Thurston of Orchard Valley Part 13

Applause and a whispering followed, and another man said, "Our sentiments exactly! Guess you've seen _The Freespeaker's_ article!"

"I have," Savine acknowledged coolly. "It suggested that I have no intention of carrying out my agreement, that I am hoodwinking the authorities for some indefinite purpose mysteriously connected with maintaining our present provincial rulers in power. The thing's absurd on the face of it, when I'm spending my money like water, and you ought to know me better. I won't even get the comparatively insignificant bonus until the work is finished."

Several of the listeners rapped upon the table, one or two growled suspiciously, and a big sunburnt Englishman stood up. "We'll let the article in question pa.s.s," he said. "It is clearly written with personal animus. As you say, we know you better; but see here, Savine, this is going to be a serious business for us if you fail. We've helped you with free labor, hauled your timber in, lent you oxen, and, in fact, done almost everything, besides giving you our bonds for a good many dollars and signing full approval of your scheme. By doing this we have barred ourselves from encouraging the other fellows'

plans."

After similar but less complimentary speeches had been made, Thurston, who had been whispering to Savine, claimed attention. He cast a searching glance round the a.s.sembly. "Any sensible man could see that the opposition scheme is impracticable," he declared. "I am afraid some of you have been sent here well primed."

His last remark was perhaps combatant rashness, or possibly a premeditated attempt to force the listeners to reveal their actual sentiments. If he wished to get at the truth, he was successful, for several men began to speak at once, and while disjointed words interloped his remarks, the loudest of them said:

"You can't fool us, Savine. We're poor men with a living to earn, but we're mighty tough, and n.o.body walks over us with nails in their boots.

If you can't hold up that river, where are we going to be? I'd sooner shove in the giant powder to blow them up, than stand by and see my crops and cattle washed out when your big d.y.k.es bust."

"So would I," cried several voices, and there was a rapid cross-fire of question and comment. "Not the men to be fooled with." "Stand by our rights; appeal to legislation, and choke this thing right up!" "Can you make your d.y.k.es stand water at all?" "Give the man--a fair show."

"How many years do you figure on keeping us waiting?"

Savine rose somewhat stiffly from his chair, and Thurston noted an ominous grayness in either cheek.

"There are just two things you can do," Savine said; "appeal to your legislators to get my grants canceled, or sit tight and trust me. For thirty-five years I've done my share in the development of the Dominion, and I never took a contract I didn't put through. This has proved a tough one, but if it costs me my last dollar----"

The honest persons among the malcontents were mostly struggling men, who, having expected the operations would bring them swift prosperity, had been the more disappointed. Still, the speaker's sincerity inspired returning confidence, and, when he paused, there was a measure of sympathy for him, for he seemed haggard and ill, and was one against many. His guests began to wonder whether they had not been too impatient and suspicious, and one broke in apologetically, "That's good! We're not unreasonable. But we like straight talking--what if the d.y.k.es keep on bursting?"

Then there was consternation, for Savine collapsed into his chair, after he had said, "Mr. Thurston will tell you. Remember he acts for me." To Geoffrey he whispered, "I don't feel well. Help me out, and then go back to them."

"Sit still. Stand back! You have done rather too much already,"

Geoffrey declared, turning fiercely upon the men, who hurried forward, one with a water decanter, and another with a wine gla.s.s.

The guests fell back before Thurston, as he led Savine, who leaned heavily upon him, from the banquet room. As they entered a broad hall Helen and her aunt pa.s.sed along the veranda upon which it opened.

"They must not know; keep them out!" gasped the contractor. "Get me some brandy and ring for the steward--quick. You have got to go back and convince those fellows, Thurston. Good Lord!--this is agony."

Savine sank into a chair. His twitching face was livid, and great beads of moisture gathered upon his forehead. Thurston pressed a b.u.t.ton, then strode swiftly towards the door hoping that Helen, who pa.s.sed outside with a laugh upon her lips, might be spared the sight of her father's suffering. But Mrs. Savine, gazing in through a long window, started as she exclaimed, "Helen, your father's very sick! Run along and bring me the elixir out of my valise."

Helen turned towards the window, and Geoffrey, who groaned inwardly, placed himself so that she could not see. There was a rustle of skirts, and swift, light footsteps approached.

"What is the matter? Why do you stand there? Let me pa.s.s at once!"

cried Helen in a voice trembling with fear.

"Please wait a few moments," answered Geoffrey, standing between the suffering man and his daughter. "Your father will be better directly, and you must not excite him."

There was no mistaking the color in Helen's face now. If her eyes were anxious the crimson in her cheeks and on her forehead was that of anger. Geoffrey felt compa.s.sionate, but he was still determined to spare her.

"For your father's sake and your own, don't go to him just yet, Miss Savine," he pleaded, but, with little fingers whose grip felt steely, the girl wrenched away his detaining arm.

"Is there no limit to your interference or presumption?" she asked, sweeping past him to fall with a low cry beside the big chair upon which her father was reclining. The cry pierced to Thurston's heart.

Helen had seen little of either sickness or tragedy. Savine sat still as if he did not see her, his face contracted into a ghastly grin of pain. The attendant who came to them deftly aided Geoffrey to force a little cordial between the sufferer's teeth. Savine made no sign.

Forgetting her indignation in her terror Helen glanced at Geoffrey in vague question, but he merely raised his hand with a restraining gesture.

"We had better get him onto a sofa, sir," whispered the attendant, presently. "Not very heavy. Perhaps you and I could manage." It was when he was being lifted that Savine first showed signs of intelligence. He glanced at Geoffrey and attempted to beckon towards the room they had left. When he seemed slightly better, Thurston said:

"I am going, sir. Stay here a few minutes, and then call somebody, waiter. I cannot stay any longer."

Savine made an approving gesture, but Helen said with fear and evident surprise, "You will not leave us now, Mr. Thurston?"

"I must," answered Geoffrey, restraining an intense longing to stay since she desired it, but loyal to his master's charge. "I believe your father is recovering, and it is his especial wish. I can do nothing, and he needs only quiet."

Helen said nothing further. She began to chafe her father's hand, while Thurston went back, pale and grim, to the head of the long table.

"Mr. Savine was seized by a pa.s.sing faintness, but is recovering," he said. "Nevertheless, he may not be able to return, and, as I am interested with him in the drainage scheme he has appointed me his deputy. Therefore, in brief answer to your questions, I would say that if either of us lives you shall have good oat fields instead of swamp gra.s.s and muskeg. It is a solemn promise--we intend to redeem it."

"I want to ask just two questions," announced a sun-bronzed man, in picturesque jacket of fringed deerskin. "Who are the--we; and how are you going to build d.y.k.es strong enough to stand the river when the lake's full of melting snow and sends the water down roaring under a twenty-foot head?"

The speaker had touched the one weak spot in Savine's scheme, but Geoffrey rose to the occasion, and there was a wondering hush when he said, "In answer to the first question--Julius Savine and I are the 'we.' Secondly, we will, if necessary, obliterate the lake. It can be done."

The boldness of the answer from a comparatively unknown man held the listeners still, until there were further questions and finally, amid acclamation, one of the party said:

"Then it's a bargain, and we'll back you solid through thick and thin.

Isn't that so, gentlemen? If the opposition try to make legal trouble, as the holders of the cleared land likely to be affected we've got the strongest pull. We came here doubting; you have convinced us."

"I hardly think you will regret it," Geoffrey a.s.sured them. "Now, as I must see to Mr. Savine, you will excuse me."

Savine lay breathing heavily when Geoffrey rejoined him, but he demanded what had happened, and nodded approval when told. Then Geoffrey withdrew, beckoning to Helen, who rose and followed him.

"This is no time for useless recrimination, or I would ask how you could leave one who has been a generous friend, helpless and suffering," the girl said reproachfully. "My father is evidently seriously ill, and you are the only person I can turn to, for the hotel manager tells me there is no doctor within miles of us. So in my distress I must stoop to ask you, for his sake, what I can do?"

"Will you believe not only that I sympathize, but that I would gladly have given all I possess to save you from this shock?" Thurston began, but Helen cut him short by an impatient wave of the hand, and stood close beside him with distress and displeasure in her eyes.

"All that is outside the question--what can we do?" she asked imploringly.

"Only one thing," answered Geoffrey. "Bring up the best doctor in Vancouver by special train. I'm going now to hold up the fast freight.

Gather your courage. I will be back soon after daylight with skilled a.s.sistance."

He went out before the girl could answer, and, comforted, Helen hurried back to her father's side. Whatever his failings might be, Thurston was at least a man to depend upon when there was need of action.

There was a little platform near the hotel where trains might be flagged for the benefit of pa.s.sengers, but the office was locked.

Thurston, who knew that shortly a freight train would pa.s.s, broke in the window, borrowed a lantern, lighted it, and hurried up the track which here wound round a curve through the forest and over a trestle.

It is not pleasant to cross a lofty trestle bridge on foot in broad daylight, for one must step from sleeper to sleeper over wide s.p.a.ces with empty air beneath, and, as the ties are just wide enough to carry the single pair of rails, it would mean death to meet a train.

Geoffrey nevertheless pressed on fast, the light of the blinking lantern dazzling his eyes and rendering it more difficult to judge the distances between the ties--until he halted for breath a moment in the center of the bridge. White mist and the roar of hurrying water rose out of the chasm beneath, but another sound broke through the noise of the swift stream. Geoffrey hear the vibratory rattle of freight cars racing down the valley, and he went on again at a reckless run, leaping across black gulfs of shadow.

The sound had gained in volume when he reached firm earth and ran swiftly towards the end of the curve, from which, down a long declivity, the engineer could see his lantern. Panting, he held the light aloft as a great fan-shaped blaze of radiance came flaming like a comet down the track.

Soon he could dimly discern the shape of two huge mountain engines, while the rails trembled beside him, and a wall of rock flung back the din of whirring wheels. The fast freight had started from the head of Atlantic navigation at Montreal, and would not stop until the huge cars rolled alongside the Empress liner at Vancouver, for part of their burden was being hurried West from England around half the world to China and the East again. The track led down-grade, and the engineers, who had nursed the great machines up the long climb to the summit, were now racing them down hill.

Waving the lantern Geoffrey stood with a foot on one of the rails and every sense intent, until the first engine's cow-catcher was almost upon him. Then he leaped for his life and stood half-blinded amid whirling ballast and a rus.h.i.+ng wind, as, veiled in thick dust, the great box cars clanged by. He was savage with dismay, for it seemed that the engineer had not seen his signal; then his heart bounded, a shrill hoot from two whistles was followed by the screaming of brakes.

When he came up with the standing train at the end of the trestle, one engineer, leaning down from the rail of the cab, said:

"I saw your light away back, but was too busy trying to stop without smas.h.i.+ng something to answer. Say, has the trestle caved in, or what in the name of thunder is holding us up?"