“Oh, Mr. Ross!” exclaimed Ruth. “You ought to do it—my Uncle Eby always used to say there was oil here!”
“Is that so?” said Dad. “Well, I’ll take a chance then, jist for fun.” And he looked at Bunny, with just the flicker of a smile. It told Bunny a lot, when he came to think it over; Dad had guessed that Bunny was worried, and exactly what was his dilemma with the Watkinses; and Dad had had the wit to save Bunny’s face, and avoid the need of confessing. Dear, kind old Dad, that was anxious to do everything for his boy—that would even do his lying for him! How could any boy refuse to be content with such a happy solution of his ethical problems?
CHAPTER VI
THE WILD-CAT
I
Dad had thought things over, and studied his bank account, and given his decision; they would drill the Ross Junior-Paradise No. 1, and do it quick, and give the “Excelsior Pete” crowd a run for their money; there was no use letting the Big Five think they owned the whole oil industry. Dad would stick here and see things started; so he phoned for his geologist, and hunted up a contractor to figure over a well for water.
Mr. Banning, the geologist, came next day, and gave Bunny’s hopes a knock over the head at the very outset. He said Dad was right in his idea that you couldn’t count very much on that streak of oil on the top of the ground. You might come on oil-sands one or two hundred feet down, but they wouldn’t be likely to amount to much; if that was all you were looking for, you might bring in one of those little drilling-rigs on wheels such as they used back in Pennsylvania! But out here, said Mr. Banning, the real oil-sands lay deep, and you never knew what you’d find till you got there. But he liked the looks of the district, and thought it worth a chance; he spent a couple of days wandering over the hills with Dad and Bunny, studying the slope of the strata, and finally he and Dad chose the side of a hill on the Watkins ranch, not far from the place where Bunny had sat and talked with Ruth while she tended the goats.
The water-well man came, offering to drill a four-inch well for $2.12 a foot; and Dad signed a contract with him, on the basis of his making so many feet a day, and getting a bonus if he went above that, and paying a forfeit if he fell below it. After which Dad and Bunny drove over to pay a visit to Mr. Jeremiah Carey, a rancher near Roseville, who was chairman of the county board of supervisors, which had to do with the all-important question of road construction.
A great part of the road passed through Dad’s own property; and it had been Bunny’s naive idea that Dad would call in a contractor, and pay the price, as in the case of the water well. But Dad said no, that wasn’t the way you did with roads; it was a public road, running from Paradise to Roseville, down along the slide, and it would be graded and paved at public expense. To be sure, Dad would use this road more than anyone else, but also he would pay some of the taxes; all the people owning property along the slide would pay a share, and the new road would increase the value of their property.
All this Dad explained, first to Bunny, and then to Mr. Carey, a friendly old fellow who grew apricots and peaches on the slopes of a ridge overlooking the San Elido valley. Mr. Carey was evidently pleased to meet a famous oil operator, and he took them up to the house and made them sit comfortable in big porch chairs, and called to Mrs. Carey to bring some lemonade for Bunny. Dad produced his gold-foil cigars, and told the chairman of the county board of supervisors what a great thing it was going to mean for this whole section if oil developments came in; he told about the Bankside lease at Prospect Hill, and the million and more which he had paid to the Bankside family, and the palace on the beach front which Mr. Bankside was now occupying; you could see the eyes of Mr. and Mrs. Carey open wider and wider, as Dad visioned this slope covered with a forest of oil-derricks. Absolutely, the whole thing depended upon one problem, that of roads. Manifestly, you couldn’t bring in derrick materials and drilling tools and heavy machinery over that sheep-track which they now had, and which had jist broken a spring on Dad’s new motor-car; nor could the county expect Dad to improve a public road at his own expense, in order to have the privilege of paying tens of thousands of dollars of new taxes into the county treasury. To all of which Mr. Carey agreed.
Dad went on to say that it was a question of time; if the county authorities were going to dilly-dally along, and keep him waiting—why then, he had plenty of other tracts he could drill, and he would keep this here Paradise place for a quail-preserve. Mr. Carey looked worried, and said he’d do his best, but of course Mr. Ross understood that public affairs didn’t move in a hurry, you had to issue bonds to pave a new road, and there would have to be a special election to vote them. Dad said that was what he had come to find out about; if that was the case, it was all off so far as he was concerned. Wasn’t there some way this work could be done at once, on the basis of its being repairs to an old road, instead of new paving? And Mr. Carey said of course, they had funds for repair work, he didn’t know just how much, he’d have to consult his associates on the board.