A RECKONING
It was some time after the holding up of Carrington Manor before I was
able, with Jasper's assistance, to fulfill my promise to Minnie Fletcher.
Jasper knew everybody within fifty miles up and down the C. P. R. Line,
and at least as far across the prairie, while they all had a good word for
him. So when he heard the story he drove us over to Clearwater, where an
elevator had been built beside the track, only to find that the agent in
charge of it had already a sufficient staff. He, however, informed us that
the manager of a new creamery wanted a handy man to drive round collecting
milk from the scattered homesteads who could also help at the accounts and
clerking. Such a combination might not have been usual in England, but in
the Western Dominion one may find University graduates digging trenches
and unfortunate barristers glad to earn a few dollars as railroad hands.
"I guess we'll fix him up in that creamery," said Jasper. "The man who
runs it was raised not far from the old folks' place in Ontario," and we
started forthwith on an apparently endless ride across the frozen prairie.
Some of our horses are not much to look at, and others are hard to drive,
but the way they can haul the light wagons or even the humble ground
sleigh along league after league would surprise those not used to them. We
spent one night with a Highland crofter in a dwelling that resembled a
burrow, for most of it was underground, but the rammed earth walls kept
out the cold and the interior was both warm and clean. We spent another
in somewhat grim conviviality at the creamery, for the men whose fathers
hewed sites for what are now thriving towns out of the bush of Ontario are
rather hard and staunch than sprightly.
Still, the manager did his best for us, and said on parting, "Send him
right along. I'll give any friend of yours a show if Jasper will vouch for
him. Pay's no great thing as yet, but he can live on it, and if we
flourish he'll sail ahead with us."
So we brought Thomas Fletcher out from Winnipeg by joint subscription, and
it cost us rather more than we cared about, for he came second class,
while at that time Harry and I would have traveled "Colonist," or on
opportunity would have earned our passage by tending stock. If we could
spare a dollar in those days we wanted it for our land. The old jauntiness
had gone out of Fletcher. He looked worn and thinner, with, I fancied,
signs of indulgence in alcohol, but he professed his willingness to work
hard at anything that would keep a roof over Minnie's head. We drove him
across to the creamery, and the manager seemed disappointed when he saw
him, while on the journey home Jasper said:
"I've been sizing up that young man. Strikes me he's too much like the
trash you British are over-fond of dumping on to us. Why can't your people
understand that if a man's a dead failure over there we don't want him?
Dare say he's honest, but he's got no sand. Let that fellow sit up and
talk over a glass of rye whiskey and a bad cigar and he's right there; set
him wrestling with a tough job and he'll double up."
Jasper posed as a judge of character, and I felt inclined to agree with
him. Fletcher had not the appearance of a vicious or dishonest man, but I
fancied under pressure of circumstances he might become one.
We built a new stable and barn that winter, hauling suitable logs--and
they were very hard to find--ten miles across the prairie, while Harry
nearly lost his hands by frost-bite bringing in one load. Nevertheless,
and there is leisure in that season, we drove over now and then to
Fletcher's humble dwelling beside the creamery, and were both embarrassed
the first time Minnie thanked us with tears in her eyes. Already she was
recovering her good looks and spirits, but as Fletcher's pay would be
scanty until spring the odd bags of potatoes and flour we brought them
were evidently acceptable. We had received help freely when we needed it,
and it seemed only fitting that now we should help others in turn; so we
did what little we could, and, as transpired later, it brought trouble on
us. Also we managed to pay a few visits to other neighbors who lived at
any distance within thirty miles, including a few farms of the Carrington
group, where, perhaps especially for Harry's sake, they made us welcome,
and we went twice to Carrington Manor. The second visit was a memorable
one.
It was a still, starlit night with an intense frost and a few pale green
streamers shimmering in the north, but the big main room of the Manor with
its open fireplace and central stove was very warm and snug. Our team was
safely stabled, for owing to the distance we could not well return that
night, and since the affair with the cattle thieves Colonel Carrington had
so far as in him lay been cordial. He sat beside the glowing birch logs,
silent and stern of aspect as usual, with a big shaggy hound which I had
seen roll over a coyote with a broken spine curled up against his knee,
while the firelight flickered redly across his lean, bronzed face.
Opposite sat his sister, who partly resembled him, though in her case the
Carrington dignity was softened by a winning sympathy. She was an old maid
of a fine but perhaps not common type, white-haired and stately, and in
all things gracious.
Harry, who was a favorite of hers, knelt with one knee on a wolf-skin rug,
turning over a collection of photographs on a low table that she might
see, and she smiled at some of his comments. Ormond leaned against the
wall behind them interposing whimsical sallies, and casting occasional
glances toward Grace and myself. Resigning his commission, he had lately,
we understood, purchased land near the Manor. One or two other of the
Colonel's subjects also were present. Being lighted with shaded lamps that
shed their soft radiance only where it was wanted, portions of the long
room remained in shadow, so Grace and I, sitting near one window, could
look out between the looped-back curtains across the prairie. High over
the sweep of dimly glimmering snow hung a vault of fathomless indigo. It
was not such a sky as one sees in England, but rather a clear transparency
where the stars, ranged one behind the other, led the gaze back and lost
it in infinity, while at intervals a steely scintillation flickered up
from horizon to zenith and then back again. Feathery frost-flowers on the
window framed the picture like a screen of delicate embroidery.
I do not think either of us said much, but I felt that we had a kindred
interest in the spectacle. Within there was warmth and light and life;
outside, impressive silence reigned unbroken, with the coldness of the
grave. Yet there was one man who, poorly nourished and still more poorly
clad, had the courage to cross long leagues of frozen prairie on foot, for
presently we heard a knocking at the door, and after an altercation with
somebody outside a stranger walked with uneven steps into the room. White
crystals sprinkled his old English coat, a most inadequate protection
against such weather, while his breath was frozen about the collar, and
the fur cap he could scarcely hold in one stiffened hand was of the cheap
and rubbishly description that Jew peddlers retail to the new arrival in
Winnipeg. His age might have been fifty, but he had been bent by toil or
sickness, and his pinched face was a study in itself. Anxiety, suspense,
and fierce determination seemed written on it.
"I'm wanting Ralph Lorimer, who came out from England. They told me he was
here," he said, and clutched at the table, for, as often happens, the
change of temperature had been too much for him.
Then I recollected what Jasper, who had been in to Winnipeg, told me a day
or two before. "I looked in at the Tecumseh House, and the clerk mentioned
that a wild man from the old country had been asking for you. Wouldn't
answer any questions; a lunatic of some sort, the clerk reckoned."
Nevertheless, as I stood up by the window I had no suspicion of the truth,
though perhaps Harry had, for, drawing forward a chair, he said: "Feeling
dizzy, are you not? Better sit down. But before we answer I should like to
know who you are, and what you want with him."
"What has that to do with thee?" was the fierce answer. "I'm wanting Ralph
Lorimer, and if he's alive in Canada I'll find him!"
I stepped out into the lamplight, saying: "You need not search far. With
your permission, Miss Carrington! Now I am only a guest here. Will you
follow me?"
The drawn face twitched, his left hand was clenched, and the other fumbled
inside the breast of the threadbare coat as the old man turned to meet
me.
"No; here before them all I'll ask thee," he said hoarsely. "I'm Adam Lee
of Stoney Clough. Where's my daughter, Minnie Lee, that left her home to
follow thee?"
The words seemed to break in on the warmth and harmony like a blast of
Arctic cold, and sudden silence followed them. Colonel Carrington leaned
forward with an angry glitter in his eyes, Miss Carrington watched me in
cold surprise, and Grace--well, I do not care to recall her face. Once
afterward I saw her look the same, and was thankful that her scornful
glance rested on another man. Then, while I stood bolt upright, staring at
the speaker, and wondering how I could make the matter plain, others
intervened, for Ormond, turning toward Colonel Carrington, said:
"I fancy, sir, this is not the place for--er--such explanations. They
might prove embarrassing."
Colonel Carrington glanced at his sister, who followed by the rest had
already risen from her chair, beckoning to Grace, but Harry broke in.
"I agree with Captain Ormond in part," he said, "but this is a serious
matter. We have all unfortunately heard the charge, and in fairness to Mr.
Lorimer we should hear him refute it. It's either a cruel mistake, sir, or
gratuitous malice, and I would stake my last dollar on his honor. A few
words will suffice."
It was a kindly thought of Harry's, and the Colonel nodded.
"You will excuse us, Jessy," he said. "Geoffrey, as a matter of fairness
he is perfectly right. Now, sir, for the space of two minutes will you
restrain your impatience and follow us?"
Adam Lee of Stoney Clough, however, thought differently. I had never seen
him before, but I knew him well by reputation; for, though not born there,
he was one of the erratic ultra-reformers one may find in many an English
industrial town. They have left all regular creeds and parties behind, and
look for the regeneration of an iniquitous world by some fantastic new
religion, or the subversion of all existing authorities. Some, it is true,
live lives of self-denial, and die, worn out by disappointment, of a
broken heart, but the rest develop into fanatics of savage bigotry.
"No! I've followed him weary and hungry for many days," he said. "He
doesn't leave my sight until he has answered me. Stop! you that sit warm
in luxury, pampering your sinful bodies and grinding the poor, you shall
hear what one of your kind has done, and judge between us. The tale will
be good for you. Shall the rich rob us of our children, as they rob us of
our bread?"
He flung out one arm as he spoke, and there was a rude power in voice and
gesture that commanded attention. Neither was his accent now altogether
that of Lancashire, for Lee, as is not uncommon, would sometimes speak a
purer English than the local vernacular. Miss Carrington glanced past him
toward the door, irresolute, and Grace leaned forward staring at him as
though fascinated, while perhaps I of all the others found the sentiment
familiar. It was the same spirit which, trammeled by poverty and
ignorance, stirs many a man weary of a hopeless struggle for better
things, and blazes into strange coruscations of eloquence in market-square
orations and from the platforms of conventicles where men whose religion
is a thing of terror worship the jealous God of the Hebrews.
"Nay, sit still and hear." The words fell as though they were an order. "I
am a poor man, a maker of shoes for the poor who could not always buy
them, and I had one daughter. She was all I had, and I wrestled with the
devil for her that she might escape perdition through the snare of beauty.
But the nephew of a rich man cast desiring eyes upon her, and Satan helped
him. He might well be strong and comely, for he fed on the finest, while
when trade was bad half of us went cold and hungry in Stoney Clough; but
he was filled with the wiles of the devil and the lusts of the flesh, so
when there were plenty of his own kind to choose among he tempted the poor
man's daughter who worked for a pittance in his uncle's mill. Her mother
died; they mocked me at the chapel; and I have come four thousand miles to
find him, but now and here he shall answer. Ralph Lorimer of Orb Mill,
where is Minnie Lee?"
His hand was clear of the threadbare coat now; something glinted in it,
and I looked into the muzzle of a pistol. But Geoffrey Ormond, in spite of
his surface languidness, was quick of thought and action, and with swift
dexterity gripped his right arm from behind. Then, and we were never quite
sure how it happened, though the weapon was evidently a cheap Belgian
revolver, and perhaps the hammer shook down, there was a ringing crash, a
cry from Grace, a tinkle of falling glass, and Adam Lee stood
empty-handed, while Ormond, who flung down the smoking weapon, said
coolly:
"It is safer with me. These things are dangerous to people who don't
understand them, and you may be thankful that, without perhaps intending
it, you are not a murderer."
"Thank you, Geoffrey," said Colonel Carrington. "Lee, sit down. I don't
know what your religious or political crazes are, and it doesn't matter,
but I have rather more power here than an English magistrate, and if you
move again, by the Lord I'll send you in irons to Winnipeg for attempted
murder. Mr. Lorimer, I am not inclined to thank you, but if you have any
explanation you had better give it to him."
Lee, I learned, was a fearless man, with the full courage of his somewhat
curious convictions, but there were few who could withstand Colonel
Carrington, and, half-dazed, half-savage, he did his bidding, while again
every eye in the room was turned upon me.
"Minnie Lee was certainly employed in my uncle's mill in Lancashire," I
said slowly, "but on my word of honor nothing ever passed between us that
all the world might not hear. She married a former clerk there, one Thomas
Fletcher, secretly, and at present lives with him at the Willow Lake
creamery. I met her for the first time in Canada at the Elktail hotel,
where she was a waitress, and at her request helped to find her husband
the situation. She promised to write home, but evidently did not do so."
"It is perfectly true," said Harry. "I was present at that meeting. If our
visitor has any doubts on the subject he has only to ride over there and
see."
Lee gasped for breath, recovered himself, and strode toward me with
fingers trembling and his eyes blood-shot.
"Is it true?" he said. "I know thy vain pride in an honor that can stoop
to steal the honor of the poor; it is only women to whom thy kind tell
lies. Here, before these witnesses, tell me again, is it Gospel true?"
He seemed half-crazed by excitement and over-fatigue, while his relief was
evidently tempered by a fear that we might yet be bent on duping him; but
I pitied him in all sincerity, for whatever were his foibles it was
evident that this broken-down wreck of humanity with the warped intellect
loved his daughter, and as I wondered what would most quickly set his mind
at rest Harry said stiffly:
"We do not lie to any one, and we are poor men, too. At least we work for
a bare living harder than many English poor. On his friend's word
as--well, in deference to your prejudices, we'll say an honest man--Mr.
Lorimer has told you nothing but the truth. You will find Mrs. Fletcher
safe and well at the Willow Lake creamery."
"Then I'm going there now," was the answer. "I thank thee for the story.
No, I don't want the pistol. It was the devil tempted me to bring it, but
it was only to force the truth from him, and it went off of itself."
"You are somewhat premature," said Colonel Carrington. "We haven't quite
done with you. As I said, I hold myself responsible for the peace of
Carrington, and though I am inclined to believe it was an accident, you
can't ride twenty miles hungry at midnight. You came here without my
invitation, and you have customs of your own, but you'll certainly get
lost and frozen on the prairie if you leave this house before to-morrow
morning."
They stood facing each other, a curious contrast, the pinched and bowed
cobbler and the army officer, but there was the same stubborn pride in
both; for with a quaint dignity, which in some measure covered its
discourtesy, the former made answer in the tongue of the spinning
country:
"I thank thee, but I take no favors from the rich. Thou and the others
like thee have all the smooth things in this life, though even they cannot
escape the bitterness that is hidden under them. Well, maybe thou'lt find
a difference in the next. Good night to thee."
He marched out, and we heard the door crash to.
"I dare say he is right," the Colonel said, with a curious smile. "At
times I almost hope we will. An interesting character, slightly mad, I
think; heard of such people, but I never met them."
This was evidently true, for the lot of Colonel Carrington had not been
cast among the alleys of a spinning town where the heavens are blackened
by factory smoke, and as the silver value changes in the East there is
hunger among the operatives. In such places the mind of many a thinking
man, worn keen as it were by poor living, sickened by foulness and
monotony, makes fantastic efforts to reach beyond its environment, and
occasionally hurries its owner to the brink of what some call insanity,
and perhaps is not so.
Then one lonely and pathetic figure, with bent head and shambling gait,
grew smaller down the great white waste of prairie.
"I am very sorry for him," Grace said, "but the poor old man will never
reach Willow Lake on foot, even if he could find the way. He must have
walked many miles already, and he will be frozen before morning. Some one
must go after him."
"If you will allow us, Miss Carrington, I think we had better take our
leave and drive him there on our homeward way. I am sorry that all this
happened under your roof," I said. "Harry, we must hurry before we lose
him;" and Colonel Carrington answered coldly.
"I am inclined to agree with you."
Brief leavetakings followed. Miss Carrington was cordial, but, and it may
have been exaggeration of sentiment, I dare not look at Grace with the
shadow of such a charge hanging over me. Neither, I think, did the Colonel
shake hands with me; and when the sleigh sped hissing down the beaten
trail Harry said:
"Ralph, you almost make one angry. Of course, she is too high for you; but
there was no reason you should look like a convicted felon when we took
the trouble to demonstrate your innocence. Confusion to Thomas Fletcher
and all his works, I say! Why should that invertebrate wastrel have turned
up to plague us so?"
Some time had elapsed before we got the horses harnessed, because they
objected strenuously, and several branching trails crossed the prairie, so
we spent a much longer time than I liked in driving through the bitter
cold before we found my late accuser sitting under a copse of willows, and
apparently awaiting his death. As the settlers say when it freezes on the
prairie, you can't fool with that kind of cold. Harry for some reason
swore profanely.
"Get in, and we'll take you straight to Willow Lake," he said, lifting the
unfortunate man, who already had almost lost the use of his limbs, and who
answered with his teeth chattering:
"You two are very good; I couldn't drag myself further; walked there from
Elktail to-day, and I felt main drowsy. What brought thee after me? From
one of thy sort I never expected it."
"I don't care what you expected," said Harry briefly, "so you needn't
trouble to tell me. Get into these furs here before you freeze to death;
another half-hour would have made an end of you."
The team already had traveled far that day, but they responded gallantly
to Harry's encouragement. The cold bit deep, however, and I could scarcely
move a limb when, toward midnight, with a hiss of runners and a jingle of
bells, we came into sight of Fletcher's shanty by Willow Lake. As luck
would have it a light still shone in the window, and he opened the door
when Harry and I made shift to draw some wrappings over the team. It
grieved me to leave the poor beasts waiting there, for I found it
difficult even to speak.
"It's Mr. Lorimer, Minnie," Fletcher shouted; and before I could intervene
a woman's shape filled the lighted door, while Harry said softly,
"Confound it! I hoped to have got out before the play commenced."
"We have brought you a visitor, Minnie," I said. "You must not be
surprised. There's nothing too strange to happen in a new country. Harry,
help me with him;" and between us we half carried Lee inside, for all the
strength had gone out of him. The hot room reeled about me, and there was
a drumming in my head, but with an effort, I said, "It's your father,
Minnie. You forgot the letter, and he came over to Carrington in search of
me."
She dropped the stove-iron in her hand with a startled cry. Fletcher
blinked at us stupidly, and the old man sat down with one elbow on the
table and his head drooping forward limply, while for a moment or two
afterward no one moved, and the ticking of a nickeled clock almost
maddened me. Then the woman came forward timidly with the word "Father" on
her lips, and Lee, groaning as though in pain, checked her with a gesture.
"Who is this man here, lass?" he said.
"My husband, Thomas Fletcher; you ought to remember him. We were married
before I left home," she said.
Harry coughed, while Lee said hoarsely: "I thank the Lord for it; lass,
thou hast acted cruelly, but we'll say no more of that. I've left all I
had to find thee, and now I'm only glad."
There were tears in Minnie's eyes as she leaned over him with one arm
round his shoulder, but I fancied there was a flash of resentment in them
too.
"If you had listened that night before you said what you did, all might
have been different," she answered. "But I'm so glad to see you, and
hungry for news. How did you leave mother, and the shop? I don't care to
hear about the chapel."
"Thy mother is dead. The Lord took her," the old man answered solemnly,
though as yet the warmth brought only pain to him. "I'll hear no word
against the chapel. Nay," as the woman straightened herself with a cry,
"she grieved sorely; but it was the typhoid, and to the last she would
hear no ill of thee. The shop, I sold it; and maybe there's harness to
mend, and saddles, that will earn my bread in this country. I'm an old
broken man, and a little will content me. A weary time of struggle and
black shame I've suffered for thee; but now there's nought that matters
when I find thee so."
"We must go," I said. "Our team is freezing and we can't afford to lose
it;" and Minnie, touching her father, said, "You should thank Mr. Lorimer.
Forty miles at least he has driven to-day, and there's another fifteen
before him;" but ere he could turn I bundled Harry out of the door, and
two minutes later we were flying across the prairie.
"I'm sorry for the old man," said Harry. "Fletcher didn't look delighted,
and perhaps it's not to be wondered at. As to Minnie, she'll probably cry
over him all night; but I hardly fancy she has quite forgiven him. It's
not a nice thing, either, when you think of it. And I suppose it cost the
old fanatic a fearful wrench to give up what he considered his mission to
reform that benighted town. Lord, what fools--it's true--we mortals are."
I was too drowsy and cold to answer, and how we got the team into the
stables or even found Fairmead I do not remember; but we probably did it
by force of habit, and it was high noon the next day before we awakened.