The times-herald. [volume] (Burns, Harney County, Or.) 1896-1929, 1919-03-22

GF~n w." w.
~ Am Going to Send You Down to the
Break"
face, ms the Chinese say. ! may tell
you that II was case Of firing. He'd
made a terrible fuke down there"
II know" murmured Rickard. II
/ was growing more difficult. more dis
tasteful. II Marshall wanted him to
supplnnt Hardini II had been inered-
ible. that mans follyI Reckless gam
bling. nothing else. Make cut In the
banks Of wild river, without put
ting In head gates to control Il; q
child would guess betteri IL was a
problem now. all right; the writer Of
the report he'd Just read wasn't the
only one who was prophesyIng failure.
Let the river cut back. and the gov
ernment works at Laguna would be
| useless; a pickle Hardin had made.
Still TO gain time he suggested that
Marshall tell him the situation. 'Tvs
followed only the engineering side of
II. l don't know the relattonship Of
the two companIes."
where the railroad came inf The
Inside OF that story7 I'm responsible
Il guaranteed TO Fnraday the closing
OF that break. There was a big dis
trIct to save. a district that the rail-
road tapped-but I'll tell you that
later" He was leisurely putting blue,
perfectly formed rings into the air,
his eyes admiring them.
Perhaps you've heard how Estrada,
the general. took party OF men Into
the desert to sell mine he owned.
After the deal was made he decided
to let II slip. He'd found something
bigger to do, more to his liking than
the sale of a mine. Estrada was
big man, a great man. He had the
Idea Powell and others had. of turn
Ing the river, of saving the desert. He
dreamed himself Of doing II. II sick
ness hadn't come to him the Colorado
would be meekly carrying water now
instead OF flooding country. Pity
Eduardo. the son. IL not like him. He's
Ike his mother-you never know what
they are dreaming about. Not at all
alike, my wife and Estrada's."
Then II came TO Rickard that he
had heard somewhere that Marshall
and General Estrada had married sis
tiers, famous beauties of Guadalajara.
He began TO piece together the per-
sonal background OF the story.
ut was long time before Estrada
could get II started. and It's n long
story. AS soon as he began he was
Knocked down. Other men took hold.
You'll hear II all In the valley. Har-
din took n day TO tell Il to mel He
sees himself as martyr. Promoters
got In; the thing swelled into
swindie, spectacular swindle. They
showed oranges Oh Broadway before
IA drop OF water was brought In. Har-
din has lots Of grievances He'd made
me original survey. SO when he sued
Tor his back wages re took the papers
or the bankrupt company In settle
lnent. He's n grim sort of Intellectual
bulldog. He's clung with his teeth
10 the Estrada Idea. And he's not big
enough for II. He uses the optimistic
method-gyes you only half of case.
halt of the problem gets started on
false premise. Well, he got up nm
other company on that method. the
Desert Reclamation company. tried 10 I
"hitcwash the desert project; 1t wns
N bad odor then, and he managed 10 /
Drlng lew drops OF water to the |
losert."
1T was Hardin who did that?"
But he couldn't deliver enough.
me cut silted up. He cut again, the
'aine story. He was In pretty bad
lole. He'd brought colonlsts In nj.
'eady; he'd used their money, the
money they'd paid for land with wa
er TO make the cuts. No wonder he
vas desperate"
IL recalled the man Rickard had
Iisliked, the rough-shod, loud-voiced
tudent OF his first class In engineer
ng. That was the man who had made
he fiamboyant carpets of the Holmes
0arding house impossible any longer
o him. He had sudden dlsconcert.
ng vision Of n large unfinished face
eering through the honeysuckles MT
man and girl drawing apart IN
onfusion from their first ana last
lss. He wanted to tell Marshall he
'as wasting his time.
Overwhelmed with lawsuits" Mar.
hail was saying. Hardin had to de-
ver water to those colonlsts. II was /
hen that he ran over into Mexico. II
o as to get better gradient for his \
anal, and made his cut there. You i
Aow the rest. 1t ran away from him. \
made the Salton sea-"
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