Читать книгу The Lone Hand - Harold Bindloss - Страница 6

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A waitress carried off the plates and Mark went to an easy-chair. A cheerful fire snapped in the old-fashioned grate, and across the hearth-rug the stranger he had met on the sands rolled a cigarette. Red curtains covered the windows, and the furniture was old, for the inn was built when mail-coaches and post-chaises took the road for Scotland along the Solway shore. Now swift road-borne traffic again rolled by its gate. Mark heard wheels and a motor-bus's horn.

Since he had satisfied his appetite, he studied his companion. The other was an athletic young fellow, tall but not heavily built, and his glance was alert and frank. Mark thought his boots and clothes American. Mark had not a change of clothes, but he had borrowed the landlord's slippers, and he stretched his legs to the fire. After a strenuous evening, he was entitled to go slack.

"Will you take a ready-made cigarette?" he asked. "No, thanks," said the other. "When I was in the woods I rolled all I used, and the habit sticks." He balanced the neatly rolled cigarette. "Pretty good! Can you beat it?"

"I could not," Mark admitted. "You're American?"

The young fellow gave him a twinkling glance.

"The next thing. I'm Canadian; although you might not spot it, there's a difference. Anyhow, reserve is not our habit, and if I had not met up with you, I might have roamed about the sands until the tide got me. I guess I have a card—"

He found a card, and Mark read:

Robert Wellwin Duquesne Lumber Company Export Products

"Thank you," he said. "I'm Mark Crozier, until recently of Newcastle, but now at Howbarrow, about twenty miles off. Are you in this country for business?"

Wellwin studied him. Crozier was large, but he was not, like some large men, slow; Wellwin had crossed the treacherous sands with him. His look was calm, and when he fronted one he tilted his head a little and squarely met one's glance. But for his twinkle, Wellwin might have thought him dull. He talked in a quiet voice. Not a Canadian type; but somehow Wellwin knew him a good sort.

"When I pulled out from Glasgow my business was put across, and the old man cabled I might take a holiday. He's the Duquesne Company's president. When I graduated at Toronto I went to the woods, and studied slashing and hauling logs at the winter camps. Then I was at the mill, where we rip the stuff for lumber, and now I'm working through the salesman gang. Well, my mother's folk were Borderers, and I thought I'd see the Solway and the Roman wall. The country's interesting, although it's surely wet. Anyhow, I mustn't bore you. Are you a farmer?"

"Not long since I was an engineer's draughtsman, but the foundry shut down and the heavy machinery trade is bad. I'd thought about starting a car repair-shop; but I don't yet know. One needs some capital and money is hard to get."

"Sure thing!" Wellwin agreed. "But have you thought about the Dominion? If you have not, you might. So long as you are willing to sweat, it's a pretty good country."

"I'll wait," said Mark. "On the English Border, we are not an impulsive lot, and I doubt if the Scots are very rash."

For a few minutes they smoked. The river brawled and they heard the wind in the trees. A motor-lorry clanged across a bridge, and when the roll of wheels got faint a fresh noise throbbed about the inn. Wellwin went to the window and pushed the casement back. A dull rumble, something like a roll of drums, pulsated in the dark.

"An aeroplane? Or a big express freight laboring up-grade?"

"The Solway tide, pushed up the firth by a western gale! Sometimes it advances in a breaking wave two or three feet high."

Wellwin fastened the window and stretched his legs to the fire.

"I'm content to be where I am. When you heard my gun I was lucky. But there is no gale."

"The gale will arrive by morning and lift the tide three or four feet. In fact, after breakfast I must see that the herds move my uncle's sheep. I don't know if you would be interested, but our dogs are clever."

"So long as the job is on dry ground, I'd like to watch; I'm not going on the sands," said Wellwin, firmly.

For a time they smoked and talked. Although their types were different, each was conscious of a queer attraction. For the most part, youth is trustful and friendship springs fast.

"When I know the sheep are safe, I must get back to Howbarrow," Mark said by and by. "Hadrian's wall is not far off, and if you'd like the excursion, we might visit a spot where the Picts broke through, and a famous camp. Then I could show you an older rampart that puzzles the antiquaries. The bogs, however, are numerous, and the inns are not remarkably good."

Wellwin laughed and got up.

"When you have lived at a loggers' camp and mushed along the river trails in the melting snow, you're not fastidious. We'll fix things in the morning. I guess it's time for bed."

Breakfast was served at daybreak, and soon afterwards Mark and Wellwin left the inn and plowed across the wet fields. The morning was gray, the light was dim, and a savage wind drove low-flying scud across the sky. When Mark pulled out his watch behind a battered hedge, it was nine o'clock, but two or three miles off all was indistinct.

The marsh, a tapering, sage-green peninsula, pierced the vague sands. The sands were colorless, but in some places their wet surface glimmered with faint reflected light. Whistling curlew sped inland before the gale. A flock of clamorous gulls got up from a pool, circled on wings that for a moment were white and distinct, and then melted in the gloom. About a mile in front, patches of dingy color dotted the marsh. The patches moved, and in the background Mark saw two or three speeding objects.

"The herds have got to work," he said. "Since the sheep are down on the low end, the men have rather an awkward job. Our lot's about two hundred, but I imagine there's a thousand on the marsh. However, the tide will not reach the sands for two hours, and I dare say we can help."

"How much is a sheep worth?" Wellwin inquired.

"Round about two pounds, for the small hill sorts."

Wellwin calculated. "Two thousand dollars. A useful wad, and straight reckoning! Pounds, shillings, and pence; hundredweights, quarters, and pounds, and then some, leave a Canadian to guess. At Glasgow I was forced to buy me a schooboy's arithmetic book—But I expect you want to get busy."

They crossed the low marsh, and stopped where two men sheltered from the wind behind a broken bank. The herds were big, lean fellows and their clothes had faded to the color of dry soil. One, like Mark, was frankly Saxon; the other, although his eyes were gray, was the old, thin-faced Cumbrian type. His pointed chin and long head were perhaps inherited from the Picts. The herds looked at Mark inquiringly, and he told them who he was.

In front, three or four hundred small sheep slowly followed the bank of a circling creek. The wind blew back their stained fleeces, and where the clean wool showed it looked as if they were flayed. The flock was compact, for a dog turned back stragglers. Other sheep were scattered about the marsh, and at one spot a number plunged into a hollow by a creek and vanished. A dog jumped on some broken turf and fronted the herds, as if it waited for an order.

"Get away back, Nell!" one shouted, and the dog went off at top speed.

"You are gathering them up," said Mark.

"T' black-faces ho'd togedder; yan can han'le them. T' d—Herdwicks are as wild as hawks."

"How many were there in the bunch that took the creek?"

"A score and tyan, I doot they'll scatter," the herd replied. He whistled and shouted: "Fetch on, Nell!"

"I'd have guessed a dozen. They were over the bank like a flash," Wellwin remarked.

A dog barked and the sheep leaped from a gully. The other herd waved his arms, and two dogs sped across the grass and vanished in broken ground. By and by they reappeared, circling round a straggling gray-faced flock. The herd began to count, and Wellwin looked up with surprise.

"You are pretty obviously British, but for all I can distinguish, the fellow might calculate in Chinese," he said to Mark.

"We reckon by scores. I believe the numerals are Scandinavian."

"But who in thunder taught you to count like that?"

"Hakon, King of Norway, or perhaps Hardicanute," Mark replied with a laugh. "At all events, the first Herdwicks were Viking sheep."

"You are a queer crowd," Wellwin remarked. "You stay put for a thousand years!"

"Oh, well," said Mark, "your gotten and I'll get me were Elizabethan English. Then in some American towns I believe the mayor is a reeve."

The gray-faced Herdwicks jointed the larger flock, but did not mix, and Mark and Wellwin took posts to hold them in the bow of the creek. The herds went the other way, and for a time barking dogs and speeding groups of sheep scoured the marsh. Wellwin remarked that the groups got larger, until at length a compact mass, pushed on by the herds and flanked by circling dogs, rolled into the loop. Mark pulled out his watch.

"Ten o'clock! We must be across the hollow spot in an hour."

"Just that," the herd agreed, and whistled. "Gan forrad, Bob! Fetch on, Beauty!"

Six hundred sheep rolled along the watershed, where the ground was firmest and the creeks were small; the black-faces together, the Herdwicks straggling on their flank. Splashing in pools and jumping channels, the men directed their advance, and the dogs stopped the groups that tried to break away. So far, all went smoothly, but sometimes Mark turned his head and looked about.

All he saw behind the marsh-top was the dreary sands, through which a river-channel curved. The water broke in angry waves and foam like soapsuds blew along the bank. The current yet went down the firth, but the tide was not far off, and Mark imagined the savage gale drowned the noise of its advance. Moreover, in front the ground sloped to a hollow where the river at one time had pierced the marsh. A large creek, opening to the sands at both ends, drained the hollow, and although the creek was bridged, tributary channels curved about the slopes. When the party reached the top, gray scum in the grass indicated that the tide had recently swept the basin. The channels bothered the sheep. Buffeted by the gale, they stopped, and rolling together in a bleating mass, fronted the dogs. Then a herd in advance of the groups signaled by tossing arms, and began to run.

"Tide's broken low bridge," said the other. "We must shift them to north end and there's nut much time."

The sheep were frightened and stubborn, and the Herdwicks broke.

"Can ye hold black-faces?" the herd inquired.

"I don't know," said Mark. "So long as they're afraid to cross the creek, we'll try."

Wellwin touched him and he looked round. The river-channel in the sands was smooth, as if the current now ran with the wind; but not far off a white-topped wave stretched from bank to bank. The wave rolled up the channel, and where it passed, the sands melted in a surging flood. Before long the flood would sweep the hollow, and Isaac's sheep were yet scattered about the marsh.

Mark sent Wellwin where he thought he ought to go. The creek the animals dared not cross was behind the compact black-faced flock; for the most part, the sheep were quiet, but now and then a number surged irresolutely about. In the meantime, the herds were occupied, and when for a few moments Wellwin could watch the dogs, he thought the swift animals reasoned like men. A whistle and sometimes a signal from a lifted arm was all the command they got, but the clusters of sheep got larger. The scores soon were fifties and the fifties hundreds, and at length a solid mass of woolly bodies rolled back tumultuously to the other flock.

The sands, however, had vanished and the tide went up the creek. The low marsh would soon be an island, and the island would melt. The north bridge was a mile off, and Mark doubted if they could get there before the flood. Yet, with the deep creek on one side, the sheep, in order to break away, must pass the row of men; and pushed by the dogs, the flock began to surge along the bank.

One dared not stop for the tributaries; where one could not jump, men and draggled animals plowed through the mud. Wellwin's face was red and his breath was labored. Mark's skin was wet by sweat, and when he dared he glanced at the creek. The current leaped up the bank, and where but a few minutes since the flock had passed water shone in the grass. Dogs barked, one heard the surf beat the marsh-top and mud-crusted fleeces shake. After a time, a herd signed Mark.

"Ye'll get in front and turn them t'other side o' brig. Maybe we'll win over."

Mark called Wellwin, and, circling widely round the flock, they came back to the creek. The north bridge stood; but the flood was nearly level with the small birch trunks, there was not a rail, and the turfs that covered the poles were trampled to sticky slime. Mark and Wellwin took their posts a dozen yards behind the bridge, and for a few moments the flock stopped. Then the Herdwicks saw their line across, and by scores and fifties started down the slope.

"Let them gan!" shouted a herd.

The leaders leaped across the bridge, and Mark got his breath. The black-faces were starting, and where one went all would go. But there was the trouble. The bridge was about five feet wide, and six or seven hundred sheep rolled down the incline on a twenty-yard front. The flock charged for the bridge and all could not get across. Moreover, a sheep swims but poorly.

Shouting for Wellwin, Mark jumped into the creek. The current reached his waist, and he thought it would pull his legs from under him. Wellwin, two or three yards off, took the plunge and gave Mark a smile.

"Nothing very fresh, partner; I have handled logs in the rivers of the North. But watch out. We are for it."

The sheep spilled from the crowded bridge and went up the creek with the flood. None must pass, for the bank farther on was steep; but in front a muddy incline dipped to the water. The swimming animals steered for the spot. Some were carried by, and more fell from the bridge. Struggling stupidly, they collided with Mark, who seized their wool and pushed them across. Fresh sheep, urged by the press behind, took the water, and the herds plunged in. The creek was blocked by struggling animals, held back, as yet, from destruction by four tired men. Three, however, were six-foot Cumbrians, and Wellwin had steered crashing logs down Canadian rapids.

All were savage and breathless. The bottom was treacherous and the flood rose fast. Braced against the current, they somehow kept their feet, shoved back the drifting sheep, and dragged the brutes across. Sometimes the thin-faced herd pulled one from the water, and with a swing of his big shoulders tossed it on the others' backs.

When Mark imagined they were beaten, two cowmen from a farm across the flats arrived. Six men were now in the water, and where live-stock must be controlled four were experts. By degrees the pressure slackened and the flock got thin. The bridge would carry the sheep, and since the most part were on the other side, Mark floundered across. Wellwin pulled him onto the mud and when they climbed the bank the flock streamed up the sage-green slope.

Half an hour afterward, the group stopped where prickly whinns dotted rising ground.

"We'll mannish noo," a herd remarked, and studied the gloomy sky. "The tide is by the top, and if wind drops, she'll be doon three-fit to-neet. Weel but for the Greenrigg lads, I thowt we were beat at brig."

Wellwin looked back. The hollow was a lake, and all he saw of the low marsh was a small island, washed by angry surf.

"I reckon I have had enough, and I want a bath," he said. "My hands are gummed up by sticky grease and my slicker coat smells like—perhaps a tannery is the nearest thing. Anyhow, your relation is two thousand dollars' worth of mutton to the good."

Mark smiled. "One likes to be modest, but I imagine our help tipped the beam and my uncle owes me something. However, I have not much grounds to hope he will meet the bill, and in the meantime we'll steer for the inn."