Читать книгу Larry of Lonesome Lake - Harold Bindloss - Страница 4

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A warm wind from the Pacific touched the pines and the noise in their high tops was like the murmur of the sea. Branches swung and yellow light and trembling shadow splashed the big straight trunks. Then for a minute or two all was quiet, and Bethune heard a woodpecker tap on rotten bark. A stick cracked under his horse's feet, red and green feathers gleamed, and the bird was gone, but in the background a blue grouse began to drum.

In summer the Canadian Pacific slope is beautiful, and the time was Sunday afternoon, but Lawrence Bethune, steering his horse down the mountain trail, tried to calculate the sum he could prudently draw from the bank at Vancouver and the quantity of hay he ought to put up. The young steers he had examined at the ranch where he had stopped for the night were useful animals, and while summer lasted would find their food in the woods. In four or five days he could drive them across the pass to his ranch by Lonesome Lake; but he must not be rash, and the oats on the ground he had recently cleared were not growing strong. In British Columbia, there was the trouble: when one had chopped and burned the great pines, the crop for the first two or three years was thin. He ought perhaps to have sown more timothy and orchard grass.

Shining water crossed the trail, and when his horse's feet splashed in the creek he let go the bridle and allowed the animal to drink while he rolled a cigarette. At Bourlon ranch one used economy, and American cigarettes carried a duty stamp. In England Lawrence had not bothered about things like that; but when all one had was invested in virgin forest from which one hoped to chop a ranch, one mustn't be extravagant. Well, in four years he had cleared some ground, and before he was forced to let his hired men go they had ditched the swampy belt and the soil was drying out. To cut the trench through the hemlock roots was something of a job, but Lawrence knew himself a harder and stronger man than the young fellow who had shivered, and sometimes sweated, in the mud in France.

In Canada one must get hard, for the soft and slack went broke. All the same, the Pacific slope was a good country, and he looked about. Where the branches were thin, he saw the Cascade Range's snow cut the serene sky; on the other side, behind the woods, the sea sparkled like a looking-glass. The trees hid the ugly settlement by the inlet under the hill.

The creek, splashing musically, splashed across smooth, quartz-veined stones. Lawrence's glance followed the gliding water, and stopped. On the stony soil, the brushwood was thin, and little red wineberries shone among the glossy leaves. At the bottom of a big cedar, cradled by the spreading roots, a girl was asleep.

Lawrence put up his tobacco pouch. To study her was something of an impertinence, but at Qualichan white women were not numerous, and her type was not the mountain type. Anyhow, she certainly was asleep, and he thought fatigue had something to do with it.

Her body was thin and her face rather pinched, but, in her quiet sleep, attractive. She obviously used powder, and Lawrence doubted if the touch of strong color in her cheek were altogether natural. Her clothes, so far as he could judge, were cheaply fashionable; in fact, he imagined only her thin city shoes were good. In London or Paris she would not have excited his curiosity; under the Canadian pines, she was frankly puzzling. On the whole, she moved him to vague compassion, but he ought not to stop, and he touched his horse.

The horse splashed rather noisily through the creek, and the girl looked up. She saw a brown-skinned man on a cayuse horse. His clothes were yellow overalls, his long boots were shabby, and his large felt hat had some time since lost its shape in the rain. Yet when he met her swift glance his was rather apologetic than embarrassed. He was not remarkably young—thirty perhaps—and for all his shabby clothes, she thought she knew his type.

"If I disturbed you, I am sorry," he said, and lifted his hand to his hat.

She signed him to stop. Lawrence noted that she got up gracefully.

"I am rather glad you did disturb me. Do you know what time it is?"

"Half-past four," said Lawrence, looking at the sun.

"Thank you," said the girl with a sort of resigned shrug. "On Sundays supper is at six, and the settlement is two miles off."

"About two miles. The trail is downhill, and you have an hour and a half—"

"The trouble is, I must help cook supper at the Tecumseh House. I am the head, and only, waitress."

Lawrence was surprised. He had not thought her the sort of waitress Mrs. Monroe of the Tecumseh would engage. It had nothing to do with him, but now she was on her feet he thought her tired and slack. In fact, he wondered whether she was not ill.

"If you can ride, you might take my horse."

"You are kind," she said. "I could ride when I was six or seven years old, and I did not always use a saddle."

Lawrence shortened a stirrup. If she could ride a barebacked horse, she could use his saddle, but her skirt was short.

"The old cayuse will go quietly. You might leave him at the livery yard," he said, and held his hand for her foot.

Her shoe rested in his palm for a moment, and then she was in the saddle. He remarked that she was light and agile. Balancing sideways, she touched the horse.

"You are a good sort," she said, and vanished in the shade.

Lawrence sat down in the wineberries and lighted his cigarette. Although the mountain trail was steep, he did not think the girl would come down. He had noted her balance and confidence; anyhow, since her clothes were not at all riding clothes, he had imagined she would sooner he did not lead the horse. In fact, when he was out of sight, she might ride astride.

At the little coast settlement she was exotic, and he wondered how she got there. Then, Mrs. Monroe was a remarkably sober and rather grim Ontario Presbyterian, while the girl's proper background was perhaps a third-class cabaret. Yet he did not know. One sensed a touch of refinement.

Lawrence wondered why she interested him. He did not think her beautiful, although she was somehow attractive, and for long he had had nothing to do with women. He was not by temperament a recluse and misogynist, and when he talked about ranching in Canada his English friends were ironically amused. Lawrence allowed them to joke. His habit was not to argue about his plans; when he himself was satisfied he coolly went ahead. Well, he had for four years lived laboriously and frugally in the woods, and he did not regret the plunge the others had thought rash. He was, in fact, content, and if he held on for another ten years, he might begin to be prosperous.

In the meantime, he could not support the sort of wife he would care to marry, and he must leave women alone. Lawrence hoped he was logical, and so far he enjoyed his bachelor's freedom. Yet sometimes, particularly when he came home from work on a summer evening and all he heard was the cowbells in the creeping gloom, the log-house was lonely, and he pictured another in the quiet room.

Branches tossed, the pine-tops murmured, and Lawrence got up. He had thought to wait for morning, but the wind freshened and would carry the sloop down the strait. He ought to be round Stokonish Point, twenty miles off, by dark, and instead of bothering to cook on board, he might get supper at the hotel.

The dining-room at the Tecumseh was bleak. The sun and the stove had cracked the match-boards; the chairs were hard American bent-wood, and the table was covered with thin, shining oilcloth. Lumbermen, ranchers, storekeepers, and two or three mechanics pushed into the room as the bell stopped ringing. For the most part, they were a sober, rather laconic, and industrious lot, but in the store clothes they had put on for Sunday some were awkward and uncouth.

When Lawrence sat down, the girl he had met carried a tray across the floor. Although her load was heavy, he noted her supple carriage. She moved gracefully, and he imagined she could dance. To picture her stopping at the dreary spot was hard.

"Halibut; steak, if you like," she said, in a cultivated voice. "Dessert is desiccated apples and raspberry pie."

Lawrence asked for halibut, and with the fish she put down a large saucer of fried potatoes. Then for a moment she bent her head.

"Thank you for the horse. He is at the livery yard, and I was back in time."

She went off, and a young fellow across the table looked up with a grin.

"Some waitress for a back-blocks hotel! Has she given you a date?"

"Not at all," said Lawrence. "In an hour I'm off, and I expect an ambitious young woman would not have much use for a bush rancher. At the small coast settlements the storekeepers are the aristocrats. Anyhow, you take all the money we have got."

"That's the talk!" a big chopper remarked. "Steve puts on a white shirt Sundays and a gold tie-ring. Sold me a soft ax last week, and the crosscut I got a month since wants filing all the time. He's surely getting rich."

"If you paid your bills, I'd get rich sooner," Steve rejoined. "Anyhow, for a vaudeville kid, Ruby's a bully waitress, and the boys hope she'll stay."

Lawrence began to see a light, but why a vaudeville dancer should want to stop at the settlement was another thing, and since the girl had gone for fresh supplies he inquired.

"The Lacoste touring company was here for a week," a storekeeper replied. "When I saw Perry Lacoste at Victoria, two years since, the show was pretty good, but I guess he struck bad luck and couldn't hire a proper gang. This girl, Ruby, was near the best of the bunch. At all events, the show didn't draw, and when he pulled out for Vancouver, I reckon he was broke."

"He didn't go to Vancouver," somebody remarked. "Bill and I were at Cheemanco with the halibut sloop, and Perry was playing to quite a good house. One of the boys told us the gang was going up the strait on the Maud. If she keeps her time-bill, she sails in the morning."

Only a bushman could reach the cities across the mountains, and the settlement was off the Alaska steamers' route, but the Maud, an old wooden propeller, cruised about the inlets and islands. At some she touched but once in three or four weeks, and Lawrence imagined Ruby had somehow got left behind. Turning his head, he saw she had returned with the dessert and looked up sharply, as if the talk about the Maud interested her. Then she began to unload her tray and Lawrence drained his coffee mug.

By and by he went to the veranda. Somebody had given him a comparatively recent Colonist, and he had not had a newspaper for two or three weeks. Besides, the tide was running strongly south, and since he must steer the other way, he would not lose much by waiting until the stream got slack. After a time he pulled out his watch and started for the wharf.

Behind the rocks the wind was light, and the shadows of the big pines trembled in the sliding water. The tide yet flowed up the river-mouth and he need not hurry to get on board. He had thought nobody was about, but when he passed a lumber stack he saw the waitress sat where a sunbeam touched the boards. She looked straight in front and her brows were knit. Her pose was slack and Lawrence thought she brooded. He was not romantic and for four years he had concentrated on his ranch, but somehow the girl moved him to pity. Then she heard his step and looked up.

"I am going on board," he said, in an apologetic voice, and indicated a mast that topped the edge of the wharf. "The evening is fine, and after the hot dining-room I dare say you like the fresh breeze from the strait."

She smiled. Her smile was not coquettish, and Lawrence imagined she saw he implied that he had not purposely followed her to the wharf.

"To work for an old-fashioned Presbyterian has some advantages. On Sundays, at all events, one gets a few hours' rest, which accounts for your finding me asleep in the woods. But if you are a rancher, I expect you are industrious."

"Oh, well," said Lawrence, "I like my job. Yours, perhaps, is not inviting, and Mother Monroe's love for cleanliness might have some drawbacks."

"She never stops," the girl agreed. "Still, for all her hardness, she is kind, and when I was stranded she took me in. Since stranded implies being left on the beach like wreckage, it's quite the proper word. Then I expect she conquered some prejudices. My recent pals were not the sort of young women a good Presbyterian approves."

Lawrence understood he was allowed to stop, and he sat down on a mooring post. The girl interested him; her voice was cultivated, and she talked with the ironical frankness young women he had known in London used. For a few moments she was quiet; and then with a sweeping gesture she indicated the landscape.

"What a country! If one was fit and strong, and could but get a decent post—"

High up behind the climbing forest the Coast Range's snow shone in the evening light. In front the sea sparkled, but the jade-green inlet was in the shadow and darkly reflected gray rocks and giant pines. The breeze was warm and carried sweet, resinous scents.

"The country's all right, but one must be strong and hopeful," Lawrence remarked. "Looks as if you didn't like your job."

"I cannot stick it, although I've honestly tried, and not long since I thought my pluck and muscle as good as another's. When respectable industry is something fresh, to begin at six o'clock in the morning and stop when you have cleaned the supper plates gets exhausting. Then, of course, there's the strain on your temper, and so forth. Sometimes, you see, the boys are amorous. However, I mustn't bore you. If I could get across to Cheemanco, I'd rejoin the troupe. Perry owes me sixty dollars. But I must get across before he leaves on board the Maud."

Lawrence smiled. He did not know if her remark, so to speak, was spontaneous, or if she meant to indicate his part.

"It might be possible," he said. "I am going down the strait and Cheemanco is not much off my course. The wind is a beam wind, and if it holds, we ought to make the inlet in six or seven hours. Day breaks about three o'clock, but the Maud will not start until some time after work at the wharf begins. Yes, I believe I could engage to land you before she goes."

"You're a sport," the girl replied, and gave him a searching glance. Then she shrugged. "I don't see another plan, and something must be risked. If you can wait for ten minutes, I'll go for my clothes."

"You will need some help."

"Not at all. My trunk went on board with the company's luggage, and by this time I expect Pearl and Coralie have shared the loot."

She went off, and Lawrence frowned. For a sober, industrious rancher he perhaps was rash, but the girl was broke, and he ought to land her at Cheemanco in six or seven hours.