It was the second morning after the attempt upon the papers, and Brooke lay in a basket chair on the little verandah at the ranch. In spite of the settlement doctor's ministrations his arm was a good deal more painful than he had expected it to be, his head ached; and he felt unpleasantly lethargic and limp. It, however, seemed to him that this wound was not sufficiently serious to account for this, and he wondered vaguely whether it resulted from too strenuous physical exertion coupled with the increasing mental strain he had borne of late. That question was, however, of no great importance, for he had a more urgent one to grapple with, and in the meanwhile it was pleasant to lie there and listen languidly while Barbara talked to him.
The sunshine lay bright upon the climbing pines which filled the listless air with resinous odors, but there was restful shadow on the verandah, and wherever the eye wandered an entrancing vista of gleaming snow. Brooke had, however, seen a good deal of snow, and floundered through it waist-deep, already,and it was the girl who sat close at hand, looking, it seemed to him, refreshingly cool and dainty in her loose white dress, his gaze most often rested on. Her quiet graciousness had also a soothing effect upon the man who had risen unrefreshed after a night of mental conflict which had continued through the few brief snatches of fevered sleep. Brooke felt the need of moral stimulant as well as physical rest, for the struggle he had desisted from for the time was not over yet.
He was tenacious of purpose, but it had cost him an effort to adhere to the terms of his compact with Saxton, and it was with a thrill of intense disgust he realized how far it had led him when he came upon the thief, for there was no ignoring the fact that it would be very difficult to make any great distinction between them. It had also become evident that he could not continue to play the part Saxton had allotted him, and yet if he threw it over he stood to lose everything his companion, who was at once a reproach to him and an incentive to a continuance in the career of deception, impersonated. Her society and his few visits to the ranch had shown him the due value of the refinement and congenial environment which no man without dollars could hope to enjoy, and re-awakened an appreciation of the little amenities and decencies of life which had become scarcely more than a memory to him. With the six thousand dollars in his hands he might once moreattain them, but it was now evident that the memory of how he had accomplished it would tend to mar any satisfaction he could expect to derive from this. He could, in the meanwhile, neither nerve himself to bear the thought of the girl's scorn when she realized what his purpose had been, nor bid her farewell and go back to the aimless life of poverty. One thing alone was certain. Devine's papers were safe from him.
He lay silent almost too long, watching her with a vague longing in his gaze, for her head was partly turned from him. He could see her face in profile, which accentuated its clean chiselling, while her pose displayed the firm white neck and fine lines of the figure the thin white dress flowed away from. He had also guessed enough of her character to realize that it was not to any approach to physical perfection she owed most of her attractiveness, for it seemed to him that she brought with her an atmosphere of refinement and tranquillity which nothing that was sordid or ignoble could breathe in. Perhaps she felt his eyes upon her, for she turned at last and glanced at him.
"I have been thinking—about that night," she said.
"You really shouldn't," said Brooke, who felt suddenly uneasy. "It isn't worth while."
Barbara smiled. "That is a point upon which opinions may differ, but I understand your attitude.You see, I have been in England, and you apparently believe it the correct thing to hide your light under a bushel there."
"No," said Brooke, drily, "at least, not all of us. In fact, we are not averse from graciously permitting other folks, and now and then the Press, to proclaim our good deeds for us. I don't know that the more primitive fashion of doing it one's self isn't quite as tasteful."
Barbara shook her head. "There are," she said, "several kinds of affectation, and I am not to be put off. Now, you are quite aware that you did my brother-in-law a signal service, and contrived to get me out of a very unpleasant, and, I fancy, a slightly perilous situation."
The color deepened a little in Brooke's face, and once more he was sensible of the humiliation that had troubled him on previous occasions, as he remembered that it was by no means to do Devine a service he had crept into the ranch. It was a most unpleasant feeling, and he had signally failed to accustom himself to it.
"I really don't think there was very much risk," he said. "Besides, you had a pistol."
Barbara laughed softly. "I never fired off a pistol in my life, and I almost fancy there was nothing in the one in question."
"Didn't you notice whether there were any cartridges in the chamber?"
"No," said Barbara. "I'm not sure I know which the chamber is, but I pressed something I supposed to be the trigger, and it only made a click."
Brooke glanced at her a trifle sharply. "You meant to fire at the man?"
"I'm afraid I did. Was it very dreadful? He was there with an unlawful purpose, and I saw his eyes grow wicked and his hand tighten just as you sprang at him. Still, I was almost glad when the pistol did not go off."
She seemed to have some difficulty in repressing a shiver at the recollection, and Brooke sat silent for a moment or two with his heart throbbing a good deal faster than usual. He could guess what that effort had cost his companion, and that it was his peril which had nerved her to overcome her natural shrinking from taking life. Perhaps Barbara noticed the effect her explanation had on him, and desired to lessen it, for she said, "It really was unpleasant, but I remembered that you had come there to ensure the safety of my brother-in-law's property, and one is permitted to shoot at a thief in this country."
Brooke, who could not help it, made a little abrupt movement, and felt his face grow hot as he wondered what she would think of him if she knew the purpose that had brought him there. The fact that she seemed quite willing to believe that one was warranted in firing at a thief had also its sting.
"Of course!" he said. "I am, however, inclinedto think you saved my life. The man probably saw your hand go up and that made him a trifle too precipitate. Still, perhaps, he only wanted to look at your brother-in-law's papers and had no intention of stealing anything."
Barbara, who appeared glad to change the subject, smiled.
"Admitting that, I can't see any great difference," she said. "The man who runs a personal risk to secure a wallet with dollar bills in it that belongs to somebody else naturally does not expect commendation, or usually get it, but it seems to me a good deal meaner thing to steal a claim by cunning trickery. For instance, one has a certain admiration for the train robbers across the frontier. For two or three road-agents—and there are not often more—to hold up and rob a train demands, at least, a good deal of courage, but to plunder a man by prying into his secrets is only contemptible. Don't you think so?"
Brooke winced beneath her gaze.
"Well," he said slowly, "I suppose it is. Still, you see there may be excuses even for such a person."
"Excuses! Surely—you—do not feel capable of inventing any for a claim-jumper?"
Brooke felt that in his case there were, at least, one or two, but he had sufficient reasons for not making them clear to the girl.
"Well," he said, "I wonder if you could make any for a train-robber?"
Barbara appeared reflective. "We will admit that the dishonesty is the same in both cases, though that is not quite the point. The men who hold a train up, however, take a serious personal risk, and stake their lives upon their quickness and nerve. They have nobody to fall back upon, and must face the results if the courage of any of the passengers is equal to theirs. Daring of that kind commands a certain respect. The claim-jumper, on the contrary, must necessarily proceed by stealth, and, of course, rarely ventures on an attempt until he makes sure that the law will support him, because the man he means to rob has neglected some trivial requirement."
"Then it is admissible to steal, so long as you do it openly and take a personal risk? Still, I believe I have heard of claim-jumpers being shot, though I am not quite sure that it happened in Canada."
Barbara laughed. "They probably deserved it. It is not admissible to steal under any circumstances, but the safer and more subtle forms of theft are especially repellent. Now, I think I have made out my case for the train-robber, but I cannot see why you should constitute yourself an advocate for the claim-jumper."
Brooke contrived to force a smile. "It is," he said, "often a little difficult to make sure of one's motives, but we can, at least, take it for granted that the man who robs a train is the nobler rascal."
Barbara, who appeared thoughtful, sat silentawhile. "It was fortunate you arrived when you did that night," she said, meditatively. "Still, as you could not well have known the man meant to make the attempt, or have expected to find anybody still awake at the ranch, it seems an almost astonishing coincidence."
Though he surmised that no notion of what had brought him there had entered his companion's mind, Brooke felt hot to the forehead now, for he was unpleasantly sensible that the girl was watching him. An explanation that might have served also suggested itself to him, but he felt that he could not add to his offences.
"It certainly was," he said, languidly. "I have, however, heard of coincidences that were more astonishing still."
Barbara nodded. "No doubt," she said. "We will let it go at that. As you may have noticed, we are now and then almost indecently candid in this country, but I agree with my brother-in-law who says that nobody could make an Englishman talk unless he wanted to."
"Silence is reputed to be golden," said Brooke, reflectively, "and I really think there are cases when it is. At least, there was one I figured in when some two or three minutes' unchecked speech cost me more dollars than I have made ever since. It happened in England, and I merely favored another man withmy frank opinion of him. After a thing of that kind one is apt to be guarded."
"I think you should cultivate a sense of proportion. Can one make up for a single mistake in one direction by erring continually in the opposite one? Still, that is not a question we need go into now. You expect to get the rope across the cañon very shortly?"
"Yes," said Brooke, whose expression changed suddenly, "I do."
"And then?"
Brooke, who felt the girl's eyes upon him, and understood what she meant, made a little gesture. "I don't know. I shall probably take the trail again. It does not matter greatly where it may lead me."
There was a curious little vibration he could not quite repress in his voice, and both he and his companion were, under the circumstances, silent a trifle too long, for there are times when silence is very expressive. Then it was Barbara who spoke, though she felt that what she said was not especially appropriate.
"You will be sorry to go?"
Brooke looked at her steadily, with his lips set, and, though she did not see this, his fingers quivering a little, for he realized at last what it would cost him to leave her. For a moment a hot flood of passion and longing threatened to sweep him away, buthe held it in check, and Barbara only noticed the grimness of his face.
"What answer could I make? The conventional one demanded scarcely fits the case," he said, and his laugh rang hollow.
"But the dam will not be finished," said Barbara, who realized that she had made an unfortunate start.
Again Brooke sat silent. It seemed folly to abandon his purpose, and he wondered whether he would have sufficient strength of will to go away. It was also folly to stay and sink further under the girl's influence, when the revelation he shrank from would, if he persisted in his attempt to recover his dollars, become inevitable. Still, once he left the Canopus he must go back to a life of hardship and labor, and, in spite of the humiliation and fear of the future he often felt, the present was very pleasant. On the other hand there was only scarcity, exposure to rain and frost, and bitter, hopeless toil. He sat very still with one hand closed, not daring to look at his companion until she spoke again.
"You say you do not know where the trail may lead you, and you do not seem to care. One would fancy that was wrong," she said.
"Why?"
Barbara turned a little, and looked at him with a faint sparkle in her eyes. "In this province the trail the resolute man takes usually leads to success. We want bridges and railroad trestles, forests cleared,and the valleys lined with roads. You can build them."
Brooke shook his head, though her confidence in him, as well as her optimism, had its due effect.
"I wish I was a little more sure," he said. "The difficulty, as I think I once pointed out, is that one needs dollars to make a fair start with."
"They are, at least, not indispensable, as the history of most of the men who have done anything worth while in the province shows. Isn't there a certain satisfaction in starting with everything against one?"
"Afterwards, perhaps. That is, if one struggles through. There is, however, one learns by experience, really very little satisfaction at the time, especially if one scarcely gets beyond the start at all."
Barbara smiled a little, though she looked at him steadily. "You," she said, "will, I think, go a long way. In fact, if it was a sword I gave you, I should expect it of you."
Brooke came very near losing his head just then, though he realized that, after all, the words implied little more than a belief in his capabilities, and for a few insensate moments he almost decided to stay at the Canopus and make the most of his opportunities. Saxton, he reflected, might put sufficient pressure upon Devine to extort the six thousand dollars from him without the necessity for his part becoming apparent at all. With that sum in his hands there was,he felt, very little he could not attain, and then he shook off the deluding fancy, for it once more became apparent that the deed, which gave Saxton the hold he wished for upon Devine would, even if she never heard of it, stand as barrier between Barbara Heathcote and him.
"One feels inclined to wonder now and then whether success does not occasionally, at least, cost the man who achieves it more than it is worth," he said. "The actual record of the leaders one is expected to look up to might, in that connection, provide one with a fund of somewhat astonishing information."
Barbara made a little gesture of impatience. "Is the poor man the only one who can be honest?"
"One would, at least, feel inclined to fancy that the man who is unduly honest runs a serious risk of remaining poor."
"I think that is an argument I have very little sympathy with," said Barbara. "It is, you see, so easy for the incapable to impeach the successful man's honesty. I might even go a little further and admit that it is an attitude I scarcely expected from you."
Brooke smiled somewhat bitterly. "You will, however, remember that I have made no attempt to persuade you of my own integrity."
Just then, as it happened, Mrs. Devine came into the verandah with a packet in her hand.
"These are the papers the man tried to steal," she said. "Since you insist upon going back to the cañon to-day I wonder if you would take care of them?"
Brooke gasped, and felt the veins swell on his forehead as he looked at her. "You wish me to take them away?"
"Of course! My nerves are really horribly unsettled, and I was sent to the mountains for quietness. How could any one expect me to get it when I couldn't even sleep for fear of that man or some one else coming back for these documents?"
"They are, I think, of considerable importance to your husband," said Brooke.
"That is precisely why I would like to feel that they were safe in your tent. Nobody would expect you to have them there."
Brooke turned his head a little so that he could see Barbara's face.
"I appreciate your confidence," he said, and the girl noticed that his voice was a trifle hoarse. "Still, I must point out that I am almost a stranger to Mr. Devine and you."
Barbara smiled a little, but there was something that set the man's heart beating in her eyes.
"I am not sure that everybody would be so willing to make the most of the fact, but I feel quite sure my sister's confidence is warranted," she said."That, of course, does not sound very nice, but you have made it necessary."
Brooke, who glanced curiously at the single seal, laid down the packet, and Mrs. Devine smiled. "Ifeel ever so much easier now that is off my mind," she said. "Still, I shall expect you to sleep with the papers under your pillow."
She went out, and left him and Barbara alone again, but Brooke knew that the struggle was over and the question decided once for all. The girl's trust in him had not only made those papers inviolable so far as he was concerned, but had rendered a breach with Saxton unavoidable. He knew now that he could never do what the latter had expected from him.
"You appeared almost unwilling to take the responsibility," said the girl.
Brooke smiled curiously. "I really think that was the case," he said. "In fact, your confidence almost hurt me. One feels the obligation of proving it warranted—in every respect—you see. That is partly why I shall go away the day we swing the first load of props across the cañon."
Barbara felt a trace of disconcertion. "But my brother-in-law may ask you to do something else for him."
"I scarcely think that is likely," said Brooke, with a little dry smile.
Barbara said nothing further, and when she lefthim Brooke was once more sensible of a curious relief. It would, he knew, cost him a strenuous effort to go away, but he would, at least, be freed from the horrible necessity of duping the girl, who, it seemed, believed in him. When Jimmy arrived that evening to accompany him back to his tent at the cañon, and expressed his satisfaction at the fact that he did not appear very much the worse, he smiled a trifle drily.
"That," he said, "is a little astonishing. I am, I think, warranted in believing myself six thousand dollars worse off than when I went away."
Jimmy stared at him incredulously.
"Well," he said, "I never figured you had that many, and I don't quite see how you could have let them get away from you here. Something you didn't expect has happened?"
Brooke appeared reflective. "I'm not quite sure whether I expected it or not, but I almost hope I did," he said.
There was a portentous quietness in the little wooden town which did not exactly please Mr. Faraday Slocum, the somewhat discredited local agent of Grant Devine, as he ascended the steep street from the grocery store. The pines closed in upon it, but their sombre spires were growing dim, and the white mists clung about them, for dusk was creeping up the valley. The latter fact brought Slocum a sense of satisfaction, and at the same time a growing uneasiness. He had, as it happened, signally failed to collect a certain sum from the store-keeper, who had expressed his opinion of him and his doings with vitriolic candor, and it was partly as the result of this that very little escaped his notice as he proceeded with an ostentatious leisureliness towards his dwelling.
A straggling row of stores and houses, log and frame and galvanized iron, jumbled all together in unsightly confusion, stretched away before him towards the gap in the forest where the railroad track came in, but it was the little groups of menwho hung about them which occupied his quiet attention. He saluted them with somewhat forced good-humor as he went by, but there was no great cordiality in their responses, and some of them stared at him in uncompromising silence. There was, he felt, a certain tension in the atmosphere, and it was not without a purpose he stopped in front of the wooden hotel, where a little crowd had collected upon the verandah.
"It's kind of sultry to-night, boys," he said.
Nobody responded for a moment or two, and then there was an unpleasant laugh as somebody said, "You've hit it; I guess it is."
Slocum remembered that most of those loungers had been glad to greet him, and even hand him their spare dollars, not long ago; but there was a decided difference now. He was a capable business man, who could make the most of an opportunity, and the inhabitants of the little wooden town had shown themselves disposed to regard certain trifling obliquities leniently, while they or their friends made satisfactory profits on the deals in ranching land and building lots he recommended. That, however, was while the boom lasted, but when the bottom had, as they expressed it, dropped out, and a good many of them found themselves saddled with unmarketable possessions, they commenced to be troubled with grave doubts concerning the rectitude of his conduct. Slocum was naturally quite aware of this, but he wasa man of nerve, and quietly walked up the verandah steps.
"It's that hot I must have a drink, boys. Who's coming in with me?" he said, genially.
A few months ago a good many of them would have been willing to profit by the invitation, but that night nobody moved, and Slocum laughed softly.
"Well," he said, "I'm not going to worry you. This is evidently a temperance meeting."
He passed into the empty bar alone, and a man who leaned upon the counter in his shirt sleeves shook his head as he glanced towards the verandah.
"They're not in a good humor to-night. It looks very much as if someone has been talking to them?" he said.
Slocum smiled a little, though he had already noticed this, and taken precautions the bar-keeper never suspected.
"I guess they'll simmer down. Who has been talking to them?" he said.
"The two ranchers you sold the Hemlock Range to. There was another man who'd bought a piece of natural prairie, and it cost him most of five dollars before he got through telling them what he thought of you. Now, I don't know what their notion is, but I'd light out for a little if I was you."
Slocum appeared to reflect. "Well," he said, "I may go to-morrow."
"I'd go to-night," said the bar-keeper, significantly. "I guess it would be wiser."
Slocum, who did not consider it necessary to tell him that he quite agreed with this, went out, and a few minutes later stopped outside his house, which was the last one in the town. A big, rudely-painted sign, nailed across the front of it, recommended any one who desired to buy or sell land and mineral properties or had mortgages to arrange, to come in and confer with the agent of Grant Devine. He glanced back up the street, and was relieved to notice that there was nobody loitering about that part of it. Then he looked at the forest the trail led into, which was shadowy and still, and, slipping round the building, went in through the back of it. A woman stood waiting him in a dimly-lighted room, which was littered with feminine clothing besides two big valises and an array of bulky packages. She was expensively dressed, but her face was anxious, and he noticed that her fingers were quivering.
"You're quite ready, Sue?" he said.
The woman pointed to the packages with a little dramatic gesture. "Oh, yes," she said. "I'm ready, though I'll have to leave most two hundred dollars' worth of clothes behind me. I've no use for taking in plain sewing while you think over what you've brought me to in the penitentiary."
Slocum smiled drily. "If you hadn't wanted quite so many dry goods, I'm not sure it would have cometo this, but we needn't worry about that just now. Tom will have the horses round in 'bout five minutes. You don't figure on taking all that truck along with you?"
"I do," said the woman. "I've got to have something to put on when we get to Oregon!"
"Well," said Slocum, grimly, "I'll be quite glad to get out with a whole hide, and I guess it couldn't be done if we started with a packhorse train or a wagon. I hadn't quite fixed to light out until I got the message that Devine, who didn't seem quite pleased with the last accounts, was coming in."
"Could you have stood the boys off?"
"I might have done," said Slocum, reflectively. "Still, I couldn't stand off Devine. It's dollars he's coming for, and I've got 'bout half the accounts call for here."
"You're going to leave him them?"
Slocum laughed. "No," he said. "I guess they'll come in handy in Oregon. I'm going to leave him the boys to reckon with. They'll be here with clubs soon after the cars come in, and we'll be a league away down the trail by then."
A patter of horse hoofs outside cut short the colloquy, though there was a brief altercation when the woman once more insisted on taking all the packages with her. Slocum terminated it by bundling her out of the door, and, when she tearfully consented to mount a kicking pony, swung himself to the saddle.Still, for several minutes his heart was in his mouth, as he picked his way through the blacker shadows on the skirt of the beaten trail, until a man rose suddenly out of them.
"Hallo!" he said. "Where're you going?"
Slocum, leaning sideways, gave his wife's pony a cut with the switch he held, and then laughed as he turned to the man.
"I guess that's my business, but I'm going out of town."
"Quite sure?" said the other, who made a sudden clutch at his bridle.
He did not reach it, for Slocum was ready with hand and heel, and the switch came down upon the outstretched arm. Then there was a plunge and a rapid beat of hoofs, and Slocum, swinging half round in his saddle, swept off his hat to the gasping man.
"I guess I am," he said. "You'll tell the boys I'm sorry I couldn't wait for them."
Then he struck his wife's horse again. "Let him go," he said. "We'll have three or four of them after us in about ten minutes."
The woman said nothing, but braced herself to ride, and, while the beat of hoofs grew fainter among the silent pines, the man on foot ran gasping up the climbing trail. There was bustle and consternation when he reached the wooden town, and, while two or three men who had good horses hastily saddled them, the rest collected in clusters which coalesced, andpresently a body of silent men proceeded towards the Slocum dwelling. As they stopped in front of it, the hoot of a whistle came ringing across the pines, and there was an increasing roar as a train came up the valley. That, however, did not, so they fancied, concern them, and they commenced a parley with the local constable, who came hurrying after them. His duties consisted chiefly in the raising and peddling of fruit, and he had been recommended for the post by popular acclaim as the most tolerant man in the settlement, but he was, it seemed, not without a certain sense of responsibility.
"What d'you figure on doing with those clubs, boys?" he said.
"Seasoning them," said somebody. "Mine's quite soft and green. Now, why're you not taking the trail after Slocum? The province allows you for a horse, and Hake Guffy's has three good legs on him, anyway."
The constable waved his hand, deprecatingly. "He fell down and hurt one of them hauling green stuff to the depôt. I guess I'd have to shove him most of the way."
There was a little laughter, which had, however, a trace of grimness in it, and one of the men grasped the constable's shoulder.
"Hadn't you better go round and run Jean Frenchy's hogs out of your citron patch?" he said.
For a moment the constable appeared about to go, and then his face expanded into a genial grin.
"That's not good enough, boys," he said. "I'm not quite so fresh that the cows would eat me. What've you come round here for, anyway?"
The man who had spoken made a little gesture of resignation. "Well," he said, "if you have got to know, we are going in to see if Slocum has left any of the dollars he beat us out of behind him."
"No," said the constable, stoutly. "Nobody's going in there without a warrant, unless it's me."
There was a little murmur. The man was elderly, and a trifle infirm, which was partly why it had been decided that he was most likely to find a use for the provincial pay, but he turned upon the threshold and faced the crowd resolutely. Had he been younger, it is very probable that he would have been hustled away, but a Western mob is usually, to some extent, at least, chivalrous, and there was another murmur of protest.
"Go home!" said one man. "They're not your dollars, anyway."
"Boys," and the old man swung an arm aloft, "I'm here, and I'm going to make considerable trouble for the man who lays a hand on me. This is a law-abiding country, and Slocum wasn't fool enough to leave anything he could carry off."
"We don't want to hurt you," said one of the assembly, "but we're going in."
There was a growl of approbation, and the men were closing in upon the door when a stranger pushed his way through the midst of them, and then swung round and stood facing them beside the constable. He held himself commandingly, and, though nobody appeared to recognize him, for darkness was closing down, the meaning of his attitude was plain, and the crowd gave back a little.
"Go home, boys!" he said. "I'll most certainly have the law of any man who puts his foot inside this door."
There was a little ironical laughter, and the crowd once more closed in. Half the men of the settlement were present there, and a good many of them had bought land from, or trusted their spare dollars to, Slocum.
"Who are you, anyway?" said one.
The stranger laughed. "The man who owns the building. My name's Devine."
It was a bold announcement, for those who heard him were not in the best of humors then, or disposed to concern themselves with the question how far the principal was acquainted with or responsible for the doings of his agent.
"The boss thief!" said somebody. "Get hold of him, and bring him along to the hotel. Then, if Thorkell can't lock him up, we'll consider what we'll do with him."
"No," said another man. "He'll keep for a littlewithout going bad, and we're here to see if Slocum left anything behind him. Break that door in!"
It was a critical moment, for there was a hoarse murmur of approbation, and the crowd surged closer about the pair. At any sign of weakness it would, perhaps, have gone hardly with them, but the elderly constable stood very still and quiet, with empty hands, while Devine fumbled inside his jacket. Then he swung one foot forward, and his right arm rose, until his hand, which was clenched on a dusky object, was level with his shoulder.
"Boys," he said, drily, "somebody's going to get hurt in another minute. This is my office, and I can't do with any of you inside it to-night."
"Then, if you hand our dollars out, it would suit us most as well," said the spokesman.
Devine appeared to laugh softly. "I guess there are very few of them there. Anybody who can prove a claim on me will get satisfaction, but he'll have to wait. Neither the place nor I will run away, and you'll find me right here when you come along to-morrow."
"Are you going to give every man back the dollars Slocum got from him?"
It was evident that the question met with the approbation of the crowd, and a less resolute man might have temporized, but Devine laughed openly now.
"No," he said, drily. "That's just what I'm notgoing to do. A man takes his chances when he makes a deal in land, and can't expect to cry off his bargain when they go against him. Still, if any one will bring me proof that Slocum swindled him, I'll see what I can do, but I guess it will be very little if some of you destroy the books and papers he recorded the deals in. You'll have to wait until to-morrow, while I worry through them."
His resolution had its due effect, and the fact that no man could reach the threshold until he and the constable had been pulled down counted for a good deal, too. The men also wanted no more than they considered themselves entitled to, and shrank from what, if it was to prove successful, must evidently be a murderous assault upon two elderly men.
"I guess there's sense in that," said one of them. "It's going to be quite easy to make sure he don't get out of the settlement."
"I'm for letting him have until to-morrow, anyway," said another. "Still, the papers aren't there. Where's John Collier? He picked up some books and truck Slocum slung away when he met him on the trail."
"I've got them right here," and another man stepped forward. "I was coming in from the ranch when I heard two horses pounding down the trail, and jumped clear into the fern. The man who went past me tried to sling a package into the gully, but I guess he got kind of rattled when I shouted, anddropped the thing. He didn't seem to want to stop, and, when he went on at a gallop, I groped round and picked the package up."
Devine lowered the pistol, and turned quietly to the crowd. "There are just two courses open to you, boys, and you're going to make mighty little but trouble for yourselves by taking one of them. This is my office, and so long as I can hold you off nobody's coming in until he's asked. I feel quite equal to stopping two or three. Now, if you'll let me have those books and go home quietly, I'll have straightened Slocum's affairs out by to-morrow, and be ready to see what can be done for you."
The men were evidently wavering, and there was a brief consultation, after which the leader turned to Devine.
"We've no use for making any trouble that can be helped, and we'll go home," he said. "You can have those books, and a committee will come round to see what you've fixed up after breakfast to-morrow."
Devine nodded tranquilly. "I guess you're wise," he said. "Good night, boys!"
They went away, and left him to go in with the constable, who came out in a few minutes with a contented grin, which suggested that Devine had signified his appreciation of his efforts liberally. The latter, however, sat down, dusty and worn with an arduous journey, to undertake a night's hard work. He had left the Canopus before sunrise, and spentmost of the day in the saddle, but nobody would have suspected him of weariness as he sat, grim and intent of face, before a table littered with papers. He had just imposed his will upon an angry crowd, and the tension of the past few minutes would have shaken many a younger man, but he showed no sign of feeling it, and, as the hours slipped by, only rose at intervals to stretch his aching limbs and brush the cigar ash from his dust-smeared clothes. This was one of the hard men who, in building up their own fortunes, had also laid the foundations of the future prosperity of a great province, and a little fatigue did not count with him.
The settlement was very still, and the lamp-light paling as the chilly dawn crept in, when at last he opened a book that recorded Slocum's dealings several years back. There were several folded slips on which he had jotted down certain data inside it, and Devine smiled somewhat drily as he came upon one entry:—
"24th. 6,000 dollars from Harford Brooke, in purchase of 400 acres bush land, Quatomac Valley. Ref. 22, slip B."
Devine turned up 22 B, and read: "Mem. About 150 acres 200-foot pines, with gravel sub-soil, and very little mould on top of it. Rest of it rock. Oregon man bid 1,000 dollars on the 2nd, but asked for re-survey and cried off. 12th. Gave Custer fourdays' option at 950. 20th. Asked the British sucker 6,500, and clinched the deal at 6,000."
Devine closed the book, and sat thoughtfully still for a minute or two. The epithet his agent had applied to Brooke carried with it the stigma of puerile folly in that country, and Devine had usually very little sympathy with the men it could be fittingly attached to. Still, he felt that nobody could very appropriately term his contractor a sucker now, and he had just discovered that he had been systematically plundered himself. Several points which had given him food for reflection also became suddenly plain, and he lighted another cigar before he fell to work again. He had, however, in the meanwhile decided what course to adopt with Brooke when he went back to the Canopus mine.
It was a week or two after he undertook the investigation of Slocum's affairs, and once more the light was failing, when Devine stood at the head of the gully above the cañon. His wife and Barbara were with him, and they were about to descend, when a cluster of moving figures appeared among the pines on the opposite hillside. So far as Devine could make out, they were rolling down two or three small trunks of firs.
The river was veiled in white mist now, but the sound of its turmoil came up hoarsely out of the growing obscurity, and there was sufficient light above to show the rope which spanned the awful chasm. It swept downwards in a flattened curve, slender and ethereal, at that distance, as a film of gossamer, and lost itself in the gloom of the rocks, across the cañon. Barbara, however, fancied she realized what it had cost the flume-builder to place it there, and, as he glanced at it, a somewhat curious look crept into Devine's eyes. He knew that slender thread of steel had only been flung across the hollowat the risk of life and limb, and under a heavy nervous strain.
"If we are going down, hadn't we better start?" said Mrs. Devine. "If it gets quite dark before we come up, I shall certainly have to stay there until to-morrow. In fact, I'm quite willing to let you and Barbara go without me now."
Devine smiled. "I'm not sure we'll go at all. It seems to me Brooke means to give the thing a private trial before he asks me to come over and see it work, and that's why he waited until it was almost dark. Can you make him out, Barbara?"
Barbara had, as a matter of fact, already done so, but she realized that her sister's eyes were upon her, and for no very apparent reason preferred not to admit it.
"It is getting a little shadowy among the pines, and Katty used to tell me she had sharper eyes than mine," she said.
Mrs. Devine laughed. "Still," she said, reflectively, "I scarcely think I have seen Mr. Brooke quite so often as you have."
Devine glanced at them both a trifle sharply, but there was nothing in their faces that gave him a clue to their thoughts. "Well," he said, "I'm a good deal older than either of you, but I can make him out myself now. As usual, he seems to be doing most of the work."
Nobody said anything further, and the moving figures stopped where the rope ran into the shadows of the rocks, while it was a few minutes later when a long, dusky object swung out on it. It slid somewhat slowly down the incline, and then stopped where the slight curve led upward, and remained dangling high above the hidden river. A shout came faintly through the roar of water in the gulf below, and the dark mass oscillated violently, but otherwise remained immovable.
"What are they doing? Shouldn't it have run all the way across?" asked Mrs. Devine.
Devine nodded. "I guess they're 'most pulling their arms off trying to haul the thing across," he said. "It should have come itself, but the sheave the trolley runs on must have jammed, or they haven't pulled all the kinks and snarls out of the rope. It's quite a big log they've loaded her with."
The suspended trunk still oscillated, and a faint clinking came up with a hoarse murmur of voices from the hollow. Then there was silence, and Devine, who pointed to a fallen cedar, took out his cigar-case.
"We'll stay right here, and see the thing out," he said. "I guess the boys have quite enough to worry them just now."
Barbara surmised that most of the anxiety would fall on Brooke, and wondered why she should feel as eager as she did to see the fir trunk safely swung across. The economical handling of mining propswas naturally not a subject she had any particular interest in, though she realized that the success of his venture was of some importance to the man who had stretched the rope across the cañon. There was no ostensible reason why it should affect her, and yet she was sensible of a curious nervous impatience.
In the meanwhile, it was growing darker, and she could not quite see what the dim figures across the river were doing. They did not, in fact, appear to be doing anything in particular, beyond standing in a group, while the rope no longer oscillated. A thin, white mist commenced to drift out of the hollow in filmy wisps, and, in a curious fashion, suggested the vast depth of it. The silence the roar of the river broke through grew more intense as the chill of the distant snow descended, and the stately pines seemed to grow older and greater of girth. They dwarfed the tiny clustering figures into insignificance, and as iron columns and the raw gashes in the side of the gully faded into the gathering night, it seemed to Barbara that here in her primeval fastnesses Nature ignored man's puny handiwork.
Then it was with a little thrill of anticipation she saw there was a movement among the dusky figures at last, but it cost her an effort to sit still when one of them appeared to move out on the rope, for she felt she knew who it must be. Devine rose sharply, and flung his cigar away, while his wife seemed to shiver apprehensively.
"One of them is coming across. Isn't it horribly dangerous?" she said.
Devine nodded. "It depends a good deal on what he means to do, but if he figures on clearing the jammed trolley there is a risk, especially to a man who has only one sound hand," he said. "They've slung him under the spare one. It's most probably Brooke."
Mrs. Devine glanced at Barbara, and fancied that the rigidity of her attitude was a trifle significant. The girl, however, said nothing, for her lips were pressed together, and she felt a shiver run through her as she watched the dusky figure sliding down the curving rope. The rope itself was no longer visible, but the dangling shape that moved across the horrible gulf was forced up by the whiteness of the drifting mists below. She held her breath when it stopped, and swung perilously beside the pine trunk which oscillated too, and then clenched her fingers viciously as it rose and apparently clutched at something overhead. Then she became sensible of the distressful beating of her heart, and that the tension was growing unendurable. Dark pines and hillside seemed to have faded now, and the dim objects outlined against the sliding mists dominated her attention. Still, though they were invisible to her, the space between the hoary pines, tremendous rock wall, and never-melting snow, formed a fitting arena forthat conflict between daring humanity and unsubdued Nature.
Barbara never knew how long she sat there with set lips and straining eyes, but the time seemed interminable, until at last she gasped when Devine, who had been standing as motionless as the pines behind him, moved abruptly.
"I guess he has done it," he said. "That man has hard sand in him."
The dusky trunk slid onward; the dangling figure followed it; and a hoarse cry, that had a note of exultation in it as well as relief, came up when they vanished into the gloom beneath the dark rock's side.
"They've got him, but I guess that's not all they mean," said Devine. "Whatever was wrong with it, he has fixed the thing. They've beaten the cañon. The sling's working."
Then Barbara, rising, stood very straight, with a curious feeling that she had a personal part in those men's triumph. It did not even seem to matter when she felt that Mrs. Devine was looking at her.
"Why don't you shout?" said the latter, significantly.
Barbara laughed, but there was a little vibration in her voice her sister had not often noticed there.
"If I thought any one could hear me, I certainly would," she said.
They stayed where they were a few minutes, untilonce more a faint creaking and rattling came out of the mist, and an object, that was scarcely distinguishable, swung across the chasm. Another followed, until Barbara had counted three of them, and Devine laughed drily as they turned away.
"It's most of eight miles round by the cañon foot, where one can get across by the big redwood log, but I guess they'd have taken the trail if Brooke hadn't given them a lead," he said. "It's not easy to understand any one, but that's a curious kind of man."
"Is Mr. Brooke more peculiar than the rest of you?" asked Barbara.
Devine seemed to smile, though she could not see him very well.
"Well," he said, drily, "that's rather more than I know, but I have a notion that his difficulty is he isn't quite sure what he would be at. Now, the man who does one thing at one time, and all with the same purpose, is the one who generally gets there first."
"And Brooke does not do that?"
"It kind of seems to me he is being pulled hard two ways at once just now," said Devine, with a curious little laugh.
Barbara asked no more questions, and said very little to her sister as they walked home through the pines. She could not blot out the picture which, for a few intense minutes, she had gazed upon, though it had been exasperatingly blurred, and, she felt, considering what it stood for, ineffective in itself—adim, half-seen figure, dwarfed to insignificance, swinging across a background of filmy mist. There had been nothing at that distance to suggest the intensity of the effort which was the expression of an unyielding will, but she had, by some subtle sympathy, grasped it all—the daring that recognized the peril and disregarded it, and the thrill of the triumph, the wholesome satisfaction born of the struggle with the primitive forces of the universe which man was meant to wage. This, it seemed to her, was a nobler one than the strife of the cities, where wealth was less often created than torn or fleeced from one's fellows; for needy humanity flowed in to build her homes and prosper by sturdy toil at every fresh rolling back of the gates of the wilderness. The miner and the axeman led the way; but the big plough oxen and plodding packhorse train followed hard along the trails they made. Behind, in long procession, jaded with many sorrows, came the outcasts from crowded Eastern lands, but there was room, and to spare, for all of them in the new Canaan.
That the man who had bridged the cañon would admit any feelings of the kind was, she knew, not to be expected. Men of his description, she had discovered, very seldom do, and she could rather fancy him coming fresh from such a struggle to discuss the climate or the flavor of a cigar. Yet he had once told her that she had brought him a sword, and, as shehad certainly shivered at his peril, she could, without asking herself troublesome questions, now participate in the victory he had won. Still, she seemed to feel that one could not draw any very apt comparison between him and the stainless hero of the Arthurian legend belted with Excalibur, for Brooke was, she fancied, in the phraseology of the country, not that kind of man. That, however, appeared of less importance, since she had discovered that perfection is apt to pall on one.
She had, she decided, permitted this train of thought to carry her sufficiently far, when a man appeared suddenly in the shadowy trail. It was evident that he did not see them at first, and Barbara fancied he was a trifle disconcerted and half-disposed to slip back into the undergrowth when he did. He, however, passed them hastily, and Devine swung round and looked after him.
"That wasn't one of Brooke's men?" he said.
"No," said Barbara. "I don't think it was. You didn't recognize him, Katty?"
Mrs. Devine laughed. "If you didn't, I scarcely fancy there was anything to be gained by asking me."
Barbara was not quite pleased with her sister, but she noticed that Devine was standing still.
"Was there anything remarkable about the man?" she said.
Devine laughed. "I didn't see his face; but if he'sthe man I took him for, nobody would have expected to meet him here."
Then he turned, and they proceeded towards the ranch, while Barbara, who recollected Devine's speech at the cañon, also remembered her sister had said she would like to know what her husband really thought of Brooke. This had not been very comprehensible to Barbara, who had experienced no great trouble in forming what she believed to be an accurate opinion concerning the flume-builder. It was her feelings towards him that presented the difficulty.
In the meanwhile, Brooke had flung himself down in a folding-chair in his tent. He was soaked with perspiration, his hard hands still quivered a little from the nervous strain, and his bronzed face was a trifle more colorless than usual, but he was, for the time being, sensible of a quiet exultation. He had done a difficult and dangerous thing, and the flush of success had swept away all his anxieties. He, however, found it a trifle difficult to sit still, and was carefully selecting a cigar in an attempt to compose himself, when a man came in, and took the chair opposite him. Then his face grew a trifle hard, and all sense of satisfaction was suddenly reft away from him.
"I scarcely expected you quite so soon, Saxton," he said. "Here are cigars; you'll find some drinkables in the box yonder."
Saxton opened the box he pointed to, and then looked at him with a grin as he took out a bottle.
"I've no great use for California wine. Bourbon whisky's good enough for me," he said. "Who've you been entertaining? Not Devine, anyway."
"Isn't the question a little outside the mark? If you want it, there's water with ice in it here. It's from the tail of the glacier."
Saxton laughed. "Then it would take a man 'most an hour and a half to bring a pail of it. It's quite easy to tell where you came from. Well, I'm here; but on the other occasions it was I who sent for you."
"There is, however, a difference on this one, though I wouldn't like you to think that was the reason. The fact is, I've been busy."
"Well," said Saxton, "we'll get down to the business one. Still, how'd you get your arm in a sling?"
"Are you sure you don't know?"
"Quite!" and Saxton's sincerity was evident. "How should I?"
"I had fancied you knew all about it by this time, and felt a little astonished that you didn't come over, but I see I was mistaken. I tried to get hold of Devine's papers, as I promised you, and came upon another man attempting the same thing. During the difference of opinion that followed he shot me."
Saxton rose, and, kicking his chair aside, condemned himself several times as he moved up and down the tent.
"To be quite straight, I put another man on to it, as you didn't seem to be making much of a show," he said. "Still, what in the name of thunder did he want to shoot you for, when he knew you were standing in with me?"
"I can't say. The difficulty was that I was not as well informed as he seems to have been. It would have paid you better to be frank with me. Hasn't the man come back to you?"
"No," and Saxton's face grew a trifle vicious, "he hasn't—concern him! You see what that brings us to? I felt sure of that man; but it's plain he meant to find out what I wanted, and then, if he couldn't make use of it himself, sell it me. There are three of us after the same thing now."
Brooke shook his head. "No," he said, drily, "I don't think there are. You and the other man make two, while I scarcely fancy either of you will get hold of the papers, because I gave them back to Devine, and he has sent them to Vancouver."
"You had them?" and Saxton gasped.
"I certainly had," said Brooke. "They were put up in a very flimsy packet, which Mrs. Devine handed me. I did not, however, look at one of them."
Saxton, who seemed about to sit down, crossed the tent and stared at him.
"Well," he said, "may I be shot if I ever struck another man quite like you! What in the name of thunder made you let Devine have them back for?"
"I really don't think you would appreciate my motives, especially as I'm not quite sure I understand them myself. Anyway, I did it, and that, of course, implies that there can be no further understanding between you and me. I don't mean to question the morality of what we purposed doing, but, to be quite frank, I've had enough of it."
Saxton, who appeared to restrain himself with an effort, sat down and lighted a cigar.
"No doubt I could worry along 'most as well without you, but there's a question to be answered," he said, drily. "Do you mean to give me away?"
"It's not one I appreciate, and it seems to me a trifle unnecessary. You can reassure yourself on that point."
Saxton took a drink of whisky. "Well," he said, meditatively, "I guess I can trust you, and I'm not going to worry about letting you off the deal. You have too many fancies to be of much use to anybody. There's just another thing, and it has to be said. It's business I have on hand, and life's too short for any man to waste time he could pile up dollars in, trying to get even with a partner who has gone back on him. In fact, I've a kind of liking for you—but you'll most certainly get hurt if you put yourself in my way. It's a friendly warning."
Brooke laughed. "I will endeavor to keep out of it, so far as I can."
Saxton nodded, and then looked at him reflectively.
"Miss Heathcote's kind of pretty," he said.
"I suggested once already that we should get on better if you left Miss Heathcote out."
"You did. Still, when I've anything to say, it is scarcely a hint of that kind that's going to stop me. I guess you know she has quite a pile of dollars?"
Brooke's face flushed. "I don't, and it does not concern me in the least."
"She has, anyway. Devine's wife brought him a pile, and I heard one sister had the same as the other. Now, you ought to feel obliged to me."
Brooke straightened himself a trifle in his chair. "I don't wish to be unpleasant, but you have gone quite as far as is advisable. Can't you see the thing you are suggesting is quite out of the question?"
Saxton surveyed him critically. "Well," he said, reflectively, "I have seen better-looking men—quite a few of them, and you're blame hard to get on with, but there are women who don't expect too much."
Brooke's face was growing flushed, but he realized that nothing short of physical violence was likely to restrain his visitor, and he laughed.
"You will, of course, believe what pleases you," he said. "Are you going to stay here to-night?"
"No," said Saxton. "When I'm through with this whisky, I'm going right back to Tomlinson's ranch. I wouldn't like Devine to run up against me, and he nearly did it on the trail a little while ago."
Brooke looked up sharply. "He recognized you?"
"No," said Saxton, drily. "He didn't. It wouldn't have suited me. When I come to clinch with Devine, I want to be sure I have the whip-hand of him. Still, it wouldn't have been a case of pistols out and getting behind a tree. It's quite a long while since I had any, and, though you don't seem to think so in England, nobody has any use for a circus of that kind now. I don't know that the way they had in '49 wasn't better than trying to get ahead of the other man quietly."
Brooke made a little gesture of resignation. Saxton, he realized, had sufficient discretion not to persist in a useless attempt to hold him to his compact, but he was addicted to moralizing, and Brooke, who lighted another cigar, listened, as patiently as he could, while he discoursed upon the anxieties of the enterprising business man.