Nasmyth looked embarra.s.sed, but next moment Wisbech laid a hand upon his shoulder.

"Derrick," he said simply, "if you had closed with my offer, I wouldn't have blamed you, but I'd have felt I had done my duty then, and I'd never have made you another. As it is, when things are going wrong, all you have to do is to send a word to me."

Then, to the relief of his companions, Acton, whose expression changed suddenly, broke in again. "Well," he commented, "I'm not quite sure that Miss Hamilton will look at the thing from Nasmyth's point of view. I guess we'll leave him to explain it to her and Mrs. Acton."

Nasmyth fancied that the explanation would not be an easy task. In fact, it was one he shrank from, but it had to be undertaken, and, leaving the others, he went back to the drawing-room. Violet Hamilton was surrounded by several companions, and he did not approach her until she glanced at him as she slipped out into the big cedar hall.

She sat down on a lounge near the fire, and he leaned upon the arm of it, looking down on her with grave misgivings. He recognized that it was scarcely reasonable to expect that she would be satisfied with the decision he had made.

"You have seen your uncle and Acton?" she asked.

"Yes," answered Nasmyth; "I have something to tell you."

The girl turned towards him quickly. "Ah!" she said, "you are not going to do what they proposed?"

"I'm sorry the thing they suggested was out of the question. You will let me tell you what it was?"

Violet made a sign of a.s.sent, and Nasmyth spoke quietly for a minute or two. Then a faint flush crept into the girl's cheeks and a sparkle into her eyes.

"You said no!" she interrupted.

"I felt I had to. There seemed no other course open to me."

Violet looked at him in evident bewilderment, and Nasmyth spoke again deprecatingly. "You see," he explained, "I felt I had to keep faith with those ranchers."

"Didn't it occur to you that you had also to keep faith with me?" she inquired sharply.

"I think that was the one thing I was trying to do."

Violet showed no sign of comprehension, and it was borne in upon Nasmyth then that, in her place, Laura Waynefleet would have understood the motives that had influenced him, and applauded them.

"My dear," he said, "can't you understand that you have laid an obligation on me to play a creditable part? I couldn't turn my back on my comrades now that they have mortgaged their possessions, and, though I think Gordon or one of the others could lead them as well as I could, when I asked them to join me, I tacitly pledged myself to hold on until we were crushed or had achieved success."

He looked at her wistfully when he stopped speaking; but she made a gesture of impatience.

"The one thing clear to me is that if you had done what Mr. Acton suggested you could have lived in Victoria, and have seen me almost whenever you wished," she declared. "Some of those ranchers must know a good deal more about work of the kind you are doing than you do, and, if you had explained it all to them, they would have released you."

Nasmyth sighed. Apart from the obligation to his comrades, there were other motives which had influenced him. He vaguely felt that it was inc.u.mbent on him to prove his manhood in this arduous grapple with Nature, and, after a purposeless life, to vindicate himself. The wilderness, as Gordon had said, had also gotten hold of him, and that described what had befallen him reasonably well. There are many men, and among them men of education, in those Western forests who, having once taken up the axe and drill, can never wholly let them go again.

These men grow restless and morose in the cities, which seldom hold them long. The customs of civilization pall on them, and content comes to them only when they toil knee-deep in some frothing rapid, or hew the new waggon-road through a stupendous forest. Why this should be they do not exactly know, and very few of them trouble themselves about the matter. Perhaps it is a subconscious recognition of the first great task that was laid on man to subdue the earth and to make it fruitful. Nasmyth, at least, heard the river. Its hoa.r.s.e roar rang insistently in his ears, and he braced himself for the conflict that must be fought out in the depths of the canon. These, however, were feelings that he could not well express, and once more he doubted Violet's comprehension.

"My dear," he told her humbly, "I am sorry; but there was, I think, only one thing I could do."

Violet, looking up, saw that his face was stern, and became sensible of a faint and perplexing repulsion from him. His languid gracefulness had vanished, and he was no longer gay or amusing. A rugged elemental forcefulness had come uppermost in him, and this was a thing she did not understand. Involuntarily she shrank from this grave, serious man.

There was a disfiguring newly healed cut on one of his cheeks, and his hand was raw and horribly scarred.

"You have changed since you were last here," she said, looking at him with disapproval. "Perhaps you really are a little sorry to leave me, but I think that is all. At least, you will not be sorry to get back to the canon."

Nasmyth started a little. It was a thing that he would at one time certainly not have expected, but he realized now that he was driven by a fierce impatience to get back to the work he had undertaken.

"I think that is not astonishing in one respect," he replied. "I told you why I feel that I must carry the project through. The sooner I am successful, the sooner I can come back to you."

The girl laughed somewhat bitterly. "If you would only be sensible, you need not go away. Are you quite sure it is not the project that comes first with you?" she questioned.

Nasmyth felt the blood creep into his face, for it suddenly dawned on him that the suggestion she had made was to some extent warranted.

"My dear," he answered quietly, "you must try to bear with me."

Violet rose. "Well," she said, "when do you go away?"

"In the morning."

There was resentment in the girl's expression. "Since you have made up your mind to go, I will make no protest," she declared. Then, with a swift change of manner, she turned and laid her hand upon his arm.

"After all, I suppose you must go. Derrick, you won't stay away very long!"

They went into the drawing-room together, and half an hour had pa.s.sed when Mrs. Acton beckoned to Nasmyth, and he followed her into an adjoining alcove. She sat down and looked at him reproachfully.

"I am very angry with you," she a.s.serted; "in fact, I feel distinctly hurt. You have not come up to my expectations."

"I'm sorry," replied Nasmyth quietly. "Still, I'm not astonished. Your indignation is perfectly natural. I felt at the time Mr. Acton made me the offer that he had been prompted by you. That"--and he made a deprecatory gesture--"is one reason why I'm especially sorry I couldn't profit by it."

Mrs. Acton sat silent a moment or two, regarding him thoughtfully.

"Well," she declared, "from now I am afraid you must depend upon yourself. I have tried to be your friend, and it seems that I have failed. Will you be very long at the canon?"

"If all goes as I expect it, six months. If not, I may be a year, or longer. I shall certainly not come back until I am successful."

"That is, of course, in one sense the kind of decision I should expect you to make. It does you credit. Unfortunately, I'm not sure that it's wise."

Nasmyth looked at her with quick apprehension. "I wonder," he said, "if you would tell me why it isn't?"

Mrs. Acton appeared to weigh her words, "My views are, naturally, not always correct," she answered. "Even if they were, I should scarcely expect you to be guided by them. Still, I think it would not be wise of you to stay away very long."

She rose, and smiled at him. "It is advice that may be worth taking.

Now I must go back to the others."

Nasmyth pushed aside the portieres for her, and then sauntered into the hall, where in a very thoughtful mood, he sat down by the fire.

CHAPTER XXVI

ONE NIGHT'S TASK

Daylight was dying out in a flurry of whirling snow, when Nasmyth, who led a jaded horse, floundered down from the steep rock slopes of the divide into the shelter of the dark pines about the head of the gully.

It was a little warmer there, and he was glad of it, for he was chilled, in spite of the toilsome climb. The dark boughs wailed above him, tossing athwart his path a haze of sliding snow, but he caught a faint and rea.s.suring clink of drills, and straightened himself as he clambered down between the trees. The sound had a bracing effect on him, and he felt a curious little thrill as the clamour of the river came up to him in long pulsations. The sound of the waters was growing louder when Gordon, with a big axe in his hand, materialized out of the shadows, and strode forward impulsively at the sight of him.

"Hand better? We're glad to see you; but you might have stayed another day or two," he said.