Lady Merton, Colonist Part 23

So also, as they left the Rockies behind; as they sped along the Columbia between the Rockies to their right and the Selkirks to their left; or as they turned away from the Columbia, and, on the flanks of the Selkirks, began to mount that forest valley which leads to Roger's Pa.s.s, he talked freely and well, exerting himself to the utmost. The hopes and despairs, the endurances and ambitions of the first explorers who ever broke into that fierce solitude, he could reproduce them; for, though himself of a younger generation, yet by sympathy he had lived them. And if he had not been one of the builders of the line, in the incessant guardianship which preserves it from day to day, he had at one time played a prominent part, battling with Nature for it, summer and winter.

Delaine, at last, came out to listen. Philip in the grip of his first hero-worship, lay silent and absorbed, watching the face and gestures of the speaker. Elizabeth sat with her eyes turned away from Anderson towards the wild valley, as they rose and rose above it. She listened; but her heart was full of new anxieties. What had happened to him? She felt him changed. He was talking for their pleasure, by a strong effort of will; that she realised. When could she get him alone?--her friend!--who was clearly in distress.

They approached the famous bridges on the long ascent. Yerkes came running through the car to point out with pride the place where the Grand d.u.c.h.ess had fainted beneath the terrors of the line. With only the railing of their little platform between them and the abyss, they ran over ravines hundreds of feet deep--the valley, a thousand feet sheer, below. And in that valley, not a sign of house, of path; only black impenetrable forest--huge cedars and Douglas pines, filling up the bottoms, choking the river with their debris, climbing up the further sides, towards the gleaming line of peaks.

"It is a nightmare!" said Delaine involuntarily, looking round him.

Elizabeth laughed, a bright colour in her cheeks. Again the wilderness ran through her blood, answering the challenge of Nature. Faint!--she was more inclined to sing or shout. And with the exhilaration, physical and mental, that stole upon her, there mingled secretly, the first thrill of pa.s.sion she had ever known. Anderson sat beside her, once more silent after his burst of talk. She was vividly conscious of him--of his bare curly head--of certain lines of fatigue and suffering in the bronzed face. And it was conveyed to her that, although he was clearly preoccupied and sad, he was yet conscious of her in the same way. Once, as they were pa.s.sing the highest bridge of all, where, carried on a great steel arch, that has replaced the older trestles, the rails run naked and gleaming, without the smallest shred of wall or parapet, across a gash in the mountain up which they were creeping, and at a terrific height above the valley, Elizabeth, who was sitting with her back to the engine, bent suddenly to one side, leaning over the little railing and looking ahead--that she might if possible get a clearer sight of Mount Macdonald, the giant at whose feet lies Roger's Pa.s.s.

Suddenly, as her weight pressed against the ironwork where only that morning a fastening had been mended, she felt a grip on her arm. She drew back, startled.

"I beg your pardon!" said Anderson, smiling, but a trifle paler than before. "I'm not troubled with nerves for myself, but--"

He did not complete the sentence, and Elizabeth, could find nothing to say.

"Why, Elizabeth's not afraid!" cried Philip, scornfully.

"This is Roger's Pa.s.s, and here we are at the top of the Selkirks," said Anderson, rising. "The train will wait here some twenty minutes. Perhaps you would like to walk about."

They descended, all but Philip, who grumbled at the cold, wrapped himself in a rug inside the car, and summoned Yerkes to bring him a cup of coffee.

On this height indeed, and beneath the precipices of Mount Macdonald, which rise some five thousand feet perpendicularly above the railway, the air was chill and the clouds had gathered. On the right, ran a line of glacier-laden peaks, calling to their fellows across the pa.s.s. The ravine itself, darkly magnificent, made a gulf of shadow out of which rose glacier and snow slope, now veiled and now revealed by scudding cloud. Heavy rain had not long since fallen on the pa.s.s; the small stream, winding and looping through the narrow strip of desolate ground which marks the summit, roared in flood through marshy growths of dank weed and stunted shrub; and the noise reverberated from the mountain walls, pressing straight and close on either hand.

"Hark!" cried Elizabeth, standing still, her face and her light dress beaten by the wind.

A sound which was neither thunder nor the voice of the stream rose and swelled and filled the pa.s.s. Another followed it. Anderson pointed to the snowy crags of Mount Macdonald, and there, leaping from ledge to ledge, they saw the summer avalanches descend, roaring as they came, till they sank engulfed in a vaporous whirl of snow.

Delaine tried to persuade Elizabeth to return to the car--in vain. He himself returned thither for a warmer coat, and she and Anderson walked on alone.

"The Rockies were fine!--but the Selkirks are superb!"

She smiled at him as she spoke, as though she thanked him personally for the grandeur round them. Her slender form seemed to have grown in stature and in energy. The mountain rain was on her fresh cheek and her hair; a blue veil eddying round her head and face framed the brilliance of her eyes. Those who had known Elizabeth in Europe would hardly have recognised her here. The spirit of earth's wild and virgin places had mingled with her spirit, and as she had grown in sympathy, so also she had grown in beauty. Anderson looked at her from time to time in enchantment, grudging every minute that pa.s.sed. The temptation strengthened to tell her his trouble. But how, or when?

As he turned to her he saw that she, too, was gazing at him with an anxious, wistful expression, her lips parted as though to speak.

He bent over her.

"What was that?" exclaimed Elizabeth, looking round her.

They had pa.s.sed beyond the station where the train was at rest. But the sound of shouts pursued them. Anderson distinguished his own name. A couple of railway officials had left the station and were hurrying towards them.

A sudden thought struck Anderson. He held up his hand with a gesture as though to ask Lady Merton not to follow, and himself ran back to the station.

Elizabeth, from where she stood, saw the pa.s.sengers all pouring out of the train on to the platform. Even Philip emerged and waved to her. She slowly returned, and meanwhile Anderson had disappeared.

She found an excited crowd of travellers and a babel of noise. Delaine hurried to her.

It appeared that an extraordinary thing had happened. The train immediately in front of them, carrying mail and express cars but no pa.s.sengers, had been "held up" by a gang of train-robbers, at a spot between Sicamous junction and Kamloops. In order to break open the mail van the robbers had employed a charge of dynamite, which had wrecked the car and caused some damage to the line; enough to block the permanent way for some hours.

"And Philip has just opened this telegram for you."

Delaine handed it to her. It was from the District Superintendent, expressing great regret for the interruption to their journey, and suggesting that they should spend the night at the hotel at Glacier.

"Which I understand is only four miles off, the other side of the pa.s.s,"

said Delaine. "Was there ever anything more annoying!"

Elizabeth's face expressed an utter bewilderment.

"A train held up in Canada--and on the C.P.R.--impossible!"

An elderly man in front of her heard what she said, and turned upon her a face purple with wrath.

"You may well say that, madam! We are a law-abiding nation. We don't put up with the pranks they play in Montana. They say the scoundrels have got off. If we don't catch them, Canada's disgraced."

"I say, Elizabeth," cried Philip, pushing his way to her through the crowd, "there's been a lot of shooting. There's some Mounted Police here, we picked up at Revelstoke, on their way to help catch these fellows. I've been talking to them. The police from Kamloops came upon them just as they were making off with a pretty pile--boxes full of money for some of the banks in Vancouver. The police fired, so did the robbers. One of the police was killed, and one of the thieves. Then the rest got off. I say, let's go and help hunt them!"

The boy's eyes danced with the joy of adventure.

"If they've any sense they'll send bloodhounds after them," said the elderly man, fiercely. "I helped catch a murderer with my own hands that way, last summer, near the Arrow Lakes."

"Where is Mr. Anderson?"

The question escaped Elizabeth involuntarily. She had not meant to put it. But it was curious that he should have left them in the lurch at this particular moment.

"Take your seats!" cried the station-master, making his way through the crowded platform. "This train goes as far as Sicamous Junction only. Any pa.s.senger who wishes to break his journey will find accommodation at Glacier--next station."

The English travellers were hurried back into their car. Still no sign of Anderson. Yerkes was only able to tell them that he had seen Anderson go into the station-master's private room with a couple of the Mounted Police. He might have come out again, or he might not. Yerkes had been too well occupied in exciting gossip with all his many acquaintances in the train and the station to notice.

The conductor went along through the train. Yerkes, standing on the inside platform, called to him:

"Have you seen Mr. Anderson?"

The man shook his head, but another standing by, evidently an official of some kind, looked round and ran up to the car.

"I'm sorry, madam," he said, addressing Elizabeth, who was standing in the doorway, "but Mr. Anderson isn't at liberty just now. He'll be travelling with the police."

And as he spoke a door in the station building opened, and Anderson came out, accompanied by two constables of the Mounted Police and two or three officials. They walked hurriedly along the train and got into an empty compartment together. Immediately afterwards the train moved off.

"Well, I wonder what's up now!" said Philip in astonishment. "Do you suppose Anderson's got some clue to the men?"

Delaine looked uncomfortably at Elizabeth. As an old adviser and servant of the railway, extensively acquainted moreover with the population--settled or occasional--of the district it was very natural that Anderson should be consulted on such an event. And yet--Delaine had caught a glimpse of his aspect on his way along the platform, and had noticed that he never looked towards the car. Some odd conjectures ran through his mind.

Elizabeth sat silent, looking back on the grim defile the train was just leaving. It was evident that they had pa.s.sed the water-shed, and the train was descending. In a few minutes they would be at Glacier.

She roused herself to hold a rapid consultation over plans.

They must of course do as they were advised, and spend the night at Glacier.