"I fancy they did," said Imogene, "especially if they were in love."

"In love?" The professor brought his spectacles around to his daughter questioningly.

"With everything," she said, laughing. "Daddy, I'm awfully glad we are back to the soil--instead of back to the Greeks."

"I am not discontent with our environment." And the little professor plowed on. She smiled maternally at his back. And then two swift tears sprang to her eyes. Tender tears.

"Dear old daddy. It has been good for him. He would have dried up and blown away in that little old college."

Returning to the shack she was still bareheaded. She loved the feel of the sun, and the few freckles it brought only added a piquancy to her face.

"I wonder if he"--she meant Rogeen--"will make it go this year. I hope he has a good crop. It makes one feel that maybe after all things are as they ought to be when a man like he succeeds. Wonder what his plans are?"

Then as she sat down in the shade and began a little very necessary mending:

"I do wish he'd come over--and tell me some more about cotton crops--and himself."

CHAPTER XX

It is a good thing the wind does not blow from the same direction all the time. Things would never grow straight if it did. And if one emotion persists too long the human mind becomes even worse twisted than a tree. For that reason, if we are normal, buoyance and depression, ecstasy and pain follow each other as regularly as ripples on a stream. It is good they do, but it is hard to believe it when we are down in the trough of the wave.

As Bob started away with the promise of Jim Crill to lend him the money for the Red b.u.t.te Ranch, his blood was pumping faster than the running engine of his car. But directly enthusiasm began to slow down.

Suppose he lost--what an appalling debt for a man working at a hundred and fifty a month! It never figured in Bob's calculation to settle his debts in red ink. And there were chances to lose. The lawyer was waiting for him at the hotel when he returned.

"I saw Jenkins," he reported. "Says they paid $20,000 for the Red b.u.t.te lease last spring. Half of it for bonus on the lease, and half for the equipment. He claims the mules and equipment are easily worth $10,000; and he offers to sell lease and all for that, but won't consider a dollar less. I heard on the street this evening that a Chinaman had offered them $7,500. I have an option on it until eleven o'clock in the morning at $10,000."

"Thanks, T. J." Bob was figuring in his mind the basis of this price.

"I'll let you know before that time." He went up to his room to think it out. He could hardly see any chance for loss, yet of course there was. If this was such a sure thing, why had not some of the more experienced cotton growers in the valley jumped at it? But Bob dismissed that line of reasoning with a positive jerk of his head.

That was a weak man's reason--the excuse of failures, sheep philosophy.

Every day of the year some new man came into a community and picked up a profitable opportunity that other people had stumbled over for years.

The lease was certainly a bargain; the land was in excellent condition, and there would be no difficulty about labour with plenty of Chinese and Mexicans. The price of cotton could scarcely go lower. Bob had no fear of that. Then what were the dangers? The chance of a water shortage was remote. There had been little trouble about water. Of course bad farming could spoil a crop; but Lou Wing was an expert cotton grower, and you could trust a Chinaman's vigilance. With Lou as a partner he could be sure the crop would receive proper attention.

"It seems good!" Bob walked out of his room on to the balcony that ran the length of the hotel and stood overlooking the twinkling lights of the town. Calexico was getting to be quite a little city, and the string of lights were flung out for half a mile to the east and north.

Across the line the high-arched sign of the Red Owl already winked alluringly.

He looked at his watch. It was only a quarter past eight. He turned back to his room, took his violin from the battered trunk, went to the garage, and in fifteen minutes was chugging south between the rows of cottonwood and willows that stood dim guardians in the night against the desert.

Imogene Chandler heard the machine coming. She put on her new spring coat and came out into the yard. The night was a little cool, and that new coat was the first article of wearing apparel she had bought for herself in three years.

"I'm glad you brought your fiddle again," she said as Bob came into the yard. She was bare-headed, and her hair showed loose and wavy in the starlight. "I've felt rather lilty all day." She snapped her fingers and danced round in a circle. "Just a little hippety-hoppety," she laughed, dropping down upon the bench. "Sit down and play to us--me and this wonderful night."

"I want to talk first." He laid the fiddle across his knees. In spite of the spell of the desert, figures were still running through his head.

"How like a man!" she said, mockingly. "And is it about yourself?"

"Of course," he replied, soberly. "You don't think I'd waste gasolene to come down here to talk about any other man, do you?"

"Before you begin on that absorbing subject," she bantered, "tell me, will our cotton now sell for enough to pay Mr. Crill that note?"

"Yes, but you are not going to sell it. He has extended the note another six months. Cotton is going up this fall."

"Isn't that great!" she exclaimed. "Here we have money enough for another crop, and can speculate on last year's cotton by holding for higher prices. Why, man, if it should go to ten cents we'd clear $3,000 on that cotton above what we already have."

"Yes, and if it goes to twelve, you'll have $4,500 to the good."

He sat still for a moment, gripping the neck of his fiddle with his fingers as though choking it into waiting.

"Well?" she prompted.

"I've got a chance for something big." He got up and walked, holding the fiddle by the neck, swinging it back and forth. "If I put it through, it will be a fortune; but if I fail I'll be in debt world without end--mortgaged all the rest of my life!"

Walking back and forth before her in the starlight he told Imogene Chandler of the big opportunity--of the rare combination of circ.u.mstances which made it possible for him, without property or backing, to borrow one hundred thousand dollars for a crop; and marshalled his reasons for belief in its success. "The water might fail," she suggested, when he had finished and sat down again with the fiddle across his knee.

"Yes, it might," he admitted.

"The Chinamen might get into trouble among themselves or with the Mexicans and leave you at a critical time."

"Possibly."

"The duty might be raised on cotton," she added.

"Yes," he confessed.

"But," she continued, "there is one thing much more likely than any of these--a thing fairly certain. Reedy Jenkins will fight you in every way he can invent. First he'll fight to get your money; and then he'll fight you just for hate."

"I have thought of that," Bob again got up, moved by the agitation of doubt. If it were his own money to be risked he would not hesitate a moment--but one hundred thousand dollars of another man's money and his own reputation!

"For these reasons," continued Imogene Chandler, "I advise you to go into it--and _you'll_ win.

"Now play to me."

CHAPTER XXI

Imogene Chandler had spoken most confidently to Bob of his success.

But after he was gone she began to be pestered by uneasy doubts--which is the way of a woman.

She and her father had been compelled to operate on small capital.

They had figured, or rather Imogene had, dollar at a time. This new venture of Rogeen's rather appalled her. A hundred thousand of borrowed money! It was almost unthinkable. Anywhere else but in this land of surprises such a proposition would seem entirely fantastic.

With so much involved any disastrous turn would leave him hopelessly in debt. And besides--her thoughts took a more uneasy turn--she felt it was going to put him in danger. Reedy Jenkins and his Mexican a.s.sociates would be very bitter over Bob's getting the Red b.u.t.te--and they might do anything.