e thought you would make up a party to go up
with her."

"You'll start the first of the week? Yes, I guess I'll go." Uncle Sid
was certain of it.

"Then I'll go up in a day or two and get things ready for you. The gates
are closed, you know, and the reservoir is nearly full. The rains in the
mountains have been unusually heavy this season."

"How are you makin' out with Mellin?"

Winston's smile was not pleasant to contemplate.

"I've got him all done but the finishing. He talked fight when I left
him, but I think this will take it out of him." Winston held out a
bundle of papers to Uncle Sid. "Do you want to look them over?"

Uncle Sid shook his head as he pushed the papers aside.

"I've got a parcel o' papers too. Betwixt the two of us, I guess we have
got things pretty well straightened out."

"How does Helen feel about it now?"

"She's stickin' to 'Lige like a barnacle. She says that 'Lige meant all
right an' would have done all right, if Eunice an' Mellin had let him
alone. She didn't say so, but I guess she meant she'd a made him,
herself."

Winston's expression was skeptical, but it softened as he answered.

"She would have tried, all right."

"She would have succeeded too, if Eunice had kept out." Uncle Sid spoke
with unusual emphasis. "If there's anything worth savin' in a man, a
good woman's bound to save it. Things have looked pretty black for 'Lige
an' for Helen too, but they'll come out all right. I don't like 'Lige's
cat-awaulin' any more than you do, an' you ain't seen the worst o' him
yet, unless I miss my guess, an' you ain't seen the best o' him,
neither. I can't understan' everything an' so I take some things on
trust, an' I want to tell you this, Helen Lonsdale ain't the kind o'
fish to bite on a bare hook, an' she bit hard on 'Lige."

"So did I. That is, I bit." Winston was thinking of the days when the
Las Cruces was hair-hung. He was straight in word and deed. Right and
wrong were too sharply defined in his mind to allow room for sympathy
towards those differently constituted.

"I wish the whole thing was over," he burst out impatiently. "It makes
me boil to have these Ysleta sharks looking cross-eyed at me."

Uncle Sid held up a warning hand.

"Don't think o' that, young man, don't think o' that. Just think how
much worse you'd boil if you had anything to boil over. You go along
now, an' do a little trustin' that counts. You needn't talk about who
you are trustin' in, but 'two