Part 14 (1/2)
”The trestle is all right,” answered Geoffrey, climbing into the cab.
”I held you up, and I'm going on with you to bring out a doctor to my partner, who is dangerously ill.”
The engineer's comments were indignant and sulphurous, while the big fireman turned back his s.h.i.+rt sleeves as if preparing to chastise the man rash enough to interfere with express freight traffic. Geoffrey, reaching for a shovel, said:
”When we get there, I'll go with you to your superintendent at Vancouver; but, if either of you try to put me off or to call a.s.sistance, I'll make good use of this. I tell you it's a question of life and death, and two at least of your directors are good friends of the man I want to help. They wouldn't thank you for destroying his last chance. Meantime you're wasting precious moments. Start the train.”
”Hold fast!” commanded the grizzled engineer, opening the throttle.
”When she's under way, I'll talk to you, and unless you satisfy me, by the time we reach Vancouver there won't be much of you left for the police to take charge of.”
Then the two locomotives started the long cars on their inter-ocean race again.
CHAPTER XII
GEOFFREY TESTS HIS FATE
It was a lowering afternoon in the Fall, when Thurston and Julius Savine stood talking together upon a spray-drenched ledge in the depths of a British Columbian canon. On the crest of the smooth-scarped hillside, which stretched back from the sheer face of rock far overhead, stood what looked like a tiny fretwork in ebony, and consisted of two-hundred-foot conifers. Here and there a clamorous torrent had worn out a gully, and, with Thurston's a.s.sistance, Savine had accomplished the descent of one of the less precipitous. Elsewhere the rocks had been rubbed into smooth walls, between which the river had fretted out its channel during countless ages. The water was coming down in a mad green flood, for the higher snows had melted fast under the autumn sun, and the clay beneath the glaciers had stained it.
Foam licked the ledges, a roaring white wake streamed behind each boulder's ugly head, and the whole gloomy canon rang with the thunder of a rapid, whose filmy stream whirled in the chilly breeze.
Savine gazed at the rapid and the whirlpool that fed it, distinguis.h.i.+ng the roar of scoring gravel and grind of broken rock from its vibratory booming, and though he was a daring man, his heart almost failed him.
”It looks ugly, horribly ugly, and I doubt if another man in the Dominion would have suggested tackling the river here, but you are right,” he admitted. ”Human judgment has its limits, and the constant bursts have proved that no d.y.k.es which wouldn't ruin me in the building could stand high-water pressure long. If you don't mind, Thurston, we'll move farther from the edge. I've been a little shaky since that last attack.”
”The climb down was awkward, but you have looked better lately,”
declared Geoffrey and Savine sighed.
”I guess my best days are done, and that is one reason why I wish to end up with a big success,” he said. ”I got a plain warning from the Vancouver doctor you brought me in that morning. You managed it smartly.”
”I was lucky,” said Thurston, laughing. ”At first, I expected to be ignominiously locked up after the engineer and fireman had torn my clothes off me. But we did not climb down here to talk of that.”
”No!” and Savine looked straight at his companion. ”This is a great scheme, Thurston, the biggest I have ever undertaken. There will be room for scores of ranches, herds of cattle, wheat fields and orchards, if we can put it through--and we have just got to put it through.
Those confounded d.y.k.es have drained me heavily, and they'll keep right on costing money. Still, even to me, it looks almost beyond the power of mortal man to deepen the channel here. The risk will figure high in money, but higher in human life. You feel quite certain you can do it?”
”Yes!” a.s.serted Geoffrey. ”I believe I can--in winter, when the frost binds the glaciers and the waters shrink. Once it is done, and the only hard rock barrier that holds the water up removed, the river will scour its own way through the alluvial deposits. I have asked a long price, but the work will be difficult.”
Savine nodded. He knew that it would be a task almost fit for demi-G.o.ds or giants to cut down the bed of what was a furious torrent, thick with grinding debris and scoring ice, and that only very strong bold men could grapple with the angry waters, amid blinding snow or under the bitter frost of the inland ranges in winter time.
”The price is not too heavy, but I don't accept your terms,” Savine said. ”Hold on until I have finished and then begin your talking.
I'll offer you a minor partners.h.i.+p in my business instead. Take time, and keep your answer until I explain things in my offices, in case you find the terms onerous; but there are many men in this country who would be glad of the chance you're getting.”
Geoffrey stood up, his lean brown face twitching. He walked twice along the slippery ledge, and then halted before Savine. ”I will accept them whatever they are on one condition, which I hardly dare hope you will approve,” he replied. ”That is, regarding the partners.h.i.+p, for in any case, holding to my first suggestion, you can count on my best help down here. I don't forget that I owe you a heavy debt of grat.i.tude, sir, though, as you know, I have had several good offers latterly.”
Savine, who had been abstractedly watching the mad rush of the stream, looked up as he inquired:
”What is the condition? You seem unusually diffident to-day, Thurston.”
”It is a great thing I am going to ask.” Geoffrey, standing on the treacherous ledge above the thundering river, scarcely looked like a suppliant as he put his fate to the test. ”It is your permission to ask Miss Savine to marry me when the time seems opportune. It would not be surprising if you laughed at me, but even then I should only wait the more patiently. This is not a new ambition, for one day when I first came, a poor man, into this country I set my heart upon it, and working ever since to realize it, I have, so far at least as worldly prospects go, lessened the distance between us.”