Pat McCann, the faithful friend and shadow of young Pickles, after studying the attitude and motions of his friend, gave answer:
“It’s the preacher, I guess. He’s kiddin’ the kids inside. He’s some kidder, too,” he said, moving to take his place beside his friend.
“What’s he doing anyway?” said Ewen. “I’m going to see.”
Gradually a little company gathered behind young Pickles and Pat McCann. The window commanded a view of the room, yet in such a way that the group were unobserved by the speaker.
“Say, you ought to seen him do the camel a minute ago,” whispered Pickles.
In the little vestry room were packed some twenty children of all ages and sizes, with a number of grownups who had joined the class in charge of some of its younger members. There was, for instance, Mrs. Innes, with the two youngest of her numerous progeny pillowed against her yielding and billowy person; and Mrs. Stewart Duff, an infant of only a few weeks upon her knee accounting sufficiently for the paleness of her sweet face, and two or three other women with their small children filling the bench that ran along the wall.
“Say! look at Harry Hobbs,” said Pat McCann to his friend.
Upon the stove, which in summer was relegated to the corner of the room, sat Harry Hobbs, a man of any age from his appearance, thin and wiry, with keen, darting eyes, which now, however, were fastened upon the preacher. All other eyes were, too. Even the smallest of the children seated on the front bench were gazing with mouths wide open, as if fascinated, upon the preacher who, moving up and down with quick, lithe steps, was telling them a story. A wonderful story, too, it seemed, the wonder of it apparent in the riveted eyes and fixed faces. It was the immortal story, matchless in the language, of Joseph, the Hebrew shepherd boy, who, sold into slavery by his brethren, became prime minister of the mighty empire of Egypt. The voice tone of the minister, now clear and high, now low and soft, vibrating like the deeper notes of the ‘cello, was made for story telling. Changing with every changing emotion, it formed an exquisite medium to the hearts of the listeners for the exquisite music of the tale.
The story was approaching its climactic denouement; the rapturous moment of the younger brother’s revealing was at hand; Judah, the older brother, was now holding the centre of the stage and making that thrilling appeal, than which nothing more moving is to be found in our English speech. The preacher’s voice was throbbing with all the pathos of the tale. Motionless, the little group hung hard upon the story-teller, when the door opened quickly, a red head appeared, a rasping voice broke in:
“Your class report, Mr. Dunbar, please. We’re waiting for it.”
A sigh of disappointment and regret swept the room.
“Oh, darn the little woodpecker!” said Ewen from the outside, in a disgusted tone. “That’s the way with Hayes. He thinks he’s the whole works, and that he never can get in wrong.”
The spell was broken, never to be renewed. The story hurried to its close, but the great climax failed of its proper effect.
“He’s a hummer, ain’t he?” exclaimed young Pickles to his friend, Pat McCann.
“Some hummer, and then some!” replied Pat.
“I’m goin’ in,” said Pickles.
“Aw, what for? He ain’t no good preachin’ to them folks. By gum! I think he’s scared of ’em.”
But Pickles persisted, and followed with the men and boys who lounged lazily into the church, from which the Sunday School had now been dismissed.
It appeared that the judgment of Pat McCann upon the merits of the preacher would be echoed by the majority of the congregation present. While the service was conducted in proper form and in reverent spirit, the sermon was marked by that most unpardonable sin of which sermons can be guilty; it was dull. Solid enough in matter, thoughtful beyond the average, it was delivered in a style appallingly wooden, with an utter absence of that arresting, dramatic power that the preacher had shown in his children’s class.
The appearance of the congregation was, as ever, a reflection of the sermon. The heat of the day, the reaction from the long week in the open air, the quiet monotony of the well modulated voice rising and falling in regular cadence in what is supposed by so many preachers to be the tone suitable for any sacred office, produced an overwhelmingly somnolent effect. Many of them slept, some frankly and openly, others under cover of shading hands, bowed heads, or other subterfuges. Others again spent the whole of the period of the sermon, except for some delicious moments of surreptitious sleep, in a painful but altogether commendable struggle against the insidious influence of the god of slumber.
Among the latter was Mrs. Innes, whose loyalty to her minister, which was as much a part of her as her breathing, contended in a vigorous fight against her much too solid flesh. It was a certain aid to wakefulness that her two children, deep in audible slumber, kept her in a state of active concern lest their inert and rotund little masses of slippery flesh should elude her grasp, and wreck the proprieties of the hour by flopping on the floor. There was also a further sleep deterrent in the fact that immediately before her sat Mr. McFettridge, whose usually erect form, yielding to the soporific influences of the environment, showed a tendency gradually to sag into an attitude, relaxed and formless, which suggested sleep. This, to the lady behind him, partook of the nature of an affront to her minister. Consequently she considered it her duty to arouse the snoozing McFettridge with a vigorous poke in the small of the back.
The effect was instantaneously apparent. As if her insistent finger had touched a button and released an electric current, Mr. McFettridge’s sagging form shot convulsively into rigidity, and impinging violently upon the peacefully slumbering Mr. Boggs on the extreme end of the bench, toppled him over into the aisle.
The astonished Boggs, finding himself thus deposited upon the floor, and beholding the irate face of Mr. McFettridge glooming down upon him, and fancying him to be the cause of his present humiliating position, sprang to his feet, swung a violent blow upon Mr. Fettridge’s ear, exclaiming sotto voce:
“Take that, will you! And mind your own business! You were sleeping yourself, anyway!”
Before the astonished and enraged Mr. McFettridge could gather his wits sufficiently for action, there rang over the astonished congregation a peal of boyish laughter. It was from the minister. A few irrepressible youngsters joined in the laugh; the rest of the congregation, however, were held rigid in the grip of a shocked amazement.
“Oh, I say! do forgive me, Mr. McFettridge!” cried the young man at the desk. “It was quite involuntary, I assure you.” Then, quickly recovering himself, he added, “And now we shall conclude the service by singing the seventy-ninth hymn.”
Before the last verse was sung he reminded the audience of the congregational meeting immediately following, and without further comment the service was brought to a close.
A number of the congregation, among them Barry’s father, departed.
“Sit down, Neil,” said Mrs. Innes to Neil Fraser. “You’ll be wanted I doot.” And Neil, protesting that he knew nothing about church business, sat down.
At the back of the church were gathered Harry Hobbs, young Pickles, and others of the less important attendants of the church, who had been induced to remain by the rumour of a “scrap.”
By a fatal mischance, the pliant Nathan Pilley was elected chairman. This gentleman was obsessed by the notion that he possessed in a high degree the two qualities which he considered essential to the harmonious and expeditious conduct of a public meeting, namely, an invincible determination to agree with every speaker, and an equally invincible determination to get motions passed.
In a rambling and aimless speech, Mr. Pilley set forth in a somewhat general way the steps leading up to this meeting, and then called upon Mr. Innes, the chairman of the Board of Management, to state more specifically the object for which it was called.
Mr. Innes, who was incurably averse to voluble speech, whether public or private, arose and said, in rolling Doric:
“Weel, Mr. Chair-r-man, there’s no much to be done. We’re behind a few hundred dollars, but if some one will go about wi’ a bit paper, nae doot the ar-rear-rs wad soon be made up, and everything wad be ar-richt.”
“Exactly,” said Mr. Pilley pleasantly. “Now will some one offer a motion?”
Thereupon Mr. Hayes was instantly upon his feet, and in a voice thin and rasping exclaimed:
“Mr. Chairman, there’s business to be done, and we are here to do it, and we’re not going to be rushed through in this way.”
“Exactly, Mr. Hayes, exactly,” said Mr. Pilley. “We must give these matters the fullest consideration.”
Then followed a silence.
“Perhaps Mr. Hayes–” continued the chairman, looking appealingly at that gentleman.
“Well, Mr. Chairman,” said Mr. Hayes, with an appeased but slightly injured air, “it is not my place to set forth the cause of this meeting being called. If the chairman of the board would do his duty”–here he glared at the unconscious Mr. Innes–“he would set before it the things that have made this meeting necessary, and that call for drastic action.”
“Hear! Hear!” cried Mr. Boggs.
“Exactly so,” acquiesced the chairman. “Please continue, Mr. Hayes.”
Mr. Hayes continued: “The situation briefly is this: We are almost hopelessly in debt, and–“
“How much?” enquired Neil Fraser, briskly interrupting.
“Seven hundred dollars,” replied Mr. Hayes, “and further–“
“Five hundred dollars,” said Mr. Innes.
“I have examined the treasurer’s books,” said Mr. Hayes in the calmly triumphant tone of one sure of his position, “and I find the amount to be seven hundred dollars, and therefore–“
“Five hundred dollars,” repeated Mr. Innes, gazing into space.
“Seven hundred dollars, I say,” snapped Mr. Hayes.
“Five hundred dollars,” reiterated Mr. Innes, without further comment.
“I say I have examined the books. The arrears are seven hundred dollars.”
“Five hundred dollars,” said Mr. Innes calmly.
The youngsters at the back snickered.
“Go to it!” said Harry Hobbs, under his breath.
Even the minister, who was sitting immediately behind Harry, could not restrain a smile.
“Mr. Chairman,” cried Mr. Hayes, indignantly, “I appeal against this interruption. I assert–“
“Where’s the treasurer?” said Neil Fraser. “What’s the use of this chewin’ the rag?”
“Ah! Exactly so,” said the chairman, greatly relieved. “Mr. Boggs– Perhaps Mr. Boggs will enlighten us.”
Mr. Boggs arose with ponderous deliberation.
“Mr. Chairman,” he said, “in one sense Mr. Hayes is right when he states the arrears to be seven hundred dollars–“
“Five hundred dollars A’m tellin’ ye,” said Mr. Innes with the first sign of feeling he had shown.
“And Mr. Innes is also right,” continued Mr. Boggs, ignoring the interruption, “when he makes the arrears five hundred dollars, the two hundred dollars difference being the quarterly revenue now due.”
“Next week,” said Mr. Innes, reverting to his wonted calm.
“Exactly so,” said the chairman, rubbing his hands amiably; “so that the seven hundred dollars we now owe–“
This was too much even for the imperturbable Mr. Innes.
He arose in his place, moved out into the aisle, advanced toward the platform, and with arm outstretched, exclaimed in wrathful tones:
“Mon, did ye no hear me tellin’ ye? I want nae mon to mak’ me a le-ear.”
At this point Mr. Stewart Duff, who had come to convey his wife home, and had got tired waiting for her outside, entered the church.
“Oh, get on with the business,” said Neil Fraser, who, although enjoying the scene, was becoming anxious for his dinner. “The question what’s to be done with the five hundred dollars’ arrears. I say, let’s make it up right here. I am willing to give–“
“No, Mr. Chairman,” shouted Mr. Hayes, who was notoriously averse to parting with his money, and was especially fearful of a public subscription.
“There is something more than mere arrears–much more–“
“Ay, there is,” emphatically declared Mr. McFettridge, rising straight and stiff. “I’m for plain speakin’. The finances is not the worst about this congregation. The congregation has fallen off. Other churches in this village has good congregations. Why shouldn’t we? The truth is, Mr. Chairman,”–Mr. McFettridge’s voice rolled deep and sonorous over the audience–“we want a popular preacher–a preacher that draws–a preacher with some pep.”
“Hear! hear!” cried Mr. Boggs. “Pep’s what we want. That’s it– pep.”
“Pep,” echoed the chairman. “Exactly so, pep.”
“More than that,” continued Mr. McFettridge, “we want a minister that’s a good mixer–one that stands in with the boys.”
“Hear! Hear!” cried Mr. Boggs again.
“A mixer! Exactly!” agreed the chairman. “A mixer!” nodding pleasantly at Mr. Boggs.
“And another thing I will say,” continued Mr. McFettridge, “now that I am on my feet. We want a preacher that will stick to his job–that will preach the gospel and not go meddlin’ with other matters–with politics and such like.”
“Or prohibition,” shouted Harry Hobbs from the rear, to the undiluted joy of the youngsters in his vicinity.
The minister shook his head at him.
“Yes, prohibition,” answered Mr. McFettridge, facing toward the rear of the church defiantly. “Let him stick to his preaching the gospel; I believe the time has come for a change and I’m prepared to make a motion that we ask our minister to resign, and that motion I now make.”
“Second the motion,” cried Mr. Boggs promptly.
“You have heard the motion,” said the chairman, with business-like promptitude. “Are you ready for the question?”
“Question,” said Mr. Hayes, after a few moments’ silence, broken by the shuffling of some members in their seats, and by the audible whispering of Mrs. Innes, evidently exhorting her husband to action.
“Then all those in favour of the motion will please–“
Then from behind the organ a little voice piped up, “Does this mean, Mr. Chairman, that we lose our minister?”
It was Miss Quigg, a lady whose years no gallantry could set below forty, for her appearance indicated that she was long past the bloom of her youth. She was thin, almost to the point of frailness, with sharp, delicately cut features; but the little chin was firm, and a flash of the brown eyes revealed a fiery soul within. Miss Quigg was the milliner and dressmaker of the village, and was herself a walking model of her own exquisite taste in clothes and hats. It was only her failing health that had driven her to abandon a much larger sphere than her present position offered, but even here her fame was such as to draw to her little shop customers from the villages round about for many miles.
“Does this mean, sir, that Mr. Dunbar will leave us?” she repeated.
“Well,–yes, madam–that is, Miss, I suppose, in a way–practically it would amount to that.”
“Will you tell me yes or no, please,” Miss Quigg’s neat little figure was all a-quiver to the tips of her hat plumes.
“Well,” said the chairman, squirming under the unpleasant experience of being forced to a definite answer, “I suppose,–yes.”
Miss Quigg turned from the squirming and smiling Mr. Pilley in contempt.
“Then,” she said, “I say no. And I believe there are many here who would say no–and men, too.” The wealth of indignation and contemptuous scorn infused into the word by which the difference in sex of the human species was indicated, made those unhappy individuals glance shamefacedly at each other–“only they are too timid, the creatures! or too indifferent.”
Again there was an exchange of furtive glances and smiles and an uneasy shifting of position on the part of “the creatures.”
“But if you give them time, Mr. Chairman, I believe they will perhaps get up courage enough to speak.”
Miss Quigg sat down in her place behind the organ, disappearing quite from view except for the tips of her plumes, whose rapid and rhythmic vibrations were eloquent of the beating of her gallant little heart.
“Exactly so,” said the chairman, in confused but hearty acquiescence. “Perhaps some one will say something.”
Then Mr. Innes, forced to a change of position by the physical discomfort caused by his wife’s prodding, rose and said,
“I dinna see the need o’ any change. Mr. Dunbar is no a great preacher, but Ah doot he does his best. And the bairns all like him.”
Then the congregation had a thrill. In the back seat rose Harry Hobbs.
“I’m near forty years old,” he cried, in a high nasal tone that indicated a state of extreme nervous tension, “and I never spoke in meetin’ before. I ain’t had no use for churches and preachers, and I guess they hadn’t no use for me. You folks all know me. I’ve been in this burg for near eight years, and I was a drinkin’, swearin’, fightin’ cuss. This preacher came into the barn one day when I was freezin’ to death after a big spree. He tuk me home with him and kep’ me there for two weeks, settin’ up nights with me, too. Let me be,” he said impatiently to Barry, who was trying to pull him down to his seat. “I’m agoin’ to speak this time if it kills me. Many a time I done him dirt sence then, but he stuck to me, and never quit till he got me turned ’round. I was goin’ straight to hell; he says I’m goin’ to heaven now.” Here he laughed with a touch of scorn. “I dunno. But, by gum! if you fire him and do him dirt, I don’t know what’ll become of me, but I guess I’ll go straight to hell again.”
“No, Harry, no you won’t. You’ll keep right on, Harry, straight to heaven.” It was the preacher’s voice, full of cheery confidence.
Mrs. Innes was audibly sniffling; Mrs. Stewart Duff wiping her eyes. It was doubtless this sight that brought her husband to his feet.
“I don’t quite know what the trouble is here,” he said. “I understand there are arrears. I heard some criticism of the minister’s preaching. I can’t say I care much for it myself, but I want to say right here that there are other things wanted in a minister, and this young fellow has got some of them. If he stays, he gets my money; if he doesn’t, no one else does. I’ll make you gentlemen who are kicking about finances a sporting proposition. I’m willing to double my subscription, if any other ten men will cover my ante.”
“I’ll call you,” said Neil Fraser, “and I’ll raise you one.”
“I’m willing to meet Mr. Duff and Mr. Fraser,” said Miss Quigg, rising from behind her organ with a triumphant smile on her face.
“I ain’t got much money,” said Harry Hobbs, “but I’ll go you just half what I earn if you’ll meet me on that proposition.”
“Ah may say,” said Mr. Innes, yielding to his wife’s vigorous vocal and physical incitations, “A’m prepair-r-ed to mak’ a substantial increase in my subscreeption–that is, if necessary,” he added cautiously.
Then Barry came forward from the back of the church and stood before the platform. After looking them over for a few moments in silence, he said, in a voice clear, quiet, but with a ring in it that made it echo in every heart:
“Had it not been for these last speeches, it would have been unnecessary to allow the motion to go before you. I could not have remained where I am not wanted. But now I am puzzled, I confess, I am really puzzled to know what to do. I am not a great preacher, I know, but then there are worse. I don’t, at least I think I don’t, talk nonsense. And I am not what Mr. McFettridge calls a ‘good mixer.’ On the other hand, I think Mr. Innes is right when he says the bairns like me; at least, it would break”–he paused, his lip quivering, then he went on quietly–“it would be very hard to think they didn’t.”
“They do that, then,” said Mrs. Innes, emphatically.
“So you see, it is really very difficult to know what to do. I would hate to go away, but it might be right to go away. I suggest you let me have a week to think it over. Can you wait that long?”
His handsome, boyish face, alight with a fine glow of earnestness and sincerity, made irresistible appeal to all but those who for personal reasons were opposed to him.
“You see,” he continued, in a tone of voice deliberative and quite detached, “there are a number of things to think about. Those arrears, for instance, are hardly my fault–at least, not altogether. I was looking over the treasurer’s books the other day, and I was surprised to find how many had apparently quite forgotten to pay their church subscription. It is no doubt just an oversight. For instance,” he added, in the confidential tone of one imparting interesting and valuable information, “you will be surprised to learn, Mr. Duff, that you are twenty-five dollars behind in your payments.”
At this Neil Fraser threw back his head with a loud laugh. “Touche!” he said, in a joyous undertone.
The minister looked at him in surprise, and went on, “And while Mr. Innes and Miss Quigg are both paid up in full, Mr. Hayes has apparently neglected to pay his last quarter.”
“Hit him again,” murmured Harry Hobbs, while Mr. Hayes rose in virtuous indignation.
“I protest, Mr. Chairman!” he cried, “against these personalities.”
“Oh, you quite mistake me, Mr. Hayes,” said the preacher, “these are not personalities. I am simply showing how easy it is for arrears to arise, and that it may not be my fault at all. Of course, it may be right for me to resign. I don’t know about that yet, but I want to be very sure. It would be easier to resign, but I don’t want to be a quitter.”
“I move we adjourn,” said Neil Fraser.
“I second the motion,” said Stewart Duff. The motion was carried, and the meeting adjourned.
At the door the minister stood shaking hands with all as they passed out, making no distinction in the heartiness with which he greeted all his parishioners. To Miss Quigg, however, he said, “Thank you. You were splendidly plucky.”
“Nonsense!” cried the little lady, the colour flaming in her faded cheeks. “But,” she added hastily, “you did that beautifully, and he deserved it, the little beast!”
“Solar plexus!” said Neil Fraser, who was immediately behind Miss Quigg.
The minister glanced from one to the other in perplexity, as they passed out of the door.
“But, you know, I was only–“
“Oh, yes, we know,” cried Miss Quigg. “But if those men would only take hold! Oh, those men!” She turned upon Neil Fraser and shook her head at him violently.
“I know, Miss Quigg. We are a hopeless and helpless lot. But we’re going to reform.”
“You need to, badly,” she said. “But you need some one to reform you. Look at Mr. Duff there, how vastly improved he is,” and she waved her hand to that gentleman, who was driving away with his wife in their buckboard.
“He is a perfect dear,” sighed Mrs. Duff, as she bowed to the minister. “And you, too, Stewart,” she added, giving his arm a little squeeze, “you said just the right thing when those horrid people were going to turn him out.”
“Say! Your preacher isn’t so bad after all,” said her husband. “Wasn’t that a neat one for old Hayes?”
“He rather got you, though, Stewart.”
“Yes, he did, by Jove! Not the first time, either, he’s done it. But I must look after that. Say, he’s the limit for freshness though. Or is it freshness? I’m not quite sure.”
“Will he stay with us?” said his wife. “I really do hope he will.”
“Guess he’ll stay all right. He won’t give up his job,” said her husband.
But next week proved Mr. Duff a poor prophet, for the minister after the service informed his people that he had come to the conclusion that another man might get better results as minister of the congregation; he had therefore handed in his resignation to the Presbytery.
It was a shock to them all, but he adhered to his resolution in spite of tearful lamentations from the women, wide-eyed amazement and dismay from the bairns of the congregation, and indignation, loudly expressed, from Neil Fraser and Stewart Duff, and others of their kind.
“Well,” said Miss Quigg, struggling with indignant tears, as she was passing out of the church, “you won’t see Harry Hobbs in this church again, nor me, either.”
“Oh, yes, Miss Quigg, Harry has promised me that he will stick by the church, and that he will be there every Sunday. And so will you, dear Miss Quigg. I know you. You will do what is right.”
But that little lady, with her head very erect and a red spot burning in each faded cheek, passed out of the church saying nothing, the plumes on her jaunty little hat quivering defiance and wrath against “those men, who had so little spunk as to allow a little beast like Hayes to run them.”
CHAPTER V
THE WAR DRUM CALLS
“Well, dad,” said Barry next evening as they were sitting in the garden after tea, “I feel something like Mohammed’s coffin, detached from earth but not yet ascended into heaven. It’s unpleasant to be out of a job. I confess I shall always cherish a more intelligent sympathy henceforth for the great unemployed. But cheer up, dad! You are taking this thing much too seriously. The world is wide, and there is something waiting me that I can do better than any one else.”
But the father had little to say. He felt bitterly the humiliation to which his son had been subjected.
Barry refused to see the humiliation.
“Why should I not resign if I decide it is my duty so to do? And why, on the other hand, should not they have the right to terminate my engagement with them when they so desire? That’s democratic government.”
“But good Lord, Barry!” burst out his father, with quite an unusual display of feeling; “to think that a gentleman should hold his position at the whim of such whippersnappers as Hayes, Boggs et hoc genus omne. And more than that, that I should have to accept as my minister a man who would be the choice of cattle like that.”
“After all, dad, we are ruled by majorities in this age and in this country. That is at once the glory and the danger of democratic government. There is no better way discovered as yet. And besides, I couldn’t go on here, dad, preaching Sunday after Sunday to people who I felt were all the time saying, ‘He’s no good’; to people, in short, who could not profit by my preaching.”
“Because it had no pep, eh?” said his father with bitter scorn.
“Do you know, dad, I believe that’s what is wrong with my preaching: it hasn’t got pep. What pep is, only the initiated know. But the long and the short of this thing is, it is the people that must be satisfied. It is they who have to stand your preaching, they who pay the piper. But cheer up, dad, I have no fear for the future.”
“Nor have I, my boy, not the slightest. I hope you did not think for a moment, my son,” he added with some dignity, “that I was in doubt about your future.”
“No, no, dad. We both feel a little sore naturally, but the future is all right.”
“True, my dear boy, true. I was forgetting myself. As you say, the world is wide and your place is waiting.”
“Hello! here comes my friend, Mr. Duff,” said Barry in a low voice. “He was ready to throw Mr. McFettridge out of the meeting yesterday, body and bones. Awfully funny, if it hadn’t been in church. Wonder what he wants! Seems in a bit of a hurry.”
But hurry or not, it was a full hour before Mr. Duff introduced his business. As he entered the garden he stood gazing about him in amazed wonder and delight, and that hour was spent in company with Mr. Dunbar, exploring the garden, Barry following behind lost in amazement at the new phase of character displayed by their visitor.
“I have not had such a delightful evening, Mr. Dunbar, for years,” said Duff, when they had finished making the round of the garden. “I have heard about your garden, but I had no idea that it held such a wealth and variety of treasures. I had something of a garden myself in the old country, but here there is no time apparently for anything but cattle and horses and money. But if you would allow me I should greatly like to have the pleasure of bringing Mrs. Duff to see your beautiful garden.”
Mr. Duff was assured that the Dunbars would have the greatest pleasure in receiving Mrs. Duff.
“Do bring her,” said Barry, “and we can have a little music, too. She is musical, I know. I hear her sing in church.”
“Music! Why, she loves it. But she dropped her music when she came here; there seemed to be no time, no time, no time. I wonder sometimes– Well, I must get at my business. It is this letter that brings me. It is from an American whom you know, at least, he knows you, a Mr. Osborne Howland of Pittsburgh.”
Mr. Dunbar nodded.
“He is planning a big trip up the Peace River country prospecting for oil and mines, and later hunting. He says you and your son engaged to accompany him, and he asks me to complete arrangements with you. I am getting Jim Knight to look after the outfit. You know Jim, perhaps. He runs the Lone Pine ranch. Fine chap he is. Knows all about the hunting business. Takes a party into the mountains every year. He’ll take Tom Fielding with him. I don’t know Fielding, but Knight does. Mr. Howland says there will be three of their party. Far too many, but that’s his business. I myself am rather anxious to look after some oil deposits, and this will be a good chance. What do you say?”
Father and son looked at each other.
“It would be fine, if we could manage it,” said Mr. Dunbar, “but my work is so pressing just now. A great many are coming in, and I am alone in the office at present. When does he propose to start?”
“In six weeks’ time. I hope you can come, Mr. Dunbar. I couldn’t have said so yesterday, but I can now. Any man with a garden like this, the product of his own planning and working, is worth knowing. So I do hope you can both come. By the way, Knight wants a camp hand, a kind of roustabout, who can cook–a handy man, you know.”
“I have him,” said Barry. “Harry Hobbs.”
“Hobbs? Boozes a bit, doesn’t he?”
“Not now. Hasn’t for six months. He’s a new man. I can guarantee him.”
“You can, eh? Well, my experience is once a boozer always a boozer.”
“Oh,” said Barry, “Hobbs is different. He is a member of our church, you know.”
“No, I didn’t know. But I don’t know that that makes much difference anyway,” said Duff with a laugh. “I don’t mean to be offensive,” he added.
“It does to Hobbs, he’s a Christian man now. I mean a real Christian, Mr. Duff.”
“Well, I suppose there is such a thing. In fact, I’ve known one or two, but–well, if you guarantee him I’ll take him.”
“I will guarantee him,” said Barry.
“Let me have your answer to-morrow,” said Duff as he bade them good-night.
The Dunbars discussed the matter far into the night. It was clearly impossible for Mr. Dunbar to leave his work, and the only question was whether or not Barry should make one of the party. Barry greatly disliked the idea of leaving his father during the hot summer months, as he said, “to slave away at his desk, and to slop away in his bachelor diggings.” He raised many objections, but one consideration seemed to settle things for the Dunbars. To them a promise was a promise.
“If I remember aright, Barry, we promised that we should join their party on this expedition.”
“Yes,” added Barry quickly, “if our work permitted it.”
“Exactly,” said his father. “My work prevents me, your work does not.”
Hence it came that by the end of August Barry found himself in the far northern wilds of the Peace River country, a hundred miles or so from Edmonton, attached to a prospecting-hunting party of which Mr. Osborne Howland was the nominal head, but of which the “boss” was undoubtedly his handsome, athletic and impetuous daughter Paula. The party had not been on the trail for more than a week before every member was moving at her command, and apparently glad to do so.
The party were camped by a rushing river at the foot of a falls. Below the falls the river made a wide eddy, then swept down in a turbulent rapid for some miles. The landing was a smooth and shelving rock that pitched somewhat steeply into the river.
The unfortunate Harry, who after the day’s march had exchanged his heavy marching boots with their clinging hobnails for shoes more comfortable but with less clinging qualities, in making preparation for the evening meal made his way down this shelving rock of water. No sooner had he filled his pail than his foot slipped from under him, and in an instant the pail and himself were in the swiftly flowing river.
His cry startled the camp.
“Hello!” shouted Duff, with a great laugh. “Harry is in the drink! I never knew he was so fond of water as all that. You’ve got to swim for it now, old boy.”
“Throw him something,” said Knight.
Past them ran Barry, throwing off coat and vest.
“He can’t swim,” he cried, tearing at his boots. “Throw him a line, some one.” He ran down to the water’s edge, plunged in, and swam toward the unfortunate Harry, who, splashing wildly, was being carried rapidly into the rough water.
“Oh, father, he will be drowned!” cried Paula, rushing toward a canoe which was drawn up on the shore. Before any one could reach her she had pushed it out and was steering over the boiling current in Barry’s wake. But after a few strokes of her paddle she found herself driven far out into the current and away from the struggling men. Paula had had sufficient experience with a canoe to handle it with considerable ease in smooth water and under ordinary conditions, but in the swirl of this rough and swift water the canoe took the management of its course out of her hands, and she had all she could do to keep afloat.
“For God’s sake, men, get her!” cried Brand. “She will be drowned before our eyes.”
“Come on, Tom,” cried Jim Knight, swinging another canoe into the water. A glance he gave at the girl, another at the struggling men, for by this time Barry could be seen struggling with the drowning Hobbs.
“Get in, Tom,” ordered Knight, taking the stern. “We will get the men first. The girl is all right in the meantime.”
“Get the girl!” commanded Brand. “For God’s sake go for the girl,” he entreated in a frenzy of distress.
“No,” said Knight, “the men first. She’s all right.”
“Here,” said Duff to Brand, pushing out the remaining canoe, “get into the bow, and stop howling. Those men are in danger of being drowned, but Knight will get them. We’ll go for the girl.”
It took but a few minutes for Knight and Fielding, who knew their craft thoroughly and how to get the best out of her in just such an emergency, to draw up upon Harry and his rescuer.
“Say, they are fighting hard,” said Fielding. “That bloody little fool is choking the life out of Dunbar. My God! they are out of sight!”
“Go on,” roared Knight. “Keep your eyes on the spot, and for Heaven’s sake, paddle!”
“They are up again! One of them is. It’s Barry. The other is gone. No, by Jove! he’s got him! Hold on, Barry, we’re coming,” yelled Tom. “Stick to it, old boy!”
Swiftly the canoe sped toward the drowning men.
“They are gone this time for sure,” cried Tom, as the canoe shot over the spot where the men had last been seen.
“Not much!” said Knight, as reaching out of the stern he gripped Barry by the hair. “Hold hard, Barry,” he said quietly. “No monkey work now or you’ll drown us all.” Immediately Barry ceased struggling.
“Don’t try to get in, Barry. We’ll have to tow you ashore.”
“All right, Jim,” he said between his sobbing breaths. “Only– hurry up–I’ve got him–here.”
Knight reached down carefully, lifted Barry till his hand touched the gunwale of the canoe.
“Not too hard, Barry,” he said. “I’ll ease you round to the stern. Steady, boy, steady. Don’t dump us.”
“All right–Jim–but–he’s under the water–here.”
“Oh, never mind him. We’ll get him all right. Can you hold on now?” said Knight.
“Yes–I think so.”
“Now, for God’s sake, Tom, edge her into the shore. See that little eddy there? Swing into that! You’ll do it all right. Good man!”
By this time Knight was able to get Harry’s head above water.
In a few minutes they had reached the shore, and were working hard over Harry’s unconscious body, leaving Barry lying on the sand to recover his strength. A long fight was necessary to bring the life back into Harry, by which time Barry was sufficiently recovered to sit up.
“Stay where you are, Barry, until we get this man back to camp,” ordered Knight. “We’ll light a bit of a fire for you.”
“I’m warm enough,” said Barry.
“Warm enough? You may be, but you will be better with a fire, and you lie beside it till we get you. Don’t move now.”
“There’s the other canoes coming,” said Fielding. “They’ll make shore a little lower down. They’re all right. Say, she’s handling that canoe like a man!”
“Who?” said Barry.
“Why, Miss Howland,” said Fielding. “She was out after you like a shot. She’s a plucky one!”
Barry was on his feet in an instant, watching anxiously the progress of the canoes, which were being slowly edged across the river in a long incline toward the shore.
“They’ll make it, all right,” said Knight, after observing them for a time. “Don’t you worry. Just lie down by the fire. We’ll be back in a jiffy.”
In an hour they were all safely back in camp, and sufficiently recovered to discover the humorous points in the episode. But they were all familiar enough with the treacherous possibilities of rough and rapid water to know that for Hobbs and his deliverer at least, there had been some serious moments during their fierce struggle in the river.
“Another minute would have done,” said Fielding to his friend, as they sat over the fire after supper.
“A half a minute would have been just as good,” said Knight. “I got Barry by the hair under water. He was at his last kick, you bet! And that rat,” he added, smiling good naturedly at Harry, “was dragging him down for the last time.”
“I didn’t know nothin’ about it,” said poor Harry, who was lying stretched out by the fire, still very weak and miserable. “I didn’t know nothin’ about it, or you bet I woudn’t ha’ done it. I didn’t know nothin’ after he got me.”
“After you got him, you mean,” said Fielding.
“I guess that’s right,” said Harry, “but I wouldn’t ha’ got him if he hadn’t ha’ got me first.”
They all joined in the discussion of the event except Paula, who sat distrait and silent, gazing into the fire, and Barry, who lay, drowsy and relaxed, on a blanket not far from her side.
“You ought to go to bed,” said Paula at length in a low voice to him. “You need a good night’s sleep.”
“I’m too tired to sleep,” said Barry. “I feel rather rotten, in fact. I ought to feel very grateful, but somehow I just feel rotten.”
“Can one be grateful and feel rotten at the same time?” said Paula, making talk.
“Behold me,” replied Barry. “I know I am grateful, but I do feel rotten. I don’t think I have even thanked you for risking your life for me,” he added, turning toward her.
“Risking my life? Nonsense! I paddled ’round in the canoe for a bit, till two strong men came to tow me in, and would have, if I had allowed them. Thank the boys, who got you in time.” She shuddered as she spoke.
“I do thank them, and I do feel grateful to them,” said Barry. “It was rather a near thing. You see, I let him grip me. I choked him off my arms, but he slid down to my thigh, and I could not kick him off. Had to practically drown him. Even then he hung on.”
“Oh, don’t speak about it,” she said with a shudder, covering her face with her hands. “It was too awful, and it might have been the end of you.” Her voice broke a little.
“No, not an end,” answered Barry, in a quiet voice. “Not the end by a long way, not by a very long way.”
“What do you mean? Oh, you are thinking of immortality, and all that,” said Paula. “It’s a chilly, ghostly subject. It makes me shiver. I get little comfort out of it.”
“Ghostly it is, if you mean a thing of spirits,” said Barry, “but chilly! Why chilly?” Then he added to himself in an undertone: “I wonder! I wonder! I wish sometimes I knew more.”
“Sometimes?” cried Paula. “Always!” she added passionately. “It’s a dreadful business to me. To be suddenly snatched out of the light and the warmth, away from the touch of warm fingers and the sight of dear faces! Ah, I dread it! I loathe the thought of it. I hate it!”
“And yet,” mused Barry, “somehow I cannot forget that out there somewhere there is One, kindly, genial, true,–like my dad. How good he has been to me–my dad, I mean, and that Other, too, has been good. Somehow I think of them together. Yes, I am grateful to Him.”
“Oh, God, you mean,” said Paula, a little impatiently.
“Yes, to God. He saved me to-day. ‘Saved,’ I say. It is a queer way to speak, after all. What I really ought to say is that God thought it best that I should camp ’round here for a bit longer before moving in nearer.”
“Nearer?”
“Yes, into the nearer circle. Life moves ’round a centre, in outer and inner circles. This is the outer circle. Nearer in there, it is kindlier, with better light and clearer vision. ‘We shall know even as we are known.'” Barry mused on, as if communing with himself.
“But when you move in,” said Paula, and there was no mistaking the earnestness of her tone, “you break touch with those you love here.”
“I don’t know about that,” answered Barry quickly.
“Oh, yes you do. You are out of all this,–all this,” she swept her hand at the world around her, “this good old world, all your joy and happiness, all you love. Oh, that’s the worst of it; you give up your love. I hate it!” she concluded with vehemence sudden and fierce, as she shook her fist towards the stars.
“Give up your love?” said Barry. “Not I! Not one good, honest affection do I mean to give up, nor shall I.”
“Oh, nonsense! Don’t be religious. Just be honest,” said Paula, in a low, intense voice. “Let me speak to you. Suppose I–I love a man with all my soul and body–and body, mind you, and he goes out, or goes in, as you say. No matter, he goes out of my life. I lose him, he is not here. I cannot feel and respond to his love. I cannot feel his strong arms about me. My God!” Her voice came with increasing vehemence. “I want his arms. I want him as he is. I want his body–I cannot love a ghost. No! no!” she added in a low, hopeless voice. “When he goes out I lose him, and lose him as mine forever. Oh, what do I care for your spirit love! The old Greeks were right. They are shades–shades, mere shades beyond the river. I don’t want a shade. I want a man, a strong, warm- hearted, brave man. Yes, a good man, a man with a soul. But a MAN, not a SOUL. My God!” she moaned, “how terrible it all is! And it came so near to us to-day. But I should not be saying this to you, played out as you are. I am going to bed. Good-night.”
She put out her hand and gripped his in warm, strong, muscular fingers. “Thank God, yes God, if you like, you are still–still in this outer circle,”–she broke into a laugh, but there was little mirth in her laughter–“this good old outer circle, yet awhile.”
“Yes,” said Barry simply but very earnestly, “thank God. It is a good world. But with all my soul I believe there is a better, and all that is best in love and life we shall take with us. Good- night,” he added, “and thank you, at least for the will and the attempt to save my life.”
“Sleep well,” she said.
“I hope so,” he replied, “but I doubt it.”
His doubts, it turned out, were justified, for soon after midnight Mr. Howland was aroused by Harry Hobbs in a terror of excitement.
“Will you come to Mr. Dunbar, sir?” he cried. “I think he is dying.”
“Dying?” Mr. Howland was out of his cot immediately and at Barry’s side. He found him fighting for breath, his eyes starting from his head, a look of infinite distress on his face.
“My dear boy, what is it? Hobbs says you are dying.”
“That con-con-founded–fool–shouldn’t have–called you. I forbade– him,” gasped Barry.
“But, my dear boy, what is the matter? Are you in pain?”
“No, no,–it’s–nothing–only an old–friend come back–for a call,–a brief one–let us–hope. It’s only asthma. Looks bad– feels worse–but really–not at all dangerous.”
“What can be done, my boy?” asked Mr. Howland, greatly relieved, as are most laymen, when the trouble can be named. It is upon the terror inspired by the unknown that the medical profession lives.
“Tell Harry–to make–a hot drink,” said Barry, but Harry had already forestalled the request, and appeared with a steaming bowl. “This will–help. Now–go to–bed, Mr. Howland. Do, please.–You distress–me by remaining–there. Harry will–look after me. Good-night.”
Next morning Barry appeared at breakfast a little washed out in appearance, but quite bright and announcing himself fit for anything.
The incident, however, was a determining factor in changing the party’s plans. Already they were behind their time schedule, to Mr. Cornwall Brand’s disgust. The party was too large and too heavily encumbered with impedimenta for swift travel. Besides, as Paula said, “Why rush? Are we not doing the Peace River Country? We are out for a good time and we are having it.” Paula was not interested in mines and oil. She did not announce just what special interest was hers. She was “having a good time” and that was reason enough for leisurely travel. In consequence their provisions had run low.
It was decided to send forward a scouting party to the Hudson’s Bay Post some thirty miles further on to restock their commissariat. Accordingly Knight and Fielding were despatched on this mission, the rest of the party remaining in camp.
“A lazy day or two in camp is what we all need,” said Mr. Howland. “I confess I am quite used up myself, and therefore I know you must all feel much the same.”
On the fourth day the scouting party appeared.
“There’s war!” cried Knight as he touched land. He flung out a bundle of papers for Mr. Howland.
“War!” The word came back in tones as varied as those who uttered it.
“War!” said Mr. Howland. “Between whom?”
“Every one, pretty much,” said Knight. “Germany, France, Russia, Austria, Servia, Belgium, and Britain.”
“Britain!” said Barry and Duff at the same moment.
“Britain,” answered Knight solemnly.
The men stood stock still, looking at each other with awed faces.
“War!” again said Barry. “With Germany!” He turned abruptly away from the group and said, “I am going.”
“Going! Going where?” said Mr. Howland.
“To the war,” said Barry quietly.
“To the war! You? A clergyman?” said Mr. Howland.
“You? You going?” cried Paula. At the pain in her voice her father and Brand turned and looked at her. Disturbed by what he saw, her father began an excited appeal to Barry.
“Why, my dear sir, it would surely be most unusual for a man like you to go to war,” he began, and for quite ten minutes he proceeded to set forth in fluent and excited speech a number of reasons why the idea of Barry’s going to war was absurd and preposterous to him. It must be confessed that Barry was the only one of the men who appeared to give much heed to him. They seemed to be dazed by the stupendous fact that had been announced to them, and to be adjusting themselves to that fact.
When he had finished his lengthy and excited speech Brand took up the discourse.
“Of course you don’t think of going immediately,” he said. “We have this expedition in hand.”
The men made no reply. Indeed, they hardly seemed to hear him.
“You don’t mean to say,” continued Brand with a touch of indignation in his voice, addressing Duff, the recognised leader of the party, “that you would break your engagement with this party, Mr. Duff?”
Duff glanced at him, then looked away in silence, studying the horizon. The world was to him and to them all a new world within the last few minutes.
His silence appeared to enrage Brand. He turned to Barry.
“Do you mean to tell me, sir, that you approve of this? Do you consider it right and fair that these men should break their engagement with us? We have gone to great expense, we have extremely important interests at stake in this exploration.”
Barry stood looking at him in silence, as if trying to take in exactly what he meant, then in a low and awed tone he said:
“It is war! War with Germany!”
“We cannot help that,” cried Brand. “What difference can this war make to you here a hundred miles from civilisation? These men are pledged to us.”
“Their first pledge is to their country, sir,” said Barry gravely.
“But why should you, a Canadian, take part in this war?” argued Mr. Howland. “Surely this is England’s war.”
Then Barry appeared to awake as from a dream.
“Yes, it is England’s war, it is Britain’s war, and when Britain is at war my country is at war, and when my country is at war I ought to be there.”
“God in heaven!” shouted Duff, striking him on the back, “you have said it! My country is at war, and I must be there. As God hears me, I am off to-day–now.”
“Me, too!” said Knight with a shout.
“I’m going with you, sir,” said little Harry Hobbs, ranging himself beside Barry.
“Count me in,” said Tom Fielding quietly. “I have a wife and three kids, but–“
“My God!” gasped Duff. “My wife.” His face went white. He had not yet fully adjusted himself to the fact of war.
“Why, of course,” said Mr. Howland, “you married men won’t be called upon. You must be reasonable. For instance you, Mr. Duff, cannot leave your wife.”
But Duff had recovered himself.
“My wife, sir? My wife would despise me if I stayed up here. Sir, my wife will buckle on my belt and spurs and send me off to the war,” cried Duff in a voice that shook as he spoke.
With a single stride Barry was at his side, offering both his hands.
“Thank God for men like you! And in my soul I believe the Empire has millions of them.”
“Does your Empire demand that you desert those you have pledged yourself to?” enquired Brand in a sneering tone.
“Oh, Cornwall!” exclaimed Paula, “how can you?”
“Why, Brand,” said Mr. Howland, “that is unworthy of you.”
“We will see you into safety, sir,” said Duff, swinging round upon Brand, “either to the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post, where you can get Indians, or back to Edmonton, but not one step further on this expedition do I go.”
“Nor I,” said Knight.
“Nor I,” said Fielding.
“Nor I,” said Barry.
“Nor I,” said Harry Hobbs.
“You are quite right, sir,” said Mr. Howland, turning to Barry. “I apologise to you, sir, to all of you Canadians. I am ashamed to confess that I did not at first get the full meaning of this terrific thing that has befallen your Empire. Were it the U.S.A. that was in a war of this kind, hell itself would not keep me from going to her aid. Nor you either, Brand. Yes, you are right. Go to your war. God go with you.”
He shook hands solemnly with them one by one. “I only wish to God that my country were with you, too, in this thing,” he said when he had performed this function.
“Father,” cried Paula, “do you think for one minute that Uncle Sam won’t be in this? You put it down,” she said, swinging ’round upon Barry, “where it will jump at you some day: We will be with you in this scrap for all we are worth.”
“And now for the march,” said Barry, who seemed almost to assume command. Then removing his hat and lifting high his hand, he said in a voice thrilling with solemn reverence, “God grant victory to the right! God save the king!”
Instinctively the men took off their hats and stood with bared and bent heads, as if sharing in a solemn ritual. They stood with millions upon millions of their kin in the old mother lands, and scattered wide upon the seas, stood with many millions more of peoples and nations, pledging to this same cause of right, life and love and all they held dear, and with hearts open to that all- searching eye, praying that same prayer, “God grant victory to the right. Amen and amen. We ask no other.”
Then they faced to their hundred miles’ trek en route to the war.
CHAPTER VI
THE MEN OF THE NORTH
“Fifty miles–not too bad, boy, not too bad for a one day’s go. We’ll camp right here at the portage. How is it, Knight?”
“Good place, Duff, right on that point. Good wood, good landing. Besides there’s a deuce of a portage beyond, which we can do after supper to-night. How do you feel, Barry?” asked Knight. “Hard day, eh?”
“Feeling fit, a little tired, of course, but good for another ten miles,” answered Barry.
“That’s the stuff,” replied Knight, looking at him keenly, “but, see here, you must ease up on the carrying. You haven’t quite got over that ducking of yours.”
“I’m fit enough,” answered Barry, rather more curtly than his wont.
They brought the canoes up to the landing, and with the speed of long practice unloaded them, and drew them upon the shore.
Knight approached Duff, and, pointing toward Barry, said quietly:
“I guess we’ll have to ease him up a bit. That fight, you know, took it out of him, and he always jumps for the biggest pack. We’d better hold him back to-morrow a bit.”
“Can’t hold back any one,” said Duff, with an oath. “We’ve got to make it to-morrow night. There’s the devil of a trip before us. That big marsh portage is a heartbreaker, and there must be a dozen or fifteen of them awaiting us, and we’re going to get through–at least, I am.”
“All right,” said Knight, with a quick flash of temper. “I’ll stay with you, only I thought we might ease him a bit.”
“I’m telling you, we’re going to get through,” said Duff, with another oath.
“You needn’t tell me, Duff,” said Knight. “Keep your shirt on.”
“On or off, wet or dry, sink or swim, we’re going to make that train to-morrow, Knight. That’s all about it.”
Then Knight let himself go.
“See here, Duff. Do you want to go on to-night? If you do, hell and blazes, say the word and I’m with you.”
His face was white as he spoke. He seized a tump-line, swung the pack upon his head, and set off across the portage.
“Come on, boys,” he yelled. “We’re going through to-night.”
“Oh, hold up, Knight!” said Duff. “What the hell’s eating you? We’ll grub first anyway.”
“No,” said Knight. “The next rapid is a bad bit of water, and if we’re going through to-night, I want that bit behind me, before it gets too dark. So come along!”
“Oh, cut it out, Knight,” said Duff, in a gruff but conciliatory tone. “We’ll camp right here.”
“It’s all the same to me,” said Knight, flinging his pack down. “When you want to go on, say the word. You won’t have to ask me twice.”
Duff looked over the six feet of bone and sinew and muscle of the young rancher, made as if to answer, paused a moment, changed his mind, and said more quietly:
“Don’t be an ass, Knight. I’m not trying to hang your shirt on a tree.”
“You know damned well you can’t,” said Knight, who was still white with passion.
“Oh, come off,” replied Duff. “Anyway, I don’t see what young Dunbar is to you. We must get through to-morrow night. The overseas contingent is camping at Valcartier, according to these papers and whatever happens I am going with that contingent.”
Knight made no reply. He was a little ashamed of his temper. But during the past two days he had chafed under the rasp of Duff’s tongue and his overbearing manner. He resented too his total disregard of Barry’s weariness, for in spite of his sheer grit, the pace was wearing the boy down.
“We ought to reach the railroad by six to-morrow,” said Duff, renewing the conversation, and anxious to appease his comrade. “There’s a late train, but if we catch the six we shall make home in good time. Hello, what’s this coming?”
At his words they all turned and looked in the direction in which he pointed.
Down a stream, which at this point came tumbling into theirs in a dangerous looking rapid, came a canoe with a man in the centre guiding it as only an expert could.
“By Jove! He can’t make that drop,” said Knight, walking down toward the landing.
They all stood watching the canoe which, at the moment, hung poised upon the brink of the rapid like a bird for flight. Even as Knight spoke the canoe entered the first smooth pitch at the top. Two long, swallow-like sweeps, then she plunged into the foam, to appear a moment later fighting her way through the mass of crowding, crested waves, which, like white-fanged wolves upon a doe, seemed to be hurling themselves upon her, intent upon bearing her down to destruction.
“By the living, jumping Jemima!” said Fielding, in an awe-stricken tone, “she’s gone!”
“She’s through!” cried Knight.
“Great Jehoshaphat!” said Fielding. “He’s a bird!”
With a flip or two of his paddle, the stranger shot his canoe across the stream, and floated quietly to the landing.
Barry ran down to meet him.
“I say, that was beautifully done,” he cried, taking the nose of the canoe while the man stepped ashore and stood a moment looking back at the water.
“A leetle more to the left would have been better, I think. She took some water,” he remarked in a slow voice, as if to himself.
He was a strange-looking creature. He might have stepped out of one of Fenimore Cooper’s novels. Indeed, as Barry’s eyes travelled up and down his long, bony, stooping, slouching figure, his mind leaped at once to the Pathfinder.
“Come far?” asked Duff, approaching the stranger.
“Quite a bit,” he answered, in a quiet, courteous voice, pausing a moment in his work.
“Going out?” enquired Duff.
“Not yet,” he said. “Going up the country first to The Post.”
“Ah, we have just come down from there,” said Duff. “We started yesterday morning,” he added, evidently hoping to surprise the man.
“Yes,” he answered in a quiet tone of approval. “Nice little run! Nice little run! Bit of a hurry, I guess,” he ventured apologetically.
“You bet your life, we just are. This damned war makes a man feel like as if the devil was after him,” said Duff.
“War!” The man looked blankly at him. “Who’s fightin’?”
“Why, haven’t you heard? It’s been going on for a month. We heard only three days ago as we were going further up the country. It knocked our plans endways, and here we are chasing ourselves to get out.”
“War!” said the man again. “Who’s fightin’? Uncle Sam after them Mexicans?”
“No. Mexicans, hell!” exclaimed Duff. “Germany and Britain.”
“Britain!” The slouching shoulders lost their droop. “Britain!” he said, straightening himself up. “What’s she been doin’ to Germany?”
“What’s Germany been doing to her, and to Belgium, and to Servia, and to France?” answered Duff, in a wrathful voice. “She’s been raising hell all around. You haven’t seen the papers, eh? I have them all here.”
The stranger seemed dazed by the news. He made no reply, but getting out his frying-pan and tea-pail, his only utensils, he set about preparing his evening meal.
“I say,” said Duff, “won’t you eat with us? We’re just about ready. We’ll be glad to have you.”
The man hesitated a perceptible moment. In the wilds men do not always accept invitations to eat. Food is sometimes worth more than its weight in gold.
“I guess I will, if you’ve lots of stuff,” he said at length.
“We’ve lots of grub, and we expect to be home by tomorrow night anyway, if things go all right. You are very welcome.”
The man laid down his frying-pan and tea-pail, and walked with Duff toward his camp.
“Are you goin’?” he enquired.
“Going?”
“To the war. Guess some of our Canadian boys will be goin’ likely, eh?”
“Going,” cried Duff. “You bet your life I’m going. But, come on. We’ll talk as we eat. And we can’t stay long, either.”
Duff introduced the party.
“My name’s McCuaig,” said the stranger.
“Scotch, I guess?” enquired Duff.
“My father came out with The Company. I was born up north. Never been much out, but I read the papers,” he added quickly, as if to correct any misapprehension as to his knowledge of the world and its affairs. “My father always got the Times and the Spectator, and I’ve continued the habit.”
“Any one who reads the Times and the Spectator,” said Barry, “can claim to be a fairly well-read man. My father takes the Spectator, too.”
As they sat down to supper, he noticed that McCuaig took off his old grey felt and crossed himself before beginning toast.
As a matter of courtesy, Barry had always been asked to say grace before meals while with the Howland party. This custom, however, had been discontinued upon this trip. They had no time for meals. They had “just grabbed their grub and run,” as Harry Hobbs said.
While they ate, Duff kept a full tide of conversation going in regard to the causes of the war and its progress, as reported in the papers. Barry noticed that McCuaig’s comments, though few, revealed a unique knowledge of European political affairs during the last quarter of a century. He noticed too that his manners at the table were those of a gentleman.
After supper they packed their stuff over the long portage, leaving their tent and sleeping gear, with their food, however, to be taken in the morning. For a long time they sat over the fire, Barry reading, for McCuaig’s benefit, the newspaper accounts of the Belgian atrocities, the story of the smashing drive of the German hosts, and the retreat of the British army from Mons.
“What,” exclaimed McCuaig, “the British soldiers goin’ back! Runnin’ away from them Germans!”
“Well, the Germans are only about ten to one, not only in men but in guns, and in this war it’s guns that count. Guns can wipe out an army of heroes as easily as an army of cowards,” said Duff.
“And them women and children,” said McCuaig. “Are they killing them still?”
“You’re just right, they are,” replied Duff, “and will till we stop them.”
McCuaig’s eyes were glowing with a deep inner light. They were wonderful eyes, quick, darting, straight-looking and fearless, the eyes of a man who owes his life to his vigilance and his courage.
Before turning in for the night, Barry went to the river’s edge, and stood looking up at the stars holding their steadfast watch over the turbulent and tossing waters below.
“Quiet, ain’t they?” said a voice at his shoulder.
“Why, you startled me, Mr. McCuaig; I never heard you step.”
McCuaig laughed his quiet laugh.
“Got to move quietly in this country,” he said, “if you are going to keep alive.”
A moment or so he stood by Barry’s side, looking up with him at the stars.
“No fuss, up there,” he said, interpreting Barry’s mood and attitude. “Not like that there pitchin’, tossin’, threatenin’ water.”
“No,” said Barry, “but though they look quiet, I suppose if we could really see, there is a most terrific whirling of millions of stars up there, going at the rate of thousands of miles a minute.”
“Millions of ’em, and all whirlin’ about,” said McCuaig in an awe- stricken voice. “It’s a wonder they don’t hit.”
“They don’t hit because they each keep their own orbit,” said Barry, “and they obey the laws of their existence.”
“Orbut,” enquired McCuaig. “What’s that?”
“The trail that each star follows,” said Barry.
“I see,” said McCuaig, “each one keeps its own trail, its own orbut, and so there’s peace up there. And I guess there’d be peace down here if folks did the same thing. It’s when a man gets out of his own orbut and into another fellow’s that the scrap begins. I guess that’s where Germany’s got wrong.”
“Something like that,” replied Barry.
“And sometimes,” continued McCuaig, his eyes upon the stars, “when a little one comes up against a big one, he gets busted, eh?”
Barry nodded.
“And a big one, when he comes up against a bigger one gets pretty badly jarred, eh?”
“I suppose so,” said Barry.
“That’s what’s goin’ to happen to Germany,” said McCuaig.
“Germany’s a very powerful nation,” said Barry. “The most powerful military nation in the world.”
“What!” said McCuaig. “Bigger than Britain?”
“Britain has two or three hundred thousand men in her army; Germany has seven millions or more, with seventy millions of people behind them, organised for war. Of course, Britain has her navy, but then Germany has the next biggest in the world. Oh, it’s going to be a terrific war.”
“I say,” said McCuaig, putting his hand on Barry’s shoulder. “You don’t think it will bother us any to lick her?”
“It will be the most terrible of all Britain’s wars,” replied Barry. “It will take every ounce of Britain’s strength.”
“You don’t tell me!” exclaimed McCuaig, as if struck by an entirely new idea. “Say, are you really anxious, young man?”
“I am terribly anxious,” replied Barry. “I know Germany a little. I spent a year there. She is a mighty nation, and she is ready for war.”
“She is, eh!” replied McCuaig thoughtfully. He wandered off to the fire without further word, where, rolling himself in his blanket and scorning the place in the tent offered him by Duff, he made himself comfortable for the night.
At the break of day Duff was awakened by the smell of something frying. Over the fire bent McCuaig, busy preparing a breakfast of tea, bacon and bannocks, together with thick slices of fat pork.
Breakfast was eaten in haste. The day’s work was before them, and there was no time for talk. In a very few minutes they stood ready for their trip across the portage.
With them stood McCuaig. His blanket roll containing his grub, with frying-pan and tea-pail attached, lay at his feet; his rifle beside it.
For a moment or two he stood looking back up the stream by which, last night, he had come. Then he began tying his paddles to the canoe thwarts in preparation for packing it across the portage.
As he was tying on the second paddle, Duff’s eye fell on him.
“What’s up, McCuaig?” he said. “Aren’t you going up to the Post?”
“No, I guess I ain’t goin’ up no more,” replied McCuaig slowly.
“What do you mean? You aren’t going back home?”
“No. My old shack will do without me for a while, I guess.–Say,” he continued, facing around upon Duff and looking him squarely in the face, “this young chap says”–putting his hand upon Barry’s shoulder–“Britain is going to have a hell of a time licking Germany back into her own orbut. Them papers said last night that Canada was going in strong. Do you think she could use a fellow like me?”
A silence fell upon the group of men.
“What! Do you mean it, McCuaig?” said Duff at length.
The man turned his thin, eagle face toward the speaker, a light in his eyes.
“Why, ain’t you goin’? Ain’t every one goin’ that can? If a fellow stood on one side while his country was fightin’, where would he live when it’s all over? He read out of the papers that them Germans were shootin’ women and children. So–” his face began to work, “am I goin’ to stand by and ask some one else to make ’em quit? No, by God!”
The men stood watching his face, curiously twisted and quivering. Then without a word Duff seized his pack, and swung into the trail, every man following him in his order. Without pausing, except for a brief half hour at noon, and another later in the day for eating, they pressed the trail, running what rapids they could and portaging the others, until in the early evening they saw, far away, a dirty blur on the skyline.
“Hurrah!” yelled Fielding. “Good old firebus, waiting for us.”
“Somebody run ahead and hold her,” said Duff.
Barry flung his pack down and started away.
“Come back here, Barry,” cried Knight. “You’re not fit. You’re all in.”
“That’s right, too,” said McCuaig. “I guess I’ll go.”
And off he set with the long, shuffling, tireless trot with which, for a hundred years, the “runners of the woods” have packed their loads and tracked their game in the wilds of northwestern Canada.
CHAPTER VII
BARRICADES AND BAYONETS
The city of Edmonton was in an uproar, its streets thronged with excited men, ranchers and cowboys from the ranches, lumberjacks from the foothill camps, men from the mines, trappers with lean, hard faces, in weird garb, from the north.
The news from the front was ominous. Belgium was a smoking waste. Her skies were black with the burning of her towns, villages and homesteads, her soil red with the blood of her old men, her women and children. The French armies, driven back in rout from the Belgian frontier, were being pounded to death by the German hordes. Fortresses hitherto considered impregnable were tumbling like ninepins before the terrible smashing of Austrian and German sixteen-inch guns. Already von Kluck with his four hundred thousand of conquering warriors was at the gates of Paris.
Most ominous of all, the British army, that gallant, little sacrificial army, of a scant seventy-five thousand men, holding like a bulldog to the flank of von Bulow’s mighty army, fifty times as strong, threatened by von Kluck on the left flank and by von Housen on the right, was slowing down the German advance, but was itself being slowly ground into the bloody dust of the northern and eastern roads of Northern and Eastern France.
Black days these were for the men of British blood. Was the world to see something new in war? Were Germans to overcome men of the race of Nelson, and Wellington and Colin Campbell?
At home, hundreds of thousands were battering at the recruiting offices. In the Dominions of the Empire overseas it was the same. In Canada a hundred thousand men were demanding a place in the first Canadian contingent of thirty-five thousand, now almost ready to sail. General Sam at Ottawa was being snowed under by entreating, insistent, cajoling, threatening telegrams. Already northern Alberta had sent two thousand men. The rumour in Edmonton ran that there were only a few places left to be filled in the north Alberta quota. For these few places hundreds of men were fighting in the streets.
Alighting from their train, Duff and his men stood amazed, aghast, gazing upon the scene before them. Duff climbed a wagon wheel and surveyed the crowd packing the street in front of the bulletin boards.
“No use, this way, boys. We’ll have to go around. Come on.”
They went on. Up side streets and lanes, through back yards and shops they went until at length they emerged within a hundred yards of the recruiting office.
Duff called his men about him.
“Boys, we’ll have to bluff them,” he said. “You’re a party of recruits that Col. Kavanagh expects. You’ve been sent for. I’m bringing you in under orders. Look as much like soldiers as you can, and bore in like hell. Come on!”
They began to bore. At once there was an uproar, punctuated with vociferous and varied profanity.
Duff proved himself an effective leader.
“Here, let me pass,” he shouted into the backs of men’s heads. “I’m on duty here. I must get through to Colonel Kavanagh. Keep up there, men; keep your line! Stand back, please! Make way!”
His huge bulk, distorted face and his loud and authoritative voice startled men into temporary submission, and before they could recover themselves he and his little company of hard-boring men were through.
Twenty-five yards from the recruiting office a side rush of the crowd caught them.
“They’ve smashed the barricades,” a boy from a telegraph pole called out.
Duff and his men fought to hold their places, but they became conscious of a steady pressure backwards.
“What’s doing now, boy?” shouted Duff to the urchin clinging to the telegraph pole.
“The fusileers–they are sticking their bayonets into them.”
Before the line of bayonets the crowd retreated slowly, but Duff and his company held their ground, allowing the crowd to ebb past them, until they found themselves against the line of bayonets.
“Let me through here, sergeant, with my party,” said Duff. “I’m under orders of Colonel Kavanagh.”
The sergeant, an old British army man, looked them over.
“Have you an order, sir–a written order, I mean?”
“No,” said Duff. “I haven’t, but the colonel expects us. He is waiting for me now.”
“Sorry, sir,” replied the sergeant, “my orders are to let no one through without a written pass.”
Duff argued, stormed, threatened, swore; but to no purpose. The N. C. O. knew his job.
“Send a note in,” suggested Barry in Duff’s ear.
“Good idea,” replied Duff, and wrote hurriedly.
“Here, take this through to your colonel,” he said, passing the note to the sergeant.
Almost immediately Colonel Kavanagh came out and greeted Duff warmly.
“Where in this wide creation have you been, Duff?” he exclaimed. “I’ve wanted you terribly.”
“Here I am now, then,” answered Duff. “Six of us. We’re going with you.”
“It can’t be done,” said the colonel. “I have only twenty places left; every one promised ten times over.”
“That makes it easy, Kavanagh. You can give six of them to us.”
“Duff, it simply can’t be done. You know I’d give it to you if I could. I’ve wires from Ottawa backing up a hundred applicants, actually ordering me to put them on. No! It’s no use,” continued the colonel, holding up his hand. “Look here, I’ll give you a pointer. We have got word to-day that there’s to be a second contingent. Neil Fraser is out there in your district, Wapiti, raising a company of two hundred and fifty men. We have stripped that country bare already, so he’s up against it. He wants Wapiti men, he says. They are no better than any other, but he thinks they are. You get out there to-night, Duff, and get in on that thing. You will get a commission, too. Now hike! Hike! Go! Honest to God, Duff, I want you with my battalion, and if I can work it afterwards, I’ll get you exchanged, but your only chance now is Wapiti. Go, for God’s sake, go quick!”
“What do you say, boys?” asked Duff, wheeling upon his men.
“I say, go!” said Knight.
In this decision they all agreed.
“Go it is,” said Duff. “Right about turn. Good luck, Kavanagh, damn you. I see you have got a good sergeant there.”
“Who? McDowell? None better. You couldn’t beat him, eh?” said the colonel with a grin.
The sergeant stood at attention, with a wooden face.
“He’s the kind of man they want in the front lines,” said Duff. “The devil himself couldn’t break through where he is.”
“That’s why I have him. Good luck. Good-bye!”
Throughout the night they marched, now and then receiving a lift from a ranch wagon, and in the grey of the morning, weary, hungry, but resolute for a place in the Wapiti company, they made the village.
Early as it was, Barry found his father astir, with breakfast in readiness.
“Hello, boy!” cried his father running to him with outstretched hands.
“Hello, dad!” answered Barry. His father threw a searching glance over his son’s face as he shook his hand warmly.
“Not a word, Barry, until you eat. Not a word. Go get ready for your bath. I’ll have it for you in a minute. No, not one word. Quick. March. That is the only word these days. As you eat I’ll give you the news.”
Resolutely he refused to talk until he saw his son begin upon his breakfast. Then he poured forth a stream of news. The whole country was aflame with war enthusiasm. Alberta had offered half a million bushels of oats for the imperial army, and a thousand horses or more. The Calgary district had recruited two thousand men, the Edmonton district as many more. All over Canada, from Vancouver to Halifax, it was the same.
From the Wapiti district twenty-six ranchers, furnishing their own horses, had already gone. Ewen Innes was in Edmonton. His brother Malcolm was in uniform, too, and his young brother Jim was keen to enlist. Neil Fraser was busy raising a company of Wapiti men. Young Pickles and McCann had joined up as buglers.
And so the stream flowed, Barry listening with grave face but making no response.
“And I’m glad you’re back, my boy. I’m glad you’re back,” said his father, clapping him on the shoulder.
The rest of the meal was eaten in silence. They were having each his own thoughts, and for the first time in their life together, they kept their thoughts to themselves.
“You’re going to your office, Dad,” said Barry, when they had cleared away, and set the house in order.
“No, the office is closed, and will be for some time, I imagine. I’m busy with Neil Fraser. I’m acting paymaster, quartermaster, recruiting sergeant, and half a dozen other things.”
“I’ll go down with you,” said Barry, as his father rose to go.
His father came back to him, put his hands on his shoulders, and said:
“Barry, I want you to go to bed.”
“Nonsense, dad. I’m all right. I’m going downtown with you.”
“Barry,” said his father, “we have hard times before us, and you must be fit. I ask you to go to bed and sleep there this forenoon. You’re half asleep now. This afternoon we shall face up to our job.”
His father’s voice was quietly authoritative and Barry yielded.
“All right, dad. I’ll do as you say, and this afternoon–well, we’ll see.”
At the noonday meal they were conscious of a mutual restraint. For the first time in their lives they were not opening to each other their innermost souls. The experience was as distressing as it was unusual. The father, as if in dread of silence, was obviously exerting himself to keep a stream of talk flowing. Barry was listening with a face very grave and very unlike the bright and buoyant face he usually carried. They avoided each other’s eyes, and paid little heed to their food.
At length Barry pushed back his chair.
“Will you excuse me, dad,” he said. “I think I shall step out a moment into the garden.”
“Do, Barry,” said his father, in obvious relief. “You are fagged out, my boy.”
“Thanks, dad. I am a bit played out.”
“And take it easy this afternoon, Barry. To-night you will tell me about your trip, and–and–we’ll have a talk.”
“Good old dad!” said Barry. “You do understand a chap. See you later, then,” he called back as he passed through the door.
His father sat gazing before him for some moments with a deep shadow on his face.
“There is something wrong with that boy,” he said to himself. “I wish I knew what it was.”
He set his house in order, moving heavily as if a sudden weight of years had fallen upon his shoulders, and took his way slowly down the street.
“I wonder what it is,” he mused, refusing to give form to a horrible thought that hovered like a spectre about the windows of his soul.
The first glance at his son’s face at the time of the evening meal made his heart sing within him.
“He’s all right again! He’s all right!” he said to himself jubilantly.
“Hello, dad,” cried Barry, as his father entered the room. “Supper’s just ready. How do you feel, eh?”
“Better, my boy–first rate, I mean. I’m properly hungry. You’re rested, I can see.”
“I’m all right, dad! I’m all right!” cried Barry, in his old cheery way. “Dad, I want to apologise to you. I wasn’t myself to- day, but now I’m all right again. Dad, I’ve joined up. I’m a soldier now,” he said with a smile on his face, but with anxious eyes turned on his father.
“Joined up!” echoed his father. “Barry, you have enlisted! Thank God, my boy. I feared–I thought– No, damned if I did!” he added, with such an unusual burst of passion that Barry could only gaze at him with astonishment.
“Forgive me, my boy,” he said, coming forward with outstretched hand. “For a moment I confess I thought–” Again he paused, apparently unable to continue.
“You thought, dad,” cried Barry, “and–forgive me, dad–I thought too. I ought to have known you better.”
“And I, you, my son.”
They shook hands with each other in an ecstasy of jubilation.
“My God, I’m glad that’s through,” said the older man. “We were both fools, Barry, but thank God that horror is past. Now tell me all about everything–your trip, your plans. Let’s have a good talk as we always do.”
“Come on then, dad,” cried Barry. “Let’s have an eat first. By Jove, I feel a thousand years younger. I go to the M. O. to-morrow for an examination.”
“He is quite unusually severe in his interpretation of the regulations, I understand,” said his father. “He is turning men down right and left. He knows, of course, that there are plenty to choose from. But there is no fear of your fitness, Barry.”
“Not much,” said Barry, with a gay laugh.
Never had they spent a happier evening together. True, the spectre of war would thrust itself upon them, but they faced it as men–