The three homesteads Nevada and Ben intended to purchase comprised the whole basin and part of the higher slopes. Ben had not passed by there for a year. What a deplorable change! This lake region was one of the finest bits of ranching ground in all the country. But the lake was surface water, from snow and rain, and as there had been practically no precipitation for six years it was all gone except a patch of yellow filthy water that would soon kill any stock which drank it.

Ben and Nevada drove their horses into the pole–fenced corral and went on to the little log cabin, where Modoc had stopped with the pack horses. Sims lived there. He was a fine specimen of cowboy turned rancher, a lean rangy fellow, clear–eyed and bronze–faced. He looked worn, and his person and surroundings had the appearance of hard times.

“Get down an’ come in,” was his cordial greeting. “Whar you goin’ with all thet fine stock? Say, how on earth do you keep them hosses alive?”

“Nevada, let me do the talking,” said Ben, as Nevada assumed a very important air. “Sims, we’re here to buy you out. Do you and your partners want to sell?”

“Man alive! Do we?” ejaculated the rancher. “Ide, we come in hyar on a shoestring, an’ if we’d had rain we’d made a success of it. But this terrible drought has ruined us. I’m tellin’ you thet these three homesteads are the poorest buys in northern California. Moore’s place is as bad as this, an’ Nagel’s is burned black.”

“Will these fellows sell?”

“They’d break their necks takin’ what they could get,” replied Sims, abruptly.

“All right. What do you want?”

“But, Ide, you ain’t really serious, are you?”

“Yes, Nevada and I are going to gamble,” said Ben, frankly.

“I wish I could afford to. But I’m stone broke an’ no credit. Our mistake in the first place was homesteadin’ hyar without allowin’ for dry seasons. We knew Mule Lake was surface water. A big reservoir would have saved us. An’ there’s a canyon on Moore’s land where a good cement dam would have done the trick. It’d take money.”

“Shore we’ll build the dam,” interposed Nevada, complacently.

“What’s the lowest you’ll take?” demanded Ben.

“Wal—would, say—eight hundred dollars be too much?” hesitatingly returned Sims.

“It’s too little,” replied Ben. “I’ll make it a thousand. Get Moore and Nagel over here pronto. I’ve thirty head of fine horses out there in your corral. You can sell them to–morrow at Klamath for a hundred dollars each. And if you hang on to them a little you can get two hundred. What do you say?”

“By jiminy! I take you up,” shouted Sims, “an’ I’ll say you are a good fellar, Ben Ide.”

The deal went through, Sims’s partners proving as eager as he, if not more so; and by midday Ben had the satisfaction of seeing them ready to drive off toward Klamath Falls.

It struck him that Sims acted a little queer, now jubilant, and again preoccupied. He had something on his mind. Finally Moore arrived in a spring wagon with his family.