The Winning of Barbara Worth

by Harold Bell Wright

In the centuries of those forgotten ages that went into the making of The King's Basin Desert, the families of men grew slowly into tribes, the tribes grew slowly into nations and the nations grew slowly into worlds. New worlds became old; and other new worlds were discovered, explored, developed and made old; war and famine and pestilence and prosperity hewed and formed, carved and built and fashioned, even as wave and river and sun and wind. The kingdoms of earth, air and water yielded up their wealth as men grew strong to take it; the elements bowed their necks to his yoke, to fetch and carry for him as he grew wise to order; the wilderness fled, the mountains lay bare their hearts, the waste places paid tribute as he grew brave to command.

Across the wide continent the tracks of its wild life were trodden out by the broad cattle trails, the paths of the herds were marked by the wheels of immigrant wagons and the roads of the slow-moving teams became swift highways of steel. In the East the great cities that received the hordes from every land were growing ever greater. On the far west coast the crowded multitude was building even as it was building in the East. In the Southwest savage race succeeded savage race, until at last the slow-footed padres overtook the swift-footed Indian and the rude civilization made possible by the priests in turn ran down the priest.

About the land of my story, forgotten under the dry sky, this ever-restless, ever-swelling tide of life swirled and eddied-swirled and eddied, but touched it not. On the west it swept even to the foot of the grim mountain wall. On the east one far-flung ripple reached even to the river—when Rubio City was born. But the Desert waited, silent and hot and fierce in its desolation, holding its treasures under the seal of death against the coming of the strong ones; waited until the man-making forces that wrought through those long ages should have done also their work; waited for this age—for your age and mine—for the age of the Seer and his companions—for the days of my story, the days of Barbara and her friends.

The Seer's expedition, returning from the south, made camp on the bank of the Rio Colorado twenty miles below Rubio City. It was the last night out. Supper was over and the men, with their pipes and cigarettes, settled themselves in various careless attitudes of repose after the long day. Their sun-burned faces, toughened figures and worn, desert-stained clothing testified to their weeks of toil in the open air under the dry sky of an almost rainless land. Some were old-timers—veterans of many a similar campaign. Two were new recruits on their first trip. All were strong, clean-cut, vigorous specimens of intelligent, healthy manhood, for in all the professions, not excepting the army and navy, there can be found no finer body of men than our civil engineers.

Easily they fell to talking of to-morrow night in Rubio City, of baths and barbers and good beds and clean clothes and dinners and the pleasures of civilization and prospective future jobs. Much good-natured chaff was passed with hearty give and take. Jokes that had become time-worn in the many days and nights that the party had been cut off from all other society were revived with fresh interest. Incidents and accidents of the trip were related and reviewed with zest, with here and there a comment on the work itself that was still fresh in their minds.

Abe Lee, sitting with his back against a wagon-wheel and his long legs stretched straight out in front, listened, enjoying it all in his own way, taking his share of the chaff with a slow smile, exhaling great clouds of cigarette smoke and only at rare intervals contributing a word or a short sentence to the talk. Abe was at home with these men out there in the desert night. Under the Chief he was their master—respected, admired and loved. But the old-timers knew that to-morrow, in town with these same men, dressed in conventional garb, on the street or in the hotel, the surveyor would be as bashful and awkward as a country boy. So they joked him about his numerous sweethearts in Rubio City and related many entirely fictitious love adventures and romantic experiences that he was said to have passed through in different parts of the country during the years they had known him. Not one of them but would have been astonished beyond words had he known of Abe's adventure the afternoon before they left Rubio City, and how, through every day of the hard, grilling labor with the expedition, the image of the girl he had watched through his field glass was before him.

When the fire of the wits was turned on another mark Abe slowly arose to his feet and slipped out of the circle. Going quietly to the cook-wagon where the Chinaman sat smoking in solitary grandeur, he asked: "Wing, where is the Chief? I saw him talking to you a little while ago."

"Me no sabe, Boss Abe. Chief, him go off that way." He pointed toward the river with his long bamboo pipe. "Wing sabe Chief feel velly bad, Boss Abe; damn."

The white man regarded the Chinaman silently for a moment, then:
"You're a good boy, Wing. Good night."

"Night, Boss Abe," came the plaintive answer, and the surveyor went on to where a group of Cocopah Indian laborers made their rude camp. These he greeted in Spanish and asked: "Has the Chief been with you since supper?"