Desert Conquest, A. M. Chisholm [best reads .TXT] 📗

to her his conversation was directed.

So much for the simple magic of a white dress. When he had seen her with Dunne, in a dusty riding costume, he had not been especially attracted. He had not thought of her since. Now, she seemed a different person. He liked her level, direct glance, her low, clear voice, the quiet certainty of each movement of her brown hands. Farwell, though his acquaintance with the species was slight, recognized the hall mark. Unmistakably the girl was a lady.

Sheila, listening, felt that her estimate of Farwell needed revision. He was a bigger man than she had thought, stronger, and therefore a more formidable opponent. It seemed to her monstrous, incongruous, that he should be sitting there as a guest and yet be carrying out a project which would ruin them. But since he was a guest he had the rights of a guest.

Afterward she found herself alone with him on the veranda. Her father and brother had gone to the stables, and her mother was indoors planning the next day's housework.

"You smoke, Mr. Farwell?" she said. "I'll get you some cigars."

"I have some in my pocket, thanks."

"No. Talapus cigars at Talapus. That's the rule."

"If you insist on it." He lit a cigar, finding to his relief that it was very good indeed. "Well, Miss McCrae, I must say your hospitality goes the full limit. I'm rather overwhelmed by it."

"What nonsense! Supper, a cigar—that's not very burdensome surely."

"It's the way things are, of course," he explained. "I'm not blind. I know what you were thinking about—what you are thinking now."

"I doubt it, Mr. Farwell."

"Yes, I do. You are wondering how I have the nerve to eat your food and smoke your tobacco when I'm here on this irrigation job."

It was her thought stripped naked. She made a little gesture, scarcely deprecatory. Why protest when he had guessed so exactly?

"I'm glad you don't feel called on to lie politely," said Farwell. "I'm pretty outspoken myself. I don't blame you at all. I merely want to point out that if I weren't on this job some one else would be. You see that. I'm just earning my living."

She was silent. He went on:

"I'm not apologizing, you understand, and I'm not saying anything about the rights of the ranchers or of my employers, one or the other. I don't care about either. I'm just concerned with my own business."

"That is to say, the railway's," Sheila commented.

"I'm trying to point out that I'm a hired man, with no personal interest. But of course I'll do what I'm paid to do—and more. I never saw the time I didn't give full value for every dollar of my pay."

"I don't question it," said Sheila.

"You think I'm talking too much about myself," he said quickly. "That's so. I'm sorry. You people have treated me well, no matter what you thought, and I appreciate it. I've enjoyed the evening very much. I wonder"—he hesitated for a moment—"I wonder if you'd mind my riding over here once in a while?"

"Of course not—if you care to come," Sheila replied. Intuitively she divined that she had interested him, and she guessed by his manner that it was not his custom to be interested in young women. Apart from the ranchers' grievance against the corporation he represented, she had no reason for refusal. She rather liked his downrightness. Casey Dunne had said that he was a bit of a bully, but not a bluff. His extreme frankness, while it amused her, seemed genuine.

"Thank you!" he said. "I don't flatter myself that you want me particularly, and I'm quite satisfied with the bare permission. I'm not entertaining or pleasant, and I know it. I've been busy all my life. No time for—for—well, no time for anything but work. But this little job isn't going to keep me more than half busy. I've done all the hard work of it now."

"I didn't know it was so nearly finished."

"I mean I've been over the ground and over the figures, and I know all that is to be done. Now it's merely a question of bossing a gang. A foreman could do that."

Sheila could find no fault with the last statement. Obviously it was a fact. But the tone more than the words was self-assertive, even arrogant. She was unreasonably annoyed.

"Naturally you consider yourself above foreman's work," she commented, with faint sarcasm.

"I don't consider myself above any work when it's up to me to do it or see it left undone," he replied. "I've held a riveter and driven spikes and shimmed up ties before now. But a concern that pays a first-class man to do third-class work is robbing itself. This is the last time I'll do it. That's how I feel about it."

Sheila was not accustomed to hear a man blow his own horn so frankly. The best men of her acquaintance—her father, Casey Dunne, Tom McHale, and others—seldom talked of themselves, never bragged, never mentioned their proficiency in anything. She had been brought up to regard a boaster and a bluff as synonymous. To her an egotist was also a bluff. His bad taste repelled her. And yet he did not seem to stress the announcement.

"A first-class man should not waste his time," she observed, but to save her life she could not keep her tone free from sarcasm. He took up her meaning with extraordinary quickness.

"You think I might have let somebody else say that? Pshaw! I'm not mock-modest. I am a good man, and I'm paid accordingly. I want you to know it. I don't want you to take me for a poor devil of a line runner."

"What on earth does it matter what I take you for?" said Sheila. "I don't care whether you have a hundred or a thousand a month. What difference does it make to me?"

"None—but it makes a whole lot to me," said Farwell. "I'm interested in my profession. I want to get to the top of it. I'm halfway up, and time counts. And then to be sent down here on this rotten job! Pah! it makes me sick."

"I'm glad to hear you admit that it's rotten," said Sheila. "It's outrageous—a straight steal."

He stared at her a moment, laughed, and shook his head.

"You don't understand me. It's rotten from my standpoint—too trivial to waste time on."

"It's rotten from our standpoint. Can't you get away from your supreme self for a moment? Can't you appreciate what it means to us?"

"I know exactly what it means, but I can't help it. You know—but you can't help it. What are you going to do, anyway?"

"I don't know," she admitted, thinking of her conversation with Casey Dunne.

"You're sure you don't? We heard rumours—I may as well tell you—that the ranchers were prepared to make trouble for us."

"Then you've heard more than I have."

He eyed her a moment in silence. She returned his glance unwaveringly.

"I'm glad to know it," he said at length. "I don't want a row. Now, you people here—on this ranch—why don't you sell and get out?"

She thought it brutally put. "In the first place, we don't want to sell out. And in the next place who would buy?"

"That's so," he said. "I guess you wouldn't find many buyers. Still, if you got the chance——"

Whatever he was about to say was lost in a clamour of wheels and hoofs. Donald McCrae appeared in a buckboard drawn by a light team which he was holding with difficulty. He pulled them to a momentary halt.

"Now, if you're ready, Mr. Farwell. Jump in quick. These little devils won't stand. They haven't had any work for a week. All set? G'lang, boys!"

They started with a rear and a furious rush that flung Farwell back against the seat. In two hundred yards McCrae had them steadied, hitting a gait that fairly ate up the miles.

Farwell sat silent, chewing an unlighted cigar, turning a new idea over and over in his mind. This idea was to arrange for the purchase of Talapus Ranch by the railway's land department. None knew better than he that the taking of their water would mean absolute ruin to the McCraes, as it did to others. For the others he cared nothing. But he told himself that he owed something to the McCraes. They had treated him decently, like a white man. He was under a certain obligation, and here was a chance to return it many thousandfold. Also it would show the McCrae girl that he was no common employee, but a man of influence. He thought he had pull enough. Yes, when he came to think about it, it was a shame that people like the McCraes should lose everything. Nobody but the railway would buy their ranch, under the circumstances. But the railway could do so, and likely make a profit. That would be fair to everybody.

Once Farwell came to a conclusion he was prompt to act. He said, without preliminary:

"McCrae, what do you want for that ranch of yours?"

"It's not for sale now," McCrae replied.

"Everything's for sale at some price," Farwell commented. "What's a fair figure for it? I don't mean what you'll take—but what's it worth?"

McCrae considered.

"There's a thousand acres, and all good. There's no better land in the world. Then there's the buildings and fencing and stock and implements. Hard to say, nowadays. Why, raw land in little patches is selling at fancy figures. I should say as it stands—stocked and all—it's worth a hundred and fifty thousand of any man's money."

"If I can find a buyer at that figure will you take it?"

"No I'm not selling."

"Now, look here," said Farwell, "you say your place is worth one hundred and fifty thousand. That's with plenty of water for irrigation. Say it is. But what's it worth without water?"

"Without water," said McCrae slowly, "the land itself is worth about one dollar an acre. Twenty-five thousand would be an outside price for a crazy man to pay for Talapus."

"Exactly," said Farwell. "McCrae, you'd better let me try to find you a purchaser. For, if you hang on, just as sure as God made little red apples you'll be praying to Him to send you a crazy man."

McCrae was silent for a long minute, his eyes fixed on his horses' ears. "This is the first time," he said, "that it's been put up to me straight. I knew, of course—we all knew—but nobody had the nerve to come here and tell us so."

"Well, I have the nerve," said Farwell. "But I'm not saying it the way you think I am. I'm not talking as an official; I'm talking as a friend—as I'd like a man to talk to me if I were in your fix. I'm trying to get you to stand from under. Here's the situation, as plainly as I can put it: If you can't get water you will be forced to sell, and the best you can get is grazing-land prices. You know that. On the other hand, if you will sell now I think I can get you the price you named. Understand, I'm not doing this for a commission. I don't want one, and I wouldn't take one. I think the railway would buy on my recommendation if I put it strongly enough; and I'd do that for you people because—oh, well, just because I would. Now, there it is, McCrae, and it's up to you."

McCrae eased his team. His big shoulders seemed to droop, as if a heavy weight had been laid upon them. He fought his temptation in the darkness.

"No," he said at last, "I won't sell. But I'm obliged to you all the same. If the railway would buy us all out——"

"No!" snapped Farwell. "So that's why you won't sell. You think your friends will hold out, too. You've got a sort of a pool. It won't do you any good. The rest of them haven't the sand. I'll bet there isn't another man who would turn down such an offer as