Thrice Armed Part 23

"Ah!" said Burnell; "their terms are still more favorable? One would scarcely have fancied it."

"No," said Jimmy, "that is certainly not the case. Still, they put me into the little boat out of friendliness--and I'm not quite sure anybody else could do as much for them, or, at least, would make an equal effort in the somewhat curious circ.u.mstances. Of course, that sounds a trifle egotistical; but still----"

Burnell signified comprehension. "It is not altogether a question of money."

"I couldn't come if you offered me treble the usual thing," said Jimmy gravely.

The other man nodded. "Well," he said, "I'm sorry, because after what you have told me I almost think we should have hit it tolerably well together. At any time you think I could be of service, you can write to me."

He talked about other matters for a while, and it was half an hour after he went away when Jimmy once more came face to face with Anthea Merril.

She was walking slowly through the creeping shadow of the pines, and stopped when she saw him beside a barberry bush, among whose cl.u.s.tering blossoms jeweled humming-birds flitted. One of them that gleamed iridescent hovered on wings that moved invisibly close above her shoulder.

"So," she said, "you have not done as I suggested?"

Jimmy looked at her gravely, and once more felt the blood creep into his face. She had told him she was going to Alaska on board the yacht, and he almost ventured to fancy she had meant it as an inducement; but there was no trace of resentment in her voice. Anthea was too proud for that.

"I'm sorry," he said. "Still, you see, I couldn't."

There was no doubt that he was sorry, and a look that left him almost bewildered crept into the girl's eyes.

"Why?" she asked quietly.

It was a somewhat unfortunate question, since it afforded an opening for two different answers, and Jimmy, who fancied she wished to learn why the fact that he could not go should grieve him, lost his head.

"Why?" he said. "Surely that can't be necessary. I think there is only one thing that could have stopped my going. If it hadn't been for that, I would have walked bare-foot across the Province to join the ship."

Anthea looked up, and met his eyes steadily. It was clear that she understood him, but there was no reproof in her gaze, and for a moment the man felt the sudden pa.s.sion seize and almost shake the self-restraint from him. The girl was very alluring, and just then her pride had gone, while it was vaguely borne in on him that he had but to ask, or rather take her masterfully. Perhaps he was right, for there are moments when wealth and station do not seem to count, and an eager word or two, or a sudden compelling seizure of the white hand that hung so close beside him, might have been all that was needed. He looked at her with gleaming eyes, while a little quiver ran through him. Still, he remembered suddenly whose daughter she was, and the bitter grievance he had against her father. The opposition Merril would certainly offer and the stigma others might cast upon him if he wrested a promise from her then, also counted for something; and though neither of them made any sign, both knew when she spoke again that the moment had pa.s.sed.

"That," she said, "was not what I meant. Why is it impossible for you to go?"

Jimmy was himself again, for her voice and look had swiftly changed. "I think it is only your due that I should tell you, since I know why Burnell put the offer before me. Well, I was glad to get the _Shasta_, and it would hardly be the thing to leave her now. Jordan and the others put money they could very hardly spare into the venture--and when they did it, they had confidence in me."

"Ah!" said Anthea, and stood silent for a moment or two. Then she smiled at him gravely. "Perhaps you are right--and, at least, one could fancy that Jordan and the others were warranted."

Jimmy, whose face once more grew a trifle flushed, raised a hand in protest. "I feel I have to thank you for sending Burnell to me. It must have seemed very ungrateful that I didn't close with him; but, after all, that is only part of what I mean. You see----"

The girl looked at him, still with the curious little smile. "You fancied I should feel hurt because you could not take a favor of that kind from me? Well, perhaps I did, but, as you have said, you couldn't help it--and I don't think it matters, after all."

Her voice was quietly even, and there was certainly no suggestion in it that she resented what he had done; but Jimmy knew that he was now expected to put on his reserve again, and he hastened to explain in conventional fashion that the way she might regard the matter was really a question of interest to him. Then Anthea looked at him, and they both laughed as they turned away, which, as it happened, very nearly led to Jimmy's flinging prudence aside again, and he felt relieved when he saw Austerly and his daughter approaching them. Before the latter two joined them, Anthea, however, once more turned to her companion.

"There is still something I wish to say, and perhaps I should have mentioned it earlier; but in such cases one shrinks from causing pain,"

she said. "I should like you to believe that I was very sorry when I heard--about your father."

Jimmy only made her a grave inclination, for, though he could not blame her for it, his father's death was the most formidable of the barriers between them, and, recognizing it, he felt a little thrill of dismay as she turned off across the lawn toward where Mrs. Burnell was apparently awaiting her. It afterward cost him an effort to talk intelligently to Austerly and his daughter; but since they betrayed no astonishment at his observations, he fancied that he had somehow accomplished it.

CHAPTER XVII

THE RANCHER'S ANSWER

It was a Sat.u.r.day evening, and Barbison, the fruit-tree drummer, felt that he had chosen a fitting time to introduce the business which had brought him there, as he sat amidst a cl.u.s.ter of bush-ranchers on the veranda of the little wooden hotel. It stood beside a crystal river in a lonely settlement, with the dark coniferous forest rolling close up to it. There were, however, wide gaps in the firs in front of the veranda, with tall, split fences, raised to keep the deer out, straggling athwart them amidst the pale-green of the oats, while here and there one could see an axe-built log-house embowered in young orchard trees. A trail led past the hotel, rutted by the wooden runners of jumper-sleds and ploughed up by the feet of toiling oxen and pack-horses. It led back in one direction through shadowy forest to the Dunsmore railroad, thirty miles away, and in the other to the deep inlet where the _Shasta_ lay.

The ranchers, however, usually reached the latter by canoe, because the trail was as bad as most of the others are in that country.

On the evening in question there was a little stir in the sleepy place, for the mounted mail-carrier, who accomplished the journey weekly, had come in, and hard-handed, jean-clad men had plodded down from lonely clearings among the enfolding hills to inquire for letters, purchase stores, and ask each other whether the Government meant to make a wagon-road or do anything at all for them. The question was, however, not quite so important as usual just then, for private enterprise had, as not infrequently happens, undertaken the Government's responsibilities, and the ranchers were conscious of a certain grat.i.tude to the _Shasta_ Shipping Company. Thirty miles over mountains is rather a long way to convey one's produce and supplies.

A select company of deeply bronzed and wiry men who had tried to do it with pack-horses as well as oxen and jumper-sledges sat listening to Barbison, apparently with grave attention, while another entertainment was being prepared for them. Two of their comrades, stripped to their blue shirts and old jean trousers, were then engaged in grubbing a very big fir-stump in front of the veranda--that is, clearing out the soil from beneath it, and cutting through the smaller roots with an instrument which much resembled a ship carpenter's adze. It is in general use on the Pacific Slope, where the process of making a bush-ranch seldom varies greatly. The rancher purchases the raw material, thin red soil covered with tremendous forest, as cheaply as he can, and at the cost of several years' strenuous toil hews down a few acres of the latter. Then he proceeds to burn up the logs, and there are left rows of unsightly stumps rising four to six feet above the ground, which he laboriously ploughs around. When he has garnered a crop or two he usually attacks these in turn--that is, if they show no sign of rotting; and to grub out a big one and haul it clear with oxen frequently costs him at least a day.

Barbison, who watched the proceedings with the rest, was aware of this, but he did not know that the man who sat smoking on a big mechanical appliance of the screw-jack order was the _Shasta_'s engineer. It was also somewhat curious, since he had contrived to mention her several times, that his companions had not thought it worth while to acquaint him with the fact, but left him to suppose the gentleman in question was traveling the country on behalf of the manufacturers of the American stump-grubber. In the meanwhile Barbison discoursed glibly about fruit-trees and produce prices, and pointed now and then to a big tin case partly filled with desiccated fruits and pictures which lay on a chair beside him. He was a little, dapper man, evidently from the cities, and by no mean disingenuous, though he was apparently young. He turned when a big quiet rancher picked up and gravely munched a fine Californian plum.

"Oh, let up!--that's the third," he said. "How can I sell trees on my samples when the boys have eaten them?"

The man looked at him stolidly. "It's high-grade fruit," he said. "How'd you start those plum-trees bearing?--they're quite a long while showing a flower or two. Cut them hard when the frost lets up in spring?"

"Quite hard!" said Barbison, for one must make a venture now and then; and none of his companions showed any astonishment, though fruit is freely raised in that country, and the trees that grow the kind with stones in it resent the use of the pruning knife, as everybody who has much to do with them knows.

"Juss so!" said the rancher. "Boys, you cut them--hard. Now, those apples. S'pose you had good parent stocks, could you bud on to them--and how'd you do it? Guess that would suit some sorts better than whip-grafting."

One might have fancied that Barbison was for a moment a trifle disconcerted, but he smiled airily. "Just how you'd bud on anything else. I'd wax the thread."

"You hear him, boys?" said the rancher. "What you want to do is to wax your thread."

They were very quiet, but perhaps not unusually so, for the clearers of those forests are, except on occasion, generally silent men. Barbison looked at them reflectively.

"Raising the fruit's only half the trouble, anyway," he said. "The big question everywhere is how to put it on the market; and if I can be of any use in that direction, you have only to command me. Seems to me the Government's tired of making roads."

"What's the matter with the steamboat?" asked somebody. "Never had no trouble since we hauled our stuff down to the _Shasta_."

Barbison's smile was sympathetic now. "I guess you're not going to haul your stuff down to her very much longer. She's played out, and run by little, struggling men who can't get credit for the patching up that ought to be done on her, and who'll have nothing to meet claims with if she breaks down and spoils your freight some day. That's a sure thing.

From what I heard in Vancouver, the bottom's just ready to drop out of the concern. You want to think of that. Creditors have a lien on freight, too, when a boat's held up for debt."

"Then if I sent down my potatoes or fat steers in her, somebody could seize them for the money the company owed?" asked another rancher.

"That's the law," said Barbison, and there was nothing in his companions' manner to suggest that they did not in the least believe him. "Now, there's some talk about another firm putting a smart new boat on. Plenty money behind that crowd, and when she comes round it might suit you considerably better to make a deal with them."

"Who's running the thing?"

"Man called Merril. Enterprising man. When he takes hold he makes things hum. If it were necessary to start a trade, he'd 'most carry your stuff for nothing."

"Juss so!" said the big rancher. "Kind of philanthropist. I've heard of him."

The man's face was vacantly expressionless, but Barbison, who glanced at him sharply, fancied that he had said enough on the subject. He had visited most of the settlements that could be reached from the coast, and had never neglected an opportunity for dropping a word about the _Shasta_ and the new boat.

"Where's that stump-grubber fellow from?" he asked.

"Don't quite know," said one of the others. "Strikes me as an Ontario Scotchman. But the machine's an American notion; never saw one quite like it before."