The Land of Strong Men

by A. M. Chisholm

  CHAPTER XX

  AN ENEMY AT WORK

  Spring merged into early summer, and Jean came home. Angus met her, andbefore they were clear of town he was undergoing a femininecross-examination as to Faith Winton.

  "Is she pretty, Angus?"

  "You girls are all alike," he grinned. "That's what she asked aboutyou."

  "What did you say?"

  "I said I hadn't noticed."

  "You're a nice brother!"

  "That's exactly what she said."

  "Well, I like her for that. But is _she_ pretty?"

  "Well, I don't know that a girl would call her pretty. She doesn't dressherself up like a French wedding and frizzle her hair and all that, butshe's--she's--oh, darned if I know! She looks _clean_."

  "Clean!" Miss Jean cried. "Well, I should hope so!"

  "I mean clean-run, clean-strain, clean-built, like a good horse."

  "My heavens, Angus, don't tell me she's built like a horse!"

  "Don't be a little fool!" her brother growled. "She's better built thanyou are, young lady, and prettier, too."

  "Oh, indeed!" Miss Jean sniffed. "Well, beauty doesn't run in ourfamily. Now tell me about Turkey."

  But Angus could not give her much information. Turkey was workingaround, here and there, but he never came to the ranch.

  "Can't we get him to come back, Angus?"

  "He can come when he likes."

  "Yes, I know. But won't you ask him?"

  Angus did not reply at once.

  "No" he said at last, deliberately, "I won't. It's not the fire; I don'tcare for that. But we haven't got along well for a long time. It had tocome to a show-down."

  Out of her knowledge of her brother, Jean dropped the subjecttemporarily. She asked casually about Chetwood.

  "Did he ever tell you why his remittances had stopped?"

  "No. Of course I never asked. I got the idea that something had gonebust--that there was no more money coming in. He wasn't actually aremittance man, you know. He had some money of his own."

  "It comes to the same thing--if he hasn't any now," said Miss Jean. "Itwill be a good thing for him to do some work."

  She exhibited no special enthusiasm when she met the young man. Chetwoodin overalls, with nailed boots, hard and brown, differed materially fromthe young idler of the summer before, but his cheery good nature wasunchanged. Apparently the loss of his income or capital, or both, didnot worry him.

  The next day Jean rode over with Angus to make Faith Winton'sacquaintance. Angus left them alone to be friends or otherwise.Returning a couple of hours later, he found that there was no doubtabout their mutual attitude.

  "Why, she's a dear!" Jean declared enthusiastically as they rodehomeward. "Why didn't you tell me what she was like?"

  "I tried to."

  "You said she was clean-built, like a good horse. I told her--"

  "What!" Angus cried in horror.

  "Not that, of course. I told her you were a clam. She said from yourdescription she thought I was a skinny, little girl in braids and shortdresses."

  "I never said anything about braids and dresses."

  "Did you say I was skinny?" Miss Jean demanded.

  "Well--"

  "Then you did say it. Ye great, long, lummix--"

  "Hello!" said Angus. "That sounds like Mrs. Foley.

  "'And so yez do be th' sister iv that great, long, lummix iv an AngusMackay,'" said his sister in startling imitation of that lady. "'Yez donot favor him, bein' a good-lookin' slip iv a colleen.' What do youthink of that, Angus?"

  "That you're making the last part up," her brother grinned.

  "Not a word, not a syllable. I told her I thought you were a big,fine-looking young man, and what do you think she said?"

  "I'll bet she didn't agree with you."

  "''Tis yer duty as a sisther to stand up f'r yer brother,' she told me,'an' I am not mixin' it wid yez on th' question iv his shape. 'Tis truehe's that big they was a good pair iv twins spoilt in him, and he hasth' legs an' arrums an' back iv a rale man; but his face is that hard itwud make a foine map f'r a haythen god.'"

  "Huh!" Angus snorted. "She ought to look at her own."

  "Heavens, Angus! I believe you're vain."

  "Vain--blazes!" Angus growled. "I suppose I ought to be tickled when anold she-mick says I look like a totem pole."

  "Like a god!" his sister chuckled. "Don't get sore, old boy. Miss Wintonsays she's never complimentary to the people she likes best. She thinksyou've made a hit with the lady."

  "Then I wonder what she'd have said about my figurehead if I hadn't?"Angus grinned. "I like the old girl, myself, but she sure does hand itto me. Well, I guess I can take my medicine."

  But Angus had more important things to think about. One which began toworry him was exceptionally dry weather. High, drying winds sucked allthe moisture from the soil, and with the loss of it the surface earthshifted and blew away from the roots of the grain. Deprived of thissupport, they twisted in the winds, their arteries of life hardened andwithered. The grass crops were poor, short and wiry when they shouldhave been lush and long. Pallid green instead of dark dominated the hueof the fields, the worst possible sign to the eye of the rancher. Andthis was in spite of the best that could be done by way of irrigation.

  Now Angus obtained the water for his ditch system from a mountain creekfed by innumerable springs as well as by melting snows back in thehills. But for the first time in his experience he found himself withoutsufficient water. For he had been clearing land steadily, year afteryear, without enlarging his main ditch. So far the seasons had favoredhim. But now, in the first, old-time dry season for years, he found thathis ditch was insufficient to irrigate his enlarged acreage.

  It was out of the question to deepen or broaden the ditch just then. Todo so would be a task of some magnitude, for from intake to ranch wasnearly two miles. Time had packed and cemented the gravel of its banks,and further bound them with roots of grasses and willows. Again, toavoid expensive fluming the ditch wound sinuously around the flanks ofseveral steep sidehills, and to disturb existing sidehill ditches is toinvite slides, which necessitate flumes. He made up his mind to enlargethe ditch before another season, but meanwhile he had to depend on it.So he took every drop of water it would carry. The creek was high, amuddy torrent, and he set the water gate of his intake so that the ditchshould run rap full, but no spill, and thus cause washouts along itsbanks.

  One morning in the gray of dawn Angus awoke. The wind which had blownall night seemed to have lulled. He heard Gus pass his door on the wayto the stables, but as he was dressing the big Swede returned. Hepounded on Angus' door.

  "Hey, gat oop!" he cried. He stuck his head inside, his eyes round andgoggling. "We ent gat no watter!" he announced.

  "The devil we haven't!" Angus exclaimed. "What's wrong?"

  "Ay be goldarn if Ay know. She's yoost oft. Mebbe dae ditch ban plug."

  "Glom a shovel for me and get an ax and pick and I'll be right withyou," Angus told him.

  Dressing hastily, he struck the main ditch behind the house. It was dry,save for little pools in which water lingered. They crossed the rearfence, finding no obstruction, and followed the ditch until it struckthe sidehill section. Then Gus who was in the lead, stopped with anoath.

  "By Yudas Priest!" he ejaculated, "dae whole dam' sidehill ban vash tohal!"

  Pushing past him, Angus surveyed the damage. Where the ditch had run wasa raw, gaping wound in the hillside. Hundreds of tons of gravel, earthand small bowlders had slid down on it. The far end of the ditch vomitedwater upon the mass. Even as they looked a few yards of hillsideundermined by its rush came down upon the broken end, blocking thewater. This, backed up, began to pour over the banks of the ditch.

  Left to itself the whole ditch would wash away. Circling the break, bothmen took the trail to the intake. The water gate was wide open. The highwater of the creek was hurrying through in a swift flood, far more thanthe ditch could carry. They threw their weight on th
e lever and shut itoff.

  "Who opened it this far on that water?" Angus demanded.

  "Ay ent been near him," Gus replied. "Mebbe dae Engelschman monkey medhim."

  It was most unfortunate. In other years the ditch had carried a fullhead without accident. This time, however, it had failed just at thetime when water was absolutely necessary to the crops. The only way toget water now was to build a flume; and so, immediately after breakfast,Rennie started for a load of planks, while the others began to get outtimbers to support them, and to clear away the mass of dirt. Chetwood,it appeared, had not been near the water gate. Somebody, however, hadchanged it.

  They dug into the mess, and sank holes for timbers to support the flume.Now and then a small bowlder or a little dirt came down from above,where the hill rose sheer above the slip. Gus, looking up at it, shookhis head.

  "Mebbe she come anoder slide an' take dae flume, hey! Mebbe I better putin leetle shot up dere an' fetch him now?

  "You might fetch half the hill."

  "Yoost vat you say."

  "Well, make it a darn small one."

  So Gus put in a very small shot which brought down a small patch of dirtand gravel, but did not budge the mass.

  "I guess she ban O.K.," he admitted.

  It took four days to put in the flume. When water was running once moreand the long, silver ribbons of it were trickling down the length of thefields giving fresh life to the grain which, even in that short time wasyellowing with the drouth, Angus heaved a sigh of relief.

  "Thank the Lord that's done," he observed.

  "If we couldn't have put her in we'd have had a hundred years of dryweather," Rennie grumbled. "But now, of course, she'll rain."

  That night, as if to make his prediction good, thunder-heads rose abovethe ranges and lightning was splitting the back of the southwest sky.But all that came of it was a heavy wind, though some time in the nightAngus was awakened by what he thought was a heavy roll of thunder. Butas he emerged from the house in the early morning the sky was clear andthe day seemed to promise more heat than ever.

  Thankful that he had water anyway, he stood for a moment cleaning hislungs with big draughts of mountain air; but as he stood he seemed tomiss something which was or should have been a part of thatearly-morning stretch and breath. Puzzled for an instant he would nottell what was missing. And then he knew. He could not hear the gurgle ofwater in the ditch which ran beside the house.

  He reached it in two jumps. It was dry. For a moment he stoodcontemplating it, and then started on a run for the flume. There hisworst fears were verified. There was no flume. The hanging section ofsidehill above it which Gus' shot had failed to shake, had fetched awayand swept the structure out of existence. The only evidence of it was afew ends of planks and timbers sticking up at crazy angles. All the workand a great deal more was to do over again.

  Angus stood scowling at the wreck. His crops needed water very, verybadly, and this time, to judge from appearances, it would take a week tomake repairs. If the dry weather continued that would mean practicalruin to his crop.

  But standing there would not help matters and time was precious. As soonas he had shut off the water he returned to the house, and afterbreakfast all hands tackled the job.

  It was harder than before. Much earth and loose rock had to be moved.The morning was hot, breathless. As the sun gained power the sidehillabsorbed its rays and threw off a baking heat. Chetwood, unused to suchwork, puffed and gasped, but stuck to it. Angus and Gus laboredsteadily, without respite. But Rennie after a while leaned on his shoveland stared up at the raw earth above.

  "Where'd you put in that shot, Gus, when you was tryin' to shake her?"he asked.

  Gus told him, and soon after he abandoned his shovel and climbing aroundthe track of the slide he got above it. There he poked around for sometime. Coming down he beckoned to Angus.

  "How long do you s'pose it'll take to put in this flume?" he queried.

  "Maybe a week."

  "Uh-huh! And then s'pose she goes out again?"

  "What's the use of supposing that?" Angus demanded irritably, for hishard luck was getting on his nerves. "What the devil are you croakingfor? I've got troubles enough."

  "I'm goin' to give you more," Rennie told him. "Look a-here!" Heexhibited four or five small stones with fresh, yellow earth stillclinging to them, and a piece of broken root. "What do you think of thislay-out?" he asked.

  Angus frowned at the junk impatiently. The stones came from the layer oflike stuff which lay beneath most of the land in the district. The rootwas fir, old, resinous, so that it had not rotted with the tree it hadonce helped to anchor, and apparently it was freshly broken off andtwisted.

  "I've been shoveling stuff like that for hours," he said. "What aboutit?"

  "Quite a bit. You seen me nanitchin' round up there, and I s'pose youdamned me for a lazy cuss. Well, up there's where I find them things."

  "You could have found plenty of them without climbing."

  "But I'm tellin' you I found these here _above_ the slide."

  Angus stared at him, slowly taking in his meaning.

  "Above it!" he exclaimed.

  "That's what I said. Up hill from the slide. Slide stuff never runs uphill. This stuff was _blown_ there."

  "Gus put in a little shot--"

  "Near a week ago. The dirt on these rocks ain't dry yet. Same with thewood. They ain't been lyin' out in the sun no time at all. All Gus didwas to put in a little coyote hole, and she blew straight out. Thisshot was above, and when she blew she ripped the whole sidehill loose.Mebbe there was more than one shot. I'll bet I heard it, and thought itwas thunder. Anyway, all this stuff was above where the slide started.And that's what made the first slide, too. It wasn't water. Some son ofa gun shot the ditch."

  Angus turned the bits of evidence over in his hands, frowning.

  "Who would do a trick like that?"

  "You can come as near guessin' as I can."

  Angus shook his head. Nobody, so far as he knew, would deliberately cutoff his water. And yet, according to this silent but conclusiveevidence, somebody had done so. The repairs had been wrecked as soon ascompleted. They might be wrecked again. It gave him a strange,uncomfortable feeling, akin to that of a mysterious presence in thedark. Also it moved him to deep, silent anger.

  "I would give a good deal to know," he said quietly.

  "Nobody hangin' round lately that I've noticed. But somebody was keepin'case all right, 'cause we only got water a few hours. And I'll tell yousomethin' else: When we get the flume pretty near in again I'm keepin'case myself."