The Vision of Elijah Berl

"That's tolerably condensed."

Ralph laughed at Uncle Sid's disapproval.

"If you are really interested, you'd better let us show you around a little. You can see a good deal better than I can tell you."

Uncle Sid's face had lost its humorous wrinkles.

"'Lige is really doin' something worth while out here, is he?"

"He's got me on the jump. That's a good deal in itself."

"What are you doin'?"

"Oh," Ralph laughed. "I'm being bossed."

Uncle Sid looked sharply at Ralph.

"If I was on the quarter deck as I used to be, an' saw you afore the mast, I'd think over my orders before I handed 'em to you. If 'Lige has any sense with his dreamin', he'll do the same."

"Helen's helping 'Lige to boss me. When he isn't around, she does it alone."

Uncle Sid looked at Helen. The humorous wrinkles returned to his face.

"What's the matter with you? You swallowed your tongue?"

"No; I'm holding it." She answered Uncle Sid's look as well as his words.

The lumbering wagon drew up in front of the Rio Vista. Before Ralph could dispose of the reins, Helen was on the ground and ascending the steps of the hotel. At the top she paused, speaking to Ralph.

"I'm going to take Uncle Sid out to the works before long." Then she entered the door.

Uncle Sid turned to Ralph.

"I don't guess you're bein' bossed quite so much as you say." He slowly clambered from the wagon and stood, looking at Ralph, his hand on the wheel. "I ain't askin' questions just for fun," he began.

Ralph interrupted.

"I won't answer your questions in fun either. But you do what Helen says. Come out to the works."

Perhaps it was because she had expected too much, but Helen was disappointed in the morning. Certain things had been disquieting. Ralph's words "For the sake of old times, if for nothing else" – had at first annoyed her. The annoyance changed to a questioning disquietude. The very annoyance suggested possibilities which had never distinctly occurred to her before. She did not, she could not resent it as she would like to do. She could not avoid a comparison between the clear, steady eyes of Ralph Winston and the glowing, shifting ones of Elijah Berl which had moved her so profoundly.

The contrast between the two men forced itself upon her. The convincing alertness of Ralph Winston, clear and cool and bracing, the glowing mystical enthusiasm of Elijah Berl that breathed upon her, laid hold upon her like languorous exhalations from a tropic growth. She recalled her childhood days with Ralph Winston. His masterful ways which flashed out in open revolt against her impetuous temper, that took her in his arms and in spite of her panting protests, soothed her into forgiving smiles. There was no yielding to her wrongs, no tyranny in his right, but a subtle stimulating air that suggested no personality, rather an impersonal force which compelled him, even as it did her.

There were tears in her eyes now. There was a great longing to go to Ralph as she had gone years ago, to hear again the words which had melted her darkness into clear light. An almost irresistible impulse came to her. "Why not go to him now?" He had opened the way. A word, a motion, a glance from her eyes and the way would open again. She rose to her feet and laid her hand upon the door.

Had Winston been in the hotel that night! But he was miles away and she returned to her seat. Her brain went on and on, twisting and turning the same old problem. Ralph knew Elijah Berl, yet he had cast in his lot with him. Ralph trusted in his own strength, why should not she trust in hers? She drew a long, shuddering breath. Elijah had asked her for bread. Could she give him a stone?

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Winston had been in earnest when he invited the old sea captain to make him a visit. He had felt as strongly attracted to the kindly old man as Uncle Sid had been to him. To a certain extent he was curious to know just why Elijah's affairs so deeply interested him. The chance remark of the old captain to the effect that he had known Elijah from childhood up, was a partial explanation that opened the door to the desire to know the cause in full. Evidently the youthful Elijah had displayed the same characteristics which maturer years had developed in California. Winston guessed that the weak spots in Elijah which had aroused his own opposition, had not escaped the eyes of the captain. As day after day passed by, he concluded that Uncle Sid was waiting for Helen and that Helen was too busy to accompany him.

Whether Uncle Sid had become tired of waiting for Helen or whether he decided that a proper time had elapsed since the invitation had been given, matters not. Late one afternoon, one of the supply wagons delivered him at Ralph's tent.

The flaps of the tent were open and Ralph was there explaining some blue prints to one of his assistants. He looked up at the sound of the wagon.

"Oh, hello, Captain! I'm mighty glad to see you. I had about given you up."

"Huh!" the old man grunted. "That ain't over complimentary. From what I've heard, you ain't over quick at givin' up what is worth while."

"Give me a chance, Captain. You don't want to believe all that you hear."

"I don't. That's what I'm up here for."

"Now we're even on compliments. Let's call it quits."

Uncle Sid looked up shrewdly.

"Figures and doin' things ain't all that you're quick at." He paused, taking in the assistant. "Don't mind me. You go on stuffin' that young man. He ain't full yet."

"Just a minute; then I'm yours truly." Ralph devoted a few moments to the "young man" who, having been "stuffed", departed. "How would you like to take a little drive up the line!"

"Just how much is your little?"

"It's fifteen miles to the next camp. If you say so, we will drive up there and stay all night and the next day we can make the dam in the mountains. I think you'll like it, if it isn't too much." Ralph purposely touched up Uncle Sid with his last remark.

"I ain't too old to know when I've got enough an' I ain't bashful at hollerin' about it, either. You just drive on till I holler, unless you get enough before."

Uncle Sid had little to say on the way, but his keen eyes were taking in everything along the line. Ralph's explanations were listened to in silence. Ralph was not slow to note the absorbed interest of his companion, nor the fact that not a word of his explanations was lost. At every gang of men, Ralph was halted by alert foremen, and often he left the team in charge of Uncle Sid while he went forth to untangle some snarled bit of work or to give further directions in advancing it.

The sun was down when they drew up before the camp and surrendered the team to a waiting Mexican.

Uncle Sid glanced at Ralph with a look at once appreciative and cynical.

"The next time you tell me about a place, you just say how long it is, not how far."

"You'll have to excuse me there. You see I know distances, but I can't always say about the time."

Ralph was up the next morning even before the captain who believed in early rising.

"Good morning, Captain. Ready for another trip?"

"I guess so."

"I can tell distance and time all right today. Do you see what you're up against?" Ralph pointed to the towering San Bernardinos. "It's horseback from here and we ought to be there by three o'clock anyway."

At the mouth of the cañon, Ralph explained the dam that was being built across the river and the heavy gates that were being put in.

"You see we let the water come from the reservoir as far as this, in its natural bed. If anything should happen along the canal we can shut off the water at this point first. Later, we could shut it off at the reservoir."