“It is queer,” said Rice with equal gravity; “but it's so. The road, sure!” Nevertheless he looked up into the large eyes of Clementina with a certain confidential air of truthfulness.
“You see, ladies,” continued the surveyor, appealing to them with unabashed rigidity of feature, “the cards don't lie! Luckily we are in a position to corroborate them. The road in question is a secret known only to us and some capitalists in San Francisco. In fact even THEY don't know that it is feasible until WE report to them. But I don't mind telling you now, as a slight return for your charming hospitality, that the road is a RAILROAD from Oakland to Tasajara Creek of which we've just made the preliminary survey. So you see what the cards mean is this: You're not far from Tasajara Creek; in fact with a very little expense your father could connect this stream with the creek, and have a WATERWAY STRAIGHT TO THE RAILROAD TERMINUS. That's the wealth the cards promise; and if your father knows how to take a hint he can make his fortune!”
It was impossible to say which was the most dominant in the face of the speaker, the expression of assumed gravity or the twinkling of humor in his eyes. The two girls with superior feminine perception divined that there was much truth in what he said, albeit they didn't entirely understand it, and what they did understand—except the man's good-humored motive—was not particularly interesting. In fact they were slightly disappointed. What had promised to be an audaciously flirtatious declaration, and even a mischievous suggestion of marriage, had resolved itself into something absurdly practical and business-like.
Not so Mr. Harkutt. He quickly rose from his chair, and, leaning over the table, with his eyes fixed on the card as if it really signified the railroad, repeated quickly: “Railroad, eh! What's that? A railroad to Tasajara Creek? Ye don't mean it!—That is—it ain't a SURE thing?”
“Perfectly sure. The money is ready in San Francisco now, and by this time next year—”
“A railroad to Tasajara Creek!” continued Harkutt hurriedly. “What part of it? Where?”
“At the embarcadero naturally,” responded Grant. “There isn't but the one place for the terminus. There's an old shanty there now belongs to somebody.”
“Why, pop!” said Phemie with sudden recollection, “ain't it 'Lige Curtis's house? The land he offered”—
“Hush!” said her father.
“You know, the one written in that bit of paper,” continued the innocent Phemie.