t winter? Little woman, I recall."

"Little, but a lot better than plenty of bigger ones I know of," Dave
asserted, stoutly. "She died of pneumonia."

"Boy, I've held you on my knee when you were about as high as my hand.
But I guess you don't remember that, and I'm mighty sorry to learn
your mother's gone. Dave--is that your name? Well, now, Dave, fight
your grub harder from now on."

The speaker gathered his reins, nodded, and rode away along the barb
wire fence.

CHAPTER VI

"When gentlemen of a dark and sinister cast of mind deliberately set
out to frustrate one's legitimate efforts under a misapprehension as
to the course to be pursued, the proper diplomacy in such a case is to
foster the delusion circulating in their craniums as long as possible
and thus divert their attention from the real purpose. Don't you agree
with me, David?" Lee Bryant gravely inquired of his young companion,
as they were about to set forth next morning.

"Yes, sir," Dave affirmed, to whom the statement was so much Greek.

"Then since the vote is unanimous, we'll proceed to run a line along
the mountain side where it will collide with these new homesteads."

The engineer shouldered tripod and rod, whistled Mike to heel, and
with Dave started forward. Half way to Bartolo they perceived three
men busy on the hillside, so Bryant swung up to a point a quarter of a
mile off and began surveying. When he approached the workmen, Mexicans
naturally, he saw that they were engaged in setting fence posts, of
which a row was already in line part way up the hill.

The men dropped their tools and confronted him as he drew near.

"This is my land; you keep away," one exclaimed, with waving arms,
while the other backed him up in a show of force.

"How can I build a canal here if you won't let me go through?" Bryant
demanded.

"No go through, no canal on my claim!"

"Well, just let me run a line, anyhow."

"No. Keep off, keep off," was the obstinate answer.

The engineer continued to argue, now as if in anger and now with a
conciliatory mien, all the while protesting that the homesteader must
not prevent the construction of the canal. But he received only shakes
of the head, short replies, and malicious looks. So at length, with
every pretense of disappointment and dejection, he went down the
hillside.

A mile farther along, where he found two more men occupied at similar
labour, he likewise dissembled his purpose, with the same o