"What built up the Western Dominion, called leagues of wheat from the prairie, and opened the gate of the mountains--opened it wide to all, with a welcome to the Pacific Slope paradise?" he said. "The conundrum's easy--just the railroad. Good markets and mills, say the city men, but where do the markets come in if you can't get at them? What is it that's binding London over the breadth of Canada with China and j.a.pan--only the level steel road. You said, 'We've gold and silver and timber, but we're wanting bread, machines, and men.' We said, 'We'll send the locomotives; it will bring you them;' and this railroad keeps its promise--keeps it every time. So we cut down the forest, and we blew up the mighty rocks, we drove a smooth pathway through the heart of the ranges--and now its your part to fill the freight cars to the bursting.

"We'll bring you good men in legions; we'll take out your high-grade ore, but you'll remember that the building of this railroad wasn't all luxury.

Some of those who laid the ties sleep soundly beside them, some lost their money, and now when you have thanked the leaders in Ottawa, Montreal, and Victoria, there are others to whom your thanks are due--the men who stayed right there with their contracts in spite of fire and snow, staking dollar after dollar on a terribly risky game. There were considerable of them, but most of you know this one--I'm sharing my laurels with him--" and as a thunder of applause which followed the halt he made died away he turned toward me. "Stand right up, Contractor Lorimer--they're shouting for you."

There was further clamor, but I scarcely heard it, and I longed that the floor of the hall might open beneath me. Still, there was clearly no escape, and I stood up under the lamplight, noticing, as one often notices trifles at such times, how like a navvy's my right hand was as it trembled a little on the white tablecloth. A sea of faces were turned toward me expectantly, and I pitied their owners' disappointment, but I saw only four persons plainly--my uncle, and Alice, who flashed an encouraging glance at me, Colonel Carrington looking up with a semi-ironical smile, and Grace. I could not tell what her expression meant.

I should sooner have faced a forest fire than that a.s.sembly, but at least my remarks were brief, and I felt on firmer ground when memories of the rock-barred track and the lonely camps rose up before me, and there was a shout at the lame conclusion, "We gave our bond and we tried to keep it, as the rest did too. We were poor men, all of us, and we are poor men still; but every one owes something to the land that gives him bread. So we tried to pay back a little, and perhaps we failed; but at least the road is made, and we look forward hoping that a full tide of prosperity will flow into this country along the rails we laid."

The applause swelled and deepened when Harry Lorraine stood up, silver-tongued, graceful, smiling, and called forth roars of laughter by his happy wit; and when he had finished Martin Lorimer, who was red in the face, stretched his arm across the table toward me, and held up a goblet, saying: "For the honor of the old country! Well done, both of you!"

"The fun is nearly over. We can talk business," said the gray-haired man from Winnipeg, on my right side. "I may say that we are satisfied with the way you have served us, and, though a bargain is a bargain, we don't wish to take an unfair advantage of any one; so the surveyor will meet you over the extras. He is waiting with the schedule, and by his advice we're open to let you this contract for hewn lumber supplies. Here's a rough memo; the quant.i.ty is large, and that is our idea of a reasonable figure."

I glanced at the paper with open pleasure, but the other checked me as I began to speak.

"Glad you will take it! It's a commercial transaction, and not a matter of thanks," he said. "Settle details with the surveyor."

I spent some time with the latter, who smiled dryly as he said, "Not quite cleaned out yet? Well, it's seldom wise to be too previous, and you can't well come to grief over the new deal. Wanted again, confound them! Sail in and prosper, Lorimer."

He left a payment order which somewhat surprised me, and when I stood under the stars wondering whether all that had happened was not too good to be true, Harry came up in search of me. I grabbed him by the shoulder and shook the paper before him.

"Our friend has acted more than fairly," I said. "We can pay off all debts, and I have just concluded a big new, profitable deal!"

"That will keep," said Harry, laughing; "another matter won't. They're going to haul out the visitors' picnic straight away, and they show good judgment. A sleeper on the main line will form a much more peaceful resting-place than this elated hamlet to-night. Your uncle wants to see you, and Miss Carrington is waiting beside the cars."

I found Alice and Martin Lorimer beside the track, the latter fuming impatiently, while the locomotive bell summoned the pa.s.sengers; and as I joined them Grace walked into the group before she recognized us. Alice was the first to speak, and I saw the two faces plainly under the lighted car windows, as she said:

"I am glad to meet you again, Miss Carrington, and am sorry I missed you this afternoon. I was too busy giving my cousin good advice--it's a privilege I have enjoyed from childhood--to recognize you at first."

Grace's expression changed, and I thanked Alice in my heart for what I believe few women would have done. Then there was a shriek of the whistle, and a bustle about the train; and as Grace moved toward the car she said softly in pa.s.sing:

"It was a fitting consummation. Better times are coming, Ralph, and I am proud of you."

"Am I never to speak to thee, lad?" said Martin. "There's nothing would please me better than to wait and see the fun out; but Alice, she won't hear of it. Come to see us, and stay a month if you can. Anyway, come to-morrow or the day after. I have lots to tell thee. Oh, hang them!

they're starting. Alice, wouldn't that lady take charge of thee while I stay back?"

"Get into the car, father," said the girl, with a laugh. "You mustn't forget you're the people's warden. Good-bye, Ralph, until we see you at the chalet."

"All aboard!" called a loud voice; the couplings tightened; and I waved my hat as, followed by a last cheer, the train rolled away.

"Is it true that all has been settled satisfactorily?" asked Harry, presently, and when I answered, he added: "Then we're going back to finish the evening. Johnston's to honor the company with stump speeches and all kinds of banjo eccentricities. You are getting too sober and serious, Ralph; come along."

I refused laughingly, and spent at least an hour walking up and down through the cool dimness that hung over the track to dissipate the excitement of a day of varied emotions. Then I went back to our shanty and slept soundly, until about daybreak I was partly wakened by the feasters returning with discordant songs, though I promptly went to sleep again. I never heard exactly what happened in the wooden town that night, but there was wreckage in its streets the next morning, and when I opened my eyes the first thing I saw was our partner Johnston slumbering peacefully with his head among the fragments of his shattered banjo.

CHAPTER XIX

A GENEROUS OFFER

It was late in the afternoon of the next day when Harry and I sat figuring in our shanty, while Johnston lay on a heap of cedar twigs sucking at his pipe and encouraging us languidly.

"I never could stand figures, and that's perhaps why I'm poor," he said.

"Go on, you are doing famously, and, though Ralph can't add up correctly to save his life, I'll take your word for it."

He formed a characteristic picture of the free lance as he lay there, bronzed and blonde-bearded, with his ma.s.sy limbs disposed in an att.i.tude of easy grace, awaiting the result with a careless unconcern until Harry flung a long boot at him as a signal for silence.

"As the surveyor told you, Ralph, we can't well lose money on this last venture, even if we wanted to," said Harry at length. "You'll observe I'm almost getting superst.i.tious. Now, on cashing the order, we can repay your loan, keeping back sufficient to meet emergencies, while with the rest one of us could return to Fairmead and plough every available acre for next spring's sowing. Many things suggest that you are the one to go. Johnston and I with the others could get the timber out during the winter--we have worked in the snow before--and I would join you in the spring. That, however, again raises a point that must be settled once for all. Are we to hold on to our first ambition, or turn contractors?"

Again there was a silence through which the roar of the river reached us brokenly, and for some minutes I breathed the smell of hot dust and resinous twigs that entered the open doorway.

"I hold on to the first," I said finally.

"And I stand by you," answered Harry.

Simultaneously we glanced at Johnston, who looked up with the same gay indifference he had manifested when we floundered half-fed, knee-deep in slush of snow. "I'll save you unpleasant explanations," he said. "I'm a stormy petrel, and the monotonous life of a farmer would pall on me, so I'll see you through the railroad contract, and then--well, I'll thank you for a s.p.a.ce of pleasant comradeship, and go on my way again. The mountain province is sufficiently good for me, and some day I'll find either a gold mine in it, or, more likely, a grave. If not, you can count on a visit whenever I am hard up and hungry."

The words were typical of the man, though their undercurrent of melancholy troubled me; but, for we knew he spoke the truth in regard to the farming, the matter was settled so. I should much have preferred that Harry return to Fairmead, but it was clear that the task most suited me. Perhaps Johnston guessed my reluctance, for he said playfully: "Is not banishment worse than snow slides or the high peak's frost, and what are all the flowers of the prairie to the blood-red rose of the valley that was grafted from Lancastrian stock?"

Thereupon Harry deftly dropped an almost-empty flour bag on his head, and the consultation broke up amid a cloud of white dust.

"This," remarked Johnston, "is the beginning of riches. Two days ago, he would have carefully swept up the fragments to make flapjacks."

Thus it came about that the next morning I boarded the main line express, and traveled first-cla.s.s with a special pa.s.s, while as luck would have it the conductor, who evinced an unusual civility when he glanced at the autograph thereon, was the same man I had worsted the memorable night when I arrived a penniless stranger on the prairie. "If you want anything in these cars, just let me know," he said.

"I will," I answered, thrusting back the wide-brimmed hat as I looked at him. "The last time we traveled together you were not so accommodating. We had a little dispute at Elktail one night in the snow."

"General Jackson!" exclaimed the conductor. "But you didn't travel with that name on your ticket then. Say, it was all a mistake and in the way of business. You won't bear malice?"

He vanished without awaiting an answer, and I leaned back on the cushions chuckling softly, after which, fishing out my pipe, I sank into a soothing reverie. There was no doubt that this kind of traveling had its advantages, and it appeared equally certain that I had earned a few days'

luxurious holiday, while, as the blue wreaths curled up, the towering pines outside the windows changed into the gaunt chimneys of smoky Lancashire. Then they dwindled to wind-dwarfed birches, and I was lashing the frantic broncos as they raced the hail for the shelter of a bluff, until once more it seemed to be autumn and a breadth of yellow wheat stood high above the prairie, while the rhythmic beat of wheels changed to the rattle of the elevators lifting in the golden grain. Here, however, roused by a scream of the whistle as the long train swept by a little station, I found that the pipe lay among feathery ashes on my knee, and an hour had pa.s.sed, while I knew that under the touch of sleep my thoughts had turned mechanically into the old channel.

It was toward noon when I left the cars at a station looking down upon a broad reach of sunlit river which wound past maples, willows, and a few clearings through a deep valley. Martin Lorimer and Alice met me on the platform, and his greeting was hearty.

"We have watched every train since we last saw you," he said. "Alice, though she won't own it, has been anxious, too. Never spent such an interesting time as I did up yonder, and we're going to make it pleasant for you here. Of course, you'll stay with us a week or two?"

The old man's face fell as I answered that time was pressing, and I must return the following day, while for some reason Alice turned her face aside, but she laughed pleasantly.

"Your uncle has been talking of nothing else the last two days," she said.

"I am glad I did not leave him with those wild men in the rejoicing city.

Some of them, however, seemed very nice. Meanwhile, I think lunch is waiting for us."

We reached the pretty chalet hotel, which was hardly completed then, though it is a famous resort now, and it was a new experience, after faring hardly on doughy flapjacks and reist.i.t pork of our own cooking, to sit at a well-ordered table covered with spotless linen. Still better did it seem to see Alice smiling upon me across the flowers in the gla.s.ses and sparkling silver, and Martin Lorimer's cheery face as, while he pressed the good things upon me, we chatted of old times and England. It is only through adversity and hardship that one learns to appreciate fully such an interlude.

My uncle had, however, not yet recovered his strength, and when later his eyes grew heavy Alice whispered that he usually slept in the heat of the afternoon, and I was glad to follow her into a garden newly hewn out of the forest. We sat there in scented shadow under the branches of giant redwoods, with the song of rippling water in our ears, and I remember taking Alice into my confidence about the mysterious loan. She listened with interest, and once more I noticed how ill she looked.

"You have more good friends than you think, Ralph; and it was of service to you, was it not?"