Flower of the North - James Oliver Curwood (desktop ebook reader .txt) 📗

here, Phil," he cried, a little heatedly, "I've been having a hell of a time since you left the camp, and I want to talk seriously."
It was Philip who stared now. He fairly thrust himself upon the engineer.
"Do you mean to say you didn't get my letter telling you to put the camps in fighting shape?"
"No, I didn't get it," said MacDougall. "But I got the other."
"There was no other!"
MacDougall jumped to his feet, darted to his bunk, and came back a moment later with a letter. He thrust it almost fiercely into Philip's hands. A sweat broke out upon his face as he saw its effect upon his companion. Philip's face was deadly pale when he looked up from the letter.
"My God! you haven't done this?" he gasped.
"What else could I do?" demanded MacDougall. "It's down there in black and white, isn't it? It charges me to outfit six prospecting parties of ten men each, arm every man with a rifle and revolver, victual them for two months, and send them to the points named there. That letter came ten days ago, and the last party, under Tom Billinger, has been gone a week. You told me to send your very best men, and I have. It has fairly stripped the camp of the men we depended upon, and there are hardly enough guns left to kill meat with."
"I didn't write this letter," said Philip, looking hard at MacDougall. "The signature is a fraud. The letter which I sent to you, revealing my discoveries at Churchill, has been intercepted and replaced by this. Do you know what it means?"
MacDougall was speechless. His square jaw was set like an iron clamp, his heavy hands doubled into knots on his knees.
"It means--fight," continued Philip. "To-night--to-morrow--at any moment now. I can't guess why the blow hasn't fallen before this."
He quickly related to MacDougall the chief facts he had gathered at Fort Churchill. When he had finished, the young Scotchman reached over to the table, seized his revolver, and held the butt end of it out to Philip.
"Pump me full of lead--for God's sake, do, Phil," he pleaded.
Philip laughed, and gripped his hand.
"Not while I need a few fighters like yourself, Sandy," he objected. "We're on to the game in time. By to-morrow morning we'll be prepared for the war. We haven't an hour--perhaps not a minute--to lose. How many men can you get hold of to-night whom we can depend upon to fight?"
"Ten or a dozen, no more. The road gang that we were expecting up from the Grand Trunk Pacific came three days after you started for Churchill--twenty-eight of 'em. They're a tough-looking outfit, but devilish good workers. I believe you could HIRE that gang to do anything. They won't take a word from me. It's all up to Thorpe, the foreman who brought 'em up, and they won't obey an order unless it comes through him. Thorpe could get them to fight, but they haven't anything to fight with, except a few knives. I've got eight guns left, and I can scrape up eight men who'll handle them for the glory of it. Thorpe's gang would be mighty handy in close quarters, if it came to that."
MacDougall moved restlessly, and ran a hand through his tawny hair.
"I almost wish we hadn't invited that bunch up here," he added. "They look to me like a lot of dollar thugs, but they work like horses. Never saw such men with the shovel and pick. And fight? They've cleaned up on a half of the men in camp. If we can get Thorpe--"
"We'll see him to-night," interrupted Philip. "Or to be correct, this morning. It's one o'clock. How long will it take to round up our best men?"
"Half an hour," said MacDougall, promptly, jumping to his feet. "There are Roberts, Henshaw, Tom Cassidy, Lecault, the Frenchman, and the two St. Pierre brothers. They're all crack gun-men. Give 'em each an automatic and they're worth twenty ordinary men."
A few moments later MacDougall extinguished the light, and the two men left the cabin. Philip drew his companion's attention to the dimly lighted window of the cabin to which he had followed the stranger a short time before,
"That's Thorpe's," said the young engineer. "I haven't seen him since morning. Guess he must be up."
"We'll sound him first," said Philip, starting off.
At MacDougall's knock there was a moment's silence inside, then heavy footsteps, and the door was flung open. Sandy entered, followed by Philip. Thorpe stepped back. He was of medium height, yet so athletically built that he gave the impression of being two inches taller than he actually was. He was smooth-shaven, and his hair and eyes were black. His whole appearance was that of a person infinitely superior to what Philip had expected to find in the gang-foreman. His first words, and the manner in which they were spoken, added to this impression.
"Good evening, gentlemen."
"Good morning," replied MacDougall, nodding toward Philip. "This is Mr. Whittemore, Thorpe. We saw your light, and thought you wouldn't mind a call."
Philip and Thorpe shook hands.
"Just in time to have a cup of coffee," invited Thorpe, pleasantly, motioning toward a steaming pot on the stove. "I just got in from a long hike out over the new road-bed. Been looking the ground over along the north shore of the Gray Beaver, and was so interested that I didn't start for home until dark. Won't you draw up, gentlemen? There are mighty few who can beat me at making coffee."
MacDougall had noted a sudden change in Philip's face, and as Thorpe hastened to lift the over-boiling pot from the stove he saw his chief make a quick movement toward a small table, and pick up an object which looked like a bit of cloth. In an instant Philip had hidden it in the palm of his hand. A flush leaped into his cheeks. A strange fire burned in his eyes when Thorpe turned.
"I'm afraid we can't accept your hospitality," he said. "I'm tired, and want to get to bed. In passing, however, I couldn't refrain from dropping in to compliment you on the remarkable work your men are doing out on the plain. It's splendid."
"They're good men," said Thorpe, quietly. "Pretty wild, but good workers."
He followed them to the door. Outside, Philip's voice trembled when he spoke to MacDougall.
"You go for the others, and bring them to the office, Sandy," he said. "I said nothing to Thorpe because I have no confidence in liars, and Thorpe is a liar. He was not out to the Gray Beaver to- day; for I saw him when he came in--from the opposite direction. He is a liar, and he will bear watching. Mind that, Sandy. Keep your eyes on this man Thorpe. And keep your eyes on his gang. Hustle the others over to the office as soon as you can."
They separated, and Philip returned to the cabin which they had left a few minutes before. He relighted the lamp, and with a sharp gasp in his breath held out before his eyes the object which he had taken from Thorpe's table. He knew now why Thorpe had come from over the mountains that night, why he was exhausted, and why he had lied. He clasped his head between his hands, scarcely believing the evidence of his eyes. A deeper breath, almost a moan, fell from his twisted lips. For he had discovered that Thorpe, the gang-foreman, was Jeanne's lover. In his hand he held the dainty handkerchief, embroidered in blue, which he had seen in Jeanne's possession earlier that evening--crumpled and discolored, still damp with her tears!


XX
For many minutes Philip did not move, or look from the bit of damp fabric which be held between his fingers. His heart was chilled. He felt sick. Each moment added to the emotion which was growing in him, an emotion which was a composite of disgust and of anguish. Jeanne--Thorpe! An eternity of difference seemed to lie between those two--Jeanne, with her tender beauty, her sweet life, her idyllic dreams, and Thorpe, the gang-driver! In his own soul he had made a shrine for Jeanne, and from his knees he had looked up at her, filled with the knowledge of his own unworthiness. He had worshiped her, as Dante might have worshiped Beatrice. To him she was the culmination of all that was sweet and lovable in woman, transcendently above him. And from this love, this worship of his, she had gone that very night to Thorpe, the gang-man. He shivered. Going to the stove he thrust in a handful of paper, dropped the handkerchief in with it, and set the whole on fire.
A few moments later the door opened and MacDougall came in. He was followed by the two swarthy-faced St. Pierres, the camp huntsmen. Philip shook hands with them, and they passed after the engineer through a narrow door leading into a room which was known as the camp office, Cassidy, Henshaw, and the others followed within the next ten minutes. There was not a man among them whose eyes faltered when Philip put up his proposition to them. As briefly as possible he told them a part of what he had previously revealed to MacDougall, and frankly conceded that the preservation of property and life in the camp depended almost entirely upon them.
"You're not the sort of men to demand pay in a pinch like this," he finished, "and that's just the reason I've confidence enough in you to ask for your support. There are fifty men in camp whom we could hire to fight, but I don't want hired fighters. I don't want men who will run at the crack of a few rifles, but men who are willing to die with their boots on. I won't offer you money for this, because I know you too well. But from this hour on you're going to be a part of the Great Northern Fish and Development Company, and as soon as the certificates can be signed I'm going to turn over a hundred shares of stock to each of you. Remember that this isn't pay. It's simply a selfish scheme of mine to make you a part of the company. There are eight of us. Give us each an automatic and I'll wager that there isn't a combination in this neck of the woods strong enough to do us up."
In the pale light of the two oil-lamps the men's faces glowed with enthusiasm. Cassidy was the first to grip Philip's hand in a pledge of fealty.
"When hell freezes over, we're licked," he said. "Where's me automatic?"
MacDougall brought in the guns and ammunition.
"In the morning we will begin the erection of a new building close to this one," said Philip. "There is no reason for the building, but that will give me an excuse for keeping you men together on one job, within fifty feet of your guns, which we can keep in this room. Only four men need work at a shift, and I'll put Cassidy in charge of the operations, if that is satisfactory to the others. We'll have a couple of new bunks put in here so that four men can stay with MacDougall and me every night. The other four, who are not on the working shift, can hunt not far from the camp, and keep their eyes peeled. Does that look good?"
"Can't be beat," said Henshaw, throwing open the breech of his gun. "Shall we load?"
"Yes."
The room became ominous with the metallic click of loaded cartridge clips and the hard snap of released chambers.
Five minutes later Philip stood alone with MacDougall. The loaded rifles, each with a filled cartridge belt hanging