the bed of the torrent.</p>
+<p>Blake could give all his thought to picking the best
+and quickest way through rapids and falls, over the
+water-washed rocks and along the side ledges. And
+he could give all his great strength to helping his companion
+past the hard places. In return Ashton gave
+such help as he could to the engineer, many times when
+a steadying hand or the outstretched rod rendered
+easier a descent or the fording of some swift mill race
+in the stream.</p>
+<p>At the end of the first quarter-mile Blake had fired
+a shot, and again at the second quarter. After that
+he waited longer intervals. He considered it advisable
+to husband the few remaining cartridges.</p>
+<p>The river was now rapidly rising. But every inch
+of added depth found the two fugitives much farther
+down the ca&ntilde;on. In two hours they advanced thrice
+the distance that they had covered in the same time
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_324' name='page_324'></a>324</span>
+before noon, and this despite the increasing depth and
+force of the river.</p>
+<p>The pace was so hot that Ashton was beginning to
+stumble and slip, but Blake kept by him and helped him
+along by word and deed. He asserted and repeated a
+dozen times over, that they were nearing the place
+where an ascent of the precipices might be possible.
+At last they rounded a turn in the winding chasm, and
+Blake was able to point to a break in the sheer wall on
+the Dry Mesa side, where the precipices were set back
+one above the other in a Cyclopean stepladder and
+their steeply-pitched faces were rough with crevices and
+shelves.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look!&#8221; he cried. &#8220;There&#8217;s the place&ndash;&ndash;there&#8217;s
+our ladder up from hell to heaven!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton soon lowered his weary head. He stared
+dully downstream to where a fifty-foot cliff extended
+across from side to side of the ca&ntilde;on like a dam.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Part of the wall slid in,&#8221; he stated with the simplicity
+of one who is nearing exhaustion.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That shall be our bridge to the ladder,&#8221; shouted
+Blake. &#8220;It&#8217;s all sheer cliff along here at the foot of
+the break, but the ledges run down sideways to the top
+of the cross cliff. We shall soon be lying up there,
+high and dry, getting our second wind for the run up
+the ladder.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The engineer spoke confidently, and felt what he
+spoke. But as they struggled on down the turbulent
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_325' name='page_325'></a>325</span>
+stream to the cross cliff, the light left his face. From
+wall to wall of the ca&ntilde;on the great mass of fallen rock
+stretched across the bottom in a sheer-faced barrier,
+broken only by a tunnel barely large enough to suck in
+the swelling volume of the river.</p>
+<p>Blake came down close to the intake, scanning every
+foot of the cliff face for a scalable break or crevice.
+There was none to be found. He climbed along the
+cliff foot to a low shelf beside the roaring tunnel, and
+stood staring at the opening in deep thought. Even
+while he looked, the swelling volume of the river filled
+the tunnel to its roof. Blake peered at the fresh watermark
+twenty feet up the face of the cliff, and bent down
+beside Ashton, who had stretched out to rest on the
+shelf of rock.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s only one thing to it, old man,&#8221; he said.
+&#8220;We must dive through that tunnel.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Through that hole?&#8221; gasped Ashton. &#8220;No!
+I&#8217;ve done enough. I shall stay here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;To drown like a rat in a rainwater barrel!&#8221; rejoined
+Blake. &#8220;Look at that watermark. The tunnel
+is now running full. Inside a quarter-hour the
+river will be up over this ledge. It will keep rising
+till it reaches that mark, and it will not fall until after
+low water.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do I care?&#8221; said Ashton hopelessly. &#8220;Go
+to the devil your own way. I&#8217;d rather drown here
+than in that underground hole. Leave me alone.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_326' name='page_326'></a>326</span></p>
+<p>Blake considered a full half minute, looked up the
+cliff face, and replied: &#8220;Perhaps it&#8217;s as well. I shall
+do the best I can. But first I want to tell you I&#8217;ve
+wiped out all that past affair. You are another person
+from that Lafayette Ashton. We stand here almost
+face to face with the Unknown. One or both of us
+may soon go out into the Darkness. As we may never
+meet again, I wish to tell you that you have proved
+yourself, even more than I hoped when I saw you come
+rushing down the ravine to join me. You have proved
+yourself a man. Good-by.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He held out his hand. But Ashton turned his face
+to the wall of rock and was silent. After a time he
+heard the sound of Blake&#8217;s worn heels on the outer
+end of the shelf. His ears, attuned to the ceaseless
+tumult of the waters, caught the click of the protruded
+heel-nail heads. There was a brief pause&ndash;&ndash;then the
+plunge. He looked about quickly and saw Blake&#8217;s hands
+vanish in the down-sucking eddy where the swollen
+waters drew into the now hidden intake of the tunnel.</p>
+<p>A cry of horror burst from his heaving chest.
+Blake had gone&ndash;&ndash;Blake the iron-limbed, iron-hearted
+man. He had conquered the river&ndash;&ndash;and now the
+wild waters had seized him and were mauling and
+smashing and crushing him in the terrible mill of the
+cavern. Beyond that underground passage, it might
+be miles away, the victor would fling up on some fanged
+rock a shapeless mass that once had been a man.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_327' name='page_327'></a>327</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXVIII_LIGHT_IN_THE_DARKNESS' id='CHAPTER_XXVIII_LIGHT_IN_THE_DARKNESS'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXVIII</h2>
+<h3>LIGHT IN THE DARKNESS</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Ashton again turned his face to the rock and
+groaned. God had answered his prayer. Now
+must he pay the price. If only he could force himself
+to lie still while the rising waters brimmed up over the
+ledge and up over his head and face. He was tired&ndash;&ndash;tired!
+It would be so peaceful to lie and rest under
+the quiet waters.</p>
+<p>But the first ripple that crept over the surface of the
+shelf brought him to his feet with the chill of its icy
+touch. He climbed to a shelf higher up and again
+stretched himself full length on the rock. To lie still
+and rest was heavenly.... It was too good to last.
+The water crept after him up the ledge. This time he
+could climb no higher.</p>
+<p>He sat erect and waited, still resting, until the flood
+rose to his chin. Then he stood up, leaning on the
+battered level rod. The water rose after him, creeping
+with relentless stealth from his thigh to his waist,
+from his waist to his chest. It would soon be lapping
+at his throat, and then&ndash;&ndash;he must begin to swim.
+Life was far stronger within him than he had thought.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_328' name='page_328'></a>328</span>
+His strength had come back. Blake was right. A
+man should fight. He should hold fast to hope, and
+fight to the very last.</p>
+<p>Something swept from side to side along the face
+of the cliff above him. It tapped the rock close over
+his head. He looked up and saw a rope. He could
+not see over the rounded brink of the cliff, but he had
+no need. There was a rescuer above him who knew
+his desperate situation. Could it be Blake? Surely
+not! He must have perished in the frightful vortex
+of the tunnel.</p>
+<p>The rope swung lower. Now it was within reach.
+Ashton made a clutch as it swept over him and caught
+its end. He gave a tug. At once the line slackened
+down to him. He felt something in his palm, twisted
+between the rope strands. He looked and saw that it
+was a piece of folded paper. He opened it and found
+written a terse sentence in Blake&#8217;s bold clear hand:</p>
+<table style='margin: auto' summary=''><tr><td>
+<p style='margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0;'>
+Tie rod to line and climb.</p>
+</td></tr></table>
+<p>Why should he tie the splintered level rod to the
+rope? Of what possible use could it be in climbing the
+precipices? But even while Ashton asked himself
+the questions he obeyed Blake&#8217;s directions. The water
+lapped up over his chin as he tied the knot. He pulled
+heavily on the rope. It gave a little way, and then
+tautened. He reached up and began to climb, hand
+over hand, with desperate speed.</p>
+<div class='figtag'>
+<a name='linki_6' id='linki_6'></a>
+</div>
+<div class='figcenter'>
+<img src='images/depths-006.jpg' alt='' title='' width='411' height='615' /><br />
+<p class='caption'>
+Another desperate clutch at the rope&ndash;&ndash;still another<br />
+</p>
+</div>
+<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_329' name='page_329'></a>329</span></div>
+<p>Thirty feet above the water his strength was almost
+outspent, but he struggled to raise himself one more
+time, and then another. To pause meant to slip back
+and perish. Another upward heave. The rope here
+bent in over the rounding cliff. Hardly could he force
+his fingers between it and the rock. Yet if only he
+could get his knee up on the sharp slope! He heaved
+again, his face purple with exertion, the veins swelling
+out on his forehead as if about to burst.</p>
+<p>At last! his knee was up and braced against the
+rock. Another desperate clutch at the rope&ndash;&ndash;another
+heave&ndash;&ndash;still another. The cliff edge was rounding
+back. Every upward hitch was easier than the one before.
+Now he was scrambling up on toes and knees;
+now he could rise to his feet.</p>
+<p>The line led across a waterworn ledge and downward.
+Ashton peered over, and saw the senseless
+body of Blake wedged against the other side of the
+ledge. About it, close below the arms, the line was
+knotted fast.</p>
+<p>Ashton stared wonderingly at the still, white face
+of the unconscious man. It was covered with cold
+sweat. A peculiar twist in the sprawling left leg
+caught his attention. He looked&ndash;&ndash;and understood.
+Panting with exertion, he staggered down the ledges of
+the lower side of the barrier to where the river burst
+furiously out of the mouth of the tunnel.</p>
+<p>Hurled by that mad torrent from the darkness of the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_330' name='page_330'></a>330</span>
+gorged cavern straight upon a line of rocks, all Blake&#8217;s
+strength and quickness had not enabled him to save
+himself from injury. Yet he had crept up those rough
+ledges, dragging his shattered leg. Atrocious as must
+have been his agony, he had crept all the way to the
+top, had written the note, and flung down the rope to
+rescue his companion.</p>
+<p>There was no vessel in which Ashton could carry
+water. He had no hat, his boots were full of holes,
+he must use his hands in scrambling back up the ledges.
+He stripped off his tattered flannel shirt, dipped it in
+a swirling eddy, and started back as fast as he could
+climb.</p>
+<p>Blake still lay unconscious. Ashton straightened
+out the twisted leg, and knelt to bathe the big white
+face with an end of the dripping garment. After a
+time the eyelids of the prostrate man fluttered and
+lifted, and the pale blue eyes stared upward with returning
+consciousness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m here!&#8221; cried Ashton. &#8220;Do you see? You
+saved me!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Colt&#8217;s gone,&#8221; muttered Blake. &#8220;But cartridges&ndash;&ndash;fire.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You mean, fire the cartridges to let them know
+where we are? How can I do it without the revolver?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, build a fire,&#8221; replied the engineer. He raised
+a heavy hand to point towards the high end of the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_331' name='page_331'></a>331</span>
+barrier. &#8220;Driftwood up there. Bring it down.
+I&#8217;ll light it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Light it&ndash;&ndash;how?&#8221; asked Ashton incredulously.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Get it,&#8221; ordered Blake.</p>
+<p>Ashton hurried across the crest of the barrier to
+where it sloped up and merged in the precipice foot.
+The mass of rock that formed the barrier had fallen
+out of the face of the lower part of the ca&ntilde;on wall,
+leaving a great hollow in the rock. But above the hollow
+the upper precipices beetled out and rose sheer, on
+up the dizzy heights to the verge of the chasm. Contrasted
+with this awesome undermined wall, the
+broken, steeple-sloped precipices adjoining it on the
+upstream side looked hopefully scalable to Ashton.
+He marked out a line of shelves and crevices running
+far up to where the full sunlight smiled on the rock.</p>
+<p>But Blake had told him to fetch wood for a fire, that
+they might signal the watchers on the heights. He
+hastened up over the rocks to the heaps of logs and
+branches stranded on the high end of the barrier by the
+freshets. Every year the river, swollen by the spring
+rains, brimmed over the top of this natural dam.</p>
+<p>Yet not all the heaps lying on the ledges were driftwood.
+As Ashton approached, he was horrified to see
+that the largest and highest situated piles were nothing
+else than masses of bones. Drawn by a gruesome
+fascination, he climbed up to the nearest of the ghastly
+heaps. The loose ribs and vertebr&aelig; scattered down
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_332' name='page_332'></a>332</span>
+the slope seemed to him the size of human ribs and
+vertebr&aelig;. He shuddered as they crunched under his
+tread.</p>
+<p>Then he saw a skull with spiral-curved horns. He
+looked up the ca&ntilde;on wall, and understood. The high-heaped
+bones were the skeletons of sheep. In a flash,
+he remembered Isobel&#8217;s account of Gowan, that first
+day up there on the top of the mesa. Not only had
+the puncher killed six men; he had, together with other
+violent men of the cattle ranges, driven thousands of
+sheep over into the ca&ntilde;on&ndash;&ndash;and this was the place.</p>
+<p>Sick with horror and loathing, Ashton ran to snatch
+up an armful of the smaller driftwood and hurry back
+down to the center of the barrier. He found Blake
+lying white and still. But beside him were three
+cartridges from which the bullets had been worked out.
+At the terse command of the engineer, Ashton ground
+one of the older and drier pieces of wood to minute
+fragments on a rock.</p>
+<p>Blake emptied the powder from one of the cartridges
+into the little pile of splinters, and holding the
+edge of another shell against a corner of the rock,
+tapped the cap with a stone. At the fifth stroke the
+cap exploded. The loosened powder of the cartridge
+flared out into the powder-sprinkled tinder. Soon a
+fire of the dry, half-rotted driftwood was blazing
+bright and almost smokeless in the twilight of the
+depths.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_333' name='page_333'></a>333</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Now haul up the rod,&#8221; directed Blake, and he lay
+back to bask in the grateful warmth.</p>
+<p>Ashton drew up the level rod and came back over the
+ledge. He found that the engineer had freed himself
+from the last coils of the rope and was unraveling the
+end that had been next his body. But his eyes were
+upturned to the heights.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look&ndash;&ndash;the flag!&#8221; he said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Already?&#8221; exclaimed Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. No doubt one of them has been waiting
+on that out-jutting point.&ndash;&ndash;Now, if you&#8217;ll break the
+rod. We&#8217;ve got to get my leg into splints.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The crude splints were soon ready. For bandages
+there were strips from the tattered shirts of both men.
+Unraveled rope-strands, burnt off in the fire, served to
+lash all together. Beads of cold sweat gathered and
+rolled down Blake&#8217;s white face throughout the cruel
+operation. Yet he endured every twist and pull of
+the broken limb without a groan. When at last the
+bones were set to his satisfaction and the leg lashed
+rigid to the splints, he even mustered a faint smile.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That beats an amputation,&#8221; he declared. &#8220;Now
+if you can help me up under the cliff, where you can
+plant the fire against a back-log&ndash;&ndash;I want to dry out
+and do some planning while you&#8217;re climbing up for
+help. I&#8217;ve an idea we can put in a dynamo down
+here, with turbines in the intake and in the mouth of
+the tunnel&ndash;&ndash;carry a wire up over the top of the mesa
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_334' name='page_334'></a>334</span>
+and down into the gulch. Understand? All the
+electric power we want to drive the tunnel, and very
+cheap.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My God!&#8221; gasped Ashton. &#8220;You can lie here&ndash;&ndash;here&ndash;&ndash;maimed,
+already starving&ndash;&ndash;and can plan
+like that?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why not? No fun thinking of my leg, is it? As
+for the rest, you&#8217;re going up to report the situation.
+They&#8217;ll soon manage to yank me out of this blessed
+hole.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton&#8217;s face darkened. &#8220;But that&#8217;s the question,&#8221;
+he rejoined. &#8220;Am I going to go up? Am I
+going to try to go up?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake looked at him with a steady, unflinching gaze.
+&#8220;There&#8217;s something queer about all this. Isn&#8217;t it
+time you explained? When the rope came off that last
+cliff in the gorge and I saw that you had untied it before
+sliding down, I thought you were off your head.
+And two or three times today, too. But since we
+landed here&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Your broken leg,&#8221; interrupted Ashton&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;it made
+me forget. You had saved me with the rope. I had
+to help you. Now I see how foolish I have been. I
+should have left you to lie here, and flung myself back
+over into the water.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why?&#8221; calmly queried Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why! You ask why?&#8221; cried Ashton, his eyes
+ablaze with excitement, his whole body quivering.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_335' name='page_335'></a>335</span>
+&#8220;Can&#8217;t you see? Are you blind? What do I care
+about myself if I can save her from you? I shall not
+try to escape. You shall never go up there to work
+her harm!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Harm her? You mean put through this irrigation
+project?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No!&#8221; shouted Ashton. &#8220;Don&#8217;t lie and pretend,
+you hypocrite! You know what I mean! You know
+she could not hide how you were enticing her!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake stared in utter astonishment. Then, regardless
+of his leg, he sat up and said quietly: &#8220;I see. I
+thought you must have understood when she told me,
+there at the last moment before we started. She is my
+sister.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sister!&#8221; scoffed Ashton. &#8220;You liar! You have
+no sister. Your sisters died years ago. Genevieve
+told me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That was what I told her. I believed it true.
+But it was not true. Belle did not die&ndash;&ndash;God! when
+I think of that! It has helped me through this fight&ndash;&ndash;it
+helped me crawl up here with that leg dangling.
+Good God! To think of Jenny waiting for me up
+there, and Son, and little Belle too&ndash;&ndash;little Belle whom
+all these years I thought dead!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton stood as if turned to stone. &#8220;Belle&ndash;&ndash;you
+call her Belle? She told me&ndash;&ndash;Chuckie only a
+nickname!&#8221; he stammered. &#8220;Adopted&ndash;&ndash;her real
+name Isobel!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_336' name='page_336'></a>336</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;We always called her Belle&ndash;&ndash;Baby Belle! She
+was the youngest,&#8221; said Blake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But why&ndash;&ndash;why did you not&ndash;&ndash;tell me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I did not know. She did&ndash;&ndash;she knew from the
+first, there at Stockchute. I see it now. Even before
+that, she must have guessed it. Yes, I see all now.
+She sent for me to come out here, because she thought
+I might be her brother.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You did not tell me!&#8221; reproached Ashton, his face
+ghastly. &#8220;How was I to know?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I tell you, I did not know,&#8221; repeated Blake. &#8220;At
+first&ndash;&ndash;yes, all along&ndash;&ndash;there was something about her
+voice and face&ndash;&ndash;But she had changed so much, and
+all these years&ndash;&ndash;eight, nine years&ndash;&ndash;I had thought
+her dead. She gave me no sign&ndash;&ndash;only that friendliness.
+I did not know until the very last moment, there
+on the edge of the ravine. I thought you saw it; that
+you heard her tell me. It seemed to me everybody
+must have heard.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I was running away&ndash;&ndash;I could not bear it. I
+think I must have been crazy for a time. If only I had
+heard! My God! if only I had heard!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, you know now,&#8221; said Blake. &#8220;What&#8217;s
+done is done. The question now is, what are you going
+to do next?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Instantly Ashton&#8217;s drooping figure was a-quiver with
+eagerness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You wish first to be taken up near the driftwood,&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_337' name='page_337'></a>337</span>
+he exclaimed. &#8220;Let me lift you. Don&#8217;t be afraid to
+put your weight on me. Hurry! We must lose no
+time!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake was already struggling up. Ashton strained
+to help him rise erect on his sound leg. Braced and
+half lifted by the younger man, the engineer hobbled
+and hopped along the barrier crest and up its sloping
+side. His trained eye picked out a great weather-seasoned
+pine log lying directly beneath the outermost
+point of the ca&ntilde;on rim. An object dropped over
+where the flag still flecked against the indigo sky, would
+have fallen straight down to the log, unless deflected
+by the prong of a ledge that jutted out twelve hundred
+feet from the top.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Here,&#8221; panted Blake, regardless of the great pile
+of skeletons heaped on the far end of the log. &#8220;This
+place&ndash;&ndash;right below them! Go back&ndash;&ndash;bring fire and
+rope.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton ran back to fetch the rope and a dozen blazing
+sticks. Driftwood was strewn all around. In a
+minute he had a fire started against the butt end of the
+log. He began to gather a pile of fuel. But Blake
+checked him with a cheerful&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;That&#8217;s enough, old
+man. I can manage now. Take the rope, and go.&#8221;</p>
+<p>When Ashton had coiled the rope over his shoulder
+and under the opposite arm, he came and stood before
+his prostrate companion. His face was scarlet with
+shame.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_338' name='page_338'></a>338</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I have been a fool&ndash;&ndash;and worse,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I
+doubted her. I am utterly unfit to live. If I were
+alone down here, I would stay and rot. But you are
+her brother. If it is possible to get up there, I am
+going up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You are going up!&#8221; encouraged Blake. &#8220;You
+will make it. Give my love to them. Tell them I&#8217;m
+doing fine.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He held out his hand.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No,&#8221; said Ashton. &#8220;I&#8217;d give anything if I could
+grip hands with you. But I cannot. You are her
+brother. I am unfit to touch your hand.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He turned and ran up the precipice-foot to the first
+steep ascent of the steeple-sloped break in the wall of
+the abyss.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_339' name='page_339'></a>339</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXIX_THE_CLIMBER' id='CHAPTER_XXIX_THE_CLIMBER'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXIX</h2>
+<h3>THE CLIMBER</h3>
+</div>
+<p>A day of anxiety, only partly relieved by those
+tiny flashes of light so far, far down in the awful
+depths; then the long night of ceaseless watching.
+Neither Genevieve nor Isobel had been able to sleep
+during those hours when no flash signaled up to them
+from the abysmal darkness.</p>
+<p>Then at last, a full hour after dawn on the mesa
+top, the down-peering wife had caught the flash that
+told of the renewal of the exploration. As throughout
+the previous day, Gowan brought the ladies food
+and whatever else they needed. Only the needs of the
+baby had power to draw its mother away from the
+ca&ntilde;on edge. Isobel moved always along the giddy
+verge wherever she could cling to it, following the unseen
+workers in the depths.</p>
+<p>On his first trip to the ranch, the puncher had
+brought Genevieve&#8217;s field glasses&ndash;&ndash;an absurdly small
+instrument of remarkable power. Three times the
+first day and twice the second morning she and Isobel
+had the joy of seeing their loved ones creeping along
+the abyss bottom at places where the sun pierced down
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_340' name='page_340'></a>340</span>
+through the gloom. They missed other chances because
+the ca&ntilde;on edge was not everywhere so easily
+approachable.</p>
+<p>Many times the flash of Blake&#8217;s revolver passed unseen
+by them. Sometimes they had been forced away
+from the brink; sometimes the depths were cut off from
+their view by juttings of the vast walls. Yet now and
+again one or the other caught a flash that marked the
+advance of the explorers.</p>
+<p>Towards midday a last flash was seen by both above
+the turn where the ca&ntilde;on curved to run towards Dry
+Fork Gulch. Between this point and the sharp bend
+opposite the gulch the precipices overhung the ca&ntilde;on
+bottom. Carrying the baby, the two hastened to the
+bend, to heap up and light a great beacon fire of green
+wood.</p>
+<p>Gowan followed with the ponies, cool, silent and
+efficient. From the first he had seldom looked over
+into the ca&ntilde;on. His part was to serve Miss Chuckie
+and her friend, and wait. Like Ashton, he had failed
+to surmise the real significance of that tender parting
+between Blake and Isobel. His look had betrayed
+boundless amazement when he saw the wife of the man
+take the sobbing girl into her arms and comfort her.
+But he had spoken no word of inquiry; and every moment
+since, both ladies had been too utterly absorbed
+in their watch to talk to him of anything else.</p>
+<p>At last the exploration was nearing the turning point.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_341' name='page_341'></a>341</span>
+Genevieve and Isobel lay on the edge of the precipice
+near the beacon fire, peering down for the flash that
+would tell of the last rod reading.</p>
+<p>Slowly the minutes dragged by, and no welcome
+signal flashed through the dark shadows. The usual
+interval between shots had passed. Still no signal.
+They waited and watched, with fast-mounting apprehension.
+Could the brave ones down in those fearsome
+depths have failed almost in sight of the goal? or
+could misfortune have overtaken them in that narrow,
+cavernous reach of the chasm so close to their objective
+point?</p>
+<p>At last&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;There! there it is!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Together the two watchers saw the flash, and together
+they shrieked the glad discovery.</p>
+<p>Genevieve rose to go to her crying baby. Before
+she could silence him, Isobel screamed to her: &#8220;Another
+shot!&ndash;&ndash;farther downstream! What can it
+mean?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Genevieve put down the still-sobbing baby and ran
+again to the verge of the precipice. Two minutes
+after the second flash there came a third, a few yards
+still farther along the ca&ntilde;on.</p>
+<p>&#8220;They have changed their plans. They are going
+downstream,&#8221; said Genevieve.</p>
+<p>She caught up the long pole of the flag and ran to
+thrust it out opposite the point where she had seen the
+flash.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_342' name='page_342'></a>342</span></p>
+<p>Gowan was preparing for the return trip up along
+the ca&ntilde;on to the starting point. At Isobel&#8217;s call, he
+silently turned the ponies about the other way and followed
+the excited watchers. As he did so, the girl
+perceived a fourth flash in the abyss, a hundred yards
+farther downstream. She hastened with the flag to a
+point a little beyond the place.</p>
+<p>When Genevieve had quieted the baby and overtaken
+Isobel, the latter was ready with a question:
+&#8220;You know Tom so well. Why is he going on down?
+He said that he would at once return after reaching the
+place where the head of the tunnel is to be.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He must have seen the beacon,&#8221; replied Genevieve.
+&#8220;He could not have mistaken that. Something has
+forced him to change his plans. It may be they were
+swept down some place in the river that he knows they
+cannot re-ascend.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh! do not say it!&#8221; sobbed the girl. &#8220;If they
+cannot get back&ndash;&ndash;oh! what will they do? How
+will they ever escape?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is there no other place?&#8221; asked Genevieve.
+&#8220;Think, dear. Is there no break in these terrible
+precipices?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s a place where the wall slopes back&ndash;&ndash;but
+steep, oh, so steep! Yet it is barely possible&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;
+The girl&#8217;s voice sank, and she glanced about at Gowan.
+&#8220;It is just this side of where more than five thousand
+sheep were driven over into the ca&ntilde;on. That was four
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_343' name='page_343'></a>343</span>
+years ago. I have never since been able to go near the
+place.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tom said that he rode all along the ca&ntilde;on for
+miles. You say it may be possible to climb up at that
+place. He must have seen it, and he has remembered
+it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then you think&ndash;&ndash;?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know that if it is possible for anyone to climb
+the wall, Tom will climb it&ndash;&ndash;and he will bring up
+Lafayette with him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dear Genevieve! You are so strong! so full of
+hope!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not hope, dear. It is trust. I know Tom better
+than you. That is all.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Another flash!&#8221; cried Isobel. &#8220;So soon, yet all
+that long way from the last! They are traveling far
+faster!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, they have finished with the levels,&#8221; divined
+Genevieve. &#8220;We must hasten.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Isobel called the news to the silent puncher, and all
+moved along to overtake the hurrying fugitives below.
+Though both parties went so much faster, Blake&#8217;s frequent
+shots kept the anxious watchers above in closer
+touch than at any time before.</p>
+<p>At last they came to that Cyclopean ladder of precipices,
+rising one above the other in narrow steps, and
+all inclined at a giddy pitch far steeper than any house
+roof. Yet for a long way down them the field glasses
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_344' name='page_344'></a>344</span>
+showed their surfaces wrinkled with shelves and projecting
+ledges and creased with faults and crevices.</p>
+<p>The party went past this semi-break in the sheer
+wall, and halted on the out-jutting point of the rim
+where the luckless flock of sheep had been driven over
+to destruction. No reference was made to that ruthless
+slaughter of innocents. Gowan calmly set about
+preparing a camp. The ladies lay down to watch in
+the shade of a frost-cracked rock on the verge of the
+wall.</p>
+<p>Already the time had come and gone for the regular
+signal of the revolver shot. The watchers began
+to grow apprehensive. Still their straining eyes saw
+no flash in the depths. A half hour passed. Their
+apprehension deepened to dread. An hour&ndash;&ndash;they
+were white with terror.</p>
+<p>Suddenly a tiny red spot appeared&ndash;&ndash;not a flash that
+came and went like lightning, but a flame that remained
+and grew larger.</p>
+<p>&#8220;A fire!&#8221; cried Isobel. &#8220;They have halted and
+built a fire.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Genevieve brought the flag and thrust it out over
+the edge. The inner end of the pole she wedged in
+a crevice of the split rock.</p>
+<p>&#8220;They have stopped to rest,&#8221; she said. &#8220;It may
+be that Lafayette is worn out. But soon I trust they
+will be coming up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She looked through her glasses. The fire was burning
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_345' name='page_345'></a>345</span>
+its brightest. She discerned the prostrate figure
+beside the ledge. She watched it fixedly. Soon another
+figure appeared in the circle of firelight. It bent
+over the first, doing something with pieces of stick.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look,&#8221; whispered Genevieve, handing the glasses
+to her companion, &#8220;Tom is hurt. Lafayette is binding
+his leg. It is broken or badly strained.&ndash;&ndash;Oh!
+will your father never come?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tom hurt? It can&#8217;t be&ndash;&ndash;no, no!&#8221; protested
+Isobel. But she too looked and saw. After a time
+she added breathlessly: &#8220;It can&#8217;t be so bad! Lafe
+is helping him to rise.... They are starting this
+way&ndash;&ndash;to the foot of the wall! They will be climbing
+up!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But if his leg is injured!&#8221; differed Genevieve.</p>
+<p>Again they waited. Presently the fire scattered,
+and a streak of flame traveled across the ca&ntilde;on to a
+point beneath them. Soon the red spot of a new fire
+glowed in the shadows so directly under them that a
+pebble dropped from their fingers must have grazed
+down the precipices and fallen into the flames.</p>
+<p>After several minutes of alternate peering through
+the glasses, Genevieve handed them back to Isobel for
+the third time, and rose to go to her baby.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It is Tom alone,&#8221; she said, divining the truth.
+&#8220;Lafayette has helped him to the best place they could
+find, and now he is coming up to us for help.&#8221;</p>
+<p>When she had fed the baby and soothed him to
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_346' name='page_346'></a>346</span>
+sleep, she laid out bandages and salve, set a full coffeepot
+on the fire started by Gowan, and examined the
+cream and eggs brought back by the puncher on his
+second night trip to the ranch.</p>
+<p>Nearly an hour had passed when Isobel called in
+joyous excitement: &#8220;I see him! I see him! Down
+there where the sunlight slants on the rocks. Oh! how
+bravely! how swiftly he climbs!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Genevieve went to take the glasses and look. Several
+moments were lost before she could locate the tiny
+figure creeping up that stairway of the giants. But,
+once she had fixed the glasses upon him, she could see
+him clearly. Isobel had well expressed it when she
+said that he was climbing swiftly and bravely. Running
+along shelves, clambering ledges, following up
+the crevices that offered the best foothold, the tattered
+climber fought his dizzy way upwards, upwards, ever
+upwards!</p>
+<p>Rarely, after some particularly hard scramble, he
+flung himself down on a shelf or on one of the steps
+of the Titanic ladder, to rest and summon energy for
+another upward rush. His good fortune seemed as
+marvelous as his endurance and daring. He never
+once slipped and never once had to turn back from an
+ascent. As if guided by instinct or divine intuition,
+he chose always the safest, the least difficult, the most
+continuously scalable way on all that perilous pitch.</p>
+<p>So swift an ascent was beyond the ordinary powers
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_347' name='page_347'></a>347</span>
+of man. It could have been made only by a maniac
+or by one to whom great passion had given command
+of those latent forces of the body that enable the
+maniac to fling strong men about like children. Long
+before the climber reached the top of that terrible ladder,
+his hands were torn and bleeding, the tattered
+garments were half rent from his limbs and body, his
+eyes were sunk deep in their sockets.</p>
+<p>Yet ever he climbed, ledge above ledge, crevice after
+crevice, until at last only one steep pitch rose above
+him. A rope came sliding down the rock. A voice&ndash;&ndash;the
+sweetest voice in all the wide world of sunshine
+and life&ndash;&ndash;called to him. It sounded very far away,
+farther than the bounds of reality, yet he heard and
+obeyed. He slipped the loop of the rope down over
+his shoulders and about his heaving forebody. Then
+suddenly his labor was lightened. His leaden body
+became winged. It floated upwards.</p>
+<p>When he came to himself, a bitter refreshing wetness
+was soothing his parched mouth and black swollen
+tongue; gentle fingers were spreading balm on his torn
+hands; the loveliest face of earth or heaven was downbent
+over him, its tender blue eyes brimming with tears
+of compassion and love. Softly his head and shoulders
+were raised, and hot coffee was poured down his throat
+as fast as he could swallow.</p>
+<p>He half roused from his daze. The swollen,
+cracked lips moved in faintly muttered words: &#8220;Leg
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_348' name='page_348'></a>348</span>
+broken&ndash;&ndash;sends love&ndash;&ndash;doing fine&ndash;&ndash;project feasible&ndash;&ndash;irrigation&ndash;&ndash;no
+food&ndash;&ndash;must rest&ndash;&ndash;go down
+again.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The eyes of the two ministering angels met. Genevieve
+bent down and pressed her lips to the purple,
+swollen-veined forehead. The heavy lids closed over
+the sunken eyes; but before he lapsed into the torpid
+sleep of exhaustion that fell upon him, the two succeeded
+in feeding him several spoonfuls of raw egg
+beaten in cream. He then sank into utter unconsciousness.</p>
+<p>Flaccid and inert as a corpse, he lay outstretched on
+the grassy slope while they bound up the cuts and
+bruises on his naked arms and shoulders and cut the
+broken, gaping boots from his bruised feet. His legs,
+doubly protected by the tough leather chapareras and
+thick riding leggins, had fared less cruelly than his
+arms, but his knees were raw and bleeding where the
+chaps had worn through on the rocks.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_349' name='page_349'></a>349</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXX_LURKING_BEASTS' id='CHAPTER_XXX_LURKING_BEASTS'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXX</h2>
+<h3>LURKING BEASTS</h3>
+</div>
+<p>The moment that he had helped haul the climber
+to safety Gowan had ridden away with the horses
+to the camp. He now came jogging back with the
+tent and all else that they had not been carrying with
+them in their skirting of the ca&ntilde;on edge. He unloaded
+the packs and hastened to pitch the tent.</p>
+<p>As he was finishing, Isobel called to him sharply.
+&#8220;What are you doing there, Kid? That can wait.
+Come here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, Miss Chuckie,&#8221; he replied with ready obedience.
+But when he came down the slope to the little
+group, his mouth was like a thin gash across his lean
+jaws. He stared coldly at Ashton between narrowed
+lids. &#8220;Want me to help tote him up by the fire?&#8221; he
+asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No!&#8221; she replied. &#8220;It is Tom! He is down
+there&ndash;&ndash;his leg broken&ndash;&ndash;and no food! You must go
+down to him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Go down?&#8221; queried the puncher. &#8220;What good
+would that do? I couldn&#8217;t help him with that climb.
+He weighs a good two hundred.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_350' name='page_350'></a>350</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You can take food down to him and let him know
+that help is coming. You must!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan looked sullenly at the unconscious man.
+&#8220;Sorry, Miss Chuckie. It&#8217;s no go. I ain&#8217;t a mountain
+sheep.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But <i>he</i> came up!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s different. It&#8217;s a sight easier going up
+cliffs than climbing down. No, you&#8217;ll have to excuse
+me, Miss Chuckie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl flamed with indignant anger. &#8220;You coward!
+You saw him come up, after all that time down
+in those fearful depths&ndash;&ndash;after fighting his way all
+those miles along the terrible river&ndash;&ndash;yet you dare not
+go down! You coward! you quitter!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The puncher&#8217;s face turned a sickly yellow, and he
+seemed to shrink in on himself. His voice sank to
+a husky whisper: &#8220;You can say that, Miss Chuckie!
+Any man say it, he&#8217;d be dead before now. If you
+want to know, I&#8217;ve got a mighty good reason for not
+wanting to go down. It ain&#8217;t that I&#8217;m afraid. You
+can bank on that. It&#8217;s something else. I&#8217;ll go quick
+enough&ndash;&ndash;but it&#8217;s got to be on one condition. You&#8217;ve
+got to promise to marry me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Marry you?</i>&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. You know how I&#8217;ve felt towards you all
+these years. Promise to marry me, and I&#8217;ll go to
+hell and back for you. I&#8217;ll do anything for you. I&#8217;ll
+save him!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_351' name='page_351'></a>351</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You cur! You&#8217;d force me to bargain myself to
+you!&#8221; she cried, fairly beside herself with righteous
+fury. &#8220;I thought you a man! You cur&ndash;&ndash;you cowardly
+cur!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Gowan turned from her and walked rapidly away
+along the ca&ntilde;on edge, his head hunched between his
+shoulders, his hands downstretched at his thighs, the
+fingers crooked convulsively.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh!&#8221; gasped Genevieve. &#8220;You&#8217;ve driven him
+away! Call him back! We need him! He must go
+for help!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The words shocked the girl out of her rash anger.
+Her flushed face whitened with fear. &#8220;Kid!&#8221; she
+screamed. &#8220;Come back, Kid! You must go to the
+ranch&ndash;&ndash;bring the men!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The cry of appeal should have brought him back
+to her on the run. It pierced high above the booming
+reverberations of the ca&ntilde;on. Yet he paid no heed.
+He neither halted nor paused nor even looked back.
+If anything, he hurried away faster than before.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Kid! dear Kid! forgive me! Come back and help
+us!&#8221; shrieked the girl.</p>
+<p>He kept on down along the ca&ntilde;on rim, his chin sunk
+on his breast, his downstretched hands bent like claws.
+She ran a little way after him; only to flutter back
+again, wringing her hands, distracted. &#8220;What shall
+we do? what shall we do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Be quiet, dear&ndash;&ndash;be quiet!&#8221; urged Genevieve.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_352' name='page_352'></a>352</span>
+&#8220;You&#8217;ve driven him away. We must do the best we
+can. You must go yourself. I can stay and watch&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no!&#8221; cried Isobel. &#8220;The way he looked at
+Lafe!&ndash;&ndash;I dare not go! He may come back&ndash;&ndash;and I
+not here!&#8221;</p>
+<p>She knelt to place her trembling hand on Ashton&#8217;s
+forehead.</p>
+<p>Genevieve looked at the setting sun. &#8220;There is no
+time to lose,&#8221; she said. &#8220;Saddle my horse while I
+nurse Baby. I cannot take him with me down the
+mountain, in the dark.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Genevieve! You dare go&ndash;&ndash;at night?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Someone must bring help, else Tom&ndash;&ndash;all alone
+down in that dreadful chasm&ndash;&ndash;!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But you may lose the way! I will go!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no, you must stay, Belle. I saw his eyes.
+He may come back. I could not protect Lafayette,
+but you&ndash;&ndash;There is no other way. I must leave
+Baby, and go.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Wondering at the courage of the young mother,
+Isobel ran to saddle the oldest of the picketed horses.
+He was the slowest of them all, but he was surefooted
+and steady and very wise. When she brought him
+down the ridge, Genevieve placed the newly fed baby
+in her arms and went with the glasses to peer down the
+sheer precipices. There in the blackness so far beneath
+her the glowing fire illuminated an outstretched
+form. It was her husband, lying flat on his back and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_353' name='page_353'></a>353</span>
+gazing up at the heights. Almost she could fancy that
+he saw her as she saw him.</p>
+<p>But she did not linger. Time was too precious.
+She dropped him a kiss, and ran to spring upon the
+waiting pony. She did not pause even to kiss the big-eyed
+baby. The thirsty pony needed no urging to
+start at a lively jog up the slope of the first ridge.
+As he topped the crest and broke into a lope the sun
+dipped below the western edge of High Mesa. A few
+seconds later horse and rider disappeared from Isobel&#8217;s
+anxious gaze down the far side of the ridge.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Old Buck knows the trail,&#8221; murmured the girl.
+&#8220;He knows he is headed for the waterhole. Yet if&ndash;&ndash;if
+he <i>should</i> lose the trail!&#8221;</p>
+<p>A spasm of fear sent her hand to the pistol hilt under
+the fold of her skirt and twisted her head about. She
+glared along the ca&ntilde;on rim. Gowan was still striding
+away from her. She watched him fixedly, her hand
+clutched fast on the hilt of her pistol, until he disappeared
+around a mass of rocks.</p>
+<p>The whinnying of the horses after their companion
+at last drew her attention. They had not been watered
+since the previous evening. Cuddling close the frightened
+baby, the girl fetched a basin and one of the water
+cans, to sponge out the dusty nostrils of the animals
+and give each two or three swallows.</p>
+<p>Then, when she had soothed the fretful child to
+sleep, she laid him in a snug nest of blankets between
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_354' name='page_354'></a>354</span>
+a rock and a fallen tree, and went to watch beside Ashton.
+He lay as she had left him, in a stupor of sleep
+and exhaustion.</p>
+<p>Gradually the twilight faded. Stars began to twinkle
+in the cloudless sky. She watched and waited while
+the dusk deepened. When she could barely see objects
+a few yards away, she stooped over the unconscious
+man and, putting out all her supple young strength,
+half dragged, half carried him up the slope to a hiding
+place that she had chosen, in under an overhanging
+ledge. There she spread pine needles and blankets
+on the soft mold and lifted him upon them, so that
+nothing hard should press against his wounds.</p>
+<p>The fire had burned low. It was a full hundred
+yards away from the hiding place. She went to replenish
+it and take a hasty look down at that outstretched
+form in the depths. But soon she stole back
+to the sleeping man under the rock, going, as she had
+come, by a roundabout way in the darkness.</p>
+<p>Night settled down close and dense over the plateau.
+The girl crouched beside the sleeper, her eyes peering
+out into the blackness, the drawn pistol ready in her
+hand. She could see only a few feet in the dim starlight.
+But her ears, accustomed to the dull monotone
+of the booming ca&ntilde;on, heard every sound&ndash;&ndash;the click
+of the horses&#8217; hoofs, even the munching of the nearest
+one, the hoot of the owls that flitted overhead, the
+distant yelps and wails of coyotes.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_355' name='page_355'></a>355</span></p>
+<p>An hour passed, two hours&ndash;&ndash;a third. She crept
+around to replenish the fire. When she returned she
+heard the baby fretting. Swiftly she groped her way
+to him and carried him to the hiding place, to quiet his
+outcry. He sucked in a little of the beaten egg and
+cream that she had ready for Ashton. It satisfied
+his hunger, and he fell asleep, clasped against her soft
+warm bosom. She crouched down with him in her lap,
+her right hand again clasped on the pistol hilt, ready
+for the expected attack.</p>
+<p>She waited as before, silent, motionless, every sense
+alert. Another hour dragged by, and another. Midnight
+passed. Suddenly, on the ridge slope above her,
+one of the horses snorted and plunged. She raised
+the pistol. The horse became quiet. But something
+came gliding around the rocks, a low form vaguely
+outlined in the darkness. It might have been a creeping
+man. It turned towards the hiding place. The
+girl found herself looking into a pair of glaring eyes.
+She thrust out the pistol, with her forefinger pointing
+along the barrel. The darkness was too deep for her
+to aim by the sights.</p>
+<p>Before she could press the trigger, the beast bounded
+away, with a snarl far deeper, far more ferocious than
+any coyote could have uttered. The girl did not fire.
+The wolf had seen the glint of her pistol barrel and
+had fled. He would not return. But she shuddered
+and drew the sleeping baby close as she thought of
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_356' name='page_356'></a>356</span>
+what might have happened had she left him alone in
+the nest between the rock and the tree.</p>
+<p>The precious, helpless child! He was of her own
+blood, the son of her strong, splendid brother ... of
+her brother, lying down there in those awful depths,
+helpless&ndash;&ndash;in agony!...</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_357' name='page_357'></a>357</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXXI_CONFESSIONS' id='CHAPTER_XXXI_CONFESSIONS'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXXI</h2>
+<h3>CONFESSIONS</h3>
+</div>
+<p>A groping hand touched her arm; bandaged
+fingers sought to feel who she was. Behind her
+sounded a drowsy incoherent murmur. The snarl of
+the wolf had roused the sleeper from his torpor.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hush&ndash;&ndash;hush!&#8221; she whispered. &#8220;It is all well.
+I am here by you. Lie still.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Isobel!&#8221; he murmured. &#8220;Isobel!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, dear!&#8221; she soothed. &#8220;I am here. Rest&ndash;&ndash;go
+to sleep again. All is well.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All is&ndash;&ndash;?&#8221; He roused a little more. &#8220;You
+say&ndash;&ndash;Then he is safe! They have brought him up&ndash;&ndash;out
+of that hell!&#8221;</p>
+<p>She could not lie outright. &#8220;He will soon be safe.
+By morning help will have come to us. As soon as
+the men can see to go down, they will descend for him.
+They will bring him up the way that you have shown
+us!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her voice quivered with pride of what he had done.
+She drew up his hand and pressed her lips tenderly
+upon the bandages.</p>
+<p>Had the caress been a burn, he could not have more
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_358' name='page_358'></a>358</span>
+quickly snatched the hand away. He sought to rise,
+and struck his head against the overhanging rock.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Where am I? Let me out!&#8221; he said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, you must not! Lie still! You must not!&#8221;
+she remonstrated.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lie still?&#8221; he repeated. &#8220;Lie still! with him
+down there&ndash;&ndash;alone!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But it is night&ndash;&ndash;midnight. It will be hours before
+even the moon rises.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And he down there&ndash;&ndash;alone! Help me make
+ready. I am going down to him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Going down? But you cannot! It is midnight!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There is a lantern. I shall take that. It will
+be easier than in the daytime, for I shall not see those
+sickening precipices below.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He sought to creep out past her. She clutched his
+arm.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no! do not go! There is no need! Wait
+until they come. You have done your share&ndash;&ndash;far
+more than your share! Wait!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I cannot,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;I must go down to him.
+I have no right to be up here, and he still down there.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You must!&#8221; she urged, clinging tighter to his arm.
+&#8220;You may fall. I am afraid! I cannot bear it! Do
+not go! Stay with me&ndash;&ndash;say that you will stay with
+me&ndash;&ndash;dearest!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good God!&#8221; he cried, tearing himself away from
+her, &#8220;To let you say it&ndash;&ndash;say it to me!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_359' name='page_359'></a>359</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Dearest!&#8221; she repeated. &#8220;Dearest, do not go!
+There is no need! I cannot bear it! Do not go!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No need? My God! When I could fling myself
+over, if it were not for him! To have let you say it&ndash;&ndash;to
+me&ndash;&ndash;to a liar! thief! murderer!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dearest!&#8221; she whispered. &#8220;Hush! You are
+delirious&ndash;&ndash;you do not know&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It is you who do not know!&#8221; he cried. &#8220;But you
+shall&ndash;&ndash;everything&ndash;&ndash;all my cowardly baseness!&#8221;
+The confession burst from him in a torrent of self-denunciation&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;That
+trip to town, when we went to
+fetch them, I lied to you about those bridge plans.
+It was not true that I found them. He handed them
+to me. He took no receipt. I looked at them and
+saw how wonderful they were. I stole them. My
+father had threatened to cast me off if I did not do
+something worth while. I was desperate. So I stole
+your brother&#8217;s plans. I copied them&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know about Tom!&#8221; she interrupted. &#8220;But
+of course. You saw me tell him, there at the ravine.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I saw you put your arms about his neck and kiss
+him; but I did not hear&ndash;&ndash;I did not see the truth. I
+believed&ndash;&ndash;that is the worst of it all&ndash;&ndash;I believed
+it possible that you&ndash;&ndash;<i>you</i>&ndash;&ndash;!... That devil Gowan.... But
+that is no excuse. Had I not already doubted
+you.... And I went down&ndash;&ndash;down into hell, with
+only one purpose&ndash;&ndash;to make certain that he never
+should come up again!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_360' name='page_360'></a>360</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Dear Christ!&#8221; whispered the girl&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;Dear
+Christ! He has gone mad!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, Isobel,&#8221; he said, his voice slow and dead with
+the calm of utter despair, &#8220;I am not mad. I have
+never been mad except for a little while after you put
+your arms about his neck. No&ndash;&ndash;For years I was a
+fool, a profligate fool, wasting my life as I wasted
+all those thousands of dollars that I had not earned.
+I turned thief&ndash;&ndash;a despicable sneak thief. At last the
+dirty crime found me out. I received a small share
+of the punishment that I deserved. Then you took
+me in&ndash;&ndash;without question&ndash;&ndash;treated me as a man.
+God knows I tried to be one!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You were!&ndash;&ndash;you are!&#8221; she broke in. &#8220;This is
+all a mistake&ndash;&ndash;a cruel, hideous mistake!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I tried to go,&#8221; he went on unflinchingly. &#8220;You
+urged me to stay. I was weak. I could not force myself
+to leave you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Because&ndash;&ndash;because!&#8221; she murmured.</p>
+<p>&#8220;All the more reason why I should have gone,&#8221; he
+replied. &#8220;But I was weak, unfit. I lied to you and
+won your pity. You gave me the chance to stay and
+prove myself what I am. Down there, when he told
+me what I should have guessed&ndash;&ndash;what I must have
+guessed had not my own baseness blinded me to the
+truth&ndash;&ndash;when he told me he was your brother, I saw
+myself, my real self,&ndash;&ndash;my shriveled, black, hellish
+soul. Now you see why I must go down again. I can
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_361' name='page_361'></a>361</span>
+never make reparation for what I have done. But I
+can at least go down to him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You take all the blame on yourself!&#8221; she protested.
+&#8220;What if I had confessed my secret, there
+at the first, when Tom sprang down from the car and I
+knew him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you had told, then I should not have been
+tempted to doubt you, and I should have gone on, it
+might have been forever, with that lie and that theft
+between us&ndash;&ndash;and I should not have been forced to
+see, as I now see, my absolute unworthiness of you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of me!&#8221; she cried shrilly, and she burst into wild
+hysterical laughter. It broke off as abruptly as it began.
+&#8220;Unworthy of me&ndash;&ndash;of me? the daughter of
+a drunken mother, the sister of a girl who&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; A sob
+choked her. She went on desperately: &#8220;You have
+told me all. But I&ndash;&ndash;do you not wonder why I kept
+silent&ndash;&ndash;why I denied Mary by my silence? You say
+you sought to harm Tom&ndash;&ndash;down there. You did
+not know he was my brother. You thought he would
+harm me. Is it not so?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I doubted you!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why? Because I failed to tell the truth. I
+feared to hurt him&ndash;&ndash;to make trouble between him
+and his rich, high-bred wife. As if I should not have
+known better the moment I saw Genevieve! Dear sister!
+she knows all. But you&ndash;&ndash;Either I should have
+spoken, or I should have hidden all my fondness for
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_362' name='page_362'></a>362</span>
+him. But I could not hide my love for him&ndash;&ndash;and I
+was ashamed to tell.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ashamed&ndash;&ndash;you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We lived in the slums. They told me my father
+was a big man, a man such as Tom is now. He was
+a railroad engineer. He was killed when I was a baby.
+Then we sank into the slums. My mother&ndash;&ndash;she died
+when I was twelve. There was then only Mary and
+I and Tom. He could make only a little, working at
+odd jobs. Mary and I worked in a factory. Even
+she was under age. When I was going on fourteen
+there came a terrible winter when thousands were out
+of work. We almost starved.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&ndash;&ndash;starved!&#8221; murmured Ashton. &#8220;Starved!
+And I was starting in at college, flinging away money!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tom tried to force people to let him work,&#8221; the
+girl went on drearily. &#8220;He was violent. They put
+him in jail. Soon Mary and I had nothing left. There
+was no work for us. We had sold everything that
+anyone would buy. The rent was overdue. They
+turned us out&ndash;&ndash;on the streets.... I was too young;
+but Mary.... She found a place where I could stay.
+They were decent people, but hard....</p>
+<p>&#8220;The weather was bitterly cold. She was taken
+sick. When the people with whom I was staying
+heard what she had done, they refused to help. I
+begged in the street. I was very small and thin. The&ndash;&ndash;the
+beasts did not trouble me. Then, when Mary
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_363' name='page_363'></a>363</span>
+was very sick, I met Daddy. I begged from him. He
+did not give me a nickel and pass on. He stopped and
+made me talk&ndash;&ndash;he made me take him to Mary.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He had her moved to the best hospital.... It
+was too late.... I also had pneumonia. They said I
+would die. But Daddy brought me home just as soon
+as I could be moved. The railroad was then a hundred
+miles from Dry Mesa. But he kept me wrapped
+in furs, and all the way he carried me in his arms. Do
+you wonder why I love him so?... That is all.
+You see now why I shrank from telling&ndash;&ndash;why I denied
+Mary.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;She is in Heaven,&#8221; said Ashton&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;in Heaven,
+where some day you will go. But I&ndash;&ndash;I&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; She
+could see no more than the vague blotch of his white
+face in the darkness, but his voice told her the anguish
+of his look. &#8220;He was right&ndash;&ndash;your brother. He
+told me that we always take with us the heaven or the
+hell that we each have made for ourselves.... I have
+lost you.... You know now why I am going down
+to do the little that I can do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You are going down?&#8221; she asked wonderingly.
+&#8220;You still say that you are going down? Yet I have
+told you about&ndash;&ndash;Mary!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you were she, I still would be utterly unfit to
+look you in the face. I shall go to the camp for the
+lantern. There were other gloves and some of my
+clothing.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_364' name='page_364'></a>364</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;They are all here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Show me where they are, and get ready the lantern
+and bandages and a sack of food.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You are going down,&#8221; she acquiesced. &#8220;You are
+going to Tom. And you are coming up with him&ndash;&ndash;to
+me!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That is too much. I doubted you. Where are
+those things? He is waiting down there alone.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Here is his child, my nephew,&#8221; she said. &#8220;Hold
+him while I go for what you need. Here is my pistol.
+The man who shot you, who twice tried to murder you&ndash;&ndash;he
+is somewhere up here. He will not harm me.
+But you&ndash;&ndash;If he comes creeping in on you here, shoot
+him as you would shoot a coyote.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The man who shot me? He is up here?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You have seen him every day since that first day
+I met you,&#8221; replied the girl. &#8220;His name is Gowan.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Gowan?</i>&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Kid Gowan, murderer! I saw his eyes as he
+looked at you, lying down there on the brink. Then I
+knew.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&ndash;&ndash;if he&ndash;&ndash;Where is Genevieve? I cannot
+go and leave you alone.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You can&ndash;&ndash;you must! He is a coward. He dare
+not follow you down that terrible place. No harm
+will come to me if you are gone. But if he comes back
+and finds you&ndash;&ndash;do you not see that if he kills you, he
+must also kill me? But in the morning, when the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_365' name='page_365'></a>365</span>
+others come&ndash;&ndash;Oh, why hasn&#8217;t Daddy come? All
+this long time since you went down into the depths,
+and he not with us! If only he were here!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Genevieve?&#8221; again inquired Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;She has gone. She started down the mountain
+for help when Kid went away. I&#8217;m so afraid for you,
+dear! He may be creeping back now&ndash;&ndash;he may be
+waiting already, close by here, in the darkness. But
+if he has not heard our voices, he will go first to where
+you came up, and then to the tent. Keep quiet until I
+return. Wait; here is cream and egg. Drink it all.&#8221;</p>
+<p>When he had drained the bowl that she held to his
+lips, she crept away. Ashton sat still, the warm, soft
+little body of the sleeping baby in his arms, the pistol
+in his bandaged right hand. In her excitement Isobel
+had forgotten his bound fingers. If Gowan had come
+on him then, he would have put the baby back in under
+the rock, and faced the puncher&#8217;s revolver with a smile.
+What had he now to live for? He had lost her. She
+had not yet grasped the baseness of what he had
+thought and done. As soon as she realized ... And
+he could never forgive himself.</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_366' name='page_366'></a>366</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXXII_OVER_THE_BRINK' id='CHAPTER_XXXII_OVER_THE_BRINK'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXXII</h2>
+<h3>OVER THE BRINK</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Isobel came back to him, noiselessly gliding around
+through the darkness. She set down the bundle
+she was carrying, and hung blankets over the entrance
+of the little cave. She then lighted the lantern. He
+held out his bound hands. She unbound them enough
+for him to use his fingers, and taking the baby and the
+pistol, crouched down, with her ear close to the screening
+blankets, while he exchanged his tattered clothes
+for those she had brought to him.</p>
+<p>There were also his change of boots and a pair of
+Blake&#8217;s gauntlet gloves, into which he was able to force
+his slender fingers without removing the remaining
+bandages. Isobel had already bound up into a kind
+of knapsack the food and clothing and first-aid package
+that he was to take down to her injured brother.
+He slung it upon his back, and whispered that he was
+ready.</p>
+<p>She nestled the baby in the warm blankets on which
+he had lain, wrapped a blanket about the lantern, and
+led him cautiously down to the brink of the chasm.
+Dark as was the night about them, it was bright compared
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_367' name='page_367'></a>367</span>
+with the intense blackness of that profound
+abyss. The girl caught his arm and shrank back from
+the edge.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You will not fall? you are certain you will not
+fall?&#8221; she whispered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I cannot fall,&#8221; he answered with calm conviction.
+&#8220;He needs me. I am going down to him. Besides,
+it will be easier with the lantern than if I could see below.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do not uncover the light until you are down over
+the edge.&ndash;&ndash;Wait!&#8221;</p>
+<p>She stooped to knot the rope that he had brought
+up from the depths, to the lariats with which he had
+been dragged up the last ledges. She looped the end
+about his waist.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There,&#8221; she said. &#8220;I shall at least be able to help
+you down the first fifty yards.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;God bless you and keep you! Good-by!&#8221; he murmured
+in a choking voice, and he hastily crept down
+to slip over the first ledge of that night-shrouded Cyclopean
+ladder.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lafe!&#8221; she whispered. &#8220;Surely you do not mean
+to go without first telling me&ndash;&ndash;I cannot let you go
+until&ndash;&ndash;If you should fall! Wait, dearest! Kiss
+me&ndash;&ndash;tell me that you&ndash;&ndash;Oh, if you should fall!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I will not fall; I cannot. Good-by!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The dim white blotch of his face disappeared below
+the verge. The line jerked through the girl&#8217;s hands.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_368' name='page_368'></a>368</span>
+She clutched it with frantic strength and flung herself
+back with her feet braced against a point of rock.
+After a moment of tense straining, the rope slackened,
+and his voice came up to her over the ledge: &#8220;Pay
+out, please. It&#8217;s all right. I&#8217;ve found a crevice.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She eased off on the line a few inches at a time,
+but always keeping it taut and always holding herself
+braced for a sudden jerk. At last the end came into
+her hand. She had to lie out on the rim-rock and
+call down to him. He called back in a tone of quiet
+assurance. The line slackened. He had cast it loose.
+The lantern glowed out in the blackness and showed
+him standing on a narrow shelf.</p>
+<p>As Isobel bent lower to gaze at him, a frightful
+scream rang out above the booming of the ca&ntilde;on. It
+was a shriek such as a woman would utter in mortal
+fear. The girl drew back from the verge, her hair
+stiffening with horror. Could it be possible that Genevieve
+had lost her way and was wandering back to
+camp, and that Gowan&ndash;&ndash;</p>
+<p>Again the fearful scream pierced the air. Isobel
+looked quickly across towards the far side of the ca&ntilde;on.
+She could see nothing, but she drew in a deep sigh of
+relief. The second cry had told her that it was only
+a mountain lion, over on the other brink of the chasm.</p>
+<p>When she again looked down at Ashton he was descending
+a crevice with a rapidity that brought her
+heart into her mouth. Yet there was no hurry in his
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_369' name='page_369'></a>369</span>
+quick movements, and every little while he paused on
+a shelf to peer at the steep slope immediately below
+him. Soon the circle of lantern light became smaller
+and dimmer to the anxious watcher above. Steadily
+it waned until all she could see was a little point of light
+far down in the darkness&ndash;&ndash;and always it grew smaller
+and fainter.</p>
+<p>Lying there with her bosom pressed against the hard
+stone, her straining eyes fixed on that lessening point
+of light, she had lost all count of time. Her whole
+soul was in her eyes, watching, watching, watching lest
+that tiny light should suddenly shoot down like a meteor
+and vanish in the darkness. Many times it disappeared,
+but never in swift downward flight, and always
+it reappeared.</p>
+<p>Not until the moon came gliding up above the lofty
+white crests of the snowy range did she think of aught
+else than that speck of light and of him who was bearing
+it down into the black depths. But the glint of
+moonlight on a crystalline stone broke her steadfast
+gaze. Before she could again fix it on the faint point
+of lantern light a sound that had been knocking at the
+threshold of her consciousness at last made itself
+heard. It was an intermittent clinking as of steel on
+stone.</p>
+<p>She looked around, thinking that one of the horses
+was walking along the ridge slope with a loose shoe.
+But all were standing motionless in the moonlight,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_370' name='page_370'></a>370</span>
+dozing. Again she heard the click, and this time she
+located the direction from which it came. She looked
+at the split rock on the edge of the sheer drop. From
+beside it she had peered down through the field glasses
+at the outstretched form of her brother, far beneath in
+the ca&ntilde;on bottom.</p>
+<p>The sound came from that rock. She stared at the
+side of the frost-split fragment with dilated eyes. The
+crack between the loose outer bowlder and the main
+mass showed very black and wide in the moonlight.
+Could it be possible that it had widened&ndash;&ndash;that it was
+slipping over? And her brother down there beneath
+it!...</p>
+<hr class='tb' />
+<p>By setting wedge-shaped stones in the top of the cleft
+rock and prying with the crowbar, Gowan had gradually
+canted the top of the loose outer bowlder towards
+the edge of the precipice. It had only to topple forward
+in order to plunge down the ca&ntilde;on wall. He
+was working as silently as he could, but with a fierce
+eagerness that caused an occasional slip of the crowbar
+on the rock.</p>
+<p>Although the great block of stone weighed over two
+tons, its base was small and rounded, and the mass behind
+it gave him leverage for his bar. Every inch
+that he pried it forward, the stones slipped farther
+down into the widening crack and held the vantage
+he had gained. Already the bowlder had been pushed
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_371' name='page_371'></a>371</span>
+out at the top many inches. It was almost balanced.
+The time had come to see if he could not pry it over
+with a single heave.</p>
+<p>He did not propose to fall over after the rock. He
+turned his face to the brink, set the end of the bar in
+the crevice, and braced himself to heave backwards
+on the outer end. He put his weight on it and pulled.
+He could feel the rock give&ndash;&ndash;the top was moving
+outward. A little more, and it must topple over.</p>
+<p>Close behind him spoke a voice so hoarse and low-pitched
+with horror that it sounded like a man&#8217;s&ndash;&ndash;&#8220;Drop
+that bar! drop it!&#8221;</p>
+<p>With the swiftness of a wolf, he bounded sideways
+along the rim-rock. In the same lightning movement,
+he whirled face about and whipped his Colt&#8217;s from its
+holster. His finger was crooking against the trigger
+before he saw who it was that confronted him. The
+hammer fell in the same instant that he twitched the
+muzzle up and sideways. The heavy bullet scorched
+the girl&#8217;s cheek.</p>
+<p>Above the crashing report rose a wild cry, &#8220;Miss
+Chuckie&ndash;&ndash;God!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Through the blinding, stinging powder-smoke she
+saw him stagger backwards as if to flee from what he
+thought he had done. His foot went down over the
+sharp edge. He flung up his hands and dropped into
+the abyss.</p>
+<p>She did not shriek. She could not. Her tongue
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_372' name='page_372'></a>372</span>
+clove to the roof of her mouth. Her heart stopped
+beating. She crumpled down and lay gasping. But
+the fascination of horror spurred her to struggle to her
+knees and creep over to peer down from the place
+where he had fallen.</p>
+<p>Beneath her was only blank, utter darkness. No
+sound came up out of the deep except only that ceaseless
+reverberation of the hidden river. Twelve hundred
+feet down, the falling man had struck glancingly
+upon the smooth side of an out-jutting rock and his
+crushed body had been flung far out and sideways. It
+plunged into the rapids below the barrier and was borne
+away down the ca&ntilde;on. But this the girl could not have
+seen even in midday.</p>
+<p>She looked for the red star of the distant fire where
+she knew her brother was lying. She could not see
+it. The point upon which the falling man had struck
+shut off her view. The other side of the split rock
+was where she and Genevieve had looked down through
+the glasses and seen Blake. She failed to realize the
+difference in the change of position. Her horror deepened.
+She thought that Gowan had hurled straight
+down to the bottom with all the terrific velocity of
+that sheer drop, and that he had plunged upon the fire
+and upon the dear form outstretched beside it, to crush
+and mangle and be crushed and mangled. The thought
+was too frightful for human endurance.</p>
+<p>A long time she lay in a swoon, her head on the very
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_373' name='page_373'></a>373</span>
+edge of the brink. It was the wailing of the hungry,
+frightened baby that at last called her back to life and
+action. She dragged herself up around to the hiding
+place. The neglected baby was not easy to quiet. The
+cream had soured. There was nothing that she could
+give him except water. All the eggs that were left
+she had put in the knapsack that Ashton was carrying
+down to her brother. The baby now showed the full
+reflex of his mother&#8217;s long hours of anxiety and fear.
+He fretted and cried and would not be comforted.</p>
+<p>The chill of approaching dawn forced her to rebuild
+the outburnt fire. The warm glow and the play
+of the flames diverted the child and hushed his outcry.
+Holding him so that he might continue to watch the
+dancing tongues of fire, the girl sat motionless, going
+over and over again in her mind all that had occurred
+since the tattered, bleeding, purple-faced climber had
+come straining up out of the depths.... It could not
+have happened&ndash;&ndash;it was all a hideous dream....
+Would they never come? Must she sit here forever&ndash;&ndash;alone!</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_374' name='page_374'></a>374</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXXIII_FRIENDS_IN_NEED' id='CHAPTER_XXXIII_FRIENDS_IN_NEED'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXXIII</h2>
+<h3>FRIENDS IN NEED</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Because of the moonlight she did not heed the
+graying of the east. But the whinnying of the
+picketed horses roused her from the apathy of misery
+into which she had sunk. She stood up and looked
+along the ridge. A small roundish object appeared
+above the crest&ndash;&ndash;then others. They rose quickly&ndash;&ndash;the
+heads of riders spurring their horses up the far
+side of the ridge.</p>
+<p>Singly, in pairs, in groups, the rescuers burst up into
+view and came loping down to her, shouting and waving.
+In the lead rode her father and the sheriff; in
+the midst Genevieve, between two attendant young
+punchers. In all, there were nearly two dozen eager,
+resolute men, everyone an admiring friend of Miss
+Chuckie, everyone zealous to serve her and hers.</p>
+<p>The girl stood waiting beside the fire. She had tried
+to run to meet them and found that she could not move.
+The suddenness of their coming after all that fearful
+night of waiting seemed to numb her limbs.</p>
+<p>They rushed down upon her, waving, shouting questions.
+Her father, on Rocket, was the first to reach
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_375' name='page_375'></a>375</span>
+her. He sprang off and ran to put his arm about her
+quivering shoulders.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Honey! it&#8217;s all right now!&#8221; he assured her.
+&#8220;We&#8217;re here with everything that&#8217;s needed. We&#8217;ll
+soon yank him up out of that hole!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The baby, frightened by the rush and tumult of the
+off-leaping riders, began to scream. Someone took
+him from the girl&#8217;s arms and handed him to his mother
+as she was lifted down out of her saddle. Isobel
+pressed her face against her father&#8217;s sweaty breast.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hold on, Miss Chuckie!&#8221; sang out one of the
+men. &#8220;Don&#8217;t let go yet. Where&#8217;s Gowan&ndash;&ndash;Kid
+Gowan?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She shuddered convulsively, yet managed to reply:
+&#8220;He&ndash;&ndash;was trying to&ndash;&ndash;to roll the rock down. Tom,
+my brother, is right below it. I heard and came to
+see. His back was to me. I could not shoot&ndash;&ndash;I
+could not raise my pistol. When I spoke, he whirled
+and shot at me. He&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Kid&ndash;&ndash;shot at you?&#8221; cried Knowles. &#8220;At you?
+&#8217;Tain&#8217;t possible!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He didn&#8217;t mean to. He fired before he saw who
+I was. Then he saw. He forgot everything&ndash;&ndash;everything
+except that he had shot at me. He backed
+off&ndash;&ndash;there&ndash;&ndash;over the edge!&#8221;</p>
+<p>A sudden hush fell on the excited crowd. One man
+went to peer down from the place to which the girl
+had pointed. He came back softly. &#8220;Same place
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_376' name='page_376'></a>376</span>
+where the last bunch of sheep went over,&#8221; he said.
+&#8220;Rest of us were pretty sick&ndash;&ndash;ready to quit. He
+kept after them until the last ewe jumped. Said they&#8217;d
+gone to hell, where they belonged.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s the one that&#8217;s gone there!&#8221; said the sheriff.
+&#8220;Look at the way this bowlder is pried loose, ready
+to roll over! Once heard tell that his real dad
+was Billie the Kid. Some of you mayn&#8217;t have heard
+tell of Billie. He was the coldest blooded, promiscuous
+murderer of them days when we used to drive
+from Texas to Montana and the boys used to shoot-up
+towns and each other just for fun. Well, this Kid
+Gowan has got Billie&#8217;s eyes and slit mouth. Can&#8217;t say
+I ever took to him, but seeing as how he was a crack-up
+puncher and Wes Knowles&#8217; foreman&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s it! I can&#8217;t understand it&ndash;&ndash;Kid has been
+almost like a son to me all these years!&#8221; complained
+Knowles perplexedly. He explained to his daughter.
+&#8220;You&#8217;re wondering why I didn&#8217;t come sooner, honey.
+Those Utes had been let go. We had to follow them
+up a long ways. When we got them back and put
+them on that trail from the waterhole, they found it
+led straight across the flats to where the horses and
+wagon had stood. There the tracks of the Indian
+shoes ended, and the tracks of shod hoofs led off into
+the brush. We followed them all the way &#8217;round to
+the lower waterhole and up the lower creek to the
+ranch, and there they took us right to Rocket&#8217;s heels.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_377' name='page_377'></a>377</span>
+The Jap said Kid had his saddle in the wagon when
+he came back from town, and he had a new hat. Mr.
+Blake did some hot shooting at that assassin on the
+hill. So, putting two and two together&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Daddy, I know&ndash;&ndash;I knew when I saw him
+look at Lafe!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; Knowles choked back the epithet.
+&#8220;Yes, Mrs. Blake told us about that&ndash;&ndash;and about her
+husband! Jumping Jehosaphat! Think of his being
+your brother! You must have been plumb locoed, to
+keep still about that! Why didn&#8217;t you tell us, honey?&ndash;&ndash;leastways
+me, your Daddy!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&ndash;&ndash;I&ndash;&ndash;But about Genevieve? Tell me. You
+could have come sooner if she&ndash;&ndash;Was she lost? I
+was sure that pony&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Better have given her a fast one. It came on so
+dark before he was half down the mountain that she
+was knocked out of the saddle by a branch. He went
+on down to the waterhole. She tried to catch him&ndash;&ndash;couldn&#8217;t.
+Got lost and wandered all around before
+she got down to the waterhole and caught him. We
+had got to the ranch at dusk, and all the posse had
+turned in for the night. She came loping down the
+divide just after moonrise. We started as soon as
+we could rake up all the picket-pins and rope. Wanted
+Mrs. Blake to wait and come on later; but talk about
+grit! We simply couldn&#8217;t make her stay behind.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Isobel thrust herself free from her father&#8217;s arms
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_378' name='page_378'></a>378</span>
+and darted out through the circle of rugged, earnest-faced
+punchers and cowmen to where Genevieve lay
+resting with the baby clasped to her bosom.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dear! you poor dear!&#8221; she murmured, kneeling
+to stroke the head of the weary young mother.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall soon be rested,&#8221; replied Genevieve.
+&#8220;How about Tom? Have you kept watch of him?
+Has he moved?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl shrank back, unable to face her sister-in-law&#8217;s
+eager look.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&ndash;&ndash;I&ndash;&ndash;The fire&ndash;&ndash;it&ndash;&ndash;it disappeared, and
+I could not see.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Genevieve smiled, and the reddening dawn lent a
+trace of color to her pale face. &#8220;It was a good sign.
+He could not have been suffering so much. He must
+have slept, and the fire died down.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh! you think that was it?&#8221; sighed Isobel. &#8220;I
+feared&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>She did not say what it was she had feared. As
+she paused Genevieve looked up into her agitated face
+and asked quickly: &#8220;But Lafayette? Is he still
+sleeping?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, where&#8217;s Lafe, honey?&#8221; inquired Knowles.
+&#8220;We&#8217;ll have to roust him out to tell us just what way
+he came up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Haven&#8217;t I told you?&#8221; cried Isobel, her head still
+in a whirl of conflicting emotions. Then, as tersely and
+quietly as her father would have related it, she told
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_379' name='page_379'></a>379</span>
+the bald facts of how Ashton had been wakened by the
+snarl of the wolf, how he had insisted upon going back
+to help her brother, and how he had gone down into
+the darkness, the pack and lantern slung over his shoulder.</p>
+<p>&#8220;By&ndash;&ndash;James!&#8221; vowed Knowles, when she had
+finished. &#8220;Any man on the Western Slope say that
+boy&#8217;s not acclimated, he&#8217;d better look for another climate
+himself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Gentleman,&#8221; the sheriff addressed the exclaiming
+crowd, &#8220;you heard tell what the little lady had to say
+about her husband and this Lafe Ashton going down
+into Deep Ca&ntilde;on, where no man ever went before.
+Now Miss Chuckie has told us again how Ashton
+climbed up here, where no man in this section had a
+notion anything short of a mountain sheep could climb.
+Well, what does the gritty kid do but turn round and
+climb down again&ndash;&ndash;in the dark, mind you! They&#8217;re
+down there now, both of them&ndash;&ndash;down in the bottom
+of Deep Ca&ntilde;on. We called them tenderfeet, that day
+when Mr. Blake honored our county seat by sidetracking
+his palatial car. Boys, down there in that hole are
+the two nerviest men I ever heard tell about. One of
+&#8217;em has a broken leg. The other has broke the trail
+for us. I ask for volunteers to go down with me and
+yank &#8217;em up out of there. Gentlemen, who offers?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Instantly the crowd surged forward. Every man
+shouted, whooped, struggled to thrust himself ahead
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_380' name='page_380'></a>380</span>
+of the others and force the acceptance of his services on
+the sheriff.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hold on, boys!&#8221; he remonstrated. &#8220;Just hold
+your hawsses. I didn&#8217;t ask for a stampede. You
+can&#8217;t all go down. Last man over might get in a hurry
+to catch the first, and start a manslide.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I vote we set a thirty-year limit,&#8221; put in one of the
+younger punchers.</p>
+<p>This raised a clamor of dissent from the older men.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tell you what,&#8221; shouted another. &#8220;Let Miss
+Chuckie cut out the lucky ones.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s the ticket&ndash;&ndash;Now you&#8217;re talking!&#8221;
+Every man shouted approval, and fell silent as Isobel
+sprang up from beside Genevieve.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Friends!&#8221; she exclaimed, her eyes radiant, &#8220;it&#8217;s
+such times as these that makes life grand! I believe
+six of you would be enough, but I&#8217;ll make it ten. First,
+I&#8217;m going to bar everyone who has a wife or children.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That doesn&#8217;t include me, honey,&#8221; hastily protested
+her father.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then you come in the next&ndash;&ndash;none over thirty-five
+nor under twenty.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A groan arose from some of the youngsters, but the
+older men took their disappointment in stolid silence.
+She went on with calm decisiveness: &#8220;Now those of
+you that have done any considerable mountain climbing
+afoot this summer, please step this way.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_381' name='page_381'></a>381</span></p>
+<p>Two members of a recently disbanded surveying
+party, four punchers who had tried their luck at prospecting
+on the snowy range, and three wild horse hunters
+sprang forward in response to the request.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s enough,&#8221; said the sheriff. &#8220;I&#8217;ve got to
+own up to being forty. But I&#8217;m leading this here
+posse, and I&#8217;ll eat my hat if I can&#8217;t outclimb anything
+on two legs in this county. String out your ropes, boys,
+and pass over all them picket-pins. We&#8217;ll need a purchase
+now and again, I figure, hauling up Mr. Blake.
+Hustle! Here&#8217;s the sun clean up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Under the brusquely jovial directions of their leader,
+the lucky nine divested themselves of spurs and cartridge
+belts, tied themselves to the line at intervals of
+several feet, and promptly started down the dizzy
+ledges. The others helped them during the first fifty
+yards of descent with the line that Isobel had drawn
+up after it had been cast loose by Ashton. They then
+gathered along the brink, enviously watching the descent
+of their companions into the shadowy abyss.</p>
+<p>Genevieve came to where Isobel and her father
+crouched beside the others. &#8220;Thomas will not let
+me put him down, Belle,&#8221; she said. &#8220;I see you left
+the glasses beside the rock. If Lafayette has reached
+the bottom safely&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If&ndash;&ndash;safely!&#8221; echoed Isobel. &#8220;Daddy, you look&ndash;&ndash;quick,
+please!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Knowles hastened to skirt along the brink to where
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_382' name='page_382'></a>382</span>
+the little field glasses lay at the near side of the split
+rock. The two followed him, Genevieve smiling with
+pleasant anticipation, Isobel trembling with doubt and
+dread. The cowman stretched out on the rim shelf
+and peered over.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Um-m-m,&#8221; he muttered. &#8220;Can&#8217;t see anything
+down there. Too dark yet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look straight below you,&#8221; said Genevieve.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hey?&ndash;&ndash;Uh! By&ndash;&ndash;James! Well, if that ain&#8217;t
+a picture now! These sure are mighty fine little
+glasses, ma&#8217;am. I can see &#8217;em plain as day.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Them?&ndash;&ndash;you say &#8216;them,&#8217; Daddy?&#8221; cried Isobel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sure. Come and look for yourself. Guess Lafe
+is fixing Mr. Blake&#8217;s leg.&ndash;&ndash;Which reminds me, honey,
+that before we left the ranch, Mrs. Blake had me send
+for that lunger sawbones that&#8217;s come to live at Stockchute.
+He&#8217;ll be here, I figure, before or soon after
+the boys get Mr. Blake up into God&#8217;s sunshine.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Brother Tom, Daddy&ndash;&ndash;you mean my Brother
+Tom!&#8221; joyfully corrected the girl as she took the
+glasses.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, you&#8217;ve got to give me time to chew on it,
+honey. It&#8217;s come too sudden for me to take it all
+in.&#8221; He stood up and gazed gravely at the smiling
+mother and her comforted baby. &#8220;Hum-m-m. Then
+that yearling is my Chuckie&#8217;s own blood nephew.
+Well, ma&#8217;am, what do <i>you</i> think of it, if I may ask?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_383' name='page_383'></a>383</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t you make it &#8216;Jenny,&#8217; Uncle Wes?&#8221; asked
+Genevieve.</p>
+<p>He stared at her blankly. &#8220;But I didn&#8217;t adopt
+him, ma&#8217;am&ndash;&ndash;only her.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He is the brother of your dear daughter, and I
+am his wife. Come now,&#8221; she coaxed, &#8220;you must admit
+that brings me near enough to call you &#8216;Uncle
+Wes.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ve got me, ma&#8217;am&ndash;&ndash;Jenny. I give in, I
+throw up the fight. That irrigation project now&ndash;&ndash;Chuckie&#8217;s
+brother can have anything of mine he asks
+for. Only there&#8217;s one thing&ndash;&ndash;you&#8217;ve got to make
+that yearling say &#8216;Granddad&#8217; when he talks to me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;O-oh!&#8221; cooed Genevieve. &#8220;To think you feel
+that way towards him! Of course he shall say it.
+And I&ndash;&ndash;Will you not allow me to make it
+&#8216;Daddy&#8217;?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He could not resist her enticingly upturned lips. He
+brushed down his bristly mustache, and bent over awkwardly,
+to kiss his new daughter.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thought you were one of those super-high-toned
+ladies, m&#8217;m&ndash;&ndash;Jenny,&#8221; he remarked.</p>
+<p>The cultured child of millions smiled up at him reproachfully.
+&#8220;What! after I have been with you so
+long, Daddy? But it&#8217;s true there was a time&ndash;&ndash;before
+Tom taught me that men cannot be judged by
+mere polish and veneer, or the lack of polish and veneer.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_384' name='page_384'></a>384</span></p>
+<p>Isobel, all her doubts and fears allayed, had risen
+from the precipice&#8217;s edge in time to hear Genevieve&#8217;s
+reply. She added eagerly: &#8220;Nor should men be
+judged by what they have been if they have become
+something else&ndash;&ndash;if they have climbed up&ndash;&ndash;up out of
+the depths!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Belle! dear Sister Belle! Then he has proved
+it to you? Oh, I am so glad for you! He has proved
+to you that he has climbed&ndash;&ndash;to the heights.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;To the very heights! I must tell Daddy. Give
+me Thomas. See, he is fast asleep, the poor abused
+little darling! Go and watch them, and our climbers.
+They are going down like a string of mountain sheep.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Genevieve placed the baby in his aunt&#8217;s outstretched
+arms and went to look into the abyss through the field
+glasses. Isobel drew her father away, out of earshot
+of the down-peering group of men. She stopped behind
+the tent, which Gowan had pitched part way up
+the slope of the ridge.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You want to talk with me about Lafe, honey?&#8221;
+surmised Knowles, as the girl started to speak and hesitated.</p>
+<p>Her cheeks flamed scarlet, but she raised her shyly
+lowered eyes and looked up at him with a clear, direct
+gaze. &#8220;Yes, Daddy. He&ndash;&ndash;he loves me, and I&ndash;&ndash;love
+him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That so?&#8221; said Knowles. His eyes contracted.
+It was his only betrayal of the wrench she had given
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_385' name='page_385'></a>385</span>
+the tender heart within his tough exterior. &#8220;Well, I
+figured it was bound to come some day. I&#8217;ve been
+lucky not to lose you any time the last four years.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&ndash;&ndash;you do not say anything about him,
+Daddy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Haven&#8217;t you cut him out of the herd?&#8221; he dryly
+replied. &#8220;That&#8217;s enough for me, long as I know
+he&#8217;s your choice and is square.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He has nothing; he is very poor.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s got the will to work. He&#8217;ll get there, with
+you pushing on the reins. That&#8217;s how I size him
+up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But, Daddy, he told me he had been bad, very
+bad.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Knowles searched the girl&#8217;s face, with a sudden up-leaping
+of concern&ndash;&ndash;that vanished as quickly before
+what he saw in her clear eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Might have expected it of you, honey. You
+stand by him. You&#8217;ve got sense enough to know what
+it means when a man thinks enough of a girl to tell
+her the wrong things he has done. I was wild, too,
+when I was a youngster. There was a girl I thought
+enough of to tell. She wasn&#8217;t your kind, honey. It
+came near sending me to the devil for good. You
+know better. No girl ought to be fool enough to
+hitch up with a man to reform him. But if he has
+already taken a brace and straightened the kinks out of
+himself, that&#8217;s different.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_386' name='page_386'></a>386</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;He has come up, Daddy&ndash;&ndash;out of the depths.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Knowles only half caught her meaning. &#8220;Sure he
+climbed up. That proves he has the grit and the nerve.
+He had proved that even better, going down at the
+other place. Put any man down there, and he&#8217;d make
+a try to get out. No, the real test was his going back
+down again. He might have come up just for himself.
+But going down again&ndash;&ndash;that&#8217;s the proof of
+what&#8217;s in him; that&#8217;s what proves he&#8217;s white!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dear Daddy!... But I&#8217;m afraid. He thinks
+he has been too bad ever to&ndash;&ndash;to marry me. I&#8217;m so
+afraid he&#8217;ll go away and leave me!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The cowman straightened up, his eyes glinting with
+righteous indignation.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What! Go &#8217;way and leave you?&ndash;&ndash;when you want
+him to stay? By&ndash;&ndash;James! He&#8217;s going to stay!
+Don&#8217;t you worry, honey. He&#8217;s going to stay, if I have
+to rope and hogtie him for you!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl stared into the frowning face of her father.
+There was no twinkle in the corner of his eyes. He
+was absolutely serious. For the first time in over two
+days her dimples flashed. Her eyes sparkled with
+merriment. Her lips parted. But she checked the
+gay laugh before it could burst out.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh!&#8221; she reproached herself. &#8220;How could I?
+And they still down there&ndash;&ndash;and Tom suffering!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tom?&#8221; repeated Knowles. &#8220;Thomas Blake&ndash;&ndash;your
+brother! That&#8217;s why you got me started reading
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_387' name='page_387'></a>387</span>
+all those reports and engineering journals. You
+guessed it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It did not seem possible. Yet I could not help
+hoping.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Things do happen our way&ndash;&ndash;sometimes,&#8221; qualified
+Knowles. &#8220;Mrs. Blake&ndash;&ndash;Jenny&ndash;&ndash;says Lafe
+brought up word that the project can be put through.
+I meant to fight. But now&ndash;&ndash;he is your brother, and
+he has done something no man ever before thought
+could be done&ndash;&ndash;he has surveyed Deep Ca&ntilde;on. He
+has me beat. I&#8217;ve told Mrs.&ndash;&ndash;Jenny straight out.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know he will do what is right by you, dear, dear
+Daddy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s your brother, honey. That settles it.&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='toprule' />
+<div class='chsp'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_388' name='page_388'></a>388</span>
+<a name='CHAPTER_XXXIV_RECLAMATION' id='CHAPTER_XXXIV_RECLAMATION'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XXXIV</h2>
+<h3>RECLAMATION</h3>
+</div>
+<p>Even with the mutual assistance that they could
+give one another, and with the certain knowledge
+that the descent was possible, the rescuers had no easy
+task following the trail &#8220;broken&#8221; by Ashton. Their
+very numbers prevented them from going down as
+fast as he had gone. On the other hand, those on the
+upper part of the life-line could steady their companions
+over ledges and down the steeper crevices, while
+the leaders helped the ones who followed by hammering
+footholds in the rock and at the very worst places
+driving in picket-pins to hold the extra ropes brought
+down for the purpose.</p>
+<p>Still, Deep Ca&ntilde;on was Deep Ca&ntilde;on&ndash;&ndash;the ladder it
+offered was a ladder of Titans. Many long hours of
+waiting passed after the rescuing party disappeared
+among the shadows less than a third of the way down
+the steep-sloping precipices, before they came struggling
+upwards again into view of the anxious watchers
+on the brink. The sun had circled well over into the
+western sky.</p>
+<p>There was yet a thousand feet for the rescuers to
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_389' name='page_389'></a>389</span>
+clamber, hauling and pushing up in their midst the
+heavy body of the injured engineer. All during the
+first half of the ascent Blake had made the task as easy
+as he could by the strenuous exertion of the great
+strength still left in his arms and his sound leg. But
+at last the bandages that bound his broken leg had
+chafed in two on the rough ledges; and even his iron
+nerve had not long been able to withstand the torture
+of the twisting break.</p>
+<p>He now dangled helpless in the sling by which they
+had secured him. Half the time he was mercifully
+unconscious; the other half his jaw was set rigid and
+his lips were compressed to stifle his groans of agony.
+Whenever possible Ashton climbed beside him, striving
+to ease the roughness of the ascent.</p>
+<p>A full hour before they reached the top, the thin-faced
+consumptive surgeon arrived from Stockchute
+with his splints and medical case. Waited upon by
+Isobel and Genevieve, he was fully recovered from the
+exertion of his ride when at last the panting rescuers
+came toiling up to the brink.</p>
+<p>Eager hands dragged the unconscious engineer to the
+top and carried him to where the surgeon sat waiting.
+A few of the watchers lingered to help the rescuers
+over the rim; then they, too, hurried away to see if
+Blake had survived that terrible ascent. For the last
+two hundred feet he had looked like a dead man.
+There was no cheering. Deep Ca&ntilde;on had been conquered;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_390' name='page_390'></a>390</span>
+but it was yet to be seen whether the victory
+had not been won at a disastrous cost.</p>
+<p>The sheriff and his nine men sank down on the
+grassy slope, gasping, outspent. Ashton collapsed in
+their midst. He was more than outspent; he was utterly
+exhausted. The instant he had seen Blake lifted
+over the rim-rock, he had given way to the strain of his
+frightful exertions. When a man sent by Isobel came
+hurrying to the rescuers with water and coffee, Ashton
+was unable to move or speak. The man had to hold
+him up and pour the coffee down his throat.</p>
+<p>One by one, the sheriff and the others staggered up
+and went to join the silent group about Blake. No
+one left that circle of watchers. They were waiting
+for the result of the surgeon&#8217;s efforts to resuscitate the
+unconscious man. It was a desperate fight. But the
+surgeon had won a place in the forefront of his profession
+before the white plague had driven him from
+New York to this health-giving wilderness. He knew
+all the latest, most wonderful methods of resuscitation.
+And he had for assistants two who loved and were
+loved by his patient.</p>
+<p>When at last the announcement was made that the
+engineer had come out of his swoon and probably
+would live, the sheriff and all the members of the posse
+not employ&eacute;s of Knowles prepared to ride down to
+Plum Creek ranch for the night. The cowman ordered
+his men to go down with the party, to water the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_391' name='page_391'></a>391</span>
+horses and bring back food and water for the camp.
+The surgeon had said that his patient could not be
+moved for many days.</p>
+<p>But before the party rode off, each man, from the
+sheriff to the youngest of the punchers, came to where
+Ashton was still lying on the grass, and took his limp
+hand in theirs. They did not grip it, for the tattered
+glove and shredded bandages were wet with blood;
+nor did they put into speech what they thought of him.
+A gruff word or two of fellowship and parting was all
+they gave him. Yet he saw and knew that he had won
+his place among these reddest blooded of all red-blooded
+men.</p>
+<p>When one of his fellow employ&eacute;s came to him, leading
+Rocket, he sought to summon strength enough to
+rise, but found that he could not even turn on his side.
+He had driven his body to superhuman efforts. He
+must now pay the price. At his request, he was lifted
+up on Rocket, but he could not hold up his head, much
+less his body. They laid him again on the grass, and
+told Knowles his condition, before they rode off.</p>
+<p>The cowman fetched the surgeon, who felt the pulse
+of the exhausted man, gave him a pellet, and hastened
+back to Blake. In a few moments Ashton&#8217;s feeble,
+racing pulse became calm and slow, the wild whirl of
+his thoughts lulled. He sank into profound slumber.</p>
+<p>When he awoke the sun of another day was just
+clearing the great white peaks of the snowy range. He
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_392' name='page_392'></a>392</span>
+was outstretched on a soft bed of blankets spread over
+a thick layer of pine needles. Above his face sloped
+the roof of a small tent. He had been cared for&ndash;&ndash;but
+there was no one watching at his bedside. He
+thought he understood, and smiled in bitter resignation.</p>
+<p>When he moved, racking pains shot through his
+stiff muscles. Only the renewed life that surged
+through his veins enabled him to turn and twist and
+bend until the pains subsided to a dull aching and he
+was able to command his limbs. His hands were
+swathed fast in bandages. He tore them off with his
+teeth until the fingers were free enough for use. After
+much effort, he succeeded in forcing his swollen feet
+into his boots.</p>
+<p>In the midst Yuki, the Jap cook, appeared before the
+low entrance of the tent and sank down on his knees
+to set a trayful of food beside the occupant. He hissed
+a pleasant, &#8220;Good morning, Mistah Lafe!&#8221; and was
+gone before Ashton could reply. The aroma of hot
+coffee and the savory smell of chicken broth forced
+Ashton to forget all else than that he was famished.
+Besides the coffee and broth, there was a nogg of eggs
+and thick cream slightly flavored with whiskey. He
+drank one liquid after the other with the greediness
+of a starving man; nor did he stop until he had drained
+the last drop of all three. He could have followed
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_393' name='page_393'></a>393</span>
+with a hearty meal of solids, but the fluids were enough
+to stimulate him to renewed energy.</p>
+<p>He crept out of his tent and looked around. Up
+where they had carried Blake from the precipices stood
+a larger tent. Near it, under a low-growing pine, the
+surgeon lay rolled in a blanket, fast asleep. Some distance
+away, in the other direction, Yuki and two of
+the ranch hands were building a stone fireplace. Beyond
+them were picketed three horses, the nearest of
+which was Rocket.</p>
+<p>Ashton stood up and started rapidly towards the big
+rawboned horse. Within a few yards, however, his
+pace slackened. He faltered and stopped to look back
+at the larger tent. After a pause, he turned about and
+slowly approached the tent.</p>
+<p>As he drew near he heard a murmur of voices barely
+distinguishable above the booming of the ca&ntilde;on.
+Again he faltered and stopped and stood hesitating.
+The open front of the tent faced at right angles to
+his line of approach. As he hesitated, he saw Isobel&#8217;s
+head appear, veiled in the loose meshes of her chestnut
+hair. She looked about towards him, and drew back
+with a startled little cry.</p>
+<p>He turned away to go to Rocket. A quick heavy
+step sounded behind him. Knowles had sprung out
+of the tent and was striding to overtake the retreating
+man.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_394' name='page_394'></a>394</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Hold on, Lafe,&#8221; he ordered. &#8220;Where you going?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton faced him with quiet resolution. His eyes
+were dark with misery, but his once lax mouth was
+strangely like Blake&#8217;s in its firm full lines.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s only one thing for me to do, Mr.
+Knowles,&#8221; he replied. &#8220;I am going away. Your
+daughter will understand why.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How&#8217;re you going?&#8221; asked the cowman, his face
+impassive.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I traded with Miss&ndash;&ndash;Miss Knowles for Rocket.
+Didn&#8217;t she ever tell you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t matter if she did. Rocket wasn&#8217;t her
+hawss to trade.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then, unless my pony is up here, I shall walk
+down as far as the ranch,&#8221; said Ashton. He added
+with bitter humiliation: &#8220;It&#8217;s well I have learned
+about Rocket in time. I&#8217;ve done enough, without adding
+horse thief to the list. I would have started at
+once, but I could not leave until I had asked about Mr.
+Blake. I wished to thank him for all that he has done
+for me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All that he&ndash;&ndash;!&#8221; echoed Knowles. &#8220;If you want
+to know, it was a mighty narrow squeak. But we
+pulled him through. He&#8217;s awake now and says he&#8217;s
+doing fine. He wants to talk to you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I should like very much to do as he wishes, Mr.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_395' name='page_395'></a>395</span>
+Knowles, but I&ndash;&ndash;cannot bear to&ndash;&ndash;meet her. You
+may realize that it is hard enough at best.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Sho!</i> If that&#8217;s all,&#8221; readily reassured the cowman,
+&#8220;I&#8217;ll ask Chuckie to go out and hide in the
+bushes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But I could not allow that, you know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then I figure you&#8217;ve got to come anyhow. Can&#8217;t
+let you go off without saying good-by to him and
+Jenny.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jenny?&#8221; repeated Ashton.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s all in the family now,&#8221; explained Knowles.
+&#8220;Tom has been telling us how he&#8217;s got that irrigation
+project all figured out in his head. He was saying
+what he and Jenny had planned to do for us even
+before Chuckie let out her secret. Come on and hear
+the rest.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I fear I must ask you to excuse me, Mr. Knowles.
+I&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, you don&#8217;t,&#8221; rejoined the cowman. &#8220;After
+what you&#8217;ve done you can&#8217;t make me believe you&#8217;re
+afraid of anything. You&#8217;ll come and face it out before
+you go.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The misery in Ashton&#8217;s eyes deepened, and his lips
+tightened.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Very well. Since you put it that way, I shall do
+as you wish, sir.&#8221;</p>
+<p>When he followed Knowles around to the door of
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_396' name='page_396'></a>396</span>
+the tent, Isobel, who was hastily braiding her loose
+hair, drew back into the far corner and averted her
+face from him. But Genevieve met him with a radiant
+smile and motioned him to kneel down beside her
+husband.</p>
+<p>Blake, with one thick arm crooked about his sleeping
+son, lay with his eyes closed. His big square face
+was drawn and pallid, but there was a smile lurking in
+the corners of his mouth. As Ashton knelt beside him
+he looked up and lifted his free hand.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You wouldn&#8217;t take it&ndash;&ndash;down there,&#8221; he said.</p>
+<p>Ashton flushed. &#8220;You know why.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll take it now,&#8221; said Blake, with quiet confidence.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I will. I am going away,&#8221; replied Ashton as he
+held out his bandaged hand.</p>
+<p>The big palm closed over it in a clasp as gentle as
+it was strong.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, Lafe. I&#8217;ve got hold of you now. I can&#8217;t
+let you go. I need you in my business. We&#8217;re
+organizing the Belle Mesa Irrigation and Development
+Company.&ndash;&ndash;How do you like my new name for Dry
+Mesa? Mr. Knowles puts in the reservoir site in
+exchange for water on his other land, a tenth share in
+the company, and a royalty of half the gold we placer
+out of the reservoir bed. As Jenny is to put up all
+the capital, she and I will take the lion&#8217;s share. That
+will leave a tenth for you and a tenth for Belle.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_397' name='page_397'></a>397</span></p>
+<p>Ashton sought to draw his hand away. &#8220;It is very
+good of you, Mr. Blake. But I cannot accept&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, you can. You can&#8217;t help yourself. Besides,
+I&#8217;ve an idea a man always does better by his work
+when he has a stake in the undertaking. You&#8217;re to
+be our Resident Engineer, you know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Resident Engineer?&#8221; repeated Ashton, paling and
+flushing. &#8220;Mr. Blake, I&ndash;&ndash;I&ndash;&ndash;It&#8217;s impossible
+that you can mean&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Make it &#8216;Tom&#8217;! You&#8217;ll have to brush up on
+mining engineering, too. There&#8217;s the bonanza.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, yes, Tom!&#8221; exclaimed Genevieve. &#8220;Tell
+him about the gold mine.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I was going to keep still about it till I had the apex
+located,&#8221; he said. He looked full at Ashton. &#8220;But
+there&#8217;s no one here that the secret will not be as safe
+with as it is with me. Besides, it&#8217;s all in the family.
+I found the vein a thousand feet up the chute of Dry
+Fork Gulch. We will name it the Genevieve Lode.
+There are six of us here, counting Tommy. Each of
+us gets a sixth interest.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton was now pale. &#8220;Mr. Blake&ndash;&ndash;Tom, I cannot!
+If I were fit to stay and work for you&ndash;&ndash;as an
+axman&ndash;&ndash;anything!&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blake&#8217;s eyes twinkled. &#8220;Then your sixth will have
+to go to Belle.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mine too, Tom,&#8221; hastily put in Knowles.</p>
+<p>Blake looked down solemnly at his youthful heir.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_398' name='page_398'></a>398</span>
+&#8220;Hear that, Tommy? Guess we&#8217;ll have to pull out,
+too, and make it half and half to the ladies." He
+looked up at Ashton with a swift change from mock
+to real gravity. &#8220;We&#8217;ve got to begin by installing a
+turbine power-plant down here. Where will I find another
+engineer with nerve enough to go down these
+cliffs? I need you, Lafe.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am very sorry, Tom.&#8221; Ashton drew his hand
+from Blake&#8217;s wearied clasp, and rose.</p>
+<p>Isobel slipped past him and stood with her arms outstretched
+across the entrance of the tent. There was
+a dimple in each of her blushing cheeks; her eyes were
+radiant with tenderness and love.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, you can&#8217;t get away!&#8221; she declared. &#8220;Don&#8217;t
+you see how we&#8217;ve got you corralled?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s what,&#8221; confirmed Knowles. &#8220;I promised
+her to rope and hogtie you if you made a break.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Ashton was gazing into the girl&#8217;s eyes, his own
+shining with reverent adoration.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Isobel?&#8221; he whispered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let us go up on the ridge and look out over our
+mesa,&#8221; she murmured.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Wait a moment, dear,&#8221; interposed Genevieve.
+&#8220;Lafayette, I wish to tell you that as soon as Tom and
+I return to Chicago, we shall go to your father. I
+feel certain that when he hears&ndash;&ndash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, no!&#8221; begged Ashton. &#8220;You must wait.
+Promise that you will wait. I have only begun to
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_399' name='page_399'></a>399</span>
+make a beginning. Wait until I see if I can&ndash;&ndash;&#8221; He
+straightened and looked at Isobel, his head well up,
+his eyes as resolute as his mouth. &#8220;Wait until I have
+proved what I am.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Come,&#8221; said Isobel. &#8220;We&#8217;re going to look at
+our dry mesa that we are to reclaim and make into a
+garden with the waste waters of the depths.&#8221;</p>
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<hr class="full" />
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+++ b/29131.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,11366 @@
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Out of the Depths, by Robert Ames Bennet,
+Illustrated by George Brehm
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Out of the Depths
+       A Romance of Reclamation
+
+
+Author: Robert Ames Bennet
+
+
+
+Release Date: June 15, 2009  [eBook #29131]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OUT OF THE DEPTHS***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Roger Frank and the Project Gutenberg Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
+      file which includes the original illustrations.
+      See 29131-h.htm or 29131-h.zip:
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/29131/29131-h/29131-h.htm)
+      or
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/29131/29131-h.zip)
+
+
+Transcriber's note:
+
+      The author consistently refers to a handgun as a "Colt's."
+      This is a Colt's revolver, though the word "revolver" is
+      not used.
+
+
+
+
+
+OUT OF THE DEPTHS
+
+A Romance of Reclamation
+
+by
+
+ROBERT AMES BENNET
+
+Author of "Out of the Primitive," "The Shogun's Daughter,"
+"Which One," Etc.
+
+With Illustrations by George Brehm
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: It was a wild race [_Page 32_]]
+
+
+
+
+Chicago
+A. C. McClurg & Co.
+1913
+
+Copyright
+A. C. McClurg & Co.
+1913
+
+Published March, 1913
+
+Copyrighted in Great Britain
+
+Press of the Vail Company
+Coshocton, U. S. A.
+
+
+
+
+TO
+
+"THE SONS OF MARTHA"
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+ CHAPTER                                                          PAGE
+      I. Deep Canyon                                                 1
+     II. A Yearling Sold                                             9
+    III. Queen of What?                                             20
+     IV. Downhill and Up                                            32
+      V. Into the Depths                                            39
+     VI. A Test of Caliber                                          52
+    VII. The Chance of Reclamation                                  68
+   VIII. A Man's Size Horse                                         81
+     IX. The Snake                                                  93
+      X. Coming Events                                             110
+     XI. Self-Defense                                              125
+    XII. The Meeting                                               138
+   XIII. The Other Lady's Husband                                  148
+    XIV. A Descent                                                 162
+     XV. Levels and Slants                                         176
+    XVI. Metal and Mettle                                          185
+   XVII. A Shot in the Dusk                                        197
+  XVIII. On the Brink                                              207
+    XIX. The Plotters                                              218
+     XX. Indian Shoes                                              232
+    XXI. Madonna Dolorosa                                          244
+   XXII. A Real Wolf                                               254
+  XXIII. The Temptation                                            268
+   XXIV. Blind Love                                                280
+    XXV. The Descent Into Hell                                     291
+   XXVI. In the Gloom                                              303
+  XXVII. Lower Depths                                              315
+ XXVIII. Light in the Darkness                                     327
+   XXIX. The Climber                                               339
+    XXX. Lurking Beasts                                            349
+   XXXI. Confessions                                               357
+  XXXII. Over the Brink                                            366
+ XXXIII. Friends in Need                                           374
+  XXXIV. Reclamation                                               388
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+                                                                  PAGE
+
+ It was a wild race                                     _Frontispiece_
+
+ It sounded its shrill, menacing rattle                            106
+
+ "You have something to tell me--your voice--your
+ eyes--"                                                           286
+
+ Another desperate clutch at the rope--still another               328
+
+
+
+
+OUT OF THE DEPTHS
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+DEEP CANYON
+
+
+The hunter was riding leisurely up the steep mountain side above Dry
+Mesa. On such an ascent most city men would have preferred to climb
+afoot. But there was a month's layer of tan on the hunter's handsome,
+supercilious face. He balanced himself lightly on his flat English
+saddle, and permitted the wiry little cow pony to pick the best path
+over the ledges and up the stiff slopes between the scattered pines.
+
+In keeping with his saddle, the hunter wore English riding breeches
+and leggins. Otherwise he was dressed as a Texas cowboy of the past
+generation. His sombrero was almost Mexican in its size and
+ornateness. But his rifle was of the latest American pattern, and in
+place of the conventional Colt's he carried an automatic pistol. As
+his horse patiently clambered with him up towards the top of the
+escarpment the man gazed indolently about between half-closed eyelids
+and inhaled the smoke from an unbroken "chain" of gilt-tipped
+cigarettes.
+
+The pony scrambled up the last ledges and came to a halt on the rim of
+High Mesa. It had been a long, hard climb. Tough as he was and
+mountain bred, the beast's rough coat was lathered with sweat and his
+flanks were heaving. The hunter's gaze roamed carelessly over the
+hilly pine-clad plateau of the upper mesa, while he took a nip of
+brandy from a silver-cased flask and washed it down with a drink of
+the tepid water in his canteen.
+
+Having refreshed himself, he touched a patent lighter to another
+cigarette, chose a direction at random, and spurred his pony into a
+canter. The beast held to the pace until the ascent of a low but steep
+ridge brought him down to a walk. With the change of gait the hunter
+paused in the act of lighting a fresh cigarette, to gaze up at the
+sapphire sky. The air was reverberating with a muffled sound like
+distant thunder. Yet the crystal-clear dome above him showed no trace
+of a cloud all across from the magnificent snowy ranges on the east
+and north to the sparsely wooded mountains and sage-gray mesas to the
+south and west.
+
+"Can't be thunder," he murmured--"no sign of a storm. Must be a
+stream. Ah! cool, fresh water!"
+
+The sharp-roweled spurs goaded the pony up over the round of the ridge
+as fast as he could scramble. At the top he broke into a lope and
+raced headlong down the other side of the ridge through the tall
+brush. The reverberating sound of water was clearer but still muffled
+and distant.
+
+The rider let his reins hang slack and recklessly dug in his spurs.
+The pony leaped ahead with still greater speed and burst out of the
+brush on to a narrow open slope that led down to the brink of a canyon.
+The hunter saw first the precipice on the far side of the yawning
+chasm--then the near edge, seemingly, to his startled gaze, right
+under his horse's forefeet. He was dashing straight at the frightful
+abyss.
+
+A yell of terror burst from his lips, and he sought to fling himself
+backwards and sideways out of the saddle. His instinctive purpose was
+to fall to the ground and clutch the grass tufts. But in the same
+moment that he tried to throw himself off, the nimble pony swerved to
+the left so abruptly that the man's effort served only to keep himself
+balanced on the saddle. Had he remained erect or flung himself to the
+other side he must have been hurled off and down over the precipice.
+
+Nor was the danger far from past. Carried on down the slope by the
+momentum of their headlong rush, the plunging pony "skidded" to the
+very brink of the precipice. Though the man shrank down and sought to
+avert his face, he caught a glimpse of the black depths below them as,
+snorting with fear, the pony wrenched himself around on the rim shelf
+of the edge.
+
+For an instant--an instant that was an age of sickening suspense to
+his rider--the pony toppled. But before the man could shriek out his
+horror, the agile beast had recovered his balance and was scrambling
+around, away from the edge. He plunged a few yards up the slope, and
+stopped, wheezing and blowing.
+
+The man flung the reins over the pony's head and slipped to the
+ground. For a minute or longer he lay outstretched, limp and
+white-faced. When he looked up, the pony was stolidly cropping a tuft
+of grass. Beasts are not often troubled with imagination. The hunter
+remembered his brandy flask. After two long pulls at its contents, the
+vivid coloring began to return to his cheeks.
+
+He rose to his feet and walked down to a ledge on the brink of the
+precipice with an air of bravado. But when he looked over into the
+chasm, he quickly shrank back and crouched on his hands and knees.
+Before again peering over he stretched himself out flat on the level
+ledge and grasped an out-jutting point of rock.
+
+Beneath his dizzy eyes the precipitous sides of the canyon dropped away
+seemingly into the very bowels of the earth,--far down in sheer
+unbroken walls of black rock for hundreds and thousands of feet. He
+flattened closer to the rock on which he lay, and sought to pierce
+with his gaze the blue-black shadows of the stupendous rift. Every
+nerve in his body tingled; his ankles ached with the exquisite pain of
+that overpowering sight.
+
+The chasm was so narrow and its depth so great that only in one place
+did the noonday sun strike down through its gloomy abyss to the
+bottom. At that single spot he could distinguish the foam and flash of
+the rushing waters, but elsewhere his only evidence of the sunken
+torrent beneath him was the ceaseless reverberations that came rolling
+up out of the depths.
+
+"_Mon Dieu!_" he muttered. "To think I came so near--!... Must be what
+they call Deep Canyon."
+
+He crept away from the brink. As he rose to his feet his trembling
+fingers automatically placed a cigarette between his lips and applied
+the patent lighter. Soothed by the narcotic, he stood gazing across at
+the far side of the canyon while he sucked in and slowly exhaled the
+smoke. With the last puff he touched a fresh cigarette to the butt of
+the first, thrust it between his lips, and snipped the cork stub over
+the edge into the canyon.
+
+"There you are--take that!" he mocked the abyss.
+
+As he turned away he drew out an extremely thin gold watch. The
+position of the hour hand brought a petulant frown to his white
+forehead. He hastened to mount his pony. Short as had been the rest,
+the wiry little animal had regained his wind and strength. Stung by
+the spurs, he plunged up the side of the ridge and loped off along
+its level top, parallel with the canyon.
+
+The hunter drew his rifle from its saddle sheath and began to
+scrutinize the country before him in search of game. A pair of
+weather-beaten antlers so excited him that he even forgot to maintain
+his chain of cigarettes. His dark eyes shone bright and eager and his
+full red lips grew tense in resolute lines that completely altered the
+previous laxity of his expression.
+
+He had covered nearly a mile when he was rewarded for his alertness by
+a glimpse of a large animal in the chaparral thicket before him. He
+drew rein to test the wind in approved book hunter fashion. There was
+not a breath of air stirring. The mesa lay basking in the dry, hot
+stillness of the July afternoon. He set the safety catch of his rifle,
+ready for instant firing, stretched himself flat on his pony's neck,
+and started on.
+
+The animal in the thicket moved slowly to the right, as if grazing. At
+frequent intervals the hunter caught glimpses of its roan side, but
+could not see its head or the outline of its body. At seventy-five
+yards, fearful that his game might take fright and bolt, he turned his
+horse sideways, and slipped down to aim his rifle across the saddle.
+It was his first deer. He waited, twitching and quivering with "buck
+fever."
+
+Part of the fore quarters of the animal became visible to his excited
+gaze through a small gap in the screening bushes. The muzzle of his
+rifle wobbled all around the mark. Unable to steady it, he caught the
+sights as they wavered into line, and pulled the trigger.
+
+The report of the shot was followed by a loud _bawl_ and a violent
+crashing in the thicket. There could be no doubt that the animal had
+been hit and was seeking to escape. It was running across the top of
+the ridge towards the canyon. The hunter sprang around the head of his
+pony and threw up his rifle, which had automatically reloaded itself.
+As it came to his shoulder, the wounded animal burst out of cover. It
+was a yearling calf.
+
+But the sportsman knew that he had shot a deer, and a deer was all he
+saw. He was now fairly shaking with the "fever." His finger crooked
+convulsively on the automatic firing lever. Instantly a stream of
+bullets began to pour from the wildly wavering muzzle, and empty
+shells whirred up from the ejector like hornets.
+
+Before the hunter could realize what was happening, his magazine was
+exhausted, the last cartridge fired, and the shell flipped out. But he
+paid no heed to this. His eyes were on the fleeing calf. His
+cartridges were smokeless. Through the slight haze above his rifle
+muzzle he saw the animal pitch forward and fall heavily upon the round
+of the ridge. It did not move.
+
+Tugging at the bridle to quicken his horse's pace, he hastened forward
+to examine his game. He was still so excited that he was almost upon
+the outstretched carcass before he noticed the odd scar on its side.
+He bent down and saw that the mark was a cattle brand seared on the
+hide with a hot iron.
+
+His first impulse was to jump on his pony and ride off. He was about
+to set his foot in the stirrup when the apprehensive glance with which
+he was peering around shifted down to the canyon. His gaze traveled
+back from the near edge of the chasm, up the two hundred yards of
+slope, and rested on the yearling as though estimating its weight.
+
+It was a fat, thoroughbred Hereford. He could not lift it on his pony,
+and he had no rope to use as a drag-line. He shook his head. But the
+pause had given him time to recover from his panic. He shrugged his
+shoulders, drew a silver-handled hunting knife, and awkwardly set
+about dressing his kill.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+A YEARLING SOLD
+
+
+Three riders came galloping along the ridge towards the hunter. At
+sight of his pony the grizzled cowman in the lead signed to his
+companions and came to a sudden stop behind a clump of service-berry
+bushes. The others swerved in beside him, the bowlegged young puncher
+on the right with his hand at his hip.
+
+"Jumping Jehosaphat!" he exulted. "We shore have got him, Mr. Knowles,
+the blasted--" His thin lips closed tight to shut in the oath as he
+turned his gaze on the lovely flushed face of the girl beside him.
+When his cold gray eyes met hers they lighted with a glow like that of
+fire through ice.
+
+"You better stay here, Miss Chuckie," he advised. "We're going to cure
+that rustler."
+
+"But, Kid, what if--No, no! wait!" she cried at sight of his drawn
+Colt's. "Daddy, stop him! The man may not be a rustler."
+
+"You heard the shooting," answered the cowman.
+
+"Yes, but he may have been after a deer," answered the girl, lifting
+her lithe figure tiptoe in the stirrups of her man's saddle to peer
+over the bushes.
+
+"Deer?" rejoined the puncher. "Who'd be deer-hunting in July?"
+
+"Then a bear. He fired fast enough," remarked the girl.
+
+"Not much chance of that round here," said the cowman. "Still, it
+might be. At any rate, Kid, this time I want you to wait for me to ask
+questions _before_ you cut loose."
+
+"If he don't try any funny business," qualified the puncher.
+
+"Course," assented Knowles. "Chuckie, you best stay back here."
+
+"Oh, no, Daddy. There's only one man and between you and Kid--"
+
+"_Sho!_ Come on, then, if you're set on it. Kid, you circle to the
+right."
+
+The puncher wheeled his horse and rode off around the chaparral. The
+girl and Knowles, after a short wait, advanced upon the hunter. They
+were soon within a few yards of him and in plain view. His pony
+stopped browsing and raised its head to look at them. But the man was
+stooped over, with his face the other way, and the incessant,
+reverberating roar of the canyon muffled the tread of their horses on
+the dusty turf.
+
+The puncher crashed through the corner of the thicket and pulled up on
+the top of the slope immediately opposite the hunter. The latter
+sprang to his feet. The puncher instantly covered him with his
+long-barreled revolver and snapped tersely: "Hands up!"
+
+"My--ante!" gasped the hunter. "A--a road agent!"
+
+But he did not throw up his hands. With the rash bravery of
+inexperience, he dropped his knife and snatched out his automatic
+pistol. On the instant the puncher's big revolver roared. The pistol
+went spinning out of the hunter's hand. Through the smoke of the shot
+the puncher leveled his weapon.
+
+"Put up your hands!--put them up!" screamed the girl, urging her horse
+forward.
+
+The hunter obeyed, none too soon. For several moments he stood rigid,
+glaring half dazed at the revolver muzzle and the cool hard face
+behind it. Then slowly he twisted about to see who it was had warned
+him. The girl had ridden up within a few feet.
+
+"You--you _tenderfoot_!" she flung at him. "Are you locoed? Hadn't you
+any more sense than to do that? Why, if Daddy hadn't told Mr. Gowan to
+wait--"
+
+"You shore would have got yours, you--rustler!" snapped the puncher.
+"It was you, though, Miss Chuckie--your being here."
+
+"But he's not a rustler, Kid," protested the girl. "Where are your
+eyes? Look at his riding togs. If they're not tenderfoot, howling
+tenderfoot--!"
+
+"Just the same, honey, he's shot a yearling," said Knowles, frowning
+at the culprit. "Suppose you let me do the questioning."
+
+"Ah--pardon me," remarked the hunter, rebounding from apprehension to
+easy assurance at sight of the girl's smile. "I would prefer to be
+third-degreed by the young lady. Permit me to salute the Queen of the
+Outlaws!"
+
+He bent over the fingers of one hand to raise his silver-banded
+sombrero by its high peak. It left his head--and a bullet left the
+muzzle of the puncher's revolver. A hole appeared low down in the side
+of the sombrero.
+
+"That'll do, Kid," ordered the cowman. "No more hazing, even if he is
+a tenderfoot."
+
+"Tenderfoot?" replied Gowan, his mouth like a straight gash across his
+lean jaws. "How about his drawing on me--and how about your yearling?
+That bullet went just where it ought to 've gone with his hat down on
+his head."
+
+There was no jesting even of the grimmest quality in the puncher's
+look and tone. He was very cool and quiet--and his Colt's was leveled
+for another shot.
+
+The hunter thrust up his hands as high as he could reach.
+
+"You--you surely can't intend to murder me!" he stammered, staring from
+the puncher to the cowman. "I'll pay ransom--anything you ask! Don't let
+him shoot me! I'm Lafayette Ashton--I'll pay thousands--anything! My
+father is George Ashton, the great financier!"
+
+"New York?" queried Knowles.
+
+"No, no, Chicago! He--If only you'll write to him!"
+
+The girl burst into a ringing laugh. "Oh!" she cried, the moment she
+could speak, "Oh, Daddy! don't you see? He really thinks we're a bunch
+of wild and woolly bandits!"
+
+The hunter looked uncertainly from her dimpled face to Gowan's ready
+revolver. Turning sharply about to the cowman, he caught him in a
+reluctant grin. With a sudden spring, he placed the girl between
+himself and the scowling puncher. Behind this barrier of safety he
+swept off his hat and bowed to the girl with an exaggerated display of
+politeness that hinted at mockery.
+
+"So it's merely a cowboy joke," he said. "I bend, not to the Queen of
+the Outlaws, but to the Princess of the Cows!"
+
+Her dimples vanished. She looked over his head with the barest shade
+of disdain in her expression.
+
+"The joke came near to being on us," she said. "Kid, put up your gun.
+A tenderfoot who has enough nerve and no more sense than to draw when
+you have the drop on him, you've hazed him enough."
+
+Gowan sullenly reloaded his Colt's and replaced it in its holster.
+
+"That's right," said Knowles; but he turned sharply upon the offender.
+"Look here, Mr. Ashton, if that's your name--there's still the matter
+of this yearling. Shooting stock in a cattle country isn't any
+laughing matter."
+
+"But, I say," replied the hunter, "I didn't know it was your cow,
+really I didn't."
+
+"Doesn't make any difference whose brand was on the calf. Even if it
+had been a maverick--"
+
+"But that's it!" interrupted Ashton. "I didn't see the brand--only
+glimpses of the beast in the chaparral. I thought it a deer until
+after it fell and I came up to look."
+
+"You shore did," jeered Gowan. "That's why you was hurrying to yank
+off the hide. No chance of proving a case on you with the brand down
+in Deep Canyon."
+
+"Indeed no," replied Ashton, drawing a trifle closer to the girl's
+stirrup. "You are quite wrong--quite. I was dressing the animal to
+take it to my camp. Because I had mistaken it for a deer was no reason
+why I should leave it to the coyotes."
+
+"What business you got hunting deer out of season?" questioned
+Knowles.
+
+"Pardon me, but are you the game warden?" asked Ashton, with a
+supercilious smile.
+
+"Never you mind about that," rejoined the cowman. "Just you answer my
+question."
+
+Ashton shrugged, and replied in a bored tone: "I fail to see that it
+is any of your affair. But since you are so urgent to learn--I prefer
+to enjoy my sport before the rush of the open season."
+
+"Don't you know it's against the law?" exclaimed the girl.
+
+"Ah--as to that, a trifling fine--" drawled the hunter, again
+shrugging.
+
+"Humph!" grunted Knowles. "A fine might get you off for deer. Shooting
+stock, though, is a penitentiary offense--when the criminal is lucky
+enough to get into court."
+
+"Criminal!" repeated Ashton, flushing. "I have explained who I am. My
+father could buy out this entire cattle country, and never know it.
+I'll do it myself, some day, and turn the whole thing into a game
+preserve."
+
+"When you do," warned Gowan, "you'd better hunt a healthier climate."
+
+"What we're concerned with now," interposed Knowles, "is this
+yearling."
+
+"The live or the dead one, Daddy?" asked the girl, her cheeks
+dimpling.
+
+"What d'you--Aw--_haw! haw! haw!_--The live or the dead one! Catch
+that, Kid? The live or the dead one! _Haw! haw! haw!_"
+
+The cowman fairly roared with laughter. Neither of the young men
+joined in his hilarious outburst. Gowan waited, cold and unsmiling.
+Ashton stiffened with offended dignity.
+
+"I told you that the shooting of the animal was unintentional," he
+said. "I shall settle the affair by paying you the price usually asked
+for veal."
+
+"You will?" said the cowman, looking down at the indignant tenderfoot
+with a twinkle in his mirth-reddened eyes. "Well, we don't usually
+sell veal on the range. But I'll let you have this yearling at cutlet
+prices. Fifty dollars is the figure."
+
+"Why, Daddy," interrupted the girl, "half that would be--"
+
+"On the hoof, yes; but he's buying dressed veal," broke in the cowman,
+and he smiled grimly at the culprit. "Fifty dollars is cheap for a
+deer hunter who goes round shooting up the country out of season. He
+can take his choice--pay for his veal or make a trip to the county
+seat."
+
+"That's talking, Mr. Knowles," approved Gowan. "We'll corral him at
+Stockchute in that little log calaboose. He'll have a peach of a time
+talking the jury out of sending him up for rustling."
+
+"This is an outrage--rank robbery!" complained Ashton. "Of course you
+know I will pay rather than be inconvenienced by an interruption of
+my hunting." He thrust his slender hand into his pocket, and drew it
+out empty.
+
+"Dead broke!" jeered Gowan.
+
+Ashton shrugged disdainfully. "I have money at my camp. If that is not
+enough to pay your blackmail, my valet has gone back to the railway
+with my guide for a remittance of a thousand dollars, which must have
+come on a week ago."
+
+"Your camp is at the waterhole on Dry Fork," stated Knowles. "Saw a
+big smoke over there--tenderfoot's fire. Well, it's only five miles,
+and we can ride down that way. We'll go to your camp."
+
+"Ye-es?" murmured Ashton, his ardent eyes on the girl. "Miss--er--Chuckie,
+it is superfluous to remark that I shall vastly enjoy a cross-country
+ride with you."
+
+"Oh, really!" she replied.
+
+Heedless of her ironical tone, he turned a supercilious glance on
+Knowles. "Yes, and at the same time your papa and his hired man can
+take advantage of the opportunity to deliver my veal."
+
+"What's that?" growled the cowman, flushing hotly.
+
+But the girl burst into such a peal of laughter that his scowl relaxed
+to an uncertain smile.
+
+"Well, what's the joke, honey?" he asked.
+
+"Oh! oh! oh!" she cried, her blue eyes glistening with mirthful
+tears. "Don't you see he's got you, Daddy? You didn't sell him his
+meat on the hoof. You've got to dress and deliver his cutlets."
+
+"By--James!" vowed Gowan. "Before I'll butcher for such a knock-kneed
+tenderfoot I'll see him, in--"
+
+"Hold your hawsses, Kid," put in Knowles. "The joke's on me. You go on
+and look for that bunch of strays, if you want to. But I'm not going
+to back up when Chuckie says I'm roped in."
+
+Gowan looked fixedly at Ashton and the girl, swore under his breath,
+and swung to the ground. He came down beside the calf with the
+waddling step of one who has lived in the saddle from early childhood.
+Knowles joined him, and they set to work on the calf without paying
+any farther heed to the tenderfoot.
+
+Ashton, after fastidiously wiping his hands on a wisp of grass, placed
+his hunting knife in his belt and his rifle in its saddle sheath. He
+next picked up his pistol, but after a single glance at the side
+plate, smashed in by Gowan's first shot, he dropped the ruined weapon
+and rather hurriedly mounted his pony.
+
+The girl had faced away from the partly butchered carcass. As Ashton
+rode around alongside, her pony started to walk away. Instead of
+reining in, she glanced demurely at Ashton, and called over her
+shoulder: "Daddy, we'll be riding on ahead. You and Kid have the
+faster hawsses."
+
+"All right," acquiesced Knowles, without pausing in his work.
+
+Gowan said nothing; but he glanced up at the jaunty back of the
+tenderfoot with a look of cold enmity.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+QUEEN OF WHAT?
+
+
+Heedless of the men behind him, Ashton rode off with his ardent gaze
+fixed admiringly upon his companion. The more he looked at her the
+more astonished and gratified he was to have found so charming a girl
+in this raw wilderness.
+
+As a city man, he might have considered the healthy color that glowed
+under the tan of her cheeks a trifle too pronounced, had it not been
+offset by the delicate mold of her features. Her eyes were as blue as
+alpine forget-me-nots.
+
+Though she sat astride and the soft coils of her chestnut hair were
+covered with a broad-brimmed felt hat, he was puzzled to find that
+there really was nothing of the Wild West cowgirl in her costume and
+bearing. Her modest gray riding dress was cut in the very latest
+style. If her manner differed from that of most young ladies of his
+acquaintance, it was only in her delightful frankness and total
+absence of affectation. Yet she could not be a city girl on a visit,
+for she sat her horse with the erect, long-stirruped, graceful,
+yielding seat peculiar to riders of the cattle ranges.
+
+"Do you know," he gave voice to his curiosity, as she directed their
+course slantingly down the ridge away from Deep Canyon, "I am simply
+dying to learn, Miss Chuckie--"
+
+"Perhaps you had better make it 'Miss Knowles,'" she suggested, with a
+quiet smile that checked the familiarity of his manner.
+
+"Ah, yes--pardon me!--'Miss Knowles,' of course," he murmured. "But,
+you know, so unusual a name--"
+
+"You mean Chuckie?" she asked. "It formerly was quite common in the
+West--was often used as a nickname. My real name is Isobel. I
+understand that Chuckie comes from the Spanish Chiquita."
+
+"Chiquita!" he exclaimed. "But that is not a regular name. It is only
+a term of endearment, like Nina. And you say Chuckie comes from
+Chiquita? Chiquita--dear one!"
+
+His large dark eyes glowed at her brilliant with audacious admiration.
+Her color deepened, but she replied with perfect composure: "You see
+why I prefer to be addressed as 'Miss Knowles'--by you."
+
+"Yet you permitted that common cowpuncher to call you Miss Chuckie."
+
+The girl smiled ironically. "For one thing, Mr. Ashton, I have known
+Kid Gowan over eight years, and, for another, he is hardly a _common_
+cowpuncher."
+
+"He looks ordinary enough to me."
+
+"Well, well!" she rallied. "I should have thought that even to the
+innocent gaze of a tenderfoot--Let me hasten to explain that the
+common or garden variety of cowshepherd is to be distinguished in many
+respects from his predecessor of the Texas trail."
+
+"Texas trail?" he rejoined. "Now I know you're trying to string me.
+This Gowan can't be much older than I am."
+
+The girl dropped her bantering tone, and answered soberly: "He is only
+twenty-five, and yet he is a full generation older than you. He was
+born and raised in a cow camp. He is one of the few men of the type
+that remain to link the range of today with the vanished world of the
+cattle frontier."
+
+"Yet you say that the fellow is only my age?"
+
+"In years, yes. But in type he belongs to the generation that is
+past--the generation of longhorns, long drives, long Colt's, and short
+lives; of stampedes, and hats like yours, badmen, and Injins."
+
+"Surely you cannot mean that this--You called him 'Kid.'"
+
+"Kid Gowan," she confirmed. "Yes, he holds to the old traditions even
+in that. There are six notches on the hilt of his 'gun,' if you count
+the two little ones he nicked for his brace of Utes."
+
+"What! He is a real Indian fighter, like Kit Carson?"
+
+"Oh, no, it was merely a band of hide hunters that came over the line
+from Utah, and Mr. Gowan helped the game warden run them back to their
+reservation."
+
+"He actually killed two of them?"
+
+"Yes," replied the girl, her gravity deepening to a concerned frown.
+"The worst of it is that I'm not altogether certain it was necessary.
+Men out here, as a rule, think much too little of the life of an
+Indian."
+
+"Ah!" murmured Ashton. "Two Indians. But didn't you speak of six
+notches?"
+
+"Six," confirmed the girl, her brow partly clearing. "The others were
+different. Three were rustlers. The sheriff's posse overtook them.
+Both sides were firing. Kid circled around and shot three. He happened
+to have a long-range rifle. Daddy says they threw up their hands when
+the first one fell; but Kid explained to me that he was too far away
+to see it."
+
+"Ah!" murmured Ashton the second time, and he put up his hand to the
+hole in the front of his sombrero.
+
+"The last was two years ago," went on the girl. "There was a dispute
+over a maverick. Kid was tried and acquitted on his plea of
+self-defense. There were no witnesses. He claimed that the other man
+drew first. Two empty shells were found in the other man's revolver,
+and only one in Kid's. That cleared him."
+
+Ashton took off his hat and stared at the holes where the heavy
+forty-four bullet had gone in and gone out. He was silent.
+
+"You see, poor Kid has been unfortunate," remarked the girl, as she
+headed her pony down over the edge of the mesa. "That time with the
+rustlers, all the posse were firing, and he just happened to be the
+one that got the best aim; and the time with the Indians, I'm sure he
+did not shoot to kill. It just happened that way. He told me so
+himself."
+
+Ashton ran his tongue over his lip. "Yes--I suppose so," he muttered.
+
+"Kid has all the good qualities and only a few of the faults of the
+old-time cowboys," went on the girl. "He is almost fiercely loyal to
+Daddy's interests. That's why he led a raid on a sheep outfit, four
+years ago, when almost half of a large flock were run over into Deep
+Canyon--poor innocent beasts! Daddy was furious with Kid; but there was
+no legal proof as to who were members of the attacking party, and the
+sheep were destroying our range. All of Daddy's cattle would have
+starved."
+
+"He was not punished?" murmured Ashton.
+
+"Daddy could not be expected to discharge him, could he, when Kid did
+it to save our range? You see, it was just because he was so very
+loyal. You must not think from these things that he--It is true he is
+suspicious of strangers, but he always has been very kind and gentle
+to me. I am very fond of him."
+
+"You are?" exclaimed Ashton, stirred from his uneasy depression. "I
+should hardly have thought him the kind to interest a girl like you."
+
+"Really?" she bantered. "Why not? I have lived on the range ever since
+I was fourteen."
+
+He stared at her incredulously. "Since you were fourteen?"
+
+"For nine years," she added, smiling at his astonishment.
+
+"But--it can't be," he protested, his eyes on her stylish costume. "At
+least, not all the time."
+
+She nodded at him encouragingly. "So you _can_ see--a little. Nearly
+all my winters have been spent in Denver, except one in Europe."
+
+"Europe?" he repeated.
+
+"We didn't cross in a cattle boat," she flashed back at him, dimpling
+mischievously. "Nor did I go as the Queen of the Rancho, or of the
+Roundup, or even of the Wild and Woolly Outlaw Band."
+
+He flushed with mortification. "I am only too well aware, Miss
+Knowles, how you must regard me."
+
+"Oh, I do not regard you at all--as yet," she bantered. "But of course
+I could not expect you to know that Daddy's sister is one of the
+Sacred Thirty-six."
+
+"Sacred--? Is that one of the orders of nuns?"
+
+"None whatever," she punned. In the same moment she drew a most
+solemn looking face. "My deah Mistah Ashton, I will have you to
+understand my reference was to that most select coterie which
+comprises Denver's Real Society."
+
+"Indeed!" he said, with a subtle alteration in his tone and manner.
+"You say that your aunt is one of--"
+
+"My aunt by adoption," she corrected.
+
+"Adoption?"
+
+"I am not Daddy's natural daughter. He adopted me," explained the girl
+in her frank way.
+
+"Yes?" asked Ashton, plainly eager to learn more of her history.
+
+Without seeming to observe this, she adroitly balked his curiosity--"So,
+you see, Daddy's sister is only my aunt by adoption. Still, she has been
+very, very good to me; though I love Daddy and this free outdoor
+life so much that I insist on coming back home every spring."
+
+"Ah, yes, I see," he replied. "Really, Miss Knowles, you must think me
+a good deal of a dub."
+
+"Oh, well, allowances should be made for a tenderfoot," she bantered.
+
+"At least I recognized your queenliness, even if at first I did
+mistake what you were queen of," he thrust back.
+
+"So you still insist I'm a queen? Of what, pray?"
+
+"Of Hearts!" he answered with fervor.
+
+His daring was rewarded with a lovely blush. But she was only
+momentarily disconcerted.
+
+"I am not so sure of that," she replied. "Though it's not Queen of
+Spades, because I do not have to work; and it can't be Diamonds,
+because Daddy is no more than comfortably well to do--only six
+thousand head of stock. But as for Hearts--No, I'm sure it must be
+Clubs; I do so love to knock around. Really, if ever they break up
+this range, it will break my heart same time."
+
+"Break up the range? How do you mean?"
+
+"Put it under irrigation and turn it into orchards and farms, as they
+have done so many places here on the Western Slope. You know, Colorado
+apples and peaches are fast becoming famous even in Europe."
+
+"I do not wonder, not in the least--if I am to judge from a certain
+sample of the Colorado peach," he ventured.
+
+This time she did not blush. "I am quite serious, Mr. Ashton," she
+reproved him. "Daddy owns only five sections. The rest of his range is
+public land. If settlers should come in and homestead it, he would
+have to quit the cattle business. You cannot realize how fearfully we
+are watching the irrigation projects--all the Government reclamation
+work, and the private dams, too. There seems to be no water that can
+be put on Dry Mesa, yet the engineers are doing such wonderful things
+these days."
+
+Ashton straightened on his saddle. "That is quite true, Miss Knowles.
+You know, I myself am an engineer."
+
+"Oh!" she exclaimed in dismay. "You, an engineer? Have you come here
+to see if our mesa can be irrigated?"
+
+"No, indeed, no, I shall not do that," he replied. "I have not the
+slightest thought of such a project. I am merely out for sport."
+
+She eyed him uncertainly. "But--We get all the reports--There is an
+Ashton connected with that wonderful Zariba Dam, just being finished
+in Arizona."
+
+"That is my father. He is interested in it with a Mr. Leslie. They are
+financing the project. But I have nothing to do with it, nothing
+whatever, I assure you. The engineer is another man, a fellow
+named--"
+
+He paused as if unable to remember. The girl looked at him with a
+shade of disappointment in her clear eyes.
+
+"A Mr. Blake--Thomas Blake," she supplied the name. "I thought you
+might have known him."
+
+"Ah--Blake?" he murmured hesitatingly. "Why, yes, I did at one time
+have somewhat of an acquaintance with him."
+
+"You did?" she cried, her eyes brilliant with excitement. "Oh, tell
+me! I--" She faltered under his surprised stare, and went on rather
+lamely: "You see, I--we have been immensely interested in the Zariba
+Dam. The reports all describe it as an extraordinary work of
+engineering. And so we have been curious to learn something about the
+engineer."
+
+"But if you're so opposed to irrigation projects?" he thrust.
+
+"That makes no difference," she parried. "We--Daddy and I--cannot but
+admire such a remarkable engineer."
+
+Ashton shrugged. "The dam was a big thing. I fail to see why you
+should admire Blake just because he happened to blunder on the idea
+that solved the difficulty."
+
+"You do not like him," she said with frank directness.
+
+He hesitated and looked away. When he replied it was with evident
+reluctance: "No, I do not. He is--You would hardly admire him
+personally, even though he did bully Genevieve Leslie into marrying
+him."
+
+"He is married?" exclaimed the girl.
+
+"No wonder you are surprised," said Ashton. "It was the most amazing
+thing imaginable--she the daughter of H. V. Leslie, one of our
+wealthiest financiers, and he a rough, uncouth drunkard."
+
+"Drunkard?" almost screamed the girl. "No, no, not drunkard! I cannot
+believe it!"
+
+"He certainly was one until just before Genevieve married him,"
+insisted Ashton. "I hear he has managed to keep sober since."
+
+"O-o-oh!" sighed Miss Isobel, making no effort to conceal her vast
+relief. She attempted a smile. "I am so glad to hear that he is all
+right now. Of course he must be!... You say he married an heiress?"
+
+"She is worth three millions in her own right, and Leslie is as daft
+over him as she is. Leslie and my father are the ones who backed him
+on the Zariba Dam."
+
+"How interesting! And I suppose Mr. Blake is a Western man. So many of
+the best engineers come from the West."
+
+Ashton looked at her suspiciously. He could not make out her interest
+in Blake. She apparently had come to regard the engineer as a sort of
+hero. Yet why should she continue to inquire about him, now that she
+knew he was a married man?
+
+"I'm sure I cannot tell you," he replied, somewhat stiffly. "The
+fellow seems to have come from nowhere. Had it not been for an
+accident, he would never have got within speaking distance of
+Genevieve, but they happened to be shipwrecked together alone--on the
+coast of Africa."
+
+"Wrecked?--shipwrecked? How perfectly glorious!"
+
+"I wouldn't mind it myself--with you!" he flashed back.
+
+"I might," she bantered. "This Mr. Blake, I imagine, was hardly a
+tenderfoot."
+
+"No, he was a roughneck," muttered Ashton.
+
+"You do not like him," she remarked the second time.
+
+"Why should I, a low fellow like that? I've heard that he even brags
+that he started in the Chicago slums."
+
+The girl put her hand to her bosom. "In the--the Chicago slums!" she
+half whispered.
+
+"No wonder you are surprised," said Ashton. "Anyone would presume
+that he would keep such a disgrace to himself. It shows what he
+is--absolutely devoid of good taste."
+
+"Is he--What does he look like?" she eagerly inquired.
+
+Ashton shrugged. "Pardon me. I prefer not to talk any more about the
+fellow."
+
+Miss Isobel checked her curiosity. "Very well, Mr. Ashton." She looked
+around, and suddenly flourished her leathern quirt. "Look--there are
+Kid and Daddy trying to head us. Come on, if you want a race. I'm
+going to beat them down to Dry Fork."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+DOWNHILL AND UP
+
+
+The lash of the quirt fell with a swish on the flank of the girl's
+pony. He did not wait for a second hint, but started down the steep
+slope "on the jump." Before Ashton realized what was happening, his
+own horse was following at the same breakneck pace.
+
+Down plunged the two ponies--down, down, down the sharply pitched
+mountain side, leaping logs and stones, crashing through brush,
+scrambling or slithering stiff-legged down rock slides. It was a wild
+race, a race that would have been utterly foolhardy with any other
+horses than these mountain bred cow ponies. A single misstep would
+have sent horse and rider rolling for yards, unless sooner brought up
+against tree or rock.
+
+Most of the color had left Ashton's cheeks, but his full lips were set
+in resolute lines. His gaze alertly took in the ground before his
+horse and at the same time the girl's graceful, swaying figure.
+Fortunately he knew enough to let his horse pick his own way. But such
+a way as it was! Had not the two animals been as surefooted as goats
+and as quick as cats, both must have pitched head over heels, not
+once, but a score of times.
+
+They had leaped down over numbers of rocks and logs and ledges, and
+the girl had not cast back a single glance to see if Ashton was
+following. But as they plunged down an open slope she suddenly twisted
+about and flung up a warning hand.
+
+"Here's a jump!" she cried--as though they had not been jumping every
+few yards since the beginning of that mad descent.
+
+Hardly had she faced about again when her pony leaped and dropped with
+her clear out of sight. Ashton gasped and started to draw rein. He was
+too late. Three strides brought his horse to a ledge fully six feet
+high. The beast leaped over the edge without making the slightest
+effort to check himself.
+
+Ashton uttered a startled cry, but poised himself for the shock with
+the cleverness of a skillful rider. His pony landed squarely, and at
+once started on again as if nothing unusual had happened.
+
+The girl was already racing down the lower slope, which was more
+moderate, or rather, less immoderate than that above the ledge. She
+looked around and waved her hand gayly when she saw that Ashton had
+kept his seat.
+
+The salute so fired him that he gave his pony the spur and dashed
+recklessly down to overtake her. At last he raced alongside and a
+little past her. She looked at his overridden pony and drew rein.
+
+"Hold on," she said. "Better pull up a bit. You don't want to blow
+your hawss. 'Tisn't everyone can take that jump as neatly as he did."
+
+"But the others?" he panted--"they'll beat us!"
+
+"They cut down to the right. It's nothing to worry about if they do
+head us. They've got the best hawsses. We'll jog the rest of the
+way."
+
+"Of course," he hastened to agree, "if you prefer."
+
+"I'd prefer to lope uphill and down, but--" she nodded towards his
+pony's heaving flanks--"no use riding a willing hawss to death."
+
+"No danger of that with this old nag. He's tough as a mule," Ashton
+assured her, though he followed her example by pulling his mount in to
+a walk.
+
+"A mule knows enough to balk when he's got enough," she informed him.
+
+He did not reply. With the lessening of his excitement habit sent his
+hand to his open packet of cigarettes. He had not smoked since before
+shooting the calf. As they came down into the shallow valley between
+the foot of the mesa and a parallel line of low rocky hills he could
+wait no longer. His lighter was already half raised to the gilt-tipped
+cigarette when it was checked by etiquette. He bowed to the girl as a
+matter of form.
+
+"Ah, pardon me--if you have no objections," he said.
+
+"I have," was her unexpected reply.
+
+"Er--what?" he asked, his finger on the spring of the lighter.
+
+"You inquired if I have any objections," she answered. "I told you the
+truth. I dislike cigarettes most intensely."
+
+"But--but--" he stammered, completely taken aback, "don't your cowboys
+all smoke?"
+
+"Not cigarettes--where I ever see them," she said.
+
+"And cigars or pipes?" he queried.
+
+"One has to concede something to masculine weakness," she sighed.
+
+"Unfortunately I have no cigars with me, not even at my camp, and a
+pipe is so slow," he complained.
+
+"Oh, pray, do not deprive yourself on my account," she said. "You'll
+find the cut between those two hills about as short a way to your camp
+as this one, if you prefer your cigarettes to my company."
+
+"Crool maid!" he reproached, not altogether jestingly. He even looked
+across at the gap through the hills to which she was pointing. Then he
+saw the disdain in her blue eyes. He took the cigarette from his lips,
+eyed it regretfully, and flung it away with a petulant fillip.
+
+"There!" he said. Meeting her amused smile, he added in the injured
+tone of a spoiled child. "You don't realize what a compliment that
+is."
+
+"What?--abstaining for a half hour or so? If I asked you to break off
+entirely, and you did it, I would consider that a real compliment."
+
+"I should say so!"
+
+"But I am by no means sure that I would care to ask you," she
+bantered.
+
+"You're not? Why, may I inquire?"
+
+"I do not like to make useless requests."
+
+"Useless!" he exclaimed, his self-esteem stung by her raillery. "Do
+you think I cannot quit smoking them?"
+
+"I think you do not care to try."
+
+Impulsively he snatched out a package of his expensive cigarettes and
+tossed it over his shoulder. Another and another and still others
+followed in rapid succession, until he had exhausted his supply.
+
+"How's that?" he demanded her approval.
+
+"Well, it's not so bad for a start-off," she answered with an absence
+of enthusiasm that dashed him from his pose of self-abnegation.
+
+"You don't realize what that means," he complained.
+
+"It means, jilt Miss Nicotine in haste, and repent at leisure."
+
+"You're ragging me! You ought to be particularly nice to me. I did it
+for you."
+
+"Thanks awfully. But I didn't ask you to do it, you know."
+
+"Oh, now, that's hardly--when I did it because of what you said."
+
+"Well, then, I promise to be nice to you until events do us part. That
+will be in about five minutes. Over there is Dry Fork Gulch. The
+waterhole is just down around this hill."
+
+Ashton took his ardent gaze off the girl's face long enough to glance
+to his left. He recognized the tremendous gorge in the face of the
+mountain side that he had tried to ascend the previous day. It ran in
+with a moderately inclined bottom for nearly a mile, and then scaled
+up to the top of High Mesa in steep slopes and sheer ledges.
+
+His eyes followed the dry gravelly creek bed around to the right, and
+he nodded: "Yes, my camp is just over the corner of those crags. But
+surely, Miss Knowles, you will not end our acquaintance there."
+
+She met his appealing look with a level glance. "Seriously, Mr.
+Ashton, don't you think you had better move camp to another section?
+It seems to me you have done quite enough unseasonable deer hunting."
+
+Without waiting for him to reply, she urged her horse into a lope. His
+own mount was too jaded for a quick start. When he overtook the girl
+she had rounded the craggy hill on their right and was in sight of a
+scattered grove of boxelders below a dike of dark colored trap rock
+that outcropped across the bed of the creek.
+
+Above the natural dam made by this dike the valley was bedded up with
+sand and large gravel washed down by the torrential rush of spring
+freshets. Below it the same wild floods, leaping down in a twenty-foot
+fall, had gouged out a pothole so wide and deep that it was never
+empty of water even in the driest seasons.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+INTO THE DEPTHS
+
+
+At the top of the bank made by the dike the girl pointed with her
+quirt down to the rock-rimmed pool edge where a pair of riders were
+just swinging out of their saddles.
+
+"Hello, Daddy! We're coming, Kid," she called, and she turned to
+explain to Ashton. "They came around the other end of the hills; a
+longer way but better going. How's this? Thought you said you were
+camped here."
+
+"Yes, of course. Don't you see the tent? It's right there among
+the--Why, what--where is it?" cried Ashton, gaping in blank
+amazement.
+
+"We'll soon see," replied the girl.
+
+Their horses were scrambling down the short steep slope to the pool,
+where the other horses were drinking their fill of the cool water. The
+two men watched Ashton's approach, Knowles with an impassive gaze,
+Gowan with cold suspicion in his narrowed eyes.
+
+"Well, honey," asked the cowman, "did you have him pulling leather?"
+
+"No, and I didn't lose him, either," she replied, with a mischievous
+glance at Gowan. "I took that jump-off where the white-cheeked steer
+broke its neck. He took it after me without pulling leather."
+
+"Huh!" grunted the puncher. "Mr. Tenderfoot shore is some rider. We're
+waiting for him now to ride around and find that camp where we were to
+deliver his veal."
+
+Ashton stared with a puzzled, half-dazed expression from the tentless
+trees beside him to the fore and hind quarters of veal wrapped in
+slicker raincoats and fastened on back of the men's saddles.
+
+"Well?" demanded Knowles. "Thought you said you were camped here."
+
+"I am--that is, I--My tent was right there between those two trees,"
+said Ashton. "You see, there are the twigs and leaves I had my valet
+collect for my bed."
+
+"Shore--valleys are great on collecting beds of leaves and sand and
+bowlders," observed Gowan.
+
+"There's his fireplace," said the girl, wheeling her horse through a
+clump of wild rosebushes. "Yes, and he's right about the tent, too. It
+is a bed. Here's a dozen cigarette boxes and--What's this, Mr. Ashton!
+Looks as if someone had left a note for you."
+
+"A note?" he muttered, slipping to the ground.
+
+He ran over to the spot to which she was pointing. On a little pile of
+stones, in front of where his tent had been pitched, a piece of
+coarse wrapping paper covered with writing was fluttering in the light
+breeze. He snatched it up and read the note with fast-growing
+bewilderment.
+
+"What is it?" sympathetically questioned the girl, quick to see that
+he was in real trouble.
+
+He did not answer. He did not even realize that she had spoken. With
+feverish haste he caught up an opened envelope that had lain under the
+paper. Drawn by his odd manner, Knowles and Gowan came over to stare
+at him. He had torn a letter from the envelope. It was in typewriting
+and covered less than a page, yet he gaped at it, reading and
+re-reading the lines as if too dazed to be able to comprehend their
+meaning.
+
+Slowly the involved sentences burned their way into his consciousness.
+As his bewilderment cleared, his concern deepened to dismay, and from
+dismay to consternation. His jaw dropped slack, his face whitened, the
+pupils of his eyes dilated.
+
+"What is it? What's the matter?" exclaimed the girl.
+
+"Matter?"--His voice was hoarse and strained. He crumpled the letter
+in a convulsive grasp--"Matter? I'm ruined!--ruined! God!"
+
+Knowles and the girl were both silent before the despair in the young
+man's face. Gowan was more obtuse or else less considerate.
+
+"Shore, you're plumb busted, partner," he ironically condoled. "Your
+whole outfit has flown away on the wings of the morning. Hope you
+won't tell us the pay for your veal has vamoosed with the rest."
+
+"Oh, Kid, for shame!" reproved the girl. "Of course Daddy won't ask
+for any pay--now."
+
+Ashton burst into a jangling high-pitched laugh.
+
+"No, no! there's still my pony and saddle and rifle and watch!" he
+cried, half hysterically. "Take them! strip me! Here's my hat, too! I
+paid forty-five dollars for it--silver band." He flung it on the
+ground. "There's a hole in it--I wish the hole were through my head!"
+
+"Now, now, look here, son. Keep a stiff upper lip," said Knowles.
+"Don't act like you're locoed. It's all right about that veal, as
+Chuckie says, and you oughtn't to make such a fuss over the loss of a
+camp outfit."
+
+"Camp outfit?" shrilled Ashton. "If that were all! if that were all!
+What shall I do? Lost--all lost!--father--all! Ruined! Oh, my God!
+What shall I do? Oh, my God! Oh--" Anguish and despair choked the cry
+in his throat. He collapsed in a huddled, quivering heap.
+
+"_Sho!_ It can't be as bad as that, can it?" condoled the cowman.
+
+"Go away!" sobbed the prostrated man. "Go away! Take my pony--all!
+Only leave me!"
+
+"If ever I saw a fellow plumb locoed!" muttered Gowan, half
+awe-struck.
+
+"Maybe he'll come to his senses if we leave him," suggested Knowles.
+He took a step towards Ashton. "All right, son, we'll go. But we'll
+leave you half that veal, and we won't take your hawss. D'you want
+help in looking for your outfit?"
+
+Ashton shook his downbent head.
+
+"Well, if you want to let the thieves get away with it, that's your
+own lookout. You'd better strike back to the railroad."
+
+"Go away! Leave me!" moaned Ashton.
+
+"Gone to smash--clean busted!" commented Gowan, as he turned about to
+go to his horse, his spurs jingling gayly.
+
+Knowles followed him, shaking his head. The girl had been gazing at
+Ashton with an expression that varied from sympathetic commiseration
+to contemptuous pity. As her adopted father and Gowan mounted, she
+rode over to them.
+
+"Go on," she said. "I'll overtake you as soon as I've watered my
+hawss."
+
+"You're not going to speak to that kettle of mush again, Miss
+Chuckie," remonstrated Gowan.
+
+"Yes, I am, Kid, and you know you wouldn't stop me if you could. He
+needs it. I'm glad you smashed his pistol. A rifle is not so handy."
+
+Knowles stared over the bushes at the huddled figure on the ground.
+"Look here, Chuckie, you can't mean that?"
+
+"Yes," she insisted. "He is ready to do it right now, unless someone
+throws him a rope and hauls him out of the slough."
+
+"Lot of fuss over a tenderfoot you never saw before today," grumbled
+Gowan.
+
+"That's not like you, Kid," she reproached. "Besides, you don't want
+the trouble of digging a grave. It would have to be deep, to keep out
+the coyotes. Daddy, you're forgetting the veal."
+
+"So I am," agreed the cowman. "Ride on, Kid. You'll be carrying most
+weight."
+
+The puncher reluctantly wheeled his horse and started down the bank of
+the dry stream. Knowles unfastened the hind quarters of veal from
+behind the cantle of his saddle, lifted them into a fork of one of the
+low trees, and rode off after Gowan, folding up his blood-stained
+slicker.
+
+The girl at once slipped from her pony and walked quietly around to
+the drooping, despairing man.
+
+"Mr. Ashton," she softly began, "they have gone. I have stayed to find
+out if there is anything I can do."
+
+She paused for him to reply. His shoulders quivered, but he remained
+silent. She went on soothingly: "You are all unstrung. The shock was
+too sudden. It must have been a terrible one! Won't you tell me about
+it? Perhaps that will make you feel better."
+
+"As if anything could when I am ruined, utterly ruined!" he moaned.
+
+"But how? Please tell me," she urged.
+
+Slowly he raised his haggard face and looked up at her. There could be
+no question but that she was full of sincere sympathy and concern for
+him. Her eyes shone upon him with all the motherly tenderness that any
+good woman, however young, has in her heart for those who suffer.
+
+"It's all in this--this letter," he muttered brokenly. "Expected my
+remittance in it--Got ruin! ruin!"
+
+"It had been opened," suggested the girl. "Perhaps those who took your
+outfit also took your remittance money."
+
+"No, there wasn't any--not a cent! My valet had my written instructions
+to open it and cash the money orders--that weren't there! He and the
+guide--they came back. The letter had told them all, all! I was not
+here. They took the outfit--the money--divided it. Left that note--they
+had no more use for me.... Ruined! utterly ruined!"
+
+"But if you wish us to run them down?"
+
+"No--good riddance! What they took is less than what I owed them.
+Ungrateful scoundrels!"
+
+"That's it!" approved the girl. "Get up your spunk. Cuss, if you like.
+Rip loose, good and hard. It will ease you off."
+
+"It's no use," he groaned, slumping back into his posture of abject
+dejection.
+
+"Oh, come, now!" she encouraged. "You're a young, healthy man. What if
+you have been bucked off this time? There are lots other hawsses in
+Life's corral."
+
+He hung his head lower.
+
+She went on, in an altered tone: "Mr. Ashton, it is evident you have
+been bred as a gentleman. I wish you to give me your word that you
+will not put an end to yourself."
+
+There was a prolonged pause. At last he stirred as if uneasy under her
+steady gaze. He could not see her eyes, yet he seemed to feel them.
+Twice he started to speak, but checked himself and hesitated. The
+third time he muttered a reluctant, "I--will not."
+
+"Good! I have your word," she replied. "I must go now. When you've
+shaken yourself together a bit, come down to the ranch. You ride down
+Dry Fork to the junction, and then three miles up Plum Creek. Daddy'll
+be glad to put you up a few days until you can think of what to do to
+get a new start. Good-by!"
+
+She went back to her horse as lightfooted and graceful as an antelope.
+But he did not look up after her, nor did he respond to her cordial
+parting. For a long time after she rode away he continued to crouch as
+she had left him, motionless, almost torpid with the immensity of his
+loss.
+
+The sun sank lower and lower. It touched the skyline of High Mesa and
+dipped below. The shadow of twilight fell upon Dry Fork and the
+waterhole. The man shivered and, as if afraid that the darkness would
+rush upon him, hastily opened his clenched hand and smoothed out the
+crumpled letter.
+
+To his bloodshot eyes, the accusing words seemed to glare up at him in
+letters of fire:
+
+  Sir:
+
+  We have been instructed by our client, Mr. George Ashton, to
+  inform you that he has at last learned the full particulars of
+  the manner in which you obtained possession of the plans of Mr.
+  Thomas Blake, C.E., drawn by him for the competition on the then
+  projected Michamac bridge; how you copied said plans and
+  destroyed the originals, and was awarded the construction of
+  said bridge on said copied plans presented by you as of your own
+  device and invention; that you were awarded and did enjoy the
+  office of Resident Engineer of said bridge during a period
+  covering the greater part of the construction thereof, and
+  received the full salary of said office, to and until said Blake
+  took charge of said bridge, which had been imperilled by your
+  incompetence; and said Blake, against your strenuous objections
+  and opposition and at great personal risk, saved said bridge
+  from destruction.
+
+  Wherefore, because of the disgrace which you have, by reason of
+  the aforesaid actions and conduct, brought upon his name, and
+  because of various and sundry acts of disobedience, as well as
+  your life of frivolity and dissipation,--our client has
+  instructed us to inform you, that he has cut you off from him
+  absolutely; that he has drawn a new will wherein the amount of
+  your legacy is fixed at the sum of one ($1.00) dollar; that he
+  will no longer make you an allowance in any sum whatever; that
+  he no longer regards you as his son; that any communication
+  addressed to him by you, either directly or indirectly, will not
+  be received or read by him; and that he absolutely refuses to
+  see you or to grant you a personal interview.
+
+                                                Respectfully, etc.
+
+The signature was that of his father's confidential lawyers, and
+below, to the left, lest there be no possibility of misunderstanding,
+were his name and address in full: "Mr. Lafayette Ashton, Stockchute,
+Colorado."
+
+Again he bent over with his head on his breast and the letter clutched
+convulsively in his slender palm.
+
+A bloodcurdling yell brought him to his feet with a sudden leap. He
+still did not know the difference between the cry of a coyote and the
+deeper note of a timber wolf. He hastily started a fire, and ran to
+fetch his rifle from the saddle sheath. The pony was quietly munching
+a wisp of grass as best he could with the bit in his mouth. The
+unconcern of the beast reassured his master, who, however, filled the
+magazine of his rifle before offsaddling.
+
+Having hobbled the pony for the night, Ashton laid the rifle on the
+rim of the pool, stripped, and dived in. He went down like a plummet,
+reckless of the danger of striking some upjutting ledge. He may have
+forgotten for the moment his word to the girl, or he may have
+considered that it did not prevent him from courting death by
+accident.
+
+But, deeply as he dived, he failed to reach bottom. He came up,
+puffing and blowing, and swam swiftly around the pool before
+scrambling out to dress. The combined effect of the vigorous exercise,
+the grateful coolness of the water, and the riddance of the day's dust
+and sweat brought him ashore in a far less morbid frame of mind. Going
+up the bank, he pulled the hind quarters of veal from the tree and
+sliced off three or four ragged strips with his knife. After washing
+them, he put them to broil over his smoky fire of green twigs. The
+"cutlets" came off, one half raw and the other half burned to a crisp.
+But he had not eaten since the early forenoon. He devoured the mess
+without salt, ravenously. He topped off with the scant swallow of
+brandy left in his flask.
+
+Stimulated by the food and drink, he set about gathering a large heap
+of wood. Three or four coyotes had approached his camp, attracted by
+the scent of the calf meat. With the fading of twilight into night
+they came in closer, making such a racket with their yelping and
+wailing that he thought himself surrounded by a pack of ravenous
+wolves.
+
+He could not see how his pony was unconcernedly grazing within a few
+yards of one of the cowardly beasts. Had the wistful singers been
+timber wolves, the animal soon would have come hobbling in near the
+fire; but Ashton did not know that. He flung on brush and crouched
+down near the blaze, rifle in hand, peering out into the blackness.
+Every moment he expected to hear that terrible cry of which he had
+read, the death-scream of a horse, and then to hear the crunching of
+bones between the jaws of the ferocious wolves.
+
+He had spent the previous night alone in camp, peacefully sleeping.
+But then the yells of the beasts of darkness had been far away, and
+the walls of his tent had shut him in from the wild. Tonight his
+nerves had been shattered by the terrible blow of his father's
+repudiation. Worst of all, he had no tobacco with which to soothe
+them.
+
+His dread of the supposed wolf pack in a way eased the anguish of
+his ruin by diverting his mind. But the lack of cigarettes served
+only to put a more frightful strain on his overwrought nerves. He
+felt it first in a vague discomfort that set his hands to groping
+automatically through his pockets. The absence of the usual box
+roused his consciousness, with a dismayed start, to the realization
+that he was absolutely without his soothing drug. The absconding
+guide and valet had taken the large store he had in camp, and, to
+please Miss Knowles, he had flung away all that were left in his
+pockets.
+
+From vague fumbling he instantly concentrated his mind on an eager
+search for a packet that might have been overlooked, either in his
+pockets or around the camp. He could find none, nor even a single
+cigarette. His nerves were now clamoring wildly for their soothing
+poison. So great was the strain that it began to affect his mind. He
+fancied that the wolf pack was closing in to attack him. Twice he
+fired his rifle at imaginary eyes out in the darkness.
+
+All the time the craving for nicotine increased in intensity, until he
+was half frantic. Midnight found him, torch in hand, crawling around
+on the ground where his tent had been pitched, hunting for cigarette
+stubs. He had only to look close in order to find any number. Most
+were no more than cork tips, but some had at least one puff left in
+them, and a few had been only half smoked.
+
+Beside the bed he came upon almost a handful, close together. By this
+time his jangled nerves were "toning down." He became conscious of
+great weariness. He stretched out on his leafy bed, and with his head
+pillowed on his arm, luxuriously sucked in the drugging smoke.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+A TEST OF CALIBER
+
+
+When he opened his eyes the sun was beating down into his face. He had
+slept far into the morning. He stood up to stare around. His horse was
+cropping the grass near the lower side of the grove. There was no sign
+of any wolves. He walked over to his fireplace. The fire had burned to
+ashes hours ago. He started a fresh one with his patent lighter, and
+turned to where he had left the veal. It was gone.
+
+He went a few steps farther, and found a bone gnawed clean of every
+shred of meat and gristle. A fox is a far less cunning thief than a
+coyote. The quantity of calf meat had alone saved his saddle and
+bridle, and even at that, one of the bridle reins was slashed and the
+stirrup leathers were gnawed. He looked from the white bone to the
+saddle, and ripped out a half dozen vigorous Anglo-Saxon oaths. It was
+not nice, but the explosion argued a far healthier frame of mind than
+either his morbid hysteria of the previous afternoon or his frenzy of
+the night.
+
+After the outburst of anger had spent itself, he realized that he was
+hungry. The feeling became acute when he remembered that he had
+absolutely nothing on hand to eat. He hastened to saddle up. As he was
+about to mount he paused to look uncertainly up the trail on which he
+had thrown away the cigarettes. While he stood vacillating, his hand
+went to his hip pocket and drew out the silver-cased brandy flask. He
+looked at it, and its emptiness reminded him that he was thirsty. He
+went down to the pool for a drink. Having filled his flask, he
+returned up the bank and sprang into the saddle.
+
+His horse, in fine fettle after the night's rest and grazing, started
+off on the jump, cow pony fashion. Ashton gave him his head, and the
+horse bore him at a steady lope down along the stream, crossing over
+to the other bank of the dry bed, of his own volition, when the going
+became too rough on the near side. The direction of the railway was
+now off across the sagebrush flats to Ashton's right, but he allowed
+his horse to continue on down the creek. About four miles from the
+waterhole he approached a bunch of grazing cattle. He drew rein and
+walked his horse past them, looking for a herder. There was none in
+sight. The animals were on their home range. He rode on down the creek
+at a canter.
+
+A mile farther on, as he neared another scattered bunch of cattle,
+something thwacked the dry ground a little in front and to the left of
+him, throwing up a splash of sand and dust. His pony snorted and
+leaped ahead at a quickened pace.
+
+Ashton turned to look back at the spot--and instinctively ducked as a
+bullet pinged past his ear so close that he felt the windage on his
+cheek. He did not lack quickness of perception. He glanced up the open
+slope to his left, and grasped the fact that someone was shooting at
+him with a rifle from the crest of the ridge half a mile distant.
+
+Instantly he flung himself flat on his pony's neck and dug in his
+spurs. The pony bounded forward with a suddenness that spoiled the aim
+of the third bullet. It whined past over the beast's haunches. The
+fourth shot, best aimed of all, smashed the silver brandy flask in
+Ashton's hip pocket. Had he been upright in the saddle, the
+steel-jacketed bullet must have pierced him through the waist.
+
+With a yell of terror, he flattened himself still closer to his pony's
+neck and dug in his spurs at every jump. The beast was already going
+at a pace that would have won most quarter-mile sprints. Just after
+the fourth shot he swept in among the scattered bunch of cattle,
+running at his highest speed. Still Ashton swung his sharp-roweled
+spurs. He knew that the range of a high-power rifle is well over a
+mile.
+
+To his vast surprise, the shooting ceased the moment he raced into
+line with the first steer. The short respite gave him time to recover
+his wits.
+
+As the pony sprinted clear of the last steer in the bunch, a fifth
+bullet ranged close down over Ashton's head. He pulled hard on the
+right rein and leaned the same way. The sixth shot burned the skin on
+the pony's hip as he swerved suddenly towards the edge of the creek
+channel. He made a wild leap out over the edge of the cut bank and
+came plunging down on a gravel bar. At once he started to race along
+the dry stream bed. But instead of spurring, Ashton now tugged at the
+bridle.
+
+The pony swung to the left and came to a halt close in under the bank.
+Ashton cautiously straightened from his crouch. When erect he was just
+high enough to see over the edge of the bank. Looking back and up the
+ridge, he saw the figure of a man clearly outlined against the sky.
+His lips closed in resolute lines; his dark eyes flashed. Jerking out
+his rifle, he set the sight for fifteen hundred yards, and began
+firing at the would-be murderer as coolly and steadily as a marksman.
+
+Before he had pulled the trigger the third time the man leaped
+sideways and knelt to return his fire. At once Ashton gripped his
+rifle still more firmly and drew back the automatic lever. The
+crackling discharge was like the fire of a miniature Maxim gun. Puffs
+of dust spouted up all around the man on the ridge crest. He sprang to
+his feet and ran back out of sight, jumping from side to side like an
+Indian.
+
+"Ho!" shouted Ashton. "He's running! I made him run!"
+
+He sat up very erect in his saddle, staring defiantly at the place
+where the murderer had disappeared.
+
+"The coward! I made him run!" he exulted.
+
+He shifted his grip on his rifle, and the heat of the barrel reminded
+him that he had emptied the magazine. He reloaded the weapon to its
+fullest capacity, and stood up in his stirrups to stare at the ridge
+crest. The murderer did not reappear. Ashton's exultance gave place to
+disappointment. He was more than ready to continue the duel.
+
+He rode down the creek, searching for a place to ascend the cut bank.
+But by the time he came to a slope he had cooled sufficiently to
+realize the foolishness of bravado. Not unlikely the murderer was
+lying back out of sight, ready to shoot him when he came up out of the
+creek. He reflected, and decided that the going was quite good enough
+in the bottom of the creek bed. He rode on down the channel, over the
+gravel bars, at an easy canter.
+
+After a half mile the bank became so low and the creek bed so sandy
+that he turned up on to the dry sod. As he did so he kept his eye
+warily on the now distant ridge. But no bullet came pinging down after
+him.
+
+Instead, he heard the thud of galloping hoofs, and twisted about just
+in time to see a rider top a rise a short distance in front of him.
+He snapped down his breech sight and faced the supposed assailant with
+the rifle ready at his shoulder. Almost as quickly he lowered the
+weapon and snatched off his sombrero in joyful salute. The rider was
+Miss Knowles.
+
+She waved back gayly and cantered up to him, her lovely face aglow
+with cordial greeting.
+
+"Good noon!" she called. "So you have come at last? But better late
+than never."
+
+"How could I help coming?" he gallantly exclaimed.
+
+"I see. The coyotes stole your cutlets, and you were hungry," she
+bantered, as she came alongside and whirled her horse around to ride
+with him down the creek.
+
+"How did you guess?" he asked.
+
+"I know coyotes," she replied. "They're the worst--" She stopped
+short, gazing at the bleeding flanks of his pony. "Oh, Mr. Ashton! how
+could you? I did not think you so cruel!"
+
+"Cruel?" he repeated, twisting about to see what she meant. "Ah, you
+refer to the spurring. But I simply couldn't help it, you know. There
+was a bandit taking pot shots at me as I passed the ridge back
+there."
+
+"A bandit--on Dry Mesa?" she incredulously exclaimed.
+
+"Yes; he pegged at me eight or nine times."
+
+The girl smiled. "You probably heard one of the punchers shooting at a
+coyote."
+
+"No," he insisted, flushing under her look. "The ruffian was shooting
+at me. See here."
+
+He put his hand to his left hip pocket, one side of which had been
+torn out. From it he drew his brandy flask.
+
+"That was done by the third or fourth shot," he explained. "Do you
+wonder I was flat on my pony's neck and spurring as hard as I could?"
+
+The girl took the flask from his outstretched hand and looked it over
+with keen interest. In one side of the silver case was a small, neat
+hole. Opposite it half of the other side had been burst out as if by
+an explosion within. She took off the silver cap, shook out the
+shattered glass of the inner flask, and looked again at the small
+hole.
+
+"A thirty-eight," she observed.
+
+"Pardon me," he replied. "I fail to--Ah, yes; thirty-eight caliber,
+you mean."
+
+"It is I who must ask pardon," she said in frank apology. "Your rifle
+is a thirty-two. I heard a number of shots, ending with the rattle of
+an automatic. Thought you were after another deer."
+
+He could afford to smile at the merry thrust and the flash of dimples
+that accompanied it.
+
+"At least it wasn't a calf this time," he replied. "Nor was it a doe.
+But it may have been a buck."
+
+"Indian?" she queried, with instant perception of his play on the
+word.
+
+"I didn't see any war plumes," he admitted.
+
+"War plumes? Oh, that _is_ a joke!" she exclaimed. She chanced to look
+down at the shattered flask, and her merriment vanished. "But this
+isn't any joke. Didn't you see the man who was shooting at you?"
+
+"Yes, after I jumped my pony down into the creek. Perhaps the bandit
+thought he had tumbled us both. He stood up on top the ridge, until I
+cut loose and made him run."
+
+"He ran?"
+
+Ashton's eyes sparkled at the remembrance, and his chest began to
+expand. Then he met the girl's clear, direct gaze, and answered
+modestly: "Well, you see, when I had got down behind the bank our
+positions were reversed. He was the one in full view. It's curious,
+though, Miss Knowles--shooting at that poor calf, under the impression
+it was a deer, I simply couldn't hold my rifle steady, while--"
+
+"No wonder, if it was your first deer," put in the girl. "We call it
+buck fever."
+
+"Yes, but wouldn't you have thought my first bandit--Why, I couldn't
+have aimed at him more steadily if I had been made of cast iron."
+
+"Guess he had made you fighting mad," she bantered; but under her
+seeming levity he perceived a change in her manner towards him
+immensely gratifying to his humbled self-esteem.
+
+"At first I was just a trifle apprehensive--" He hesitated, and
+suddenly burst out with a candid confession--"No, not a trifle!
+Really, I was horribly frightened!"
+
+This was more than the girl had hoped from him. She nodded and smiled
+in open approval. "You had a good right to be frightened. I don't
+blame you for spurring that way. Look. It wasn't only one shot that
+came close. There's a neat hair brand on your hawss's hip that wasn't
+there yesterday."
+
+"Must have been the shot just before we took the bank," said Ashton,
+twisting about to look at the streak cut by the bullet. "The first was
+the only other one that didn't go higher."
+
+"But what did the man look like?" questioned Miss Isobel. "I can't
+imagine who--Can it be that your guide has a grudge against you on
+account of his pay?"
+
+"I wouldn't have thought it possible before yesterday, though he was a
+surly fellow and inclined to be insolent."
+
+"All such men are apt to be with tenderfeet," she remarked, permitting
+herself a half twinkle of her sweet eyes. "But I should have thought
+yours would have kept on going. Whatever you may have owed him, he had
+no right to steal your outfit. He must be a real badman, if it's true
+he is the party who did this shooting."
+
+"I shouldn't be at all surprised," agreed Ashton. In her concern over
+him she looked so charming that he would have agreed if she had told
+him the moon was made of green cheese.
+
+She shook her head thoughtfully, and went on: "I can't imagine even
+one of our badmen trying to murder you that way. Their usual course
+would be to come up to you, face to face, pick a quarrel, and beat you
+to it on the draw. But whoever the cowardly scoundrel is, we'll turn
+out the boys, and either run him down or out of the country."
+
+"If it's my guide, he probably is running already."
+
+"I hope so," replied the girl.
+
+"You do! Don't you want him punished?" exclaimed Ashton.
+
+"Of course, but you see I don't want Kid to--to cut another notch on
+his Colt's."
+
+"I must say, I cannot see how that--"
+
+"You could if you realized how kind and good he has been to me all
+these years. Do you know, when I first came West, I couldn't tell a
+jackrabbit from a burro. Daddy had told me that each had big ears, and
+I got them mixed. And actually I didn't know the off from the nigh
+side of a hawss!"
+
+"But we--er--have horses and riding-schools in the East," put in
+Ashton.
+
+She parried the indirect question without seeming to notice it. "You
+proved that yesterday, coming down from High Mesa. I felt sure I would
+have you pulling leather."
+
+"Pulling leather?" he asked. "You see, I own to my tenderfootness."
+
+"Grabbing your saddle to hold yourself on," she explained. Before he
+could reply, she rose in her stirrups and pointed ahead with her
+quirt. "Look, that's the top of the biggest haystack, up by the
+feed-sheds. You'll see the buildings in half a minute."
+
+Unheeded by Ashton, she had guided him off to the left, away from Dry
+Fork, across the angle above its junction with Plum Creek. They were
+now coming up over the divide between the two streams. Ashton failed
+to locate the haystack until its two mates and the long, half-open
+shelter-sheds came into view.
+
+A moment later he was looking at the horse corral and the group of log
+ranch houses. Below and beyond them the scattered groves of Plum Creek
+stretched away up across the mesa--green bouquets on the slender
+silver ribbon of the creek's midsummer rill.
+
+"Well?" she asked. "What do you think of my home?"
+
+"Your summer home," he suggested.
+
+"No, my real home," she insisted. "Auntie couldn't be nicer or fonder
+than she is; but her house is a residence, not a home, even to her.
+Anyway, here, where I have Daddy and Kid--I do so hope you and Kid
+will become friends."
+
+"Since you wish it, I shall try to do my part. But it is a matter that
+might take time, and--" he smiled ruefully and concluded with seeming
+irrelevance--"I have no home."
+
+She gazed at him with the look of tender motherly sympathy that he had
+been too distraught to really feel the previous day. "Do not say that,
+Mr. Ashton! Though a ranch house is hardly the kind of home to which
+you are accustomed, you will find that we range folks retain the
+old-fashioned Western ideas of hospitality."
+
+"My dear Miss Knowles!" he exclaimed with ardent gallantry, "the mere
+thought of being under the same sky with you--"
+
+"Don't, please," she begged. "This _is_ the blue sky we are under, not
+a stuccoed ceiling."
+
+"Well, I really meant it," he protested, greatly dashed.
+
+"Kid often says nice things to me. But he speaks with his hands," she
+remarked.
+
+"Deaf and dumb alphabet?" he queried wonderingly.
+
+"Hardly," she answered, dimpling under his puzzled gaze. "Actions
+speak louder than words, you know."
+
+"Ah!" he murmured, and his look indicated that she had given him food
+for thought.
+
+They were now cantering down the long easy slope towards the ranch
+buildings. The girl's quick eye perceived a horseman riding towards
+the ranch from one of the groves up Plum Creek.
+
+"There's Kid coming in," she remarked. "He went out early this morning
+after a big wolf that had killed a calf. He reported last evening that
+he found the carcass over near the head of Plum Creek. A wolf that
+gets to killing calves this time of year is a pretty costly neighbor.
+Daddy told Kid to go out and try to get him."
+
+"I'm glad you didn't let him get _this_ calf-killer," observed
+Ashton.
+
+"Oh, as soon as we saw your tenderfoot riding togs--!" she rejoined.
+"Seriously, though, you must not mind if the men poke a little fun at
+you. Most of them are more farmhands than cowboys, but Kid will be apt
+to lead off. I do so want you to be agreeable to Kid. He is almost a
+member of the family, not a hired man."
+
+"I shall try to be agreeable to him," replied Ashton, a trifle
+stiffly.
+
+The puncher had seen them probably before they saw him. He was riding
+at a pace that brought him to the horse corral a few moments ahead of
+them. When they came up he nodded carelessly in response to Ashton's
+studiously polite greeting, "Good day, Mr. Gowan," and turned to
+loosen the cinch of his saddle.
+
+"You've been riding some," remarked the girl, looking at the puncher's
+heaving, lathered horse.
+
+"Jumped that wolf--ran him," replied Gowan, as he lifted off his
+saddle and deftly tossed it up on the top rail of the corral.
+
+"You're in luck," congratulated Miss Isobel. She explained to Ashton:
+"The cattlemen in this county pay fifteen dollars for wolf scalps.
+That's in addition to the state bounty."
+
+Ashton sprang off to offer her his hand. But she was on the ground as
+soon as he. Gowan stared at him between narrowed lids, and replied to
+the girl somewhat shortly: "I didn't get him this time, Miss
+Chuckie."
+
+"You didn't? That's too bad! You don't often miss. I wish you had been
+with me, to run down the scoundrel who tried to murder Mr. Ashton."
+
+Gowan burst into the harsh, strained laughter of one who seldom gives
+way to mirth. He checked himself abruptly and cast a hostile look at
+Ashton. "By--James, Miss Chuckie, you don't mean to say you let a
+tenderfoot string you?"
+
+"How about this?" asked the girl. She held out the silver flask, which
+she had not returned to Ashton.
+
+Gowan gave it a casual glance, and answered almost jeeringly: "Easy
+enough for him to set it up and plug it--if he didn't get too far
+away."
+
+"His rifle is a thirty-two. This was done by a thirty-eight," she
+replied.
+
+"Thirty-eight?" he repeated. "Let's see." He took the flask from her,
+drew a rifle cartridge from his belt, and fitted the steel-jacketed
+bullet into the clean, small hole. "You're right, Miss Chuckie. It
+shore was a thirty-eight." He turned sharply on Ashton. "Where'd it
+happen? Who was it?"
+
+"Over on that dry stream," answered Ashton. "Unfortunately the fellow
+was too far away for me to be able to describe him."
+
+"But we think it may have been his guide," explained the girl.
+
+"Guide?" muttered Gowan, staring intently at Ashton.
+
+"Yes. You see, if he was mean enough to help steal Mr. Ashton's
+outfit, he--"
+
+"Shore, I savvy!" exclaimed the puncher. "I'll rope a couple of fresh
+hawsses, and go out with Mr. Ashton after the two-legged wolf."
+
+"That's like you, Kid! But you must wait at least until you've both
+had dinner. Mr. Ashton, I'm sure, is half starved."
+
+"Me, too, Miss Chuckie. But you know I'd rather eat a wolf or a
+rustler or even a daring desperado than sinkers and beans, any day."
+
+"You'll come in with us and see what Daddy has to say about it," the
+girl insisted.
+
+She started to loosen her saddle-cinch. Gowan handed back the silver
+flask, and stripping off saddle and bridle from her horse, placed them
+on the rail beside his own. Ashton waited, as if expecting a like
+service. The puncher started off beside Miss Isobel without looking at
+him. Ashton flushed hotly, and hastened to do his own unsaddling.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE CHANCE OF RECLAMATION
+
+
+Beyond the bunkhouse, which was the nearest building to the corral,
+stood the low but roomy log structure of the main ranch house. As
+Ashton came around the front corner, close behind Gowan and the girl,
+Knowles rose from his comfortable chair in the rustic porch, knocked
+out the half burned contents of his pipe and extended a freckled,
+corded hand to the stranger.
+
+"Howdy, Mr. Ashton! Glad to see you!" he said with hearty hospitality.
+"Hope you've come to ease up our lonesomeness by a month or two's
+visit."
+
+"Why, I--You're too kind, really!" replied Ashton, his voice quavering
+and breaking at the unexpected cordiality of the welcome. "If you--I
+shall take advantage of your generous offer. You see, I'm rather in a
+box, owing to my--" He caught himself up, and tightened his slackening
+lip. "But you'll pardon me if I ask you to let me do something in
+return for your hospitality."
+
+"We don't sell our hospitality on the range," brusquely replied the
+cowman.
+
+"Oh, no, no, I did not mean--I could not pay a penny. I'm utterly
+destitute--a--a pauper!" A spasm of bitter despair contorted his
+handsome face.
+
+Knowles and the girl hastily looked away from him, that they might not
+see him in his weakness. But he rallied and forced a rather unsteady
+laugh at himself. "You see, I haven't quite got used to it yet. I've
+always had money. I never really had to work. Now I must learn to earn
+a living. It's very good of you, Mr. Knowles, but--there's that veal.
+If only you'll let me work out what I owe you."
+
+"You don't owe me a cent for the yearling," gruffly replied the
+cowman. "Don't know what I could put you at, anyway."
+
+"Might use him to shoo off the rattlers and jackrabbits from in front
+the mowing machine," suggested Gowan.
+
+"Mr. Ashton can ride," interposed the girl, with a friendliness of
+tone that brought Gowan to a thin-lipped silence.
+
+"That's something," said Knowles, gazing speculatively at the slim
+aristocratic figure of the tenderfoot. "You're not built for pitching
+hay, but like as not you have the makings of a puncher. Ever throw a
+rope?"
+
+"Never. I shall start practicing the art--at once."
+
+"No, not until you and Kid have had dinner," gayly contradicted the
+girl. "We've had ours. But Yuki always has something ready. Kid, if
+you'll show Mr. Ashton where to wash, I'll tell Yuki."
+
+She darted through the open doorway into the house. At a curt nod from
+Gowan, Ashton followed him around to the far side of the house,
+leaving Knowles in the act of hastily reloading his pipe. Under a
+lean-to that covered a door in the side of the house was a barrel of
+water and a bench with two basins. On a row of pegs above hung a
+number of towels, all rumpled but none dirty.
+
+Gowan pointed to a box of unused towels, and proceeded to lather and
+wash himself. Ashton took a towel, and after rinsing out the second
+washbasin, made as fastidious a toilet as the scant conveniences of
+the place would permit. There were combs and a fairly good mirror
+above the soap shelf. Gowan went in by the side door, without waiting
+for his companion. Ashton presently followed him, having looked in
+vain for a razor to rid himself of his two days' growth of beard.
+
+The long table told him that he had entered the ranch mess-hall, or
+rather, dining-room. Though the table was covered with oilcloth and
+the rough-hewn logs of the outer walls were lime-plastered only in the
+chinks, the seats were chairs instead of benches, and between the gay
+Mexican _serape_ drapes of the clean windows hung several well-done
+water color landscapes, appropriately framed in unbarked pine. On the
+oiled deal floor were scattered half a dozen Navajo rugs.
+
+Gowan had taken a seat at one end of the table. As Ashton sat down at
+the neatly laid place opposite him, a silent, smiling, deft-handed Jap
+came in from the kitchen with a heaping trayful of dishes. For the
+most part, the food was ordinary ranch fare, but cooked with the skill
+of a _chef_. The exceptions were the fresh milk and delicious unsalted
+butter. On most cattle ranches, the milk comes from "tin cows" and the
+butter from oleomargarine tubs.
+
+The two diners were well along in their meal, eating as earnestly and
+as taciturnly as the Jap served, when Miss Isobel came in with her
+father. The girl had dressed for the afternoon in a gown of the latest
+style, whose quiet color and simple lines harmonized perfectly with
+her surroundings. She smiled impartially at puncher, tenderfoot, and
+Jap.
+
+"Thank you, Yuki. I see you did not keep our hungry hunters
+waiting.--Mr. Ashton, I have told Daddy about that shooting."
+
+"It's a mighty strange happening. You might tell us the full
+particulars," said Knowles.
+
+Ashton at once gave a fairly accurate account of the affair. He could
+hardly exaggerate the peril he had incurred, and the touch of
+exultance with which he described his defeat of the murderer was quite
+pardonable in a tenderfoot.
+
+"Strange--mighty strange. Can't understand it," commented the cowman
+when Ashton had finished his account.
+
+"It shore is, Mr. Knowles," added Gowan. "The only thirty-eight on the
+ranch is mine. That seems to clear our people."
+
+"Of course! It could not possibly be any of our people!" exclaimed the
+girl.
+
+"Mr. Ashton thinks it might have been his guide," went on Gowan.
+
+"His guide? What caliber was his rifle?" shrewdly queried the cowman.
+
+"Why, I--really I cannot remember," answered Ashton. "I know it was of
+a larger bore than mine, but that is all."
+
+"Um-m," considered Knowles. "Looks rather like he's the man. Can't
+think of anyone else. Trouble is, if he was laying in wait for you,
+his horse would be fresh. Must have covered a right smart bit of
+territory by now."
+
+"I'll go out and take a look at his tracks," said Gowan, rising with a
+readiness that brought a nod of approval from his employer.
+
+"You'll be careful, Kid," cautioned the girl, with a shade of concern
+in her tone.
+
+"He'll keep his eye open, Chuckie," reassured her father. "It's the
+other fellow wants to be careful, if he hasn't already vamoosed. Hey,
+Kid?"
+
+"I'll get him, if I get the chance," laconically replied Gowan,
+looking from the girl to Ashton with the characteristic straightening
+of his lips that marked the tensing of his emotions.
+
+As he left the room Miss Isobel smiled and nodded to Ashton. "You see
+how friendly he is, in spite of his cold manner to strangers. I
+thought he had taken a dislike to you, yet you saw how readily he
+offered to go out after your assailant."
+
+"More likely it's because he thinks it would discredit us to let such
+a scoundrel get away," differed her father. "However, he'll leave you
+alone, Mr. Ashton, if you stay with us as a guest, and will only haze
+you a bit, if you insist upon joining our force."
+
+"You mean, working for you? I must insist on that," said Ashton, with
+an eager look at the girl. "If only I can do well enough to be
+employed right along!"
+
+The cowman grunted, and winked solemnly at his daughter. "Yes, I can
+understand your feeling that way. How about the winter, though? You
+mayn't like it over here so well then."
+
+Ashton flushed and laughed at the older man's shrewdness; hesitated,
+and confessed candidly: "No, I should prefer Denver in winter."
+
+Miss Isobel blushed in adorable payment of his compliment, but thrust
+back at him: "We bar cowboys in the Sacred Thirty-six."
+
+He winced. Her stroke had pierced into his raw wound.
+
+"Oh!--oh!" she breathlessly exclaimed. "I didn't mean to--Oh, I'm so
+sorry!"
+
+He dashed the tears from his eyes. "No, you--don't apologize! It's
+only that I'm--Please don't fancy I'm a baby! You see, when a fellow
+has always lived high--on top, you know--and then to have everything
+go out from under him without warning!"
+
+"Keep a stiff upper lip, son," advised Knowles. "You'll pull through
+all right. It isn't everyone in your fix that would be asking for
+work."
+
+Ashton laughed a trifle unsteadily. "It's very kind of you to say
+that, Mr. Knowles. I--I wish a steady position, winter as well as
+summer."
+
+"How about Denver?" asked Knowles.
+
+"That can wait," replied Ashton. He met the girl's smile of approval,
+and rallied fully. "Yes, that can wait--and so can I."
+
+Again the girl blushed, but she found a bantering rejoinder: "With you
+and Kid and Daddy all waiting for me to come home, I suppose I'll have
+to cut the season short."
+
+"The winters here are like those you read about up at the North
+Pole," the cowman informed Ashton. "But we get our sunshine back along
+in the spring."
+
+"Oh, Daddy! you're a poet!" cried his daughter, flinging her arm
+around his sunburnt neck.
+
+"Wish I were one!" enviously sighed Ashton. The cowman gave him a look
+that brought him to his feet. "Mr. Knowles," he hastened to ask, "if
+you'll kindly tell me what my work is to be this afternoon."
+
+The older man's frown relaxed. "Did you come out here from Stockchute?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Think you could find your way back?"
+
+"Why, yes; though we wandered all around--But surely, Mr. Knowles,
+you'll not require me--"
+
+"I want a man to ride over with some letters and fetch the mail. I'll
+need Gowan for work you can't do. Chuckie was to have gone; but I
+can't let her now, until we're more sure about that man who shot at
+you."
+
+"I see."
+
+"Well, have you got the nerve, in case the man is loose over that
+way?"
+
+Ashton's eyes flashed. "I'll go! Perhaps I'll get another crack at the
+scoundrel."
+
+"Keep cool. It's ninety-nine chances in the hundred he's on the run
+and'll keep going all week."
+
+"Shall I start now? As we came by a very roundabout way--We went first
+in the opposite direction, and then skirted High Mesa down from the
+mountains. So, you see, I may have a little difficulty--"
+
+"No you won't. There's our wagon trail. Even if you got off that, all
+you'd have to do would be to keep headed for Split Peak. That's right
+in line with Stockchute. But you'll not start till morning. I haven't
+got all my letters written. That'll give you all day to go and come.
+It's only twenty-five miles over there. Chuckie, you show this new
+puncher of ours over the place, while I write those letters."
+
+"I'll start teaching him how to throw a rope," volunteered the girl.
+
+She led the way out through a daintily furnished front room, in which
+Ashton observed an upright piano and other articles of culture that he
+would never have expected to come upon in this remote section. In
+passing, the girl picked up a wide-brimmed lacy hat.
+
+Once outside, she first took Ashton for a walk up Plum Creek to where
+half a dozen men were at work with a mowing machine and horse rakes
+making hay of the rich bunch-grass.
+
+"Daddy feeds all he can in winter," she explained. "The spring when I
+first came back from Denver I cried so over the starving cattle that
+he promised to always afterwards cut and stack all the hay he could.
+And he has found it pays to feed well. We would put a lot of land into
+oats, but, as you see, there's not enough water in the creek."
+
+"That's where an irrigation system would come in," remarked Ashton.
+
+"Oh, I hope you don't think it possible to water our mesa!" she cried.
+"I told you how it would break up our range."
+
+"I assure you, I don't think at all," he replied. "I'm not a
+reclamation engineer--never specialized on hydraulics."
+
+She flashed an odd look at him. "You never? But Mr. Blake--that
+wonderful engineer of the Zariba Dam--he would know, wouldn't he?"
+
+"I--suppose he would--that is, if he--" Ashton hesitated, and
+exclaimed, "But that's just it!"
+
+"What?" she asked.
+
+"Why, to--to have him come here. He's the luckiest for blundering on
+ways to do things," muttered Ashton. He added with growing bitterness:
+"Yes, if there's any way at all to do it, you'd have him flooding your
+whole range--deluging it. He's got all those millions to back him."
+
+"You do not like him," said the girl. She looked off towards High
+Mesa, her face glowing with suppressed excitement. "No doubt you are
+right--as to his ability. But--don't you see?--if it can be done, it
+is bound to be done sooner or later. All the time Daddy and I--and
+Kid, too--are living under this constant dread that it may be
+possible. But if such an engineer as--as Mr. Blake came and looked
+over the situation and told us we needn't fear--don't you see how--?"
+
+"You don't mean that you--?" Ashton, in turn, left his question
+unfinished and averted his face.
+
+"Yes," she answered. "I'm sure it will be best to put an end to this
+uncertainty. So I believe I shall send for--for Mr. Blake."
+
+"But--why for--for him--in particular?" he stammered.
+
+"I am sorry you dislike him," she said, regaining her composure when
+she saw that he too was agitated.
+
+He did not reply. She tactfully changed the subject. By the time they
+had circled around, back to the half open feed-sheds, he was gayly
+chatting with her on music and the drama. When they came down to the
+horse corral she proceeded to lecture him on the duties of a cowboy
+and showed him how to hold and throw a rope. Under her skillful
+tuition, he at last learned the knack of casting an open noose.
+
+Evening was near when they returned to the house. As before, they
+caught Knowles in the front porch contentedly puffing at his pipe. He
+dropped it down out of sight. The girl shook her finger at him, nodded
+to Ashton, and went indoors. Immediately the cowman put his pipe back
+into his mouth and drew another from his pocket, together with an
+unopened sack of tobacco.
+
+"Smoke?" he asked.
+
+Ashton's eyes gleamed. In the girl's presence he had been able to
+restrain the fierce craving that had tortured him since dinner. Now it
+so overmastered him that he almost snatched the pipe and tobacco out
+of the cowman's hand. The latter gravely shook his head.
+
+"Got it that bad, have you?" he deplored.
+
+Ashton could not answer until his pipe was well under way.
+
+"I'm--I'm breaking off," he replied. "Haven't had a cigarette all
+day--nor anything else. A-ah!"
+
+"Glad you like it," said Knowles. "A pipe is all right with this kind
+of tobacco. You can't inhale it like you can cigarettes, unless you
+want to strangle."
+
+"I shall break off entirely as soon as I can," asserted Ashton.
+
+"Well," considered Knowles, "I'm not saying you can't or won't. It's
+mighty curious what a young fellow can do to please a pretty girl.
+Just the same, I'd say from the color of Kid's fingers that he hasn't
+forgotten how to roll a fat Mexican _cigaretto_.--Hello! 'Talk of the
+devil--' Here he comes now."
+
+Gowan came around the corner of the house, his spurs jingling. His
+eyes were as cold and his face as emotionless as usual.
+
+"Well?" asked Knowles. "Have a seat."
+
+"Didn't get him," reported Gowan, dropping into a chair. "Near as I
+could make out, he cut straight across for the railroad, on the
+jump."
+
+"Then it must have been that guide!" exclaimed Ashton.
+
+"Looks that way," added Knowles. "Glad of it. We won't see him again,
+unless you want to notify the sheriff, when you ride over tomorrow."
+
+"No, oh, no. I am satisfied to be rid of him."
+
+"If he don't come back," remarked Gowan.
+
+"He won't," predicted Knowles.
+
+"Well, not for a time maybe," agreed Gowan.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+A MAN'S SIZE HORSE
+
+
+At dusk the sonorous boom of a Japanese gong gave warning of the
+approach of the supper hour. A few minutes later a second booming
+summoned all in to the meal. Miss Isobel sat at one end of the table;
+her father at the other. Along the sides were the employes, Ashton and
+Gowan at the corners nearest the girl. A large coal oil lamp with an
+artistic shade cast a pink light on the clean white oilcloth of the
+table and the simple tasteful table service.
+
+Yuki, the silent Jap, served all with strict impartiality, starting
+with the mistress of the house and going around the table in regular
+succession, either one way or the other. The six rough-appearing
+haymakers used their knives with a freedom to which Ashton was
+unaccustomed, but their faces were clean, their behavior quiet, and
+their occasional remarks by no means inapt.
+
+After the meal they wished Miss Knowles a pleasant "Good-night," and
+left for the bunkhouse. But Ashton and Gowan, at the smiling
+invitation of the girl, followed her into the front room. Knowles
+came in a few minutes later and, with scarcely a glance at the young
+people, settled down beside a tableful of periodicals and magazines to
+study the latest Government report on the reclamation service.
+
+Ashton had entered the "parlor" under the impression that here he
+would have Gowan at a disadvantage. To his surprise, the puncher
+proved to be quite at ease; his manners were correct and his
+conversation by no means provincial. A moment's reflection showed
+Ashton that this could not well be otherwise, in view of the young
+fellow's intimacy with Miss Chuckie Isobel.
+
+Another surprise was the discovery that Gowan had a remarkably good
+ear for music and knew even more than the girl about the masters and
+their works. There was a player attachment to the piano, and the girl
+and Gowan had a contest, playing the same selections in turn, to see
+which could get the most expression by means of the mechanical
+apparatus. If anything, the girl came out second best. At least she
+said so; but Ashton would not admit it.
+
+Between times the three chatted on a thousand and one topics, the girl
+always ready to bubble over with animation and merriment. She bestowed
+her dimpled smiles on both her admirers with strict impartiality and
+as impartially stimulated each to his best with her tact and gay
+wit.
+
+At nine o'clock sharp Knowles closed his report and rose from his
+comfortable seat.
+
+"Time to turn in, boys. Coal oil costs more than sunlight," he
+announced, in the flat tone of a standing joke. "We'll take a jog down
+creek to the Bar-Lazy-J ranch, first thing tomorrow, Kid.--Ashton,
+you'd better start off in the cool, before sunup. Here's my bunch of
+letters, case I might forget them."
+
+He handed over half a dozen thinly padded envelopes. Gowan was already
+at the door, hat in hand.
+
+"Good night, Mr. Knowles. Good night, Miss Chuckie. Pleasant dreams!"
+he said.
+
+"Same to you, Kid!" replied the girl.
+
+"May I give and receive the same?" asked Ashton.
+
+"Of course," she answered. "But wait a moment, please. I've some
+letters to go, myself, if you'll kindly take them with Daddy's."
+
+As she darted into a side room, Knowles stepped out after Gowan. When
+the girl returned, Ashton took the letters that she held out to him
+and deliberately started to tie them in a packet with those of her
+father. His sole purpose was to prolong his stay to the last possible
+moment. But inadvertently his eye caught the name "Blake" on one of
+the envelopes. His smile vanished; his jaw dropped.
+
+"Why, Mr. Ashton, what is the matter?" said the girl.
+
+"I--I beg your pardon," he replied. "I did not realize that--But it's
+too absurd--it can't be! You did not mean what you said this
+afternoon. It can't be you're writing to that man to come here."
+
+"I am," she replied.
+
+"But you can't--you must not. He's the very devil for doing impossible
+things. He'll be sure to turn loose a flood on you--drown you
+out--destroy your range!"
+
+"If it can be done, the sooner we know it the better," she argued.
+"Daddy says little, but it is becoming a monomania with him--the
+dread. I wish to put an end to his suspense. Besides, if--if this Mr.
+Blake is as remarkable as you and the reports say he is, it will be
+interesting to meet him. My only fear is that so great an engineer
+will not think it worth while to come to this out-of-the-way
+section."
+
+"The big four-flusher!" muttered Ashton.
+
+"How you must dislike him! It makes me all the more curious to see
+him."
+
+"Does your father know about this letter?" queried Ashton.
+
+"You forget yourself, sir," she said.
+
+Meeting her level gaze, he flushed crimson with mortification. He
+stood biting his lip, unable to speak.
+
+She went on coldly: "I do not ask you to tell me the cause of your
+hatred for Mr. Blake. I assume that you are a gentleman and will not
+destroy my letter. But even if you should do so, it would mean only a
+short delay. I shall write him again if I receive no reply to this."
+
+Ashton's flush deepened. "I did not think you could be so hard. But--I
+presume I deserved it."
+
+"Yes, you did," she agreed, with no lessening of her coldness.
+
+"I see you will not accept an apology, Miss Knowles. However, I give
+you my word that I will deliver your letter to the postmaster at
+Stockchute."
+
+He started out, very stiff and erect. As he passed through the doorway
+she suddenly relented and called after him: "Good night, Mr. Ashton!
+Pleasant dreams!"
+
+He wheeled and would have stepped back to reply had not Knowles spoken
+to him from the darkness at the end of the porch: "This way, Ashton.
+Kid is waiting to show you to the bunkhouse. You'll find a clean bunk
+and new blankets. I've also issued you corduroy pants and a pair of
+leather chaps from the commissary. Those city riding togs aren't
+hardly the thing on the range. There's a spare saddle, if you want to
+change off from yours."
+
+"Thank you for the other things; but I prefer my own saddle," replied
+Ashton.
+
+He now perceived the dim form of Gowan starting off in the starlight,
+and followed him to the bunkhouse. The other men were already in
+their beds, fast asleep and half of them snoring. Gowan silently lit a
+lantern and showed the tenderfoot to an unoccupied bunk in the far
+corner of the rough but clean building. After a curt request for
+Ashton to blow out the lantern when through with the light, he
+withdrew, to tumble into a bunk near the door.
+
+Ashton removed twice as many garments as had the puncher, and slipped
+in between his fresh new blankets, after several minutes spent in
+finding out how to extinguish the lantern. For some time he lay
+listening. He had often read of the practical jokes that cowboys are
+supposed always to play on tenderfeet. But the steady concert of the
+snoring sleepers was unbroken by any horseplay. Presently he, too,
+fell asleep.
+
+He was wakened by a general stir in the bunkhouse. Day had not yet
+come, but by the light of a lantern near the door he could see his
+fellow employes passing out. He dressed as hastily as he could in his
+gloomy corner, putting on his new trousers and the stiff leather
+chapareras in place of his breeches and leggings. Gowan came in,
+glanced at him with a trace of surprise, and went out with the
+lantern.
+
+Ashton followed to the house and around into the side porch. The other
+men were making their morning toilets by lantern light, each drying
+face and hands on his own towel. Ashton and Gowan waited their turn
+at the basins, and together went into the lamplit dining-room, where
+the Jap cook was serving bacon, coffee, and hot bread. Ashton lingered
+over his meal, hoping to see Miss Isobel. But neither she nor her
+father appeared.
+
+Gowan had gone out with the other men. Presently he came back to the
+side door and remarked in almost a friendly tone: "Your hawss is ready
+whenever you are, Ashton."
+
+"Thanks," said Ashton, rising. "The poor old brute must be rather
+stiff after the spurring I gave him yesterday."
+
+Gowan did not reply. He had gone out again. Somewhat nettled, Ashton
+hastened after him. Dawn had come. The gray light in the east was
+brightening to an exquisite pink. The clear twilight showed the
+puncher waiting at the front of the house beside a saddled horse. A
+glance showed Ashton that the saddle and bridle were his own, but that
+the horse was a big, rawboned beast.
+
+"That's not my pony," he said.
+
+"This here Rocket hawss ain't _any_ pony," agreed Gowan. "He's a man's
+size hawss. Ain't afraid you'll drop too far when you fall off, are
+you?"
+
+"You're trying to get me on a bucking bronco!" said Ashton,
+suspiciously eying the bony, wild-eyed brute.
+
+"He's no outlaw," reassured Gowan. "Most all our hawsses are liable
+to prance some when they've et too many rattlers. But Miss Chuckie
+said you can ride."
+
+"I can," said Ashton, tightening the thong of his sombrero down across
+the back of his head and buttoning his coat.
+
+"Roped this Rocket hawss for you because Mr. Knowles wants his mail by
+sundown," remarked Gowan. "He shore can travel some when he feels like
+it. Don't know as you'll need your spurs. Here's a five-spot Mr.
+Knowles said to hand you by way of advance. Thought you might want to
+refresh yourself over at Stockchute. Wouldn't rather have another
+saddle and bridle, would you?"
+
+"Kindly thank Mr. Knowles for me," said Ashton, pocketing the five
+dollar bill. "No--the horse is hard-mouthed, but I prefer my own
+saddle and bridle."
+
+He drew his rifle from its sheath, wiped the dew from the butt, and
+tested the mechanism. The horse cocked his ears, but stood motionless
+while the rifle was taken out and replaced. Ashton picked up the reins
+from the ground and threw them over the horse's head. The beast did
+not swing around, but his ewe neck straightened and his entire body
+stiffened to a peculiar rigidity.
+
+Ashton tested the tightness of his saddle girth, and paused to gaze at
+the closed front door of the house. Aside from his saddle and
+burlesque sombrero, he looked every inch a puncher, both in dress and
+in bearing. But Miss Isobel missed the effect of his new _ensemble_.
+She missed also the interesting spectacle of his mounting.
+
+If he had never ridden a cow pony he would have been thrown and
+dragged the instant he put his foot in the narrow metal stirrup. The
+horse was watching him alertly, every muscle tense. Ashton smiled
+confidently, spoke to the beast in a quiet tone, and pulled on the off
+rein. The horse bent his head to the pull, for the moment off his
+guard. In a twinkling Ashton had his foot in the stirrup and was up in
+the saddle. His toe slipped into the other stirrup as the horse jumped
+sideways.
+
+The leap was tremendous, but it failed to unseat Ashton. It was
+instantly followed by other wild jumps--whirling forward and sidelong
+leaps, interspersed with frantic plunging and rearing. Gowan looked
+on, agape with amazement. The tenderfoot stuck fast on his flat little
+saddle and only once pulled leather. Rocket was not a star bucker, but
+he had thrown more than one half-baked cowboy.
+
+Finding that he could not unseat his rider, the beast suddenly gave
+over his plunging, and bolted at furious speed down the smooth slope
+towards Plum Creek. Before they had gone half a furlong Ashton
+realized that he was on a blooded horse of unusual speed and a
+runaway. He could not hope to pull down so tough-mouthed a beast with
+his ordinary curb. The best he could do was to throw all his weight on
+the right rein. Unable altogether to resist the steady tug at his
+head, the racing horse gradually swerved until he was headed across
+the mesa towards the jagged, snow-streaked twin crests of Split Peak.
+
+Horse and rider were still in the curve of their swift flight when
+Isobel Knowles came out into the porch, yawning behind her plump,
+sunbrowned hand. A glance at Gowan cut the yawn short. She looked
+alertly afield and at once caught sight of the runaway.
+
+"Kid!--O-oh!" she cried. "Mr. Ashton!--on Rocket!"
+
+Gowan spun about to her with a guilty start, but answered almost
+glibly: "You said he could ride, Miss Chuckie."
+
+"He'll--he'll be killed!--Daddy!"
+
+Knowles stepped out through the doorway, cocking his big blue-barreled
+Colt's. Gowan hastily pointed towards the runaway. Knowles looked, and
+dropped the revolver to his side. "What's up?" he growled.
+
+"Kid--he--he put Mr. Ashton on Rocket!" breathlessly answered his
+daughter.
+
+"Sorry to contradict you, Miss Chuckie," said Gowan. "He put himself
+on."
+
+"He's on yet," dryly commented the cowman. "May be something to that
+boy, after all."
+
+"But, Daddy!--"
+
+"Now, just stop fussing yourself, honey. He and Rocket are going
+smooth as axlegrease and bee-lining for Stockchute. How did the hawss
+start off?--skittish?"
+
+"Enough to make the tenderfoot pull leather," said Gowan.
+
+"If he stuck at all, with that fool saddle--!" rejoined Knowles.
+"Don't you worry, honey. He sure can fork a hawss--that tenderfoot."
+
+"Oh, yes," the girl sighed with relief. "If Rocket started off
+bucking, and he kept his seat, of course it's all right. See him take
+that gully!"
+
+"You sure gave me a start, honey, calling out that way.--Well, Kid,
+it's about time we were off. I'll get my hat."
+
+Gowan stepped nearer the girl as her father went inside. "I'll leave
+it to the tenderfoot to tell you, Miss Chuckie. He'll have to own up I
+gave him fair warning. Told him he wouldn't need his spurs, and asked
+if he'd have another bit and saddle; but it wasn't any use. He's the
+kind that won't take advice."
+
+"I know you meant it as a joke, Kid. You did not realize the danger of
+his narrow stirrups. Had he been caught in mounting or had he been
+thrown, he would almost certainly have been dragged. And for you to
+give him our one ugly hawss!"
+
+"You said he could ride," the puncher defended himself.
+
+"I'll forgive you for your joke--if he comes back safe," she
+qualified, without turning her gaze from the now distant horse and
+rider.
+
+Gowan started for the corral, the slight waddle of his bowlegged gait
+rather more pronounced than usual. When Knowles came out with his hat,
+the runaway was well up on the divide towards Dry Fork. Rocket was
+justifying his name.
+
+In a few seconds the flying horse and rider had disappeared down the
+far slope. The girl followed her father and Gowan to the corral, and
+after they had ridden off, she roped and saddled one of the three
+horses in the corral. She mounted and was off on the jump, riding
+straight for the nearest point on the summit of the divide.
+
+As, presently, she came up towards the top of the rise, she gazed
+anxiously ahead towards Dry Fork. Before she could see over the bend
+down to the creek channel, she caught sight of a cloud of dust far out
+on the mesa beyond the stream. She smiled with relief and wheeled
+about to return. The tenderfoot had safely crossed the stream bed. He
+would have Rocket well in hand before they came to rough country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE SNAKE
+
+
+Early in the afternoon, having nothing else to do, Isobel again
+saddled up and started off towards Dry Fork. Her intention was to ride
+out on the road to Stockchute and meet Ashton, if he was not too
+late.
+
+As she rode up one side of the divide, a hat appeared over the bend of
+the other side. She could not mistake the high peak of that comic
+opera sombrero. Ashton was almost back to the ranch. Her first thought
+was that he had gone part way, and given up the trip. The big sombrero
+bobbed up and down in an odd manner. She guessed the cause even before
+Ashton's head and body appeared, rising and falling rhythmically. She
+stared as Rocket swept up into view, covering the ground with a
+long-strided trot.
+
+Ashton waved to her. She waved back. A few moments later they were
+close together. As she spun her pony around, he pulled in his horse to
+a walk, patting the beast's neck and speaking to him caressingly.
+
+"Back already?" she asked. "Surely, you've not been to Stockchute--Yes,
+you have!" Her experienced eye was taking in every indication of his
+horse's condition. "He's been traveling; but you've handled him well."
+
+"He's grand!" said Ashton. "Been putting him through his paces. I
+suppose he is your father's best mount."
+
+"Daddy and Kid ride him when they're in a hurry or there's no other
+horse handy."
+
+"You can't mean--? Then perhaps I can have him again occasionally."
+
+"You like him, really?"
+
+"All he needs is a little management," replied Ashton, again patting
+the horse's lean neck.
+
+"If you wish to take him in hand, I'll assign him to you. No one else
+wants him."
+
+"As your rural deliveryman's mount--" began Ashton. He stopped to show
+the bulging bag slung under his arm. "Here's the mail. Do you wish
+your letters now?"
+
+"Thank you, no."
+
+"Here is this, however," he said, handing her a folded slip of paper.
+
+She opened it and looked at the writing inside. It was a receipt from
+the postmaster at Stockchute to Lafayette Ashton for certain letters
+delivered for mailing. The address of the letter to Thomas Blake was
+given in full. The girl colored, bit her lip, and murmured
+contritely: "You have turned the tables on me. I deserved it!"
+
+"Please don't take it that way!" he begged. "My purpose was merely to
+assure you the letter was mailed. After all, I am a stranger, Miss
+Knowles."
+
+"No, not now," she differed.
+
+"It's very kind of you to say it! Yet it's just as well for me to
+start off with no doubts in your mind, in view of the fact that in two
+or three weeks--"
+
+"Yes?" she asked, as he hesitated.
+
+"I--Your father will hardly keep me more than two weeks, unless--unless
+I make good," he answered.
+
+"I guess you needn't worry about that," she replied, somewhat
+ambiguously.
+
+He shrugged. "It is very good of you to say it, Miss Knowles. I know I
+shall fail. Can you expect anyone who has always lived within touch of
+millions, one who has spent more in four years at college than all
+this range is worth--He cut my allowance repeatedly, until it was only
+a beggarly twenty-five thousand."
+
+"Twenty-five thousand dollars!" exclaimed Isobel. "You had all that
+to--to throw away in a single year?"
+
+"He cut me down to it the last year--a mere bagatelle to what I had
+all the time I was at college and Tech.," replied Ashton, his eyes
+sparkling at the recollection. "He wished me to get in thick with the
+New Yorkers, the sons of the Wall Street leaders. He gave me leave to
+draw on him without limit. I did what he wished me to do,--I got in
+with the most exclusive set. Ah-h!--the way I made the dollars fly!
+Before I graduated I was the acknowledged leader. What's more, I led
+my class, too--when I chose."
+
+"When you chose!" she echoed. "And now what are you going to do?"
+
+The question punctured his reminiscent elation. He sagged down in his
+saddle. "I don't know," he answered despondently. "_Mon Dieu!_ To come
+down to this--a common laborer for wages--after _that_! When I think
+of it--when I think of it!"
+
+"You are not to think of it again!" she commanded with kindly
+severity. "What you are to remember all the time is that you are now a
+man and honestly earning your own living, and no longer a--a leech
+battening on the sustenance produced by others."
+
+He winced. "Was that my fault?"
+
+"No, it was your father's. I marvel that he did not utterly ruin
+you."
+
+"He has! In his last will he cuts me off with only a dollar."
+
+"So that was it?--And you think that ruined you? I say it saved you!"
+she went on with the same kindly severity. "You were a parasite. Now
+the chance is yours to prove that you have the makings of a man. You
+have started to prove it. You shall not stop proving it. You are not
+going to be a quitter."
+
+"No!" he declared, straightening under her bright gaze. "I will not
+quit. I will try my best to make good as long as the chance is given
+me."
+
+"Now you're talking!" she commended him breezily.
+
+"How could I do otherwise when you asked me?" he replied with a grave
+sincerity far more complimentary than mere gallantry.
+
+She colored with pleasure and began to tell him of the cattle and
+their ways.
+
+When they reached the corral she complimented him in turn by allowing
+him to offsaddle her horse. They walked on down to the house and
+seated themselves in the porch. As he opened the bag of mail for her
+she noticed that her hand was empty and turned to look back towards
+the corral.
+
+"Your receipt from the postmaster," she remarked; "I must have dropped
+it."
+
+He sprang up. "If you wish to keep it, I shall go back and find it for
+you."
+
+"No, oh, no; unless you want it yourself," she replied.
+
+"Not I. The matter is closed, thanks to your kindness," he declared,
+again seating himself.
+
+He was right, in so far as they were concerned. Yet the matter was
+not closed. That evening, when Knowles and Gowan returned from their
+day of range riding, the younger man noticed a crumpled slip of paper
+lying against the foot of the corral post below the place where he
+tossed up his saddle. He picked it up and looked to see if it was of
+any value. An oath burst from his thin-drawn lips.
+
+"Shut up, Kid!" remonstrated Knowles. "I'm no more squeamish than
+most, but you know I don't like any cussing so near Chuckie."
+
+"Look at this!" cried Gowan--"Enough to make anybody cuss!"
+
+He thrust out the slip of paper close before his employer's eyes.
+Knowles took it and read it through with deliberate care.
+
+"Well?" he said. "It's a receipt from the postmaster to Ashton for
+those letters I sent over by him. What of it?"
+
+"_Your_ letters?" asked Gowan, taken aback. "Did you write that one
+what is most particularly mentioned, the one to that big engineer
+Blake?"
+
+"No. What would I be doing, writing to him or any engineer? They're
+just the people I don't want to have any doings with."
+
+"Then if you didn't write him, who did?" questioned Gowan, his mouth
+again tightening.
+
+"Why, I reckon you'll have to do your own guessing, Kid--unless it
+might be Ashton did it."
+
+"That's one leg roped," said Gowan. "Can you guess why he'd be writing
+to that engineer?"
+
+"Lord, no. He may have the luck to know him. Mr. Blake is a mighty big
+man, judging from all accounts; but money stands for a lot in the
+cities and back East, and Ashton's father is one of the richest men in
+Chicago. I looked it up in the magazine that told about his helping to
+back the Zariba Dam project."
+
+"That's another leg noosed--on the second throw," said Gowan. "Another
+try or two, and we'll have the skunk ready for hog-tying."
+
+"How's that?" exclaimed the cowman. "You've got something up your
+sleeve."
+
+"No, it's that striped skunk that's doing the crooked playing,"
+snapped Gowan. "Can't you savvy his game? It's all a frame-up--his
+sending off his guide and outfit, so's to let on to you he'd been
+busted up and kicked out by his dad. You take him in to keep his
+pretty carcass from the coyotes--which has saved them from being
+poisoned."
+
+"Now, look here, Kid, only trouble about you you're too apt to go off
+at half-cock. This young fellow may not be--"
+
+"He shore is a snake, Mr. Knowles, and this receipt proves it on him,"
+broke in the puncher. "Ain't you taken him into your employ?--ain't
+you treated him like he was a man?"
+
+"Well, 'tisn't every busted millionaire would have asked for work, and
+he seems to mean it."
+
+"Just a bluff! You don't savvy the game yet. Busted millionaire--_bah!_
+He's the coyote of that bunch of reclamation wolves. He comes out here
+to sneak around and get the lay of things. We happen to catch him
+rustling. To save his cussed carcass, he lets out about who his dad
+is. Course he couldn't know we'd got all the reports on that Zariba
+Dam and who backed the engineer, nor that we'd know all about Blake."
+
+"Well?" asked Knowles, frowning.
+
+"So he works us for suckers,--worms in here with us where he can learn
+all about you and your holdings; ropes a job with you, and gets off
+his report to that engineer Blake, first time he rides over to town."
+
+"Is that all your argument?" asked Knowles.
+
+"Ain't it enough?" rejoined Gowan. "Ain't he and that bunch all in
+cahoots together? Ain't this sneaking cuss's dad either the partner or
+the boss of Blake? Ain't Blake engaged in reclamation projects? You
+shore see all that. What follows?--It's all a frame-up, I tell you.
+Young Ashton comes out here as a sort of forerider for his concern;
+finds out what his people want to know, and now he's sent in his
+report to Blake. Next thing happens, Blake'll be turning up with a
+surveying outfit."
+
+Knowles scratched his head. "Hum-m-m--You sure put up a mighty stiff
+argument, Kid. I'm not so sure, though.... Um-m-m--Strikes me some of
+your knots might be tighter. First place, there wasn't any play-acting
+about the way the boy went plumb to pieces there at the waterhole.
+Next place, a man like his father, that's piled up a mint of money,
+isn't going to send out his son as forerider in a hostile country.
+Lastly, I've read a lot more about that engineer Blake than you have,
+and I've sized him up as a man who won't do anything that isn't square
+and open."
+
+"Maybe he ain't in on the dirty side of the deal," admitted Gowan.
+"How about this letter, though?"
+
+"Just a friendly writing, like as not," answered the cowman. "No,
+Kid--only trouble with you is you're too anxious over the interests of
+Dry Mesa range. I appreciate it, boy, and so does Chuckie. But that's
+no reason for you to take every newcomer for a wolf 'til he proves
+he's only a dog."
+
+"You won't do anything?" asked the puncher.
+
+"What d'you want me to do?"
+
+"Fire him--run him off Dry Mesa," snapped Gowan.
+
+"Sorry I can't oblige you, Kid," replied Knowles. "You mean well, but
+you'll have to make a better showing before I'll turn adrift any man
+that seems to be trying to make good."
+
+Gowan looked down. After a brief pause he replied with unexpected
+submissiveness: "All right, Mr. Knowles. You're the boss. Reckon you
+know best. I don't savvy these city folks."
+
+"Glad you admit it," said Knowles. "You're all wrong in sizing him up
+that way. I've a notion he's got a lot of good in him, spite of his
+city rearing. I wouldn't object, though, if you wanted to test him out
+with a little harmless hazing, long as you didn't go too far."
+
+"No," declined Gowan. "I've got my own notion of what he is. There's
+just one way to deal with skunks, and that is, don't fool with them."
+
+The cowman accepted this as conclusive. But when, a little later,
+Ashton met Gowan at the supper table he was rendered uneasy by the
+cold glint in the puncher's gray eyes. As nothing was said about the
+postmaster's receipt, he could conjecture no reason for the look other
+than that Gowan was planning to render him ridiculous with some cowboy
+trick.
+
+Isobel had assured him with utmost confidence that the testing of his
+horsemanship by means of Rocket had been intended only as a practical
+joke, and that Gowan would never have permitted him to mount the horse
+had he considered it at all dangerous. Yet the fellow might next
+undertake jokes containing no element of physical peril and
+consequently all the more humiliating unless evaded.
+
+In apprehension of this, the tenderfoot lay awake most of that night
+and fully half of the next. His watch was fruitless. Each night Gowan
+and the other men left him strictly alone in his far dark corner of
+the bunkhouse. In the daytime the puncher was studiously polite to him
+during the few hours that he was not off on the range.
+
+The third evening, after supper, Gowan handed Isobel the horny,
+half-flattened rattles of an unusually large rattlesnake.
+
+"What is it? Do you wish me to guess his length?" she asked, evidently
+surprised that he should fetch her so commonplace an object. "I make
+it four feet."
+
+"You're three inches short," he replied.
+
+"Well, what about it?" she inquired.
+
+"Nothing--only I just happened to get him up near the bunkhouse, Miss
+Chuckie. Thought I'd tell you, in case he has a mate around."
+
+"We must all look sharp. You, too, Mr. Ashton. They are more apt to
+strike without warning, this time of year."
+
+"I know," remarked Ashton. "It's before they cast their old skin, and
+it makes them blind."
+
+"Too early for that," corrected Knowles. "I figure it's the long spell
+of the summer's heat. Gets on their nerves, same as with us."
+
+"They shore are mighty like some humans," observed Gowan. "Look at the
+way they like to snuggle up in your blankets on a cool night.
+Remember how I used to carry a hair rope on spring round-up?"
+
+"I remember that they used to crawl into the bunkhouse before the
+floor was laid," said Isobel. She smiled at Ashton. "That was the Dry
+Mesa reptilian age. I first learned to handle a 'gun' shooting at
+rattlers. There were so many we had to make it a rule to kill everyone
+we could. But there hasn't been one killed so near the house for
+years."
+
+"They often go in pairs. This one, though, may have been a lone
+stray," added Gowan. He looked at his employer. "Talking about strays,
+guess I'd best go out in the morning and head back that Bar-Lazy-J
+bunch. I can take an iron along and brand those two calves, same
+trip."
+
+Knowles nodded and returned to his Government report. The two young
+men and Isobel began an evening's entertainment at the piano. Ashton
+enjoyed himself immensely. Though so frank and unconstrained in
+manner, the girl was as truly refined as the most fastidiously reared
+ladies of the East.
+
+At the end of the delightful evening he withdrew with Gowan to the
+bunkhouse, reluctant to leave, yet aglow with pleasure. Isobel had so
+charmed him that he lay in his bunk forgetful of all else than her
+limpid blue eyes and dimpled cheeks. But after his two nights of
+broken rest he could not long resist the heaviness that pressed
+together his eyelids. He fell asleep, smiling at the recollection of
+the girl's gracious, "Good-night and pleasant dreams!"
+
+With such a kindly wish from her, his dreams certainly should have
+been heavenly. Yet he began the night by sinking into so profound a
+sleep that he had no dreams whatever. When at last he did rouse to the
+dream-state of consciousness, it was not to enjoy any pleasant fantasy
+of music and flowers.
+
+He was lying in Deep Canyon, down at the very bottom of those gloomy
+depths. About him was an awful stillness. The river of the abyss was
+no longer roaring. It had risen up, up, up to the very rim of the
+precipices--and all the tremendous weight of its waters was above him,
+bearing down upon him, smothering him, crushing in his chest! He
+sought to shriek, and found himself dumb.
+
+Suddenly an Indian stood over him, a gigantic Indian with feet set
+upon his breast. The red giant was a medicine man, for he clashed and
+rattled an enormous gourd full of bowlders.
+
+The rattle sounded sharper, shriller, more vibrant in the ears of the
+rousing sleeper. His eyelids fluttered, rose a little way, and snapped
+wide apart. His eyes, bared of their covers, glared in utter horror of
+that which they saw. Their pupils dilated, their balls bulged as if
+about to burst from the sockets.
+
+The weight was still on his chest,--a weight far more to be dreaded
+than a canyon full of water or the foot of an Indian Titan. It was a
+weight of living, quivering coils. Above those coils, clearly
+illuminated in the full daylight that streamed through the open door
+of the bunkhouse, there upreared a hideous gaping maw, set with four
+slender curved fangs of dazzling whiteness.
+
+The snake's eyes, green as emeralds, glared down into the face of the
+man with such intense malignancy that they seemed to stream forth a
+cold evil light. Fortunately he was paralyzed with fright. The
+slightest movement would have caused that fanged maw to lash down into
+his face.
+
+Something partly obscured the light in the doorway. Ashton was too
+terrified to heed. But the snake was more sensitive to the change in
+the light. Without altering the deadly poise of its head, it again
+sounded its shrill, menacing rattle. The shadow passed and the light
+streamed in as before. The rattling ceased. There followed a pause of
+a few seconds' duration--To the man every second was an age-long
+period of horror.
+
+A faint metallic click came from across the room. Slight as was the
+sound, the irritated snake again set its rattle to quivering. The
+triangular head flattened back for the delayed stroke at the ashen
+face of the man. The billowing coils stiffened--the stroke started. In
+the same instant came a report that to the strained ears of the man
+sounded like the crashing roar of a cannon.
+
+[Illustration: It sounded its shrill, menacing rattle]
+
+The head and forepart of the snake's body shot alongside his face,
+writhing in swift convulsions. The first touch of its cold scales
+against his cheek broke the spell of horror that had bound him. He
+jerked his head aside, and flung out his left hand to push the hideous
+thing from him. As his fingers thrust away the nearest coil, the head
+flipped around on its half-severed neck, and the deadly jaws
+automatically gaped and snapped together. Two of the dripping poison
+fangs struck in the cushion of flesh on the outer edge of Ashton's
+hand. With a shriek, he flung the dying snake on the floor and put the
+wounded hand to his mouth.
+
+"He struck you!" cried the voice of Isobel, "but only on the hand,
+thank goodness! Wait, I'll fix it. Lie still."
+
+She came swiftly across the room, thrusting a long-barreled automatic
+pistol into its holster under a fold of her skirt. Her other hand drew
+out a locket that was suspended in her bosom.
+
+"Whiskey! I'm bitten!" panted Ashton, sucking frantically at his
+wounds. "Quick! I'm bitten. Give me whiskey!"
+
+"Steady, steady," she reassured. "It's not bad--only on your hand.
+Give it to me. Here's something a thousand times better than
+whiskey--permanganate."
+
+While speaking, she caught up his neckerchief from the head of the
+bunk and knotted it about the wrist of the wounded hand tightly enough
+to check the circulation.
+
+"Now hold it steady," she directed. "Won't have to use a knife. You
+tore open the holes when you jerked off the horrid thing."
+
+Obedient but still sweating with fear, he held up the bleeding hand.
+She had opened her locket, in which were a number of small,
+dark-purple crystals. Two of the larger ones she thrust lengthwise as
+deeply as she could into the little slits gashed by the fangs. Another
+large and two small crystals were all that she could force into the
+openings.
+
+"There!" she cheerily exclaimed. "That will kill the poison in short
+order, and will not hurt you a particle. It's the best thing there is
+to cheat rattlers,--just cheap, ordinary permanganate of potash. If
+people only had sense enough always to carry a few crystals, no one
+would ever die of rattlesnake bites."
+
+"I've--I've heard that whiskey--" began Ashton.
+
+"Yes, and far more victims die from the whiskey than from the bites,"
+rejoined Isobel.
+
+"But a stimulant--"
+
+"Stimulant, then heart depressant--first up, then down--that's
+alcohol. No, you'll get only one poison, the snake's, this time. So
+don't worry. You'll soon be all right. Even had you been struck in the
+face, quick action with permanganate would have saved you."
+
+He shuddered. "Ah!... But if you had not come!"
+
+"It was fortunate, wasn't it?" she remarked. "I did not know you were
+in here. I was going up to the corral and heard the rattle as I came
+past. It was so faint that I might not have noticed it, had not Kid
+told of killing the rattler yesterday."
+
+Ashton stared fearfully at his blackening hand. Isobel smiled and
+began to unknot the neckerchief.
+
+"There is nothing to fear," she insisted. "That is due only to lack of
+circulation. You'll soon be all right. Come up to the house as soon as
+you can and get two or three cups of coffee. I'll tell Yuki."
+
+She hastened out. When he had made sure that the still writhing snake
+was far over on the floor, he slipped from his bunk and dressed as
+quickly as was possible without the use of his numbed hand. Shirt,
+trousers, boots--he stopped for no more, but hurried after Isobel.
+Whether because of the effects of the poison or merely as the reaction
+of the shock, he felt faint and dizzy. Several cups of hot strong
+coffee, however, went far towards restoring him.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+COMING EVENTS
+
+
+Knowles had gone with Gowan to cut out and drive back the stray cattle
+belonging to the adjoining range. They returned during the regular
+supper hour. The cowman washed quickly and hastened in to the table.
+Gowan, however, loitered just outside the door, fastening and
+refastening his neckerchief. He entered the dining-room while Isobel
+was in the midst of telling her father about the snake.
+
+"Did you hear, Kid?" she asked, when she finished her vivid account.
+
+"Yes, Miss Chuckie. I was slicking-up close 'longside the door. I
+heard all you told," he replied as he took his seat at the corner next
+to the animated girl. "We shore have got one mighty lucky tenderfoot
+on this range."
+
+"Indeed, yes!" exclaimed Ashton. "Had not Miss Chuckie chanced to be
+passing as the monster rattled--You know, she says that she might not
+have heeded it but for your killing the other snake yesterday. That
+put her on the alert."
+
+The puncher stared across the table at the city man with a coldly
+speculative gaze. "You shore are a lucky tenderfoot," he repeated.
+"'Tain't every fellow gets that close to a rattler this time of year
+and comes out of it as easy as you have. All I can see is you're kind
+of pale yet around the gills."
+
+Ashton held up his bandaged left hand. "Ah, but I have also this
+memento of the occasion. It is far from a pleasant one, I assure
+you."
+
+"Feels 'most as bad as a bee sting, don't it?" ironically condoled the
+puncher.
+
+"What I can't make out," interposed Knowles, "is how that rattler got
+up into Mr. Ashton's bunk."
+
+Gowan again stared across at the tenderfoot, this time with unblinking
+solemnity. "Can't say, Mr. Knowles," he replied. "Except it might be
+that desperado guide of his came around in the night and brought him
+Mr. Rattler for bedfellow."
+
+"Oh, Kid!" remonstrated Isobel. "It's not a joking matter!"
+
+"No, you're dead right, Miss Chuckie," he agreed. "There shore ain't
+any joke about it."
+
+"Ah, but perhaps I can make one," gayly dissented Ashton. "Had you not
+interfered, Miss Chuckie, the poor snake would have taken one bite,
+and then curled up and died. I'm so charged with nicotine, you know."
+
+Neither Isobel nor the puncher smiled at this ancient witticism. But
+Knowles burst into a hearty laugh, which was caught up and reenforced
+by the hitherto silent haymakers.
+
+"By--James! Ashton, you'll do!" declared the cowman, wiping his eyes.
+"When a tenderfoot can let off a joke like that on himself it's a sure
+sign he's getting acclimated. Yes, you'll make a puncher, some day."
+
+Ashton smiled with gratification, and looked at Isobel in eager-eyed
+appeal for the confirmation of the statement. She smiled and nodded.
+
+Upon his return from his remarkable ride to town she had assured him
+that he need not worry. Her present kindly look and the words of her
+father might have been expected to remove his last doubts. Such in
+fact was the result for the remainder of the evening.
+
+But that night the new employe must have given much anxious thought to
+the question of his future and his great need to "make good." The
+liveliness of his concern was shown by his behavior during the next
+two weeks. His zeal for work astonished Knowles quite as much as his
+efforts to be agreeable to his fellow employes gratified Miss Isobel.
+He charmed the Japanese cook with his praise of the cooking, he
+flattered the haymakers with his interest in their opinions. Towards
+the girl and her father he was impeccably respectful.
+
+Within ten days he was "Lafe" to everybody except Gowan and the Jap.
+The latter addressed him as "Mistah Lafe"; Gowan kept to the
+noncommittal "Ashton." The puncher had become more taciturn than ever,
+but missed none of the home evenings in the parlor. He watched Ashton
+with catlike closeness when Isobel was present, and seemed puzzled
+that the interloper refrained from courting her.
+
+"Don't savvy that tenderfoot," he remarked one day to Knowles. "All
+his talk about his dad being a multimillionaire--Acted like it at the
+start-off. Came down to this candidate-for-office way of comporting
+himself. It ain't natural."
+
+"Not when he's on the same range with Chuckie?" queried the cowman,
+his eyes twinkling. "Why don't you ever go into Stockchute and paint
+the town red?"
+
+"That's another thing," insisted Gowan. "He started in with Miss
+Chuckie brash as all hell. Now he acts towards her like I feel."
+
+"That's natural. He soon found out she's a lady."
+
+"No, it ain't natural, Mr. Knowles--not in him, it ain't. Nor it ain't
+natural for him to be so all-fired polite to everybody, nor his
+pestering you to find work for him."
+
+"And it's not natural for a tenderfoot to gentle a hawss like Rocket
+the way he's done already," rallied Knowles. "That crazy hawss follows
+him about like a dog."
+
+"Yes; Ashton feeds him sugar, like he does the rest of you," rejoined
+the puncher. "It ain't natural in his brand of tenderfoot--Bound to
+ride out, if there's any riding to do; bound to fuss and stew around
+the corral; bound to help with the haying; bound to help haul the
+water; bound to practice with his rope every moment he ain't doing
+something else. Can't tell me there ain't a nigger in that woodpile."
+
+"Now, don't go to hunting out any more mares' nests, Kid," admonished
+Knowles. "He's just a busted millionaire, that's all; and he's proving
+he realizes it. Guess the smash scared him. He's afraid he can't make
+good. Chuckie says he thinks I'll turn him adrift if he doesn't hustle
+enough to earn his salt."
+
+"Why not fire him anyway? You don't need him, and you won't need him,"
+argued the puncher.
+
+"Well, he helps keep Chuckie entertained. With you and him both on the
+place, she might conclude to stay over the winter, this year."
+
+Gowan's mouth straightened to a thin slit. "Better send her to Denver
+right off."
+
+"Look here, Kid," reproved the cowman. "You've had your chance, and
+you've got it yet. I've never interfered with you, and I'm not going
+to with him. It's for Chuckie to pick the winner. Like as not it'll be
+some man in town, for all I know. She has the say. Whether he wears a
+derby or a sombrero, she's to have her own choice. I don't care if
+he's a millionaire or a busted millionaire or a bronco buster,
+provided he's a man, and provided I'm sure he'll treat her right."
+
+Gowan lapsed into a sullen silence.
+
+Mounted as before on Rocket, Ashton had already made a second trip to
+Stockchute for mail, returning almost as quickly as on his wild first
+ride. Monday of his third week at the ranch he was sent on his third
+trip. As before, he started at dawn. But this time he did not come
+racing back early enough for a belated noon meal as he had on each of
+the previous occasions.
+
+By mid-afternoon Isobel began to grow uneasy. Remarkable as had been
+the efforts of his new rider's training, there was the not improbable
+chance that Rocket had reverted to his ugly tricks. She shuddered as
+she pictured the battered corpse of the city man dragging over the
+rocks and through the brush, with a foot twisted fast in one of the
+narrow iron stirrups.
+
+Her father and Gowan were off on their usual work of inspecting the
+bunches of cattle scattered about the range. The other men were as
+busy as ever mowing more hay and hauling in that which was cured. She
+was alone at the ranch with the Jap. At four o'clock she saddled her
+best horse and rode out towards Dry Fork. She hoped to sight Ashton
+from the divide. But there was no sign of any horseman out on the
+wide stretch of sagebrush flats.
+
+She rode down to Dry Fork, crossed over the sandy channel, and started
+on at a gallop along the half-beaten road that wound away through the
+sagebrush towards the distant Split Peak. An hour found her nearing
+the pinyon clad hills on the far side of Dry Mesa, with still no sign
+of Ashton.
+
+By this time she had worked herself into a fever of excitement and
+dread. Her relief was correspondingly great when at last she saw him
+coming towards her around the bend of the nearest hill. But his horse
+was walking and he was bent over in the saddle as if injured or
+greatly fatigued. Puzzled and again apprehensive, she urged her pony
+to sprinting speed.
+
+When he heard the approaching hoofs Ashton looked up as if startled.
+But he did not wave to her or raise his sombrero. As she came racing
+up she scrutinized his dejected figure for wounds or bruises. There
+was nothing to indicate that he had been either shot or thrown. His
+sullen look when she drew up beside him not unnaturally changed her
+anxiety to vexation.
+
+"What made you so slow?" she queried. "You know how eager I am for the
+mail each time. You might as well have ridden your own hawss."
+
+"It--has come," he muttered.
+
+"What?" she demanded.
+
+"The letter from him."
+
+"Him?" echoed the girl, trying hard to cover her confusion with a look
+of surprise.
+
+His dejection deepened as he observed her heightened color and the
+light in her eyes. "Yes, from him," he mumbled.
+
+"Oh, you mean Mr. Blake, I suppose," she replied. Lightly as she
+spoke, she could not suppress the quiver of eagerness in her voice.
+"If you will kindly give it to me now."
+
+He drew out a letter, not from among the other mail in his pouch, but
+from his pocket. Her look of surprise showed that she was struck with
+the oddness of this. She was too excited, however, to consider what
+might be its meaning. She tore open the letter and read it swiftly.
+Her sparkling eyes and glowing cheeks when she looked up served only
+to increase Ashton's gloom.
+
+"So the fellow is coming," he groaned. "What else could I have
+expected?"
+
+The girl held out the open letter to him. It was in typewriting,
+addressed from Chicago, and read:--
+
+  Dear Madam:
+
+  In reply to your letter of inquiry regarding an inspection to
+  determine the feasibility of irrigating certain lands in your
+  vicinity--my fee for personal inspection and opinion would be
+  $50. per day and expenses, if I came as consulting engineer.
+  However, I am about to make a trip to Colorado. If you can
+  furnish good ranch fare for my wife, son, and self as guests,
+  will look over your situation without charge. Wife wishes to
+  rough-it, but must have milk and eggs. Will leave servants in
+  car at Stockchute, where we shall expect a conveyance to meet us
+  Thursday, the 25th inst., if terms agreeable.
+
+                                       Respectfully yours,
+                                                   THOMAS BLAKE.
+
+Ashton crumpled the letter in his clenched hand as he had crumpled the
+letter from his father's lawyers.
+
+"He is coming! he really is coming!" he gasped. "Thursday--only three
+days! Genevieve too!"
+
+"And his son!" cried Isobel, too excited to heed the dismay in her
+companion's look and tone. "He and his family, too, as my guests!"
+
+"Yes," said Ashton bitterly. "And what of it when he floods you off
+your cattle range? By another year or two, the irrigation farmers will
+be settling all over this mesa, thick as flies."
+
+"Oh, no; it is probable that Mr. Blake will find there is no chance to
+water Dry Mesa," she replied, in a tone strangely nonchalant
+considering her former expressions of apprehension. She drew the
+crumpled letter from his relaxing fingers, and smoothed it out for a
+second reading.
+
+"'Wife, son, and self,'" she quoted. "Son? How old is he?"
+
+"I don't know. They've been married nearly two years," muttered
+Ashton.
+
+"Then it's a baby!--oh! oh! how lovely!" shrieked the girl. "And its
+mamma wants to rough it! She shall have every egg and chicken on the
+place--and gallons of cream! We shall take the skim milk."
+
+Still Ashton failed to enthuse. "To them that have, shall be given,
+and from him who has lost millions shall be taken all that's left!" he
+gibed.
+
+"No, we'll still have the skim milk," she bantered, refusing to notice
+his cynical bitterness.
+
+"I'm a day laborer!" he went on, still more bitterly. "I'm afraid of
+losing even my skim milk--And two weeks ago I thought myself certain
+of three times the millions that he will get when her father dies!"
+
+"No use crying over spilt milk, or spilt cream, either!" she replied.
+
+The note of sympathetic concern under her raillery brought a glimmer
+of hopefulness into his moody eyes.
+
+"If I did not think your father will drive me away!" he murmured.
+
+"Why should he?" she asked.
+
+"Because when Blake comes--" Ashton paused and shifted to a question.
+"Will you tell your father about their coming?"
+
+"Of course. I did not tell him about writing, because it would only
+have increased his suspense. But now--Let's hurry back!"
+
+A cut of her quirt set her pony into a lope. Rocket needed no urging.
+He followed and maintained a position close behind the galloping pony
+without breaking out of his rangy trot. Occasionally Isobel flung back
+a gay remark over her shoulder. Ashton did not respond. He rode after
+her, silent and depressed, his eyes fixed longingly on her graceful
+form, ever fleeing forward before him as he advanced.
+
+Once clear of the sagebrush, she drew rein for him to come up. They
+rode side by side across Dry Fork and over the divide. When they
+stopped at the corral she would have unsaddled her pony had he not
+begged leave to do her the service. As reward, she waited until he
+could accompany her to the house.
+
+They found her father and Gowan resting in the cool porch after a
+particularly hard day's ride. The puncher was strumming soft melodies
+on a guitar. Knowles was peering at his report of the Reclamation
+Service, held to windward of a belching cloud of pipe smoke. His
+daughter darted to him regardless of the offending incense.
+
+"Oh, Daddy!" she cried. "What do you think! Mr. Blake is coming to
+visit us!"
+
+"Blake?" repeated the cowman, staring blankly over his pipe.
+
+"Yes, Mr. Blake, the engineer--the great Thomas Blake of the Zariba
+Dam."
+
+"By--James!" swore Gowan, dropping his guitar and springing up to
+confront Ashton with deadly menace in his cold eyes. "This is what
+comes of nursing scotched rattlers! This here tenderfoot skunk has
+been foreriding for that engineer! I warned you, Mr. Knowles! I told
+you he had sent for him to come out here and cut up our range with his
+damned irrigation schemes!"
+
+"I send for Blake--I?" protested Ashton. He burst into a discordant
+laugh.
+
+"Laugh, will you?" said Gowan, dropping his hand to his hip.
+
+The girl flung herself before him. "Stop! stop, Kid! Are you locoed?
+He had nothing to do with it. I myself sent for Mr. Blake."
+
+"_You!_" cried Gowan.
+
+The cowman slowly stood up, his eyes fixed on the girl in an
+incredulous stare. "Chuckie," he half whispered, "you couldn't ha'
+done it. You're--you're dreaming, honey!"
+
+"No. Listen, Daddy! It's been growing on you so--your fear that we'll
+lose our range. I thought if Mr. Blake came and told you it can't be
+done--Don't you see?"
+
+"What if he finds it can?" huskily demanded Knowles.
+
+"He can't. I'm sure he can't. If he builds a reservoir, where could he
+get enough water to fill it? The watershed above us is too small. He
+couldn't impound more than three thousand acre feet of flood waters
+at the utmost."
+
+"How about the whole river going to waste, down in Deep Canyon?"
+queried her father.
+
+"Heavens, Mr. Knowles! How would he ever get a drop of water out of
+that awful chasm?" exclaimed Ashton. "I looked down into it. The river
+is thousands of feet down. It must be way below the level of Dry
+Mesa."
+
+"I'm not so sure about that," replied the cowman. "Holes are mighty
+deceiving."
+
+"Well, what if it ain't so deep as the mesa?" argued Gowan, for once
+half in accord with Ashton. "It shore is deep enough, ain't it? Even
+allowing that this man Blake is the biggest engineer in the U.S.,
+how's he going to pump that water up over the rim of the canyon? The
+devil himself couldn't do it."
+
+"If I am mistaken regarding the depth, that is, if the river really is
+higher than the mesa," remarked Ashton, "there is the possibility that
+it might be tapped by a tunnel through the side of High Mesa. But even
+if it is possible, it still is quite out of the question. The cost
+would be prohibitive."
+
+"You see, Daddy!" exclaimed Isobel. "Lafe knows. He's an engineer
+himself."
+
+"How's that?" growled her father, frowning heavily at Ashton. "You
+never told me you're an engineer."
+
+"I told Miss Chuckie the first day I met her," explained Ashton. "Ever
+since then I've been so busy trying to be something else--"
+
+"Shore you have!" jeered Gowan.
+
+"But about Mr. Blake, Daddy?" interposed Isobel. "I'm certain he'll
+find that no irrigation project is possible; and if _he_ says so, you
+will be able to give up worrying about it."
+
+"So that's your idea," he replied. "Of course, honey, you meant well.
+But he's a pretty big man, according to all the reports. What if he--"
+The cowman stopped, unable to state the calamity he dreaded.
+
+"Yes, what if?" bravely declared his daughter. "Isn't it best to know
+the worst, and have it over?"
+
+"Well--I don't know but what you're right, honey."
+
+"It's your say, Mr. Knowles," put in Gowan. "If you want the
+tenderfeet on your range, all right. If you don't, I'll engage to head
+back any bunch of engineers agoing, and I don't care whether they're
+dogies or longhorns."
+
+"There is to be no surveying party," explained Isobel. "Mr. Blake is
+coming to visit us with his wife and baby. Here is his letter."
+
+"Hey?" ejaculated Knowles. He read the letter with frowning
+deliberation, and passed it on to Gowan. "Well, he seems to be square
+enough. Guess we'll have to send over for him, honey, long as you
+asked him to come."
+
+"Oh, you will, Daddy!" she cried. She gave him a delicious kiss and
+cuddled against his shoulder coaxingly. "You'll let me go over in the
+buckboard for them, won't you?"
+
+"Kind of early in the season for you to begin hankering after city
+folks," he sought to tease her.
+
+"But think of the baby!" she exclaimed as excitedly as a little girl
+over the prospect of a doll. "A baby on our ranch! I simply must see
+it at the earliest possible moment! Besides, it will look better for
+our hospitality for me to meet Mrs. Blake at the train, since
+she--That's something I meant to ask you, Lafe. What does Mr. Blake
+mean by saying they will leave the servants in the car?"
+
+"I presume they are traveling in Mr. Leslie's private car, and will
+have it sidetracked at Stockchute," answered Ashton.
+
+"_Whee-ew!_" ejaculated Knowles. "Private car! And we're supposed to
+feed them!"
+
+"It is just because of the change we will give them that they are
+coming out here," surmised Isobel. "Look at the letter again. Mr.
+Blake expressly writes that his wife wishes to rough-it. Of course she
+cannot know what real roughing-it means. But if she is coming to us
+without a maid, we shall like her as much as--as Mr. Blake."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+SELF-DEFENSE
+
+
+Nothing more was said about the trip to town until late Wednesday
+evening. As Knowles slammed shut his book and the young men rose to
+withdraw to the bunkhouse, he asked Gowan casually: "Got those harness
+hawsses in the corral?"
+
+"Brought 'em in this afternoon. Greased the buckboard and overhauled
+the harness. Everything's in shape," answered the puncher.
+
+Knowles merely nodded. Yet in the morning, immediately after the usual
+early breakfast, Gowan went up to the corral and returned driving a
+lively pair of broncos to the old buckboard. Ashton happened to come
+around the house as Knowles stepped from the front door. The cowman
+was followed by his daughter, attired in a new riding habit and a
+fashionable hat with a veil.
+
+"You're just in time, Lafe," said Knowles. "Saddle a couple of hawsses
+and follow Chuckie to town. I misdoubt that seat is cramped for three,
+and a baby to boot."
+
+"But I--it looks quite wide to me," said Ashton, flushing and drawing
+back.
+
+"You know the size of Blake and his lady--I don't," replied the
+cowman. "Just the same, I want you to go along with Chuckie. There's
+not a puncher in this section would harm her, drunk or sober; but the
+fellows that come in and go out on the railroad are sometimes another
+sort."
+
+"Of course I--if necessary," stammered Ashton. "Yet may I ask you to
+excuse me? In the event of trouble, Mr. Gowan, you know--"
+
+"Great snakes!" called Gowan from the buckboard. "Needn't ask _me_ to
+go, twice!"
+
+"Can't spare you today," said Knowles, his keen eyes fixed on Ashton
+in unconcealed amazement.
+
+It was inconceivable. For the first time in his career as an employe,
+the tenderfoot was attempting to evade a duty,--a duty that comprised
+a fifty-mile ride in company with Miss Isobel Knowles!
+
+The girl looked at Ashton with a perfect composure that betrayed no
+trace of her feelings.
+
+"I'm sure there's no reason whatever why Lafe should go, if he does
+not wish to," she remarked. "Any of my hawsses will lead to the
+buckboard."
+
+"He's going to town with you," said Knowles, his jaw setting hard with
+stubborn determination.
+
+"Why, of course, Mr. Knowles, if you really think it necessary,"
+reluctantly acquiesced Ashton. He put his hand into his pocket,
+shrugged, and asked in a hesitating manner: "May I request--I have
+only a small amount left from that five dollars. If you consider there
+are any wages owing me--Going to town, you know."
+
+"Lord!" said the cowman. "So that's what you stuck on. 'Fraid of
+running out of change with a lady along. Here's the balance of your
+first month's wages, and more, if you want it."
+
+He drew out a fat wallet and began counting out banknotes.
+
+"Oh, no, not so many," said Ashton. "I wish only what you consider as
+owing to me now."
+
+"You'll take an even hundred," ordered Knowles, forcing the money on
+him. "A man doesn't feel just right in town unless he's well heeled.
+Only don't show more than a ten at a time in the saloon."
+
+"You have chosen me to act as your daughter's escort," replied
+Ashton.
+
+Quick to catch the inference of his remark, Isobel flashed him a look
+of approval, but called banteringly as she darted out to the
+buckboard: "Better move, if you expect to get near enough to escort
+me, this side of Stockchute."
+
+Gowan sprang down to hand her into the buckboard. She took the reins
+from him and spoke to the fidgetting broncos. They plunged forward and
+started off on a lope. Ashton perceived that she did not intend to
+wait for him. He caught Gowan's look of mingled exultance and envy,
+and dashed for the corral. Rocket was outside, but at his call trotted
+to meet him, whinnying for his morning's lump of sugar. Ashton flung
+on saddle and bridle, and slipped inside the corral to rope his own
+pony. Haste made him miss the two first throws. At last he noosed the
+pony, and slapped on the girl's saddle and bridle.
+
+As he raced off, pounding the pony with his rope to keep him alongside
+Rocket, Knowles waved to him from the house. He had saddled up in less
+than twice the time that Gowan could have done it,--which was a record
+for a tenderfoot. He waved back, but his look was heavy despite the
+excitement of the pursuit.
+
+He expected to overtake Isobel in a few minutes. This he could have
+done had he been able to give Rocket free rein. But he had to hold
+back for the slower-gaited pony. Also, the girl had more of a start
+than he had at first realized, and she did her best to hold the
+handicap. Hitched to the light buckboard, her young broncos could have
+run a good part of the way to Stockchute. She was far out on the flat
+before she at last tired of the wild bumping over ruts and sagebrush
+roots, and pulled her horses down to a walk.
+
+"I could have kept ahead clear across to the hills," she flung back at
+him as he galloped up.
+
+"You shouldn't have been so reckless!" he reproached. "Every moment
+I've been dreading to see you bounced out."
+
+"That's the fun of it," she declared, her cheeks aglow and eyes
+sparkling with delight.
+
+"But the road is so rough!" he protested. "Wouldn't it be easier for
+you to ride my pony? He's like a rocking-chair."
+
+"No," she refused. But she smiled, by no means ill pleased at his
+solicitude for her comfort. She halted the broncos, and said
+cordially: "Tie the saddle hawsses to the back rail, and pile in. We
+may as well be sociable."
+
+He hastened to accept the invitation. She moved over to the left side
+of the seat and relinquished the lines to him. With most young ladies
+this would have been a matter-of-course proceeding; from so
+accomplished a horsewoman it was a tactful compliment. He appreciated
+it at its full value, and his mood lightened. They rattled gayly
+along, on across the flats, up and down among the pinyon clad hills,
+and through the sage and greasewood of the valleys.
+
+He had thought the country a desolate wilderness; but now it seemed
+a Garden of Eden. Never had the girl's loveliness been more
+intoxicating, never had her manner to him been more charming and
+gracious. He could not resist the infection of her high spirits. For
+the greater part of the trip he gave himself over to the delight of
+her merry eyes and dimpling, rosy cheeks, her adorable blushes and
+gay repartee.
+
+All earthly journeys and joys have an ending. The buckboard creaked up
+over the round of the last and highest hill, and they came in sight of
+the little shack town down across the broad valley. Though five miles
+away, every house, every telegraph pole, even the thin lines of the
+railroad rails appeared through the dry clear air as distinct as a
+miniature painting. Miles beyond, on the far side of the valley,
+uprose the huge bulk of Split Peak, with its white-mantled shoulders
+and craggy twin peaks.
+
+But neither Ashton nor Isobel exclaimed on this magnificent view of
+valley and peak. Each fell silent and gazed soberly down at the dozen
+scattered shacks that marked the end of their outward trip. Rapidly
+the gravity of Ashton's face deepened to gloom and from gloom to
+dejection. The horses would have broken into a lope on the down grade.
+He held them to a walk.
+
+Chancing to gaze about and see his face, the girl started from her
+bright-eyed daydream. "Why, Lafe! what is it?" she inquired. "You look
+as you did the other day, when you brought the mail."
+
+"It's--everything!" he muttered.
+
+"As what?" she queried.
+
+He shrugged hopelessly, hesitated, and drew out the roll of bills
+forced on him by Knowles. "Tell me, please, just how much of this is
+mine, at your father's usual rate of wages, and deducting the real
+value of that calf."
+
+"Why, I can't just say, offhand," she replied. "But why should you--"
+
+"I shall tell you as soon as--but first--" He drew out his watch.
+"This cost me two hundred and fifty dollars. It is the only thing I
+have worth trading. Would you take it in exchange for Rocket and the
+balance of this hundred dollars over and above what is due me?"
+
+"Why--no, of course, I wouldn't think of such a thing. It would be
+absurd, cheating yourself that way. Anyhow, Rocket is your horse to
+ride, as long as you wish to."
+
+"But I would like him for my own. How about trading him for my pony
+and the wages due me?"
+
+"Well, that wouldn't be an unfair bargain. Your hawss is the best cow
+pony of the two."
+
+"It is very kind of you to agree, Miss Chuckie! Here is all the
+money; and here is the watch. I wish you to accept it from me as
+a--memento."
+
+"Mr. Ashton!" she exclaimed, indignantly widening the space between
+them as much as the seat would permit.
+
+"Please!" he begged. "Don't you understand? I am going away."
+
+"Going away?" she echoed.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"But--why?"
+
+"Because he is coming."
+
+"Mr. Blake?"
+
+"Yes. I cannot stay after he--"
+
+"But why not? Has he injured you? Are you afraid of him?"
+
+"No. I'm afraid that you--" Ashton's voice sank to a whisper--"that
+you will believe what he--what they will say against me."
+
+"Oh!" she commented, her expression shifting swiftly from sympathetic
+concern to doubt.
+
+He caught the change in her look and tone, and flushed darkly.
+
+"There are sometimes two sides to a story," he muttered.
+
+"Tell me your side now," she suggested, with her usual directness.
+
+His eyes fell before her clear honest gaze. His flush deepened. He
+hung his head, biting his twisted lip. After several moments he began
+to speak in a hesitating broken murmur:
+
+"I've always been--wild. But I graduated from Tech.--not at the foot
+of my class. My father--always busy piling up millions--never a word
+or thought for me, except when I overspent my allowance. I was in
+a--fast set. My father--threatened me. I had to make good. I took a
+position in old Leslie's office--Genevieve's father. I--"
+
+He paused, licked his lips, hesitated, and abruptly went on again,
+this time speaking with almost glib facility: "There was an engineers'
+contest for a projected bridge over Michamac Strait. I started to draw
+plans, that I might enter the contest, but I did not finish in time.
+The plans of the other engineers were all rejected. I continued to
+work on mine. After the contest I happened to pick up a piece of torn
+plan out of the office wastebasket, and it gave me a suggestion how to
+improve the central span of my bridge."
+
+"Yes?" asked the girl, her interest deepening.
+
+He again licked his lips, hesitated, and continued: "There was no
+name on that torn plan--nothing to indicate to whom it had belonged.
+So I used it--that is, the suggestion I got from it, and was awarded
+the bridge on my plans. This made me the Resident Engineer of the
+bridge, and I had it almost completed when this man Blake came back
+from Africa after Genevieve, and claimed that I had--had stolen his
+plans of the bridge. It seems they were lost in Mr. Leslie's office.
+He claimed he had handed them in to me for the contest. But so had
+all the other contestants, and their plans were not lost. It may have
+been that one of the doorkeepers tore his plans up, out of
+revenge. Blake was a very rough brute of a fellow at that time. He
+quarreled with the doorkeeper because the man would not admit him
+to see Mr. Leslie--threatened to smash him. Afterwards he accused
+Mr. Leslie of stealing his plans."
+
+"Oh, no, no! he couldn't have done that! He can't be that kind of a
+man!" protested Isobel.
+
+"It's true! Even he will not deny it. Old Leslie thought him
+crazy--then. It was different when he came back and accused me! He had
+been shipwrecked with Genevieve. They were alone together all those
+weeks, and so one can--" Ashton checked himself. "No, you must not
+think--He saved her. When they came back he claimed the bridge as his
+own--those lost plans."
+
+"His plans? So that was it! And you--?"
+
+"Of course they believed him. What was my word against his with
+Genevieve and Leslie. Leslie's consulting engineer was an old pal of
+Blake's. So of course I--I'll say though that Blake agreed to put it
+that I had only borrowed his idea of the central span."
+
+"That was generous of him, if he really believed--"
+
+"Did he?--did Genevieve? Do they believe it now? You see why I must go
+away."
+
+"I don't any such thing," rejoined the girl.
+
+"You don't?" he exclaimed. "When they are coming here, believing I
+did it! They must believe it, all of them! And my father--after all
+this time--They agreed not to tell him. Yet he has found out. That
+letter, up at the waterhole--it was from his lawyers. He had cut me
+off--branded me as an outcast."
+
+"Without waiting to hear your side--without asking you to explain? How
+unjust! how unfair!" cried Isobel.
+
+Ashton winced. "I--I told you I--my record was against me. But I was
+his son--he had no right to brand me as a--a thief! My valet read the
+letter. He must have told the guide--the scoundrels!"
+
+Tears of chagrin gathered in the young man's dark eyes. He bit his lip
+until the blood ran.
+
+"O-o-oh!" sighed the girl. "It's all been frightfully unjust! You
+haven't had fair play! I shall tell Mr. Blake."
+
+"No, not him!--not him!" Ashton's voice was almost shrill. "All I wish
+is to slip away, before they see me."
+
+"You don't mean, run away?" she said, quietly placing her little
+gauntlet-gloved hand on his arm. "You're not going to run away,
+Lafe."
+
+"What else?" he asked, his eyes dark with bitter despair. "Would you
+have me return, to be booted off the range when they tell your
+father?"
+
+"Just wait and see," she replied, gazing at him with a reassuring
+smile. "You've proved yourself a right smart puncher--for a
+tenderfoot. You're in the West, the good old-style West, where it's a
+man's present record that counts; not what he has been or what he has
+done. No, you're not going to run. You're going to face it out--and
+going to stay to learn your new profession of puncher and--_man_!"
+
+"But they will not wish to associate with me."
+
+"Yes, they will," she predicted. "I shall see to that."
+
+He took heart a little from her cheery, positive assurance. "Well, if
+you insist, I shall not go until they show--"
+
+"They'll not recognize you at first. That will give me a chance to
+speak before they can say anything disagreeable. I'm sure Mr. Blake
+will understand."
+
+"But--Genevieve?"
+
+"If she married him when he was as rough as you say, and if he agrees
+to let bygones be bygones, you need have no fear of Mrs. Blake. Only
+be sure to go into raptures over the baby. Tell her it's the perfect
+image of its father."
+
+"What if it isn't?" objected Ashton gloomily.
+
+She dimpled. "One must allow for the difference in age; and there's
+always some resemblance--each must have a mouth and eyes and ears and
+a nose."
+
+He caught himself on the verge of laughter. Her eyes were fixed upon
+him, pure and honest and dancing with mirth. A sudden flood of
+crimson swept up his face from his bristly, tanned chin to his white
+forehead. He averted his gaze from hers.
+
+"You're _good_!" he choked out. "I don't deserve--But I can't go--when
+you tell me to stay!"
+
+"Of course you can't," she lightly rejoined. "Look! There's the train
+coming. Push on the lines!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE MEETING
+
+
+A word started the horses into a lope. The buckboard was whirled along
+over the last two miles to Stockchute in a wild race against the
+train. The steam horse won. It had sidetracked the private car
+attached to the rear of the last pullman and was puffing away
+westward, when Ashton guided his running team in among the crude
+shacks of the town. He swung around at a more moderate pace towards
+the big chute for cattle-loading, and fetched up a few yards out from
+the rear step of the private car.
+
+An assiduous porter had already swung down with a box step. A big,
+square-faced, square-framed man of twenty-eight or thirty stepped out
+into the car vestibule. He sprang to the ground as Miss Knowles
+stepped from the buckboard. She had lowered her veil, but it failed to
+mask the extreme brilliancy of her eyes and her quick changes of
+color. Her face, flushed from the excitement of the race into town,
+went white when she first saw the man in the vestibule; flushed again
+when he sprang down; again paled; and, last of all, glowed radiantly
+as she advanced to meet him.
+
+He hastened to her, baring his big head of its Panama, and staring at
+her fashionable hat and dress in frank surprise.
+
+"Mr. Blake!" she murmured.
+
+At the sound of her voice he started and fixed his light blue eyes on
+her veiled face with a keen glance. She turned pale and as quickly
+blushed, as if embarrassed by his scrutiny.
+
+"Excuse me!" he apologized. "You are Miss Knowles?"
+
+"Yes," she murmured.
+
+"Knowles?" he repeated, half to himself. "Strange! Haven't I met you
+before?"
+
+"In Denver?" she suggested. "I spend my winters in Denver. But there
+was one in Europe."
+
+"No, it wouldn't be either. You must excuse me, Miss Knowles. There
+was something about your voice and face--rather threw me off my
+balance. If you'll kindly overlook the bungling start-off! I'm greatly
+pleased to meet you. My wife will be, too. May I ask you to step
+aboard the car?--No, here she is now."
+
+A graceful, rather small lady, dressed with elegant simplicity, had
+come out into the car vestibule.
+
+"Jenny, here's Miss Knowles now," said Blake. "She came to meet us
+herself."
+
+"That was very good of you, Miss Knowles," said the lady, as the two
+advanced towards her. "We are very glad to meet you. Will you not
+come up out of the sun?"
+
+The white-uniformed porter promptly stood at attention. Blake as
+promptly offered his hand. The girl accepted his assistance and
+mounted the car steps with an absence of awkwardness instantly noted
+by Mrs. Blake. That lady held out a somewhat thin white hand as Isobel
+drew off her gauntlet gloves. But she did not stop with the light firm
+handclasp. Lifting the girl's veil, she kissed her full on her coral
+lips.
+
+"We shall be friends," she stated, a smile in her hazel eyes.
+
+"I hope so," murmured the girl, blushing with delight. "The only
+question is whether you will like me."
+
+Mrs. Blake patted the plump, sunbrowned hand that she had not yet
+relinquished. She was little if any older than the girl, but her air
+was that of matronly wisdom. "My dear, can you doubt it? I was
+prepared to like even the kind of young woman my husband told me to
+expect."
+
+"Bronco Bess, Queen of the Cattle Camp," suggested the girl, dimpling.
+"Wait till you see me rope and hogtie a steer."
+
+Mrs. Blake smiled, and looked across at Ashton, who sat motionless
+under the shadow of his big sombrero, his face half averted from the
+car.
+
+"I've a real surprise for you," said the girl. "Mr. Blake, if I may
+tell it to you also."
+
+Blake swung up the steps, hat in hand. "It can't be half as pleasant
+as the surprise you've already given us," he said.
+
+"I fear not," she replied, with a quick change to gravity. She looked
+earnestly into their faces. "Still, I hope--yes, I really believe it
+will please you when you consider it. But first, I want to tell you
+that out here it's our notion that a man should be rated according to
+his present life, and not blamed for his past mistakes."
+
+"Certainly not!" agreed Mrs. Blake, with a swift glance at her
+husband. "If a man has mounted to a higher level, he should be upheld,
+not dragged down again."
+
+"That's good old-style Western fair play," added Blake.
+
+"I'm so glad you take it that way!" said Isobel. "A young man utterly
+ruined in fortune--partly at least through his own fault--came to us
+and asked to be hired. He has been a hard worker and a gentleman. His
+name is Lafayette Ashton."
+
+"Ashton?" said Blake, his face as impassive as a granite mask.
+
+"Yes. He has told me all about the bridge. He wished to go away,
+because he thought you and Mrs. Blake would not like to meet him. I
+told him you would be willing to let bygones be bygones, and help him
+start off with a new tally card."
+
+"Lafayette Ashton working--as a cowboy!" murmured Mrs. Blake.
+
+"He is still a good deal of a tenderfoot. But he is learning fast; and
+work!--the way he pesters Daddy to find him something to do!"
+
+"He certainly must be a changed man," dryly commented Blake.
+
+"_Cherchez la femme_," said his wife.
+
+"Mrs. Blake!" protested the girl, blushing.
+
+"What's that?" he asked.
+
+"'Find the woman,'" explained Mrs. Blake.
+
+"That's easy," he said, fixing his twinkling eyes on the rosy-faced
+girl.
+
+"But I'm sure it has not been because of me--at least not altogether,"
+she qualified with her uncompromising honesty.
+
+"I wouldn't blame him even if it was altogether," said Blake.
+
+"Then you will be willing to overlook your past trouble with him?"
+
+"Since you say he has straightened out--yes."
+
+"That's good of you! That's what I expected of you!" exclaimed the
+girl. "That is he, in the buckboard."
+
+Without a word, Blake started down the car steps.
+
+"Bring him here at once, Tom," said Mrs. Blake.
+
+Her husband went up beside the motionless figure in the buckboard and
+held out his hand. "Glad to meet you, Ashton," he said with
+matter-of-fact heartiness. "Jenny wants you to come to her. We're not
+ready to start, as we were not certain we would be met."
+
+"Miss--Mrs. Blake wishes me to come!" mumbled Ashton.
+
+"Yes," said Blake, gripping the other's hesitatingly extended hand.
+
+Ashton flushed darkly. "But I--I can't leave the horses," he replied.
+
+Blake signed to the porter, who hastened forward. "Hold the lines for
+this gentleman, Sam."
+
+Ashton reluctantly gave the lines into the mulatto's sallow hands and
+stepped from the buckboard. His head hung forward as he followed
+Blake. But at the foot of the steps he removed his sombrero and forced
+himself to look up. Isobel was smiling down at him encouragingly. He
+looked from her to Mrs. Blake, his handsome face crimson with shame.
+
+"How do you do, Lafayette?" Mrs. Blake greeted him with quiet
+cordiality. "This is a pleasant surprise."
+
+"Yes--yes, indeed! I--yes, very!" he stammered, so embarrassed that he
+would have stuck at the foot of the steps had not Blake started him up
+with a vigorous boost.
+
+Mrs. Blake gave him her hand. "You look so strong and hearty!" she
+remarked. "It speaks well for the fare Miss Knowles provides."
+
+"Oh, that credit is due our Jap chef," laughed the girl. "I can cut
+out a cow from the herd better than I can bone a chop. But the butter
+and eggs and cream that are awaiting you--Which reminds me that we've
+yet to see It."
+
+"It?" asked Blake.
+
+"Yes, him--the _baby_!"
+
+"Oh, you dear girl!" cooed Mrs. Blake. "Come in and see him."
+
+Isobel followed her into the car. Blake nodded to Ashton. But the
+younger man shrank away from the door.
+
+"If you'll kindly excuse me," he muttered. "It would remind me too
+much of--the time when--No, I'd rather not."
+
+"Of course," assented Blake with ready understanding. "How do you like
+this country? I went through here once on a railway survey. It's rare
+good luck--this chance to visit Miss Knowles. Jenny is a little run
+down, as you see."
+
+"I shall trust that her visit to this locality will soon quite restore
+her," remarked Ashton.
+
+"It will. The doctors said Maine; I said Colorado. It has done you no
+end of good. You are looking particularly fine and fit."
+
+"It has helped me--in more ways than one," murmured Ashton.
+
+"Glad to hear you say it!" responded Blake in hearty approval.
+
+Ashton turned from him as Isobel appeared in the doorway, cuddling a
+lusty, rosy-cheeked baby. The mother hovered close behind her.
+
+"Look at him!" jeered Blake with heavily feigned derision. "Did you
+ever see such a big, fat, lubberly--"
+
+"Yes, look at him, Lafe," said the girl, stepping out into the
+vestibule. "He is only a yearling, but isn't he just the perfect image
+of his father?"
+
+Ashton burst into a ringing laugh, but abruptly checked himself at
+sight of the sober face of the young mother. "I--I beg pardon!" he
+stammered. "I--she--Miss Knowles--that is what she told me to tell you
+about him."
+
+"And you didn't play up worth a little bit, Lafe!" complained the
+girl.
+
+It was Blake's turn to laugh. "You--!" he accused. "Schemed to frame
+up a case on us did you!"
+
+His wife smiled faintly, not altogether certain that an aspersion had
+not been cast upon her chuckling son.
+
+"But it's partly true, really," remarked Ashton, peering at the baby's
+big pale-blue eyes.
+
+Blake burst into a hilarious roar. But Mrs. Blake now beamed upon
+Ashton. "Then you, too, see the resemblance, Lafayette! Isn't it
+wonderful, and he so young? His name is Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie
+Blake.--Now, my dear, if you please, I shall take him in. We must be
+preparing to start, if it is so long a drive."
+
+"Do let me hold him until you and Mr. Blake are ready," begged the
+girl.
+
+"I am not quite sure that--You will be careful not to drop him? He is
+tremendously strong, and he squirms," dubiously assented the fond
+mother. "Come, Tom. We must not keep Miss Knowles waiting."
+
+Blake disappeared with her into the luxuriously furnished car.
+
+"Isn't he a dear?" cooed the girl, clasping the baby to her bosom and
+kissing his chubby clenched hands. He stared up into her glowing face
+with his round light-blue eyes. "Thomas Blake!--Tom Blake!" she
+whispered.
+
+Ashton did not heed the words. He was gazing too intently at the girl
+and the child. His eyes glistened with a wonderment and longing so
+exquisitely intense that it was like a pain. The girl sank down in one
+of the cane chairs and laid the baby on his back. He kicked and
+gurgled, seized one of his upraised feet and thrust a pink big toe in
+between his white milk teeth.
+
+"That's more than you can do, Lafe!" challenged the girl.
+
+She glanced up, dimpling with merriment,--met the adoration in his
+eyes, and looked down, blushing. He attempted to speak, but the words
+choked into an incoherent sound like a sob. He jumped from the car and
+hurried to take the lines from the porter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+THE OTHER LADY'S HUSBAND
+
+
+Miss Knowles did not seem to observe Ashton's deflection. She remained
+worshipfully downbent over the wriggling, chuckling baby until its
+parents reappeared.
+
+Mrs. Blake had changed to an easy and serviceable dress of plain,
+strong material. The skirt, cut to walking length, showed that
+her feet and ankles were protected by a pair of absurdly small
+laced boots. Her husband had shifted to an equally serviceable
+costume--flannel shirt, broad-brimmed felt hat, and surveyor's
+boots.
+
+"Crossing the plains we packed a trunk with what we considered most
+necessary," said Mrs. Blake, as she took the baby. "It is not a large
+one, and in addition there is only my satchel and the level and the
+lunch my maid is putting up for us."
+
+"There is room for more, if you wish," replied Isobel. "But we can
+send over here for anything you need, any time."
+
+"You're not going to let us really rough-it!" complained Mrs. Blake,
+as her husband swung her to the ground. "Were it not for Thomas
+Herbert--"
+
+"--We'd go to Africa again and eat lions," Blake completed the
+sentence. "Wait, though--we may have a chance at mountain lions."
+
+The porter had gone to help a manservant fetch the trunk from the
+other end of the car. Isobel untied the saddle horses from the rear of
+the buckboard. The trunk was lifted in, and Blake lashed it on,
+together with his level rod and tripod, using Ashton's lariat.
+
+"Level is in the trunk," he explained, in response to Ashton's look of
+inquiry. "I suppose we ride."
+
+"I think it will be better if Lafe drives," objected Isobel. "I am so
+reckless, and you don't know the road, as he does. The only thing is
+Rocket--Lafe has about trained him out of his tricks. But I should
+warn you that the hawss has been rather vicious."
+
+"Tom will ride him," confidently stated Mrs. Blake.
+
+Her husband took the bridle reins of the big horse and mounted him
+with the agility of a cowboy. For a moment Rocket stood motionless.
+Then, whether because of Blake's weight or the fact that he was a
+stranger, all the beast's newly acquired docility vanished. He began
+to plunge and buck even more violently than when first mounted by
+Ashton.
+
+Half a hundred Stockchuteites--all the residents of the town and
+several floaters--had come down to inspect the palatial private car
+and its passengers. At Rocket's first leap these highly interested
+spectators broke into a murmur of joyful anticipation. They were about
+to see the millionaire tenderfoot pull leather.
+
+Yet somehow the event failed to transpire. Blake sat the flat saddle
+as if glued fast to it. His knees and legs were crushing against the
+sides of the leaping, whirling beast with the firmness of an iron
+vise. He held both hands upraised, away from the "leather."
+
+Presently Rocket's efforts began to flag. Instead of seeking to quiet
+the frantic beast, Blake began to whoop and to strike him with his
+hat. Thus taunted, Rocket resorted to his second trick. He took the
+bit in his teeth and started to bolt. The crowd scattered before
+the rush of the runaway. But they need not have moved. Blake
+reached down on each side of the beast's outstretched neck and
+pulled. Tough-mouthed as he was, Rocket could not resist that
+powerful grip. His head was drawn down and backwards until his trumpet
+nostrils blew against his deep chest. After half a dozen wild plunges,
+he was forced to a stand, snorting but subdued.
+
+"That's some riding, Miss Chuckie!" called the burly sheriff of the
+county. "Your guest forks a hawss like a buster."
+
+The girl rode forward beside Blake, her face radiant. She paid him the
+highest of compliments by taking his riding as a matter of course; but
+in her eyes was a look strangely like that of his wife's fond gaze,--a
+look of pride at his achievement, rather than admiration.
+
+"We'll ride ahead of the team to keep clear of the dust," she
+remarked.
+
+He twisted about and saw that Ashton was starting to drive after them.
+His wife's elderly maid was waving her handkerchief from one of the
+car windows. The porter and the manservant stood at attention. He
+exchanged a nod and smile with his wife, patted Rocket's arched neck
+and clicked to him to start.
+
+"This is great, Miss Knowles!" he said. "I did not look for such fun,
+first crack out of the box. And--if you don't mind my saying it--it's
+such a jolly surprise your being what you are."
+
+The girl blushed with pleasure. "I--we have been so eager to meet
+you," she murmured. She added hurriedly, "On account of your wonderful
+work as an engineer, you know."
+
+"I wouldn't have suspected Ashton of bragging for me," he replied.
+
+"Oh, he--he says you have a remarkable knack of hitting on the
+solution of problems. But it's in the engineering journals and reports
+that we've read about your work. Perhaps that is why you thought we
+had met before. After reading about you so much, I felt that I already
+knew you, and so my manner, you know--"
+
+He shook his head at this seemingly ingenuous explanation. "No, there
+is something about your voice and face--" His eyes clouded with
+the grief of a painful memory; his head sank forward until his square
+chin touched his broad chest. He muttered brokenly: "But that's
+impossible.... Anyway--better for them they died--better than to
+live after...."
+
+Behind her veil the girl's face became deathly white. He raised his
+head and looked at her with a wistful gleam of hope. She had averted
+her face from him and was gazing off at the hills with dim unseeing
+eyes.
+
+"Pardon me, Miss Knowles," he said, "but do you mind if I ask what is
+your first name?"
+
+She hesitated almost imperceptibly before replying: "I am called
+Chuckie--Chuckie Knowles. Doesn't that sound cowgirlish? We always
+have a chuck-wagon on the round-ups, you know. But it's a name that
+used to be quite common in the West."
+
+"Yes, it comes from the Spanish Chiquita," he said. He repeated the
+word with the soft caressing Spanish accent, "_Che-kee-tah!_"
+
+A flood of scarlet swept up into the girl's pallid face, and slowly
+subsided to her normal rich coloring. After a short silence she asked
+in a conventional tone: "I suppose you are glad to get away from
+Chicago. The last papers we received say that the East is sweltering
+in one of those smothery heat waves."
+
+"It's the humidity and close air that kills," said Blake. "I ought to
+know. I lived for years in the slums."
+
+"Oh, you--you really speak of it--openly!" the girl exclaimed.
+
+"What of it?" he asked, astonished in turn at her lack of tact.
+
+"Nothing--nothing," she hastened to disclaim. "Only I know--have read
+about the dreadful conditions in the Chicago slums. It is--it must be
+so painful to recall them--That was so rude of me to--"
+
+"Not at all," he interrupted. To cover her evident confusion he held
+up his white hand in the scorching sunrays and commented jovially:
+"Talk about Eastern heat--this is a hundred and five Fahrenheit at the
+very least! A-a-ah!" He drew in a deep breath of the dry pure air.
+"This is something like! When you get your land under ditch, you'll
+have a paradise."
+
+"Oh, but you do not understand," she replied. "We want you to find out
+and tell us that Dry Mesa _cannot_ be watered. Irrigation would break
+up Daddy's range and put him out of business. It is just what we do
+not want."
+
+"I see," said Blake, with instant comprehension of the situation.
+
+"I know it cannot be done. But there are so many reclamation projects,
+and Daddy has read and read about them until he almost has a bee in
+his bonnet."
+
+"Yet you sent for me--an engineer."
+
+"Because I knew that when _you_ told him our mesa couldn't be watered,
+he would stop worrying. You know, you are quite a hero with us. We
+have read all about your wonderful work."
+
+Blake's pale eyes twinkled. "So I'm a hero. Will you dynamite my
+pedestal if I figure out a way to water your range?"
+
+She flashed him a troubled glance, but rallied for a quick rejoinder:
+"Even you can't pump the water out of Deep Canyon, and Plum Creek is
+only a trickle most of the year."
+
+"I see you want me to make my report as dry as I can write it," he
+bantered.
+
+"No," she replied, suddenly serious. "We wish the exact truth, though
+we hope you'll find it dry."
+
+"Then you are to blame if the matter does not figure out your way," he
+warned her. "You've given me a problem. If there is any possible way
+for me to irrigate your mesa, I am bound to try my best to work it
+out. Hadn't you better head me off before I start in? At present I
+haven't the remotest desire to do this except to comply with your
+wishes."
+
+"It's as I told Daddy," she said. "If there really is a way, the
+sooner we know it the better. It is the uncertainty that is bothering
+Daddy. If your report is for us, all well and good; if against us, he
+will stand up and fight and forget about worrying."
+
+"Fight?" asked Blake.
+
+"Fight the project, fight against the formation of any irrigation
+district. He owns five sections. The reservoir might have to be on his
+patented land. He'd fight fair and square and hard--to the last
+ditch!"
+
+"Isn't that a Dutchman's saying?" asked Blake humorously.
+
+The girl's tense face relaxed, and she burst out in a ringing laugh.
+She shifted the conversation to less serious subjects, and they
+cantered along together, laughing and chatting like old friends.
+
+By this time Ashton and Mrs. Blake had gradually come to the same
+stage of pleasant comradeship. Ashton had started the drive in a
+sullen mood, his manner half resentful and wholly embarrassed. Of this
+the lady was tactfully oblivious. Avoiding all allusion to the
+catastrophe that had befallen him, she told him the latest news of the
+mutual friends and acquaintances in whom ordinarily he would have been
+expected to be interested.
+
+She even spoke casually of his father. His face contracted with pain,
+but he showed no bitterness against the parent who had disowned him.
+After that her graciousness towards him redoubled. With Isobel for
+excuse, she gradually shifted the conversation to ranch life and his
+employment as cowboy. In many subtle ways she conveyed to him her
+admiration of the manner in which he had turned over a new leaf and
+was making a clean fresh start in life.
+
+After delicately intimating her feelings, she at once turned to less
+personal topics. The last traces of his embarrassment and moodiness
+left him, and he began to talk quite at his ease, though with a
+certain reserve that she attributed to the vast change in his
+fortunes. In return for her kindness, he repaid her by showing a real
+interest in Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie Blake.
+
+That young man spent his time chuckling and crowing and kicking, until
+overcome with sleep. Two hours out from Stockchute he awoke and
+vociferously demanded nourishment. Promptly the party was brought to a
+halt. They were among the pinyons on one of the hillsides. While the
+baby took his dinner, Isobel laid out the lunch and the men burned
+incense in the guise of a pair of Havana cigars produced by Blake.
+
+The lunch might have been put up in the kitchen of a first-class
+metropolitan hotel. The fruit was the most luscious that money could
+buy; the sandwiches and cake would have tempted a sated epicure; the
+mineral water had come out of an ice chest so nearly frozen that it
+was still refreshingly cool. But--what was rather odd for a lunch
+packed in a private car--it included no wine or whiskey or liqueur.
+Blake caught Ashton's glance, and smiled.
+
+"You see I'm still on the waterwagon," he remarked. "I've got a
+permanent seat. There have been times when it looked as if I might be
+jolted off, but--"
+
+"But there's never been the slightest chance of that!" put in his
+wife. She looked at Isobel, her soft eyes shining with love and pride.
+"Once he gets a grip on anything, he never lets go."
+
+"Oh, I can believe that!" exclaimed the girl with an enthusiasm that
+brought a shadow into the mobile face of Ashton.
+
+"A man can't help holding on when he has something to hold on for,"
+said Blake, gazing at his wife and baby.
+
+"That's true!" agreed Ashton, his eyes on the dimpled face of Isobel.
+
+Refreshed by the delicious meal, the party prepared to start on. But
+they did not travel as before. While Ashton was considerately washing
+out the dusty nostrils of the horses with water from his canteen,
+Isobel decided to drive with Mrs. Blake. Declaring that it would be
+like old times to sit a cowboy saddle, the big engineer lengthened the
+girl's stirrup leathers and swung on to the pony. This left Rocket to
+his owner.
+
+At first Ashton seemed inclined to be stiff with his new road-mate.
+But as they jogged along, side by side, over the hills and across the
+sagebrush flats, Blake restricted his talk to impersonal topics and
+spared his companion from any allusion to their past difficulties.
+Throughout the ride, however, the two men maintained a certain reserve
+towards each other, and at no time approached the cordial intimacy
+that developed between the girl and Mrs. Blake before the end of their
+first mile together.
+
+After telling merrily about her dual life as summer cowgirl and winter
+society maiden, Isobel drifted around, by seemingly casual association
+of ideas, to the troublesome question of irrigation on Dry Mesa, and
+from that to Blake and his work as an engineer.
+
+"I do so hope Mr. Blake finds that there is no project practicable,"
+she went on. "He has warned me that if there seems to be any chance to
+work out an irrigation scheme on our mesa he is bound to try to do
+it."
+
+"And he would do it," added Mrs. Blake with quiet confidence.
+
+"Then I hope and pray he will find there is no chance, because Daddy
+would have to oppose him. That would be such a pity! He and I have
+read so much about Mr. Blake's work that we have come to regard him as
+our--as one of our heroes."
+
+Mrs. Blake smiled. It was very apparent, despite the quietness and
+repression of her high-bred manner, that she was very much in love
+with her husband.
+
+The girl continued in a meekly deferential tone: "So you will not mind
+my worshiping him. He is a hero, a real hero! Isn't he?"
+
+The words were spoken with an earnestness and sincerity that won Mrs.
+Blake to a like candor. "You are quite right," she said. "Lafayette
+may have told you how Mr. Blake and I were wrecked on the most savage
+coast of Africa. He saved me from wild beasts and tropical storms,
+from fever and snakes,--from death in a dozen horrible forms. Then,
+when he had saved me--and won me, he gave me up until he could prove
+to himself that he was worthy of me."
+
+"He did?" cried the girl. "But of course!--of course!"
+
+"Yet that was nothing to the next proof of his strength and manhood,"
+went on the proud wife. "He destroyed a monster more frightful than
+any lion or tropical snake--he overcame the curse of drink that had
+come down to him from--one of his parents."
+
+"From--from his--" whispered the girl, her averted face white and
+drawn with pain.
+
+Mrs. Blake had bent over to kiss the forehead of her sleeping baby and
+did not see. "If only all parents knew what terrible misfortunes,
+what tortures, their transgressions are apt to bring upon their
+innocent children!" she murmured.
+
+"He told me that he won his way up out of the--the slums," said
+Isobel. "It must be some men fail to do that because they have
+relatives to drag them down--their families."
+
+"It seems hard to say it, yet I do not know but that you are right, my
+dear," agreed Mrs. Blake. "Strong men, if unhampered, have a chance to
+fight their way up out of the social pit. But women and girls, even
+when they escape the--the worst down there, can hardly hope ever to
+attain--And of course those that fall!--Our dual code of morality is
+hideously unjust to our sex, yet it still is the code under which we
+live."
+
+The girl drew in a deep, sighing breath. Her eyes were dark with
+anguish. Yet she forced a gay little laugh. "Aren't we solemn
+sociologists! All we are concerned with is that _he_ has won his way
+up, and there's no one ever to drag him down or disgrace him; and--and
+you won't be jealous if I set him up on a pedestal and bring incense
+to him on my bended knees."
+
+"Only you must give Thomas Herbert his share at the same time,"
+stipulated the mother.
+
+The girl burst into prolonged and rather shrill laughter that passed
+the bounds of good breeding. Her emotion was so unrestrained that when
+she looked about at her surprised companion her face was flushed and
+her eyes were swimming with tears.
+
+"Please, oh, do please forgive me!" she begged with a humility as
+immoderate as had been her laughter. "I--I can't tell you why, but--"
+
+"Say no more, my dear," soothed Mrs. Blake. "You are merely a bit
+hysterical. Perhaps the excitement of our coming, after your months of
+lonely ranch life--"
+
+"You're so good!" sighed the girl. "Yes, it was due to--your coming.
+But now the worst is over. I'll not shock you again with any more such
+outbursts."
+
+She smiled, and began to talk of other things, with somewhat unsteady
+but persistent gayety.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+A DESCENT
+
+
+When the party arrived at the ranch, the girl hostess took Mrs. Blake
+to rest in the clean, simply furnished room provided for the visitors.
+Blake, after carrying in their trunk single-handed, went to look
+around at the ranch buildings in company with Ashton.
+
+On returning to the house, the two found Knowles and Gowan in the
+parlor with the ladies. Isobel had already introduced them to Mrs.
+Blake and also to her son. That young man was sprawled, face up, in
+the cowman's big hands, crowing and valiantly clutching at his bristly
+mustache.
+
+Gowan sat across from him, perfectly at ease in the presence of the
+city lady. But, with his characteristic lack of humor, he was unmoved
+by the laughable spectacle presented by his employer and the baby, and
+his manner was both reserved and watchful.
+
+At sight of Blake, Isobel called to her father in feigned alarm: "Look
+out, Daddy! Better stop hazing that yearling. Here comes his sire."
+
+Knowles gave the baby back to its half-fearful mother, and rose to
+greet his guest with hospitable warmth: "Howdy, Mr. Blake! I'm
+downright glad to meet you. Hope you've found things comfortable and
+homelike."
+
+"Too much so," asserted Blake, his eyes twinkling. "We came out
+expecting to rough-it."
+
+"Well, your lady won't know the difference," remarked Knowles.
+
+"You're quite mistaken, Daddy, really," interposed his daughter. "She
+and Mr. Blake were wrecked in Africa and lived on roast leopards.
+We'll have to feed them on mountain lions and bobcats."
+
+"If you mean that, Miss Chuckie," put in Gowan, "I can get a bobcat in
+time for dinner tomorrow."
+
+The girl led the general outburst of laughter over this serious
+proposal. "Oh! oh! Kid! You'll be the death of me!--Yet I sent you a
+joke-book last Christmas!"
+
+"Couldn't see anything funny in it," replied the puncher. "I haven't
+lost it, though. It came from you."
+
+To cover the girl's blush at this blunt disclosure of sentiment, Mrs.
+Blake somewhat formally introduced her husband to the puncher. He
+shook Blake's hand with like formality and politeness. But as their
+glances met, his gray eyes shone with the same cold suspicion with
+which he had regarded Ashton at their first meeting. Before that look
+the engineer's friendly eyes hardened to disks of burnished steel,
+and his big fist released its cordial grip of the other's small, bony
+hand. He gave back hostility for hostility with the readiness of a
+born fighter. Gowan was the first to look away.
+
+The incident passed so swiftly that only Knowles observed the outflash
+of enmity. His words indicated that he had anticipated the puncher's
+attitude. He addressed Blake seriously: "Kid has been with us ever
+since he was a youngster and has always made my interests his own.
+Chuckie has been telling us what you said about putting through any
+project you once started."
+
+Blake nodded. "Yes. That is why I suggested to Miss Knowles that she
+call off the agreement under which I came on this visit. We shall
+gladly pay board, and I'll merely knock around; or, if you prefer,
+we'll leave you and go back tomorrow morning."
+
+"No, Daddy, no! we can't allow our guests to leave, when they've only
+just come!" protested Isobel.
+
+"As for any talk about board," added her father, "you ought to know
+better, Mr. Blake."
+
+"My apology!" admitted Blake. "I've been living in the East."
+
+"That explains," agreed the cowman. "Even as far east as Denver--I've
+got a sister there; lives up beyond the Capitol. But I've talked with
+other men there from over this way. They all agree you might as well
+look for good cow pasture behind a sheep drive as for hospitality in a
+city. Sometimes you can get what you want, and all times you're sure
+to get a lot of attention you don't want--if you have money to
+spend."
+
+"That's true. But about my going ahead here?" inquired Blake. "Say the
+word, and I put irrigation on the shelf throughout our visit."
+
+Knowles shook his head thoughtfully. "No, I reckon Chuckie is right.
+We'd best learn just how we stand."
+
+"What if I work out a practical project? There's any amount of good
+land on your mesa. The lay of it and the altitude ought to make it
+ideal for fruit. If I see that the proposition is feasible, I shall be
+bound to put water on all of your range that I can. I am an
+engineer,--I cannot let good land and water go to waste."
+
+"The land isn't going to waste," replied Knowles. "It's the best
+cattle range in this section, and it's being used for the purpose
+Nature intended. As for the water, Chuckie has figured out there isn't
+more than three thousand acre feet of flood waters that can be
+impounded off the watershed above us. That wouldn't pay for building
+any kind of a dam."
+
+"And the devil himself couldn't pump the water up out of Deep Canyon,"
+put in Gowan.
+
+"The devil hasn't much use for science," said Blake. "It has almost
+put him out of business. So he is not apt to be well up on modern
+engineering."
+
+"Then you think you can do what the devil can't?" demanded Knowles.
+
+"I can try. Unless you wish to call off the deal, I shall ride around
+tomorrow and look over the country. Maybe that will be sufficient to
+show me there is no chance for irrigation, or, on the contrary, I may
+have to run levels and do some figuring."
+
+"Then perhaps you will know by tomorrow night?" exclaimed Isobel.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well, that's something," said the cowman. "I'll take you out first
+thing in the morning.--Lafe, show Mr. Blake the wash bench. There goes
+the first gong."
+
+When, a little later, all came together again at the supper table,
+nothing more was said about the vexed question of irrigation. Isobel
+had made no changes in her table arrangements other than to have a
+plate laid for Mrs. Blake beside her father's and another for Blake
+beside her own.
+
+The employes were too accustomed to Miss Chuckie to be embarrassed by
+the presence of another lady, and Blake put himself on familiar terms
+with them by his first remarks. If his wealthy high-bred wife was
+surprised to find herself seated at the same table with common
+workmen, she betrayed no resentment over the situation. Her perfect
+breeding was shown in the unaffected simplicity of her manner, which
+was precisely the same to the roughest man present as to her hostess.
+
+Even had there been any indications of uncongeniality, they must have
+been overcome by the presence of Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie Blake.
+The most unkempt, hard-bitten bachelor present gazed upon the majesty
+of babyhood with awed reverence and delight. The silent Jap
+interrupted his serving to fetch a queer rattle of ivory balls carved
+out one within the other. This he cleansed with soap, peroxide and hot
+water, in the presence of the honorable lady mother, before presenting
+it to her infant with much smiling and hissing insuckings of breath.
+
+After supper all retired at an early hour, out of regard for the
+weariness of Mrs. Blake.
+
+When she reappeared, late the next morning, she learned that Knowles,
+Gowan and her husband had ridden off together hours before. But Isobel
+and Ashton seemed to have nothing else to do than to entertain the
+mother and child. Mrs. Blake donned one of the girl's divided skirts
+and took her first lesson in riding astride. There was no sidesaddle
+at the ranch, but there was a surefooted old cow pony too wise and
+spiritless for tricks, and therefore safe even for a less experienced
+horsewoman than was Mrs. Blake.
+
+Knowles and Gowan and the engineer returned so late that they found
+all the others at the supper table. Blake's freshly sunburnt face was
+cheerful. Gowan's expression was as noncommittal as usual. But the
+cowman's forehead was furrowed with unrelieved suspense.
+
+"Oh, Mr. Blake!" exclaimed Isobel. "Don't tell us your report is
+unfavorable."
+
+"Afraid I can't say, as yet," he replied. "We've covered the ground
+pretty thoroughly for miles along High Mesa and Deep Canyon. If the
+annual precipitation here is what I estimate it from what your father
+tells me, it would be possible to put in a drainage and reservoir
+system that would store four thousand acre feet. Except as an
+auxiliary system, however, it would cost too much to be practicable.
+As for Deep Canyon--" He turned to his wife. "Jenny, whatever else
+happens, I must get you up to see that canyon. It's almost as grand and
+in some ways even more wonderful than the Canyon of the Colorado."
+
+"Then I must see it, by all means," responded Mrs. Blake. "I shall
+soon be able to ride up to it, Isobel assures me."
+
+"Within a few days," said the girl. "But, Mr. Blake, pardon me--How
+about the water in the canyon? You surely see no way to lift it out
+over the top of High Mesa?"
+
+"I'm sorry, but I can't even guess what can be done until I have run a
+line of levels and found the depth of the canyon. I tried to estimate
+it by dropping in rocks and timing them, but we couldn't see them
+strike bottom."
+
+"A line of levels? Will it take you long?"
+
+"Maybe a week; possibly more. If I had a transit as well as my level,
+it would save time. However, I can make out with the chain and compass
+I brought."
+
+"Mr. Blake is to start running his levels in the morning," said
+Knowles. "Lafe, I'd like you to help him as his rodman, if you have no
+objections. As you've been an engineer, you can help him along faster
+than Kid.--You said one would do, Mr. Blake; but if you need more,
+take all the men you want. The sooner this thing is settled, the
+better it will suit me."
+
+"The sooner the better, Daddy!" agreed Isobel, "that is, if our guests
+promise to not hurry away."
+
+"We shall stay at least a month, if you wish us to," said Mrs. Blake.
+
+"Two months would be too short!--And the sooner we are over with this
+uncertainty--Lafe, you'll do your utmost to help Mr. Blake, won't
+you?"
+
+"Yes, indeed; anything I can," eagerly responded Ashton.
+
+Gowan's face darkened at sight of the smile with which the girl
+rewarded the tenderfoot. Yet instead of sulking, he joined in the
+evening's entertainment of the guests with a zeal that agreeably
+surprised everyone. His guitar playing won genuine praise from the
+Blakes, though both were sophisticated and critical music lovers.
+
+Somewhat earlier than usual he rose to go, with the excuse that he
+wished to consult Knowles about some business with the owner of the
+adjoining range. The cowman went out with him, and did not return. An
+hour later Ashton took reluctant leave of Isobel, and started for the
+bunkhouse. Half way across he was met by his employer, who stopped
+before him.
+
+"Everybody turning in, Lafe?"
+
+"Not at my suggestion, though," replied Ashton.
+
+"Reckon not. Mr. Blake and his lady are old friends of yours, I take
+it."
+
+"Mrs. Blake is," stated Ashton, with a touch of his former arrogance.
+"We made mud-pies together, in a hundred thousand dollar dooryard."
+
+"Humph!" grunted Knowles. "And her husband?"
+
+The darkness hid Ashton's face, but his voice betrayed the sudden
+upwelling of his bitterness: "I never heard of him until he--until a
+little over three years ago. I wish to Heaven he hadn't taken part in
+that bridge contest!"
+
+"How's that?" asked Knowles in a casual tone.
+
+"Nothing--nothing!" Ashton hastened to disclaim. "You haven't been
+talking with Miss Chuckie about me, have you, Mr. Knowles?"
+
+"No. Why?"
+
+"It was only that I explained to her how I came to be ruined--to lose
+my fortune. You see, the circumstances are such that I cannot very
+well say anything against Blake; yet he was the cause--it was owing to
+something he did that I lost all--everything--millions! Curse him!"
+
+"You've appeared friendly enough towards him," remarked Knowles.
+
+"Yes, I--I promised Miss Chuckie to try to forget the past. But when I
+think of what I lost, all because of him--"
+
+"So-o!" considered the cowman. "Maybe there's more in what Kid says
+than I thought. He's been cross-questioning Blake all day. You know
+how little Kid is given to gab. But from the time we started off he
+kept after Blake like he was cutting out steers at the round-up."
+
+"Blake isn't the kind you could get to tell anything against himself,"
+asserted Ashton.
+
+"Well, that may be. All his talk today struck me as being straightforward
+and outspoken. But Kid has been drawing inferences. He keeps hammering
+at it that Blake must be in thick with his father-in-law, and that all
+millionaires round-up their money in ways that would make a rustler go
+off and shoot himself."
+
+"Business is business," replied Ashton with all his old cynicism.
+"I'll not say that H. V. Leslie is crooked, but I never knew of his
+coming out of a deal second best."
+
+"Well, at any rate, it's white of Blake to tell us beforehand what he
+intends to do if he sees a chance of a practical project."
+
+"Has he told you everything?" scoffed Ashton.
+
+"How about his offer to drop the whole matter and not go into it at
+all?" rejoined Knowles.
+
+Ashton hesitated to reply. For one thing, he was momentarily
+nonplused, and, for another, the Blakes had treated him as a
+gentleman. But a fresh upwelling of bitterness dulled his conscience
+and sharpened his wits.
+
+"It may have been to throw you off your guard," he said. "Blake is
+deep, and he has had old Leslie to coach him ever since he married
+Genevieve. He could have laid his plans,--looked over the ground, and
+found out just what are your rights here,--all without your suspecting
+him."
+
+"Well, I'm not so sure--"
+
+"Have you told him what lands you have deeds to?"
+
+"No, but if he knows as much about the West as I figure he does, he
+can guess it. Fence every swallow of get-at-able water to be found on
+my range this time of year, and you won't have to dig a posthole off
+of land I hold in fee simple. Plum Creek sinks just below where Dry
+Fork junctions."
+
+"But you can't have _all_ the water?" exclaimed Ashton incredulously.
+
+"Yes, every drop to be found outside Deep Canyon this time of year.
+There's my seven and a half mile string of quarter-sections blanketing
+Plum Creek from the springs to down below Dry Fork, and five
+quarter-sections covering all the waterholes. That makes up five
+sections. A bunch of tenderfeet came in here, years ago, and preempted
+all the quarter-sections with water on them. Got their patents from
+the government. Then the Utes stampeded them clean out of the country,
+and I bought up their titles at a fair figure."
+
+"And you own even that splendid pool up where I had my camp?"
+
+"Everything wet on this range that a cow or hawss can get to, this
+time of year."
+
+Ashton considered, and advised craftily: "Don't tell him this. Does
+Miss Chuckie know it?"
+
+"She knows I have five sections, and that most of it is on Plum Creek.
+I don't think anything has ever been said to her about the waterholes.
+But why not tell Blake?"
+
+"Don't you see? Even if he finds a way to get at the water in Deep
+Canyon, he will first have to bore his tunnel. He and his construction
+gang must have water to drink and for their engines while they are
+carrying out his plans. You can lie low, and, when the right time
+comes, get out an injunction against their trespassing on your land."
+
+"Say, that's not a bad idea. The best I could figure was that they
+might need one of my waterholes for a reservoir site. But why not call
+him when he first takes a hand?" asked Knowles.
+
+"No, you should not show your cards until you have to," replied
+Ashton. "With all Leslie's money against you, it might be hard to get
+your injunction if they knew of your plans. But if you wait until they
+have their men, machinery and materials on the ground, you will have
+them where they must buy you out at your own terms."
+
+"By--James!" commented Knowles. "Talk about business sharps!"
+
+"I was in Leslie's office for a time," explained Ashton. "Your
+interests are Miss Chuckie's interests. I'm for her--first, last, and
+all the time."
+
+"Um-m-m. Then I guess I can count on you as sure as on Gowan."
+
+"You can. I am going to try my best to win your daughter, Mr. Knowles.
+She's a lady--the loveliest girl I ever met."
+
+"No doubt about that. What's more, she's got grit and brains. That's
+why I tell you now, as I've told Kid, it's for her to decide on the
+man she's going to make happy. If he's square and white, that's all I
+ask."
+
+"About my helping Blake with his levels," Ashton rather hastily
+changed the subject. "I am in your employ--and so is he, for that
+matter. Don't you think I have a right to keep you posted on all his
+plans?"
+
+"Well--yes. But he as much as says he will tell them himself."
+
+"Perhaps he will, and perhaps he won't, Mr. Knowles. I've told you
+what Leslie is like; and Blake is his son-in-law."
+
+"Well, I'm not so sure. You and Kid, between you, have shaken my
+judgment of the man. It can't do any harm to watch him, and I'll be
+obliged to you for doing it. If it comes to a fight against him and
+the millions of backing he has, I want a fair deal and--But, Lord!
+what if we're making all this fuss over nothing? It doesn't stand to
+reason that there's any way to get the water out of Deep Canyon."
+
+"Wait a week or so," cautioned Ashton. "In my opinion, Blake already
+sees a possibility."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+LEVELS AND SLANTS
+
+
+At sunrise the next morning Blake screwed his level on its tripod and
+set up the instrument about a hundred yards away from the ranch house.
+Ashton held the level rod for him on a spike driven into the foot of
+the nearest post of the front porch. Blake called the spike a
+bench-mark. For convenience of determining the relative heights of the
+points along his lines of levels, he designated this first "bench" in
+his fieldbook as "elevation 1,000."
+
+From the porch he ran the line of level "readings" up the slope to the
+top of the divide between Plum Creek and Dry Fork and from there
+towards the waterhole on Dry Fork. At noon Isobel and Mrs. Blake drove
+out to them in the buckboard, bringing a hot meal in an improvised
+fireless-cooker.
+
+"And we came West to rough-it!" groaned Blake, his eyes twinkling.
+
+"You can camp at the waterhole where Lafe did, and I'll send Kid out
+for that bobcat," suggested the girl. "You could roast him, hair and
+all."
+
+"What! roast Gowan?" protested Blake. "Let me tell you, Miss
+Chuckie--you and my wife and Ashton may like him that much, but I
+don't!"
+
+"You need not worry, Mr. Tenderfoot," the girl flashed back at him.
+"Whenever it comes to a hot time, Kid always gets in the first fire,
+without waiting to be told."
+
+"Don't I know it?" exclaimed Ashton. "Maybe you haven't noticed this
+hole in my hat, Mrs. Blake. He put a bullet through it."
+
+"But it's right over your temple, Lafayette!" replied Mrs. Blake.
+
+"Lafe was lifting his some-berero to me, and Kid did it to haze
+him--only a joke, you know," explained Isobel. "Of course Lafe was in
+no danger. It was different, though, when somebody--we think it was
+his thieving guide--took several rifle shots at him. Tell them about
+it, Lafe."
+
+Ashton gave an account of the murderous attack, more than once
+checking himself in a natural tendency to embellish the exciting
+details.
+
+"Oh! What if the man should come back and shoot at us?" shuddered Mrs.
+Blake, drawing her baby close in her arms.
+
+"No fear of that," asserted Isobel. "Kid found that he had fled
+towards the railroad. That proves it must have been the guide. He
+would never dare come back after such a crime."
+
+"If he should, I always carry my rifle, as you see," remarked Ashton;
+adding, with a touch of bravado, "I made him run once, and I would
+again."
+
+"I'm glad Miss Chuckie is sure he will not come back," said Blake. "I
+don't fancy anyone shooting at me that way."
+
+"Timid Mr. Blake!" teased the girl. "Genevieve has been telling me how
+you faced a lion with only a bow and arrow."
+
+"Had to," said Blake. "He'd have jumped on me if I had turned or
+backed off.--Speaking about camping at that waterhole, I believe we'll
+do it, Ashton, if it's the same thing to you. It would save the time
+that would be lost coming and going to the ranch."
+
+"Save time?" repeated Isobel. "Then of course we'll bring out a tent
+and camp kit for you tomorrow. Genevieve and I can ride or drive up to
+the waterhole each day, to picnic with you."
+
+"It will be delightful," agreed Mrs. Blake.
+
+"You ride on ahead and wait for us in the shade," said her husband.
+"We'll knock off for the day when we reach that dolerite dike above
+the waterhole.--If you are ready, Ashton, we'll peg along."
+
+He started off to set up his level as briskly as at dawn, though the
+midday sun was so hot that he had to shade the instrument with his
+handkerchief to keep the air-bubble from outstretching its scale. His
+wife and the girl drove on up Dry Fork to the waterhole.
+
+Mrs. Blake was outstretched on her back, fast asleep, and Isobel was
+playing with the baby under the adjoining tree, when at last the
+surveyors came up on the other side of the creek and ended their day's
+run with the establishment of a bench-mark on the top of the dike
+above the pool. Blake seemed as fresh as in the morning. He took a
+moderate drink of water dipped up in the brim of his hat, and without
+wakening his wife, sat down beside her to "figure up" his fieldbook.
+
+Ashton had come down to the pool panting from heat and exertion. It
+was the first time that he had walked more than half a mile since
+coming to the ranch, for he had immediately fallen into the cowboy
+practice of saddling a horse to go even short distances. He had his
+reward for his work when, having soused his hot head in the pool and
+drunk his fill, he came up to rest in the shade of Isobel's tree. Very
+considerately the baby fell asleep. To avoid disturbing him and his
+mother, the young couple talked in low tones and half whispers very
+conducive to intimacy.
+
+Ashton did his utmost to improve his opportunity. Without openly
+speaking his love, he allowed it to appear in his every look and
+intonation. The girl met the attack with banter and raillery and
+adroit shiftings of the conversation whenever his ardent inferences
+became too obvious. Yet her evasion and her teasing could not always
+mask her maidenly pleasure over his adoration of her loveliness, and
+an occasional blush betrayed to him that his wooing was not
+altogether unwelcome.
+
+He was in the seventh heaven when Mrs. Blake awoke from her
+health-giving sleep and her husband closed his fieldbook. The girl
+promptly dashed her suitor back to earth by dropping him for the
+engineer.
+
+"Mr. Blake! You can't have figured it out already?" she exclaimed.
+"What do you find?"
+
+"Only an 'if,' Miss Chuckie," he answered. "If water can be stored or
+brought by ditch to this elevation, practically all Dry Mesa can be
+irrigated. Our bench-mark there on the dike is more than two hundred
+feet above that spike we drove into your porch post."
+
+"Is that all you've found out today?"
+
+"All for today," said Blake. "I could have left this line of levels
+until later, but I thought I might as well get through with them."
+
+"You would not have run them if you had thought they would be
+useless," she stated, perceiving the point with intuitive acuteness.
+
+"I like to clean up my work as I go along," he replied. "If you wish
+to know, I have thought of a possible way to get water enough for the
+whole mesa. It depends on two 'ifs.' I shall be certain as to one of
+them within the next two days. The other is the question of the depth
+of Deep Canyon. If I had a transit, I could determine that by a
+vertical angle,--triangulation. As it is, I probably shall have to go
+down to the bottom."
+
+"Go down to the bottom of Deep Canyon?" cried the girl.
+
+"Yes," he answered in a matter-of-course tone. "A big ravine runs
+clear down to the bottom, up beyond where your father said you first
+met Ashton. I think it is possible to get down that gulch.--Suppose we
+hitch up? We'll make the ranch just about supper-time."
+
+Ashton hastened to bring in the picketed horses. When they were
+harnessed Isobel fetched the sleeping baby and handed him to his
+mother; but she did not take the seat beside her.
+
+"You drive, Lafe," she ordered. "I'm going to ride behind with Mr.
+Blake. It's such fun bouncing."
+
+All protested in vain against this odd whim. The girl plumped herself
+in on the rear end of the buckboard and dangled her slender feet with
+the gleefulness of a child.
+
+"Mr. Blake will catch me if I go to jolt off," she declared.
+
+The engineer nodded with responsive gayety and seated himself beside
+her. As the buckboard rattled away over the rough sod, they made as
+merry over their jolts and bounces as a pair of school-children on a
+hayrack party.
+
+Mrs. Blake sought to divert Ashton from his disappointment, but he
+had ears only for the laughing, chatting couple behind him. The fact
+that Blake was a married man did not prevent the lover from giving way
+to jealous envy. Chancing to look around as he warned the hilarious
+pair of a gully, he saw the girl grasp Blake's shoulder. Natural as
+was the act, his envy flared up in hot resentment. Except on their
+drive to Stockchute, she had always avoided even touching his hand
+with her finger tips; yet now she clung to the engineer with a grasp
+as familiar as that of an affectionate child. Nor did she release her
+clasp until they were some yards beyond the gully.
+
+Mrs. Blake had seen not only the expression that betrayed Ashton's
+anger but also the action that caused it. She raised her fine
+eyebrows; but meeting Ashton's significant glance, she sought to pass
+over the incident with a smile. He refused to respond. All during the
+remainder of the drive he sat in sullen silence. Genevieve bent over
+her baby. Behind them the unconscious couple continued in their
+mirthful enjoyment of each other and the ride.
+
+When the party reached the ranch, the girl must have perceived
+Ashton's moroseness had she not first caught sight of her father. He
+was standing outside the front porch, his eyes fixed upon the corner
+post in a perplexed stare.
+
+"Why, Daddy," she called, "what is it? You look as you do when playing
+chess with Kid."
+
+"Afraid it's something that'll annoy Mr. Blake," replied the cowman.
+
+"What is it?" asked Blake, who was handing his wife from the
+buckboard.
+
+As the engineer faced Knowles, Gowan sauntered around the far corner
+of the house. At sight of the ladies he paused to adjust his
+neckerchief.
+
+"Can't understand it, Mr. Blake," said the cowman. "Somebody has
+pulled out that spike you drove in here this morning."
+
+"Pulled the spike?" repeated Gowan, coming forward to stare at the
+post. "That shore is a joke. The Jap's building a new henhouse. Must
+be short of nails."
+
+"That's so," said Knowles. "I forgot to order them for him. I'm mighty
+sorry, Mr. Blake. But of course the little brown cuss didn't know what
+he was meddling with."
+
+"Jumping Jehosaphat!" ejaculated Gowan. "That shore is mighty hard
+luck! I reckon pulling that spike turns your line of levels adrift
+like knocking out the picket-pin of an uneasy hawss."
+
+Blake burst into a hearty laugh. "That's a fine metaphor, Mr. Gowan.
+But it does not happen to fit the case. It would not matter if the
+spike-hole had been pulled out and the post along with it, so far as
+concerns this line of levels."
+
+"It wouldn't?" muttered Gowan, his lean jaw dropping slack. He
+glowered as if chagrined at the engineer's laughter at his mistake.
+
+Without heeding the puncher's look, Blake began to tell Knowles the
+result of his day's work. While he was speaking, they went into the
+house after his wife and the girl, leaving Gowan and Ashton alone.
+Equally sullen and resentful, the rivals exchanged stares of open
+hostility. Ashton pointed a derisive finger at the spike-hole in the
+post.
+
+"'Hole ... and the post along with it!'" he repeated Blake's words.
+"On bridge work it might have caused some trouble. But a preliminary
+line of levels--_Mon Dieu_! A Jap should have known better--or even a
+yap!" With a supercilious shrug, he swung back into the buckboard and
+drove up to the corral.
+
+Gowan's right hand had dropped to his hip. Slowly it came up and
+joined the other hand in rolling a thick Mexican cigarette. But the
+puncher did not light his "smoke." He looked at the spike-hole in the
+post, scowled, and went back around the house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+METAL AND METTLE
+
+
+At dawn Blake and Ashton drove up to the waterhole on Dry Fork with
+their camp equipment. There they left the outfit in the buckboard and
+proceeded with the line of levels on up the creek bed into the gorge
+from which it issued.
+
+For more than a mile they carried the levels over the bowlders of the
+gradually sloping bottom of that stupendous gash in the mountain side.
+So far the work was fairly easy. At last, however, they came to the
+place where the bed of the gulch suddenly tilted upward at a sharp
+angle and climbed the tremendous heights to the top of High Mesa in
+sheer ascents and cliff-like ledges. Blake established a bench-mark at
+the foot of the acclivity, and came forward beside Ashton to peer up
+the Titanic chute between the dizzy precipices. From where they stood
+to the head of the gulch was fully four thousand feet.
+
+"What do you think of it?" asked the engineer.
+
+"I think this is where your line ends," answered Ashton, and he rolled
+a cigarette. He had been anything but agreeable since their start from
+the ranch.
+
+"We of course can't go up with the level and rod," said Blake, smiling
+at the absurdity of the suggestion. "Still, we might possibly chain it
+to the top."
+
+Ashton shrugged. "I fail to see the need of risking my neck to climb
+this goat stairway."
+
+"Very well," agreed Blake, ignoring his companion's ill humor. "Kindly
+take back the level and get out the chain."
+
+Ashton started off without replying. Blake looked at the young man's
+back with a regretful, half-puzzled expression. But he quickly
+returned to the business in hand. He laid the level rod on a rock and
+inclined it at the same steep pitch as the uptilt of the gorge bottom.
+Over the lower end of this he held a plumb bob, and took the angle
+between the perpendicular line of the bob-string and the inclined line
+of the rod with a small protractor that he carried in his notebook.
+The angle measured over fifty degrees from the horizontal.
+
+Having thus determined the angle of inclination, the engineer picked a
+likely line of ascent and started to climb the gulch chute. He went up
+in rapid rushes, with the ease and surefootedness of a coolheaded,
+steel-muscled climber. He stopped frequently, not because of weariness
+or of lack of breath, but to test the structure and hardness of the
+rocks with a small magnifying glass and the butt of his pocket knife.
+
+At last, nearly a thousand feet up, his ascent was stopped by a sheer
+hundred-foot cliff. He had seen it beetling above him and knew
+beforehand that he could not hope to scale such a precipice; yet he
+clambered up to it, still examining the rock with minute care. As he
+walked across the waterworn shelf at the foot of the sheer cliff, his
+eye was caught by a wide seam of quartz in the side wall of the
+gulch.
+
+Going on over to the vein, he looked at it in several places through
+his magnifying glass. Everywhere little yellow specks showed in the
+semi-translucent quartz. He drew back across the gorge to examine the
+trend of the vein. It ran far outward and upward, and in no place was
+it narrower than where it disappeared under the bed of the gorge.
+
+His lips pursed in a prolonged, soundless whistle. But he did not
+linger. Immediately after he had estimated the visible length and dip
+of the seam, he began his descent. Arriving at the foot without
+accident, he picked up the level rod and swung away down the gulch.
+
+He saw nothing of Ashton until he had come all the distance down
+across the valley to the dike above the pool. His assistant was in the
+grove below, assiduously helping Miss Knowles to erect a tent that the
+girl had improvised from a tarpaulin. Genevieve and Thomas Herbert
+were interesting themselves in the contents of the kit-box. The two
+ladies had ridden up to the camp on horseback, Isobel carrying the
+baby.
+
+When Blake came striding down to them, the girl left Ashton and ran
+to meet him, her eyes beaming with affectionate welcome.
+
+"What has kept you so long?" she called. "Lafe says the gulch is
+absolutely unclimbable. I could have told you so, beforehand."
+
+"You are right. I tried it, but had to quit," replied Blake, engulfing
+her outstretched hand in his big palm.
+
+When he would have released her, she caught his fingers and held fast,
+so that they came down to his wife hand in hand. Oblivious of Ashton's
+frown, the girl dimpled at Mrs. Blake.
+
+"Here he is, Genevieve," she said. "We have him corralled for the rest
+of the morning."
+
+"Sorry," replied Blake, stooping to pick up his chuckling son. "We
+can't knock off now."
+
+"But if you cannot continue your levels?" asked his wife. "From what
+Lafayette told us, we thought you would not start in again until after
+lunch."
+
+"No more levels until tomorrow," said Blake. "But I must settle one of
+my big 'ifs' by night. To do it, Ashton and I will have to go up on
+High Mesa and measure a line. There's still two hours till noon. We'll
+borrow your saddle ponies, Miss Chuckie, and start at once, if Jenny
+will put us up a bite of lunch."
+
+"Immediately, Tom," assented Mrs. Blake, delighted at the opportunity
+to serve her big husband.
+
+"When shall we take Genevieve to see the canyon?" asked the girl. "I am
+sure she can ride up safely on old Buck."
+
+"We have only the two saddle horses today," replied Blake. "If our
+measurement settles that 'if' one way, I shall start a line of levels
+up the mountain tomorrow morning, if the other way, any irrigation
+project is out of the question, and we shall go up to the canyon merely
+as a sightseeing party."
+
+"Ah!" sighed the girl. "'If!' 'if'--I do so hope it turns out to be
+the last one!"
+
+Blake looked at her with a quizzical smile. "Perhaps you would not,
+Miss Chuckie, if you could see all the results of a successful water
+system."
+
+"You mean, turning our range into farms for hundreds of irrigationists,"
+she replied. "I suppose I am selfish, but I am thinking of what it
+would mean to Daddy. Just consider how it will affect us. For years
+this land has been our own for miles and miles!"
+
+"Well, we shall see," said Blake, his eyes twinkling.
+
+"Yes, indeed!" she exclaimed. "Lafe, if you'll help me saddle up and
+help Mr. Blake rush up to do that measuring, I'll--I'll be ever so
+grateful!"
+
+Though all the more resentful at Blake over having to leave her
+company, Ashton eagerly sprang forward to help the girl saddle the
+ponies. When they were ready, she filled his canteen for him and took
+a sip from it "for luck." Genevieve had packed an ample lunch in a
+gamebag, along with her husband's linked steel-wire surveyor's chain.
+
+Ten minutes after Blake's arrival, he handed the baby to its mother
+and swung into the saddle. Ashton had already mounted, fired by a kind
+glance from the girl's forget-me-not eyes. In his zeal, he led the way
+at a gallop around the craggy hill and across the intervening valley
+to the escarpment of High Mesa. Had not Blake checked him, he would
+have forced the pace on up the mountain side.
+
+"Hold on," called the engineer. "We want to make haste slowly. That
+buckskin you're on isn't so young as he has been, and my pony has to
+lug around two hundred pounds. We'll get back sooner by being
+moderate. Besides you don't wish to knock up old Buck. He is about the
+only one of these jumpy cow ponies that is safe for Jenny."
+
+"That's so," admitted Ashton. "Suppose you set the pace."
+
+He stopped to let Blake pass him, and trailed behind up the mountain
+side. He had headed into a draw. The engineer at once turned and began
+zigzagging up the steep side of the ridge that thrust out into the
+valley between the draw and the gulch of Dry Fork. At the stiffest
+places he jumped off and led his pony. None too willingly, Ashton
+followed the example set by his companion. There were some places
+where he could not have avoided so doing--ledges that the old
+buckskin, despite his years of mountain service, could hardly scramble
+up under an empty saddle.
+
+Long before they reached the point of the ridge, Ashton was panting
+and sweating, and his handsome face was red from exertion and anger.
+But his indignation at being misguided up so difficult a line of
+ascent received a damper when he reached the lower end of the ridge
+crest. Blake, who had waited patiently for him to clamber up the last
+sharp slope, gave him a cheerful nod and pointed to the long but
+fairly easy incline of the ridge crest.
+
+"In mountain climbing, always take your stiffest ground first, when
+you can," he said. "We can jog along pretty fast now."
+
+They mounted and rode up the ridge, much of the time at a jog trot.
+Before long they came to the top of High Mesa, and galloped across to
+one of the ridges that lay parallel with Deep Canyon. Climbing the
+ridge, they found themselves looking over into a ravine that ran down
+to the right to join another ravine from the opposite direction, at
+the head of Dry Fork Gulch. Blake turned and rode to the left along
+the ridge, until he found a place where they could cross the ravine.
+The still air was reverberating with the muffled roar of Deep Canyon.
+
+From the ridge on the other side of the ravine, they could look down
+between the scattered pines to the gaping chasm of the stupendous
+canyon. But Blake rode to the right along the summit of the ridge until
+they came opposite the head of Dry Fork Gulch. Here he flung the reins
+over his pony's head, and dismounted. Ashton was about to do the same
+when he caught sight of a wolf slinking away like a gray shadow up the
+farther ravine. He reached for his rifle, and for the first time
+noticed that he had failed to bring it along. In his haste to start
+from camp he had left it in the tent.
+
+"_Sacre!_" he petulantly exclaimed. "There goes twenty-five dollars!"
+
+"How's that?" asked Blake. He looked and caught a glimpse of the wolf
+just as it vanished. "Why don't you shoot?"
+
+"Left my rifle in camp, curse the luck!"
+
+"Keep cool," advised Blake. "It's only twenty-five dollars, and you
+might have missed anyway."
+
+"Not with my automatic," snapped Ashton. "You needn't sneer about the
+money. You've seen times when you'd have been glad of a chance at half
+the amount."
+
+"That's true," gravely agreed the engineer. "What's more, I realize
+that it is far harder for you than it ever was for me. I want to tell
+you I admire the way you have stood your loss."
+
+"You do?" burst out the younger man. "I want to tell _you_ I don't
+admire the way you ruined me--babbling to my father--when you
+promised to keep still! You sneak!"
+
+Blake looked into the other's furious face with no shade of change in
+his grave gaze. "I have never said a word to your father against you,"
+he declared.
+
+"Then--then how, after all this time--?" stammered Ashton, even in his
+anger unable to disbelieve the engineer's quiet statement. He was
+disconcerted only for the moment. Again he flared hotly: "But if you
+didn't, old Leslie must have! It's all the same!"
+
+"No, it is not the same," corrected Blake. "As for my father-in-law,
+if he said anything about--the past, I feel sure it was not with
+intention to hurt your interests."
+
+"Hurt my interests! You know I am utterly ruined!"
+
+"On the contrary, I know you are not ruined. You have lost a large
+allowance, and a will has been made cutting you off from a great many
+millions that you expected to inherit. But you have landed square on
+your feet; you have a pretty good job, and you are stronger and
+healthier than you were."
+
+"If you break up Mr. Knowles' range with your irrigation schemes, I
+stand to lose my job. You know that."
+
+"If the project proves to be feasible, I shall offer you a position on
+the works," said Blake.
+
+"You needn't try to bribe me!" retorted Ashton. "I'm working for Mr.
+Knowles."
+
+"Well, he directed you to help me with this survey," replied the
+engineer, with imperturbable good nature. "The next move is to chain
+across to the canyon."
+
+He pulled his surveyor's chain from the bag and descended the ridge to
+an out-jutting rock above the head of the tremendous gorge in the
+mountain side. Ashton followed him down. Blake handed him the front
+end of the chain.
+
+"You lead," he said. "I'll line you, as I know where to strike the
+nearest point on the canyon."
+
+Ashton sullenly started up the ridge, and the measurement began. As
+Blake required only a rough approximation, they soon crossed the ridge
+and chained down through the trees to the edge of Deep Canyon. Ashton
+was astonished at the shortness of the distance. The canyon at this
+point ran towards the mesa escarpment as if it had originally intended
+to drive through into Dry Fork Gulch, but twisted sharp about and
+curved back across the plateau. Even Blake was surprised at the
+measurement. It was only a little over two thousand feet.
+
+"Noticed this place when out with Mr. Knowles and Gowan," he remarked,
+gazing down into the abyss with keen appreciation of its awful
+grandeur. "They told me it is the nearest that the canyon comes to the
+edge of the mesa, until it breaks out, thirty or forty miles down."
+
+"How--how about that 'if' you said this measurement would settle?"
+asked Ashton.
+
+"What's the time?"
+
+Ashton looked at his watch, frowning over the evasive reply. "It's
+two-ten."
+
+"I'll figure on the proposition while we eat lunch," said Blake. "I
+can answer you better regarding that 'if' when I have done some
+calculating. Luckily I climbed up to examine the rock in the gulch."
+He smiled quizzically at his companion. "You were right as to its
+being unclimbable; but I found out even more than I expected."
+
+Ashton silently took the bag from him and arranged the lunch and his
+canteen on a rock under a pine. The engineer figured and drew little
+diagrams in his fieldbook while he ate his sandwiches. Ashton had half
+drained the canteen on the way up the mountain. Before sitting down
+Blake had rinsed out his mouth and taken a few swallows of water.
+After eating, he started to take another drink, noticed his
+companion's hot dry face, and stopped after a single sip.
+
+"Guess you need it more than I do," he remarked, as he rose to his
+feet. "Time to start. I wish to go around and down the mountain on the
+other side of the gulch."
+
+"How about the--the 'if'?" inquired Ashton.
+
+"Killed," answered Blake. "There now is only one left. If that comes
+out the same way, Dry Mesa will have good cause to change its name."
+
+"You can tunnel through from the gulch to the canyon?" exclaimed
+Ashton.
+
+"Yes; and I shall do so--if Deep Canyon is not too deep."
+
+"I hope it is a thousand feet below Dry Mesa!" said Ashton.
+
+"In the circumstances," Blake replied to the fervent declaration, "I
+am glad to hear you say it."
+
+Ashton stared, but could detect no sarcasm in the other's smile of
+commendation.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+A SHOT IN THE DUSK
+
+
+They returned to their grazing ponies, and at once started the descent
+of the mountain, after crossing the ravine where they had seen the
+wolf. Blake chose a route that brought them down into the valley above
+the waterhole shortly before five o'clock. They cantered the remaining
+distance along the wide, gravelly wash of the creek bed to the dike.
+
+Looking down from the dike, they saw that Knowles and Gowan had come
+up the creek and were waiting for them in company with the ladies.
+Ashton set spurs to his horse and dashed across above the pool, to
+descend the slope to the party. Blake descended on the other side, to
+water his horse and slake his own thirst.
+
+To Ashton's chagrin, Isobel joined Genevieve in hastening to meet the
+engineer. He rode down beside the two men and jumped off to follow the
+ladies. But Gowan sprang before him.
+
+"Hold on," he said. "Mr. Knowles wants your report."
+
+"If you'll oblige us, Lafe," added the cowman. "I'm pretty much worked
+up."
+
+"You have cause to be!" replied Ashton. "He says the only question
+left is whether the water in the canyon is not at too low a level. We
+measured across from the creek gulch to the canyon. A tunnel is
+practicable, he says."
+
+"Through all that mountain?" scoffed Gowan. "It's solid rock, clean
+through. It would take him a hundred years to burrow a hole like
+that."
+
+"You know nothing of engineering and its tools. We now have electric
+drills that will eat into granite like cheese," condescendingly
+explained Ashton.
+
+"Think I don't know that? But just you try to figure out how he's
+going to get his electricity for his drills," retorted Gowan.
+
+Without stopping for his disconcerted rival to reply, he turned his
+back on him and started towards Isobel. The girl was running up from
+the pool, her face almost pitiful with disappointment.
+
+"Oh, Daddy!" she called, "Mr. Blake says that if the water in the
+canyon--"
+
+"Needn't tell me, honey. I know already," broke in her father,
+hastening to meet her.
+
+She flung her arms about his neck, and sobbed brokenly: "I'm--I'm so
+sorry for you, D-Daddy!"
+
+"There, there now!" he soothed, awkwardly patting her back. "'Tisn't
+like you to cry before you're hurt."
+
+"No, no--you! not me. It doesn't matter about me!"
+
+"Doesn't it, though! But I'm not hurt either, as yet. It's a long ways
+from being a sure thing."
+
+"All the way down to the bottom of Deep Canyon!" put in Ashton.
+
+"And then some!" added Gowan. "I've hit on another 'if,' Miss
+Chuckie."
+
+"You have? Oh, Kid, tell us!"
+
+"It's this: How's he going to get electricity to dig his tunnel?"
+
+Blake was coming up from the pool, with his baby in one arm and his
+wife clinging fondly to the other. He met the coldly exultant glance
+of Gowan, and smiled.
+
+"The only question regarding the power is one of cost, Mr. Gowan," he
+said. "There is no coal near enough to be hauled. But gasolene is not
+bulky. If there was water power to generate electricity, a tunnel
+could be bored at half the cost I have figured. The point is that
+there is no water power available, nor will there be until the tunnel
+is finished."
+
+"What! You talk about finishing the tunnel? Didn't you say it is still
+uncertain about the water?" demanded Knowles.
+
+"I was merely explaining to Mr. Gowan," replied Blake. "The question
+he raised is one of the factors in our problem as to whether an
+irrigation project is practicable. We now know that we have the land
+for it, the tunnel site, the reservoir site--" he pointed to the
+valley above the dike--"and I have figured that the cost of
+construction would not be excessive. All that remains is to determine
+if we have the water. I have already explained that this will require
+a descent into the canyon."
+
+"You say that that will decide it, one way or the other?" queried
+Knowles, his forehead creased with deep lines of foreboding.
+
+"Yes," replied Blake. "I regret that you feel as you do about it.
+Consider what it would mean to hundreds, yes, thousands of people, if
+this mesa were watered. I assure you that you, too, would benefit by
+the project."
+
+"I don't care for any such benefit, Mr. Blake. I've been a cowman for
+twenty-five years. I want to keep my range until the time comes for me
+to take the long trail."
+
+"It would be hard to change," agreed the engineer. "However, the point
+now is to find what Deep Canyon has to tell us."
+
+"You still think you can go down it?"
+
+"Yes, if I have ropes, a two-pound hammer, and some iron pins;
+railroad spikes and picket-pins would do."
+
+"Going to rope the rocks and pull them up for steps?" asked Gowan.
+
+"I shall need two or three hundred feet of half-inch manila," said
+Blake, ignoring the sarcasm.
+
+"They may have it at Stockchute," said Knowles. "Kid, you can drive
+over with the wagon and fetch Mr. Blake all the rope and other things
+he wants. I can't stand this waiting much longer."
+
+"There will be no time lost," said Blake. "It will take Ashton and me
+all of tomorrow to carry a line of levels up the mountain."
+
+"Why need you do that, Tom?" asked his wife.
+
+"Yes, why, if all that's left is to go down into the canyon?" added
+Isobel, dabbing the tears from her wet eyes.
+
+Ashton thrust in an answer before Blake could speak. "We must see how
+high the upper mesa is above this one, Miss Chuckie, and then compare
+the difference of altitude with the depth of the canyon, to see whether
+its bottom is above or below the bottom of the gulch."
+
+"Oh--measure up and then down, to see which way is longest," said
+Genevieve.
+
+"Sorry, ma'am," broke in Knowles. "We'll have to be starting now to
+get home by dark. If you think you can trust me with that young man,
+I'd like the honor of packing him all the way in. I've toted calves
+for miles, so I guess I can hold onto a baby if I use both hands."
+
+"You shall have him!" replied Genevieve, smiling like a daughter as
+she met the look in his grave eyes. "Tom, give Thomas to Mr.
+Knowles--when he is safe in the saddle."
+
+Even Gowan cracked a smile at this cautious qualification. He hastened
+to bring Isobel's horse and hold him for her--which gave Ashton the
+opportunity to help her mount. Both services were needless, but she
+rewarded each eager servitor with a dimpled smile. When Blake handed
+the baby up to Knowles, his wife, untroubled by mock modesty, gave him
+a loving kiss. He lifted her bodily into the saddle, and she rode off
+with her three companions.
+
+Isobel, however, wheeled within the first few yards, and came back for
+a parting word: "You can expect us quite early tomorrow. We will
+overtake you on your way up the mountain. I wish Genevieve to see the
+canyon. Good night--Pleasant dreams!"
+
+She had addressed Ashton, but her last smile was for Blake, and it was
+undisguisedly affectionate. As she loped away after the others, Ashton
+frowned, and, picking up his rifle, started off up the valley. Blake
+was staring after the girl with a wondering look. He turned to cast a
+quizzical glance at the back of the resentful lover.
+
+When the latter had disappeared around the hill, the engineer took the
+frying pan and walked up into the creek bed above the dike. After
+going some distance over the gravel bars, he came to a place where
+the swirl of the last freshet had gouged a hole almost to bedrock.
+Scooping a panful of sand and gravel from the bottom of the hole, he
+went back and squatted down beside the pool within easy reach of the
+water.
+
+He picked the larger pebbles from the pan, added water, and began to
+swirl the contents around with a circular motion. Each turn flirted
+some of the sand and water over the pan's beveled edge. Every little
+while he renewed the water. At last the pan's contents were reduced to
+a half dozen, irregular, dirty, little lumps and a handful of "black
+sand" in which gleamed numbers of yellow particles.
+
+Blake put the nuggets into his pocket and threw the rest out into the
+pool. He returned to the tent and sat down to re-check his level-book
+and his calculations on the approximate cost of the tunnel. Sundown
+found him still figuring; but when twilight faded into dusk, he put
+away his fieldbook and started a fire for supper.
+
+He was in the act of setting on a pan of bacon when, without the
+slightest warning, a bullet cut the knot of the loose neckerchief
+under his downbent chin. In the same instant that he heard the ping of
+the shot he pitched sideways and flattened himself on the ground with
+the chuck-box between him and the fire. A roll and a quick crawl took
+him into the underbrush beyond the circle of firelight. No second
+bullet followed him in his amazingly swift movements. He lay
+motionless, listening intently, but no sound broke the stillness of
+the evening except the distant wail of a coyote and the hoot of an
+owl.
+
+Half an hour passed, and still the engineer waited. The dusk deepened
+into darkness. At last a heavy footfall sounded up on the dike. Blake
+rose, and slipping silently to the tent, groped about until he found a
+heavy iron picket-pin.
+
+Someone came down the slope and kicked his way petulantly through the
+bushes to the dying fire. He threw on an armful of brush. The light of
+the up-blazing flame showed Ashton standing beside the chuck-box,
+rifle in hand. But he dropped the weapon to pick up the overturned
+frying pan, which lay at his feet.
+
+"Hello, Blake!" he sang out irritably. "I supposed you'd have supper
+waiting. Haven't turned in this early, have you?"
+
+"No," replied Blake, and he came forward, carelessly swinging the
+picket-pin. "Thought I saw a coyote sneaking about, and tried to trick
+him into coming close enough for me to nail him with this pin."
+
+"With that!" scoffed Ashton. "But it would do as well as my rifle. I
+took a shot at a wolf, and then the mechanism jammed. I can't get it
+to work."
+
+"You fired a shot?" asked Blake.
+
+"Yes. Was it too far off for you to hear? I circled all around these
+hills."
+
+"No, I heard it," replied Blake, looking close into the other's sullen
+face. "You may not have been as far away as you thought."
+
+"I was far enough," grumbled Ashton. "I've walked till I'm hungry as a
+shark."
+
+"Do you realize that you want to be careful how you shoot with these
+high-power rifles?" asked Blake. "They carry a mile or more."
+
+"I've carried mine more than that, and _it_ won't carry an inch,"
+complained Ashton. "Wish you would see if you can fix it, while I get
+on some bacon."
+
+Blake took his scrutinizing gaze from his companion's face, and picked
+up the rifle. Ashton showed plainly that he was tired and hungry and
+very irritable, but there was no trace of guilt in his look or manner.
+While he hurriedly prepared supper, Blake took apart the mechanism of
+the rifle. He discovered the trouble at once.
+
+"This is easy," he said. "Nothing broken--just a screw loose. Have you
+been monkeying with the parts, to see how they work?"
+
+"No; I don't care a hang how they work. What gets me is that they
+didn't work!"
+
+"Queer, then, how this screw got loose," said Blake as he tightened it
+with the blade of his pocket knife. "It sets tight enough. Of course
+it might have come from the factory a bit loose, and jarred out with
+the firing; but neither seems probable."
+
+"Is it all right now?" queried Ashton.
+
+"Yes.--Seems to me someone _must_ have loosened this screw."
+
+"What's the difference how it happened, if it will not happen again?"
+irritably replied Ashton. "Guess this bacon is fried enough. Let's
+eat."
+
+Blake recoupled the rifle, emptied the magazine, tested the mechanism,
+refilled the magazine, and joined his ravenous companion in his
+ill-cooked meal.
+
+Immediately after eating, Ashton flung himself down in the tent. A few
+minutes later Blake crept in beside him and struck a match. The young
+man had already fallen into the deep slumber of utter physical and
+mental relaxation. Blake went outside and listened to the wailing of
+the coyotes. Difficult as it was to determine the direction of their
+mournful cries, he at last satisfied himself that they were circling
+entirely around the camp.
+
+A watchdog could not have indicated with greater certainty that there
+was no other wild beast or any human being lurking near the waterhole.
+Blake crept back into the tent and was soon fast asleep beside his
+companion.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+ON THE BRINK
+
+
+Early to bed, early to rise. The two men were up at dawn. During the
+night the coyotes had sneaked into the camp. But Blake had fastened
+the food in the chuck-box and slung everything gnawable up in the
+branches out of reach of the sly thieves.
+
+At sunrise the two started out on their day's work, Ashton carrying
+his rifle and canteen and the level rod, Blake with the level and a
+bag containing their lunch and a two-quart sirup-can of water.
+
+"We'll run a new line from the dike bench, around the hill and across
+the valley the way we rode out yesterday," said the engineer, as they
+climbed the slope above the waterhole. "That will give us a check by
+cross-tying to the line of the creek levels where it runs into the
+gulch."
+
+"Can't you trust to the accuracy of your own work?" asked Ashton with
+evident intent to mortify.
+
+Blake smiled in his good-natured way. "You forget the first rule of
+engineering. Always check when you can, then re-check and check
+again.--Now, if you'll kindly give me a reading off that bench."
+
+Ashton complied, though with evident ill will. He had wakened in good
+spirits, but was fast returning to his sullenness of the previous day.
+He took his time in going from the bench-mark to the first turning
+point. Blake moved up past him with inspiring briskness, but the
+younger man kept to his leisurely saunter. In rounding the corner of
+the hill twice as much time was consumed as was necessary.
+
+When they came to the last turn at the foot of the rocky slope, where
+the line struck out across the valley towards the foot of the mountain
+side, Ashton paused to roll a cigarette before holding his rod for the
+reading. Small as was the incident, it was particularly aggravating to
+an engineer. The reading would have taken only a moment, and he could
+then have rolled his cigarette and smoked it while Blake was moving
+past him for the next "set up." Instead, he deliberately kept Blake
+waiting until the cigarette had been rolled and lighted.
+
+Blake "pulled up" his level and started forward, his face impassive.
+Ashton leaned jauntily on the rod, sucked in a mouthful of smoke, and
+raising his cigarette, flicked the ash from the tip with his little
+finger. At the same instant a bullet from the crags above him pierced
+the crown of his hat. He pitched forward on his face, rolled half
+over, and lay quiet.
+
+Most men would have been dumfounded by the frightful suddenness of the
+occurrence--the shot and the instant fall of Ashton. It was like a
+stroke of lightning out of a clear sky. Blake did not stand gaping
+even for a moment. As Ashton's senseless body struck the ground, he
+sprang sideways and bent to lay down his instrument, with the
+instinctive carefulness of an old railroad surveyor. A swift rush
+towards Ashton barely saved him from the second bullet that came
+pinging down from the hill crest. It burned across the back of his
+shoulder.
+
+Heedless of the blood spurting from the wound in the side of Ashton's
+head, Blake snatched up the automatic rifle and fired at a point
+between two knobs of rock on the hill crest. Promptly a hat appeared,
+then an arm and a rifle. It might have been expected that a bullet
+would have instantly followed; yet the assassin was strangely
+deliberate about getting his aim. Blake did not wait for him. He began
+to fire as fast as the automatic ejector and reloader set the rifle
+trigger. Three bullets sped up at the assassin before he had time to
+drop back out of sight.
+
+Blake started up the hillside, his pale eyes like white-hot steel. He
+was in a fury, but it was the cold fury of a man too courageous for
+reckless bravado. He went up the hill as an Apache would have charged,
+dodging from cover to cover and, wherever possible, keeping in line
+with a rock or tree in his successive rushes. At every brief stop he
+scanned the ridge crest for a sign of his enemy. But the assassin did
+not show himself. For all that Blake could tell, he might be waiting
+for a sure shot, or he might be lying with a bullet through his
+brain.
+
+To avoid suicidal exposure, the engineer was compelled to veer off to
+the right in his ascent. He reached the ridge crest without a shot
+having been fired at him. Leaping suddenly to his feet, he scrambled
+up to the flat top of a high crag, from which he could peer down upon
+the others. The natural embrazure from which the assassin had fired
+was exposed to his view; but the place was empty. He looked cautiously
+about at the many huge bowlders behind which a hundred men might have
+been crouching unseen by him, advantageous as was his position. To
+flush the assassin would require a bold rush over and around the
+rocks.
+
+Blake set his powerful jaw and gathered himself together for the leap
+down from his crag. At that moment his alert eye caught a glimpse of a
+swiftly moving object on the mesa at the foot of the far side of the
+hill. It was a horse and rider racing out of sight around the bend of
+a ridge point.
+
+Blake whipped the rifle to his shoulder. But the cowardly fugitive had
+disappeared. He lowered the rifle and started back down the hill
+faster than he had come up. Leaping like a goat, sliding, rushing--he
+raced to the bottom in a direct line for Ashton.
+
+The victim lay as he had fallen, his head ghastly red with blood,
+which was still oozing from his wound. Blake dropped down beside the
+flaccid body and tore open the front of the silk shirt. He thrust in
+his hand. For some moments he was baffled by the violent throbbing of
+his own pulse. Then, at last, he detected a heartbeat, very feeble and
+slow yet unmistakable.
+
+He turned Ashton on his side, and washing away the blood with water
+from the canteen, examined the wound with utmost carefulness. The
+bullet had pierced the scalp and plowed a furrow down along the side
+of the skull, grazing but not penetrating the bone.
+
+"Only stunned.... Mighty close, though," muttered Blake. He looked at
+the ashen face of the wounded man and added apprehensively, "Too
+close!... Concussion--"
+
+Hastily he knotted a compress bandage made of handkerchiefs and
+neckerchiefs around the bleeding head, and stretching Ashton flat
+on his back, began to pump his arms up and down as is done in
+resuscitating a drowned person. After a time Ashton's face began
+to lose its deathly pallor. His heart beat less feebly; he drew in a
+deep sighing breath, and stared up dazedly at Blake, with slowly
+returning consciousness.
+
+"I'll smoke all I please and when I please," he murmured in a
+supercilious drawl.
+
+Blake dashed his face with the cupful of water still left in the
+canteen. The wounded man flushed with quick anger and attempted to
+rise.
+
+"What--what you--How dare you?" he spluttered, only to sink back with
+a groan, "My head! O-o-oh! You've smashed my head!"
+
+"You're in luck that your head _wasn't_ smashed," replied Blake. "It
+was a bullet knocked you over."
+
+"Bullet?" echoed Ashton.
+
+"Yes. Scoundrel up on the hill tried to get us both."
+
+"Up on the hill?" Ashton twisted his head about, in alarm, to look at
+the hill crest. "But if he--He may shoot again."
+
+"Not this time. I went up for him. He went down faster, other side the
+hill. Saw him on the run. The sneaking--" Blake closed his lips on the
+word. After a moment his grimness relaxed. "Came back to start your
+funeral. Found you'd cheated the undertaker. How do you feel now?"
+
+"I believe I--" began Ashton, again trying to raise himself, only to
+sink back as before. "My head!--What makes me so weak?"
+
+"Don't worry," reassured Blake. "It's only a scalp wound. You are weak
+from the shock and a little loss of blood. I'll get you a drink from
+my can, and then tote you into camp. You'll be all right in a day or
+two."
+
+He fetched the can of water from his bag, which he had dropped beside
+the level. Ashton drank with the thirstiness of one who has lost
+blood. When at last his thirst was quenched, he glanced up at Blake
+with a look of half reluctant apology.
+
+"I said something about your striking me," he murmured. "I did not
+understand--did not realize I had been shot. You see, just before--"
+
+"That's all right," broke in Blake. "I owe you a bigger apology. Last
+evening, while you were out hunting, someone took a shot at me. It
+must have been this same sneaking skunk. I thought it was you."
+
+"You thought I could try to--to shoot you?" muttered Ashton.
+
+"Yes. There's the old matter of the bridge, and you seem to think I am
+responsible for what your father has done. But after you came in, I
+soon concluded that you had fired towards the camp unintentionally."
+
+"If you had asked," explained Ashton, "I was around at the far end of
+these hills, nearly two miles from the camp, when I shot at the wolf
+and the rifle went wrong."
+
+"That was a fortunate occurrence--your going out and seeing the wolf;"
+said Blake. "If you hadn't taken that shot, we would not have known
+your rifle was out of gear. My first bullet merely made the sneak rise
+up to pot me. If the rapidity of the next three shots hadn't rattled
+him, I believe he would have potted me, instead of running."
+
+"So that was it?" exclaimed Ashton. "Do you know, I believe it must be
+the same scoundrel who attacked me the first day I rode down Dry
+Fork. No doubt he remembered how I ripped loose at him with the
+automatic-catch set."
+
+"Your thieving guide?" said Blake. "But why should he try to kill
+me?"
+
+"I'm sure I don't know," murmured Ashton. "Another drink, please."
+
+"I shall tote you back to camp, and--No, I'll lay you over there in
+the shade and go up to see if he is in sight."
+
+Picking up the wounded man as easily as if he had been a child, the
+engineer carried him over under a tree, fetched him the can of water,
+and for the second time climbed the rocky hillside. Scaling his
+lookout crag, he surveyed the country below him. A mile down the creek
+two riders were coming up towards the waterhole at an easy canter. He
+surmised that they were his wife and Miss Knowles.
+
+Their approach brought a shade of anxiety into his strong face. He
+swept the landscape with his glance. A little cloud of dust far out on
+the mesa towards Split Peak caught his eye. He looked at it
+steadfastly under his hand, and drew a deep breath of relief as he
+made out a fleeing horse and rider.
+
+He descended to Ashton, and taking him up pick-a-back, swung away for
+the camp with long, swift strides. Before he had gone half the
+distance, he felt Ashton's arms loosening their clasp of his neck. He
+caught him as he sank in a swoon. Without a moment's hesitation, he
+slung his senseless burden up on his shoulder like a sack of meal, and
+hastened on faster than before.
+
+Swiftly as he walked, the ladies reached the camp before him. When he
+came to the top of the dike slope, his wife had dismounted and Isobel
+was handing down the baby to her. As the girl slipped out of the
+saddle she looked up the slope. With a startled cry, she darted to
+meet Blake.
+
+Quick to forestall her alarm, he called in a gasping shout: "Not
+serious--not serious!"
+
+"Oh, Tom--Mr. Blake!" she cried. "What has happened?"
+
+"Scalp wound--faint--blood loss," Blake panted in terse answer.
+
+"He is wounded? O-o-oh!" She ran up and looked fearfully at the
+bloodsoaked bandages across Ashton's hanging head.
+
+Blake staggered on down the slope without pausing. Genevieve had
+started to meet him. But at her husband's panting explanation, she
+laid the baby on the nearest soft spot of earth and darted to the
+kit-chest. She was opening a "first aid" box when Blake crashed
+through the bushes and sank down with his burden under the first
+tree.
+
+Genevieve hastened towards the men, calling to her companion: "Water,
+Chuckie--that pail by the fireplace."
+
+The girl flew to fetch a bucket of water from the pool.
+
+Blake was peering anxiously down into Ashton's white face.
+"Didn't--know--but--that--" he panted.
+
+"No," reassured his wife. "He will soon be all right."
+
+She drew the unconscious man flat on his back and held a bottle of
+ammonia to his nostrils. The powerful stimulant revived him just as
+the girl came running back with the water. He opened his eyes, and the
+first object they rested upon was her anxious pitiful face. He smiled
+and whispered gallantly: "Don't be afraid. I'm all right--now!"
+
+"Then I'll drink first," said Blake.
+
+He took a deep draught from the pail, doused a hatful of water over
+his hot head and face, and stretched out to cool off. Genevieve,
+assisted by the deeply concerned girl, took the handkerchief bandage
+from Ashton's head and washed the wound with an antiseptic solution.
+She then clipped away the hair from the edges and drew the scalp
+together with a number of stitches.
+
+In this last the hardy cowgirl was unable to help. She clasped
+Ashton's hand convulsively and sat shuddering. Ashton smiled up into
+her tender pitying eyes. Genevieve had numbed his wound with cocaine.
+He was quite satisfied with the situation.
+
+Another antiseptic washing and a compress of sterilized cotton bound
+on with surgical bandages completed the operation. Then, when it was
+all over with, the young mother, who had gone through everything with
+the aplomb and deftness of a surgeon, quietly sank back in a faint. On
+the instant Blake was reaching for the ammonia bottle.
+
+A whiff restored his wife to consciousness. She opened her eyes, and
+smiling at her weakness, sought to rise. He held her down with gentle
+force and ordered her to lie quiet.
+
+"I shall fetch Tommy," he added. "We'll all take a _siesta_ until
+noon."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+THE PLOTTERS
+
+
+When Blake came back with the baby, Isobel begged him for a full
+account of how Ashton had been wounded. In relating the affair he
+sought to minimize the danger that he had incurred, and he omitted all
+mention of the bullet shot at him the previous evening. But his
+account was frequently interrupted by exclamations from his wife and
+Isobel.
+
+At the end he dwelt strongly on the cowardly haste of the assassin's
+flight; only to be met by a shrewdly anxious rejoinder from the girl:
+"He ran away after he attacked Lafe the other time. He will come back
+again!"
+
+"Oh, Tom!" cried Genevieve--"if he does!"
+
+"We will get him, that is all there is to it," replied her husband.
+"What do you say to that, Ashton?"
+
+"We will not have the chance," said Ashton. "I don't believe he has
+nerve enough to try it the third time. But if he should--"
+
+"No, no! I hope he keeps running forever!" fervently wished Isobel.
+"Don't you realize how close a miss that was, Lafe?--and the other
+time, too?"
+
+"I like having one Miss close," he punned.
+
+The girl blushed, but failed to show any sign of resentment.
+
+Blake looked significantly at his wife. "Don't know but what I've
+changed my mind about a _siesta_," he remarked. "Here's Tommy gone to
+sleep just when I wanted to fight him. Do you think Miss Chuckie can
+keep him and Ashton from running away if I go to bring in the level?"
+
+"You say you had started to run the line of levels across to the
+mountain?" she asked.
+
+"Yes.... This little pleasantry has knocked us out of a day's work and
+you out of your trip to the canyon."
+
+"But why couldn't I rod for you?" she suggested. "I noticed Lafayette
+the other day. It seems easier than golfing."
+
+"It is."
+
+"Then I shall do it. A good walk is exactly what I need."
+
+"Genevieve!" hastily appealed Isobel. "Surely you'll not go off and
+leave me--us!"
+
+"Thomas is asleep, and Lafayette needs to be quiet," was the demure
+reply. "Come, Tom. We'll run the levels over to the foot of the
+mountain, at least."
+
+With a reproachful glance at the smiling couple, the girl slipped over
+to put Thomas Herbert between herself and Ashton. Blake found another
+bag and can, which last he filled with water from the bucket.
+Genevieve put on the cowboy hat that she had borrowed at the ranch,
+and sprang up to join him.
+
+He paused for a question: "How about leaving the rifle?"
+
+Isobel put her hand to a fold in her skirt and drew out her
+long-barreled automatic pistol. "I can do as well or better with
+this," she answered.
+
+"What a wicked looking thing!" exclaimed Genevieve. "Surely, dear, you
+do not shoot it?"
+
+"Shoot it!" put in Ashton. "Hasn't she told you about saving me from a
+rattler?"
+
+"She did?"
+
+"Yes," he replied, and he told about the rattlesnake in the
+bunkhouse.
+
+"But I ought to have shot quicker," Isobel explained, when he
+finished. "I missed the head, though I aimed at it."
+
+"The way we've left Thomas about on the ground!" exclaimed Genevieve.
+"Are there any of the horrid things around here? Is that why you carry
+the pistol?"
+
+"No, no, don't be afraid. We've killed them out here, long ago,
+because of the cattle. I carry my pistol on the chance of killing
+wolves. They're dreadfully harmful to the calves and colts, you
+know."
+
+"Good for you," praised Blake, as he picked up the rifle. "Well, we're
+off."
+
+He started away, hand in hand with his wife. They were soon at the top
+of the dike slope and almost dancing along over the dry turf. It was
+months since they had been alone together in the open, and they were
+still deeper in love than at the time of their marriage--if that were
+possible.
+
+They soon reached the place where the shooting had occurred. Here they
+picked up the lunch bag, Ashton's canteen and his hat, now punctured
+with another bullet hole; and at once started to carry the line of
+levels out across the valley. A few words of instruction made an
+efficient rodwoman of Genevieve, so that they soon reached the foot of
+the ridge up which her husband had led Ashton the previous day. Here
+he established a bench-mark, and turned along the base of the
+escarpment to the mouth of Dry Fork Gully, where he checked the line
+of levels that had been run up the bed of the creek.
+
+"Good work--less than three tenths difference, and all that I am
+concerned about is an error in feet," he commented. "It's getting
+along towards noon. We'll go up the gulch, and eat our lunch in the
+shade. This place is almost as much of a sight as the canyon."
+
+Genevieve more than agreed with her husband's opinion when he led her
+up into the stupendous gorge and the walls of rock began to tower on
+each side ever steeper and loftier.
+
+"Oh, I do not see how anything can be so grand, so awesome as this!"
+she cried, gazing up the precipices. "It makes me positively giddy to
+look at such heights!"
+
+"Better stop off for a while," advised Blake. "We are almost to where
+the bottom tilts skyward. You can stargaze while we are eating lunch.
+It's rougher along here. We can get on faster this way."
+
+He picked her up in his arms as though she were a feather, and carried
+her on up the gulch to the foot of the Titanic chute. Here, resting on
+a flat rock in the cool semi-twilight of the gorge bottom, they ate
+their lunch and talked with as much zest as if they were still new
+acquaintances.
+
+"Those awful cliffs!" she murmured, lowering her gaze from the
+colossal walls above her. "I cannot bear to look at them any longer.
+They overpower me!"
+
+"Wait till you look down into the canyon," replied her husband. "In
+some ways it is more tremendous than the Grand Canyon of the
+Colorado--the width is so much narrower in proportion to the depth."
+
+"What makes these frightful chasms?--earthquakes?"
+
+"Water," he replied.
+
+"Water? Not all these hundreds and thousands of feet cut down through
+the solid rock!"
+
+"Every foot," he insisted. "Think of water flowing along in the
+same bed and always washing sand and gravel and even bowlders
+downstream--grind, grind, grind, through the centuries and hundreds of
+centuries."
+
+"But there is no water here, Tom."
+
+"Not now, and no chance of any this time of year, else I wouldn't
+have brought you in here. A sudden heavy June rain up above there
+would pour down a torrent that would drown us before we could run
+three hundred yards. Imagine a flood roaring down that bumpy
+shoot-the-chutes."
+
+"I can't! It's too terrifying. Is that the way it will be if you get
+the water and dig the tunnel?"
+
+"No. At this end, the tunnel may terminate any place from down here to
+a thousand feet up, but in any event far below the top. I hope it
+proves to be well up. The greater the drop to the level of the mesa,
+the more turbines could be put in to generate electricity."
+
+"That sounds so inspiring! But, Dear--" Genevieve looked at her
+husband with a shade of anxiety--"even if this project is feasible, do
+you feel you should carry it through?"
+
+"You mean on account of Miss Chuckie and her father," he replied. "I
+have considered their side of the matter, and even at the first I saw
+how--Listen, Sweetheart. No one knows better than you that I'm an
+engineer to the very marrow of my bones. My work in life is to
+construct,--to harness the forces of nature and compel them to serve
+mankind; and to save waste--waste material, waste energy--and put it
+to use."
+
+"Don't I know, Tom!"
+
+"Well, then," he went on, "in the bottom of Deep Canyon is a
+river--waste waters down there beyond the reach of this rich but
+waterless land, down in the gloom, doing no good to anything or
+anybody, frittering away their energy on barren rocks. Why, it's as
+bad as the way Ashton, with all the good qualities we now see he has
+in him--the way he dissipated his strength and his brains and his
+father's money."
+
+"Ah, Dear! wasn't it a splendid thing when he was thrown out of his
+rut of wastefulness?"
+
+"Otherwise known as the primrose path, or the great white way," added
+Blake. "It certainly was a throw out. I'm as pleased as I am
+astonished that he seems to have landed squarely on his feet."
+
+"What a marvelous change it has made in him!" exclaimed Genevieve.
+"Sometimes I hardly can believe it really is Lafayette. He is so
+serious and manly."
+
+"Good thing he has changed," replied Blake. "If Miss Chuckie hadn't
+told us he had made a clean breast of that bridge, I should begin to
+feel worried about--Do you know, Sweetheart, it's the strangest thing
+in the world the way I feel towards that girl. It's not because she is
+so lovely. Of course I enjoy her beauty, but that's not it. If Tommy
+were a girl and grown up--that's how I feel."
+
+"She is a very dear, sweet girl."
+
+"So are several of your friends--our friends," said Blake. "This is
+different. The very first day we met her, there was something about
+her voice and face--seemed as though I already knew her."
+
+"She knew you, through what she had read of you. She warned me, in
+that frank, charming way of hers, that you were a hero to her and I
+must not mind if she worshiped you openly."
+
+Blake laughed pleasedly. "Isn't she the greatest! And the way she
+chums with me! Wonder if that is what makes Ashton so sore at me? The
+idiot! Can't he see the difference?"
+
+"Lovers always are blind," said Genevieve.
+
+"I'm not," he rejoined, his eyes, as he gazed down into hers, as blue
+and tender as Isobel's.
+
+The young wife blushed deliciously and rewarded him with a kiss.
+
+"But about Chuckie?" she returned to the previous question. "You were
+going to tell me--"
+
+"I am going to tell you something you will think is very fanciful--and
+it is! Do you know why I am so taken with that girl? It's because
+she reminds me of my sisters--what they might have grown to be!...
+God!--" he bent over with his face in his shaking hands--"God! If only
+they had gone any other way than--the way they did!"
+
+"My poor dear boy!" soothed his wife, her hand on his downbent head.
+"Let us trust that they are in a happier world, a world where sorrow
+and pain--"
+
+"If only I could believe that!" he groaned.
+
+Genevieve waited a few moments and with quiet tactfulness sought to
+divert him from his grief: "If Chuckie reminds you of them, Dear--"
+
+"She might be either--only Mary, the older one, had dark brown eyes.
+But Belle's were blue like Chuckie's."
+
+"What a pure blue her eyes are--the sweet true girl! Why can't you
+regard her as your sister, and--and give over further thought of this
+irrigation project?"
+
+Blake looked up, completely diverted. "You little schemer! So that's
+what you've been working around to?"
+
+"But why not?" she insisted.
+
+"I'll tell you. It is because I am so fond of Chuckie that I am
+determined to get water on Dry Mesa, if it is possible."
+
+"But--"
+
+"To make use of those waste waters," he explained; "to turn this dusty
+semi-desert into a garden; and to benefit Chuckie by doubling the
+value of her father's property."
+
+"How could that be, when the farmers would divide up his range?"
+
+"He owns five sections, Chuckie told me. What are they worth now? But
+with water on them, even without a single tree planted, they would
+sell as orchard land for more than all his herd; and he would still
+have his cattle. He could sell them to the settlers for more than what
+he now gets shipping them over the range."
+
+"I begin to see, Tom. I might have known it."
+
+"I'm telling you, of course. We're to keep it from them as a happy
+surprise, because it may not come off. There's still the question
+whether the water in the canyon--"
+
+"But if it is! How delightful it will be to help Mr. Knowles and
+Chuckie, besides, as you say, turning this desert into a garden!"
+
+"That valley is a natural reservoir site to hold flood waters,"
+continued the engineer. "All that's needed is a dam built across the
+narrow place above the waterhole, with the dike for foundation. I
+would build it of rock from the tunnel, run down on a gravity tram."
+
+"You've worked it all out?"
+
+"Not all, only the general scheme. If the tunnel comes through high
+enough up here, we shall be able to manufacture cheap electricity to
+sell. Just think of our settlers plowing by electricity, and their
+wives cooking on electric stoves."
+
+"You humorous boy!"
+
+"No, I mean it. There's another thing--I wouldn't whisper it even to
+you if you weren't my partner as well as my wife. I have reason to
+believe the creek bed above the dike is a rich placer. I've planned to
+take Knowles and Ashton in on that discovery--Gowan, too, if Knowles
+asks it."
+
+"A placer?"
+
+"Yes, placer mine--gold washed down in the creek bed. But it's a small
+thing compared with another discovery I've made. Up there--" Blake
+pointed up the steep ledges that he had climbed--"I found a bonanza."
+
+"Bonanza? What is that, pray?"
+
+"A mint, a John D. bank account, a--Guess?"
+
+"A gold mine! Oh, Tom, how romantic!"
+
+"Yes; it's free-milling quartz. We can mill it ourselves, and not have
+to pay tribute to the Smelting Trust. That's romance--or at least
+sounds like it. You will pay for all the development work, in return
+for one-third share. I shall take a third, as the discoverer, and
+Chuckie gets the remaining third as grub-staker."
+
+"As what?"
+
+"She is staking us with grub--food and supplies. If she had not sent
+for me to come and look over the situation, I should not have been
+here to stumble on this mine. So she gets a share."
+
+"I'm glad, glad, Tom! Isn't it nice to be able to do fine things for
+others? I'm so glad for Chuckie's sake, because, if Lafayette keeps on
+as he is doing now, he may win his father's forgiveness."
+
+"What has that to do with Chuckie?"
+
+"You and I know what she is, Dear; yet if she had no money, his father
+might insist on regarding her as a mere farm girl. He is as--as
+snobbish as I was when we were flung ashore by the storm, there in
+Mozambique."
+
+"I fail to see that it matters any to Chuckie what Ashton senior
+thinks."
+
+"Of course you don't see. You're as blind as when I--" the lady
+blushed--"as when I had to fling myself at you to make you see. The
+dear girl is as deeply in love with Lafayette as he is with her."
+
+"No? She doesn't show it. How can you tell?"
+
+"You know that Mr. Gowan is desperately in love with her."
+
+"That stands to reason. He couldn't help but be. Can't say I like
+the fellow. He may be all right, though. Must have some good
+qualities--Chuckie seems to be very fond of him."
+
+"As fond as if he were a brother. No; Lafayette is to be the happy
+man--unless he backslides. We must help him."
+
+Blake nodded. "That's another thing that hangs on this project. If it
+proves to be feasible, I can give Ashton a chance to make good as an
+engineer. I used to think he must have bought his C.E. Now I see he
+has the makings."
+
+"He can be brilliant when he chooses. If only he were not so--so
+scatter-brained."
+
+"What he needed was a jolt heavy enough to shake him together. It
+seems as though his father gave it to him."
+
+"That shock, and being picked up by Chuckie," agreed Genevieve.
+
+"We'll help her keep him braced until the cement sets," said her
+husband. "It's even worse to let brains go to waste than water."
+
+"Far worse! What is the good of all your engineering--of all the
+machinery, yes, and all the culture of civilization, if not to uplift
+men and women? May the next generation work for the uplifting of all
+mankind, both materially and spiritually!"
+
+"We might make a try at it ourselves," said Blake. "As for the future,
+I know it will not be your fault if our member of the next generation
+fails to do his share of uplift work."
+
+The young mother placed her hand on her bosom, and sprang up. "We
+should be going back, Dear. Thomas will be wakening."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+INDIAN SHOES
+
+
+They returned along the shadowy bottom of the great gorge to the
+glaring sunshine of the open creek bed, where they had left the rod
+and level. Blake placed both upon one of his broad shoulders, and gave
+his wife the unencumbered arm to assist her somewhat hurried pace.
+
+As they approached the dike her hasty steps quickened to a run. She
+darted ahead down to the camp. Thomas Herbert Vincent was vociferating
+for his dinner. Blake followed at a walk. He was only a father.
+
+When he came down to the trees he found Isobel and Ashton alone. The
+girl's manner was constrained and her color higher than usual. Ashton,
+comfortably outstretched on a blanket with her saddle for pillow,
+frowned petulantly at the intruder. But Isobel sprang up and came to
+meet Blake, unable to conceal her relief.
+
+"I was so glad to see Genevieve," she said. "You came back just in
+time."
+
+"How's that?" asked Blake, his eyes twinkling.
+
+She blushed, but quickly recovered from her confusion to dimple and
+cast a teasing glance at Ashton. "Baby woke up," she answered. "You
+may not know it, but babies cry when they fail to get what they
+want."
+
+"He's getting what he wants--I'm not!" complained Ashton.
+
+"I--I must see if Genevieve needs anything," murmured the girl, and
+she fled to the tent.
+
+"I need you!" Ashton called after her without avail.
+
+"How're you feeling?" inquired Blake.
+
+Ashton's frown deepened to a scowl.
+
+"Didn't mean how you feel towards me," added Blake. "I can guess that.
+My reference was to your head."
+
+"I'm all right," snapped Ashton. "Needn't worry. I'm still weak and
+dizzy, but I shall be quite able to do my work tomorrow."
+
+"That's fine," said the engineer, with insistent good humor. "However,
+if you feel at all shaky in the morning, I can perhaps get Gowan, or
+maybe Miss Chuckie would like to--"
+
+"No!" broke in Ashton. "She shall not! I will do it, I tell you."
+
+"Very well," said Blake. He put down the level and rod, but retained
+the rifle. "Tell the ladies I shall be back before long. I am going
+to look for something I forgot this morning."
+
+Without waiting for the other's reply, he returned up the dike slope
+and around the bend of the hill to where Ashton had been shot. That
+for which he was looking was not here, for he at once turned and
+started up the hill. He climbed direct to the place where the assassin
+had lain in wait.
+
+The bare ledge told Blake nothing, but from a crevice nearby he picked
+out two long thirty-eight caliber rifle shells. He put them into his
+pocket and went over to scan the mesa from the top of his lookout
+crag. He could see no sign of the fugitive murderer. Down below the
+mesa side of the hill, however, he saw a man riding up the bank of Dry
+Fork, and recognized him as Knowles.
+
+Trained to alert observation by years of life on the range, the cowman
+had already perceived Blake. He wheeled aside and rode towards the
+hill when the engineer waved his hat and began to descend. The two met
+at the foot of the rugged slope.
+
+"Howdy, Mr. Blake," greeted the cowman, "I thought I'd just ride up to
+see how things are coming along."
+
+"Not so fast as they might, Mr. Knowles. We have stopped for
+repairs."
+
+"Haven't broken your level?"
+
+"No. Ashton is laid up for the day with a scalp wound. We were shot
+at this morning from up there--other side of the crest."
+
+"Shot at, and Lafe hit?"
+
+"Not seriously, though it could not well have been a closer shave. He
+says he will be all right by tomorrow," said Blake, and he gave the
+bald details of the occurrence in a few words.
+
+Knowles listened without comment, his leathery face stolid, but his
+eyes glinting. When Blake had finished, he remarked shortly: "Must be
+the same man. Let's see those shells."
+
+Blake handed over the two empty cartridge shells.
+
+"Thirty-eight," confirmed Knowles. "Same as were fired at Lafe before.
+Kid and Chuckie showed me how a thirty-eight fitted the hole in Lafe's
+silver flask. About where did the snake crawl down the hill?"
+
+"Not far from here. He could not have gone any considerable distance
+along the top or side. He was down and riding away when I reached the
+crags, and I had not lost much time coming up the other side."
+
+"It'll take an Indian to make out his tracks on this dry ground,"
+remarked the cowman. "We'll try a look, though, at his hawss's hoof
+prints. Just keep behind, if you don't mind."
+
+He threw the reins over the head of his horse, and dismounted, to walk
+slowly along the more level ground at the foot of the slope. Blake
+followed, as he had requested, but scrutinizing the ground with a
+gaze no less keenly observant than that of his companion.
+
+"Mighty queer," said Knowles, after they had carried their examination
+over a hundred yards. "Either he came down more slanting or else--"
+
+"What do you make of this?" Blake interrupted, bending over a blurred
+round print in the dust between two grass tufts.
+
+"_Sho!_" exclaimed the cowman as he peered at the mark. "That's why,
+of course."
+
+"Indian shoes," said Blake.
+
+"You've seen a thing or two. You're no tenderfoot," remarked Knowles.
+
+"I have myself shrunk rawhide shoes on horses' hoofs when short of
+iron shoes," Blake explained. "This would make a hard trail to run
+down without hounds."
+
+The cowman straightened and looked at his companion, his weather-beaten
+face set in quiet resolve.
+
+"I know what's better than hounds," he said. "This is one badman who
+has played his game once too often. I'm going to run him down if it
+takes all year and all the men in the county. There's a couple of Ute
+bucks being held in the jail at Stockchute, to be tried for hunting
+deer. I'm going to get the loan of them. The sheriff will turn out
+with a posse, and we'll trail that snake, if it takes us clear over
+into Utah."
+
+"We'll have a fair chance to get him with Ute trackers," agreed
+Blake.
+
+Knowles shook his head. "Unless you're particular to come along, Mr.
+Blake, I'd like you and Lafe to keep on with this survey. I've been
+worrying over the chance of losing my range, till it's got on my
+nerves."
+
+"Certainly, Mr. Knowles. I shall go ahead in the morning, if Ashton is
+able to rod. It will be best, I suppose, for my wife and Miss Chuckie
+to remain close at the ranch until you make sure where this trail
+leads."
+
+"No; he's a snake, but the Indian shoes prove he's Western--He won't
+strike at the ladies. Another thing, I'm going to give you Kid for
+guard."
+
+"He may prefer to join the posse."
+
+"Of course he'll prefer that. You can count on Kid Gowan when it comes
+to a man hunt. He'll stay, though, all right. I don't want Mrs. Blake
+to think she has to stop indoors. With Kid on the lookout around your
+camp, the ladies can feel free to come and go any time between sunup
+and sundown, and you and Lafe can do what you want. There won't be any
+more shooting, unless it's by Kid."
+
+"Very well," said Blake. "I'm not anxious to play hide and seek with a
+man who shoots and runs. When can we expect the rope and spikes?"
+
+"That's another thing," replied Knowles. "Kid can be packing them and
+your camp outfit up to the canyon while you and Lafe are running your
+line of levels. He ought to be home by now. He was gone when the men
+turned out this morning. Soon as I get back I'll send him up to camp
+with you. He can bring along Rocket, to be ready for a chase,
+providing we can find the brute. Queer about that hawss. Wanted to
+ride him this morning. Found he'd got out and gone off the way he used
+to before Lafe gentled him."
+
+While talking, the two men had returned to the cowman's horse and
+started around the hill to the camp. They found Isobel and Genevieve
+and the baby all engaged in entertaining Ashton. Knowles briefly
+congratulated the wounded man, and led his pony down to the pool for a
+drink. Blake had seated himself beside his wife. She handed the baby
+to him, and remarking that she also wished to drink, she followed
+Knowles.
+
+The cowman smiled at her reassuringly. "You're not afraid of any more
+shooting, ma'am, are you?" he asked. "I've told your husband that Kid
+is to come up to keep guard. He will stay right along, unless that
+scoundrel is trailed down sooner."
+
+"Then I shall have no fear, Mr. Knowles."
+
+"You needn't, and you and Chuckie can come and go just the same as
+ever. I don't want your visit spoiled. It's a great treat to all of us
+to have you with us."
+
+"And to my husband and myself to be your guests! I have quite fallen
+in love with your daughter, Mr. Knowles. If you'll permit me to say
+it, you are very fortunate to have so lovely and lovable a girl."
+
+"Don't I know it, ma'am!"
+
+"So beautiful--and her character as beautiful as her face. How you
+must prize her!"
+
+"Prize her!" repeated Knowles, his usual stolid face aglow with pride
+and tenderness. "Why, ma'am, I couldn't hold her more in liking if she
+was my own flesh and blood!"
+
+Genevieve suddenly bent down to hide the intense emotion that had
+struck the color from her face. Yet after a moment's pause, she spoke
+in a composed, almost casual tone: "Then Chuckie is not your own
+daughter?"
+
+"Not in the way you mean. Hasn't she told you? I adopted her."
+
+"I see," remarked Genevieve, with a show of polite interest. "But of
+course, taking her when a young infant, she has always thought of you
+as her own father."
+
+"No--what I can't get over is that she feels that way, and I feel the
+same to her, though I never saw or heard of her till she was going on
+fourteen."
+
+"Ah!" Genevieve could no longer suppress her agitation. "Then she
+is--I'm sure that she must be--You said she came from the East, from
+Chicago?"
+
+"No, ma'am! I didn't say where she came from," curtly replied the
+cowman.
+
+The shock of his brusqueness restored the lady to her usual quiet
+composure. Looking up into his face, she found it as blank and
+impenetrable as a cement wall.
+
+"You must pardon me," she murmured. "I myself am a Chicago girl, so
+you must see how natural it is for me to hope that so sweet and
+beautiful a girl as Chuckie came from my city."
+
+"Chuckie is my daughter," stated Knowles in a flat tone.
+
+"If you will kindly permit me to explain. My husband--"
+
+"Chuckie is my daughter, legally adopted," repeated the cowman. "You
+can see what she is like. If that is not enough, ma'am, I can't
+prevent you from declining our hospitality, though we'd be mighty
+sorry to have you and your husband leave."
+
+The tears started into Genevieve's hazel eyes. "Mr. Knowles! how could
+you think for a moment that I--that we--"
+
+"Excuse me, ma'am!" he hastened to apologize. "I didn't mean to hurt
+your feelings. You see, I'm kind of prejudiced along some lines. I've
+been bred up to the Western idea that it isn't just etiquette to ask
+about people's antecedents. Real Western, I mean. Our city folks are
+nearly as bad as you Easterners over family trees. As if a child isn't
+as much descended from its mother's maternal grandmother as from its
+father's paternal grandfather!"
+
+Genevieve smiled at this adroit diversion of the subject by the
+seemingly simple Westerner, and replied: "My father's and mother's
+parents were farm people. My husband worked his way up out of the
+Chicago slums."
+
+"He did?" The cowman could not conceal his astonishment. He looked
+curiously into the lady's high-bred face. "Well, now, that sure is
+something to be right proud of--not that I'd have exactly expected you
+to think so. If you'll excuse me, ma'am, I'm more surprised at the way
+you feel about it than that he was able to do such a big thing."
+
+"No one is responsible for what he is born. But we are at least partly
+entitled to the credit or discredit of what we become," she observed.
+
+"That's good American doctrine, ma'am--Western American!" approved
+Knowles.
+
+"It should apply to women as well as men," she stated.
+
+"It ought," he dryly replied, and he jerked up the head of his pawing
+horse. "Here, you! I guess it's high time we were starting in, ma'am.
+Kid may think he's to lay over at the ranch until morning. We want to
+get him out here before dusk. I don't reckon there's any show of that
+snake coming back tonight, but it's as well to be on the safe side."
+
+He walked up the slope towards the others, unbuckling his cartridge
+belt as he went.
+
+"Sling on your saddle, honey," he called to his daughter.
+
+The girl sprang up from beside Ashton and ran to fetch her own and
+Genevieve's picketed ponies. Her father held out his belt and revolver
+to the engineer.
+
+"Here's my Colt's, Mr. Blake," he said. "I have another at home. You
+won't need it, but I may as well leave it. We're going to lope in now,
+so as to hustle Kid out to you before night. Just swap me that
+yearling for my gun. It wouldn't seem natural not to be toting
+something that can make a noise."
+
+"Thomas never cries unless he needs attention," Genevieve sought to
+defend her infant.
+
+"Yes, ma'am. It's a good thing he knows that much already. You have to
+make yourself heard to get what you want in the world generally, as
+well as in hostleries and eating-houses."
+
+Blake buckled on the cartridge belt, with its holstered revolver, and
+went to help saddle the ponies. Ashton watched him and Isobel
+narrowly. He was far from pleased with the familiarity of their talk
+and manner towards one another. Twice the girl put her hand on Blake's
+arm.
+
+In marked contrast to this affectionate intimacy, Isobel was distrait
+and hurried when she came to take leave of the wounded man. He had
+risen to his feet, and she could not ignore his proffered hand. But
+she avoided his gaze and quickly withdrew her fingers from his warm
+clasp to hurry off.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+MADONNA DOLOROSA
+
+
+Blake was cooking supper when, shortly before sunset, Gowan drove up
+to the waterhole, with a pony in lead behind the heavy wagon. Leaving
+the wagon with the rope and other articles of his load on the far side
+of the creek bed, he watered and picketed the horses, and came across
+to the tent with his rifle and a roll of blankets.
+
+"Howdy, Mr. Blake. Got here in time for supper, I see," he remarked as
+he unburdened himself. "Met Mr. Knowles and the ladies down near the
+ranch. They told me about the shooting." He faced about to stare at
+Ashton's bandaged head. "They told me you came mighty near getting
+yours. You shore are a lucky tenderfoot."
+
+Ashton shrugged superciliously. "The worst of it is the additional
+hole in my hat. I see you have a new one. Is that the latest style on
+the range?"
+
+"Stetson, brand A-1.," replied the puncher. "How does it strike you,
+Mr. Blake?--and my new shirt? Having a dude puncher on our range kind
+of stirred up my emulosity. They don't have real cowboy attire like
+his at an ordinary shorthorn cow town like Stockchute--but I did the
+best I could."
+
+Blake made no response to this heavy badinage. He set the supper on
+the chuck-box, and laconically said: "Come and get it."
+
+"Might have known you've been on round-up," remarked Gowan, with an
+insistent sociability oddly at variance with his usual taciturn
+reserve. "According to Miss Chuckie, you're some rider, and according
+to Mr. Knowles, you can shoot. I wouldn't mind hearing from you direct
+about that shooting this morning."
+
+Blake recounted the affair still more briefly than he had told it to
+Knowles.
+
+"That shore was a mighty close shave," commented the puncher. "But you
+haven't said what the fellow looked like."
+
+"He wore ordinary range clothes," replied Blake. "I couldn't see him
+behind the rocks, and caught only a glimpse of him as he went around
+the ridge. His horse was much the same build and color as Rocket."
+
+The puncher stared at Ashton with his cold unblinking eyes. "You shore
+picked out a Jim Dandy guide, Mr. Tenderfoot. According to this, it
+looks mighty like he's gone and turned hawss thief. Mr. Knowles says
+your Rocket hawss has vamoosed. If he's moving to Utah under your
+ex-guide, it'll take some lively posse to head him. What d'you say,
+Mr. Blake?"
+
+"I think the man is apt soon to come to the end of his rope--after
+dropping through a trap door," said the engineer.
+
+Gowan looked at him between narrowed eyelids, and paused with upraised
+coffee cup to reply: "A man that has shown the nerve this one has
+won't let anyone get close enough to rope him."
+
+"It will be either that or a bullet, before long," predicted Blake.
+"The badman is getting to be rather out of date."
+
+"Maybe a bullet," admitted Gowan. "Never any rope, though, for his
+kind.--Guess I'll turn in. It's something of a drive over to
+Stockchute and back with the wagon, and I got up early. You and Ashton
+might go on watch until midnight, and turn me out for the rest of the
+night."
+
+"Very well," agreed Blake.
+
+The puncher stretched out on his blankets under a tree, a few yards
+from the tent. Ashton took the dishes down to sand-scour them at the
+pool, while Blake saw that everything damageable was disposed safe
+from the knife-like fangs of the coyotes.
+
+"How about keeping watch?" asked Ashton, when he returned with the
+cleansed dishes. "Shall I take first or second?"
+
+"Neither," answered Blake. "You will need all the sleep and rest you
+can get. Tomorrow may be a hard day. Turn in at once."
+
+"If you insist," acquiesced Ashton. "I still am rather weak and
+dizzy." He went to the tent and disappeared.
+
+Blake took the lantern and strolled across to the wagon, to look at
+the numerous articles brought by Gowan. He set the lantern over in the
+wagon bed on top of what seemed to be a heap of empty oat sacks, while
+he overhauled the load. It included three coils of rope of a hundred
+feet each, a keg of railroad spikes, two dozen picket-pins, two heavy
+hammers, a pick and shovel, and a crowbar.
+
+The last three articles had not been ordered by Blake. The puncher had
+brought them along, apparently with a hazy idea that the descent of
+the canyon would be something on the order of mining. There were also
+in the wagon two five-gallon kerosene cans to use in carrying water up
+the mountain, a sack of oats, Gowan's saddle, and two packsaddles.
+
+In shifting one of the packsaddles to get at the hammers, Blake
+knocked it against the sack on which the lantern had been set. The
+lantern suddenly fell over on its side. Blake reached in to pick it
+up, and perceived that the sack was rising in a mound. He caught up
+one of the hammers, and held it poised for a stroke. From the sack
+came a muffled rattle. The hammer descended in a smashing blow.
+
+The sack rose and fell as if something under it was squirming about
+convulsively. But to Blake's surprise it did not fall aside and
+disclose that which was making the violent movement. The squirming
+lessened. He grasped an outer corner of the sack and jerked it upward.
+It failed to flip into the air. The lower part sagged heavily. The
+squirmer was inside and--the mouth of the sack was tied fast.
+
+Blake looked at it thoughtfully. After some moments, he placed the
+sack where it had lain at first, and upset the keg of spikes on top of
+it. He then carefully examined Gowan's saddle; but it told him
+nothing. He shook his head doubtfully, and returned to camp.
+
+Going quietly around to Gowan, he set down the lantern close before
+the puncher's face and stopped to light a cigar. Gowan stirred
+restlessly and rolled half over, but did not open his eyes. Blake
+smoked his cigar, extinguished the lantern, and quietly stretched out
+on the edge of the sleeper's blankets. In a few moments he, too, was
+asleep.
+
+About two o'clock Gowan stirred and rolled over, pulling at his
+blankets. Instantly Blake was wide awake. The puncher mumbled, drew
+the blankets closer about him, and lay quiet. Blake went into the tent
+and dozed on his own blankets until roused by the chill of dawn. He
+went down for a plunge in the pool, and was dressed and back at the
+fireplace, cooking breakfast, when Gowan started up out of his heavy
+slumber.
+
+"Yes, it's getting along about that time," Blake called to him
+cheerfully. "You might turn out Ashton. He has made as good a night of
+it as you have."
+
+Gowan had been staring at the dawn, his lean jaw slack. As Blake
+spoke, he snapped his mouth shut and came over to confront the
+engineer. "You agreed to call me at midnight," he said.
+
+"My apology!" politely replied Blake. "I know how you must feel about
+it. But I hope you will excuse me. I saw that you, like Ashton, needed
+a full night's sleep, and so did not disturb you."
+
+The puncher looked away and muttered: "I'm responsible for you to Mr.
+Knowles. He sent me here to guard you."
+
+"That is true. Of course you will say it's owing to no fault of mine
+that we have come through the night safely. Well, we have a big day's
+work before us. May I ask you to call Ashton? Breakfast is ready."
+
+At this the puncher sullenly went to rouse the sleeper. Ashton came
+out rubbing his eyes; but after a dip in the pool, he declared himself
+restored by his long sleep and ready for a day's work. During the
+night his bandage had come loose. He would have tossed it away, but
+Blake insisted upon re-dressing the wound. He did so with as much
+skill and almost as much gentleness as had his wife.
+
+When Blake and Ashton left the camp, the puncher was leading the
+horses across to load their first packs. The two levelmen walked
+briskly up the valley, carrying only enough food and water to last
+themselves until evening, when Gowan was to have the camp moved to the
+top of High Mesa.
+
+Beginning from his bench-mark at the foot of the mountain, Blake
+carried the level line slantingly up the ridge side. The work was slow
+and tedious, since the telescope of the level could never be on a
+horizontal line either higher or lower respectively than the top and
+bottom of the thirteen-foot rod. This necessitated setting-up the
+instrument every few feet during the steepest part of the ascent.
+
+They saw nothing of Gowan, who had chosen a more roundabout but easier
+trail. At midmorning, however, they were overtaken by Genevieve and
+Isobel and Thomas Herbert Vincent Leslie Blake. Knowles had started
+for Stockchute to seek the aid of the sheriff and his Indian
+prisoners. The ladies divided the ascent into several stages, riding
+ahead of the surveyors and resting in the shade of a rock or pine
+until the men had passed them.
+
+Near noon, when the levels had been carried up close to the top of
+High Mesa, Gowan rode down to the party to inquire where the new camp
+was to be pitched.
+
+"I've brought up a lot this trip," he stated. "I can fetch the rest by
+sundown, if I don't have to meander all over the mesa with these first
+packs."
+
+"Where did you leave the packhorses?" asked Blake.
+
+"Up along the canyon where Ashton shot his yearling deer," answered the
+puncher. "It's about half way between that gulch where you say you're
+going down and the bend across from the head of Dry Fork Gulch."
+
+"We'll camp there," decided Blake. "It is on the shortest trail to
+that gulch, and you'll not have time to get your second load farther
+before dark."
+
+The puncher started back. But Isobel, who had come riding up with
+Genevieve, called out to stop him: "Wait, Kid. It is almost noon. You
+must take lunch with us."
+
+"Can't leave those hawsses standing with the packs, Miss Chuckie, if
+they're to make another trip today," he replied.
+
+"Suppose you unload them and come back along the edge of the canyon?"
+suggested Blake. "We shall knock off soon and all go over to give my
+wife her first look at the canyon. We can eat lunch there together."
+
+To this Gowan nodded a willing assent, and he jogged away, with a half
+smile on his thin lips. But that which pleased him had precisely the
+opposite effect on Ashton. He did not fancy sharing the companionship
+and attention of Miss Knowles with the puncher. As this interference
+with his happiness was due to Blake, he showed a petulant resentment
+towards the engineer that won him the girl's sympathetic concern. She
+attributed his fretfulness to his wound. Blake made the same mistake.
+
+"You've done quite enough for the morning, Ashton, with that head of
+yours," he said. "We're over the worst now, and can easily run on up
+to the camp this afternoon. We shall knock off for a siesta."
+
+"Needn't try to make out I'm a baby!" snapped Ashton.
+
+"Leave your rod here," went on Blake, disregarding the other's
+irascibility. "I'll take the level. It may enable us to see the bottom
+of the canyon."
+
+He started on up the slope beside his wife's pony. Ashton was somewhat
+mollified when he saw Isobel linger for him to walk beside her horse.
+She was carrying the baby, who, regardless of scenic attractions, had
+fallen asleep during the long climb from the lower mesa. The sight of
+the child clasped to her bosom awakened all that was highest in his
+nature. Concern over his wound had sobered her usual gay vivacity to a
+look of motherly tenderness.
+
+"Do you know," he murmured during a pause in their conversation, "you
+make me think of pictures of the Madonna!"
+
+"Lafe!" she protested, blushing and as quickly paling. "You should not
+say such a thing. It is lovely--a beautiful thing to tell me; but--but
+I do not deserve it!"
+
+"Madonna!--my Madonna!" he murmured in ardent adoration.
+
+"Oh, please! when I've asked you not to!" she implored. "It is not
+right! I--I am not!--" Tears glistened in her soft eyes. She bent over
+to suppress a sob that might have awakened the sleeping infant.
+
+Ashton gazed up at her, wonder and contrition mingling with his
+deepening adoration. "Forgive me, Miss Chuckie! But I meant it--I feel
+it! I never before felt this way towards any girl!... I know I have no
+right to say anything now. I am a pennyless adventurer, a disgraced,
+disinherited son, a mere cowpuncher apprentice; but if, by next
+spring, I shall have--"
+
+"Oh, see. They're getting such a long way ahead of us!" exclaimed the
+girl, urging her pony to a faster gait.
+
+The animal started forward with a suddenness that left Ashton behind.
+He made no effort to regain his position beside the girl's stirrup.
+Instead, he lagged farther and farther in the rear, his face crimson
+with mortification and anger. As his chagrin deepened, his flush
+became almost feverish and there was a suggestion of wildness in his
+flashing eyes. It was as though his passion was intensifying some
+injury to his brain caused by the concussion of the bullet on his
+skull.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+A REAL WOLF
+
+
+When the loiterer came over the second ridge into view of the booming
+chasm in the top of the plateau, he saw the others down near the
+brink. The baby had been laid on a soft bed of pine needles, and Blake
+was leading the ladies down to look over into the abyss, one on each
+arm.
+
+Ashton's chagrin flared into jealous hate. He felt certain that the
+girl was quite capable of strolling along the extreme edge of the
+precipice without a trace of giddiness. Yet now she was clinging to
+Blake even more closely than was Genevieve. There was more than
+apprehension in the clasp of her little brown hand on the engineer's
+shoulder. Her cheek brushed his sleeve.
+
+The anger of the onlooker was so intense that he did not see Gowan
+riding towards him from the left. The puncher dismounted and came
+forward, his cold gaze fixed on Ashton's face.
+
+"So you're beginning to savvy it, too," he remarked.
+
+Ashton confronted him, vainly attempting to mask his telltale look
+and color with a show of hauteur. "I never discuss personal matters
+with acquaintances of your stamp," he said.
+
+"That's too bad," coolly deplored Gowan. "Maybe you've heard the
+saying about cutting off your nose to spite your face."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"If you want to go it alone, I can't stop you," replied the puncher.
+"Needn't think I'm sucking around you for any favors or friendship. If
+this was my range, I would run you off it so fast you'd reach
+Stockchute with your tongue hanging out like a dog's. That's how much
+I like you."
+
+"The feeling is fully reciprocated, I assure you," rejoined Ashton.
+
+"All right. Now what're we going to do about him?--each play a lone
+hand, or make it pardners for this deal?"
+
+"I--fail to understand," hesitated Ashton.
+
+"No, you don't," jeeringly contradicted the puncher. "It's a
+three-cornered fight. You see it now, even if you have been too big a
+fool to see it before. We can settle ours after. But I'm free to own
+up to it that you're a striped skunk if you won't work with me first
+to get rid of him. Look at him now--and him married!"
+
+Ashton's flush deepened to purple. "Married!--yes, married!" he choked
+out.
+
+"Right alongside his wife, too!" Gowan thrust the goad deeper. "You'd
+think even that brand of skunk would have more decency. Not that his
+wife is any friend of mine, like she is yours. But for a man with such
+a wife and baby ... with Miss Chuckie! The--"
+
+Gowan ended with a string of oaths so virulent that even Ashton's
+half-mad anger was checked.
+
+"You may be--er--I fear that we--Perhaps it's not so bad as it
+appears!" he stammered.
+
+"_Bah!_" disgustedly sneered the puncher, and he strode on ahead,
+leaving Ashton torn between rage and doubt and terror of his own
+furious jealousy.
+
+The others continued to stand on a flat ledge that here formed the lip
+of the canyon. Genevieve was trembling with awed delight. Her husband
+and the girl appeared more calm, but they were drinking in the
+grandeur of the tremendous gorge below them with no less intense
+appreciation of its gloomy vastness.
+
+Upstream, to their left, the precipices jutted so far out from each
+wall of the canyon that they overlapped, a thousand or fifteen hundred
+feet from the top. But downstream the upper part of the chasm flared
+to a width that permitted the noonday sun to penetrate part way down
+through the blue-black shadows.
+
+"O-o-o-oh!" sighed Genevieve, for the tenth time, and she clung
+tighter than ever to the strong arm of her husband. "Isn't it
+fearfully, fearfully delightful? It makes the soles of my feet tingle
+to look at it!"
+
+"That tickly feeling!" exclaimed Isobel. "I often ride up here to the
+canyon, I do so love to feel that way! Only with me it's like ants
+crawling up and down my back."
+
+"O-o-o-oh!" again sighed Genevieve. "It--it so overpowers one!"
+
+"It's sure some canyon," admitted her husband. "That French artist Dore
+ought to have seen it."
+
+"If only we had a copy of Dante's Inferno to read here on the brink!"
+she whispered.
+
+"It always reminds me of Coleridge's poem," murmured Isobel, and she
+quoted in an awed whisper:
+
+                 Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
+                 Through caverns measureless to man,
+                 Down to the sunless sea.
+
+"Fortunately for us, this is a canyon, not a string of measureless
+caverns," said Blake. "It can be measured, one way or another. If I
+had a transit, I could calculate the depth at any point where the
+water shows--triangulate with a vertical angle. But it would cause a
+long delay to send on for a transit. We shall first try to chain down
+at that gulch break."
+
+Genevieve shrank back from the verge of the precipice and drew the
+others after her.
+
+"Dear!" she exclaimed, "I did not dream it was so fearful. One has to
+see to realize! You will not go down--promise me you will not go
+down!"
+
+"Now, now, little woman," reproached Blake. "What's become of my
+partner?"
+
+"But baby--? If you should leave him fatherless!"
+
+"Better that than for him to have a father who is a quitter! Just
+wait, Sweetheart. That break looks much less overwhelming than these
+sheer cliffs. You know I shall not attempt anything foolhardy. If it
+is not possible to get down without too great risk, I shall give it up
+and send for a transit."
+
+"Oh, will you?" exclaimed Isobel, hardly less apprehensive than his
+wife. "Why not wait anyway until you can send for your transit?"
+
+"Because I cannot triangulate the bottom within half a mile upstream
+from where the tunnel would have to be located. That roar and the
+wildness of the water wherever we can see it is proof that it is
+flowing down a heavy grade. At the point where I triangulated it might
+be above the level of Dry Mesa, and way below the mesa here at the
+tunnel site."
+
+"You could triangulate at the first place where the bottom can be
+seen, beyond here," suggested Genevieve.
+
+"Suppose it proved to be lower than Dry Mesa, wouldn't that still
+leave us up in the air?" he asked. "Like this--"
+
+He pulled out his notebook and drew a rough sketch.
+
+[Transcriber's Note: an illustration showing "Elevation of bench-mark
+at foot of chute in Dry Fork Gulch" appears in the text here.]
+
+"I see, Dear," said his wife. "When do you plan to go down?"
+
+"Tomorrow morning."
+
+"Can you wait until we come up from the ranch?"
+
+"Yes. Mr. Knowles will no doubt be back by then. He can bring you out
+early."
+
+"We shall come early, anyway," said Isobel.
+
+"Of course!" added Genevieve. She drew a deep breath. "I shall see the
+place before you attempt to descend."
+
+Her husband nodded reassuringly and looked around to where Gowan and
+Ashton stood waiting, several yards from one another.
+
+"About lunch time, isn't it?" he remarked. "Mr. Gowan will wish to be
+starting soon to bring up his second load."
+
+At the suggestion, the ladies hastened to spread out their own lunch
+and the one brought by Blake. When called by Isobel, Gowan came
+forward to join the party, with rather less than his usual reserve in
+his speech and manner.
+
+Ashton was the last to seat himself on the springy cushion of brown
+pine needles, and he sat throughout the meal in moody silence. Blake
+and the ladies attributed this to the fatigue of working through the
+long hot morning while suffering from his unhealed wound. He repulsed
+the sympathetic attentions of the Blakes. But he could not long
+continue to resist the kindly concern of the girl. After lunch she
+made him lie down in the shade while she bathed his wound with a good
+part of the small supply of water remaining in the canteens.
+
+Gowan had been asking questions about the work. Blake explained at
+some length why he considered it necessary not only to descend into
+the canyon but to carry the line of levels down along the bed of the
+subterranean stream to this point opposite Dry Fork Gulch. When Isobel
+drew apart with Ashton the puncher did not look at them, though his
+eyes narrowed to slits and his mouth straightened.
+
+"You shore have nerve to tackle it, Mr. Blake," he commented.
+"Everything alive that I know of that's ever gone down into Deep Canyon
+hasn't ever come up again, except it had wings."
+
+"We'll prove that the rule has an exception," replied Blake, smiling
+away the reawakened apprehension of his wife.
+
+Gowan shook his head doubtfully, and strolled down the slope to peer
+into the canyon. The level was directly in his path, set up firmly on
+its tripod, about six feet from the brink. The puncher stopped beside
+it to squint through the telescope.
+
+"You'll have one--peach of a time seeing anything through this
+contraption down there," he remarked. "I can't see even right here in
+the sun."
+
+"The telescope is out of focus," explained Blake. "Turn that screw on
+the side." Gowan twisted a protruding thumbscrew. "Not that--the one
+above it," directed Blake.
+
+"Can't stop to fool now," replied the puncher. "I've got to hustle
+along."
+
+He started hastily around between the level and the precipice. The toe
+of his boot struck hard against the iron toe of the outer tripod-leg.
+He stumbled and sprawled forward on his hands and knees. Behind him
+the instrument toppled over towards the brink.
+
+Genevieve cried out in alarm at Gowan's fall. Her husband sprang to
+the rescue--not of the puncher, but of the level. It had crashed down
+with its head to the chasm, and was sliding out over the brink. Blake
+barely caught it by the tip of one of the legs as it swung up for the
+plunge. He drew it back and set it up to see what damage had been done
+to the head. Gowan watched him, tight-lipped.
+
+"This is luck!" exclaimed the engineer, after a swift examination.
+"Nothing broken--only knocked out of adjustment. I can fix that in
+half an hour. She struck with the telescope turned sideways. You must
+have set the clamp screw."
+
+The puncher's face darkened. "Wish the--infernal machine had gone
+plumb down to hell!" he growled. "It came near tripping me over the
+edge."
+
+"My apology," said Blake. "I spraddled the tripod purposely to keep it
+from being upset."
+
+"Oh, Kid, you've hurt yourself," called Isobel, as the puncher began
+to wrap a kerchief about his hand. "Come here and let me bandage it."
+
+"No," he replied. "Two babies are enough for you to coddle at one
+time. I've got to hit out."
+
+He turned his back on Blake and hurried up to his horse. The engineer
+followed as far as the nearest tree, where he set up the instrument in
+the shade and began to adjust it.
+
+"Good thing she has platinum crosshairs," he said to Ashton. "A fall
+like that would have been certain to break the old-style spiderweb
+hairs."
+
+Ashton did not reply. He was absorbed in a murmured conversation with
+Isobel. Blake completed the adjustments of the level and stretched out
+beside his wife to play with his gurgling son. A half hour of this
+completed the two hours that he had set apart for the noon rest. He
+placed the baby back in his wife's lap and stood up to stretch his
+powerful frame.
+
+"How about it, Ashton?" he inquired. "Think you feel fit to rod this
+afternoon? Don't hesitate to say no, if that's the right answer. I
+expect my wife and Miss Chuckie, between them, can help me carry the
+line as far as the camp."
+
+"I can do it alone," interposed the girl. "Let them both stay here and
+rest all afternoon."
+
+"No, Miss Chuckie. I can and shall do my work," insisted Ashton,
+springing up with unexpected briskness for one who had appeared so
+fatigued. "It is you and Mrs. Blake who must stay here to rest--unless
+you wish to keep us company."
+
+"Might we not go to the new camp and put it in order?" suggested
+Genevieve.
+
+"What if that outlaw should come sneaking back?" objected Ashton. "It
+seems to me you should keep with us."
+
+"He would not trouble us," replied Isobel.
+
+"Yet if he should? Anyway, Blake and I saw a wolf up here the other
+day."
+
+"A real wolf! Where?"
+
+"Yes," answered Blake. "Over in the ravine the other side of the head
+of Dry Fork Gulch."
+
+"He may attack you," argued Ashton.
+
+The girl laughed. "You're still a tenderfoot to think a wolf wouldn't
+know better than that. Wish he didn't! It would mean the saving of a
+half dozen calves this winter." She flashed out her long-barreled
+automatic pistol and knocked a cone from the tree above Blake's head
+with a swiftly aimed shot.
+
+Blake caught the cone as it fell and looked at the bullet hole through
+its center. "Unless that was an accident, I should call it some
+shooting," he remarked.
+
+"Accident!" she called back. "Stand sideways and see what happens to
+your cigar."
+
+"No, thanks. I'll take your word for it. Just lit this one, and I've
+only a few left. By by, Tommy! Don't let the wolves eat mamma and the
+poor little cowlady!"
+
+He picked up the level and started off at a swinging stride. Ashton
+followed several paces behind. His face was sullen and heavy, but in
+their merriment over Blake's banter, the ladies failed to observe his
+expression.
+
+They rested for a while longer. Then, after venturing down for another
+awed look into the abyss, they rode along, parallel with the
+stupendous rift, to the place selected for the new camp. As Gowan had
+brought up the tent in one of the first packs, the ladies pitched it
+on the level top of the ridge.
+
+"This is real camping!" delightedly exclaimed Genevieve, as they set
+to gathering leafy twigs for bedding and dry branches for fuel. "How I
+wish we could stay all night!"
+
+"We can, if you wish," replied Isobel.
+
+"Can we, really?"
+
+"Our men often sleep out in the open, this time of year. We shall take
+the tent for ourselves. Won't it be fun! But will Thomas be all
+right?"
+
+"I can manage with what I have until tomorrow afternoon."
+
+"How long do you think they will be down in the canyon?" the girl
+inquired.
+
+Genevieve shuddered. "I wish I could tell! If only Tom finds that he
+cannot get down at all, how thankful I shall be!"
+
+"And--Lafe!" murmured the girl.
+
+"It is possible that they may be unable to do it in one day," went on
+Genevieve apprehensively--"Down, down into those dreadful depths, and
+then along the river, all the way to where the tunnel is to be, and
+back again, and then up the awful cliffs! Surely they cannot finish in
+one day! Of course they will succeed--Tom can do anything, _anything_!
+Yet how I dread the very thought--!"
+
+"We must prepare to stay right here on High Mesa until they do
+finish!" declared Isobel. "It will be impossible to go back to the
+ranch tomorrow if they are still in that frightful place! Kid will
+have to take the hawsses down to the waterhole. He shall go on home,
+and tomorrow morning fetch us cream and eggs and everything you need.
+They will have to be told at the ranch; and if Daddy has returned, he
+will come up to help and be with us."
+
+"You dear girl! The more I think of this terrible descent, the more I
+dread it. I feel a presentiment that--But I must try to be brave and
+not interfere with Tom's work! It will be a great comfort to have your
+father with us."
+
+"Daddy will surely come if he has returned. Isn't he kind and good? He
+couldn't have done more to make me happy if he had been my own real
+father!"
+
+Genevieve smiled into the girl's glowing face. "Yes, dear. Yet I am
+far from surprised, since _you_ are the daughter he wished to make
+happy. I was more surprised to have him tell me you were adopted. You
+have never said a word about it."
+
+"I--you see, I did not happen to," confusedly murmured the girl.
+
+"Chuckie Knowles is not your real name," Genevieve gently reproached
+her.
+
+"No, it is the pet name Daddy gave me. My real one is--Isobel."
+
+"Isobel--?"
+
+"Yes. Daddy's sister, in Denver, always calls me that. But here on the
+ranch--"
+
+"Isobel--?" repeated Genevieve, with a rising inflection.
+
+The color ebbed from the girl's face, but she answered steadily:
+"Chuckie--Isobel--Knowles. I am Daddy's daughter. I have no other
+father."
+
+"Is-o-bel--Is-o-bel," Genevieve intoned the name musically. "It has a
+beautiful sound. I had a friend at school--Isabella--but we always
+called her Belle."
+
+The girl suddenly faced away from her companion, and darted to meet
+Blake and Ashton, who were bringing the line of levels up over the
+ridge.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+THE TEMPTATION
+
+
+When the ladies explained their plans for remaining in camp on High
+Mesa, Blake gave a ready assent.
+
+"All right, Jenny. It'll be something like old times. Can't scare you
+up any lions or fever, leopards or cyclones; but you may see that
+wolf."
+
+"I should welcome all savage Africa if it would rid us of this awful
+canyon!" replied his wife.
+
+"Won't you please give it up?" begged Isobel. "I am to blame for your
+coming here. If anything should happen to you, I--I could never
+forgive myself--never!"
+
+Blake looked at the two lovely, anxious faces before him, and smiled
+gravely. "There you go again, and you have yet to see that gulch. But
+even if you find that it looks dangerous, you wouldn't want me to let
+a little risk interfere with my work, would you? Think of the fools
+who climb the highest and steepest mountains just for sport. I am
+going down there because it is necessary."
+
+"But is it?" the girl half sobbed.
+
+"Someone must do it, sooner or later," he replied, and he took his
+wife's hand in his big palm. "Come, little woman, speak up. Do you
+want your husband to be a shirker and quitter?"
+
+"Of course not, Tom. Yet one should be reasonable."
+
+"I have had enough experience in climbing to know not to attempt the
+impossible, Sweetheart," he assured her. "The worst looking places are
+not always the most dangerous. I promise you to take only reasonable
+risks."
+
+"Have we time enough to look at the place this afternoon?" she
+inquired.
+
+Blake glanced at the sun, and nodded. "The riding is good. We can get
+back long before dark. Ashton, you had better stretch out and rest."
+
+"No, I shall go with you," replied Ashton, his lips set in as firm
+lines as Blake's.
+
+"You cannot go, Lafe, unless you agree to ride my pony," said Isobel.
+
+"I'm not going to have Gowan call me a baby again," he objected.
+
+"You will need all your strength tomorrow," predicted Blake.
+
+"You must ride," insisted Isobel.
+
+"Very well--to please you," he agreed. "We shall take turns."
+
+Blake again looked at the sun. "As long as we are going, we may as
+well carry forward the line of levels. We can take long turns nearly
+all the way, so there will be little delay."
+
+"And I shall rod for you!" delightedly exclaimed Isobel.
+
+"Only part of the time," qualified Ashton with a sharpness that the
+others attributed to his zeal to serve her.
+
+He filled his canteen from one of the cans of water brought up by
+Gowan, and rinsed out the mouths and nostrils of the thirsty ponies.
+This done, he and Genevieve mounted, and the party started off on a
+route parallel with the canyon, which here trended back away from the
+edge of the plateau.
+
+They soon came to where the surface of the mesa was slashed with
+gulleys and ravines, all running down into the canyon. Blake swung away
+from the canyon, in order to head the worst of these ravines or to
+cross them where they were less precipitous. Presently, however, he
+struck in again towards the great rift along the flank of a high
+barren ridge. At last he led over the ridge and down to the side of a
+very large ravine where it pitched into the canyon at an angle little
+less steep than the descent of Dry Fork Gulch.
+
+The line of levels, as Blake had foretold, had been an easy one to
+run. It was stopped on the corner of a shelf of rock that jutted out
+above the gorge. Having provided a soft nest for the baby, the four
+went out on the shelf and peered down the dizzy slope into the black
+shadows of the depths.
+
+The two ladies drew back shuddering. Blake looked about at them and
+seeing their troubled faces, sought to quiet their dread.
+
+"You have not looked close enough," he said. "With spikes and ropes,
+the worst of this will be comparatively easy. There are ledges and
+crevices all the way down. You cannot see the lower half. When I was
+here with Gowan and Mr. Knowles, the sun was shining to the bottom.
+The lower half of the descent is much less steep than this you see."
+
+Genevieve smiled trustfully. "Oh, if you say it is safe, Tom!"
+
+"We shall take down the rope and all the spikes we can carry," he
+explained in further reassurance. "At the worst places a spike and a
+piece of the rope will not only let us down safely, but can be left
+for our ascent."
+
+"Then it will be all right!" sighed Isobel.
+
+"For him--yes!" broke in Ashton, his voice harsh and strained. He was
+cringing back, white-faced, from the edge of the gulch.
+
+"Why, Lafe!" exclaimed the girl. "If Tom--Mr. Blake goes down, surely
+you can't mean that you--"
+
+"He's used to climbing--I'm not!" Ashton sought to excuse himself.
+
+"Oh, very well," she said. "Of course it is not right to ask you to do
+it if you suffer from vertigo. I shall ask Kid to take your place. If
+he refuses, Daddy will do it."
+
+"That may mean delay," remarked Blake. "If that scoundrel really is
+headed for Utah, your father may not be back for several days. Yet he
+asked me to settle this matter as soon as possible."
+
+"Then, if Kid will not go down with you, I shall," declared the girl,
+her blue eyes flashing.
+
+"No, no indeed, dear!" protested Genevieve. "It is simply impossible!
+You shall not do it!"
+
+"I shall, unless Kid--"
+
+"You shall not ask him!" interposed Ashton, his pale face suddenly
+flushing a hot red. "I am going down!"
+
+"You will, Lafayette?" cried Genevieve. "That is very brave and--and
+kind of you!"
+
+"But if you have no experience in climbing?" objected Isobel in a tone
+that transmuted the young man's angry flush into a glow of delight.
+
+"Don't inexperienced climbers go up the Alps with guides?" he
+nonchalantly replied. "I can trust Blake to get me safe to the bottom.
+He will need me in his business."
+
+"Good for you, Lafe!" commended Blake.
+
+It was the first time that he had ever addressed Ashton so familiarly.
+He accompanied it with the proffer of his hand. But Ashton did not
+look at him. He was basking in the frankly admiring gaze of Miss
+Knowles.
+
+The party returned in the same manner that they had come out, for
+Isobel firmly refused to permit Ashton to walk. Blake allowed her to
+set the pace, and she chose such a rapid one that they reached camp a
+full half hour before sunset.
+
+A few minutes later, as they were sitting down to a hastily prepared
+supper, Gowan appeared with the second load from the lower camp. Blake
+and Ashton sprang up to loosen the packs of the sweating, panting
+horses. The puncher swung down from his saddle, not to assist them,
+but to remonstrate with Isobel.
+
+"Been expecting to meet you, all the way up, Miss Chuckie," he said.
+"Ain't you staying too late? You won't get home before long after
+dark."
+
+"Mrs. Blake and I are not going down tonight, Kid," replied the girl,
+and she explained the change of plans.
+
+Gowan listened attentively, though without commenting either by look
+or word. When she had quite finished, he asked a single question:
+"Think your Daddy won't mind, Miss Chuckie?"
+
+"He will understand that we simply can't leave here until Lafe
+and--Mr. Blake are safe up out of the canyon."
+
+"All right. You're the boss," he acquiesced. "Just write out a list
+of what you want. I'll take all the hawsses down to the waterhole, and
+go on to the ranch. You can look for me back at sunup. The moon rises
+between three and four."
+
+"Genevieve, will you make out the list? Sit down and eat, Kid."
+
+"Well, just a snack, Miss Chuckie. Wouldn't stop for that if the
+hawsses didn't know the trail well enough to go down in the dark."
+
+"Have you seen any sign of the murderer?" inquired Ashton.
+
+Gowan drained the cup of scalding hot coffee handed to him by Isobel,
+and answered jeeringly: "Don't worry, Tenderfoot. He won't try to get
+you tonight. If he came back today, he saw me around. If he comes back
+tonight, he won't think of climbing High Mesa to look for you."
+
+Blake came to the puncher with a list written by himself and his wife
+on a leaf from his fieldbook. Gowan folded it in his hatband, washed
+down the last mouthful of bread and ham that he had been bolting, and
+went to shift his saddle to Isobel's pony, the youngest and freshest
+of the horses. In two minutes he was riding away down the ridge,
+willingly followed by the four other horses. They knew as well as he
+that they were returning to the waterhole.
+
+As the campers again sat down to their supper Isobel paused with the
+coffeepot upraised. "Genevieve," she inquired, "did you put cream on
+the list?"
+
+"Why, no, my dear. It did not occur to me."
+
+"Nor may it to Yuki. He will be sure to send eggs and butter, but
+unless he thinks to save tonight's cream--I'll run and tell Kid."
+
+Ashton sprang up ahead of her. "I'll catch him," he said, and sprinted
+down the ridge.
+
+Racing around a thicket of scrub oak, he caught sight of Gowan more
+than an eighth of a mile ahead. He whistled repeatedly. At last Gowan
+twisted about in the saddle, and drew rein. He did not turn back, but
+made Ashton come all the way to him.
+
+"Well, what's wanted?" he demanded.
+
+"Cream," panted Ashton. "Miss Chuckie says--tell Yuki."
+
+"Shore pop, I'll bring all there is," replied Gowan. Ashton started
+back. "Hold on," said the puncher. "I want to say something to you,
+and here's the chance."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"About him. I want you to keep a mighty close watch tonight."
+
+"But you said that the murderer would not--"
+
+"_Bah!_ What does he count in this deal? It's this engineer. I've been
+chewing it over all afternoon. Miss Chuckie is as innocent and
+trusting as a lamb, spite of her winterings in Denver, and she's
+plumb locoed over him, reading so much about him in the reports."
+
+"Still, it does not necessarily follow--"
+
+"Don't it, though!" broke in the puncher. "Guess you didn't find it
+any funnier than I did seeing her hanging onto his shoulder."
+
+"Curse him!" cried Ashton, his jealousy flaring at the remembrance.
+
+"Now you're talking!" approved Gowan. "That shows you like her like I
+do. You're not going to stand for her losing her fortune."
+
+"Her fortune?"
+
+"By his flooding us off our range."
+
+"Ah--as for that, I have been thinking it over. She told me Mr.
+Knowles owns five sections. If water is put on them--Western Colorado
+fruit lands are very valuable, you know."
+
+"That's a lie. Water can't make five sections worth a range
+like ours. But supposing it could--" the puncher leaned towards
+Ashton, his eyes glaring with the cold malignancy of a striking
+rattlesnake's--"supposing it could, how about us letting her
+lose her good name?"
+
+"Good God!" gasped Ashton. "It can't come to that!"
+
+"Can't it? can't it? Where's your eyes? And him a married man! The--"
+Gowan cursed horribly.
+
+"You really believe it!" cried Ashton, convinced by the other's
+outburst.
+
+"Believe it? I know it!" declared Gowan. "If you thought half as much
+of her as I do--"
+
+"I do!--not half, but a hundred times more!"
+
+"Yes, you do?"
+
+"I swear it! I'd do anything for her!"
+
+"Except save her from him."
+
+"No, no! How can I? Tell me how!"
+
+The puncher bent nearer to the half-frenzied man. "You're going down
+that gulch with him. Suppose a spike gets knocked out or a rope breaks
+or a loose rock gets pushed over?"
+
+"God!" cried Ashton, putting his hands over his eyes. "That would be
+murder!"
+
+"_Bah!_ You'd make a dog sick! Willing to do anything for her--except
+save her from him! And nothing to it but just an accident that's just
+as like as not to happen anyway."
+
+"But--murder!" shudderingly muttered Ashton.
+
+"Murder a skunk," sneered Gowan. "If saving her from him isn't a case
+of justifiable homicide, what is? Don't you get the idea? Just a
+likely accident, down there where nobody can see."
+
+Ashton dropped his hands, half clenched, to his sides. Beads of cold
+sweat were gathering and running down his drawn face.
+
+"I can't!" he whispered. "I--I can't!"
+
+"Not if I agree to get out of the way and give you clear running?"
+tempted Gowan.
+
+"You would?"
+
+"Yes. You see how much I like her. You rid her of him, and I'll let
+you have her for doing it."
+
+Ashton shuddered.
+
+"Think it over--and watch him mighty close tonight," advised the
+tempter.
+
+A red flush leaped into Ashton's face. Gowan struck his spurs into his
+horse's flank and loped away.
+
+Ashton stood motionless. The puncher disappeared down the mountain
+side. The twilight faded and darkness closed down about the tortured
+man. He stood there motionless, his convulsed face alternately
+flushing and paling, his eyes now clouding, now burning with rage and
+hate.
+
+When at last he returned to the camp he kept beyond the circle of
+firelight. Hurriedly he rolled up in his blankets for the night,
+muttering something about his head and his need of rest for the next
+day's work. The others accepted the explanation without question. They
+formed a cheerful domestic group about the fire from which he was shut
+out by his passion.
+
+The ladies withdrew into the tent at an early hour. Blake strolled
+around the camp until after nine o'clock, but finally came with his
+blankets and companionably rolled up near Ashton. He was soon fast
+asleep. But Ashton lay tossing until after midnight. Weariness at
+last weighed down the lids of his hot eyes and numbed his tortured
+brain. He sank into a feverish sleep haunted with evil dreams.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+BLIND LOVE
+
+
+At sunrise the harassed dreamer awoke to find Gowan gazing down at him
+somberly.
+
+"You--you here?" he exclaimed, starting up on his elbow. "What is--" He
+checked himself and muttered brokenly, "I've been dreaming--horrible
+nightmares."
+
+"He's down there overhauling his outfit," said Gowan. "Hope you've
+thought the matter over."
+
+"My answer must be the same. I cannot do it, I cannot!" replied
+Ashton. He spoke hurriedly, as if afraid to linger on the thought.
+
+"You can't--not to save her and have me give her to you?" asked
+Gowan.
+
+Ashton clenched his hands and bent over in an agony of doubt and
+indecision.
+
+"You devil!" he groaned.
+
+"What! Because I'm willing to give her up, in order to see her
+saved?"
+
+"Why don't you shoot him, if you're so anxious?" queried Ashton.
+
+"And hang for it," retorted the puncher. "You can do it with an
+accident, and no risk. Anyway, that'll make things easier for his
+wife--to have him meet a natural death. Won't be anything said about
+why he was taken off. She hasn't begun to suspect what's going on
+between him and--"
+
+Gowan paused, looked at the tent, and concluded: "I've done my part. I
+won't say any more. But just you remember what I've told you. You
+won't run any risk. Mr. Knowles hasn't come back yet. There'll be only
+them and me along, and we won't be able to see you do it. Just
+remember what it will mean to her--just remember that--when you get
+him where a shove or a loosened spike--Savvy?"
+
+He went to loosen the diamond hitch of the packs that he had brought
+with him from the ranch. Ashton sank back and lay brooding until the
+girl came from the tent and called to inquire how he felt. Too
+wretched to care about his appearance, he rose and went over to her.
+
+"Oh!" she exclaimed at sight of his haggard face. "You are ill!"
+
+"Only an attack of indigestion and loss of sleep--something I often
+have," he lied. "A cup of coffee will set me up. Don't worry. I'm
+strong--head doesn't bother me at all this morning, except a numb
+feeling inside."
+
+"I shall dress the wound at once, while the coffee is boiling," she
+replied.
+
+He would have objected. She silenced him with a look that acted on his
+chafed spirit like oil upon a burn. Her kind, almost tender voice and
+the soft touch of her fingers on his head soothed his anguish and
+seemed to counteract the poison instilled by Gowan. He began to doubt
+the puncher and the witness of his own eyes.
+
+When Blake and his wife came to breakfast, Ashton was so cheerful that
+they hardly noticed the traces of haggardness that yet lingered in his
+face. Blake at once centered the attention of all by explaining his
+plans for the exploration of the canyon. In addition to the surveyor's
+chain, a hammer, and the rope and spikes,--which were to be used only
+in making the descent,--he and Ashton were to carry the level and rod
+and a quantity of food. At the suggestion of Isobel, he agreed to take
+her father's revolver and fire it at intervals, on the chance that the
+watchers above might see the flash of the shots and so be able to
+follow the progress of the explorers down in the depths.
+
+Genevieve quickly thought out signals to be given in response. If at
+night, a torch was to be cast down into the chasm; if in the daytime,
+a white flag, made of a sheet sent by Yuki, was to be waved out over
+the brink. As the explorers might become confused in the gloom of the
+canyon bottom, the point of the bend opposite Dry Fork Gulch was to be
+marked by a beacon fire built on the verge of the canyon wall.
+
+Blake had already arranged everything that he and Ashton were to take
+down with them. Immediately after breakfast the outfit was fastened on
+the packhorses, together with food, water and blankets for those who
+were to remain on the heights. The ladies were determined to keep
+above the explorers at all points where the rim of the canyon could be
+approached. Gowan was to fetch and carry for them and take the horses
+down to the pool for water at night.
+
+Within half an hour after breakfast the party was jogging away from
+camp, fully equipped for the great undertaking. Gowan was afoot. His
+horse, as well as the regular pack animals, was heavily loaded with
+stores. He walked with Isobel, who had insisted that Ashton should
+ride her pony. Blake strode along at his wife's stirrup, carrying his
+son in a clasp as tender as it was strong.
+
+The engineer was the only cheerful member of the party. Even Thomas
+Herbert, that best tempered of babies, was peevish and fretful. He was
+instinctively reflexing the suppressed nervousness and anxiety of his
+mother. Gowan and Ashton were as gloomy in look and speech as the
+shadowy depths of the canyon. Isobel bravely sought to respond to
+Blake's confidence in the favorable outcome of the survey; but her
+smile, like Genevieve's, was forced and her eyes were troubled.
+
+They reached the point of attack as the rays of the morning sun were
+beginning to strike down into the side gorge. This was as Blake had
+planned. He at once began to direct the preparations for the descent,
+himself doing the lion's share of the work.
+
+A long detour to a point higher up the ravine offered an easy descent
+of its bottom to the place where it pitched steeply into the canyon.
+Blake preferred to take a short cut down the almost vertical side of
+the gulch. The three pieces of rope, each a hundred feet long, were
+knotted together and used to lower a grass-padded package containing
+all the equipment of the explorers except the level. The bundle was
+lodged on a broad shelf of rock, over two hundred and fifty feet
+down.
+
+"Our first measurement," remarked Blake, as he subtracted from three
+hundred feet the length of the line left above the edge of the cliff.
+He jotted down the remainder in his notebook, and nodded to Ashton,
+who, with Gowan and Isobel, was holding the end of the rope. "You see
+why I had Mr. Gowan bring gloves and chaps and your leggins. We will
+make the line fast around that rock, and follow our outfit."
+
+Ashton stared, slack jawed. "Really, you cannot mean--?"
+
+"Yes. Why not?" asked Blake. "There's nothing to a slide like this
+except the look of it."
+
+"Oh, Tom!" breathlessly cried Genevieve. "Are you sure--quite sure!"
+
+"Sure I'm sure, little woman," he replied. "There's not the slightest
+danger. This is a new manila rope, and the package, with all those
+spikes in it, weighs as much as I do. That gives us a sure test."
+
+"I might have known!" she sighed her relief.
+
+"Still it does look a bit stiff for a start-off," he admitted. "If
+Lafe prefers, he can go around and come down the ravine bed. I shall
+slide the line and be getting the outfit in shape for shooting the
+chutes."
+
+"How about the rope?" asked Isobel.
+
+"You are to drop it to me as soon as I get down and stand from under,"
+directed Blake. He examined with minute care the loop and knot with
+which Gowan and Isobel had made the rope fast around the point of
+rock. Having satisfied himself that the knot was perfectly secure, he
+turned to his wife and opened his arms. "Now, Sweetheart! Wish us good
+luck and a quick journey!"
+
+Gowan and Ashton drew back and looked away as Genevieve flung herself
+on her husband's broad chest, unable to restrain her tears.
+
+"Now, now, little woman," he soothed, patting her shoulder. "There's
+nothing to be afraid of, and you know it."
+
+"If--if only we could see you down there!" she sobbed.
+
+"You will, part of the time, with your glasses. And you'll be sure to
+see the flash of some of my shots. That's all that I'm worrying
+about--you'll be skirting along the canyon rim. Promise me you'll not
+go near the edge except where the footing is perfectly safe."
+
+"Yes, Dear. I shall have Thomas to remind me to be careful. But you?"
+
+"I shall have the thought of you both to keep me from being rash.
+Remember that."
+
+"You will not be rash, I know," she answered, smiling up at him
+bravely. "You will go and come back to us soon. Now kiss me and
+Thomas. I shall not detain you from your work."
+
+"Spoken like my partner," he quietly praised her.
+
+Both by tone and manner he was plainly seeking to ease the parting to
+the calmness of an ordinary farewell. His wife responded to this,
+outwardly at least. Not so Isobel. From the moment he had turned to
+Genevieve, the girl had betrayed a rapidly increasing agitation.
+
+He went to kiss his baby, who had fallen asleep during the last half
+mile of the trip and lay sprawled in the shade of a bowlder. As he
+came back, Genevieve lingered beside the child, as if half fearful of
+watching her husband begin his dizzy descent of the rope.
+
+Isobel was standing close to the verge, her bosom heaving with
+quick-drawn breaths, her excited face flushing and paling in rapid
+alternation. Blake had pulled on his left glove, but had kept his
+right hand bare for her. As he held it out he looked up from the taut
+rope at his feet and saw her excessively agitated face.
+
+[Illustration: "You have something to tell me--your voice--your eyes--"]
+
+"Why, Miss Chuckie!" he remonstrated, "you're not going to break down
+now. You see how Jenny takes it. There's nothing to fear."
+
+"Oh, but, Tom!" she panted, "you--you don't understand! you don't
+know! It's not merely the danger! It's the dreadful thought that if
+you--if you should not--come back--and I hadn't told you!"
+
+"Told me?" he echoed in hushed wonderment as her anguished soul looked
+out at him through her wide eyes and he sensed the first vague
+foreshadowing of the truth. "You have something to tell me--your
+voice!--your eyes!--"
+
+"You see it! You know me!" she gasped, and she flung herself into his
+arms. Straining herself to him in half frantic ecstasy, she murmured
+in a broken whisper: "Yes! I am--am Belle! It is wicked and selfish to
+tell you; but to have you go down there without first--I could not
+bear it! Yet I--I shall not drag you down--disgrace you. Never that!
+I'll go away!... Oh, Tom! dear Tom!"
+
+He had stood dumfounded by the revelation of her identity. At first he
+could not speak; hardly could he think. His eyes stared into hers with
+a dazed look. But before she could finish her impassioned declaration
+of self-abnegation he roused from his bewilderment, and his great
+arms closed about her quivering body. He crushed her to him and
+pressed his lips upon her white forehead.
+
+"Belle!--poor little Belle!... But why? Tell me why? All this time,
+and you never showed by a single word or look!"
+
+"I did!" she sought to defend herself from the tender reproach. "I
+did, but I--I was afraid to tell."
+
+"Afraid?"
+
+The girl's face flamed scarlet with shame. She sought to draw away
+from him. "Let me go, Tom! oh, please, let me go! I am a selfish,
+wicked girl! I have done it! I have done it! Now there is no help for
+it! She must be told--all!"
+
+"All?" he questioned.
+
+"Yes, all, Tom! I cannot deny Mary! She saved me! I believe she is in
+Heaven. She could not help doing what she did. She could not help it,
+Tom--and she saved me! I must give you up--go away; but I can never,
+never deny my sister!"
+
+Blake swung half around with the quivering girl, and looked over her
+downbent head at his wife. Genevieve stood almost within arm's-length
+of them. He met her gaze, and immediately pushed the girl out towards
+her.
+
+"Listen, Belle," he said. "It is all right. Here is Jenny waiting for
+you. She understands."
+
+Gowan, watching rigid and tense-lipped, with his hand clenched on the
+hilt of his half-drawn Colt's, was astonished to see Mrs. Blake step
+forward and clasp Isobel in her arms. But Ashton did not see the
+strange act that checked the puncher's vengeful shot. While the girl
+was yet clinging to Blake, he had turned and fled along the edge of
+the ravine, for the moment stark mad with rage and despair.
+
+He rushed off without a cry, and the others were themselves far too
+surcharged with emotion to heed his going until he had disappeared
+around a turn in the ravine. When at last, almost spent with exertion,
+he staggered up a ridge to glare back at those from whom he had fled,
+his bloodshot eyes could perceive only three figures on the brink of
+the gorge. They were kneeling to look over into the ravine.
+
+His thoughts were still in a wild whirl, but the heat of his mad rage
+had passed and left him in a cold fury. He instantly comprehended that
+Blake had swung over the edge and was descending the rope down the
+almost sheer face of the ravine wall.
+
+Now was the time! A touch of a knife-edge to the rope, and the girl
+would be saved. Would Gowan think of it?... Of course he would
+think of it. But he would not do it. He would leave the deed to be
+done by the man to whom he had relinquished Miss Chuckie. It was
+for that man to save her--to destroy the tempter and break the
+spell of fascination that was drawing her over the brink of a pit
+far deeper than any earthly canyon. He, Lafayette Ashton--not
+Gowan--was the man. He must save her--down there in the depths, where
+no eye could see.
+
+[Transcriber's Note: Map of High Mesa and Dry Mesa with place of
+descent and other landmarks shown appears here.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+THE DESCENT INTO HELL
+
+
+Dangling like a spider on its thread, with a twist of the rope
+around one of his legs, Blake had gone down into the ravine, hand
+under hand, with the agility of a sailor. The tough leather of his
+chapareras prevented the rope from chafing the leg around which it
+slipped, and he managed with his free foot to fend himself off from
+the sharp-cornered ledges of the cliff side. In this he was less
+concerned for himself than for his level, which he carried in a sling,
+high up between his shoulders.
+
+He was soon safe at the lower end of the rope, on the shelf beside the
+bundled outfit. He waved his hat to the down-peering watchers, and
+climbed a few yards up the ravine, to creep in under an overhanging
+rock. A few moments later the loosened rope came sliding down the
+steep descent, the last length whipping from ledge to ledge with a
+velocity that made it hiss through the air.
+
+Blake was not disturbed by this proof of the cumulative speed of
+falling bodies. He came down and coolly set about his preparations for
+the descent of the gorge bottom. He unlashed the bundle and divided
+its contents. This done, he took a vertical measurement by going out
+towards the canyon along a horizontal shelf on the side wall of the
+gorge, until he could drop his surveying chain down the sheer
+precipice to a shelf almost a hundred feet below him.
+
+Unaware of Ashton's mistake and furious flight, the engineer was
+proceeding with his work in the expectation that he would soon be
+joined by his assistant. He was not disappointed. As he returned along
+the shelf, after entering the measurement in his notebook, Ashton came
+bounding and scrambling down the ravine bottom at reckless speed. He
+fetched up on the verge of the break, purple-faced and panting. His
+mouth twitched nervously and there was a wild look in his dark eyes.
+But Blake attributed all to the excitement and exertion of the
+headlong rush down the ravine.
+
+"No need for you to have hurried so, Lafe," he said. "I suppose you
+had to go farther around than I thought would be necessary. But I'd
+rather you had kept me waiting an hour than for you to have chanced
+spraining an ankle."
+
+"Yes, you need me in your business!" scoffed Ashton.
+
+"Your employer's business," rejoined the engineer. He straightened up
+from the packs that he was lashing together and gazed gravely at his
+scowling assistant. "See here, Mr. Ashton, this is no time for you to
+raise a row. We shall have quite enough else to think about from now
+on, until we are up again out of the canyon."
+
+"I've enough to think about--and more!" muttered Ashton.
+
+"Understand? I'm not asking anything of you for myself," said Blake.
+"You are doing this survey for your employer."
+
+"I'm here because of _her_!" retorted the younger man. "I'm here to
+make it certain that no harm is to come to _her_!"
+
+Blake smiled. "Good for you! I hardly thought you were here for the
+fun of it. You are going to prove to us that you have the makings.
+We're both working for her, Lafe. I don't mind telling you now that I
+am planning to do something big for her." He looked up the ravine
+wall, his eyes aglow with tenderness. "Belle! dear little Belle! To
+think that after all these years--"
+
+"Shut up!" cried Ashton. "Stop that! stop it, and get to work! I know
+what you're planning to do! Don't talk to me!"
+
+Blake stared in astonishment. "Didn't think you were so sore over that
+old affair. I told you I had nothing to do about your father's--"
+
+"Don't talk to me! don't talk to me!" frantically cried Ashton. "You
+ruined me! Now her!"
+
+"Lord! If you're as sore as all that!" rejoined Blake, his eyes
+hardening. "Look here, Mr. Ashton, we'll settle this when we get up
+on top again. Meantime, I shall do my work, and I shall see to it that
+you do yours. Understand?"
+
+"Get busy, then! I shall do _my_ work!" snarled Ashton.
+
+Blake pointed to one of the three bundles that he had tied together.
+"There's half the grub, the tripod and the rod. I can manage the rest.
+I've dropped a measurement to the foot of the first incline."
+
+He swung one of the other bundles on his back, under the level. The
+third, which was made up of railroad spikes and picket-pins, he sent
+rolling down the steep slope, tied to one end of the rope. He had
+driven a spike into a crevice of the rock. Hooking the other end of
+the rope over its head with an open loop, he grasped the line and
+started to walk down the gorge bottom. As he descended he dragged the
+loose lengths of rope after him.
+
+Ashton stood rigid, staring at the spike and loop. If the loop should
+slip or the spike pull out, he need only climb back out of the
+ravine--to her. But Blake's work was not the kind to slip or pull out.
+The watcher looked at the powerful figure backing rapidly down that
+roof-like pitch. One of the toes of the level tripod under the taut
+loop would easily pry the rope off the spike-head. He turned his pack
+around to get at the tripod--and paused to look upwards at the three
+tiny faces peering down over the brink of the cliff.
+
+He slung the pack over his shoulder and grasped the rope to follow his
+leader, who had come to the narrow shelf from which another
+measurement must be taken. He made the descent no less rapidly and
+easily than had the engineer. He was naturally agile, and now he was
+too full of his purpose to have any thought of vertigo. Yet quickly as
+he followed, when he reached the shelf he found that Blake had already
+lowered the bundle of spikes over the cliff below and was reenforcing
+with a spike a picket-pin that he had driven deep into a crevice.
+
+"Drop over the chain at that point," curtly ordered the engineer.
+"Think you can climb back up this slope without the rope?"
+
+"Yes," answered Ashton, still more curtly.
+
+Blake lifted the line and sent up it a wave that carried to the upper
+end and flipped the loop from the spike-head. He jerked the freed end
+down to him and knotted it securely to the picket-pin, while Ashton
+was making the third vertical measurement. He then lowered everything
+except the level in loops of the line, and wrapped a strip of canvas
+around the line where it bent over the sharp edge of the cliff.
+
+Ashton laconically reported the measurement. Blake noted it in his
+book, and promptly swung himself out over the edge of the cliff.
+Again his assistant looked at the fastening of the rope; again he
+looked upwards at the three tiny down-peering faces; and again he
+followed his leader. The sun was glaring directly down into the gorge.
+Later they would descend into the shadows where no eye could perceive
+from above the loosening of the rope.
+
+Blake cut off the line at the foot of the cliff and left it dangling.
+They would require it for their ascent. Another Titan step took fifty
+feet more of the rope.
+
+There followed a series of steep pitches, which they descended like
+the first, unlooping the rope from spike-head after spike-head. The
+only real difficulty of this part of the descent was the tedious task
+of carrying the vertical measurement down the slopes at places where
+even Blake could not find footing to climb out horizontally on either
+wall of the gorge to obtain a clear drop.
+
+Always, as they descended, the engineer scanned the rocks both above
+and below, calculating where the gorge bottom could be reascended
+without a line. Whenever he considered the incline too smooth or too
+steep for safe footing, he drove in spikes near enough together to be
+successively lassoed from below with a length of line.
+
+Had not the nature and condition of the rock provided frequent faults
+and crevices that permitted the driving of spikes, the descent must
+soon have become impracticable. But the engineer invariably found
+some chink in which to hammer a spike with his powerful blows. As,
+time after time, he overcame difficulties so great that his companion
+could perceive no possible solution, Ashton began to feel himself
+struggling against a feeling of reluctant admiration.
+
+All his hate could not blind him to the extraordinary mental and
+physical efficiency displayed by the engineer. Never once did the
+steely muscles permit a slip or false step, never once did the cool
+brain miscalculate the next most advantageous movement.
+
+They were now so deep that Blake had to shout his infrequent
+directions, to be heard above the booming reverberations of the canyon.
+Half way down they came to a forty-foot cliff. Blake made his
+preparations, and swung over the edge. Here was an opportunity. Ashton
+instantly bent over the knot of the rope.
+
+Close before his eyes he saw the clearly outlined shadow of his head.
+He hesitated and straightened on his knees to stare up at the top of
+the gorge. He could no longer discern the three down-peering faces,
+but he knew that they were still there. And the sunrays still pierced
+down to him between the walls of the gorge. The shadows were farther
+down, in the lower depths. He must follow and wait.
+
+When he slid to the foot of the cliff, Blake silently cut off the
+rope. There was still nearly a hundred and fifty feet left for them
+to use below. But they went down more than a thousand feet before they
+again had need of it. As Blake had foretold, the lower half of the
+descent was far less precipitous than the upper. In places the
+vertical measurements were carried down by rod readings, the level
+being set without its tripod on the points of rock where the previous
+readings had been taken. At other places Blake marked out horizontal
+points ahead on the gorge wall, and climbed to them with the chain.
+
+All the time the reverberations of the canyon were becoming louder.
+Dark shadows began to gather along one wall of the gorge. The sun was
+no longer directly in line with the ravine, and they were now far down
+in the lower depths. Ashton's knees were beginning to tremble with
+weakness. They had brought no water, for they were descending to the
+river. The torment of thirst was added to the torment of his hate. He
+began to look with fierce eagerness for the opportunity to do his
+work--to accomplish the deed for which he had descended into this
+inferno. Then he could go up again, out of the roaring, reverberating
+hell about him, away from the burning hell within him.
+
+The shadows were creeping out at him from the side of the gorge. The
+sunshine was going--it was flickering away up the opposite precipices.
+Now it had gone. All the gorge was somber with shadows. And below were
+the blue-black depths of the canyon bottom. Dread crept in upon his
+smoldering hate to sweep across its white-hot coals with chill gusts
+of fear.
+
+But now they were come to another sheer cliff--the last in the
+descent. From its foot the gorge bottom inclined easily down the final
+three hundred feet to its mouth, where the river of the deep roared
+past along the canyon bed, its foam flashing silvery white through the
+gloom.
+
+Here at last was the opportunity for which he had waited--here down in
+these dark shadows where no eye could see--here where no shriek or cry
+could pierce up to the outer world of light and sunshine through the
+wild uproar of the angry waters. He awaited the moment, aflame with
+pent-up fury, shivering with cold dread.
+
+Blake dropped his chain from the cliff-edge and took the last vertical
+measurement--fifty-three feet. He smiled. The hardest part of the work
+was almost accomplished. He swung over the edge.
+
+Ashton flung himself on his knees beside the triple knot that held the
+line fast to its spike. This time he did not hesitate, but began to
+tug at the rope end with fierce eagerness. He loosened one knot. The
+next was harder to unfasten. Blake had tied it with utmost secureness.
+At last it yielded to the tugging of his gloved fingers. He started to
+loosen the third knot. Suddenly the taut line slackened. With a
+stifled cry of rage, he paused to peer over the edge. Blake had
+slipped down the line so rapidly that he was already at the foot of
+the cliff.
+
+Reaching back, Ashton jerked the rope from the spike-head, to cast it
+down on the engineer. A glimpse of the flashing water in the canyon
+bottom gave momentary check to his vengeful impulse. If only he had a
+drink of that cool water! He was parched; his lips were cracking; in
+his mouth was the taste of dust. Must he stay up here on the dry rock
+while Blake went on down beside the foaming river to drink his fill?
+
+As he paused, a doubt clutched his heart in an icy grip. All the
+way down that devil's stairway he had been witness to Blake's
+extraordinary resourcefulness and tremendous strength. What if he
+should find a way to clamber up the precipices? He had lowered
+everything before descending. There was nothing to fling down upon
+him--no loose rock or stone to topple over and crush him.
+
+Chilled by that doubt, Ashton hesitated, his hands alternately
+tightening and relaxing their grip on the rope. What if the man should
+contrive to escape? There seemed no bounds to his ingenuity.... No, he
+must be followed on down into the canyon and destroyed, else he would
+escape--he would come up out of this inferno, like the demon he was,
+and destroy _her_. He must be followed!... And the water--the cool,
+refreshing water!
+
+His thirst now seized upon Ashton with terrible intensity. Rage, no
+less than the laborious exertion of the descent, had dried up his body
+with its feverish fire. Almost maddened with the torment of his
+craving, he looped the rope on the spike-head with reckless haste and
+slid down over the edge of the cliff.
+
+As the line tautened with his weight it gave several inches, but he
+was too nearly frantic to heed. He slipped down it so swiftly that the
+strands burned his hands through the tough palms of his gloves. In a
+few moments his feet were on a level with Blake's head. He clutched
+the rope tighter to check his fall. An instant later he dropped
+heavily on the rock shelf at the cliff foot, and the rope came
+swishing down after him.
+
+"God!" shouted Blake. Involuntarily he flung back his head and stared
+up the great gorge to the faraway heights where were waiting his wife
+and child.
+
+But Ashton neither paused nor looked upward. Rebounding from his fall,
+he rushed down the slope to the river, with a gasping cry--"Water!
+water!"
+
+For a time the engineer stood as if stunned, his big fists clenched,
+his broad chest heaving laboriously. Yet he was far too well seasoned
+in desperate adventure to give way to despair. Soon he rallied. He
+lowered his gaze from the heights to examine the cliff and the
+adjoining walls of the gorge. All were alike sheer and unscalable. The
+lines about his big mouth hardened with grim determination. He picked
+up the rope and began winding it about his mid-body above the
+low-buckled cartridge belt.
+
+He arranged the coils with such care that he did not notice the
+condition of the end of the line until he had drawn in over eighty
+feet. Then at last he saw. Though he had not forgotten to wrap the
+line with canvas where it passed over the cliff edge, he had thought
+the strands must have been frayed through on a sharp corner of rock.
+Instead, he found himself staring at the clean-cut string-wrapped rope
+end that he had knotted to the spike.
+
+For several moments he stood looking at it, his forehead creased in
+thought. What had become of the knot?... He could think of only one
+solution to the puzzle. He turned and gazed down through the gloom at
+the dim figure crouched beside the edge of the swirling water.
+
+"Locoed," he said pityingly--"Locoed.... Poor devil!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+IN THE GLOOM
+
+
+When the engineer came down to the river, Ashton still crouched low,
+his dripping head close over the water, as if he was afraid even to
+look away from it. Blake rinsed out his mouth and stood up to sip
+slowly from his hat, while looking about at the awesome spectacle of
+the canyon bottom.
+
+His first glance was at the swift-flowing stream. His eyes brightened
+and the furrows in his forehead smoothed away. The river was not as
+formidable as its tumult and foam had threatened. It could be
+descended by wading at the places where ledges and bowlders along the
+base of the canyon walls failed to afford safe footing. He glanced up
+the stupendous precipices at the blue-black ribbon of sky, but only
+for a moment. His present thought was not of escape from the depths.
+
+He bent over to grip the crouching man by the shoulder and lift him to
+his feet. Ashton writhed about and glared at him like a trapped wolf.
+
+"Let go!" he snarled. "It was an accident! I didn't mean to do it!"
+
+"Of course not," replied Blake, releasing his grip but standing close
+that he might not have to shout. "It's all right, old man--my fault.
+The knot slipped."
+
+"You own it! You own it's your fault!" cried Ashton. "You've brought
+me down here into this hell-pit! We can't get out! Lost! All your
+fault--yours!"
+
+He made a frantic snatch and jerked the revolver from Blake's holster.
+The engineer caught his wrist in an iron grasp and wrenched the weapon
+from him.
+
+"None of that, old man," he admonished with a cool sternness that
+chilled the frenzy of the other like a dash of ice water. "You're here
+to do your work, and you're going to do it. Understand?"
+
+"My work!" repeated Ashton wildly.
+
+"Yes, your work," commanded Blake, his face as hard as iron. "We're
+going to survey Deep Canyon down to the tunnel site. Your work is to
+carry rod. Do you get that?"
+
+"Down the canyon?--deeper!"
+
+"We can't get back up here. There's a place down there beyond the
+tunnel site where perhaps we can make it up the canyon wall."
+
+"A place where we--?" shrilled Ashton. "A place--Good God! and you
+stand here doing nothing!"
+
+He whirled to spring out into the swirling water. Blake was still
+swifter in his movements. He caught the fugitive by the arm and
+dragged him back.
+
+"Wait!" he commanded. "We must first carry the levels down to the
+tunnel site. You hear that? Stick by me, and I'll pull you through.
+Try to run, and, by God, I'll shoot you like a dog!"
+
+The captive glared into the steel-white eyes of the engineer, anger
+overcoming his panicky fear.
+
+"Let go!" he panted. "Don't worry! I'll do my work--I'll do my work!"
+
+"If you don't, you'll never get out of this canyon," grimly rejoined
+Blake. He released his hold, and started up the slope, with a curt
+order: "Come along. We can rod down the slope."
+
+Ashton followed him, silent and morose. The instrument was screwed to
+its tripod, and a line of levels from the foot of the last vertical
+measurement was carried down the slope to the canyon. The last rod
+reading was on a ledge, three feet above the water, at the corner of
+the gorge. Blake considered the reading worthy of permanent record.
+They had measured all the many hundreds of feet down from the top of
+High Mesa to these profound depths. With his two-pound hammer and one
+of the few remaining spikes, he chiseled a cross deep in the surface
+of the black rock.
+
+That mark of the engineer-captain, scouting before the van of man's
+Nature-conquering army, was the sign of the first human beings that
+had ever descended alive to the bottom of Deep Canyon.
+
+When he had cut the cross, Blake took out his Colt's, and, gazing up
+the heights, began to fire at slow intervals. Confined between the
+walls of gorge and canyon, each report of the heavy revolver crashed
+out above the tumult of the river and ran echoing and reechoing up the
+stupendous precipices. Yet long before they reached the rim of those
+towering walls they blurred away and merged and were lost in the
+ceaseless reverberations of the waters.
+
+Blake well knew that this would happen. But he also knew that the
+flash of the shot would be distinctly discernible in the gloom of the
+abyss. As he fired, he scanned the verge of the uppermost precipices.
+After the fourth shot he ceased firing and flung up his hand to point
+at the heights.
+
+"Look!" he shouted. "They see! There is the flag!"
+
+Ashton stared up with wide, feverish eyes. From an out-jutting point
+of rock on the lofty rim he saw a tiny white dot waving to and fro
+against the blue-black sky. The watchers above had seen the flash of
+the revolver shots and were fluttering the white flag in responsive
+signal. Though on the world above the sun beat down its full
+mid-afternoon flood of light, the two men in the abyss could see stars
+twinkling in the dark sky around the waving fleck of white.
+
+Blake fired two shots in quick succession, the agreed signal that told
+the flag was seen. He then calmly seated himself and began to add
+together the vertical measurements taken during the descent of the
+gorge. But Ashton groaned and flung himself face downward on the rough
+stone.
+
+Blake soon finished his sum in addition, and the result brought a
+smile to his serious face. He checked the figures with painstaking
+carefulness, and nodded, fully satisfied. Replacing book and pencil in
+the deep pocket of his shirt, he opened one of the packages of food.
+When he had laid out enough for a hearty meal, he looked at Ashton.
+The prostrate man had not stirred.
+
+"Come, Lafe," he called encouragingly. "Time to eat."
+
+Ashton lay still and made no response.
+
+Blake raised his voice--"Come! You're not going to quit. You're going
+to eat. You must keep your strength to fight your way through and up
+out of here--to _her_!"
+
+Ashton sullenly rose and came to sit down on the rock beside the
+outspread food. He was silent, but he ate even more heartily than his
+companion. When they had finished, Blake swung his pack and level on
+his shoulder, fired one shot, and stepped out into the swift but
+shallow river. Wading as far downstream as he could see to read the
+rod in the twilight of the depths, he set up the tripod of his
+instrument on a rock and took the reading given him by Ashton.
+
+The survey of the canyon itself had begun. Unappalled by the awful
+height of the mighty precipices on either side, undaunted by the
+uncertainty of escape, heedless of the gloom of the deep, of the
+tumult and rush and chill of the icy waters, the engineer boldly
+advanced to the attack of this abysmal stronghold of Primeval Nature,
+his square jaw set in grim determination to wrest from these hitherto
+inviolate depths that which he sought to learn. Whatever might follow,
+he must and would unlock the secret of the hidden waters. Afterwards
+might come death by slow starvation or the quick dashing down from
+some half-scaled precipice. That mattered not now. First must the
+engineer perform his work,--first must he execute the task that he had
+set himself for the conquest of the chasm that was likely to prove his
+tomb.
+
+Vastly different in purpose, yet no less resolute than the engineer,
+Ashton joined zealously in the grim battle with the abyss--for battle
+it soon proved to be. Only in places was the subterranean river
+shallow and easy to wade. More often it foamed in wild fury down steep
+rapids, to fling itself over ledges into black pools; or, worst of
+all, it swirled deep and arrowy-swift between fanged rocks where the
+channel narrowed.
+
+Wading, swimming, leaping from rock to rock, scrambling up and down
+the steep precipice foot, creeping along narrow shelves,--stubbornly
+the explorers fought their way deeper through that wild passage.
+Chilled by the icy waters and bruised by many a slip on loose stones
+and wet, water-polished rocks, ever they carried the line of levels
+down alongside the torrent, crossing over and back from side to side,
+twisting and turning with the twists and bends of the chasm. And at
+every stand Blake jotted down the rod readings in his half-soaked book
+with his pencil and figured the elevation of each turning point before
+"pulling up" his instrument to move on downstream to the next "set
+up."
+
+At the end of every half hour he fired a single shot to signal their
+progress in the depths to the watchers above. But never once did he
+stop to look up for the flag. Occasionally he was required to help
+Ashton through or over some unusually difficult passage. For the most
+part, however, each fought his own way. The odds were not altogether
+in favor of the older man. He was hampered by the care of the
+instrument, which must be shielded from all blows or falls. The rod,
+on the contrary, served as a staff and support to Ashton, alike in the
+water and on the rocks.
+
+Some time before sunset the waning light in the canyon bottom became so
+dim that Blake was compelled to cease work. He took a last reading on
+a broad shelf of rock well above the surface of the water, joined
+Ashton on the shelf, and began firing the revolver at five-minute
+intervals. After the fifth shot he at last perceived the white dot of
+the flag far above on the opposite brink of the chasm. He fired two
+shots in quick succession, and calmly sat down to open one of the
+soaked packages of food.
+
+Ashton did not wait to be bidden to supper. He fell to on the food and
+ate ravenously. Blake did not check him, though he himself took little
+and carefully gathered up and returned to the package every scrap of
+food left at the end of the meal. As Ashton lay back on the rock he
+squirmed from side to side and groaned. His bruises were so numerous
+that he could not find a comfortable position.
+
+"Cheer up!" grimly quoted Blake. "The worst is yet to come."
+
+He stretched himself out on the rock-shelf and, regardless of the
+sullen resistance of the younger man, drew him into his arms. Chilled
+to the marrow by his frequent icy drenchings, Ashton was shivering in
+the cold wind which came down the canyon with the approach of night.
+But Blake's massive body and limbs were aglow with abundant vitality.
+Warmed and sheltered from the wind, the exhausted man relaxed like a
+child in the strong arms of his companion and quickly sank into the
+deep slumber of overtaxed nature.
+
+Blake lay awake until the narrow strip of sky that showed between the
+vast walls of rock deepened to an inky blackness thickly sprinkled
+with scintillating stars. The light of a watchfire flamed red far
+above on the opposite rim of the chasm wall. To the man below it was
+like the glow of human love in the chill darkness of the Unknown. With
+a gesture of reverent passion and adoration, he put his fingers to his
+lips and flung a kiss up out of the abyss. Then he, too, relaxed on
+the hard rock and sank into heavy sleep.
+
+Ashton was the first to waken. The wind had changed, and he was roused
+by the different note in the ceaseless roar of the river. He stared up
+at the star-jeweled sky. It was still intensely black; yet the gloom
+of the depths was lessened by a vague pale illumination, a faint
+shadow of light that might have been the ghost of a dead day. He
+thought it was the gray dawn, and sought to roll over on his rock bed
+away from the sheltering embrace of Blake. The engineer was still deep
+in profound slumber. His big arm slipped laxly from across the moving
+man's breast.
+
+The change of position wrung a groan from Ashton. Every muscle in his
+body was cramped, every bruise stiff and sore. Not until he had turned
+and twisted for several moments was he able to rise to his feet. The
+vague ghost light about him brightened. He gazed upwards. He did not
+notice the tiny flame of the fire that told of the anxious watchers
+above. Out over the monstrous black wall of the abyss was drifting a
+burnished silver-white disk.
+
+"The moon!" he groaned. "Only the moon! To wait here--with him!--with
+him!"
+
+He looked down at the big form of the sleeping man, and suddenly all
+his pent-up rage burst its bounds. It poured through his veins in
+streams of fire. He stared about in fierce eagerness in search of a
+weapon. Blake lay upon the hilt of the revolver; the level rod lacked
+weight and balance. But the heavy hammer--a blow on the upturned
+temple of the sleeper!--
+
+With the cunning stealth of madness, Ashton took up the hammer and
+crept around back of Blake's head. He straightened on his knees, and
+peered down at the calm, powerful face of the engineer.
+
+What if he was a veritable Samson, this conqueror of canyons? Where now
+was his power? Sleep had bound fast his steel muscles, had numbed his
+indomitable will and locked his keen intellect in the black prison of
+unconsciousness.
+
+The avenger hovered over him, gloating. Now at last was come the
+opportunity--the perfect opportunity, down in these uttermost depths,
+in the secret night time. The world above slept--and he slept. Never
+should he waken from that sleep; never should he rouse up in his evil
+strength to escape out of the abyss and bring ruin to her!
+
+Lightly the hammer swung over and downward, measuring the curve of the
+stroke. It lifted and poised. Again it swung down; and again it lifted
+and poised. The blow must be certain--there must not be the slightest
+chance of missing.
+
+Each time the heavy steel head stopped a full two inches short of the
+upturned temple--but each time its shadow fell across the eyes of the
+sleeper. He stirred. The hammer whirled up, gripped in both hands of
+the kneeling man. The sleeper turned flat on his back, with his face
+full to the light. A quiver ran through the tense muscles of the
+avenger. Had the eyes of the sleeper opened, had their lids so much as
+fluttered, the hammer must have crashed down.
+
+But it was the sleeper's lips that moved. As it were by a miracle of
+acuteness, the tense nerves of the other's ear caught the whispered
+words through the roaring of the river--"_Jenny! Son!_"
+
+The hammer hurled away out into the swirl of the foam-flecked waters.
+The avenger flung himself about, face downward on the rock.
+
+"God!" he sobbed, in an agony of remorse. "Forgive me, God! I cannot
+do it! I am weak--unfit!... Not even to save her!--not even to save
+her!"
+
+He writhed in the anguish of his love and rage and self-abasement. He
+had failed; he was too weak to do the deed. But God--Would God permit
+that evil should befall her?
+
+He struggled to his feet and flung up his quivering hands to moon and
+stars and black sky in passionate invocation--"O God! You say that
+vengeance is Yours; that You will repay! Take me, if You will--I give
+myself! Only destroy him too! Save her! save her!"
+
+Again Blake stirred, and this time he opened his eyes. Ashton had sunk
+down in a huddled silent heap. Blake gazed up at the watchfire on the
+heights, smiled, and turned over to again fall asleep.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+
+LOWER DEPTHS
+
+
+Beetling precipices shut off the direct light of the moonbeams and
+left the abyss again in dense darkness long before the coming of the
+laggard dawn. Blake slept on, storing up strength for the renewal of
+the battle. Yet even he could not outsleep the reluctant lingering of
+night. He awoke while the tiny flame of the watchfire still flickered
+bright against the inky darkness of the sky.
+
+Ashton had fallen into a fitful doze. The engineer stood up and
+silently groped his way to and fro on the shelf of rock, stretching
+and limbering his cramped muscles. He wasted no particle of energy;
+the moment he had relieved his stiffness he stretched out again. He
+lay contemplating that flame of love on the heights until it faded
+against the lessening blackness of the sky and the rays of the morning
+sun began to angle down the upper precipices.
+
+He rose to take out two portions of food from the single pack in which
+he had bound up all the provisions. The portion for Ashton was small;
+his own was smaller. He roused the dozing man and placed the larger
+share of food in his hand.
+
+"Don't drop it," he cautioned. "That's all I can let you have. We must
+go on rations until we can see a way out of this hole."
+
+Ashton ate his meager breakfast without replying. The fire within him
+had burned to ashes. He was cold and dull and dispirited. He had
+failed. He would have been willing to sit and brood, and wait for God
+to answer his prayer.--But his waiting was not to be an inert
+lingering in the place where he had failed.
+
+The moment the down-creeping daylight so lessened the gloom of the
+depths that Blake could take rod readings, he plunged over into the
+stream, with a curtly cheerful command for Ashton to prepare to
+follow. Too dejected even to resist, the younger man silently obeyed.
+When Blake signaled to him through the dimness, he held the rod on the
+last turning-point of the previous day, and lowered himself from the
+shelf down into the stream.
+
+The evening before, the water at this point had come up to his waist.
+It was now only knee-deep. His surprise was so great that in passing
+Blake he broke his sullen silence to remark the fact and ask what
+could have caused the change.
+
+"Melting of the snow on the high range," the engineer shouted in
+explanation. "Takes time for it to run down the canyon all these miles.
+River probably still falling. Will begin to rise about noon. Faster
+we get along now, the easier it will be. Hustle!"
+
+Ashton responded mechanically to the will of his commander. For the
+time being his own will was almost paralyzed. The reaction from his
+long-sustained rage had left him dazed and nerveless. He had sunk into
+a state of fatalistic indifference. He moved quickly downstream from
+turning-point to turning-point, driven by Blake's will, but with a
+heedless recklessness that all Blake's warnings could not check.
+
+Within the first hour he twice stumbled and went under while wading
+deep reaches of the river, and once he fell from a ledge, bruising
+himself severely and knocking a splinter from the rod. Half an hour
+later he lost his footing in descending a swift and narrow place that
+would have been impassable at high water. Had not Blake been below him
+he would never have come out alive.
+
+The engineer leaped in and dragged the drowning man to safety, after a
+desperate struggle with the torrent. But in the wild swirl, both the
+food-pack and the rod went adrift. The moment he had rescued his
+companion, Blake rushed away downstream, leaping like a goat from rock
+to rock. He at last overtook the rod, caught in the eddy of a pool. Of
+the pack he could find no trace. He returned to Ashton and silently
+handed him the rod.
+
+There was no need for him to admonish. The loss of all the food and
+the narrowness of his escape had sobered the younger man. He resumed
+his work with a cautious swiftness of movement that avoided all
+needless risks yet never hesitated to encounter and rush through the
+dangers that could not be avoided. In this he copied Blake.
+
+All the time they were advancing down the angry torrent, deeper and
+deeper into its secret stronghold,--creeping, crawling, leaping,
+wading, swimming--step by step, turn after turn, wresting from the
+abyss that which the engineer was resolved to learn, even though he
+should learn, only to perish.
+
+The day advanced. Steadfastly they struggled on down the bed of the
+river, twisting and crossing over with the winding course of the
+chasm; now between beetling precipices that shut out all sight of the
+blue-black sky; now in more open stretches where the Titanic walls
+swung apart and the glorious hot sun rays pierced down into the very
+depths to warm their drenched bodies and lighten their heavy spirits.
+
+Ashton had long since lost all count of time. His watch had been
+smashed in his first fall of the day. But Blake seemed to have an
+intuitive sense of time. At fairly regular intervals he fired a shot
+to tell the watchers above the extent of their progress. Sometimes the
+answering flag-signal could be seen waving from the rim of the canyon.
+But in many places those above could not come near the brink to look
+over.
+
+The approach of midday found the bruised and weary fighters
+struggling through one of the narrowest reaches of the canyon. The
+precipices jutted out so far that the lower depths seemed more
+cavern than chasm, and the river swirled deep and swift between
+sheer, narrow walls. Twice Ashton was swept past what should have
+been the next turning-point, and Blake, unable to see the figures on
+the rod, had to guess at his readings.
+
+At last the precipices swung apart and showed the sky at a twist in
+the canyon's course that was the sharpest of all the turns the
+explorers had as yet encountered. As Blake came wading down past
+Ashton, along the inner curve of the bend, he stopped and pointed
+skywards. Ashton raised his drooping head and peered up at the rim of
+the opposite wall. From the brink a dense column of green-wood smoke
+was rising into the indigo sky.
+
+"One more set-up," shouted Blake.
+
+Three minutes later he took a reading on the water and on a point of
+rock at the angle of the canyon-side around which the river swung in
+its sharp curve. Three more minutes, and the two battered fighters
+stood together on the last bench of that tremendous line of levels,
+with torn and rent clothing, sodden, gaping boots, bodies bruised from
+head to foot--bleeding, weary, but victorious! They had finished the
+work that Blake had set out to do.
+
+He held up the now-soaked notebook for Ashton to see the last penciled
+elevation on the wet paper.
+
+"Two thousand, forty-five!" he shouted. "Over five hundred feet above
+that bench in Dry Greek Gulch! Water, electricity!--Dry Mesa shall be
+a garden!"
+
+Ashton stared moodily into the exultant face of the engineer.
+
+"Are you sure of that?" he asked. "How do you know that God will let
+you climb up out of this hell of stone and water?"
+
+"There's the saying, 'God helps those who help themselves,'" replied
+Blake. "I'm going to put up the best fight I can. If that doesn't win
+out, I shall at least have the satisfaction of not having quit. If you
+wish to pray, do so. The sooner we start the better. From now on, the
+water will be rising."
+
+"I prayed last night," said Ashton. He added somberly, "And now we are
+both going to the devil."
+
+"No," said Blake, with no less earnestness. "There is no devil--there
+is no room for a devil in all the universe. What man calls evil is
+ignorance,--his ignorance of those primeval forces of nature which he
+has yet to chain; his ignorance of those higher qualities in his own
+nature which, if known, would prevent him from wronging others and
+would enable him to bring happiness to himself and others."
+
+"You say that!" cried Ashton. "You can mock! You do not believe in
+hell!"
+
+Blake smiled grimly. "What do you call this?--But you mean a hell
+hereafter. I believe this: If, when we pass into the Unknown, we
+continue to exist as individual consciousnesses, then we carry with us
+the heaven and the hell that we have each upbuilt for ourselves."
+
+"God will not let you escape," stated Ashton. "You will pass from this
+hell of water into the hell of fire and brimstone."
+
+"Have it your own way," said Blake. "I lived one summer in Death
+Valley. The other place can't be much hotter."
+
+He climbed up the ledges and planted the level firmly on its tripod
+above the high-water mark of the spring floods. He called down to
+Ashton: "Hate to leave the old monkey up here; but it will serve as a
+memento of our present visit, when we come down again to locate the
+tunnel head."
+
+"How can it be that we shall ever come down again?" replied Ashton.
+"It is impossible--for we shall never go up."
+
+Blake jumped down the ledges to him and pointed to the column of smoke
+on the lofty heights.
+
+"Look there," he said. "That is where we are going, if there is any
+possible way to go. An optimist would stand here and wait, certain
+that wings would soon sprout for him to fly up; a pessimist would sit
+down and quit. An optimist is a fool; a pessimist is a worse fool."
+
+"And which are you?" asked Ashton.
+
+"I am neither. I am a meliorist. I am going to face the facts, and
+then fight for all I'm worth. What's more, you're going to do the
+same. Come! We've still got some clothes left, the rod for you to use
+as a staff, this rope, the revolver, and seventeen cartridges. It's
+fortunate we have any. We've got to signal that we are going on down
+the canyon, instead of back up."
+
+"We may as well stay and die here. But since you prefer to keep
+moving, I have no objections," said Ashton, with ironical politeness.
+
+Blake promptly stepped into the water and led the way to the next
+shelf of rock. Here he fired a shot. Going a few yards farther along
+the rocks, he fired again. Three times he fired, at intervals of two
+minutes. Then the white dot of the flag appeared on the precipice
+brink directly up across from him.
+
+"Once more, and we're sure they understand," he said.
+
+Advancing a full hundred yards on down the canyon, he fired the fourth
+shot. Very soon the fleck of white flaunted on the rim a little way
+beyond them.
+
+"They understand!" cried Blake. "Trust Jenny to use her head! Now
+catch your breath and tighten up. We're going to move!"
+
+He started, and Ashton followed close behind. It was the same rough,
+fierce game of leaping, crawling, wading, swimming,--battling with the
+river, the rocks, the ledges. But now they were no longer checked and
+halted by the alternate stoppings for set-ups and turning-points, and
+no longer was Blake encumbered with the care of the level. There was
+nothing now to hinder or delay them except the natural obstacles of
+their wild path down the bed of the torrent.
+
+Blake could give all his thought to picking the best and quickest way
+through rapids and falls, over the water-washed rocks and along the
+side ledges. And he could give all his great strength to helping his
+companion past the hard places. In return Ashton gave such help as he
+could to the engineer, many times when a steadying hand or the
+outstretched rod rendered easier a descent or the fording of some
+swift mill race in the stream.
+
+At the end of the first quarter-mile Blake had fired a shot, and again
+at the second quarter. After that he waited longer intervals. He
+considered it advisable to husband the few remaining cartridges.
+
+The river was now rapidly rising. But every inch of added depth found
+the two fugitives much farther down the canyon. In two hours they
+advanced thrice the distance that they had covered in the same time
+before noon, and this despite the increasing depth and force of the
+river.
+
+The pace was so hot that Ashton was beginning to stumble and slip, but
+Blake kept by him and helped him along by word and deed. He asserted
+and repeated a dozen times over, that they were nearing the place
+where an ascent of the precipices might be possible. At last they
+rounded a turn in the winding chasm, and Blake was able to point to a
+break in the sheer wall on the Dry Mesa side, where the precipices
+were set back one above the other in a Cyclopean stepladder and their
+steeply-pitched faces were rough with crevices and shelves.
+
+"Look!" he cried. "There's the place--there's our ladder up from hell
+to heaven!"
+
+Ashton soon lowered his weary head. He stared dully downstream to
+where a fifty-foot cliff extended across from side to side of the
+canyon like a dam.
+
+"Part of the wall slid in," he stated with the simplicity of one who
+is nearing exhaustion.
+
+"That shall be our bridge to the ladder," shouted Blake. "It's all
+sheer cliff along here at the foot of the break, but the ledges run
+down sideways to the top of the cross cliff. We shall soon be lying up
+there, high and dry, getting our second wind for the run up the
+ladder."
+
+The engineer spoke confidently, and felt what he spoke. But as they
+struggled on down the turbulent stream to the cross cliff, the light
+left his face. From wall to wall of the canyon the great mass of fallen
+rock stretched across the bottom in a sheer-faced barrier, broken only
+by a tunnel barely large enough to suck in the swelling volume of the
+river.
+
+Blake came down close to the intake, scanning every foot of the cliff
+face for a scalable break or crevice. There was none to be found. He
+climbed along the cliff foot to a low shelf beside the roaring tunnel,
+and stood staring at the opening in deep thought. Even while he
+looked, the swelling volume of the river filled the tunnel to its
+roof. Blake peered at the fresh watermark twenty feet up the face of
+the cliff, and bent down beside Ashton, who had stretched out to rest
+on the shelf of rock.
+
+"There's only one thing to it, old man," he said. "We must dive
+through that tunnel."
+
+"Through that hole?" gasped Ashton. "No! I've done enough. I shall
+stay here."
+
+"To drown like a rat in a rainwater barrel!" rejoined Blake. "Look at
+that watermark. The tunnel is now running full. Inside a quarter-hour
+the river will be up over this ledge. It will keep rising till it
+reaches that mark, and it will not fall until after low water."
+
+"What do I care?" said Ashton hopelessly. "Go to the devil your own
+way. I'd rather drown here than in that underground hole. Leave me
+alone."
+
+Blake considered a full half minute, looked up the cliff face, and
+replied: "Perhaps it's as well. I shall do the best I can. But first I
+want to tell you I've wiped out all that past affair. You are another
+person from that Lafayette Ashton. We stand here almost face to face
+with the Unknown. One or both of us may soon go out into the Darkness.
+As we may never meet again, I wish to tell you that you have proved
+yourself, even more than I hoped when I saw you come rushing down the
+ravine to join me. You have proved yourself a man. Good-by."
+
+He held out his hand. But Ashton turned his face to the wall of rock
+and was silent. After a time he heard the sound of Blake's worn heels
+on the outer end of the shelf. His ears, attuned to the ceaseless
+tumult of the waters, caught the click of the protruded heel-nail
+heads. There was a brief pause--then the plunge. He looked about
+quickly and saw Blake's hands vanish in the down-sucking eddy where
+the swollen waters drew into the now hidden intake of the tunnel.
+
+A cry of horror burst from his heaving chest. Blake had gone--Blake
+the iron-limbed, iron-hearted man. He had conquered the river--and now
+the wild waters had seized him and were mauling and smashing and
+crushing him in the terrible mill of the cavern. Beyond that
+underground passage, it might be miles away, the victor would fling up
+on some fanged rock a shapeless mass that once had been a man.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+
+LIGHT IN THE DARKNESS
+
+
+Ashton again turned his face to the rock and groaned. God had answered
+his prayer. Now must he pay the price. If only he could force himself
+to lie still while the rising waters brimmed up over the ledge and up
+over his head and face. He was tired--tired! It would be so peaceful
+to lie and rest under the quiet waters.
+
+But the first ripple that crept over the surface of the shelf brought
+him to his feet with the chill of its icy touch. He climbed to a shelf
+higher up and again stretched himself full length on the rock. To lie
+still and rest was heavenly.... It was too good to last. The water
+crept after him up the ledge. This time he could climb no higher.
+
+He sat erect and waited, still resting, until the flood rose to his
+chin. Then he stood up, leaning on the battered level rod. The water
+rose after him, creeping with relentless stealth from his thigh to his
+waist, from his waist to his chest. It would soon be lapping at his
+throat, and then--he must begin to swim. Life was far stronger within
+him than he had thought. His strength had come back. Blake was right.
+A man should fight. He should hold fast to hope, and fight to the very
+last.
+
+Something swept from side to side along the face of the cliff above
+him. It tapped the rock close over his head. He looked up and saw a
+rope. He could not see over the rounded brink of the cliff, but he had
+no need. There was a rescuer above him who knew his desperate
+situation. Could it be Blake? Surely not! He must have perished in the
+frightful vortex of the tunnel.
+
+The rope swung lower. Now it was within reach. Ashton made a clutch as
+it swept over him and caught its end. He gave a tug. At once the line
+slackened down to him. He felt something in his palm, twisted between
+the rope strands. He looked and saw that it was a piece of folded
+paper. He opened it and found written a terse sentence in Blake's bold
+clear hand:
+
+                      Tie rod to line and climb.
+
+Why should he tie the splintered level rod to the rope? Of what
+possible use could it be in climbing the precipices? But even while
+Ashton asked himself the questions he obeyed Blake's directions. The
+water lapped up over his chin as he tied the knot. He pulled heavily
+on the rope. It gave a little way, and then tautened. He reached up
+and began to climb, hand over hand, with desperate speed.
+
+[Illustration: Another desperate clutch at the rope--still another]
+
+Thirty feet above the water his strength was almost outspent, but he
+struggled to raise himself one more time, and then another. To pause
+meant to slip back and perish. Another upward heave. The rope here
+bent in over the rounding cliff. Hardly could he force his fingers
+between it and the rock. Yet if only he could get his knee up on the
+sharp slope! He heaved again, his face purple with exertion, the veins
+swelling out on his forehead as if about to burst.
+
+At last! his knee was up and braced against the rock. Another
+desperate clutch at the rope--another heave--still another. The cliff
+edge was rounding back. Every upward hitch was easier than the one
+before. Now he was scrambling up on toes and knees; now he could rise
+to his feet.
+
+The line led across a waterworn ledge and downward. Ashton peered
+over, and saw the senseless body of Blake wedged against the other
+side of the ledge. About it, close below the arms, the line was
+knotted fast.
+
+Ashton stared wonderingly at the still, white face of the unconscious
+man. It was covered with cold sweat. A peculiar twist in the sprawling
+left leg caught his attention. He looked--and understood. Panting with
+exertion, he staggered down the ledges of the lower side of the
+barrier to where the river burst furiously out of the mouth of the
+tunnel.
+
+Hurled by that mad torrent from the darkness of the gorged cavern
+straight upon a line of rocks, all Blake's strength and quickness had
+not enabled him to save himself from injury. Yet he had crept up those
+rough ledges, dragging his shattered leg. Atrocious as must have been
+his agony, he had crept all the way to the top, had written the note,
+and flung down the rope to rescue his companion.
+
+There was no vessel in which Ashton could carry water. He had no hat,
+his boots were full of holes, he must use his hands in scrambling back
+up the ledges. He stripped off his tattered flannel shirt, dipped it
+in a swirling eddy, and started back as fast as he could climb.
+
+Blake still lay unconscious. Ashton straightened out the twisted leg,
+and knelt to bathe the big white face with an end of the dripping
+garment. After a time the eyelids of the prostrate man fluttered and
+lifted, and the pale blue eyes stared upward with returning
+consciousness.
+
+"I'm here!" cried Ashton. "Do you see? You saved me!"
+
+"Colt's gone," muttered Blake. "But cartridges--fire."
+
+"You mean, fire the cartridges to let them know where we are? How can
+I do it without the revolver?"
+
+"No, build a fire," replied the engineer. He raised a heavy hand to
+point towards the high end of the barrier. "Driftwood up there. Bring
+it down. I'll light it."
+
+"Light it--how?" asked Ashton incredulously.
+
+"Get it," ordered Blake.
+
+Ashton hurried across the crest of the barrier to where it sloped up
+and merged in the precipice foot. The mass of rock that formed the
+barrier had fallen out of the face of the lower part of the canyon
+wall, leaving a great hollow in the rock. But above the hollow the
+upper precipices beetled out and rose sheer, on up the dizzy heights
+to the verge of the chasm. Contrasted with this awesome undermined
+wall, the broken, steeple-sloped precipices adjoining it on the
+upstream side looked hopefully scalable to Ashton. He marked out a
+line of shelves and crevices running far up to where the full sunlight
+smiled on the rock.
+
+But Blake had told him to fetch wood for a fire, that they might
+signal the watchers on the heights. He hastened up over the rocks to
+the heaps of logs and branches stranded on the high end of the barrier
+by the freshets. Every year the river, swollen by the spring rains,
+brimmed over the top of this natural dam.
+
+Yet not all the heaps lying on the ledges were driftwood. As Ashton
+approached, he was horrified to see that the largest and highest
+situated piles were nothing else than masses of bones. Drawn by a
+gruesome fascination, he climbed up to the nearest of the ghastly
+heaps. The loose ribs and vertebrae scattered down the slope seemed to
+him the size of human ribs and vertebrae. He shuddered as they crunched
+under his tread.
+
+Then he saw a skull with spiral-curved horns. He looked up the canyon
+wall, and understood. The high-heaped bones were the skeletons of
+sheep. In a flash, he remembered Isobel's account of Gowan, that first
+day up there on the top of the mesa. Not only had the puncher killed
+six men; he had, together with other violent men of the cattle ranges,
+driven thousands of sheep over into the canyon--and this was the
+place.
+
+Sick with horror and loathing, Ashton ran to snatch up an armful of
+the smaller driftwood and hurry back down to the center of the
+barrier. He found Blake lying white and still. But beside him were
+three cartridges from which the bullets had been worked out. At the
+terse command of the engineer, Ashton ground one of the older and
+drier pieces of wood to minute fragments on a rock.
+
+Blake emptied the powder from one of the cartridges into the little
+pile of splinters, and holding the edge of another shell against a
+corner of the rock, tapped the cap with a stone. At the fifth stroke
+the cap exploded. The loosened powder of the cartridge flared out into
+the powder-sprinkled tinder. Soon a fire of the dry, half-rotted
+driftwood was blazing bright and almost smokeless in the twilight of
+the depths.
+
+"Now haul up the rod," directed Blake, and he lay back to bask in the
+grateful warmth.
+
+Ashton drew up the level rod and came back over the ledge. He found
+that the engineer had freed himself from the last coils of the rope
+and was unraveling the end that had been next his body. But his eyes
+were upturned to the heights.
+
+"Look--the flag!" he said.
+
+"Already?" exclaimed Ashton.
+
+"Yes. No doubt one of them has been waiting on that out-jutting
+point.--Now, if you'll break the rod. We've got to get my leg into
+splints."
+
+The crude splints were soon ready. For bandages there were strips from
+the tattered shirts of both men. Unraveled rope-strands, burnt off in
+the fire, served to lash all together. Beads of cold sweat gathered
+and rolled down Blake's white face throughout the cruel operation. Yet
+he endured every twist and pull of the broken limb without a groan.
+When at last the bones were set to his satisfaction and the leg lashed
+rigid to the splints, he even mustered a faint smile.
+
+"That beats an amputation," he declared. "Now if you can help me up
+under the cliff, where you can plant the fire against a back-log--I
+want to dry out and do some planning while you're climbing up for
+help. I've an idea we can put in a dynamo down here, with turbines in
+the intake and in the mouth of the tunnel--carry a wire up over the
+top of the mesa and down into the gulch. Understand? All the electric
+power we want to drive the tunnel, and very cheap."
+
+"My God!" gasped Ashton. "You can lie here--here--maimed, already
+starving--and can plan like that?"
+
+"Why not? No fun thinking of my leg, is it? As for the rest, you're
+going up to report the situation. They'll soon manage to yank me out
+of this blessed hole."
+
+Ashton's face darkened. "But that's the question," he rejoined. "Am I
+going to go up? Am I going to try to go up?"
+
+Blake looked at him with a steady, unflinching gaze. "There's
+something queer about all this. Isn't it time you explained? When the
+rope came off that last cliff in the gorge and I saw that you had
+untied it before sliding down, I thought you were off your head. And
+two or three times today, too. But since we landed here--"
+
+"Your broken leg," interrupted Ashton--"it made me forget. You had
+saved me with the rope. I had to help you. Now I see how foolish I
+have been. I should have left you to lie here, and flung myself back
+over into the water."
+
+"Why?" calmly queried Blake.
+
+"Why! You ask why?" cried Ashton, his eyes ablaze with excitement, his
+whole body quivering. "Can't you see? Are you blind? What do I care
+about myself if I can save her from you? I shall not try to escape.
+You shall never go up there to work her harm!"
+
+"Harm her? You mean put through this irrigation project?"
+
+"No!" shouted Ashton. "Don't lie and pretend, you hypocrite! You know
+what I mean! You know she could not hide how you were enticing her!"
+
+Blake stared in utter astonishment. Then, regardless of his leg, he
+sat up and said quietly: "I see. I thought you must have understood
+when she told me, there at the last moment before we started. She is
+my sister."
+
+"Sister!" scoffed Ashton. "You liar! You have no sister. Your sisters
+died years ago. Genevieve told me."
+
+"That was what I told her. I believed it true. But it was not true.
+Belle did not die--God! when I think of that! It has helped me through
+this fight--it helped me crawl up here with that leg dangling. Good
+God! To think of Jenny waiting for me up there, and Son, and little
+Belle too--little Belle whom all these years I thought dead!"
+
+Ashton stood as if turned to stone. "Belle--you call her Belle? She
+told me--Chuckie only a nickname!" he stammered. "Adopted--her real
+name Isobel!"
+
+"We always called her Belle--Baby Belle! She was the youngest," said
+Blake.
+
+"But why--why did you not--tell me?"
+
+"I did not know. She did--she knew from the first, there at
+Stockchute. I see it now. Even before that, she must have guessed it.
+Yes, I see all now. She sent for me to come out here, because she
+thought I might be her brother."
+
+"You did not tell me!" reproached Ashton, his face ghastly. "How was I
+to know?"
+
+"I tell you, I did not know," repeated Blake. "At first--yes, all
+along--there was something about her voice and face--But she had
+changed so much, and all these years--eight, nine years--I had thought
+her dead. She gave me no sign--only that friendliness. I did not know
+until the very last moment, there on the edge of the ravine. I thought
+you saw it; that you heard her tell me. It seemed to me everybody must
+have heard."
+
+"I was running away--I could not bear it. I think I must have been
+crazy for a time. If only I had heard! My God! if only I had heard!"
+
+"Well, you know now," said Blake. "What's done is done. The question
+now is, what are you going to do next?"
+
+Instantly Ashton's drooping figure was a-quiver with eagerness.
+
+"You wish first to be taken up near the driftwood," he exclaimed.
+"Let me lift you. Don't be afraid to put your weight on me. Hurry! We
+must lose no time!"
+
+Blake was already struggling up. Ashton strained to help him rise
+erect on his sound leg. Braced and half lifted by the younger man, the
+engineer hobbled and hopped along the barrier crest and up its sloping
+side. His trained eye picked out a great weather-seasoned pine log
+lying directly beneath the outermost point of the canyon rim. An object
+dropped over where the flag still flecked against the indigo sky,
+would have fallen straight down to the log, unless deflected by the
+prong of a ledge that jutted out twelve hundred feet from the top.
+
+"Here," panted Blake, regardless of the great pile of skeletons heaped
+on the far end of the log. "This place--right below them! Go
+back--bring fire and rope."
+
+Ashton ran back to fetch the rope and a dozen blazing sticks.
+Driftwood was strewn all around. In a minute he had a fire started
+against the butt end of the log. He began to gather a pile of fuel.
+But Blake checked him with a cheerful--"That's enough, old man. I can
+manage now. Take the rope, and go."
+
+When Ashton had coiled the rope over his shoulder and under the
+opposite arm, he came and stood before his prostrate companion. His
+face was scarlet with shame.
+
+"I have been a fool--and worse," he said. "I doubted her. I am utterly
+unfit to live. If I were alone down here, I would stay and rot. But
+you are her brother. If it is possible to get up there, I am going
+up."
+
+"You are going up!" encouraged Blake. "You will make it. Give my love
+to them. Tell them I'm doing fine."
+
+He held out his hand.
+
+"No," said Ashton. "I'd give anything if I could grip hands with you.
+But I cannot. You are her brother. I am unfit to touch your hand."
+
+He turned and ran up the precipice-foot to the first steep ascent of
+the steeple-sloped break in the wall of the abyss.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+
+THE CLIMBER
+
+
+A day of anxiety, only partly relieved by those tiny flashes of light
+so far, far down in the awful depths; then the long night of ceaseless
+watching. Neither Genevieve nor Isobel had been able to sleep during
+those hours when no flash signaled up to them from the abysmal
+darkness.
+
+Then at last, a full hour after dawn on the mesa top, the down-peering
+wife had caught the flash that told of the renewal of the exploration.
+As throughout the previous day, Gowan brought the ladies food and
+whatever else they needed. Only the needs of the baby had power to
+draw its mother away from the canyon edge. Isobel moved always along
+the giddy verge wherever she could cling to it, following the unseen
+workers in the depths.
+
+On his first trip to the ranch, the puncher had brought Genevieve's
+field glasses--an absurdly small instrument of remarkable power. Three
+times the first day and twice the second morning she and Isobel had
+the joy of seeing their loved ones creeping along the abyss bottom at
+places where the sun pierced down through the gloom. They missed
+other chances because the canyon edge was not everywhere so easily
+approachable.
+
+Many times the flash of Blake's revolver passed unseen by them.
+Sometimes they had been forced away from the brink; sometimes the
+depths were cut off from their view by juttings of the vast walls. Yet
+now and again one or the other caught a flash that marked the advance
+of the explorers.
+
+Towards midday a last flash was seen by both above the turn where the
+canyon curved to run towards Dry Fork Gulch. Between this point and the
+sharp bend opposite the gulch the precipices overhung the canyon
+bottom. Carrying the baby, the two hastened to the bend, to heap up
+and light a great beacon fire of green wood.
+
+Gowan followed with the ponies, cool, silent and efficient. From the
+first he had seldom looked over into the canyon. His part was to serve
+Miss Chuckie and her friend, and wait. Like Ashton, he had failed to
+surmise the real significance of that tender parting between Blake and
+Isobel. His look had betrayed boundless amazement when he saw the wife
+of the man take the sobbing girl into her arms and comfort her. But he
+had spoken no word of inquiry; and every moment since, both ladies had
+been too utterly absorbed in their watch to talk to him of anything
+else.
+
+At last the exploration was nearing the turning point. Genevieve and
+Isobel lay on the edge of the precipice near the beacon fire, peering
+down for the flash that would tell of the last rod reading.
+
+Slowly the minutes dragged by, and no welcome signal flashed through
+the dark shadows. The usual interval between shots had passed. Still
+no signal. They waited and watched, with fast-mounting apprehension.
+Could the brave ones down in those fearsome depths have failed almost
+in sight of the goal? or could misfortune have overtaken them in that
+narrow, cavernous reach of the chasm so close to their objective
+point?
+
+At last--"There! there it is!"
+
+Together the two watchers saw the flash, and together they shrieked
+the glad discovery.
+
+Genevieve rose to go to her crying baby. Before she could silence him,
+Isobel screamed to her: "Another shot!--farther downstream! What can
+it mean?"
+
+Genevieve put down the still-sobbing baby and ran again to the verge
+of the precipice. Two minutes after the second flash there came a
+third, a few yards still farther along the canyon.
+
+"They have changed their plans. They are going downstream," said
+Genevieve.
+
+She caught up the long pole of the flag and ran to thrust it out
+opposite the point where she had seen the flash.
+
+Gowan was preparing for the return trip up along the canyon to the
+starting point. At Isobel's call, he silently turned the ponies about
+the other way and followed the excited watchers. As he did so, the
+girl perceived a fourth flash in the abyss, a hundred yards farther
+downstream. She hastened with the flag to a point a little beyond the
+place.
+
+When Genevieve had quieted the baby and overtaken Isobel, the latter
+was ready with a question: "You know Tom so well. Why is he going on
+down? He said that he would at once return after reaching the place
+where the head of the tunnel is to be."
+
+"He must have seen the beacon," replied Genevieve. "He could not have
+mistaken that. Something has forced him to change his plans. It may be
+they were swept down some place in the river that he knows they cannot
+re-ascend."
+
+"Oh! do not say it!" sobbed the girl. "If they cannot get back--oh!
+what will they do? How will they ever escape?"
+
+"Is there no other place?" asked Genevieve. "Think, dear. Is there no
+break in these terrible precipices?"
+
+"There's a place where the wall slopes back--but steep, oh, so steep!
+Yet it is barely possible--" The girl's voice sank, and she glanced
+about at Gowan. "It is just this side of where more than five thousand
+sheep were driven over into the canyon. That was four years ago. I
+have never since been able to go near the place."
+
+"Tom said that he rode all along the canyon for miles. You say it may
+be possible to climb up at that place. He must have seen it, and he
+has remembered it."
+
+"Then you think--?"
+
+"I know that if it is possible for anyone to climb the wall, Tom will
+climb it--and he will bring up Lafayette with him."
+
+"Dear Genevieve! You are so strong! so full of hope!"
+
+"Not hope, dear. It is trust. I know Tom better than you. That is
+all."
+
+"Another flash!" cried Isobel. "So soon, yet all that long way from
+the last! They are traveling far faster!"
+
+"Yes, they have finished with the levels," divined Genevieve. "We must
+hasten."
+
+Isobel called the news to the silent puncher, and all moved along to
+overtake the hurrying fugitives below. Though both parties went so
+much faster, Blake's frequent shots kept the anxious watchers above in
+closer touch than at any time before.
+
+At last they came to that Cyclopean ladder of precipices, rising one
+above the other in narrow steps, and all inclined at a giddy pitch far
+steeper than any house roof. Yet for a long way down them the field
+glasses showed their surfaces wrinkled with shelves and projecting
+ledges and creased with faults and crevices.
+
+The party went past this semi-break in the sheer wall, and halted on
+the out-jutting point of the rim where the luckless flock of sheep had
+been driven over to destruction. No reference was made to that
+ruthless slaughter of innocents. Gowan calmly set about preparing a
+camp. The ladies lay down to watch in the shade of a frost-cracked
+rock on the verge of the wall.
+
+Already the time had come and gone for the regular signal of the
+revolver shot. The watchers began to grow apprehensive. Still their
+straining eyes saw no flash in the depths. A half hour passed. Their
+apprehension deepened to dread. An hour--they were white with terror.
+
+Suddenly a tiny red spot appeared--not a flash that came and went like
+lightning, but a flame that remained and grew larger.
+
+"A fire!" cried Isobel. "They have halted and built a fire."
+
+Genevieve brought the flag and thrust it out over the edge. The inner
+end of the pole she wedged in a crevice of the split rock.
+
+"They have stopped to rest," she said. "It may be that Lafayette is
+worn out. But soon I trust they will be coming up."
+
+She looked through her glasses. The fire was burning its brightest.
+She discerned the prostrate figure beside the ledge. She watched it
+fixedly. Soon another figure appeared in the circle of firelight. It
+bent over the first, doing something with pieces of stick.
+
+"Look," whispered Genevieve, handing the glasses to her companion,
+"Tom is hurt. Lafayette is binding his leg. It is broken or badly
+strained.--Oh! will your father never come?"
+
+"Tom hurt? It can't be--no, no!" protested Isobel. But she too looked
+and saw. After a time she added breathlessly: "It can't be so bad!
+Lafe is helping him to rise.... They are starting this way--to the
+foot of the wall! They will be climbing up!"
+
+"But if his leg is injured!" differed Genevieve.
+
+Again they waited. Presently the fire scattered, and a streak of flame
+traveled across the canyon to a point beneath them. Soon the red spot
+of a new fire glowed in the shadows so directly under them that a
+pebble dropped from their fingers must have grazed down the precipices
+and fallen into the flames.
+
+After several minutes of alternate peering through the glasses,
+Genevieve handed them back to Isobel for the third time, and rose to
+go to her baby.
+
+"It is Tom alone," she said, divining the truth. "Lafayette has helped
+him to the best place they could find, and now he is coming up to us
+for help."
+
+When she had fed the baby and soothed him to sleep, she laid out
+bandages and salve, set a full coffeepot on the fire started by Gowan,
+and examined the cream and eggs brought back by the puncher on his
+second night trip to the ranch.
+
+Nearly an hour had passed when Isobel called in joyous excitement: "I
+see him! I see him! Down there where the sunlight slants on the rocks.
+Oh! how bravely! how swiftly he climbs!"
+
+Genevieve went to take the glasses and look. Several moments were lost
+before she could locate the tiny figure creeping up that stairway of
+the giants. But, once she had fixed the glasses upon him, she could
+see him clearly. Isobel had well expressed it when she said that he
+was climbing swiftly and bravely. Running along shelves, clambering
+ledges, following up the crevices that offered the best foothold, the
+tattered climber fought his dizzy way upwards, upwards, ever upwards!
+
+Rarely, after some particularly hard scramble, he flung himself down
+on a shelf or on one of the steps of the Titanic ladder, to rest and
+summon energy for another upward rush. His good fortune seemed as
+marvelous as his endurance and daring. He never once slipped and never
+once had to turn back from an ascent. As if guided by instinct or
+divine intuition, he chose always the safest, the least difficult, the
+most continuously scalable way on all that perilous pitch.
+
+So swift an ascent was beyond the ordinary powers of man. It could
+have been made only by a maniac or by one to whom great passion had
+given command of those latent forces of the body that enable the
+maniac to fling strong men about like children. Long before the
+climber reached the top of that terrible ladder, his hands were torn
+and bleeding, the tattered garments were half rent from his limbs and
+body, his eyes were sunk deep in their sockets.
+
+Yet ever he climbed, ledge above ledge, crevice after crevice, until
+at last only one steep pitch rose above him. A rope came sliding down
+the rock. A voice--the sweetest voice in all the wide world of
+sunshine and life--called to him. It sounded very far away, farther
+than the bounds of reality, yet he heard and obeyed. He slipped the
+loop of the rope down over his shoulders and about his heaving
+forebody. Then suddenly his labor was lightened. His leaden body
+became winged. It floated upwards.
+
+When he came to himself, a bitter refreshing wetness was soothing his
+parched mouth and black swollen tongue; gentle fingers were spreading
+balm on his torn hands; the loveliest face of earth or heaven was
+downbent over him, its tender blue eyes brimming with tears of
+compassion and love. Softly his head and shoulders were raised, and
+hot coffee was poured down his throat as fast as he could swallow.
+
+He half roused from his daze. The swollen, cracked lips moved in
+faintly muttered words: "Leg broken--sends love--doing fine--project
+feasible--irrigation--no food--must rest--go down again."
+
+The eyes of the two ministering angels met. Genevieve bent down and
+pressed her lips to the purple, swollen-veined forehead. The heavy
+lids closed over the sunken eyes; but before he lapsed into the torpid
+sleep of exhaustion that fell upon him, the two succeeded in feeding
+him several spoonfuls of raw egg beaten in cream. He then sank into
+utter unconsciousness.
+
+Flaccid and inert as a corpse, he lay outstretched on the grassy slope
+while they bound up the cuts and bruises on his naked arms and
+shoulders and cut the broken, gaping boots from his bruised feet. His
+legs, doubly protected by the tough leather chapareras and thick
+riding leggins, had fared less cruelly than his arms, but his knees
+were raw and bleeding where the chaps had worn through on the rocks.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+
+LURKING BEASTS
+
+
+The moment that he had helped haul the climber to safety Gowan had
+ridden away with the horses to the camp. He now came jogging back with
+the tent and all else that they had not been carrying with them in
+their skirting of the canyon edge. He unloaded the packs and hastened
+to pitch the tent.
+
+As he was finishing, Isobel called to him sharply. "What are you doing
+there, Kid? That can wait. Come here."
+
+"Yes, Miss Chuckie," he replied with ready obedience. But when he came
+down the slope to the little group, his mouth was like a thin gash
+across his lean jaws. He stared coldly at Ashton between narrowed
+lids. "Want me to help tote him up by the fire?" he asked.
+
+"No!" she replied. "It is Tom! He is down there--his leg broken--and
+no food! You must go down to him."
+
+"Go down?" queried the puncher. "What good would that do? I couldn't
+help him with that climb. He weighs a good two hundred."
+
+"You can take food down to him and let him know that help is coming.
+You must!"
+
+Gowan looked sullenly at the unconscious man. "Sorry, Miss Chuckie.
+It's no go. I ain't a mountain sheep."
+
+"But _he_ came up!"
+
+"That's different. It's a sight easier going up cliffs than climbing
+down. No, you'll have to excuse me, Miss Chuckie."
+
+The girl flamed with indignant anger. "You coward! You saw him come
+up, after all that time down in those fearful depths--after fighting
+his way all those miles along the terrible river--yet you dare not go
+down! You coward! you quitter!"
+
+The puncher's face turned a sickly yellow, and he seemed to shrink in
+on himself. His voice sank to a husky whisper: "You can say that, Miss
+Chuckie! Any man say it, he'd be dead before now. If you want to know,
+I've got a mighty good reason for not wanting to go down. It ain't
+that I'm afraid. You can bank on that. It's something else. I'll go
+quick enough--but it's got to be on one condition. You've got to
+promise to marry me."
+
+"_Marry you?_"
+
+"Yes. You know how I've felt towards you all these years. Promise to
+marry me, and I'll go to hell and back for you. I'll do anything for
+you. I'll save him!"
+
+"You cur! You'd force me to bargain myself to you!" she cried, fairly
+beside herself with righteous fury. "I thought you a man! You cur--you
+cowardly cur!"
+
+Gowan turned from her and walked rapidly away along the canyon edge,
+his head hunched between his shoulders, his hands downstretched at his
+thighs, the fingers crooked convulsively.
+
+"Oh!" gasped Genevieve. "You've driven him away! Call him back! We
+need him! He must go for help!"
+
+The words shocked the girl out of her rash anger. Her flushed face
+whitened with fear. "Kid!" she screamed. "Come back, Kid! You must go
+to the ranch--bring the men!"
+
+The cry of appeal should have brought him back to her on the run. It
+pierced high above the booming reverberations of the canyon. Yet he
+paid no heed. He neither halted nor paused nor even looked back. If
+anything, he hurried away faster than before.
+
+"Kid! dear Kid! forgive me! Come back and help us!" shrieked the
+girl.
+
+He kept on down along the canyon rim, his chin sunk on his breast, his
+downstretched hands bent like claws. She ran a little way after him;
+only to flutter back again, wringing her hands, distracted. "What
+shall we do? what shall we do?"
+
+"Be quiet, dear--be quiet!" urged Genevieve. "You've driven him away.
+We must do the best we can. You must go yourself. I can stay and
+watch--"
+
+"No, no!" cried Isobel. "The way he looked at Lafe!--I dare not go! He
+may come back--and I not here!"
+
+She knelt to place her trembling hand on Ashton's forehead.
+
+Genevieve looked at the setting sun. "There is no time to lose," she
+said. "Saddle my horse while I nurse Baby. I cannot take him with me
+down the mountain, in the dark."
+
+"Genevieve! You dare go--at night?"
+
+"Someone must bring help, else Tom--all alone down in that dreadful
+chasm--!"
+
+"But you may lose the way! I will go!"
+
+"No, no, you must stay, Belle. I saw his eyes. He may come back. I
+could not protect Lafayette, but you--There is no other way. I must
+leave Baby, and go."
+
+Wondering at the courage of the young mother, Isobel ran to saddle the
+oldest of the picketed horses. He was the slowest of them all, but he
+was surefooted and steady and very wise. When she brought him down the
+ridge, Genevieve placed the newly fed baby in her arms and went with
+the glasses to peer down the sheer precipices. There in the blackness
+so far beneath her the glowing fire illuminated an outstretched form.
+It was her husband, lying flat on his back and gazing up at the
+heights. Almost she could fancy that he saw her as she saw him.
+
+But she did not linger. Time was too precious. She dropped him a kiss,
+and ran to spring upon the waiting pony. She did not pause even to
+kiss the big-eyed baby. The thirsty pony needed no urging to start at
+a lively jog up the slope of the first ridge. As he topped the crest
+and broke into a lope the sun dipped below the western edge of High
+Mesa. A few seconds later horse and rider disappeared from Isobel's
+anxious gaze down the far side of the ridge.
+
+"Old Buck knows the trail," murmured the girl. "He knows he is headed
+for the waterhole. Yet if--if he _should_ lose the trail!"
+
+A spasm of fear sent her hand to the pistol hilt under the fold of her
+skirt and twisted her head about. She glared along the canyon rim.
+Gowan was still striding away from her. She watched him fixedly, her
+hand clutched fast on the hilt of her pistol, until he disappeared
+around a mass of rocks.
+
+The whinnying of the horses after their companion at last drew her
+attention. They had not been watered since the previous evening.
+Cuddling close the frightened baby, the girl fetched a basin and one
+of the water cans, to sponge out the dusty nostrils of the animals and
+give each two or three swallows.
+
+Then, when she had soothed the fretful child to sleep, she laid him in
+a snug nest of blankets between a rock and a fallen tree, and went to
+watch beside Ashton. He lay as she had left him, in a stupor of sleep
+and exhaustion.
+
+Gradually the twilight faded. Stars began to twinkle in the cloudless
+sky. She watched and waited while the dusk deepened. When she could
+barely see objects a few yards away, she stooped over the unconscious
+man and, putting out all her supple young strength, half dragged, half
+carried him up the slope to a hiding place that she had chosen, in
+under an overhanging ledge. There she spread pine needles and blankets
+on the soft mold and lifted him upon them, so that nothing hard should
+press against his wounds.
+
+The fire had burned low. It was a full hundred yards away from the
+hiding place. She went to replenish it and take a hasty look down at
+that outstretched form in the depths. But soon she stole back to the
+sleeping man under the rock, going, as she had come, by a roundabout
+way in the darkness.
+
+Night settled down close and dense over the plateau. The girl crouched
+beside the sleeper, her eyes peering out into the blackness, the drawn
+pistol ready in her hand. She could see only a few feet in the dim
+starlight. But her ears, accustomed to the dull monotone of the
+booming canyon, heard every sound--the click of the horses' hoofs, even
+the munching of the nearest one, the hoot of the owls that flitted
+overhead, the distant yelps and wails of coyotes.
+
+An hour passed, two hours--a third. She crept around to replenish the
+fire. When she returned she heard the baby fretting. Swiftly she
+groped her way to him and carried him to the hiding place, to quiet
+his outcry. He sucked in a little of the beaten egg and cream that she
+had ready for Ashton. It satisfied his hunger, and he fell asleep,
+clasped against her soft warm bosom. She crouched down with him in her
+lap, her right hand again clasped on the pistol hilt, ready for the
+expected attack.
+
+She waited as before, silent, motionless, every sense alert. Another
+hour dragged by, and another. Midnight passed. Suddenly, on the ridge
+slope above her, one of the horses snorted and plunged. She raised the
+pistol. The horse became quiet. But something came gliding around the
+rocks, a low form vaguely outlined in the darkness. It might have been
+a creeping man. It turned towards the hiding place. The girl found
+herself looking into a pair of glaring eyes. She thrust out the
+pistol, with her forefinger pointing along the barrel. The darkness
+was too deep for her to aim by the sights.
+
+Before she could press the trigger, the beast bounded away, with a
+snarl far deeper, far more ferocious than any coyote could have
+uttered. The girl did not fire. The wolf had seen the glint of her
+pistol barrel and had fled. He would not return. But she shuddered and
+drew the sleeping baby close as she thought of what might have
+happened had she left him alone in the nest between the rock and the
+tree.
+
+The precious, helpless child! He was of her own blood, the son of her
+strong, splendid brother ... of her brother, lying down there in those
+awful depths, helpless--in agony!...
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+
+CONFESSIONS
+
+
+A groping hand touched her arm; bandaged fingers sought to feel who
+she was. Behind her sounded a drowsy incoherent murmur. The snarl of
+the wolf had roused the sleeper from his torpor.
+
+"Hush--hush!" she whispered. "It is all well. I am here by you. Lie
+still."
+
+"Isobel!" he murmured. "Isobel!"
+
+"Yes, dear!" she soothed. "I am here. Rest--go to sleep again. All is
+well."
+
+"All is--?" He roused a little more. "You say--Then he is safe! They
+have brought him up--out of that hell!"
+
+She could not lie outright. "He will soon be safe. By morning help
+will have come to us. As soon as the men can see to go down, they will
+descend for him. They will bring him up the way that you have shown
+us!"
+
+Her voice quivered with pride of what he had done. She drew up his
+hand and pressed her lips tenderly upon the bandages.
+
+Had the caress been a burn, he could not have more quickly snatched
+the hand away. He sought to rise, and struck his head against the
+overhanging rock.
+
+"Where am I? Let me out!" he said.
+
+"No, you must not! Lie still! You must not!" she remonstrated.
+
+"Lie still?" he repeated. "Lie still! with him down there--alone!"
+
+"But it is night--midnight. It will be hours before even the moon
+rises."
+
+"And he down there--alone! Help me make ready. I am going down to
+him."
+
+"Going down? But you cannot! It is midnight!"
+
+"There is a lantern. I shall take that. It will be easier than in the
+daytime, for I shall not see those sickening precipices below."
+
+He sought to creep out past her. She clutched his arm.
+
+"No, no! do not go! There is no need! Wait until they come. You have
+done your share--far more than your share! Wait!"
+
+"I cannot," he replied. "I must go down to him. I have no right to be
+up here, and he still down there."
+
+"You must!" she urged, clinging tighter to his arm. "You may fall. I
+am afraid! I cannot bear it! Do not go! Stay with me--say that you
+will stay with me--dearest!"
+
+"Good God!" he cried, tearing himself away from her, "To let you say
+it--say it to me!"
+
+"Dearest!" she repeated. "Dearest, do not go! There is no need! I
+cannot bear it! Do not go!"
+
+"No need? My God! When I could fling myself over, if it were not for
+him! To have let you say it--to me--to a liar! thief! murderer!"
+
+"Dearest!" she whispered. "Hush! You are delirious--you do not
+know--"
+
+"It is you who do not know!" he cried. "But you shall--everything--all
+my cowardly baseness!" The confession burst from him in a torrent of
+self-denunciation--"That trip to town, when we went to fetch them, I
+lied to you about those bridge plans. It was not true that I found
+them. He handed them to me. He took no receipt. I looked at them and
+saw how wonderful they were. I stole them. My father had threatened to
+cast me off if I did not do something worth while. I was desperate. So
+I stole your brother's plans. I copied them--"
+
+"You know about Tom!" she interrupted. "But of course. You saw me tell
+him, there at the ravine."
+
+"I saw you put your arms about his neck and kiss him; but I did not
+hear--I did not see the truth. I believed--that is the worst of it
+all--I believed it possible that you--_you_--!... That devil Gowan....
+But that is no excuse. Had I not already doubted you.... And I went
+down--down into hell, with only one purpose--to make certain that he
+never should come up again!"
+
+"Dear Christ!" whispered the girl--"Dear Christ! He has gone mad!"
+
+"No, Isobel," he said, his voice slow and dead with the calm of utter
+despair, "I am not mad. I have never been mad except for a little
+while after you put your arms about his neck. No--For years I was a
+fool, a profligate fool, wasting my life as I wasted all those
+thousands of dollars that I had not earned. I turned thief--a
+despicable sneak thief. At last the dirty crime found me out. I
+received a small share of the punishment that I deserved. Then you
+took me in--without question--treated me as a man. God knows I tried
+to be one!"
+
+"You were!--you are!" she broke in. "This is all a mistake--a cruel,
+hideous mistake!"
+
+"I tried to go," he went on unflinchingly. "You urged me to stay. I
+was weak. I could not force myself to leave you."
+
+"Because--because!" she murmured.
+
+"All the more reason why I should have gone," he replied. "But I was
+weak, unfit. I lied to you and won your pity. You gave me the chance
+to stay and prove myself what I am. Down there, when he told me what I
+should have guessed--what I must have guessed had not my own baseness
+blinded me to the truth--when he told me he was your brother, I saw
+myself, my real self,--my shriveled, black, hellish soul. Now you see
+why I must go down again. I can never make reparation for what I have
+done. But I can at least go down to him."
+
+"You take all the blame on yourself!" she protested. "What if I had
+confessed my secret, there at the first, when Tom sprang down from the
+car and I knew him."
+
+"If you had told, then I should not have been tempted to doubt you,
+and I should have gone on, it might have been forever, with that lie
+and that theft between us--and I should not have been forced to see,
+as I now see, my absolute unworthiness of you."
+
+"Of me!" she cried shrilly, and she burst into wild hysterical
+laughter. It broke off as abruptly as it began. "Unworthy of me--of
+me? the daughter of a drunken mother, the sister of a girl who--" A
+sob choked her. She went on desperately: "You have told me all. But
+I--do you not wonder why I kept silent--why I denied Mary by my
+silence? You say you sought to harm Tom--down there. You did not know
+he was my brother. You thought he would harm me. Is it not so?"
+
+"I doubted you!"
+
+"Why? Because I failed to tell the truth. I feared to hurt him--to
+make trouble between him and his rich, high-bred wife. As if I should
+not have known better the moment I saw Genevieve! Dear sister! she
+knows all. But you--Either I should have spoken, or I should have
+hidden all my fondness for him. But I could not hide my love for
+him--and I was ashamed to tell."
+
+"Ashamed--you?"
+
+"We lived in the slums. They told me my father was a big man, a man
+such as Tom is now. He was a railroad engineer. He was killed when I
+was a baby. Then we sank into the slums. My mother--she died when I
+was twelve. There was then only Mary and I and Tom. He could make only
+a little, working at odd jobs. Mary and I worked in a factory. Even
+she was under age. When I was going on fourteen there came a terrible
+winter when thousands were out of work. We almost starved."
+
+"You--starved!" murmured Ashton. "Starved! And I was starting in at
+college, flinging away money!"
+
+"Tom tried to force people to let him work," the girl went on
+drearily. "He was violent. They put him in jail. Soon Mary and I had
+nothing left. There was no work for us. We had sold everything that
+anyone would buy. The rent was overdue. They turned us out--on the
+streets.... I was too young; but Mary.... She found a place where I
+could stay. They were decent people, but hard....
+
+"The weather was bitterly cold. She was taken sick. When the people
+with whom I was staying heard what she had done, they refused to help.
+I begged in the street. I was very small and thin. The--the beasts did
+not trouble me. Then, when Mary was very sick, I met Daddy. I begged
+from him. He did not give me a nickel and pass on. He stopped and made
+me talk--he made me take him to Mary.
+
+"He had her moved to the best hospital.... It was too late.... I also
+had pneumonia. They said I would die. But Daddy brought me home just
+as soon as I could be moved. The railroad was then a hundred miles
+from Dry Mesa. But he kept me wrapped in furs, and all the way he
+carried me in his arms. Do you wonder why I love him so?... That is
+all. You see now why I shrank from telling--why I denied Mary."
+
+"She is in Heaven," said Ashton--"in Heaven, where some day you will
+go. But I--I--" She could see no more than the vague blotch of his
+white face in the darkness, but his voice told her the anguish of his
+look. "He was right--your brother. He told me that we always take with
+us the heaven or the hell that we each have made for ourselves.... I
+have lost you.... You know now why I am going down to do the little
+that I can do."
+
+"You are going down?" she asked wonderingly. "You still say that you
+are going down? Yet I have told you about--Mary!"
+
+"If you were she, I still would be utterly unfit to look you in the
+face. I shall go to the camp for the lantern. There were other gloves
+and some of my clothing."
+
+"They are all here."
+
+"Show me where they are, and get ready the lantern and bandages and a
+sack of food."
+
+"You are going down," she acquiesced. "You are going to Tom. And you
+are coming up with him--to me!"
+
+"That is too much. I doubted you. Where are those things? He is
+waiting down there alone."
+
+"Here is his child, my nephew," she said. "Hold him while I go for
+what you need. Here is my pistol. The man who shot you, who twice
+tried to murder you--he is somewhere up here. He will not harm me. But
+you--If he comes creeping in on you here, shoot him as you would shoot
+a coyote."
+
+"The man who shot me? He is up here?"
+
+"You have seen him every day since that first day I met you," replied
+the girl. "His name is Gowan."
+
+"_Gowan?_"
+
+"Kid Gowan, murderer! I saw his eyes as he looked at you, lying down
+there on the brink. Then I knew."
+
+"But--if he--Where is Genevieve? I cannot go and leave you alone."
+
+"You can--you must! He is a coward. He dare not follow you down that
+terrible place. No harm will come to me if you are gone. But if he
+comes back and finds you--do you not see that if he kills you, he must
+also kill me? But in the morning, when the others come--Oh, why
+hasn't Daddy come? All this long time since you went down into the
+depths, and he not with us! If only he were here!"
+
+"Genevieve?" again inquired Ashton.
+
+"She has gone. She started down the mountain for help when Kid went
+away. I'm so afraid for you, dear! He may be creeping back now--he may
+be waiting already, close by here, in the darkness. But if he has not
+heard our voices, he will go first to where you came up, and then to
+the tent. Keep quiet until I return. Wait; here is cream and egg.
+Drink it all."
+
+When he had drained the bowl that she held to his lips, she crept
+away. Ashton sat still, the warm, soft little body of the sleeping
+baby in his arms, the pistol in his bandaged right hand. In her
+excitement Isobel had forgotten his bound fingers. If Gowan had come
+on him then, he would have put the baby back in under the rock, and
+faced the puncher's revolver with a smile. What had he now to live
+for? He had lost her. She had not yet grasped the baseness of what he
+had thought and done. As soon as she realized ... And he could never
+forgive himself.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+
+OVER THE BRINK
+
+
+Isobel came back to him, noiselessly gliding around through the
+darkness. She set down the bundle she was carrying, and hung blankets
+over the entrance of the little cave. She then lighted the lantern. He
+held out his bound hands. She unbound them enough for him to use his
+fingers, and taking the baby and the pistol, crouched down, with her
+ear close to the screening blankets, while he exchanged his tattered
+clothes for those she had brought to him.
+
+There were also his change of boots and a pair of Blake's gauntlet
+gloves, into which he was able to force his slender fingers without
+removing the remaining bandages. Isobel had already bound up into a
+kind of knapsack the food and clothing and first-aid package that he
+was to take down to her injured brother. He slung it upon his back,
+and whispered that he was ready.
+
+She nestled the baby in the warm blankets on which he had lain,
+wrapped a blanket about the lantern, and led him cautiously down to
+the brink of the chasm. Dark as was the night about them, it was
+bright compared with the intense blackness of that profound abyss.
+The girl caught his arm and shrank back from the edge.
+
+"You will not fall? you are certain you will not fall?" she
+whispered.
+
+"I cannot fall," he answered with calm conviction. "He needs me. I am
+going down to him. Besides, it will be easier with the lantern than if
+I could see below."
+
+"Do not uncover the light until you are down over the edge.--Wait!"
+
+She stooped to knot the rope that he had brought up from the depths,
+to the lariats with which he had been dragged up the last ledges. She
+looped the end about his waist.
+
+"There," she said. "I shall at least be able to help you down the
+first fifty yards."
+
+"God bless you and keep you! Good-by!" he murmured in a choking voice,
+and he hastily crept down to slip over the first ledge of that
+night-shrouded Cyclopean ladder.
+
+"Lafe!" she whispered. "Surely you do not mean to go without first
+telling me--I cannot let you go until--If you should fall! Wait,
+dearest! Kiss me--tell me that you--Oh, if you should fall!"
+
+"I will not fall; I cannot. Good-by!"
+
+The dim white blotch of his face disappeared below the verge. The line
+jerked through the girl's hands. She clutched it with frantic
+strength and flung herself back with her feet braced against a point
+of rock. After a moment of tense straining, the rope slackened, and
+his voice came up to her over the ledge: "Pay out, please. It's all
+right. I've found a crevice."
+
+She eased off on the line a few inches at a time, but always keeping
+it taut and always holding herself braced for a sudden jerk. At last
+the end came into her hand. She had to lie out on the rim-rock and
+call down to him. He called back in a tone of quiet assurance. The
+line slackened. He had cast it loose. The lantern glowed out in the
+blackness and showed him standing on a narrow shelf.
+
+As Isobel bent lower to gaze at him, a frightful scream rang out above
+the booming of the canyon. It was a shriek such as a woman would utter
+in mortal fear. The girl drew back from the verge, her hair stiffening
+with horror. Could it be possible that Genevieve had lost her way and
+was wandering back to camp, and that Gowan--
+
+Again the fearful scream pierced the air. Isobel looked quickly across
+towards the far side of the canyon. She could see nothing, but she drew
+in a deep sigh of relief. The second cry had told her that it was only
+a mountain lion, over on the other brink of the chasm.
+
+When she again looked down at Ashton he was descending a crevice with
+a rapidity that brought her heart into her mouth. Yet there was no
+hurry in his quick movements, and every little while he paused on a
+shelf to peer at the steep slope immediately below him. Soon the
+circle of lantern light became smaller and dimmer to the anxious
+watcher above. Steadily it waned until all she could see was a little
+point of light far down in the darkness--and always it grew smaller
+and fainter.
+
+Lying there with her bosom pressed against the hard stone, her
+straining eyes fixed on that lessening point of light, she had lost
+all count of time. Her whole soul was in her eyes, watching, watching,
+watching lest that tiny light should suddenly shoot down like a meteor
+and vanish in the darkness. Many times it disappeared, but never in
+swift downward flight, and always it reappeared.
+
+Not until the moon came gliding up above the lofty white crests of the
+snowy range did she think of aught else than that speck of light and
+of him who was bearing it down into the black depths. But the glint of
+moonlight on a crystalline stone broke her steadfast gaze. Before she
+could again fix it on the faint point of lantern light a sound that
+had been knocking at the threshold of her consciousness at last made
+itself heard. It was an intermittent clinking as of steel on stone.
+
+She looked around, thinking that one of the horses was walking along
+the ridge slope with a loose shoe. But all were standing motionless in
+the moonlight, dozing. Again she heard the click, and this time she
+located the direction from which it came. She looked at the split rock
+on the edge of the sheer drop. From beside it she had peered down
+through the field glasses at the outstretched form of her brother, far
+beneath in the canyon bottom.
+
+The sound came from that rock. She stared at the side of the
+frost-split fragment with dilated eyes. The crack between the loose
+outer bowlder and the main mass showed very black and wide in the
+moonlight. Could it be possible that it had widened--that it was
+slipping over? And her brother down there beneath it!...
+
+                  *       *       *       *       *
+
+By setting wedge-shaped stones in the top of the cleft rock and prying
+with the crowbar, Gowan had gradually canted the top of the loose
+outer bowlder towards the edge of the precipice. It had only to topple
+forward in order to plunge down the canyon wall. He was working as
+silently as he could, but with a fierce eagerness that caused an
+occasional slip of the crowbar on the rock.
+
+Although the great block of stone weighed over two tons, its base was
+small and rounded, and the mass behind it gave him leverage for his
+bar. Every inch that he pried it forward, the stones slipped farther
+down into the widening crack and held the vantage he had gained.
+Already the bowlder had been pushed out at the top many inches. It
+was almost balanced. The time had come to see if he could not pry it
+over with a single heave.
+
+He did not propose to fall over after the rock. He turned his face to
+the brink, set the end of the bar in the crevice, and braced himself
+to heave backwards on the outer end. He put his weight on it and
+pulled. He could feel the rock give--the top was moving outward. A
+little more, and it must topple over.
+
+Close behind him spoke a voice so hoarse and low-pitched with horror
+that it sounded like a man's--"Drop that bar! drop it!"
+
+With the swiftness of a wolf, he bounded sideways along the rim-rock.
+In the same lightning movement, he whirled face about and whipped his
+Colt's from its holster. His finger was crooking against the trigger
+before he saw who it was that confronted him. The hammer fell in the
+same instant that he twitched the muzzle up and sideways. The heavy
+bullet scorched the girl's cheek.
+
+Above the crashing report rose a wild cry, "Miss Chuckie--God!"
+
+Through the blinding, stinging powder-smoke she saw him stagger
+backwards as if to flee from what he thought he had done. His foot
+went down over the sharp edge. He flung up his hands and dropped into
+the abyss.
+
+She did not shriek. She could not. Her tongue clove to the roof of
+her mouth. Her heart stopped beating. She crumpled down and lay
+gasping. But the fascination of horror spurred her to struggle to her
+knees and creep over to peer down from the place where he had fallen.
+
+Beneath her was only blank, utter darkness. No sound came up out of
+the deep except only that ceaseless reverberation of the hidden river.
+Twelve hundred feet down, the falling man had struck glancingly upon
+the smooth side of an out-jutting rock and his crushed body had been
+flung far out and sideways. It plunged into the rapids below the
+barrier and was borne away down the canyon. But this the girl could not
+have seen even in midday.
+
+She looked for the red star of the distant fire where she knew her
+brother was lying. She could not see it. The point upon which the
+falling man had struck shut off her view. The other side of the split
+rock was where she and Genevieve had looked down through the glasses
+and seen Blake. She failed to realize the difference in the change of
+position. Her horror deepened. She thought that Gowan had hurled
+straight down to the bottom with all the terrific velocity of that
+sheer drop, and that he had plunged upon the fire and upon the dear
+form outstretched beside it, to crush and mangle and be crushed and
+mangled. The thought was too frightful for human endurance.
+
+A long time she lay in a swoon, her head on the very edge of the
+brink. It was the wailing of the hungry, frightened baby that at last
+called her back to life and action. She dragged herself up around to
+the hiding place. The neglected baby was not easy to quiet. The cream
+had soured. There was nothing that she could give him except water.
+All the eggs that were left she had put in the knapsack that Ashton
+was carrying down to her brother. The baby now showed the full reflex
+of his mother's long hours of anxiety and fear. He fretted and cried
+and would not be comforted.
+
+The chill of approaching dawn forced her to rebuild the outburnt fire.
+The warm glow and the play of the flames diverted the child and hushed
+his outcry. Holding him so that he might continue to watch the dancing
+tongues of fire, the girl sat motionless, going over and over again in
+her mind all that had occurred since the tattered, bleeding,
+purple-faced climber had come straining up out of the depths.... It
+could not have happened--it was all a hideous dream.... Would they
+never come? Must she sit here forever--alone!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII
+
+FRIENDS IN NEED
+
+
+Because of the moonlight she did not heed the graying of the east. But
+the whinnying of the picketed horses roused her from the apathy of
+misery into which she had sunk. She stood up and looked along the
+ridge. A small roundish object appeared above the crest--then others.
+They rose quickly--the heads of riders spurring their horses up the
+far side of the ridge.
+
+Singly, in pairs, in groups, the rescuers burst up into view and came
+loping down to her, shouting and waving. In the lead rode her father
+and the sheriff; in the midst Genevieve, between two attendant young
+punchers. In all, there were nearly two dozen eager, resolute men,
+everyone an admiring friend of Miss Chuckie, everyone zealous to serve
+her and hers.
+
+The girl stood waiting beside the fire. She had tried to run to meet
+them and found that she could not move. The suddenness of their coming
+after all that fearful night of waiting seemed to numb her limbs.
+
+They rushed down upon her, waving, shouting questions. Her father, on
+Rocket, was the first to reach her. He sprang off and ran to put his
+arm about her quivering shoulders.
+
+"Honey! it's all right now!" he assured her. "We're here with
+everything that's needed. We'll soon yank him up out of that hole!"
+
+The baby, frightened by the rush and tumult of the off-leaping riders,
+began to scream. Someone took him from the girl's arms and handed him
+to his mother as she was lifted down out of her saddle. Isobel pressed
+her face against her father's sweaty breast.
+
+"Hold on, Miss Chuckie!" sang out one of the men. "Don't let go yet.
+Where's Gowan--Kid Gowan?"
+
+She shuddered convulsively, yet managed to reply: "He--was trying
+to--to roll the rock down. Tom, my brother, is right below it. I heard
+and came to see. His back was to me. I could not shoot--I could not
+raise my pistol. When I spoke, he whirled and shot at me. He--"
+
+"Kid--shot at you?" cried Knowles. "At you? 'Tain't possible!"
+
+"He didn't mean to. He fired before he saw who I was. Then he saw. He
+forgot everything--everything except that he had shot at me. He backed
+off--there--over the edge!"
+
+A sudden hush fell on the excited crowd. One man went to peer down
+from the place to which the girl had pointed. He came back softly.
+"Same place where the last bunch of sheep went over," he said. "Rest
+of us were pretty sick--ready to quit. He kept after them until the
+last ewe jumped. Said they'd gone to hell, where they belonged."
+
+"He's the one that's gone there!" said the sheriff. "Look at the way
+this bowlder is pried loose, ready to roll over! Once heard tell that
+his real dad was Billie the Kid. Some of you mayn't have heard tell of
+Billie. He was the coldest blooded, promiscuous murderer of them days
+when we used to drive from Texas to Montana and the boys used to
+shoot-up towns and each other just for fun. Well, this Kid Gowan has
+got Billie's eyes and slit mouth. Can't say I ever took to him, but
+seeing as how he was a crack-up puncher and Wes Knowles' foreman--"
+
+"That's it! I can't understand it--Kid has been almost like a son to
+me all these years!" complained Knowles perplexedly. He explained to
+his daughter. "You're wondering why I didn't come sooner, honey. Those
+Utes had been let go. We had to follow them up a long ways. When we
+got them back and put them on that trail from the waterhole, they
+found it led straight across the flats to where the horses and wagon
+had stood. There the tracks of the Indian shoes ended, and the tracks
+of shod hoofs led off into the brush. We followed them all the way
+'round to the lower waterhole and up the lower creek to the ranch, and
+there they took us right to Rocket's heels. The Jap said Kid had his
+saddle in the wagon when he came back from town, and he had a new hat.
+Mr. Blake did some hot shooting at that assassin on the hill. So,
+putting two and two together--"
+
+"Oh, Daddy, I know--I knew when I saw him look at Lafe!"
+
+"The--" Knowles choked back the epithet. "Yes, Mrs. Blake told us
+about that--and about her husband! Jumping Jehosaphat! Think of his
+being your brother! You must have been plumb locoed, to keep still
+about that! Why didn't you tell us, honey?--leastways me, your
+Daddy!"
+
+"I--I--But about Genevieve? Tell me. You could have come sooner if
+she--Was she lost? I was sure that pony--"
+
+"Better have given her a fast one. It came on so dark before he was
+half down the mountain that she was knocked out of the saddle by a
+branch. He went on down to the waterhole. She tried to catch
+him--couldn't. Got lost and wandered all around before she got down to
+the waterhole and caught him. We had got to the ranch at dusk, and all
+the posse had turned in for the night. She came loping down the divide
+just after moonrise. We started as soon as we could rake up all the
+picket-pins and rope. Wanted Mrs. Blake to wait and come on later; but
+talk about grit! We simply couldn't make her stay behind."
+
+Isobel thrust herself free from her father's arms and darted out
+through the circle of rugged, earnest-faced punchers and cowmen to
+where Genevieve lay resting with the baby clasped to her bosom.
+
+"Dear! you poor dear!" she murmured, kneeling to stroke the head of
+the weary young mother.
+
+"I shall soon be rested," replied Genevieve. "How about Tom? Have you
+kept watch of him? Has he moved?"
+
+The girl shrank back, unable to face her sister-in-law's eager look.
+
+"No--I--The fire--it--it disappeared, and I could not see."
+
+Genevieve smiled, and the reddening dawn lent a trace of color to her
+pale face. "It was a good sign. He could not have been suffering so
+much. He must have slept, and the fire died down."
+
+"Oh! you think that was it?" sighed Isobel. "I feared--"
+
+She did not say what it was she had feared. As she paused Genevieve
+looked up into her agitated face and asked quickly: "But Lafayette? Is
+he still sleeping?"
+
+"Yes, where's Lafe, honey?" inquired Knowles. "We'll have to roust him
+out to tell us just what way he came up."
+
+"Haven't I told you?" cried Isobel, her head still in a whirl of
+conflicting emotions. Then, as tersely and quietly as her father would
+have related it, she told the bald facts of how Ashton had been
+wakened by the snarl of the wolf, how he had insisted upon going back
+to help her brother, and how he had gone down into the darkness, the
+pack and lantern slung over his shoulder.
+
+"By--James!" vowed Knowles, when she had finished. "Any man on the
+Western Slope say that boy's not acclimated, he'd better look for
+another climate himself."
+
+"Gentleman," the sheriff addressed the exclaiming crowd, "you heard
+tell what the little lady had to say about her husband and this Lafe
+Ashton going down into Deep Canyon, where no man ever went before. Now
+Miss Chuckie has told us again how Ashton climbed up here, where no
+man in this section had a notion anything short of a mountain sheep
+could climb. Well, what does the gritty kid do but turn round and
+climb down again--in the dark, mind you! They're down there now, both
+of them--down in the bottom of Deep Canyon. We called them tenderfeet,
+that day when Mr. Blake honored our county seat by sidetracking his
+palatial car. Boys, down there in that hole are the two nerviest men I
+ever heard tell about. One of 'em has a broken leg. The other has
+broke the trail for us. I ask for volunteers to go down with me and
+yank 'em up out of there. Gentlemen, who offers?"
+
+Instantly the crowd surged forward. Every man shouted, whooped,
+struggled to thrust himself ahead of the others and force the
+acceptance of his services on the sheriff.
+
+"Hold on, boys!" he remonstrated. "Just hold your hawsses. I didn't
+ask for a stampede. You can't all go down. Last man over might get in
+a hurry to catch the first, and start a manslide."
+
+"I vote we set a thirty-year limit," put in one of the younger
+punchers.
+
+This raised a clamor of dissent from the older men.
+
+"Tell you what," shouted another. "Let Miss Chuckie cut out the lucky
+ones."
+
+"That's the ticket--Now you're talking!" Every man shouted approval,
+and fell silent as Isobel sprang up from beside Genevieve.
+
+"Friends!" she exclaimed, her eyes radiant, "it's such times as these
+that makes life grand! I believe six of you would be enough, but I'll
+make it ten. First, I'm going to bar everyone who has a wife or
+children."
+
+"That doesn't include me, honey," hastily protested her father.
+
+"Then you come in the next--none over thirty-five nor under twenty."
+
+A groan arose from some of the youngsters, but the older men took
+their disappointment in stolid silence. She went on with calm
+decisiveness: "Now those of you that have done any considerable
+mountain climbing afoot this summer, please step this way."
+
+Two members of a recently disbanded surveying party, four punchers who
+had tried their luck at prospecting on the snowy range, and three wild
+horse hunters sprang forward in response to the request.
+
+"That's enough," said the sheriff. "I've got to own up to being forty.
+But I'm leading this here posse, and I'll eat my hat if I can't
+outclimb anything on two legs in this county. String out your ropes,
+boys, and pass over all them picket-pins. We'll need a purchase now
+and again, I figure, hauling up Mr. Blake. Hustle! Here's the sun
+clean up."
+
+Under the brusquely jovial directions of their leader, the lucky nine
+divested themselves of spurs and cartridge belts, tied themselves to
+the line at intervals of several feet, and promptly started down the
+dizzy ledges. The others helped them during the first fifty yards of
+descent with the line that Isobel had drawn up after it had been cast
+loose by Ashton. They then gathered along the brink, enviously
+watching the descent of their companions into the shadowy abyss.
+
+Genevieve came to where Isobel and her father crouched beside the
+others. "Thomas will not let me put him down, Belle," she said. "I see
+you left the glasses beside the rock. If Lafayette has reached the
+bottom safely--"
+
+"If--safely!" echoed Isobel. "Daddy, you look--quick, please!"
+
+Knowles hastened to skirt along the brink to where the little field
+glasses lay at the near side of the split rock. The two followed him,
+Genevieve smiling with pleasant anticipation, Isobel trembling with
+doubt and dread. The cowman stretched out on the rim shelf and peered
+over.
+
+"Um-m-m," he muttered. "Can't see anything down there. Too dark yet."
+
+"Look straight below you," said Genevieve.
+
+"Hey?--Uh! By--James! Well, if that ain't a picture now! These sure
+are mighty fine little glasses, ma'am. I can see 'em plain as day."
+
+"Them?--you say 'them,' Daddy?" cried Isobel.
+
+"Sure. Come and look for yourself. Guess Lafe is fixing Mr. Blake's
+leg.--Which reminds me, honey, that before we left the ranch, Mrs.
+Blake had me send for that lunger sawbones that's come to live at
+Stockchute. He'll be here, I figure, before or soon after the boys get
+Mr. Blake up into God's sunshine."
+
+"Brother Tom, Daddy--you mean my Brother Tom!" joyfully corrected the
+girl as she took the glasses.
+
+"Well, you've got to give me time to chew on it, honey. It's come too
+sudden for me to take it all in." He stood up and gazed gravely at the
+smiling mother and her comforted baby. "Hum-m-m. Then that yearling is
+my Chuckie's own blood nephew. Well, ma'am, what do _you_ think of it,
+if I may ask?"
+
+"Can't you make it 'Jenny,' Uncle Wes?" asked Genevieve.
+
+He stared at her blankly. "But I didn't adopt him, ma'am--only her."
+
+"He is the brother of your dear daughter, and I am his wife. Come
+now," she coaxed, "you must admit that brings me near enough to call
+you 'Uncle Wes.'"
+
+"You've got me, ma'am--Jenny. I give in, I throw up the fight. That
+irrigation project now--Chuckie's brother can have anything of mine he
+asks for. Only there's one thing--you've got to make that yearling say
+'Granddad' when he talks to me."
+
+"O-oh!" cooed Genevieve. "To think you feel that way towards him! Of
+course he shall say it. And I--Will you not allow me to make it
+'Daddy'?"
+
+He could not resist her enticingly upturned lips. He brushed down his
+bristly mustache, and bent over awkwardly, to kiss his new daughter.
+
+"Thought you were one of those super-high-toned ladies, m'm--Jenny,"
+he remarked.
+
+The cultured child of millions smiled up at him reproachfully. "What!
+after I have been with you so long, Daddy? But it's true there was a
+time--before Tom taught me that men cannot be judged by mere polish
+and veneer, or the lack of polish and veneer."
+
+Isobel, all her doubts and fears allayed, had risen from the
+precipice's edge in time to hear Genevieve's reply. She added eagerly:
+"Nor should men be judged by what they have been if they have become
+something else--if they have climbed up--up out of the depths!"
+
+"Belle! dear Sister Belle! Then he has proved it to you? Oh, I am so
+glad for you! He has proved to you that he has climbed--to the
+heights."
+
+"To the very heights! I must tell Daddy. Give me Thomas. See, he is
+fast asleep, the poor abused little darling! Go and watch them, and
+our climbers. They are going down like a string of mountain sheep."
+
+Genevieve placed the baby in his aunt's outstretched arms and went to
+look into the abyss through the field glasses. Isobel drew her father
+away, out of earshot of the down-peering group of men. She stopped
+behind the tent, which Gowan had pitched part way up the slope of the
+ridge.
+
+"You want to talk with me about Lafe, honey?" surmised Knowles, as the
+girl started to speak and hesitated.
+
+Her cheeks flamed scarlet, but she raised her shyly lowered eyes and
+looked up at him with a clear, direct gaze. "Yes, Daddy. He--he loves
+me, and I--love him."
+
+"That so?" said Knowles. His eyes contracted. It was his only betrayal
+of the wrench she had given the tender heart within his tough
+exterior. "Well, I figured it was bound to come some day. I've been
+lucky not to lose you any time the last four years."
+
+"You--you do not say anything about him, Daddy."
+
+"Haven't you cut him out of the herd?" he dryly replied. "That's
+enough for me, long as I know he's your choice and is square."
+
+"He has nothing; he is very poor."
+
+"He's got the will to work. He'll get there, with you pushing on the
+reins. That's how I size him up."
+
+"But, Daddy, he told me he had been bad, very bad."
+
+Knowles searched the girl's face, with a sudden up-leaping of
+concern--that vanished as quickly before what he saw in her clear
+eyes.
+
+"Might have expected it of you, honey. You stand by him. You've got
+sense enough to know what it means when a man thinks enough of a girl
+to tell her the wrong things he has done. I was wild, too, when I was
+a youngster. There was a girl I thought enough of to tell. She wasn't
+your kind, honey. It came near sending me to the devil for good. You
+know better. No girl ought to be fool enough to hitch up with a man to
+reform him. But if he has already taken a brace and straightened the
+kinks out of himself, that's different."
+
+"He has come up, Daddy--out of the depths."
+
+Knowles only half caught her meaning. "Sure he climbed up. That proves
+he has the grit and the nerve. He had proved that even better, going
+down at the other place. Put any man down there, and he'd make a try
+to get out. No, the real test was his going back down again. He might
+have come up just for himself. But going down again--that's the proof
+of what's in him; that's what proves he's white!"
+
+"Dear Daddy!... But I'm afraid. He thinks he has been too bad ever
+to--to marry me. I'm so afraid he'll go away and leave me!"
+
+The cowman straightened up, his eyes glinting with righteous
+indignation.
+
+"What! Go 'way and leave you?--when you want him to stay? By--James!
+He's going to stay! Don't you worry, honey. He's going to stay, if I
+have to rope and hogtie him for you!"
+
+The girl stared into the frowning face of her father. There was no
+twinkle in the corner of his eyes. He was absolutely serious. For the
+first time in over two days her dimples flashed. Her eyes sparkled
+with merriment. Her lips parted. But she checked the gay laugh before
+it could burst out.
+
+"Oh!" she reproached herself. "How could I? And they still down
+there--and Tom suffering!"
+
+"Tom?" repeated Knowles. "Thomas Blake--your brother! That's why you
+got me started reading all those reports and engineering journals.
+You guessed it."
+
+"It did not seem possible. Yet I could not help hoping."
+
+"Things do happen our way--sometimes," qualified Knowles. "Mrs.
+Blake--Jenny--says Lafe brought up word that the project can be put
+through. I meant to fight. But now--he is your brother, and he has
+done something no man ever before thought could be done--he has
+surveyed Deep Canyon. He has me beat. I've told Mrs.--Jenny straight
+out."
+
+"I know he will do what is right by you, dear, dear Daddy."
+
+"He's your brother, honey. That settles it."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV
+
+RECLAMATION
+
+
+Even with the mutual assistance that they could give one another, and
+with the certain knowledge that the descent was possible, the rescuers
+had no easy task following the trail "broken" by Ashton. Their very
+numbers prevented them from going down as fast as he had gone. On the
+other hand, those on the upper part of the life-line could steady
+their companions over ledges and down the steeper crevices, while the
+leaders helped the ones who followed by hammering footholds in the
+rock and at the very worst places driving in picket-pins to hold the
+extra ropes brought down for the purpose.
+
+Still, Deep Canyon was Deep Canyon--the ladder it offered was a ladder
+of Titans. Many long hours of waiting passed after the rescuing party
+disappeared among the shadows less than a third of the way down the
+steep-sloping precipices, before they came struggling upwards again
+into view of the anxious watchers on the brink. The sun had circled
+well over into the western sky.
+
+There was yet a thousand feet for the rescuers to clamber, hauling
+and pushing up in their midst the heavy body of the injured engineer.
+All during the first half of the ascent Blake had made the task as
+easy as he could by the strenuous exertion of the great strength still
+left in his arms and his sound leg. But at last the bandages that
+bound his broken leg had chafed in two on the rough ledges; and even
+his iron nerve had not long been able to withstand the torture of the
+twisting break.
+
+He now dangled helpless in the sling by which they had secured him.
+Half the time he was mercifully unconscious; the other half his jaw
+was set rigid and his lips were compressed to stifle his groans of
+agony. Whenever possible Ashton climbed beside him, striving to ease
+the roughness of the ascent.
+
+A full hour before they reached the top, the thin-faced consumptive
+surgeon arrived from Stockchute with his splints and medical case.
+Waited upon by Isobel and Genevieve, he was fully recovered from the
+exertion of his ride when at last the panting rescuers came toiling up
+to the brink.
+
+Eager hands dragged the unconscious engineer to the top and carried
+him to where the surgeon sat waiting. A few of the watchers lingered
+to help the rescuers over the rim; then they, too, hurried away to see
+if Blake had survived that terrible ascent. For the last two hundred
+feet he had looked like a dead man. There was no cheering. Deep Canyon
+had been conquered; but it was yet to be seen whether the victory had
+not been won at a disastrous cost.
+
+The sheriff and his nine men sank down on the grassy slope, gasping,
+outspent. Ashton collapsed in their midst. He was more than outspent;
+he was utterly exhausted. The instant he had seen Blake lifted over
+the rim-rock, he had given way to the strain of his frightful
+exertions. When a man sent by Isobel came hurrying to the rescuers
+with water and coffee, Ashton was unable to move or speak. The man had
+to hold him up and pour the coffee down his throat.
+
+One by one, the sheriff and the others staggered up and went to join
+the silent group about Blake. No one left that circle of watchers.
+They were waiting for the result of the surgeon's efforts to
+resuscitate the unconscious man. It was a desperate fight. But the
+surgeon had won a place in the forefront of his profession before the
+white plague had driven him from New York to this health-giving
+wilderness. He knew all the latest, most wonderful methods of
+resuscitation. And he had for assistants two who loved and were loved
+by his patient.
+
+When at last the announcement was made that the engineer had come out
+of his swoon and probably would live, the sheriff and all the members
+of the posse not employes of Knowles prepared to ride down to Plum
+Creek ranch for the night. The cowman ordered his men to go down with
+the party, to water the horses and bring back food and water for the
+camp. The surgeon had said that his patient could not be moved for
+many days.
+
+But before the party rode off, each man, from the sheriff to the
+youngest of the punchers, came to where Ashton was still lying on the
+grass, and took his limp hand in theirs. They did not grip it, for the
+tattered glove and shredded bandages were wet with blood; nor did they
+put into speech what they thought of him. A gruff word or two of
+fellowship and parting was all they gave him. Yet he saw and knew that
+he had won his place among these reddest blooded of all red-blooded
+men.
+
+When one of his fellow employes came to him, leading Rocket, he sought
+to summon strength enough to rise, but found that he could not even
+turn on his side. He had driven his body to superhuman efforts. He
+must now pay the price. At his request, he was lifted up on Rocket,
+but he could not hold up his head, much less his body. They laid him
+again on the grass, and told Knowles his condition, before they rode
+off.
+
+The cowman fetched the surgeon, who felt the pulse of the exhausted
+man, gave him a pellet, and hastened back to Blake. In a few moments
+Ashton's feeble, racing pulse became calm and slow, the wild whirl of
+his thoughts lulled. He sank into profound slumber.
+
+When he awoke the sun of another day was just clearing the great white
+peaks of the snowy range. He was outstretched on a soft bed of
+blankets spread over a thick layer of pine needles. Above his face
+sloped the roof of a small tent. He had been cared for--but there was
+no one watching at his bedside. He thought he understood, and smiled
+in bitter resignation.
+
+When he moved, racking pains shot through his stiff muscles. Only the
+renewed life that surged through his veins enabled him to turn and
+twist and bend until the pains subsided to a dull aching and he was
+able to command his limbs. His hands were swathed fast in bandages. He
+tore them off with his teeth until the fingers were free enough for
+use. After much effort, he succeeded in forcing his swollen feet into
+his boots.
+
+In the midst Yuki, the Jap cook, appeared before the low entrance of
+the tent and sank down on his knees to set a trayful of food beside
+the occupant. He hissed a pleasant, "Good morning, Mistah Lafe!" and
+was gone before Ashton could reply. The aroma of hot coffee and the
+savory smell of chicken broth forced Ashton to forget all else than
+that he was famished. Besides the coffee and broth, there was a nogg
+of eggs and thick cream slightly flavored with whiskey. He drank one
+liquid after the other with the greediness of a starving man; nor did
+he stop until he had drained the last drop of all three. He could have
+followed with a hearty meal of solids, but the fluids were enough to
+stimulate him to renewed energy.
+
+He crept out of his tent and looked around. Up where they had carried
+Blake from the precipices stood a larger tent. Near it, under a
+low-growing pine, the surgeon lay rolled in a blanket, fast asleep.
+Some distance away, in the other direction, Yuki and two of the ranch
+hands were building a stone fireplace. Beyond them were picketed three
+horses, the nearest of which was Rocket.
+
+Ashton stood up and started rapidly towards the big rawboned horse.
+Within a few yards, however, his pace slackened. He faltered and
+stopped to look back at the larger tent. After a pause, he turned
+about and slowly approached the tent.
+
+As he drew near he heard a murmur of voices barely distinguishable
+above the booming of the canyon. Again he faltered and stopped and
+stood hesitating. The open front of the tent faced at right angles to
+his line of approach. As he hesitated, he saw Isobel's head appear,
+veiled in the loose meshes of her chestnut hair. She looked about
+towards him, and drew back with a startled little cry.
+
+He turned away to go to Rocket. A quick heavy step sounded behind him.
+Knowles had sprung out of the tent and was striding to overtake the
+retreating man.
+
+"Hold on, Lafe," he ordered. "Where you going?"
+
+Ashton faced him with quiet resolution. His eyes were dark with
+misery, but his once lax mouth was strangely like Blake's in its firm
+full lines.
+
+"There's only one thing for me to do, Mr. Knowles," he replied. "I am
+going away. Your daughter will understand why."
+
+"How're you going?" asked the cowman, his face impassive.
+
+"I traded with Miss--Miss Knowles for Rocket. Didn't she ever tell
+you?"
+
+"Don't matter if she did. Rocket wasn't her hawss to trade."
+
+"Then, unless my pony is up here, I shall walk down as far as the
+ranch," said Ashton. He added with bitter humiliation: "It's well I
+have learned about Rocket in time. I've done enough, without adding
+horse thief to the list. I would have started at once, but I could not
+leave until I had asked about Mr. Blake. I wished to thank him for all
+that he has done for me."
+
+"All that he--!" echoed Knowles. "If you want to know, it was a mighty
+narrow squeak. But we pulled him through. He's awake now and says he's
+doing fine. He wants to talk to you."
+
+"I should like very much to do as he wishes, Mr. Knowles, but
+I--cannot bear to--meet her. You may realize that it is hard enough at
+best."
+
+"_Sho!_ If that's all," readily reassured the cowman, "I'll ask
+Chuckie to go out and hide in the bushes."
+
+"But I could not allow that, you know."
+
+"Then I figure you've got to come anyhow. Can't let you go off without
+saying good-by to him and Jenny."
+
+"Jenny?" repeated Ashton.
+
+"It's all in the family now," explained Knowles. "Tom has been telling
+us how he's got that irrigation project all figured out in his head.
+He was saying what he and Jenny had planned to do for us even before
+Chuckie let out her secret. Come on and hear the rest."
+
+"I fear I must ask you to excuse me, Mr. Knowles. I--"
+
+"No, you don't," rejoined the cowman. "After what you've done you
+can't make me believe you're afraid of anything. You'll come and face
+it out before you go."
+
+The misery in Ashton's eyes deepened, and his lips tightened.
+
+"Very well. Since you put it that way, I shall do as you wish, sir."
+
+When he followed Knowles around to the door of the tent, Isobel, who
+was hastily braiding her loose hair, drew back into the far corner and
+averted her face from him. But Genevieve met him with a radiant smile
+and motioned him to kneel down beside her husband.
+
+Blake, with one thick arm crooked about his sleeping son, lay with his
+eyes closed. His big square face was drawn and pallid, but there was a
+smile lurking in the corners of his mouth. As Ashton knelt beside him
+he looked up and lifted his free hand.
+
+"You wouldn't take it--down there," he said.
+
+Ashton flushed. "You know why."
+
+"You'll take it now," said Blake, with quiet confidence.
+
+"I will. I am going away," replied Ashton as he held out his bandaged
+hand.
+
+The big palm closed over it in a clasp as gentle as it was strong.
+
+"No, Lafe. I've got hold of you now. I can't let you go. I need you in
+my business. We're organizing the Belle Mesa Irrigation and
+Development Company.--How do you like my new name for Dry Mesa? Mr.
+Knowles puts in the reservoir site in exchange for water on his other
+land, a tenth share in the company, and a royalty of half the gold we
+placer out of the reservoir bed. As Jenny is to put up all the
+capital, she and I will take the lion's share. That will leave a tenth
+for you and a tenth for Belle."
+
+Ashton sought to draw his hand away. "It is very good of you, Mr.
+Blake. But I cannot accept--"
+
+"Yes, you can. You can't help yourself. Besides, I've an idea a man
+always does better by his work when he has a stake in the undertaking.
+You're to be our Resident Engineer, you know."
+
+"Resident Engineer?" repeated Ashton, paling and flushing. "Mr. Blake,
+I--I--It's impossible that you can mean--"
+
+"Make it 'Tom'! You'll have to brush up on mining engineering, too.
+There's the bonanza."
+
+"Oh, yes, Tom!" exclaimed Genevieve. "Tell him about the gold mine."
+
+"I was going to keep still about it till I had the apex located," he
+said. He looked full at Ashton. "But there's no one here that the
+secret will not be as safe with as it is with me. Besides, it's all in
+the family. I found the vein a thousand feet up the chute of Dry Fork
+Gulch. We will name it the Genevieve Lode. There are six of us here,
+counting Tommy. Each of us gets a sixth interest."
+
+Ashton was now pale. "Mr. Blake--Tom, I cannot! If I were fit to stay
+and work for you--as an axman--anything!--"
+
+Blake's eyes twinkled. "Then your sixth will have to go to Belle."
+
+"Mine too, Tom," hastily put in Knowles.
+
+Blake looked down solemnly at his youthful heir. "Hear that, Tommy?
+Guess we'll have to pull out, too, and make it half and half to the
+ladies." He looked up at Ashton with a swift change from mock to real
+gravity. "We've got to begin by installing a turbine power-plant down
+here. Where will I find another engineer with nerve enough to go down
+these cliffs? I need you, Lafe."
+
+"I am very sorry, Tom." Ashton drew his hand from Blake's wearied
+clasp, and rose.
+
+Isobel slipped past him and stood with her arms outstretched across
+the entrance of the tent. There was a dimple in each of her blushing
+cheeks; her eyes were radiant with tenderness and love.
+
+"No, you can't get away!" she declared. "Don't you see how we've got
+you corralled?"
+
+"That's what," confirmed Knowles. "I promised her to rope and hogtie
+you if you made a break."
+
+Ashton was gazing into the girl's eyes, his own shining with reverent
+adoration.
+
+"Isobel?" he whispered.
+
+"Let us go up on the ridge and look out over our mesa," she murmured.
+
+"Wait a moment, dear," interposed Genevieve. "Lafayette, I wish to
+tell you that as soon as Tom and I return to Chicago, we shall go to
+your father. I feel certain that when he hears--"
+
+"No, no!" begged Ashton. "You must wait. Promise that you will wait. I
+have only begun to make a beginning. Wait until I see if I can--" He
+straightened and looked at Isobel, his head well up, his eyes as
+resolute as his mouth. "Wait until I have proved what I am."
+
+"Come," said Isobel. "We're going to look at our dry mesa that we are
+to reclaim and make into a garden with the waste waters of the
+depths."
+
+
+
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