"By leaving camp at nine-thirty you will meet the north-bound limited at Grafton, sir."

"Then, Crosby, we will stay here until that hour. But where shall we dine?"

"It will be a pleasure to Mrs. Burford and myself if you and Mr.

Crosby will dine with us at our cabin," interposed Burford eagerly.

The stout potentate graciously accepted, and Burford fled to break the news to Sally Lou.

"Mercy, Sally Lou, how can you manage it!" cried Marian, as Burford popped his head through the window, shouted his news, then hastily departed. "How on earth can you entertain such high mightinesses?"

"Well, I should hope that I could give them one meal at least."

"But you haven't enough dishes. That is, you haven't cups that match----"

"Cups that match, indeed! H'm. They can be thankful to get any cups at all in this wilderness. I've promised Mammy Easter my pink beads if she'll make us some beaten biscuit, and I have sent Mulcahy to Mrs.

Gates's for three chickens, and I'll open two jars of my white peach preserve. I don't care if they're the Grand Mogul and the Czar of all the Russias, they can surely condescend to eat Mammy's fried chicken."

"Yes, they'll be sure to like chicken," conceded Marian.

"They'd better like it. It's all they're going to get. Chicken and potatoes and biscuit, preserves and coffee, that's all. Yes, and lashin's and lavin's of cream gravy. It'll be fit for a king. Even his Highness, the acting president, won't dare complain!"

If any complaints as to Sally Lou's hospitality were spoken, they were not audible to the human ear. As Roderick said afterward, it was fortunate that n.o.body kept the beaten biscuit score; while one grieves to relate that in spite of Sally Lou's generous preparation, poor Mammy Easter was obliged to piece out an exceedingly skimpy meal from the fragments of the supper, instead of the feast that she had antic.i.p.ated. Even the pink beads proved a barely adequate consolation.

The hour that followed, spent before the Burfords' tiny hearth-fire, was the best of all. For a while, the men worked over the ma.s.s of blueprints that recorded the excavation made during the month past.

Here President Locke, the magnificent figure-head, gave way, promptly and meekly, before Crosby's wider experience. Roderick and Burford listened, all ears, to the elder man's shrewd illuminating comment, his quiet suggestion, his amused friendly sympathy. Both groaned inwardly when the launch whistled from below, a warning that their guests must be off to meet the north-bound train.

President Locke bowed over Sally Lou's hand with majestic courtesy.

"A most delightful hour you have given us, Mrs. Burford. We shall remember it always and with deep pleasure. But one thing is lacking in your hospitality. You have not given us the special pleasure of meeting your young sons."

Then Sally Lou, the poised stately young hostess, colored pink to her curly fair hair.

"It is high time that my sons were sound asleep," said she. "But if you really wish to see them, and can overlook their informal attire, Mammy Easter shall bring them in."

In came two small podgy polar bears, wide-eyed at the marvel of company, and up-at-Nine-o'clock, dimpling, crimson-cheeked. Roderick and Burford stood gaping, to behold their august superiors now stooping from their heights to beguile small Edward and shy Thomas Tucker with clumsy blandishments.

"_Where_ did you learn to handle a baby like that?" gasped Sally Lou, so astonished at Mr. Crosby's dexterous ease that she forgot all convention.

"Six of my own," returned the eminent engineer, capably shifting small, slippery Thomas Tucker on his gaunt shoulder. "All grown up, I regret to say. My baby girl is a junior at Smith this year. Try him.

Isn't he a stunner for a year old?" He plumped the baby into the arms of the lordly president, who was already jouncing Edward Junior on his knee and showing him his watch.

"A whale," approved President Locke, with impressive emphasis. He stood up, gaining his footing with some difficulty; for both the babies were now clambering over him delightedly, while Finnegan yapped and nipped his ankles with cordial zest. "I wish we might spend another hour with these most interesting members of your household, Mr. Burford." His stern, arrogant face was beaming; he was no longer the exacting official, but the gracious, kindly gentleman. "Since we must go, we will leave behind us our good wishes, as well as our thanks for your most charming hospitality. And we will take with us"--his eye sought Mr. Crosby's; there pa.s.sed between the two men a quick, satisfied glance--"we shall take with us our hearty certainty that these good wishes for your husband's work, as well as for his household, will be abundantly fulfilled."

In the flickering torchlight of the landing Roderick and Ned watched their launch start away. Then they looked at each other.

"Well! Do you feel like tackling your job again, Burford?"

"Feel like tackling it!" Ned chuckled, softly. "When I know they're going to give their executive committee a gilt-edged report of our company and its work! When Crosby himself said that we were the right men on the right job! Feel like tackling it? Give me a shovel and I'll tackle the Panama Ca.n.a.l."

CHAPTER XI

A LONG PULL AND A STRONG PULL

"What is the latest bulletin, Sally Lou?"

Ned Burford, hot, muddy, breathless, ran up the martin-box steps and put his head inside the door.

Sally Lou sat at Ned's desk, her brown eyes intent, her cheeks a little pale. A broad map lay spread before her. One hand steadied small Thomas Tucker, who clung against her knee. The other hand grasped the telephone receiver.

"What's the news, I say? Doesn't central answer? Wires down again, do you s'pose?"

"Yes, central answered, and we reached the operator at Bates Creek an hour ago. She says that the smaller streams below Carter's Ford have not risen since daybreak, but that Bates Creek itself has risen three inches in the last four hours."

"Whew! Three inches since morning! That sounds serious. What about Jackson River?"

"Below Millville the Jackson has flooded its banks. Above Millville the men are patrolling the levees and stacking in sand bags and brush to reinforce the earthwork."

"That means, another crest of water will reach us to-morrow, early.

Well, we are ready to face it, I'm thankful to say." Ned settled back in his big chair with a sigh of relief. "That is, unless it should prove to be more than a three-foot rise. And there is practically no danger that it will go beyond that stage. Our upper laterals are excavated to final depth. Our levee is growing like magic, and Hallowell is putting in splendid time on the lower laterals with the big dredge. So we needn't worry. As soon as he finishes all the lateral excavation, he will bring the dredges down to the main ditch and start in to deepen the channel to its final depth. When that second excavation is done, the channel will allow for a six-foot rise.

That channel depth, of course, will put us far out of any danger of overflow. Then when the June floods come, the creeks can rise four inches or forty inches if they like. We won't care."

Sally Lou looked sharply at his grimy, cheerful face. Her own did not reflect his contentment. She put down the receiver and bent frowning over the map. Her pencil wandered over the maze of fine red lines that marked the excavation.

"Hallowell and I had nothing but bad luck on this contract until two weeks ago, when Locke and Crosby came on their inspection tour," Ned went on serenely. "But since their visit, we've had two solid weeks of the best fortune any engineer could ask. It has been almost too good; it's positively uncanny. Not a break in the machinery; only one cave-in, and that a trifle; not a solitary quarrel among the laborers--the shifts have moved like clock-work. It was Crosby's doing, I suppose. His coming heartened us all up; all of us; even to the dredges themselves. Though, on my word, Sally Lou, I'm almost afraid of such unchanging good luck. It's no' canny."

Sally Lou turned to him suddenly. Her fingers tapped the desk with nervous little clicks.

"Listen, Ned. Have you finished the upper laterals? Are they safe, no matter how high the water may rise?"

"N-no. They are excavated, but the bank is nothing but heaped mud, you know. Still, it would stand anything short of a flood."

"What about the lower laterals?"

"Same state of affairs there. Only that the two lowest ditches aren't cut at all. Why?"

Sally Lou swung round in the desk chair and faced her husband. Her eyes were very dark and anxious now.

"One more question, Ned. Could the work stand a three-foot rise?"

Ned stared.

"A three-foot rise? No, it could not. A three-foot rise would stop our levee-building. A rise of four feet or more would put us out of the game. We'd be washed out, smashed, ruined. But why do you ask such questions? What makes you imagine----"