On a morning early in January, Charley Abbott answered a telephone call
which interrupted him while was taking the Secretary's dictation.
"It's Mr. Cheney!" he said, "He's very anxious to see you for ten
minutes, Mr. Secretary."
"Crowd him in, Abbott," replied Enoch.
Abbott nodded, and in less than half an hour the director of the Survey
came in.
"Mr. Secretary," he began without preliminaries, "I took your advice
and began investigating the trouble spots. Among other steps I took, I
detached two men temporarily from a Colorado River expedition and sent
them into Texas to discover if possible what the ordinary oil
prospectors felt toward the Survey."
Enoch's face brightened. "That was an interesting move!" he exclaimed.
"Were these experienced oil men?"
"One of them, Harden, knew something of drilling. Well, they struck up
some sort of a pseudo partnership with a man, a miner, name Field, and
the three of them undertook to locate some wells in southern Texas.
They were near the Mexican border and were heckled constantly by bands
of Mexicans. Finally, as the man Field, Curly, Harden calls him in his
report, was standing guard over the horses one night, he was shot
through the abdomen. Three days later, he died.
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