Darkness was closing down on the waste of tumbling foam, and theSoratawas clear of the shore, when Jimmy made shift to hoist the trysail reduced by two reefs to a narrow strip of drenched canvas. Then, while Anthea Merril held the helm, he proceeded to set the little spitfire jib. However, he clung to the weather-shrouds, gasping and dripping with perspiration for the first few moments, because the struggle with the trysail had tried his strength. Indeed, Anthea, who stood bareheaded at the helm with her loosened hair whipping about her, wondered how he had contrived to do it alone in that strength of wind.
His figure, shapeless in the streaming oilskins, cut darkly against the livid foam as theSorataswung her bows high above the sea, and then was almost lost in a filmy cloud as she plunged and buried them in the breast of a big comber. Suddenly, however, he dropped on hands and knees, and, crouching with one arm around the forestay, hauled the strip of canvas out along the bowsprit until once more a sea smote theSorataand he sank into a rush of foam. The girl caught her breath as she waited until the boat swung her head out again,for it was very evident that the man alone stood between her and destruction.
He swung into sight, clinging with an arm around jib and bowsprit until he staggered to his feet, and a strip of sailcloth that went aloft beat him with its wet folds amidst a frantic banging. Anthea scarcely dared to look at him as he struggled with the rope that hoisted it, and she gasped with relief when at last he came scrambling back and pushed her from the tiller.
"Thanks!" he said. "Go down and get Miss Austerly on to the leeward settee, and then try to sleep. The boat ought to lie-to dryly until the morning, but I can't leave the tiller."
Anthea just heard him through the turmoil of the sea, and did not resent the grasp he had laid on her shoulder. Quietly imperious as she usually was, it seemed only fitting that she should obey him then. She went down through the little companion, and Jimmy, pulling the slide to after her, settled himself for his long night-watch as darkness rolled down upon the sea. He was anxious, but not unduly so, for the boat was high of side and able; and a comparatively small craft will usually ride out a vicious breeze if one can keep her hove-to under a strip or two of sail, so as to meet the sea while not forging through it with her weather-bow. Indeed, after the first half-hour he felt somewhat reassured, and his thoughts went back to a subject which had occupied them somewhat frequently of late, and that, not unnaturally, was Anthea Merril.
She was, he knew, the daughter of the man who was ruining his father, but that was an incident and no fault of hers. It was, he fancied, clear that she knewnothing about Merril's business operations, and was unacquainted with one aspect of his character. In fact, it seemed to him that there was a painful shock in store for her when she made the discovery. He had never met a woman with so much that compelled his appreciation besides her physical beauty. Her quiet graciousness and courage had their effect on him, and he was sure, at least, that he would never feel quite the same regard for anybody else. Indeed, he admitted that she was a woman with whom he might have fallen in love had circumstances been propitious, but, as they certainly were not, he strove to assure himself that he had sense and will enough to refrain from thinking more of her than was advisable.
These reflections were, however, fragmentary, for the boat required attention, and he fancied that a good deal of water was finding its way into her. TheSoratawould not lie-to without somebody at the helm, and he could only leave the tiller lashed for a few minutes now and then while he labored at the little rotary pump. Once or twice when he did so, a foot of brine came frothing into the cockpit across the coaming, and he commenced to wonder how long the breeze would last, for he was becoming sensible that another twelve hours of it would probably be as much as he could stand.
In the meanwhile the night was wearing through, and at last a faint light crept up from the east across the waste of tumbling seas. They were not by any means mountainous, for as a matter of fact it is very probable that the biggest ocean sea scarcely exceeds forty feet between its trough and summit, but they rolled up out of the northwest in a continuous phalanx ofsteep, gray ridges crested with spouting froth that looked quite big enough. The drift whirled across them, and now and then wrapped the craft in wisps of filmy smoke, while Jimmy, with smarting and temporarily blinded eyes, trusted to the feel of the tiller. He was as wet as he could be, as well as stiff and cold, and it was with relief and some astonishment that he saw the saloon companion open, and Miss Merril appear with a plate and a jug of steaming coffee.
Her skirt was woefully bedraggled, from which he surmised that there was more water than there should be in the saloon, and her hair was promptly powdered with glistening spray; but her face was quiet, and she sat down collectedly, huddling herself on a locker, where the after bulkhead of the saloon partly sheltered her. Jimmy dropped into the cockpit, and crouched there with the tiller against his shoulder, for nobody could have eaten in the face of that wind. Then he stretched out a hand for the coffee.
"I'm unusually glad to get it. It was very kind of you," he said.
Anthea smiled. "Why?" she asked. "Are you sure it wasn't selfishness? We couldn't take the boat home without you, and a man must eat if he has to go on with this kind of task."
Jimmy looked at her, and, finding no very apposite rejoinder, nodded. "Well," he said, "I suppose he must; but did you get anything for yourself or Miss Austerly? You can't live on nothing any more than I can. At least, that's the conclusion I've come to after what I've noticed in the mail-boat's saloons."
He was aware that he had made a slip, but fancied ithad escaped his companion's attention, which, of course, displayed very little perspicacity. In the meanwhile, he got a turn of the weather tiller line round a cleat, and lowered himself further until he sat in the cockpit with several inches of water swishing about him.
"Nellie is asleep at last. I did not awaken her," said his companion.
"That isn't all I asked. Did you get anything yourself?"
The girl said she had not done so, and for a moment there was the faintest suspicion of color in her face.
"Then you will share what you have brought with me," said Jimmy.
"There isn't a cup. I couldn't find one that wasn't broken. The forecastle shelf has torn away."
"You couldn't have kept the coffee in it if you had. Take what you want before it gets cold," and Jimmy pointed to the jug.
Anthea raised it to her lips, and then pushed it back along the cockpit floor, while, though she had not meant to do so, she flashed a swift glance at her companion when he held it in his hand. As it happened, Jimmy looked at her just then, and she saw the little glint in his eyes. He felt that she had done so, and, while he would not have had it happen, let his gaze rest on her steadily while he made her a little inclination. Then he drank, and, after he had thrust the plate in her direction, broke off a portion of bread and canned meat; some of which crumbled and stuck to his wet oilskins.
He was quite aware that neither his attitude nor manner of eating was especially graceful, but that couldnot be helped, and he laughed when his companion clutched at the remnant on the plate. She smiled at him too, and he wondered why they were both apparently so much at ease. Still, it did not seem in any way an unusual or unfitting thing that he and this delicately brought up girl should make their meal as equals in the little dripping cockpit with a single plate and one drinking vessel between them. He felt that it was as a comrade she regarded him, in place of tolerating him from necessity, and he noticed that even under the very uncomfortable conditions she ate daintily.
"Where are we?" she asked at last.
"About twenty miles to leeward of the Inlet, and perhaps eight off the shore. At least, I should like to believe we are. How is it you look so fresh, instead of worn out? Where did you learn to make yourself at home in a boat?"
"In Toronto," said Anthea. "I was there two years, and they are fond of yachting in that city. I once did some sailing in England too. What do you think of their boats? It is, perhaps, fortunate Valentine made theSorataa cutter, as they generally do, instead of a sloop. You could hardly have handled her under the latter's single headsail last night."
"No," said Jimmy, "I don't think I could. If she had been rigged that way she would probably have gone under by now. Still, I don't see why you should expect me to know anything about English boats."
Anthea smiled as she looked at him. "Perhaps you don't, though you don't invariably express yourself as a man would who had never been away from the Pacific Slope."
"Well," said Jimmy reflectively, "it's not quite a sure thing that the way they talk in an English ship's forecastle is very much nicer."
"There are more places in a mail-boat than her forecastle."
It seemed to Jimmy advisable to change the subject, and he made a little grimace as he glanced at the plate.
"I'm afraid I've cleaned up everything," he said.
Anthea laughed. "Which is quite as it should be. I can get more, and you can't. Still, perhaps you have left some coffee."
Jimmy was about to point out that there was no cup, but refrained, for it flashed on him that his companion was, of course, aware of this, and he gravely handed her the jug. What her purpose was he did not know, and indeed he was never clear on this point, though he fancied that she had one; but it was, at least, evident that she was damp and chilled, and needed the physical stimulant. The trifling act, it seemed, might equally be a pledge of camaraderie, or a recognition of the fact that they were for the time being no more than man and woman between whom all distinctions had vanished in the face of peril; but he seemed to feel it had a still deeper significance. He had once held her in his arms, and now they had shared the same plate and drunk from the same vessel.
Then theSoratareminded him that she required attention, for a sea seethed on board her forward, and when it poured into the cockpit he swung himself back to the coaming. A minute or two later he stretched out his hand, and the girl drew in her breath as she glanced ahead, for a sail materialized suddenly out of the vapor.It was suggestively slanted, and a dusky strip that looked very small appeared beneath it when it swung high on the crest of a sea.
"Siwashes," said Jimmy; "one of their sea canoes. They have to keep her running. She wouldn't lie-to."
The craft drew abreast of them, traveling wonderfully fast, and Anthea long remembered how she drove by theSorata, hove half her length out of water, riding on the ridge of a big gray sea. She was entirely open, a long, narrow, bird-headed thing, and the foam she flung off forward seemed to lap over her after-half. A little drenched spritsail was spread from an insignificant mast, and four crouching figures with dusky faces were partly visible amidst the wisps of spray that whirled about her. One of them held a long paddle, and looked fixedly ahead; the others gazed at theSorataexpressionlessly until the craft swooped down between two seas. Jimmy saw his companion's hands clench on the coaming, and the color ebb from her face, and then she gasped as the little strip of canvas swung into sight again.
"Ah!" she said, "it's a trifle horrible to watch them; and what must it be to steer her? How many of us in the cities know what the struggle for existence really is?"
Jimmy nodded assent. "At least," he said, "the thing is tolerably clear to the men who live at sea. If that Siwash lost his nerve for a moment the next comber would swallow the canoe. After all, the sea knows no distinctions; white men and red men alike must face the strain."
"In the big mail-boats too?"
"Of course. I'm not sure it isn't a little heavier there. When you are traveling as fast as a freight train there is little time to decide how you will clear a crossing steamer, or to pick out green from yellow among a blink of sliding lights. The man who fails is very apt to hurl as much as fourteen thousand tons of hull and cargo into destruction, and, perhaps, two thousand passengers into another world, though some vessels now carry more than that. The owner seldom gets rich when he doesn't; and there is, after all, no very great difference between his lot and that of the Siwash, who stakes his life against the value of a few salmon or halibut."
He broke off with a laugh. "Hadn't you better go back? You are getting very wet."
Anthea did so, and it was almost noon when she came up again. Jimmy still sat at the tiller, and his wet face looked a trifle worn; but the breeze had softened, and as the girl glanced round her, a shaft of sunlight fell suddenly upon the foaming sea.
"Yes," said Jimmy, "it's blowing itself out. I expect we'll be able to shake the reefs out of the trysail and beat up for the Inlet before it's dark. If it were necessary I would run her before it now."
"Wouldn't there be shelter in one of the inlets to leeward?" asked the girl, with a very natural longing to escape from the strain and turmoil.
"It's very probable," said Jimmy. "I dare say I could make one. Still, you see——"
He stopped, and Anthea flushed ever so slightly, for it was evident to her that she and her companion couldnot extend that cruise indefinitely in company with Valentine's hired man.
"Of course!" she said. "Austerly will be horribly anxious. Well, if you think you could leave the tiller lashed, I have dinner ready."
"I believe I could. Still, it might be awkward to get back fast enough from the forecastle in case of necessity."
"I wonder," said the girl, "whether you have any very decided objections to sitting down with us in the saloon? If you have, it would make it necessary for Nellie or me to bring the things out to you."
Jimmy fancied that the last was an inspiration, and after a glance to windward went down into the saloon, which was very wet. Miss Austerly, who seemed to have stood the shaking better than he expected, reclined on one settee with her feet drawn up for the sake of dryness, and she smiled at him. He wondered when he saw how the little swing-table was set. Miss Merril, finding the crockery kept for charterers mostly smashed, had apparently come upon Valentine's enameled and indurated ware.
There was no restraint upon any of them during the meal. The fact that the breeze was undoubtedly falling would have been sufficient in itself to restore their cheerfulness, but Jimmy was also sensible of a curious exhilaration, and discoursed whimsically upon various topics besides the sea. In fact, he was astonished to find that he had been away an hour when at last he went back to the cockpit. The breeze was falling rapidly, and before Anthea prepared the supper, which was, as usual in that country, at about six o'clock, he had setthe whole trysail, and soon afterward he got the reefed mainsail up. By midnight theSoratawas close in with the coast, working fast to windward through smooth water with her biggest topsail set, while a half-moon hung low in the western sky. The sea gleamed silver under it, and scarcely half a mile away dim hillsides and long ranks of somber pines half-veiled in fleecy mists went sliding by.
The soft gleam of the swinging lamps in the saloon shone out in faint streams of colored radiance through the skylights, and, late as it was, Nellie Austerly nestled well wrapped up on a locker in the cockpit. She watched the long swell break away from beneath the bows in glittering cascades, and Jimmy fancied he knew what she was thinking when she gazed aloft at the tall spire of canvas that shone in the moonlight as white as the peak ahead of them. It was a nocturne in blue and silver, and if sound were wanted, the splashing at the bows and the deep rumble of the surf emphasized the softer harmonies of the night.
"You are not so very sorry we were blown off, after all?" he asked.
The girl smiled. "No," she said; "I managed to sleep through a good deal of it, and now I feel almost as fresh as if I had stayed ashore. Besides, this would make up for anything. One could almost wish we could sail south with the topsail up under the moonlight—forever. In spite of the bad weather, I have been so well since I came to sea."
"Just the three of us?" asked Jimmy unguardedly.
He saw the twinkle in the girl's eyes as she glanced at her companion, who sat close by.
"I wonder," she said, "whether you would like that, Anthea? I almost think I should."
The moonlight sufficed to show the faint tinge of color in Anthea's face, but she laughed. "And what about your father?"
Nellie Austerly did not appear concerned. "It is very undutiful, for he must have been anxious; but I really can't help feeling amused when I think of him and Mr. Valentine being left on the beach to sleep in the Siwash rancherie. One understands they are rather dreadful places, and he is so horribly particular, you know."
Anthea said nothing further, and presently the two girls went below, but they were about again when, soon after six o'clock next morning, Jimmy beat theSoratainto the Inlet. Indeed, he left Anthea at the tiller while he went into the saloon to look for a piece of spun yarn which Valentine kept in one of the lockers. Nellie Austerly smiled at him as he opened it.
"I suppose we shall be in very soon, and I want to thank you now for bringing me back safe," she said. "Anthea, of course, can thank you for herself."
Jimmy felt a trifle embarrassed. "I really don't see why she should. I think the charter covers anything I have done."
The girl made a little whimsical gesture. "Does it? You are not a regular yacht-hand, really?"
"I am, at least, mate of a lumber-carrying schooner, which comes to much the same thing."
The twinkle in Nellie Austerly's eyes grew plainer. "I can be quite frank with Mr. Valentine and you, and perhaps it is because I like you both. You can makewhat you think fit of that. Still, I haven't asked you how long you have been on board the schooner, and one understands there are a good many opportunities for men—like you and Mr. Valentine—in this country."
Jimmy was a little startled, for it almost seemed that she had guessed his thoughts, but he smiled.
"Valentine seems to have all he wants already. He is content with the sea."
The girl laughed. "Well," she said, "I don't think the sea would altogether satisfy him. But I must not keep you here; hadn't you better make sure Anthea isn't running us ashore?"
Jimmy went up, and found theSoratawas smoothly slipping by the climbing pines; and a little later her dory with three white men in it came sliding toward them as he hauled the topsail down.
TheSoratawent to sea again next morning, and one night a week later she bore up for Vancouver before a westerly breeze. A thin crescent moon had just cleared the dim white line of the mainland snow, and the sea glittered faintly in her frothing wake under a vast sweep of dusky blue. The big topsail swayed across it, blotting out the stars, and there was a rhythmic splashing beneath the bows.
Anthea Merril stood at the tiller outlined against the heave of sea, for the night was warm and she was dressed in white. Nellie Austerly sat on a locker in the cockpit, and her father on the saloon skylights with a cigar in his hand. Valentine lay on the deck not far away, and Jimmy a little further forward.
"I suppose we will be in soon after daylight, and I'm sorry," said Nellie Austerly. "It has been an almost perfect cruise in spite of the bad weather. Don't you wish we were going back again, instead of home, Anthea?"
Jimmy roused himself to attention, for he would very much have liked to hear Miss Merril's real thoughts on the matter; but she laughed.
"I don't think it would be very much use if I did,"she said. "One can't go sailing always—and if you feel that that is a pity, you can think of the rain and the wind."
"Ah!" said Nellie Austerly, "one has to bear so much of them everywhere. Sometimes one wonders whether life is all gray days and rain; but this trip has made me better, and, perhaps, if Mr. Valentine will take us, we will go back next year and revel once more in the sea and the sunshine—we really had a good deal of the latter."
Jimmy saw his comrade make a little abrupt movement, and guessed what he was thinking, for he too realized that before another year Nellie Austerly would in all probability have slipped away from the sad gray weather to the shores of the glassy sea where there is eternal radiance.
Then Austerly looked around, and his observation was very matter-of-fact, as usual.
"If circumstances are propitious, I should be glad to arrange it," he said. "I certainly think Mr. Valentine has done everything he could for us. Indeed, we owe it largely to him that this has been such a pleasant trip."
He appeared to expect some expression of approval, and Anthea laughed. "Of course. It's only unfortunate he couldn't arrange the weather."
"I wonder," said Nellie reflectively, "why you both leave Jimmy out?"
There was a certain suggestiveness in the girl's tone which Jimmy noticed, though he did not think her father did, and he wished it had been light enough to see Anthea Merril's face; but unfortunately it was not.She appeared to disregard the question, and glanced in Valentine's direction.
"Couldn't we have the big spinnaker up?" she asked.
Valentine hesitated a little. The breeze was moderately fresh and theSoratatraveling fast enough, while it is not a very easy thing to steer a craft running under the great three-cornered sail, which is apt to swing over in case of a blunder at the tiller.
"You could hold her steady before the wind?" he asked.
"If I don't, I will make my father buy you a new mast," said Anthea.
Valentine made a little gesture which was expressive of resignation. It was, he had discovered, singularly hard to say no to Anthea Merril; but it seemed to him that the new mast might be needed if she ventured too far now. He and Jimmy between them got the great sail up and its boom run out, though it cost them an effort; and then Jimmy glanced aft with more than a trace of uneasiness at the white figure at the helm. TheSoratahad now on each side of her a swelling mass of canvas that dwarfed the narrow strip of hull, and she swung each of them high in turn as she rolled viciously. Still, as far as Jimmy could see, the girl stood very composedly at the tiller. Then, as the great mainboom went up high above the sea, Valentine signed to him.
"You had better get out and steady it," he said. "It wouldn't need much to bring that boom over."
Jimmy crawled out on the slippery spar, and sat astride near the end of it, while Valentine made his way along the one beneath the spinnaker. Their weight checked the lifting of the sails in some degree, but forthe first few minutes it seemed to Jimmy that they and their companions were hazarding a good deal. If the girl at the helm let the tiller swing a hand's-breadth too much when theSorata, piling the froth about her, rushed up a dim slope of water, either mainsail or spinnaker would swing over, and the men on the booms would have no opportunity for attempting to obviate the unpleasantness that would certainly succeed it. In all probability they would be flung off headlong into the sea. Still, the sail did not come over, for theSoratadrove along straight before the wind, and once more Jimmy paid silent homage to the girl at the tiller.
He could see her only dimly, a blurred white shape against the dusky sea, but he could imagine the little glow in her eyes and the way in which her lips were pressed together. He had seen her look that way when she sat beside him in the cockpit one wild morning as theSorataplunged over the great Pacific combers, and it seemed to him that she was one who would face difficulties and perils of any kind as unwaveringly. Indeed, he was angry with himself for having fancied there was any hazard at all in leaving her to steer theSorataunder spinnaker, for he felt that Anthea Merril must necessarily be capable of carrying out anything she had undertaken.
So he swung contentedly with the lifting boom, now hove high above the dark water, now dropped down until his feet were almost in the streaming froth, while shadowy islets clothed with pines sprang out of the sea ahead, grew into solid blurs of blackness, and flitted by, until at last Austerly said that his daughter must go below. Then Valentine and Jimmy came in alongthe booms, stowed the spinnaker with some difficulty, and dropped the topsail too, for the dim mainland shore was black ahead when the rest left the deck to them.
"That girl has quite excellent nerves," said Valentine. "Still, what I like about her is that she doesn't think it necessary to impress it on you. Her husband won't have much to complain of if she ever marries anybody, though I'm not sure that's certain."
"Not certain?" said Jimmy.
"No," replied Valentine reflectively. "A girl of her kind is apt to be particular. The man who pleases her would have to be quite straight, and it's scarcely likely he'd go to leeward either."
Jimmy fancied that his comrade was right, though he said nothing, for after all it was, as he compelled himself to admit, no concern of his. However, he sighed a little as he went down and crawled into his cot, leaving Valentine to feel his way along the dusky shore.
It was early next morning when they rowed Austerly and his two companions ashore, and the man shook hands with them on the wharf.
"I feel that I am indebted to both of you," he said with somewhat unusual diffidence. "In fact, I can't exactly consider that the attention you have shown my daughter is no more than one would expect—from the charter."
He seemed to feel that he was becoming involved, and went on abruptly. "She desires me to say that it would be a pleasure should either of you care to call at any time."
Jimmy left him to Valentine, and, when the latter hadhanded Miss Austerly into the waiting vehicle, saw that Anthea Merril was looking at him.
"If you don't mind my saying so, I think that was rather good of Austerly," she said. "You probably know his point of view, and I daresay it cost him an effort. I think your comrade should go. Nellie finds him amusing, and there is naturally not very much in her life that pleases her."
She stopped with a little soft laugh. "Mr. Wheelock—isn't it? I haven't the least difficulty in saying as much as Austerly did. Any time you or Mr. Valentine care to call I should be glad to receive you. Our house is always open, and anybody will tell you where it is."
Jimmy once more remembered that he had on a pair of burst canvas shoes, as well as old duck trousers cobbled with sail twine, and a man-o'-war cap that had grown shapeless with the rain. He also realized that his companion was quite aware of it too.
"I'm afraid it wouldn't be a very appropriate thing if I did," he said.
Anthea looked at him steadily. "Pshaw!" she said. "Still, you really can't expect me to urge you."
Perhaps it was a slight relief to both of them that Valentine signed to Jimmy just then. "They want this box," he said. "The rest of the things are to wait for the express wagon."
Jimmy, who turned away, heaved the box into the vehicle, and did not see the curious little smile in Anthea Merril's eyes. In a few minutes she had driven away, and, he fancied, had passed out of his life altogether. He stood still on the wharf and sighed.
"Well," said Valentine, "where are you going now?"
"Straight back to the schooner," said Jimmy. "I see her lying outside the steamboat yonder. You might bring my things across when you have straightened up the boat."
Valentine promised to do so, and Jimmy, who strode away, met Jordan, whom he had not expected to see there, on the water-front.
"What are you doing in Vancouver?" he asked.
"Looking after my patent rights—among other things," said Jordan. "The mill's shut down for two or three weeks anyway. Between the stone in the water and the new detergent the directors insisted on my using, the boiler has 'most turned herself inside out. Our people have their office here, as you know, and my agreement with them only stands for another month, while it seems that Merril has been buying up their stock. I'm not sure his notions are going to suit me. You heard we had to break off your father's contract?"
"I hadn't, though I was afraid it would happen," said Jimmy, whose face grew a trifle grim. "That was Merril's doing?"
"It was. I couldn't help the thing. But we can't talk here; won't you come along to my hotel?"
Jimmy glanced at his garments, and Jordan grinned. "Those things don't count for so much here," he said. "Anyway, there was a time when I tramped into the wooden cities along Puget Sound looking way more like a dead-beat than you do now. Still, if that's going to worry you, can't you get a boat and take me for a sail?"
Jimmy was sorry that it was out of the question.He had spent only a few evenings with Jordan at the mill, but he liked the man, and was vaguely sensible that Jordan liked him.
"Valentine and I have just run in, and I must see how the old man is getting along," he said. "After that I fancy I ought to go over to a ranch on the Westminster road, and look up my sister. I haven't seen her since I came home."
"Well," said Jordan, "I've nothing on hand until to-morrow. What's the matter with taking me? I'll hire a team somewhere and drive you. I can drop you at the ranch, and go on to Westminster."
They arranged it during the next few minutes, and then Jimmy was rowed off to theTyee. Prescott met him as he climbed on board, and a glance at his face showed Jimmy that things had not been going well.
"You will be wanted," he said. "Your father has been getting very shaky since you went away, and I don't quite see how he's to hold on to the schooner, now that he has lost that lumber contract and has to face the carpenter's bill. Guess he's worrying over it. Hasn't got up the last three days, and the doctor don't seem to know what is wrong with him."
Jimmy went down into the little stern cabin with a sinking heart, and found Tom Wheelock lying propped up in his berth. He looked very old and haggard, and the perspiration stood beaded on his face, in which pale patches showed through the bronze.
"Glad you've got back, boy," he said. "You'll have to take hold soon—that is, if there's anything left to get a grip on. The old man's played out."
This, it seemed to Jimmy, was painfully evident, andthough he contrived to hide it, a sense of dismay crept over him as he sat down. Tom Wheelock looked played out, and though his son was ready to take up his burden, he felt it would be heavy. He realized that through the compassion he felt, and then a sudden fit of anger against the man who had crushed his father came over him. The color darkened a trifle in his face, but he put a restraint upon himself.
"You'll be about again in a day or two," he said cheerily. "Now, tell me all about it. But first of all, what is the matter with you?"
The old man looked at him with a curious little smile. "The doctor Bob brought off didn't quite seem to know, but I could have told him. Guess I'm done, boy. It's quite likely I'll crawl out on deck for a little while, but how's that going to count? Nobody's going to have any more use for your father, Jimmy, and when the month is up Merril will take the schooner from him."
Jimmy clenched a big brown fist, but his voice was very quiet. "Well," he said, "I want to understand what has happened since I went away."
Wheelock reached out for the pipe that lay near him, and fumbled with it, spilling the tobacco with shaky fingers, until Jimmy quietly took it from him, and struck a match as he handed it back to him. The old man raised himself a trifle as he lighted it, and then laid a trembling hand on his son's arm.
"I guess I've worked as hard as most other men, but somehow I don't seem to have gone to windward as the rest did," he said. "Perhaps I was too easy with the money, and a little slack in other ways. Still, yourblood's red, Jimmy, and there's a streak of hard sand in you. You got it from your mother; it was she who made me. Hard work don't count, boy. You want to get your elbows into the other people who're standing in your way. Well, I'm glad there's that streak of grit in you. You'll get those fingers on the throat of the man who brought your father down, and gripe the life out of him, some day."
He broke off abruptly, and fumbled with his pipe, which had gone out again. "Let that go; it's fool talk, Jimmy. What do I want putting my trouble on to you? Guess you'll have plenty of your own, boy."
"I think I asked you to tell me what Merril had done," said Jimmy.
"Kept us here under repairs while the lumber was piling up on the sawmill wharf. I 'most guess he'd fixed the thing with the boss carpenter. I was to bring all that the people at the Inlet cut for Victoria or Vancouver down fast as it was ready, or they were to let up on the contract; but Jordan would have made things easy if Merril hadn't bought their stock and put the screw on hard."
"It wouldn't be worth his while to buy the stock for that."
"The thing's quite plain. He's playing a bigger game. Wants control of all that's going on along that coast, and its carrying. Guess I can't stop his getting theTyee, and she's the second boat he has taken from me. Well, I may get a freight of ore in a week or two, and, it's quite likely, a load from a cannery—go up light—freight one way. How's that going to count,though, when there's the carpenter's bill to meet, and a big instalment on the bond with interest due?"
"How much?" Jimmy asked, harshly.
He sat silent a while, with a hard, set face, when his father told him.
"Then he must have the vessel. Still, he'll have to sell her by auction," he said by and by.
"That won't count. When I've nobody to run the price up against him, it's quite easy for a man like Merril to fix the thing. He'll get one of his friends to buy her in at 'bout half her value, and the bond don't quite call for that. It isn't everybody wants a vessel, and the few men who do fix these things between them."
Jimmy set his lips, and once more there was silence for a while. Then he looked up with a little abrupt movement. "There's a question in front of us to be faced—and I'm going to find the answer; but we won't talk any more about it now. I'm going over with Jordan this afternoon to see Eleanor. You can get along until to-night without me?"
Wheelock made a sign of concurrence. "I guess it's a thing you ought to do. Got a letter from her yesterday, and she was asking about you. Eleanor's like you. Take after your mother, both of you, and, if anything, the harder grit's in her. You have to remember, Jimmy, you can't afford to show a soft spot when you're fighting a man like Merril."
He stopped a moment, with a sigh. "Guess he is too hard for your father. Won't you light me this pipe again? My hand's shaky."
Jordan was driving a spirited team along the water-front when Jimmy came up from the wharf, and he smiled when the latter swung himself up into the light, four-wheeled vehicle. Jimmy was dressed tastefully in his English shore-going clothes, and now looked very much unlike a yacht-hand. He was well endued physically, and, though the bronze in his face and a certain steadiness of gaze betrayed his calling, there was an indefinite but unmistakable stamp upon him which he had acquired on board the big mail-boats, and perhaps also in a greater measure from his comrades on the battleship. Jimmy had certainly not cultivated it, and was, in fact, not aware that he possessed it, but his companion had already recognized it.
"Take a cigar, and light it before I let the team out. They look as if they could go," he said.
Jimmy did so, and then found it somewhat difficult to keep his seat as his comrade sent the horses through the city as fast as they could lay hoof to the ground, and out of it past the clustering wooden hovels in its less reputable quarter, and up the slope that led into the shadowy bush. Roads are not remarkable for theirsmoothness anywhere in that country, but it was evident that Jordan liked fast traveling and could handle a team. He laughed when Jimmy said so.
"I come of farmer stock, and that's probably why I always had a notion of the sea," he said. "If you look at it in one way, the thing's quite natural."
"I suppose it is," said Jimmy. "Why didn't you go to sea?"
"It seemed to me one has mighty few chances of picking up money there, though I found out quite early that the poor man has no great show anywhere. It was a mortgage he couldn't pay off that broke up my father."
He stopped for a moment, with a little confidential gesture. "I guess that's why I wanted to do what I could for your father. In one or two ways he's very much like the man I buried back in Washington. He was straight—and it wasn't his fault if he didn't whale all the meanness out of me—but, when smartness means getting your grip on what belongs to somebody else, he was just a trifle slow. He worked hard, and gave every man a hundred cents' worth for his dollar—and that's quite likely why there was mighty little but a mortgage on the ranch when he died."
Jimmy was not astonished, in view of their short acquaintance, that his companion should tell him this. He was aware that reticence is not a prominent characteristic of the men of the Pacific Slope, and, besides this, there was a rapidly growing sympathy between himself and Jordan. Still, he sat silent, and his companion spoke again.
"I was about sixteen then, and I saw I had to makeout differently," he said. "Well, somehow I've done it—looked on this life as a battle where the hurt man gets no mercy, and I've cleared quite a little money on my royalties—but now and then the memory of those old days on the ranch comes back to me. Then I feel that if ever it's necessary for me to get my knife into any kind of mortgage man, it will be red right to the hilt when it comes out again."
The snap in his companion's dark eyes and the hardening of his lips were comprehensible to Jimmy, for he had once or twice been sensible of much the same feeling. Jordan had, as is usual in the land to which he belonged, expressed himself frankly, and perhaps a trifle crudely; but Jimmy recognized that it was with very genuine tenderness and regret he remembered the man he had buried long ago in Washington. He asked an abrupt question, which did not, however, altogether change the subject.
"Will you be here any time?" he said.
"I don't quite know. There's no reason I shouldn't tell you what I can, and I feel like talking now. I'm quite pleased to run that mill up the Inlet for our people, that is, while they leave me to fix things as I like them; but as I told you, Merril has been getting his grip on the stock lately, and his views about the royalties on my patents don't quite coincide with mine. I've a couple of other notions that will save labor which our company has not bought up, and it's quite likely I'll turn them over to the Hastings people. In the meanwhile I'm not going to rush things, and it's probable I'll hang on until we've had the stockholders' meeting."
"Then it's Merril who is standing in your way?"
Jordan smiled dryly. "Now you understand the thing. Seems to me neither of us has any great reason to like that man."
Nothing more was said on that point, and by and by they left the scented shadow of the pines, and clattered across a wooden bridge which spanned the turbid, green Fraser, into a stretch of sunlit meadows and oatfields formed by the silt the great river had brought down. In due time they reached a wooden ranch flanked by shadowy bush, and Jordan, pulling the team up before it, glanced down the long white road that leads to New Westminster, a few miles away.
"I guess I'll go on to town, and come back for you," he said. "Still, you had better make sure you're at the right place first."
Jimmy got down, and a man who had apparently heard the beat of hoofs, commenced to throw down the split slip-rails which in Western Canada usually serve as gates.
"Yes," he said, when Jimmy spoke to him, "this is Forster's ranch. In fact, that is my name."
He was dressed in the bush-rancher's jean, but he had a pleasant face with a certain hint of refinement in it, and smiled when Jimmy told him who he was.
"Miss Wheelock's brother? Come right in and put your team up," he said. "It's not more than an hour or so until supper. Your friend will come with you?"
Supper is usually served at six o'clock in that country, and in no way differs from the other meals of the day; while nobody acquainted with its customs would have considered it an unusual thing for the rancher toextend the invitation to Jimmy's companion. Jordan once more glanced down the road to New Westminster, and, though none of them knew it, a good deal was to depend on the fact that he elected to stay.
"Well," he said, turning to Jimmy, "I don't want to worry you, but the fact is, one of the lumber people yonder has been writing me about my gang-saw frame, and, after thinking the thing out last night, I'd sooner hold him off a while. I'd have to call on the man if I drove into town, and, after all, it might be wiser to keep clear of him."
"Then you had better get down," said Forster. "While Miss Wheelock talks to her brother you can walk round the ranch with me. I don't see many strangers, and I'm by no means busy."
Jordan got down, and, after spending an hour with Forster, was somewhat astonished when he was presented to Miss Wheelock in the big general room of the ranch. It was roughly paneled with cedar, very simply furnished, and had, as usual, an uncovered floor, while the sunlight that streamed through the uncurtained window fell upon the girl. She stood still a moment looking at him when she had acknowledged his greeting, and for once, at least, the sawmiller felt almost embarrassed, for Eleanor Wheelock possessed, as her brother did not, a somewhat striking personality.
Jimmy might have passed for a quiet Englishman; but his sister was typically Western in everything but speech—tall, wiry, and a trifle straight of figure, but with something that was almost imperious in her attitude. She had light hair like Jimmy's, but there was a reddish gleam in it, and her eyes which had a glint inthem were of a paler blue, while her skin was of a curious colorless purity. Jordan could not analyze her features, but he felt that she was beautiful, and there was a suggestion of vigor about her that further attracted him. One would scarcely have called her domineering, but she had not, as her brother recognized, the quiet graciousness and composure which half-concealed Anthea Merril's strength of character. Jordan, however, was not too discriminating. He liked vigor in any guise, and he noticed that one of the two little girls who had entered with her clung to her hand.
"I think I passed you twice in Vancouver one day a month or two ago," she said.
Jordan made her a little inclination, and his Western candor was free alike from awkwardness or any hint of presumption.
"Then I didn't see you. If I had done so, I should certainly have remembered it."
Eleanor laughed, and turned to the others. "It's ten minutes since Jake called you. Will you sit here, Jimmy, with Mr. Jordan next to you? Mrs. Forster is away just now."
She moved to the head of the table, and the usual ranch supper of pork, potatoes, flapjacks, hot cakes, desiccated fruits, and green tea was brought in. Forster, who appeared to be a man of education, made an excellent host, but it was Eleanor and Jordan who led most of the conversation, and there was delicacy as well as keenness in their badinage. Almost an hour had passed before the party rose, which was a very unusual thing in that country, for the Westerner seldom wastes much time over his meals. Then, as it happened, it wasJimmy who walked round the ranch with Forster, while Jordan sat on the veranda with Eleanor and the little girls while the shadows of the firs crept slowly up to it. They talked about a good many things, while each felt that they were just skirting a confidence, until the little girl who sat next to Jordan looked up at him gravely.
"Why don't you go and see the cows with father and the other man?" she asked.
Jordan laughed, but he looked at Eleanor. "Well," he said, "for one thing, I guess it's a good deal nicer here."
Miss Wheelock met his glance with a directness which, had his disposition and training been different, he might have found disconcerting. She was, like himself, absolutely devoid of affectation, and he felt that she was quietly making an estimate of him. Still, there was not a great deal in his character that he had occasion to hide from any one, and the evident sincerity of his observation was in itself an excuse for it. It was characteristic of the girl that she let it pass, not with the obvious intention of ignoring it because that appeared advisable, but as though she had never heard it. When a thing did not appeal to Eleanor Wheelock, she simply brushed it aside.
"Have you met the Miss Merril Jimmy mentioned?" she asked. "I almost fancy she is the girl I used to see now and then when I was in Toronto. What is she like?"
Jordan, who had met Anthea Merril in Vancouver, told her as well as he was able, and Eleanor's lips set in a straight line.
"One could fancy you were not fond of Miss Merril," he said.
"I have never spoken to her; but I have no great reason to feel well-disposed toward anybody of that family."
"Ah!" said Jordan; "that means Jimmy has told you what Merril is doing. I'm no friend of that man's either, but I'm not quite sure one could reasonably hold the girl responsible for her father."
"Especially when she's pretty? Still, she is his daughter, and must be like him in some respects."
Jordan's eyes twinkled. "Do you consider yourself like your father?"
Eleanor flashed a swift glance at him. "You are keener than I expected. In reality I am not like him in the least, though I don't know why I should trouble to admit it. In any case, I think the rule generally holds good."
She dismissed the subject abruptly, with a laugh. "After all, our affairs can't interest you. You can't have seen very much of my brother."
Jordan appeared to consider this. "I'm not sure that counts," he said. "I seem to have been a friend of Jimmy's quite a long while. There are people who make you feel that, even when it isn't so, although they may not consciously want to. One can't tell how they do it—but I think you have the power in you."
"I don't know," said Eleanor. "I am, however, by no means certain that I was ever very anxious to make friends with anybody."
"That's comprehensible. You would sooner theywanted to make friends with you, and if no one did, you would be sufficient for yourself."
Eleanor looked at him with a chilly smile. "You have a certain penetration, but I don't know that there is any reason why I should confess to you. How do you come to know anything about Mr. Merril?"
Jordan, who appeared to have no doubt as to her ability to understand him, in which he was warranted, told her.
"Well," she said, "suppose this man's influence is too strong for you, and you have to break your connection with the mill?"
"There are two or three other things I could turn to."
"One would suppose as much;" and Jordan took it as a compliment, which perhaps it was, especially as the girl had not said it with the least desire to gratify him. "Still, that is not what I mean. Would you try to find any means of retaliating?"
"If he afterward got in my way—that is, thrust himself between me and something I wanted to do—I would try all I could to get my foot on him, and then perhaps keep it there a little longer than was necessary."
"You would go no further?"
Jordan knew what she meant, though he could not grasp her purpose in pressing the point. "It wouldn't be business if I did. When a man starts out to make money he can't afford to load himself up with purely personal grievances. If another man tries to get the things you want you naturally have to fight, but it's wiser to grin and bear it when he's too smart for you. Still, there are cases when the feeling that you wouldlike to get even afterward is apt to be 'most too much for human nature."
"And in some respects you could be very human?"
Jordan turned to her with the twinkle still in his eyes. "Well," he said, "if I let any weakness of that kind master me in the present case, I should be very much like the black-tail deer that turned around on the man with the rifle. Still, one can't invariably be wise."
His manner was whimsical, but it seemed to Eleanor there was something behind it, for when he broke off a faint glint which she understood crept into his eyes.
"Sometimes accidents happen to the man with the rifle," she said. "In the meanwhile, I rather fancy Jimmy is making signs to you."
"Then," said Jordan gravely, "I'm not sure I'm much obliged to him. But before I go there's something I want to ask: would it be a liberty if I came back here with him some day?"
"You would like to come?"
"Of course. Why do I ask?"
Eleanor laughed. "That is what I was wondering. I almost think a man likely to get even with Mr. Merril would do what he wanted. Anyway, you know the customs of the country as well as I do, and I scarcely think Forster and his wife would mind."
Jordan rose, and kissed the child he picked up and held high in his arms. "Well," he said, "since—Forster and his wife—wouldn't mind, I shall very probably come along again by and by."
He turned and went down the veranda stairway, while the little girl looked at her companion gravely.
"I like that man. He's nice," she said. "You like him too, don't you?"
Eleanor was beckoning Jimmy, but the child went on. "Well," she said, "he thinks you nice, I know. I could tell it by the way he looked at you. Perhaps you didn't see him, but I did."
Eleanor laughed, for she had naturally noticed every glance Jordan had cast in her direction, and had understood it. That, however, did not count for very much with her. She recognized in Jordan something that pleased her, and she had a vague fancy that there were things he might be able to do for Jimmy and her father in the difficulties she foresaw. There was, she admitted reluctantly, after all, a good deal that a woman could not do; but in the meanwhile the feeling went no further. Then while Jordan and Forster harnessed the team, Jimmy joined her.
"You will have to stay in the Province, Jimmy. You can't go back to sea," she said. "Your father will need somebody beside him now."
Jimmy only smiled, but the girl made a little gesture of comprehension.
"Oh," she said, "I know how hard it is for you. You will have to give up your career."
"It can't be helped," said the man simply, "and I may make another here."
Eleanor laid her hand on his arm, and pressed it. "I knew you would face it like that. There's just one other thing. Hold on to that man Jordan; I think he will make you a good friend."
"You like him?"
"That," said Eleanor, "is quite another matter. Anyway, he is a man who could be depended on—and I think he could be firm on points where you might waver. You are a little too good-natured, Jimmy."
Jordan drove his team up before they had said much more, and Forster shook hands with Jimmy as he stood beside the vehicle.
"From what your sister has told us, I dare say you are a trifle anxious about—things in general—just now," he said. "If it is any relief to you, I would like to say that Mrs. Forster and I think very highly of your sister, and that so long as she cares to stay with us we should be very glad to do what we can for her."
Jimmy thanked the rancher, and swung himself up into the vehicle, while Jordan turned to him as they drove away.
"They think very highly of her! They'd be—idiots if they didn't," he said. "Of course, I don't know if that's quite the kind of thing you appreciate from me."
Jimmy said nothing, as was usual with him when he was not sure what he felt, but Jordan went on.
"I never expected to find you had a sister like that," he said. "She's very different from you in many ways. One feels that's a girl with 'most enough capacity for anything."
Jimmy looked at him with a whimsical smile, and Jordan laughed.
"Now," he said, "I might have expressed myself differently. What I mean is that you're a good deal more like your father than she is."
"Ah!" said Jimmy. "Well, perhaps you're right. In fact, the same thing has struck me occasionally."
Jimmy went back to the ranch beside the Fraser once, but Jordan went without him several times, for Forster apparently found his company congenial. It happened that he contrived to see a good deal of Eleanor Wheelock during his visits, but neither of them mentioned this to Jimmy, who, indeed, would probably have concerned himself little about it had he heard of it, since he had other things to think about just then. Merril had sent his father a formal notice that unless the money due should be paid by a certain time, the schooner would be sold as stipulated in the bond, and, though Tom Wheelock had expected nothing else, he apparently collapsed altogether under the final blow.
Jordan, who had just come back from Forster's ranch, arrived on board theTyeewhile the doctor was talking to Jimmy, and, strolling forward, he sat down on the windlass and commenced a conversation with Prescott, with whom he had promptly made friends. In the meanwhile, Jimmy looked at the doctor a trifle wearily as he leaned on the rail.
"Perhaps my mind's not as clear as usual to-day, but these scientific terms don't convey very much to me," he said.
"In plain English, then," said the doctor, "it is general break-down your father is suffering from, though it is intensified by a partial loss of control over the muscles on one side of him. The latter trouble is, perhaps, the result of what one might call constitutional causes, but, as you seem to fancy, worry and nervous strain, or a shock of any kind, may have accelerated it or brought about the climax."
"Well," said Jimmy hoarsely, "the cure?"
The doctor's tone was sympathetic. "To be quite frank, there is none. It is possible, even probable, that he may recover sufficiently to hobble about a little, but he will never be fit for any active occupation again."
"Ah!" said Jimmy, with a little indrawing of his breath. "Still, it is only what I expected, and I suppose I must face it. You are quite sure about that shock?"
The doctor looked at him curiously. "I want you to understand that it probably brought about the climax, though such things don't often happen in the case of a vigorous man. Your father has, I should fancy, in ordinary language, been losing his grip for several years. In his case the natural decline of physical strength has, perhaps, been accelerated by undue anxiety, and——"
He hesitated, and Jimmy made a quick sign of comprehension. "Oh, yes," he said, "I know. Still, I'm not sure that anybody could blame him, under the circumstances. Well, I think the thing that brought about the climax has been steadily preparing him to break down under it; but, after all, that does not concern you."
The doctor, who admitted this, gave him certain directions before he went away, and Jimmy descended to the little cabin where Tom Wheelock lay. He looked up and nodded when his son came in.
"Well," he said, with a faint smile, "I guess by the names that doctor calls it, I've got enough to kill any man. Wouldn't talk quite straight, but I know as well as he does that I'm not going to worry you very long, and that's just as it should be. Merril takes the schooner, and you'll go back to the blue water. I was never good for very much, anyway, after your mother had gone. She stood behind me and kept things going."
Jimmy sat down, and, much as he desired it, could think of nothing apposite to say. He felt that there are occasions on which one should speak clearly, but, as not infrequently happens, it was just then that he was usually dumb. Perhaps Tom Wheelock understood this, for once more he smiled as he looked at him.
"I wouldn't worry about it, Jimmy," he said.
Jimmy was still tongue-tied, but one result of his father's observations was that fierce anger commenced to mingle with his distress, and he felt his nature stir in protest. Merril would take theTyee—that could not be helped—but it seemed an insufferable thing that for the paltry value of the schooner he should have crushed this frail and broken man. Jimmy clenched a firm brown hand, and felt his fingers itch for a grip on the bondholder's throat.
There was silence for a while, intensified by the soft splash of ripples against theTyee's planking, and Jimmy afterward remembered how his father's wornface showed up in the stream of light that shone down through the skylights into the shadowy cabin. He lay wrapped in old and dirty blankets, a worn-out and broken man who stood in the way of one who was stronger. He held an unlighted pipe in his limp and nerveless hand, and the cabin reeked with unsavory odors. It was unclean and wholly comfortless, and it seemed to Jimmy, who was fresh from the luxury of the mail-boats, almost horrible that the man to whom he owed his being should lie there in sordid misery. At last he straightened himself resolutely.
"There are several points to consider," he said. "The schooner will be sold—that's certain—and I must find a room for you ashore. It's fortunate that one difficulty can be got over. Men who can work seem to be in demand here just now, and when Merril sells theTyeethere ought to be a few dollars over."
"There might be if we had anybody to bid against him and run the figure up, but we haven't. Anyway, Bob and I have been talking things over this morning. He has had 'most enough of the sea, and one of the C.P.R. men will put him on a soft thing on the wharf. Well, we're going to take one of the little frame-houses just back of the town between us. Not quite a mansion, Jimmy, but there are four rooms in it."
Jimmy felt inclined to groan, for he had seen the very primitive and unattractive dwellings in question, but he knew that rents are high in that city and money somewhat hard to earn anywhere. Still, it was in one way a relief to turn the conversation in this direction, and by and by he remembered that Jordan was awaitinghim and went up on deck. The latter sat down and pulled out his cigar-case.
"Take one, and then tell me what's troubling you," he said. "I'll own up that I got some notion out of Prescott."
Jimmy found it a relief to comply, and talked for several minutes while Jordan listened attentively.
"You have got to stay here," said the latter. "That's a sure thing; but there's not much sense in your notion of track-grading for the railroad or wharf-laboring. You wait a week or two, and I fancy I can suggest something by then that will suit you."
"I don't know why you should trouble about it," said Jimmy.
"We'll let that go;" and Jordan looked at him with a smile in his keen dark eyes. "Your sister and I have been talking about you. She feels that you ought to stay with the old man, too."
It did not occur to Jimmy that there was anything significant in this, for he was too anxious to concern himself about anything then except the question as to how he was to secure his father's comfort.
"I've been thinking about the auction," he said.
"So have I," said Jordan. "Now, I'm going to talk straight to you. I've invented one or two sawmill fixings; and they've brought me in some money, as you know; but I want considerably more, and I've always had a notion that it was business and not sawing redwood logs I was meant for. Well, Merril wants me out of that mill, and it seems to me there's room for a big extension of the coast-carrying trade of this country. That's Merril's notion too. I once thought of buyingthis schooner—that is, wiping out your father's loan—and putting you in command of her. Now, don't get hold of it the wrong way—it was the money there might be in it I was after."
He smiled as he saw the faint flush on Jimmy's face. "Then I fancied there might be more in steam, and that since Merril wants theTyee, I'd let him have her—at a figure. Anything she brings over and above the bond goes to your father. Well, I'll put on a broker to bid for her who knows his business. If I have to take her I guess I could get my money back by sailing her, and, anyway, the broker will run Merril up. You couldn't do it, because you'd be asked for security that you could put up the money. Now, that's about all, except that I want you not to take hold of anything that may be offered you until the auction's over and you have had a talk with me. I've got to go back to the mill to-morrow for a week or two."
"I don't want to be ungracious, but there is no reason why you should burden yourself with my affairs."
"No," said Jordan dryly, "I guess there isn't. I'm out for money, and that's why I figure that a man who knows as much about the sea as you do might be of some use to me. You'll promise, anyway?"
Jimmy did so, and felt that he had done wisely when his comrade went away. There was, after all, no reason why Jordan should not befriend him if he wished to, and he had a curious confidence in the man. It was, however, two or three weeks later, and only a few minutes before the auction which was to be held in a room ashore, when he saw him again. He did not know thatJordan, who had arrived in the city two days ago, had spent most of one of them at Forster's ranch. Jimmy, who had promised Tom Wheelock to attend the sale, was walking up and down the street waiting for the time announced, when Jordan strolled up to him with a cigar in his hand.
"Had to come down to see our people here," he said, which was, as it happened, correct enough. "Went round this morning and saw that broker man. He's coming along, and if it will be any relief to you I'll hand you on his bill. Of course, I could have made my own bid, but these fellows know the tricks of the game, and I'm not ready yet for a clean break with Merril. Now, we might as well walk in."
They passed through part of a big stone building into a large room where a group of city men were talking together, for there were timber lands and ranching properties to be sold that afternoon as well as the schooner. It was very hot, and Jimmy found the waiting difficult to bear as he listened to the hum of voices and glanced at his watch, until at last the auctioneer sat down at a raised table. He hastily read out particulars of the vessel as well as his authority to sell her, and then smiled at the assembly.
"Now," he said, "we'll get right down to business. Most of you have seen the vessel, the rest of you have heard about her, and all you have to do is to make me a reasonable bid. There is no reserve on her."
Jimmy felt his face grow a trifle hot with anger. TheTyeehad made his father's living, and, since anything she might bring in excess of the loan on her would belong to him, it did not seem fitting that she should beflung in this casual fashion on the hands of palpably indifferent purchasers. The result of that sale was of vital interest to him and Thomas Wheelock, and he glanced inquiringly at Jordan.
"My man has not come," said the latter tranquilly. "It's a game he's accustomed to, and when he's wanted he'll be here. That's one of the new cannery men starting the bidding. Their inlet's a difficult place to make, and the steamboat men don't care about calling there except for big loads. It's significant that he should think of buying her."
Jimmy did not understand why it should be so, but his face grew hard at the laughter when the man made a nominal bid. There was silence for almost a minute, and he felt a little thrill of dismay run through him, for if theTyeewent at that figure it would leave his father still heavily in debt.
"The anchors and cables are worth more," said the auctioneer. "Is there nobody willing to raise him fifty dollars?"
One of the men nodded. "I'll go that far," he said. "Still, I don't know where I could get it back for her."