Thrice Armed Part 29

The city was almost insufferably hot, and Jimmy, who had time on his hands that afternoon, found it pleasant to saunter through the dim green shadow among the Stanley pines which crowd close up to its western boundary. They rose about him, old and great of girth, a tremendous colonnade of towering trunks, two hundred feet above the narrow riband of driving road which was further walled in by tall green fern. There was drowsy silence in those dim recesses, and a solemnity which the occasional faint hoot of a whistle or tolling of a locomotive bell did not seem to dissipate, for the civic authorities had, up to that time, at least, with somewhat unusual wisdom made no attempt to improve on what nature had done for them. Here they cut a little foot-path, there a wavy driving road, but except for that they left the Stanley Park a beautiful strip of primeval wilderness.

Jimmy had arrived in Vancouver a few hours earlier with the _Shasta_ loaded deep, but, although affairs had been going tolerably well with the Company, this fact afforded him no very great satisfaction. He liked the sea, and had succeeded in making firm friends of most of the ranchers and salmon-packers whose produce he carried; but there was ambition in him, and of late he had been growing vaguely restless. After all, the command of a boat like the _Shasta_, with some two hundred and fifty odd tons of carrying capacity, could not be expected to prove a very lucrative occupation, and Jimmy now and then remembered regretfully that he might have had a commission in the Navy. He had also an incentive for desiring advancement, upon which, however, he seldom permitted himself to dwell, since on two occasions he and Anthea Merril had read in each other's eyes a fact that had a vital significance to both of them. Jimmy scarcely dared remember it, but he felt that the girl would listen when he thought it fit to speak.

That, however, was in the meanwhile out of the question. He must by some means first make his mark, and, as happens not infrequently in similar circ.u.mstances to other men, he did not know how it was to be done. One thing, at least, was clear: he could not expect to advance himself very much by commanding the _Shasta_. There was also, in any case, Merril's opposition to count on, while the bitterness Eleanor had endued him with against the man she held responsible for the death of his father had its effect, and it was in an unusually somber mood that Jimmy strolled through the shadow of the pines that hot afternoon.

By and by he heard a soft thud of hoofs, and, looking up, felt the blood creep into his face. He recognized the costly team that swung out of the shadow, and the girl in the white dress who held the reins in the vehicle behind them. He also recognized the lady beside her, for her husband was an Englishman who held high office under the Crown in Victoria. The fact that she was sitting by Anthea Merril's side suggested how far circ.u.mstances held the latter apart from the _Shasta_'s skipper. Silver-mounted harness and splendid horses had the same effect, and, since these things also reminded him of something else, Jimmy unfortunately lost his head. A sudden vindictive anger came upon him as he remembered that the money that provided them and stood as a barrier between him and the girl had been wrung from struggling men, and that some of it at least was the result of his father's ruin.

It was, of course, not reasonable to blame Anthea for this, but Jimmy was scarcely in a mood just then to make any very nice distinction, and, straightening himself a trifle, he stood still a moment looking at the girl. He saw the little friendly smile fade out of her face and a look of perplexity take its place, and then, while his heart thumped furiously, he turned and stepped aside into a little trail that led into the shadow of the bush. In another moment the team swept past, and he was left uncomfortably conscious that he had made a fool of himself. The feeling, while far from pleasant, is no doubt wholesome, which is fortunate, since there are probably very few men who are not now and then sensible of it.

It was half an hour later when Anthea came up with him again. The road was narrow and crossed a little bridge near where he was standing. As it happened, another lady was then driving a pair of ponies over it. Anthea pulled up her team close behind Jimmy, and when the impatient horses moved and drew the vehicle partly across the road, he turned and seized the head of the nearest. He did not know much about horses, but he contrived to back the team sufficiently to leave a pa.s.sage, and was unpleasantly sensible that Anthea was watching him with a little smile.

It brought a tinge of darker color to her face, and hurt him considerably more than if she had shown resentment of his previous att.i.tude by any suggestion of distance. There is, after all, a certain vague consolation in feeling that one is able to offend a person whose good-will is valuable. Anthea perhaps realized this, for when the other team had gone by she made a sign to him. Jimmy, who felt far from comfortable, approached the vehicle, and the girl looked down at him, with the twinkle still in her eyes.

"Thank you! That is permissible?" she said.

Jimmy flushed again. "In any case, I'm not sure it's exactly what I deserve."

"Well," said Anthea reflectively, "I really was wondering whether you saw us a little while ago."

"I did," said Jimmy, meeting her inquiring gaze. "Still, perhaps there were excuses for me."

There was a scarcely perceptible change in Anthea's expression, but Jimmy noticed it, though he did not know that she was thinking of what his sister had told her. Next moment she smiled at him again.

"I scarcely think it would be worth while to make them," she said.

Then she shook the reins, and left him standing in the road. When they were out of earshot her companion turned to her.

"Who is that young man?" she asked.

"Captain Wheelock of the _Shasta_."

"Ah!" said the other; "I remember hearing about him. The man who took off the schooner's skipper? But what did he mean by saying that there were excuses for his not seeing you?"

"I don't know," said Anthea, who contrived to smile, though she was rather more thoughtful than usual. "I don't mind admitting that the question has a certain interest. Still, one cannot always demand an explanation."

Her companion flashed a keen glance at her. "Well," she said, "I almost fancy it would have been a sufficient one if you had heard it. In fact, I think I should like that man. After all, honesty is a quality that wears well. But what is a man of his description doing in that very little and somewhat dirty _Shasta_? I made somebody point her out to me one day in Victoria."

"I don't know," said Anthea; "that is, I know why he went on board her in the first case, but not why he seems content to stay there altogether. Still, it naturally isn't a matter of any particular consequence."

Then they spoke of other things, while Jimmy, who suddenly remembered that he was standing vacantly in the road, turned toward the city, wondering as Anthea had done why he had remained so long the _Shasta_'s skipper. Now that the trade Jordan and his a.s.sociates had inaugurated had been well established in spite of Merril's opposition, he felt that they had no longer any particular need of him.

The city was unusually hot when he reached it, but he fancied that alone did not account for the crowded state of the saloons he pa.s.sed. It also seemed to him that the groups of men who stood here and there on the sidewalks talking animatedly must have found some unusually interesting topic; but he had his own affairs to think of, and, as they appeared sufficient for him just then, he walked on quietly until he reached Jordan's office. It was not elaborately furnished. In fact, there was very little in it besides a table, a safe, a chair or two, and an American stump-puller standing against one wall. Jordan sat reading a newspaper, with a cigar, which had gone out, in his hand, but he looked up and threw the paper on the table when Jimmy came in.

"Read that. They've struck it rich at last," he said. "Guess there are men who have believed in that gold ever since we bought Alaska from the Russians. Ran across one of them, 'most eight years ago, Commercial Company man, and he told me it was a sure thing there was gold up the Yukon. Odd prospectors had struck a pocket here and there, but though they brought a few ounces out, n.o.body seemed inclined to take up the thing. Practically every white man in that country was connected with the Indian trade in furs, and I'm not sure they were anxious to see an army of diggers marching in. Anyway, the few men who believed in the gold couldn't put up the money to prove their confidence warranted. Now, as you see, they've found it, and before long the whole Slope will be humming from Wrangel to Lower California."

Jimmy read a column of the paper with almost breathless interest, as many another man had done that day in every seaboard city and lonely wooden settlement to which the news had spread. Then he looked at Jordan.

"The thing appears almost incredible," he said.

"It isn't," said his companion. "I know what the Alaska Commercial old-timer told me quite a while ago. It's going leagues ahead of Caribou. They'll be going up in their thousands in a month or two. Now, you sit still a minute, and listen to me. This is a thing I believe in, and I'll tell you what I know."

He spoke for ten minutes with dark eyes snapping, and Jimmy's blood tingled as he listened. Jordan's faith, the all-daring optimism of the Pacific Slope of which many men have died in the wilderness, was infectious, and something in Jimmy's nature responded. He had fought with bitter gales and frothing seas, and it seemed to him that the struggle with ice and frost, rock and snow, could not be harder. He was also, though he had not quite realized it until that moment, one of those who are born to play their part in the forefront of the battle between man and nature--and nature is not beneficent, but very grim and terrible until she is subdued, as everybody who has seen that strife knows.

Then Jimmy stood up and slowly straightened himself, with a quiet smile.

"You'll have to get a new skipper for the _Shasta_--I'm going north," he said.

Jordan gazed at him a moment in amazement, and then laughed in a fas.h.i.+on which suggested that comprehension had dawned on him.

"Sit down again," he said. "I begin to understand how it is with you.

Still, you can't afford to do the thing you want to. It quite often happens that way."

"I fancy that what I can't afford is to remain on board the _Shasta_,"

said Jimmy dryly.

"Sit down," said Jordan; "we'll talk out this thing. Now, why do you want to go up there?"

Jimmy did as he was bidden, though there was a significant gleam in his eyes. "Well," he said, "perhaps it's your due that I should tell you.

For one thing, because I feel that I must. I'm not sure you'll understand me, but I feel it's what I was made for. There are half-frozen swamps to be crossed, leagues of forest, canons, melting snow to be floundered through. That kind of thing gets hold of some of us. I feel I have to go. Secondly, there seems to be gold up there. I want the money."

Jordan noisily thrust back his chair, and then took up a pen and, apparently without recognizing what he was doing, snapped it across.

"Stop right there! I can't stand too much--and there's Eleanor," he said, and broke into a harsh laugh as he glanced down at the pen. "In one way, it's significant that I've broken the--thing."

He said nothing for the next moment or two, and appeared to be putting a restraint upon himself, but there was longing in his voice when he went on again. "Lord! I guess it's in us. When we'd only the wagons and axes we worried right across the continent. There was always something that drew us to the place we didn't know. The harder the way was the more the longing grew. I was up in the Selkirks on the gold-trail once, and I'm never going to work something that life left behind right out of me."

"Come!" said Jimmy simply.

The veins rose swollen on Jordan's forehead, but he struck the table with a clenched fist and gazed at his comrade with hot anger in his eyes.

"Will you stop, you--fool?" he said. "Don't you know how I want to go?

Stop, or I'll throw you out right now!"

He sat still, looking at Jimmy for perhaps half a minute, and each was conscious of the same longing in his heart and the same tingling of his blood, for that is a country where men still feel the l.u.s.t of the primeval conflict and the allurements of the wilderness. Then Jordan appeared to recover himself.

"I guess we'll be ashamed of this afterwards, but I have got to talk,"

he said. "Anyway, we can't all get right in with the axe and shovel. My work's here, and I've just sense enough to stay with it. Besides, it's a sure thing that everybody who goes north won't rake out money. Now, you want the snow and the canons? You can't have them; but I'll give you drift-ice, blinding fog, reefs and breaking surf instead. You want money? Well, we'll try to meet your views on that point, and by and by we'll double what you're getting."

Jimmy gazed at him in evident bewilderment, and his comrade waved his hand.

"You're going to take the first of the crowd to St. Michael's in the _Shasta_, and the man who can run a 250-ton boat there and back again will have all the excitement he has any use for. Half the reefs aren't charted, the tides run any way, and when the gale drops, the fog shuts down thicker than a blanket. You can't pound a rock-drill or swing the shovel, but you can hold a steamer's wheel. Get hold of that, and try to understand it. It's the whole point of the thing."

He stopped a moment as if for breath, and then went on again, hurling out his words incisively while his eyes snapped.

"It's St. Michaels now, but by and by they'll find a way in from the Pan-handle or over British soil. The C.P.R. will put big boats on, and they'll run everything that will float up from 'Frisco and Portland; but we'll be in first and take hold with the _Shasta_. The men you're going to carry would go in a canoe. She has built up the coast trade enough to make it easy for us to raise the money to buy another boat--I'm hanging right on to that trade too--and I know of a handy steamer. I'll get an option on her now. She'll be worth considerably more in a week or two.

You stand by the _Shasta_ Company, and do your part in the rush that's coming in the way you know, and you'll rake in more money than you ever would mining. We'll put a thousand-ton boat on before long if you play our hand well. I want your answer right off: are you hanging on to us?"

"Yes," said Jimmy quietly. "After all, your point of view is no doubt the right one. If the boat were only fifty tons I'd start as soon as she was ready."