Chapter XI: Part 11

"So has Brooke. You needn't worry about that point."

Mrs. Devine's astonishment was very apparent. "Then whatever is he working at the mine for--and why didn't you tell me before?"

"I guess it's because that kind of thing pleases him, and, anyway, it's only since last mail came in I knew."

"You're quite sure, now?"

"I'll tell you what I heard. There was a man who bought up our stock in England when nobody else seemed to have any use for it. The directors wanted to know a little about him, and they found it was a trust account. He was taking up the stock for another man, who had been left quite a few dollars, and that man was called Harford Brooke. The executor, it seems, told somebody that the man he was buying for was here. Now, it's not likely there are two of them in this part of Canada."

The door, as it happened, was not closed, and Mrs. Devine was too intent to hear it swing open a little further. "The dollars," she said, "are by no means the most important consideration, but still----"

She stopped abruptly at a sound, and then turned round with a little gasp, for Barbara stood just inside the room. Then there was a disconcerting silence for a moment or two, until the girl glanced at Devine.

"Yes," she said, quietly. "I heard. When did Mr. Brooke buy that stock?"

Devine understood the question, and once more the twinkle crept into his eyes.

"Well," he said, "it was quite a while before they found the silver. I don't know what he did it for. Now, I guess I've been here longer than I meant to stay. You'll excuse me, Katty."

He seemed in haste to get away, and when the door closed behind him the two who were left looked at one another curiously. Mrs. Devine was evidently embarrassed.

"I suppose," she said, drily, "you don't know why Brooke bought those shares, either?"

"I think I do," said Barbara, with unusual quietness, though the color was very visible in her cheeks. "He had a reason----"

She stopped abruptly, and there was once more an awkward silence, until she made a little impulsive gesture.

"Oh!" she said, sharply now, "I feel horribly mean. He stayed there through the winter when they had scarcely anything to eat, and bought that stock when nobody else would have it or believed in the Dayspring. Then he risked his life to save the Canopus, and when he came down, worn out and ill, I had only hard words for him."

"Well," said Mrs. Devine, drily, "the sensation is probably good for you. You don't seem to remember that he also tried to jump the mine."

Barbara turned towards her with a little sparkle in her eyes. "Have you--never--done anything that was wrong?"

Mrs. Devine naturally saw the point of this, but while she considered her answer, Barbara, who had a good deal to think of, and scarcely felt equal to any further conversation just then, abruptly turned away. Glancing at her watch, she went straight to a room, from the window of which she could see the road to the depot, for she knew the Atlantic express would shortly start, and she had not been told that Brooke was not coming back. Exactly what she meant to say to him she did not know, but she felt she could not let him go without, at least, a slight expression of her appreciation of what he had done. She knew that he would value it, and that it would go far to blot out the memory of past unkindness. He had certainly meant to jump the Canopus, and deceived her shamefully, which was far harder to forgive, for the realization of the fact that she had bestowed rather more than friendliness upon a man who was unworthy of it had its sting, but she scarcely remembered that now. He had, it appeared, since then, sacrificed his fortune and broken down his strength, and that, considering the purpose which she fancied had impelled him, went a long way to condone his offences.

He, however, did not appear on the road, as she had expected; and she grew a trifle anxious when the tolling of a bell came up from the depot by the wharf as the big locomotive backed the long cars in. It was also significant that she did not notice that the room, which had no stove in it, was very cold. Then looking down she saw men with valises pass across an opening between the roofs and express wagons lurching along the uneven road. The train would start very soon, and there was at least one admission she must make, but the minutes were slipping by and still Brooke did not come. The man, it almost appeared, was content to go away without seeing her, though she felt compelled to admit that in view of what had passed at their last meeting this was not altogether astonishing. Still, the fact that he could do so hurt her, and she waited in a state of painful tension. A very few minutes would suffice for him to climb the hill, and even if there was no opportunity for an explanation, which now appeared very probable, a smile or even a glance might go a long way to set matters right.

The few minutes, however, slipped by as the rest had done, until at last the locomotive bell slowly clanged again, and the hoot of a whistle came up the hillside and was flung back by the pines. Then a puff of white smoke rolled up from the wharf, and Barbara turned away from the window with the crimson in her face as the cars swept through an opening between the clustering roofs. The train had gone, and the man would not know how far she had relented towards him. She could settle to nothing during the rest of the evening, and scarcely slept that night, though she naturally did not mention the fact when she and Mrs. Devine met at breakfast next morning. Instead, she took out a letter she had received a week earlier.

"It's from Hetty Hume, and the English mail goes out to-day," she said. "She suggests that I should come over and spend a few months with her. I really think we did what we could for her when she was here with the Major."

Mrs. Devine took the letter. "I fancy she wants you to go," she said. "She mentions that she has asked you several times already."

Barbara appeared reflective. "So she has," she said. "In fact, I think I'll go. The change will do me good."

"Well," said Mrs. Devine, "I suppose you can afford it, but if you indulge in many changes of that kind you're not going to have very much of a dowry."

"Do you think I need one?"

Mrs. Devine laughed as she glanced at her, but her face grew thoughtful again. "Perhaps in your case it wouldn't be necessary, and though it is a very long way, I fancy that you might do worse than go to England and stay there while Hetty is willing to keep you."

A little flush crept into Barbara's cheek, but she said quietly, "I think I'll start on Saturday."

She did so, and it came about one night while the big train she travelled by swept across the rolling levels of the Assiniboian prairie that Brooke sat in his shanty at the Dayspring with Jimmy, who had just come down from the range, standing in front of him. The freighter had still now and then a difficulty in bringing them provisions in, and whenever Jimmy found the persistent plying of drill and hammer pall upon him he would go out and look out for a deer, though it was not always that he came back with one. On this occasion he brought a somewhat alarming tale instead.

"A big snow-slide must have come along since I was up on that slope before, and gouged out quite a canyon for itself," he said. "Anyway, if it wasn't a snow-slide it was a cloudburst or a waterspout. They happen around when folks don't want them now and then."

"Come to the point," said Brooke. "I'm sufficiently acquainted with the meteorological perversities of the country."

"Slinging names at them isn't much use. I've tried it, and any one raised here could give you points at the thing. Now before I came to Quatomac I was staying up at the Tillicum ranch, and I'd just taken a new twelve-dollar pair of gum-boots off one night when there was a waterspout up the valley that washed me and Jardine out of the house. We sailed along until we struck a convenient pine, and sat in it most of the night while the flood went down. Then I hadn't any gum-boots, and Jardine couldn't find his house."

"I believe you told me you went down the river on a door on the last occasion," Brooke said, wearily. "Still, it doesn't greatly matter. What has all this to do with the hollow the snow-slide made in the range?"

"Well," said Jimmy, "I guess you know the way the big rock outcrop runs across the foot of the valley. Now, before the snow-slide or the waterspout came along the melting snow went down into the next hollow, and the one where the outcrop is got just enough to keep the outlet of the creek that comes through it open."

"I do. Will it be an hour or more before you make it clear how that concerns anybody?"

"No, sir. I'm getting right there. The snow's melting tolerably fast, and the drainage from the big peak isn't going the way it used to now. The foot of the valley's quite a nice-sized lake, and the stream has washed most of the broke-up pines the snow brought down into the outlet gully. I guess you have seen a bad lumber jam?"

Brooke had, and he started as he recognized the significance of what was happening, for once a drifting log strikes fast in a narrow passage the stream is very apt to pile up and wedge fast those that come behind into a tolerably efficient substitute for a dam, while when log still follows log the result is usually an inextricable confusion of interlocked timber.

"When the jam up broke we'd have the water and the wreckage down on the mine," he said.

"All there is of it," said Jimmy. "It would cost quite a pile of dollars to dry the workings out."

Brooke strode to the door and flung it open, but there was black darkness outside and a persistent patter of thick warm rain. Then he swung round with an objurgation and Jimmy grinned.

"I guess it's no use. You couldn't see a pine ten foot off, and there isn't a man in the country who would go down that gully with a lantern in his hand," he said. "Go off to sleep. You'll see quite as much as you want to, anyway, to-morrow."

Brooke stood still and listened a moment or two while the hoarse roar of a river which he knew was swirling in fierce flood among the boulders far down in the hollow came up in deep reverberations across the pines. It was a significant hint of what was likely to happen when the pent-up water poured down upon the mine. Still, there was nothing he could do in that thick darkness.

"Sleep!" he said. "When almost every dollar I have--and a good deal more than that--is sunk in the mine."

"Well," said Jimmy, reflectively, "in your place, if I could make sure of the dollars, I'd take my chances on the rest. Now and then I'm quite thankful I haven't any. It saves a mighty lot of worry."

He swung out of the shanty, and Brooke, who flung himself down on his couch of spruce twigs, endeavored to sleep, though he had no great expectation of succeeding. As it happened, he lay tossing or holding himself still by an effort the long night through, for he had set his whole mind on the prosperity of the Dayspring. A good deal of his small fortune was also sunk in it, though that was not of the greatest moment to him. He had a vague hope that when the mine was, through his efforts, pouring out high-grade ore, he might reinstate himself in Barbara's estimation. In that case, at least, she might believe in his contrition, for he felt that where protests were evidently useless deeds might avail. Then the dollars in question would be valuable to him.

It was two hours before the dawn, and still apparently raining hard, when he rose and lighted the stove. He felt a trifle dizzy and very shivery as he did it, but the frugal breakfast put a little warmth into him, and he went out into the thick haze of falling water and up the hillside, walking somewhat wearily and with considerably more effort than he had found it necessary to make a few months ago.

XXIX.

A FINAL EFFORT.

A dim, grey light was creeping through the rain when Brooke stopped on a ridge of hillside that broke off from the parent range above the mine. The pines were slowly growing into shape, though as yet they showed as mere spires of blackness in the sliding haze, and there was a faint glimmer in the hollow beneath him, while the sound of running water drowned the splashing of the rain. The snow upon the lower slopes had mostly melted now, though that on the great hill shoulders would swell the frothing rivers for months to come, and, sinking ankle-deep in quaggy mould, he went down through the dripping undergrowth until he stopped again on the verge of what had become in the last few days a muddy lake.

The wreckage of the higher forests was strewn upon it, but Brooke noticed that it drifted steadily in one direction, and floundering along the water's edge, he reached a narrow gully, which had served as outlet for the stream through the ridge that hemmed in the valley. The passage was, however, now choked by a mass of groaning timber, which was apparently growing every hour, and it already seemed scarcely possible to cut through that pile of wreckage by any means at his command. Once the pent-up water, which seemed rising rapidly, burst the jam, it would come down in an overwhelming torrent upon the mine, and he sat down on a fallen redwood to consider how the difficulty could be grappled with.

He, however, found it no easy matter to keep his mind upon the question at all. His head was aching, he felt unpleasantly limp, as well as wet and cold, and the distressful stiffness of his back suggested that he had by no means recovered from the effects of his fall. The long months of strenuous physical toil, the scanty, and, when the freighter could not get in, often wholly insufficient food, and exposure to bitter frost and snow, had left their mark on him, while now, worn out in mind and body as he was, he realized that a last grim effort was demanded from him. How it was to be made he did not know, and he was sitting still, shivering, with the rain running from him, when Jimmy and another man from the mine appeared. It was almost light now, and the miner glanced at the gathering water with evident concern.

"I guess something has got to be done," he said.

Brooke lifted himself shakily to his feet, and blinked in a curious, heavy fashion at the man.

"It has, and if you'll bring the boys up we'll make a start," he said. "Now I don't know that we could cut that jam, and if we did it would only turn the lake loose on the mine. What I purpose is to break a new cut through the rise where it's thinnest, and run enough water off to ease the pressure. Then we might, if it appeared advisable, get at the jam. In the meanwhile every man I can spare from here will start in cutting out a ten-foot trench at the mine. That would take away a good deal of any water that did come down."

"I've been at this kind of work 'most all my life, and that's 'bout how I would fix it," said the other man.

"Well," said Brooke, "there's just another point. Once you get started, you'll go right on, and there'll be very little sleep for any one until it's done, but we'll credit you with half extra on every hour's time in the pay-bill."

The man laughed and waved his hand. "You needn't worry 'bout that. I guess the boys will see you through," he said.

He disappeared into the rain, and the struggle commenced when he came back with the men. There were but a handful of them in all, and their task appeared almost beyond accomplishment, even to those born in a country where man and Nature unsubdued come to the closest grapple, and human daring and endurance must make head against the tremendous forces that unloose the rivers and slowly grind the ranges down. It is a continuous struggle, primitive and elemental, in which brute strength and the animal courage that plies axe and drill with worn-out muscle and bleeding hands plays at least an equal part with ingenuity, for man has arrayed against him sun and frost, roaring water, crushing ice, and sliding snow; and those who fall in it lie thick by towering trestle bridge and along each railroad track. Worn out, aching in every limb, and with heavy eyes, Brooke braced himself to bear his part in it.

For three days they toiled with pick and shovel and clinking drill, and the roar of the blasting charges shook the wet hillside, but while the trenches deepened slowly the water rose. By night the big fires snapped and sputtered, and the feeble lanterns blinked through the rain, while wild figures, stained with mire and dripping water, moved amidst the smoke, and those who dragged themselves out of the workings lay down on the wet ground for a brief hour's sleep. Brooke, however, so far as he could afterwards remember, did not close his eyes at all, and where his dripping figure appeared the shovels swung more rapidly, and the ringing of the drills grew a trifle louder. The pace was, however, too fierce to last, and, though even the men who work for another toil strenuously in that land, it was evident to him that while their task was less than half-done, they could not sustain it long.

Baffled in one direction, he had also changed his plans, for the ridge was singularly hard to cut through, even with giant powder, and he had withdrawn most of the men from it and sent them to the trench, which would, he hoped, afford a passage to, at least, part of the water that must eventually come down upon the mine. It was late on the third night when it became evident that this would very shortly happen, and he sat, wet through and very weary, in his tent on the hillside, when Jimmy and another man came in.

"Water's riz another foot since sundown, and I guess there's lakes of it ready to come down yonder," said the miner, who stretched out a wet hand, and pointed towards the dripping canvas above him, though Brooke surmised that he intended to indicate the range. "So far as I could make out, there's quite a forest of smashed-up logs sailing along to pile up in the jam."

Brooke lifted a wet, grey face, and blinked at him with half-closed eyes.

"Then I'm afraid there are only two courses open to us," he said. "We can wait until the jam breaks up, when there'll be water enough to fill the Dayspring up and wash the plant above ground right down into the canyon, or we must try to cut it now."

"And turn the lake loose on us with the trench 'bout half big enough to take it away?" said Jimmy.

"Yes," said Brooke, grimly. "You have a six-foot dam thrown up. I'm not sure it will stand, but it's a good deal less likely to do it when the lake is twice as big."

Jimmy looked at the other man, who nodded. "The boss is right," he said. "You can't stop to look for the nicest way out when you're in a blame tight place. No, sir, you've got to take the quickest one. When do you figure on starting on the jam, Mr. Brooke?"

"Now."

The man appeared astonished, and shook his head. "It can't be done in the dark," he said. "I guess nobody could find the king log that's keying up the jam, and though the boys aren't nervous, I'm not sure you'd get one of them to crawl down that gulley and over the live logs until it's light. They couldn't see to do anything with the axe anyway."

Brooke smiled drily. "Since they will not be asked to do it, that does not count. I purposed trying giant-powder, and going myself; that is, unless Jimmy feels anxious to come along with me."

"I don't," said Jimmy, with decision in his tone. "If it was anybody else, watching him would be quite good enough for me. Still, as it isn't, I guess I'll have to see you through."

"Thanks!" said Brooke. "You can let them know what to expect at the mine, Cropper. I'll want you to put the detonators on the fuses with me, Jimmy."

The other man went out, and the two who were left proceeded to nip down the fulminating caps on the strips of snaky fuse, after which they carefully embedded them in sundry plastic rolls, which looked very like big candles made of yellow wax. These they packed in an iron case, and then, carrying an axe and a big auger, went out of the tent. The rest of the men left at the ridge were waiting them, for every one understood the perilous nature of the attempt, though, as two men were sufficient for the work, there was nothing that they could do, and they proceeded in a body through the dripping undergrowth towards the gully. Here a big fire of resinous wood was lighted, and when at last the smoky glare flickered upon the wet rocks in the hollow, Brooke, who stripped to shirt and trousers, flung himself over the edge.

He dropped upon a little ledge, and made another yard or two down a cranny, then a bold leap landed him on a second ledge, and the groaning trunks were close beneath him when he dropped again. The glare of the fire scarcely reached him now, and Jimmy, who alighted close by him, looked up longingly at the flickering light above.

"It wasn't easy getting down, and I'd feel better if I knew just how we were going back," he said. "I guess it's not quite wise either to bang that can about on the rocks."

This was incontrovertible, for while giant powder, which is dynamite, is, with due precaution, comparatively safe to handle, and cannot be exploded without a detonator, so those who make it claim, it is still addicted to going off with disastrous results on very small provocation. Brooke, who had the case containing it slung round his back, was, however, looking down on the logs that stirred and heaved beneath him with the water spouting up through the interstices between. He could see them when the fire grew brighter.

"The king should not be far away, from the look of the jam," he said. "If we can't cut it, we may jar it loose. Giant powder strikes down. Let me have the axe."

Jimmy glanced at him, and shook his head, for Brooke's face showed drawn and grey in the flickering light.

"I'll do any chopping that's wanted, and be glad when I get you out of this," he said.

He dropped upon the timber, and the gap he splashed into closed up suddenly as he whipped out his leg. Then, with Brooke behind him, he crawled over the grinding logs, and by and by drove the point of the auger into one that seemed to run downwards through the midst of them. It was a good many feet in girth, and Brooke gasped heavily when he also laid hold of the auger crutch. The hole they made was charged with one of the yellow rolls, and, moving to a second log, they bored another, while the mass shook and trembled under them, and twice a great spout of water fell splashing upon them. The logs were apparently endued with vitality, for they moved under and over their fellows, and ground upon them with the pulsations of the stream that brought down fresh accessions and found a fresh channel that promptly closed again. The jam might resist the pressure for another week, or break up at any moment, and whirl down the gully in chaotic ruin. Still, with the rain beating down upon them, the pair toiled on until several sticks of explosive had been embedded, when Brooke rose very stiffly and straightened himself as he took a little case out of his pocket.

"I don't know that we've got the king, but the general shake-up ought to loosen it," he said. "Light your fuse, Jimmy, and then get up. I'll come in a moment or two, when I'm ready."

Jimmy looked up, and saw a cluster of dark figures outlined against the glow of the fire, for the men had crowded to the edge of the gully.

"Stand by to give us a lift up, boys," he said.

Then he turned away, and was rather longer than he liked persuading a damp match to ignite. The fuse, however, sparkled readily, and, groping his way across the logs, he clutched a ledge of rock. It was wet and slippery, and he slid back from it, hurting one arm, while, when he regained the narrow shelf, a voice was raised warningly above.

"Let her go," it said. "Jimmy's fuse will be on to the powder before you're through."

Jimmy turned, and dimly saw his comrade still apparently stooping over one of the logs.

"Have I got to come back and bring you?" he shouted.

Brooke stood up, and a faint sparkling broke out at his feet. "Go on," he said. "It's burning now."

Jimmy said nothing further. Those fuses were short, and he was anxious to be clear of the gully. Still, even though he decided to sacrifice the axe, it was not an easy matter to ascend the almost precipitous slope of slippery rock, and as he climbed higher the glare of the fire in his eyes confused him. He had, however, almost reached the top when there was a crash and a rattle of stones below him, and he twisted himself partly round, while a hoarse shout rang out.

"Get hold of him!" cried one of the men. "Oh, jump for it. He'll be over the ledge!"

For a moment Jimmy had a glimpse of a wet, white face, and a hand, apparently clinging to a cranny, and then the flicker of firelight sank and left him in black darkness. He did not understand exactly what had taken place, but it was unpleasantly evident that the fuses would soon reach the powder, while his comrade, whom he could no longer see, was apparently unable to ascend the gully.

"Can't you get him?" shouted somebody.

"Jump down. Put the fuses out!" said another man.

Jimmy was, fortunately, one of the slow men who usually keep their heads, and while he glanced down at the twinkling fuses in the dark pit beneath him, he swung up a warning hand.

"Light right out of that, boys. It can't be done," he said. "Hold on, partner. Let me know where you are--I'm coming along."

A faint shout answered him, and Jimmy made his way downwards until he could discern a dusky blur, which he surmised was Brooke, close beneath him. Taking a firm hold with one hand, he leaned down and clutched at it, and then, with every muscle strained, strove to drag his comrade up. Jimmy was a strong man, but Brooke, it seemed, was able to do very little to help him, and Jimmy's fingers commenced to slacken under the tension. Then Brooke, who made a convulsive flounder, lost the grip he had, and the arm Jimmy clung to was torn away from him. A dull sound that was unpleasantly suggestive rose from a ledge below, and there was silence that was more so after it.

Then while Jimmy leaned down, blinking into the darkness and ignoring the risk he ran, a yellow flash leapt out below, and there was a stunning detonation. It was followed almost in the same moment by another, and the solid rock seemed to heave a shiver, while the hollow was filled with overwhelming sound and a nauseating vapor. Giant-powder strikes chiefly downwards, which was especially fortunate for two men just then, but the rock was swept by flying fragments of shattered trunks, and Jimmy cowered against it half-dazed. Then another sound rose out of the acrid haze as the rent trunks crushed beneath the pressure, and there was an appalling grinding and smashing of timber. It was succeeded by a furious roar of water.

A minute had probably slipped by when once more a man who showed faintly black against the firelight leaned over the edge of the gully, and his voice reached Jimmy brokenly.

"Hallo! Are either of you alive?" he cried.

Jimmy roused himself with an effort. "Well," he said, hoarsely, "I guess I am. I don't quite know whether Brooke is."

"Then I'm coming down," said the other man. "We have got to get him out of the stink if there's anything left of him."

Jimmy grasped the necessity for this, since the fumes of giant-powder are in confined spaces usually sufficient to prostrate a strong man, and several of his comrades apparently came down instead of one, bringing lanterns and blazing brands with them. There was a slippery ledge a little lower down the gully, and while the nauseating vapor eddied about them and the shattered wreckage went thundering past below, they made their way along it until they came on Brooke.

He was lying partly up on the ledge with his feet in the swirling torrent and his shirt rent open. There was a big red smear on it, his lips were bloodless, and one arm was doubled limply under him. Jimmy stooped and shook him gently, but Brooke made no sign, and his head sank forward until his face was hidden. Then Jimmy, who slipped his hand inside the torn shirt, withdrew it, smeared and warm, with a little shiver.

"He's bleeding quite hard, and that shows there's life in him. We have got to get him out of this right now," he said.

None of them quite remembered how they did it, for few men unaccustomed to the ranges would have cared to ascend that gully unencumbered by daylight, but it was accomplished, and when a litter of fir branches had been hastily lashed together they plodded behind it in silence down the hillside. If anything could be done, and they were very uncertain on that point, it could only be done in the shanty.

As they floundered down the trail a man met them with the news that very little of the water had got into the mine, but that did not appear of much importance to any one just then. After all, the Dayspring belonged to an English company, and it was Brooke, who lay in the litter oblivious of everything, they had worked for.

XXX.

THE OTHER CHANCE.

The blink of sunlight was pleasantly warm where Barbara sat with Hetty Hume on a seat set back among the laurels which just there cut off the shrewd wind from the English lawn. A black cloud sailed slowly over the green hilltop behind the old grey house, and the close-cropped grass was sparkling still with the sprinkle of bitter rain, but the scent of the pale narcissus drifted up from the borders and the sticky buds of a big chestnut were opening overhead. Barbara glanced across the sweep of lawn towards the line of willows that swung their tasseled boughs above the palely flashing river. They were apparently dusted with silver and ochre, and here and there a flush of green chequered the ridge of thorn along the winding road that led the eye upwards to the clean-cut edge of the moor. It was, however, a regular, even line, cropped to one unvarying level save for the breaks where the neat gates were hung; the road was smooth and wide, with a red board beside the wisp of firs above to warn all it might concern of the gradient; while the square fields with the polled trees in the trim hedgerows all conveyed the same impression. This was decorous, well-ordered England, where Nature was broken to man's dominion centuries ago. As she glanced at it her companion laughed.

"The prospect from here is, I believe, generally admitted to be attractive, though I have not noticed any of my other friends spend much time in admiring it," she said. "Still, perhaps it is different in your case. You haven't anything quite like it in Canada."

"No," said Barbara. "Anyway, not between Quatomac and the big glacier. You remember that ride?"

"Of course!" said Hetty Hume. "I found it a little overwhelming. That is, the peaks and glaciers. I also remember the rancher. The one who played the violin. I suppose you never came across him again?"

"I met him once or twice. At a big concert--and on other occasions."

Barbara's smile was indifferent, but she was silent for the next minute or two. She had now spent several weeks in England, and had found the smooth, well-regulated life there pleasant after the restless activity of the one she had led in Western Canada, where everybody toiled feverishly. She felt the contrast every day, and now the sight of that softly-sliding river, whose low murmur came up soothingly across the lawn, recalled the one that frothed and foamed amidst the Quatomac pines, and the roar that rose from the misty canyon. That, very naturally, also brought back the face of the flume-builder, and she wondered vaguely whether he was still at the Dayspring, and what he was doing then, until her companion turned to her again.

"We will really have to decide about the Cruttendens' dance to-night," she said. "It will be the last frivolity of the season in this vicinity."

"I haven't met Mrs. Cruttenden, have I?" said Barbara, indifferently.

"You did, when you were here before. Don't you remember the old house you were so pleased with lower down the valley? In any case, she remembers you, and made a point of my bringing you. Cruttenden has a relative in your country, though I never heard much about the man."

Barbara remembered the old building very well, and it suddenly flashed upon her that Brooke had on one occasion displayed a curious acquaintance with it. Everything that afternoon seemed to force him upon her recollection.

"You would like to go?" she said.

"I, at least, feel I ought to. We are, of course, quite newcomers here. In fact, we had only bought Larchwood just before you last came over, and it was Mrs. Cruttenden who first took us up. One may live a very long while in places of this kind without being admitted within the pale, you see, and even the rank of Major isn't a very great warranty, especially if it has been gained in foreign service instead of Aldershot."

Miss Hume stopped as her father came slowly down the pathway with a grey-haired lady, whose dress proclaimed her a widow, and the latter's voice reached the girl's clearly. Her face was, so Barbara noticed, very expressive as she turned to her companion.

"I think you know what I really came for," she said. "I feel I owe you a very great deal."

Major Hume made a little deprecatory gesture. "I have," he said, "at least, seen the papers, and was very glad to notice that Reggie has got his step. He certainly deserved it. Very plucky thing, especially with only a handful of a raw native levy to back him. Frontal attack in daylight--and the niggers behind the stockade seem to have served their old guns astonishingly well!"

"Still, if it had not been for your forbearance he would never have had the opportunity of doing it," said the lady. "I shall always remember that. You were the only one who made any excuse for him, and he told me his colonel was very bitter against him."

The pair passed the girls, apparently without noticing them, and Barbara did not hear Major Hume's answer, but when he came back alone a few minutes later he stopped in front of them.

"You were here when we went by?" he said.

"Yes," said Hetty. "We heard you quite distinctly, too, and that suggests a question. What was it Reggie Ferris did?"

Major Hume smiled drily. "Stormed a big rebel stockade with only a few half-drilled natives to help him. If you haven't read it already I can give you a paper with an account of the affair."

"That," said Hetty, "is, as you are aware, not what I wished to ask. What was it he did before he left the line regiment? It was, presumably, something not especially creditable--and I always had an idea that he owed it to you that the result was not a good deal more unpleasant."

The Major appeared a trifle embarrassed. "I scarcely think it would do you very much good to know," he said. "The thing wasn't a nice one, but there was good stuff in the lad, who, it was evident to me, at least, had been considerably more of a fool than a rogue, and all I did was to persuade the Colonel, who meant to break him, to give him another chance. It seems I was wise. Reggie Ferris has had his lesson, and has from all accounts retrieved his credit in the Colonial service."

"If I remember correctly you once made a bad mistake in being equally considerate to another man," said Hetty, reflectively.

"I certainly did, but you will find by the time you are as old as I am that taking it all round it is better to be merciful."

"The Major," said Hetty, with a glance at Barbara, "is a confirmed optimist--and he has been in India."

Major Hume smiled. "Well," he said, "the mistakes one makes from that cause hurt one less afterwards than the ones that result from believing in nobody. Now, there was that young woman who was engaged to Reggie----"

"He has applied the suggestive epithet to her ever since she gave him up," said Hetty. "Still, I really don't think anybody could have expected very much more from her."

"No," said the Major, grimly. "In my opinion she went further than there was any particular necessity for her to do. She knew the man's shortcomings when she was engaged to him--and she should have stuck to him. You don't condemn any one for a single slip in your country, Miss Heathcote?"

Barbara made no answer, for this, it seemed, was just what she had done, but Hetty, who had been watching her, laughed.

"You couldn't expect her to admit that their standard in Canada is lower than ours," she said.

The Major appeared disconcerted. "That is not exactly what I mean. They have a little more charity yonder, and, in some respects, a good deal more sense. From one or two cases I am acquainted with they are, in fact, usually willing to give the man who trips another chance instead of falling upon him mercilessly before he can get up."

"Still you haven't told us yet what Reggie Ferris did."

Major Hume laughed as he turned away. "I am," he said, "quite aware of it."

He left them, and Hetty smiled as she said, "The Major has not infrequently been imposed upon, but nothing will disabuse him of his cheerful belief in human nature, and I must admit that he is quite as often right as more censorious people. There was Lily Harland who gave Reggie Ferris up, which, of course, was probably only what he could have expected under the circumstances, but Reggie, it appears, is wiping out the past, and I have reasons for surmising that she has been sorry ever since. Nobody but my father and his mother ever hear from him now, and if that hurts Lily she has only herself to blame. She had her opportunity of showing what faith she had in the man, and can't expect to get another just because she would like it."

She wondered why the warm color had crept into her companion's face, but Barbara said nothing, and vacantly watched the road that wound up through the meadows out of the valley, until a moving object appeared where it crossed the crest of the hill. In the meanwhile her thoughts were busy, for the Major's suggestive little story had not been without its effect on her, and the case of Reggie Ferris was, it seemed, remarkably similar to that of a certain Canadian flume-builder. The English soldier and Grant Devine had both been charitable, but she and the girl who was sorry ever since had shown themselves merciless, and there was in that connection a curious significance in the fact that Reggie Ferris, who was now brilliantly blotting out the past, wrote nobody but his mother and the man who had given him what the latter termed another chance. Barbara remembered the afternoon when she waited at the window and Brooke, who, she fancied, could have done so had he wished, had not come up from the depot. She could not ignore the fact that this had since occasioned her a vague uneasiness.

In the meanwhile the moving object had been growing larger, and when it reappeared lower down the road resolved itself into a gardener who had been despatched to the nearest village on a bicycle.

"We will wait until Tom brings in the letters," said Hetty.

It was a few minutes later when the man came up the path and handed her a packet. Among the letters she spread out there was one for Barbara, whose face grew suddenly intent as she opened it. It was from Mrs. Devine, and the thin paper crackled under her tightening fingers as she read:--

"I have been alone since I last wrote you, as Grant had to go up to the Dayspring suddenly and has not come back. There was, I understand, a big flood in the valley above the mine, and Brooke, it seems, was very seriously hurt when endeavoring to protect the workings. I don't understand exactly how it happened, though I surmise from Grant's letters that he did a very daring thing. He is now in the Vancouver hospital, for although Grant wished him brought here, the surgeon considered him far too ill to move. His injuries, I understand, are not very serious in themselves, but it appears that the man was badly worn out and run down when he sustained them, and his condition, I am sorry to say, is just now very precarious."

The rest of the letter concerned the doings of Barbara's friends in Vancouver, but the girl read no more of it, and sat still, a trifle white in the face, with her hands trembling, until Hetty turned to her.

"You don't look well," she said. "I hope nothing has happened to your sister or Mr. Devine?"

"No," said Barbara, quietly, though there was a faint tremor in her voice. "They are apparently in as good health as usual."

"I'm glad to hear it," said Hetty, with an air of relief. "There is, of course, nobody else, or I should have known it, though you really seem a trifle paler than you generally do. Shall we go in and look through these patterns? I have been writing up about some dress material, and they've sent cuttings. Still, I don't suppose you will want anything new for Mrs. Cruttenden's?"

"No," said Barbara, in a voice that was almost too even now, and not in keeping with the tension in her face. "In fact, I'm not going at all."

Hetty glanced at her sharply, and then made a little gesture of comprehension.

"Very well!" she said. "Whenever you feel it would be any consolation you can tell me, but in the meanwhile I have no doubt that you can get on without my company."

She moved away, and Barbara, who was glad to be alone, sat still, for she wished to set her thoughts in order. This was apparently the climax all that had passed that afternoon had led up to, but she was just then chiefly conscious of an overwhelming distress that precluded any systematic consideration of its causes. The man whom she had roused from his lethargy at the Quatomac ranch was now, she gathered, dying in the Vancouver hospital, but not before he had blotted out his offences by slow endurance and unwearying effort in the face of flood and frost. She would have admitted this to him willingly now, but the opportunity was, it seemed, not to be afforded her, and the bitter words with which she had lashed him could never be withdrawn. She who had shown no mercy, and would not afford him what Major Hume had termed another chance, must, it seemed, long for it in vain herself.

By degrees, however, her innate resolution rose against that decision, and she remembered that it was not, in point of time, at least a very long journey to British Columbia. There was nothing to prevent her setting out when it pleased her; and then it occurred to her that the difficulties would be plentiful at the other end. What explanation would she make to her sister, or the man, if--and the doubt was horrible--he was, indeed, still capable of receiving it? He had never in direct speech offered her his love, and she had not even the excuse of the girl who had given Reggie Ferris up for throwing herself at his feet. She was not even sure that she could have done it in that case, for her pride was strong, and once more she felt the hopelessness of the irrevocable. She had shown herself hard and unforgiving, and now she realized that the man she loved--and it was borne in upon her, that in spite of his offences she loved him well--was as far beyond her reach as though he had already slipped away from her into the other world at whose shadowy portals he lay in the Vancouver hospital.

There had been a time, indeed the occasion had twice presented itself, when she could have relented gracefully, but she could no longer hope that it would ever happen again, and it only remained for her to face the result of her folly, and bear herself befittingly. It would, she realized, cost her a bitter effort, but the effort must be made, and she rose with a tense white face and turned towards the house. Hetty, as it happened, met her in the hall, and looked at her curiously.

"There are, as you may remember, two or three people coming in to dinner," she said. "I have no doubt I could think out some excuse if you would sooner not come down."

"Why do you think that would please me?" said Barbara, quietly.

"Well," said Hetty, a trifle drily, "I fancied you would sooner have stayed away. Your appearance rather suggested it."

Barbara smiled in a listless fashion. "I'm afraid I can't help that," she said. "Your friends, however, will presumably not be here for an hour or two yet."

Hetty made no further suggestions, and Barbara moved on slowly towards the stairway. She came of a stock that had grappled with frost and flood in the wild ranges of the mountain province, and courage and steadfastness were born in her, but she knew there was peril in the slightest concession to her gentler nature she might make just then. What she bore in the meanwhile she told nobody, but when the sonorous notes of a gong rolled through the building she came down the great stairway only a trifle colder in face than usual, and immaculately dressed.

XXXI.

BROOKE IS FORGIVEN.

It was a pleasant morning, and Brooke lay luxuriating in the sunlight by an open window of the Vancouver hospital. His face was blanched and haggard, and his clothes hung loosely about his limbs, but there was a brightness in his eyes, and he was sensible that at last his strength was coming back to him. Opposite him sat Devine, who had just come in, and was watching him with evident approbation.

"You will be fit to be moved out in a day or two, and I want to see you in Mrs. Devine's hands," he said. "We have a room fixed ready, and I came round to ask when the doctor would let you go."

Brooke slowly shook his head. "You are both very kind, but I'm going back to the Old Country," he said. "Still, I don't know whether I shall stay there yet."

Devine appeared a trifle disconcerted. "We had counted on you taking hold again at the Dayspring," he said. "Wilkins is getting an old man, and I don't know of any one who could handle that mine as you have done. Quite sure there's nothing I could do that would keep you?"

Brooke lay silent a moment or two. He was loth to leave the mine, but during his slow recovery at the hospital a curious longing to see the Old Country once more had come upon him. He could go back now, and, if it pleased him, pick up the threads of the old life he had left behind, though he was by no means sure this would afford him the satisfaction he had once anticipated. The ambition to prove his capabilities in Canada had, in the meanwhile, at least, deserted him since his last meeting with Barbara, and he had heard from Mrs. Devine that it would probably be several months before she returned to Vancouver. He realized that it was she who had kept him there, and now she had gone, and the mine was, as Devine had informed him, exceeding all expectations, there was no longer any great inducement to stay in Canada. He had seen enough of the country, and, of late, a restless desire to get away from it had been growing stronger with every day of his recovery. It might, he felt, be easier to shake off the memory of his folly in another land.

"No," he said, slowly, "I don't think there is. I feel I must go back, for a while, at least."

"Well," said Devine, who seemed to recognize that protests would be useless, "it's quite a long journey. I guess you can afford it?"

Brooke felt the keen eyes fixed on him with an almost disconcerting steadiness, but he contrived to smile.

"Yes," he said, "if I don't do it too extravagantly, I fancy I can."

"Then there's another point," said Devine, with a faint twinkle in his eyes. "You might want to do something yonder that would bring the dollars in. Now, I could give you a few lines that would be useful in case you wanted an engagement with one of your waterworks contractors or any one of that kind."

"I scarcely think it will be necessary," said Brooke, with a little smile.

"Well," said Devine, "I have a notion that it's not going to be very long before we see you back again. You have got used to us, and you're going to find the folks yonder slow. I can think of quite a few men who saved up, one or two of them for a very long while, to go home to the Old Country, and in about a month they'd had enough of it. The country was very much as they left it--but they had altered."

He stopped a moment, with a little chuckle, before he continued. "Now, there was Sandy Campbell, who ran the stamps at the Canopus for me. He never spent a dollar when he could help it, and, when he'd quite a pile of them, he told me he was just sickening for a sight of Glasgow. Well, I let him go, and that day six weeks Sandy came round to the mine again. The Old Country was badly played out, he said, but, for another month, that was all he would tell me, and then the facts came out. Sandy's friends had met him at the Donaldson wharf, and started a circus over the whisky. Somebody broke the furniture, and Sandy doubled up a policeman who, he figured, had insulted him, so they had him up for doing it before whatever they call a magistrate in that country. Sandy's remarks were printed in a Glasgow paper, and he showed it me.