Harrison, somewhat clumsily, held the hotel door open for the stranger, and, as he followed him out into the street, quietly took his measure with a shrewd and appreciative eye.
Indeed, as the two men strolled leisurely along down through the town and out toward the smelting works, there seemed physically little to choose between them. Harrison, big and burly and strong, was the heavier by some twenty or thirty pounds, and yet the easterner, with his broad back, sloping shoulders, powerful, well-rounded chest, and alert, confident step, though evidently lacking the rugged endurance of the miner, looked nevertheless in strength to be fully his equal, and in agility and speed his superior. Both, indeed, were well-nigh perfect examples of their type; the mastiff and the wolfhound might perhaps have been a not inapt comparison.
The stranger was the first to break the silence. "Mighty good of you to take all this trouble, Jack," he said, "I'm getting to feel at home already."
Harrison grinned, with a rough attempt to disclaim any courtesy on his part. "That's all right," he said. "Want to treat a man fair if I can. Anyways a mining man. Too bad it's Saturday afternoon, though. That's a regular half holiday here now. Boys mostly lay around and enjoy themselves. We'll find most of 'em out at the park, I guess, doin' stunts."
The stranger looked at him inquiringly. "Stunts?" he queried.
Harrison grinned. "Athletic craze struck here about a month ago," he answered. "Kind o' funny, too, when you come to think of it, ain't it? Here's a crowd o' big miners slavin' away five days an' a half a week gettin' out copper, workin' like truck horses, an' then when Saturday afternoons come they've got to get out an' work just about twice as hard playin' baseball an' runnin' an' throwin' weights. It's a pretty damn lucky thing they've got Sunday to rest up in, or they'd be one o' these fallin' offs in copper production you minin' fellers tell of."
Gordon's face betrayed his interest. "It does seem funny," he acquiesced, "but I know how it is, just the same. I used to do a little in that line myself once on a time, and pretty good fun it was, too," and he smiled reminiscently as he spoke, as if the memories that came to mind were pleasant ones.
Half a mile or so from town they came to the smelting works, as Harrison had predicted, shut down for the afternoon. Beyond the line of low buildings, a flat open field, the grass burned brown by the sun, stretched away for a quarter of a mile or more. The heat of the afternoon was just changing to the cool of evening, and, in the center of the field, true to Harrison's prophecy, two rival ball teams were playing with all the zest of boys. Nearer at hand a dozen brawny miners were throwing the hammer. Even as Gordon looked, one of them picked up the missile, swung it around his head, and hurled it far out from the circle. The stranger's eyes gleamed. "Rotten form," he muttered under his breath, and then, with apparent irrelevance, he added, "and they say there's no such thing as luck."
They had reached the little group, and Harrison, evidently well known and well liked, was greeted with rough good will. Responding, he introduced the visitor. "Boys," he said, "let me make you acquainted with Mr. Gordon. He's another one o' these eastern minin' sharps, come out on purpose to buy the whole township, if we'll give him a cheap enough rate on it; so you want to look out an' treat him good."
There was a general laugh, in which Gordon joined. "Oh, we easterners are easy, I admit," he said good-naturedly. "Don't soak it to me too hard, that's all I ask. Jack's got no license, though, to go to talking business on Saturday afternoon, just for the fun of getting after me. We're on a vacation now. Let's see somebody throw that hammer again."
"That's right," cried Harrison; "let Bill Martin give her a toss. He's the man can do it."
The others drew back, and as Martin willingly enough stepped forward, Gordon looked him over with undisguised admiration. He was perhaps thirty-five years of age, well over six feet, and a much bigger man than Harrison even. His woolen shirt, open at the neck, showed the play of the corded muscles in his massive throat and neck, and his uprolled sleeves disclosed the arms of a giant. Taking his stand somewhat awkwardly, he swung the hammer stiffly around his head, and then, with one final tremendous heave, sent it hurling a good ten feet beyond the farthest mark.
There was a chorus of good-natured approval. "Put the tape on it," cried three or four at once, and the hundred-foot measure was slowly unrolled until the mark was reached, and then pulled tight. "Ninety-four feet, eight inches," called the measurer, and there was another murmur of satisfaction. Harrison turned to Gordon. "How's that?" he grinned. "Beat that back east?"
Gordon smiled too. "Well, that's a good throw," he answered noncommittally, "a mighty good throw from a stand, but the real way to throw a hammer's to turn with it; you can get up so much more speed that way."
The little group gazed at him in astonishment. One or two grinned derisively. Old Jim Stickney, with deep meaning, spat upon the ground, then looked up at Gordon.
"Would you show us?" he asked, with mild and deceptive politeness. "We all hail from Missouri here."
Harrison looked distressed. He felt in a way responsible for the stranger. "Oh, hell, Jim," he expostulated, "ain't you got no manners?"
Gordon laughed easily. "I guess it's up to me, boys," he said quietly, and, leisurely removing his coat, collar and tie, he laid them methodically on the ground.
The group eyed him with surprised interest. Stickney grinned malevolently and moved away. "Goin' to git out o' range, boys," he said; "don't want to git hit."
Gordon showed no resentment, but on the contrary nodded with the utmost cheerfulness. "That's a good idea," he said; "it's a long time since I've thrown one of these things. Can't tell what'll happen. I don't know that I ought to be throwing, anyway. My lungs aren't any too strong."
Harrison, in mute distress, dreading a scene, laid a hand on his arm. "Don't let 'em make a fool of you," he whispered; "they'll tell it all over the county; unless," he added, "you really can throw the darned thing."
Gordon nodded in quick appreciation of the other's good will. "Don't you worry, Jack," he whispered in answer; "I wouldn't try it if I couldn't get by. We've got to take the good chances when they come along. They're not apt to turn around and come back again."
Harrison looked puzzled, and a little dubious, but as Gordon took his stand within the circle the miner's face cleared. There was a masterful ease in the way in which the easterner took his position very different from the awkward pose of the others. Once, twice, three times, the hammer circled around his head, and then, like lightning, he spun around in his tracks, once, twice, so quickly that the eye could scarcely follow the whirling missile. Then, in a flash, it leaped from his hands, and Gordon was left standing motionless in the ring, while the hammer shot up and out in a high, graceful curve, sailing along as if on wings until it landed with a thud so far beyond Martin's mark as to make comparison ridiculous.
There was silence, bewildered, complete, absolute. Gordon, not seeming to notice, stepped from the circle. "A little low," he said, with a note of apology in his tone, "and I didn't quite get my weight behind it. A little out of practice, I guess, but the turn's a great thing."
And then over the group swept a sudden revulsion, and there burst forth a mighty roar of laughter. Stickney spat again, but, if the phrase be permissible, with a far different intonation; and then voiced the sentiment of the crowd. "Well, by God," he cried nasally, "all I can say is I'm glad you ain't kept in steady practice, an' I'll say further that you can bet I ain't wastin' a mite of sympathy on them pore weak lungs o' yourn. No, sir, I ain't, an' not by a damned sight, neither."
Bill Martin eyed the stranger with increased respect. "I'd like to know that trick," he volunteered. "Want to learn it to me?"
Gordon nodded. "Certainly," he said; "glad to. Only you can't expect to get it right away. It looks easy enough, but I had to practise it every day for three months before I could get it down right. Here's the idea. I won't throw it. Just to show you"—He picked up the hammer, illustrating as he talked—"See? Pull back from it like this. Keep pulling against it all the time, and when you swing it around your head the third time, turn right on your toes, this way; once, twice, and then let her go for all there is in you. See?"
Martin nodded, and took the hammer again in his hands, while Gordon and the others stepped quickly back. Once, twice, three times, he swung the missile with ever-increasing speed, and then, as he tried to turn rapidly, there ensued a sudden amazing tangle of arms and legs, hammer and man mixed in hopeless, whirling confusion, and two hundred and thirty pounds of bone and muscle and misdirected energy struck the ground with a mighty, jarring crash.
Each man in the little knot of spectators expressed himself according to his temperament. One or two howled their joy aloud, others rolled prone upon the ground. Jim Stickney, holding his sides, the tears coursing down his cheeks, shook his head from side to side in helpless merriment. As a tableau the picture appeared to his delighted eyes too beautiful, too perfect, to spoil with mere words.
Slowly Martin picked himself up from the ground, a flush of anger darkening his face. "Shut up, you damn fools," he growled, "the whole thing's a trick. There ain't no fair test to it. But if any one of you jackasses, when you get through your braying, wants to try and see how strong he is, I'll fight any three of you in succession, and I'll knock the everlasting stuffing out of you, too." He paused a moment, glaring blackly at the group; then, as an afterthought, added with deliberation: "West—or east. No bar. First come, first served."
His words had a sudden sobering effect upon the crowd. The laughter died away. Gordon felt rather than actually saw all eyes turned curiously in his direction. He hesitated, but only for a moment.
"Oh, the devil," he began good-naturedly, "nobody wants to fight—" but Martin's ill humor was not to be so easily appeased.
"Oh, no," he jeered; "nobody wants to fight, and it's lucky for them they don't. It's lucky for them they're afraid—"
On the instant Gordon stepped forward, an ugly little smile playing around the corners of his mouth. "Meaning me?" he asked quietly.
Martin eyed him malevolently. "Sure," he grinned, with all the disagreeable effrontery he could put into his tone, "meaning you; and why not, I'd like to know."
"Only this," said Gordon in a perfectly level tone; "that you're not the man to use that word quite so freely without knowing first what you're talking about. And you'll apologize to me right away before these gentlemen—or I'll fight you with all the pleasure in life, three-minute rounds, one minute rests, no hitting in clinches, Harrison to referee."
Martin, the lust of battle glowing in his deep-set eyes, breathed a sigh of content. "Come on," was all that he said.
With the readiness born of much experience, Harrison and Stickney in a twinkling had the simple preparations under way. The rough dimensions of a twenty-four-foot ring were paced off; the spectators took their places where corner posts and ropes should have been, and a messenger was despatched to the ball field for the two players' benches there in use. In short order he returned, aided with his burden by many willing hands; behind him trailing some two score eager followers, for in the eyes of the Lake a fist fight still took precedence without competition over all else in the line of true diversion.
There was a moment's silence, and then Stickney, spitting furiously in his excitement, looked at his watch, and nodded. "All ready!" he cried, his voice vibrant with excitement, and at the word the two men, stripped to the waist, stepped quickly forward and shook hands.
Gordon smiled at his burly antagonist. "No ill-feeling?" he queried good-naturedly.
The miner shook his massive head. "Oh, no, not a bit," he said grimly, and his tone and the smoldering wrath in his eyes belied his words.
Both men turned and walked slowly toward their corners; then "Time!" yelled Stickney, and, turning again, they put up their hands and warily faced each other.
Martin stood upright in the center of the ring, body a little thrown back, his left arm held straight in front of him, and his right doubled across his chest. Gordon, standing easily and loosely, with muscles relaxed, eyed his man for a moment, and then suddenly dropped into the more modern fighting pose, crouched catlike, his weight well over his hips, shoulders hunched, both arms held loosely in front of him. Slowly he walked around the miner with quick and cautious steps, Martin pivoting slowly to meet him as he advanced. Nearer, nearer still, they came; imperceptibly the distance between them grew less and less, and then, all at once, like a flash, Gordon jumped in.
Thud! came his right on Martin's ribs, and crack! came his left on Martin's face. The miner's head jerked suddenly back; he gave an involuntary grunt of pain; and from his twitching nostrils there came a sudden dark red stream of blood.
Just for an instant he stood motionless, inert; then, smarting with pain, and half mad with rage, he lowered his head and charged like a bull. Gordon, hard-pressed, gave ground at once, stalling off as best he might the angry giant's reckless charge. Once the miner's right found his ribs, and his face contracted with a sudden spasm of pain, while the angry red blotches showed mottled against the clear white skin. Twice a mighty left swing just missed his jaw, and both times the indrawn breath of the crowd expended itself in a sigh, half of relief, half of disappointment, as they saw the easterner still unharmed.
Thus two minutes of the round had gone, and then all at once there came a change, for by this time it had become evident to Gordon, long skilled in all the craft and science of the ring, that he had opposed to him a man, unskilful, to be sure, but untireable as well, and that the longer the fight lasted the better it would be for the miner and the worse for him. Thus, his mind made up, he summoned to his aid every particle of strength and cunning at his command, and when next the miner rushed, he no longer gave ground, but for an instant met the attack squarely and then again forced the fighting in his turn. Three times he landed straight lefts on Martin's face that should have put an ordinary man away for good, and three times the giant grunted and came on for more. Again Gordon drove home a smashing blow on the miner's gory nose, and then, in trying to get his right to the heart, he left himself for an instant unprotected, and in that instant Martin, fighting more craftily in his turn and biding his time, landed one of his wild right swings on Gordon's left cheek, just under the eye. Gordon staggered back, reeling; earth and sky blazed suddenly in a mist of swimming red; the wild yells of the miners reached him as the faintest buzzing of a swarm of bees; and, flushed and eager, Martin came on to finish his man. Like a drunken man Gordon blocked weakly, clenched mechanically with the fighter's instinct for an instant's respite, and then as Harrison, pitying but firm, walked between them, pushing them roughly apart and ordering them to take the center of the ring, in that blessed moment the mist cleared from Gordon's eyes, the red tide of life pulsed again through every vein, and brave heart and cunning brain waked again to life.
Fortunate it would have been for Martin had he realized the change, but all unmindful he came gaily on, thrilling with the triumph of the fighting beast. Carelessly, recklessly, well-nigh disdainfully, he started in to demolish his weakening foe, and then—sudden, unlooked-for, amazing—Gordon's left caught him with a lightning jab in the ribs, Gordon's right caught him full on the point of the jaw, and, like a pole-axed bullock, he stood still for the veriest instant of time, and then, crashing face downward, lay motionless on the field.
With the inrush of the crowd Gordon laid a hand on Harrison's arm, lifting his eyes in mute appeal, and Harrison, understanding, picked him up bodily in his arms and got him away to one side. Here, for ten minutes, he lay weakly enough, his head against Harrison's knee, his eyes half closed. Then, somewhat unsteadily, he struggled to his feet, and walked over to his still prostrate foe. Martin's grin, this time, was sincere, and his faint handshake had a friendly pressure.
"All right," he said weakly; "no kick comin'. I know when I'm up against a better man, and you done me fair."
Gordon straightened up, and spoke that all might hear. "Look here, gentlemen," he said, "I'm afraid I've started off badly. I'm out here on business, and I need the good-will of every one of you. Perhaps later on you may be glad of mine in return, but we can't tell about that now. All I want to say is that I didn't look for a fight, but since it came along I'm glad it's over, and I hope we'll all be better friends for it. I'm afraid I only beat Bill here by accident, and I'll bet I feel a good deal worse done up than he does." He paused and drew a fifty-dollar note from his pocket, handing it to Stickney with a smile, "I'm afraid I shan't be with you to-night," he added, "but I want you gentlemen to have a drink on me, all around, and then do a repeat as long as the money holds out, and I never want a better fight than I had to-day."
Amid the general murmur of approval he nodded to Harrison, and together they started back for town. That evening Gordon spent alone in the hotel, in greater pain than he would have been willing to admit; but in tavern and bar-room and store his fame waxed mightily, and the next morning every man, woman and child in Seneca township knew that Mr. Richard Gordon, a "minin' sharp" from the effete East, had suddenly appeared among them, and had most emphatically "made good."
The three men were seated together in Gordon's tiny room in the hotel. The shades were drawn, and the lamp on the table diffused at one and the same time light, heat, and a reek of ill-smelling oil. A scattered mass of papers, notes, jottings, memoranda, littered the room, and from the midst of this disorder Gordon, flushed, perspiring, for once lacking his usual calm, was seeking to bring about some semblance of system and order. Seated at the table, coat and vest tossed aside, he went through a regular routine, seizing on a paper and reading it through, then either tearing it up and tossing it aside, or transcribing its contents, his fingers flying furiously over the typewriter's clicking keys. Steadily and rapidly he did his work, and steadily the little heap of typewritten pages at his right hand mounted higher and higher still.
Jim Mason, sprawled comfortably in the armchair, smoked in silence, apparently waiting with calmness for the completion of the task. Jack Harrison sat on the side of the bed, awkward and uncomfortable, his troubled gaze shifting from Mason to Gordon and back again with the air of one who wishes to see a puzzling silence brought to an end.
Finally Gordon cast the last discarded memorandum from him, whirled the last sheet of copy from the typewriter, and with a heartfelt sigh of relief pushed back his chair. "There," he cried, "that's out of the way; and now let's see what we've got to show for it."
For a moment he sorted and arranged the typewritten sheets; then, looking up at the others, he spoke eagerly, anxiously, almost with a note of entreaty in his tone. "I hate to rush this thing through this way," he said, "and under ordinary circumstances I wouldn't do it, but you understand the situation as well as I do. This is the time you want to give me a free hand on the stock market end of the deal, just as later on, when you want all kinds of new-fangled machinery and all that sort of thing, I shall have to let you get it, though I won't know whether we need it or not. In other words, it's a mutual affair. You don't know and don't care just the precise moment when the stock ought to be listed, and I don't know and don't care about the difference in the rock on the sixth level and the seventh, but you want to let me run the incorporation and the market end, though you're not especially interested in them, and I want to let you run everything connected with the mine, though personally I don't care half so much about all that part of it as you do."
He paused for a moment, then continued, more slowly, "The point in our settling this thing up quick is right here. It's only about once in every five or six years that there comes a time like this in coppers, anyway. It takes a long time to get the pot boiling; then for a while it boils like the very devil, and then—it boils over; there's a busted boom, and people are left to sit down on their holdings for five or six years more, calling themselves names and wondering how they could ever have been such fools. At the end of that time, such a wonderful thing is the human mind, they've forgotten the past, and fairly tumble over themselves in their anxiety to repeat the process. Right now is the beginning of the biggest copper boom this country's ever seen, and it looks as if it would last for a good long time. Still, you can't ever tell; there are so many things that can happen; and what I want to do is to have the Ethel all incorporated and ready to launch just at the exact moment when the people are so crazy over coppers that they'll buy anything that's even named a mine, let alone a genuine first-class proposition like ours. Then we'll be sure of the mine's future, for we'll be able to make enough legitimate profit in the market to set aside a sum big enough to look out for all the development work we might ever be called upon to do. So the quicker we can get the papers signed, and the quicker I can get back East and have the company incorporated, the safer for all of us. There, that's the whole story, and if there's anything about it that isn't on the square, I want you to say so. How about it, Jim?"
Mason slowly removed his pipe from his mouth. "Sounds all right," he said laconically.
Gordon turned to Harrison. "Any objection, Jack?" he queried.
Harrison shook his head. "Sounds all right," he echoed. "Maybe down on the sixth level me and Jim could give you some pointers, but when it comes to stocks and bonds I guess you're the doctor. I don't see what's wrong with getting things fixed up right away."
Gordon nodded. "I'm glad you both think so," he said, his relief showing in his tone. "And you'll find you won't regret it, either. Now—" he reached for the typewritten papers, "here's the best I could do on an agreement. It's a lawyer's job, but I guess what I've patched together here will hold water, anyway. Stop me if there's anything you don't understand, and if you want to ask any questions, just fire away."
He tilted his chair back against the wall, glanced the papers through for an instant, and began to read rapidly, skipping here and there.
"This agreement, entered into this blank day of blank, between said Mason and said Gordon, witnesseth; said Mason, hereinafter styled the party of the first part, in consideration of the sum of one dollar and other good and valuable consideration, the receipt whereof is hereby acknowledged, to him paid—does hereby covenant and agree with said party of the second part—"
He broke off suddenly, letting the papers fall from his hand, and mopping his forehead with his handkerchief.
"Damn the language they use," he said, "it's too much to wade through now. Boiled right down to plain common sense, I give you fifty thousand dollars cash for a half interest in the mine, and you're appointed superintendent for ten years at a salary of five thousand a year, and Jack assistant for the same time at three thousand a year. That's the gist of it, isn't it? and that's plain enough for any one."
Mason glanced a trifle doubtfully at the ten or twelve scattered sheets. "What's all the rest of it?" he inquired.
Gordon slowly lit a cigar. "Well," he said at length, "you know all the stuff that has to go into one of these things. There's nothing of any real importance beyond what I've just said. The other clauses take up provisions as to how the corporation's going to be formed, and all that sort of thing. They don't amount to anything except to get us all mixed up, though, if we start to go into them. Why don't we say that I'll get the whole thing in final shape by to-morrow night. Then we can sign it before a notary, and I can put for home and get things underway without any delay at all. Or do you think of anything else? You're all right as far as the board of directors goes. You'll both be on the board, and any other Michigan man you think ought to go on. The eastern men that I'm going to get are all first-class in every way, and there's no doubt we'll have a strong board. Most of the other things, as I say, are mere matters of detail, so I should think if you could get around about this same time to-morrow night we could fix things up then, and make our start."
There was a moment's silence. Then Jim Mason again removed his pipe from his mouth. "About what," he said deliberately, "were you calculatin' on for your capital stock?"
From Gordon's manner no one could have guessed that this was the one subject he had feared and dreaded, that this was the one question he had hoped and prayed no one would raise. Indeed, to all appearances, he welcomed the topic with real pleasure.
"Well, where are my wits wandering to?" he cried. "Why, that was one of the things I particularly meant to speak of, Jim, because I knew if I didn't, you might have your breath taken away. You see, times have changed in the stock market, altogether. Where once it was a rich man's game, now everybody plays it. The clerk on his twelve dollars a week reads the stock column with just as much care as the millionaire, perhaps with more. The coachman the butler and the chauffeur, even the maid and the milliner, keep their ears open, and when an employer plunges, he carries a lot of people and a lot of money, of whom and of which he is entirely unconscious, along with him. So a copper stock, to be attractive to the general public to-day, has got to be a low-priced one; and of course that means a larger capitalization. Ten years ago, if you'd asked me the same question, I'd have said, 'Capitalize at ten thousand shares, at a par of a hundred,' and I guess, for that time, that would have been about right. For that time, you understand, but—"
Mason interrupted. "For that time, or for any time," he said positively, "that would have been right then, and it's right to-day, too. I'm agin' these big capitalizations, and that's just why I asked you for the information. Ten thousand shares, and par a hundred dollars. That's my ideas. What do you say, Jack?"
Harrison nodded, with, for him, unusual decision. "I guess that's about the regular thing," he answered, "leastways, in this state. That's what the Orono's in at, and the Hawkeye, and the Iroquois's only got five thousand, but they're a smaller proposition than the others. Yes, I guess for us ten thousand, and par a hundred, just about hits things right."
Gordon shook his head vigorously. "No, no," he cried, "you're wrong, both of you. But it's only because, as Jack just said a few moments ago, you're not in touch with market conditions in just the same way that I am. A big capitalization and a low par are the two things that are going to benefit everybody. They're going to help us make money, and that's going to help develop the mine, and, better than anything else, it's going to give lots of poor devils a chance to get into a really good thing at a moderate price, instead of wasting their good money on the first wildcat scheme that comes along, some kind of a fake mine that doesn't exist at all except on paper. Really, I hope you'll be willing to take my judgment on this; I'm right; I'm sure of it, or I wouldn't say so."
Both Mason and Harrison looked puzzled. There was a moment's silence. Then Mason, asked abruptly, "Well, what do you call right, then?"
Gordon, as he answered, made an effort to speak in a perfectly casual tone. "Why," he said easily, "as I say, I'd make the par very low, say five dollars a share. Then, of course, to give everybody a show, you'd have to have plenty of stock. I don't really care about the exact amount. I haven't given that much thought; but I should say, off hand, perhaps a million shares would be about right."
Mason stared at him in blank astonishment. "A million shares!" he gasped. "You'd capitalize the Ethel at five million dollars. God, man, you're crazy!"
Gordon flushed. "I guess one of us is crazy," he retorted, with some heat, "and I don't think I'm the one. I keep telling you you'd do a lot better to leave the whole market end of this thing to me. Why, half the people that'll buy our stock won't know how many shares there are, won't know what the par is, won't know a single identical thing about the mine except what I tell 'em in my advertisements. What's more, if we offered to tell 'em every single thing we know about the mine, they wouldn't care to take the trouble to listen. They're not buying shares in a copper mine. They're scraping together money enough to take a little flier, on margin, of course, something they mean to hold for a day or a week or maybe a month, and get out of at the first decent chance. The whole damned market's nothing but a big gamble, anyway, and everybody knows it, and what we're offering's a hundred times more legitimate than most of the stock deals people frame up, because, when all's said and done, we've got a genuine mine behind us. Still, we're not taking all this trouble just for our health, and we can use money just as well as anybody else. And the way to get the money, as I'm now trying to drive into your heads for about the tenth time, is to launch our mine with a big capitalization and a low par."
He stopped abruptly. Harrison, indeed, looked somewhat impressed, but Mason shook his head. "No, sir," he said stubbornly, "I know just a little mite about the market myself, and I don't say but what, if anybody's goin' to get skun, I wouldn't rather kinder give ourselves the benefit of the doubt, but five million dollars for the Ethel,"—he straightened up in his chair in his excitement—"five million dollars! Why, that's so damned unreasonable they're ain't no good tryin' to argue about it. When do you expect to pay a dividend on your million shares, I'd like to know?"
Gordon, to all appearances, looked thoughtful, as indeed he was. "Well," he admitted at length, "not right away, I suppose, and I'll own up there's some sense in the way you look at it, if the people were going to buy the stock for a real investment. Why don't we do this? Issue ten thousand shares of preferred stock, at a par of twenty-five or fifty, for the kind of people that want to buy for investment. We could really pay dividends on that, without the slightest doubt. And then, for the crowd that only wants to take a flier, and don't care a continental about the merits of the mine, or its future, we'll issue a million shares of common stock, at a par of five. Then we'll all be suited. How does that strike you?"
Mason snorted. "Oh, hell," he said forcibly, "what's the use of you talking that way? I've lived pretty near seventy years without robbing any one yet, and damned if I want to begin now. I'll wind up in the poorhouse first. What say, Jack?"
Harrison shook his head helplessly. "I don't know," he said vaguely. "Seems a pretty big lot of stock to me. Too big, I reckon."
Gordon laughed, with an attempt to pass the matter off lightly. "Oh, well," he said, "I don't want to do anything that neither of you approve of, of course. Why not let the whole matter of the capital stock drop for the present, and let the full board of directors settle it when we're organized?"
It was a last effort, and a futile one. Indeed, the moment the words had left his mouth, Gordon saw his mistake. Mason laughed a little dry laugh. "Yes," he said, with irony, "and four of the seven on the board are easterners. How'd they settle it, I wonder?"
Gordon's expression was not a pleasant one. With a faint shrug of his shoulders, he arose.
"Well, I'm sorry," he said, "but I don't see what I can do. If I do say it, you're being treated as fair as any two men could ask. You're looked out for in every possible way, and if you choose to spite yourselves, and call everything off, because you can't trust me on one of the minor details of the whole scheme, why, I can't see that it's up to me. I'm sorry, though, sincerely sorry. I firmly believe the mine has a great future."
Harrison's face lengthened perceptibly. The downfall of all his own cherished plans was far from pleasant. Mason, however, got up from his chair, his stern old face set in aggressive lines.
"Dick Gordon," he said, "I've liked you first-rate, up to now; I've tried my best to use you right, an' I've gone further with you than I ever went with any other man concernin' the mine, but I don't like this part of your scheme, an' I never will. It ain't honest. Capitalize her at a million dollars, an' we're with you up to the neck, but if you're goin' to stick to any of these five million schemes, why—you can go plumb to hell for all of me."
He walked slowly towards the door. Harrison rose and, awkwardly enough, followed suit. There was a moment's tense silence. Then Gordon stepped forward and laid his hand on Mason's arm.
"For God's sake, Jim," he cried, "don't let's part this way. We seem to look at this thing differently, but we've been too good friends to start quarreling over it now. Give me a week to think the whole proposition over, and you take the same. Pretty nearly everything in the world can be fixed up by some sort of a compromise. You're sure you're right, and I'm sure I'm right, but I'm not going to quarrel with you and Jack, if we never have a mine at all. And if we find we can't come to terms, and there's anything else I can do, why, I'll be ready, just the same, to help out any time in any way I can."
By good fortune he had struck the proper chord. Almost instantly Mason's face cleared, and with, for him, unusual feeling, he extended his hand. "That sounds more like it," he cried, "we'll sleep on it for a while, anyway, and see what we can fix up." He paused a moment, then added gruffly, "I guess maybe I spoke kind of hasty, too."
Gordon laughed. "Oh, that's all right," he said. "Maybe you're right, and I'm wrong, after all. But let's make an honest try to get together, anyway, and see if we don't come out better than we think. Good night, Jim; good night, Jack; see you again in a day or two; good night."
His tone was easy and pleasant, his expression fairness and cordiality itself, yet scarcely had the door closed behind them when his whole face suddenly darkened and distorted with rage.
"You fool," he muttered; "you damned straitlaced old fool. To have a chance like that, and turn it down because you thought it wasn't honest. Well, you've had your chance, and it won't come again—"
Just for a moment he paused, and then, his eyes gleaming with passion under his frowning brows, he added, with savage, deliberate meaning, "It won't come again, as long as you live."
Bill Hinckley, pallid, unshaven, tremulous with drink, his drooping lower lip destroying whatever intelligence of expression he might have had when sober, blinked across the table at Harrison, and with his tattered coat sleeve wiped the maudlin tears from his staring, bloodshot eyes.
"I'm damn much obliged, Jack," he quavered, "you're good frien' to me always, an' I'll never forget it, never. I thought I was down 'n out for good, 'n would have been, too, 'f 'twan't for you. You're good frien', Jack, an' I'll never forget it, never."
Harrison eyed him with some disgust. "Ah, cut out the thanks, Bill," he said good-naturedly. "This ain't charity; it's business. We need a watchman, an' if you've got sense enough to keep sober there ain't no reason why you can't hold down the job as well as the next man. It ain't my doings, anyway; it's Gordon's. He's puttin' up the stuff, an' he asks me if I've got any friend I think'll be partial to the job. That's how you come in. But you want to get out of this place pretty damn quick. You've got two days to sober off in, an' then it's up to you whether you make good on your job or not. So you want to make a break out of here right away now. Rum shops ain't healthy for you. Get the idea?"
He rose, and Hinckley obediently enough followed suit, although into his drink-sodden brain hardly a word of Harrison's explanation and caution had penetrated. He had a chance at a job, and Harrison had got it for him; those were the two ideas he had absorbed, and those only, and his last words to Harrison were a repetition of his old refrain, "You're good frien' to me, Jack, an' I'll never forget it, never."
The week which Gordon had proposed for the consideration of the question of the capital stock had become first two, and then three, without any definite agreement being reached. The old man stood firm. Ten thousand shares, par one hundred; that he had determined upon as the proper thing, and to move him one share or one dollar in either direction seemed apparently a task impossible of achievement. To Gordon, therefore, fell the lot of yielding gracefully, and while he did not at once abandon his position outright, he did take pains to make it clear both to Mason and to Harrison that any arrangement in reason would be satisfactory to him. Thus complete good feeling was restored among the three, each tacitly assuming that some kind of an understanding would be reached whenever Gordon was ready to say the word.
Certain much needed improvements, indeed, Gordon insisted upon having made at once; for the mine's sake, as he phrased it, and not for his own. Not the least of these was the appointment of Bill Hinckley as watchman, and in Hinckley's welfare Gordon from the first showed a most kindly interest. Not only did he fit him out with a suit of clothes, a cartridge belt and revolver, but further he did what he could to arouse the drunkard's self-respect, smoothing out occasional dissensions between Mason and Hinckley, and sometimes even, when bound towards the mine, taking Hinckley's lunch pail down to him, and stopping for a pipe and a friendly chat.
Small wonder that he soon numbered Hinckley, along with most of the rest of the township, among his devoted admirers. With high and low alike, indeed, throughout the county, Gordon, as time went on, had reinforced his first good impression, gained by force of arms, by showing equal aptitude for the gentler arts of peace. Alike in the town of Seneca, among the scattered mountain claims, and in Jim Mason's little cabin itself, he was soon a welcome visitor, honestly liked, respected and looked up to.
And all this time, for all his different activities, for all the seeming aimlessness of many of his expeditions and conversations, Gordon, far underneath the surface, was working ceaselessly, steadily, relentlessly, toward one desired end; with Jim Mason's cabin as the scene, and the members of Jim Mason's household as the involuntary actors, in the drama whose final act he was seeking to hasten to its end.
With honest, open-minded Jack Harrison he had been on the best terms from the first; with Jim Mason progress had been slower, but progress it had been, for all that. And while the old man's grunts and occasional dry chuckles meant to Gordon little in the way of cordiality or good-will, to Ethel Mason and to Harrison they were a source of constant wonderment, revealing, as they did, depths of good-humor in the crusty old man of which they had never even dreamed. With the girl herself Gordon found his wits kept busy in a spirited warfare of words, for apparently to Ethel Mason his every action was a subject for criticism, his every word an opening for a shaft of wit, barbed for the most part, too, with a sarcasm keen and fine; and yet, for all their contention, under the surface both felt a mutual—perhaps both alike would have paused, at a loss for the precise word—liking, regard, attraction, perchance even a word of deeper meaning still.
From the first, indeed, they had been thrown much in each other's company. Many a long ride Gordon had been forced to take over the winding, solitary mountain roads, and what more natural than that he should ask Ethel Mason to go with him as companion and guide. And then, on days when business did not intrude itself, what again more natural than the transition to rides and walks with pleasure and not business as their aim.
One place especially possessed for Gordon an irresistible attraction,—beyond the pass, down in the lowland between the mountains, where the brown of the marsh, dotted with many a quiet pond and reedy pool, stretched far away on either hand, far as the eye could reach, losing itself at last against the dim, smoky outline of the distant hills. The river, a narrow ribbon of brightest blue, flowing peacefully along through the valley in many a winding curve, spread gradually out, just under the shadow of Burnt Mountain, into a long, shallow, sedgy lagoon, the stopping place for innumerable hosts of chattering wild-fowl, winging their leisurely way along on their journey to the southward. Hither it was that Gordon loved to come, and hither it was, on a crisp fall afternoon, that he and Ethel Mason, driving over the mountain from Seneca, had come, intent upon the evening flight.
The sun still hung, an hour high, above the horizon. A big green-headed mallard drake winged his way lazily from the marsh over toward the pond, noted with pleased interest the little flock of his companions feeding near the shore, turned, set his wings, and glided gently downward through the crisp, dry stillness of the keen October air. A puff of white smoke darted from the clump of reeds, there was a crack like the sharp snap of a whip lash; the drake's head jerked suddenly back over his body, and with a mighty splash fell stone dead into the quiet waters of the pond. The little ripples spread away until they touched the shore, a few feathers floated softly downward on to the quiet surface, the smoke wreathed slowly heavenward, dissolving against the clear blue sky, and all was still again.
Lying back at ease in the little blind skilfully hidden on the shore, Gordon leisurely took the gun from the girl's hand, snapped it open, slipped in a fresh cartridge, and with a slow smile of admiration handed it back to her again.
"Ethel," he said, "you certainly can shoot. I've never heard of a girl killing ducks the way you can. It's really remarkable."
The girl nodded indifferently. "Yes," she answered listlessly; "I can shoot, and fish, and ride a horse, and cook, and keep house, and that's all. That makes a great life for a girl, doesn't it? And all the things I'd really like to do, the things that make any girl's life pleasant, why, I've never had a chance at one of them—and I suppose I never shall."
Gordon gazed steadily at the girl as she sat looking out over the pond, the little sixteen-gage across her knees. For the hundredth time he noted the slender perfection of her lithe young figure, the faultless profile, the delicate, almost childlike beauty of every feature. And he did not take his eyes away.
"The things you'd really like to do," he repeated. "I'm afraid, Ethel, you're just like nine-tenths of the rest of the world, not knowing when you're well off. What could you want better than this?"—he waved his hand toward the quiet waters of the pond, the level marsh beyond, the pleasant valley stretching away to meet the distant hills, and above them the huge mountain towering up against the sky. "And you'd leave the life you're living—for what? Suppose you had all the money you wanted, suppose this very minute you were free absolutely to act as you pleased, now what would you really do?"
The girl gazed dreamily away over the valley. "All the money I wanted," she mused; "oh, I don't know. First of all, I'd get straight away from here. I'm sick to death of it all. I'd go right to some big city, where I could see all the things I've always wanted to see, and buy all the things I've always wanted to buy. Clothes, first, of course, and jewels and things; and theaters, and the opera, and an automobile. Oh, I could spend the money all right; you needn't worry about that."
Gordon laughed. "I believe you," he said. "I'd like to watch you doing it, and I believe I'll have a chance to, some day. I don't know how good it's going to be for you, but if you'll have patience a little while longer, till this deal about the mine goes through, you'll have money enough. There's no question about that."
The girl shook her head disbelievingly. "For the last five years," she said, "I've been hearing about the money we were going to get out of the mine some day. Now I've got so that when I see it—real, true money—I'll believe it; and not a minute before."
Gordon smiled. "This time," he said, "things are really going through. I'm willing to admit that your father is about the toughest proposition to do business with that I've ever come across. I'm used to getting my own way, myself, but I can always see the other fellow's side, and come to some sort of a compromise; but your father—good heavens, he doesn't know what the word compromise means. I've given in to him practically on every detail of the whole agreement, and when, at the very end of everything, there's one little point that I'm anxious to have my way about, why, no, he won't give in on that, either, and if I don't like it, I can go back East without the mine, or go to another place he mentioned. That's compromise for you, with a vengeance."
The girl laughed in thorough enjoyment. "What is it you can't agree about?" she queried.
"Why," answered Gordon, "it's about the question of the capital stock. It's a little technical, perhaps, to explain to you, but the result is that where he wants to make one dollar, I want to make five. Doesn't my way sound the best?"
The girl laughed again, but, withal, glanced at him shrewdly. "Of course it does," she answered lightly, "much the best; but I suppose in the end you've got to give in to him, just the same; that is, if you want the mine."
Gordon sighed. "Yes, I suppose so," he assented, "but don't let him know it, just the same. I'm still holding out on a bluff. But I've as good as made up my mind. The mine's really a wonder; it's too good a chance to let go, even though it's got to be run on your father's somewhat old-fashioned ideas."
There was a moment's silence. Then the girl spoke again. "You've waked them up a little, anyway," she observed. "Didn't Jack tell me you were going to keep Hinckley for a watchman?"
Gordon nodded. "We surely are," he answered. "I did manage to persuade the old man about that. Oh, and that reminds me, too; there's something else I meant to ask him about that. Isn't there another opening of some old claim that comes out near our fifth level somewhere?"
The girl nodded in turn. "Sure," she answered "Abe Peters started a claim before the one he's got now that does come out right on the fifth level, but we bought the land afterwards; it wasn't any use to him. You wouldn't need any watchman there."
"No," assented Gordon; "I guess that's right. I had an idea it was on Peters' land. I don't suppose any one could get down it, anyway."
The girl laughed outright. "Of course they could," she cried; "but they couldn't do any harm to the claim. It seems to me you're awfully green about mining for such a smart man as they say you are."
Gordon did not seem in the least offended. On the contrary, he laughed with the utmost good nature. "I'll admit it," he said; "but I'm not nearly so green when it comes to the stock market end of things, and that's what concerns you most, after all. You wait about six months, and you'll be spending money hand over fist; see if you don't."
The girl pondered. "I don't suppose," she said, at last, "that the old man would let me go off traveling alone. Maybe I'll have the money, but no chance to blow it in."
Gordon laughed. "Of course," he said, with mock seriousness, "what you really need is a husband to take you around and give you a good time. I think I know a man that would like the job first-rate, too."
The girl nodded. "I know of several myself," she answered coolly, "but I suppose you mean Jack, don't you?"
"Yes," said Gordon, "I mean Jack. It's quite evident to any one. Joking aside, though, Jack's a mighty good fellow, and he's been a mighty good friend to your father. It isn't one man in a hundred that would stick the way he has. If your father's made a will, or ever does make one, you really ought to remind him to fix Jack all right in it. It's a curious thing, but as a man grows older, he sometimes forgets things like that altogether."
The girl shrugged her shapely shoulders. "A will," she echoed. "He'd never take the trouble to make a will. He's pretty healthy yet. And as long as you've got it all fixed that I'm to marry Jack, it'll be all right, anyway."
Gordon laughed. He found the girl distinctly amusing. "I wonder," he said idly, "how Jack will like taking a spending trip around the country. Not very much, I fancy. I imagine he's more for the happy fireside act, isn't he?"
The girl laughed, too. "I think you're awfully good," she said, "to take so much trouble over my affairs. I think you're right, too. I never thought of it before. I don't believe I'll take Jack, after all."
"I wonder, now," ventured Gordon, "if any of the others—"
The girl shook her head. "No, not a bit better," she answered. "I'll tell you, though, what you might do. You might break off your engagement with that girl back East you've been telling me about, and then ask me. I'm not sure but what you'd do pretty well. You've got money, they say, and that's a good deal. Of course, you're rather conceited, but then you're not bad-looking. On the whole—"
Gordon cut her short. "I beg off," he cried; "a joke's a joke, but you're rather rubbing it in. I tried to be funny with the wrong person; I'll admit it. Speaking of Rose, though; that reminds me again—I'm going to see if I can't persuade her to come out here soon; it's taking so much longer to get things in shape than I thought it would, and I was wondering—do you suppose you'd mind asking her to stay with you? The hotel, to be frank, is pretty near the limit, and then there'd be a chaperon, too, while if you invited her—"
The girl nodded. "Sure," she said; "glad to. I'd really like to see—"
She stopped abruptly. A pair of black ducks swung swiftly across the decoys, and like a flash the gun leaped to her cheek. The two quick reports sounded almost as one, and the two ducks struck the water, dead. The girl rose.
"Come on," she cried, "that makes our dozen. We've got to be getting back home."
By the time Gordon had launched the little skiff and brought the ducks ashore, she had deftly harnessed the horse to the old buggy, and stood waiting for him. Tossing the ducks under the seat, he stood back for her to get in, and then, with a sudden impulse, stepped forward again, blocking her path. Very dainty, very charming, she stood there with a little smile of understanding on her lips.
"Ethel," he whispered.
She made no answer. A sudden gust of passion shook him. He took one quick step forward, and clasped her in his arms. "Ethel," he whispered hoarsely, "suppose there wasn't any other girl."
With a glance enticing beyond words, she raised her eyes to his. "Oh, but there is," she answered, and yet she made no move to free herself, and in another moment their lips met.