Kitabı oku: «Gabriel Conroy», sayfa 13

CHAPTER II.
IN WHICH THE TREASURE IS FOUND – AND LOST

As no word has been handed down of the conversation that night between Olly and her sister-in-law, I fear the masculine reader must view their subsequent conduct in the light of Gabriel's abstract proportion. The feminine reader – to whose well-known sense of justice and readiness to acknowledge a characteristic weakness, I chiefly commend these pages – will of course require no further explanation, and will be quite ready to believe that the next morning Olly and Mrs. Conroy were apparently firm friends, and that Gabriel was incontinently snubbed by both of these ladies as he deserved.

"You don't treat July right," said Olly, one morning, to Gabriel, during five minutes that she had snatched from the inseparable company of Mrs. Conroy.

Gabriel opened his eyes in wonder. "I hain't been 'round the house much, because I allowed you and July didn't want my kempany," he began apologetically, "and ef it's shortness of provisions, I've fooled away so much time, Olly, in prospectin' that ledge that I had no time to clar up and get any dust. I reckon, may be the pork bar'l is low. But I'll fix thet straight soon, Olly, soon."

"But it ain't thet, Gabe – it ain't provisions – it's – it's – O! you ain't got no sabe ez a husband – thar!" burst out the direct Olly at last.

Without the least sign of resentment, Gabriel looked thoughtfully at his sister.

"Thet's so – I reckon thet is the thing. Not hevin' been married afore, and bein', so to speak, strange and green-handed, like as not I don't exactly come up to the views of a woman ez hez hed thet experience. And her husband a savang! a savang! Olly, and a larned man."

"You're as good as him!" ejaculated Olly, hastily, whose parts of speech were less accurately placed than her feelings, "and I reckon she loves you a heap better, Gabe. But you ain't quite lovin' enough," she added, as Gabriel started. "Why, thar was thet young couple thet came up from Simpson's last week, and stayed over at Mrs. Markle's. Thar was no end of the attentions thet thet man paid to thet thar woman – fixin' her shawl, histin' the winder and puttin' it down, and askin' after her health every five minnits – and they'd sit and sit, just like this," – here Olly, in the interests of domestic felicity, improvised the favourite attitude of the bridegroom, as far as the great girth of Gabriel's waist and chest could be "clipped" by her small arms.

"Wot! afore folks?" asked Gabriel, looking down a little shamefully on the twining arms of his sister.

"Yes – in course – afore folks. Why, they want it to be known thet they're married."

"Olly," broke out Gabriel desperately, "your sister-in-law ain't thet kind of woman. She'd reckon thet kind o' thing was low."

But Olly only replied by casting a mischievous look at her brother, shaking her curls, and with the mysterious admonition, "Try it!" left him, and went back to Mrs. Conroy.

Happily for Gabriel, Mrs. Conroy did not offer an opportunity for the exhibition of any tenderness on Gabriel's part. Although she did not make any allusion to the past, and even utterly ignored any previous quarrel, she still preserved a certain coy demeanour toward him, that, while it relieved him of an onerous duty, very greatly weakened his faith in the infallibility of Olly's judgment. When, out of respect to that judgment, he went so far as to throw his arms ostentatiously around his wife's waist one Sunday, while perambulating the single long public street of One Horse Gulch, and that lady, with great decision, quietly slipped out of his embrace, he doubted still more.

"I did it on account o' what you said, Olly, and darn my skin if she seemed to like it at all, and even the boys hangin' around seemed to think it was queer. Jo Hobson snickered right out."

"When was it?" said Olly.

"Sunday."

Olly, sharply – "Where?"

Gabriel – "On Main Street."

Olly, apostrophising heaven with her blue eyes – "Ef thar ever was a blunderin' mule, Gabe, it's YOU!"

Gabriel, mildly and thoughtfully – "Thet's so."

Howbeit, some kind of a hollow truce was patched up between these three belligerents, and Mrs. Conroy did not go to San Francisco on business. It is presumed that the urgency of her affairs there was relieved by correspondence, for during the next two weeks she expressed much anxiety on the arrival of the regular tri-weekly mails. And one day it brought her not only a letter, but an individual of some importance in this history.

He got down from the Wingdam coach amid considerable local enthusiasm. Apart from the fact that it was well known that he was a rich San Francisco banker and capitalist, his brusque, sharp energy, his easy, sceptical familiarity and general contempt for and ignoring of everything but the practical and material, and, above all, his reputation for success, which seemed to make that success a wholesome business principal rather than good fortune, had already fascinated the passengers who had listened to his curt speech and half oracular axioms. They had forgiven dogmatisms voiced in such a hearty manner, and emphasised possibly with a slap on the back of the listener. He had already converted them to his broad materialism – less, perhaps, by his curt rhetoric than by the logic of his habitual business success, and the respectability that it commanded. It was easy to accept scepticism from a man who evidently had not suffered by it. Radicalism and democracy are much more fascinating to us when the apostle is in comfortable case and easy circumstances, than when he is clad in fustian, and consistently out of a situation. Human nature thirsts for the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, but would prefer to receive it from the happy owner of a latch-key to the Garden of Eden, rather than from the pilferer who had just been ejected from the premises.

It is probable, however, that the possessor of these admirable qualities had none of that fine scorn for a mankind accessible to this weakness which at present fills the breast of the writer, and, I trust, the reader, of these pages. If he had, I doubt if he would have been successful. Like a true hero, he was quite unconscious of the quality of his heroism, and utterly unable to analyse it. So that, without any previous calculations or pre-arranged plan, he managed to get rid of his admirers, and apply himself to the business he had in hand without either wilfully misleading the public of One Horse Gulch, or giving the slightest intimation of what that real business was. That the general interests of One Horse Gulch had attracted the attention of this powerful capitalist – that he intended to erect a new Hotel, or "start" an independent line of stage-coaches from Sacramento, were among the accepted theories. Everybody offered him vast and gratuitous information, and out of the various facts and theories submitted to him he gained the particular knowledge he required without asking for it. Given a reputation for business shrewdness and omnipresence in any one individual, and the world will speedily place him beyond the necessity of using them.

And so in a casual, general way, the stranger was shown over the length and breadth and thickness and present and future of One Horse Gulch. When he had reached the farther extremity of the Gulch he turned to his escort – "I'll make the inquiry you ask now."

"How?"

"By telegraph – if you'll take it."

He tore a leaf from a memorandum-book and wrote a few lines.

"And you?"

"Oh, I'll look around here – I suppose there's not much beyond this?"

"No; the next claim is Gabriel Conroy's."

"Not much account, I reckon?"

"No? It pays him grub!"

"Well, dine with me at three o'clock, when and where you choose – you know best. Invite whom you like. Good-bye!" And the great man's escort, thus dismissed, departed, lost in admiration of the decisive promptitude and liberality of his guest.

Left to himself, the stranger turned his footsteps in the direction of Gabriel Conroy's claim. Had he been an admirer of Nature, or accessible to any of those influences which a contemplation of wild scenery is apt to produce in weaker humanity, he would have been awed by the gradual transition of a pastoral landscape to one of uncouth heroics. In a few minutes he had left the belt of sheltering pines and entered upon the ascent of a shadowless, scorched, and blistered mountain, that here and there in places of vegetation had put on the excrescences of scoria, or a singular eruption of crust, that, breaking beneath his feet in slippery grey powder, made his footing difficult and uncertain. Had he been possessed of a scientific eye, he would have noted here and there the evidences of volcanic action, in the sudden depressions, the abrupt elevations, the marks of disruption and upheaval, and the river-like flow of débris that protruded a black tongue into the valley below. But I am constrained to believe the stranger's dominant impression was simply one of heat. Half-way up the ascent he took off his coat and wiped his forehead with his handkerchief. Nevertheless, certain peculiarities in his modes of progression showed him to be not unfamiliar with mountain travel. Two or three times during the ascent he stopped, and, facing about, carefully resurveyed the path beneath him. Slight as was the action, it was the unfailing sign of the mountaineer, who recognised that the other side of the mountain was as yet an undetermined quantity, and was prepared to retrace his steps if necessary. At the summit he paused and looked around him.

Immediately at his feet the Gulch which gave its name to the settlement, and from which the golden harvest was gathered, broadened into a thickly wooded valley. Its quivering depths were suffused by the incense of odorous gums and balms liberated by the fierce heat of the noonday sun that rose to his face in soft, tremulous waves, and filled the air with its heated spices. Through a gap in the cañon to the west, a faint, scarcely-distinguishable line of cloud indicated the coast range. North and south, higher hills arose heavily terraced with straight colonnades of pines, that made the vast black monolith on which he stood appear blacker and barer by contrast. Higher hills to the east – one or two peaks – and between them in the sunlight odd-looking, indistinct, vacant intervals – blanks in the landscape as yet not filled in with colour or expression. Yet the stranger knew them to be snow, and for a few moments seemed fascinated – gazing at them with a fixed eye and rigid mouth, until, with an effort, he tore himself away.

Scattered over the summit were numerous holes that appeared to have been recently sunk. In one of them the stranger picked up a fragment of the crumbled rock, and examined it carelessly. Then he slowly descended the gentler slope towards the west, in the direction of a claim wherein his quick eye had discovered a man at work. A walk of a few moments brought him to the bank of red clay, the heap of tailings, the wooden sluice-box, and the pan and shovel which constituted the appurtenances of an ordinary claim. As he approached nearer, the workman rose from the bank over which he was bending, and leaning on his pick, turned his face to the new-comer. His broad, athletic figure, his heavy blonde beard, and serious, perplexed eyes, were unmistakable. It was Gabriel Conroy.

"How are ye?" said the stranger, briskly extending a hand, which Gabriel took mechanically. "You're looking well! Recollect you, but you don't recollect me. Eh?" He laughed curtly, in a fashion as short and business-like as his speech, and then fixed his eyes rather impatiently on the hesitating Gabriel.

Gabriel could only stare, and struggle with a tide of thick-coming remembrances. He looked around him; the sun was beating down on the old familiar objects, everything was unchanged – and yet this face, this voice.

"I am here on a matter of business," continued the stranger briskly, dismissing the question of recognition as one unessential to the business on hand – "and – what have you got to propose?" He leaned lightly against the bank and supported himself by thrusting Gabriel's pickaxe against the bank, as he waited a reply.

"It's Peter Dumphy," said Gabriel, in a awe-stricken voice.

"Yes. You recollect me now! Thought you would. It's five years and over – ain't it? Rough times them, Gabriel – warn't they? Eh! But you're lookin' well – doin' well, too. Hey? Well – what do you propose to do about this claim? Haven't made up your mind – hey? Come then – I'll make a proposition. First, I suppose your title's all right, hey?"

It was so evident from Gabriel's dazed manner that, apart from his astonishment at meeting Peter Dumphy, he did not know what he was talking about, that Dumphy paused.

"It's about these specimens," he added, eyeing Gabriel keenly, "the specimens you sent me."

"Wot specimens?" said Gabriel vaguely, still lost in the past.

"The ones your wife sent me – all the same thing, you know."

"But it ain't," said Gabriel, with his old truthful directness. "You better talk to her 'bout thet. Thet's her look-out. I reckon now she did say suthin'," continued Gabriel, meditatively, "about sendin' rock to Frisco to be tested, but I didn't somehow get to take an interest in it. Leastways, it's her funeral. You'd better see her."

It was Mr. Dumphy's turn to be perplexed. In his perfect misapprehension of the character of the man before him, he saw only skilful business evasion under the guise of simplicity. He remembered, moreover, that in the earlier days of his prosperity as Dumphy and Jenkins, Commission Merchants, he was himself in the habit of referring customers with whom he was not ready to treat, to Jenkins, very much as he had just now been referred to Mrs. Conroy.

"Of course," he said briskly; "only I thought I'd save time, which is short with me to-day, by coming directly to you. May not have time to see her. But you can write."

"Thet's so," said Gabriel, "p'r'aps it's just as well in the long run. Ef ye don't see her, she'll know it ain't your fault. I'll let on that much to her." And having disposed of this unimportant feature of the interview, he continued, "Ye haven't heard nought o' Grace – ye mind Grace? Dumphy! – a purty little girl ez was with me up thar. Ye ain't heerd anything o' her – nor seen her, may be – hev you?"

Of course this question at such a moment was to Mr. Dumphy susceptible of only one meaning. It was that Mrs. Conroy had confessed everything to Gabriel, and that he wished to use Dumphy's complicity in the deceit as a lever in future business transactions. Mr. Dumphy felt he had to deal with two consummate actors – one of whom was a natural hypocrite. For the first time in his life he was impatient of evil. We never admire truth and sincerity so highly as when we find it wanting in an adversary.

"Ran off with some fellow, didn't she? Yes, I remember. You won't see her again. It's just as well for you! I'd call her dead, anyway."

Although Dumphy was convinced that Gabriel's interest in the fate of his sister was hypocritical, he was not above a Christian hope that this might wound a brother's feelings. He turned to go.

"Can't you come back this way and hev a little talk about ol' times?" said Gabriel, warming toward Dumphy under the magic of old associations, and ignoring with provoking unconsciousness the sting of his last speech. "There's Olly ez 'ud jest admire to see ye. Ye mind Olly? – the baby, Grace's little sister, growed a fine likely gal now. See yer," continued Gabriel with sudden energy, putting down his pick and shovel, "I'll jess go over thar with ye now."

"No! no!" said Dumphy quickly. "Busy! Can't! 'Nother time! Good-day; see you again some time. So long!" and he hurriedly departed, retracing his steps until the claim and its possessor were lost in the intervening foliage.

Then he paused, hesitated, and then striking across the summit of the hill, made his way boldly to Gabriel's cottage.

Either Mrs. Conroy was expecting him, or had detected him coming through the woods, for she opened the door to him and took him into her little parlour with a graciousness of demeanour and an elaboration of toilet that would have been dangerous to any other man. But, like most men with a deservedly bad reputation among women, Mr. Dumphy always rigidly separated any weakness of gallantly from his business.

"Here only for a few moments. Sorry can't stay longer. You're looking well!" said Mr. Dumphy.

Mrs. Conroy said she had not expected the pleasure of a personal interview; Mr. Dumphy must be so busy always.

"Yes. But I like to bring good news myself. The specimens you sent have been assayed by first-class, reliable men. They'll do. No gold – but eighty per cent silver. Hey! P'r'aps you expected it."

But Mr. Dumphy could see plainly from Mrs. Conroy's eager face that she had not expected it.

"Silver," she gasped – "eighty per cent!"

He was mystified, but relieved. It was evident that she had not consulted anybody else, and that he was first on the ground. So he said curtly —

"What do you propose?"

"I don't know," began the lady. "I haven't thought" —

"Exactly!" interrupted Dumphy. "Haven't got any proposition. Excuse me – but" (taking out his watch) "time's nearly up. Look here. Eighty per cent's big thing! But silver mine takes gold mine to run it. All expense first – no profit till you get down. Works, smelting – cost twenty per cent. Here's my proposition. Put whole thing in joint-stock company; 100 shares; five millions capital. You take fifty shares. I'll take twenty-five – dispose of other twenty-five as I can. How's that? Hey? You can't say! Well – think of it!"

But all Mrs. Conroy could think of was two and a half millions! It stared at her, stretching its gigantic ciphers across the room. It blazed in golden letters on cheques, – it rose on glittering piles of silver coin to the ceiling of the parlour. Yet she turned to him with a haggard face, and said —

"But this – this money – is only in prospective."

"Cash your draft for the sum ten minutes after the stock's issued. That's business."

With this certainty Mrs. Conroy recovered herself.

"I will talk – with – my husband," she said.

Mr. Dumphy smiled – palpably, openly, and shamelessly. Mrs. Conroy coloured quickly, but not from the consciousness Mr. Dumphy attributed to her, of detected cunning. She had begun to be ashamed of the position she believed she occupied in this man's eyes, and fearful that he should have discovered her husband's indifference to her.

"I've already seen him," said Mr. Dumphy quietly.

The colour dropped from Mrs. Conroy's cheeks.

"He knows nothing of this," she said faintly.

"Of course," said Dumphy half contemptuously, "he said so; referred to you. That's all right. That's business."

"You did not tell him – you dared not" – she said excitedly.

Mr. Dumphy looked curiously at her for a moment. Then he rose and shut the door.

"Look here," he said, facing Mrs. Conroy in a hard, matter-of-fact way, "do you mean to say that what that man – your husband – said, was true? That he knows nothing of you; of the circumstances under which you came here?"

"He does not – I swear to God he does not," she said passionately.

It was inexplicable, but Mr. Dumphy believed her.

"But how will you explain this to him? You can do nothing without him."

"Why should he know more? If he has discovered this mine, it is his– free of any gift of mine – as independent of any claim of mine as if we were strangers. The law makes him the owner of the mine that he discovers, no matter on whose land it may be found. In personating his sister, I only claimed a grant to the land. He has made the discovery which gives it its value! Even that sister," she added with a sudden flash in her eyes – "even that sister, were she living, could not take it from him now!"

It was true! This woman, with whose weakness he had played, had outwitted them all, and slipped through their fingers almost without stain or blemish. And in a way so simple! Duped as he had been, he could hardly restrain his admiration, and said quite frankly and heartily —

"Good – that's business!"

And then – ah me! this clever creature – this sharp adventuress, this Anonyma Victrix began to cry, and to beg him not to tell her husband!

At this familiar sign of the universal feminine weakness, Dumphy picked up his ears and arts again.

"Where's your proof that your husband is the first discoverer?" he said curtly, but not unkindly. "Won't that paper that Dr. Devarges gave his sister show that the doctor was really the discoverer of this lead?"

"Yes; but Dr. Devarges is dead, and I hold the paper."

"Good!" He took out his watch. "I've five minutes more. Now look here. I'm not going to say that you haven't managed this thing well – you have! – and that you can, if you like, get along without me – you can! See! I'm not going to say that I went into this thing without the prospect of making something out of it myself. I have! That's business. The thing for you to consider now is this: understanding each other as we do, couldn't you push this thing through better with my help – and helping me – than to go elsewhere! Understand me! You could find a dozen men in San Francisco who would make you as good an offer and better! But it wouldn't be to their interest to keep down any unpleasant reminders of the past as it would be mine. You understand?"

Mrs. Conroy replied by extending her hand.

"To keep my secret from every one – from him," she said earnestly.

"Certainly —that's business."

Then these two artful ones shook hands with a heartfelt and loyal admiration and belief for each other that I fear more honest folks might have profited by, and Mr. Dumphy went off to dine.

As Mrs. Conroy closed the front door, Olly came running in from the back piazza. Mrs. Conroy caught her in her arms and discharged her pent-up feelings, and, let us hope, her penitence, in a joyful and passionate embrace. But Olly struggled to extricate herself. When at last she got her head free, she said angrily —

"Let me go. I want to see him."

"Who – Mr. Dumphy?" asked Mrs. Conroy, still holding the child, with a half-hysterical laugh.

"Yes. Gabe said he was here. Let me go, I say!"

"What do you want with him?" asked her captor with shrill gaiety.

"Gabe says – Gabe says – let me go, will you? Gabe says he knew" —

"Whom?"

"My dear, dear sister Grace! There! I didn't mean to hurt you – but I must go!"

And she did, leaving the prospective possessor of two and a half millions, vexed, suspicious, and alone.