Kitabı oku: «For the Allinson Honor», sayfa 15

CHAPTER XXV
A DELICATE POINT

The afternoon was drawing to a close when Andrew, Olcott, and a friend of the latter's, carrying guns and spread out in line, entered a stretch of rough, boggy pasture near the river. Clumps of reeds and rushes grew along the open drains, water gleamed among the grass, and the bare trees on the high bank across the stream stood out sharp and black against a glow of saffron light. The men were wet to the knees, and a white setter, splashed with mire, trotted in front of them. Murray, Olcott's friend, who was on Andrew's right, sprang across a broad drain and laughed when he alighted.

"Over my boots, but my feet can't get any wetter," he remarked. "I don't know that this is a judicious amusement after being invalided home from the tropics; but it looks a likely place for a mallard."

Allinson had met Murray for the first time that morning, and noticed that the man, a government official in a West African colony, looked at him rather intently when they were introduced. They had, however, spent a pleasant day, and Andrew was going to Olcott's to dinner.

"I'm afraid the plover will put up any ducks there are about," he said. "They're a nuisance and you're not allowed to shoot them here. It will be bad to keep our line over this rough ground."

Four or five lapwings, screaming shrilly, wheeled in wide circles overhead, showing sharply black and white as the light struck them, and fading into indistinct gray patches as they turned in erratic flight. The men advanced cautiously, searching the ground with eager eyes, and keeping their positions as closely as possible. This was needful for the safety of the party in case a bird got up and crossed their line of march, when the right to first shot would be determined by the code of shooting etiquette.

Andrew was plodding through a belt of rush with a plover circling close above his head when the setter, after creeping slowly forward for a few paces, suddenly stopped. Then a small gray object sprang up from a drain and Andrew threw his gun to his shoulder. He dropped it the next moment, with a low call to Murray:

"Your bird!"

The snipe had swung a little to the right in its swift flight, swerving in sharp corkscrew twists, and Murray's gun twice flashed. The bird, however, held on and faded against the dusky background of the river bank. Murray stopped and turned to Andrew with a laugh.

"I'm afraid I'm hardly up to snipe," he said. "It's a pity you were generous enough to give me the shot."

"It was yours by right."

"That," Murray disputed, "is an open point. If I had been in your place and could have hit the bird, I wouldn't have let it go. However, if the firing hasn't made them wild, you may get another chance."

The sun had sunk behind the tall bank and the pale yellow light that lingered was confusing when the setter flushed a second snipe, which went away at long range in front of Andrew. During a part of each quick gyration he could not see it, but when it was outlined for a second, black against the light, his gun flashed and the bird fell among the reeds. When the setter had found it Murray looked surprised.

"Considering the bad light and the distance, it was a remarkably clean shot," he said. "I expected to see that you had hit it with only a stray pellet or two."

"I used the left barrel," Andrew explained, smiling. "It's a half-choke; an old gun. That accounts for the charge hanging together."

"It doesn't account for your killing your bird at a long range with shot which wouldn't spread. But it's getting dark and we've had enough."

They turned back to the nearest road, and an hour or two after reaching home Andrew walked across to Olcott's. Ethel Hillyard was there, and when they went into dinner Murray, sitting next to her, glanced at Andrew near the other end of the table.

"I was out with Mr. Allinson to-day," he said. "As he's a neighbor of yours, I've no doubt you know him pretty well. He struck me as a particularly straight man."

"He is so," declared Ethel warmly. "I don't know a straighter. Still, I don't see how you came to that conclusion by watching his shooting."

"It doesn't seem very obvious," Murray responded with a smile. "However, so far as my experience goes, a man who's scrupulous in one thing is very apt to prove the same in another. When we were out this afternoon, a snipe got up in front of him and he let me have the shot."

"But how does that prove his general honesty?"

"I'm not sure I was entitled to the shot, though as the bird headed slightly toward me there was some doubt about the matter. Allinson gave me the full benefit, though I think he must have known that I would miss."

"Is it a great sacrifice to give up a shot?"

"A snipe," said Murray, "is very hard to hit, though Allinson showed us afterward that he is capable of bringing one down. Now when you know you can do a difficult thing neatly, it's not easy to refrain."

"Perhaps that's true," Ethel agreed. "No doubt the temptation's stronger when you have an appreciative audience."

"Mine," said Murray, "was too polite to laugh."

Mrs. Olcott asked him a question and they changed the subject, but after dinner Murray found an opportunity for a word with Andrew, whom Olcott had left alone in his smoking-room.

"Perhaps it's hardly correct to talk to you on business here, and I won't press you, but there's some information you may be able to give me," he said.

Andrew looked at the man more carefully than he had hitherto done. Murray's face was thin and rather haggard, but it bore the stamp of authority. His manner was grave but pleasant.

"I am at your service," he replied.

"Then I want to ask about the Rain Bluff mine. A little time ago a stock-jobbing friend told me it ought to turn out a good thing. He said that whatever Allinson's took up could be relied on, and it was clear that he had a high opinion of your house. On the strength of it, I put some money into the venture." He paused with a smile. "Now, you are wondering why a man with means enough to speculate should go to West Africa?"

"Something like that was in my mind."

"Well, I learned that I'd the knack of getting on with primitive peoples; in fact, it's my only talent, and I felt that I had to make use of it. Then it's a mysterious country, that gets hold of one, and perhaps is hardly so bad as it's painted. As a rule, I don't have fever more than half a dozen times a year. What's more to the purpose, part of the money was lately left to me. But I'm getting away from the point."

Andrew was favorably impressed by the man. They had something in common, for both were imbued with a sense of responsibility. Murray had lightly indicated this, and Andrew knew that West Africa is far from a desirable place to live.

"You have a reason for feeling anxious about those shares?"

"Yes. In my district, the risk of getting permanently disabled by the climate or shot by an ambushed nigger has to be considered. Stipend and pension are small, and I felt that I needed something to fall back on. That was why I bought the Rain Bluff stock. Now my friend tells me that the shares are being quietly sold in small lots, which he seems to think ominous. If you can tell me anything about the matter, I'll be grateful."

Andrew was silent for a minute or two, feeling troubled. He did not pity the regular stock-jobbers and speculators who had bought Rain Bluff stock, for they were accustomed to playing a risky game. It was, however, different with such investors as Murray – men of small means, who had carefully saved something to provide for old age, and women left with just enough to keep them from want. These, he thought, formed a numerous class and demanded his sympathy. They had, no doubt, avoiding ventures which offered a larger return, been influenced by a desire for security, which would seem to be promised by Allinson's connection with the mine.

"Well," he said at last, "I believe it is true that shares have been parted with by a man who has a say in the management of the company."

"That sounds discouraging. If I sell out, I'll lose three or four shillings on every share."

"Yes; and if others follow your example, it will weaken the Company's position. However, I think you can venture to keep your stock."

"You can't expect me to take the risk of holding, in order to support a concern in which I'm badly disappointed. I must ask you frankly what is wrong at the mine?"

"In strict confidence, I may say that the ore we are working does not promise well."

Murray looked at him in astonishment.

"You are remarkably candid; but you give me a curious reason for holding on to my shares."

"Here's a better one," said Andrew. "We have another mine in view; but whether it turns out rich or not, no holder of Rain Bluff stock shall lose a penny by his confidence in Allinson's."

"Though I don't know much about stock-jobbing, that strikes me as an extraordinary promise."

"I dare say it is," Andrew replied. "I offer you no guarantee; you must use your judgment."

Murray looked up sharply.

"I believe your word is good enough. You have taken a load off my mind, Mr. Allinson. I'll hold those shares. May I add that if my proxy is likely to be of any value at your meetings, you may count on it?"

"Thanks! And now, did I tell you that Olcott promised to bring you out again to-morrow? There's a cover I want to beat and the pheasants ought to be plentiful."

They went down together and Murray joined Ethel Hillyard in the drawing-room.

"I've had a talk with Mr. Allinson which confirms your opinion of him," he said. "But I must say that he doesn't fit in with my idea of a Company director."

Ethel laughed.

"Andrew's new to the business, and undertook it with reluctance from a sense of duty. For all that, though his ignorance of commercial matters must be a handicap, I expect him to make a success of it."

"One would imagine that a desire to make money is the more usual object, but I think you're right. In fact, you have touched upon a pet idea of mine."

The girl turned and studied him. There was a trace of gravity in his manner, and she understood that he had done with credit difficult and dangerous work.

"What is the idea?" she asked.

"To put it roughly, something like this – more depends on character than specialized training; determination and strong sincerity often carry one farther than a knowledge of the rules of the game. One sees people who rely on the latter come to grief."

"Even in Company floating?"

"That," said Murray, smiling, "is a subject about which I'm ignorant. I was speaking of the general principle."

"Do you mean that right must prevail?"

"I'm sanguine enough to believe it often does in the end."

"One would like to think so. But as we seem to be getting serious, isn't the question whether it prevails or not another matter from an altruistic point of view?"

Murray pondered this and then looked up with a twinkle.

"So long as I'm not priggish, I don't mind being serious. You see, I'm fresh from the shadowy bush, where life is solemn enough, and when I came home not long ago after a three years' absence I felt strangely out of place. You're at a disadvantage when you can't talk about the latest musical comedy or popular dancer, and it's as bad not to know the favorite for an approaching steeplechase. However, to stick to our subject, I see what you mean. One must do one's work and not worry about the result?"

Olcott was passing and he stopped beside them.

"Murray seems to be moralizing," he laughed. "I must warn you that he spends his evenings in Africa sitting behind a mosquito-netting studying the early Victorian philosophers. It's some excuse for him that when the niggers are quiet he has nothing else to do and nobody to talk to except a colored official."

"Don't you get any newspapers?" Ethel asked.

"They're often too wet and pulpy to read, and now and then the sporting natives bag the mail-carrier. I've known them try to stalk the white officer responsible for too drastic reforms."

Ethel regarded Murray with heightened interest. There was something that both amused and touched her in the thought of the lonely man, shut in by the black, steamy forest, spending his evenings reading philosophy.

"I wonder," she said, "whether you find any practical application of the great thinkers' theories?"

"One old favorite of mine strikes me as rather grim and singularly hard to please; but so far as I can judge, he hits the mark now and then. It's a pet theme of his that only that which stands on justice, and is better than what it displaces, can endure. You see that worked out in a primitive country like West Africa."

"But isn't the progress of civilization assisted by machine-guns and followed by gin?"

"A fair shot!" laughed Olcott. "Our rule's often faulty, but it's a good deal better than the natives had before. Murray knows a creek that mutilated corpses used to drift down after each big palaver and celebration of Ju-Ju rites."

"I suppose he had some trouble in putting a stop to it?"

Olcott broke into a grim smile.

"One would imagine so, from what I heard of the matter. An army of savages with flintlocks took the bush on the other side; there were about two dozen colored Mohammedan soldiers, a white lieutenant, carried in a hammock because he was too ill to walk, and a civil officer who wasn't authorized to fight, to carry out the reforms. Though it didn't look encouraging at the start, they were effected."

"Ah," said Ethel, "one could be proud of things like that! After all, Mr. Murray's philosopher may be right. It's cheering to find a man ready to put his belief in justice to the test."

"There's one," said Olcott, indicating Andrew. "I shouldn't wonder if it costs him something."

The group broke up and some time later Andrew walked home with Ethel. The distance was not great, the road was dry, and a half moon threw down a silvery light. Thin mist filled the hollows, the murmur of the river rose from a deep valley, and the air was soft.

"It's very open weather," Ethel remarked. "I suppose it's different in Canada?"

"In the part I'm best acquainted with the thermometer is now registering forty degrees below zero, and it would need a charge of dynamite to break the ice on the lakes."

"Prospecting must be stern work," said Ethel speculatively. "It's curious that you haven't thought it worth while to give me an account of your adventures. Won't you do so?"

"Well, you mustn't blame me if you find them tedious. As a matter of fact, I haven't said much about them to anybody yet."

He began with a few rather involved explanations, but his style became clearer as he followed up the main thread of the tale, and Ethel listened with close interest.

"So it was the Frobishers who saved you by sending off a rescue party!" she exclaimed when he had finished. "But how did they know you were in danger?"

"That's more than I can tell. Of course, we were behind our time, but that doesn't account for all. I've a suspicion that Miss Frobisher had some means of finding out the most serious risk we ran."

Ethel thought this indicated that Geraldine took a marked interest in the man. She wondered if it had occurred to him.

"And you believe the fellow really meant to starve you?" she said.

"He didn't intend us to find the food. It comes to the same thing."

"But his conduct seems so inhuman! Surely, he would not have let you die of hunger with no better reason than to prevent you from interfering with his contract?"

Andrew hesitated. He could not tell her that Mappin might have been actuated by jealousy; modesty prevented his doing so.

"The fellow is greedy and unscrupulous enough for anything," he replied evasively.

"But you hinted that he was clever," Ethel persisted. "Only a fool would commit a serious crime for a small advantage."

"It's certainly puzzling," Andrew admitted.

Then he was surprised and disconcerted when Ethel turned on him a searching glance.

"Andrew," she said, "the man must have been given a hint by some one more powerful. His is not the strongest interest you are opposed to."

The color crept into Andrew's face. He suspected Leonard, but it was unthinkable that he should declare his brother-in-law's infamy. This was a matter that lay between the culprit and himself.

"It's an unpleasant topic and the fellow's a rascal," he answered. "It's hard to say what might influence such men. They're not quite normal; you can't account for them."

"But you're going back to look for the lode, aren't you?" Ethel laid her hand on his arm. "Be careful; you have had a warning. I suppose you must do what you have fixed your mind on and, knowing you are right, I dare not dissuade you."

"I'll run no risks that can be avoided and, in particular, trust no outsider to look after the supplies for our next trip," Andrew said grimly. "One experience like the last is enough."

For a few minutes they walked on in silence. Ethel knew her companion's character and admired it; and now she had met Murray, who in some respects resembled him, as did Olcott. All were men of action, and there was the same indefinite but recognizable stamp on them. They were direct, simple in a sense which did not imply foolishness, free from petty assumption and incapable of suave diplomacy; but one could rely on them in time of stress. Leonard was a good example of the opposite type; but she found the other more pleasant to think about. When she reached the gate she gave Andrew her hand.

"You know you have my good wishes," she said.

CHAPTER XXVI
A SUSPICIOUS STRANGER

Andrew returned to Canada satisfied with his English visit. He had not convinced his relatives that his judgment was entirely to be trusted, but he knew that he stood higher in their esteem than he had done; and that was something to be thankful for. Leonard, he thought, would find it more difficult to prejudice them against his plans. On reaching the Lake of Shadows, he found Graham recovering and learned that the Frobishers had left for their home in Denver. After remaining a few days at the Landing he went up to the mine, where the ore showed no sign of improvement. For all that, he spent a month there, waiting until the thaw came and maturing his plans for his second journey to Dream Mine.

At last the rotting ice began to yield, and Andrew sat outside Watson's shack one day, watching an impressive spectacle. The river broke up with violence, the ice ripping and rending with a sound like the roar of artillery, and as the great torn masses swept away, the water pent up in the higher reaches poured into the gorge, swollen with melting snow. It rolled by in savage flood, laden with tremendous blocks of ice, some of which, cemented together near falls and rapids, were the size of small frame houses. Among them drove huge floes into which the floating cakes had solidified during the earlier frosts. Here and there one stranded upon a point, or swung in an eddy, until another crashed into it and both were shattered amid a bewildering uproar. Then, for a while, the stream was filled with massive, driving sheets of ice, which ground the banks with a tremendous din and scored the tops of projecting boulders, while waterlogged pines and stumps sunk in the river-bed were crushed to pulp.

Andrew had never seen any display of natural forces to equal this, and when he went into the shack for supper he found that he could not get the recollection of it out of his mind. The lonely North is a savage country, very grim and terrible in some of its moods. Andrew, however, had carefully considered and endeavored to guard against its dangers, and when a canoe which had been especially built for him in Toronto arrived, he set out on his journey with Carnally and Graham. There was now no risk of frostbite and the gray trout would help out their food supply, but they knew the trip would cost them much exhausting labor.

For some days they poled and paddled up the swollen river, spending hours in dragging the canoe and provisions across rocky portages to avoid furious rapids, and often wading waist-deep in icy water with the tracking line. At night they slept, generally wet through, among the stones, though there was often sharp frost and the slack along the bank was covered with fresh ice in the morning; but they made steady progress until the stream broke up into small forks and they must cross the height of land. This was singularly toilsome work. In some places they were forced to hew a path through scrub spruce bush; in others there were slippery rocks to be scrambled across, while two in turn carried the canoe, borne upside-down upon the shoulders. Then there were the provisions to be brought up, and in relaying them each difficult stage had to be traversed several times, so that once or twice, when they had made only a mile or two in an exhausting day, Andrew almost despaired of getting any farther.

At last, however, they found a creek rushing tumultuously down the back of the divide. They followed it, one of them checking the canoe by the tracking line while the others kept her off the rocks with pole and paddle. Their provisions were secured, so far as possible, from damage by water, but there was danger of losing them in a capsize, and boiling eddies and roaring rapids made caution needful. For a while the creek led them roughly where they wished to go, and then turned off, and they crossed a high ridge in search of another. Lakes and rivers abound in those wilds, which are almost impassable on foot during the short summer. As they worked north the sun grew warmer, but the temperature fell sharply at night, and now and then the waste was swept by piercing winds.

One of these was raging when they scudded down a lake on a cold and lowering evening. Gray vapor blurred the rocky shore, but here and there a few dark pines stood out, harshly distinct. The water was leaden-colored between the lines of foam, and short, slashing seas broke angrily about the canoe, which ran before them with a small lugsail set. Carnally knelt astern, holding the steering paddle; Andrew lay down amidships, out of the wind; and Graham, crouching forward, fixed his eyes ahead.

"There seems to be a creek abreast of us," Carnally said. "We're in shoaling water; watch out for snags."

A violent gust struck them and the canoe drove on furiously, lifting her bows on a foaming ridge while the water lapped level with her stern.

"Shoot her up!" Graham called out sharply. "Log right ahead!"

Andrew seized the sheet and Carnally plied the paddle; but the warning had come too late. While the canoe slanted over until her lee side was under water as she altered her course, there was a sharp crash. Her speed slackened for a moment or two. Then she lifted as a white wave surged by; and when she drove on again the water poured in through a rent in her side.

"Can't be kept under by baling," Carnally remarked. "We'll have to put her on the wind and make the beach."

He hauled the sheet, but she would not bear the pressure when she brought the wind abeam, and seeing the water pouring in over her lowered side, Carnally let her fall off again.

"Looks as if we had to keep her running," he said.

"The end of the lake can't be far off and the water's too rough to do much with the paddle."

They scudded on, Andrew and Graham baling as fast as possible, while the rising water gained on them, until blurred trees and rocks began to grow out of the haze ahead. Then as a strip of beach became distinguishable they lowered the sail, and soon afterward jumped over and carried her out across the jagged driftwood that hammered on the pebbles. There was a small promontory near at hand, and Carnally walked across it while the others made camp. Supper was ready when he returned, and after the meal was finished he lay down near the fire.

"The canoe wants a patch on her bilge," he said. "Could you sew on a bit of the thin cedar with the copper wire, Graham? There's some caulking gum in the green can."

"It would take me a day to make a neat job."

"No hurry," replied Carnally. "The outlet from the lake's just beyond that rise and it looks pretty good. When you have finished the canoe, you and Andrew could take her down and wait for me where the creek runs into the river we're looking for."

"It would be hard work at the portages. But why aren't you coming with us?" Andrew asked.

"I ought to make the creek where Mappin cached the first lot of stores for our other trip in about two days' march."

"We have enough without them."

"That's so. Anyhow, I want to look at the cache. Stores are a consideration on a trip like this; the less you have to pack over the portages, the quicker you can travel. Though we didn't find it, Mappin knows where the cache was made."

"I don't see the drift of this," Andrew said.

Carnally smiled.

"Hasn't it struck you that we might be followed? Sending up the canoe and camp truck would show the people at the Landing that we were ready to start, and Mappin knows our line roughly as far as the cache. You can't make camp and haul across brush portages without leaving a trail."

"Ah! That makes one think. Of course, we would have no legal claim to the lode unless we got our stakes in before anybody else."

"It's not enough. You have to get back to a government office and file your record before you're safe. Well, considering everything, I guess I'll start for the cache at sun-up."

The others agreed to this and after he left the next morning they set to work on the canoe and repaired her satisfactorily. Then they launched her on the outflowing stream and a few days later made camp on the bank of a larger river, where they sat beside their fire late at night. The gorge was filled with the clamor of rushing water, but the night was very still, and they could hear sounds in the bush through the deep-toned roar of the flood. Outside the glow of the fire, which fell on the straight spruce trunks, there was nothing to be seen; but they sat listening, for Carnally had been longer than he expected and Andrew was anxious.

At last, Graham raised his hand.

"I heard something!"

Andrew turned his head, but for a while could hear only the hoarse turmoil of the river. Then he started as a faint crackle came out of the shadows. It rose again, more clearly, and presently a man's dark shape emerged from the gloom. A few moments later Carnally threw off his pack and sat down by the fire, his boots badly ripped and his clothing tattered.

"I struck some pretty rough country," he explained. "The creek winds a lot and I came across the range."

"Did you find the cache?" Andrew asked.

"Sure! It had been opened not long before and provisions taken out."

Graham moved abruptly.

"I suppose the things couldn't have been taken by Indians?"

"No, sir! Indians would have cleaned out the whole lot. Whoever found the cache left some food to pick up when coming back. There were three or four white men in the party; I learned that when I struck their empty camp. Looks as if the hog was still getting after us."

"I'm afraid so," said Andrew, frowning. "What's to be done to shake off his men?"

"The fellows were heading down-stream, and I guess they'd hold on until they struck this river, where they'd make a base camp and look for our trail. Well, instead of keeping to the water, as they'd expect, we'll strike across the divide, though it will be an awkward traverse."

His companions approved the plan, and the next day they found a spot where smooth rocky slabs dropped gently to the water. Here they took off their boots, to avoid leaving tell-tale scratches, and then they hauled out the canoe. They were able to carry her some distance before they met with much brush, and when they had brought up the provisions, Carnally looked about with a satisfied air.

"This wouldn't strike one as an easy place to portage across, and the stream runs smartly past the stones we landed on," he chuckled. "I guess Mappin's boys will go straight on, and it may be some time before they get suspicious."

His opinion was reassuring, as far as it went, but Andrew felt daunted as he studied the rise ahead. The ravines were filled with brushwood, the spurs clothed with spruce, and he failed to see how the canoe was to be conveyed to the top. It must, however, be tried, and they set to work, laboriously carrying her up the steep slopes, a few yards at a time, until they reached a gully choked with brush, where progress became almost impossible. They were forced to drag her through thick bushes, stopping every two or three minutes for breath, while on the steeper pitches they buried knees and toes in the gravel as they passed her from hand to hand. The light was fading when they reached the crest, exhausted, and it cost Andrew a determined effort to go back some distance with Carnally for the provisions. Indeed, it was only hunger forced him to do so.

The nights had been getting lighter rapidly, but the soft dimness was puzzling when the two men faced the ascent. They could not judge the steepness of the slope; they plunged into bushes they had not noticed, and there were spots where they narrowly escaped dangerous falls. Slipping, scrambling, floundering, Andrew struggled up with his load, and sank down, worn out and aching, beside Graham's fire.

"You'll have to cook; I can't make another move," he said. "It strikes me that the man who finds a mine in this country deserves all he gets. That raises the question – how is it that Mappin can trust the rascals he has sent after us? Suppose they found the lode, why couldn't they stick to it?"

"A mineral vein is of little use to a man without money," Graham explained. "It would cost him a good deal in transport of provisions and tools before he got his legal development work done; and then he wouldn't be much farther on, because he'd have to put up expensive plant and clear a trail to bring the ore out. As a matter of fact, the fortunate prospector is forced to look for a capitalist."

"That," remarked Carnally, "is how we are fixed. You needn't worry about our going back on you."