A Damaged Reputation Part 18

"Well," he said, drily, "I was going to ask you."

The blood surged into Brooke's forehead, and for the time he forgot his six thousand dollars and that the man who made the suggestion had plundered him of them. He had, during the course of his English education, shown signs of a certain originality and daring of thought which had slightly astonished those who taught him, and then had lounged three or four years away in the quiet valley, where originality of any kind was not looked upon with favor. The men and women he had been brought into contact with in London were also, for the most part, those who regarded everything from the accepted point of view, and his engagement to the girl his friends regarded with disapproval had, though he did not suspect this at the time, been in part, at least, a protest against the doctrine that no man of his station must do anything that was not outwardly befitting and convenient to it.

The revolt had brought him disaster, as it usually does, but it had also thrust upon him the necessity of thinking for himself, though even during his two years' struggle on the worthless ranch he had not realized what qualities he was endued with, for it was not until he met Barbara Heathcote by the river that they were wholly stirred into activity. Then ambition, self-confidence, and l.u.s.t of conflict with men and Nature a.s.serted themselves, for it was, in point of fact, a sword she had brought him. Still, he was as yet a trifle inconsequent and precipitate in his activities, for at times the purpose which had sent him to the Canopus mine faded into insignificance, and he became oblivious to everything beyond the pleasure he found in the grapple with natural difficulties he was engaged in. Those who had known Brooke in England would have had little difficulty in recognizing him morally or physically as he stood, brawny and sinewy, in ragged jean, high above the thundering river.

"Then I'll undertake it," he said, with a little vibration in his voice.

Devine looked hard at him again. "Feel sure you can do it? You'll want good nerves."

"I think I can," said Brooke, with a quietness the other man appreciated.

"Then you can go down to the Mineral Development's new shaft, where they have one of those tramways working, and see how they swing their ore across the valley. I'll give you a line to the manager. Start when you're ready."

Devine said nothing further as they turned back towards the mine, but Brooke felt that the bargain was already made. His companion was not the man to haggle over non-essentials, but one who knew what he wanted and usually went straight to the point. Brooke left him presently, and, turning off where the flume climbed to the dam, came upon Jimmy, tranquilly leaning upon his shovel while he watched the two or three men who toiled waist-deep in water.

"I was kind of wondering whether she wouldn't be stiffer with another log or two in that framing?" he said, in explanation.

"Of course!" said Brooke, drily. "It's more restful than shovelling.

Still, that's my affair, and you'll have to rustle more and wonder less.

I'm going to leave you in charge here."

Jimmy grinned. "Then I guess the way that dam will grow will astonish you when you come back again. Where're you going to?"

Brooke told him, and Jimmy contemplated the forest reflectively.

"Well," he said, "n.o.body who saw you at the ranch would ever have figured you had snap enough to put a contract of that kind through.

Still, you have me behind you."

"A good way, as a rule," said Brooke, drily. "Especially when there is anything one can get very wet at to be done. Still, I shouldn't wonder if you were quite correct. I scarcely think I ever suspected I had it in myself."

Jimmy still ruminated. "A man is like a mine. You see the indications on the top, but you can't be sure whether there's gold at the bottom or dirt that won't pay for was.h.i.+ng, until you set the drills going or put in the giant powder and shake everything up. Still, I can't quite figure how anything of that kind could have happened to you."

Brooke flashed a quick glance at him, but Jimmy's eyes were vacant, and he was apparently watching a mink slip in and out among the roots of a cedar.

"There is a good deal of gravel waiting down there, and only two men to heave it out," he said.

"Oh, yes," said Jimmy, tranquilly. "Still, it's a good while until it's dark, and I was thinking. Now, if you had the dollars you threw away over that ranch, and me for a partner, you'd make quite a smart contractor. While they're wanting flumes and bridges everywhere, it's a game one can pile up dollars at."

Brooke's face flushed a trifle, and he slowly closed one hand.

"Confound the six thousand dollars, and you for reminding me of them!"

he said. "Get on with your shovelling."

XIII.

THE OLD LOVE.

Next morning Brooke set out for the Mineral Development Syndicate's new shaft, which lay a long day's ride nearer the railroad through the bush, and was well received by the manager.

"Stay just as long as it pleases you, and look at everything you want, though you'll have to excuse me going round with you to-day," he said.

"There's a party of the Directors' city friends coming up, and it's quite likely they'll keep me busy."

Brooke was perfectly content to go round himself, and he had acquired a good deal of information about the working of aerial tramways when he sat on the hillside watching a rattling trolley swing across the tree tops beneath him on a curving rope of steel. A foreman leaned on a sawn-off cedar close by, and glanced at Brooke with a little ironical grin when a hum of voices broke out behind them.

"You hear them? I guess the boss is enjoying himself," he said.

Brooke turned his head and listened, and a woman said, "But how do those little specks of gold get into the rock? It really looks so solid."

"That's nothing," said the foreman. "She quite expects him to know how the earth was made. Still, the other one's the worst. You'll hear her starting in again once she gets her breath. It's not information she's wanting, but to hear herself talk."

The prediction was evidently warranted, for another voice broke in, "What makes those little trucks run down the rope? Gravity! Of course, I might have known that. How clever of you to think of it. You haven't anything like that at those works you're a director of, Shafton?"

Brooke started a little, for though the speaker was invisible her voice was curiously familiar. It was also evidently an Englishman who answered the last remark, and Brooke, who decided that his ears must have deceived him, nevertheless became intent. He felt that the mere fancy should have awakened a host of memories, but he was only sensible of a wholly dispa.s.sionate curiosity when the voice was raised again, though it was, at least, very like one to which he had frequently listened in times past. Then there was a patter of approaching steps, and he rose to his feet as the strangers and the mine manager came down the slope.

There were several men, one of whom was palpably an Englishman, and two women. One of the latter stopped abruptly, with a little exclamation.

"Harford--is it really you?" she said.

Brooke quietly swung off his wide hat, which he remembered, without embarra.s.sment, was considerably battered, and while most of the others turned and gazed at him, stood still a moment looking at her. He did not appreciate being made the central figure in a dramatic incident, but it was evident that the woman rather relished the situation. Several years had certainly elapsed since she had tearfully bidden him farewell with protestations of unwavering constancy, but he realized with faint astonishment that he felt no emotion whatever, not even a trace of anger.

"Yes," he said. "I really think it is."

The woman made a little theatrical gesture, which might have meant anything, and in that moment the few illusions Brooke still retained concerning her vanished. She seemed very little older than when he parted from her, and at least as comely, but her shallow artificiality was very evident to him now. Her astonishment had, he felt, been exaggerated with a view to making the most of the situation, and even the little tremble in her voice appeared no more than an artistic affectation. The same impression was conveyed by her dress, which struck him as too ornate and in no way adapted to the country.

Then she turned swiftly to the man who stood beside her, looking on with a little faintly ironical smile. He was a personable man, but his lips were thin, and there was a suggestion of half-contemptuous weariness in his face.

"This is Harford Brooke, Shafton. Of course, you have heard of him!" she said with a coquettish smile, which it occurred to Brooke was not, under the circ.u.mstances, especially appropriate. "Harford, I don't think you ever met my husband."

Brooke stood still and the other man nodded with an air of languid indifference. "Glad to see you, I'm sure," he said. "Met quite a number of Englishmen in this country."

Then he turned towards the other woman as though he had done all that could be reasonably expected of him, and when the manager of the mine led the way down into the valley Brooke found himself walking with the woman who had flung him over a few paces behind the rest of the party.

He did not know exactly how this came about, but he was certain that he, at least, had neither desired nor in any way contrived it.

They went down into the hollow between colonnades of towering trunks, crossed a crystal stream and climbed a steep ascent towards the clas.h.i.+ng stamp-heads, but the woman appeared in difficulties and gasped a little until Brooke held out his arm. He had already decided that her little high-heeled shoes were distinctly out of place in that country, and wondered at the same time what kind Barbara Heathcote wore, for she, at least, moved with lithe gracefulness through the bush. He was, however, sensible of nothing in particular when his companion looked up at him as she leaned upon his arm.

"I was wondering how long it would be before you offered to help me. You used to be anxious to do it once," she said.

Brooke smiled a little. "That was quite a long time ago. I scarcely supposed you needed help, and one does not care to risk a repulse."

"Could you have expected one from me?"

There was an archness in the glance she cast him which Brooke was not especially gratified to see, and it struck him that the eyes which he had once considered softest blue were in reality tinged with a hazy grey, but he smiled again as he parried the question. "One," he said, "never quite knows what to expect from a lady."

His companion made no immediate answer, but by and by she once more glanced up at him.

"I am really not used to climbing if Shafton is, and I am not going any further just now," she said.