In all his forecastings he
had never pictured a homecoming remotely resembling the fact. In each
succeeding hour of the long summer day the edges of the chasm of the
years drew closer together; and when, in the afternoon, his father put
him on a horse and rode with him to a corner of the vast home domain, a
corner fenced off by sentinel cottonwoods and watered by the single
small irrigation ditch of his childish recollections; rode with him
through the screening cottonwoods and showed him, lying beyond them, the
old ranch buildings of the "Circle-Bar," untouched and undisturbed; his
heart was full and a sudden mist came before his eyes to dim the
picture.
"I've kept it all just as it used to be, Evan," the father said gently.
"I thought maybe you'd come back some day and be sure-enough
disappointed if it were gone."
The younger man slipped from his saddle and went to look in at the open
door of the old ranch-house. Everything was precisely as he remembered
it: the simple, old-fashioned furniture, the crossed quirts over the
high wooden mantel, his mother's rocking-chair ... that was the final
touch; he sat down on the worn door-log and put his face in his hands.
For now the gaping chasm of the years was quite closed and he was a boy
again.
Still later in this same first day there were ambling gallops along the
country roads, and the father explained how the transformation from
cattle-raising to agriculture and fruit-growing had come about; how the
great irrigation project in Quaretaro Canyon had put a thousand square
miles of the fertile mesa under cultivation; how with the inpouring of
the new population had come new blood, new methods, good roads, the
telephone, the rural mail route, and other civilizing agencies.
Pages:
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84