"When you put me first and the ca.n.a.l second, why, who knows what I may think then?" she said, tantalizingly. "But to esteem an irrigation ditch before me, the idea! What if you had to choose between us?" And she continued thus to tease him, fanning the fires hotter in his breast.

By the end of August Bryant had completed the survey of the ca.n.a.l line down to a point where it touched the northern boundary of the ranch, tapping the latter's system of distributing ditches. Pinas River, Perro Creek, and the tract to be watered were thus united. Though later, doubtless, it would be necessary to make minor corrections, as always, the surveying was finished. One tracing showed the entire irrigation scheme from the dam on the Pinas to the tips of the laterals branching out in a gridiron over the land. There were other tracings, too, on a larger scale and of successive sections, ready to be taken to Kennard in order to make blueprints.

"Town for us to-morrow, Dave," Lee exclaimed one day, as he rolled and tied his maps in a waterproof canvas. "We're due for a rest; our job is done for the present. We'll leave the instruments and note-books with the girls at Sarita Creek, who've agreed to keep them until we return. The Mexicans are still hanging around."

Toward the middle of the afternoon they appeared at the cabins, where they disengaged d.i.c.k from his burden of freight and turned him out to graze. Imogene was nursing an obstinate headache in her darkened bedroom, and Dave immediately settled himself under a tree with a novel of the girls'. So Ruth and Lee were left to themselves.

"I'm going up the creek to gather raspberries, and you came just in time to carry the basket," said she. "I discovered a large thicket of them half way up the canon; the more you pick, the more you'll have for supper to-night. And if you don't bring Imo and me a box of chocolates, and a big box, when you come back from wherever you're going to-morrow, you need never show your lean brown face again at our doors! I'm dying for some. Oh, Lee, I really am. They help so when one's lonely."

The pathetic tone in which she uttered the final words sent Bryant off in a fit of laughter.

"You may count on them," he said, at length.

"Your heart's of stone to laugh like that. Bonbons _do_ help when one is low-spirited."

Nevertheless, her spirits were high enough on this afternoon. All the while that they were gathering raspberries she kept up a lively chatter, and when Lee suggested, now that the basket was full, leaving it at the spot and making an excursion to the head of the gorge, she readily a.s.sented. The sun was still far from setting; the air between the rocky walls was pleasant; and the canon held forth a fresh enticement. They walked for an hour, and though they failed to gain the end of the long mountain crevice they ascended to where the springs that fed the brook had their source, and where the rivulet trickled over ledges and among boulders, finding themselves in the heavy timber that forested the upper mountains. There they sat on a rock, Ruth holding the wild flowers she had plucked on the way, and talked.

"Does your going now have to do with your project?" she questioned.

"Yes; I've finished the preliminary work."

"But Charlie Menocal said you were making no progress, that you were blocked."

"What Charlie doesn't know would fill lots of s.p.a.ce," Lee said. "In spite of the Menocals' opposition and tricks, I've established my survey--but don't breathe it yet! And now I'm ready for the financing of the scheme. When that's done, I'll begin actual work."

Ruth considered him with shining eyes.

"I'm glad you succeeded; I knew you would succeed," she exclaimed.

"You've worked so hard. And I hope that it makes you famous and wealthy."

"So do I," he laughed. "I need the money."

She nodded.

"One needs money to be happy in this world."

"Oh, I don't know about that," he responded, thoughtfully. "I've probably been as happy while hammering out this survey as I'll ever be, that is, happy in my work. Of course, money means comforts and luxuries. But I doubt if it really ever brings contentment."

The obstinate touch grew in her chin.

"If I had plenty of money I'd have the contentment, or I'd soon find it," she declared. "Pretty clothes, and fine furniture, and automobiles, and servants, and parties, and so on, are things--at least with women--that go a long way toward satisfaction. I sometimes don't blame girls who marry rich old men; they can put up with them for the pleasures their money will procure."

"Ruth, Ruth, don't utter such nonsense! At any rate, you've too much common sense ever to waste yourself on a doddering money bags."

"I'll never have the chance," said she. "But if I had, I'd think it over carefully. A young man with money I could be especially nice to, and I might even set out to catch him. You see, I'm quite frank and open about it."

"Nonsense," he repeated. "You'd marry no one just for his money."

"That depends whether or not he caught me at a moment when I was feeling sick of everything and reckless. Look at my hands, all calloused from work. If I have to work, I shall do it for myself; not marry to work."

Bryant lifted her hands and regarded them.

"They please me immensely as they are; they're lovely hands," he a.s.serted.

"Then your vision is poor."

"It's clear enough when I look at you, Ruth. And when you talk as you have, I become impatient because I know you don't mean it. But nonetheless, you deserve the best that any man can give, and you ought to have all the comforts and pretty things any woman has, for you're too sweet and good for a bare, commonplace life." He pressed gently the fingers he yet retained. "I told you once that you had bewitched me. It was true; I am bewitched, have been ever since I touched your dear lips. And I love you. It hurts my heart to think of you at this homesteading business--"

"What else was there for me?" she asked. "I've had no business training, nothing but two years in a college, no knowledge of anything that a girl needs to hold a position. And I'm not even a good homesteader." Her tone rang with a trace of bitterness.

"You ought not to have to do it--and you shall not, Ruth, if I have my way. I want to save you from it, and make life pleasant and happy for you. The money I have now is little, but I'm going ahead; I'm going ahead, and nothing shall stop me, I tell you. Soon I shall have ample means. Within a year or two. Already I've told you I love you, though this you must have known, for I've made no effort to conceal my love.

To me you're the dearest, sweetest girl in the world; and all I ask is the chance to strive and toil for you, and make a home for you, and relieve you of anxiety and care, and have you for a joyous companion and mate."

Ruth closed her hands on his, while her eyes grew wet.

"You mean it, Lee?"

"Ah, I do, I do! I love you; I hold you dearer than anything in the world."

The smile she gave was tender, trustful.

"I believe you," she said.

She yielded to his arms. Her head fell back upon his shoulder and her look lifted to his blissfully. When he kissed her a thrill of pa.s.sionate desire answered, as when on that fragrant evening in the canon he first had fiercely pressed her lips. This was happiness--happiness. If it could but last forever!

"And my love is yours, too, Lee," she exclaimed, so earnestly that he felt his heart quiver. "I want to be happy; I want to be loved; I don't want to live a life of just dreary commonplaceness, alone, uncared for, with no outlook, with no prospect of joys. I want the most there is in happiness--every girl wants that; and this monotonous existence has been robbing me, stifling me, until sometimes I've been wild enough to leap off a high rock. But now!"

Bryant's arms went closer about her.

"It shall be different now," he murmured.

"Yes, yes; it must, it shall. There's no sense in people not being happy when the world was made for that very purpose."

"Whenever you say, we'll be married," Lee stated.

Ruth was silent for a time, considering this. It, indeed, left her a little startled.

"But it mustn't be too soon," she replied, at last. "We had best go on as we are while your project is being started, for I wouldn't be so selfish as to make a command on your time at a critical moment, Lee dear. And I must plan clothes and things. Knowing that happiness is ahead of us, oh, homesteading then will be only a lark! I'll never need follow it up, but just abandon it when we're ready. Kiss me again, Lee, and then we must start back."

They retraced their steps down the canon, obtaining the basket of berries on the way. Once, as they neared the cabins, Ruth paused, gazing at her lover.

"I had actually come to hate these claims," she said. "I felt chained to the spot, as if something would keep me in the miserable place for the rest of my life. Had I known how lonely I should be here, I never would have come."

"But that's over now, Ruth. A little while longer, that's all."

She gazed at him with an odd, intent, anxious expression upon her countenance.

"You'll not let your irrigation project keep you here always?" she asked. "Or live in other places like it? These mountains and this desolate mesa get on my nerves. If I thought you were going to stay away from other people, foregoing all the pleasures of cities and the like, I think I should lose my courage and not be able to love you enough to stand it. I want you most of all, but shall want other things, too."