"No. Why?"

"It was only that I explained to her how I came to be ruined--to lose my fortune. You see, the circ.u.mstances 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,"

a.s.serted 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 Canon 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 t.i.tles 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 Canon, 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 trespa.s.sing 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 Canon."

"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."