“Gentlemen, I have finished. I should like to show you the Cramer Dam, to-morrow. It may upset your schedule, just as I am making you late for the banquet, which is probably waiting and cooling at this moment. But, gentlemen, it will pay you to upset your schedule. It will pay you to take the time and walk the two or three miles between the nearest road and the dam. Until you do see the Cramer Dam, which I now publicly announce as being completed, you are not fully qualified to make your report, if report you must make, to the Secretary of the Interior, or whoever receives and passes upon your findings in the matter. Gentlemen, I thank you.” CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE FATE HAS DECREED “I should like to say just here, if I may, that many of the astonishing facts as Mr. Cramer has placed them before you I can vouch for from my own personal knowledge.” Rawley was on his feet, turned toward Peter’s audience. “Just before the war, I was permitted to look over the work on the Cramer Dam”--privately, Rawley liked the way Uncle Peter had dignified the dam by giving it a name which would hereafter identify it to the public--“which at that time was uncompleted. I did not approve of their project, but I will say that I was personally in sympathy with it. “In considering the facts which Mr. Cramer has presented to you, I am taking the liberty of asking you to bear in mind that I am willing to vouch for their authenticity. And in explanation of my silence on the subject, I will say that I went to the Cramers and urged them to abandon their project, since it would interfere with the reclamation plans of the government. I did not know, until he stated their position in the matter just now, what stand they meant to take.” He sat down, and his chief nodded approvingly. It was perfectly apparent to Peter that his cause would be none the worse for Rawley’s championship. He glowed to see how friendly they all were with Rawley. Also, it surprised his unsophisticated soul to observe the ease and familiarity with which these men comported themselves. Headliners in the newspapers, every one of them save the reporters themselves, he had half expected them to retain their platform manners in private. They were just men, after all, he decided, and turned to answer the questions of a great man as easily as he would have answered Rawley. The committee of entertainment waited a bit for their guests of honor, that night. From the manner in which the talk slid into other and more accustomed channels the moment others entered the car, Peter gathered that Las Vegas would continue for a time in ignorance of what had been going on under its nose for so long. It tickled him to picture the amazement and incredulity when the Commission should make its announcement. Or perhaps Las Vegas would read it in the city papers first. They would be slow to believe that the obscure family of Cramers could put over a thing like that and keep it under cover all these years.