Part 22 (1/2)

”It's my nephew's affair,” he said.

”Oh, yes!” returned Acton, significantly. ”Any way, I'll go ash.o.r.e with him, as soon as George has the gig ready.”

Acton and Nasmyth were rowed off together half an hour later, and they walked up through the hot main street of the little colliery town. It was not an attractive place, with rickety plank sidewalks raised several feet above the street, towering telegraph-poles, wooden stores, and square frame houses cracked by the weather, and mostly dest.i.tute of any adornment or paint. Blazing suns.h.i.+ne beat down upon the rutted street, and an unpleasant gritty dust blew along it.

There was evidently very little going on in the town that afternoon.

Here and there a man leaned heavy-eyed, as if unaccustomed to the brightness, on the bal.u.s.trade in front of a store, and raucous voices rose from one or two second-rate saloons, but there were few other signs of life, and Nasmyth was not sorry when they reached the wooden hotel. Acton stopped a moment in front of the building.

”Hutton's an acquaintance of mine, and if you have to apply to men of his kind, he is, perhaps, as reliable as most,” he said. ”Still, you want to remember that in this country it's every man for himself, especially when you undertake a deal in land.” He smiled suggestively.

”And now we'll go in and see him.”

They came upon a man who appeared a little older than Nasmyth. He was sitting on the veranda, which was s.p.a.cious, and had one or two wooden pillars with crude scroll-work attached to them in front. Acton nodded to the stranger.

”This is Mr. Nasmyth,” he said. ”He came up with me. Doing much round here?”

The question was abrupt, but the man smiled.

”Oh,” he answered, ”we endeavour to do a little everywhere.”

”Then I'll leave you to it, and look round again by-and-by. I guess I may as well mention that Mr. Nasmyth is coming back with me.”

Acton looked hard at Hutton, who smiled again. ”Oh, yes,” replied Hutton, ”I understand that. It's quite likely we'll have the thing fixed up in half an hour or so. A cigar, Mr. Nasmyth?”

Nasmyth took a cigar, and went with Hutton to the little table which had been set out, on the inner side of the veranda, with a carafe of ice-water and a couple of bottles. They sat down at it, and Hutton took out two letters and glanced at them.

”Now,” he said, ”we'll get to work. I understand your proposition is to run the water out of the Cedar Valley. What's the area?”

”About four thousand acres available for ranching land, though it has never been surveyed.”

”And you want to take up as many acres beforehand as you can, and can't quite raise the capital?”

Nasmyth said that was very much the state of affairs, and Hutton drummed his fingers on the table. He was a lean-faced man, dressed quietly and precisely, in city fas.h.i.+on, but he wore a big stone in a ring on one hand, which for no very evident reason prejudiced his companion against him.

”Well,” he averred, ”we might consider going into the thing and finding part of the capital. It's our business, but naturally we would want to be remunerated for the risk. It's rather a big one. You see, you would have to take up the whole four thousand acres.”

”Then,” replied Nasmyth, ”what's your proposition?”

”We'll put up what money you can't raise, and our surveyor will locate land at present first-cla.s.s Crown land figure. We'll charge you bank rate until the land's made marketable when you have run the water out.

In a general way, that's my idea of the thing.”

Nasmyth laid down his cigar and looked at him. ”Isn't it a little exorbitant? You get the land at cost value, and a heavy charge on that, while I do the work?”

Hutton laughed. ”Well,” he said, ”it's money we're out for, and unless you take it all up, your claim's no good. Anybody else could jump right in and buy a few hundred acres. Then he could locate water rights and stop you running down the river, unless you bought him out.”

”The difficulty is that the Crown authorities haven't been selling land lately, and would sooner lease. They seem inclined to admit that this is a somewhat exceptional case; in fact, they have granted me one or two privileges.”

”What you would call a first option?”