Bob walked as one on a precipice during the following weeks. Never was a man more torn between hope and fear. On the one hand, the cotton grew amazingly. Fed by the nourishment stored in that soil which had lain dormant for thousands of years, watered by the full sluices from the Colorado River and warmed like a hotbed by the floods of sunshine day after day, the stalks climbed and climbed and branched until they looked more like green bushes than frail plants. Bob rode the fields all day long, even when the thermometer crept up to 127 in the shade, and a skillet left in the sun would fry bacon and eggs perfectly done in seven minutes. Often he continued to ride until far into the night, watching the chopping of the weeds, watching the men in the fields, and most of all watching the watering. Yes, the crop was advancing with a promise almost staggering in its richness. It looked now as though some of these fields would go to a bale and a half an acre. And slowly but surely the price of cotton had climbed since March, a quarter of a cent one day, a half the next, a jump of a whole cent one Friday; and now on the second day of August it touched 10.37. With a bale to the acre at that price Bob could add $30,000 to his estimated expense and still clear a hundred thousand dollars on this crop. When he thought of it as he rode along the water ditches in the early evening, he grew fairly dizzy with hope. But then on the other side: the unformed menace--Reedy Jenkins owned the water system!

The fear had taken tangible shape when he got his water bill for June.

But there was no raise in price. Again yesterday, the bill for July came, and still no raise in price.

It was ten o'clock that night when he got into Calexico and went to the hotel.

As the clerk gave him the key to his room, he also handed him a letter, saying:

"A special delivery that came for you an hour ago; I signed for it."

Bob's fingers shook slightly as he took it. Glancing swiftly at the corner of the envelope he read:

DILLENBECK WATER CO.

CHAPTER XXII

Reedy Jenkins, the first night of August, sat in his office, the windows open, the door open, the neck of his soft shirt open, and his low shoes kicked off. But his plump, pink face was freshly shaven and ma.s.saged and he wore two-dollar silk socks. Even in dishabille Reedy had an air of ready money.

There had been dark days last fall when he had been so closely cornered by his creditors that it took many a writhe and a wriggle to get through. n.o.body but himself, unless it was the dour Tom Barton, knew how overwhelmingly he was bankrupt.

But Reedy had kept up an affable front to all his creditors and a ready explanation. "We are all broke, everybody in same boat. Why sweat over it? Of course I've got some cotton across the line; we'll just leave it there and save the duty until it'll sell. Then I'll pay out."

He kept up this rea.s.surance until cotton began to sell, and then he postponed:

"Wait; we are all easier now. Got enough so I can cash in any day and have plenty to pay all bills. But just wait until it goes a little higher."

And when it had gone to eight cents, eight and a half, and at last nine, his creditors had ceased to worry him. Now that Reedy could sell out any day and liquidate, and still be worth a hundred thousand or more, there was no hurry to collect. n.o.body wants to push a man who can pay his debts any hour. Some of them even began to lend him more money. He had borrowed $25,000 as a first payment on the $200,000 for the Dillenbeck water system.

To-night Reedy had a list of figures before him again. Cotton had touched 9.76 to-day. Things were coming to a head. It was time to act.

Reedy had one set of figures in which 8,000 bales were multiplied by fifty and a fraction. It added $474,000. There was a column of smaller sums, the largest of which was, Revenue $28,000. These smaller sums were totalled and subtracted from $474,000, leaving $365,000--a sum over which Reedy moistened his lips. Then he multiplied 15,000 acres by something and set that sum also under the $365,000 and added again. The total made him roll his pencil between his two plump hands.

Madrigal, the Mexican Jew, entered with a jaunty gesture, and took a chair and lighted a cigarette.

"When did you get back from Guaymas?" Reedy leaned back, lighted a match on the bottom of his chair and touched it to a plump cigar.

"Yesterday, Senor Reedy." There was always a mixture of aggressiveness and mocking freshness in Madrigal's tone and air.

"See Bondeberg?"

The Mexican nodded.

"Everything all right?"

"_Si, si._" Madrigal sometimes was American and sometimes Mexican.

"I've had a d.i.c.kens of a time getting trucks," said Reedy, speaking in a low, casual tone. "But I got 'em--twenty. Be unloaded to-morrow or the next day. I've arranged to take care of the duty. They are to be sold, you understand, with an actual bill of sale to each of the twenty Mexican chauffeurs you have employed."

Madrigal nodded lightly as though all of this was primer work for him.

"Have everything ready by the tenth. I think I can close up this water deal by that time."

As the Mexican left, Reedy reached for his telephone and called El Centro.

"Mrs. Barnett?" Soft oiliness oozed from his voice. "This is Reedy.

What are you doing this evening? Nothing? How would you like a little spin out to the foot of the mountains to get a cool breath and watch the moon rise?--All right. I'll be along in about thirty minutes. By, by." The words sounded almost like kisses.

"Mrs. Barnett"--Reedy slowed down the machine as they drove off across the desert toward the foothills--"I owe everything to you."

The widow, all in white now--very light, cool white--felt a little shivery thrill of pride go over her. She half simpered and tried to sound deprecating.

"Oh, you merely flatter me." She was rolling a small dainty handkerchief in her palms.

"No, indeed!" responded Reedy, roundly. "No one can estimate the influence of a good woman on a man's life."

"I'm so glad"--the shivery thrill got to her throat--"if I've really helped you--Reedy." It was the first time she had used his given name, although he had often urged it.

"You know," he continued, "in spite of the great opportunities for wealth here, I do not believe that I could have endured this valley if it had not been for you. You can't imagine what it means to a man, after the disagreeable hurly-burly of the day's business, to know there is a pure, sweet, womanly woman waiting for him on the porch."

Mrs. Barnett gulped, filled with emotion. "I do believe," she almost gushed, "men like the shy, womanly woman who keeps her place best after all."

"They certainly do!"

"I don't see," mused Mrs. Barnett, "how a man really _could_ care for a woman who becomes so--so--well, rough and sunburned, and coa.r.s.ened by sordid work--like that Chandler woman, for instance. I mean, I don't see how any _good_ man could care for that sort."

"Nor I," said Reedy, emphatically. He steered with one hand, and got both of her hands in the other.

"This year is going to be a great one for me. Cotton is already over ten cents. I'll need only $25,000 more, and then I can clean up a fortune for all of us."

Mrs. Barnett, still thrilling to that hand pressure, moved a little uneasily.

"Uncle Jim has been right hard to manage for the last two times. He was real ugly about that last $40,000. I had to remind him how much my poor mother did for him and how little he had done for us before he would listen to me."

No wonder the widow quaked within her at the honour of being elected to do it all over again. It was not because she hesitated to attempt it for so n.o.ble a man; but for the moment she was desperate for a way to go at it. She had used in the last effort every "womanly" device known to conservative tradition for separating a man from his money. But she hesitated only a moment. A watery heart and a dry eye never won a fat loan. Undoubtedly her womanly intuition--or Providence--would show her a way.

"I'll do my best, Mr. Jenkins"--she lapsed into the formal again--"to get the loan for you. But Uncle is getting right obstinate."

"That's all right, little girl," he patted her hands. "I trust you to do it, you could move the heart of Gibraltar. And as I've promised you all the time, when I close up these deals I'm going to give you personally $25,000 of the profits in appreciation of your a.s.sistance.

And that is not all"--he squeezed both the widow's hands a moment, then released them as if by terrific resolution--"but more of that later.

We must close up this prosaic business first."

The next morning at ten o'clock Jim Crill stamped up the outside stairway, stamped through the open door and threw a check for $25,000 on Reedy's desk.

"That's the last," the old gentleman snapped with finality. "And I want to begin to see some payments mighty quick."

Reedy smiled as the old gentleman stamped back down the stairs, proud of his own ability as a "worker." And he was not without admiration for Mrs. Barnett's ability in that line. It would be interesting to know how she had done it so quickly.