The Winds of Chance Part 16

Jerry was still dazed, for his world had come to an end, but he pretended to an extravagant joy and managed to chirp: "Good news-- the first I've had since we went pardners. I'll sure kick up my heels. What'll we do with the boat?"

"Cut her in two."

"Right. We'll toss up for ends. We'll divide everything the same way, down to the skillet."

"Every blame' thing," Linton agreed.

Side by side they set off heavily through the woods.

Quarrels similar to this were of daily occurrence on the trail, but especially common were they here at Linderman, for of all the devices of the devil the one most trying to human patience is a whip-saw. It is a saying in the North that to know a man one must eat a sack of flour with him; it is also generally recognized that a partners.h.i.+p which survives the vexations of a saw-pit is time and weather proof--a predestined union more sacred and more perfect even than that of matrimony. Few indeed have stood the test.

It was in this loosening of sentimental ties, in the breach of friends.h.i.+ps and the birth of bitter enmities, where lay the deepest tragedy of the Chilkoot and the Chilkat trails. Under ordinary, normal circ.u.mstances men of opposite temperaments may live with each other in harmony and die in mutual accord, but circ.u.mstances here were extraordinary, abnormal. Hards.h.i.+p, monotony, fatigue score the very soul; constant close a.s.sociation renders men absurdly petulant and childishly quarrelsome. Many are the heartaches charged against those early days and those early trails.

Of course there was much less internal friction in outfits like Kirby's or the Countess Courteau's, where the men worked under orders, but even there relations were often strained. Both Danny Royal and Pierce Phillips had had their troubles, their problems-- n.o.body could escape them--but I on the whole they had held their men together pretty well and had made fast progress, all things considered. Royal had experience to draw upon, while Phillips had none; nevertheless, the Countess was a good counselor and this brief training in authority was of extreme value to the younger man, who developed some of the qualities of leaders.h.i.+p. As a result of their frequent conferences a frank, free intimacy had sprung up between Pierce and his employer, an intimacy both gratifying and disappointing to him. Just how it affected the woman he could not tell. As a matter of fact he made little effort to learn, being for the moment too deeply concerned in the great change that had come over him.

Pierce Phillips made no effort to deceive himself: he was in love, yes, desperately in love, and his infatuation grew with every hour. It was his first serious affair and quite naturally its newness took his breath. He had heard of puppy love and he scorned it, but this was not that kind, he told himself; his was an epic adoration, a full-grown, deathless man's affection such as comes to none but the favored of the G.o.ds and then but once in a lifetime. The reason was patent--it lay in the fact that the object of his soul-consuming wors.h.i.+p was not an ordinary woman.

No, the Countess was cast in heroic mold and she inspired love of a character to match her individuality; she was one of those rare, flaming creatures the like of whom illuminate the pages of history. She was another Cleopatra, a regal, matchless creature.

To be sure, she was not at all the sort of woman he had expected to love, therefore he loved her the more; nor was she the sort he had chosen as his ideal. But it is this abandonment of old ideals and acceptance of new ones which marks development, which signalizes youth's evolution into maturity. She was a never-ending surprise to Pierce, and the fact that she remained a well of mystery, an unsounded deep that defied his attempts at exploration, excited his imagination and led him to clothe her with every admirable trait, in no few of which she was, of course, entirely lacking.

He was very boyish about this love of his. Lacking confidence to make known his feelings, he undertook to conceal them and believed he had succeeded. No doubt he had, so far as the men in his party were concerned--they were far too busy to give thought to affairs other than their own--but the woman had marked his very first surrender and now read him like an open page, from day to day. His blind, unreasoning loyalty, his complete acquiescence to her desires, his extravagant joy in doing her will, would have told her the truth even without the aid of those numerous little things which every woman understands. Now, oddly enough, the effect upon her was only a little less disturbing than upon him, for this first boy-love was a thing which no good woman could have treated lightly: its simplicity, its purity, its unselfishness were different to anything she had known--so different, for instance, to that affection which Count Courteau had bestowed upon her as to seem almost sacred--therefore she watched its growth with gratification not unmixed with apprehension. It was flattering and yet it gave her cause for some uneasiness.

As a matter of fact, Phillips was boyish only in this one regard; in other things he was very much of a man--more of a man than any one the Countess had met in a long time--and she derived unusual satisfaction from the mere privilege of depending upon him. This pleasure was so keen at times that she allowed her thoughts to take strange shape, and was stirred by yearnings, by impulses, by foolish fancies that reminded her of her girlhood days.

The boat-building had proceeded with such despatch thanks largely to Phillips, that the time for departure was close at hand, and inasmuch as there still remained a reasonable margin of safety the Countess began to feel the first certainty of success. While she was not disposed to quarrel with such a happy state of affairs, nevertheless one thing continued to bother her: she could not understand why interference had failed to come from the Kirby crowd. She had expected it, for Sam Kirby had the name of being a hard, conscienceless man, and Danny Royal had given proof that he was not above resorting to desperate means to gain time. Why, therefore, they had made no effort to hire her men away from her, especially as men were almost un.o.btainable here at Linderman, was something that baffled her. She had learned by bitter experience to put trust in no man, and this, coupled perhaps with the natural suspicion of her s.e.x, combined to excite her liveliest curiosity and her deepest concern; she could not overcome the fear that this unspoken truce concealed some sinister design.

Feeling, this afternoon, a strong desire to see with her own eyes just what progress her rivals were making, she called Pierce away from his work and took him with her around the sh.o.r.e of the lake.

"Our last boat will be in the water to-morrow," he told her.

"Kirby can't hold us up now, if he tries."

"I don't know," she said, doubtfully. "He is as short-handed as we are. I can't understand why he has left us alone so long."

Phillips laughed. "He probably knows it isn't safe to trifle with you."

The Countess shook her head. "I couldn't bluff him. He wouldn't care whether I'm a woman or not."

"Were you bluffing when you held up Royal? I didn't think so."

"I don't think so, either. There's no telling what I might have done--I have a furious temper."

"That's nothing to apologize for," the young man declared, warmly.

"It's a sign of character, force. I hope I never have reason to feel it."

"You? How absurd! You've been perfectly dear. You couldn't be otherwise."

"Do you think so, really? I'm awfully glad."

The Countess was impelled to answer this boy's eagerness by telling him frankly just how well she thought of him, just how grateful she was for all that he had done, but she restrained herself.

"All the fellows have been splendid, especially those two gamblers," she said, coolly. After a moment she continued: "Don't stop when we get to Kirby's camp. I don't want him to think we're curious."

Neither father nor daughter was in evidence when the visitors arrived at their destination, but Danny Royal was superintending the final work upon a stout scow the seams of which were being calked and daubed with tar. Mast and sweeps were being rigged; Royal himself was painting a name on the stern.

At sight of the Countess the ex-horseman dropped his brush and thrust his hands aloft, exclaiming, "Don't shoot, ma'am!" His grin was friendly; there was no rancor in his voice. "How you gettin'

along down at your house?" he inquired.

"Very well," the Countess told him.

"We'll get loaded to-morrow," said Pierce.

"Same here," Royal advised. "Better come to the launching. Ain't she a bear?" He gazed fondly at the bluff-bowed, ungainly barge.

"I'm goin' to bust a bottle of wine on her nose when she wets her feet. First rainy-weather hack we ever had in the family. Her name's Rouletta."

"I hope she has a safe voyage."

Royal eyed the speaker meditatively. "This trip has got my goat,"

he acknowledged. "Water's all right when it's cracked up and put in a gla.s.s, but--it ain't meant to build roads with. I've heard a lot about this canon and them White Horse Rapids. Are they bad?"

When the Countess nodded, his weazened face darkened visibly.

"Gimme a horse and I'm all right, but water scares me. Well, the Rouletta's good and strong and I'm goin' to christen her with a bottle of real champagne. If there's anything in good liquor and a good name she'll be a lucky s.h.i.+p."

When they were out of hearing the Countess Courteau repeated: "I don't understand it. They could have gained a week."

"We could, too, if we'd built one scow instead of those small boats," Pierce declared.

"Kirby is used to taking chances; he can risk all his eggs in one basket if he wants to, but--not I." A moment later the speaker paused to stare at a curious sight. On the beach ahead of her stood a brand-new rowboat ready for launching. Near it was a.s.sembled an outfit of gear and provisions, divided into two equal piles. Two old men, armed each with a hand-saw, were silently at work upon the skiff. They were sawing it in two, exactly in the middle, and they did not look up until the Countess greeted them.

"h.e.l.lo! Changing the model of your boat?" she inquired.

The partners straightened themselves stiffly and removed their caps.

"Yep!" said Quirk, avoiding his partner's eyes.

"Changing her model," Mr. Linton agreed, with a hangdog expression.

"But--why? What for?"

"We've split," Mr. Quirk explained. Then he heaved a sigh. "It's made a new man of me a'ready."

"My end will look all right when I get her boarded up," Linton vouchsafed, "but Old Jerry drew the hind quarters." His shoulders heaved in silent amus.e.m.e.nt.

"'Old' Jerry!" snapped the smaller man. "Where'd you get the 'old'

at? I've acted like a feeble-minded idiot, I'll admit--bein'

imposed on so regular--but that's over and I'm breathin' free.

Wait till you shove off in that front end; it 'ain't got the beam and you'll upset. Ha!" He uttered a malicious bark. "You'll drownd!" Mr. Quirk turned indignant eyes upon the visitors. "The idea of HIM callin' ME 'old.' Can you beat that?"

"Maybe I will drown," Linton agreed, "but drowning ain't so bad.

It's better than being picked and pecked to death by a blunt- billed buzzard. I'd look on it as a kind of relief. Anyhow, you won't be there to see it; you'll be dead of rheumatism. I've got the tent."