Читать книгу Flower of the North - James Oliver Curwood - Страница 6

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Philip broke the silence.

"Now—you understand."

"It is impossible!" gasped Gregson. "I cannot believe this! It—it might have happened a thousand—two thousand years ago—but not now. My God, man!" he cried, more excitedly. "You do not mean to tell me that you believe this will be done?"

"Yes," replied Philip.

"It is impossible!" exclaimed Gregson again, crushing the letter in his hand. "A man doesn't live—a combination doesn't exist—that would start such a hell loose as this—in this way!"

Philip smiled grimly.

"The man does live, and the combination does exist," he said, slowly. "Greggy, I have known of men, and of combinations who have spent millions, who have sacrificed everything of honor and truth, who have driven thousands of men, women, and children to starvation—and worse—to achieve a victory in high finance. I have known of men and combinations who have broken almost every law of man and God in the fight for money and power. And so have you! You have associated with some of these men. You have laughed and talked with them, smoked with them, and have dined at their tables. You spent a week at Selden's summer borne, and it was Selden who cornered wheat three years ago and raised the price of bread two cents a loaf. It was Selden who brought about the bread riots in New York, Chicago, and a score of other cities, who swung wide the prison doors for thousands, whose millions were gained at a cost of misery, crime, and even death. And Selden is only one out of thousands who live to-day, watching for their opportunities, giving no heed to those who may fall under the juggernaut of their capital. This isn't the age of petty discrimination, Greggy. It's the age of the almighty dollar, and of the fight for it. And there's no chivalry, no quarter shown in this fight. Men of Selden's stamp don't stop at women and children. The scrubwoman's dollar is just as big as yours or mine, and if a scheme could be promoted whereby every scrubwoman in America could be safely robbed of a dollar you'd find thousands of men down there in our cities ready to go into it to-morrow. And to such men as these what is the sacrifice of a few women up here?"

Gregson dropped the letter, crumpled and twisted, upon the table.

"I wonder—if I understand," he said, looking into Philip's white face. "There has undoubtedly been previous correspondence, and this letter contains the final word. It shows that your enemies have already succeeded in working up the forest people against you, and have filled them with suspicion. Their last blow is to be—"

He stopped, and Philip nodded at the horrified question in his eyes.

"Greggy, up here there is one law which reigns above all other law. When I was in Prince Albert a year ago I was sitting on the veranda of the little old Windsor Hotel. About me were a dozen wild men of the north, who had come down for a day or two to the edge of civilization. Most of those men had not been out of the forests for a year. Two of them were from the Barrens, and this was their first glimpse of civilized life in five years. As we sat there a woman came up the street. She turned in at the hotel. About me there was a sudden lowering of voices, a shuffling of feet. As she passed, every one of those twelve rose from their seats and stood with bowed heads and their caps in their hands until she had gone. I was the only one who remained sitting! That, Greggy, is the one great law of life up here, the worship of woman because she is woman. A man may steal, he may kill, but he must not break this law. If he steals or kills, the mounted police may bring the offender to justice; but if he breaks this other law there is but one punishment, and that is the punishment of the people. That is what this letter purposes to do—to break this law in order that its penalty may fall upon us. And if they succeed, God help us!"

It was Gregson who jumped to his feet now. He took half a dozen nervous steps, paused, lighted a cigarette, and looked down into Philip's upturned face.

"I understand now where the fight is coming in," he said. "If this thing goes through, these people will rise and wipe you off the map. They'll lay it to you and your men, of course. And I fancy it won't be a job half done if they feel about it as I'd feel. But," he demanded, sharply, "why don't you put the affair into the hands of the proper authorities—the police or the government? You've got—By George, you must have the name of the man to whom that letter was addressed!"

Philip handed him a soiled white envelope, of the kind in which official documents are usually mailed.

"That's the man."

Gregson gave a low whistle.

"Lord—Fitzhugh—Lee!" he read, slowly, as though scarce believing his eyes. "Great Scott! A British peer!"

The cynical smile on Philip's lips cut his words short.

"Perhaps," he said. "But if there is a British lord up here he isn't very well known, Greggy. No one knows of him. No one has heard a rumor of him. That is why we can't go to the police or the government. They'd give small credence to what we've got to show. This letter wouldn't count the weight of a feather without further evidence, and a lot of it. Besides, we haven't time to go to the government. It is too far away and too slow. And as for the police—I know of three in this territory, and there are fifteen thousand square miles of mountains and plains and forest in their 'beat.' It's up to you and me to find this Lord Fitzhugh. If we can do that we will be in a position to put a kibosh on this plot in a hurry. If we fail to run him down—"

"What then?"

"We'll have to watch our chances. I've told you all that I know, and you're on an even working basis with me. At first I thought that I understood the object of those who are planning to ruin us in this cowardly manner. But I don't now. If they ruin us they also destroy the chances of any other company that may be scheming to usurp our place. For that reason I—"

"There must still be other factors in the game," said Gregson, as Philip hesitated.

"There are. I want you to work out your own suspicions, Greggy, and then we'll compare notes. Lord Fitzhugh is the key to the whole situation. No matter who is at the bottom of this plot, Lord Fitzhugh is the man at the working end of it. We don't care so much about the writer of this letter as the one to whom it was written. It is evident that he had planned to be at Churchill, for the letter is addressed to him here. But he hasn't shown up. He has never been here, so far as I can discover."

"I'd give a year's growth for a copy of the BRITISH PEERAGE or a WHO'S WHO," mused Gregson, flecking the ashes from his cigarette. "Who the deuce can this Lord Fitzhugh be? What sort of an Englishman would mix up in a dirty job of this kind? You might imagine him to be one of the men behind the guns, like Brokaw. But, by George, he's working the dirty end of it himself, according to that letter!"

"You're beginning to use your head already, Greggy," said Philip, a little more cheerfully. "I've asked myself that question a hundred times during the last three days, and I'm more at sea than ever. If it had been plain Tom Brown or Bill Jones, the name would not have suggested anything beyond what you have read in the letter. That's the question: Why should a Lord Fitzhugh Lee be mixed up in this affair?"

The two men looked at each other keenly for a few moments in silence.

"It suggests—" began Gregson.

"What?"

"That there may be a bigger scheme behind this affair than we imagine. In fact, it suggests to me that the northerners are being stirred up against you and your men for some other and more powerful reason than to make you get out of the country and compel the government to withdraw your license. So help me God, I believe there's more behind it!"

"So do I," said Philip, quietly.

"Have you any suspicions of what might be the more powerful motive?"

"None. I know that British capital is heavily interested in mineral lands east of the surveyed line. But there is none at Churchill. All operations have been carried on from Montreal and Toronto."

"Have you written to Brokaw about this letter?"

"You are the first to whom I have revealed its contents," said Philip. "I have neglected to tell you that Brokaw is so worked up over the affair that he is joining me in the north. The Hudson's Bay Company's ship, which comes over twice a year, touches at Halifax, and if Brokaw followed out his intentions he took passage there. The ship should be in within a week or ten days. And, by the way"—Philip stood up and thrust his hands deep in his pockets as he spoke, half smiling at Gregson—"it gives me pleasure to hand you a bit of cheerful information along with that," he added. "Miss Brokaw is coming with him. She is very beautiful."

Gregson held a lighted match until it burnt his finger-tips.

"The deuce you say! I've heard—"

"Yes, you have heard of her beauty, no doubt. I am not a special enthusiast in your line, Greggy, but I will confirm your opinion of Miss Brokaw. You will say that she is the most beautiful girl you have ever seen, and you will want to make heads of her for BURKE'S. I suppose you wonder why she is coming up here? So do I."

There was a look of perplexity in Philip's eyes which Gregson might have noticed if he had not gone to the door to look out into the night.

"What makes the stars so big and bright up in this country, Phil?" he asked.

"Because of the clearness of the atmosphere through which you are looking," replied Philip, wondering what was passing through the other's mind. "This air—compared with ours—is just like a piece of glass that has been cleaned of a year's accumulation of dirt."

Gregson whistled softly for a few moments. Then he said, without turning:

"She's got to go some if she beats the girl I saw this evening, Phil." He turned at Philip's silence, and laughed. "I beg your pardon, old man, I didn't mean to speak of her as if she were a horse. I mean Miss Brokaw."

"And I don't particularly like the idea of betting on the merits of a pretty girl," replied Philip, "but I'll break the rule for once, and wager you the best hat in New York that she does beat her."

"Done!" said Gregson. "A little gentle excitement of this sort will relieve the tension of the other thing, Phil. I've heard enough of business for to-night. I'm going to finish a sketch that I have begun of her before I forget the fine points. Any objection?"

"None at all," said Philip. "Meanwhile I'll go out to breathe a spell."

He put on his coat and took down his cap from a peg in the wall. Gregson had seated himself under the lamp and was sharpening a pencil. As Philip went to go out Gregson drew an envelope from his pocket and tossed it on the table.

"If you should happen to see any one that looks like—her," he said, nodding toward the envelope, "kindly put in a word for me, will you? I did that in a hurry. It's not half flattering."

Philip laughed as he picked up the envelope.

"The most beau—" he began.

He caught himself with a jerk. Gregson, looking up from his pencil-sharpening, saw the smile leave his lips and a quick flush leap into his bronzed cheeks. He stared at the face on the envelope for a half a minute, then gazed speechlessly at Gregson.

It was Gregson who laughed, softly and without suspicion.

"How does your wager look now?" he taunted.

"She—is—beautiful," murmured Philip, dropping the envelope and turning to the door, "Don't wait for me, Greggy. Go to bed."

He heard Gregson laugh behind him, and he wondered, as he went out, what Gregson would say if he told him that he had drawn on the back of the old envelope the beautiful face of Eileen Brokaw!