not replied. The Western Union operator was almost insulted
that Bob should imagine there was a message there for him.

Bob wrote another appeal, a little longer, and if possible more urgent,
and fired that into Washington.

The consul came the following day. He interviewed the other ranchers
and verified Bob's statements. He took affidavits, and made up quite a
bulky report and dispatched it by mail to Washington. In the meantime
he wired, briefly outlining the substance of his letter, and asked for
temporary authority to take measures that would force the Mexican
officials to act.

Bob was fairly hopeful over this. He waited anxiously for twenty-four
hours for some answer. None came. This was the third day since his
cotton began to need water. The thermometer went to 131 at two
o'clock. No green plant could survive long without water.

He rode all day enlisting the cooperation of influential men in the
valley on the American side, and got several of them to send wires to
Washington. Every night when he returned to Calexico he went eagerly
to the telegraph office; but each time the operator emphatically shook
his head. Then Bob laboured over another long telegram, begging for
haste; he paid nine dollars and forty cents toll and urged that the
message be rushed.

By the fifth day Rogeen was getting desperate. He returned to Calexico
at seven o'clock, jumped out of his car, and hurried into the telegraph
office.

A message! A telegram for him at last! He had got action. Maybe even
yet he could save most of his crop. The message was collect--$1.62.
He dropped two silver dollars on the counter and without noticing the
change tore open the message. It was from the department at Washington
and was brief:

DEAR SIR:

If you file your complaints in writing, they will be referred to the
proper department for consideration.

R. P. M., _Ass't to Sec. of State._

Then Bob gave up, turned about gloomily, and went out to his machine,
and started south toward the Chandler ranch.

CHAPTER XXVII

As the sun, like a burnished lid to some hotter caldron, slid down
behind the yellow sandhills that rimmed the desert, Imogene Chandler
felt as though she must scream. She would have made some wild outcry
of relief if it had not been for her father, who still sat in the
doorway of the shack, as he had all day, gray and bent like a dusty,
wilted mullein stalk.

It had been a terrible day--the hotte