The King of Arcadia

A warning telegram reaches Breckenridge Ballard just as he prepares to leave Boston for a new engineering post in Colorado. Three men connected with the Arcadia irrigation scheme have already died, but he accepts the challenge of completing its dam, canals and railway. His confidence gives the opening its tension: technical problems and possible human interference stand between an ambitious plan and the water needed to turn desert land into farms.

Francis Lynde combines a construction story with romance and frontier adventure. Mountain scenery, railway travel and the practical details of a major works project share space with personal loyalties and open conflict. In a later episode, Ballard and his allies outwit cattle thieves who have damaged the canal, then send their captives away by train. Readers interested in the meeting of engineering and adventure will find a novel in which professional responsibility quickly becomes a test of nerve.