"You know, it is a wonder to me," she said, "that no one has built a
summer resort here. I think it ever so much more charming than either
Hollis Creek or Meadow Brook."

"Do you believe in telepathy?" asked Sam, almost startled. "I do. It
hasn't been but a few minutes since that identical idea popped into my
head, and I had just now decided that if I could secure options on this
property I would have a real summer resort here--one that would make
Hollis Creek and Meadow Brook mere farm boarding-houses. Do you see
how close together these hills draw at their feet? The hollow is at
least a thousand feet across at the widest part, but down there at the
road, where the stream emerges to the fields, they close in with
natural buttresses, as it were, to not over a hundred feet in width.
Well, right across there we'll build a dam, and there is enough water
here to make a beautiful lake up as high as that yellow rock."

Miss Josephine looked up at the yellow rock and clasped her hands with
an exclamation of delight.

"Glorious!" she said. "I never would have thought of that; and how
beautiful it will be! Why, if the lake comes up that high it will go
clear back around that turn in the valley, won't it?"

"Easily," he replied; "although that might make us trouble, for I don't
know where that turn in the valley leads. I have never explored that
region. Suppose we go up and look it over."

"Won't that be fun?" she agreed, and they started to follow the stream.

As they reached the rear of the "pocket," where they could see around
the curve, they turned and looked back over the route they had just
traversed.

"My idea," Sam explained, having waited until they reached this
viewpoint to do so, "is to build the dam down there at the roadside,
and build the hotel right over it so that arriving guests will, after
an elevator has brought them up to the height of the main floor, find
the blue of the lake suddenly bursting upon them from the main piazza,
which will face the valley. All of the inside rooms will, of course,
have hanging balconies looking out over the water."

"Perfectly ideal!" she agreed, her enthusiasm growing.

"I think I'd better investigate the curve of the valley," he decided,
studying the path carefully. "It seems rather rough for you, and I'll
go alone. All I want to see is how far the water height will carry
around there, and if it will become necessary to build a dam at the
other end."