"What rot!" she said. "I didn't know my father thought anything of the kind, and certainly I don't. I hope you will be very happy. When did it happen?"
Angus told her, but it was a subject on which he did not care to enlarge. Where the trail forked to the French ranch they parted and he rode on. But if he had turned back and ridden half a mile on the other trail, and two hundred yards to the right behind a thick growth of cottonwoods, he would have seen a girl lying on the ground, her face buried in her arms, while a big, bay horse with a sweat-dried coat stood by flicking the flies and regarding his mistress wonderingly.
CHAPTER XXVI
CONSPIRACY
On the chance that, after all, water might be got on Faith's ranch, Angus had his own levels checked by a surveyor. The result was to confirm them. Thus most of the level land was undoubtedly worthless for agricultural purposes. As for the rest of the property, it was hill and coulee and included the round mountain. Angus had ridden over it and hunted through it and he thought he had nothing to learn about it. He dismissed it with contempt. The only reasonable explanation of French's desire to purchase seemed to be that he was acting for Braden and that Braden had some purchaser in view. That being so, it would pay to hold out for a better offer.
So far as his own affairs were concerned, the outlook was not promising. His loan applications were turned down cold by various loan companies, as Judge Riley had feared. And one day he received a formal demand for payment of mortgage and note, coupled with an intimation that, failing immediate payment, legal proceedings would follow.
"Yes, I thought this was about due," Judge Riley said when Angus showed him the letter of Mr. Braden's lawyers. "There are no grounds for defending the actions, that I know of."
"The money is owing, no doubt about it. And I can't pay it."
"Then it will have to be realized upon the security. I'm sorry, my boy. I don't know where you can raise a loan. If I had the money I'd lend it to you myself, but I haven't. Braden will get his judgments and sell."