The Foreigner Part 47

And Jack, patting her cheek, said, "I know all about him."

"Do you, indeed?" she answered, with a knowing smile. "I doubt.

But oh! he has broken his foot or something. And oh, Jack, he has got a mine!"

And Jack, not knowing what she meant, looked curiously into her face and wondered, till Brown, examining Kalman's foot and finding a broken bone, exclaimed wrathfully, "Say, boy, you don't tell me you have been walking on this foot?"

But Kalman answered nothing.

"He came for me--for us, Mr. Brown, through that awful storm,"

cried Marjorie penitently; "and is it broken? Oh, Kalman, how could you?"

But Kalman still answered nothing. His dream was pa.s.sing from him.

She was restored to her world and was no longer in his care.

"And here's his mine," cried Marjorie, turning Jack toward the black seam.

"By Jove!" cried Mr. Penny, "and I never saw it. You never showed it to me."

But during those hours spent in the cave Kalman and Marjorie had something other to occupy their minds than mines. Jack French examined the seam closely and in growing excitement.

"By the Lord Harry! Kalman, did you find this?"

Kalman nodded indifferently. Mines were nothing to him now.

"How did you light upon it?"

And Kalman told him how.

"He's just half dead and starved," said Marjorie in a voice that broke with pity. "He watched all last night while we slept away like a pair o' stirks."

At the tone in her voice, Jack French turned and gave her a searching look. The quick, hot blood flamed into her cheeks, and in her eyes dawned a frank shyness as she gave him back his look.

"I don't care," she said at length; "he's fair dune oot."

But Jack only nodded his head sagely while he whispered to her, "Happy boy, happy boy! Two mines in one night!"

At which the red flamed up again and she fell to examining with greater diligence the seam of black running athwart the cave side.

In a few minutes they were mounted and away, Brown riding hard to bring the great news to the engineer's camp and recall the hunting parties; the rest to make the ranch, Marjorie in front in happy sparkling converse with Jack French, and Kalman, haggard and gloomy, bringing up the rear. A new man was being brought to birth within him, and sore were the parturition pangs. For one brief night she had been his; now back to her world, she was his no more.

It was quite two days before the shining sun and the eager air had licked up from earth the drifts of snow, and two days before Marjorie felt quite sure she was able to bear again the rigours of camp life, and two days before Aunt Janet woke up to the fact that that foreign young man was altogether too handsome to be riding from morning till night with her niece. For Jack, meanwhile, was attending with a.s.siduous courtesy the Aunt and receiving radiant looks of grat.i.tude from the niece. Two days of Heaven, when Kalman forgot all but that she was beside him; two days of h.e.l.l when he remembered that he was but a poor foreign boy and she a great English lady. Two days and they said farewell. Marjorie was the last, turning first to French, who kissed her, saying, "Come back again, little girl," and then to Kalman, sitting on his broncho, for he hated to go lame before them all.

"Good-by, Kalman," she said, smiling bravely, while her lips quivered. "I'll no forget yon awful and," leaning slightly toward him as he took her hand, "yon happy night. Good-by for now.

I'll no forget."

And Kalman, looking straight into her eyes, held her hand without a word till, withdrawing it from his hold, she turned away, leaving the smile with him and carrying with her the quivering lips.

"I shall ride a bit with you, little girl," said Jack French, who was ever quick with his eyes.

She tried to smile at him, but failed piteously. But Jack rode close to her, talking bright nothings till she could smile again.

"Oh, Jack, but you are the dear!" she said to him as they galloped together up the trail, Mr. Penny following behind. "I'll mind this to you."

But before they took the descent to the Night Hawk ravine, they heard a thunder of hoofs, and wheeling, found Kalman bearing down upon them.

"Mercy me!" cried Aunt Janet, "what's wrang wi' the lad?"

"I have come to say good-by," he shouted, his broncho tearing up the earth by Marjorie's side.

Reaching out his hands, he drew her toward him and kissed her before them all, once, again, and yet again, with Aunt Janet screaming, "Mercy sakes alive! The lad is daft! He'll do her a hurt!"

"Hoots! woman, let the bairns be," cried Marjorie's father.

"He saved her for us."

But having said his farewell, Kalman rode away, waving his hand and singing at the top of his voice his Hungarian love-song,

"While the flower blooms in the meadow, And fishes swim the sea, Heart of my heart, soul of my soul, I'll love and live for thee,"

which none but Marjorie could understand, but they all stood watching as he rode away, and listening,

"With my lances at my back, My good sword at my knee, Light of my life, joy of my soul, I'll fight, I'll die for thee!"

And as the song ceased she rode away, and as she rode she smiled.

CHAPTER XVII

THE FIGHT FOR THE MINE

The early approach of winter checked the railroad construction proper, but with the snow came good roads, and contractors were quick to take advantage of the easier methods of transportation furnished by winter roads to establish supply depots along the line, and to open tie camps up in the hills. And so the old Edmonton Trail was once more humming with life and activity far exceeding that of its palmiest days.

As for Kalman, however, it was the mine that absorbed his attention and his energies. By day and by night he planned and dreamed and toiled for the development of his mine. With equal enthusiasm Brown and French joined in this enterprise. It was French that undertook to deal with all matters pertaining to the organization of a company by which the mine should be operated. Registration of claim, the securing of capital, the obtaining of charter, all these matters were left in his hands. A few weeks' correspondence, however, revealed the fact that for Western enterprises money was exceedingly difficult to secure.

French was eager to raise money by mortgaging his ranch and all his possessions, but this proposal Kalman absolutely refused to consider.

Brown, too, was opposed to this scheme. Determined that something should be done, French then entered into contracts with the Railroad Company for the supply of ties. But though he and Mackenzie took a large force into the woods, and spent their three months in arduous toil, when the traders and the whiskey runners had taken their full toll little was left for the development of the mine.

The actual working of the mine fell to Kalman, aided by Brown.

There was an immediate market for coal among the Galicians of the colony, who much preferred it to wood as a fuel for the clay ovens with which they heated their houses. But they had little money to spare, and hence, at the beginning of the work, Kalman hit upon the device of bartering coal for labour, two days' work in the mine ent.i.tling a labourer to a load of coal. Brown, too, needed coal for his mill. At the Crossing there was large demand for coal, while correspondence with the Railroad Company discovered to Kalman a limitless market for the product of his mine. By outside sales Kalman came to have control of a little ready money, and with this he engaged a small force of Galicians, who, following lines suggested by Brown, pushed in the tunnel, ran cross drifts, laid down a small tramway, and accomplished exploration and development work that appeared to Kalman's uninstructed eyes wonderful indeed.

The interest of the whole colony centred in the mine and in its development, and the confidence of the people in Kalman's integrity and efficiency became more and more firmly established.

But Brown was too fully occupied with his own mission to give much of his time to the mine. The work along the line of construction and in the camps meant sickness and accident, and consequently his hospital accommodation had once more to be increased, and this entailed upon himself and his wife, who acted as matron, a heavy burden of responsibility and of toil.

It was a happy inspiration of Jack French's that led Brown to invoke the aid of Mrs. French in securing the services of a nurse, and Mrs. French's proposal that Irma, who for two years had been in regular training, should relieve Mrs. Brown of her duties as matron, was received by all concerned with enthusiastic approval. And so, to the great relief of Mrs. Brown and to the unspeakable joy of both Kalman and his sister, Irma and Paulina with her child were installed in the Wakota inst.i.tution, Irma taking charge of the hospital and Paulina of the kitchen.

It was not by Brown's request or even desire that Paulina decided to make her home in the Wakota colony. She was there because nothing could prevent her coming. Her life was bound up with the children of her lord, and for their sakes she toiled in the kitchen with a devotion that never flagged and never sought reward.