Argosy All-Story Weekly, Vol. 123, No. 4 — page 114: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

620 He turned on his heel and strode from the house. The Mexican mozo in the outer hall saw him pass, and at the sight of his face the little servant shrank away and crossed himself. “The devil is loosed!” he muttered in Spanish, and started as the door clicked softly shut behind the departing figure. . The stronger the purpose which guides a man the greater is the strength he feels within him, and as Tyson went down the street he looked toward the towering mass of the dam. The street he walked had been paved for the workers upon that ‘dam. ' The houses he passed were occupied by the builders. Yet in spite of the myriads who had labored on it, the dam seemed too vast a work for human hands. Nevertheless, the task before him was the ruin of the man whose brain had conceived the labor, and whose will had executed it. A thought that would have bowed the heads of most men, but Tyson walked with an upright, springy tread. For one thing, all methods were open to him, good and evil, and when a man admits any possible means of attaining a given end, his re- sources are infinitely increased. . Full of these thoughts, he saw little about him until he turned aside and leaped up the steps in front of Mrs. Casey’s boarding-house. At the head he checked himself with an exclamation, for he had almost collided with a brilliant figure in blues and reds—Rona Carnahan. She, too, started back, but at once she con- trolled herself. | “ Rona!” he exclaimed. “By the Lord, I’ve been eager to see you. Stand over here. Let me look at you!” “Why,” she said suddenly, the topic up- permost in her mind coming out, childlike, ‘““why do people smile when they look at me—white people, I mean?”’ “7 never smile.” “You did at first.” “‘ Then I was a fool, and the others who smile now are blockheads. I'll crack their sconces for ’em if I ever see ’em doing it, ‘ I promise you that. Rona, give me your hand again. I haven’t realized how I’ve missed you.” ARGOSY-ALLSTORY WEEKLY. 2 And he spoke the truth. ‘Then why have you stayed away?” He thought of his last talk to her and his farewell; and he thought of the good old padre; but last of all the words of Garth rang through his mind: “ All’s fair in love—to the victor beleng ithe spoils.” And was he not committed to any course, good or evil? ““T said good-by, but I’ye changed my mind about that.” He brushed the past away with a wide gesture, and‘then smiled on her. “I'd like to begin again if I may. Did you really come all the way down here to see me?” There had been just the glint of a com- ing smile in her eyes, but she threw a cur- tain over them now. “ No.’ “No? Then why? Ah, it was Ken- nedy!” “ Bah!” | She tossed the thought of Kennedy away with both hands. “Then why are you here?” “To find out if you were sick—you’ve been away so long.” — ““You knew all the time that I would come back?” — “Of course.” He chuckled, watching -her with new eyes of observancy. “You seem thinner, Rona. been ill?’ “No, I have been sad.” Every man has a taint of the cad at heart—unless he is a saint. “Sad?” queried Tyson eagerly. “‘ Because the dam is nearly finished.”’ She turned and shook her fist at the cor- ner of it which was visible around the edge of the house. . | _“ Vhen it is finished the water will rise in the valley. And San Vicente will be drowned. Poor San Vicente! Tell me, senor, is it not a crime against the dear saint to cover his house with water? How can men do such a work?’ + . When the ground is plowed, any seed will grow in it. Tyson caught a deep breath. * “ How can men work at it?” he echoed thoughtfully. ‘The Mexicans—I won- Have you -_™= {DOO r-Va |