“I’m called back on the job.” Rawley tried to meet her eyes unconcernedly. “I won’t even have the week I promised myself. This is pretty urgent, and so I think I’ll take the trail again in the morning.”
Even Nevada betrayed some mental disturbance over that information, especially when Rawley could not hazard any opinion concerning his next visit.
“I won’t even have time to look over your work at the dam,” he told Peter. “I intended going down to-morrow. I wanted to have a talk with you about that. I’ve picked up a little information, here and there, and I’m afraid there will be complications. But I’ve been holding off until I was sure of my ground. I know, of course, that my personal opinion won’t have much weight.”
Peter shook his head. “You can work and pry and lift till your eyes pop out of your head, starting a bowlder down a mountain,” he said grimly, “and you can give it the last heave and over she goes. Any time, up to that last heave, you can quit and she stays right there where she was planted. But once she starts, all hell can’t stop her. I’m afraid we’ve given the last heave, son.”
“Look out below!” Nevada cried mockingly and looked at Rawley. “I could tell a cousin in three words how he can make himself as popular as a rattlesnake with the Cramers,—and the last of the Macalisters.”
“And those three words?” Rawley looked her squarely in the eyes.
“Fight the dam.” Nevada’s eyes were as steady as his own.
“Thunder!” Rawley sat back and reached for his tobacco sack. “I’ve no notion of fighting the dam. It’s the biggest proposition I ever saw three lone men—and a girl; excuse me, Nevada!—tackle in my life. Four of you, thinking to stop, just like that,”—he made a slicing, downward gesture, “—the second largest river in the United States! You’ll be damming the Gulf Stream next, I suppose. Divert it so as to warm up Maine and make it a winter-bathing resort!”
“Do you dare us to try?” Nevada poured nuggets from one palm to the other. “That might be a good investment, when we’ve made our clean-up in the river bed.” She smiled dreamily at her handful of gold. “That’s a wonderful idea. We need some wonderful idea to work on, after the dam is in and the gold is out. You can’t,” she looked up wistfully at Rawley, “you can’t live with a tremendous idea all your life and suddenly drop back to three meals a day and which dress shall you wear. One would go mad. It—it’s like taking the mainspring out of life.”
Johnny Buffalo nodded his head in significant approval. “A man can only wait, then, until it is time to go,” he said with quiet decision.