Delilah of the Snows Part 36

"Would you like to go on?" he asked.

"No," said Ingleby, with a little harsh laugh. "There was a time when if I'd had no food since yesterday I should not have stopped, but one gets over that. Besides, I almost fancy we shall know quite soon enough what a third-share in the Tomlinson mine is worth."

Leger made a fire, and Sewell appeared while they ate.

"I have made the record. How have you got on?" he inquired.

Ingleby pointed to the pile of soil and stones and sand. "So far. We are not going any farther until after dinner. It is not very long since I turned prospector, but I have twice bottomed on gold and had to let it go. The last occasion was only two or three hours ago--and I'm not quite sure I've got over it yet."

Sewell nodded sympathetically. "There is gold here--though it's remarkable that n.o.body seems to know how much," he said. "Tomlinson apparently was not communicative."

"That," said Ingleby, "is, of course, the question. If there is not a good deal a third-share is scarcely likely to recompense me for leaving the other claim, especially when there is a thousand dollars to come out of this one. That's one reason I'm getting dinner before I go any further. I bought a pig in a poke, you see, and now I'm almost afraid to open it."

"I wonder why you made the bargain, especially in view of the fact that Tomlinson told you the chances of striking gold on your own claim were good."

Ingleby appeared a trifle confused. "Well," he said, "Tomlinson had found gold while I hadn't then--and one naturally prefers a certainty.

The man was in a difficulty, too."

"Tomlinson, in fact, made use of the old woman back in Oregon somewhat artistically."

Ingleby flushed a trifle. He was one who, though he had, formerly, at least, proclaimed his views, nervously concealed his charities.

"Tomlinson never meant to wrong me of a dollar. He isn't that kind of man," he said.

"No," said Sewell, with a little laugh, "I scarcely think he did. Well, are we to help you with the wash-up?"

They toiled for awhile knee-deep in very cold water while the rocker clashed and rattled, and Ingleby, whose face grew a trifle grim as the time wore on, washed out the residue of its contents in a little pan.

Then, for the others insisted, when there was a good deal of the pile left, they went back to the mine; and the hour of supper had crept round again when Ingleby came out of the stream carrying the result of all that they had done in a little pan. He stood still a moment in the shadow of the pines, and his lips were set and his eyes unusually grave as he looked at Sewell.

"If your new claim turns out dirt equal to what we found this morning you will go South rich," he said. "I would sooner you had it than anybody else--and I don't think I grudge it you."

Sewell took the pan from him and glanced into it. "I'm sorry," he said simply. "The thing is done now, and I can't make you a partner unless you let Tomlinson's claim go, which I presume you don't mean to do."

"That is, of course, quite out of the question. Tomlinson went out believing it was safe with me."

"Then we come back to the other suggestion. I still fancy you are ent.i.tled to sell me what one might consider your option on the claim.

There are men in the valley who would have willingly handed you their bill for a thousand dollars for the information you supplied me."

Ingleby looked at him steadily, with his head held back a little.

"It already belonged to the Crown," he said. "Have I ever done anything that would lead my friends to believe they could bestow alms on me?"

Sewell smiled. "I fancy there are one or two of them who advocate a community of property!"

It occurred to Leger that it might be advisable to change the subject.

"I'm afraid we usually stop there," he said, with a grin. "It has seemed to me lately that there are two difficulties in the way of bringing an equitable division, about, though most people only recognize the obvious one, which is, however, serious enough. I mean inducing the people who have anything worth having to part with it."

"And the other?"

"The other," said Leger reflectively, "would consist in inducing the people who have very little to receive it. There are a few of them who wouldn't be willing to do so--at least, in the Colonies. They want to reap only what they have sown."

"It isn't quite clear that they will be permitted."

Leger smiled drily, though he looked hard at Sewell. "Well," he said, "I almost fancy one could leave it to them. It would be an unfortunate thing for the men who insisted on getting in the way of the sickle."

Then he turned to Ingleby, and laid a hand on his shoulder. "It might be worse," he said.

"Yes," answered Ingleby, who laughed a little, though it cost him an effort, "considerably. The man who has what is evidently a very good living in his hands really doesn't deserve very much sympathy. Still, you see, I twice threw away what looked like a fortune. Any one would find the reflection apt to worry him."

They went away and left him sitting on a blackened cedar stump in the desolate clearing. The clink of the shovels no longer rose from beyond the sombre trees, and there was deep stillness in the hollow. The gaps in the forest grew duskier, and a peak across the valley flung a cold blue shadow athwart the gleaming snow. The dew was settling heavily; but Ingleby sat still, grave in face, seeing nothing, until he rose with a little resolute shake of his shoulders and, slipping down from the stump, took up his axe.

He had twice thrown away a fortune, and with it, for a time, at least, the prospect of realizing a very precious hope; but fortunes are now and then retrieved suddenly in that country; and, in any case, a man who would work must eat.

XXII

ALISON'S SAULT

Some weeks had pa.s.sed since Ingleby took over Tomlinson's claim, when one lowering evening Grace Coulthurst pulled up her cayuse pony in the depths of the Green River valley. Leaden cloud had veiled the peaks since early morning, and now the pines were wailing dolefully beneath a bitter breeze. A little dust of snow, fine and dry as flour, whirled about her, and the trail was hard as adamant beneath her pony's feet.

The beast p.r.i.c.ked its ears and stamped impatiently, for it had been bred in the wilderness and knew what was coming.

Grace, whose fingers were growing stiff, relaxed her grasp on the bridle, and looked about her observantly, but without uneasiness. She was some distance from home, and daylight was dying out unusually early, while few horses unaccustomed to the mountains could have scrambled over either of the trails. There were two of them, foot-wide tracks which climbed up and down steep hollows and twisted round great fallen trees, and she had stopped at the forking, though there was, she knew, very little to choose between them.

The bush was a little thinner just there, but she could see nothing beyond dim colonnades of towering trunks that were rapidly fading into the gloom. The cold was nipping, and she s.h.i.+vered when the breeze dropped a moment. The silence was startling, and she felt it almost a relief when a low crescendo murmur like the sound of distant surf rose from the pines as the wind awoke again. Then a puff of powdery snow stung her tingling cheeks, and she shook the bridle and turned the cayuse into the lower trail.

She had ridden to the mines at the head of the valley early in the afternoon, while her father walked by her stirrup, which, considering the nature of the trail, he had no difficulty in doing. Indeed, he had led, and now and then dragged, the horse up parts of it. There had, as not infrequently happened, been a dispute concerning the boundaries of a placer claim, and the commissioner had gone over to adjudicate. He was not a brilliant man, but he showed no one favour, and the whimsically expressed decisions which he apparently blundered upon gave general satisfaction and are still remembered in the Green River valley. It was also characteristic of him that he had saved more than one difficult situation, in which a logical exposition of the mining laws would probably have been unavailing, by a little free badinage.

In the meanwhile his daughter, whom he had bidden ride home, realized without any undue anxiety that it might be advisable to reach there as soon as she could. She was at home in the saddle, and rightly thought herself secure from any difficulty that might not be occasioned by the weather. The free miner is a somewhat chivalrous person, which is going far enough by way of appreciation, since the epithet which might suggest itself to those acquainted with his characteristics has little meaning in the land to which he belongs, where men have outgrown the need of meretricious t.i.tles. Still, when a thin white haze blotted out the dim colonnades and obscured the firs beside the trail she strove to quicken the cayuse's pace a trifle. The beast was apparently already doing what it could, clambering up slopes of gravel, sliding down them amidst a great clatter of stones, and turning and twisting amidst tangled undergrowth.

Now and then a drooping branch whipped the girl as she went by or shook the snow that was gathering on it into her face, and the withered fern smote smears of white powder across her skirt. Winter was closing in earlier than any one had expected, and that night an Arctic cold descended suddenly upon the lonely valley. Her hands grew numb on the bridle, all sense of feeling seemed to go out of the foot in the stirrup, and at last it was with difficulty she pulled up the cayuse, which appeared as anxious to get home as she was. They had floundered round the spreading branches of a great fallen tree, and now there no longer appeared to be a trail beneath them.

Grace s.h.i.+vered all through as she looked about her. The pines were roaring in the sliding haze; the air was thick with dust, not flakes, of snow. Here and there she could dimly see a tree, but the white powder obscured her sight and stung her face when she lifted it. She could not remember having pa.s.sed that fallen tree when riding out, nor could she recall how long it was since she had seen the narrow trail in front of her. Where it was now she did not know, but there was, at least, the sound of the river on one side of her, when she could hear it across the moaning of the trees. In heading for it she would probably strike the trail again, and once more she spoke to the cayuse and shook the bridle.

She was becoming distinctly anxious now.

Then a hazy object appeared suddenly a few yards in front of her, and stopped at her cry, while in another moment Ingleby was standing by her stirrup, and her apprehensions melted away. It was significant that she was by no means astonished. She felt that it was only fitting that when she wanted him he should be there. The mere sight of his face, of which she caught a faint glimpse, was rea.s.suring.

"Do you know that I am very glad I met you? Where is the trail?" she said.

Ingleby did not protest that it afforded him an equal gratification, and if he had done so it would probably not have pleased her. Grace was critical, and rather liked the reticence which was, it seemed, in harmony with his character--that is, since he had, fortunately, grown out of the evil habit of discussing social economics.

"I don't think it can be far away. In fact, I was Just trying to cut off a bend of it," he said, with a little laugh.

"It isn't exactly a pleasant night for a stroll through the bush," said Grace suggestively.

"No," replied Ingleby, who fell into the snare. "Still, you see, they were expecting me at the bakery."