The Rapids Part 4

"I think I'd move that mill about a hundred feet west," he went on, bending over a drawing. "It will shorten the head race and save money."

The engineer nodded and drew a long breath. He had expected to get a glimpse of the inner man, but the door was banged in his face.

That winter was, for him, an adventure in regions fascinating and remote. It is probable that at the time there was not on the North American continent a man more highly endowed than Clark with gifts of sheer psychological power. Belding, young in his world, could not recognize it as such, but he fell the more completely under the wizard-like spell of his companion's imagination. The days, shortened by late sun and long nights, pa.s.sed with early journeys to the temporary office which Clark had built at the ca.n.a.l, where they compiled endless surveys and plans in which the scope of the future was graphically depicted. On these miniature s.p.a.ces factory shouldered against factory and mill against mill. The ca.n.a.l doubled in size, and, stupendous as it all seemed, Belding could see no reason why these things should not shortly exist. It was vastly different from former days.

As the weeks pa.s.sed, he began to get Clark in clearer prospective. It became forced on him that this hypnotic stranger had no desire except that of creation. It seemed that his supreme determination was to win from the earth that which he believed it offered, and express himself in steel and stone and concrete, in the construction of great buildings and in the impressive rumble of natural power under human control.

There was talk of many things, colored by keen, incisive comments from this man of many parts, but never once did he put forward the subject of wealth or the means of its ama.s.sing. The possession, or at least the direction, of great sums was imperative to him, but he valued them only for what they could achieve, and Belding always got the sensation of his new approach to subjects. .h.i.therto deemed well worn, and that remarkable mixture of impatience and intuitive power which characterized his a.n.a.lysis. Again there were evenings when Clark did not want to talk, but slipped off to the piano. Then the engineer saw another man within the man, one who, plunged in profound meditation, sat for hours, while his strong yet delicate fingers explored the keys, interpreting the color of his mood and drawing, as it were, from some mystical source that on which the subtle brain was nourished. And these were periods which the other soon learned were not to be interrupted.

They were constantly asked out and entertained with old time hospitality, Clark being the object of supreme curiosity in St. Marys, and more often than not he slipped away early, leaving Belding on duty.

It was on these occasions that the contrast between his chief and others stood out most prominently, there being nothing, it seemed, that any one could do for him. His princ.i.p.al desire was to be let alone.

It was one night at the Wordens' that Belding caught what he took to be evidence of a heart that was fastidiously concealed. Clark, in front of the fireplace, was listening to the judge dilate on the ancient history of St. Marys, and that of lost and silent tribes who once paddled along the sh.o.r.e and lifted their delicate bark canoes around the tumbling rapids. Worden was a wise, old man with a certain gentle dignity, and his wife, a dainty, middle-aged lady with slowly graying hair and kindly eyes.

"There was a good deal of bloodshed about," ruminated the judge. "Of course the Jesuit got here first and performed the mysteries of the Host in front of the natives. There were Indian wars and a good deal of torturing went on up on your property, Mr. Clark. Then the French and English traders shot each other from behind trees, where I understand you are going to build your pulp mill, and the survivors took the furs and struck off for Montreal in canoes, a matter of some six hundred miles. After that the Red River Company and the Hudson Bay got at loggerheads."

"In short," put in Clark, "I've picked out a veritable battle ground.

By the way, who is this, if I may ask?" He lifted a photograph from the mantel.

Mrs. Worden smiled proudly. "Our daughter, Elsie. She's seventeen now and we won't see her for two years. She's in the West with her aunt."

"Oh!" said Clark. His brows pulled down and he scanned the print with close attention. "She has imagination I take it."

"Too much for her own comfort," remarked the judge.

Clark did not answer but dropped into one of those thoughtful silences which, while they did not seem to exclude, made it nevertheless appear presumptuous to rouse him.

"Too much imagination," he repeated presently. "Is that possible?"

Then, after another long stare, "It's a very unusual face."

Mrs. Worden looked very happy. "We're going to take great care of Elsie when we get her back. She had this long, delightful invitation and we let her go because we thought she'd see more than she could in St. Marys, but she writes that it's even quieter."

"The old St. Marys is nearly at an end and your daughter will find food for her imagination when she gets back. May I show this to Mr.

Belding?"

The young man took the photograph with a queer sense of partic.i.p.ation in something he did not understand. He saw a broad, low forehead, ma.s.ses of soft and slightly curly hair, eyes that looked beautifully and wistfully, out from beneath finely arched brows and a mouth that lacked nothing in humorous suggestion. Puzzling for an instant what it was that had attracted his impersonal chief, he heard the latter saying good night with customary abruptness.

"Come along, Belding; we've got a long day ahead of us. The directors will be here to-morrow."

The judge was vastly interested. "So St. Marys is in actual touch with Philadelphia?"

"Very much so, and in about two years St. Marys will loom very large in Philadelphia. Good night and thank you."

The wind was stinging and they drove home rather silently. Arriving at the big house, Clark went to the piano and played for a moment. The music ceased as suddenly as it began and, warming himself at the great stove in the hall, Belding heard a short laugh and an exclamation.

"Too much imagination," exploded Clark. The tone was one of utter incredulity. At that the young man felt curiously truculent. Elsie was only seventeen, while Clark was certainly not less than thirty-five. Then the latter reappeared, rubbing his chilled fingers.

"The piano is too stiff with cold to talk. By the way, Worden was talking about the bishop. What bishop?"

Belding told him what he knew. "He's an Irishman and a fine man. He works this part of his diocese from St. Marys in the summer. One hears all kinds of stories about him from the woods and the islands. He's got a sense of humor and is a good sportsman, but I've only met him once or twice. Just now he's over in England raising money to buy a small yacht to navigate himself when he's traveling on duty, and weather won't stop him if he gets it. You'll see him next spring."

Clark seemed interested. "I don't know many parsons but that doesn't describe them to me. A sportsman and a sense of humor, eh? It sounds like a hunting parson. I thought they were all dead."

"This one isn't."

"St. Marys begins to offer more than I expected," smiled his chief.

"Are you going to bed, or will you sit here and freeze to death?"

Riggs, Stoughton, and Wimperley came up next day. Clark met them at the station, where a bitter wind was droning down from the north, and Belding, by engineering of a high order, made room for them at his quarters. Then they drove out to the ca.n.a.l, and with Clark climbed the icy embankment while the latter expounded the situation.

"There," he said cheerfully, "will be the first power house, and there mill number one."

Riggs, a small thin-blooded man, peered at the gla.s.sy landscape.

"Splendid," he chattered, while Stoughton pulled his fur collar over his ears and set his back to the wind.

"Up at the north end,--you can see it better if you step a little this way--will be the head gates. That railway trestle--you see that trestle don't you, Wimperley?--"

Wimperley pulled himself together, but his feet had lost all feeling.

"Yes, any one could see that."

"Well, that will be replaced by a steel bridge at the railway's expense. We propose to widen the ca.n.a.l at that point to one hundred feet at the bottom, and now--" here he seized the unfortunate Stoughton and swung him so that he faced into the chilling blast--"I want to point out the booming ground for logs."

Stoughton muttered something that sounded like strong condemnation of all logs, but Clark did not seem to hear him.

"They'll come round that point, swing into the bay and feed down this way to the mill. You get that, don't you?"

They all got it, at least so they earnestly a.s.sured the speaker who stood with his overcoat half unb.u.t.toned, his cap on the back of his head and apparently oblivious of the temperature. This frigid and desolate scene had no terrors for him. Beneath the icy skin he discovered its promise.

"There'll be two booms--one for pulp wood and the other for hard wood for the veneer mills. You make hard wood float by driving plugs of lighter wood into both ends of the log. And now, if you'll step down this way, I'll show you where the dredges will start work."

"Look here," said Riggs in a quavering voice, "what's the matter with my cheek? I can't feel it."

Clark glanced at him and shook with sudden laughter. "Only a bit of frost bite,--perhaps we'd better go back to the office. It's a pity, though,"--here he hesitated a little--"there's quite a lot more to see."

Whereupon Riggs and the other two at once a.s.sured him that unless they sought shelter forthwith they would flatly refuse to authorize the expenditure of any more money whatever in a country as blasted as this.

After which they repaired to the office, where Belding waited with his blue prints and Clark outlined the possible future. As he put it, these developments were only possible and depended on what that future might bring forth. But as he talked, Belding, for one, knew that the whole magnificent program had been definitely determined in that astonis.h.i.+ng brain.

They drove back in the open sleigh and the horses, chilled in the cold, sent the snow flying about their ears. There was but little talk and it was not until they drew abreast of a stone building that Stoughton spoke.

"Nice jail you've got here," he remarked with a grin. "Looks as if they had been expecting our crowd."

Clark laughed. "It's the home of the only pessimist I have found in St. Marys."

"Then let's drop in and convert him." Stoughton was feeling warmer, and the keen, dry air and brilliant sun affected him like wine.

There was an instantaneous shout of approval, and three school boys in the shape of the three most influential men of Philadelphia rolled happily out of the sleigh. Riggs turned with mischief in his eye and a bright red patch on his cheek.

"Come on, Clark; we need something like this after the dose you have given us."

At the trampling of feet, Manson looked out of the window, then stepped deliberately to the door. The next minute Clark was busy introducing.

"Mr. Manson, this is Mr. Wimperley, auditor of the Columbian Railway Company; Mr. Riggs, president of the Philadelphia Bank, and Mr.