CHAPTER XVI
METAL AND METTLE
At dawn Blake and Ashton drove up to the waterhole on Dry Fork withtheir camp equipment. There they left the outfit in the buckboard andproceeded with the line of levels on up the creek bed into the gorgefrom which it issued.
For more than a mile they carried the levels over the bowlders of thegradually sloping bottom of that stupendous gash in the mountain side.So far the work was fairly easy. At last, however, they came to theplace where the bed of the gulch suddenly tilted upward at a sharpangle and climbed the tremendous heights to the top of High Mesa insheer ascents and cliff-like ledges. Blake established a bench-mark atthe foot of the acclivity, and came forward beside Ashton to peer upthe Titanic chute between the dizzy precipices. From where they stoodto the head of the gulch was fully four thousand feet.
"What do you think of it?" asked the engineer.
"I think this is where your line ends," answered Ashton, and he rolleda cigarette. He had been anything but agreeable since their start fromthe ranch.
"We of course can't go up with the level and rod," said Blake, smilingat the absurdity of the suggestion. "Still, we might possibly chain itto the top."
Ashton shrugged. "I fail to see the need of risking my neck to climbthis goat stairway."
"Very well," agreed Blake, ignoring his companion's ill humor. "Kindlytake back the level and get out the chain."
Ashton started off without replying. Blake looked at the young man'sback with a regretful, half-puzzled expression. But he quicklyreturned to the business in hand. He laid the level rod on a rock andinclined it at the same steep pitch as the uptilt of the gorge bottom.Over the lower end of this he held a plumb bob, and took the anglebetween the perpendicular line of the bob-string and the inclined lineof the rod with a small protractor that he carried in his notebook.The angle measured over fifty degrees from the horizontal.
Having thus determined the angle of inclination, the engineer picked alikely line of ascent and started to climb the gulch chute. He went upin rapid rushes, with the ease and surefootedness of a coolheaded,steel-muscled climber. He stopped frequently, not because of wearinessor of lack of breath, but to test the structure and hardness of therocks with a small magnifying glass and the butt of his pocket knife.
At last, nearly a thousand feet up, his ascent was stopped by a sheerhundred-foot cliff. He had seen it beetling above him and knewbeforehand that he could not hope to scale such a precipice; yet heclambered up to it, still examining the rock with minute care. As hewalked across the waterworn shelf at the foot of the sheer cliff, hiseye was caught by a wide seam of quartz in the side wall of thegulch.
Going on over to the vein, he looked at it in several places throughhis magnifying glass. Everywhere little yellow specks showed in thesemi-translucent quartz. He drew back across the gorge to examine thetrend of the vein. It ran far outward and upward, and in no place wasit narrower than where it disappeared under the bed of the gorge.
His lips pursed in a prolonged, soundless whistle. But he did notlinger. Immediately after he had estimated the visible length and dipof the seam, he began his descent. Arriving at the foot withoutaccident, he picked up the level rod and swung away down the gulch.
He saw nothing of Ashton until he had come all the distance downacross the valley to the dike above the pool. His assistant was in thegrove below, assiduously helping Miss Knowles to erect a tent that thegirl had improvised from a tarpaulin. Genevieve and Thomas Herbertwere interesting themselves in the contents of the kit-box. The twoladies had ridden up to the camp on horseback, Isobel carrying thebaby.
When Blake came striding down to them, the girl left Ashton and ranto meet him, her eyes beaming with affectionate welcome.
"What has kept you so long?" she called. "Lafe says the gulch isabsolutely unclimbable. I could have told you so, beforehand."
"You are right. I tried it, but had to quit," replied Blake, engulfingher outstretched hand in his big palm.
When he would have released her, she caught his fingers and held fast,so that they came down to his wife hand in hand. Oblivious of Ashton'sfrown, the girl dimpled at Mrs. Blake.
"Here he is, Genevieve," she said. "We have him corralled for the restof the morning."
"Sorry," replied Blake, stooping to pick up his chuckling son. "Wecan't knock off now."
"But if you cannot continue your levels?" asked his wife. "From whatLafayette told us, we thought you would not start in again until afterlunch."
"No more levels until tomorrow," said Blake. "But I must settle one ofmy big 'ifs' by night. To do it, Ashton and I will have to go up onHigh Mesa and measure a line. There's still two hours till noon. We'llborrow your saddle ponies, Miss Chuckie, and start at once, if Jennywill put us up a bite of lunch."
"Immediately, Tom," assented Mrs. Blake, delighted at the opportunityto serve her big husband.
"When shall we take Genevieve to see the canyon?" asked the girl. "I amsure she can ride up safely on old Buck."
"We have only the two saddle horses today," replied Blake. "If ourmeasurement settles that 'if' one way, I shall start a line of levelsup the mountain tomorrow morning, if the other way, any irrigationproject is out of the question, and we shall go up to the canyon merelyas a sightseeing party."
"Ah!" sighed the girl. "'If!' 'if'--I do so hope it turns out to bethe last one!"
Blake looked at her with a quizzical smile. "Perhaps you would not,Miss Chuckie, if you could see all the results of a successful watersystem."
"You mean, turning our range into farms for hundreds of irrigationists,"she replied. "I suppose I am selfish, but I am thinking of what itwould mean to Daddy. Just consider how it will affect us. For yearsthis land has been our own for miles and miles!"
"Well, we shall see," said Blake, his eyes twinkling.
"Yes, indeed!" she exclaimed. "Lafe, if you'll help me saddle up andhelp Mr. Blake rush up to do that measuring, I'll--I'll be ever sograteful!"
Though all the more resentful at Blake over having to leave hercompany, Ashton eagerly sprang forward to help the girl saddle theponies. When they were ready, she filled his canteen for him and tooka sip from it "for luck." Genevieve had packed an ample lunch in agamebag, along with her husband's linked steel-wire surveyor's chain.
Ten minutes after Blake's arrival, he handed the baby to its motherand swung into the saddle. Ashton had already mounted, fired by a kindglance from the girl's forget-me-not eyes. In his zeal, he led the wayat a gallop around the craggy hill and across the intervening valleyto the escarpment of High Mesa. Had not Blake checked him, he wouldhave forced the pace on up the mountain side.
"Hold on," called the engineer. "We want to make haste slowly. Thatbuckskin you're on isn't so young as he has been, and my pony has tolug around two hundred pounds. We'll get back sooner by beingmoderate. Besides you don't wish to knock up old Buck. He is about theonly one of these jumpy cow ponies that is safe for Jenny."
"That's so," admitted Ashton. "Suppose you set the pace."
He stopped to let Blake pass him, and trailed behind up the mountainside. He had headed into a draw. The engineer at once turned and beganzigzagging up the steep side of the ridge that thrust out into thevalley between the draw and the gulch of Dry Fork. At the stiffestplaces he jumped off and led his pony. None too willingly, Ashtonfollowed the example set by his companion. There were some placeswhere he could not have avoided so doing--ledges that the oldbuckskin, despite his years of mountain service, could hardly scrambleup under an empty saddle.
Long before they reached the point of the ridge, Ashton was pantingand sweating, and his handsome face was red from exertion and anger.But his indignation at being misguided up so difficult a line ofascent received a damper when he reached the lower end of the ridgecrest. Blake, who had waited patiently for him to clamber up the lastsharp slope, gave him a cheerful nod and pointed to the long butfairly easy incline of the ridge crest.
"In mountain climbing, always take your stiffest gr
ound first, whenyou can," he said. "We can jog along pretty fast now."
They mounted and rode up the ridge, much of the time at a jog trot.Before long they came to the top of High Mesa, and galloped across toone of the ridges that lay parallel with Deep Canyon. Climbing theridge, they found themselves looking over into a ravine that ran downto the right to join another ravine from the opposite direction, atthe head of Dry Fork Gulch. Blake turned and rode to the left alongthe ridge, until he found a place where they could cross the ravine.The still air was reverberating with the muffled roar of Deep Canyon.
From the ridge on the other side of the ravine, they could look downbetween the scattered pines to the gaping chasm of the stupendouscanyon. But Blake rode to the right along the summit of the ridge untilthey came opposite the head of Dry Fork Gulch. Here he flung the reinsover his pony's head, and dismounted. Ashton was about to do the samewhen he caught sight of a wolf slinking away like a gray shadow up thefarther ravine. He reached for his rifle, and for the first timenoticed that he had failed to bring it along. In his haste to startfrom camp he had left it in the tent.
"_Sacre!_" he petulantly exclaimed. "There goes twenty-five dollars!"
"How's that?" asked Blake. He looked and caught a glimpse of the wolfjust as it vanished. "Why don't you shoot?"
"Left my rifle in camp, curse the luck!"
"Keep cool," advised Blake. "It's only twenty-five dollars, and youmight have missed anyway."
"Not with my automatic," snapped Ashton. "You needn't sneer about themoney. You've seen times when you'd have been glad of a chance at halfthe amount."
"That's true," gravely agreed the engineer. "What's more, I realizethat it is far harder for you than it ever was for me. I want to tellyou I admire the way you have stood your loss."
"You do?" burst out the younger man. "I want to tell _you_ I don'tadmire the way you ruined me--babbling to my father--when youpromised to keep still! You sneak!"
Blake looked into the other's furious face with no shade of change inhis grave gaze. "I have never said a word to your father against you,"he declared.
"Then--then how, after all this time--?" stammered Ashton, even in hisanger unable to disbelieve the engineer's quiet statement. He wasdisconcerted only for the moment. Again he flared hotly: "But if youdidn't, old Leslie must have! It's all the same!"
"No, it is not the same," corrected Blake. "As for my father-in-law,if he said anything about--the past, I feel sure it was not withintention to hurt your interests."
"Hurt my interests! You know I am utterly ruined!"
"On the contrary, I know you are not ruined. You have lost a largeallowance, and a will has been made cutting you off from a great manymillions that you expected to inherit. But you have landed square onyour feet; you have a pretty good job, and you are stronger andhealthier than you were."
"If you break up Mr. Knowles' range with your irrigation schemes, Istand to lose my job. You know that."
"If the project proves to be feasible, I shall offer you a position onthe works," said Blake.
"You needn't try to bribe me!" retorted Ashton. "I'm working for Mr.Knowles."
"Well, he directed you to help me with this survey," replied theengineer, with imperturbable good nature. "The next move is to chainacross to the canyon."
He pulled his surveyor's chain from the bag and descended the ridge toan out-jutting rock above the head of the tremendous gorge in themountain side. Ashton followed him down. Blake handed him the frontend of the chain.
"You lead," he said. "I'll line you, as I know where to strike thenearest point on the canyon."
Ashton sullenly started up the ridge, and the measurement began. AsBlake required only a rough approximation, they soon crossed the ridgeand chained down through the trees to the edge of Deep Canyon. Ashtonwas astonished at the shortness of the distance. The canyon at thispoint ran towards the mesa escarpment as if it had originally intendedto drive through into Dry Fork Gulch, but twisted sharp about andcurved back across the plateau. Even Blake was surprised at themeasurement. It was only a little over two thousand feet.
"Noticed this place when out with Mr. Knowles and Gowan," he remarked,gazing down into the abyss with keen appreciation of its awfulgrandeur. "They told me it is the nearest that the canyon comes to theedge of the mesa, until it breaks out, thirty or forty miles down."
"How--how about that 'if' you said this measurement would settle?"asked Ashton.
"What's the time?"
Ashton looked at his watch, frowning over the evasive reply. "It'stwo-ten."
"I'll figure on the proposition while we eat lunch," said Blake. "Ican answer you better regarding that 'if' when I have done somecalculating. Luckily I climbed up to examine the rock in the gulch."He smiled quizzically at his companion. "You were right as to itsbeing unclimbable; but I found out even more than I expected."
Ashton silently took the bag from him and arranged the lunch and hiscanteen on a rock under a pine. The engineer figured and drew littlediagrams in his fieldbook while he ate his sandwiches. Ashton had halfdrained the canteen on the way up the mountain. Before sitting downBlake had rinsed out his mouth and taken a few swallows of water.After eating, he started to take another drink, noticed hiscompanion's hot dry face, and stopped after a single sip.
"Guess you need it more than I do," he remarked, as he rose to hisfeet. "Time to start. I wish to go around and down the mountain on theother side of the gulch."
"How about the--the 'if'?" inquired Ashton.
"Killed," answered Blake. "There now is only one left. If that comesout the same way, Dry Mesa will have good cause to change its name."
"You can tunnel through from the gulch to the canyon?" exclaimedAshton.
"Yes; and I shall do so--if Deep Canyon is not too deep."
"I hope it is a thousand feet below Dry Mesa!" said Ashton.
"In the circumstances," Blake replied to the fervent declaration, "Iam glad to hear you say it."
Ashton stared, but could detect no sarcasm in the other's smile ofcommendation.