Then out came the story of life in the House of Refuge and of Beaver Clegg and his wondrous telescope.
“Why, you’ve accomplished marvels!” Madge finally interrupted. “Here we’ve been feeling sorry for you, and now you tell us that you’ve been helped on toward the goal of your ambition in a way that never would have happened if you’d not been sent to that reformatory.”
“Yes, I learned a lot from Mr. Clegg,” said Joshua. “But now I’ve got to begin at the beginning again. Science is progressing by leaps and bounds these days, and unless a fellow is in constant touch with new developments he’s out of luck. My first payday goes back to Hathaway for my books and Clegg’s notes and the photographs. If there’s any left I’ll subscribe to several scientific magazines and try to catch up. Last Sunday I found a cave about a mile from our camp. Just stumbled onto it. I’m going to appropriate it as a study and laboratory, and I’ll spend all of my spare time there. I can give at least three or four hours every night, and all day of every Sunday, to study. I’m a hound for work, if I do say it myself, and I’ll be caught up before this job is finished in the mountains. Then I hope to put another new idea to work.
“I discovered something else last Sunday. Before I’d stumbled onto the cave I walked around the lake to the other side, and climbed that rocky ridge over there to see if I could get a view of the desert. It’s a steep climb, but I made it—and, say, the view is marvelous. For miles and miles, far as the eye can reach—and I was told by the doctor at the House of Refuge that I have particularly good eyes—the desert sweeps below you, the most magnificent sight on earth. It seemed that from that particular mountain-top—for it is a miniature mountain—objects on the desert stood out with a clearness almost unbelievable. I turned and looked into the range at the forests and peaks, and they too seemed clearer than I had ever seen them before. And I got to thinking.
“It strikes me that there is something mighty peculiar over there on that ridge. To the west of us lies the coast—to the east the desert. All of the western slopes of the range, they tell me, are covered with trees—great forests of pine. And on the eastern slopes nothing much grows but scrubby piñons, cactus, yuccas, and sage. You can almost see the dividing line at the lake shore. Haven’t you noticed that there are no pine forests on the other side of the lake, and that they begin abruptly on this side? So over there we have the influence of the dry desert in the atmosphere, while at the same time we have an altitude of over six thousand feet.
“Well, all this seems to make for the clearest atmosphere on top of that ridge that I have ever seen. And I’m going up there to-night to see what it’s like after dark. If I’m right, that mountain that I stood on last Sunday is the most marvelous spot on earth, atmospherically, for astronomical observations. And if repeated visits prove that I am right as to the atmosphere’s rare transparency—”
“Yes, go on,” urged Madge.
“Well, then that’s my mountain,” replied Joshua, “and I’ll install a telescope there and astonish the world of science. That is—perhaps.”
“But where will you get your telescope?” asked Madge’s mother.
Joshua threw out his hands in a gesture of submission. “I’ll have to earn it,” he told her. “And the one that was given to me cost Mr. Clegg five hundred dollars. Whew! And I’m only a hammerman for Demarest, Spruce and Tillou. But that doesn’t discourage me. I’ll earn the money in time. And while I’m doing that I’ll make a telescope for myself—one that will do for the time being, anyway.”