But under cover of the darkness a warm blush colored the young woman's cheeks, for when Pat spoke she had not been thinking of the absence of her old friend, but wishing for the presence of another engineer, who also was working for the reclamation of her Desert and who was himself in turn being wrought upon by his work, learning as the girl had hoped he would learn, the language of the land.
Jefferson Worth spoke in his exact way. "Even if he is not here this is all the Seer's work."
And just then from a distance up the old wash came the weird, unnatural cry of a coyote. It was as though the spirit of the desert spoke in answer to the banker's words.
"Yell, ye sneaking thievin' imp. Yer time in this counthry is about up!" exclaimed the Irishman with a growl of deep satisfaction. And again out of the shadow the soft, plaintively sweet music of Pablo's guitar floated away on the still darkness of the night.
CHAPTER XX.
WHAT THE STAKES REVEALED.
James Greenfield, returning to Kingston from his tour of inspection, left at once for his own world—a world of offices with mahogany furniture, of men with white collars and pale faces, of banks and trust companies, and Good Business.
The afternoon of the day he left, Willard Holmes rode into the camp at Dry River Crossing. The engineer explained that he was looking over the route of a new main canal that was being surveyed by his men and that, finding himself in the vicinity of Mr. Worth's headquarters, he had taken the opportunity to call.
From Barbara as well as from Jefferson Worth and Abe Lee the Company man received a hearty welcome with a cordial invitation to ride with them the next day over the line of their work. Although Holmes watched with peculiar sensitiveness, there was no sign from either of the three that they had yet discovered the real significance of the South Central deal or that they knew the part he had played in it. His desire to end the whole unpleasant situation by going over the work with Mr. Worth and the surveyor, and by confessing to Barbara how he had permitted her father to walk into the trap, led him to accept the invitation.
The little party left camp early the next morning and following the line of Black's survey found a mile or more of the canal already completed, while a large force of men and teams was at work clearing the ground and pushing the big ditch still farther in a general southerly direction toward the Company canal fifteen miles away.