quarry I
made believe I was looking at? Well, I'm going to buy it. I'm going
to buy these hills, too, clear from here around to Berkeley and down
the other way to San Leandro. I own a lot of them already, for that
matter. But mum is the word. I'll be buying a long time to come
before anything much is guessed about it, and I don't want the market
to jump up out of sight. You see that hill over there. It's my hill
running clear down its slopes through Piedmont and halfway along those
rolling hills into Oakland. And it's nothing to all the things I'm
going to buy."

He paused triumphantly. "And all to make two minutes grow where one
grew before?" Dede queried, at the same time laughing heartily at his
affectation of mystery.

He stared at her fascinated. She had such a frank, boyish way of
throwing her head back when she laughed. And her teeth were an
unending delight to him. Not small, yet regular and firm, without a
blemish, he considered then the healthiest, whitest, prettiest teeth he
had ever seen. And for months he had been comparing them with the
teeth of every woman he met.

It was not until her laughter was over that he was able to continue.

"The ferry system between Oakland and San Francisco is the worst
one-horse concern in the United States. You cross on it every day, six
days in the week. That's say, twenty-five days a month, or three
hundred a year. Now long does it take you one way? Forty minutes, if
you're lucky. I'm going to put you across in twenty minutes. If that
ain't making two minutes grow where one grew before, knock off my head
with little apples. I'll save you twenty minutes each way. That's
forty minutes a day, times three hundred, equals twelve thousand
minutes a year, just for you, just for one person. Let's see: that's
two hundred whole hours. Suppose I save two hundred hours a year for
thousands of other folks,--that's farming some, ain't it?"

Dede could only nod breathlessly. She had caught the contagion of his
enthusiasm, though she had no clew as to how this great time-saving was
to be accomplished.

"Come on," he said. "Let's ride up that hill, and when I get you out
on top where you can see something, I'll talk sense."

A small footpath dropped down to the dry bed of the canon, which they
crossed before they began the climb. The slope was steep and covered
with matted brush and bushes, through which the horses slipped and
lunged. Bob, growing disgusted