On the evening after his arrival in Vancouver, Vane paid a visit to one of his directors; and, in accordance with the invitation, he and Carroll reached the latter's dwelling some little time before the arrival of several other guests, whose acquaintance it was considered advisable he should make. In the business parts of most western cities iron and stone have now replaced the native lumber, but on their outskirts wood is still employed with admirable effect as a building material, and Nairn's house was an example of the judicious use of the latter. It stood on a rise above the inlet; picturesque in outline, with its artistic scroll-work, Its wooden pillars, its lattice shutters and its balustraded verandas. Virgin forest crept up close about it, and there was no fence to the sweep of garden which divided it from the road.
Vane and his companion were ushered into a small room, with an uncovered floor and simple, hardwood furniture. It was obviously a working room, for, as a rule, the work of the western business man goes on continuously except when he is asleep; but a somewhat portly lady with a good-humored face reclined in a rocking chair. A gaunt, elderly man of rugged appearance rose from his seat at a writing-table as his guests entered.
"So ye have come at last," he said. "I had ye shown in here, because this room is mine, and I can smoke when I like. The rest of the house is Mrs. Nairn's, and it seems that her friends do not appreciate the smell of my cigars. I'm no sure that I can blame them."
Mrs. Nairn smiled placidly.
"Alic," she explained, "leaves them lying everywhere, and I do not like the stubs of them on the stairs. But sit ye down and he will give ye one."
Vane felt at home with both of them. He had met people of their kind before, and, allowing for certain idiosyncrasies, considered them the salt of the Dominion. Nairn had done good service to his adopted country, developing her industries—with some profit to himself, for he was of Scottish extraction; but, while close at a bargain, he could be generous afterward. In the beginning, he had fought sternly for his own hand, and it was supposed that Mrs. Nairn had helped him, not only by sound advice, but by such practical economies as the making of his working clothes. Those he wore on the evening in question did not fit him well, though they were no longer the work of her capable fingers. When his guests were seated he laid two cigar boxes on the table.
"Those," he said, pointing to one of them, "are mine. I think ye had better try the others; they're for visitors."
Vane had already noticed the aroma of the cigar that was smoldering on a tray and he decided that Nairn was right; so he dipped his hand into the second box, which he passed to Carroll.
"Now," declared Nairn, "we can talk comfortably. Clara will listen.Afterwards, it's possible she will favor me with her opinion."
Mrs. Nairn smiled at them encouragingly, and her husband proceeded.
"One or two of my colleagues were no pleased at ye for putting off the meeting."
"The sloop was small, and it was blowing rather hard," Vane explained.
"Maybe. For all that, the tone of your message was no altogether what one would call conciliatory. It informed us that ye would arrange for the postponed meeting at your earliest convenience. Ye did not mention ours."
"I pointed that out to him, and he said it didn't matter," Carroll interrupted with a laugh.
Nairn spread out his hands in expostulation, but there was dry appreciation in his eyes.
"Young blood must have its way." He paused and looked thoughtful. "Ye will no have said anything definite to Horsfield yet about the smelter?"
"No. So far, I'm not sure that it would pay us to put up the plant; and the other man's terms are lower."
"Maybe," Nairn answered, and he made the single word very expressive. "Ye have had the handling of the thing; but henceforward it will be necessary to get the sanction of the board. However, ye will meet Horsfield to-night. We expect him and his sister."
Vane thought he had been favored with a hint, but he fancied also that his host was not inimical and was merely reserving his judgment with Caledonian caution. Nairn changed the subject.
"So ye're going to England for a holiday. Ye will have friends who'll be glad to see ye yonder?"
"I've one sister, but no other near relatives. But I expect to spend some time with people you know. The Chisholms are old family friends, and, as you will remember, it was through them that I first approached you."
Then, obeying one of the impulses which occasionally swayed him, he turned to Mrs. Nairn.
"I'm grateful to them for sending me the letter of introduction to your husband, because in many ways I'm in his debt. He didn't treat me as the others did when I first went round this city with a few mineral specimens."
He had expected nothing when he spoke, but there was a responsive look in the lady's face which hinted that he had made a friend. As a matter of fact, he owed a good deal to his host. There is a vein of human kindness in the Scot, and he is often endowed with a keen, half-instinctive judgment of his fellows which renders him less likely to be impressed by outward appearances and the accidental advantages of polished speech or tasteful dress than his southern neighbors. Vane would have had even more trouble in floating his company had not Nairn been satisfied with him.
"So ye are meaning to stay with Chisholm!" the latter exclaimed. "We had Evelyn here two years ago, and Clara said something about her coming out again."
"It's nine years since I saw Evelyn."
"Then there's a surprise in store for ye. I believe they've a bonny place—and there's no doubt Chisholm will make ye welcome."
The slight pause was expressive. It implied that Nairn, who had a somewhat biting humor, could furnish a reason for Chisholm's hospitality if he desired, and Vane was confirmed in this supposition when he saw the warning look which his hostess cast at her husband.
"It's likely that we'll have Evelyn again in the fall," she said hastily."It's a very small world, Mr. Vane."
"It's a far cry from Vancouver to England," Vane replied. "How did you first come to know Chisholm?"
Nairn answered him.
"Our acquaintance began with business. A concern that he was chairman of had invested in British Columbian mining stock; and he's some kind of connection of Colquhoun's."
Colquhoun was a man of some importance, who held a Crown appointment, and Vane felt inclined to wonder why Chisholm had not sent him a letter to him. Afterward, he guessed at the reason, which was not flattering to himself or his host. Nairn and he chatted a while on business topics, until there was a sound of voices below, and going down in company with Mrs. Nairn they found two or three new arrivals in the entrance hall. More came in; and when they sat down to supper, Vane was given a place beside a young lady whom he had already met.
Jessy Horsfield was about his own age; tall and slight in figure, with regular features, a rather colorless face, and eyes of a cold, light blue. There was, however, something striking in her appearance, and Vane was gratified by her graciousness to him. Her brother sat almost opposite them: a tall, spare man, with a somewhat expressionless countenance, except for the aggressive hardness in his eyes. Vane had noticed this look, and it had aroused his dislike, but he had not observed it in the eyes of Miss Horsfield, though it was present now and then. Nor did he realize that while she chatted she was unobtrusively studying him. She had not favored him with much notice when she was in his company on a previous occasion; he had been a man of no importance then.
He was now dressed in ordinary attire, and the well-cut garments displayed his lean, athletic figure. His face, Miss Horsfield decided, was a good one: not exactly handsome, but attractive in its frankness; and she liked the way he had of looking steadily at the person he addressed. Though he had been, as she knew, a wandering chopper, a survey packer, and, for a time, an unsuccessful prospector, there was no coarsening stamp of toil on him. Indeed, the latter is not common in the West, where as yet the division of employments is not practised to the extent it is in older countries. Specialization has its advantages; but it brands a man's profession upon him and renders it difficult for him to change it. Except for the clear bronze of his skin, Vane might just have left a Government office, or have come out from London or Montreal. He was, moreover, a man whose acquaintance might be worth cultivating.
"I suppose you are glad you have finished your work in the bush," she remarked presently. "It must be nice to get back to civilization."
Vane smiled as he glanced round the room. It ran right across the house, and through the open windows came the clank of a locomotive bell down by the wharf and the rattle of a steamer's winch. The sounds appealed to him. They suggested organized activity, the stir of busy life; and it was pleasant to hear them after the silence of the bush. The gleam of snowy linen, dainty glass and silver caught his eye; and the hum of careless voices and the light laughter were soothing.
"Yes; it's remarkably nice after living for nine years in the wilderness, with only an occasional visit to some little wooden town."
A fresh dish was laid before him, and his companion smiled.
"You didn't get things of this kind among the pines."
"No," laughed Vane. "In fact, cookery is one of the bushman's trials; anyway, when he's working for himself. You come back dead tired, and often very wet, to your lonely tent, and then there's a fire to make and supper to get before you can rest. It happens now and then that you're too played out to trouble, and you go to sleep instead."
"Dreadful!" sympathized the girl. "But you have been in Vancouver before?"
"Except on the last occasion, I stayed down near the water-front. We were not provided with luxurious quarters or with suppers of this kind there."
"It's romantic; and, though you're glad it's over, there must be some satisfaction in feeling that you owe the change to your own efforts. I mean it must be nice to think one has captured a fair share of the good things of life, instead of having them accidentally thrust upon one. Doesn't it give you a feeling that in some degree you're master of your fate? I should like that"
It was subtle flattery, and there were reasons why it appealed to the man. He had worked for others, sometimes for inadequate wages, and had wandered about the Province, dusty and footsore, in search of employment, besides being beaten down at many a small bargain by richer or more fortunately situated men. Now, however, he had resolved that there should be a difference; instead of begging favors, he would dictate terms.
"I should have imagined it," he laughed, in answer to her last remark; and he was right, for Jessy Horsfield was a clever woman who loved power and influence.
Vane dropped his napkin, and was stooping to pick it up when an attendant handed it back to him. He noticed and responded to the glimmer of amusement in his companion's eyes.
"We are not accustomed to being waited on in the bush," he explained. "It takes some time to get used to the change. When we wanted anything there we got it for ourselves."
"Is that, in its wider sense, a characteristic of most bushmen?"
"I don't quite follow."
The girl laughed.
"I suppose one could divide men into two classes: those who are able to get the things they desire for themselves—which implies the possession of certain eminently useful qualities—and those who have them given to them. In Canada the former are the more numerous."
"There's a third division," Vane corrected her, with a trace of grimness. "I mean those who want a good many things and have to learn to do without. It strikes me they're the most numerous of all."
"It's no doubt excellent discipline," retorted his companion.
She looked at him boldly, for she was interested in the man and was not afraid of personalities.
"In any case, you have now passed out of that division."
Vane sat silent for the next few moments. Up to the age of eighteen most of his reasonable wishes had been gratified. Then had come a startling change, and he had discovered in the Dominion that he must lead a life of Spartan self-denial. He had had the strength to do so, and for nine years he had resolutely banished most natural longings. Amusements, in some of which he excelled, the society of women, all the small amenities of life, were things which must be foregone, and he had forced himself to be content with food and, as a rule, very indifferent shelter. This, as his companion suggested, had proved a wholesome discipline, since it had not soured him. Now, though he did not overvalue them, he rejoiced in his new surroundings, and the girl's comeliness and quickness of comprehension had their full effect.
"It was you who located the Clermont Mine, wasn't it?" she went on. "I read something about it in the papers—I think they said it was copper ore."
This vagueness was misleading, for her brother had given her a good deal of definite information about the mine.
"Yes," replied Vane, willing to take up any subject she suggested; "it's copper ore, but there's some silver combined with it. Of course, the value of any ore depends upon two things—the percentage of the metal, and the cost of extracting it."
Her interest was flattering, and he added:
"In both respects, the Clermont product is promising."
After that he did not remember what they talked about; but the time passed rapidly and he was surprised when Mrs. Nairn rose and the company drifted away by twos and threes toward the veranda. Left by himself a moment, he came upon Carroll sauntering down a corridor.
"I've had a chat with Horsfield," Carroll remarked.
"Well?"
"He may merely have meant to make himself agreeable, and he may have wished to extract information about you: If the latter was his object, he was not successful."
"Ah! Nairn's straight, anyway, and to be relied on. I like him and his wife."
"So do I, though they differ from some of the others. There's not much gilding on either of them."
"It's not needed; they're sterling metal."
"That's my own idea."
Carroll moved away and Vane strolled out onto the veranda, whereHorsfield joined him a few minutes later.
"I don't know whether it's a very suitable time to mention it; but may I ask whether you are any nearer a decision about that smelter? Candidly, I'd like the contract."
"I am not," Vane answered. "I can't make up my mind, and I may postpone the matter indefinitely. It might prove more profitable to ship the ore out for reduction."
Horsfield examined his cigar.
"Of course, I can't press you; but I may, perhaps, suggest that, as we'll have to work together in other matters, I might be able to give you a quid pro quo."
"That occurred to me. On the other hand, I don't know how much importanceI ought to attach to the consideration."
His companion laughed with apparent good-humor.
"Oh, well; I must wait until you're ready."
He strolled away, and presently joined his sister.
"How does Vane strike you?" he asked. "You seem to get on with him."
"I've an idea that you won't find him easy to influence," answered the girl, looking at her brother pointedly.
"I'm inclined to agree with you. In spite of that, he's a man whose acquaintance is worth cultivating."
He passed on to speak to Nairn; and shortly afterward Vane sat down beside Jessy in a corner of a big room. Looking out across the veranda, he could see far-off snowy heights tower in cold silver tracery against the green of the evening sky. Voices and laughter reached him, and now and then some of the guests strolled through the room. It was pleasant to lounge there and feel that Miss Horsfield had taken him under her wing, which seemed to describe her attitude toward him. She was handsome, and he noticed how finely the soft, neutral tinting of her attire, which was neither blue nor altogether gray, matched the azure of her eyes and emphasized the dead-gold coloring of her hair.
"As Mrs. Nairn tells me you are going to England, I suppose we shall not see you in Vancouver for some months," she said presently. "This city really isn't a bad place to live in."
Vane felt gratified. She had implied that he would be an acquisition and had included him among the number of her acquaintances.
"I fancy that I shall find it a particularly pleasant place," he responded. "Indeed, I'm inclined to be sorry that I've made arrangements to leave it very shortly."
"That is pure good-nature," laughed his companion.
"No; it's what I really feel."
Jessy let this pass.
"Mrs. Nairn mentioned that you know the Chisholms."
"I'd better say that I used to do so. They have probably changed out of my knowledge, and they can scarcely remember me except by name."
"But you are going to see them?"
"I expect to spend some time with them."
Jessy changed the subject, and Vane found her conversation entertaining. She appealed to his artistic perceptions and his intelligence, and it must be admitted that she laid herself out to do so. She said nothing of any consequence, but she knew how to make a glance or a changed inflection expressive. He was sorry when she left him, but she smiled at him before she moved away.
"If you and Mr. Carroll care to call, I am generally at home in the afternoon," she said.
She crossed the room, and Vane joined Nairn and remained near him until he took his departure.
Late the next afternoon, an hour or two after an Empress liner from China and Japan had arrived, he and Carroll reached the C.P.R. station. The Atlantic train was waiting and an unusual number of passengers were hurrying about the cars. They were, for the most part, prosperous people: business men, and tourists from England going home that way; and when Vane found Mrs. Marvin and Kitty, he once more was conscious of a stirring of compassion. The girl's dress, which had struck him as becoming on the afternoon they spent on the beach, now looked shabby. In Mrs. Marvin's case, the impression was more marked, and standing amid the bustling throng with the child clinging to her hand she looked curiously forlorn. Kitty smiled at him diffidently.
"You have been so kind," she began, and, pausing, added with a tremor in her voice: "But the tickets—"
"Pshaw!" interrupted Vane. "If it will ease your mind, you can send me what they cost after the first full house you draw."
"How shall we address you?"
"Clermont Mineral Exploitation. I don't want to think I'm going to lose sight of you."
Kitty looked away from him a moment, and then looked back.
"I'm afraid you must make up your mind to that," she said.
Vane could not remember his answer, though he afterward tried; but just then an official strode along beside the cars, calling to the passengers, and when a bell began tolling Vane hurried the girl and her companions onto a platform. Mrs. Marvin entered the car, Elsie held up her face to kiss him before she disappeared, and he and Kitty were left alone. She held out her hand, and a liquid gleam crept into her eyes.
"We can't thank you properly," she murmured, "Good-by!"
"No," Vane protested. "You mustn't say that."
"Yes," answered Kitty firmly, but with signs of effort. "It's good-by.You'll be carried on in a moment!"
Vane gazed down at her, and afterward wondered at what he did, but she looked so forlorn and desolate, and the pretty face was so close to his. Stooping swiftly, he kissed her, and had a thrilling fancy that she did not recoil; then the cars lurched forward and he swung himself down. They slid past him, clanking, while he stood and gazed after them. Turning around, he was by no means pleased to see that Nairn was regarding him with quiet amusement.
"Been seeing the train away?" the latter suggested. "It's a popular diversion with idle folk."
"I was saying good-by to somebody I met on the west coast," Vane explained.
"Weel," chuckled Nairn, "she has bonny een."
A month after Vane said good-by to Kitty he and Carroll alighted one evening at a little station in northern England. Brown moors stretched about it, for the heather had not bloomed yet, rolling back in long slopes to the high ridge which cut against leaden thunder-clouds in the eastern sky. To the westward, they fell away; and across a wide, green valley smooth-backed heights gave place in turn to splintered crags and ragged pinnacles etched in gray and purple on a vivid saffron glow. The road outside the station gleamed with water, and a few big drops of rain came splashing down, but there was a bracing freshness in the mountain air.
The train went on, and Vane stood still, looking about him with a poignant recollection of how he had last waited on that platform, sick at heart, but gathering his youthful courage for the effort that he must make. It all came back to him—the dejection, the sense of loneliness—for he was then going out to the Western Dominion in which he had not a friend. Now he was returning, moderately prosperous and successful; but once again the feeling of loneliness was with him—most of those whom he had left behind had made a longer journey than he had done. Then he noticed an elderly man, in rather shabby livery, approaching, and he held out his hand with a smile of pleasure.
"You haven't changed a bit, Jim!" he exclaimed. "Have you got the young gray in the new cart outside?"
"T' owd gray was shot twelve months since," the man replied. "Broke his leg comin' down Hartop Bank. New car was sold off, done, two or t'ree years ago."
"That's bad news. Anyway, you're the same."
"A bit stiffer in the joints, and maybe a bit sourer," was the answer.Then the man's wrinkled face relaxed. "I'm main glad to see thee, Mr.Wallace. Master wad have come, only he'd t' gan t' Manchester suddenly."
Vane helped him to place their baggage into the trap and then bade him sit behind; and as he gathered up the reins, he glanced at the horse and harness. The one did not show the breeding of the gray he remembered, and there was no doubt that the other was rather the worse for wear. They set off down the descending road, which wound, unconfined, through the heather, where the raindrops sparkled like diamonds. Farther down, they ran in between rough limestone walls with gleaming spar in them, smothered here and there in trailing brambles and clumps of fern, while the streams that poured out from black gaps in the peat and flowed beside the road flashed with coppery gold in the evening light. It was growing brighter ahead of them, though inky clouds still clung to the moors behind.
By and by, ragged hedges, rent and twisted by the winds, climbed up to meet them, and, clattering down between the straggling greenery, they crossed a river sparkling over banks of gravel. After that, there was a climb, for the country rolled in ridge and valley, and the crags ahead, growing nearer, rose in more rugged grandeur against the paling glow. Carroll gazed about him in open appreciation as they drove.
"This little compact country is really wonderful, in its way!" he exclaimed. "There's so much squeezed into it, even leaving out your towns. Parts of it are like Ontario—-the southern strip I mean—with the plow-land, orchards and homesteads sprinkled among the woods and rolling ground. Then your Midlands are like the prairie, only that they're greener—there's the same sweep of grass and the same sweep of sky, and this"—he gazed at the rugged hills rent by winding dales—"is British Columbia on a miniature scale."
"Yes," agreed Vane; "it isn't monotonous."
"Now you have hit it! That's the precise difference. We've three belts of country, beginning at Labrador and running west—rock and pine scrub, level prairie, and ranges piled on ranges beyond the Rockies. Hundreds of leagues of each of them, and, within their limits, all the same. But this country's mixed. You can get what you like—woods, smooth grass-land, mountains—in a few hours' ride."
Vane smiled.
"Our people and their speech and habits are mixed, too. There's more difference between county and county in thirty miles than there is right across your whole continent. You're cast in the one mold."
"I'm inclined to think it's a good one," laughed Carroll. "What's more, it has set its stamp on you. The very way your clothes hang proclaims that you're a Westerner."
Vane laughed good-humoredly; but as they clattered through a sleepy hamlet with its little, square-towered church overhanging a brawling river, his face grew grave. Pulling up the horse, he handed the reins to Carroll.
"This is the first stage of my pilgrimage. I won't keep you five minutes."
He swung himself down, and the groom motioned to him.
"West of the tower, Mr. Wallace; just before you reach the porch."
Vane passed through the wicket in the lichened limestone wall, and there was a troubled look in his eyes when he came back and took the reins again.
"I went away in bitterness—and I'm sorry now," he said. "The real trouble was unimportant; I think it was forgotten. Every now and then the letters came; but the written word is cold. There are things that can never be set quite right in this world."
Carroll made no comment, though he knew that if it had not been for the bond between them his comrade would not have spoken so. They drove on in silence for a while, and then, as they entered a deep, wooded dale, Vane turned to him again.
"I've been taken right back into the old days to-night; days in England, and afterward those when we worked on the branch road beneath the range. There's not a boy among the crowd in the sleeping-shack I can't recall—first, wild Larry, who taught me how to drill and hid my rawness from the Construction Boss."
"He lent me his gum-boots when the muskeg stiffened into half-frozen slush," Carroll interrupted him.
"And was smashed by the snowslide," Vane went on. "Then there was Tom, from the boundary country. He packed me back a league to camp the day I chopped my right foot; and went down in the lumber schooner off Flattery. Black Pete, too, who held on to you in the rapid when we were running the bridge-logs through. It was in firing a short fuse that he got his discharge," He raised his free hand, with a wry smile. "Gone on—with more of their kind after them; a goodly company. Why are we left prosperous? What have we done?"
Carroll made no response. The question was unanswerable, and after a while Vane abruptly began to talk about their business in British Columbia. It passed the time; and he had resumed his usual manner when he pulled up where a stile path led across a strip of meadow.
"You can drive round; we'll be there before you," he said to the groom as he got down.
Carroll and he crossed the meadow. Passing around a clump of larches they came suddenly into sight of an old gray house with a fir wood rolling down the hillside close behind it. The building was long and low, weather-worn and stained with lichens where the creepers and climbing roses left the stone exposed. The bottom row of mullioned windows opened upon a terrace, and in front of the terrace ran a low wall with a broad coping on which were placed urns bright with geraniums. It was pierced by an opening approached by shallow stairs on which an iridescent peacock stood, and in front of all that stretched a sweep of lawn.
A couple of minutes later, a lady met them in the wide hall, and held out her hand to Vane. She was middle-aged, and had once been handsome, but now there were wrinkles about her eyes, which had a hint of hardness in them, and her lips were thin. Carroll noticed that they closed tightly when she was not speaking.
"Welcome home, Wallace," she said effusively. "It should not be difficult to look upon the Dene as that—you were here so often once upon a time."
"Thank you," was the response. "I felt tempted to ask Jim to drive me round by Low Wood; I wanted to see the place again."
"I'm glad you didn't. The house is shut up and going to pieces. It would have been depressing to-night."
Vane presented Carroll. Mrs. Chisholm's manner was gracious, but for no particular reason Carroll wondered whether she would have extended the same welcome to his comrade had the latter not come back the discoverer of a profitable mine.
"Tom was sorry he couldn't wait to meet you, but he had to leave forManchester on some urgent business," she apologized.
Just then a girl with disordered hair and an unusual length of stocking displayed beneath her scanty skirt came up to them.
"This is Mabel," said Mrs. Chisholm. "I hardly think you will remember her."
"I've carried her across the meadow."
The girl greeted the strangers demurely, and favored Vane with a critical gaze.
"So you're Wallace Vane—who floated the Clermont Mine! Though I don't remember you, I've heard a good deal about you lately. Very pleased to make your acquaintance!"
Vane's eyes twinkled as he shook hands with her. Her manner was quaintly formal, but he fancied that there was a spice of mischief hidden behind it. Carroll, watching his hostess, surmised that her daughter's remarks had not altogether pleased her. She chatted with them, however, until the man who had driven them appeared with their baggage, when they were shown their respective rooms.
Vane was the first to go down. Reaching the hall, he found nobody there, though a clatter of dishes and a clink of silver suggested that a meal was being laid out in an adjoining room. Sitting down near the hearth, he looked about him. The house was old; a wide stairway with a quaintly carved balustrade of dark oak ran up one side and led to a landing, also fronted with ponderous oak rails. The place was shadowy, but a stream of light from a high window struck athwart one part of it and fell upon the stairs.
Vane's eyes rested on many objects that he recognized, but as his glance traveled to and fro it occurred to him that much of what he saw conveyed a hint that economy was needful. Part of the rich molding of the Jacobean mantel had fallen away, and patches of the key pattern bordering the panels beneath it had broken off, though he decided that a clever cabinet-maker could have repaired the damage in a day. There were one or two choice rugs on the floor, but they were threadbare; the heavy hangings about the inner doors were dingy and moth-eaten; and, though all this was in harmony with the drowsy quietness and the faint smell of decay, it had its significance.
Presently he heard footsteps, and looking up he saw a girl descending the stairs in the fading stream of light. She was clad in trailing white, which gleamed against the dark oak and rustled softly as it flowed about a tall, finely outlined and finely poised figure. She had hair of dark brown with paler lights in its curling tendrils, gathered back from a neck that showed a faintly warmer whiteness than the snowy fabric below it. It was her face, though, that seized Vane's attention: the level brows; the quiet, deep brown eyes; the straight, cleanly-cut nose; and the subtle suggestion of steadfastness and pride which they all conveyed. He rose with a cry that had pleasure and eagerness in it.
"Evelyn!"
She came down, moving lightly but with a rhythmic grace, and laid a firm, cool hand in his.
"I'm glad to see you back, Wallace," she said. "How you have changed!"
"I'm not sure that's kind," smiled Vane. "In some ways, you haven't changed at all; I would have known you anywhere!"
"Nine years is a long time to remember any one."
Vane had seen few women during that period; but he was not a fool, and he recognized that this was no occasion for an attempt at gallantry. There was nothing coquettish in Evelyn's words, nor was there any irony. She had answered in the tranquil, matter-of-fact manner which, as he remembered, usually characterized her.
"It's a little while since you landed, isn't it?" she added.
"A week. I had some business in London, and then I went on to look upLucy. She had just gone up to town—to a congress, I believe—and soI missed her. I shall go up again to see her as soon as she answersmy letter."
"It won't be necessary. She's coming here for a fortnight."
"That's very kind. Whom have I to thank for suggesting it?"
"Does it matter? It was a natural thing to ask your only sister—who is a friend of mine. There is plenty of room, and the place is quiet."
"It didn't used to be. If I remember, your mother generally had it full part of the year."
"Things have changed," said Evelyn quietly.
Vane was baffled by something in her manner. Evelyn had never been effusive—that was not her way—-but now, while she was cordial, she did not seem disposed to resume their acquaintance where it had been broken off. After all, he could hardly have expected this.
"Mabel is like you, as you used to be," he observed. "It struck me as soon as I saw her; but when she began to talk there was a difference."
Evelyn laughed softly.
"Yes; I think you're right in both respects. Mopsy has the courage of her convictions. She's an open rebel."
There was no bitterness in her laugh. Evelyn's manner was never pointed; but Vane fancied that she had said a meaning thing—one that might explain what he found puzzling in her attitude, when he held the key to it.
"Mopsy was dubious about you before you arrived, but I'm pleased to say she seems reassured," she laughed.
Carroll came down, and a few moments later Mrs. Chisholm appeared and they went in to dinner in a low-ceilinged room. During the general conversation, Mabel suddenly turned to Vane.
"I suppose you have brought your pistols with you?"
"I haven't owned one since I was sixteen," Vane laughed.
The girl looked at him with an excellent assumption of incredulity.
"Then you have never shot anybody in British Columbia!"
Carroll laughed, as if this greatly pleased him, but Vane's face was rather grave as he answered her.
"No; I'm thankful to say that I haven't. In fact, I've never seen a shot fired, except at a grouse or a deer."
"Then the West must be getting what the Archdeacon—he's Flora's husband, you know—calls decadent," the girl sighed.
"She's incorrigible," Mrs. Chisholm interposed with a smile.
Carroll leaned toward Mabel confidentially.
"In case you feel very badly disappointed, I'll let you into a secret.When we feel real, real savage, we take the ax instead."
Evelyn fancied that Vane winced at this, but Mabel looked openly regretful.
"Can either of you pick up a handkerchief going at full gallop on horseback?" she inquired.
"I'm sorry to say that I can't; and I've never seen Wallace do so,"Carroll laughed.
Mrs. Chisholm shook her head at her daughter.
"Miss Clifford complained of your inattention to the study of English last quarter," she reproved severely.
Mabel made no answer, though Vane thought it would have relieved her to grimace.
Presently the meal came to an end, and an hour afterward, Mrs. Chisholm rose from her seat in the lamplit drawing-room.
"We keep early hours at the Dene, but you will retire when you like," she said. "As Tom is away, I had better tell you that you will find syphons and whisky in the smoking-room. I have had the lamp lighted."
"Thank you," Vane replied with a smile. "I'm afraid you have taken more trouble on our account than you need have done. Except on special occasions, we generally confine ourselves to strong green tea."
Mabel looked at him in amazement.
"Oh!" she cried. "The West is certainly decadent! You should be here when the otter hounds are out. Why, it was only—"
She broke off abruptly beneath her mother's withering glance.
When Vane and Carroll were left alone, they strolled out, pipe in hand, upon the terrace. They could see the fells tower darkly against the soft sky, and a tarn that lay in the blackness of the valley beneath them was revealed by its pale gleam. A wonderful mingling of odors stole out of the still summer night.
"I suppose you could put in a few weeks here?" Vane remarked.
"I could," Carroll replied. "There's an atmosphere about these old houses that appeals to me, perhaps because we have nothing like it in Canada. The tranquillity of age is in it—it's restful, as a change. Besides, I think your friends mean to make things pleasant."
"I'm glad you like them."
Carroll knew that his comrade would not resent a candid expression of opinion.
"I do; the girls in particular. They interest me. The younger one's of a type that's common in our country, though it's generally given room for free development into something useful there. Mabel's chafing at the curb. It remains to be seen whether she'll kick, presently, and hurt herself in doing so."
Vane remembered that Evelyn had said something to the same effect; but he had already discovered that Carroll possessed a keen insight in certain matters.
"And her sister?" he suggested.
"You won't mind my saying that I'm inclined to be sorry for her? She has learned repression—been driven into line. That girl has character, but it's being cramped and stunted. You live in walled-in compartments in this country."
"Doesn't the same thing apply to New York, Montreal, or Toronto?"
"Not to the same extent. We haven't had time yet to number off all the little subdivisions and make rules for them, nor to elaborate the niceties of an immutable system. No doubt, we'll come to it."
He paused with a deprecatory laugh.
"Mrs. Chisholm believes in the system. She has been modeled on it—it's got into her blood; and that's why she's at variance with her daughters. No doubt, the thing's necessary; I'm finding no fault with it. You must remember that we're outsiders, with a different outlook; we've lived in the new West."
Vane strolled on along the terrace thoughtfully. He was not offended; he understood his companion's attitude. Like other men of education and good upbringing driven by unrest or disaster to the untrammeled life of the bush, Carroll had gained sympathy as well as knowledge. Facing facts candidly, he seldom indulged in decided protest against any of them. On the other hand, Vane was on occasion liable to outbreaks of indignation.
"Well," said Vane at length, "I guess it's time to go to bed."
Vane rose early the next morning, as he had been accustomed to do, and taking a towel he made his way across dewy meadows and between tall hedgerows to the tarn. Stripping where the rabbit-cropped sward met the mossy boulders, he swam out, joyously breasting the little ripples which splashed and sparkled beneath the breeze that had got up with the sun. Coming back, where the water lay in shadow beneath a larchwood which as yet had not wholly lost its vivid vernal green, he disturbed the paddling moor-hens and put up a mallard from a clump of swaying reeds. Then he dressed and turned homeward, glowing, beside a sluggish stream which wound through a waste of heather where the curlew were whistling eerily. He had no cares to trouble him, and it was delightful to feel that he had nothing to do except to enjoy himself in what he considered the fairest country in the world, at least in summertime.
Scrambling over a limestone wall tufted thick with parsley fern, he noticed Mabel stooping over an object which lay among the heather where a rough cartroad approached a wooden bridge. On joining her he saw that she was examining a finely-built canoe with a hole in one bilge. She looked up at him ruefully.
"It's sad, isn't it? That stupid Little did it with his clumsy cart."
"I think it could be mended," Vane replied.
"Old Beavan—he's the wheelwright—said it couldn't; and Dad said I could hardly expect him to send the canoe back to Kingston. He bought it for me at an exhibition."
Then a thought seemed to strike her and her eyes grew eager.
"Perhaps you had something to do with light canoes in Canada?"
"Yes; I used to pole one loaded with provisions up a river and carry the lot round several falls. If I remember, I made eight shillings a day at it, and I think I earned it. You're fond of paddling?"
"I love it! I used to row the fishing-punt, but it's too old to be safe; and now that the canoe's smashed I can't go out at all."
"Well, we'll walk across and see what we can find in Beavan's shop."
He took a few measurements, making them on a stick, and they crossed the heath to a tiny hamlet nestling in a hollow of a limestone crag. There Vane made friends with the wheelwright, who regarded him dubiously at first, and obtained a piece of larch board from him. The grizzled North Countryman watched him closely as he set a plane, which is a delicate operation, and he raised no objections when Vane made use of his work-bench. When the board had been sawed up, Vane borrowed a few tools and copper nails, and he and Mabel went back to the canoe. On the way she glanced at him curiously.
"I wasn't sure old Beavan would let you have the things," she remarked. "It isn't often he'll even lend a hammer, but he seemed to take to you; I think it was the way you handled his plane."
"It's strange what little things win some people's good opinion, isn't it?"
"Oh, don't!" exclaimed Mabel. "That's the way the Archdeacon talks. I thought you were different!"
The man acquiesced in the rebuke; and after an hour's labor at the canoe, he scraped the red lead he had used off his hands and sat down beside the craft. The sun was warm now, the dew was drying, and a lark sang riotously overhead. Vane became conscious that his companion was regarding him with what seemed to be approval.
"I really think you'll do, and we'll get on," she informed him. "If you had been the wrong kind, you would have worried about your red hands. Still, you could have rubbed them on the heather, instead of on your socks."
"I might have thought of that," Vane laughed. "But, you see, I've been accustomed to wearing old clothes. Anyway, you'll be able to launch the canoe as soon as the joint's dry."
"There's one thing I should have told you," the girl replied. "Dad would have sent the canoe away to be mended if it hadn't been so far. He's very good when things don't ruffle him; but he hasn't been fortunate lately. The lead mine takes a good deal of money."
Vane admired her loyalty, and he refrained from taking advantage of her candor, though there were one or two questions he would have liked to ask. When he was last in England, Chisholm had been generally regarded as a man of means, though it was rumored that he was addicted to hazardous speculations. Mabel, without noticing his silence, went on:
"I heard Stevens—he's the gamekeeper—tell Beavan that Dad should have been a rabbit because he's so fond of burrowing. No doubt, that meant that he couldn't keep out of mines."
Vane made no comment; and Mabel, breaking off for a moment, looked up at the rugged fells to the west and then around at the moors which cut against the blue of the morning sky.
"It's all very pretty, but it shuts one in!" she cried. "You feel you want to get out and can't! I suppose you really couldn't take me back with you to Canada?"
"I'm afraid not. If you were about ten years older, it might be possible."
Mabel grimaced.
"Oh, don't! That's the kind of thing some of Gerald's smart friends say, and it makes one want to slap them! Besides," she added naively, glancing down at her curtailed skirt, "I'm by no means so young as I appear to be. The fact is, I'm not allowed to grow up yet."
"Why?"
The girl laughed at him.
"Oh, you've lived in the woods. If you had stayed in England, you would understand."
"I'm afraid I've been injudicious," Vane answered with a show of humility. "But don't you think it's getting on toward breakfast time?"
"Breakfast won't be for a good while yet. We don't get up early. Evelyn used to, but it's different now. We used to go out on the tarn every morning, even in the wind and rain; but I suppose that's not good for one's complexion, though bothering about such things doesn't seem to me to be worth while. Aunt Julia couldn't do anything for Evelyn, though she had her in London for some time. Flora is our shining light."
"What did she do?"
"She married the Archdeacon; and he isn't so very dried up. I've seen him smile when I talked to him."
"I'm not astonished at that, Mabel," laughed Vane.
His companion looked up at him.
"My name's not Mabel—to you. I'm Mopsy to the family, but my special friends call me Mops. You're one of the few people one can be natural with, and I'm getting sick—you won't be shocked—of having to be the opposite. If you'll come along, I'll show you the setter puppies."
It was half an hour later when Vane, who had seldom had to wait so long for breakfast, sat down with an excellent appetite. The spacious room pleased him after the cramped quarters to which he had been accustomed. The sunlight that streamed in sparkled on choice old silver and glowed on freshly gathered flowers; and through the open windows mingled fragrances flowed in from the gardens. All that his gaze rested on spoke of ease and taste and leisure. Evelyn, sitting opposite him, looked wonderfully fresh in her white dress; Mopsy was as amusing as she dared to be; but Vane felt drawn back to the restless world again as he glanced at his hostess and saw the wrinkles round her eyes and a hint of cleverly hidden strain in her expression. He fancied that a good deal could be deduced from the fragments of information her younger daughter had given him.
It was Mabel who suggested that they should picnic upon the summit of a lofty hill, from which there was a striking view; and as this met with the approval of Mrs. Chisholm, who excused herself from accompanying them, they set out an hour later. The day was bright, with glaring sunshine, and a moderate breeze drove up wisps of ragged cloud that dappled the hills with flitting shadow. Towering crag and shingly scree showed blue and purple through it and then flashed again into brilliancy, while the long, grassy slopes gleamed with silvery gray and ocher.
On leaving the head of the valley they climbed leisurely up easy slopes, slipping on the crisp hill grass now and then. By and by they plunged into tangled heather on a bolder ridge, rent by black gullies, down which at times wild torrents poured. This did not trouble either of the men, who were used to forcing a passage over more rugged hillsides and through leagues of matted brush, but Vane was surprised at the ease with which Evelyn threaded her way across the heath. She wore a short skirt and stout laced boots, and he noticed the supple grace of her movements and the delicate color the wind had brought into her face. It struck him that she had somehow changed since they had left the valley. She seemed to have flung off something, and her laugh had a gay ring; but, while she smiled and chatted with him, he was still conscious of a subtle reserve in her manner.
Climbing still, they reached the haunts of the cloudberries and brushed through broad patches of the snowy blossoms that open their gleaming cups among the moss and heather. Vane gathered a handful and gave them to Evelyn.
"You should wear these. They grow only far up on the heights."
She flashed a swift glance at him, but she smiled as she drew the fragile stalks through her belt, and he felt that had it been permissible he could have elaborated the idea in his mind. They are stainless flowers, passionlessly white, that grow beyond the general reach of man, where the air is keen and pure; and, in spite of her graciousness, there was a coldness and a calm, which instead of repelling appealed to him strongly, about this girl. Mabel laughed mischievously.
"If you want to give me flowers, it had better be marsh-marigolds," she said. "They grow low down where it's slushy—but they blaze."
Carroll laughed.
"Mabel," he remarked a few moments later to Vane, "is unguarded in what she says, but she now and then shows signs of being considerably older than her years."
They left the black peat-soil behind them, and the heather gave place to thin and more fragile ling, beaded with its unopened buds, while fangs of rock cropped out here and there. Then turning the flank of a steep ascent, they reached the foot of a shingly scree, and sat down to lunch in the warm sunshine where the wind was cut off by the peak above. Beneath them, a great rift opened up among the rocks, and far beyond the blue lake in the depths of it they could catch the silver gleam of the distant sea.
The fishing creel in which the provisions had been carried was promptly emptied; and when Mabel afterward took Carroll away to climb some neighboring crags, Vane lay resting on one elbow not far from Evelyn. She was looking down the long hollow, with the sunshine, which lighted a golden sparkle in her brown eyes, falling upon her face.
"You didn't seem to mind the climb."
"I enjoyed it;" Evelyn declared, glancing at the cloudberry blossom in her belt. "I really am fond of the mountains, and I have to thank you for a day among them."
On the surface the words offered an opening for a complimentary rejoinder; but Vane was too shrewd to seize it. He had made one venture, and he surmised that a second one would not please her.
"They're almost at your door. One would imagine that you could indulge in a scramble among them whenever it pleased you."
"There are a good many things that look so close and still are out of reach," Evelyn answered with a smile that somehow troubled him. Then her manner changed. "You are content with this?"
Vane gazed about him. Purple crags lay in shadow; glistening threads of water fell among the rocks; and long slopes lay steeped in softest color under the cloud-flecked summer sky.
"Content is scarcely the right word for it," he assured her, "If it weren't so still and serene up here, I'd be riotously happy. There are reasons for this quite apart from the scenery; for one, it's remarkably pleasant to feel that I need do nothing but what I like during the next few months."
"The sensation must be unusual. I wonder if, even in your case, it will last so long?"
Vane laughed and stretched out one of his hands. It was lean and brown, and she could see the marks of old scars on the knuckles.
"In my case," he answered, "it has come only once in a lifetime, and, if it isn't too presumptuous, I think I've earned it." He indicated his battered fingers. "That's the result of holding a wet and slippery drill; and those aren't the only marks I carry about with me—though I've been more fortunate than many fine comrades."
Evelyn noticed something that pleased her in his voice as he concluded.
"I suppose one must get hurt now and then," she responded. "After all, a bruise that's only skin-deep doesn't trouble one long, and no doubt some scars are honorable. It's slow corrosion that's the deadliest."
She broke off with a laugh.
"Moralizing's out of place on a day like this," she added; "and such days are not frequent in the North. That's their greatest charm."
Vane nodded. He knew the sad gray skies of his native land, when its lonely heights are blurred by driving snow-cloud or scourged by bitter rain for weeks together, though now and then they tower serenely into the blue heavens, steeped in ethereal splendor. Once more it struck him that in their latter aspect his companion resembled them. Made finely, of warm flesh and blood, she was yet ethereal too. There was something aloof and intangible about her that seemed in harmony with the hills among which she was born.
"Yes," he agreed. "On the face of it, the North is fickle; though to those who know it that's a misleading term. To some of us it's always the same, and its dark grimness makes one feel the radiance of its smile. For all that, I think we're going to see a sudden change in the weather."
Long wisps of leaden cloud began to stream across the crags above, intensifying, until it seemed unnatural, the glow of light and color on the rest.
"I wonder if Mopsy is leading Mr. Carroll into any mischief? They have been gone some time," said Evelyn. "She has a trick of getting herself and other people into difficulties. I suppose he is an old friend of yours, as you brought him over; unless, perhaps, he's acting as your secretary."
Vane's eyes twinkled.
"If he came in any particular capacity, it's as bear-leader. You see, there are a good many things I've forgotten in the bush, and, as I left this country young, there are no doubt some that I never learned."
"And so you make Mr. Carroll your confidential adviser. How did he gain the necessary experience?"
"That is more than I can tell you; but I'm inclined to believe he has been at one of the universities—Toronto, most likely. Anyhow, on the whole he acts as a judicious restraint."
"But don't you really know anything about him?"
"Only what some years of close companionship have taught me, though I think that's enough. For the rest, I took him on trust."
Evelyn looked surprised, and he spread out his hands in a humorous manner.
"A good many people have had to take me in that way, and they seemed willing to do so—the thing's not uncommon in the West. Why should I be more particular than they were?"
Just then Mabel and Carroll appeared. The latter's garments were stained in places, as if he had been scrambling over mossy rocks, and his pockets bulged. Mabel's skirt was torn, while a patch of white skin showed through her stocking.
"We've found some sun-dew and two ferns I don't know, as well as all sorts of other things," she announced.
"That's correct," vouched Carroll dryly; "I've got them. I guess they're going to fill up most of the creel."
Mabel superintended their transfer, and then addressed the others generally.
"I think we ought to go up the Pike now, when we have the chance. It isn't much of a climb from here: and we'll have rain before to-morrow. Besides, the quickest way back to the road is across the top and down the other side."
Evelyn agreed, and they set out, following a sheep path which skirted the screes, until they left the bank of sharp stones behind and faced a steep ascent. Parts of it necessitated a breathless scramble, and the sunlight faded from the hills as they climbed, while thicker wisps of cloud drove across the ragged summit. They reached the top at length and stopped, bracing themselves against a rush of chilly breeze, while they looked down upon a wilderness of leaden-colored rock. Long trails of mist were creeping in and out among the crags, and here and there masses of it gathered round the higher slopes.
"I think the Pike's grandest in this weather," Mabel declared. "Look below, Mr. Carroll, and you'll see the mountain's like a starfish. It has prongs running out from it."
Carroll did as she directed him, and noticed three diverging ridges springing off from the shoulders of the peak. Their crests, which were narrow, led down toward the valley, but their sides fell in rent and fissured crags to great black hollows.
"You can get down two of them," Mabel went on. "The first is the nearest to the road, but the third's the easiest. It takes you to the Hause—that's the gap between it and the next big hill. You must be a climber to try the middle one."
A few big drops began to fall, and Evelyn cut her sister's explanations short.
"It strikes me that we'd better make a start at once," she said.
They set out, Mabel and Carroll leading, and drawing farther away from the two behind. The rain began in earnest as they descended. Rock slope and scattered stones were slippery, and Vane found it difficult to keep his footing on some of their lichened surfaces. He was relieved, however, to see that his companion seldom hesitated, and they made their way downward cautiously, until near the spot where the three ridges diverged they walked into a belt of drifting mist. The peak above them was suddenly blotted out, and Evelyn bade Vane hail Carroll and Mabel, who had disappeared. He sent a shout ringing through the vapor, and caught a faint and unintelligible answer. A flock of sheep fled past and dislodged a rush of sliding stones. Vane heard the stones rattle far down the hillside, and when he called again a blast of chilly wind whirled his voice away. There was a faint echo above him and then silence.
"It looks as if they were out of hearing; and the slope ahead of us seems uncommonly steep by the way those stones went down. Do you think Mabel has taken Carroll down the Stanghyll ridge?"
"I can't tell," answered Evelyn. "It's comforting to remember that she knows it better than I do. I think we ought to make for the Hause; there's only one place that's really steep. Keep up to the left a little; the Scale Crags must be close beneath us."
They moved on circumspectly, skirting what seemed to be a pit of profound depth in which dim vapors whirled, while the rain, growing thicker, beat into their faces.