Newcomers gazed curiously at the high sidewalks, raised on posts above the level of the thoroughfares, asking why, if there was such possibility of flood, the people continued to live and do business along the bottom of the gulch. The residents thought the walled sidewalks rather a good joke, a humorous distinction, and laughed at the idea of danger. Lucy Bancroft's eyes grew wide and solemn as she listened to the tale Dan Tillinghurst told her of the first year he was in Golden, years before, when a mighty torrent roared down the gulch, carried away most of the houses, and drowned a dozen souls. "But the very next day," he added proudly, "the people began rebuildin' their houses on the identical sites from which they had been swept." "Why didn't they rebuild on higher ground?" Lucy asked. "And aren't you afraid there will be another flood that will destroy all these houses and perhaps kill a great many people?" "Oh, there's no danger now," he assured her confidently. "The climate's changin'. There's not nearly so much rain as there used to be. The creek is dry half the time nowadays, and in my first years here it never went dry at all. Just look at these flood-marks," and he pointed out to her on the side of the brick building that housed her father's bank the lines to which had risen the high waters of each Summer. She saw that those of recent years were all very low. "Yes," he assured her, "the climate's changin', there's no doubt of that. There won't be any more floods." Between Lucy and the Sheriff a mutual admiration and good-fellowship had arisen, such as might exist between an elephant and a robin. The day after her arrival Tillinghurst had told Bancroft that his daughter was "the prettiest piece of dry goods that had ever come to Golden, and if he ever let her pull her freight he'd sure deserve nothin' less than tarrin' and featherin' at the hands of an outraged community." Notwithstanding her confidence in the big Sheriff, Lucy did not like the idea of living in the gulch, and persuaded her father to build their home on the brow of the _mesa_ overlooking the town from the west. She had no definite fear of the floods nor, after her first few weeks in the place, did she so much as think of danger from such a source. She liked the site on the _mesa_, although it was new and raw and treeless, because it commanded a far-reaching view, to the mountains on the west and north and, in front, across the town and the valley to the wide gray level of the plains.