The Elbert County tribune., 1919-02-21
CHAPTER l.
Mar.haII sends ter Riekard.

mdFSndH Seno6 Tor HfCkaro.
The large round clock was striking
nine as Casey" Richards dancing step
carried him into the outer Office of Tod
Marshall. The ushering clerk, coat
less and vestless in expectation of the
third hot spring day. made a critical
appraisement of the engineers get,up
before he spoke. Then he stated that
Mr.. Marshall had not yet come
For London tie and white silk
shirt belted into white serge trousers
were smart for Tucson. The clerks
in the employ of the Overland Pacific
and of the Sonora and Yaqui railroads
had stared at Rickard as he entered
they followed his progress through the
room. He was n newcomer in Tucson.
He had not yet acquired the apathetic
habits of its citizens. He wore belts,
instead of suspenders. His white
trousers. duck or serge, carried new
ly pressed crease each morning.
The Office had not reached a verdict
on the subject of X. c. Rickard. The
shirt-sleeved, collarless clerks would
have been quick to dub him dandy
were it not for a page of his history
that was puzzling them. He had held
chair of engineering in some eastern
city. He had resigned, the wind-tossed
page said. to go on the road as a
fireman. His rapid promotions had
been spectacular; the last move, a
few years ago. to fill an office position
in Tucson. The summons had found
him ON the west coast of Mexico,
where the Overland PACIFIC was push
ing its tracks.
You can wait here" suggested the
clerk. looking covertly ut the shoes of
the man who few years before had
been shoveling coal onta Wyoming en-
gine. "Mr. Marshall said to wait"
Ribbons. instead of shoe laces ~
carped the human machine that must
ever write letters which other men
sign. And a blue pin to match his
tie I call that going some"'
1t would never have occurred to
Rickard, had he thought about it at
all that morning as he knotted his tie
Of dark. brilliant blue silk, that the
selection of his lapis pin was choice;
it was an inevitable result, an instinc
tive Ndiscretion- of his fingers. 1t
warped, however, the suspended judg--
ment of Marshall's men, who had
never seen him shoveling coal, disfig-
ured by denim jumper. They did
not know that they themselves were
sIovuns, ruined by the climate that
dulls vanity and wits collars.
"Give him year to change some of
, his fine habits! I" wagered Smythe, the
Stoop-shouldered clerk, as the door of
the inner office closed
ITO change his habits less !" amend
I'd the Office wit. And then they fell
% specializing what Marshall was 60
) ng to do with him. What pawn was
he in the game that everyone in Tue
son followed with eager self-interested
concern? Marshall's was the control
ling hand in Arizona politics; the
maker of governors, the arbiter of big
corporations; president of half
dozen railroads. Not move of his
on the board that escaped notice.
On the other side of the door Rick
ard was echoing the office question.
This play job, where did it lead to?
He had liked his work. under Stratton.
There had been some pretty problems
to meet-what did Marshall mean to
do with him?
The note had set the appointment
for nine. Rickard glanced at his
watch and took out his Engineering
Review. 1t would be ten before that
, door opened on Tod Marshalll
He knew that. on the road, Mar
shall's work began at dawn. "a man
a won't break from overwork or rust
from underworld If he follows the ex-
ample of the sum-" Rickard had often
s heard him expound bis favorite the
ory. ''It is only the players, the syba-
rites, who can afford to pervert the
arrangement nature intended for us"
But In Tucson, controlled by the wife
IL solicitude of his Claudia. he was
coerced into regular perverslon. His
office never saw him until the morn
Ing was half gone.
A half-hour later Ricknrd finished
reading a report on the diversion of a
great western river. The name of
Thomas Hardin had sent him OFF on
a tangent of memory. The Thomas
Hardin whose efforts to bring water
10 the desert of the Colorado had been
so spectacularly unsuccessful was the
yom Hardin he had knownl The SIS