I stood watching until the tiny launch rounded the point; then, as the light was still fairly good,—it being the end of the month of May,—and as I had no inclination for sleep as yet, I got into the smallest of the rowing boats that were tied up alongside the wharf, loosed it and pulled leisurely up the bay, with the intention of making myself a little better acquainted with the only living soul with whom I was within hail,—Jake Meaghan.
As I ran the boat into his cove, I could hear his dog bark warningly.
The door of his barn,—for it was nothing else,—was closed, and it was some time before I heard Meaghan's deep voice in answer to my knock, inviting me to come in and bidding his dog to lie down.
Meaghan was sitting, presumably reading a newspaper, which was the only kind of "literature" I ever saw him read. His attitude appeared to me to be assumed and I had a notion that, when the dog first barked at my approach, he had been busy with the contents of a brass-bound, wooden chest which now lay half under his bunk, in a recess in the far corner.
"Hello! Thought you might come over. Sit down," he greeted. "Saw the boss pull out half an hour ago. I'm just sittin' down for my turn at the newspaper. They leave me a bundle off the steamer once in a while. This one's from the old country;—theLiverpool Monitor. It's two months old, but what's the dif,—the news is just as good as if it was yesterday's or to-morrow's."
I looked round Jake's shanty. Considering it was a single-roomed place and used for cooking, washing, sleeping and everything else, it was wonderfully tidy, although, to say truth, there was little in it after all to occasion untidiness: a stove, a pot, a frying-pan, an enamelled tin teapot, some crockery, a table, an oil lamp, three chairs, the brass-bound trunk, two wheat-flake boxes and Jake's bed,—with one other addition,—a fifteen-gallon keg with a stopcock in it and set on a wooden stand close to his bunk.
An odour of shell-fish pervaded the atmosphere, coming from some kind of soup made from clams and milk, on which Jake had evidently been dining. The residue of it still sat in a pot on the stove. This, I discovered, was Jake's favourite dish.
He rose, took two breakfast cups from a shelf and went over to the keg in the corner. He filled up both of them to the brim.
"Have a drink, George?" he invited, offering me one of the cups.
"What is it?" I asked, thinking it might be a cider of some kind.
"What d'ye suppose, man?—ginger beer? It's good rye whiskey."
From the odour, I had ascertained this for myself before he spoke.
"No, thanks, Jake, I don't drink."
"Holy mackinaw!" he exclaimed, almost dropping the cups in his astonishment. "If you don't drink, how in the Sam Hill are you going to make it stick up here? Why, man, you'll go batty in the winter time, for it's lonely as hell."
"From all accounts, Jake, hell is not a very lonely place," I laughed.
"Aw!—you know what I mean," he put in.
"I'll have plenty of work to do in the store; enough to keep me from feeling lonely."
"Not you. Once it's goin', it'll be easy's rollin' off'n a log. What'll you do o' nights, 'specially winter nights,—if you don't drink?"
He sat down and began to empty his cup of liquor by the gulp.
His dog, which had been lying sullenly on the floor near the stove, got up and ambled leisurely to Jake's feet. It looked up at him as he drank, then it put its two front paws on Jake's knees, as if to attract his attention.
Meaghan stopped his imbibing and stroked the dog's head.
"Well,—well—Mike; and did I forget you?"
He poured a little liquor in a saucer and set it down on the floor before the dog, who lapped it up with all the relish of a seasoned toper. Then it put its paws back on Jake's knees, as if asking for more.
"No! Mike. Nothin' doin'. You've had your whack. Too much ain't good for your complexion, old man."
In a sort of dreamy, contemplative mood the dog sat down on its haunches between us.
"What'll you do o' nights if you don't drink? You ain't told me that, George," reiterated Jake, sucking some of the liquor from his drooping moustaches.
"Oh!" I replied, "I'll read, and sometimes I'll sit out and watch the stars and listen to the sea and the wind."
"And what after that?" he queried.
"I can always think, when I have nothing else to do."
"And what after that?" he asked again.
"Nothing, Jake,—nothing. That's all."
"No it ain't. No it ain't, I tell you;—after that,—it's the bughouse for yours. It's the thinking,—it's the thinking that does it every time. It's the last stage, George. You'll be clean, plumb batty inside o' six months."
The dog got up, after two unsuccessful attempts.
Never did I see such a strange sight in any animal. He put out one paw and staggered to the right. He put out another and staggered to the left. All the time, his eyes were half closed. He was quite insensible of our presence, for he was as drunk as any waterfront loafer. Staggering, stumbling and balancing, he made his way back to his place beside the stove, where, in a moment more, he was in a deep sleep and snoring,—as a Westerner would put it,—to beat the cars.
Meaghan noticed my interest in the phenomenon.
"That's nothin'," he volunteered. "Mike has his drink with me every night, for the sake o' company. Why not? He doesn't see any fun in lookin' at the stars and watching the tide come up o' nights. Worst is, he can't stand up to liquor. It kind o' gets his goat; yet he's been tipplin' for three years now."
Jake finished off his cup of whisky.
"Good Heavens, man!" I exclaimed in disgust and dismay, "don't you know you will kill yourself drinking that stuff in that way?"
"Guess nit," he growled, but quite good-naturedly. "I ain't started. I've been drinkin' more'n that every night for ten years and I ain't dead yet,—not by a damn sight. No! nor I ain't never been drunk, neither."
He took up the other cupful of whisky as he spoke and slowly drained it off before my eyes. He laid the empty cup on the table with a grunt of satisfaction, pulling at his long moustaches in lazy pleasure.
"That's my nightcap, George. Better'n seein' stars, too."
I could see his end.
"I'd much rather see stars than snakes," I remarked. But Jake merely laughed it off.
I rose in a kind of cold perspiration. To me, this was horrible;—drinking for no apparent reason.
He came with me to the door. His voice was as steady as could be; so were his legs. The effects of the liquor he had consumed did not show on him except maybe for a bloodshot appearance in the whites of his baby-blue eyes.
I was worried. I had known such another as Jake in the little village of Brammerton; and I knew what the inevitable end had been and what Jake's would be also.
"Don't be sore at me, George," he pleaded. "It's the only friend I got now."
"It is not any friend of yours, Jake."
"Well,—maybe it ain't, but I think it is and that's about the only way we can reckon our friends.
"When you find I ain't doin' my share o' the work because o' the booze or when you catch me drunk,—I'll quit it. Good-night, George."
I wished him good-night gruffly, hurried over the beach, scrambled into the boat and rowed quickly for my new home.
And, as I stood on the veranda for a long time before turning in, I watched the moon rise and skim her way behind and above the clouds, throwing, as she did so, great dark shadows and eerie lights on the sea.
In the vast, awesome stillness of the forest behind and the swishing and shuffling of the incoming tide on the shingles on the beach, I thought of what my good friend, K. B. Horsfal, had quoted:
"Where every prospect pleases and only man is vile."
Next morning I was awakened bright and early by the singing of birds. For a few moments I imagined myself back in England; but the ceaseless beat of the sea and the sustained, woody-toned, chattering, chirruping squeak of an angry squirrel on my roof gave me my proper location.
I had heard once, in a London drawing-room, that there were no singing birds in British Columbia; that the songsters of the East were unable to get across the high, eternal cold and snow of the Rockies. What a fallacy! They were everywhere around me, and in thousands. How they got there was of little moment to me. They were there, much to my joy; and the forests at my back door were alive with the sweetness of their melodies.
Early as I was, I could see a thin column of smoke rising from the cove where Jake was. When I went to the woodpile at the rear of my bungalow, I found more evidence of his early morning diligence. A heap of dry, freshly cut kindling was set out, while the chickens had already been fed and let out to wander at their own sweet wills.
For the first time in my very ordinary life, I investigated the eccentricities of a cook stove, overcame them and cooked myself a rousing breakfast of porridge and bacon and eggs with toast. How proud I felt of my achievement and how delicious the food tasted! Never had woman cooked porridge and bacon and eggs to such a delightful turn.
I laughed joyously, for I felt sure I had stumbled across an important truth that woman had religiously kept from the average man throughout all the bygone ages: the truth that any man, if he only sets his mind to it, can cook a meal perfectly satisfactory to himself.
After washing up the breakfast dishes without smashing any, sweeping the kitchen floor and shovelling up—nothing; there was nothing left for me to do, for the north-going steamer was not due until early in the afternoon. When she should arrive and give me delivery of the freight which she was bringing, I knew I should have enough to occupy my attention for some days to come, getting the cases opened up and the goods checked over, priced and set out in the store; but, meantime, my time was my own.
It was a glorious morning. The sun was shining and the air was balmy as a midsummer's day at home. I opened the front door and gazed on the loveliness; I stretched my arms and felt vigour running to my finger-tips. Then I longed, how I longed, for a swim!
And why not! I slipped out of my shirt and trousers and got into my bathing suit. I ran down to the end of the wharf and out on to the rocks.
The water was calm, and deep, and of a pale green hue. I could see the rock cod and little shiners down there, darting about on a breakfast hunt.
Filling my lungs, I took a header in, coming up fifteen yards out and shaking my head with a gurgling cry of pleasure. I struck out, overhand, growing stronger and more vigorous each succeeding moment, as the refreshing sea played over my body. On, on I went, turning upon my breast sometimes, sometimes on my back, lashing the water into foam with my feet and blowing it far into the air from my mouth.
Half a mile out and I was as near to the island, in the middle of the Bay, as I was to the wharf. I knew I could make it, although I had not been in the water for several weeks. I had an abundance of time, the sea was warm, the island looked pretty,—so on I went.
I reached it at last, a trifle blown, but in good condition.
It had not been by any means a record swim for me. I had not intended that it should. All the way, it had been a pleasure trip.
I made for a sandy beach, between two rocky headlands. Soon, I got my footing and waded ashore. After a short rest, I set out to survey the island.
All the childhood visions I had stored in my memory of "Coral Island," "Crusoe's Island," and "Treasure Island" became visualised and merged into one,—the island I was exploring.
It was of fairy concept; only some four hundred yards long and about a hundred yards in breadth, with rugged rocks and sandy beaches; secret caves and strange caverns; fertile over all with small fir and arbutus trees, shrubs, ferns and turfy patches of grass of the softest velvet pile. In the most unlikely places, I stumbled across bubbling springs of fresh water forcing its way through the rocks. How they originated, was a mystery to me, for the island was separated from the mainland by a mile, at least, of salt water.
What an ideal spot, I thought, for a picnic! Would not some of my eccentric acquaintances at home,—the Duke of Athlane, for instance,—dearly love to take the whole thing up by the roots and transplant it in the centre of some of the artificial lakes they had schemed and contrived, in wild attempts to make more beautiful the natural beauties of their estates?
By this time, the warm air had dried my body. I climbed to the highest point of the island,—a small plateau, covered with short turf; a glorious place for the enjoyment of a sun bath. I lay down and stretched myself.
My only regret then was that I did not have a book with me to complete my Paradise.
Pillowed on a slight incline, I dreamily watched the scudding clouds, then my eyes travelled across to the mainland. I could see the smoke curl upward from my kitchen fire. I saw old Jake get into his boat, followed by the drunken rascal of a dog, Mike. All was still and quiet but for the seethe and shuffle of the sea.
Suddenly, on the other side of the water somewhere, but evidently far away, a voice, untrained, but of peculiar sweetness, broke into my drowsing. I listened for a time, trying to catch the refrain. As it grew clearer, I tried to pick up the words, but they were in a tongue foreign to me. They were not French, nor were they Italian. At last, it struck me that they were Spanish words; the words of a Spanish dancing song, which, when I was a gadding-about college boy, had been popular among us. I recalled having heard that it was sung by the chorus of a famous Spanish dancer, who, at one time, had been the rage of London and the Provinces, but who had mysteriously vanished from the footlights with the same suddenness as she had appeared there.
It was a haunting little melody, catchy and childishly simple; and it had remained in my memory all these years, as is so often the case with choruses that we hear in our babyhood.
Naturally, I was more than curious to see the singer, so I crept to the top of the grassy knoll and peered over, searching the far side of the island and over the water.
Away out, I discerned a small boat making in the direction of the island. The oars were being plied by a woman, or a girl,—I could not tell which, as her back was toward me and she was still a good way off. She handled her oars as if she were a part of the boat itself and the boat were a living thing.
She stopped every now and then, rose from her seat and busied herself with something. I wondered what she was doing. I saw her haul something into the boat. As she examined it in her hand, the sun flashed upon it. I could hear her laugh happily as she tossed it into the bottom of the boat.
She was trolling for fish and, evidently, getting a plentiful supply.
She rowed in as if intent upon fishing round the island. But, all at once, she changed her mind, turned the boat, pulled in her fishing line and shot into a sandy beach, springing out and pulling the boat clear of the tide.
She straightened herself as she turned and faced the plateau on the far incline of which I lay hidden. I saw at a glance that, though a mere girl in years,—somewhere between sixteen and eighteen,—yet she was a woman, maturing as a June rose, as a butterfly stretching its pretty wings for the first time in the ecstasy of its new birth. Of medium height; her hair was the darkest shade of brown and hung in two long, thick braids down to her neat waist. She seemed not at all of the countrified type I might have expected to encounter so far in the wilds.
She was dressed in a spotless white blouse, the sleeves of which were rolled back almost to her shoulders; with a dark-coloured, serviceable skirt, the hem of which hung high above a pair of small, bare feet and neat, supple-looking ankles. I could see her shoes and stockings, brown in colour, lying in the bow of the boat. She reached over, picked them up, then sat on a rock by the water's edge and pulled them on her feet.
But, after all, it was not her dress that held my attention; although in the main this was pleasing to the eye, nor yet was it the girl's features, for she was still rather far off for me to observe these distinctly. What riveted me was the light, agile rapidity of her every action; and her evident abandonment of everything else for what, for the moment, absorbed her.
As I watched, I became filled with conflicting thoughts. Should I remain where I was, or should I at once betray my presence?
I decided that the island was large enough for both of us. She was not interested in me, so why should I interrupt her in her lonely enjoyment?
I was perplexed more than a little in trying to place where she rightfully belonged. Naturally, I took her to be the daughter of one of the settlers on the far side of Golden Crescent. But there was a something in her entire appearance that seemed to place her on a different plane from that, a plane all by herself; while, again, there was the Spanish song which I had heard her lilt out on the water.
She brought my conjecturing to rather an abrupt conclusion, for, without any warning, she darted up over the rocks and through the ferns to where I lay, and she had almost trodden upon me before I had time to get out of her way.
She stepped back with an exclamation of surprise, but gave no sign to indicate that she was afraid.
I sprang to my feet.
"I am very sorry,—miss," I said sincerely.
"Oh!—there ain't much to be sorry over. This ain't my island. Still,—girls don't much care about men watching them from behind places," she replied, with a tone of displeasure.
"And I am sorry,—again," I answered. "Please forgive me, for I could hardly help it. I was lying here when I heard you sing. I became curious. When you landed, I intended making my presence known, but I said to myself just what you have said now:—'It is not my island.' However, I shall go now and leave you in possession."
"Where is your boat?"
"Didn't bring one with me."
"How did you get here then?"
Her blunt questioning was rather disconcerting.
"Oh! I walked it," I answered lightly, with a grin.
Her voice changed. "You're trying to be smart," she reprimanded.
"Sorry," I said, in a tone of contrition, "for I am not a bit smart in spite of my trying. Well,—I swam across from the wharf over there."
She looked up. "Being smart some more."
"No!—it is true."
She measured the distance from the island to the wharf with her eye.
I remarked, some time ago, that her hair was of the darkest shade of brown. I was wrong;—there was a darker hue still, and that was in her eyes; while her skin was of that attractive combination, olive and pink.
"Gee!—that was some swim.
"How are you going to get back?" she continued, in open friendliness.
"Swim!"
"Ain't you tired?"
"I was winded a bit when I got here, but I am all right again," I answered.
"You're an Englishman?"
"How did you guess it?" I asked, as if I were giving her credit for unearthing a great mystery.
Before answering, she sat down on the grass, clasping her hands over her knees. I squatted a short distance from her.
"Only Englishmen go swimming hereabouts in the morning."
"Do you often stumble across stray, swimming Englishmen?" I asked in banter.
"No!—but three summers ago there were some English people staying in that house at the wharf that's now closed up:—the one next Horsfal's, and they were in the water so much, they hardly gave the fish a chance. It was the worst year we ever had for fishing."
I laughed, and she looked up in surprise.
"Then we had an English surveyor staying with us for a month last year. He was crazy for the water. He went in for half an hour every morning and before his breakfast, too. You don't find the loggers or any of the settlers doing silly stunts like that. No, siree.
"Guess you're a surveyor?"
"No!"
"Or maybe a gentleman up for shooting and fishing? Can't be though, for there ain't any launches in the Bay. Yes, you are, too, for I saw a launch in yesterday."
"I hope I am always a gentleman," I said, "but I am not the kind of gentleman you mean. I have no launch and no money but what I can earn. I am the new man who is to look after Mr. Horsfal's Golden Crescent property. I shall be more or less of a common country storekeeper after to-day."
"Heard about that store from old Jake. Granddad over home was talking about it, too. It'll be convenient for the Camps and a fine thing for the settlers up here."
She jumped up. "Well,—I guess I got to beat it, Mister——"
"George Bremner," I put in.
"My name's Rita;—Rita Clark. I stay over at the ranch there, the one with the red-roofed houses. This island's named Rita, too."
"After you?"
"Ya!—guess so!"
She did not venture any more.
"Been here long?" I asked.
"Long's I can remember," she answered.
"Like it?"
"I love it. It's all I got. Never been away from it more'n three times in my life."
There was something akin to longing in her voice.
"I love it all the same,—all but that over there."
As she spoke, she shivered and pointed away out to the great perpendicular rock, with its jagged, devilish, shark-like teeth, which rose sheer out of the water and stood black, forbidding and snarling, even in the sunshine, to the right, at the entrance to the Bay, a quarter of a mile or so from the far horn of Golden Crescent.
"You don't like rocks?"
"Some rocks," she whispered, "but not 'The Ghoul.'"
"The Ghoul," I repeated with a shudder. "Ugh!—what a name. Who on earth saddled it with such a horrible name?"
"Nobody on earth. Guess it must have been the devil in hell, for it's a friend of his."
Her face grew pale and a nameless horror crept into her eyes.
"It ain't nice to look on now,—is it?"
"No!" I granted.
"You want to see it in the winter, when there's a storm tearing in, with the sea crashing over it in a white foam and,—and,—people trying to hang on to it. Oh!—I tell you what it is,—it's hellish, that's all. It's well named The Ghoul,—it's a robber of the dead."
"Robber of the dead!—what do you mean?"
"Everybody but a stranger knows:—it robs them of a decent burial. Heaps of men, and women too, have been wrecked out there, but only one was ever known to come off alive. Never a body has ever been found afterwards." She shivered and turned her head away.
For a while, I gazed at the horrible rock in fascination. What a reminder it was to the poor human that there is storm as well as calm; evil as well as good; that turmoil follows in the wake of quiet; that sorrow tumbles over joy; and savagery and death run riot among life and happiness and love!
At last, I also turned my eyes away from The Ghoul, with a strong feeling of anger and resentment toward it. Already I loathed and hated the thing as I hated nothing else.
I stood alongside the girl and we remained silent until the mood passed.
Then she raised her eyes to mine and smiled. In an endeavour to forget,—which, after all, was easy amid so much sunshine and beauty,—I reverted to our former conversation.
"You said you were seldom away from here. Don't you ever take a trip to Vancouver?"
"Been twice. We're not strong on trips up here. Grand-dad goes to Vancouver and Victoria once in a while. Grandmother's been here twenty years and never been five miles from the ranch, 'cept once, and she's sorry now for that once.
"Joe's the one that gets all the trips. You ain't met Joe. Guess when you do you and him won't hit it. He always fights with men of your size and build."
"Who is this Joe?" I asked. "He must be quite a man-eater."
"I ain't going to tell you any more. You'll know him when you see him.
"I'm going now. Would you like some fish? The trout were biting good this morning. I've got more'n we need."
We went down to the shore together. There were between thirty and forty beauties of sea-trout in the bottom of her boat. She handed me out a dozen.
"Guess that'll make a square meal for you and Jake."
Then she looked at me and laughed, showing her teeth. "Clean forgot," she said. "A swimming man ain't no good at carrying fish."
"Why not?" I asked.
I picked up some loose cord from her boat, strung the trout by the gills and tied them securely round my waist.
She watched me archly and a thought went flashing through my mind that it did not need the education of the city to school a woman in the art of using her eyes.
"Guess I'll see you off the premises first, before I go."
"All right!" said I.
We crossed the Island once more, and I got on to a rock which dipped sheer and deep into the sea.
She held out her hand and smiled in such a bewitching way that, had I not been a well-seasoned bachelor of almost twenty-five years' standing, I should have lost my heart to her completely.
"Good-bye! Mister,—Mister Bremner. Safe home."
"Good-bye! Miss—Rita."
"Sure you can make it?" she asked earnestly.
"Yes!" I cried, and plunged in.
As I came up, I turned and waved my hand. She waved in answer, and when I looked again she was gone.
I struck swiftly for the wharf, allowing for the incoming tide.
When I was half-way across, I heard the sound of oars and, on taking a backward glance, I saw Rita making toward me.
"Hello!" I cried, when she drew near. "What's the matter?"
A little shame-faced, she bent over. "I got scared," she said timidly, "scared you mightn't make it. Sure you don't want me to row you in?"
The boat was alluring, but my pride was touched.
"Quite sure," I answered. "I'm as fresh as the trout round my waist. Thanks all the same."
"All right! Guess I was foolish. You ain't a man; you're a porpoise."
With this half-annoyed sally, she swung the bow of the boat and rowed away.
That afternoon, prompt at two o'clock, a whistle sounded beyond the point and, shortly afterwards, the steamboatSiwash, north bound, entered the Bay.
Jake and I were waiting at the end of the wharf, seated in a large, wide-beamed, four-oared boat, with Mike, the dog,—still eyeing me suspiciously,—crouching between his master's feet.
We had a raft and half a dozen small rowing boats of all shapes and conditions, strung out, Indian file, from our stern. Every available thing in Golden Crescent Bay that could float, down to a canoe and an old Indian dug-out, we borrowed or requisitioned for our work. And, with this long procession in tow, we pulled out and made for the steamer, which came to a standby in the deep water, three hundred yards from the shore.
The merchandise was let down by slings from the lower deck, and we had to handle the freight as best we could, keeping closely alongside all the while.
A dozen times, I thought one or another of the boats would be overturned and its contents emptied into the Bay. But luck was with us. Jake spat tobacco juice on his hands every few minutes and sailed in like a nigger. Our clothes were soon moist through and through, and the perspiration was running over our noses long before our task was completed. But finally the last package was lowered and checked off by the mate and myself, a clear receipt given; and we (Jake and I) pushed for the shore, landing exhausted in body but without mishap to the freight.
Jake fetched some fresh clams to my kitchen for convenience and, after slapping half a plug of tobacco in his cheek, he started in and cooked us a savoury concoction which he called "chowder," made with baked clams mixed in hot milk, with butter and crumbled toast; all duly seasoned:—while I smoked my pipe and washed enough dishes to hold our food, and set the table for our meal.
Already, I had discovered that dish-washing was the bugbear of a kitchen drudge's existence, be the kitchen drudge female or male. I had only done the job three or four times, but I had got to loathe and abhor the operation. Not that I felt too proud to wash dishes, but it seemed such a useless, such an endless, task. However, I suppose everything in this old world carries with it more or less of these same annoyingly bad features.
At any rate, I never could make up my mind to wash a dish until I required it for my next and immediate meal.
We dined ravenously, and throughout the proceeding, Mike sat in the doorway, keeping close watch that I did not interfere with the sacred person of his lord and master, Jake Meaghan.
Rested and reinvigorated, we set-to with box-openers, hammers and chisels, unpacking and unpacking until the thing became a boring monotony.
Canned milk, canned beef, canned beans, canned salmon, canned crabs, canned well-nigh-everything; bottled fruits, bottled pickles, bottled jams and jellies, everything bottled that was not canned; bags of sugar, flour, meal, potatoes, oats and chicken feed; hardware galore, axes, hammers, wedges, peevies, cant hoops, picks, shovels, nails, paints, brooms, brushes and a thousand other commodities and contrivances the like of which I never saw before and hope never to see again.
Never, in all my humble existence, did I feel so clerky as I did then.
I checked the beastly stuff off as well as I could, taking the Vancouver wholesalers' word for the names of half the things, for I was quite sure they knew better than I did about them.
With the assistance of Jake, as "hander-up," I set the goods in a semblance of order on the shelves and about the store.
We worked and slaved as if it were the last day and our eternal happiness depended on our finishing the job before the last trump sounded its blast of dissolution.
By the last stroke of twelve, midnight, we had the front veranda swept clean of straw, paper and excelsior, and all empty boxes cleared away; just in time to welcome the advent of my first Sabbath day in the Canadian West.
Throughout our arduous afternoon and evening, what a surprise old Jake was to me! Well I knew that he was hard and tough from years of strenuous battling with the northern elements; but that he, at his age and with his record for hard drinking, should be able to keep up the sustained effort against a young man in his prime and that he should do so cheerfully and without a word of complaint,—save an occasional grunt when the steel bands around some of the boxes proved recalcitrant, and an explosive, picturesque oath when the end of a large case dropped over on his toes,—was, to me, little short of marvellous.
Already, I was beginning to think that Mr. K. B. Horsfal had erred in regard to his man and that it was Jake Meaghan who was twenty-four carat gold.
If any man ever did deserve two breakfast cups brimful of whisky, neat, before turning in, it was old, walrus-moustached, weather-battered, baby-eyed, sour-dough Jake, in the small, early hours of that Sabbath morning.
I slept that night like a dead thing, and the sun was high in the heavens before I opened my eyes and became conscious again of my surroundings.
I looked over at the clock. Fifteen minutes past ten! I threw my legs over the side of the bed, ashamed of my sluggardliness.
Then I remembered,—it was Sunday morning.
Oh! glorious remembering! Sunday,—-with nothing to do but attend to my own bodily comforts.
I pulled my legs back into the bed in order to start the day correctly. I lay and stretched myself, then, very leisurely,—always remembering that it was the Sabbath,—I put one foot out and then the other, until, at last, I stood on the floor, really and truly up and awake.
Jake had been around. I could see traces of him in the yard, though he was nowhere visible in the flesh.
After I had breakfasted and made my bed (I know little Maisie Brant, who used to make my bed away back over in the old home—little Maisie who had wept at my departure, would have laughed till she wept again, had she seen my woful endeavours to straighten out my sheets and smooth my pillow. But then, she was not there to see and laugh and—I was quite satisfied with my handiwork and satisfied that I would be able to sleep soundly in the bed when the night should come again)—I hunted the shelves for a book.
Stevenson, Poe, Scott, Hugo, Wells, Barrie, Dumas, Twain, Emerson, Byron, Longfellow, Burns,—which should it be?
Back along the line I went, and chose—oh, well!—an old favourite I had read many times before.
I hunted out a hammock and slung it comfortably from the posts on the front veranda, where I could lie and smoke and read; also where I could look away across the Bay and rest my eyes on the quiet scene when they should grow weary.
Late in the afternoon, when I was beginning to grow tired of my indolence, I heard the thud, thud of a gasoline launch as it came up the Bay. It passed between Rita's Isle and the wharf, and held on, turning in to Jake Meaghan's cove.
I wondered who the visitor could be, then I went back to my reading.
Not long after, a shadow fell across my book and I jumped up.
"Pray, don't let me disturb you, my son," said a soft, well-modulated, masculine voice. "Stay where you are. Enjoy your well-earned rest."
A little, frail-looking, pale-faced, elderly gentleman was at my elbow.
He smiled at me with the smile of an angel, and my heart went out to him at once, so much so that I could have hugged him in my arms.
"My name is William Auld," he continued. "I am the medical missionary. What is yours, my son?"
He held out his hand to me.
"George Bremner," I replied, gripping his. "Let me bring you a chair."
I went inside, and when I returned he was turning over the leaves of my book.
"So you are a book lover?" he mused. "Well, I would to God more men were book lovers, for then the world would be a better place to live in, or rather, the men in it would be better to live among.
"Victor Hugo,—'Les Miserables'!—" he went on. "To my mind, the greatest of all novelists and the greatest of all novels."
He laid the book aside, and sought my confidences, not as a preacher, not as a pedagog, but as a friend; making no effort to probe my past, seeking no secrets; but all anxiety for my welfare; keen to know my ambitions, my aspirations, my pastimes and my habits of living; open and frank in telling me of himself. He was a man's man, with the experience of men that one gets only by years of close contact.
"For twenty years it has been God's will to allow me to travel up and down this beloved coast and minister to those who need me."
"You must like the work, sir," I ventured.
"Like it!—oh! yes, yes,—-I would not exchange my post for the City Temple of London, England."
"But such toil must be arduous, Mr. Auld, for you are not a young man and you do not look altogether a robust one."
He paused in meditation. "It is arduous, sometimes;—to-day I have talked to the men at eight camps and I have visited fourteen families at different points on my journey. But, if I were to stop, who would look after my beloved people in the ranches all up the coast; who would care for my easily-led, simple-hearted brethren in the logging camps, every one of whom knows me, confides in me and looks forward to my coming; not one of whom but would part with his coat for me, not one who would harm a hair of my head. I shall not stop, Mr. Bremner,—I have no desire to stop, not till God calls me.
"I see you have been making changes even in your short time here," he said, pointing to the store.
"Yes! I think Jake and I did fairly well yesterday," I answered, not a little proudly.
"Splendidly, my boy! And, do you know,—your coming here means a great deal. It is the commencement of a new departure, for your store is going to prove a great boon to the settlers. They have been talking about it and looking forward to it ever since it was first mooted.
"But it will not be altogether smooth sailing for you, for you must keep a close rein on your credit."
It struck me, as he spoke, that he was the very man I was desirous of meeting regarding what I considered would prove my stumbling block.
"Can you spare me half an hour, sir, and have tea with me?" I asked.
"Yes! gladly, for my day's service is over,—all but one call, and a cup of tea is always refreshing."
I showed him inside and set him in my cosiest chair. While I busied with the table things,—washing some dishes as a usual preliminary,—I approached the subject.
"Mr. Auld,—I wished to ask your advice, for I am sure you can assist me. My employer, Mr. Horsfal, has given me a free hand regarding credit to the settlers. I know none of them and I am afraid that, without guidance, I may offend some or land the business in trouble with others. Will you help me, sir?"
"Why—of course, I'll help."
He took a sheet of paper from his pocket and commenced to write, talking to me as he did so.
"You know, if times are at all good, you can trust the average man who owns the ranch he lives on to pay his grocery bills sooner or later. Still, if I were you, I wouldn't let any of them get into debt more than sixty or seventy dollars, for they do not require to, and, once they get in arrears, they have difficulty in getting out.
"It is the floating population,—the here-to-day-and-away-to-morrow people who should not be given credit. And,—Mr. Bremner, if you desire to act in kindness to the men themselves, do not allow the loggers, who come in here, to run up bills for themselves personally. Not that they are more dishonest than other people,—far from it. I find it generally the other way round,—but they are notoriously improvident; inclined,—God bless them,—to live for the fleeting moment.
"In many ways they are like children in their simplicity and their waywardness,—and their lot is not one of roses and honeysuckle. They make good money and can afford to pay as they go. If they cannot pay, they can easily wait for what they want until they can, for they are well fed and well housed while in the camps."
We sat down at the table together.
"There is a list, George. May I call you George? It is so much more friendly."
I nodded in hearty approval.
"It is not by any means complete, but it contains the principal people among your near-hand neighbours. You can trust them to pay their last cent: Neil Andrews, Semple, Smith, Johannson, Doolan, MacAllister and Gourlay.
"Any others who may call,—make them pay; and I shall be glad to inform you about them when I am this way again."
"How often do you come in here, Mr. Auld?"
"I try to make it, at least, once in two weeks, but I am not always successful. I like to visit Jake Meaghan. Poor, old, faithful, plodding Jake,—how I tried, at first, to extract the thorn from his flesh—the accursed drink! I talked to him, I scolded him, I threatened him, but,—poor Jake,—he and his whisky are one, and nothing but death will ever separate them."
Suddenly his face lit up and his eyes seemed to catch fire.
"And who are we to judge?" he said, as if denying some inward question. "What right have we to think for a moment that this inherent weakness shall deprive Jake Meaghan of eternal happiness? He is honest; he does good in his own little sphere; he harms no one but himself, for he hasn't a dependent in the world. He fills a niche in God's plan; he is still God's child, no matter how erring he may be. He is some mother's son. George,—I am fully persuaded that my God, and your God, will not be hard on old Jake when his time comes; and, do you know, sometimes I think that time is not very far off."
We sat silent for a while, then the minister spoke again:
"Tell me, George,—have you met any of your neighbours yet?"
"Only two," I said, "Jake, and Rita Clark."
He raised his white, bushy eyebrows.
"So you have met Rita! She's a strange child; harboured in a strange home."
He sighed at some passing thought.
"It's a queer world,—or rather, it's a good world with queer people in it. One would expect to find love and harmony in the home every time away up here, but it does not always follow. Old Margaret Clark is the gentlest, dearest, most patient soul living. Andrew Clark is a good man in every way but one,—but in that one he is the Rock of Gibraltar itself, or, to go nearer the place of his birth, Ailsa Craig, that old milestone that stands defiantly between Scotland and Ireland. Andrew Clark is immovable. He is hard, relentless, fanatical in his ideas of right and wrong; cruel to himself and to the woman he vowed to love and cherish. Oh!—he sears my heart every time I think of him. Yet, he is living up to his idea of what is right."
The white-haired old gentleman,—bearer of the burdens of his fellows,—did not confide in me as to the nature of Andrew Clark's trouble, and it was not for me to probe.
"As for Rita," he pursued, "poor, little Rita!—she is no relative of either Margaret or Andrew Clark. She is a child of the sea. Hers is a pitiful story, and I betray no confidences in telling you of it, for it is common property.
"Fourteen years ago a launch put into the Bay and anchored at the entrance to Jake's cove. There were several ladies and gentlemen in her, and one little girl. They picnicked on the beach and, in the evening, they dined aboard, singing and laughing until after midnight. Jake was the only one who saw or heard them, and he swears they were not English-spoken. Though they were gay and pleasure-loving, yet they seemed to be of a superior class of people.
"He awoke before daylight, fancying he heard screams in the location of The Ghoul Rock. He got up and, so certain was he that he had not been mistaken, he got into his boat and rowed out and round The Ghoul,—for the night was calm,—but everything was quiet and peaceful out there.
"Next morning, while Joe Clark was scampering along the shore, he came across the unconscious form of a little girl about four years old, clad only in a nightdress and roped roughly to an unmarked life-belt. Joe carried her in to his grandfather, old Andrew, who worked over her for more than an hour; and at last succeeded in bringing her round.
"All she could say then was, "Rita, Rita, Rita," although, about a year afterwards, she started to hum and sing a little Spanish dancing song. A peculiar reversion of memory, for she certainly never heard such a song in Golden Crescent.
"Jake swears to this day that she belonged to the launch party, who must have run sheer into The Ghoul Rock and gone down.
"Little boy Joe pleaded with his grandfather and grandmother to keep the tiny girl the sea had given them, and they did not need much coaxing, for she was pretty and attractive from the first.
"Inquiries were set afoot, but, from that day to this, not a clue has been found as to her identity; so, Rita Clark she is and Rita Clark she will remain until some fellow, worthy of her I hope, wins her and changes her name.
"I thought at one time, Joe Clark would claim her and her name would not be changed after all, but since Joe has seen some of the outside world and has been meeting with all kinds of people, he has grown patronising and changeable with women, as he is domineering and bullying with men.
"He treats Rita as if he expected her to be continually at his call should he desire her, and yet he were at liberty to choose when and where he please."
"But, does Rita care for him?" I asked.
"Seems so at times," he answered, "but of late I have noticed a coldness in her at the mention of his name; just as if she resented his airs of one-sided proprietorship and were trying to decide with herself to tolerate no more of it.
"I tried to veer round to the subject with Joe once, but he swore an oath and told me to mind my own affairs. What Joe Clark needs is opposition. Yet Joe is a good fellow, strong and daring as a lion and aggressive to a degree."
I was deeply interested as the old minister told the story, and it was like bringing me up suddenly when he stopped. I had no idea how fast the time had been passing.
Well I could understand now why this Rita Clark intuitively hated The Ghoul Rock. Who, in her place, would feel otherwise?
The Rev. William Auld rose from the table.
"I must go now, my son, for the way is long. Thanks so much for the rest and for your hospitality. My only exhortation to you is, stand firm by all the principles you know to be true; never lose hold of the vital things because you are here in the wilds, for it is here the vital things count, more than in the whirr of civilisation."
"Thank you, sir. I'll try," I said. "You will come again, I hope."
"Certainly I shall. Even if you did not ask me, for that is my duty.
"If you accompany me as far as Jake's cove, where my launch is, I think I can furnish you with a paper from your countryside. I have friends in the city, in the States and in England, who supply me, every week, with American and Old Country papers. There are so many men from both lands in the camps and settled along the coast and they all so dearly love a newspaper. I generally try to give them what has been issued nearest their own home towns."
I rowed Mr. Auld over to his launch and wished him good-bye, receiving from his kindly old hands a copy ofThe Northern Examiner, dated three days after I had left Brammerton.
It was like meeting with an old friend, whom I had expected never to meet again. I put it in my inside pocket for consideration when I should get back to my bungalow with plenty of time to enjoy it.
I dropped in to Jake's shack, for I had not seen him all the sleepy day. I found him sitting in perfect content, buried up over the eyes in a current issue ofThe Northern Lights,—a Dawson newspaper, which had been in existence since the old Klondike days and was much relished by old-timers.
The dog was curled up near the stove, sleeping off certain effects; Jake was at his second cup of whisky. I left them to the peace and sanctity of their Sabbath evening and rowed back to "Paradise Regained," as I had already christened my bungalow.
I sat down on the steps of the veranda, to peruse the home paper which the minister had left with me, and it was not long before I was startled by a flaring headline. The blood rushed from my face to my heart and seemed as if it would burst that great, throbbing organ:—