to be done, as quickly as careful surveying allowed, with the fenced
part of the hillside where plausible controversies could be invented.

Toward the end of the second day he had progressed into the last tract
of owned ground. He breathed more freely. In his statement to the
Mexican concerning the right of way he had been exactly right; and he
was following to a dot the original course taken by the early ditch.
He could have improved upon this section of the canal by another
survey, but that would have involved him in a host of troubles, very
likely unsolvable ones, in securing title to another strip of ground
across the fields. Without question Menocal's influence would prevent
the owners from selling, even if Bryant had the money with which to
buy a second right of way, which he had not. Dollar for dollar it
would be cheaper in the long run to use the old line. Well, Dave was
already across the last fence with his rod; they would soon be
working entirely on government land; and with that, it did not matter
for the present what the Mexican landowners thought or did.

Bryant had walked fifty yards or so away from his transit to call
something to Dave, when the crack of a rifle sounded from the hillside
and a bullet whined near by. The engineer pivoted about. Another shot
followed, and he beheld a spurt of dust close by his instrument. The
hidden rifleman was not seeking to murder him, but to destroy his
tools.

There were no more shots and he resumed work. Later on, as he neared
the fence and was establishing his last points within the field, a
horseman with a gray moustache came galloping up along the stretch of
barb wire. He nodded, inquired if the engineer was named Bryant, and
announced that he had half a dozen injunctions to serve.