“He’s dragging something. Is it a rope?” murmured Dorothy.
“Maybe they are measuring the gorge——”
“That is about what they are doing, Tavia Travers!” exclaimed Dorothy. “It is a surveyor’s chain. There is the man with the trident.”
A second stranger had appeared. He set up his instrument quickly and the chain-bearer followed his chief’s gestures in placing a stake.
“Do let’s go on, Dorothy!” Tavia exclaimed, with immediate loss of interest in this seemingly prosaic matter. “We’ll never get to the top.”
“But what are those men doing here?”
“Can’t you see? Surveying, of course.”
“What for?”
“Oh, for a railroad, perhaps. For something or other. What does it matter?”
“This is within the boundaries of the Hardin Ranch,” Dorothy said, reflectively. “I don’t understand surveyors being here. I am sure Aunt Winnie knows nothing about it.”