colonel was merely
playing a cold-blooded game for delay. That guess comes back to us like
a fish-hook with the bait gone. There was nothing, less than nothing, to
be gained by killing me to-day."

Bromley made the negative sign of assenting perplexity.

"It's miles too deep for me," he admitted. "Three nights ago, when I was
dining at Castle 'Cadia, Colonel Craigmiles spoke of you as a father
might speak of the man whom he would like to have for a son-in-law:
talked about the good old gentlemanly Kentucky stock, and all that, you
know. I can't begin to sort it out."

"I am going to sort it out, some day when I have time," declared
Ballard; and the hurt being temporarily repaired, they went out to
superintend the arrangements for feeding the visiting throng in the big
mess-tent.

After the barbecue, and more speech-making around the trestle-tables in
the mess-tent, the railroad trains were brought into requisition, and
various tours of inspection through the park ate out the heart of the
afternoon for the visitors. Bromley took charge of that part of the
entertainment, leaving Ballard to nurse his sore arm and to watch the
slow submersion of the dam as the rising flood crept in little lapping
waves up the sloping back-wall.

The afternoon sun beat fiercely upon the deserted construction camp, and
the heat, rarely oppressive in the mountain-girt altitudes, was
stifling. Down in the cook camp, Garou and his helpers were washing
dishes by the crate and preparing the evening luncheon to be served
after the trains returned; and the tinkling clatter of china was the
only sound to replace the year-long clamour of the industries and the
hoarse roar of the river through the cut-off.

Between his occasional strolls over to the dam and the canyon brink to
mark the rising of the water, Ballard sat on the bungalow porch and
smoked. From the time-killing point of view the great house in the upper
valley loomed in mirage-like proportions in the heat haze; and by three
o'clock the double line of aspens marking the river's course had
disappeared in a broad band of molten silver half encircling the knoll
upon which the mirage mansion swayed and shimmered.

Ballard wondered what the house-party was doing; what preparations, if
any, had been made for its dispersal. For his own satisfaction he had
carefully run bench-levels with his instruments from the dam height
through the upper valley. When the water should reach the coping cou