The Huttig news., 1916-05-06

at the mouth of the gorge, where the torrenting Niquoia strengthened itself momentarily before entering upon it's plunging race through the mountain barrier beam of white light ffickered unsteadily for fraction of second Then it became a luminous pencil tc trace zigZag line up the winding course of the river, across to the foot. hill spur where the camp of the recla. nation service vanguard was pitched and so on around to the base of the Chigringo. For certain other seconds it remained quiescent, glowing bale. fully like the eye Of some fabled mon. ster searching for it's prey. Then it was gone.
 Grislow's comment took the form of half-startled exclamation.
 By love. wouldn't that give you a fit of the creepies?-this far from civi lization and a dynamo? What are you calling it?"
 Your guess is as good as mine" ;" was the half-absent reply Brouillard had got upon his feet and was but. toning his many-poeketed shooting coat.
 I'm going to take little hike down wonder for investigation purposes. Want to come along?'
 But the mapper of watersheds was yawning sleepily Not on your tin type" he refused I'm going to cork it orf in me ammick.'
 It was only a short mile from the camp on the inward slopes of the east ern foothills to the mouth of the outlet gorge. across which Brouillard could already see, in mental provision, the great gray wall of the projected Mi quoia dam-his future work-curving majestically from the broken shoulder of Chigringo to the opposing steeps of Jacks mountain. The half-grown moon, tilting now toward the skyline of the western barrier, was leaving the canyon portal in deepest gloom.
 Picking his way judiciously because the trail was new to him, Brouillard came in due time to the descending path among the spruces and scrub pines leading to the western outlook upon the desert swales and sandhills. At the canyon portal. where the forest thinned away and left him standing at the head of the final descending plunge in the trail. he found himself looking down upon the explanation of the curious apparition.
 None the less, what he saw was in itself rather inexplicable. Tn the first desert looping of the river a campfire of pinyon knots was blazing cheerfully, and beside it, with a picnic hamper for a table, sat supper party of three- two men and a woman-in enveloping dust-ccats, and a third man in chauf- feur leather serving the sitters. Pack Of the group, and with it's detachable searchlight missing, stood huge tour ing car to account for the picnic ham, per, the dust-cCats. the man in leather, and, doubtless, for the apparitianal eye which had appeared and disappeared at the mouth of the upper gorge Also 1t accounted, in purely physical sense, for the presence of the picniek- CTS, though the whim which had led them to cross the desolate Buckskin desert for the dubious pleasure of mak- ing an all-night bivouac on it's eastern edge was not so readily apparent.
 The young engineer saw no reason why he should intrude upon the group at the cheerful campfire On the cen trary, he began speedily to find good and sufficient reasons why he should not. That the real restraining motive was a sudden attack of desert shyness he would not have admitted. But the fact remained. Four years in the rec lamation service had made the good looking young chief of construction a man-queller of quality. But each year of isolation had done something toward weakening the social ties
 A loesened pebble turned the scale When bit of the coarse-grained sand stone of the trail rolled under Brouil- lard's foot and went clattering down to plunge into the stream the man in the chauffeur leather reached for the searehlight lantern and directed it's beam upon the canyon portal. But hy that time BrouiIlard had sought tha shelter of the scrub pines and was re- tracing his steps up the shoulder Of the mountain.