The check “struck” MacFarlane just as the chairman had said it would,
wiping out his losses by the flood with something ahead for his next
undertaking.
That the verdict was a just one was apparent from the reports of both
McGowan's and the Railroad Company's experts. These showed that the
McGowan mortar held but little cement, and that not of the best; that
the backing of the masonry was composed of loose rubble instead of split
stone, and that the collapse of his structure was not caused by the
downpour, but by the caving in of culverts and spillways, which
were built of materials in direct violation of the provisions of the
contract. Even then there might have been some doubt as to the outcome
but for Holker Morris's testimony. He not only sent in his report, but
appeared himself, he told the Council, so as to answer any questions Mr.
McGowan or his friends might ask. He had done this, as he said openly at
the meeting, to aid his personal friend, Mr. MacFarlane, and also that
he might raise his voice against the slipshod work that was being done
by men who either did not know their business or purposely evaded their
responsibilities. “This construction of McGowan's,” he continued, “is
especially to be condemned, as there is not the slightest doubt that the
contractor has intentionally slighted his work--a neglect which, but
for the thorough manner in which MacFarlane had constructed the lower
culvert, might have resulted in the loss of many lives.”
McGowan snarled and sputtered, denouncing Garry and his “swallow-tails”
in the bar rooms and at the board meetings, but the decision was
unanimous, two of his friends concurring, fearing, as they explained
afterward, that the “New York crowd” might claim even a larger sum in a
suit for damages.
The meeting over, Morris and Jack dined with MacFarlane and again
the distinguished architect won Ruth's heart by the charm of his
personality, she telling Jack the next day that he was the only OLD
MAN--fifty was old for Ruth--she had ever seen with whom she could have
fallen in love, and that she was not sure after all but that Jack
was too young for her, at which there was a great scrimmage and a
blind-man's-buff chase around the table, up the front stairs and into
the corner by the window, where she was finally caught, smothered in
kisses and made to correct her arithmetic.
This ghost of damages having been laid--it was buried the week after
Jack had called on his uncle--the Chief, the First Assistant, and
Bangs, the head foreman, disappeared from Corklesville and reappeared at
Morfordsburg.
The Chief came to select a site for the entrance of the shaft; the First
Assistant came to compare certain maps and documents, which he had taken
from the trunk he had brought with him from his Maryland home, with the
archives resting in the queer old courthouse; while Foreman Bangs was to
help with the level and target, should a survey be found necessary.
The faded-out old town clerk looked Jack all over when he asked to see
the duplicate of a certain deed, remarking, as he led the way to the
Hall of Records,--it was under a table in the back room,--“Reckon
there's somethin' goin' on jedgin' from the way you New Yorkers is
lookin' into ore lands up here. There come a lawyer only last month from
a man named Breen, huntin' up this same property.”
The comparisons over and found to be correct, “starting from a certain
stone marked 'B' one hundred and eighty-seven feet East by South,” etc.,
etc., the whole party, including a small boy to help carry the level
and target and a reliable citizen who said he could find the property
blindfold--and who finally collapsed with a “Goll darn!--if I know where
I'm at!”--the five jumped onto a mud-encrusted vehicle and started for
the site.
Up hill and down hill, across one stream and then another; through
the dense timber and into the open again. Here their work began, Jack
handling the level (his Chief had taught him), Bangs holding the target,
MacFarlane taking a squint now and then so as to be sure,--and then the
final result,--to wit:--First, that the Maryland Company's property,
Arthur Breen & Co., agents, lay under a hill some two miles from
Morfordsburg; that Jack's lay some miles to the south of Breen's.
Second, that outcroppings showed the Maryland Mining Company's ore
dipped, as the Senior Breen had said, to the east, and third, that
similar outcroppings showed Jack's dipped to the west.
And so the airy bubble filled with his own and Ruth's iridescent
hopes,--a bubble which had floated before him as he tramped through the
cool woods, and out upon the hillside, vanished into thin air.
For with Ruth's arms around him, her lips close to his, her boundless
enthusiasm filling his soul, the boy's emotions had for the time
overcome his judgment. So much so that all the way up in the train he
had been “supposing” and resupposing. Even the reply of the town clerk
had set his heart to thumping; his uncle had sent some one then! Then
came the thought,--Yes, to boom one of his misleading prospectuses--and
for a time the pounding had ceased: by no possible combination now,
either honest or dishonest, could the two properties be considered one
and the same mine.
Again his thoughts went back to Ruth. He knew how keenly she would be
disappointed. She had made him promise to telegraph her at once if his
own and her father's inspection of the ore lands should hold out any
rose-colored prospects for the future. This he had not now the heart to
do. One thing, however, he must do, and at once, and that was to write
to Peter, or see him immediately on his return. There was no use now
of the old fellow talking the matter over with the director; there was
nothing to talk over, except a bare hill three miles from anywhere,
covering a possible deposit of doubtful richness and which, whether good
or bad, would cost more to get to market than it was worth.
They were on the extreme edge of the forest when the final decision was
reached, MacFarlane leaning against a rock, the level and tripod tilted
against his arm, Jack sitting on a fallen tree, the map spread out on
his knees.
For some minutes Jack sat silent, his eyes roaming over the landscape.
Below him stretched an undulating mantle of velvet, laid loosely over
valley, ravine and hill, embroidered in tints of corn-yellow, purplings
of full-blossomed clover and the softer greens of meadow and swamp. In
and out, now straight, now in curves and bows, was threaded a ribbon
of silver, with here and there a connecting mirror in which flashed the
sun. Bordering its furthermost edge a chain of mountains lost themselves
in low, rolling clouds, while here and there, in its many crumplings,
were studded jewels of barn stack and house, their facets aflame in the
morning light.
Jack absorbed it all, its beauty filling his soul, the sunshine bathing
his cheeks. Soon all trace of his disappointment vanished: with Ruth
here,--with his work to occupy him,--and this mighty, all-inspiring,
all-intoxicating sweep of loveliness spread out, his own and Ruth's
every hour of the day and night, what did ore beds or anything else
matter?
MacFarlane's voice woke him to consciousness. He had called to him
before, but the boy had not heard.
“As I have just remarked, Jack,” MacFarlane began again, “there is
nothing but an earthquake will make your property of any use. It is a
low-grade ore, I should say, and tunnelling and shoring would eat it up.
Wipe it off the books. There are thousands of acres of this kind of land
lying around loose from here to the Cumberland Valley. It may get better
as you go down--only an assay can tell about that--but I don't think
it will. To begin sinking shafts might mean sinking one or a dozen; and
there's nothing so expensive. I am sorry, Jack, but wipe it out. Some
bright scoundrel might sell stock on it, but they'll never melt any of
it up into stove plate.”
“All right, sir,” Jack said at last, with a light laugh. “It is the same
old piece of bread, I reckon, and it has fallen on the same old buttered
side. Uncle Peter told me to beware of bubbles--said they were hard
to carry around. This one has burst before I got my hand on it. All
right--let her go! I hope Ruth won't take it too much to heart. Here,
boy, get hold of this map and put it with the other traps in the wagon.
And now, Mr. MacFarlane, what comes next?”
Before the day was over MacFarlane had perfected his plans. The town was
to be avoided as too demoralizing a shelter for the men, and barracks
were to be erected in which to house them. Locations of the principal
derricks were selected and staked, as well as the sites for the entrance
to the shaft, for the machine and blacksmith's shops and for a storage
shanty for tools: the Maryland Mining Company's work would require
at least two years to complete, and a rational, well-studied plan of
procedure was imperative.
“And now, Jack, where are you going to live,--in the village?” asked his
Chief, resting the level and tripod carefully against a tree trunk and
seating himself beside Jack on a fallen log.
“Out here, if you don't mind, sir, where I can be on top of the work all
the time. It's but a short ride for Ruth and she can come and go all the
time. I am going to drop some of these trees; get two or three choppers
from the village and knock up a log-house like the one I camped in when
I was a boy.”
“Where will you put it?” asked MacFarlane with a smile, as he turned
his head as if in search of a site. It was just where he wanted Jack to
live, but he would not have suggested it.
“Not a hundred yards from where we sit, sir--a little back of those
two big oaks. There's a spring above on the hill and sloping ground for
drainage; and shade, and a great sweep of country in front. I've been
hungry for this life ever since I left home; now I am going to have it.”
“It will be rather lonely, won't it?” The engineer's eyes softened as
they rested on the young fellow, his face flushed with the enthusiasm of
his new resolve. He and Ruth's mother had lived in just such a shanty,
and not so very long ago, either, it seemed,--those were the happiest
years of his life.
“No!” exclaimed Jack. “It's only a step to the town; I can walk it in
half an hour. No, it won't be lonely. I will fix up a room for Uncle
Peter somewhere, so he can be comfortable,--he would love to come here
on his holidays; and Ruth can come out for the day,--she will be crazy
about it when I tell her. No, I will get along. If the lightning had
struck my ore beds I would probably have painted and papered some musty
back room in the village and lived a respectable life. Now I am going to
turn savage.”
The next day the contracts were signed: work to commence in three
months. Henry MacFarlane, Engineer-in-Chief, John Breen in charge of
construction.
It was on that same sofa in the far corner of the sitting-room that
Jack told Ruth,--gently, one word at a time,--making the best of it, but
telling her the exact truth.
“And then we are not going to have any of the things we dreamed about,
Jack,” she said with a sigh.
“I am afraid not, my darling,--not now, unless the lightning strikes us,
which it won't.”
She looked out of the window for a moment, and her eyes filled with
tears. Then she thought of her father, and how hard he had worked,
and what disappointments he had suffered, and yet how, with all his
troubles, he had always put his best foot foremost--always encouraging
her. She would not let Jack see her chagrin. This was part of Jack's
life, just as similar disappointments had been part of her father's.
“Never mind, blessed. Well, we had lots of fun 'supposing,' didn't we,
Jack. This one didn't come true, but some of the others will and what
difference does it make, anyway, as long as I have you,” and she nestled
her face in his neck. “And now tell me what sort of a place it is and
where daddy and I are going to live, and all about it.”
And then, to soften the disappointment the more and to keep a new bubble
afloat, Jack launched out into a description of the country and how
beautiful the view was from the edge of the hill overlooking the valley,
with the big oaks crowning the top and the lichen-covered rocks and
fallen timber blanketed with green moss, and the spring of water that
gushed out of the ground and ran laughing down the hillside, and the
sweep of mountains losing themselves in the blue haze of the distance,
and then finally to the log-cabin he was going to build for his own
especial use.
“And only two miles away,” she cried in a joyous tone,--“and I can ride
out every day! Oh, Jack!--just think of it!” And so, with the breath
of this new enthusiasm filling their souls, a new bubble of hope
and gladness was floated, and again the two fell to planning, and
“supposing,” the rose-glow once more lightening up the peaks.
For days nothing else was talked of. An onslaught was at once made on
Garry's office, two doors below Mrs. Hicks, for photographs, plans
of bungalows, shanties, White Mountain lean-tos, and the like, and
as quickly tucked under Ruth's arm and carried off, with only the
permission of the office boy,--Garry himself being absent owing to
some matters connected with a big warehouse company in which he was
interested, the boy said, and which took him to New York on the early
train and did not allow his return sometimes, until after midnight.
These plans were spread out under the lamp on the sitting-room table,
the two studying the details, their heads together, MacFarlane sitting
beside them reading or listening,--the light of the lamp falling on his
earnest, thoughtful face,--Jack consulting him now and then as to the
advisability of further extensions, the same being two rooms shingled
inside and out, with an annex of bark and plank for Ruth's horse, and a
kitchen and laundry and no end of comforts, big and little,--all to be
occupied whenever their lucky day would come and the merry bells ring
out the joyful tidings of their marriage.
Nor was this all this particularly radiant bubble contained. Not only
was there to be a big open fireplace built of stone, and overhead
rafters of birch, the bark left on and still glistening,--but there
were to be palms, ferns, hanging baskets, chintz curtains, rugs, pots of
flowers, Chinese lanterns, hammocks, easy chairs; and for all Jack knew,
porcelain tubs, electric bells, steam heat and hot and cold water, so
enthusiastic had Ruth become over the possibilities lurking in the 15
X 20 log-hut which Jack proposed to throw together as a shelter in his
exile.