"Your aunt is a smart woman, but she can't help upsetting things," said Thomas Savine, when his niece went out with him to make arrangements for the trip. Helen smiled pleasantly, for she knew her aunt's good qualities, and also she was fond of adventurous wanderings.

It was perfect weather, and the three tourists enjoyed their journey among the less frequented fells, during which they camped, so Thomas Savine termed it, each night in some high-perched hostelry or trout-fisher's haunt. Helen realized that never before had she fully appreciated the beauty of England. Quite apart from its wonders of industrial enterprise, tide of world-wide commerce, and treasury of literature and art, the old country was to be loved for its quiet, green restfulness, she thought.

Suddenly there came a change. A south-wester drove thick rain-clouds scudding across peak and valley, and filled the passes with dank, white mists from the Irish Sea, and so, towards the close of a threatening day, Mrs. Savine's party came winding down in a hurry from a bare hill shoulder and under the gray crags of Crosbie Fell. The hollows beneath them were lost in a woolly vapor, low-flying scud raked the bare ridges above, and even as they passed a black rift in the hillside the first heavy drops of rain fell pattering. Helen Savine had seen many a mining adit in British Columbia, and, turning to glance at the mouth of the tunnel, she read, scratched on the rock beside it, "Thurston's Folly." That careless glance over her shoulder was to lead to important results.

"There's wild weather brewing," said Thomas Savine. "Make those ponies rustle, and we'll get in somewhere before it comes along."

When they reached the little wind-swept village, it became evident that no shelter for the night could be found there, for it was seldom that even an enterprising pedestrian tourist came down from the high moors behind Crosbie Fell. Still, one inhabitant informed their guide, in a tongue none of the others could comprehend, that if he was in an unusually good humor old Musker, the keeper, might take them in at Crosbie Ghyll. Thus it happened that just as the rain began in earnest, such a cavalcade as had probably never before passed its gloomy portals rode up to the gate of the dilapidated edifice. Some of the iron-bound barriers still lay moldering in the hollow of the arch, and Helen noticed slits for muskets in the stout walls above, for the owners had been a fighting race, and several times in bygone centuries the tide of battle had rolled about and then had ebbed away from the stubbornly-held stronghold. The observer had gathered so much from a paragraph in her guide-book.

The romance of English history appealed to Helen as it does to the citizens of the wider Britain over seas, and she turned in her saddle to look about her. Framed by the weather-worn archway she could see the black rampart of the fells fading into the rain, and the bare sweep of moss and moor, which had once stretched unbroken to the feet of the great ranges above the Solway shore. Inside the quadrangle, for the place had during the past century served as farm instead of hall, barn, cart-shed and shippon were ruinous and empty, but she could fill the space in fancy with sturdy archer, man-at-arms, and corsleted rider, for that the present venerable edifice had been built into an older one the stump of a square tower remained to testify.

Thomas Savine pounded on the oaken door at one end of the courtyard until it was opened by a bent-shouldered man with frosted hair and wrinkled visage.

"We are unfortunate strangers with a guide who has lost his way, and it would be a favor if you could take us in to-night out of the storm," he said. The older man glanced at the party suspiciously.

"If you ride straight on across the moor you'll find a road, and a brand new hotel in twelve miles, where you'll get whatever you have been used to," he said. "I once took some London folks in, and after the thanks they gave me I never will again."

"We're not Londoners, only forlorn Canadians," explained Thomas Savine. "Never mind, Matilda; he'll find out that you're an American in due time. We have all learned to rough it in our own country, and would trouble you very little."

"What part of Canada?" asked the forbidding figure in the doorway, and when Savine answered, "British Columbia," called "Margery!" A little weazened woman, with cheeks still ruddy from much lashing of the wind, appeared in the portal.

"Strangers from British Columbia! Perhaps they know the master," said the man, and there was a whispering until the woman vanished, saying, "I'll ask Miss Gracie."

She returned promptly, and, with a reserved courtesy, bade the party enter. Then she sent her husband and the guide to stable the ponies, and fifteen minutes later the travelers reassembled beside the deep-seated window of a great stone-flagged room, darkly wainscoted, which apparently once had been the hall, and was now kitchen. There were a spotless cloth and neat cutlery on the table by the window; trout and bacon, hacked from the sides hanging beneath the smoke-blackened beams, frizzled upon a peat fire; and, though she found neither wine nor potatoes, Mrs. Savine said that she had not enjoyed such a meal since she left Vancouver.

"We can't give you a sitting-room to yourselves," apologized the withered dame as the removed the cloth. "What furniture there is above is covered up, and it will be ill finding you sleeping quarters even. Nobody lives here beside ourselves, except when Mr. Forsyth comes down for a few weeks' shooting. His wife was a Thurston, and he bought the old place to please her sooner than let it go out of the family."

"A Thurston!" said Helen Savine. "We saw 'Thurston's Folly' written beside a mining tunnel on the fell. Was that one of the former owners? Being Colonials we are interested in all ancient buildings and their traditions."

"Oh, yes!" broke in Mrs. Savine. "We just love to hear about wicked barons and witches and all those quaint folk of the olden time."

Musker had drawn nearer meanwhile, and Thomas Savine held out the cigar case that lay upon his knee. "If we may smoke in the great hearth there, just help yourself," said he. "My wife is fond of antiquities, and if you have any to talk of, we should be glad of your company."

Musker glanced keenly at his guests. Though, having lived elsewhere, he spoke easy colloquial English, he was a son of the North Country dogged and slow, intensely self-respecting, and, while loyal with feudal fealty to superiors he knew, quick to resent a stranger's assumption of authority. Thomas Savine, brown-faced, vigorous, a pleasant Colonial gentleman, smiled upon him good-naturedly, and Musker took a cigar awkwardly. Mrs. Savine surveyed the great bare hall with respectful curiosity and evident interest, while Helen, visibly interested, leaned back in her chair.

"Maybe you met the master in British Columbia?" Musker hazarded with an eager look in his dim eyes.

"What is his full name, and what is he like?" asked Helen, bending forward a little. The old woman, reaching over, lifted a faded photograph from the window seat.

"Geoffrey Thurston!" she answered. "That was him when he was young. My husband yonder broke the pony in."

Helen started as she gazed at the picture of the boy and the pony. The face was like, and yet unlike, that of the gaunt and hungry man whom she had first seen sitting upon the fallen fir. "Yes," she answered gravely; "I know him. I met Mr. Thurston in British Columbia."

"We would take it very kindly if you would tell us how and where you found him, miss," said Musker in haste.

"I found him in a great Canadian forest. He was looking very worn and tired," Helen answered, with a trace of color in her face. "I—I hired him to do some work for me, and it was hard work—much harder than I fancied—but he did it, and, as we afterwards discovered, spent all I paid him on the powder he found was necessary."

"Ay," said the old man. "That was Mr. Geoffrey. They were all hard and ill to beat, the Thurstons of Crosbie. And you'll kindly tell us, miss, you saw him again?"

"Yes," repeated Helen, "I saw him again. By good fortune the work he did for me procured him a contract he carried out daringly, and when I last saw him he was no longer hungry or ragged, but, I fancy, on the way to win success as an engineer."

Musker straightened his bent shoulders and smiled a slow, almost reluctant smile of pride, while his wife's eyes were grateful as she fixed them on the speaker. "Ay! What Mr. Geoffrey sets his heart on he'll win or ruin himself over. It was the way of all of them; and this is gradely news," he told her.

"Now," said Helen, nodding towards him graciously, "we don't wish to be unduly inquisitive, but—if you may tell us—why did Mr. Thurston emigrate to Canada?"

Musker was evidently tempted to embark upon a favorite topic, and his wife went out hurriedly. But he hesitated, sitting silent for a minute or two. Savine, rising under the arch of the great hearth, flung his cigar into the fire, as a young woman, wearing what Helen noticed was a decidedly antiquated riding habit, came forward out of the shadows.

"I hope we are not intruding here," said the Canadian. "We were tired out before the rain came down, and almost afraid to cross the moor."

"You are very welcome," said the stranger. "I am not, however, mistress, only a relative of the old place's owner, and, therefore, a kinswoman of Geoffrey Thurston. I heard that you had shown him a passing kindness, and should like to thank you."

There was no apparent reason why the two young women should scrutinize each other, and yet both did so by the fading daylight and red blaze of the fire. Helen saw that the stranger was ruddy and blonde—frank by nature and impulsive, she imagined. The stranger noted only that the Colonial was pale and dark and comely, with a slightly imperious presence, and a face that it was not easy to read.

"I am Marian Thwaite of Barrow Hall, and regret I cannot stay any longer, having three miles to ride in the rain," she said. "Still, I may return to-morrow before you set out. Mrs. Forsyth will be pleased if she hears you have made these Canadian strangers comfortable, Musker, and I think you may tell them why Mr. Geoffrey left England. May I ask your names?"

Helen told her, and after Miss Thwaite departed, Musker began the story of Thurston's Folly. It had grown quite dark. Driving rain lashed the windows. The ancient building was filled with strange rumblings and the wailing of the blast when the old man concluded: "Mr. Geoffrey was too proud to turn a swindler, and that was why he shook off his sweetheart, who tried to persuade him, though he knew old Anthony Thurston would have left him his money, if they married."

"Some said it was the opposite," interposed his wife; but Musker answered angrily, "Then they didn't tell it right. No woman born could twist Geoffrey Thurston from his path, and when she gave him bad counsel he turned his back on her. A fool these dolts called him. He was a leal, hard man, and what was a light woman's greediness to him?"

"And what became of the lady?" asked Helen, with a curious flash in her eyes.

"She married a London man, who came here shooting, married him out of spite, and has rued it many times if the tales are true. She was down with him fishing, looking sour and pale, and the Hall maids were say——"

"Just gossip and lies!" broke in his spouse; and Helen, who apparently had lapsed into a disdainful indifference, asked no further questions. Mrs. Savine, however, made many inquiries, and Musker, who became unusually communicative, presently offered to show the strangers what he called the armory.

They followed him down a draughty corridor to the black-wainscoted gun-room at the base of the crumbling tower, and when he had lighted a lamp its glow revealed a modern collection of costly guns. There were also trout-rods hung upon the wall, and a few good sporting etchings, at all of which Musker glanced somewhat contemptuously. "These are Mr. Forsyth's, and I take care of them, but he only belongs to the place by purchase and marriage. Those belonged to the Thurstons—the old, dead Thurstons—and they hunted men," he said.

He ran the lamp up higher by a tarnished brass chain, and pointed first to a big moldering bow. "A Thurston drew that in France long ago, and it has splitted many an Annandale cattle thief in the Solway mosses since. Red Geoffrey carried this long spear, and, so the story goes, won his wife with it, and brought her home on the crupper from beside the Nith. She pined away and died just above where we stand now in this very tower. That was another Geoffrey's sword; they hanged him high outside Lancaster jail. He was for Prince Charlie, and cut down single-handed two of King George's dragoons carrying a warrant for a friend's arrest when the Prince's cause was lost. His wife, she poisoned herself. Those are the spurs Mad Harry rode Hellfire on a wager down Crosbie Ghyll with, and broke his neck doing it, besides his young wife's heart. The women who married the Thurstons had an ill lot to grapple with. Even when they settled down to farming, the Thurstons were men who would walk unflinchingly into ruin sooner than lose their grip on their purpose, and Mr. Geoffrey favors them."

"They must have been just lovely," sighed Mrs. Savine. "Say, I've taken a fancy to some of those old things. That rusty iron lamp can't be much use to anybody, but it's quaint, and I'd give it's weight in dollars for it. Can't you tell me where Mr. Forsyth lives?"

Musker stared at her horrified, Thomas Savine laughed, and even Helen, who had appeared unusually thoughtful, smiled. Musker answered:

"No money could buy one of them out of the family, and if any but a Thurston moves that lamp from where it hangs the dead men rise and come for it when midnight strikes. It is falling to pieces, but once when they took it to Kendal to be mended, the smith sent a man back with it on horseback before the day had broken."

There was a few moments' silence when Musker concluded, and the ancient weapons glinted strangely as the lamp's flame wavered in the chilling draughts. A gale from the Irish Sea boomed about the crumbling tower, and all the lonely mosses seemed to swell it with their moaning. Helen shivered as she listened, for those clamorous voices of wind and rain carried her back in fancy to the old unhappy days of bloodshed and foray. The associations of the place oppressed her. She had acquired a horror of those grim dead men whose mementos hung above her, and whose spirits might well wander on such a night vainly seeking rest. Even Mrs. Savine became subdued, and her husband said:

"We can't tell tales like these in our country, and I'm thankful we can't. Still, I daresay it was such men as these who bred in us the grit to chase the whales in the Arctic, build our railroads through the snow-barred passes, and master the primeval forest. Now we'll try to forget them, and go back out of this creepy place to the fire again."

An hour later Mrs. Musker escorted Helen to her quarters. A bright fire glowed in the rusty grate, and two candles burned on the dressing-table. "It's Mrs. Forsyth's own room, and the best in the house," the old caretaker assured the girl. "Musker has been telling you about the old Thurstons. He's main proud of them, but you needn't fear them—it's long since the last one walked. You have a kind heart, and nothing evil dare hurt you. See! I've tried to make you comfortable. You were kind to the old place's real master—many a time I've nursed him—God bless you!"

Helen was not in the least afraid of the dead Thurstons. She was filled with the common-sense courage which characterizes the inhabitants of her new country, but she had been affected by the stories, and she sat for a time with her feet on the hearth irons, gazing thoughtfully into the blaze. She had met a modern Thurston, and found the instincts of his forbears strong within him. She considered that strength, courage, and resolution well became a man, but that gentleness and chivalrous respect for women were desirable attributes, too. The Thurstons, however, had taken to bloodshed as a pastime, and broken most of their wives' hearts until it seemed that they had brought a curse upon their race. She suspected there was a measure of their brutality in the one she knew. Remembering something Geoffrey once had said, her face grew flushed and she clenched a little hand with an angry gesture, saying, "No man shall ever make a slave of me, and my husband, if I have one, must be my servant before he is my master."

Thereupon she dismissed the subject, tried to blot the stories from her memory, and presently buried her ears in the pillow to shut out the clamor of the storm. After a sound night's slumber, and an interview with Miss Thwaite she resumed her journey next morning.

Musker stood in the gate to watch the party ride away, and glancing at the coins in his hand said to Margery, "I wish they'd come often. Main interested in my stories they were all of them, and it's double what any of the shooting folks ever gave me. This one came from the young lady, and there's a way about her that puzzles me after seeing her."



CHAPTER VI

MILLICENT'S REWARD

The late Autumn evening was closing in. Millicent Leslie stood out on the terrace of the old North Country hall, where, the year before, she had first met her husband. A pale moon had climbed above the high black ridge of moor, which shut in one end of the valley, and the big beech wood that rolled down the lower hillside had faded to a shadowy blur, but she could still see the dim, white road running straight between the hedgerows, and could catch the faint gleam of a winding river. Twilight and night were meeting and melting into each other, the dew lay heavy upon the last of the dahlias beneath the terrace wall, and there was a chill of frost in the air. It was very still, though now and then the harsh call of a pheasant came up faintly through the murmur of the river from the depths of the wood. Millicent could hear no other sound, though she strained her ears to listen and it seemed to her that the rattle of wheels should carry far down the silent valley.

She was waiting somewhat anxiously for the return of her husband, who had set off that morning with three or four other men to walk certain distant stubble and turnip fields for partridges. They had passed a week at the hall, for, although Millicent would have preferred to avoid that particular place, Leslie had said he did not know of any other place where one could obtain rough shooting, as well as a more or less congenial company, in return for what was little more than a first-class hotel bill. He had also added that he needed a holiday, in which Millicent had agreed with him. There was no doubt that he had looked jaded and harassed.

Millicent knew little about her husband's business, except that it was connected with stocks and shares, and the flotation of companies; but she was quite aware that he had met with a serious reverse soon after he married her, since it had been necessary for them to give up their town house and install themselves temporarily in a London flat. Leslie had informed her that reverses were not uncommon in his profession, and he had appeared quite convinced of his ability to recover his losses in a new venture which had something to do with South African gold or diamonds. Of late, however, he had grown dejected and moody. On the previous evening she had seen his face set hard, as he read a letter which bore the London postmark. He had not given her any information about the contents of the letter, for there had been no great measure of confidence between them; but there were one or two telegrams for him among those a groom had brought over from the nearest station during the day, and she felt a little uneasy as she thought of them.

By and by, with a little shiver and a suppressed sigh, she glanced up at the highest part of the climbing wood. It was there she had had her last memorable interview with Geoffrey, almost a year ago. Though she had not cared to face the fact, she was troubled by a suspicion that she had made an unwise choice then. Leslie had changed since their marriage. He was harsh at times, and though he had, even in their more humble quarters, surrounded her with a certain amount of luxury, there was a laxity in his manners and conversation that jarred upon her. Geoffrey, she remembered, had not been addicted to mincing words, but, at least, he had lived in accordance with a Spartan moral code. Millicent was not a scrupulous woman, and her ideas of ethical justice were rudimentary, but she possessed in place of a conscience a delicate sense of refinement which her husband frequently offended.

Feeling chilly at length, and seeing no sign of the shooter's return, Millicent went back into the house. She stopped when she reached the square entrance hall which served the purpose of a lounging-room. The hall had been rudely ceiled and paneled at a time when skilled craftsmen were scarce in the North Country, and in the daylight it was more or less dim and forbidding, but with the lamps lighted and a fire blazing in the wide, old-fashioned hearth, the place looked invitingly comfortable. When she entered, Millicent was not altogether pleased to see another woman there. Marian Thwaite, whom she knew but had not expected to meet, lay in a big chair near the fire. The glow of health which the keen air of the moors had brought there was in her face. She wore heavy boots and severely simple walking attire. Her features suggested a decided character, and she had unwavering blue eyes.

"Mrs. Boone won't be down for some minutes, and I believe the rest are dressing," Marian said. "I haven't seen you since your marriage, and to tell the truth, you're not looking by any means as fresh as you did before you left us. I suppose it's one effect of living in London?"

She studied Millicent with a steady contemplative gaze, and there was no doubt that her comment was justified. Millicent's face was pallid, there was a certain weariness in her eyes, and on the whole, her expression was languidly querulous.

"I didn't know you were coming to-night," said Millicent, as she sank into a chair.

"I didn't know it myself," Marian explained. "I was out on the fells, and I met Boone as I came down this way. He said somebody would drive me home, if I'd stay. You have been here a week, haven't you? How is it you haven't come over to see us yet?"

"As a matter of fact, I didn't intend to call, and it was rather against my wishes that we came up here," said Millicent with the candor of an old acquaintance. "You were not very cordial when I last saw you, and I can't help a feeling that you are all of you prejudiced against me."

Quite unembarrassed Marian looked at her with a reflective air. "Yes," she admitted, "to some extent that's true. We're closely connected with the Thurstons, and I've no doubt we make rather intolerant partisans. After all, it's only natural that we sympathize with Geoffrey. Besides—you can make what you like of it—he was always a favorite of mine. I suppose you haven't heard from him since he went to Canada?"

"Would you have expected him to write?"

Marian smiled. "Perhaps it would have been unreasonable, but taking it for granted that he hasn't been communicative, I've a piece of news for you. Some Canadian tourists stayed a night at the Ghyll, two or three months ago, and it seems they met him in British Columbia. I understand he is by no means prosperous, but at least getting a footing in the country, and the people apparently have rather a high opinion of him. Did I mention that one of the party was a girl?"

She saw the quickened interest in Millicent's eyes. With assumed indifference in her voice Millicent asked: "What kind of people were they?"

"The girl was handsome—well-finished, too. In fact, she struck me as rather an imperious young person of some consequence in the place she came from. She would pass in any circle that you or I are likely to get an entry to. I don't know whether it's significant, but I understand from Margery that she took some interest in Musker's stories of the Thurstons."

There was nothing to show whether Millicent was pleased with this or not. She did not speak for a moment or two.

"Did they mention what Geoffrey had been doing?" she inquired presently.

"Chopping down trees for sawmills, or something of the kind. The man said Geoffrey had evidently been what they call 'up against it' until lately when he seems to have got upon his feet. It will probably convince you that you were perfectly right in not marrying him."

This time Millicent laughed. "It wouldn't have counted for much with you?"

Marian looked at her with unwavering eyes. "No," she replied, "if I'd had any particular tenderness for Geoffrey it certainly wouldn't have had the least effect beyond making me more sorry for him, but, as it happens, he never did anything to encourage vain ideas of the kind in me." She changed the subject with the abruptness which usually characterized her. "I suppose you haven't seen old Anthony Thurston since you married Leslie? He, at least, is openly bitter against you."

"I haven't. In a way, I suppose he is right. Of course, he would take the stereotyped view that it was all my fault—that is to say, that I had discarded Geoffrey?"

"I believe he did, but it struck me once or twice that Geoffrey proclaimed that view a little too loudly. Of course, with his rather primitive notions of delicacy and what is due to us, it's very much what one would have anticipated in his case. He naturally wouldn't want to leave room for any suspicion that he—wasn't altogether satisfied with you."

Millicent's face clouded. "That is a point which concerns nobody except Geoffrey and myself," she declared.

"And Anthony Thurston," Marian broke in. "Of course, it's an open secret that if you had married Geoffrey you would both have benefited by his will. As things have turned out, my own opinion is that the question whether either of you ever gets a penny of the property depends a great deal on the view he continues to take of the matter. Any way, that's not the least concern of mine, except that I'm sorry for Geoffrey. I wonder if I'm going too far in asking what it was you and he actually split upon. I'm referring to the immediate cause of the trouble."

"I can tell you that," Millicent answered quickly, for she was glad to remove the ground for one suspicion, which was evidently in Marian's mind. "Geoffrey insisted on giving up the mine when he could have sold it, and going out to Australia or Canada. I wouldn't go with him. I think nobody could have reasonably expected me to."

Marian smiled. "Well," she said, "I wonder if you know that your husband was one of the men who were willing to take the mine over. There are reasons for believing it was what brought him here in the first place."

Millicent's start betrayed the fact that this was news to her, but just then there was a rattle of wheels outside, and Marian rose. A murmur of voices and laughter grew clearer when the outer door was opened, and the two could hear the returning shooters talking with their host, who had gone out another way to meet them.

"The birds were scarce and very wild," announced one of them. "We had only two or three brace all morning, though we were a little more fortunate when we got up onto the higher land. It's my candid opinion that we should have done better there, but Leslie had all the luck in the turnips, and he made a shocking bad use of it."

"That's a fact," assented Leslie with what struck Millicent as a rather strained laugh. "I was right off the mark. There are some days when you simply can't shoot."

Several of the women guests now entered the hall, but the men did not come in. Judging from the sounds outside they seemed to be waiting while coats or cartridge bags were handed down to them from the dog-cart, and they were evidently bantering one another in the meanwhile.

"It depends upon how long you sit up in the smoking-room on the previous night," said one of them, and another observed:

"If you happen to be in business, the state of the markets has its effect."

Millicent started again at this, for she remembered her husband's expression when he had read his letter on the preceding evening. A third speaker took up the conversation.

"I don't think any variation in the price of Colonials or Kaffirs, or of wheat and cotton, for that matter, should prevent a man from telling the difference between a hare and a dog. I've a suspicion that if Tom cares to look he'll find one or two number six pellets in the hindquarters of the setter. It's a good thing our friend wasn't quite up to his usual form that time."

A burst of laughter followed, and Leslie's voice broke through it rather sharply as he replied: "He should have kept the brute in hand. The difference isn't a big one when you can only see a liver-colored patch through a clump of bracken. Besides, there was a hare."

"Undoubtedly," cried somebody. "Lawson got it."

Then they came in one after another, and while some of them spoke to their hostess and the other women Leslie walked up to the little table where several letters were spread out. Millicent watched him as he did it, and there was no doubt that the very way he moved was suggestive of restrained eagerness. She saw him tear open a telegram and crumple it in his hand, after which he seized a second one and ripped it across the fold in his clumsy haste. Then as he put the pieces together his face grew suddenly pale and haggard. Nobody else, however, appeared to notice him, and he leaned with one hand upon the table for a moment or two with his head turned away from her. She felt her heart beat painfully fast, for it was clear that a disaster of some kind had befallen him, though a large part of her anxiety sprang from the question how far the fact was likely to affect herself. He moved away from the table, and went towards the stairway at the further end of the hall, and she followed him a few minutes later. He was sitting by an open window when she reached their room. A candle flickered beside him and a little bundle of papers was clenched in one hand.

"What is it, Harry?" she asked.

He looked up at her, and his voice sounded hoarse. "I'll try to tell you later," he answered. "There's a dinner to be got through, and it will be a big enough effort to sit it out. Slip away as soon as you can afterward without attracting attention. You'll find me on the terrace."

He dismissed her with a wave of his hand, and she turned towards the little dressing-room. When she came out again he had gone, leaving his outdoor clothing scattered on the floor.

The dinner that followed was an ordeal to Millicent, but she took her part in the conversation, and glanced towards her husband only now and then. He did not eat a great deal, and though he spoke when it seemed necessary, she noticed the trace of unsteadiness in his voice. At last, however, the meal, which seemed to drag on interminably, was finished and as soon as possible she slipped out upon the terrace where she found Leslie leaning against a seat. The moon which had risen higher was brighter now, and she could see his face. It showed set and somber in the pale silvery light.

"Well?" she said impatiently. "Can't you speak?"

"I'll try," he answered. "Winkleheim Reef Explorations went down to four and six pence to-day, and as there's 5 shillings a share not paid up, it's very probable that one wouldn't be able to give the stock away before the market closes to-morrow."

"Ah," replied Millicent sharply, "didn't you tell me that they were worth sixteen shillings not very long ago? Why didn't you sell them then?"

"Because, as it seems to me now, my greediness was greater than my judgment. I wanted twenty shillings, and I thought I saw how I could get it." He paused with a little jarring laugh. "As a matter of fact—strange as it may seem—I believed in the thing. That is why I let them send out their independent expert, and held on when the stock began to drop. At the worst, I'd good reasons for believing Walmer would let me see the cipher report in time to sell. As it happened, he and the other traitor sold their own stock instead and that must have started the panic. Now they've got their report. There's no ore that will pay for milling in the reef."

It was not all clear to Millicent, but she understood from his manner that her husband was ruined. "Then what are we to do?" she asked. "Is there nobody who will give you a start again? You must be known in the business."

"That is the precise trouble. I'm too well known. So long as a man is a winner at this particular game and can make it worth while for interested folks to applaud him, or, at least, to keep their mouths shut, he can find a field for his talents when he wants it, but once he makes a false move or comes down with a bang, they get their claws in him and keep him from getting up again. Nobody has any sympathy with a broken company exploiter, especially when he has for once been crazy enough to believe in his own venture."

Leslie found it a small relief to run on with ironical bitterness, but Millicent, who was severely practical in some respects, checked him.

"You haven't answered my other question."

"Then I won't keep you waiting. In a few weeks we'll go out to the Pacific Slope of North America. I may save enough from the wreck to start me in the land-agency business somewhere in British Columbia."

Millicent turned from him, and gazed down the moon-lit valley. Troubled as she was, its rugged beauty and its stillness appealed to her, and she knew it would be a wrench to leave the land which had hitherto safely sheltered her. She had known only the smoother side of life in it, and nobody could appreciate the ease and luxury it could offer some of its inhabitants better than she did. Now, it seemed, she must leave it, and go out to struggle for a mere living in some unlovely town in what she supposed must be a wild and semi-barbarous country. She felt bitter against the man who, as she thought of it, had dragged her down, but she hid her resentment.

"But you know nothing about the land-agency business," she pointed out.

Leslie laughed ironically. "I have a few ideas. Milligan—we had him over at dinner once—made a good deal of money that way, and from what he told me it doesn't seem very different from the business I have been engaged in. Success evidently depends upon one's ability to sell the confiding investor what he thinks he'd like to get. Somehow I fancy that, with moderately good luck, two or three years of it should set us on our feet."

"But those two or three years. It's unthinkable!" Millicent broke out.

"I'm afraid you will have to face them," said Leslie dryly. He turned and looked hard at her. "You can't reasonably rue your bargain. You knew when I married you that while I had the command of money my business was a risky one."

Again Millicent stood silent a moment or two. She recognized that it was largely because Leslie enjoyed that command of money that she had discarded Geoffrey. Now his riches had apparently taken wings and vanished, but the man was bound to her still. One could fancy that there was something like retribution in the thing.

"It's rather dreadful, but I suppose I shall not make it any better by complaining," she remarked after a long silence.

Her husband's manner became embarrassed. "I understand that Anthony Thurston is well off and you were a favorite of his," he said. "Would it be of any use if you explained the trouble to him?"

"No," was the answer, "it would be perfectly useless, and for other reasons that course is impossible. He meant me to marry Geoffrey and I've mortally offended him. He's a hard, determined man."

Leslie made a sign of assent, though there was a suggestion of grim amusement in his manner. "I suppose you couldn't very well explain that it was Geoffrey who threw you over? That would, no doubt, be too much to expect of you, and, after all, when you get to the bottom of the matter it wouldn't be true. In reality you finished with Geoffrey when he decided to emigrate instead of selling the mine, didn't you?"

Millicent flashed a swift glance at him, but he met it half-mockingly, and she turned her head away. "Why should you make yourself intolerable?" she returned. "I'm sorry for you—that is, I want to be, if you will let me."

Leslie shrugged his shoulders as he lit a cigar. "Well," he said, "it can't be helped. We must face the thing! And now I don't want to set the others wondering why we have slipped away; we had better go in again." They walked back info the house.

Leslie, with one or two of the other men, sat up late in the smoking-room. Leslie told a number of stories with force and point, and when at length two of his companions went up the stairway together, one of them looked at the other with a lifting of the eyebrows.

"After what Leslie has got through to-night, I'll take the farthest place in the line from him to-morrow," he said. "If his nerves aren't unusually good it seems quite possible that there'll be more than a setter peppered."



CHAPTER VII

THE BREAKING OF THE JAM

It was late one moonlight night when Geoffrey Thurston sat inside his double-skinned tent which was pitched above a river of British Columbia. A few good furs checkered the spruce twigs which served as a carpet, and the canvas dwelling was both commodious and comfortable. A bright brass lamp hung from the ridge pole, a nickeled clock ticked cheerily upon a hanging shelf behind the neat camp cot, while the rest of the well-made furniture betokened a degree of prosperity. One of Savine's junior assistants, sent up there in an emergency to replace an older man, sat close by, and, because he dwelt in a bark shanty, envied Thurston his tent.

Geoffrey was studying a bridge-work tracing that lay unrolled upon his knees.

"I can only repeat what I said months ago. The wing slide of the log pass is too short and the angle over sharp," he said, glancing at the jam. "An extra big log will jam there some day and imperil the whole bridge. Did you send a man down to keep watch to-night?"

"The slide is in accordance with the Roads and Trails specification," answered the young man, airily. "There was no reason why we should do more work than they asked for. You're an uneasy man, Thurston, always looking for trouble, and I've had enough of late over the rascally hoboes who, when they feel inclined, condescend to work for me. Oh, yes! I posted the lookout as soon as I heard Davies was running his saw logs down."

Thurston hitched his chair forward and threw the door-flap back so that he could look out into the night. The tent stood perched on the hillside. Long ranks of climbing pines stretched upwards from it to the scarped rocks which held up the snow-fields on the shoulders of the mighty peaks above. Thin white mist and the roar of water rose up from the shadowy gorge below, but in one place, where the rock walls which hemmed it in sloped down, a gossamer-like structure spanned the chasm. This was a wagon-road bridge Julius Savine, the contractor of large interests and well-known name, was building for the Provincial authorities, and on their surveyor's recommendation he had sub-let to Thurston the construction of a pass through which saw-logs and driftwood might slide without jamming between the piers. Savine, being pressed for time, had brought in a motley collection of workmen, picked up haphazard in the seaboard cities. After bargaining to work for certain wages, these workmen had demanded twenty per cent. more. Thurston, who had picked his own assistants carefully, among the sturdy ranchers, and had aided Savine's representative in resisting this demand, now surmised that the malcontents were meditating mischief. There were some mighty mean rascals among them, his foreman said.

"You're looking worried again," observed his companion, presently, and Thurston answered, "Perhaps I am. I wish Davies would run his logs down by daylight, but presumably the stream is too fast for him when the waters rise. It might give some of your friends yonder an opportunity, Summers."

"You don't figure they're capable of wrecking the bridge?" replied Summers, showing sudden uneasiness.

"One or two among them, including the man I had to thrash, are capable of anything. Perhaps you had better hail your watchman," Thurston said.

Summers blew a whistle, and an answer came back faintly through the fret of the river: "Plenty saw logs coming down. All of them handy sizes and sliding safely through."

"That's good enough," declared Summers. "I'm not made of cast-iron, and need a little sleep at times, so good-night to you!"

He departed with the cheerful confidence of the salaried man, and Thurston, who fought for his own interests, flung himself down on his trestle cot with all his clothes on. Neither the timber slide nor the bridge was quite finished, but because rivers in that region shrink at night when the frost checks the drainage from the feeding glaciers on the peaks above, the saw-miller had insisted on driving down his logs when there was less chance of their stranding on the shoals that cumbered the high-water channel. Thurston lay awake for some time, listening to the fret of the river, which vibrated far across the silence of the hills, and to the occasional crash of a mighty log smiting the slide. Hardly had his eyelids closed when he was aroused by a sound of hurried footsteps approaching the tent. He stood wide awake in the entrance before the newcomer reached it.

"There's a mighty big pine caught its butt on one slide and jammed its thin end across the pier," said the man. "Logs piling up behind it already!"

As he spoke somebody beat upon a suspended iron sheet down in the valley and drowsy voices rose up from among the clustered tents. Summers went by shouting, "Get a move on, before we lose the bridge!"

Five minutes later Thurston, running across a bending plank, halted on the rock which served as foundation for the main bridge pier. Beside him Summers shouted confused orders to a group of struggling men. The moonlight beat down mistily through the haze that rose from the river, and Geoffrey could see the long wedge-headed timber framing that he had built, beside the wing on the shore-side, so that any trunk floating down would cannon off at an angle and shoot safely between the piers. But one huge fir had proved too long for the pass, and when its butt canted, the other end had driven athwart the point of the wedge, after which, because the river was black with drifting logs, other heavy trunks drove against it and jammed it fast. Panting men were hard at work with levers and pike-poles striving to wrench the massive trunk clear, and one lighted an air-blast flare, whose red glare flickered athwart the strip of water foaming between the piers. It showed that some of the logs forced up by the pressure were sliding out above the others, while, amid a horrible grinding, some sank. One side of the river was blocked by a mass of timber that was increasing every moment. Thurston feared that the unfinished piers could not long withstand the pressure, and he remembered that his own work would be paid for only on completion. Nevertheless, he passed several minutes in a critical survey, and then glanced towards certain groups of dark figures watching for the approaching ruin.

"She'll go down inside an hour—that is certain, and Savine will lose thousands of dollars," said Summers, whose eyes were wide with apprehension. "I'm rattled completely. Can't you think of anything that might be done?"

"Yes!" answered Thurston, coolly. "It is, however, almost too late now. It could have been done readily, if the man who should have seen to it had not turned traitor. Hello! Where's Mattawa Tom?"

A big sinewy ax-man from the forests of Northern Ontario sprang up beside him, and Thurston said:

"I'm going to try to chop through the king log that's keying them. It's rather more than you bargained for, but will you stand by me, Tom?"

"Looks mighty like suicide!" was the dry answer. "But if you're ready to chance it, I'm coming right along."

The workmen had divided into two hostile camps, but there was a growl of admiring wonder from friends and foes alike when two figures, balancing bright axes, stood high up on the pier slides ready to leap down upon the working logs. Then disjointed cries went up: "Too late!" "You'll be smashed flatter than a flapjack when the jam breaks up!" "Get hold of the fools, somebody!" "Take their axes away!"

"I'll brain the first man who touches mine," threatened Thurston, turning savagely upon those who approached him with remonstrances, and there was a simultaneous murmur from all the assembly when the two adventurous men dropped upon the timber. The logs rolled, groaned, and heaved beneath them and Thurston, trusting to the creeper spikes upon his heels, sprang from one great tree trunk to another behind his companion, who had a longer experience of the perilous work of log-driving. Here a gap, filled with spouting foam, opened up before him; there a trunk upon which he was about to step rolled over and sank. But he worked his way forward towards the center of the fir which keyed the growing mass. This log was many feet in girth. Pressed down level with the water, it was already bending like a slackly-strung bow.

The example proved inspiring. Thurston's assistants were sturdy, fearless men, who often risked their lives in wresting a living from the forest, so several among them prepared to follow. Two seamen deserters sprang out from the ranks of the mutineers. One stalwart forest rancher, however, tripped his comrade up, and sat upon his prostrate form shouting, "You'll stop just where you are, you blame idiot! You couldn't do nothing if you got there. Hardly room for them two fellows already where they can get at the log!"

The remaining volunteers saw the force of this argument and when somebody increased the blast of the lamp so that the roaring column of flame leapt up higher, the men stood very still, staring at the two who had now gained the center of the partly submerged log.

It requires considerable practice to acquire full mastery of the long-hafted ax, but Thurston, who was stout of arm and keen of eye, had managed to earn his bread with it one winter in an Ontario logging camp. When he swung aloft the heavy wedge of steel, it reflected the blast lamp's radiance, making red flashes as it circled round his head. It came down hissing close past his knee. Mattawa Tom's blade crossed it when it rose, and the first white chip leapt up. More chips followed in quick succession until they whirled in one continuous shower, and the razor-edged steel losing definite form became a confused circling brightness, in the center of which two supple figures swayed and heaved. The red light smiting the faces of the two showed great drops of sweat, the swell of toil-hardened muscles on the corded arms, and the rise of each straining chest. There was not a clash nor a falter, but, flash after flash, the blades came down chunking into the ever-widening notch. Summers had seen sword play in Montreal armories, and had heard the ax clang often on the side of Western firs, but—for Thurston was fighting to stave off ruin—this grim struggle in the face of a desperate risk surpassed any remembered exhibition of fencers' skill with the steel. The trunk was bending visibly beneath the hewers, the river frothed more at their feet, and the giant logs were rolling, creeping, shocking close behind, ready to plunge forward when the partly severed trunk should yield.

Thurston felt as if his lungs were bursting, his heart throbbed painfully, and something drummed deafeningly inside his head. His vision grew hazy, and he could scarcely see the widening gap in the rough bark into which the trenchant steel cut. It was evident that the steadily increasing jam would rub the bridge piers out of existence long before any two men could hew half way through the great trunk, but, fortunately, the log was now bending like a fully-drawn bow, and the pressure would burst it asunder when a little more of its circumference had been chopped into. So, choking and blinded with perspiration, Geoffrey smote on mechanically, until the man from Mattawa said, "She's about busted."

Just then there was a clamor from the watchers on the piers. Men shouted, "Come back." "Whole jam's starting!" "King log's yielding now!" "Jump for your lives before the wreckage breaks away with you!"

Mattawa Tom leapt shorewards from moving log to log, but for a few moments Thurston, who scarcely noticed his absence, chopped on alone. Filled with the lust of conflict, he remembered only that it was necessary to make sure of victory before he relaxed an effort. Thrice more in succession he whirled the heavy ax above his head, while, with a sharp snapping of fibers, the fir trunk yielded beneath his feet. Flinging his ax into the river he stood erect, breathless, a moment too late. The logs behind the one which perilously supported him were creeping forward ready for the mad rush that must follow a few seconds later.

There remained now but one poor chance of escape and he seized it instinctively. Springing along the sinking trunk, he threw himself clear of it into the river, while running men jostled each other as they surged toward the side of the timber when he sank. A wet head broke the surface, a swinging left hand followed it. The swimmer clutched the edge of a loosely-fitted beam, and held it until strong hands reached down to him. Some gripped his wet fingers, some the back of his coat, one even clutched his hair. There was a heave, then a scramble, and, amid hoarse cheers, the rescued man fell over backwards among his rescuers.

Thurston, who stood up dripping, said, somewhat shakily: "Ah, you were only just in time! I'm vastly grateful to you all."

The last words were lost in a deafening crash as the jam broke up, and the giant logs drove through the opening, thrashing the river into foam. The tree-trunks ground against one another, or smote the slide casing with a thunderous shock; but the stone-backed timber stood the strain, and when the clamor of the passage of the logs ceased, a heavy stillness brooded over the camp as the river grew empty again.

Thurston sought out the man from Mattawa. Laying a wet hand upon his shoulder he said: "Thank you, Tom. I won't forget the assistance you rendered me."

"That's all right," answered the brawny ax-man, awkwardly. "I get my wages safe and regular, and I've tackled as tough a contract for a worse master before."

There was no chance for further speech. Davies, who owned the saw-mill lower down stream, reined in a lathered horse, close by. "Where have all my logs gone to?" he asked. "My foreman roused me to say only a few dozen had brought up in the boom, and as the boys were running them down by scores I figured they'd piled up against your bridge. I don't see any special chaos about here, though you look as if you had been in swimming; but what in the name of thunder have you done with the logs?"

"They're on their way down river," Thurston replied, dryly. "We had some trouble with them which necessitated my taking a bath. But see here, what made you turn a two-hundred-foot red fir loose among them?"

"I didn't," answered Davies, with a puzzled air. "The boys saw every log into standard lengths. We have no use for a two-hundred-footer and couldn't get her into the mill. Are you sure it wasn't a wind-blown log?"

"I saw the butt had been freshly cross-cut," declared Thurston with an ominous glitter in his eyes. "I understand you are pretty slack just now. As a favor, would you hire your chopping gang to me for a few days? I'll tell you why I want them later."

"I'll decide in a few minutes," he added, when Davies had told him what the cost would be. Turning towards Summers he said: "There may be several more big red firs growing handy beside the river, and I mean to prevent any more accidents of this kind in future. If your employer will not reimburse me, I will bear the cost myself. I would sooner spend my last dollar than allow any of these loafers to coerce me."

The workmen stood still, all of them curious, and a few uneasy. Raising one hand to demand attention, Thurston said: "A red fir was felled by two or three among you to-day, and launched down stream after darkness fell. I want the men who did it to step forward and explain their reasons to me."

"You're a mighty bold man," remarked Summers—who knew that, although few were actually dangerous, the malcontents outnumbered Thurston's loyal assistants.

Among the listeners nobody moved, but there was a murmuring, and all eyes were fixed upon the speaker, who, either by design or accident, leaned upon the haft of a big ax.

"I hardly expected an answer," he went on. "Accordingly, I'll proceed to name the men who I believe must know about this contemptible action, and notify them that they will be paid off to-morrow."

A tumult of mingled wrath and applause started when Thurston coolly called aloud a dozen names. One voice broke through the others: "We're working for Julius Savine, an' don't count a bad two-bits on you," it declared defiantly. "We'll all fling our tools into the river before we let one of them fellows go."

"In that case the value of the tools will be deducted from the wages due you," Thurston announced calmly. "After this notice, Julius Savine's representative won't pay any of the men I mention, whether they work or not; and nobody, who does not earn it, will get a single meal out of the cook shanty. I'll give you until to-morrow to make up your minds concerning what you will do." Aside to Davies he said: "I'll take your lumber gang in any case. Go back and send them in as soon as you can."

The assembly broke up in a divided state of mind. Although it was very late, little groups lingered outside the tents, and at intervals angry voices were heard. Summers set out for the railroad to communicate by telegraph with his employer, and Thurston retired to his tent, where he went peacefully to sleep. Awakening later than usual, he listened with apparent unconcern to Mattawa Tom, who aroused him, with the warning:

"It's time you were out. Them fellows are coming along for their money. The boys called up a big roll, as soon as the lumber gang marched in, and, though there was considerable wild talking, the sensible ones allowed it was no more use kicking."

"That's all right," averred Thurston, who paid the departing malcontents and was glad to get rid of them, knowing that the lumbermen, who were mostly poor settlers, had small sympathy with the mutineers and that he would have at least a balance of power. He set the men to work immediately lengthening the wing of the log slide and the wedge guards of the piers. He himself toiled as hard as any two among them, and, to the astonishment of all, completed the big task before the week was past.

"I hardly like to say what it has cost me, but no log of any length could jam itself in the new pass," he said to Summers.

"You're an enterprising man," was the answer. "Savine is a bit of a rustler, too, and you'll have a chance of explaining things to him to-morrow. I have had word from him that he's coming through."



CHAPTER VIII

A REST BY THE WAY

It was afternoon when Julius Savine, accompanied by Summers, had entered Thurston's tent. On the way from the railroad, Summers had explained to the contractor all that had happened. Geoffrey rose to greet Savine, glancing at his employer with some curiosity, for he had not met him before. Savine was a man of quick, restless movements and nervous disposition. The gray that tinged his long mustache, lightly sprinkled his hair, gave evidence of his fifty years of intense living. He was known to be not only a daring engineer, but a generally successful speculator in mining and industrial enterprises. Nevertheless, Geoffrey fancied that something in his face gave a hint of physical weakness.

"I have heard one or two creditable things about you, and thought of asking you to run up to my offices, but I'm glad to meet you now," said Savine with a smile, adding when Thurston made a solemn bow, "There, I've been sufficiently civil, and I see you would rather I talked business. I'm considerably indebted to you for the way you tackled the late crisis, and approve of the log-guard's extension. How much did the extra work cost you?"

"Here is the wages bill and a list of the iron work charged at cost," Thurston answered. "As I did the work without any orders you would be justified in declining to pay for it, and I have included no profit."

"Ah!" said Savine, who glanced over the paper and scribbled across it. Looking up with a twinkle in his eye, he asked: "Have you been acquiring riches latterly? My cashier will pay that note whenever you hand it in at Vancouver. I'll also endorse your contract for payment if you will give it me. Further, I want to say that I've been to look at your work, and it pleases me. There are plenty of men in this province who would have done it as solidly, but it's the general design and ingenious fixings that take my fancy. May I ask where you got the ideas?"

"In England," answered Geoffrey. "I spent some time in the drawing office of a man of some note." He mentioned a name, and Savine, who looked at him critically, nodded as if in recognition. The older man smiled when Thurston showed signs of resenting his inspection.

"In that case I should say you ought to do," Savine observed, cheerfully.

"I don't understand," said Thurston, and Savine answered:

"No? Well, if you'll wait a few moments I'll try to make things plain to you. I want a live man with brains of his own, and some knowledge of mechanical science. There is no trouble about getting them by the car load from the East or the Old Country, but the man for me must know how to use his muscles, if necessary, and handle ax and drill as well. In short, I want one who has been right through the mill as you seem to have been, and, so long as he earns it, I'm not going to worry over his salary."

"I'm afraid I would not suit you," said Geoffrey. "I'm rather too fond of my own way to make a good servant, and of late I have not done badly fighting for my own hand. Therefore, while I thank you, and should be glad to undertake any minor contracts you can give me, I prefer to continue as at present."

"I should not fancy that you would be particularly easy to get on with," Savine observed with another shrewd glance, but with unabated good humor. "Still, what you suggest might suit me. I have rather more work at present than I can hold on to with both hands, and have tolerably good accounts of you. Come West with me and spend the week end at my house, where we could talk things over quietly."

Geoffrey was gratified—for the speaker was famous in his profession—and he showed his feeling as he answered: "I consider myself fortunate that you should ask me."

"I figured you were not fond of compliments, and I'm a plain man myself," declared Savine, with the humor apparent in his keen eyes again. "I will, however, give you one piece of advice before I forget it. My sister-in-law might be there, and if she wants to doctor you, don't let her. She has a weakness for physicking strangers, and the results are occasionally embarrassing."

It happened accordingly that Thurston, who had overhauled his wardrobe in Vancouver, duly arrived at a pretty wooden villa which looked down upon a deep inlet. He knew the mountain valleys of the Cumberland, and had wandered, sometimes footsore and hungry, under the giant ramparts of the Selkirks and the Rockies, but he had never seen a fairer spot than the reft in the hills which sheltered Savine's villa, and was known by its Indian name, "The Place of the Hundred Springs."

For a background somber cedars lifted their fretted spires against the skyline on the southern hand. Beneath the trees the hillsides closed in and the emerald green of maples and tawny tufts of oak rolled down to a breadth of milk-white pebbles and a stretch of silver sand, past which clear green water shoaling from shade to shade wound inland. Threads of glancing spray quivered in and out among the foliage, and high above, beyond a strip of sparkling sea and set apart by filmy cloud from all the earth below, stretched the giant saw-edge of the Coast Range's snow.

The white-painted, red-roofed dwelling, with its green-latticed shutters, tasteful scroll work and ample, if indifferently swarded, lawns, was pleasant to look upon, but Thurston found more pleasure in the sight of its young mistress, who awaited him in a great cool room that was hung with deer-head trophies and floored with parquetry of native timber.

Helen Savine wore a white dress and her favorite crimson roses nestled in the belt. Though she greeted Geoffrey with indifferent cordiality, the girl was surprised when her eyes rested upon him. Thurston was not a man of the conventional type one meets and straightway forgets, and she had often thought about him; but, since the night at Crosbie Ghyll, his image had presented itself as she first saw him—ragged, hungry, and grim, a worthy descendant of the wild Thurstons about whom Musker had discoursed. Now, in spite of his weather-beaten face and hardened hands, he appeared what he was, a man of education and some refinement, and his resolute expression, erect carriage, and muscular frame, rendered lithe and almost statuesque by much swinging of the ax, gave him an indefinite air of distinction. Again she decided that Geoffrey Thurston was a well-favored man, but remembering Musker's stories, she set herself to watch for some trace of inherent barbarity. This was unfortunate for Geoffrey, because in such cases observers generally discover what they search for.

Geoffrey was placed beside Helen at dinner, and having roughed it since he left England, and even before that time, it seemed strange to him to be deftly waited upon at a table glittering with silver and gay with flowers. Mrs. Thomas Savine sat opposite him, between her husband and the host, and Helen found certain suspicions confirmed when Savine referred to the crushing of the strike. Previously, he had given his daughter a brief account of it.

"It was daringly done," said Helen, "but I wonder, Mr. Thurston, if you and others who hold the power ever consider the opposite side of the question. It may be that those men, whose task is evidently highly dangerous, have wives and children depending upon them, and a few extra dollars, earned hardly enough, no doubt, might mean so much to them."

"I am afraid I don't always do so," answered Geoffrey. "I have toiled tolerably hard as a workman myself. If any employe should consider that he was underpaid for the risk he ran, and should say so civilly, I should listen to him. On the other hand, if any combination strove by unfair means to coerce me, I should spare no effort to crush it!"

Thurston generally was too much in earnest to make a pleasant dinner-table conversationalist. As he spoke, he shut one big brown hand. It was a trifling action, and he was, perhaps, unconscious of it, but Helen, who noticed the flicker in his eyes and the vindictive tightening of the hard fingers, shrank from him instinctively.

"Is that not a cruel plan of action, and is there no room for a gentler policy in your profession? Must the weak always be trampled out of existence?" she replied, with a slight trace of indignation.

Thurston turned towards her with a puzzled expression. Julius Savine smiled, but his sister-in-law, who had remained silent, but not unobservant, broke in: "You believe in the hereditary transmission of character, Mr. Thurston?"

"I think most people do to some extent," answered Geoffrey. "But why do you ask me?"

"It's quite simple," said Mrs. Savine, smiling. "Did my husband tell you that when we were in England, we were held up by a storm there one night in your ancestral home? There was a man there who ought to belong to the feudal ages. He was called Musker, and he told us quaint stories about some of you. I fancy Geoffrey, who robbed the king's dragoons, must have looked just like you when you shut your fingers so, a few minutes ago."

"I am a little surprised," Geoffrey returned with a flush rising in his cheeks. "Musker used to talk a great deal of romantic nonsense. Crosbie Ghyll is no longer mine. I hope you passed a pleasant night there." Mrs. Savine became eloquent concerning the historic interest of the ancient house and her brother-in-law, who appeared interested, observed.

"So far, you have not told me about that particular adventure."

Again the incident was unfortunate for Geoffrey, because Helen, who had no great respect for her aunt's perceptions, decided that if the similitude had struck even that lady, she was right in her own estimation of Thurston's character.

"We heard of several instances of reckless daring, and we Colonials consider all the historic romance of the land we sprang from belongs to us as well as you," Mrs. Savine said. "So, if it is not an intrusion, may I ask if any of those border warriors were remarkable for deeds of self-abnegation or charity?"

"I am afraid not," admitted Geoffrey, rather grimly. "Neither did any of them ever do much towards the making of history. All of them were generally too busy protecting their property or seizing that of their neighbors! But, at least, when they fought, they seem to have fought for the losing side, and, according to tradition, paid for it dearly. However, to change the subject, is it fair to hold any man responsible for his ancestors' shortcomings? They have gone back to the dust long ago, and it is the present that concerns us."

"Still, can anybody avoid the results of those shortcomings or virtues?" persisted Helen, and her father said:

"I hardly think so. There is an instance beside you, Mr. Thurston. Miss Savine's grandfather ruled in paternally feudal fashion over a few dozen superstitious habitants way back in old-world Quebec, as his folks had done since the first French colonization. That explains my daughter's views on social matters and her weakness for playing the somewhat autocratic Lady Bountiful. The Seigneurs were benevolent village despots with very quaint ways."

Savine spoke lightly, and one person only noticed that the face of his daughter was slightly less pale in coloring than before, but that one afterwards remembered her father's words and took them as a clue to the woman's character. He discovered also that Helen Savine was both generous and benevolent, but that she loved to rule, and to rule somewhat autocratically.

The first day at the Savine villa passed like a pleasant dream to the man who had toiled for a bare living in the shadowy forests or knelt all day among hot rocks to hold the weary drill with bleeding fingers. Mr. Savine grew more and more interested in Geoffrey, who, during the second day, made great advances in the estimation of Mrs. Thomas Savine. Bicycles were not so common a woman's possession in Canada, or elsewhere, then. In fact, there were few roads in British Columbia fit to propel one on. An American friend had sent Miss Savine a wheel which, after a few journeys over a corduroy road, groaned most distressfully whenever she mounted it. Helen desired to ride in to the railroad, but the gaudy machine complained even more than usual, and when at last one of its wheels declined to revolve, Julius Savine called Geoffrey's attention to it.

"If you are anxious for mild excitement, and want to earn my daughter's gratitude, you might tackle that confounded thing, Mr. Thurston," he said. "The local blacksmith shakes his head over it, and sent it back the last time worse than ever, with several necessary portions missing. After running many kinds of machines in my time, I'm willing to own that this particular specimen defies me."

Thurston had stripped and fitted various intricate mining appliances, but he had never struggled with a bicycle. So, when Helen accepted his offer of assistance, he wheeled the machine out upon the lawn and proceeded light-heartedly to dismantle it, while the Savine brothers lounged in cane chairs, encouraging him over their cigars. The dismantling was comparatively simple, but when the time for reassembling came, Thurston, who found that certain cups could not by any legitimate means be induced to screw home into their places, was perforce obliged to rest the machine upon two chairs and wriggle underneath it, where he reclined upon his back with grimy oil dripping upon his forehead. Red in the face, he crawled out to breathe at intervals, and Helen made stern efforts to conceal her mingled alarm and merriment, when Thomas Savine said:

"Will you take long odds, Thurston, that you never make that invention of his Satanic Majesty run straight again?"

Mrs. Savine cautioned the operator about sunstroke and apoplexy. When Thomas Savine caught Helen's eye, both laughed outright, and Geoffrey, mistaking the reason, felt hurt; he determined to conquer the bicycle or remain beneath it all night. When at last he succeeded in putting the various parts together and straightened his aching back, he hoped that he did not look so disgusted, grimy and savage as he undoubtedly felt.

"You must really let it alone," said Helen. "The sun is very hot, and perhaps, you might be more successful after luncheon. I have noticed that when mending bicycles a rest and refreshment sometimes prove beneficial."

"That's so!" agreed Thomas Savine. "Young Harry was wont to tackle it on just those lines. He used up several of my best Cubanos and a bottle of claret each time, before he had finished; and then I was never convinced that the thing went any better."

"You must beware of ruining your health," interposed Mrs. Savine. "Mending bicycles frequently leads to an accumulation of malevolent humors. Did I interrupt you, Mr. Thurston?"

"I was only going to say that it is nearly finished, and that I should not like to be vanquished by an affair of this kind," said Geoffrey with emphasis. "Would it hurt the machine if I stood it upon its head, Miss Savine?"

"Oh, no, and I am so grateful," Helen answered assuringly, noticing guiltily that there were oil and red dust, besides many somber smears, upon the operator's face and jacket, while the skin was missing from several of his knuckles.

It was done at last, and Geoffrey sighed, while the rest of the party expressed surprise as well as admiration when the wheels revolved freely without click or groan. Julius Savine nodded, with more than casual approval, and Helen was gracious with her thanks.

"You look quite faint," observed Mrs. Savine. "It was the hot sun on your forehead, and the mental excitement. Such things are often followed by dangerous consequences, and you must take a dose of my elixir. Helen, dear, you know where to find the bottle."

Julius Savine was guilty of a slight gesture of impatience. His brother laughed, while Helen seemed anxious to slip away. Geoffrey answered:

"I hardly think one should get very mentally excited over a bicycle. I feel perfectly well, and only somewhat greasy."

"That is just one of the symptoms. Yes, you have hit it—greasy feeling!" broke in the amateur dispenser, who rarely relaxed her efforts until she had run down her victim. "Helen, why don't you hunt round for that bottle?"

"I mean greasy externally," explained Geoffrey in desperation, and again Thomas Savine chuckled, while Helen, who ground one little boot-heel into the grasses, deliberately turned away. Mrs. Savine, however, cheerfully departed to find the bottle, and soon returned with it and a wine glass. She filled the glass with an inky fluid which smelt unpleasant, and said to Geoffrey:

"You will be distinctly better the moment you have taken this!"

Geoffrey took the goblet, walked apart a few paces, and, making a wry face, heroically swallowed the bitter draught, after which Mrs. Savine, who beamed upon him, said:

"You feel quite differently, don't you?"

"Yes!" asserted Geoffrey, truthfully, longing to add that he had felt perfectly well before and had now to make violent efforts to overcome his nausea.

His heroism had its reward, however, for when Helen returned from her wheel ride, she said: "I was really ashamed when my aunt insisted on doctoring you, but you must take it as a compliment, because she only prescribes for the people she takes a fancy to. I hope the dose was not particularly nasty?"

"Sorry for you, Thurston, from experience!" cried Thomas Savine. "When I see that bottle, I just vacate the locality. The taste isn't the worst of it by a long way."

That night Julius Savine called Geoffrey into his study, and, spreading a roll of plans before him, offered terms, which were gladly accepted, for the construction of portions of several works. Savine said: "I won't worry much about references. Your work speaks for itself, and the Roads and Trails surveyor has been talking about you. I'll take you, as you'll have to take me, on trust. I keep my eye on rising young men, and I have been watching you. Besides, the man who could master an obstinate bicycle the first time he wrestled with one must have some sense of his own, and it isn't everybody who would have swallowed that physic."

"I could not well avoid doing so," said Geoffrey, with a rueful smile.

"I feel I owe you an apology, but it's my sister-in-law's one weakness, and you have won her favor for the rest of your natural life," Savine returned. "You have had several distinguished fellow-sufferers, including provincial representatives and railroad directors, for to my horror she physicked a very famous one the last time he came. He did not suffer with your equanimity. In fact, he was almost uncivil, and said to me, 'If the secretary hadn't sent off your trestle contract, I should urge the board to reconsider it. Did you ask me here that your relatives might poison me, Savine?'"

Geoffrey laughed, and his host added:

"I want to talk over a good many details with you, and dare say you deserve a holiday—I know I do—so I shall retain you here for a week, at least. I take your consent for granted; it's really necessary."



CHAPTER IX

GEOFFREY STANDS FIRM

Geoffrey Thurston possessed a fine constitution, and, in spite of Mrs. Savine's treatment and her husband's predictions, rose refreshed and vigorous on the morning that followed his struggle with the bicycle. It was a glorious morning, and when breakfast was over he enjoyed the unusual luxury of lounging under the shadow of a cedar on the lawn, where he breathed in the cool breeze which rippled the sparkling straits. Hitherto, he had risen with the sun to begin a day of toil and anxiety and this brief glimpse of a life of ease, with the pleasures of congenial companionship, was as an oasis in the desert to him.

"A few days will be as much as is good for me," he told himself with a sigh. "In the meantime hard work and short commons are considerably more appropriate, but I shall win the right to all these things some day, if my strength holds out."

His forehead wrinkled, his eyes contracted, and he stared straight before him, seeing neither the luminous green of the maples nor the whispering cedars, but far off in the misty future a golden possibility, which, if well worth winning, must be painfully earned. His reverie was broken suddenly.

"Are your thoughts very serious this morning, Mr. Thurston?" a clear voice inquired, and the most alluring of the visions he had conjured up stood before him, losing nothing by the translation into material flesh. Helen Savine had halted under the cedar. In soft clinging draperies of white and cream, she was a charming reality.

"I'm afraid they were," Geoffrey answered, and Helen laughed musically.

"One would fancy that you took life too much in earnest," she said. "It is fortunately impossible either to work or to pile up money forever, and a holiday is good for everybody. I am going down to White Rock Cove to see if my marine garden is as beautiful as it used to be. Would you care to inspect it and carry this basket for me?"

Thurston showed his pleasure almost too openly. They chatted lightly on many subjects as they walked together, knee-deep, at times, among scarlet wine-berries, and the delicate green and ebony of maidenhair fern. The scents and essence of summer hung heavy in the air. Shafts of golden sunlight, piercing the somber canopy of the forest isles, touched, and, it seemed to Geoffrey, etherealized, his companion. The completeness of his enjoyment troubled the man, and presently he lapsed into silence. All this appeared too good, too pleasant, he feared, to last.

"Do you know that you have not answered my last question, nor spoken a word for the last ten minutes?" inquired Helen with a smile, at length. "Have these woods no charm for you, or are you regretting the cigarbox beneath the cedar?"

Geoffrey turned towards her, and there was a momentary flash in his eyes as he answered:

"You must forgive me. Keen enjoyment often blunts the edge of speech, and I was wishing that this walk through the cool, green stillness might last forever."

Afraid that he might have said too much, he ceased speaking abruptly, and then, after the fashion of one unskilled in tricks of speech, proceeded to remedy one blunder by committing another.

"It reminds me of the evenings at Graham's ranch. There can surely be no sunsets in the world to equal those that flame along the snows of British Columbia, and you will remember how, together, we watched them burn and fade."

It was an unfortunate reference, for now and then Helen had recalled that period with misgivings. Cut off from all association with persons of congenial tastes, she had not only found the man's society interesting, but she had allowed herself to sink into an indefinite state of companionship with him. In the mountain solitude, such camaraderie had seemed perfectly natural, but it was impossible under different circumstances. It was only on the last occasion that he had ever hinted at a continuance of this intimacy, but she had not forgotten the rash speech. Had the recollections been all upon her own side she might have permitted a partial renewal of the companionship, but she became forbidding at once when Geoffrey ventured to remind her of it.

"Yes," she said reflectively. "The sunsets were often impressive, but we are all of us unstable, and what pleases us at one time may well prove tiresome at another. If that experience were repeated I should very possibly grow sadly discontented at Graham's ranch."

Geoffrey was not only shrewd enough to comprehend that, if Miss Savine unbent during a summer holiday in the wilderness, it did not follow that she would always do so, but he felt that he deserved the rebuke. He had, however, learned patience in Canada, and was content to bide his time, so he answered good-humoredly that such a result might well be possible. They were silent until they halted where the hillside fell sharply to the verge of a cliff. Far down below Thurston could see the white pebbles shine through translucent water, and with professional instincts aroused, he dubiously surveyed the slope to the head of the crag.

Julius Savine, or somebody under his orders, had constructed a zig-zag pathway which wound down between small maples and clusters of wine-berries shimmering like blood-drops among their glossy leaves. In places the pathway was underpinned with timber against the side of an almost sheer descent, and he noticed that one could have dropped a vertical line from the fish-hawk, which hung poised a few feet outside one angle, into the water. They descended cautiously to the first sharp bend, and here Geoffrey turned around in advance of his companion. "Do you mind telling me how long it is since you or anybody else has used this path, Miss Savine?" he inquired.

"I came up this way last autumn, and think hardly any other person has used it since. But why do you ask?" was the reply.

"I fancied so!" Geoffrey lapsed instinctively into his brusque, professional style of comment. "Poor system of underpinning, badly fixed yonder. I am afraid you must find some other way down to the beach this morning."

It was long since Helen had heard anybody apply the word "must" to herself. As Julius Savine's only daughter, most of her wishes had been immediately gratified, while the men she met vied with one another in paying her homage. In addition to this, her father, in whose mechanical abilities she had supreme faith, had constructed that pathway especially for her pleasure. So for several reasons her pride took fire, and she answered coldly: "The path is perfectly safe. My father himself watched the greater portion of its building."

"It was safe once, no doubt," answered Geoffrey, slightly puzzled as to how he had offended her, but still resolute. "The rains of last winter, however, have washed out much of the surface soil, leaving bare parts of the rock beneath, and the next angle yonder is positively dangerous. Can we not go around?"

"Only by the head of the valley, two miles away at least," Helen's tone remained the reverse of cordial. "I have climbed both in the Selkirks and the Coast Range, and to anyone with a clear head, even in the most slippery places, there cannot be any real danger!"

"I regret that I cannot agree with you. I devoutly wish I could," said Geoffrey, uneasily. "No! you must please go no further, Miss Savine."

The girl's eyes glittered resentfully. A flush crept into the center of either cheek as she walked towards him. Though he did not intend it, there was perhaps too strong a suggestion of command in his attitude, and when Helen came abreast of him, he laid a hand restrainingly upon her arm. She shook it off, not with ill-humored petulance, for Helen was never ungraceful nor undignified, but with a disdain that hurt the man far more than anger. Nevertheless, knowing that he was right, he was determined that she should run no risk. Letting his hand swing at his side, he walked a few paces before her, and then turned in a narrow portion of the path where two people could not pass abreast.

"Please listen to me, Miss Savine," he began. "I am an engineer, and I can see that the bend yonder is dangerous. I cannot, therefore, consent to allow you to venture upon it. How should I face your father if anything unfortunate happened?"

"My father saw the path built," repeated Helen. "He also is an engineer, and is said to be one of the most skillful in the Dominion. I am not used to being thwarted for inadequate reasons. Let me pass."

Geoffrey stood erect and immovable. "I am very sorry, Miss Savine, that, in this one instance, I cannot obey you," he said.

There was an awkward silence, and while they looked at each other, Helen felt her breath come faster. Retreating a few paces she seated herself upon a boulder, thus leaving the task of terminating an unpleasant position to Geoffrey, who was puzzled for a time. Finally, an inspiration dawned upon Thurston, who said:

"Perhaps you would feel the disappointment less if I convinced you by ocular demonstration."

Walking cautiously forward to the dangerous angle, he grasped a broken edge of the rock outcrop about which the path twisted, and pressed hard with both feet upon the edge of the narrow causeway. It was a hazardous experiment, and the result of it startling, for there was a crash and a rattle, and Geoffrey remained clinging to the rock, with one foot in a cranny, while a mass of earth and timber slid down the steep-pitched slope and disappeared over the face of the crag. A hollow splashing rose suggestively from far beneath the rock. Helen, who had been too angry to notice the consideration for herself implied in the man's last speech, turned her eyes upon the ground and did not raise them until, after swinging himself carefully onto firmer soil, Geoffrey approached her. "I hope, after what you have seen, you will forgive me for preventing your descent," he said.