A Countess from Canada Part 12

"Would you like to have one of our boats? Miles will help you to run it down," Katherine said. It was such a usual thing to lend a customer a boat that one or two were always handy, and the customer always understood that the loan was to be returned at his earliest convenience.

"Thank you, I should be glad! The current will carry me down while I smoke my pipe. Then I shall be rested enough to cook supper when I get there," he answered. Then, bidding her good night, he went out of the store, meeting Miles in the doorway, who went back to help him to run the boat down into the water.

"Miles, I hope you didn't tell that old fraud that Mr. Ferrars was staying here?" said Katherine, when the boy came in and locked the door for the night.

"Of course I didn't. I never said a word good, bad, nor indifferent to the old fellow. I haven't got over this morning," Miles said, in a tone which sounded sullen, but which was only a cloak for feelings deeply stirred.

"Very well then, for this one night at least he will have the satisfaction of believing that he was successful in drowning Mr. Ferrars," Katherine replied.

"Don't worry yourself, Mrs. Jenkin will tell him," said Miles. "Or some of the men will chaff him, because he has been outwitted by a girl."

"It wasn't a girl this time; it was Mrs. Jenkin," objected Katherine, letting a box go down with a bang, for she did not want the listener in the other room to hear what Miles was saying.

"Mrs. Jenkin might have called out that there was someone in Oily Dave's house that wanted saving, but I guess the poor man would have had time to drown twice over if it hadn't been for you getting on the ice and going to fetch him out," Miles said, sticking to his own opinion with the obstinacy he was rather fond of displaying.

Katherine took refuge in silence, going out of the store as soon as she could, and hurrying away to bed, because of the needs of the next day. Neither she nor Mrs. Burton slept very well, however. To both of them it was a grief beyond the power of words to describe to leave their father to the care of a stranger, and they were both thankful when morning came and the day's routine had to begin again.

There was no change in the stricken man's condition, but Katherine, who stayed with him while the others had breakfast, thought that he looked more comfortable than on the previous evening. When Miles came in to take her place, she went back to the kitchen, to hear Mrs. Burton and Jervis Ferrars talking of the Selincourts.

"I suppose Mr. Selincourt is very rich," said Mrs. Burton with a little wistful sigh, as if she thought that riches might detract from his niceness.

"Yes, I expect he is very rich, but he is so thoroughly pleasant, and so free from side, that one is apt to forget all about his riches," Jervis said, then rose to set a chair for Katherine, and bring her bowl of porridge from the stove, where it was keeping warm for her.

"Is Miss Selincourt nice too, and is she pretty?" asked Mrs. Burton, who to Katherine's secret disquiet was always asking questions concerning the expected arrivals.

Jervis laughed. "I have never stopped to consider whether she is pretty, but she is certainly very charming in her manners," he said, with so much earnestness that Katherine instantly made up her mind that Miss Selincourt was the kind of person she did not care for and did not want to know.

Phil came in from the store at this moment, with a pucker of amus.e.m.e.nt on his face.

"Stee Jenkin has brought our boat back," he said. "Oily Dave paid him half a dollar to come, because he didn't feel like showing his face up here just yet."

"Why not?" demanded Jervis Ferrars.

"Stee said the ice at the river mouth didn't give way until after midnight, when it burst with a roar like cannon. When Oily Dave got to Seal Cove last night, the water reached to the shingles of his house; so the old fellow rowed across to Stee's hut and asked to be taken in for the night, because he was flooded out and the Englishman was drowned."

"But didn't Stee tell him that Mr. Ferrars was safe here with us?" asked Mrs. Burton.

"Not a bit of it," replied Phil. "That would have spoiled sport, don't you see? because Oily Dave was what Stee called most uncommon resigned, and talked such a lot about going to find the body in the morning, that they just made up their minds to let him go. He was up by daybreak and went over to look; but when he saw the door broken down he guessed there had been a rescue, and he was just mad because no one had told him anything about it."

"It was rather too bad to leave him in suspense all night, poor man," said Mrs. Burton gently.

CHAPTER XII

The First of the Fishing

For a whole week the thaw went merrily on. One by one the fishing boats left their winter anchorage in the river, and sailed out into the stormy waters of the bay. By the end of the week Jervis Ferrars had so far recovered the comfortable use of his feet that he could wear boots again and go about like other men. Directly he was able to do this he went down to Seal Cove every day, where he inspected every boat that was ready to put to sea, overhauled the store shed, and quietly took command, setting Oily Dave on one side with as little ceremony as if that worthy had never been master of the fleet.

Oily Dave took the change in government with very bad grace indeed, and it is probable that the life of Jervis Ferrars would have been in very grave danger many times during the next few weeks if it had not been for the fact that the Englishman had made a host of friends among the fishers, who would protect him at all risks in an open attack, while Jervis wisely so far avoided Oily Dave as to give no chance for the secret, cowardly thrusts in which the deposed man delighted.

Astor M'Kree personally conducted the new boats, one by one, over the rapids, bringing them down when the river was in flood and anchoring them in front of the store until their crews were ready; and when they had cleared for the bay the fishing was in full swing.

Eight hundred miles away, in the north of the great inland sea, the whalers and sealers were still fast bound in ice and snow, longing for freedom, yet forced to wait while the tardy spring crept northward. But down in the more sheltered waters of James Bay there was abundance of work for everyone. Hundreds of seals gambolled on the ice floes and on the sh.o.r.es of the little uncharted islands which make those waters such a serious menace to the mariner. Sometimes the boats were away for a week. Sometimes two days found them headed back for Seal Cove, laden with seals, walrus, and narwhal. Many of them succeeded in getting a good catch of white whales, for which those waters are so noted; but these were caught at the mouths of the tidal rivers, for the whales go up the rivers every day with the tide, and it was when the tide was ebbing that the whales were most easily caught. It was only the biggest and strongest boats that ventured so far as the tidal rivers, however, and with these Jervis Ferrars never went. Indeed, but from choice he need never have gone to sea at all, for his work lay more particularly on land, where he had to keep toll of the catch and take care that the various products of the sea harvest were properly secured and stored, until the opening of Hudson Strait enabled vessels to get through.

Astor M'Kree had made a queer addition to the side of Stee Jenkin's house by building against one end of it part of an old fishing boat which had been wrecked in the floodtime, and stranded on the bluff upon which the little house was perched. In this peculiar abode Jervis took his residence, while Mrs. Jenkin looked after his comfort and kept his room clean with a slavish industry which she had certainly never bestowed on her own house.

On most days when he was ash.o.r.e Jervis contrived to get up to Roaring Water Portage, his ostensible errand being to see 'Duke Radford, who was slowly creeping back to physical convalescence. That is, the bodily part of him was resuming its functions, only the mental part was at a standstill; and although the sick man seemed to know and love them all, he had no more understanding for the serious things of life than an average child of six or seven might have possessed. It was well for the family that their father's illness in the previous winter had in a measure prepared them for doing without him, or they must have felt even more keenly the heavy work and heavier responsibilities which had fallen upon them. As it was, they faced their difficulties with a quiet courage which left no one with a chance to pity them, although there were plenty to admire "the pluck of 'Duke Radford's young 'uns".

It was Katherine who took the lead, the boy Miles being a good second, and proving the more valuable aid because of his habit of unquestioning obedience. Mrs. Burton was willing for any drudgery, and toiled at housework and nursing with a devotion as beautiful as it was uncomplaining. But she had no talent for leadership and no faculty for organization, and, what is more, she was perfectly aware of the lack.

Night school was of course at an end. Indeed, no one had any time for thinking about education or books. Katherine made valorous attempts to carry on the studies of Miles and Phil, but had to give them up as useless, lacking strength and opportunity for the endeavour. But the long winter would make up for the neglect of the short summer, and she left off worrying over their lapse into ignorance, contenting herself with reading to them on Sundays, and, what was more important still, making them read to her.

It was delightful to be abroad in those days of early spring, and Katherine especially enjoyed the journeys to Fort Garry, when she rowed across the corner of the bay and felt the sweep of the breeze coming in from the wider waters beyond. Phil was her companion always now, because when she was absent Miles must be at home to look after the store. There were other journeys to be taken also, which, but for the portages, might have been regarded as pleasure trips pure and simple. But the portage work was hard, and by the time Katherine and Phil had tramped three times over a mile and a half of portage, laden with sugar, bacon, and flour, returning the fourth time for the birchbark, they were mostly too tired to regard the journey as anything but very hard work indeed.

Yet in spite of this it was lovely to be out in the fresh air and the sunshine. When Katherine heard the long, laughing chuckle of the ptarmigan, or saw the trailing flights of geese headed northward, she could have shouted and sung from sheer lighthearted joy at the coming of spring. But, however high her spirits rose as the weather grew better and finer, there was always the cold dread in her heart because of what the summer must bring. Of course, if her father remained in his present condition he would feel and understand nothing of the embarra.s.sment which must fall alone upon her in meeting Mr. Selincourt. It was the dread and shrinking at the thought of this meeting which robbed the spring days of their keenest joy, and although she would be happy sometimes, the happiness was certain to be followed by fits of black depression, especially after the doing of a long portage.

There was a long, low shed at Seal Cove, where all the fish oil, whalebone, blubber, ivory, skins, and other produce of the sea harvest were stored pending ocean shipment. Jervis Ferrars had a small office railed off from one end of this unsavoury shed, and he was sitting in it writing, one afternoon in early May, when he saw Katherine's boat coming across from Fort Garry. He had been looking for it any time within the last hour, and had begun to wonder that it was so long delayed. But it was coming at last, and putting on his cap he locked his office and went out to hail the boat. This was no birchbark journey broken by weary toiling to and fro on a portage trail, but Katherine and Phil were seated in one of the good, solid boats turned out by Astor M'Kree, and both of them looked even brighter than usual.

"Are you coming home with us?" Katherine asked, as she came within speaking distance and saw that Jervis had his birchbark by a towrope.

"That is my desire, if you will have me," he said.

"With pleasure. You shall be company, and sit in the place of honour," Katherine said with a laugh, feeling that the occasion had somehow become festive, even though two miles of rowing against the current lay in front of her. "Phil, move that bundle from the seat and let Mr. Ferrars sit there; he will be more comfortable."

"Thank you, I don't want to sit there, and if I can't do as I like I shall get into the birchbark and paddle you up river on a towrope, which will jerk you horribly, and probably capsize me," said Jervis, with an obstinate air.

"What do you wish to do?" she asked demurely.

"I wish to sit where you are sitting now," he answered. "Then I will row you up river and give you a necessary lesson in steering; for don't you remember how nearly you upset us into the bank the last time but one that I rowed you up?"

Katherine flushed, but there was a laughing light in her eyes as she replied: "Oh yes! I remember perfectly well, but that was quite as much your fault as mine, for you were telling us of your experiences in that Nantucket whaler, and they were quite thrilling enough to make anyone forget to steer."

"There shall be no such temptation to forgetfulness to-day; that I can safely promise you," he answered, holding the boat steady while Katherine moved to the other seat. Then, tying his birchbark on behind, he stepped into the vacant place and commenced to pull up stream with long, steady strokes.

"You were a long time at the Fort to-day," he remarked presently.

"Yes, Mrs. M'Crawney is ill, and it was only common humanity to do what I could for her," Katherine answered gravely, for poor Mrs. M'Crawney had made her heart ache that day, because of the terrible discomfort in which the poor woman was lying, and the homesickness for old Ireland which seemed to oppress her.

"I thought she looked ill the other day when I was over there, but she would not admit it. I wanted to tell her that less hot pastry and more fresh air would work a cure perhaps; but it does not do to thrust one's opinion unasked upon people, especially when one is only a doctor in intention and not in reality," Jervis said, with a tug at the oars which expressed a good many things.

"It is a good thing for us that you are not really a doctor, or else you would not be looking after Mr. Selincourt's fishing interests, and then you would not have been here to take care of Father," Phil said.

Katherine laughed as she remarked: "For pure, unadulterated selfishness that would surely beat the record, Phil. I expect Mr. Ferrars hates Seal Cove nearly as much as he did the Nantucket whaler."

"No, he does not," Jervis broke in. "Sometimes of course Seal Cove smells rather strongly of fish oil, warm blubber, and putrid seal meat; but, taken as a whole, there are many worse places to live in. I found a bank gorgeous with anemones in blue and red yesterday, and that within ten minutes' walk of the fish shed."

"I know it," said Katherine. "That bank is always a beautiful sight; but wait until you have seen the rhododendrons on the long portage."

"Where is that-at Astor M'Kree's?" asked the young man, whose time was too much occupied to admit of much exploration of the neighbourhood.