“Post-office is closed now, I suppose. Very well. It will be an accommodation,” the engineer responded.
Martinez leaned forward.
“If you can spare the time, I should like to have a little talk with you,” said he. “Pardon me if I appear presumptuous, but as you’re aware, Mr. Weir, I overheard your words to Judge Gordon in Vorse’s saloon. I inferred––check me at any instant if you consider this none of my business!––that there exists some unpleasant feeling between you two gentlemen and possibly others. Judge Gordon has always handled the company’s business in his private capacity of counselor. As you know, he’s a silent partner in many enterprises with Sorenson, Vorse and a man named Burkhardt. They run this town and county. You should also know that they’re secretly opposed to your irrigation project, whatever they profess. They’ve misled the people into believing it will work an injury to this district, whereas it will of course be beneficial. Unfortunately too they lead the people by the noses––but not me! I refuse to be subservient.”
He paused to note the effect of his words.
“Now, Mr. Weir, these are facts you can confirm if you’re not already informed of them, which I imagine you are. Because I’m independent in my opinions and 57 actions, I stand in disfavor with these gentlemen, which may or may not be an objection in your view to what I have in mind. And this is it. I should be pleased to execute any legal work that you care to give me; it might be of advantage to your company at times to have an attorney other than Judge Gordon, who is aligned against you and will serve his own interests first. He’s in a position to cause you embarrassment.”
“Our eastern attorneys draw all documents.”
“Of course. But I was thinking of delays more than anything else. There are a thousand ways a lawyer can push or halt matters at will, and your project will never be free of legal red tape until completed––if then! I’m not unselfish in this, I admit; the business would be valuable to me. But aside from that, I’ll give you this advice anyway:––secure another lawyer in any case, one without antagonistic personal interests, if you can find another in San Mateo besides me. See, I’m frank! That may sound egotistical, but really I’m the only free man of the lawyers here. And I’ve paid for my liberty!” He made a sweeping gesture to indicate his shabby office. “If I had taken orders, I could have been county attorney and probably a judge. But I respect myself too much to take orders from Sorenson and his bunch. I choose this sort of thing in preference.”
Steele Weir maintained a non-committal silence. Again the thin dark-skinned lawyer swiftly weighed the man before him, considered the dangers in which he might become involved if he went a step farther, recoiled, then grew bolder. Sorenson had marked him for poverty and nonentity; under the favoring shelter of the irrigation company’s power he might arise from both. For at moments the acute Mexican sensed the inevitable victory of the new forces at work; this, one 58 of the last strong-holds of old time cattle and sheep interests, would break down and yield to the plow and fence.
“Now, there’s something more, though I hesitate to mention it,” he went on, doubtfully. “While Sorenson and his crowd run things, it’s not because the people––and that means us Mexicans chiefly––love them. We’re indolent by nature; we idle rather than work; borrow when we can rather than earn––I speak of our race, but we’re learning that work proves best in the long run. These men have squeezed my people, and robbed them, and kept them down. Nothing more would I wish than to see these leaders deposed. It’s no secret they’ve built their wealth by questionable methods, but who can prove it?
“Do you know what I suspect? You have something on Sorenson’s crowd. That’s why they’re uneasy; that’s why the four are sitting over in the cattle company’s office this minute with their heads together, meeting the minute Sorenson arrives home. I saw them go in. Leaving aside the question of your own affairs, I’d like to have matters changed here in this county so that every man has a fair chance. Anything that will bring that about enlists my interest. When I heard your statement to Gordon and saw his face, I knew there was something in the past that alarmed him. I recalled a name I had once run across when abstracting a title–––”