The Vision of Elijah Berl

by Frank Lewis Nason

With infinite patience, the Almighty has taught us by precept and example, that our destinies are in our own hands; that the punishment for failure that comes to us, is self-inflicted, and not from him, when in blind despair, we thrust aside a redemption that is waiting to make us whole. The smitten rock that quenched the thirst of Israel, the parted sea that gave them a way to safety, the column of smoke that reached into the day, the pillar of fire that made the darkness light, these may be fables; but they speak with a voice that cannot be stilled, telling us that in ages past, as in the present, an eye that sleeps not, watches over us; that hope is for us if we will.

Among the discarded letters, was one from Winston. It told of the plucked fangs of Mellin, of Uncle Sid's restoration of the stolen money, of the meeting with Seymour. It ended, "Come back, old man, we want you."

Late as was the hour when Elijah at last turned from his unopened letters, he rang for a servant and ordered a carriage to take him to his ranch. He could not go to the dam; the thought of idly waiting at the hotel was unendurable. He wanted to see some one, he must see some one. He had deliberately put Amy from him; but she did not know this. The black heartlessness of his proposed action did not once occur to him. Before leaving the hotel he wrote an appeal to Helen. He told her where he was going and that he would wait her answer.

At the ranch, he found Amy as of old. Eager, questioning hope leaped to her eyes as they rested on his face; then the hope died out to the dumb, patient waiting; the dumb, patient suffering of an animal that endures without question, without resentment. Through the long days that followed, she did her best to draw him from himself, from the fires that were consuming him. It was in vain. In vain, when she found him seated with his eyes fastened on the dusty trail from Ysleta, she slipped her hand in his and nestled close to him, inviting confidences that were never given, tendering sympathy that was not accepted, assuring him of unswerving confidence that nothing and no one could destroy.

He let no opportunity pass to send other appeals to Helen, but these too were unanswered. One day a messenger came. Elijah did not wait, but rushed to meet him. The message was not from Helen. Instead, a telegram. Mechanically he signed the receipt which the messenger held out; then he opened the envelope. The message was in cipher, but he knew each symbol. The messenger looked at him inquiringly. Elijah shook his head, "No answer," and the messenger rode away.

It did not matter to Elijah that the message was over a week old; the message itself was sufficient. "Have failed to raise the money. I start for California tomorrow."

Elijah felt that his return to Ysleta was hopelessly barred. Mrs. MacGregor was there now, Seymour was there, Helen was there. Like sneaking jackals, they were ready to fall upon him, wounded to the death. They would not leave him in peace. They would not leave him in peace even with what was his own. Nothing was left him but vengeance; how could he compass it?

Like the white flash of a thunderbolt, the transaction with Mellin came to him. Its sinister condition—"within three months after the water shall have been turned into the main canal of the Las Graces"—danced before his eyes. The words were clear and minatory, but there was a hidden meaning that he could not catch, that was pointing the way of deliverance. He strained forward as if to listen more clearly. The swollen veins on his forehead throbbed and beat; then he sprang to his feet—

"As God lives, that water shall not be turned on!"

The sun had set and darkness was falling, but day and night were alike to Elijah now. He was at the gates of the canal at the mouth of the cañon. The roar of the Sangre de Cristo was gone, only a trickle of water slipped by blackened boulders and gurgled as it fell into tiny pools, then wimpled and slid out toward the desert. Up through the trail that led to the dam, darkened by dense evergreens to a deeper shadow, he rode wildly. In the shadow of a great rock, he looked down upon the still rising water, black with depth. He saw the great tubes let in at the base, the wheels by which the gates were controlled, the wide, rock-paved waste weir that, leading from the reservoir, gave into the cañon below. He noted the broken earth, the clinging trees that hung over the weir. His eyes, calculating, merciless, rested on the trees. A gleam of triumph came to them. If the wheels were broken, the gates could not be opened, and the water was even now trickling over the weir. In a day or two, the whole volume of the Sangre de Cristo would pour through it. Just a little powder behind the retaining wall, and the whole bank would fall and choke the weir. Just a few hours and, the weir choked, the gates unopened, the whole volume of the river would creep over the coping of the dam, pick out grain by grain the unprotected earth, till the dam weakened, the mighty mass of stored water would rush in devastating waves down through the cañon, and the canal would be as if it had never been. The dream of a life, the labor of years, these lay in the hollow of his hand.