Thrice Armed Part 22

"It's Eleanor's, and that counts with me. Besides, I'm not fond of Merril either."

Jimmy was touched by the man's devotion, but once more he could find nothing apposite to say, and Jordan went on:

"Sometimes, as I told you, I'm a little afraid of Eleanor, and perhaps that's why I like her. It seems to me you never quite understood your sister. Your mother made the Wheelock fleet, and it's quite likely that Eleanor's going to make the _Shasta_ Shipping Company. I'm no slouch, but she has more brains than you and I and old Leeson rolled together.

Now, you want to rouse yourself, and she has Prescott with her. You'll walk down to the steamer with me."

CHAPTER XVI

UNDER RESTRAINT

Austerly, who was essentially English and a servant of the Crown, somewhat naturally lived outside the boundaries of Vancouver. He had the tastes and prejudices of his cla.s.s, and did not like the life most men lead in the Western cities, which is in some respects communistic and without privacy. Even those of some standing, with a house of their own, not infrequently use it only to sleep in, and take their meals at a hotel, while, should they retire to their own dwelling in the evening, they are scarcely likely to enjoy the quietness the insular Englishman as a rule delights in. People walk in and out casually until late at night, and a certain proportion of them are chronically thirsty. This, in case of a business man, has its advantages as well as its drawbacks, but Austerly only recognized the latter. He said it was like living in the street, and he did not appreciate being called on at eleven o'clock at night by men of doubtful character whom he had met for the first time a few days before.

He accordingly retired to a retreat that one of his predecessors had built outside the city, which shades off on that side from stone and steel through gradations of frame-houses and rickety shanties into a wilderness of blackened fir-stumps. The Western cities lie open, and though the life in them is more suggestive of that of Paris than the staidness of an English town, they have neither gate nor barrier, and are usually ready to welcome all who care to enter: strong-armed men who limp in, red with dust, in dilapidated shoes, as well as purchasers of land and commercial enterprise directors. They have, it frequently happens, need of the one, and a bonus instead of taxes to offer the other, who may purpose to set up mills and workshops within their borders.

Austerly, however, was not altogether a recluse, and it came about one evening that Jimmy, who had arrived there with a few other guests, sat beside Anthea Merril in the garden of his house. The sunlight still shone upon the struggling gra.s.s, to which neither money nor labor could impart much resemblance to an English lawn, but great pines and cedars walled it in, and one caught entrancing vistas of shining water and coldly gleaming snow through the openings between their mighty trunks.

The evening was hot and still, the air heavy with the ambrosial odors of the forest, and the dying roar of a great freight train that came throbbing out of its dim recesses emphasized the silence. The little house rose, gay with painted scroll-work and relieved by its trellises and wooden pillars, beneath the dark cedar branches across the lawn.

Jimmy had seen Valentine and Miss Austerly sitting on the veranda a few minutes earlier. He was, however, just then looking at his companion, and wondering whether in spite of the pleasure it afforded him he had been wise in coming there at all.

Anthea was dressed richly, in a fashion which it seemed to him became her wonderfully well, and he was quite aware that the few minutes he had now spent in her company would be sufficient to render him restless during the remainder of the week. Jimmy had discovered that while it was difficult to resolve that he would think no more of her, it was considerably harder to carry out the prudent decision.

"It is some little time since I saw you last," she said.

"Four weeks," said Jimmy promptly. "That is, it would be if this were to-morrow."

Anthea smiled, though she naturally noticed that there was a certain significance in this accuracy. Jimmy realized it too, for he added a trifle hastily: "The fact that it was just before the _Shasta_ went to sea fixed it in my mind."

"Of course!" and Anthea laughed. "That would, no doubt, account for it.

Are your after-thoughts always as happy, Captain Wheelock?"

Jimmy felt a little uncomfortable. Her good-humor, in which there was nothing incisive, was, he felt, in one way a sufficient rebuff, though he could not tell whether she had meant it as such. It was also disconcerting to discover that she had evidently followed the train of reasoning which had led to the remark, though this was a thing she seemed addicted to doing. After all, there are men who fail to understand that in certain circ.u.mstances it is not insuperably difficult for a woman to tell their thoughts before they express them.

"I'm afraid I don't excel at that kind of thing," he said. "It's perhaps fortunate my friends realize it."

Anthea turned and looked at him with reposeful eyes. "Well," she said reflectively, "I almost fancied you were not particularly pleased to see me. You had, at least, very little to say at dinner."

Jimmy, to his annoyance, felt the blood rise to his forehead. He had sense enough to see that his companion did not intend this to be what, in similar circ.u.mstances, is sometimes called encouraging. He was not a brilliant man; but it is, after all, very seldom that an extra-master's certificate or a naval reserve commission is held by a fool. Anthea had, he felt, merely asked him a question, and he could not tell her that he would have avoided her only because he felt afraid that the delight he found in her company might prove too much for his self-restraint.

"Still," he said, somewhat inanely, "how could I? You were talking to that Englishman all the time."

"Burnell?" said Anthea. "Yes, I suppose I was. He and his wife are rather old friends of mine. They have just come from Honolulu, and talk about taking the yacht up to Alaska. In that case, they want Nellie and me to go with them."

Jimmy remembered the beautiful white steam-yacht which had pa.s.sed the _Shasta_ on her way to Vancouver a day or two ago, and was sensible of a vague relief that was at the same time not quite free from concern. If Anthea went to Alaska, it was certain that he would have no opportunity for meeting her for a considerable time. That was, in one way, what he desired, but it by no means afforded him the satisfaction he felt it should have done. She did not, however, appear inclined to dwell upon the subject.

"I think I ought to congratulate you on what you did a few weeks ago,"

she said. "I read the schooner-man's narrative in the paper."

Jimmy laughed. "If I had known he was going to tell that tale, I almost fancy I should have left him where he was; but, after all, I scarcely think he did. Seas of the kind mentioned could exist only in a newspaperman's imagination."

The girl smiled, for, though what she thought did not appear, she saw the shade of darker color in his face, and Jimmy was very likeable in his momentary confusion. Now and then his ingenuous nature revealed itself in spite of his restraint, but n.o.body ever shrank from a glimpse of it, for he had in him, as Anthea had seen, something of the largeness and openness of the sea.

"Still," she said, "I heard one or two men who understand such things talking about it, and they seemed to agree that it needed nerve and courage to take the schooner skipper off without wrecking your vessel; but you are, perhaps, right about the imagination of the men who serve such papers."

Jimmy noticed the trace of half-contemptuous anger in her face and voice, and fancied he understood it. He had, of course, seen the issue of the paper in question, and had read close beneath the schooner-man's account of his rescue a bitter and plainly worded attack upon his companion's father. Merril was a political as well as a commercial influence, and journalists in that country do not shrink from personalities. He felt, by the way she glanced at him, that she knew he had done so.

"Yes," she said, though he had not spoken, "you understand what I am alluding to. Still, I suppose anybody who does all he can for the Province must expect to be misrepresented."

Jimmy's face grew a trifle hard. He did not know exactly what she expected from him, but even to please her he would not admit that the man who had seized the _Tyee_ could be misrepresented in any way, unless, indeed, somebody held him up as a pattern of virtue.

"I suppose your father denied the statements?" he said. "I have, of course, been away."

"No," replied Anthea; "it was scarcely worth while. After all, very few people would consider the thing seriously."

She turned to him again with an inquiring glance, and there was a certain insistency in her tone. "Of course, that ought to be clear to anybody."

Jimmy met her glance steadily, and set his lips as he usually did when he was stirred, and he was stirred rather deeply then. Still, nothing would have induced him to say a word in Merril's favor. Then it seemed to him that the girl's expression changed. He could almost have fancied there was a suggestion of appeal in her eyes, as though she would have liked him to const.i.tute himself her ally, and, indeed, had half-expected it. It set his heart beating, and sent a little thrill through him, for in that moment it was clear that she wished to believe altogether in her father, and would value any support that he could offer her. In other circ.u.mstances it would have been a delight to take up the cause of any of her kin, whatever it might have cost him, but just then he was conscious of a bitter hatred of the man in question, and Jimmy was in all things honest.

"I'm afraid I don't know how people are likely to regard it," he said.

"You see, I am almost a stranger in the Province. I have been away so long."

Anthea appeared to a.s.sent to this, but Jimmy realized that she felt that he had failed her. Still, the thing was done, and he would not have done it differently had another opportunity been afforded him.

"Well," she said slowly, "there is something I want to mention. I fancy Mr. Burnell has a favor to ask of you this evening, and it might, perhaps, be wise to oblige him. He can be a very good friend, as I have reason to know, and though he may not mention this, he is, one understands, rather a prominent figure in the Directorate of the ---- Mail Company."

For a few moments Jimmy was troubled by an unpleasant sense of confusion. The man's name was famous in the shipping world, and there were a good many aspiring steamboat officers who sought his good-will, while, since he could not have heard of Jimmy until a day or two ago, it was evident that somebody in Vancouver City had spoken in his favor.

Jimmy fancied he knew who this must be, and it was but a minute or two since he had turned a deaf ear to the girl's appeal. Then he roused himself, as he saw her curious smile.

"So that is the famous man?" he said. "I should never have imagined it."

Anthea laughed as she rose; but before she moved away, she turned to him confidentially. "I really think," she said, "you should do what he asks you."

Then she left him, and it was some minutes later when a little, quiet Englishman strolled in that direction, cigar in hand. He sat down by Jimmy.

"I don't know whether I'm presuming, but I believe you are duly qualified to take command of a British steamer and are acquainted with the northwest coast?" he said.

Jimmy said he had not been far north; and Burnell appeared to reflect for a moment or two.

"After all," he said, "I don't suppose that matters so very much. I'm in rather a difficulty, and you may be able to do something for me. We lost our skipper, and my mate and several of the crew have taken leave of me here unceremoniously. I wish to ask if you would take the yacht up to Alaska for me, and afterward home again. I should naturally be prepared to offer whatever salary is obtainable here by a duly qualified skipper, and as several of my friends are also yours, you would, of course, continue to meet them on that footing while you were on board."

"There is one point," said Jimmy. "The arrangement would necessarily be a temporary one."

"I fancied you would raise it. Well, it would perhaps be a little premature to say very much just now; but I did not come to Vancouver entirely on pleasure. In fact, it is likely that we shall shortly attempt to cut into the American South-Sea trade, in which case we should want commanders for a 4000-ton boat or two from this city. If not, I almost think I can promise that you would not suffer from serving me. I may mention that your friends speak of you very favorably."

Jimmy thought hard for a minute or two. It was a very tempting offer, and wages out of that port were excellent just then. What was more to the purpose, it promised to send him back to the liners, where a commander was a person of some consequence, and, besides this, Anthea had told him that she was in all probability going to Alaska. Then he reluctantly shook his head.

"I'm afraid I can't close with you, sir," he said. "The fact is, I consider myself bound to the _Shasta_ Company."