CHAPTER XXII
THE DREAMS THAT CAME TRUE
The colony from the East had been established, and the harnessed water was doing the will of man. At the head of the valley, where the cultivated fields began to widen into a green expanse of gardens and small farms, Steve Harkness stopped his buggy in the trail and awaited the coming of another buggy he had seen issue from the town. With Harkness sat Pearl and Helen, the latter a slender, awkward girl now, but in the eyes of her father beautiful beyond the power of words to express. The three were dressed in their best—they had been attending church. Harkness shook out his handkerchief to wipe his perspiring face—church services always made him perspire freely—and the scent of cinnamon drops thickened the air.
“It’s Justin and Lucy coming,” said Pearl.
“Yes, I knowed it was; that’s why I pulled in. I don’t reckon a handsomer couple rides this valley trail, present company always accepted. Davison was with ’em at church, but I s’pose he stopped in town to take dinner with some one.”
Harkness tucked his handkerchief into his pocket and looked down the valley, where the fruitful fields were smiling. In the midst of the fields and the gardens were many houses and clumps of shade trees. The flat-topped mountain behind the town lay against the bosom of the summer sky like a great cameo. A Sabbath peace was on the land, and a great peace was in the heart of Steve Harkness.
“It’s nice to have a home,” he declared thoughtfully, as he looked at the quiet valley, “and it’s nice to see other people have homes. But until a man is married and has one of his own he don’t know how ’tis.”
Pearl glanced down at her dress of China silk and settled its folds comfortably and proudly about her.
“I think farming is better than the cattle business, anyway.”
“Yes, farmin’ this way, with irrigation; irrigation with plenty of water beats rainfall in any country under the sun. I’m satisfied. But you don’t never hear me saying anything ag’inst the cattle business; it’s all right, and it will continue in this country fer a good many years yit. But Paradise Valley was cut out fer farmers and their homes. I’m always reckonin’ that the Lord understood his business when he made men and land and cattle. The valleys that can be irrigated fer the farmers, and the high dry land that can’t be fer the men that want to raise cattle. And things will always come out right, if you’ll only give ’em time. It’s been proved right here.”
When, after pleasant greetings, Harkness had driven on, Justin, who did not care to proceed straight home on that beautiful day, turned into the trail that led to the higher land on the edge of the mesa, where the view of the valley was better. Coming out upon the highest point, they saw the valley spread wide before them, green as an emerald. The few groves were many times multiplied. On every hand were homes, girt by gardens and embowered in flowers. Irrigating canals and laterals glittered like threads of silver. Warrior River, uniting with Paradise Creek, had furnished means for the transformation of the desert, and it was literally blossoming as the rose.
Thus surveying the valley, Justin saw the fulfillment of the dream of the dreamer, Peter Wingate. More, he had the satisfaction of knowing that in the position he held, that of superintendent and manager of the irrigating company, he had done his full share in bringing that dream to its beautiful realization. He had helped to make the one-time desert bloom. Years had run their course, yet the dream had come true. He had prospered also, not only financially, but in other ways; he was in the state senate now, the position Fogg had held. And, though he was a farmer and irrigator, he was, also, a ranchman.
As he sat thus viewing the smiling valley, with his wife beside him, seeing there the fulfillment of the dream of the preacher, Justin turned to her whom he loved best of all in the world. Looking into her eyes, where wifely love had established itself, he beheld there the fulfillment of another dream; and beholding it, he bent his head and kissed her.
“Lucy,” he said, with tender earnestness, “this, too, is Paradise.”