Then he fell to watching the slower, steady ascent of Jessica, who had descended the further side so swiftly, and who had clambered lightly enough over the roughness of the gulch bottom; at times filled with a roaring torrent, but now quite dry after a long, hot summer. "Well, here I am!" "And a sorry sight to show you. Look a' that now. Isn't that a regular coyote piece of work?" Along this face of the canyon descended a line of small wooden troughs, closely joined, and supported upon slender but strong cedar uprights. This flume connected with the distant reservoir of an irrigating company and had been built by Jessica's dead father at a great and ill-afforded expense. But of all good things there was nothing so precious to the tillers of that thirsty land as water, and the cutting off of this supply meant ruin to Sobrante. Young as she was, Jessica fully understood this, though she could not understand that any human being should do a deed so dastardly. "John Benton, you mustn't say that. Some of the cattle have done it. It's an accident. It can be mended. I'm sorry, of course, but so thankful you found it. And I see you've got your tools." "Oh! I can mend it, all right, but it won't stay mended. You'll see. 'Tisn't the first break I've patched, not by any means." "Of course it isn't. Only last week in that stampede, when the boys were changing pasture, the creatures ran against it and you fixed it, good as new. There isn't anything you can't do with an ax and a few nails." John passed the compliment by unheeding. "There's breaks and there's cuts. Reckon I can tell the difference quick enough. This is a cut and isn't the first one I've found, I say. 'Twas a fresh-ground blade did this piece of deviltry, or I'm no judge of edges. Now, who did it? Why? And how's old Pedro?" Despite her faith in her friends, the small ranchwoman's heart sank. "He--he--why, he isn't sick at all! I was sent up there on a fool's errand, and just on plucking-day, when I was so needed at home. With Wun Lung hurt and mother so busy, I ought to have a dozen pairs of hands. Of course, I'm glad he's well, dear old fellow, but I shouldn't have gone this morning if somebody hadn't told Antonio wrong. I met a stranger on the trail, too, and Zulu scared his horse, and it stumbled in a gopher hole or something and is lamed for ever so long. He'll likely come to Sobrante, if he can get there, but he looked ill if Pedro didn't, and the sun nearly overcame him. Can't I help you hold that board?" John accepted her offer of help less because he needed it than because he always liked to have her near him. "So 'twas Antonio sent you, eh? H-m-m!" "He didn't send me. Course not. He just said somebody said Pedro was dying." The carpenter laughed, but his mirth was not pleasant.