The next day, when another slight fall of snow in the night had been
frozen as hard as the surface of a wedding-cake over all the roads in
the district, Mordaunt was driven by Pierce Caldwell in his sleigh up
the beautiful drive his father had made along the mountain-side to
the mouth of the mine. Here he passed some hours in examining all the
processes of silver-milling, and the many improvements, due to Pierce's
energy, which had been effected in the works since the day they were
established. He descended the mine by a new shaft opened a few days
previously, which had been sunk several hundred feet, and which had
laid bare fresh veins of ore, richer, apparently, than any which had
yet been worked. Mordaunt's enthusiasm rose to fever pitch. When he had
returned to the earth's surface, he gasped,
"By Jove! Caldwell--this is the biggest thing out. You're a lucky
chap--no! I suppose I oughtn't to say that. How few young chaps would
have been able to do what you have done! It is splendid--it really is!"
"Oh! it's no merit of mine. I have done nothing except just stick
to the business, and watch, and let nothing slip. It is desperately
interesting, I can tell you. And then the boys--they're a rough lot,
but such good fellows! I'm fond of them all, and they'd go to--well!
anywhere for me, I believe. This is the reading-room I've built for
them."
The "boys" were men, some well over fifty, begrimed with dirt, and
many, it must be confessed, of forbidding aspect. The stories Mordaunt
had been told of shots fired at random in saloons and drinking bars
gained in probability as he looked at them. Indeed, Pierce confirmed
them from his own experiences as a youth, when he remembered, in a
saloon, having to throw himself flat on the ground "to prevent stopping
the balls," and the floor was strewn subsequently with wounded men. He
repeated an anecdote of lynch law in those not-far-distant days, as he
heard it, in the words of the narrator, "which," he continued with a
laugh, "I think are characteristically succinct. The fellow was telling
me how their camp had suffered by the robbery of horses, and he added,
'But I tell you, sir, that we collared a man the other day, _owning_ a
horse that didn't _belong_ to him. The next thing that man found was
that _his legs were not touching the ground_!'"
Mordaunt laughed heartily at this graphic euphemism, and then said,
"I suppose they are getting fast civilized now? All the Bret-Harteism
will be swept away before long--eh?"
"Why, yes. We have schools now everywhere, and churches and institutes.
They spring up like mushrooms."
"But who builds them? All along the track of the railway I saw big
towns growing up. It seems little short of miraculous in so short a
time."
"Well," said the young man, with an amused expression on his handsome
face, "you see, it is like this. There is a contractor who undertakes
to build for each municipality. If they order fifty houses, he throws
in a school; if they order a hundred, he throws in a church. It is as
well to do the thing handsomely, for he is 'cute enough to know it is a
remunerative advertisement."
The ladies now drove up in a _char-à-banc_ with the other two men.
Alan Brown, having had the field all to himself for some hours, looked
reconciled to life, though he would have preferred life in Piccadilly
with Doreen to life under the same conditions in the Rocky Mountains.
But the young girl had pacified him, I presume, as to the English
baronet, and, indeed, Ballinger showed himself to be so entirely
engrossed in the ninety-stamp dry-crushing silver mill, that there was
no pretext for a renewal of the young American's jealousy. Mordaunt
found an opportunity of whispering to his aunt,
"This is the investment for me. I'm sure I can't do better than get all
the shares I can in the new company that is being formed."
But Mrs. Frampton demurred.
"Don't be in a hurry. This climate is really too exciting to judge of
anything dispassionately. Wait till we get damper, my dear. I am ready
to jump out of my skin." Then, to Pierce, who came up at that moment,
"Mr. Caldwell, how do you manage to exist, with your nerves in the
constant state of tension they must be in here? When your butler handed
me potatoes last night, and touched my shoulder, I nearly screamed,
he gave me such a shock. And I find I send out blue sparks every time
I turn the brass handle of the door! It is frightful! I am become one
vast electric battery!"
"You would no doubt be able to light the gas with your fingers. Some
people have more electricity than others. I haven't so much, and get
along here very well. And this dry climate has its advantages. We are
going to lunch on the mountain-side, if you are not afraid?"
"What! In the snow? To be sure, the sun is very hot, and there is no
cold wind--"
"Oh, yes, and we will find a sheltered place under the rocks. My mother
and sister always do this when they come up here to lunch with me, for
the men's saloon and reading-room are not odoriferous. You won't find
it cold, _al fresco_, such a still day as this."
Nor did they. Their luncheon spread upon the crisp snow, a cloudless
sky above them, the sun pouring down on the little amphitheatre of
rocks in which Pierce had ensconced the ladies, Mrs. Frampton declared
it was an ideal midday dining-room--a combination of Davos-Platz and
Cairo--which left nothing to be desired.
Bloxsome, in his coarse, loud way, was amusing; but the instinctive
dislike of our English friends seemed to be shared by Alan Brown,
between whom and the elder American there was a constant sparring.
Grace confessed to herself that the youth's Anglomania must be trying
to one of his countryman's boastful temper, but this did not excuse the
bad taste of Bloxsome's rejoinders. When Alan described, with boyish
enthusiasm, a driving tour he had taken through the north of England,
the other said,
"Why do you squirm about English scenery so much? Say, can you find
anything in all England to compare with this, I should like to know?
Talk of their lakes--why, they're mere ponds; and their rivers--ditches
beside ours."
"Size isn't everything," said Alan, scornfully. "The lovely roadside
hedges--the beautiful roads themselves--then, the dear old-fashioned
inns, the ruined abbeys, the historic castles--what have we got to
compare with _them_? Travelling here is beastly. No wonder Americans
travel very little in their own country for pleasure."
Bloxsome gave a coarse laugh. "No, they transact their business at
home, and go abroad for amusement. English people amuse themselves at
home, and come here to invest their money or pick up heiresses."
Pierce Caldwell blushed, and cut in with some wholly irrelevant remark,
talking fast and laughing, in the impotent endeavor to obliterate the
effect of this speech. And when Mrs. Caldwell found herself alone with
Mrs. Frampton afterwards, she took occasion to say,
"You must please forgive our unmannerly cousin. His education was very
much neglected. He is a rough diamond."
Mrs. Frampton said, incisively, "He should be cut."
Mrs. Caldwell, not choosing to understand the _équivoque_, remarked
that the world was the best lapidary in such a case; and John Bloxsome
had seen little of any other worlds than those of San Francisco and
Pittsburgh.
"His father was one of my husband's greatest friends. He died many
years ago, and since then John comes and goes as he likes in our house.
I wish I could give him better manners, poor fellow!"
Mrs. Frampton pursed her lips, but made no rejoinder. She felt such
doubt as to the intrinsic value of the diamond that silence was her
only refuge.
Mordaunt, in the meantime, was impelled to say to Pierce,
"That's a queer fellow, that Bloxsome! Is he always like that, or has
he some special grudge against us?"
"He is not always like that. I can't tell what has come to him. I'm
afraid the truth is he doesn't like any one being more noticed than
himself, especially an Englishman."
"What an ass! Where has the fellow lived all his life?"
"Oh! In a very narrow circle. Never was at a public school or at
college. Now he lives chiefly between San Francisco and Pittsburgh."
Mordaunt whistled. "Ho! ho! I think I begin to understand. Is he well
off?"
"Fairly so, I believe. But he never talks to me of his affairs. I've
known him ever since I can remember, but, to say the truth, we have not
much in common."
"So I should think. I like that young Brown much better, though he
scowled at me awfully yesterday; but," he added, laughing, "I think
to-day he has found out I am not such a bad chap after all."
No more was said, and as Bloxsome departed the next morning he was soon
forgotten by our friends. Mordaunt set off the same day for his old
brother-officer's ranch, not more than a hundred miles distant, whence
he was to visit Pueblo, leaving his aunt and sister at "Falcon's Nest"
for a week.
It was a pleasant, tranquil one to the small party, reinforced once
or twice by visitors from Denver or Colorado Springs. But towards the
end of that time, Grace watched eagerly for the arrival of each mail.
She counted the days, the chances of delays and accidents; it was just
possible, during the three weeks which had elapsed since she wrote
to Ivor Lawrence, for an answer to have reached her. But none came.
It was true she had given him no address, but he must have known
that anything sent to her home would be forwarded. His name was never
mentioned between her aunt and herself, and she had so schooled herself
as not to betray the anxiety she felt. Mrs. Frampton was of course
ignorant that her niece had written to Lawrence, and did not suspect
the torture of "hope deferred" which Grace suffered.
She rambled alone up the cañon sometimes, when she could slip out of
the house unperceived by Doreen, who was generally her companion; and
sitting down there among the rocks, her face dropped its mask, and her
heart called aloud to the one man on earth for whom she felt she would
make any sacrifice. Yes, though "the world" should henceforward eject
him from its portals and brand him with infamy, though her kindred
should refuse to receive one stained with so deep a dye, she would not
hesitate to go to him, to share his obloquy, if only he would come to
her with open arms and say, "You have believed in me hitherto; will you
continue to believe in me, till death us do part?"
It was strange he should not write. Common courtesy demanded that he
should answer her letter. But perhaps he was waiting to do so till
he could tell her the result of the trial. She rarely saw an English
newspaper. Mordaunt had one sent him, but it arrived very irregularly;
and, whether intentionally or not, he generally kept it to himself,
or took it to his aunt's room to discuss the financial article. But
now he was gone, and his papers were sent after him; and any chance of
learning a decision in the law courts was at an end.
He wrote from his friend's ranch, fairly pleased with the life,
"Charington is doing very well; and if a man sets himself, body and
soul, to work here, on this gigantic farming scale, he may make a
good thing of it. If I married, and gave up English politics, and was
content to lead a purely pastoral life, I am sure I could make it
answer. But Charington advises me strongly not to invest money in a
ranch, unless I am prepared to devote myself to raising cattle, and so
on. It is an awfully jolly life for a short time--I feel as fit as a
four-year-old--but I fancy it would pall after a bit."
Then, from Pueblo, a few days later, he wrote, "'Real estate' in
Pueblo! After all, _that_ I believe is the investment that is the most
absolutely certain of bringing in very large returns ultimately; for
mines are always uncertain, are they not? And railways fluctuate. But
in a rising city like this, land _must_ increase rapidly in value, year
by year. What do you say?"
"I say," wrote his aunt in reply, "that I can't trust my own judgment
here, far less yours, my dear Mordaunt. All these speculations look so
lovely on the spot that one must get at a little distance from them
to judge if they stand upright and are as solid as they seem. I trust
Pierce Caldwell implicitly--he is a fine fellow and a clever fellow,
and he has done splendidly so far. But he is young, and naturally
sanguine. Leave his mine and your Pueblo building speculation alone for
the present. There can be no harm in a few weeks' delay."
And this advice was enforced with strong verbal exhortation when her
nephew, drifted hither and thither by the contrary winds of transient
enthusiasm, returned to the bosom of his family and held counsel
with his aunt. But such counsel was not possible on the night of his
arrival, which was coincident with the unexpected appearance of an
omnibusful of young folks from Colorado Springs. This "surprise party"
brought a fiddler with them, and were greeted by Mrs. Caldwell with a
cordiality which indicated unbounded confidence in the resources of her
larder. Mrs. Frampton stood aghast. She thought with what consternation
the head of an ordinary household in England would view the inroad of a
dozen hungry young men and women, prepared to make a night of it, and,
if heavy snow should prevent their departure, by no means indisposed
to pass two or three under their friends' hospitable roof! Happily,
in this case, the snow did not descend till they were gone, when it
effectually blocked the mountain roads and the railways, delaying the
Ballingers' departure two days. But this night, though dark and windy,
was fine, and the heavily laden omnibus with its four horses performed
the journey to and fro in safety, depositing its hilarious freight at
their respective homes in the dawn of the winter morning.
To the elder Englishwoman, accustomed to the undemonstrative enjoyment
of her own country-folk, the boisterous high spirits of these young
people, under no conventional restraints but those of propriety, were
a revelation. "Could they really _all_ be as much amused as that?"
she asked. "And was it necessary to make such a noise about it?"
Grace declared that a pleasuring in the days of Queen Bess might have
been in this wise, but not later, in England; not when the corrupt
manners of the Stuarts, and the buckram and whalebones of the House of
Hanover had rendered impossible all frank demonstrations of joyousness
among persons "of quality." With what shouts of laughter these young
Americans arrived! With what security they claimed their welcome!
Did ever the finest stroke of art arouse such tempests of hilarity as
did this small and well-worn joke of the "surprise"? They danced with
the vigor of Highlanders at a Northern meeting. Mordaunt, of course,
led out all the girls in turn, and, Grace, though with no heart for
capering, if the truth had been known, waltzed with most of the young
men.
For this act of self-sacrifice, let us think, she had her reward, when,
on the arrival of the mail, a few hours before the Ballingers were to
leave the "Falcon's Nest," a thick packet was placed in her hand.
How she blessed that forty-eight hours' detention by the fall of snow!
But for it she would not have received this letter, which had been
already delayed, in transit, for many days. She hurried to her room and
tore it open. It was a long document, extending over many pages, and
this is what she read: