Black Rock Part 25

'Mrs. Mavor is greatly touched by this mark of your love, and she will wear your ring always with pride.' And it ended with--

'She has one request to make, that you will be true to the League, and that you stand close about the man who did most to make it. She wishes me to say that however far away she may have to go, she is leaving her heart in Black Rock, and she can think of no greater joy than to come back to you again.'

Then they had 'The Sweet By and By,' but the men would not join in the refrain, unwilling to lose a note of the glorious voice they loved to hear. Before the last verse she beckoned to me. I went to her standing by Craig's side as he played for her. 'Ask them to sing,' she entreated; 'I cannot bear it.'

'Mrs. Mavor wishes you to sing in the refrain,' I said, and at once the men sat up and cleared their throats. The singing was not good, but at the first sound of the hoa.r.s.e notes of the men Craig's head went down over the organ, for he was thinking I suppose of the days before them when they would long in vain for that thrilling voice that soared high over their own hoa.r.s.e tones. And after the voices died away he kept on playing till, half turning toward him, she sang alone once more the refrain in a voice low and sweet and tender, as if for him alone. And so he took it, for he smiled up at her his old smile full of courage and full of love.

Then for one whole hour she stood saying good-bye to those rough, gentle-hearted men whose inspiration to goodness she had been for five years. It was very wonderful and very quiet. It was understood that there was to be no nonsense, and Abe had been heard to declare that he would 'throw out any cotton-backed fool who couldn't hold himself down,'

and further, he had enjoined them to remember that 'her arm wasn't a pump-handle.'

At last they were all gone, all but her guard of honour--Shaw, Vernon Winton, Geordie, Nixon, Abe, Nelson, Craig, and myself.

This was the real farewell; for, though in the early light of the next morning two hundred men stood silent about the stage, and then as it moved out waved their hats and yelled madly, this was the last touch they had of her hand. Her place was up on the driver's seat between Abe and Mr. Craig, who held little Marjorie on his knee. The rest of the guard of honour were to follow with Graeme's team. It was Winton's fine sense that kept Graeme from following them close. 'Let her go out alone,' he said, and so we held back and watched her go.

She stood with her back towards Abe's plunging four-horse team, and steadying herself with one hand on Abe's shoulder, gazed down upon us.

Her head was bare, her lips parted in a smile, her eyes glowing with their own deep light; and so, facing us, erect and smiling, she drove away, waving us farewell till Abe swung his team into the canyon road and we saw her no more. A sigh shuddered through the crowd, and, with a sob in his voice, Winton said: 'G.o.d help us all.'

I close my eyes and see it all again. The waving crowd of dark-faced men, the plunging horses, and, high up beside the driver, the swaying, smiling, waving figure, and about all the mountains, framing the picture with their dark sides and white peaks tipped with the gold of the rising sun. It is a picture I love to look upon, albeit it calls up another that I can never see but through tears.

I look across a strip of ever-widening water, at a group of men upon the wharf, standing with heads uncovered, every man a hero, though not a man of them suspects it, least of all the man who stands in front, strong, resolute, self-conquered. And, gazing long, I think I see him turn again to his place among the men of the mountains, not forgetting, but every day remembering the great love that came to him, and remembering, too, that love is not all. It is then the tears come.

But for that picture two of us at least are better men to-day.

CHAPTER XIII

HOW NELSON CAME HOME

Through the long summer the mountains and the pines were with me. And through the winter, too, busy as I was filling in my Black Rock sketches for the railway people who would still persist in ordering them by the dozen, the memory of that stirring life would come over me, and once more I would be among the silent pines and the mighty snow-peaked mountains. And before me would appear the red-shirted shantymen or dark-faced miners, great, free, bold fellows, driving me almost mad with the desire to seize and fix those swiftly changing groups of picturesque figures. At such times I would drop my sketch, and with eager brush seize a group, a face, a figure, and that is how my studio comes to be filled with the men of Black Rock. There they are all about me. Graeme and the men from the woods, Sandy, Baptiste, the Campbells, and in many att.i.tudes and groups old man Nelson; Craig, too, and his miners, Shaw, Geordie, Nixon, and poor old Billy and the keeper of the League saloon.

It seemed as if I lived among them, and the illusion was greatly helped by the vivid letters Graeme sent me from time to time. Brief notes came now and then from Craig too, to whom I had sent a faithful account of how I had brought Mrs. Mavor to her ship, and of how I had watched her sail away with none too brave a face, as she held up her hand that bore the miners' ring, and smiled with that deep light in her eyes. Ah!

those eyes have driven me to despair and made me fear that I am no great painter after all, in spite of what my friends tell me who come in to smoke my good cigars and praise my brush. I can get the brow and hair, and mouth and pose, but the eyes! the eyes elude me--and the faces of Mrs. Mavor on my wall, that the men praise and rave over, are not such as I could show to any of the men from the mountains.

Graeme's letters tell me chiefly about Craig and his doings, and about old man Nelson; while from Craig I hear about Graeme, and how he and Nelson are standing at his back, and doing what they can to fill the gap that never can be filled. The three are much together, I can see, and I am glad for them all, but chiefly for Craig, whose face, grief-stricken but resolute, and often gentle as a woman's, will not leave me nor let me rest in peace.

The note of thanks he sent me was entirely characteristic. There were no heroics, much less pining or self-pity. It was simple and manly, not ignoring the pain but making much of the joy. And then they had their work to do. That note, so clear, so manly, so n.o.bly sensible, stiffens my back yet at times.

In the spring came the startling news that Black Rock would soon be no more. The mines were to close down on April 1. The company, having allured the confiding public with enticing descriptions of marvellous drifts, veins, a.s.says, and prospects, and having expended vast sums of the public's money in developing the mines till the a.s.surance of their reliability was absolutely final, calmly shut down and vanished. With their vanishing vanishes Black Rock, not without loss and much deep cursing on the part of the men brought some hundreds of miles to aid the company in its extraordinary and wholly inexplicable game.

Personally it grieved me to think that my plan of returning to Black Rock could never be carried out. It was a great compensation, however, that the three men most representative to me of that life were soon to visit me actually in my own home and den. Graeme's letter said that in one month they might be expected to appear. At least he and Nelson were soon to come, and Craig would soon follow.

On receiving the great news, I at once looked up young Nelson and his sister, and we proceeded to celebrate the joyful prospect with a specially good dinner. I found the greatest delight in picturing the joy and pride of the old man in his children, whom he had not seen for fifteen or sixteen years. The mother had died some five years before, then the farm was sold, and the brother and sister came into the city; and any father might be proud of them. The son was a well-made young fellow, handsome enough, thoughtful, and solid-looking. The girl reminded me of her father. The same resolution was seen in mouth and jaw, and the same pa.s.sion slumbered in the dark grey eyes. She was not beautiful, but she carried herself well, and one would always look at her twice. It would be worth something to see the meeting between father and daughter.

But fate, the greatest artist of us all, takes little count of the careful drawing and the bright colouring of our fancy's pictures, but with rude hand deranges all, and with one swift sweep paints out the bright and paints in the dark. And this trick he served me when, one June night, after long and anxious waiting for some word from the west, my door suddenly opened and Graeme walked in upon me like a spectre, grey and voiceless. My shout of welcome was choked back by the look in his face, and I could only gaze at him and wait for his word. He gripped my hand, tried to speak, but failed to make words come.

'Sit down, old man,' I said, pushing, him into my chair, 'and take your time.'

He obeyed, looking up at me with burning, sleepless eyes. My heart was sore for his misery, and I said: 'Don't mind, old chap; it can't be so awfully bad. You're here safe and sound at any rate,' and so I went on to give him time. But he shuddered and looked round and groaned.

'Now look here, Graeme, let's have it. When did you land here? Where is Nelson? Why didn't you bring him up?'

'He is at the station in his coffin,' he answered slowly.

'In his coffin?' I echoed, my beautiful pictures all vanishing. 'How was it?'

'Through my cursed folly,' he groaned bitterly.

'What happened?' I asked. But ignoring my question, he said: 'I must see his children. I have not slept for four nights. I hardly know what I am doing; but I can't rest till I see his children. I promised him. Get them for me.'

'To-morrow will do. Go to sleep now, and we shall arrange everything to-morrow,' I urged.

'No!' he said fiercely; 'to-night--now!'

In half an hour they were listening, pale and grief-stricken, to the story of their father's death.

Poor Graeme was relentless in his self-condemnation as he told how, through his 'cursed folly,' old Nelson was killed. The three, Craig, Graeme, and Nelson, had come as far as Victoria together. There they left Craig, and came on to San Francisco. In an evil hour Graeme met a companion of other and evil days, and it was not long till the old fever came upon him.

In vain Nelson warned and pleaded. The reaction from the monotony and poverty of camp life to the excitement and luxury of the San Francisco gaming palaces swung Graeme quite off his feet, and all that Nelson could do was to follow from place to place and keep watch.

'And there he would sit,' said Graeme in a hard, bitter voice, 'waiting and watching often till the grey morning light, while my madness held me fast to the table. One night,' here he paused a moment, put his face in his hands and shuddered; but quickly he was master of himself again, and went on in the same hard voice--'One night my partner and I were playing two men who had done us up before. I knew they were cheating, but could not detect them. Game after game they won, till I was furious at my stupidity in not being able to catch them. Happening to glance at Nelson in the corner, I caught a meaning look, and looking again, he threw me a signal. I knew at once what the fraud was, and next game charged the fellow with it. He gave me the lie; I struck his mouth, but before I could draw my gun, his partner had me by the arms. What followed I hardly know. While I was struggling to get free, I saw him reach for his weapon; but, as he drew it, Nelson sprang across the table, and bore him down. When the row was ever, three men lay on the floor. One was Nelson; he took the shot meant for me.'

Again the story paused.

'And the man that shot him?'

I started at the intense fierceness in the voice, and, looking upon the girl, saw her eyes blazing with a terrible light.

'He is dead,' answered Graeme indifferently.

'You killed him?' she asked eagerly.

Graeme looked at her curiously, and answered slowly--

'I did not mean to. He came at me. I struck him harder than I knew. He never moved.'

She drew a sigh of satisfaction, and waited.

'I got him to a private ward, had the best doctor in the city, and sent for Craig to Victoria. For three days we thought he would live--he was keen to get home; but by the time Craig came we had given up hope. Oh, but I was thankful to see Craig come in, and the joy in the old man's eyes was beautiful to see. There was no pain at last, and no fear. He would not allow me to reproach myself, saying over and over, "You would have done the same for me"--as I would, fast enough--"and it is better me than you. I am old and done; you will do much good yet for the boys."

And he kept looking at me till I could only promise to do my best.

'But I am glad I told him how much good he had done me during the last year, for he seemed to think that too good to be true. And when Craig told him how he had helped the boys in the camp, and how Sandy and Baptiste and the Campbells would always be better men for his life among them, the old man's face actually shone, as if light were coming through. And with surprise and joy he kept on saying, "Do you think so? Do you think so? Perhaps so, perhaps so." At the last he talked of Christmas night at the camp. You were there, you remember. Craig had been holding a service, and something happened, I don't know what, but they both knew.'

'I know,' I said, and I saw again the picture of the old man under the pine, upon his knees in the snow, with his face turned up to the stars.

'Whatever it was, it was in his mind at the very last, and I can never forget his face as he turned it to Craig. One hears of such things: I had often, but had never put much faith in them; but joy, rapture, triumph, these are what were in his face, as he said, his breath coming short, "You said--He wouldn't--fail me--you were right--not once--not once--He stuck to me--I'm glad he told me--thank G.o.d--for you--you showed--me--I'll see Him--and--tell Him--" And Craig, kneeling beside him so steady--I was behaving like a fool--smiled down through his streaming tears into the dim eyes so brightly, till they could see no more. Thank him for that! He helped the old man through, and he helped me too, that night, thank G.o.d!' And Graeme's voice, hard till now, broke in a sob.

He had forgotten us, and was back beside his pa.s.sing friend, and all his self-control could not keep back the flowing tears.