BIG SOUTHERN CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

CHRISTMAS 1895

THE SKEENS

"Not my notion of Christmas, Mr. Skeen," Harold Wiggins says, the Governor's aide speaking through a handkerchief covering his face from the cold. Only his eyes are unshielded. He tucks his head down, away from the wind.

"Nor mine," Moroni replies. His head sideways to combat the wind, he has one eye, the lead, shut and the other is tearing up. "But it seemed the best way to avoid fanfare."

"Out in the open on Christmas day, I don't know, seems a mite obvious to me."

"There won't be any work being done on Christmas. So, no workers to encounter. And there's but two settlers in sight of where we'll be."

"A different story than the United tells."

"Summer it's different. Most stay at their old places in Cache Valley in the winter. They put a tent up here, fix up a shack once work starts come spring."

Wiggins assimilates the new knowledge. "And Senator Dubois?"

"His place is up beyond where we're going. Anyways, there's no doubt he's performing political shenanigans somewhere else as we speak. Boise. Maybe Salt Lake, conniving with the Church."

Wiggins laughs heartily. "That would be Dubois. I wonder how the Mormons take him suddenly on their side. Has to be a hard pill for them to swallow."

Moroni's responding laugh barely registers. "Birds of a feather. Mormons are accustomed to showing one thing and feeling or thinking another. Just like Dubois. The trait is inbred. And when not, schooled from before they're baptized and well beyond."

They ride along.

"Your horse? Won't it be recognized?"

"They'll know him," he says. "I'm sure the young 'uns run crying 'Moroni! Moroni's black horse!' Can't be helped. If we do see anyone, I doubt they become neighborly." He eyes Wiggins. "More likely, word is out I'm accompanied by a stranger. From there all sorts of rumors will sprout." He paused. "I suspect word of your presence precedes us, though, rendering the worry moot."

Wiggins snorts. "Paranoia becomes you. It would be a trick of prescience to know I'm here. I haven't dawdled, haven't given word of my arrival. I suspect you've not either."

Skeen gathers a rebuttal. "A trick they are accustomed to—when Dubois sent men after polygamists down at Franklin, the Mormons had boys man the depot to spot strangers. They'd run and notify the likely arrestees, give them time to escape capture." He paused, remembering, grinned beneath his handkerchief. "It provided the populace a great deal of amusement."

"How would they discern an agent from just any other stranger?"

Skeen stops his horse and smiles at Wiggins. "You think there are so many strangers stopping in a Mormon settlement? Wearing clean clothes, no less?"

"Fair point." They continued on.

They push into the north wind. It's been a dry winter, so no snow carries on the breeze, but dust kicks up from Skeen's horse's hooves and hits Wiggins' eyes. "Country seems a bit unwelcoming."

"You're welcome to take the lead, Governor."

"I appreciate the sobriquet but you best not speak it loudly enough to be heard, lest you stir up the dust of rumor you imply to be at the ready. If word gets to the Governor that I was after his job I'd no longer have mine. Ride on."

They reach the headgate area. "Ours is this here one," Moroni says. He nods toward the area further on. "That's the United's."

Wiggins surveys the work. Both projects have yet to show completion, rightly so since the canals are not ready for water. The gates, while the most important part of the canals, have no need to be fully functioning until there is a place to put released water.

"Got your fill?" Moroni asks.

"I'll make note. Let's see the rest."

They swing their horses southwesterly, backs now mostly to the wind. The sense of warmth rises considerably. For three miles, both canals have completed their banks, though there is much left to do in terms of smoothing the sides and carving out the bottoms. The work then takes on a random look. Both canal paths, freed of sagebrush, lie evident, but long sections show naught but bare ground, the United from time to time humped where scraping and Fresno work have left their mark. Skeen pulls up. "See that?" He points to an area of fill. "The clods?" Wiggins takes note of his gestures, his eyes following their directive back and forth. "That's winter work. It looks like it's done but that ground won't settle, the banks won't hold where they pile frozen chunks up like that. Too much air. The water just finds the cracks. It just doubles the work. I suspect it's mostly for show."

Wiggins nods.

"Looks good as a way to impress newcomers. Makes a mighty fine appearance," Skeen adds. "To an amateur."

They continue on for another three miles. The Skeens' ditch shows little work, with only preliminary cutting done, while the United has random areas of activity. "What's the plan here, do you suppose?" Wiggins asks.

"Mostly the work you see is on or along a claimant's place. A man wants to make sure others don't come in and pull too much off the top or gouge his land. And he wants it done right, nothing worse than a canal break. The empty spots you see, they likely aren't filed on yet. Or if they are, the claimants haven't made it here. Might be speculators, we have them on our ditch, but likely not."

They come to a hill, some thirty feet above the surrounding terrain, rotate their horses to face directly south. "That's a section line," Skeen points out. "United work. See where it jags west, 'bout a quarter mile off?"

"An odd arrangement," Wiggins notes.

"We hold the right-of-way here, agreement with the Great Western canal. The United has to bypass this ground to get to where they want to go."

Wiggins mulls Skeen's admission. "Clever, but somewhat unneighborly."

Skeen bristles, but only slightly. "Way past neighbors here, from the time they stole our plans."

The Skeen ditch is fully complete for a quarter mile each way, its north bank tucked hard into the hill, cut into the slope to utilize it as a natural buffer. That cut prevents the United from further work on the north side—already they've flumed beneath Skeens' ditch to switch sides.

"I can take you all the way down, but all in all it's pretty much this way. Two miles down, we have another right-of-way the United has to cut under, back to the west, we're done about the same distance either side there as here. They've worked northwesterly some, along the lavas, a considerable distance but it'll be a good deal of time before either of us have the fill work done in that area, it being a low spot. Good ground but low, as is typical. Wind blows all the high spots off, I suppose." He turns his horse sharply around to face Wiggins. "A year's work, that'd be on the optimistic side. To get it operable."

Wiggins takes in the entirety of the view, ponders for a bit. "I think I get the idea. The weather tells me I can accept your word. Hopefully it's more solid than Cluff's—this doesn't at all coincide with the map he sent the Land Board."

"It would surprise me a helluva lot more if it did." Skeen says.

©2025 RALPH THURSTON