When they reached the flat rock in the shade of the pine tree, he took the reclamation plan from his inner pocket and seated himself beside her.  “This is Weatherbee’s drawing,” he said.  “See how carefully he worked in the detail.  This is the spring and that upper reservoir, and this lower one is a natural dry basin up there under that bluff, a little to the left of those granite chimneys; you can see its rocky rim.  All it needs is this short flume sketched in here to bring the water down, and a sluice-gate to feed the main canal that follows this bench we are on.  Spillways would irrigate a peach orchard along this slope below us and seep out through this level around us to supply home gardens and lawn.  Just imagine it!” He paused, while her glance followed his brief comparisons, moving from the plan to the surface of the bench and down over the slope to the vale.  “Imagine this tract at the end of four years; a billowing sea of green; with peach trees in bearing on this mountainside; apples, the finest Jonathans, Rome Beauties if you will, beginning to make a showing down there.  Water running, seeping everywhere; strawberries carpeting the ground between the boles; alfalfa, cool and moist, filling in; and even Cerberus off there losing his sinister shape in vineyards.”

“Then it is feasible,” she exclaimed softly, and the sparkles broke subdued in her eyes.  “And the price, Mr. Tisdale; what would you consider a fair price for the property as it stands now, unimproved?” Tisdale rose.  He paused to fold the drawing and put it away, while his glance moved slowly down over the vale to the goat-keeper’s cabin and her browsing flock.  “You must see, Miss Armitage,” he said then, “that idea of Mr. Morganstein’s to plat this land into five-acre tracts for the market couldn’t materialize.  It is out of range of the Wenatchee valley projects; it is inaccessible to the railroad for the small farmer.  Only the man with capital to work it on a large scale could make it pay.  And the property is Mrs. Weatherbee’s last asset; she is in urgent need of ready money.  You should be able to make easy terms with her, but I warn you, if it comes to bidding, I am prepared to offer seven thousand dollars.”

He turned, frowning a little, to look down at her and, catching those covert sparkles of her side-glance, smiled.

“You may have it,” she said.

“Wait.  Think it over,” he answered.  “I am going down to the gap now to find the surveyor’s monument and trace the section line back to the top of the plateau.  Rest here, where it’s cooler, and I will come down this way for you when I am through.  Think the project over and take my word for the spring; it’s well worth the investment.”