Thirlwell started. "It's possible you have got near the truth. n.o.body knows as much as Driscoll about Strange's prospecting. But I must answer the letter. What am I to say?"

"If you tell her to have nothing to do with Stormont, it ought to be enough in the meantime," Scott replied. "You could send down your answer when, the next Hudson's Bay breeds come along."

They were silent for a few minutes, and then Scott resumed: "I understand Miss Strange means to look for the vein next summer and you are going. Why is that, since you don't believe her father's tale?"

"She's resolved to go and I can help. When she's persuaded the ore can't be found she'll be content to give the notion up. I don't want the thing to occupy her thoughts until it becomes a kind of mania, as it did with Strange."

"I imagine she's an attractive girl."

"She is attractive; but that has nothing to do with it," Thirlwell replied with a frown. "I'm not in love with Miss Strange. To begin with, I can't support a wife, and marriage hasn't much charm for me. Then I think she's clever enough to make her mark, and will stick to her occupation until she does, if she gets rid of this foolish notion of looking for the ore."

"I see," said Scott, with some dryness. "You feel sorry for the girl and want to save her from getting like Strange? Well, it's a chivalrous object; but there's a thing you don't seem to have thought of yet.

Prospecting a big belt of country is a long job, and if you're away much of the summer, how are you going to keep your engagement with me?"

"I have thought of it," Thirlwell replied. "It's awkward--"

Scott smiled at his embarra.s.sment. "Well, I'll let you go. In fact, I don't mind taking a stake in the expedition, in the way of food and tools."

"Miss Strange wouldn't agree."

"Very well. Suppose you locate the ore, she'll need advice and further help. Now I know something about mining; I've paid pretty high for what I've learned. I understand Miss Strange hasn't much money, and we might save her some expensive mistakes. You see, I haven't much hope of getting down to pay-dirt here."

Thirlwell pondered. He liked and trusted Scott, and the thought of being able to offer Agatha the help she might need was attractive; but he meant to be honest and exercised some self-control.

"It would pay you better to leave the thing alone. I feel pretty sure the ore's a freak of Strange's imagination."

"It's possible," Scott agreed. "Go and see."

Thirlwell knocked out and filled his pipe; and then remarked with some diffidence: "You stated that you didn't think you had enough capital to keep the Clermont going long."

"I haven't enough," Scott said, smiling. "But I have some rich relations who might finance me if I could show them a sure snap. I'd like to do so, anyhow, because, after spending most all my money, I feel I've got to make good."

"I can understand this. Why did you come up here in the beginning?"

"It's rather a long story and I reckon it starts with a canoe trip I made in the North one fall. I had then begun a business in which family influence could give me a lift. Well, it was Indian summer; mosquitoes dying off, lakes and rivers all asleep in the pale sunshine. As we paddled and portaged through the woods I felt I'd got into another world. Wanted to stop forever and began to hate the cities; the feeling wasn't new, but I hadn't got it really strong till then. Sometimes at night, when the loons were calling on the lake and my packers were asleep, I'd lie by the fire and speculate what civilization was worth and if a man might not do better to cut loose and live by his gun and traps. Well, of course, it was a crank notion, and I wasn't all a fool.

I stopped longer than I meant, but I pulled out and got to work again."

Scott paused and smoked meditatively before he resumed: "It was of no use; the city palled. Don't know that I'm a cynic or much of a philosopher, but the folks I knew seemed to have a wrong idea of values.

Spent their best efforts grubbing for money and trying to take the lead in smart society. They made me tired with their hustling about things that didn't matter; I wanted the woods and the quiet the river hardly breaks."

"You went back?"

"I did," said Scott. "Felt I had to go. It was winter and the cold was fierce, but we made four hundred miles with the hand-sledge across the snow, and when I came out with some fingers frozen I was nine pounds heavier. Used to sit in my office afterwards and dream about the glittering lakes and the stiff white pines; saw them crowding round the lonely camps, when I ought to have been studying the market reports.

Well, I couldn't concentrate on buying and selling things. Betting on the market and getting after other people's money seemed a pretty mean business." He paused and added with a twinkle: "That's how I felt then, and I don't know that I've changed my opinions much."

"All the same, you're anxious to make your mining pay."

"It isn't logical, but I was born a white man and had got civilized. You can't altogether get rid of what you're taught when young, and it's harder when the notions you inherit are backed by your training. Well, I saw there was a danger of my turning out a hobo if I went back North without a job. I must get some work, and when Brinsmead came with a proposition about the Clermont vein I took down my shingle and located here with him."

"But what about your relations? Did they object?"

"Not much. On the whole, I reckon they were satisfied to see me go. They had long decided I was a crank, and since I was bound to do something foolish, I'd better do it where I wouldn't disgrace them. That's about all. We're here, and I don't know that I'd go back if the road was open.

Would you?"

Thirlwell pondered. It was a hard life he led, working, for the most part, in the dark underground, for when money was scarce and wages high he could not be satisfied to superintend. Scott, indeed, worked like a paid hand, and they had fought a long, and it seemed a losing, battle against forces whose strength science cannot yet properly measure. The fish-oil lamps sometimes went out in poisonous air while they examined an unsafe working face; props broke under a load they ought to have borne; and now and then the roof came down. Rock pillars crushed, ma.s.sive stones fell out where one least expected, and there was always the icy water that the pump could not keep under and the frost could not stop.

Yet there was something that thrilled one in the stubborn fight, and a strange ascetic satisfaction in proving how much flesh and blood could stand. One felt stronger for bracing one's tired body against fresh fatigue, and watchfulness in the face of constant danger toned up the brain. Then, after all, the vast, silent wilderness had a seductive charm.

"This country draws, and holds what it gets," he said. "I'm satisfied to stop here, as long as I'm young."

For a time they smoked in silence, and presently went to bed, tired with exhausting labor and glad to rest in dreamless sleep until they began again in the bitter dawn.

CHAPTER XI

STORMONT FINDS A CLUE

The Dufferin House was the best hotel in the small Ontario town, and about ten o'clock one evening Stormont read a newspaper in his comfortable room. His clerk had been some days in the town, looking into a proposed transaction in real estate, and Stormont left Winnipeg when a letter from him arrived. This was not because the business required his supervision, but because Watson, the clerk, had found out something that might prove to be important, although it might lead to his employer's wasting his time. Stormont seldom let what he called a fighting change go by.

He had eaten a good supper at about six o'clock, and after a talk with Watson and a young man whose acquaintance the clerk had made, had sent them off to see the town at his expense. This was not rash, because Stormont could trust his clerk. Now he waited their return, but it was not for Watson's benefit he had put a cigar-box and a bottle of strong liquor on the table. Much depended on Watson's tact and judgment, and Stormont felt relieved when he came in.

"I've got Drummond downstairs," the clerk said.

"Very good," said Stormont. "Had you much trouble?"

"I certainly had some. He wanted me to hire a sleigh and take a girl at a sweet-stuff store for a joy-ride. Suggested it when she was there, and I think she meant to go. Then he broke a lamp in the pool-room that cost us two dollars."

"Well, I hope you haven't overdone the thing."

"On the whole, I guess not," Watson replied. "It's hard to hit the proper mark, but I reckon he's just drunk enough."

"Then bring him up," said Stormont, and in a few minutes Watson came back with a young man.

The latter's skin was somewhat dark, and his coa.r.s.e black hair and athletic figure hinted at a strain of Indian blood. As a matter of fact, his mother was a French-Canadian _Metis_, and he was born in a skin tent in the North. His clothes were cut in the latest fashion, and he looked self-confident; but he moved unsteadily and his face was flushed.

"Had a gay time, Mr. Drummond?" Stormont asked.

"You bet!" said the other, giving the clerk a patronizing smile. "This young fellow is surely a sport. Promised half the girls up-town he'd take them a sleigh-ride and broke a big lamp in the pool-room."

"You broke the lamp," Watson interrupted, with a glance at his employer.

"Oh, well," said Drummond, "perhaps I did. I certainly put the marker out. He allowed I couldn't hold my cue and was going to cut the cloth.

Why, I'd play any man in this old town for fifty dollars!"

"And beat him!" said Stormont. "Watson told me how you play. But won't you sit down and take a smoke."