Weston looked at her a moment hesitatingly, and then made a little gesture of deprecation.
“It sounds absurd, of course, but I have a fancy that if I keep it up long enough I shall strike gold. You see I’m a water-finder, anyway.”
“A water-finder?”
Weston nodded.
“It’s an old English idea. Water evidently used to be scarcer there, and even now there are places where good wells aren’t plentiful. You go along with a hazel twig, and it dips when you cross water running underground. That is, if you have the gift in you. Anybody can’t do it. You think that quite foolish, don’t you?”
Ida really did, though she did not seem to admit it.
“Have you ever tried the gift out here?” she asked.
“On the prairie, quite often. A good deal of it is burnt up and dry. I generally found water.”
“You turned the—power—to account? I mean—you made—money out of it?”
There was a sudden change in Weston’s face.