Part 16 (1/2)
”I guess so. I don't know that I deserve it, but you won't be too hard on me?”
Eleanor saw the gleam in his eyes. ”It will depend. Where is Jimmy?”
”Bidding against Forster and the rest for the _Tyee_.”
”Ah!” said. Eleanor, and for a moment her face softened. ”I don't know why you didn't tell me that earlier. Hadn't you better go back and see that he doesn't get her?”
”I don't care if he does,” said Jordan; ”that is, as long as he gives me half an hour of your company.”
Eleanor laughed. ”Leaving out the compliment, what would you do if Jimmy bought her for you?”
”Run her against the first vessel Merril put on a trip she was good for, if I had to carry freight for nothing.”
The girl turned and glanced at him again, and a hard glint crept into her eyes. She looked imperious, forceful, and vindictive then, but the man felt a thrill run through him, for he knew his answer had pleased her.
”Ah!” she said; ”for that I could forgive you many a failure. Still, you must go back and look after Jimmy. We shall not go away until we hear what you have done.”
Jordan reluctantly turned away, and, as it happened, met Jimmy coming out of the auction-room with perfect satisfaction in his face.
”I feel that I owe you a good deal. In fact, I'm afraid I can't express my grat.i.tude as I ought,” he said. ”Merril's man has got her, but I have a clear thousand dollars to hand over to my father. Still, there's something that puzzles me. What brought Forster here?”
Jordan laughed. ”Your sister.”
”Eleanor?”
”Of course!” said Jordan dryly. ”No doubt, because she is your sister, you don't credit her with any useful capacity.”
”Eleanor is clever,” said Jimmy reflectively. ”Still, there are subjects girls know nothing about--and, anyway, there was Mrs. Forster's att.i.tude to consider. It's hardly in human nature that she should be pleased to see her husband staking his money to please her children's teacher.”
”Exactly! That is what made the thing cleverer. She has Mrs. Forster's good-will too.”
”Then,” said Jimmy decisively, ”she must be a very kindly lady.”
”Or your sister a very capable young woman. You seem to find it a little difficult to recognize that.”
Jimmy dismissed the subject with a little gesture. ”Well,” he said, ”I'm almost bewildered. The thing was so simple. Why didn't Merril think of it?”
”I have no doubt he did. Still, you saw what the little man has to expect if he makes a bid. On thinking it over, it seems to me that Merril trusted to my broker. He figured I'd back down once I realized that he knew my game and was a match for me. There are big men like him who live by bluff, and everybody makes way for them, but they're apt to show themselves very much the same as other people when you face them resolutely. It's just like putting a pin in a bubble.”
Then Forster joined them while his wife and Eleanor came out of the store, and a few minutes later the girl and Jordan walked behind the other three as they turned toward the hotel where the wagon had been sent. Eleanor smiled at her companion.
”We are indebted to you, after all,” she said, and there was a faint but suggestive something in her voice which satisfied Jordan.
CHAPTER XII
THE ”SHASTA” s.h.i.+PPING COMPANY
Two or three weeks had slipped away since the sale of the _Tyee_, when Jimmy Wheelock, who had been specially requested to do so, called at Forster's ranch. He did not know why his presence was required, and when he arrived was somewhat astonished to find Jordan, Valentine, and a man he had not met, sitting with his host about a little table in the big general room. A decanter and a box of cigars stood on the table, but the att.i.tude of the men suggested that it was business that had brought them there. Jordan, who was talking animatedly, looked up when Jimmy came in.
”You're not quite on time,” he said.