The Protector
by Harold Bindloss · English · Gutenberg #38286 · 454,809 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: The Protector
Author: Harold Bindloss
Release date: December 12, 2011 [eBook #38286]
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/38286
Credits: Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Canada Team at http://www.pgdpcanada.net
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PROTECTOR ***
Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Canada Team at http://www.pgdpcanada.net
[Illustration: "Two steps took him up to the waist, and he had
trouble in finding solid bottom at the next." (Chap, xvii.)]
THE PROTECTOR
BY
HAROLD BINDLOSS
Author of "The Impostor," "Hawtrey's Deputy,"
"The Pioneer," etc., etc.
WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED
LONDON, MELBOURNE AND TORONTO
1918
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. A FRIEND IN NEED 5
II. A BREEZE OF WIND 14
III. AN AFTERNOON ASHORE 24
IV. A CHANGE OF ENVIRONMENT 31
V. THE OLD COUNTRY 39
VI. UPON THE HEIGHTS 46
VII. STORM-STAYED 54
VIII. LUCY VANE 62
IX. CHISHOLM PROVES AMENABLE 69
X. WITH THE OTTER HOUNDS 75
XI. VANE WITHDRAWS 85
XII. VANE GROWS RESTLESS 95
XIII. A NEW PROJECT 101
XIV. VANE SAILS NORTH 109
XV. THE FIRST MISADVENTURE 114
XVI. THE BUSH 120
XVII. VANE POSTPONES THE SEARCH 127
XVIII. JESSIE CONFERS A FAVOUR 132
XIX. VANE FORESEES TROUBLE 140
XX. THE FLOOD 146
XXI. VANE YIELDS A POINT 151
XXII. EVELYN GOES FOR A SAIL 161
XXIII. VANE PROVES OBDURATE 169
XXIV. JESSIE STRIKES 177
XXV. THE INTERCEPTED LETTER 187
XXVI. ON THE TRAIL 196
XXVII. THE END OF THE SEARCH 201
XXVIII. CARROLL SEEKS HELP 212
XXIX. JESSIE'S CONTRITION 222
XXX. CONVINCING TESTIMONY 234
XXXI. VANE IS REINSTATED 243
THE PROTECTOR
CHAPTER I
A FRIEND IN NEED.
A light breeze was blowing down the inlet, scented with the smell of the
firs, and the tiny ripples it chased across the water splashed musically
against the bows of the canoe. There was a thud as the blade struck the
water, and the long, light hull forged onwards with slightly lifted,
bird's-head prow, while the two men swung forward for the next stroke
with a rhythmic grace of motion. They knelt, facing forward, in the
bottom of the craft; and dissimilar as they were in features and, to
some extent, in character, the likeness between them was stronger than
the difference. Both bore the unmistakable stamp of a wholesome life
spent in vigorous labour in the open. Their eyes were clear, and like
those of most bushmen singularly steady; their skin was
weather-darkened, and they were leanly muscular.
On either side of the lane of green water giant firs, Cedars and
balsams, crept down the rocky hills to the whitened driftwood fringe.
They formed part of the great coniferous forest which rolls westwards
from the wet coast range of Canada's Pacific province, and, overleaping
the Strait, spreads across the rugged and beautiful wilderness of
Vancouver Island. Ahead, clusters of little frame houses showed up here
and there in openings among the trees, and a small sloop, towards which
the canoe was heading, lay anchored near the wharf.
The men had plied the paddle during most of that day, from inclination
rather than necessity, because they could have hired Siwash Indians to
undertake the labour for them, had they been so minded. They were,
though their appearance did not suggest it, moderately prosperous; but
their prosperity was of recent date, and they had been accustomed to
doing everything for themselves, as are most of the men who dwell among
the woods and ranges of British Columbia.
Vane, who knelt nearest the bows, was twenty-seven years of age, and he
had spent nine of them chopping trees, driving cattle, poling canoes,
and assisting in the search for useful minerals among the snow-clad
ranges. He wore a wide, grey felt hat which had lost its shape from
frequent wettings, an old shirt of the same colour, and blue duck
trousers, rent in places; but the light attire revealed a fine muscular
symmetry. He had brown hair and brown eyes, and a certain warmth of
colouring which showed through the deep bronze of his skin hinted at a
sanguine and somewhat impatient temperament.
His companion, Carroll, had lighter hair and grey eyes, and his
appearance was a little less vigorous and a little more refined, though
he, too, had toiled hard and borne many privations in the wilderness.
His dress resembled Vane's. The two had located a valuable mineral
property some months earlier, and though this does not invariably
follow, had held their own against city financiers during the
negotiations that preceded the floating of a company to work the mine.
That they had succeeded in securing a good deal of the stock was largely
due to Vane's pertinacity, and said something for his acumen; but both
had been trained in a very hard school.
As the wooden houses ahead rose higher and the sloop's grey hull grew
into sharper shape upon the clear green shining of the brine, Vane broke
into a snatch of song.
"Had I the wings of a dove, I would fly,
Just for to-night, to the Old Country."
He stopped and laughed. "It's nine years since I've seen it, but I can't
get those lines out of my head. Perhaps it's because of the girl who
sang them. Somehow, I felt sorry for her. She had remarkably fine eyes."
"Sea-blue," said his companion. "I don't grasp the connection between
the last two remarks."
"Neither do I," Vane admitted. "I suppose there isn't one. But they
weren't sea-blue, unless you mean the depth of indigo, when you're out
of sounding. They're Irish eyes."
"You're not Irish. There's not a trace of the Celt in you, unless it's
your habit of getting indignant with the folks who don't share your
views."
"No, sir," answered Vane. "By birth, I'm North Country--England, I mean.
Over there, we're respectable before everything, and smart at getting
hold of whatever's worth having. As a matter of fact, you Ontario
Scotsmen are mighty like us."
"You certainly came out well ahead of those city men who put up the
dollars," said Carroll. "I guess it's in the blood, though I fancied
they would take the mine from you."
Vane brought his paddle down with a thud. "'Just for to-night, to the
Old Country,'" he hummed, and added: "It sticks to one."
"Why did you leave the Old Country?"
"That's a blamed injudicious question to ask, but you shall have an
answer. There was a row at home--I was a sentimentalist then and just
eighteen--and as the result of it I came out to Canada." His voice
changed and grew softer. "I hadn't many relatives, and except one
sister, they're all gone now. That reminds me--she's not going to
lecture for the county education authorities any longer."
The sloop was close ahead, and, slackening the paddling they ran
alongside. Vane glanced at his watch when they had climbed on board.
"Supper will be finished at the hotel," he remarked. "You had better get
the stove lighted. It's your turn, and that rascally Siwash seems to
have gone off again. If he's not back when we're ready, we'll sail
without him."
Carroll, accordingly, prepared the meal, and when they had finished it
they lay on deck smoking with a content which was not altogether
accounted for by a satisfied appetite. They had spent several anxious
months, during which they had come very near the end of their slender
resources, arranging for the exploitation of the mine, and now at last
the work was over. Vane had that day made his final plans for the
construction of a road and wharf by which the ore could be economically
shipped for reduction, or as the alternative to this, for the erection
of a small smelting plant. They had bought the sloop as a convenient
means of conveyance and shelter, since they could live in some comfort
on board. Now they could take their ease for a while, which was a very
unusual thing to both of them.
"I suppose you're bent on sailing this craft back?" Carroll said at
length, "We could hire a couple of Siwash to take her home while we rode
across the island and got the cars to Victoria. Besides, there's that
steamboat coming down the coast to-night."
"Either way would cost a good deal extra, Vane pointed out.
"That's true," Carroll agreed with an amused look, "You could charge it
to the Company."
Vane laughed. "You and I have a big stake in the concern, and I haven't
got used to spending money unnecessarily yet. I've been mighty glad to
earn 2.50 by working from sun-up until dark, though I didn't always get
it afterwards. So have you."
"How are you going to dispose of your dollars, then? You have a balance
in cash, as well as the shares."
"It has occurred to me that I might spend a few months in the Old
Country. Have you ever been over?"
"I was across some time ago, but if you would sooner I went with you,
I'll come along. We could start as soon as we've arranged the few
matters left open in Vancouver."
Vane was glad to hear it. He knew little about Carroll's antecedents,
but the latter was obviously a man of education, and they had been
comrades for the last three years. During that time they had learnt to
trust each other, and to bear with each other's idiosyncrasies. Filling
his pipe again as he lay in the fading sunlight, Vane looked back on the
nine years he had passed in Canada; and allowing for the periods of
exposure to cold and wet, and the almost ceaseless toil, he admitted
that he might have spent them more unpleasantly.
Having quarrelled with his relatives, he had come out with only a few
pounds and had promptly set about earning a living with his hands. When
he had been in the country several years, however, a friend of the
family had sent him a small sum, and the young man had made a judicious
use of the money. The lot he bought outside a wooden town doubled in
value, and the share he took in a new orchard paid him well; but he had
held aloof from the cities, and his only recklessness had been
prospecting journeys into the wilderness. Prospecting for minerals is at
once an art and a gamble, but even in this direction, in which he had
had keen wits against him, Vane had held his own; but there was one side
of life with which he was practically unacquainted.
There are no social amenities on the rangeside or in the bush, and women
are scarce. Vane had lived in Spartan simplicity; his passions had
remained unstirred, and now he was seven-and-twenty, sound and vigorous
of body and, as a rule, level of head. At length, however, there was to
be a change. He had earned an interlude of leisure, and he meant to
enjoy it, without, as he prudently determined, making a fool of himself.
Presently Carroll took his pipe from his mouth.
"Are you going ashore to the show to-night?" he asked.
"Yes," said Vane lazily. "It's a long while since I've struck another
entertainment of any kind, and that yellow-haired mite's dancing is one
of the prettiest things I've seen."
"You've been twice already," Carroll pointed out. "The girl with the
blue eyes sings her first song rather well."
"I think so," Vane agreed with a significant absence of embarrassment.
"In this case a good deal depends upon the singing--the interpretation,
don't they call it? The thing's on the border, and I've struck places
where they'd have made it gross; but the girl only brought out the
mischief. Strikes me she didn't see there was anything else in it."
"That's curious, considering the crowd she goes about with," Carroll
suggested. "Aren't you cultivating a critical faculty?"
Vane disregarded the ironical question. "She's Irish; that accounts for
a good deal." He paused and looked thoughtful. "If I knew how to do it,
I'd like to give the child who dances five dollars. It must be a tough
life, and her mother--the woman at the piano--looks ill. I wonder why
they came to a place like this?"
"Struck a cold streak at Nanaimo, the storekeeper told me," Carroll
replied. "Anyway, since we're to start at sun-up, I'm staying here."
Then he smiled. "Has it struck you that your attendance in the front
seats is liable to misconception?"
His companion rose without answering and dropped into the canoe.
Thrusting her off, he drove the craft towards the wharf with vigorous
strokes, and Carroll shook his head whimsically as he watched him.
"Anybody except myself would conclude that he was waking up at last," he
said.
A minute or two later, Vane swung himself up on to the wharf and strode
into the wooden settlement. There were one or two hydraulic mines and a
pulp mill in the vicinity, and though the place was by no means
populous, a company of third-rate entertainers had arrived some days
earlier. On reaching the rude wooden building in which they had given
their performance and finding it closed, he accosted a lounger.
"What's become of the show?" he asked.
"Busted," replied the man. "Didn't take the boys' fancy, and the crowd
went out with the stage this afternoon, though I heard that two of the
women stayed behind."
Vane turned away with a slight sense of compassion. He, however,
dismissed the matter from his mind, and having been kneeling in a
cramped position in the canoe most of the day, decided to stroll along
the waterside before going back to the sloop.
Great firs stretched out their sombre branches over the smooth shingle,
and now the sun had gone their clean resinous smell was heavy on the
dew-cooled air. Here and there brushwood grew among out-cropping rock,
and catching sight of what looked like a stripe of woven fabric beneath
a brake, he strode towards it. Then he stopped with a start, for a young
woman lay with her face hidden from him in an attitude of dejected
abandonment. He was about to turn away softly, when she started and
looked up at him. Her eyes were wet, but they were of the deep blue he
had described to Carroll, and he stood still.
"You shouldn't give way like that," he said.
It was all he could think of; but he spoke without obtrusive assurance
or pronounced embarrassment, and the girl, who shook out her crumpled
skirt over one little foot with a swift movement, choked back a sob, and
favoured him with a glance of keen scrutiny as she rose to a sitting
posture. She was quick at reading character--the life she led had made
that necessary--and his manner and appearance were reassuring. She,
however, said nothing, and sitting down on a neighbouring boulder, he
took out his pipe from force of habit.
"Well," he added, in much the same tone as he would have used to a
distressed child, "what's the trouble?"
She told him, speaking on impulse. "They've gone off and left me. The
takings didn't meet expenses."
"That's bad," said Vane gravely. "Do you mean they've left you alone?"
"No," replied the girl; "in a way it's worse than that. I suppose I
could go--somewhere--but there's Mrs. Marvin and Elsie."
"The child who danced?"
The girl assented, and Vane looked thoughtful.
"The three of you stick together," he suggested.
"Of course. Mrs. Marvin's the only friend I have."
"Then I suppose you've no idea what to do?"
His companion confessed it, and explained that it was the cause of her
distress and that they had had bad luck of late. Vane could understand
that as he looked at her; her dress was shabby, and he fancied she had
not been bountifully fed.
"If you stayed here a few days, you could go out with the next stage,
and get on to Victoria with the cars," he said. He paused and continued
diffidently: "It could be arranged with the hotel-keeper."
She laughed in a half-hysterical manner, and he remembered that fares
were high in the country.
"I suppose you have no money," he added, with blunt directness. "I want
you to tell Mrs. Marvin that I'll lend her enough to take you all to
Victoria."
Her face crimsoned, which was not quite what he had expected, and he
suddenly felt embarrassed.
"No," she replied; "I can't do that. For one thing, it would be too late
when we got to Victoria. I think we could get an engagement if we
reached Vancouver in time to get to Kamloops by----"
Vane knitted his brows when he heard the date, and it was a moment or
two before he spoke.
"Then," he said, "there's only one way you can do so. There's a little
steamboat coming down the coast to-night, and I had half thought of
intercepting her and handing the skipper some letters to post in
Victoria. He knows me. That's my sloop yonder, and if I put you on board
the steamer, you'd reach Vancouver in good time. We would have sailed at
sun-up anyway."
The girl hesitated, which struck Vane as natural, and turned partly from
him. He surmised that she did not know what to make of his offer, though
her need was urgent. In the meanwhile he stood up.
"Come along and talk it over with Mrs. Marvin," he went on. "I'd better
tell you I'm Wallace Vane of the Clermont mine. Of course, I know your
name from the programme."
She rose and they walked back to the hotel. Once more it struck him that
the girl was pretty and graceful. On reaching the hotel, he sat down on
the verandah while she went in, and a few minutes later the elder woman
came out and looked at him much as the girl had done. He grew hot under
her gaze and repeated his offer in the curtest terms.
"If this breeze holds, we'll put you on board the steamer soon after
daybreak," he explained.
The woman's face softened, and he recognised now that there had been
suspicion in it. "Thank you," she added, "we'll come." Then she added
with an eloquent gesture: "You don't know what it means to us."
Vane merely took off his hat and turned away, but a minute or two
afterwards he met the hotel-keeper.
"Do these people owe you anything?" he asked.
"Five dollars," answered the man.
Vane handed him a bill. "Take it out of this, and make any excuse you
like. I'm going to put them on board the steamboat."
The man made no comment, and Vane, striding down to the beach, sent a
hail ringing across the water. Carroll appeared on the sloop's deck and
answered him.
"Hallo!" he cried. "What's the trouble?"
"Get ready the best supper you can manage for three people as quick as
you can."
Then he turned away in a hurry, wondering rather uneasily what Carroll
would say when he grasped the situation.
CHAPTER II
A BREEZE OF WIND.
There were signs of a change in the weather when Vane walked down to the
wharf with his passengers, for a cold wind which had sprung up struck an
eerie sighing from the sombre firs and sent the white mists streaming
along the hillside. There was a watery moon in the sky, and on reaching
the end of the wharf Vane fancied that the singer hesitated; but the
elder woman laid her hand upon the girl's arm reassuringly and she got
into the canoe. In a few minutes Vane ran the craft alongside the sloop
and saw the amazement in Carroll's face by the glow from the cabin
skylight. He, however, fancied that his comrade would rise to the
occasion and he handed his guests up.
"My partner, Carroll. Mrs. Marvin and her daughter; Miss Kitty Blake.
You have seen them already," he said. "They're coming down with us to
catch the steamer."
Carroll bowed, and Vane, who thrust back the cabin slide, motioned the
others below. The place was brightly lighted by a nickelled lamp, though
it was scarcely four feet high and the centreboard trunk occupied the
middle of it. A wide, cushioned locker ran along each side a foot above
the floor, and a swing table, fixed above the trunk, filled up most of
the space between. There was no cloth upon the table, but it was
invitingly laid out with canned fruit, coffee, hot flapjacks, and a big
lake trout.
"You must help yourselves while we get sail upon the boat," said Vane.
"The saloon's at your disposal, my partner and I have the fo'c'sle. You
will notice there are blankets yonder, and as we'll have smooth water
most of the way you should get some sleep."
He withdrew, closing the slide, and went forward with Carroll to shorten
in the cable; but when they stopped beside the bitts his companion broke
into a soft laugh.
"Is there anything to amuse you?" Vane asked curtly.
"Well," said Carroll with an air of reflection, "it strikes me you're
making a rather unconventional use of your new prosperity, and it might
be prudent to consider how your friends in Vancouver may regard the
adventure."
Vane sat down upon the bitts and took out his pipe. "One trouble in
talking to you is that I never know whether you're in earnest or not.
You trot out your cold-blooded worldly wisdom, and then you grin at it."
"I think that's the only philosophic attitude," replied Carroll. "It's
possible to grow furiously indignant with the restraints stereotyped
people lay on one; but on the whole it's wiser to bow to them and
chuckle. After all, they've some foundation."
Vane looked up at him sharply.
"You've been right in the advice you have given me more than once: you
seem to know how prosperous and what you call stereotyped folks look at
things. But you've never explained where you got the knowledge."
"That," said Carroll, "is quite another matter."
"Anyway," continued Vane, "there's one remark of yours I'd like to
answer. You would, no doubt, consider I made a legitimate use of my
money when I entertained that crowd of city people--some of whom would
have plundered me if they could have managed it--in Vancouver. I didn't
grudge it, but I was a little astonished when I saw the wine and cigar
bill. It struck me that the best of them scarcely noticed what they
got--I think they'd been up against it at one time, as we have; and it
would have done the rest of the guzzlers good if they'd had to work all
day with the shovel on pork and flapjacks. But we'll let that go. What
have you and I done that we should swill in champagne, while a girl with
a face like that one below and a child who dances like a fairy haven't
enough to eat? You know what I paid for the last cigars. What confounded
hogs we are!"
Carroll laughed outright. There was not an ounce of superfluous flesh
upon his comrade, who was hardened and toughened by determined labour,
and the term hog appeared singularly inappropriate.
"Well," said Carroll, "you'll no doubt get used to the new conditions by
and by, and in regard to your latest exploit there's a motto on your
insignia of the Garter which might meet the case. But hadn't we better
heave her over her anchor?"
They seized the chain and as it ran below a sharp, musical rattle rang
out, for the hollow hull flung back the metallic clinking like a
sounding board. When the cable was short-up, they grasped the halyards
and the big gaff mainsail rose flapping up the mast. They set it and
turned to the headsails, for though, strictly speaking, a sloop only
carries one, the term is loosely applied in places, and as Vane had
changed her rig there were two of them.
"It's a fair wind, and I expect we'll find more weight in it lower
down," said Carroll. "We'll let the staysail lie and run her with the
jib."
They set the jib and broke out the anchor. Vane took the helm, and the
sloop, slanting over until her deck on one side dipped close to the
frothing brine, drove away into, the darkness. The lights of the
settlement faded among the trees, and when Carroll coming aft flung a
strip of canvas over the skylight, his comrade could see the black hills
and climbing firs on both sides slip by. Sliding vapours streaked them,
a crisp splashing sound made by the curling ripples followed the vessel;
the canoe surged along noisily astern, and the frothing and gurgling
grew louder at the bows. They were running down one of the deep,
forest-shrouded inlets which, resembling the Norwegian fiords, pierce
the Pacific littoral of Canada.
"I wonder how the wind is outside," Vane said.
Carroll looked round and saw the white mists stream athwart the pines on
a promontory they were skirting. "That's more than I can tell. In these
troughs among the hills it either blows straight up or directly down,
and I dare say we'll find it different when we reach the sound. One
thing's certain--there's some weight in it now."
Vane nodded agreement, though an idea that troubled him crept into his
mind. "I understand the steamboat skipper will run in to land some
Siwash he's bringing down. It will be awkward in the dark if the wind's
onshore."
Carroll made no comment, and they drove on, until as they swept round
the point the sloop, slanting sharply, dipped her lee rail in the froth.
"We'll have to tie down a reef," he said.
Vane told him to take the tiller and scrambling forward, rapped upon the
cabin side, which he flung back. Mrs. Marvin lay upon the leeward locker
with a blanket across her and the little girl at her feet; Miss Blake
sat on the weather one with a book in her hand.
"We're going to take some sail off the boat," he said. "You needn't be
disturbed by the noise."
"When do you expect to meet the steamer?" Miss Blake inquired.
"Not for two or three hours, anyway," Vane answered, with a hint of
uncertainty in his voice. Then, as he fancied the girl had noticed it,
he closed the slide.
"Down helm!" he said to Carroll, and there was a banging and thrashing
of canvas as the sloop came up into the wind. They held her there, with
the jib aback, while they hauled the canoe on board, which was not an
easy task, and then with difficulty hove down a reef in the mainsail. It
was heavy work, because there was nobody at the helm, and the craft
falling off once or twice as they leaned out upon the boom with toes on
her depressed lee rail, threatened to hurl them into the frothing water.
Neither of them were trained sailors, but on that coast with its inlets
and sounds and rivers the wanderer learns to handle sail and paddle and
canoe-pole.
They finished their task, and when Vane seized the helm Carroll sat down
under the shelter of the coaming, out of the flying spray.
"We'll probably have some trouble putting your friends on board the
steamer, even if she runs in," he remarked. "What are you going to do if
there's no sign of her?"
"It's a question I've been shirking for the last half-hour," Vane
confessed.
"I'd like to point out that it would be very slow work beating back up
this inlet, and if we did so there isn't a stage across the island for
several days. No doubt you remember you have to see that contractor on
Thursday, and there's the directors' meeting."
"It's uncommonly awkward," Vane answered dubiously.
Carroll laughed. "It strikes me your guests will have to stay where they
are, whether they like it or not; but there's one consolation--if this
wind is from the north-west, which is most likely, it will be a fast run
to Victoria. And now I'll try to get some sleep."
He disappeared down a scuttle forward, leaving Vane somewhat disturbed
in mind. He had merely contemplated taking his guests for a few hours'
run, but to have them on board for, perhaps, several days was a very
different thing. Besides, he was far from sure that they would
understand the necessity for the latter, in which case the situation
might become difficult. In the meanwhile, the sloop drove on, until at
last towards morning the beach fell back on each hand and she met the
long swell tumbling in from the Pacific. The wind was from the
north-west and blowing moderately hard; there was no light yet in the
sky above the black heights to the east of him, and the swell grew
higher and steeper, breaking white here and there. The sloop plunged
over it wildly, hurling the spray aloft, and it cost him a determined
effort to haul his sheets in as the wind drew ahead. Shortly afterwards,
the beach faded altogether on one hand, and he saw that the sea was
piled up into foaming ridges. It seemed most improbable that the steamer
would run in to land her Indian passengers, and he drove the sloop on
with showers of stinging brine beating into her wet canvas and whirling
about him.
By and by he noticed that a stream of smoke was pouring from the short
funnel of the stove, and soon afterwards the cabin slide opened. Miss
Blake crept out and stood up in the well, gazing forward while she
clutched the coaming.
Day was now breaking, and Vane could see that her thin dress was blown
flat against her. There was something graceful in her pose, and it
struck him that she had a very pretty slender figure.
"Where's the steamer?" she asked.
It was a question Vane had dreaded; but he answered it honestly: "I
can't tell you. It's very likely that she has gone straight on to
Victoria."
He read suspicion in her suddenly hardening face.
"You expected this when you asked us to come on board!" she cried.
"No," said Vane, whose face grew hot. "On my honour, I did nothing of
the kind. There was only a moderate breeze when we left, and when it
freshened enough to make it unlikely that the steamer would run in, I
was as vexed as you seem to be. As it happened, I couldn't go back. I
must get on to Victoria as soon as possible."
She looked at him searchingly.
"Then what are we to do?" she asked.
There was distress in the cry, but Vane answered it in his most
matter-of-fact tone: "So far as I can see, you can only reconcile
yourself to staying on board. We'll have a fresh fair wind for Victoria
once we're round the next head, and with luck we ought to get there late
to-night."
"You're sure you'll be there, then?"
"I'm sorry I can't even promise that: it depends upon the weather," he
replied. "But you mustn't stand up in the spray. You're getting wet
through."
She still clung to the coaming, but he fancied that her misgivings were
vanishing; and he spoke again: "How are Mrs. Marvin and the little girl?
I see you have lighted the stove."
The girl sat down, shivering, in the partial shelter of the coaming, and
at last a gleam of amusement which he thought was partly compassionate
shone in her eyes.
"I'm afraid they're--far from well. That was why I lighted the fire; I
wanted to make them some tea. I thought you wouldn't mind."
Vane smiled. "Everything's at your service. Go and get your breakfast,
and put on a coat you'll find below if you come out again."
She disappeared, and Vane felt relieved. Though the explanation had
proved less difficult than he had anticipated, he was glad that it was
over. Half an hour later she appeared again, carrying a loaded tray, and
he wondered at the ease of her movements, for the sloop was plunging
viciously.
"I've brought you some breakfast. You have been up all night," she said.
Vane laughed. "As I can only take one hand from the helm, you will have
to cut up the bread and canned stuff for me. Draw that box out and sit
down beneath the coaming if you mean to stay."
She did as he told her. The well was some four feet long, and the bottom
of it about half that distance below the level of the deck. As the
result of this, she sat close to his feet, while he balanced himself on
the coaming, gripping the tiller. He noticed that she had brought an
oilskin jacket with her.
"Hadn't you better put this on first? There's a good deal of spray," she
said.
Vane struggled into the jacket with some difficulty, and she smiled as
she handed him up a slice of bread and canned meat. "I suppose," she
said, "you can only manage one piece at once?"
"Thank you. That's about as much as you could expect one to be capable
of, even allowing for the bushman's appetite. I'm surprised to see you
looking so fresh."
"Oh!" said the girl, "I used to go out with the mackerel boats at home;
we lived at the ferry. It was a mile across the lough, and with the wind
westerly the sea worked in."
"The lough?" said Vane. "I told Carroll you were from the Green Isle."
It struck him that this was, perhaps, imprudent, since it implied that
they had been discussing her; but, on the other hand, he thought the
candour of the statement was in his favour. Then he added: "Have you
been long out here?"
Her face grew wistful. "Four years," she answered. "I came out with
Larry--he's my brother. He was a forester at home, and he took small
contracts for clearing land. Then he married--and I left him."
Vane made a sign of comprehension. "I see. Where's Larry now?"
"He went to Oregon. There was no answer to my last letter; I've lost
sight of him."
"And you go about with Mrs. Marvin? Is her husband alive?"
Sudden anger flared up in the girl's blue eyes, though, he knew it was
not directed against him.
"Yes," she said. "It's a pity he is. Men of his kind always seem to
live."
It occurred to Vane, that Miss Blake, who had evidently a spice of
temper, could be a staunch partisan; and he also noticed that now he had
inspired her with some degree of trust in himself, her conversation was
marked by an ingenious candour. For all that, she changed the subject.
"Another piece, or some tea?" she asked.
"Tea first," said Vane, and they both laughed when she afterwards handed
him a double slice of bread.
"These sandwiches strike me as unusually nice," he informed her. "It's
exceptionally good tea, too."
The blue eyes gleamed with amusement, "You have been in the cold all
night--but I was once in a restaurant." She watched the effect of this
statement on him. "You know I really can't sing--I was never taught,
anyway, though there were some of the settlements where we did rather
well."
Vane hummed a few bars of a song. "I don't suppose you realise what one
ballad of yours has done. I'd almost forgotten the Old Country, but the
night I heard you I felt I must go back and see it again. What's more,
Carroll and I are going shortly; it's your doing."
This was a matter of fact, but Kitty Blake had produced a deeper effect
on him, although he was not aware of it yet.
"It's a shame to keep you handing me things to eat," he added
disconnectedly. "Still, I'd like another piece."
She smiled, delighted, as she passed the food to him. "You can't help
yourself and steer the boat. Besides--after the restaurant--I don't mind
waiting on you."
Vane made no comment, but he watched her with satisfaction while he ate,
and as one result of it the sloop plunged heavily into the frothing sea.
There was no sign of the others, and they were alone on the waste of
tumbling water in the early dawn. The girl was pretty, and there was a
pleasing daintiness about her.
She belonged to the people--there was no doubt of that; but then Vane
had a strong faith in the people, native-born and adopted, of the
Pacific slope. It was from them he had received the greatest kindnesses
he could remember. They were cheerful optimists; indomitable grapplers
with forest and flood, who did almost incredible things with axe and saw
and giant-powder. They lived in lonely ranch houses, tents, and rudely
flung up shacks; driving the new roads along the rangeside, risking life
and limb in wild-cat adits. They were quick to laughter and reckless in
hospitality.
Then with an effort he brushed the hazy thoughts away. Kitty Blake was
merely a guest of his; in another day he would land her in Victoria, and
that would be the end of it. He was assuring himself of this when
Carroll crawled up through the scuttle forward and came aft to join
them. In spite of his prudent reflections, Vane was by no means certain
that he was pleased to see him.
CHAPTER III
AN AFTERNOON ASHORE.
Half the day had slipped by, when the breeze freshened further and the
sun broke through. The sloop was then rolling wildly as she drove along
with the peak of her mainsail lowered before a big following sea. Vane
looked thoughtful as he gripped the helm, because a head ran out from
the beach he was following three or four miles way, and he would have to
haul the boat up to windward to get round it. This would bring the
combers upon her quarter, or, worse still, abeam. Kitty Blake was below;
Mrs. Marvin had made no appearance yet, and he spoke to Carroll, who was
standing in the well.
"The sea's breaking more sharply, and we'd get uncommonly wet before we
hammered round yonder head," he said. "There's an inlet on this side of
it where we ought to find good shelter."
"The trouble is that if you stay there long you'll be too late for the
directors' meeting," Carroll answered.
"They can't have the meeting without me, and, if it's necessary, they
can wait," Vane pointed out. "I've had to. Many an hour I've spent
cooling my heels in offices before the head of the concern could find
time to attend to me. No doubt it was part of the game, and done to
impress me with a due sense of my unimportance."
"It's possible," Carroll agreed, smiling.
Kitty Blake made her appearance in the cabin entrance just then, and
Vane smiled at her.
"We're going to give you a rest," he announced. "There's an inlet close
ahead where we should find smooth water, and we'll put you all ashore
until the wind drops."
There was no suspicion in the girl's face now, and she gave him a
grateful glance before she disappeared below with the consoling news.
Soon afterwards, Vane luffed into a tiny bay, where the sloop rode
upright in the sunshine, with loose canvas flapping softly in a faint
breeze while the cable rattled down.
They got the canoe over, and when he had landed Mrs. Marvin and her
little girl, both of whom looked very woebegone and the worse for the
voyage, into her, Vane glanced round.
"Isn't Miss Blake coming?" he asked.
Mrs. Marvin, who was suggestively pallid, smiled. "She's changing her
dress." She glanced at her own crumpled attire and added: "I'm past
thinking of such things as that."
They waited some minutes, and then Vane called to Kitty, who appeared in
the entrance to the cabin, "Won't you look in the locker, and bring
anything you think would be nice? We'll make a fire and have supper on
the beach; if it isn't first-rate, you'll be responsible."
A few minutes later they paddled ashore, and Vane landed them on a strip
of shingle with a wall of rock behind it, to which dark firs clung in
the rifts and crannies. The sunshine streamed into the hollow, the wind
was cut off, and not far away a crystal stream came splashing down a
ravine.
Vane, who had brought an axe, made a fire of resinous wood, and Carroll
and Kitty prepared a bountiful supper. After it was finished Carroll
carried the plates away to the stream, towards which Mrs. Marvin and the
little girl followed him, and Vane and Kitty were left beside the fire.
She sat on a log of driftwood, and he lay on the warm shingle with his
pipe in his hand. The clear green water splashed and tinkled upon the
pebbles close at his feet, and a faint, elfin sighing fell from the firs
above them. It was very old music, the song of the primeval wilderness,
and though he had heard it often, it had a strange, unsettling effect
upon him as he languidly watched his companion. There was no doubt that
she was pleasant to look upon; but although he failed to recognise this
clearly, it was to a large extent an impersonal interest he took in her.
She was not so much an attractive young woman with qualities that
pleased him, as a type of something that had so far not come into his
life; something which he vaguely felt that he had missed. One could have
fancied that by some deep-sunk intuition she surmised this fact, and
felt the security of it.
"So you believe you can get an engagement if you reach Vancouver in
time," he said at length. Kitty assented, and he asked, "How long will
it last?"
"I can't tell. Perhaps a few weeks. It depends upon how the boys are
pleased with the show."
"It must be a hard life," Vane broke out. "You must make very
little--scarcely enough, I suppose, to carry you on from one engagement
to another. After all, weren't you as well off at the restaurant? Didn't
they treat you properly?"
She coloured a little at the question. "Oh, yes; at least, I have no
fault to find with the man who kept it, or his wife."
Vane made a hasty sign of comprehension. He supposed that the difficulty
had arisen from the conduct of one or more of the regular customers. He
felt he would very much like to meet the man whose undesired attentions
had driven his companion from her occupation.
"Did you never try to learn keeping accounts or typewriting?" he asked.
"I tried it once, but the mill shut down."
"I've an idea that I could find you a post," Vane made the suggestion
casually, though he was troubled by an inward diffidence.
He saw a tinge of warmer colour creep into the girl's cheeks.
"No," she said decidedly. "It wouldn't do."
The man knitted his brows, though he fancied that she was right. "Well,"
he replied, "I don't want to be officious--but how can I help?"
"You can't help at all."
Vane, who saw that she meant it, lay smoking in silence for a minute or
two. Then Carroll came up with Mrs. Marvin and the child, and he felt
strongly stirred when the little girl walked up to him shyly with a
basket filled with shells. He drew her down beside him, with an arm
about her waist, while he examined her treasures, and then glancing up
met Kitty's eyes and felt his face grow hot with an emotion he failed to
analyse. The child was delicate; life had scanty pleasure to offer her,
but now she was happy.
"They're so pretty, and there are lots of them," she said. "Can't we
stay here longer and gather some more?"
"Yes," said Vane, conscious that Carroll, who had heard the question,
was watching him. "You shall stay and get as many as you want. I'm
afraid you don't like the sloop."
"No," replied the child gravely, "I don't like it when it jumps. After I
woke up it jumped all the time."
"Never mind," said Vane. "The boat will keep still to-night, and I don't
think there'll be any waves to roll her about to-morrow. We'll bring you
ashore first thing in the morning."
He talked to her for a few minutes, and then strolled along the beach
with Carroll.
"Why did you promise that child to stay here?" Carroll asked.
"Because I felt like doing so."
"I needn't remind you that you've an appointment with Horsfield about
the smelter, and there's a meeting of the board next day. If we started
now and caught the first steamer across, you wouldn't have much time to
spare."
"That's correct. I shall have to wire from Victoria that I've been
detained."
Carroll laughed expressively. "Do you mean to keep your directors
waiting to please a child?"
"I suppose that's one reason. Anyway, I don't propose to hustle the
little girl and her mother on board the steamer helpless with sea
sickness," He paused and a gleam of humour crept into his eyes. "As I
told you, I've no objection to letting the directors wait my pleasure."
"But they set the concern on its feet."
"Just so," said Vane coolly. "On the other hand, they got excellent
value for their services--and I found the mine. What's more, during the
preliminary negotiations most of them treated me very casually."
"Well?" said Carroll.
"There's going to be a difference now, I've a board of directors; one
way or another, I've had to pay for the privilege pretty dearly; but I
don't intend that they should run the Clermont mine."
Carroll glanced at him with open amusement. There had been a marked
change in Vane since he had floated the company, but it was one that did
not astonish his comrade. Carroll had long suspected him of latent
capabilities, which had suddenly sprung to life.
"You ought to see Horsfield before you meet the board," he pointed out.
"I'm not sure," Vane answered. "In fact, I'm uncertain whether I'll give
Horsfield the contract, even if we decide about the smelter. I don't
want a man with too firm a hold up against me."
"But if he put his money in with the idea of getting certain pickings?"
"He didn't explain his intentions, and I made no promises," Vane
answered dryly. "He'll get his dividends; that'll satisfy him."
They rejoined the others, and when the white mists crept lower down from
the heights above and the chill of the dew was in the air, Vane launched
the canoe.
"It's getting late, and there's a long run in front of us to-morrow," he
informed his passengers. "The sloop will lie as still as if moored in a
pond, and you'll have her all to yourselves. Carroll and I are going to
camp ashore."
He paddled them off to the boat, and coming back with some blankets cut
a few armfuls of spruce twigs in a ravine and spread them out beside the
fire. Then sitting down just clear of the scented smoke, he lighted his
pipe and asked an abrupt question: "What do you think of Kitty Blake?"
"Well," said Carroll cautiously, "I must confess that I've taken some
interest in the girl; partly because you were obviously doing so. In a
general way, what I noticed rather surprised me. It wasn't what I
expected."
"You smart folks are as often wrong as the rest of us. I suppose you
looked for cold-blooded assurance, tempered by what one might call
experienced coquetry?"
"Something of the kind," Carroll agreed. "As you say, I was wrong. There
are only two ways of explaining Miss Blake, and the first's the one that
would strike most people. That is, she's acting a part, possibly with an
object; holding her natural self in check, and doing it cleverly."
Vane laughed scornfully. "I wouldn't have entertained that idea for five
minutes."
"Then," said Carroll, "there's the other explanation. It's simply that
the girl's life hasn't affected her. Somehow she has kept fresh and
wholesome."
"There's no doubt of it," said Vane shortly.
"You offered to help her in some way?"
"I did; I don't know how you guessed it. I said I'd find her a
situation. She wouldn't hear of it."
"She was wise," said Carroll. "Vancouver isn't a very big place yet, and
the girl has more sense than you have. What did you say?"
"Nothing. You interrupted us. But I'm going to sleep."
He rolled himself up in his blanket and lay down among the soft spruce
twigs, but Carroll sat still in the darkness and smoked his pipe out.
Then he glanced at his comrade, who lay still, breathing evenly.
"No doubt you'll be considered fortunate," he said, apostrophizing him
half aloud. "You've had power and responsibility thrust upon you. What
will you make of them?"
Then he, too, lay down, and only the soft splash of the tiny ripples
broke the silence while the fire sank lower.
They sailed next morning and eventually arrived in Victoria after the
boat which crossed the Strait had gone, but the breeze was fair from the
westwards, and after dispatching a telegram Vane put to sea again. The
sloop made a quick passage, and for most of the time her passengers
lounged in the sunshine on her gently-slanted deck. It was evening when
they ran through the Narrows into Vancouver's land-locked harbour.
Half an hour later, Vane landed his passengers, and it was not until he
had left them they discovered that he had thrust a roll of paper
currency into the little girl's hand. Then he and Carroll set off for
the C.P.R. hotel.
CHAPTER IV
A CHANGE OF ENVIRONMENT.
On the evening after his arrival in Vancouver, Vane, who took Carroll
with him, paid a visit to one of his directors and, in accordance with
the invitation, reached the latter's dwelling some little time before
the arrival of other guests, whose acquaintance it was considered
advisable that he should make.
Vane and his companion were ushered into a small room with an uncovered
floor and simple, hardwood furniture. It was obviously a working room,
for, as a rule, the work of the Western business man goes on
continuously except when he is asleep; but a somewhat portly lady with a
good-humoured face reclined in a rocking-chair. A gaunt, elderly man of
rugged appearance rose from his seat at a writing-table as his guests
entered.
"So ye have come at last," he said. "I had you shown in here, because
this room is mine, and I can smoke when I like. The rest of the house is
Mrs. Nairn's, and it seems that her friends do not appreciate the smell
of my cigars. I'm not sure that I can blame them."
Mrs. Nairn smiled placidly. "Alec," she explained, "leaves them lying
everywhere, and I do not like the stubs on the stairs. But sit ye down
and he will give ye one."
Vane felt at home with both of them. He had met people of their kind
before, and, allowing for certain idiosyncrasies, considered them the
salt of the Dominion. Nairn had done good service to his adopted
country, developing her new industries, with some profit to himself, for
he was of Scottish extraction; but while close at a bargain he could be
generous afterwards. When his guests were seated he laid two cigar boxes
on the table.
"Those," he said, pointing to one of them, "are mine. I think ye had
better try the others; they're for visitors."
Vane, who had already noticed the aroma of the cigar that was
smouldering on a tray, decided that he was right, and dipped his hand
into the second box, which he passed to Carroll.
"Now," said Nairn, "we can talk comfortably, and Clara will listen.
Afterwards it's possible she will favour me with her opinion."
Mrs. Nairn smiled at them encouragingly, and her husband proceeded: "One
or two of my colleagues were no pleased at ye for putting off the
meeting."
"The sloop was small, and it was blowing rather hard," Vane explained.
"Maybe," said Nairn. "For all that, the tone of your message was not
altogether conciliatory. It informed us that ye would arrange for the
postponed meeting at your earliest convenience. Ye didna mention ours."
"I pointed that out to him, and he said it didn't matter," Carroll broke
in, laughing.
Nairn spread out his hands in expostulation, but there was dry
appreciation in his eyes. "Young blood must have its way." Then he
paused. "Ye will not have said anything to Horsfield yet about the
smelter?"
"No. So far, I'm not sure it would pay us to put up the plant, and the
other man's terms were lower."
"Maybe," Nairn answered, and he made the word very expressive. "Ye have
had the handling of the thing; but henceforward it will be necessary to
get the sanction of the board. However, ye will meet Horsfield to-night.
We expect him and his sister."
Vane thought he had been favoured with a hint, but he also fancied that
his host was not inimical and was merely reserving his judgment. The
latter changed the subject.
"So ye're going to England for a holiday," he remarked. "Ye'll have
friends who'll be glad to see ye?"
"I've one sister and no other near relatives, but I expect to spend some
time with folks you know. The Chisholms are old family friends and, as
you will remember, it was through them I first approached you." Then
obeying one of the impulses which occasionally swayed him he turned to
Mrs. Nairn. "I'm grateful to them for sending me the letter of
introduction to your husband. He didn't treat me as the others did when
I first went round this city with a few mineral specimens."
He had expected nothing when he spoke, but there was a responsive look
in the lady's face which hinted that he had made a friend; and as a
matter of fact, he owed a good deal to his host.
"So ye are meaning to stay with Chisholm," Nairn exclaimed. "We had
Evelyn here two years ago and Clara said something about her coming out
again."
"I never heard of that, but it's nine years since I saw Evelyn."
"Then there's a surprise in store for ye," said Nairn. "I believe
they've a bonny place, and there's no doubt Chisholm will make ye
welcome."
The slight pause was expressive. It implied that Nairn, who had a
somewhat biting humour, could furnish a reason for Chisholm's
hospitality if he desired, and Vane was confirmed in this supposition
when he saw the warning look which his hostess cast at her husband.
"It's likely that we'll have Evelyn again in the fall," she broke in.
"It's a very small world, Mr. Vane."
"It's a far cry from Vancouver to England," said Vane. "How did you come
to know Chisholm?"
Nairn answered him. "Our acquaintance began with business, and he's a
kind of connection of Colquhoun's."
Colquhoun was a man of some importance, who held a Crown appointment,
and Vane felt inclined to wonder why Chisholm had not sent him a letter
to him. Afterwards he guessed at the reason, which was not flattering to
himself or his host. The latter and he chatted awhile on business
topics, until there was a sound of voices below, and going down in
company with Mrs. Nairn they found two or three new arrivals in the
entrance hall. More came in, and when they sat down to supper, Vane was
given a place beside a lady whom he had already met.
Jessie Horsfield was about his own age; tall and slight of figure, with
regular features, a rather colourless face, and eyes of a cold, light
blue. There was, however, something which Vane considered striking in
her appearance, and he was gratified by her graciousness to him. Her
brother sat almost opposite to them, a tall, spare man, with an
expressionless countenance, except for the aggressive hardness in his
eyes. Vane had noticed this look in them, and it had roused his dislike;
but he had not observed it in those of Miss Horsfield, though it was
present now and then. Nor did he realise that while she chatted, she was
unobtrusively studying him; She had not favoured him with much notice
when she was in his company on a previous occasion; he had been a man of
no importance then.
"I suppose you are glad you have finished your work in the bush," she
remarked presently. "It must be nice to get back to civilisation."
"Yes," Vane assented; "it's remarkably nice after living for nine years
in the wilderness."
A fresh dish was laid before him, and his companion smiled. "You didn't
get things of this kind among the pines."
"No," said Vane. "In fact, cookery is one of the chopper's trials. You
come back dead tired, and often very wet, to your lonely tent, and then
there's a fire to make and supper to get before you can rest. It happens
now and then that you're too played out to trouble, and go to sleep
instead."
"Dreadful," said the girl, sympathetically. "But you have been in
Vancouver before."
"Except on the last occasion, I stayed down near the water-front. We
were not provided with luxurious quarters or suppers of this kind then."
Jessie nodded. "It's romantic, and though you must be glad it's over,
there must be some satisfaction in feeling that you owe the change to
your own efforts. Doesn't it give you a feeling that in some degree
you're master of your fate? I fancy I should like that."
It was subtle flattery, and there were reasons why it appealed to the
man. He had wandered about the province in search of employment, besides
being beaten down at many a small bargain by more fortunately situated
men. Now, however, he had resolved that there should be a difference:
instead of begging favours, he would dictate terms.
"I should have imagined it," he said, in answer to her last remark, and
he was right, for Jessie Horsfield was a clever woman, who loved power
and influence. Then she abruptly changed the subject.
"It was you who located the Clermont mine, wasn't it?" she asked. "I
read something about it in the papers; I think they said it was copper."
This vagueness was misleading, because her brother had given her a good
deal of information about the mine.
"Yes," said Vane, who was willing to take up any subject she suggested;
"it's copper, but there's some silver combined with it. Of course, the
value of any ore depends upon two things--the percentage of the metal,
and the cost of extracting it."
She waited with flattering interest, and he added: "In both respects,
Clermont produce is promising."
After that he did not remember what they talked about; but the time
passed rapidly and he was surprised when Mrs. Nairn rose and the company
drifted away by twos and threes towards the verandah. Left by himself a
moment, he came upon Carroll sauntering down a corridor, and the latter
stopped him.
"I've had a chat with Horsfield," he remarked.
"Well?" said Vane.
"He may have merely meant to make himself agreeable, and he may have
wished to extract information about you. If the latter was his object,
he was not successful."
"Ah!" said Vane thoughtfully. "Nairn's straight, anyway, and to be
relied upon. I like him and his wife."
"So do I," Carroll agreed.
He moved away, and a few moments later Horsfield joined Vane, who had
strolled out on to the verandah.
"I don't know if it's a very suitable time to mention it, but are you
any nearer a decision about that smelter yet?" he said. "Candidly, I'd
like the contract."
"No," said Vane. "I can't make up my mind, and I may postpone the matter
indefinitely. It might prove more profitable to ship the ore out for
reduction."
Horsfield examined his cigar. "Of course, I can't press you; but I may
perhaps suggest that as we'll have to work together in other matters, I
might be able to give you a quid pro quo."
"That occurred to me," said Vane, "On the other hand, I don't know how
much importance I ought to attach to the consideration."
His companion laughed with apparent good-humour. "Oh, well!" he
answered, "I must wait until you're ready."
He strolled away, and presently joined his sister.
"How does Vane strike you?" he asked. "You seem to get on with him."
"I've an idea that you won't find him easy to influence, and the girl
looked at her brother pointedly.
"I'm inclined to agree with you," said Horsfield. "In spite of that,
he's a man worth cultivating."
He passed on to speak to Nairn, and by and by Vane sat down beside
Jessie in a corner of a big room. It was simply furnished, but spacious
and lofty and looked out across the verandah. It was pleasant to lounge
there and feel that Miss Horsfield had good-naturedly taken him under
her wing, which seemed to describe her attitude.
"As Mrs. Nairn tells me you are going to England, I suppose we shall not
see you in Vancouver for some months," she said presently. "This city
really isn't a bad place to live in."
Vane felt gratified. She implied that he would be an acquisition and
included him among the number of her acquaintances. "I fancy I shall
find it a particularly pleasant one," he responded. "Indeed, I'm
inclined to be sorry I've made arrangements to leave it very shortly."
"That is pure good-nature," his companion laughed.
She changed the subject, and Vane found her conversation entertaining.
She said nothing of any consequence, but she knew how to make a glance
or a changed inflection expressive. He was sorry when she left him, but
she smiled at him before she moved away.
"If you and Mr. Carroll care to call, I am generally at home in the
afternoon," she said.
She crossed the room, and Vane, who joined Nairn, remained near him
until he took his departure.
It was late the next afternoon, and an Empress liner from China and
Japan had arrived an hour or two earlier, when he and Carroll reached
the C.P.R. station. The Atlantic train was waiting, and an unusual
number of passengers were hurrying about the cars. They were, for the
most part, prosperous people, business men and tourists from England,
going home that way, and when Vane found Mrs. Marvin and Kitty, he was
once more conscious of a stirring of compassion. Kitty smiled at him
diffidently.
"You have been so kind," she began, and, pausing, added with a tremor in
her voice: "But the tickets----"
"Pshaw!" said Vane. "If it will ease your mind, you can send me what
they cost after the first full house you draw."
"How shall we address you?"
"Clermont Mineral Exploitation. I don't want to think I'm going to lose
sight of you."
Kitty turned away from him a moment, and then looked back.
"I'm afraid you must make up your mind to that," she said.
Vane could not remember his answer, though he afterwards tried; but just
then an official strode along beside the cars calling to the passengers,
and when a bell began tolling Vane hurried the girl and her companions
on to a platform. Mrs. Marvin entered the car, Elsie held up her face to
kiss him before she disappeared, and he and Kitty were left alone. She
held out her hand, and a liquid gleam crept into her eyes.
"We can't thank you properly," she said. "Good-bye."
"No," Vane protested. "You mustn't say that."
"Yes," said Kitty firmly. "It's good-bye. You'll be carried on in a
moment."
Vane gazed down at her, and afterwards wondered at what he did; but she
looked so forlorn and desolate, and the pretty face was so close to him.
Stooping swiftly, he kissed her, and had a thrilling fancy that she did
not recoil; then the cars lurched forward, and he swung himself down.
CHAPTER V
THE OLD COUNTRY.
A month had passed since Vane said good-bye to Kitty, when he and
Carroll alighted one evening at a little station in the north of
England.
The train went on, and Vane stood still, looking about him with a
poignant recollection of how he had last waited on that platform, sick
at heart, but gathering his youthful courage for the effort that he must
make. It all came back to him; the dejection, the sense of loneliness;
for he was then going out to the Western Dominion in which he had not a
friend. Now he was returning prosperous and successful. But once again
the feeling of loneliness was with him--most of those whom he had left
behind had made a longer journey than his.
Then he noticed an elderly man in livery approaching, and held out his
hand with a smile of pleasure.
"You haven't changed a bit, Jim," he said.
"A bit stiffer in the joints, and maybe a bit sourer," was the answer;
then the man's wrinkled face relaxed. "I'm main glad to see thee, Mr.
Wallace. Master wad have come, only he'd t' gan t' Manchester suddenly."
Vane helped him to place their baggage in the trap, and then, gathering
up the reins, bade him sit behind. After half an hour's ride through a
country rolled in ridge and valley, Vane pulled up where a stile path
led across a strip of meadow.
"You can drive round; we'll be there before you," he said to the groom
as he got down.
Carroll and he crossed the meadow, and passing round a clump of larches,
came suddenly into sight of an old grey house with a fir wood rolling
down the hillside close behind it. The building was long and low,
weather-worn and stained with lichens where the creepers and climbing
roses left the stone exposed. The bottom row of mullioned windows opened
upon a terrace, and in front of the latter ran a low wall with a mossy
coping on which was placed urns bright with geraniums. It was pierced by
an opening approached by shallow stairs on which a peacock stood, and
between them and the two men stretched a sweep of lawn. A couple of
minutes later a lady met them in the hall, and held out her hand to Vane
effusively. She was middle-aged, and had once been handsome, Carroll
thought, but there were wrinkles about her eyes, which had a hint of
hardness in them.
"Welcome home, Wallace," she said. "It should not be difficult to look
upon the Dene as that--you were here so often once upon a time."
"Thank you," said Vane. "I felt tempted to ask Jim to drive me round by
the Low Wood; I wanted to see the place again."
"I'm glad you didn't," and the lady smiled sympathetically. "The house
is shut up and going to pieces. It would have been depressing to-night."
Vane presented Carroll. Mrs. Chisholm's manner was gracious; but for no
particular reason Carroll wondered if she would have extended the same
welcome to either, had his comrade not come back the discoverer of a
mine.
"Tom was sorry he couldn't wait to meet you, but he had to leave for
Manchester on some urgent business," she informed Vane, and looked round
as a girl with disordered hair came up to them.
"This is Mabel," she said. "I hardly think you will remember her."
"I've carried her across the meadow," smilingly remarked Vane.
The girl greeted the strangers demurely, and favoured Vane with a
critical gaze. "So you're Wallace Vane--who found the Clermont mine.
Though I don't remember you, I've heard a good deal about you lately.
Very pleased to make your acquaintance."
Vane's eyes twinkled as he shook hands with her. Her manner was quaintly
formal, but he fancied there was a spice of mischief hidden behind it,
and in the meanwhile Carroll, watching his hostess, surmised that her
daughter's remarks had not altogether pleased her. She, however, chatted
with them until the man who had driven them appeared with their baggage,
when they were shown their respective rooms.
Vane was the first to go down, and reaching the hall found nobody there,
though a clatter of dishes and clink of silver suggested that a meal was
being laid out in an adjoining room. Sitting down near the hearth, he
looked about him.
His eyes rested on many objects that he recognised, but as his glance
travelled to and fro it occurred to him that much of what he saw
conveyed a hint that economy was needful.
By and by he heard a patter of feet, and looking up saw a girl
descending the stairs in the fading stream of light. She was clad in
trailing white, which gleamed against the dark oak and rustled softly as
it flowed about a tall, finely-outlined and finely-poised figure. She
had hair of dark brown with paler lights in its curling tendrils,
gathered back from a neck that showed a faintly warmer whiteness, than
the snowy fabric beneath it. It was, however, her face which seized
Vane's attention; the level brows, the quiet, deep brown eyes, the
straight, cleanly-cut nose, and the subtle suggestion of steadfastness
and pride which they all conveyed. He rose with a cry that had pleasure
and eagerness in it: "Evelyn!"
She came down, moving lightly but, as he noticed, with a rhythmic grace,
and laid a firm, cool hand in his.
"I'm glad to see you back, Wallace," she said. "But you have changed."
"I'm not sure that's kind. In some ways you haven't changed at all; I
would have known you anywhere."
"Nine years is a long time to remember any one."
Vane had seen few women during that period; but he was not a fool, and
he recognised that this was no occasion for an attempt at gallantry.
There was nothing coquettish in Evelyn's words, nor were they ironical.
She had answered in the tranquil, matter-of-fact manner which, as he
remembered, usually characterised her.
"It's a little while since you landed, isn't it?" she added.
"A week," said Vane. "I'd some business in London, and then I went on to
look up Lucy. She had just gone up to town, and I missed her. I shall go
up again to see her as soon as she answers my note."
"It won't be necessary. She's coming here for a fortnight very soon."
"That's kind," said Vane. "Whom have I to thank for suggesting it?"
"Does it matter? It was a natural thing to ask your only sister--who is
a friend of mine. We have plenty of room, and the place is quiet."
"It used not to be. If I remember, your mother generally had it full
part of the year."
"Things have changed," said Evelyn quietly.
Vane was baffled by something in her manner. Evelyn had never been
effusive--that was not her way--but now, while she was cordial, she did
not seem disposed to resume their acquaintance where it had been broken
off. After all, he could hardly have expected this.
"Mabel is like you, as you used to be," he said. "It struck me as soon
as I saw her; but when she began to talk there was a difference."
"Yes," she said. "I think you're right in both respects. Mopsy has the
courage of her convictions. She's an open rebel."
There was no bitterness in her tone. Evelyn's manner was never pointed,
but Vane fancied that she had said a meaning thing, one that might
explain what he found puzzling in her attitude, when he held the key to
it. Then she went on: "Mopsy was dubious about you before you arrived,
but I'm pleased to say she now seems reassured."
Then Carroll came down, and a few moments later Mrs. Chisholm appeared
and they went in to dinner in a low-ceilinged room. Nobody said anything
of importance, but by and by Mabel turned to Vane.
"I suppose you have brought your pistols with you," she said.
"I never owned one," Vane informed her.
The girl looked at him with an excellent assumption of incredulity.
"Then you have never shot anybody in British Columbia?"
Carroll laughed, as if this greatly pleased him, but Vane's face was
rather grave as he answered her.
"No," he said. "I'm thankful I haven't."
"Then the West must be getting what the Archdeacon--he's Flora's
husband, you know--calls decadent," the girl retorted.
"She's incorrigible," Mrs. Chisholm interposed with a smile.
Carroll, who was sitting next to Mabel, leaned towards her
confidentially. "In case you feel badly disappointed, I'll let you into
a secret," he said. "When we feel real savage, we take the axe instead."
Evelyn fancied that Vane winced at this, but Mabel looked openly
regretful.
"Can either of you pick up a handkerchief going at full gallop on
horseback?" she inquired.
"I'm sorry I can't, and I've never seen Wallace do so," Carroll
answered, laughing, and Mrs. Chisholm shook her head at her daughter.
"Miss Clifford complained of your inattention to the study of English
last quarter," she said severely.
Mabel made no answer, though Vane thought it would have relieved her to
grimace, and by and by the meal came to an end. Some time afterwards,
Mrs. Chisholm rose from her seat in the drawing-room.
"We keep early hours at the Dene, but you will retire when you like,"
she said. "As Tom is away, I had better tell you that you will find
syphons and whisky in the smoking-room. I have had the lamp lighted."
"Thank you," Vane replied with a smile. "I'm afraid you have taken more
trouble on our account than you need have done. Except on special
occasions we have generally confined ourselves to strong green tea."
Mabel looked at him in amazement. "Oh!" she said, "the West is certainly
decadent. You should be here when the otter hounds are out. Why, it was
only----"
She broke off abruptly beneath her mother's withering glance, and when
they were left alone, Vane and Carroll strolled out upon the terrace,
pipe in hand.
"I suppose you could put in a few weeks here," Vane remarked.
"I could," Carroll replied. "There's an--atmosphere--about these old
houses that appeals to me, perhaps because we have nothing like it in
Canada. Besides, I think your friends mean to make things pleasant."
"I'm glad you like them."
Carroll understood that his comrade would not resent a candid expression
of opinion. "I do; the girls in particular. They interest me. The
younger one's of a type that's common in our country, though it's
generally given room for free development into something useful there.
Mabel's chaffing at the curb. It remains to be seen if she'll kick, and
hurt herself in doing so, presently."
Vane, who remembered that Evelyn had said something to the same effect,
had already discovered that Carroll possessed a keen insight in certain
matters.
"And her sister?" he suggested.
"You won't mind my saying that I'm inclined to be sorry for her? She has
learned repression--been driven into line. That girl has character, but
it's being cramped and stunted. You live in walled-in compartments in
this country."
Vane strolled along the terrace thoughtfully. He was not offended, and
he understood his companion's attitude. Like other men of education and
good upbringing, driven by unrest or disaster to the untrammelled life
of the bush, Carroll had gained sympathy as well as knowledge. Facing
facts candidly, he seldom indulged in decided protest against any of
them. On the other hand, Vane was on occasion liable to outbreaks of
indignation.
"Well," said the latter at length, "I guess it's time to go to bed."
CHAPTER VI
UPON THE HEIGHTS.
Vane rose early next morning, as he had been accustomed to do, and
taking a towel with him made his way across dewy meadows and between
tall hedgerows to the tarn. Stripping where the rabbit-cropped sward met
the mossy boulders, he swam out joyously, breasting the little ripples
which splashed and sparkled beneath the breeze that had got up with the
sun. Coming back where the water lay in shadow beneath a larch wood,
which as yet had not wholly lost its vivid green, he disturbed the
paddling moor-hens and put up a mallard from a clump of swaying reeds.
Then he dressed and turned homewards.
Scrambling over a limestone wall tufted thick with parsley fern, he
noticed Mabel stooping down over an object which lay among the heather
where a rough cartroad approached a wooden bridge. On joining her, he
saw that it was a finely-built canoe with a hole in one bilge she was
examining. She looked up at him ruefully, as she said, "Very sad, isn't
it? That stupid Little did it with his clumsy cart."
"I think it could be mended," Vane replied.
"Old Beavan--he's the wheelwright--said it couldn't, and dad said I
could hardly expect him to send the canoe back to Kingston. He bought it
for me at an exhibition." Then a thought seemed to strike her. "Perhaps
you had something to do with canoes in Canada?"
"I used to pole one loaded with provisions up a river, and carry the lot
round several falls. You're fond of paddling."
"I love it. I used to row the fishing-punt, but it's too old to be safe,
and now the canoe's smashed I can't go out."
"Well," said Vane, "we'll walk across and see what we can find in
Beavan's shop."
They crossed the heath to a tiny hamlet nestling in a hollow of a
limestone crag. There Vane made friends with the wheelwright, who
regarded him dubiously at first, and obtained a piece of larch board
from him. The grizzled North countryman watched him closely as he set a
plane, which is a delicate operation, and then raised no objection when
Vane made use of his work bench. After that, Vane, who had sawn up the
board, borrowed a few tools and copper nails, and he and Mabel went back
to the canoe. On the way she glanced at him curiously.
"I wasn't sure old Beavan would let you have the things," she remarked.
"It isn't often he'll lend even a hammer, but he seemed to take to you;
I think it was the way you handled his plane."
"It's strange what little things win some people's good opinion, isn't
it?"
"Oh! don't," she exclaimed. "That's how the Archdeacon talks. I thought
you were different."
The man acquiesced in the rebuke, and after an hour's labour at the
canoe, scraped the red lead he had used off his hands, and sat down
beside the craft. By and by he became conscious that his companion was
regarding him with what seemed to be approval.
"I really think you'll do, and we'll get on," she informed him. "If you
had been the wrong kind you would have worried about your red hands.
Still, you could have rubbed them on the heather, instead of on your
socks."
"I might have thought of that," Vane agreed. "But, you see, I've been
accustomed to wearing old clothes. Anyway, you'll be able to launch the
canoe as soon as the joint's dry."
"There's one thing I should have told you," the girl replied. "Dad would
have sent the canoe away to be mended if it hadn't been so far. He's
very good when things don't ruffle him; but he hasn't been fortunate
lately. The lead mine takes a good deal of money."
Vane admired her loyalty, and refrained from taking advantage of her
candour, though there were one or two questions he would have liked to
ask. When he was last in England, Chisholm had been generally regarded
as a man of means, though it was rumoured that he was addicted to
hazardous speculations. Mabel, who did not seem to mind his silence,
went on:
"I heard Stevens--he's the gamekeeper--tell Beavan that dad should have
been a rabbit because he's so fond of burrowing. No doubt, that meant he
couldn't keep out of mines."
Vane made no comment, and to change the subject, reminded her: "Don't
you think it's getting on for breakfast time?"
"It won't be for a good while yet. We don't get up early, and though
Evelyn used to, it's different now. We went out on the tarn every
morning, even in the rain; but I suppose that's not good for one's
complexion, though bothering about such things doesn't seem to be worth
while. Aunt Julia couldn't do anything for Evelyn, though she had her in
London for some time. Flora is our shining light."
"What did she do?" Vane inquired.
"She married the Archdeacon, and he isn't so very dried up. I've seen
him smile when I talked to him."
"I'm not astonished at that, Mabel."
His companion looked up at him demurely. "My name's not Mabel--to you.
I'm Mopsy to the family, but my special friends call me Mops. You're one
of the few people one can be natural with, and I'm getting sick--you
won't be shocked at that--of having to be the opposite."
Half an hour later, Vane, who had seldom had to wait so long for it, sat
down to breakfast. All he saw spoke of ease and taste and leisure.
Evelyn, who sat opposite him, looked wonderfully fresh in her white
dress. Mopsy was as amusing as she dared to be; but he felt drawn back
to the restless world again as he glanced at his hostess and saw the
wrinkles round her eyes and a hint of cleverly-hidden strain in her
expression. He fancied a good deal could be inferred from the fragments
of information her youngest daughter had let drop.
It was the latter who suggested that they should picnic upon the summit
of a lofty hill, from which there was a striking view; and as this met
with the approval of Mrs. Chisholm, who excused herself from
accompanying them, they set out an hour later. The day was bright, with
glaring sunshine, and a moderate breeze drove up wisps of ragged cloud
that dappled the hills with flitting shadow.
Vane carried the provisions in a fishing-creel, and on leaving the head
of the valley they climbed leisurely up easy slopes, slipping on the
crisp hill grass now and then. By and by they plunged into tangled
heather on a bolder ridge, which was rent by black gullies, down which
at times wild torrents poured. This did not trouble either of the men,
but Vane was surprised at the ease with which Evelyn threaded her way
across the heath. She wore a short skirt, and he noticed the supple
grace of her movements and the delicate colour the wind had brought into
her face. She had changed since they left the valley. She seemed to have
flung off something, and her laugh had a gayer ring; but while she
chatted with him he was still conscious of a subtle reserve in her
manner.
Climbing still, they reached the haunts of the cloud-berries and brushed
through broad patches of the snowy blossoms that open their gleaming
cups among the moss and heather.
Then turning the flank of a steep ascent, they reached the foot of a
shingly scree, and sat down to lunch in the warm sunshine, where the
wind was cut off by the peak above. Beneath them a great rift opened up
among the rocks, and far beyond the blue lake in the depths of it they
caught the silver gleam of the distant sea.
The creel was promptly emptied, and when Mabel afterwards took Carroll
away to see if he could get up a chimney in some neighbouring crags,
Vane lay resting on one elbow not far from Evelyn. She was looking down
the long hollow, with the sunshine upon her face.
"You didn't seem to mind the climb," he said.
"I enjoyed it. I am fond of the mountains, and I have to thank you for a
day among them."
On the surface, the words offered an opening for a complimentary
rejoinder, but Vane was too shrewd to seize it. He had made one venture,
and he surmised that a second one would not please her.
"They're almost at your door," he said. "One would imagine you could
indulge in a scramble among them whenever if pleased you."
"There are a good many things that look so close and still are out of
reach," Evelyn answered with a smile that somehow troubled him. Then her
manner changed. "You are content with this?"
Vane gazed about him; at purple crags in shadow, glistening threads of
water that fell among the rocks, and long slopes that lay steeped in
softest colour, under the summer sky.
"Content is scarcely the right word for it," he assured her. "If it
wasn't so still and serene up here, I'd be riotously happy. There are
reasons for this quite apart from the scenery: for one, it's pleasant to
feel that I need do nothing but what I like for the next few months."
"The sensation must be unusual. I wonder if, even in your case, it will
last so long."
Vane laughed and stretched out one of his hands. It was lean and brown,
and she could see the marks of old scars on the knuckles.
"In my case," he answered, "it has only come once in a lifetime, and if
it isn't too presumptuous, I think I've earned it." He indicated his
battered fingers. "That's the result of holding a wet and slippery
drill, but those aren't the only marks I carry about with me--though
I've been more fortunate than many fine comrades."
"I suppose one must get hurt now and then," said Evelyn, who had noticed
something that pleased her in his voice as he concluded. "After all, a
bruise that's only skin-deep doesn't trouble one long, and no doubt some
scars are honourable. It's slow corrosion that's the deadliest." She
broke off with a laugh, and added: "Moralising's out of place on a day
like this, and they're not frequent in the North. In a way, that's their
greatest charm."
Vane nodded.
"Yes," he said. "On the face of it, the North is fickle, though to those
who know it that's a misleading term. To some of us it's always the
same, and its dark grimness makes you feel the radiance of its smile.
For all that, I think we're going to see a sudden change in the
weather."
Half of the wide circle their view would have commanded was cut off by
the scree, but long wisps of leaden cloud began to stream across the
crags above, intensifying, until it seemed unnatural, the glow of light
and colour on the rest.
"I wonder if Mopsy is leading Mr. Carroll into any mischief; they have
been gone some time," said Evelyn. "She has a trick of getting herself,
and other people into difficulties. I suppose he is an old friend of
yours, unless, perhaps, he's acting as your secretary."
Vane's eyes twinkled. "If he came in any particular capacity, it's as
bear-leader. You see, there are a good many things I've forgotten in the
bush, and as I left this country young, there are no doubt some I never
learned."
"And so you make Mr. Carroll your confidential adviser. How did he gain
the necessary experience?"
"That," replied Vane, "is more than I can tell you, but I'm inclined to
believe he has been at one of the universities; Toronto, most likely.
Anyhow, on the whole he acts as a judicious restraint."
"But don't you really know anything about him?"
"Only what some years of close companionship have taught me."
Evelyn looked surprised, and he spread out his hands in a humorous
manner. "A good many people have had to take me in that way, and they
seemed willing to do so; the thing's not uncommon in the West. Why
should I be more particular than they were?"
Just then Mabel and Carroll appeared. The latter's garments were stained
in places as if he had been scrambling over mossy rocks, and his pockets
bulged.
"We've found some sundew and two ferns I don't know, as well as all
sorts of other things," she announced.
"That's correct," said Carroll; "I've got them. I guess they're going to
fill up most of the creel."
Mabel superintended their transfer, and then addressed the others
generally: "I think we ought to go up the Pike now, when we have the
chance. It isn't much of a climb from here. Besides, the quickest way
back to the road is across the top and down the other side."
Evelyn agreed, and they set out, following a sheep-path which skirted
the screes, until they left the bank of sharp stones behind, and faced a
steep ascent. Parts of it necessitated a breathless scramble, and the
sunlight faded from the hills as they climbed, while thicker wisps of
cloud drove across the ragged summit. They reached the latter at length
and stopped, bracing themselves against a rush of chilly breeze, while
they looked down upon a wilderness of leaden-coloured rock. Long trails
of mist were creeping in and out among the crags, and here and there
masses of it gathered round the higher slopes.
"I think the Pike's grandest in this weather," Mabel declared. "Look
below, Mr. Carroll, and you'll see the mountain is like a starfish. It
has prongs running out from it."
Carroll did as she directed him, and noticed three diverging ridges
springing off from the shoulder of the peak. Their crests, which were
narrow, led down towards the valley, but their sides fell in rent and
fissured crags to great black hollows.
"You can get down two of them," Mabel went on. "The first is the nearest
to the road, but the third's the easiest. It takes you to the Hause;
that's the gap between it and the next hill."
A few big drops began to fall, and Evelyn cut her sister's explanations
short.
"We had better make a start at once," she said.
They set out, Mabel and Carroll leading and drawing farther away from
the two behind; and the rain began in earnest as they descended. Rock
slope and scattered stones were slippery, and Vane found it difficult to
keep his footing on some of their lichened surfaces. He, however, was
relieved to see that his companion seldom hesitated, and they made their
way downwards cautiously, until, near the spot where the three ridges
diverged, they walked into a belt of drifting mist. The peak above them
was suddenly blotted out, and Evelyn bade Vane hail Carroll and Mabel,
who had disappeared. He sent a shout ringing through the vapour, and
caught a faint and unintelligible reply, after which a flock of sheep
fled past and dislodged a rush of sliding stones. Vane heard the latter
rattle far down the hillside, and when he called again a blast of chilly
wind whirled his voice away. There was a faint echo above him, and then
silence again.
"It looks as if they were out of hearing, and the slope ahead of us
seems uncommonly steep by the way those stones went down," he remarked.
"Do you think Mabel has taken Carroll down the Stanghyll ridge?"
"I can't tell," said Evelyn. "It's comforting to remember that she knows
it better than I do. I think we ought to make for the Hause; there's
only one place that's really steep. Keep up to the left a little; the
Scale Crags must be close beneath us."
They moved on cautiously, skirting what seemed to be a pit of profound
depth in which dim vapours whirled, while the rain, which grew thicker,
beat into their faces.
CHAPTER VII
STORM-STAYED.
The weather was not the only thing that troubled Vane as he stumbled on
through the mist. Any unathletic tourist from the cities could have gone
up without much difficulty by the way they had ascended, but it was
different coming down on the opposite side of the mountain. There, their
route laid across banks of sharp-pointed stones that rested lightly on
the steep slope, interspersed with out-cropping rocks which were growing
dangerously slippery; and a wilderness of crags pierced by three great
radiating chasms lay beneath.
After half an hour's arduous scramble, he decided that they must be
close upon the top of the last rift, and stood still for a minute
looking about him. The mist was now so thick that he could scarcely see
thirty yards ahead, but the way it drove past him indicated that it was
blowing up a hollow. On one hand a rampart of hillside loomed dimly out
of it; in front there was a dark patch that looked like the face of a
dripping rock; and between the latter and the hill a boggy stretch of
grass ran back into the vapour. Then he turned, and glanced at Evelyn
with some concern. Her skirt was heavy with moisture, and the rain
dripped from the brim of her hat, but she smiled at him reassuringly.
"It's not the first time I've got wet," she said.
Vane felt relieved on one account. He had imagined that a woman hated to
feel draggled and untidy, and he was willing to own that in his case
fatigue usually tended towards shortness of temper. Though the scramble
had scarcely taxed his powers, he fancied that Evelyn, had already done
as much as one could expect of her.
"I must prospect about a bit," he said. "Scardale's somewhere below us;
but if I remember, it's an awkward descent to the head of it, and I'm
not sure of the right entrance to the Hause."
"I've only once been down this way, and that was a long while ago,"
Evelyn replied.
Vane left her, and plodded away across the grass. When he had grown
scarcely distinguishable in the haze, he turned and waved his hand.
"I know where we are; the head of the beck's close by," he cried.
Evelyn joined him at the edge of a trickle of water splashing in a peaty
hollow, and they followed it down, seeing only odd strips of hillside
amidst the vapour, until at length the ground grew softer and Vane,
going first, sank among the long green moss almost to his knees.
"That won't do. Stand still, please," he said. "I'll try a little to the
right."
He tried in one or two directions; but wherever he went he sank over his
boots, and, coming back, he informed his companion that they had better
go straight ahead.
"I know there's no bog worth speaking of; the Hause is a regular tourist
track," he added, and suddenly stripped off his jacket. "First of all,
you'll put this on; I'm sorry I didn't think of it before."
Evelyn demurred, and he rolled up the jacket. "You have to choose
between doing what I ask and watching me pitch it into the beck," he
declared. "I'm a rather determined person, and it would be a pity to
throw the thing away, particularly as the rain hasn't got through it
yet."
She yielded, and after he had held up the garment while she put it on,
he spoke again:
"There's another thing; I'm going to carry you for the next hundred
yards, or possibly farther."
"No," said Evelyn firmly. "On that point my determination is as strong
as yours."
Vane made a sign of acquiescence. "You can have your way for a minute; I
expect it will be long enough."
He was correct, Evelyn moved forward a pace or two, and then stopped
with the skirt she had gathered up brushing the quivering emerald moss,
and her boots, which were high ones, hidden in the latter. She had some
difficulty in pulling them out. Then Vane coolly picked her up.
"All you have to do is to keep still for the next few minutes," he
informed her in a most matter-of-fact voice.
Evelyn did not move, though had he shown any sign of self-conscious
hesitation she would at once have shaken herself loose. He was conscious
of a thrill and a certain stirring of his blood, but this, he decided,
must be sternly ignored, and his task occupied most of his attention. It
was not an easy one, and he stumbled once or twice, but he accomplished
it and set the girl down safely on firmer ground.
"Now," he said, "there's only the drop to the dale, but we must
endeavour to keep out of the beck."
His voice and air were unembarrassed, though he was breathless, and
Evelyn fancied that in this and the incident of the jacket he had
revealed the forceful, natural manners of the West. It was the first
glimpse she had had of them, though she had watched for one, and she was
not displeased. The man had merely done what was most advisable, with
practical sense.
A little farther on, a shoot of falling water swept out of the mist
above and came splashing down a crag, spread out in frothing threads. It
flowed across their path, reunited in a deep gully which they sprang
across, and then fell tumultuously into the beck, which was now ten or
twelve feet below on one side of them. They clung to the rock as they
traced it downwards, stepping cautiously from ledge to ledge. At times a
stone plunged into the mist beneath them, and Vane grasped the girl's
arm or held out a steadying hand, but he was never fussy or needlessly
concerned. When she wanted help, it was offered at the right moment; but
that was all, and she thought that had she been alarmed, which was not
the case, her companion's manner would have been more comforting than
persistent solicitude. He was, she decided, one who could be relied upon
in an emergency.
Though caution was still necessary, the next stage of the journey was
easier, and by and by they reached a winding dale. They followed it
downwards, splashing through water part of the time, and at length came
into sight of a cluster of little houses standing between a river and a
big fir wood.
"It must be getting on towards evening," said Evelyn. "Mopsy and Carroll
probably went down the Ridge, and as it runs out lower down the valley,
they'll be almost at home."
"It's six o'clock," said Vane, glancing at his watch. "You can't walk
home in the rain, and it's a long while since lunch. If Adam Bell and
his wife are still at the 'Golden Fleece,' we'll get something to eat
there and borrow you dry clothes. He'll drive us home afterwards."
Evelyn made no objections. She was very wet and beginning to feel weary,
and they were some distance from home. She restored him his jacket, and
a few minutes later they entered an old hostelry which, like many others
among these hills, was a farm as well as an inn. The landlady, who
recognised Vane with pleased surprise, took Evelyn away with her, and
afterwards provided Vane with some of her husband's clothes. Then she
lighted a fire, and when she had laid out a meal in the guest-room,
Evelyn came in, attired in a dress of lilac print.
"It's Maggie Bell's," she explained demurely. "Her mother's things were
rather large. Adam is away at a sheep auction, and they have only the
trap he went in, but they expect him back in an hour or so."
"Then we must wait," said Vane. "Worse misfortunes have befallen me."
They made an excellent meal, and then Vane drew up a wicker chair to the
fire for Evelyn and sat down opposite to her. Outside, the rain dripped
from the mossy flagstone eaves, and the song of the river stole in
monotonous cadence into the room.
Evelyn was silent and Vane said nothing for a while. He had been in the
air all day, and though this was nothing new to him, he was content to
sit lazily still and leave the opening of conversation to his companion.
In the meanwhile it was pleasant to glance towards her now and then. The
pale-tinted dress became her, and he felt that the room would have
looked less cheerful had she been away.
The effect she had on him was difficult to analyse, though he lazily
tried. She appealed to him by the grace of her carriage, the poise of
her head, her delicate colouring, and the changing lights in her eyes;
but behind these points something stronger and deeper was expressed
through them. He fancied she possessed qualities he had not hitherto
encountered, which would become more precious when they were fully
understood. He thought of her as wholesome in mind; one who sought for
the best; but she was also endowed with an ethereal something that could
not be defined.
Then a simile struck him: she was like the snow that towers high into
the empyrean in British Columbia; in which he was wrong, for there was
warm human passion in the girl, though it was sleeping yet. By and by,
he told himself, he was getting absurdly sentimental, and he
instinctively fumbled for his pipe and stopped. Evelyn noticed this and
smiled.
"You needn't hesitate," she said. "The Dene is redolent of cigars, and
Gerald smokes everywhere when he is at home."
"Is he likely to turn up?" Vane asked. "It's ever so long since I've
seen him."
"I'm afraid not. In fact, Gerald's rather under a cloud just now. I may
as well tell you this, because you are sure to hear of it sooner or
later. He has been extravagant, and, as he assures us, extraordinarily
unlucky."
"Stocks and shares?" suggested Vane, who was acquainted with some of the
family tendencies.
Evelyn hesitated a moment. "That would have been more readily forgiven
him. I believe he has speculated on the turf as well."
Vane was surprised, since he understood that Gerald Chisholm was a
barrister, and betting on the turf was not an amusement he would have
associated with that profession.
"Then," he said thoughtfully, "I must run up and see him later on."
Evelyn felt sorry she had spoken. Gerald needed help, which his father
was not in a position to offer. She was not censorious of other people's
faults; but it was impossible to be blind to some aspects of her
brother's character, and she would have preferred that Vane should not
meet Gerald while the latter was embarrassed by financial difficulties.
She changed the subject.
"Several of the things you told me about your life in Canada interested
me," she said. "It must have been bracing to feel that you depended upon
your own efforts and stood on your own feet, free from all the hampering
customs that are common here."
"The position has its disadvantages. You have no family influence behind
you; nothing to fall back upon. If you can't make good your footing you
must go down. It's curious that just before I came over here a lady I
met in Vancouver expressed an opinion very like yours. She said it must
be pleasant to feel that one was, to some extent at least, master of
one's fate."
"Then she merely explained my meaning more clearly than I have done."
"One could have imagined that she has everything she could reasonably
wish for. If I'm not transgressing, so have you. It's strange you should
both harbour the same idea."
"I don't think it's uncommon among young women nowadays. There's a
grandeur in the thought that one's fate lies in the hands of the high
unseen powers; but to allow one's life to be moulded by--one's
neighbours' prejudices and preconceptions is a different matter.
Besides, if unrest and human striving were sent, was it only that they
should be repressed?"
Vane sat silent a moment or two. He had noticed the brief pause and
fancied that she had changed one of the words that followed it. He did
not think it was her neighbours' opinions she most chafed against.
"It's not a point I've been concerned about," he replied at length. "In
a general way, I did what I wanted."
"Which is a privilege that is denied to us." Evelyn spoke without
bitterness, and added a moment later: "What do women who are left to
their own resources do in Western Canada?"
"Some of them marry; I suppose that's the most natural thing," said Vane
with an air of reflection that amused her. "Anyway, they have plenty of
opportunities. There's a preponderating number of unattached young men
in the newly-opened parts of the Dominion."
"Things are different here, or perhaps we want more than they do across
the Atlantic," said Evelyn. "What becomes of the others?"
"They wait in the hotels; learn stenography and typewriting, and go into
offices and stores."
"And earn just enough to live upon meagrely? If their wages are high,
they must pay out more. That follows, doesn't it?"
"To some extent."
"Is there nothing better open to them?"
"No," said Vane thoughtfully; "not unless they're trained for it and
become specialised. That implies peculiar abilities and a systematic
education with one end in view: you can't enter the arena to fight for
the higher prizes unless you're properly armed. The easiest way for a
woman to acquire power and influence is by a judicious marriage. No
doubt it's the same here."
"It is," replied Evelyn smiling. "A man is more fortunately situated."
"I suppose he is. If he's poor, he's rather walled in, too; but he
breaks through now and then. In the newer countries he gets an
opportunity."
Vane abstractedly examined his pipe, which he had not lighted yet. It
was clear that the girl was dissatisfied with her surroundings, and had
for some reason temporarily relaxed the restraint she generally laid
upon herself; but he felt that if she were wise, she would force herself
to be content. She was of too fine a fibre to plunge into the struggle
that many women had to wage, and though he did not doubt her courage,
she had not been trained for it. He had noticed that among men it was
the cruder and less developed organisations that proved hardiest in
adverse situations; one needed a strain of primitive vigour. There was,
it seemed, only one means of release for her, and that was a happy
marriage. But a marriage could not be happy unless the suitor was all
that she desired, and Evelyn would be fastidious, though her family
would, no doubt, only look for wealth and station. He imagined that this
was where the trouble lay. He would wait and keep his eyes open. Shortly
after he arrived at this decision, there was a rattle of wheels outside
and the landlord, who came in, greeted him with rude cordiality. In
another minute or two Vane handed Evelyn into the gig, and Bill drove
them home through the rain.
CHAPTER VIII
LUCY VANE.
Bright sunshine streamed down out of a cloudless sky when Vane stood
talking with his sister upon the terrace in front of the Dene one
afternoon shortly after his ascent of the Pike in Evelyn's company. He
leaned against the low wall, frowning, for Lucy had hitherto avoided a
discussion of the subject which occupied their attention, and now, as he
would have said, he could not make her listen to reason.
She stood in front of him, with the point of her parasol pressed firmly
into the gravel, and her lips set, though there was a smile which
suggested forbearance in her eyes. Lucy was tall and spare of figure; a
year younger than her brother, and of somewhat determined character. She
earned her living in a northern manufacturing town by lecturing on
domestic economy for the public authorities. Vane understood that she
also took part in Suffrage propaganda. She had a thin, forceful face,
which was seldom characterised by repose.
"After all," Vane broke out, "what I've been urging is a very natural
thing. I don't like to think of your being forced to work as you are
doing, and I've tried to show that it wouldn't cost me any self-denial
to make you an allowance. There's no reason why you should be at the
beck and call of those committees any longer."
Lucy's smile grew plainer. "I don't think that describes my position
very accurately."
"It's possible," Vane agreed with a trace of dryness. "No doubt you
insist on the chairman or lady president giving way to you; but that
doesn't affect the question. You have to work, anyway."
"But I like it, and it keeps me in some degree of comfort."
The man turned half impatiently and glanced about him. The front of the
old grey house was flooded with light, and the lawn below the terrace
glowed luminously green. The shadows of the hollies and cypresses were
thin and unsubstantial, but where a beach overarched the grass, Evelyn
and Mrs. Chisholm, attired in light draperies, reclined in basket
chairs. Carroll, who wore thin grey tweed, stood close by, talking to
Mabel, and Chisholm sat a little apart upon a bench with a newspaper in
his hand. He looked half asleep, and a languorous, stillness pervaded
the whole scene.
"Wouldn't you like this kind of thing as well?" he asked. "Of course, I
mean what it implies--the power to take life easily and get as much
enjoyment as possible out of it. It wouldn't be difficult, if you would
only take what I'd be glad to give you." He indicated the languid
figures in the foreground. "You could, for instance, spend your time
among folks like these; and, after all, it's what you were meant to do."
"Well," said Lucy, "I believe I'm more at home with the other kind of
folks--those in poverty, squalor, and ignorance. I've an idea they've a
stronger claim on me, but that's not a point I can urge. The fact is,
I've chosen my career, and there are practical reasons why I shouldn't
abandon it. I had a good deal of trouble in getting a footing, and if I
fell out now, it would be harder still to take my place in the ranks
again."
"But you wouldn't require to do so."
"I can't be sure. I don't want to hurt you; but, after all, your success
was sudden, and one understands that it isn't wise to depend upon an
income derived from mining properties."
"None of you ever did believe in me."
"I suppose there's some truth in that; you really did give us some
trouble. Somehow you were different--you wouldn't fit in--though I
believe the same thing applied to me, for that matter."
"And now you don't expect my prosperity to last?"
The girl hesitated, but she was candid by nature. "Perhaps I had better
answer. You have it in you to work determinedly and, when it's
necessary, to do things that men with less courage would shrink from;
but I doubt if yours is the temperament that leads to success. You
haven't the huckster's instincts; you're not cold-blooded enough. You
wouldn't cajole your friends or truckle to your enemies."
"If I adopted the latter course, it would be very much against the
grain," Vane confessed.
Lucy laughed. "Well," she said, "I mean to go on earning my living; but
you can take me up to London for a few days and buy me some hats and
things. Then I don't mind you giving something to the Emancipation
Society."
"I don't know if I believe in emancipation or not, but you can have ten
guineas."
"Thank you," said Lucy, glancing round towards Carroll, who was
approaching them with Mabel. "I'll give you a piece of advice--stick to
that man. He's cooler and less headstrong than you are; he'll prove a
useful friend."
Carroll came up just then. "What are you two talking about?" he asked.
"You look animated."
"Wallace has just promised me ten guineas to assist the movement for the
emancipation of women," Lucy answered pointedly. "I may mention that our
society's efforts are sadly restricted by the lack of funds."
"He's now and then a little inconsequential in his generosity," Carroll
rejoined. "I didn't know he was interested in that kind of thing, but as
I don't like to be outdone by my partner, I'll subscribe the same."
"Thanks," said Lucy, who made an entry in a pocket-book in a
businesslike manner.
They strolled along the terrace together, and as they went down the
steps to the lawn, Carroll inquired with a smile, "Have you tackled
Chisholm yet?"
"I would have done so had it appeared likely to have been of any use,
but I never waste powder and shot," Lucy replied. "A man of his
restricted views would sooner subscribe handsomely to put us down."
Carroll turned to his comrade. "Are you regretting the ten guineas? You
don't look pleased."
"No," said Vane; "the fact is, I wanted to do something which wasn't
allowed. I've met with the same disillusionment here as I did in British
Columbia."
Lucy looked up at her brother. "Did you attempt to give somebody money
there?"
"I did," said Vane shortly. "It's not worth discussing, and anyway she
wouldn't listen to me."
They strolled on, Vane frowning, while Carroll, who had seen signs of
suppressed interest in Lucy's face, smiled unobserved. Neither he nor
the others had noticed Mabel, who was following them.
They joined the rest, and some time afterwards, Mrs. Chisholm addressed
Carroll, who was lying back in a deep chair with his eyes, which were
half closed, turned in Lucy's direction.
"Are you asleep, or thinking hard?" she asked.
"Not more than half asleep," Carroll protested. "I was trying to
remember 'A Dream of Fair Women.' It struck me as a suitable occupation
for a drowsy summer afternoon in a place like this, but I must confess
that it was Miss Vane who put it into my head. She reminded me of one or
two of the heroines not long ago, when she was championing the cause of
the suffragist."
"You mustn't imagine that English women in general sympathise with her,
or that such ideas are popular at the Dene," Mrs. Chisholm rejoined.
Carroll smiled reassuringly. "I wouldn't have imagined the latter for a
moment. But, as I said, on an afternoon of this kind one can be excused
for indulging in romantic fancies; and don't you see what brought those
old-time heroines into my mind--I mean the elusive resemblance to their
latter-day prototype?"
Mrs. Chisholm looked puzzled. "No," she declared. "One of them was
Greek, another early English, and the finest of all was the Hebrew maid.
As they couldn't even have been like one another, how could they have
collectively borne a resemblance to anybody else?"
"That's logical, on the surface. To digress, why do you most admire
Jephthah's daughter, the gentle Gileadite?"
His hostess affected surprise. "Isn't it evident, when one remembers her
patient sacrifice, her fine sense of family honour?"
Carroll felt that this was much the kind of sentiment one could have
expected from her; and he did her justice in believing that it was
genuine and that she was capable of acting up to her convictions. His
glance rested on Vane for a moment, and the latter was startled as he
guessed his comrade's thought.
Evelyn sat near him, reclining languidly in a wicker chair. She had been
silent and, now her face was in repose, the signs of reserve and
repression were plainer than ever. There was, however, pride in it, and
he felt that she was endowed with a keener and finer sense of family
honour than her mother. Her brother's career was threatened by the
results of his own imprudence, and though her father could hardly be
compared with the Gileadite warrior, there was, Vane imagined, a
disturbing similarity between the two cases. It was unpleasant to
contemplate the possibility of this girl's being called upon to bear the
cost of her relations' misfortunes or follies. Carroll, however, looked
across at Lucy with a smile.
"You don't agree with Mrs. Chisholm?" he suggested.
"No," said Lucy firmly. "Leaving the instance in question out, there are
too many people who transgress and then expect somebody else--a woman as
a rule--to serve as a sacrifice."
"I don't agree, either," Mabel broke in. "I'd sooner have been Cleopatra
or Joan or Arc--only she was burned, poor thing."
"That was only what she might have expected. An unpleasant fate
generally overtakes people who go about disturbing things," Mrs.
Chisholm said severely.
The speech was characteristic, and the others smiled. It would have
astonished them had Mrs. Chisholm sympathised with the rebel idealist
whose beckoning visions led to the clash of arms. Then Vane turned to
his comrade.
"Aren't you getting off the track?" he asked. "I don't see the drift of
your previous remarks."
"Well," said Carroll, with an air of reflection, "there must be, I
think, a certain distinctive stamp upon those who belong to the leader
type; I mean the folks who are capable of doing striking and heroic
things. Apart from this, I've been studying you English--and it has
struck me that there's occasionally something imperious, or rather
imperial, in the faces of your women in the most northern counties. I
can't define the thing, but it's there--in the line of nose, the mouth,
and I think most marked in the brows. It's not Saxon, or Norse, or
Danish. I'd sooner call it Roman."
Vane was slightly astonished. He had seen that look in Evelyn's face,
and now, for the first time, he recognised it in his sister's.
"I wonder if you have hit it," he said with a laugh. "You can reach the
Wall from here in a day's ride."
"The Wall?"
"The Roman Wall; Hadrian's Wall. I believe one authority states they had
a garrison of 100,000 men to keep it."
Chisholm joined the group. He was a tall, rather florid-faced man with a
formal manner, dressed immaculately in creaseless clothes.
"The point Carroll raises is interesting," he remarked. "While I don't
know how long it takes for a strain to die out, there must have been a
large civil population living near the wall, and we know that the
characteristics of the Teutonic peoples, who followed the Romans, still
remain."
Nobody else had any comment to make, and when by and by the group broke
up, Evelyn was left alone for a few minutes with Mabel.
"Gerald should have been sent to Canada instead of Oxford," she said.
"Then he might have got as rich as Wallace Vane and Mr. Carroll."
"What makes you think they're rich?" Evelyn asked with reproof in her
tone.
"Oh!" said Mabel, "we all knew they were rich before they came, and they
were giving Lucy guineas for the suffragists an hour ago. They must have
a good deal of money to waste it like that. Besides, I think Wallace
wanted her to take some more, and he seemed quite vexed when he said
he'd tried to give money to somebody else in Canada, who wouldn't have
it. As he said--she--it must have been a woman--but I don't think he
meant to mention that. It slipped out."
"You had no right to listen," Evelyn retorted severely; but the
information sank into her mind, and she afterwards remembered it.
CHAPTER IX
CHISHOLM PROVES AMENABLE.
Vane spent a month at the Dene with quiet satisfaction, and when at last
he left for London and Paris he gladly promised to come back for another
few weeks before he sailed for Canada. He stayed some time in Paris,
because Carroll insisted on it, but it was with eagerness he went north
again. For one reason--and he laid some stress upon this--he longed for
the moorland air and the rugged fells, though he also admitted that
Evelyn's society enhanced their charm for him.
At last, shortly before setting out on the journey, he took himself to
task and endeavoured to determine what his feelings towards her were,
but he signally failed to elucidate the point. It was only clear that he
was more contented in her presence, and that, apart from her physical
comeliness, she had a stimulating effect upon his mental faculties,
although so far as he could remember she seldom said anything
remarkable. Then he wondered how she regarded him, and to this question
he could find no answer. For the most part there was a reserve he found
more piquant than deterrent about her, and he was conscious that while
willing to talk with him freely she was still holding him off at arm's
length.
On the whole, he could not be absolutely sure that he desired to get
much nearer. Though he failed to admit this clearly, his attitude was
largely one of respectful admiration with a vein of compassion in it.
Evelyn was unhappy, and out of harmony with her relatives, which he
could understand more readily because their ideas often jarred on him.
He had been back at the Dene a fortnight, when one morning he walked out
of the hamlet where the wheelwright's shop was with a telegram in his
hand. Sitting down on the wall of a bridge close by, he turned to
Carroll, who had accompanied him.
"I think you have Nairn's code in your wallet," he said. "We'll decipher
the thing."
Carroll laid the message upon a smooth stone and set to work with a
pencil.
"'Situation highly satisfactory,'" he read aloud, and commented: "It
must be, if Nairn paid for another word; 'highly's' not in the code."
Then he went on with the deciphering: "'Result of reduction exceeds
anticipations. Stock, 30 premium. Your presence not immediately
required.'"
"That's distinctly encouraging," said Vane. "Now they're getting farther
in, the ore must be carrying more silver."
"It's fortunate. I ran through the bank account last night, and you have
spent a lot of money. It confirms my opinion that you have expensive
friends."
Vane frowned at this, but Carroll continued undeterred: "You want
pulling up after the way you have been indulging in a reckless
extravagance, which I feel compelled to point out is new to you. The
cheque drawn in favour of Gerald Chisholm rather astonished me. Have you
said anything about it to his relatives?"
"I haven't," Vane answered shortly.
"Then, judging by the little I saw of him, I should consider it most
unlikely that he has made any allusion to the matter. The next cheque
was more surprising; I mean the one you gave his father."
"They were both loans."
"Have you any expectation of getting the money back?"
"What has that to do with you?"
Carroll spread out his hands. "Only this--I think you need looking
after. We can't stay here indefinitely. Hadn't you better get back to
Vancouver before your English friends ruin you?"
"I'll go in three or four weeks, not before."
Carroll sat silent a minute or two; and then he looked his companion
squarely in the face.
"Is it your intention to marry Evelyn Chisholm?"
"I don't know what has put that into your mind."
"I should be astonished if it hadn't suggested itself to her family,"
Carroll retorted.
"I'm far from sure it's an idea they'd entertain with any great favour.
For one thing, I can't live here."
"Try them, and see. Show them Nairn's telegram when you mention the
matter."
Vane swung himself down from the wall.
"It's very possible that I may do so," he informed his comrade. "But
we'll get along."
His heart beat more rapidly than usual as they turned back towards the
house, but he was perfectly composed when, some little time later, he
sat down beside Chisholm, who was lounging away the morning on the lawn.
"I've been across to the village for a telegram I expected," he
announced. "The news is encouraging."
He read it to Chisholm, who had determined on the line he meant to
follow.
"You're a fortunate man," he said. "There's probably no reasonable wish
that you can't gratify."
"There are things one can't buy with dollars," Vane replied.
"That is very true. They're often the most valuable. On the other hand,
some of them may now and then be had for the asking. Besides, when one
has a sanguine temperament, it's difficult to believe that anything one
sets one's heart upon is quite unattainable."
Vane wondered if he had been given a hint. Chisholm's manner was
suggestive and Carroll's remarks had had an effect on him. He sat
silent, and Chisholm spoke again: "If I were in your place, I should
feel I had all I could desire within my reach."
Vane was becoming sure that his comrade had been right. Chisholm would
not have harped upon the same idea unless he had intended to convey some
particular meaning, but the man's methods roused Vane's dislike. He
could face opposition, and he would sooner have been discouraged than
judiciously prompted.
"Then if I offered myself as a suitor for Evelyn, you would not think me
presumptuous?" he said.
Chisholm was somewhat surprised at his abruptness, but he smiled
reassuringly.
"No," he said; "I can't see why I should do so. You are in a position to
maintain a wife in comfort, and I don't think anybody could take
exception to your character." He paused a moment. "I suppose you have
some idea of how Evelyn regards you?"
"I haven't the faintest notion," Vane confessed. "That's the trouble."
"Would you like me to mention the matter?"
"No," said Vane decidedly. "In fact, I must ask you not to do anything
of the kind. I only wished to make sure of your good will, and now I'm
satisfied on that point, I'd sooner wait, and speak--when it seems
judicious."
Chisholm nodded. "Yes," he said indulgently, "I dare say that would be
wisest."
Vane, who thanked him, waited. He fancied that the transaction, which
seemed the best name for it, was not complete yet; but he meant to leave
what should follow to his companion. He would not help the man.
"There's a matter which had better be mentioned now, distasteful as it
is," Chisholm said at length. "I can settle nothing upon Evelyn. As you
must have guessed, my affairs are in a far from promising state. Indeed,
I'm afraid I may have to ask your indulgence when the loan falls due,
and I don't mind confessing that the prospect of Evelyn's making what I
think is a suitable marriage is a relief to me."
Vane's feelings were somewhat mixed, but contempt figured prominently
among them. He could find no fault with Chisholm's desire to safeguard
his daughter's future, but he was convinced that the man looked for more
than this. He felt he had been favoured with a delicate hint, to which
his companion expected an answer.
"Well," he said curtly, "you need not be concerned about the loan. To go
a little farther, I should naturally take an interest in the welfare of
my wife's relatives. I don't think I can say anything more in the
meanwhile."
He knew that he might have spoken more plainly without offence, when he
saw Chisholm's smile, but the latter looked satisfied.
"Those are the views I expected you to hold," he declared. "I believe
Mrs. Chisholm will share my gratification if you find Evelyn disposed to
listen to you."
Vane left him shortly afterwards with a sense of shame. He felt he had
bought the girl and that, if she ever heard of it, she would find it
hard to forgive him for the course he had taken. By and by he met
Carroll, who looked at him inquiringly.
"I've had a talk with Chisholm," said Vane. "It has upset my temper--I
feel mean. There's no doubt that you were right."
Carroll smiled and showed that he could guess what was in his comrade's
mind. "I wouldn't worry too much about the thing," he replied. "The girl
probably understands the situation. It's not pleasant, but I expect
she's more or less resigned to it. She can't help herself."
Vane gazed at him with anger. "Does that make it any better? Is it any
comfort to me?"
"Take her out of it. If she has any liking for you, she'll thank you for
doing so afterwards."
Vane, who made no answer, strode away, and nobody saw any more of him
for an hour or two.
He had her father's consent, but he felt he could not plead his cause
with Evelyn just then. With her parents on his side, she was at a
disadvantage, and he shrank from the thought that she might be forced
upon him against her will. This was not what he desired, and she might
hate him for it afterwards. She was very alluring; there had been signs
of an unusual gentleness in her manner, but he wanted time to win her
favour, aided only by such gifts as he had been endowed with. It cost
him a determined effort, but he made up his mind to wait.
CHAPTER X
WITH THE OTTER HOUNDS.
A week or two had slipped away since Vane's eventful interview, when he
lounged upon the terrace after breakfast chatting with Carroll.
Suddenly a long, faint howl came up the valley, and was answered by
another in a deeper note. Then a confused swelling clamour, which
slightly resembled the sound of chiming bells, broke out, softened by
the distance. Carroll stopped and listened.
"What in the name of wonder is that?" he asked. "The first of it
reminded me of a coyote howling, but the rest's more like the noise the
timber wolves make in the bush at night."
"You haven't made a bad shot," Vane laughed. "It's a pack of otter
hounds hot upon the scent."
The sound ceased as suddenly as it had begun, but a few moments later
Mabel came running towards the men.
"I knew the hounds met at Patten Brig, but Jim was sure they'd go
down-stream," she cried breathlessly. "They're coming up, and I think
they're at the pool below the village. Get two poles--you'll find some
in the tool-shed--and come along at once."
She clambered into the house through a window, calling for Evelyn, and
Carroll smiled.
"We have our orders," he remarked. "I suppose we'd better go."
"It's one of the popular sports up here," said Vane. "You may as well
see it."
They set out a few minutes later, accompanied by Evelyn, while Mabel
hurried on in front and reproached them for their tardiness.
At length, after crossing several wet fields, they came into a rushy
meadow on the edge of the river, which spread out into a wide pool,
fringed with alders which had not yet lost their leaves and the barer
withes of osiers. There was a swift stream at the head of it, and a long
rippling shallow at the tail, and a very mixed company was scattered
along the bank and in the water.
A red-coated man with whip and horn stood in the tail outflow, and three
or four more with poles in their hands were spread out across the stream
behind him. These and one or two in the head stream appeared by their
dress to belong to the hunt, but the rest, among whom were a few women,
were attired in everyday garments and of different walks in life:
artisans, labourers, people of leisure, and a belated tourist or two.
Three or four big hounds were swimming aimlessly up and down the pool; a
dozen more or thereabouts trotted to and fro along the water's edge,
stopping to sniff and give tongue in an uncertain manner now and then;
but there was no sign of an otter.
Carroll looked round with a smile when his companions stopped. "There'll
be very little work done in this neighbourhood to-day," he said. "I'd no
idea there were so many folks in the valley with time to spare. The only
thing that's missing is the beast they're after."
"An otter is an almost invisible creature," Evelyn explained, "You very
seldom see one, unless it's hard pressed by the dogs. There are a good
many in the river, but even the trout fishers, who are about at sunrise
in the hot weather and wade in the dusk, rarely come across them. Are
you going to take a share in the hunt?"
"No," replied Carroll, glancing humorously at his pole. "I don't know
what I brought this thing for, unless it was because Mopsy sent me for
it. I'd sooner stay and watch with you. Splashing through a river after
a little beast which I don't suppose they'd let an outsider kill doesn't
interest me, and I don't see why I should want to kill it, anyway. Some
of you English people have sporting ideas I can't understand. I struck a
young man the other day--a well-educated man by the look of him--who was
spending the afternoon happily with a ferret by a corn stack, killing
rats with a club. He seemed uncommonly pleased with himself because he'd
got four of them."
"Oh!" exclaimed Mabel, "you're as bad as the silly people who call
killing things cruelty. I wouldn't have thought it of you."
"I've seen him," said Vane, "drop a deer going almost as fast as a
locomotive through thick brush, with a single-shot rifle, and I believe
he once assisted in killing a panther in a thicket you couldn't see two
yards ahead in. The point is, that he meant to eat the deer, and the
panther had been taking a rancher's hogs."
"Then I'm sorry I brought him," said Mabel decidedly. "He's not a
sportsman."
"I really think there's some excuse for the more vigorous sports,"
Evelyn declared. "Of course, you can't eliminate a certain amount of
cruelty; but admitting that, isn't it just as well that men who live in
a luxurious civilisation should be willing to plod through miles of
heather after grouse, risk their limbs on horseback, or spend hours in
cold water? These are bracing things; they imply moral discipline. It
can't be nice to ride at a dangerous fence, or flounder down a rapid
after an otter when you're stiff with cold. The effort to do so must be
wholesome."
"A sure thing," Carroll agreed. "The only drawback is that when you've
got your fox or otter, it isn't worth anything. A good many of the folks
in the newer lands have to make something of the kind of effort you
described every day. In their case, the results are waggon-trails,
valleys cleared for orchards, new branch railroads. I suppose it's a
matter of opinion, but if I'd put in a season's risky work I'd sooner
have a piece of land to grow fruit on, or a share in a mineral
claim--you get plenty of excitement in prospecting--than a fox's tail.
But there are people in Canada who wouldn't agree with me."
He strolled along the water's edge with Evelyn, and presently looked
round.
"Mopsy's gone, and I don't see Vane," he said.
"After all, he's one of us. If you're born in the North Country, it's
hard to keep out of the river when you hear the otter hounds."
They took up their station behind a growth of alders, and for a while
the dogs went trotting by in twos and threes or swam about the pool, but
nothing else broke the surface of the leaden-coloured water. Then there
was a cry, an outbreak of shouting, a confused baying, and half a dozen
hounds dashed past. Evelyn stretched out her hand.
"Look!" she said.
Carroll saw a small grey spot--the top of the otter's head--moving
across the slacker part of the pool, with a very slight, wedge-shaped
ripple trailing away from it. It sank next moment; a bubble or two rose,
and then there was nothing but the smooth flow of water.
A horn called shrilly, a few whip-cracks rang out like pistol shots, and
the dogs took to the water, swimming slowly here and there. Men
scrambled along the bank and while some, entering the river, reinforced
the line spread out across the head rapid, others joined the second row,
wading steadily up-stream, and splashed about as they advanced with
iron-tipped poles. Nothing rewarded their efforts; the dogs turned and
went down-stream; and then suddenly everybody ran or waded towards the
tall outflow. A clamour of shouting and baying broke out, and
floundering men and swimming dogs went down the stream together in a
confused mass. Then there was silence, and the hounds came out and
trotted to and fro along the bank, up which dripping men clambered after
them. Evelyn laughed as she pointed to Vane, who looked wetter than
most, among the leading group.
"I don't suppose he meant to go in. It's in the blood," she said.
"There's no reason why he shouldn't, if it amuses him," Carroll replied.
A little later, the dogs were driven in again, and this time the whole
of the otter's head was visible as it swam, up-stream. The animal was
flagging, and on reaching shoaler water it sprang out altogether now and
then, rising and falling in the stronger stream with a curious
serpentine motion. In fact, as head and body bent in the same sinuous
curves, it looked less like an animal than a plunging fish. The men
guarding the rapid stood ready with their poles, and more were wading
and splashing up both sides of the pool. The otter's pace was getting
slower; sometimes it seemed to stop, and now and then it vanished among
the ripples. Carroll saw that Evelyn's face was intent, though there
were signs of shrinking in it.
"Now," he said, "I'll tell you what you are thinking--you want that poor
little beast to get away."
"I believe I do," Evelyn confessed.
They watched with strained attention. The girl could not help it,
though, she dreaded the climax. Her sympathies were now with the hard
pressed, exhausted creature that was making a desperate fight for life.
The pursuers were close behind it, the swimming dogs leading them; and
ahead lay a foaming rush of water which did not seem more than a foot
deep with men spread out across it. The shouting from the bank had
ceased, and everybody waited in tense expectancy, when the otter
disappeared.
The dogs reached the rapid, where they were washed back a few yards
before they could make head up-stream. Men who came splashing close upon
their tails left the river to scramble along its edge; and then stopped
abruptly, while the dogs swam in an uncertain manner about the still
reach beyond. They came out in a few minutes, and scampered up and down
among the stones, evidently at fault, for there was no sign of the otter
anywhere. The hunted creature had crept up the rush of water among the
feet of those who watched for it, and vanished unseen into the
sheltering depths beyond.
Evelyn sighed with relief. "I think it will escape," she said. "The
river's rather full after the rain, which is against the dogs, and there
isn't another shallow for some distance. Shall we go on?"
They strolled forward behind the dogs, which were again moving
up-stream; but they turned aside to avoid a wood, and it was some time
later when they came out upon a rocky promontory dropping steeply to the
river. The hunt was now widely scattered about the reach. Men crept
along slippery ledges above the water, and moved over steeply-slanting
slopes, half hidden among the trees.
A few were in the river, and three or four of the dogs were swimming;
the rest, spread out in twos and threes, trotted to and fro among the
undergrowth, Carroll did not think they were following any scent, but a
figure creeping along the foot of the rock not far away presently seized
his attention.
"It's Mopsy," he said. "The foothold doesn't look very safe among those
stones, and there seems to be deep water below."
He called out in warning, but the girl did not heed. The willows were
thinner at the spot she had reached, and, squeezing herself through
them, she leaned down, clinging to an alder branch.
"He's gone to holt among the roots," she cried.
Three or four men came running along the opposite bank and apparently
decided that she was right, for the horn was sounded and here and there
a dog broke through the underbrush; then, just as the first-comers
reached the rapid, there was a splash. It was a moment or two before
Evelyn or Carroll, who had been watching the dogs, realised what had
happened, and then the blood ebbed from the girl's face. Mabel had
disappeared.
Running a few paces forward, Carroll saw what looked like a bundle of
spread-out garments swing round in an eddy. It washed in among the
willows, and he heard a faint cry.
"Somebody help me, quick; I've caught a branch."
He could not see the girl now, but an alder bough was bending sharply,
and he flung a rapid glance around him. The summit of the rock he stood
upon rose above the trees, and though he would have faced the risky fall
had there been a better landing, it seemed impossible to alight among
the stones without a broken leg. Further down-stream he might reach the
water by a reckless jump, because the promontory sloped towards it
there; but he would not be able to swim back against the current. His
position was a painful one; it looked as if there was nothing that he
could do.
Next moment men and dogs went scrambling and swimming down the rapid;
but they were in hot pursuit of the otter, which had left its
hiding-place, and it was evident that the girl had escaped their
attention. Carroll shouted savagely as his comrade appeared among the
tail of the hunt below. The others were too occupied to heed, or perhaps
concluded that he was urging them on; but Vane, who was in the water,
seemed to understand. In another few minutes he was swimming down the
pool along the edge of the alders. Then Carroll saw that Evelyn expected
him to take some part in the rescue.
"Get down before it's too late!" she cried.
Carroll spread out his hands, as if to beg her forbearance, and while
every impulse urged him to the leap he endeavoured to keep his head.
"I can't do any good just now," he answered, knowing he was right and
yet feeling horribly ashamed. "She's holding on, and Wallace will reach
her in a moment or two."
Evelyn broke out on him in an agony of fear and anger. "You coward!" she
cried. "Will you let her drown?"
She turned and ran forward, but Carroll, dreading that she meant to
attempt the descent, seized her shoulder and held her fast. While he
grappled with her, Vane's voice rose from below, and he let his hands
drop.
"Wallace has her! There's no more danger," he said.
Evelyn suddenly recovered some degree of calm.
Standing, breathless, a pace or two apart, they saw Vane and the girl
appear from beneath the willows and wash away down-stream. The man was
swimming but he was hampered by his burden, and once he and Mabel sank
almost from sight in a whirling eddy. Carroll said nothing, but he
turned and ran along the sloping ridge, until where the fall was less
and the trees were thinner he leaped out into the air. He broke through
the alders amidst a rustle of bending boughs and disappeared; but a
moment later his head rose out of the water close beside Vane, and the
two men went down-stream with Mabel between them.
Evelyn scrambled wildly along the ridge, and when she reached the foot
of it Vane was helping Mabel up the sloping bank of gravel. The girl's
drenched garments clung about her, her wet hair was streaked across her
face; but she seemed able to stand, and she was speaking in jerky gasps.
The hunt had swept on through shoaler water, but there was a cheer from
the stragglers across the river. Evelyn clutched her sister, half
laughing, half sobbing, and incoherently upbraided her. Mabel shook
herself free, and her first remark was characteristic.
"Oh!" she said, "don't make a silly fuss." Then she tried to shake out
her dripping skirt. "I'm only wet through, Wallace, take me home."
Vane picked her up, which was what she seemed to expect, and the others
followed when he pushed through the underbush towards a neighbouring
meadow. Evelyn, however, was still a little unnerved, and when they
reached a gap in a wall she stopped, and leaning against the stones
turned to Carroll.
"I think I'm more disturbed than Mopsy is," she said. "What I felt must
be some excuse for me. I'm sorry for what I said; it was unjustifiable."
"Anyway, it was perfectly natural; but I must confess that I felt some
temptation to make a fool of myself. I might have jumped into those
alders, but it's most unlikely that I could have got out of them."
Evelyn looked at him with a faint respect. She had not troubled to point
out that he had not flinched from the leap, when it seemed likely to be
of service.
"How had you the sense to think of that?" she asked.
"I suppose it's a matter of practice," Carroll answered with amusement.
"One can't work among the ranges and rivers without learning to make the
right decision rapidly. When you don't, you get badly hurt. The thing
has to be cultivated, it's not instinctive."
Evelyn was struck by the explanation. This acquired coolness was a finer
thing, and undoubtedly more useful than hot-headed gallantry, though she
admired the latter.
"Wallace was splendid in the water," she broke out, uttering part of her
thoughts aloud.
"I thought rather more of him in the city," Carroll replied. "That kind
of thing was new to him, and I'm inclined to believe I'd have let the
folks he had to negotiate with have the mine for a good deal less than
what he eventually got for it. But I've said something about that
before, and after all I'm not here to play Boswell."
The girl was surprised at the apt allusion; it was not what she would
have expected from the man. Since she had not recovered her composure,
she forgot what Vane had told her about him, and her comment was an
incautious one. "How did you hear of him?"
Carroll parried this with a smile.
"Oh!" he said, "you don't suppose you can keep those old fellows to
yourselves--they're international. But hadn't we better be getting on?
Let me help you through the gap."
They reached the Dene some time later, and Mabel, very much against her
wishes, was sent to bed, while shortly afterwards Carroll came across
Vane, who had changed his clothes, strolling up and down among the
shrubberies.
"What are you doing here?" he asked.
Vane looked embarrassed. "For one thing, I'm keeping out of Mrs.
Chisholm's way; she's inclined to be effusive. For another, I'm trying
to decide what I ought to do. We'll have to pull out very shortly, and I
had meant to have had an interview with Evelyn to-day. That's why I feel
uncommonly annoyed with Mopsy for falling in."
Carroll made a grimace. "If that's how it strikes you, any advice I
could offer would be wasted. A sensible man would consider it a
promising opportunity."
"And trade upon it."
"Do you really want the girl?"
"That impression's firmly in my mind," said Vane, curtly.
"Then you had better pitch your quixotic notions overboard, and tell her
so."
Vane made no answer, and Carroll, seeing that his comrade was not
inclined to be communicative, left him.
CHAPTER XI
VANE WITHDRAWS.
Dusk was drawing on when Vane strolled along the terrace in front of the
Dene.
He was preoccupied and eager, but fully aware of the need for coolness,
because it was very possible that he might fail in the task he had in
hand. By and by he saw Evelyn, whom he had been waiting for, cross the
opposite end of the terrace, and moving forward he joined her at the
entrance to a shrubbery walk. A big, clipped yew with a recess in which
a seat had been placed stood close by.
"I've been sitting with Mopsy," said Evelyn. "She seems very little the
worse for her adventure--thanks to you." She hesitated, and her voice
grew softer. "I owe you a heavy debt--I am very fond of Mopsy."
"It's a great pity she fell in," Vane declared.
Evelyn looked at him with surprise. She scarcely thought he could regret
the efforts he had made on her sister's behalf, but that was what his
words implied.
"The trouble is that the thing might seem to give me some claim on you,
and I don't want that," he explained. "It cost me no more than a
wetting; I hadn't the least difficulty in getting her out."
His companion was still puzzled. She could find no fault with him for
being modest about his exploit, but that he should make it clear that he
did not require her gratitude seemed to her unnecessary.
"For all that, you did bring her out," she persisted.
"I don't seem to be beginning very fortunately," Vane replied. "What I
mean is, that I don't want to urge my claim, if I have one. I'd sooner
be taken on my merits." He paused a moment with a smile. "That's not
much better, is it? But it partly expresses what I feel. Leaving Mopsy
out altogether, let me try to explain--I don't wish you to be influenced
by anything except your own idea of me. I'm saying this because one or
two points that seem in my favour may have a contrary effect."
Evelyn made no answer, and he indicated the seat. "Won't you sit down, I
have something more to say."
The girl did as he suggested, and his smile faded. "Now," he went on,
"you won't be astonished if I ask if you will marry me?"
He stood looking down on her with an impressive steadiness of gaze. She
could imagine him facing the city men, from whom he had extorted the
full value of his mine, in the same fashion, and in a later instance, so
surveying the eddies beneath the osiers when he had gone to Mabel's
rescue. She felt that they had better understand one another.
"No," she said; "if I must be candid, I am not astonished." Then the
colour crept into her cheeks, is she met his gaze. "I suppose it is an
honour and it is undoubtedly a--temptation."
"A temptation?"
"Yes," said Evelyn, mustering her courage to face a crisis she had
dreaded. "It is only due to you that you should hear the truth--though I
think you suspect it. I have some liking for you."
"That is what I wanted you to own," Vane broke in.
She checked him with a gesture. Her manner was cold, and yet there was
something in it that stirred him more than her beauty.
"After all," she answered, "It does not go very far, and you must try to
understand. I want to be quite honest, and what I have to say
is--difficult. In the first place, things are far from pleasant for me
here; I was expected to make a good marriage, and I had my chance in
London; I refused to profit by it, and now I'm a failure. I wonder if
you can realise what a temptation it is to get away."
"Yes," he said; "it makes me savage to think of it. I can, at least,
take you out of all this. If you hadn't had a very fine courage, you
wouldn't have told me."
Evelyn smiled a curious wry smile.
"It has only prompted me to behave, as most people would consider,
shamelessly; but there are times when one must get above that point of
view. Besides, there's a reason for my candour. Had you been a man of
different stamp, it's possible that I might have been driven into taking
the risk. We should both have suffered for a time, but through open
variance we might have reached an understanding--not to intrude on one
another. As it is, I could not do you that injustice, and I should
shrink from marrying you with only a little cold liking."
The man held himself firmly in hand. Her calmness had infected him, and
he felt that this was not an occasion for romantic protestations, even
had he felt capable of making them, which was not the case. As a matter
of fact, such things were singularly foreign to his nature.
"Even that would go a long way with me, if I could get nothing better,"
he declared. "Besides, you might change. I could surround you with some
comfort; I think I could promise not to force my company upon you; I
believe I could be kind."
"Yes," assented Evelyn; "I shouldn't be afraid of harshness from you;
but it seems impossible that I should change. You must see that you
started handicapped from the beginning. Had I been free to choose, it
might have been different; but I have lived for some time in shame and
fear, hating the thought that some one would be forced on me."
He said nothing, and she went on. "Must I tell you? You are the man."
His face grew hard and for a moment he set his lips tight. It would have
been a relief to express his feelings concerning his host just then.
"If you don't hate me for it now, I'm willing to take the risk," he said
at length. "It will be my fault if you hate me in the future; I'll try
not to deserve it."
He imagined she was yielding, but she roused herself with an effort.
"No," she said. "Love on one side may go a long way, if it is strong
enough--but it must be strong to overcome the many clashes of thought
and will. Yours"--she looked at him steadily--"would not stand the
strain."
Vane started. "You are the only woman I ever wished to marry." He paused
with a forcible gesture. "What can I say to convince you?"
She smiled softly. "I'm afraid it's impossible. If you had wanted me
greatly, you would have pressed the claim you had in saving Mopsy, and I
would have forgiven you that; you would have urged any and every claim.
As it is, I suppose I am pretty"--her lips curled scornfully--"and you
find some of your ideas and mine agree. It isn't half enough. Shall I
tell you that you are scarcely moved as yet?"
It flashed upon Vane that he was confronted with the reality. Her beauty
had appealed to him, but without rousing passion, for there was little
of the sensual in this man. Her other qualities, her reserved
graciousness, which had a tinge of dignity in it; her insight and
comprehension, had also had their effect; but they had only awakened
admiration and respect. He desired her as one desires an object for its
rarity and preciousness; but this, as she had told him, was not enough.
Behind her physical and mental attributes, and half revealed by them,
there was something deeper: the real personality of the girl. It was
elusive, mystic, with a spark of immaterial radiance which might
brighten human love with its transcendent glow; but, as he dimly
realised, if he won her by force, it might recede and vanish altogether.
He could not, with strong ardour, compel its clearer manifestation.
"I think I am as moved as it is possible for me to be," he said.
Evelyn shook her head. "No; you will discover the difference some day,
and then you will thank me for leaving you your liberty. Now I beg you
to leave me mine and let me go."
Vane stood silent a minute or two, for the last appeal had stirred him
to chivalrous pity. He was shrewd enough to realise that if he persisted
he could force her to come to him. Her father and mother were with him;
she had nothing--no common-place usefulness or trained abilities--to
fall back upon if she defied them. But it was unthinkable that he should
brutally compel her.
"Well," he said at length, "I must try to face the situation; I want to
assure you that it is not a pleasant one to me. But there's another
point. I'm afraid I've made things worse for you. Your people will
probably blame you for sending me away."
Evelyn did not answer this, and he broke into a little grim smile.
"Now," he added, "I think I can save you any trouble on that
score--though the course I'm going to take isn't flattering, if you look
at it in one way. I want you to leave me to deal with your father."
He took her consent for granted, and leaning down laid a hand lightly on
her shoulder. "You will try to forgive me for the anxiety I have caused
you. The time I've spent here has been very pleasant, but I'm going back
to Canada in a few days. Perhaps you'll think of me without bitterness
now and then."
He turned away, and Evelyn sat still, glad that the strain was over, and
thinking earnestly. The man was gentle and considerate as well as
forceful, and she liked him. Indeed, she admitted that she had not met
any man she liked as much, but that was not going very far. Then she
began to wonder at her candour, and to consider if it had been
necessary. It was curious that this was the only man she had ever taken
into her confidence; and her next suitor would probably be a much less
promising specimen. On the other hand, it was consoling to remember that
eligible suitors for the daughter of an impoverished gentleman were
likely to be scarce.
It had grown dark when she rose and, entering the house, went up to
Mabel's room. The girl looked at her sharply as she came in.
"So you have got rid of him," she said. "I think you're very silly."
"How did you know?" Evelyn asked with a start.
"I heard him walking up and down the terrace, and I heard you go out.
You can't walk over raked gravel without making a noise. He went along
to join you, and it was a good while before you came back at different
times. I've been waiting for this the last day or two."
Evelyn sat down with a strained smile. "Well," she said, "I have sent
him away."
Mabel regarded her indignantly. "Then you'll never get another chance
like this one. If you had only taken him I could have worn decent
frocks. Nobody could call the last one that."
This was a favourite grievance and Evelyn ignored it; but Mabel had more
to say. "I suppose," she went on, "you don't know that Wallace has been
getting Gerald out of trouble?"
"Are you sure of that?" Evelyn asked sharply.
"Yes," said Mabel; "I'll tell you what I know. Wallace saw Gerald in
London--he told us that--and we all know that Gerald couldn't pay his
debts a little while since. You remember he came down to Kendal and went
on and stayed the next night with the Claytons. It isn't astonishing
that he didn't come here after the row there was on the last occasion."
"Go on," said Evelyn. "What has his visit to the Claytons to do with
it?"
"Well," said Mabel, "you don't know that I saw Gerald in the afternoon.
After all, he's the only brother I've got; and as Jim was going to the
station with the trap I made him take me. The Claytons were in the
garden; we were scattered about, and I heard Frank and Gerald, who had
strolled off from the others, talking. Gerald was telling him about some
things he'd bought; they must have been expensive, because Frank asked
him where he got the money. Gerald laughed, and said he'd had an
unexpected stroke of luck that had set him straight again. Now, of
course, Gerald got no money from home, and if he'd won it he would have
told Frank how he did so. Gerald always would tell a thing like that."
Evelyn was filled with confusion and hot indignation. She had little
doubt that Mabel's surmise was correct.
"I wonder if he has told anybody, though it's scarcely likely," she
said.
"Of course he hasn't. We all know what Gerald is. Wallace ought to get
his money back, now you have sent him away," Mabel, who had waited a
moment or two, went on. "But, of course, that's most unlikely. It
wouldn't take Gerald long to waste it."
Evelyn rose, and, making some excuse, left the room. A suspicion which
had troubled her more than Gerald's conduct had lately crept into her
mind, and it now thrust itself upon her attention--several things
pointed to the fact that her father had taken a similar course to that
which her brother had taken. She felt that had she heard Mabel's
information before the interview with Vane, she might have yielded to
him in an agony of humiliation. Mabel had summed up the situation with
stinging candour and crudity--Vane, who had been defrauded, was entitled
to recover the money he had parted with. For a few moments Evelyn was
furiously angry with him, and then, growing calmer, she recognised that
this was unreasonable. She could not imagine any idea of a compact
originating with the man, and he had quietly acquiesced in her decision.
Soon after she left her sister, Vane walked into the room which Chisholm
reserved for his own use. Chisholm was sitting at the table with some
papers in front of him and a cigar in his hand, and Vane drew out a
chair and lighted his pipe before he addressed him.
"I've made up my mind to sail on Saturday, instead of next week," he
said.
"You have decided rather suddenly, haven't you?"
Vane knew that what his host wished to inquire about was the cause of
his decision, and he meant to come to the point. He was troubled by no
consideration for the man.
"The last news I had indicated that I was wanted," he replied. "After
all, there was only one reason why I have abused Mrs. Chisholm's
hospitality so long."
"Well?" said Chisholm, with an abruptness which hinted at anxiety.
"You will remember what I asked you some time ago. I had better say that
I abandon the idea."
Chisholm started, and his florid face grew redder while Vane, in place
of embarrassment, was conscious of a somewhat grim amusement. It seemed
strange that a man of Chisholm's stamp should have any pride, but he
evidently possessed it.
"What am I to understand by that?" he asked with some asperity.
"I think what I said explained it. Bearing in mind your and Mrs.
Chisholm's influence, I've an idea that Evelyn might have yielded, if
I'd strongly urged my suit; but that was not by any means what I wanted.
I'd naturally prefer a wife who married me because she wished to do so.
That's why, after thinking the thing over, I've decided to--withdraw."
Chisholm straightened himself in his chair, in fiery indignation, which
he made no attempt to conceal.
"You mean that after asking my consent and seeing more of Evelyn, you
have changed your mind. Can't you understand that it's an unpardonable
confession; one which I never fancied a man born and brought up in your
station could have brought himself to make."
Vane looked at him with an impassive face. "It strikes me as largely a
question of terms--I mayn't have used the right one. Now you know how
the matter stands, you can describe it in any way that sounds nicest. In
regard to your other remark, I've been in a good many stations, and I
must admit that until lately none of them were likely to promote much
delicacy of sentiment."
"So it seems," Chisholm was almost too hot to sneer. "But can't you
realise how your action reflects upon my daughter?"
Vane held himself in hand. He had only one object: to divert Chisholm's
wrath from Evelyn to himself and he thought he was succeeding in this.
For the rest, he cherished a strong resentment against the man.
"It can't reflect upon her, unless you talk about it, and both you and
Mrs. Chisholm have sense enough to refrain from doing so," he answered
dryly. "I can't flatter myself that Evelyn will grieve over me." Then
his manner changed. "Now we'll get down to business. I don't purpose to
call that loan in, which will, no doubt, be a relief to you."
He rose leisurely and, strolling out of the room, met Carroll shortly
afterwards in the hall. The latter glanced at him sharply.
"What have you been doing?" he inquired. "There's a look I seem to
remember in your eye."
"I suppose I've been outraging the rules of decency, but I don't feel
ashamed. I've been acting the uncivilised Westerner, though it's
possible that I rather strained the part. To come to the point, however,
we pull out for the Dominion first thing to-morrow."
Carroll asked no further questions. He did not think it would serve any
purpose, and he contented himself with making arrangements for their
departure, which they took early on the morrow. Vane had a brief
interview with Mabel, who shed some tears over him, and then by her
contrivance secured a word or two with Evelyn alone.
"Now," he said, "it's possible that you may hear some hard things of me,
and I count upon your not contradicting them. After all, I think you owe
me that favour. There's just another matter--as I won't be here to
trouble you, try to think of me leniently."
He held her hand for a moment and then turned away, and a few minutes
later he and Carroll left the Dene.
CHAPTER XII
VANE GROWS RESTLESS.
Vane had been back in Vancouver a fortnight when he sat one evening on
the verandah of Nairn's house in company with his host and Carroll,
lazily looking down upon the inlet.
Nairn referred to one of the papers in his hand.
"Horsfield has been bringing up that smelter project again, and there's
something to be said in favour of his views," he remarked. "We're paying
a good deal for reduction."
"We couldn't keep a smelter going at present," Vane objected.
"There are two or three low-grade mineral properties in the
neighbourhood of the Clermont that have only had a little development
work done on them," Nairn pointed out. "They can't pay freight on their
raw product; but I'm thinking we'd encourage their owners to open up the
mines, and get their business, if we had a smelter handy."
"It wouldn't amount to much," Vane replied. "Besides, there's another
objection--we haven't the dollars to put up a thoroughly efficient
plant."
"Horsfield's ready to find part of them and do the work."
"I know he is," said Vane. "He's suspiciously eager. The arrangement
would give him a pretty strong hold upon the company; there are ways in
which he could squeeze us."
"It's possible. But, looking at it as a personal matter, there are
inducements he could offer ye. Horsfield's a man who has the handling of
other folks' dollars, as weel as a good many of his own. It might be
wise to stand in with him."
"So he hinted," Vane answered shortly.
"Your argument was about the worst you could have used, Mr. Nairn,"
Carroll broke in, laughing.
"Weel," said Nairn, good-humouredly, "I'm no urging it. I would not see
your partner make enemies for the want of a warning."
"He'd probably do so, in any case; it's a gift of his," said Carroll.
"On the other hand, it's fortunate he has a way of making friends: the
two things sometimes go together."
Vane turned to Nairn with signs of impatience. "It might save trouble if
I state that while I'm a director of the Clermont I expect to be content
with a fair profit on my stock in the company."
"He's modest," Carroll commented. "What he means is that he doesn't
propose to augment that profit by taking advantage of his position."
"It's a creditable idea, though I'm no sure it's as common as might be
desired. While I have to thank ye for it, I would not consider the
explanation altogether necessary," said Nairn, whose eyes twinkled. Then
he addressed Vane: "Now we come to another point--the company's a small
one, the mine is doing satisfactorily, and the moment's favourable for
the floating of mineral properties. If we got an option on the
half-developed claims near the Clermont and went into the market, it's
likely that an issue of new stock would meet with investors' favour."
"I suppose so," said Vane. "I'll support such a scheme, when I can see
how an increased capital could be used to advantage and I am convinced
about the need for a smelter. At present, that's not the case."
"I mentioned it as a duty--ye'll hear more of it; for the rest, I'm
inclined to agree with ye," Nairn replied.
A few minutes later he went into the house with Carroll, and as they
entered it he glanced at his companion. "In the present instance, Mr.
Vane's views are sound," he said. "But I see difficulties before him."
"So do I. When he grapples with him it will be by a frontal attack."
"A bit of compromise is judicious now and then."
"In a general way it's not likely to appeal to my partner. When he can't
get through by direct means, there'll be something wrecked. You had
better understand what kind of man he is."
"It's no the first time I've been enlightened upon the point."
Shortly after they had disappeared, Miss Horsfield came out of another
door, and Vane rose when she approached him.
"Mrs. Nairn told me I would find you and the others in the verandah,"
she informed him. "She said she would join you presently, and it was too
fine to stay in."
"I think she was right," Vane replied. "As you see, I'm alone. Nairn and
Carroll have just deserted me, but I can't complain. What pleases me
most about this house is that you can do what you like in it,
and--within limits--the same thing applies to this city."
Jessie laughed, and sank gracefully into the chair he drew forward.
"Yes," she said. "I think that would please you. But how long have you
been back?"
"A fortnight, since yesterday."
There was a hint of reproach in the glance Jessie favoured him with.
"Then I think Mrs. Nairn might have brought you over to see us."
Vane wondered if she meant she was surprised he had not come of his own
accord, and he was mildly flattered.
"I was away at the mine a good deal of the time," he replied
deprecatingly.
"I wonder if you are sorry to get back?"
Turning a little, Vane indicated the climbing city, rising tier on tier
above its water front; and then the broad expanse of blue inlet and the
faint white line of towering snow.
"Wouldn't anything I could say in praise of Vancouver be trifle
superfluous?" he asked.
Jessie recognised that he had parried her question neatly, but this did
not deter her. She was anxious to learn if he had felt any regret in
leaving England, or, to be more concise, if there was anybody in that
country whom he had reluctantly parted from. She admitted that the man
attracted her. There was a breezy freshness about him, and though she
was acquainted with a number of young men whose conversation was
characterised by snap and sparkle, they needed toning down. This miner
was set apart from them by something which he had doubtless acquired in
youth in the older land.
"That wasn't quite what I meant," she said. "We don't always want to be
flattered, and I'm in search of information. You told me you had been
nine years in this country, and life must be rather different yonder.
How did it strike you after the absence?"
"It's difficult to explain," Vane replied with an air of amused
reflection which hinted that he meant to get away from the point. "On
the whole, I think I'm more interested in the question how I struck
them. It's curious that whereas some folks insist upon considering me
English here, I've a suspicion that they looked upon me as a typical
colonial there."
"One wouldn't like to think you resented it."
"How could I? This land sheltered me when I was an outcast, and set me
on my feet."
"Ah!" said Jessie, "you are the kind we don't mind taking in. The rest
go back and abuse us. But you haven't given me very much information
yet."
"Then," said Vane, "the best comparison is supplied by my first
remark--that in this city you can do what you like. You're rather fenced
in yonder, which, if you're of a placid disposition, is, no doubt,
comforting, because it shuts out unpleasant things. On the other hand,
if you happen to be restless and active, the fences are inconvenient,
because you can't always climb over, and it is not considered proper to
break them down. Still, having admitted that, I'm proud of the old land.
It's only the fences that irritate me."
"Fences would naturally be obnoxious to you. But we have some here."
"They're generally built loose, of split-rails, and not nailed. An
energetic man can pull off a bar or two and stride over. If it's
necessary, he can afterwards put them up again, and there's no harm
done."
"Would you do the latter?"
Vane's expression changed. "No," he said. "I think if there were
anything good on the other side, I'd widen the gap so that the less
agile and the needy could crawl through." He smiled at her. "You see, I
owe some of them a good deal. They were the only friends I had when I
first tramped, jaded and footsore, about the province."
Jessie was pleased with his answer. She had heard of the bush choppers'
free hospitality, and she thought it was a graceful thing that he should
acknowledge his debt to them.
"Now at last you'll be content to rest a while," she suggested. "I dare
say you deserve it."
"It's strange you should say that, because just before you came out of
the house I was thinking that I'd sat still long enough," Vane answered
with a laugh. "It's a thing that gets monotonous. One must keep going
on."
"Then," said Jessie, "take care you don't walk over a precipice some day
when you have left all the fences behind. But I've kept you from your
meditations, and I had better see if Mrs. Nairn is coming."
She left him, and he was lighting a cigar when he noticed a girl whose
appearance seemed familiar in the road below. Moving along the verandah,
he recognised her as Kitty, and hastily crossed the lawn towards her.
She was accompanied by a young man whom Vane had once seen in the city,
but she greeted him with evident pleasure.
"Tom," she said, when they had exchanged a few words, "this is Mr.
Vane," Then turning to Vane she added: "Mr. Drayton."
Vane, who liked the man's face and manner, shook hands with him, and
then looked back at Kitty.
"What are you doing now, and how are little Elsie and her mother?" he
inquired.
Kitty's face clouded. "Mrs. Marvin's dead. Elsie's with some friends at
Spokane, and I think she's well looked after. I've given up the stage.
Tom"--she explained shyly--"didn't like it. Now I'm with some people at
a ranch near the Fraser on the Westminster road. There are two or three
children and I'm fond of them."
Drayton smiled. "She won't be there long. I've wanted to meet you for
some time, Mr. Vane. They told me at the office that you were away."
"Ah!" said Vane, "I suppose my congratulations won't be out of place.
Won't you ask me to the wedding?"
Kitty blushed. "Will you come?"
"Try," said Vane, and Drayton broke in:
"There's nobody we would sooner see. I'm heavily in your debt, Mr.
Vane."
"Oh, pshaw!" rejoined Vane. "Come and see me any time: to-morrow, if you
can manage it."
Drayton said he would do so, and shortly afterwards he and Kitty moved
away, but Vane, who turned back across the lawn, was not aware that
Jessie had watched the meeting from the verandah and had recognised
Kitty, whom she had once seen at the station. She had already
ascertained that the girl had arrived at Vancouver in his company,
which, in view of the opinion she had formed about him, somewhat puzzled
her; but she said one must endeavour to be charitable. Besides, having
closely watched the little group, she was inclined to believe from the
way Vane shook hands with the man that there was no danger to be
apprehended from Kitty.
CHAPTER XIII
A NEW PROJECT.
Vane was sitting alone in the room set apart for the Clermont Company in
Nairn's office, when Drayton was shown in. He took the chair Vane
pointed to and lighted a cigar the latter gave him.
"Now," he began with some diffidence, "you cut me off short when I met
you the other day, and one of my reasons for coming over was to get
through with what I was saying then. It's just this--I owe you a good
deal for taking care of Kitty; she's very grateful, and thinks no end of
you, I want to say I'll always feel you have a claim on me."
Vane smiled at him. It was evident that Kitty had taken her lover into
her confidence with regard to her trip on board the sloop, and, that she
had done so said a good deal for her.
"It didn't cost me any trouble," Vane replied. "We were coming down to
Vancouver, anyway."
Drayton's embarrassment became more obvious. "It cost you some dollars;
there were the tickets. Now I feel I have to----"
Vane stopped him. "When you are married to Miss Blake you can pay me
back, if it will be a relief to you. When's the wedding to be?"
"In a couple of months," said Drayton, who saw it would be useless to
protest. "I'm a clerk in the Winstanley mills, and, as one of the staff
is going, I'll get a move up then. We are to be married as soon as I
do."
He said a little more on the same subject, and then, after a few
moments' silence added: "I wonder if the Clermont business keeps your
hands full, Mr. Vane."
"It doesn't. It's a fact I'm beginning to regret."
Drayton appeared to consider. "Well," he said, "folks seem to regard you
as a rising man with snap in him, and there's a matter I might, perhaps,
bring before you. Let me explain. I've taken an interest, outside my
routine work in the lumber trade of this province and its subsidiary
branches. I figured any knowledge I could pick up might stand me in some
dollars some day. So far"--he smiled ruefully--"it hasn't done so."
"Go on," said Vane, whose curiosity was aroused.
"Well, I think that pulping spruce--paper spruce--is likely to be scarce
soon. The supply's not unlimited and the world's consumption is going up
by jumps."
"There's a good deal of timber you could make pulp of in British
Columbia alone," Vane interposed.
"Sure. But there's not a very great deal of spruce that could be milled
into high-grade paper pulp; and it's rapidly getting worked out in most
other countries. Then, as a rule, it's mixed up with the firs, cedars
and cypresses; and that means the cutting of logging roads to each
cluster of milling trees. There's another point--a good deal of the
spruce lies back from water or a railroad, and it would be costly to
bring in milling plant or pack the pulp out."
"That's obvious," said Vane: "for you might have to haul every pound of
freight over a breakneck divide."
Drayton leaned forward confidentially. "Then if one struck high-grade
paper spruce--a valley full of it--with water power and easy access to
the sea, there ought to be dollars in the thing?"
"Yes," said Vane, with growing interest. "That is very probable."
"I could put you on the track of such a valley," Drayton replied.
"We had better understand each other. Do you want to sell me the
information, and have you offered it to anyone else?"
His companion answered with the candour he had expected. "The one or two
folks I've spoken to don't seem anxious to consider it. It's mighty hard
for a small man to launch a project."
"As a rule, it is."
"Then," Drayton continued, "the idea's not my own. It was a mineral
prospector--a relative of mine--who struck the valley on his last trip.
He's an old man, and he came down played out and sick. Now I guess he's
slowly dying." He paused a moment. "Would you like to see him?"
"I'll go with you now, if it's convenient," Vane replied.
They crossed the city to where a row of squalid frame shacks stood on
its outskirts. In one which they entered, a gaunt man, with grizzled
hair lay upon a rickety bed. A glance showed Vane that the man was very
frail. Drayton, who explained the cause of his visit, motioned Vane to
sit down, and the prospector fixed his eyes upon the latter.
"I've heard of you. You're the man who located the Clermont--and put the
project through," he said. "You had the luck. I've been among the ranges
half my life, and you can see how much I've made of it. When I struck a
claim worth anything, somebody else got the money."
Vane had reasons for believing that this was not an uncommon experience;
but the man went on again: "Well, you look straight, and I've got to
take some chances; it's my last stake. We'll get down to business; I'll
tell you about that spruce."
He spoke for a few minutes, and then asked abruptly: "What are you going
to offer?"
Vane had not been certain that he would make any offer at all; but, as
had befallen him before, the swift decision flashed instinctively into
his mind.
"If I find that the timber and its location come up to your account of
it, I'll pay you so many dollars down--whatever we can agree upon--when
I get my lease from the land office," he said. "Then I'll make another
equal payment the day we start the mill. But I don't bind myself to
record the timber or put up a mill, unless I'm convinced it's worth
while."
"I'd sooner take less dollars and a small share in the concern; and
Drayton must stand in."
"It's a question of terms," Vane replied. "I'll consider your views."
They discussed it for a while, and when they had at length arrived at a
provisional understanding, the prospector made a sign of acquiescence.
"We'll let it go at that; but the thing will take time, and I'll never
get the money. If you exercise your option, you'll sure pay it down to
Seely?"
"Celia's his daughter," Drayton explained. "He has no one else. She's a
waitress at the ---- House in the city." He named an hotel of no great
standing. "Comes home at nights and looks after him."
Vane glanced round the room. It was evident that Celia's earnings were
small; but he noticed several things which suggested that she had
lavished loving care upon the sick man, probably at the cost of severe
self-denial.
"Yes," he answered; "I'll promise that. But, as I pointed out, while we
have agreed upon the two payments, I reserve the right of deciding what
share your daughter and Drayton are to take afterwards within the limits
sketched out. I can't fix it definitely until I've seen the
timber--you'll have to trust me."
The prospector once more looked at him steadily, and then implied by a
gesture that he was satisfied.
The man fumbled under his pillow, and produced a piece cut out from a
map of the province, with rough pencil notes on the back of it.
"It was on my last prospecting trip I found the spruce," he said. "I'd
been looking round for the Company I was with, and I figured I'd strike
the coast over the range. The creeks were full of snow-water, and as I
was held up here and there before I could get across, provisions began
to run short. By and by I fell sick; but I had to get out of the
mountains, and I was pushing on for the Strait when I struck the place
where the spruce is. After that, I got kind of muddled in the head, but
I went down a long valley on an easy grade and struck some Siwash curing
the last of the salmon. The trouble is, I was too sick to figure exactly
where the small inlet they were camped by lies. They took me back with
them to their rancherie--you could find that--and sailed me across to
Comox by and by. I came down on a steamboat, and the doctor told me I'd
made my last journey."
Vane expressed his sympathy. The narrative has been crudely
matter-of-fact, but he had been out on the prospecting trail often
enough to fill in the details the sick man omitted.
"How far was the valley from the inlet?" he asked.
"I can't tell you. I think I was four days on the trail, but it might
have been more. I was too sick to remember. Anyway, there was a creek
you could run the logs down."
Vane nodded. "Well," he said, "how far was the inlet from the
rancherie?"
"I was in the canoe part of one night and some of the next day. Guess
thirty miles wouldn't be far out."
"That's something to go upon."
Vane rose. "If Drayton will come along with me, I'll send him back with
a hundred dollars. It's part of the first payment--but your getting it
now should make things a little easier for Celia."
"But you haven't located the spruce yet."
"I'm going to locate it, if the thing's anyway possible." Vane shook
hands with the man. "I expect to get off up the Strait very shortly."
The prospector looked at him with relief and gratitude in his eyes,
"You're white--and I guess you'd be mighty hard to beat."
Vane touched Drayton's arm, and when they reached the street, his
companion glanced at him with open admiration.
"I'm glad I brought you across," he broke out. "You have a way of
getting hold of folks, making them believe in you. Hartley hasn't a word
in writing, but he knows you mean to act square with him. Kitty felt the
same thing--it was why she came down in the sloop with you."
Vane smiled, though there was a trace of embarrassment in his manner.
"Now you mention it, you were equally confiding. We have only arrived at
a rather indefinite understanding about your share yet."
"We'll leave it at that," said the other. "I haven't struck anybody else
in this city who would hear about the thing. Anyway, I'd prefer a few
shares in the concern, as mentioned, instead of money. If you get the
thing on foot, I guess it will go."
During the rest of the day Vane was busy on board the sloop, but in the
evening he walked over to Horsfield's house with Mrs. Nairn, and found
Jessie and her brother at home. Horsfield presently took him to his
smoking-room.
"About that smelter," he said. "Haven't you make your mind up yet?"
"Isn't it a matter for the board?" Vane asked suggestively. "There are
several directors."
Horsfield laughed. "We'll face the fact; they'll do what you decide
upon."
Vane did not reply to this. "Well," he said, "at present we couldn't
keep a smelter big enough to be economical going, and I'm doubtful if we
would get much ore from the other properties you were talking to Nairn
about."
"Did he say it was my idea?"
"He didn't: I'd reasons for assuming it. Those properties, however, are
of no account."
Horsfield waited expectantly, and Vane went on: "If it seems possible
that we can profitably increase our output later by means of further
capital, we'll put up a smelter. But in that case it might be economical
to do the work ourselves."
"Who would superintend it?"
"I would, if necessary."
Horsfield smiled in a significant manner. "Aren't you inclined to take
hold of too much? When you have plenty in your hands, it's good policy
to leave a little for somebody else. Sometimes the person who benefits
is willing to reciprocate."
The hint was plain, and Nairn had said sufficient on another occasion to
make it clearer; but Vane did not respond.
"If we gave the work out, it would be an open tender," he said. "There
would be no reason why you shouldn't make a bid."
Horsfield found it difficult to conceal his disgust. He had no desire to
bid on an open tender, which would prevent his obtaining anything beyond
the market price.
"The question must stand over until I come back," Vane resumed. "I'm
going up the west coast shortly and may be away some little time."
They left the smoking-room soon afterwards, and when they strolled back
to the other, Vane sat down near Jessie.
"I hear you are going away," she began.
"Yes," said Vane; "I'm going to look for pulping timber."
"But why do you want pulping timber?"
"It can sometimes be converted into dollars."
"Isn't there every prospect of your obtaining a good many already? Are
you never satisfied?"
"I suppose I'm open to take as many as I can get," Vane answered with an
air of humorous consideration. "The reason probably is that I've had
very few until lately. Still, I don't think it's altogether the dollars
that are driving me."
"If it's the restlessness you once spoke of, you ought to put a check on
it and try to be content. There's danger in the longing to be always
going on."
"It's a common idea that a small hazard gives a thing an interest."
Jessie shot a swift glance at him, and she had, as he noticed,
expressive eyes.
"Be careful!" she said. "After all, it's wiser to keep within safe
limits, and not climb over too many fences." She hesitated, and her
voice grew softer. "You have friends who would be sorry if you got
hurt."
The man was a little stirred; she was alluring physically, while
something in her voice had its effect on him. Evelyn, however, still
occupied his thoughts, and he smiled at his companion.
"Thank you," he said. "I like to believe it."
CHAPTER XIV
VANE SAILS NORTH.
It was growing dusk on the evening of Vane's departure when he walked
out of Nairn's room. His host was with him, and when they entered an
adjacent room, where a lamp was burning, the older man's face relaxed
into a smile as he saw Jessie Horsfield talking to his wife. Vane
stopped a few minutes to speak to them, and it was Jessie who gave the
signal for the group to break up.
"I must go," she said to Mrs. Nairn. "I've already stayed longer than I
intended. I'll let you have those patterns back in a day or two."
"Mair patterns!" Nairn exclaimed with dry amusement. "It's the second
lot this week; ye're surely industrious, Jessie. Women"--he addressed
Vane--"have curious notions of economy. They will spend a month knitting
a thing to give to somebody who does not want it, when they could buy it
for half a dollar done better by machinery. I'm no saying, however, that
it does not keep them out of mischief."
Jessie laughed. "I don't think many of us are industrious in that, way
now. After all, isn't it a pity that so many of the beautiful old
handicrafts are dying out? No loom, for instance, could turn out some of
the things your wife makes. They're matchless."
"She has an aumrie--ye can translate it trunk--full of them," said
Nairn. "It's no longer customary to scatter them ower the house."
Mrs. Nairn's smile was half a sigh. "There were no books, and no mony
amusements, when I was young," she said to Jessie. "We sat through the
long winter forenights, counting stitches, at Burnfoot, under the
Scottish moors. That, my dear, was thirty years ago."
She shook hands with Vane, who left the house with Jessie, and watched
them cross the lawn.
"I'm thinking ye'll no see so much of Jessie for the next few weeks,"
Nairn, who had accompanied her to the door, remarked. "Has she shown ye
any of yon knick-knacks when she finished them."
His wife shook her head at him reproachfully. "Alec," she said, "ye're
now and then hasty in jumping at conclusions."
"Maybe," replied Nairn. "I'm no infallible, but the fault ye mention is
no common in the land where we were born. I'm no denying that Jessie has
enterprise, but how far it will carry her in this case is mair than I
can tell."
He smiled as he recalled a scene at the station some time ago, and Mrs.
Nairn looked up at him.
"What is amusing ye, Alec?" she asked.
"It was just a bit idea no worth the mentioning," said Nairn. "I think
it wouldna count." He paused, and resumed with an air of reflection: "A
young man's heart is whiles inconstant and susceptible."
Mrs. Nairn, who ignored the last remark, went into the house, and in the
meanwhile Jessie and Vane walked down the road until they stopped at a
gate, Jessie held out her hand.
"I'm glad I met you to-night," she said. "You will allow me to wish you
every success?"
"Thank you," he replied. "It's nice to feel one has the sympathy of
one's friends."
He turned away, and Jessie stood watching him as he strode down the
road. There was, she thought, something that set him apart from other
men in his fine poise and swing. She was, however, forced to confess
that, although he had answered her courteously, there had been no warmth
in his words.
As it happened, Vane was just then conscious of a slight relief. He
admired Jessie, and he liked Nairn and his wife; but they belonged to
the city, which he was on the whole glad to leave behind. He was going
back to the shadowy woods, where men lived naturally, and the lust of
fresh adventure was strong in him.
On reaching the wharf he found Kitty and Celia Hartley, whom he had not
met hitherto, awaiting him with Carroll and Drayton. A boat lay at the
steps, and he and Carroll rowed the others off to the sloop. The moon
was just rising from behind the black firs at the inlet's inner end, and
a little cold wind faintly scented with resinous fragrance, that blew
down across them, stirred the water into tiny ripples that flashed into
silvery radiance here and there.
A soft glow shone out from the skylights to welcome them as they
approached the sloop, and when, laughing gaily, they clambered on board,
Carroll led the way to the tiny saloon, which just held them all. It was
brightly lighted by two nickelled lamps; flowers were fastened against
the panelling, and clusters of them stood upon the table, which was
covered with a spotless cloth. Vane took the head of it and Carroll
modestly explained that only part of the supper had been prepared by
him. The rest he had obtained in the city, out of regard for the guests,
who, he added, had not lived in the bush.
Carroll started the general chatter, which went on after the meal was
over, and nobody appeared to notice that Kitty sat with her hand in
Drayton's amidst the happy laughter. Even Celia, who had her grief to
grapple with, smiled bravely. Vane had given them champagne, the best in
the city, though they drank sparingly; and at last, when Celia made a
move to rise, Drayton stood up with his glass in his hand.
"We must go, but there's something to be done," he said. "It's to thank
our host and wish him success. It's a little boat he's sailing in, but
she's carrying a big freight if our good wishes count for anything."
They emptied the glasses, and Vane replied: "My success is yours. You
have all a stake in the venture, and that piles up my responsibility. If
the spruce is still in existence, I've got to find it."
"And you're going to find it," said Drayton confidently.
Then Vane divided the flowers between Celia and her companion, but when
they went up on deck Kitty raised one bunch and kissed it.
"Tom won't mind," she said. "Take that one back from Celia and me."
They got down into the boat. Then, while the girls called back to Vane,
Drayton rowed away, and the boat was fading out of sight when Kitty's
voice reached the men on board. She was singing a well-known Jacobite
ballad.
"Considering what his Highland followers suffered on his account and
what the women thought of him," said Carroll, "some of the virtues they
credited the Young Chevalier with must have been real," He raised his
hand. "You may as well listen."
Vane stood still a moment with the blood hot in his face, and the
refrain rang more clearly across the sparkling water:
"Better lo'ed ye cannot be,
Will ye no come back again?"
"I don't know if you feel flattered, but I've an idea that Kitty and
Celia would go into the fire for you, and Drayton seems to share their
confidence," Carroll resumed, in his most matter-of-fact tone.
Vane began to shake the mainsail loose. "I believe we both talked rather
freely to-night; but we have to find the spruce."
"So you have said already," Carroll pointed out. "Hadn't you better
heave the boom up with the topping lift?"
They got the mainsail on to her, broke out the anchor and set the jib;
and as the boat slipped away before a freshening breeze Vane sat at the
helm, while Carroll stood on the foredeck, coiling up the gear. The moon
was higher now; the broad sail gleamed a silvery grey; the ripples,
which were getting bigger, flashed and sparkled as they streamed back
from the bows, and the lights of the city dropped fast astern. Vane was
conscious of a keen exhilaration. He had started on a new adventure; he
was going back to the bush, and he knew that no matter how his life
might change, the wilderness would always call to him. In spite of this,
however, he was, as he had said, conscious of an unusual responsibility.
Hitherto he had fought for what he could get for himself; but now
Kitty's future partly depended upon his efforts, and his success would
be of vast importance to Celia.
He had a very friendly feeling towards both the girls. Indeed, all the
women he had met of late had attracted him in different ways, but Evelyn
stood apart from all.
She appealed less to his senses and intellect than she did to a
sublimated something in the depths of his nature; and it somehow seemed
fitting that her image should materialise before his mental vision as
the sloop drove along under the cloudless night sky, while the moonlight
poured down glamour on the shining water. Evelyn harmonised with such
things as these.
It was true that she had repulsed him; but that, he remembered, once
more with a sense of compunction, was what he deserved for entering into
an alliance against her with her venial father. He was glad now that he
had acquiesced in her dismissal of him, since to have stood firm and
broken her to his will would have brought disaster upon both of them. He
felt that she had not wholly escaped him, after all: by and by he would
go back and seek her favour by different means. Then she might, perhaps,
forgive him and listen.
CHAPTER XV
THE FIRST MISADVENTURE.
The breeze freshened fiercely with the red and fiery dawn, and Vane, who
had gone below, was advised of it by being flung off the locker on which
he sat with coffee and biscuits before him, in the saloon. The jug,
overturning, spilled its contents upon his person, the biscuits were
scattered, but he picked himself up in haste and scrambled out into the
well. He found the sloop slanted over with a good deal of her lee deck
submerged in rushing foam, and Carroll bracing himself against the
strain upon the tiller.
"I'll let her come up when you're ready," Carroll remarked. "We had
better get some sail off her, if we mean to hold on to the mast."
He put down his helm, and the sloop, forging round to windward, rose
upright, with her heavy mainboom banging to and fro. After that, they
were desperately busy for the next few minutes, and Vane wished they had
engaged a hand in Vancouver, instead of waiting to hire a Siwash
somewhere up the coast. There was a headsail to haul to windward, which
was difficult, and the mainsheet to get in; and then the two men,
standing on the slippery inclined deck, struggled hard to haul the
canvas down to the boom. The jerking spar smote them in the ribs; once
or twice the reefing tackle beneath it was torn from their hands; but
they mastered the sail, tying two reefs in it, to reduce its size, and
the craft afterwards drove away with her lee rail just awash.
"You had better go down and get some biscuits," Vane said to his
comrade. "You mayn't have an opportunity later."
"It looks like that," Carroll agreed. "The wind's backing northwards,
and that means more of it before long. You can call if you want me."
He disappeared below, and Vane sat at the helm with a frown on his face.
He knew that the breeze would increase and draw ahead, which was
unfortunate, because they would have to beat, fighting for every fathom
they slowly made. There was no help for it, and he buttoned his jacket
against the spray, while by the time Carroll came up the sloop was
plunging sharply; pitching showers of stinging brine all over her when
the bows went down. They drove her at it stubbornly most of the day,
making but little to windward, while the seas got bigger and whiter,
until they had some trouble to keep the light boat they carried upon the
deluged deck. At last, when she came bodily aft amidst a frothing
cascade which poured into the well, Vane brought the sloop round, and
they stretched away to the eastwards, until they could let go the anchor
in smooth water beneath a wall of rock. They were very wet, and stiff
with cold, for winter was drawing near.
"We'll get supper," said Vane. "If the breeze drops at dusk, we'll go on
again."
Having eaten little since dawn, they enjoyed the meal, and Carroll would
have been content to remain at anchor afterwards. The tiny saloon was
comfortably warm, and it would be pleasanter to lounge away the evening
on a locker with his pipe, instead of sitting amidst the bitter spray at
the helm. But Vane was proof against his companion's hints.
"With a head wind, we'll be some time working up to the rancherie, and
then we have thirty miles of coast to search for the inlet Hartley
reached," he said. "After that, there's the valley to locate; he was
uncertain how far it lay from the beach."
"It couldn't be very far. You wouldn't expect a man who was sick to make
any great pace."
"I can imagine a man who knew he must reach the coast before he started
making a pretty vigorous effort. Do you remember the time we crossed the
divide in the snow?"
"I could remember it, if I wanted," said Carroll with a shiver. "It's
about the last thing I'm anxious to do."
"The trouble is that there are many valleys in this strip of country,
and we may have to try a number before we strike the right one," Vane
went on. "I can't spend very much time over this search. As soon as the
man we put in charge of the mine has tried his present system long
enough to give us something to figure on, I want to see what can be done
to increase our output. We haven't marketed very much refined metal
yet."
"There's no doubt it would be advisable," Carroll, who looked after
their finances, answered. "As I've pointed out, you have spent a good
deal of the cash you got when you turned the Clermont over to the
company. In fact, that's one reason why I didn't try to head you off
this timber-hunting scheme. You can't spend many dollars over it, and if
the spruce comes up to expectations, you ought to get them back. It
would be a fortunate change, after your extravagance in England."
"That is a subject I don't want to talk about. We'll go up and see what
the weather's like."
Carroll shivered when they stood in the well. A nipping wind came down
across the darkening firs ashore, but there was no doubt that it had
fallen somewhat, and he resigned himself when Vane began to pull the
tiers off the mainsail.
In a few minutes they were under way, the sloop heading out towards open
water with two reefs down in her mainsail; a great and ghostly shape of
slanted canvas that swept across the dim, furrowed plain of sea. By
midnight the breeze was as strong as ever, but they had clear moonlight
and they held on; the craft plunging with flooded decks through the
white combers, while Carroll sat at the helm, battered by spray and
stung with cold.
When Vane came up an hour or two later, the sea was breaking viciously.
They held on and, soon after day broke with its first red flush
ominously high in the eastern sky, stretched in towards the land, with a
somewhat sheltered bay opening up beyond a foam-fringed point ahead of
them. Carroll glanced dubiously at the white turmoil, in the midst of
which black fangs of rock appeared, before he turned to his companion.
"Will she weather the point on this tack?" he asked.
"She'll have to," said Vane, who was steering.
They stood on, though it occurred to Carroll that they were not opening
up the bay very rapidly. The light was growing, and he could now discern
the orderly phalanxes of white-topped combers that crumpled into chaotic
spouting on the point's outer end. The sloop would not last long if she
touched bottom there; but once more, after a glance at his companion's
face, he kept silent. After all, Vane was leader, and when he looked as
he did then he usually resented advice. The mouth of the bay grew wider,
until Carroll could see most of the forest-girt shore on one side of it;
but the surf upon the point was also growing unpleasantly near. Wisps of
spray whirled away from it and vanished among the scrubby firs clinging
to the fissured crags behind. The sloop, however, was going to windward,
for Vane was handling her with skill, and she had almost cleared the
point when there was a bang, and the sloop stopped suddenly. The comber
to windward that should have lifted her up broke all over her; flinging
the boat on deck upon the saloon skylight, and pouring inches deep over
the coaming into the well. Vane was hurled from the tiller and cut his
forehead, for his wet face was smeared with blood, but he had seized a
big oar to shove her off when she swung upright, moved, and struck
again. The following sea hove her up; there was another less violent
crash, and while Vane dropped the oar and grasped the helm she suddenly
shot ahead.
"She'll go clear," he shouted, "Jump below and see if she's damaged."
Carroll got no farther than the scuttle, for the saloon floorings on the
depressed side were already awash and he could hear an ominous splashing
and gurgling.
"It's pouring into her," he reported.
Vane nodded. "You'll have to pump."
"We passed an opening some miles to lee. Wouldn't it be better if you
ran back there?" Carroll suggested.
"No," said Vane; "I won't run a yard. There's another inlet not far
ahead, and we'll stand on until we reach it. I'd put her on the beach
here, only that she'd go to pieces with the first shift of wind to the
westward."
Carroll agreed with this opinion; but there is a great difference
between running to leeward with the sea behind the vessel, and thrashing
to windward when it is ahead, and he hesitated.
"Get the pump started. We're going on," Vane said shortly.
The pump was, fortunately, a powerful one, and they had nearly two miles
of smoother water before they stretched out of the bay upon the other
track; but when they did so Carroll, who glanced down again through the
scuttle, could not flatter himself that he had reduced the water.
After half an hour of it, he was breathless and exhausted, and Vane took
his place. The sea was higher, the sloop wetter than she had been, and
there was no doubt that the water was rising fast inside her. Carroll
wondered how far ahead the inlet his companion had mentioned lay, and
the next two hours were anxious ones to both of them. Turn about, they
pumped with savage determination and went back, gasping, to the helm, to
thrash the boat on. They drove her remorselessly; and she went through
the combers, swept and streaming, while the spray scourged the
helmsman's face as he gazed to weather. Their arms and shoulders ached
from working in a cramped position, but since there was no help for it,
they toiled doggedly, until at last the crest of a crag they were
heading for sloped away in front of them.
A few minutes later, they drove past the end of it into a broad lane of
water with long ranks of firs dropping steeply to its edge. The wind was
suddenly cut off; the combers fell away, and the sloop crept slowly up
the inlet, which wound, green and placid, among the hills. Vane strode
to the scuttle and looked down at the flood which splashed languidly to
and fro below.
"It's fortunate that we're in. Another half-hour would have seen the end
of her," he said. "Let her come up a little. There's a smooth beach to
yonder cove."
She slid in quietly, scarcely rippling the smooth surface of the tiny
basin, about which there rose great black firs, and Carroll laid her on
the beach.
"Now," said Vane, "drop the boom on the shore side, to keep her from
canting over; and then we'll get breakfast. We'll see where she's
damaged when the tide ebbs."
Since most of their stores had lain in the flooded lockers, from which
there had been no time to extricate them, the meal was not an appetising
one. They were, however, glad of it, and, rowing ashore afterwards, they
lay on the shingle in the sunshine while
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