THE FLOOD
When he reached the blast-lamp, which was raised on a tall tripod, Vane
stood with his back to the pulsating gaze while he grasped the details of
a somewhat impressive scene. A little upstream of him, the river leaped
out of the darkness, breaking into foaming waves, and a wall of dripping
firs flung back the roar it made, the first rows of serried trunks
standing out hard and sharp in the fierce white light. Nearer the spot
where he stood, a projecting spur of rock narrowed in the river, which
boiled tumultuously against its foot, while about halfway across, the top
of a giant boulder rose above the flood.
Vane could just see it, because a mass of driftwood, which was
momentarily growing, stretched from bank to bank. A big log, drifting
down sidewise, had brought up against the boulder and once fixed had
seized and held fast each succeeding trunk. Some had been driven partly
out upon those that had preceded them; some had been drawn beneath and
catching the bottom had jammed; then the rest had been wedged by the
current into the gathering mass, trunks, branches and brushwood all
finding a place. When the stream is strong, a jam usually extends
downward, as well as rises, as the water it pens back increases in
depth, until it forms an almost solid barrier from surface to bed. If it
occurs during a log-drive the river is choked with valuable lumber.
Bent figures were at work with handspikes and axes at the shoreward end
of the mass; others had crawled out along the logs in search of another
point where they could advantageously be attacked; but Vane, watching
them with practised eye, decided that they were largely throwing their
toil away. Then he glanced down-stream; but, powerful as the light was,
it did not pierce far into the darkness and the rain, and the mad white
rush of the rapid vanished abruptly into the surrounding gloom. He caught
the clink of a hammer on a drill, and seeing Salter not far away, he
strode toward him.
"How are you getting to work?" he asked.
Salter pointed to the foot of the rock on which they stood.
"I reckoned that if we could put a shot in yonder we might cut out stone
enough to clear the butts of the larger logs that are keying up the jam."
"You're wasting time--starting at the wrong place."
"It's possible; but what am I to do? I'd rather split that boulder or
chop down to the king log there--but the boys can't get across."
"Have they tried?" Vane demanded. "I will, if it's necessary."
Salter expostulated.
"I want to point out that you're the boss director of this company. I
don't know what you're making out of it; but you can hire men to do that
kind of work for three dollars a day."
"We'll let the boys try it, if they're willing."
Vane raised his voice.
"Are any of you open to earn twenty dollars? I'll pay that to the man
who'll put a stick of giant-powder in yonder boulder, and another twenty
to any one who can find the king log and chop it through."
Three or four of them crept cautiously along the driftwood bridge. It
heaved and worked beneath them; the foam sluiced across it and the
stream forced the thinner tops of shattered trees above the barrier. It
was obvious that the men were risking life and limb, and there was a
cry from the others when one of them went down and momentarily
disappeared. He scrambled to his feet again, but those behind him
stopped, bracing themselves against the stream, nearly waist-deep in
rushing froth. Most of them had followed rough and dangerous
occupations in the bush; but they were not professional river-Jacks
trained to high proficiency in log-driving, and one of them, turning,
shouted to the watchers on the bank.
"This jam's not solid!" he explained above the roar of the water. "She's
working open and shutting; and you can't tell where the breaks are."
He stooped and rubbed his leg, and Vane understood him to add:
"Figured I had it smashed."
Vane swung round toward Carroll.
"We'll give them a lead!"
Salter ventured another expostulation:
"Stay where you are! How are you going to manage, if the boys can't
tackle the thing?"
"They haven't as much at stake as I have," was Vane's reply. "I'm a
director of the company, as you pointed out. Give me two sticks of
giant-powder, some fuse, and detonators!"
Salter yielded when he saw that Vane meant to be obeyed; and cramming the
blasting material into his pocket, Vane turned to Carroll.
"Are you coming with me?"
"Since I can't stop you, I suppose I'd better go."
As they sprang down the bank, Salter addressed one of the miners at
work near him.
"I've seen a few company bosses in my time, but this one's different from
the rest. I can't imagine any of the others wanting to cross that jam."
Vane crawled out on the groaning timber, with Carroll a few feet behind
him. The perilous bridge they traversed rolled beneath their feet; but
they had joined the other men before they came to any particularly
troublesome opening. Then the clustering wet figures were brought up by a
gap filled with leaping foam, in the midst of which brushwood swung to
and fro and projecting branches ground on one another. Whether there was
solid timber a foot or two beneath, or only the entrance to some cavity
by which the stream swept through the barrier, there was nothing to show;
but Vane set his lips and leaped. He alighted on something that bore him,
and when the others followed, floundering and splashing, the deliberation
which hitherto had characterized their movements suddenly deserted them.
They had reached the limit beyond which it was no longer needful.
There is courage which springs from knowledge, often painfully acquired,
of the threatened dangers and the best means of avoiding them; but it
carries its possessor only so far. Beyond that point he must face the
risk he cannot estimate and blindly trust to chance. At sea, when canvas
is still the propelling power, and in the wilderness, man at grips with
the elemental forces must now and then rise above bodily shrinking and
disregard the warnings of reason. There are tasks which cannot be
undertaken in cold blood; and when they had crossed the gap, Vane and
those behind him blundered on in hot Berserker fury. They had risen to
the demand on them, and the curious psychic change had come; now they
must achieve success or face annihilation. But in this there was nothing
unusual; it is the alternative offered many a log-driver, miner and
sailorman.
Neither Vane nor Carroll, nor any of those who assisted them, had a clear
recollection of what they did. Somehow they reached the boulder; somehow
they plied ax or iron-hooked peevy, while the unstable, foam-lapped
platform rocked beneath their feet. Every movement entailed a peril no
one could calculate; but they toiled savagely on. When Vane began to
swing a hammer above a drill, or from whom he got it, he did not know,
any more than he remembered when he had torn off and thrown away his
jacket although the sticks of giant-powder which had been in his pocket
lay near him upon the stone. Sparks leaped from the drill which Carroll
held and fell among the coils of snaky fuse; but that did not trouble
them; and it was only when Vane was breathless that he changed places
with his companion. They heard neither the turmoil of the flood nor the
crashing of the timber, and the foam that lapped their long boots whirled
unheeded by.
About them, bowed figures that breathed in stertorous gasps grappled
desperately with the grinding, smashing timber. Sometimes they were
forced up in harsh distinctness by a dazzling glare; sometimes they faded
into blurred shadows as the pulsating flame upon the bank sank a little
or was momentarily blown aside; but all the while gorged veins rose on
bronzed foreheads and toil-hardened muscles were taxed to the utmost. At
last, when a trunk rolled beneath him, Carroll missed a stroke and
realized with a shock of dismay that it was not the drill he had struck
with his hammer.
"I couldn't help it!" he gasped. "Where did I hit you?"
"Get on!" Vane cried hoarsely; "I can hold the drill."
Carroll struck for a few more minutes, and then flung down the hammer and
inserted the giant-powder into the holes sunk in the stone. He lighted
the fuse and, warning the others, they hastily recrossed the dangerous
bridge. They had reached the edge of the forest when, a flash leaped up
amid the foam and a sharp crash was followed by a deafening, drawn-out
uproar. Rending, grinding, smashing, the jam broke up. It hammered upon
the partly shattered boulder, and, carrying it away or driving over it,
washed in tremendous ruin down the rapid. When the wild clamor had
subsided, Salter gave the men some instructions; and then, as they
approached the lamp, he noticed Vane's reddened hand.
"That looks a nasty smash; you want to get it seen to," he advised.
"I'll get it dressed at the settlement; we'll make an early start
to-morrow. We were lucky in breaking the jam; but you'll have the same
trouble over again any time a heavy flood brings down an unusual quantity
of driftwood."
"It's what I'd expect."
"Then something will have to be done to prevent it. I'll go into the
matter when I reach the city."
Carroll and Vane walked back to the shack, where the latter bound up his
comrade's injured hand. When he had done so, Vane managed to light a
cigar, and lying back, still very wet, he looked thoughtful.
"We can't risk having the workings drowned; but I'm afraid the cost of
the remedy will force me into sanctioning some scheme for increasing
our capital."
"Its a very common procedure," Carroll rejoined. "I've wondered why
you had so strong an objection to it. Of course, I've heard your
business reasons."
Vane smiled.
"I have some of a different kind--we'll call them sentimental
ones--though I don't think I quite realized it until lately."
"You're not given to introspection. Go on; I think I know what's coming."
"To put the thing into words may help me to formulate my ideas; they're
rather hazy. Well, ostensibly, I left England as the result of a
difference of opinion--which I've regretted ever since--though I know now
that really it was from another cause. I wanted room, I wanted freedom;
and I got them both--freedom either to do work that nearly broke my heart
and wore the flesh off me or to starve."
"The experience is not an unusual one."
"Eventually," Vane proceeded, "I managed to get on my feet. I suppose I
got rather proud of myself when I beat the city men over the floating of
the mine, and I began to think of going back to the sphere of life in
which I was born--excuse the phrase."
"It looked nice, from a distance," Carroll suggested.
"It was tolerable in Vancouver; anyway, while I could go straight ahead
and interest myself in the development of the mine. I began to expect a
good deal from my English visit."
Carroll laughed softly before he helped him out.
"And you were bitterly disappointed. It's a very old tale. You had cut
loose--and you couldn't get back when you wanted to."
"I suppose I'd changed: the bush had got hold of me. The ways and views
of the people over yonder didn't seem to be those I remembered. They
couldn't look at things from my standpoint; I wouldn't adopt theirs. You
and I have had to face--realities."
"Hunger," corrected Carroll softly; "wet snow to sleep in; bodily
exhaustion. They probably teach one something, or, at any rate, they
alter one's point of view. When you've marched for days on half rations,
some things don't seem so important--how you put on your clothes, for
instance, or how your dinner's served. But I don't see yet what bearing
this has on your reluctance to extend the Clermont operations."
"I could act as director, with such men as Nairn, when it was a question
of running a mine; but it's doubtful if I'd make a successful financial
juggler. It's hard to keep one's hands off some of the professional
tricksters. Bluff, assumption, make-believe--Pshaw! I've had enough of
them. Better stick to the ax and cross-cut; that's what I feel to-night."
"Now that you've relieved your mind, I'll show you where you were wrong.
You said that you had changed in the wilderness--you haven't; your kind
are fore-loopers born. Your place is with the vedettes, ahead of the
massed columns. But there's a point that strikes one--is your objection
to financial scheming due to honesty or pride?"
Vane laughed.
"I suspect a good deal of it's bad temper. Anyhow, I've felt that rather
than truckle with that fellow Horsfield I'd like to pitch him down the
stairs. But all this is pretty random talk."
"It is," Carroll agreed. "You haven't said whether you intend to
authorize that extension of capital?"
"I suppose it will have to be done. And now it's very late and I'm going
to sleep."
They retired to the wooden bunks Salter had placed at their disposal; and
early the next morning they left the mine. Vane got his hand dressed when
they reached the little mining town at the head of the railroad, and on
the following day they arrived in Vancouver.