Thrice Armed Part 31

They made some four knots in each of the next thirty hours, with the gale on their starboard bow. When at last it broke, Jimmy, who got an observation, headed the _Shasta_ southeastward, and a day or two later ran her in behind an island. Then two boats pulled ash.o.r.e across a sluice of tide, and came back some hours later when it had slackened a little, loaded rather deeper than was safe with sawn-up pines. Fleming also brought two very rude saws with him, and invited Jimmy's attention to one of them.

"Saws," he said, "are in a general way made of steel, and you can't expect too much from soft plate-iron. The boys did well; there's not a man among the crowd of them can get his back straight. You'd understand the reason if you had tried to cut down big trees with an instrument that has an edge like a nutmeg-grater."

Jimmy smiled, for he considered it very likely. "Well," he said, "what are you going to do to make them serviceable?"

"Sit up all night re-gulletting them with a file. I want four loads of billets before we start again; but we'll take another axe ash.o.r.e in the morning."

They went off early, when the tide was slack, taking an extra axe along, while it was noon when they came back, with one man who had badly cut his leg lying upon the billets. Fleming, however, insisted on his four loads, and it was evening when he brought the last two off. The men were almost too wearied to pull across the tide, and only the handles attached to them suggested that the two worn strips of iron they pa.s.sed up had been meant for saws.

"That," said Fleming, who held one up before Jimmy, "says a good deal for the boys; but if I drove them the same way any longer there would be a mutiny."

Jimmy laughed, and told him to raise steam enough to take the _Shasta_ to sea. She made six knots most of that night; and two days later the men went ash.o.r.e again. Fleming, at least, never forgot the rest of that trip down the wild West Coast. He mixed his resinous billets with saturated coal-dust and broken hemlock bark, but in spite of it he stopped the _Shasta_ every now and then when his boilers gave him water instead of steam.

Still, she crept on south, and at last all of them were sincerely glad when the pithead gear of the Dunsmore mines rose up against the forests of Vancouver Island over the starboard hand. An hour or two later Fleming stood blackened all over amidst a gritty cloud while the coal that was to free him from his cares clattered into the _Shasta_'s bunkers, and Jimmy sat in the room beneath her bridge with one of the coaling clerks writing out a telegram.

"I'll get it sent off for you right away," said the coaling man. "Guess it will be a big relief to somebody. It seems they've 'most given you up in Vancouver."

Jimmy laughed. "Well," he said, "we have brought her here. Still, I think there were times when my engineer felt that the contract was almost too big for him."

CHAPTER XXIII

ANTHEA GROWS ANXIOUS

The afternoon was hot, but Jordan failed to notice it as he swung along, as fast as he could go without actually running, down a street in Vancouver. He walked in the glaring sunlight, because there was more room there, as everybody else was glad to seek the shadow cast across one sidewalk by the tall stores and offices, and he appeared unconscious of the remarks flung after him by the irate driver of an express wagon which had almost run over him. Jordan was one of the men who are always desperately busy, but there were reasons why his activity was a little more evident than usual just then. His a.s.sociates had contrived to raise sufficient money to purchase a boat to take up the _Shasta_'s usual trip, but the finances of the Company were in a somewhat straitened condition as the result of it, and he was beset with a good many other difficulties of the kind the struggling man has to grapple with.

For all that, he stopped abruptly when he saw Forster's driving-wagon, a light four-wheeled vehicle, standing outside a big dry-goods store. He was aware that Mrs. Forster seldom went to Vancouver without taking Eleanor with her, which appeared sufficient reason for believing that the girl was then inside the store. If anything further were needed to indicate the probability of this, there was a well-favored and very smartly-dressed man standing beside the wagon, and Jordan's face grew suddenly hard as he looked at him. As it happened, the man glanced in his direction just then, and Jordan found it difficult to keep a due restraint upon himself when he saw the sardonic twinkle in his eyes. It was more expressive than a good many words would have been.

Jordan had for some time desired an interview with him, but, warm-blooded and somewhat primitive in his notions upon certain points as he was, he had sense enough to realize that he was not likely to gain anything by an altercation in a busy street, which would certainly not advance him in Eleanor's favor. Besides this, it was probable that somebody would interfere if he found it necessary to resort to physical force. Jordan, who was by no means perfect in character, had, like a good many other men brought up as he had been in the forests of the Pacific Slope, no great aversion to resorting to the latter when he considered that the occasion warranted it.

Still, he held himself in hand, and strode into the store where, as it happened, he came upon Mrs. Forster. There was a faint smile in her eyes when she turned to him, for she was a lady of considerable discernment; but she held out her hand graciously. She liked the impulsive man.

"It is some time since we have seen anything of you," she said.

"That," said Jordan, "is just what I was thinking, though it's quite likely there are people who wouldn't let it grieve them. In fact, I was wondering whether you would mind if I asked myself over to supper with your husband this evening?"

Mrs. Forster laughed.

"I really don't think it would trouble me very much, and I have no doubt that Forster would enjoy a talk with you," she said. "I wonder whether you know that Mr. Carnforth is coming?"

"I do;" and Jordan looked at her steadily with a trace of concern in his manner. "In fact, that was one of my reasons for asking you."

The lady shook her head. "So I supposed," she said. "Still, while everybody is expected to know his own business best, I'm not sure you're wise. You see, I really don't think Eleanor is very much denser than I am, though you can tell her you have my invitation to supper."

Jordan, who expressed his thanks, strode across the store and came upon Eleanor standing by a counter with several small parcels before her. She turned at his approach, and he found it difficult to believe that his appearance afforded her any great pleasure. While he gathered up the parcels, she made him a little imperious gesture, and they moved away toward a quieter part of the big store. Then she turned to him again.

"Charley," she said sharply, "what are you doing here?"

"I saw Forster's wagon outside, and that reminded me that it was at least a week since I had seen you."

Eleanor smiled somewhat curiously, for it was, of course, clear to her that he could not have seen the wagon without seeing Carnforth too.

"And?" she said.

"I'm coming over to supper with Forster. You don't look by any means as pleased as one would think you ought to be."

The girl appeared disconcerted. "I should sooner you didn't come to-night."

"Of course!" said Jordan. "I can quite believe it."

A tinge of color crept into Eleanor's face, and there was now nothing that suggested a smile in the sparkle in her eyes. "Pshaw!" she said.

"Charley, don't be a fool!"

"I'm not," said Jordan slowly. "That is, I don't think I am, in the way you mean. In fact, though it shouldn't be necessary, I want to say right now that I have every confidence in you."

"Thanks! There are various ways of showing it. You haven't chosen one that appeals to me."

Jordan flung out one hand. "After all, I'm human--and I don't like that man."

"You are. Now and then you are also a little crude, which is probably what you mean. Still, that's not the question. I think I mentioned that I should sooner you didn't come to supper this evening."

The gleam in her pale-blue eyes grew plainer, and it said a good deal for Jordan's courage that he persisted, since most of Eleanor's acquaintances had discovered that it was not wise to thwart her when she looked as she did then.

"I'm afraid I can't allow that to influence me, especially as Mrs.

Forster expects me."

"Very well!" and Eleanor's tone was dry. "You may carry those parcels to the wagon."

Jordan did so, and felt his blood tingle when Carnforth favored him with a glance of unconcerned inquiry. There was a suggestive complacency in his faint smile that was, in the circ.u.mstances, intensely provocative, but Jordan contrived to restrain himself. Then Mrs. Forster and Eleanor came out, and the latter took the parcels from him.

"Four of them?" she said. "You haven't dropped any?"

Jordan did not think he had, and the girl pressed one or two of the parcels between her fingers. "Then I wonder where the muslin is?"

"I guess they can tell me in the store," said Jordan.

He swung around, and in a moment or two was back at the counter. The clerk there, however, had to refer to one of her companions, and, as the latter was busy, Jordan had to wait a minute or two.

"I wrapped up the muslin with the tr.i.m.m.i.n.g," she said at last. "Miss Wheelock had four parcels, and I saw you take up all of them."

Jordan turned away with an unpleasant thought in his mind, and was out of the store in a moment. There was, however, no wagon in the street, and after running down most of it he stopped with a harsh laugh.

Forster's team was a fast one, and Jordan realized that it was very unlikely that he could overtake it, especially when Eleanor, who usually drove, did not wish him to. After all, her quickness and resolution in one way appealed to him, and he remembered that he had promised to dine with Austerly that evening. Still, he went back to his business feeling a trifle sore, and one or two of the men who called on him noticed that his temper was considerably shorter than usual.

He had, in fact, not altogether recovered his customary good-humor when he sat on the veranda of Austerly's house some hours later. The meal which Austerly insisted on calling dinner, though he had found it impossible to get anybody to prepare it later than seven o'clock in the evening, was over, and the rest of the few guests were scattered about the garden. Valentine, who had arrived in the _Sorata_ a day or two earlier, sat at the foot of the short veranda stairway close by the lounge chair where Nellie Austerly lay looking unusually fragile, but listening to the bronzed man with a quiet smile. Austerly leaned on the bal.u.s.trade, and Anthea sat not far from Jordan. She was, as it happened, looking out through a gap in the firs which afforded her a glimpse of the shining Inlet. A schooner crept slowly across the strip of water, on her way to the frozen north with treasure-seekers.

"She seems very little," said Anthea. "One wonders whether she will get there, and whether the men on board her will ever come back again."