Masters of the Wheat-Lands Part 38

"Then," Sally responded, "it is way better that you didn't marry him."

She paused, and seemed to search for words with which to express herself. "I knew all along all there was to know about Gregory--except that he was going to marry you, and it was some time before I heard that--and I was ready to take him. I was fond of him."

Agatha's heart went out to her. "Yes," she said simply, "it is a very good thing that I let him go." She smiled. "That, however, doesn't quite describe it, Sally."

Gregory's fiancee flushed. "I couldn't have said that, but you don't quite understand yet. I said I knew all there was to know about him--and you never did. You made too much of him in England, and when you came out here you only saw the things you didn't like in him. Still, they weren't the only ones."

Agatha started at this statement, for she realized that part of it was certainly true, and she could admit the possibility of all of it being a fact. Gregory might possess a few good qualities that she had never discovered!

"Perhaps I did," she admitted. "I don't think it matters now."

"They're all of them mixed," persisted Sally. "One can't expect too much, but you can bear with a great deal when you're fond of any one."

Agatha sat silent a while, for she was troubled by a certain sense of wholesome confusion. It seemed to her that Sally had the clearer vision.

Love had given her discernment as well as charity, and, not expecting perfection, it was the man's strong points upon which she fixed her eyes.

"Yes," she replied presently. "I am glad you look at it that way, Sally."

The girl laughed. "Oh!" she said, "I've only seen one man on the prairie who was quite white all through, and I had a kind of notion that he was fond of you."

Agatha sat very still, but it cost her an effort.

Her face asked the question that was in her heart.

"Harry Wyllard," announced Sally.

Agatha made no answer, and Sally changed the subject. "Well," said Sally, "after all, I want you to be friends with me."

"I think you can count on that," replied Agatha with a smile, as she rose to rejoin Mrs. Hastings.

CHAPTER XXIV

THE LANDING

The ice among the inlets on the American side of the North Pacific broke up unusually early when spring came round again, and several weeks before Wyllard had expected it the _Selache_ floated clear. The crew had suffered little during the bitter winter, for Dampier had kept the men busy splicing gear and patching sails, and they had fitted the schooner with a new mainmast hewn out of a small cedar. None of the sailors had been trained as carpenters, but men who keep the sea for months in small vessels are necessarily handy at repairs, and they had all used ax and saw to some purpose in their time.

Wyllard was satisfied when they thrashed the _Selache_ out of the inlet under whole mainsail in a fresh breeze, and when evening came he sat smoking near the wheel. He was in a contemplative mood as the climbing forests and snow-clad heights dropped back astern. He wondered what his friends were doing upon the prairie, and whether Agatha had married Gregory yet. It seemed to him that it was, at least, possible that Agatha was married, for she was one to keep a promise, and it was difficult to believe that Gregory would fail to press his claim.

Wyllard's face grew grim as he thought of it, though this was a thing he had done more or less constantly during the winter. He fancied that he might have ousted Gregory if he had remained at the Range, for perhaps unconsciously Agatha had shown him that she was not quite indifferent to him; but that would have been to involve her in a breach of faith which she would probably always have looked back on with regret. In any case he could not have stayed to press his suit. He knew that he would never forget her, but it was not impossible that she might forget him. He realized also, though this was not by comparison a matter of great consequence, that the Range was scarcely likely to prosper under Gregory's management, but that could not be helped, and after all he owed Gregory something. It never occurred to him that he was doing an extravagant thing in setting out upon the search that he had undertaken.

He felt that the obligation was laid upon him, and, being what he was, he could not shrink from it.

A puff of spray that blew into his face disturbed his meditations, and when a little tumbling sea splashed in over the weather bow, he helped the others to haul down a reef in the mainsail. That accomplished, he went below and brought out a well-worn chart. The _Selache_ drove away to the westwards over a white-flecked sea. This time she carried fresh southerly breezes with her most of the way across the Pacific, and plunged along hove down under the last piece of canvas they dared to set upon her until at last they ran into the fog close in to the Kamtchatkan beaches. Then the wind dropped, and they were baffled by light and fitful breezes, while it became evident that there was ice about.

The day they saw the first big ma.s.s of ice gleaming broad across their course on a raw green sea, Dampier got an observation, and they held a brief council in the little cabin that evening. The schooner was hove to then, and lay rolling with banging blocks and thrashing canvas on a sluggish heave of sea.

"Thirty miles off sh.o.r.e," announced Dampier. "If it had been clear enough we'd have seen the top of the big range quite a way further out to sea. Now, it's drift ice ahead of us, but it's quite likely there's a solid block along the beach. Winter holds on a long while in this country. I guess you're for pushing on as fast as you can?"

Wyllard nodded. "Of course," he said, "you'll look for an opening, and work her in as far as possible. Then, if it's necessary, Charly and I and another man will take the sled and head for the beach across the ice. If there's a lane anywhere I would, however, probably take the smallest boat. We might haul her a league or two, anyway, on the sled if the ice wasn't very rough."

He looked at Charly, who acquiesced.

"Well," Charly observed simply, "I guess I'll have to see you through.

Now we've made a sled for her I'd take the boat, anyway. We're quite likely to strike a big streak of water when the ice is breaking up."

"There's one other course," declared Dampier; "the sensible one, and that's to wait until it has gone altogether. Seems to me I ought to mention it, though it's not likely to appeal to you."

Wyllard laughed. "From all appearances we might wait a month. I don't want to stay up here any longer than is strictly necessary."

"You'll head north?"

"That's my intention."

"Then," said Dampier, pointing to the chart before them, "as you should make the beach in the next day or two I'll head for the inlet here. As it's not very far you won't have to pack so many provisions along, and I'll give you, say, three weeks to turn up in. If you don't, I'll figure that there's something wrong, and do what seems advisable."

They agreed to that, and when next morning a little breeze came out of the creeping haze, they sailed the _Selache_ slowly sh.o.r.ewards among the drifting ice until, at nightfall, an apparently impenetrable barrier stretched gleaming faintly ahead of them. Wyllard turned in soon afterwards and slept soundly. All his preparations had been made during the winter and there was no occasion for new plans. When morning broke he breakfasted before he went out on deck. The boat was already packed with provisions, sleeping-bags, a tent, and two light sled frames, on one of which it seemed possible that they might haul her a few miles.

She was very light and small, and had been built for such a purpose as they had in view.

The schooner lay to with backed fore-staysail tumbling wildly on a dim, gray sea. Half a mile away the ice ran back into a dingy haze, and there was a low, gray sky to weather. Now and then a fine sprinkle of snow slid across the water before a nipping breeze. As Wyllard glanced to windward Dampier strode up to him.

"I guess you'd better put it off," he said. "I don't like the weather; we'll have wind before long."

Wyllard smiled, and Dampier made a forceful gesture.

"Then," he advised, "I'd get on to the ice just as soon as possible.

You're still quite a way off the beach."

Wyllard shook hands with him. "We should make the inlet in about nine days, and if I don't turn up in three weeks you'll know there's something wrong," he said. "If there's no sign of me in another week you can take her home again."

Dampier, who made no further comment, bade them swing the boat over, and when she lay heaving beneath the rail Wyllard and Charly and one Indian dropped into her. It was only a preliminary search they were about to engage in, for they had decided that if they found nothing they would afterwards push further north or inland when they had supplied themselves with fresh stores from the schooner.

They gazed at the _Selache_ with grim faces as they pulled away, and Wyllard, who loosed his oar a moment to wave his fur cap when Dampier stood upon her rail, was glad when a fresher rush of the bitter breeze forced him to fix his attention on his task. The boat was heavily loaded, and the tops of the gray seas splashed unpleasantly close about her gunwale. She was running before them, rising sharply, and dropping down into the hollows, out of sight of all but the schooner's canvas, and though this made rowing easier, Wyllard was apprehensive of difficulties when he reached the ice.

His misgivings proved warranted, for the ice presented an almost unbroken wall against the face of which the sea spouted. There was no doubt as to what would happen if the frail craft was hurled upon that frozen ma.s.s, and Wyllard, who was sculling, fancied that before the boat could even reach it, there was a probability of her being swamped in the upheaval where the backwash met the oncoming sea. Charly looked at him dubiously.

"It's a sure thing we can't get out there," Charly observed.

Wyllard nodded. "Then," he said, "we'll pull along the edge of it until we find an opening or something to make a lee. The sea's higher than it seemed to be from the schooner."

"We've got to do it soon," Charly declared. "There's more wind not far away."

Wyllard dipped his oar again, and for an hour they pulled along the edge of the ice, for there were now little frothing white tops on the seas.

It was evident that the wind was freshening, and at times a deluge of icy water slopped in over the gunwale. The men were hampered by their furs, and the stores lying about their feet.

The perspiration dripped from Wyllard when they approached a ragged, jutting point. It did not seem advisable to attempt a landing on that side of it, and when a little snow began to fall he looked at his companions.

"I guess we've got to pull her out," said Charly. "Dampier's heaving a reef down; he sees what's working up to windward."