Las Vegas awoke one morning to find itself in the public eye. Destiny had so decreed when it permitted Las Vegas to become the town nearest to the proposed dam site at Boulder Canyon,—the largest governmental project undertaken for many a day. The Panama Canal, said the orators (and no doubt they spoke the truth), had not cost so much as it would cost to dam the Colorado River, to conserve its tremendous power, to control its flood waters and put the river to work tamely watering long rows of cotton, potatoes, great fields of grain. Long enough had it gone leaping down through the wildest, most gorgeous scenery in the country. Now it must be harnessed to new industries and become the servant of plowboys, the friend of prospectors. It must pull trains across the desert which it was to transform into tilled farms. It must keep several States vibrant with the hum of machinery. It must make of the town of Las Vegas a city worthy the name. One can’t blame Las Vegas for being particularly interested in that phase of the project.
The town lay fairly under the eye of the Eagle,—and of the sun, whose light the magic alchemy of the desert transmuted into soft tints on the mountains, into a faint lavender glow on the desert. The air was still, with a little nip to it that would later soften to a lazy warmth. A stranger to the desert, standing on the depot platform, would have thought that he might walk quite easily to Charleston Mountains, standing bold and stark against the western sky line.
Down the flag-draped main street, coming from the side door of the little post-office, a huge, good-natured negro leaned against a pushcart piled high with dingy, striped canvas mail sacks. When he passed, certain belated citizens swung out to the edge of the pavement and took longer steps, knowing that the train was on time, and that the crowd would already be edging out upon the platform. Automobiles with flags standing perkily from headlight braces went careening past, to swing up into the parking space, trying their nonchalant best to look as if they were not going to hold governors and high officials of the Federal Government and carry them safely down to Boulder Canyon, the most popular dam site on the Colorado.
A group of small boys dressed in white came marching down the street, stubbing toes over the uneven places because they must keep their eyes on the music while they played the uncertain strains of a march. They were very sleek as to hair, very shiny as to cheeks and very solemn, those boys. Their mothers and their fathers and their teachers were going to detect any false note or flatted sharp and tell them about it afterwards. Besides, there aren’t many boys who ever get a chance to stand on the platform and play when the Governor’s train comes in—and be the only band on the job. They felt the deep responsibility attendant upon the honor and thought feverishly of certain spots in the music where they weren’t quite sure they could make it; not with the whole town standing around listening.
They fumbled their instruments, stood hipshot and consciously unconcerned while they waited for the train. Their leader glanced around the group, encountered certain anxious pairs of eyes fixed upon his face, and made an impulsive change in the programme. “The Star-Spangled Banner” was appropriate and customary for such occasions, but there were treacherous high notes which a certain scared boy might play flat, and other places where the slide trombone was in danger of skidding. He gave them a piece they could play with their eyes shut and was rewarded by hearing long sighs of relief here and there among the musicians.
So it happened that when the train had slid into the station and the Governors and high officials had descended from the private car, Rawley caught the familiar air, “I’m forever blow-ing bubbles” floating out over the heads of the assembled citizens of Las Vegas. If the tune wabbled here and there, what matter? Governors and high officials can hear better music anywhere,—but they never will hear a more sincere effort to please, made by more loyal hearts than skipped beats under the white jackets of the “kid band” of Las Vegas.
Rawley caught himself humming the words to himself and thought, in a heartsick way, of Nevada, only twenty-five miles from him, so far as miles went,—a million miles away in her thoughts.
“I’ve talked Boulder Canyon Dam until I wonder sometimes if it isn’t Bubble Canyon, maybe,” a certain governor confided to him under his breath. “Do you reckon this is a civic confession the kids are making, or what?”
“The civic air castle—nearest the kids can come to it,” Rawley grinned. “Wait till you hear this town stand up on its hind legs and tell you how they feel about it. They talk Boulder Canyon in their sleep, I reckon. It’s no bubble to this bunch! If the rest of the country had half the enthusiasm this town has got, they’d be hauling concrete to the river to-day!”
“Instead of the Commission, huh? Well, I wish they were.”
A man pushed out of the fringe of common citizens who came merely to look upon assembled greatness and faced Rawley, smiling with his eyes.
“Uncle Peter!” Rawley gripped his hand and did not know that his eyes searched the crowd, wistfully, seeking a face—
“No, she didn’t come,” Peter informed him. “I want to get a chance to talk with the men in your outfit who count the most. Not on paper, but with the government. Can you fix it for me, boy?”
“Has anything happened?” Rawley drew him anxiously aside.
“No—I just want to get at the right men. I want you there, of course.” Peter glanced here and there at the men who were smiling, shaking hands, speaking pleasant phrases.
“All right. Of course every minute is mortgaged, I suppose, to the town. But I’ll get you—”
“An hour will do me,” Peter stated modestly, and Rawley suppressed a grin.
Looking him over surreptitiously, Rawley decided that he could be very proud indeed of Uncle Peter. Even amongst governors and such, Peter could hold his own with that quiet dignity which nothing seemed able to ruffle, that poise which came of being very sure of his own mind and of what he wanted. A great man looked from one to the other curiously, and Rawley immediately introduced Peter to him. Then he caught the eye of another, and presently that man was shaking hands very humanly with Peter Cramer, who looked so much like George Rawlins King, of the Reclamation Service. Before he quite realized what was taking place, Peter was absorbed into the party of great men, and a flustered waitress in the depot dining room was hastily making room at a table and laying another knife and fork purloined from the lunch room outside.
The reception committee probably revised at the last minute their arrangements for seating the party in the decorated automobiles. Some one must have been crowded; but Peter rode in comfort in a big car in company with some of the nation’s important men, though this was not what he had gotten an early haircut for. He had seen the river in all its moods and under all conditions; it seemed strange to him now, no doubt, to be sight-seeing it with men who had heretofore been no more than names to be read in headlines in week-old newspapers. But no one suspected it,—unless perhaps some member of the reception committee wondered how he had broken in. However, as a guest of the Colorado River Commission, seven governors and railroad presidents, no mere local committee dared flicker an eyelid.
“It has to be done this way—whatever it is you want to do,” Rawley muttered once in Peter’s ear at the river, when he caught Peter looking boredly at the bold cliffs of Boulder Canyon. “You couldn’t get a look-in, just coming up and trying for an interview. As soon as we get back, and before the banquet up town, I’ve arranged for you to talk to the Commission. I told the chief,” he added drily, “that it was more important than anything else he’d hear. I gambled on that, because I know you. And a little nerve goes a long way, sometimes. We’re going to cut this short as possible and get back to the car early. Then—you’ll have to boil down your hour, Peter. There won’t be more than half that much time for whatever it is you want to say.”
“It may pay this Colorado River Commission,” said Peter laconically, “to miss their supper to-night, and even cut out some of the speeches they’ve got ready to hand out to Vegas citizens. As I understand it, the Commission was created for the purpose of investigating claims, collecting all data and adjusting rights pertaining to the Colorado River. They’d better take a piece of bread and butter in their hands and eat it while they listen to what I’ve got to say.” He paused and added significantly, “You tell Hoover I said so.”