"See here!" he said roughly. "I know I was wrong about the
sluice-gate. I was a fool to shut it with the water that high,
but I've learned my lesson; I'll never touch it again; I've worked
like a dog for weeks to pay for it; now where do I come in?
What's my job, how much is my share of the money, and when do I
get it?"
"The trouble with you, George, is that you have to learn a new
lesson about every thing you attempt. You can't carry a lesson
about one thing in your mind, and apply it to the next thing that
comes up. I know you have worked, and I know why. It is fair
that you should have something, but I can't say what, just now.
Having to rebuild the dam, and with a number of incidentals that
have come up, in spite of the best figuring I could do, I have
been forced to use my money saved for rebuilding the house; and
even with that, I am coming out a hundred or two short. I'm
strapped; and until money begins to come in I have none myself.
The first must go toward paying the men's wages, the next for
timber. If Jim Milton can find work for you, go to work at the
mill, and when we get started I'll pay you what is fair and just,
you may depend on that. If he hasn't work for you, you'll have to
find a job at something else."
"Do you mean that?" he asked wonderingly.
"I mean it," said Kate.
"After stealing my plan, and getting my land for nothing, you'd
throw me out entirely?" he demanded.
"You entreated me to put all I had into your plan, you told me
repeatedly the ravine was worth nothing, you were not even keeping
up the taxes on it until I came and urged you to, the dam is used
merely for water, the engine furnishes the real power, and if you
are thrown out, you have thrown yourself out. You have had every
chance."
"You are going to keep your nephew on the buying job?" he asked "I am," said Kate. "You can have no job that will give you a
chance to involve me financially."
"Then give me Milton's place. It's so easy a baby could do it,
and the wages you have promised him are scandalous," said George.
Kate laughed. "Oh, George," she said, "you can't mean that! Of
all your hare-brained ideas, that you could operate that saw, is
the wildest. Oh course you could start the engine, and set the
saw running -- I could myself; but to regulate its speed, to
control it with judgment, you could no more do it than Polly. As
for wages, Milton is working for less than he got in Hartley,
because he can be at home, and save his hack fare, as you know."