CHAPTER XXXVI.
OUT OF THE HOLLOW OF GOD'S HAND.
The first train from Republic to Barba over the new King's BasinCentral arrived in the town by the old Dry River Crossing shortly afternoon. Later in the day Jefferson Worth with his daughter, hissuperintendent and the Seer went to the power plant on the bank of DryRiver.
When the plant was built it was placed as low in the old wash as thedepth of the ancient channel would permit, so that the greatestpossible fall from the Company canal above might be secured. AsJefferson Worth and his companions stood now on the bank of the riverthey saw the waste-way from the turbine wheel that ran the generatorsnearly thirty feet above the bottom of the channel. The flood that hadcut the deep canyons through the heart of the Basin, destroyingKingston on its course, had worked on a smaller scale in the old DryRiver wash, cutting a narrow gorge nearly fifty feet deep from itsoutlet at the new sea past the power plant at Barba and nearly to thespillway of the main canal.
Standing almost on the very spot where they had found the baby girlyears before, the Seer asked Barbara's father: "Jeff, does yourcontract with The King's Basin Land and Irrigation Company call for acertain amount of water, or for water to develop a certain amount ofpower?"
Jefferson Worth answered in his careful, exact voice: "The firstcontract called for water to develop a certain amount of power. Thisnew one is a contract for three hundred inches of water. There'snothing in it about the amount of power, but it gives me the solerights to all the power privileges on the Company property. You see,when Greenfield tried to change the line of their canal so as to cut meout, Abe and I had begun to figure that some day the water from thespillway might cut down the channel and give us a little more drop. Butwe never counted on this, of course. I simply figured that I might justas well make the new contract safe."
The Seer smiled. "You made it safe all right, Jeff. Do you know whatthis cut means to you?"
"In a way, yes. That's why I wanted you to look at it."
"It means," said the Seer, "that you have rights here worth a milliondollars at least. By lowering your turbine to the bottom of this cutyou can, with the same amount of water that you are now using, developpower enough to run every electric light system and turn every wheel inall The King's Basin for years to come."
"You mean that the river breaking in and doing this has made daddy'sproperty worth a million dollars?" asked Barbara breathlessly.
The Seer turned toward her. "Yes, Barbara. The same force thatdestroyed Kingston and wrecked the Company has increased the value ofyour father's holding to fully that amount. A million is veryconservative."
The young woman looked down into the gorge at their feet. Slowly shesaid: "The Indians must be right. This must be indeed La Palma de laMano de Dios. Such things could happen nowhere else."
She had just finished speaking when the sound of wheels behind causedthem to turn toward the desert and the old San Felipe trail. It wasTexas and Pat in the buckboard with El Capitan leading behind.
Catching sight of the group on the river bank, the men turned asidefrom the road and went to them. "Howdy folks," drawled Tex. "We 'lowedwe'd jest about meet up with you-all somewhere about here."
"Sure, 'tis a family reunion we do be havin', wid no empthy chairs atall," declared the Irishman, looking from face to face with twinklingeyes. "Well, well, who'd a thought now that the little kid we foundunder the bank here, shcared av the coyotes an' more shcared av usrough-necks, wud av growed up like this? An' wid me a shwearin' by allthe saints I knew that I wud niver set fut on the disert again. Here weare once more altogether, wid Barbara an' Abe bigger than life. 'Tisthe danged owld disert itsilf that's a-lavin' niver to come back atall." He drew the back of his huge hairy hand across his eyes.
Barbara's eyes too were wet, and the others turned away their faces.Pat's words had recalled so vividly the scene at the dry water holewith the changes that the years had brought both to them and to thedesert.
It was Texas Joe who broke the silence. "Mr. Worth, Pat and I wouldlike to see you some time this evenin' if you ain't engaged."
"What is it, Tex?" As he spoke Jefferson Worth looked straight into theeyes of the old plainsman. Texas Joe, gazing steadily into the face ofhis employer, drawled easily: "Jest a little matter we 'lowed maybeyou'd like to know about, sir. What time shall we come?"
Something--the memories of the place, perhaps, aroused by the words ofPat a moment before--caused Jefferson Worth to lift those nervousfingers and softly caress his chin. "I guess I can go now. We're allthrough here." He turned to the others. "I'll go on to the hotel withTex and Pat and you folks can come along later when you are ready."
He stepped into the buckboard and with the two drove away. At a liverybarn where they stopped to leave the horses, Texas took from under theseat of the buckboard something that was wrapped in a sack that hadheld a feed of grain for the team and El Capitan.
When they had reached the privacy of Mr. Worth's room, the oldplainsman and the Irishman stood as if each waited for the other tobegin.
"Well, men," said Jefferson Worth. "What is it?"
"Go on, ye owld oysther," growled Pat to Tex. "Why the hell don't yetell the boss what we've come to tell him. Shpake up."
Texas Joe cleared his throat and began formally: "I don't reckon, Mr.Worth, that you-all has forgot that outfit we left in them sand hillsback yonder on the old San Felipe trail the time we found the kid."
At the words Jefferson Worth's face became a gray mask from behindwhich his mind reached out as though to grasp what Texas would saybefore the man put it into words. "Well?" The single word came with thecolorless sound of dull metal.
"Also I reckon you know how them big drifts are allus on the move, sothat when they covers up anything, say an outfit like that one, itstands to reason that some day they'll drift on an' leave it clearagain."
Jefferson Worth's hands were gripping the arms of his chair. His graylips could frame no sound.
"I've allus kind a-kept an eye on that there particular ridge,"continued Texas, "an' so to-day me and Pat stopped for a little lookaround an'"--slowly he unwrapped the grain sack from a long tinbox--"an' we found this." He laid the box carefully on the table beforeBarbara's father. "Hit was a-layin' with what was left of a biggerwooden box or trunk, which same had gone to pieces, and there was apart of that old wagon with that same piece of a halter-strap youremember fastened to a wheel. There ain't no sort of doubt, Mr. Worth,that hit's the same outfit an' hits mighty likely that there's papersin here that'll tell us what we tried so hard to find out at first, butwhat"--he paused and looked around, then finished in a low tone--"Idon't reckon any of us wants to know now."
Jefferson Worth sat motionless in his chair, his eyes fixed upon thetin box.
The heavy voice of the Irishman broke the quiet.
"Av Tex wud a listened to raison, Sorr, I'd a-dumped the danged thinginto the river, sayin' nothin' to nobody. Fwhat good can we do rakin'up the past that's dead an' gone? The girl is as much yers as if shewas yer own flesh an' blood, an' who can say fwhat divil's own mess maycome out av this thing? Lave it alone, I say; an' fwhat nobody don'tknow can't hurt thim. 'Twas wrong intirely to bring ut to ye afther allye've been sich a father to the little one. Lave it to me, Sorr. Giveme the word an' I'll"--he reached eagerly for the box, but JeffersonWorth held up his slim, nervous hand.
"Wait a moment, Pat. I--I don't think that would be right."
Never before had these men seen Jefferson Worth hesitate. The will ofthe man, whose cold decision had carried him through so many criticalsituations and upon which the pioneers had relied in the recent time ofperil, seemed to fail him at last. The spectacle told the men moreclearly than words could have done what he suffered. "I--I don't knowwhat to do," he finished weakly. "Give me time. Let me think." He bowedhis face in his hands.
Pat growled an oath under his breath and Texas turned his eyes from hiscompanions to the box and from the box back to his friends inbewildered uncertainty. At las
t he said in his soft southern drawl:"Mr. Worth, hit's dead sure that me an' Pat ain't helpin' you none inthis. I reckon I was all wrong to bring hit to you at all. But hitseemed like I was plumb balled up an' couldn't rightly say what wasbest. There ain't really no call to crowd this thing as I can see.Suppose you takes your time to think it over. Me an' Pat'll let youalone, an' if you decides to fergit all about hit, you can bet yourlast red we'll be damn glad to help. Nobody but us three will everknow. 'T ain't as if it was a-doin' anybody any harm."
Jefferson Worth raised his head. "Thank you boys," he said. "I'll haveto figure on this thing a little."
Left alone, Jefferson Worth faced the temptation of his life. Dearer tothis lonely-hearted man than all the wealth and power that he wouldrealize from his King's Basin work was the child who had come to himout of the desert. The man knew that it was the influence of Barbaraupon his life that had prepared him for that night in the sand hillsand enabled him rightly to weigh and measure and value the efforts ofhis kind. That afternoon at the power house it had all been broughtbefore him with startling vividness. He felt that in all that he hadaccomplished in Barbara's Desert he had been led by the child, who hadcome to him out of The Hollow of God's Hand. The desert had given herto him; he had given himself in return to the work she loved. He couldnot think of his work apart from her. She was his--his--his. His graylips whispered the words as he stood looking down at the box. No onehad the right to take her from him; to come into her life. And yet--andyet. He reached out and laid his hand upon the box, then, turningagain, paced the room.
Suddenly he whirled about and approached the table. With cold fury heseized the box and placing it upon the floor, broke the light tinfastening with his boot-heel. Again he paused and looked dully at thething in his hands. Then with a quick motion lie threw up the cover.The box was filled with documents and letters, with four or five oldphotographs.
The address on a large unsealed envelope met his eye and he startedback with a low cry as though he had looked upon some startlingapparition.
When Barbara with the Seer and Abe returned to the hotel that eveningthe clerk gave her a note from her father who, the note explained, hadbeen called to Republic on business of importance. He would be backto-morrow.
The clerk said that Mr. Worth had left only a few minutes before withthe engine and car that had brought them to Barba that morning.
The Winning of Barbara Worth Page 38
