Corporal Cameron
by
Ralph Connor
Part 3 out of 9
"I know not, but he has neffer been in this Glen before whateffer,"
replied Kirsty, with an ominous shake of the head, her primitive
instincts leading her to view the stranger with suspicion. "But!"
she added, with a glance at her young mistress' face, "he iss no
man to be afraid of, at any rate. He is just a laddie."
"Oh, he is a YOUNG man, Kirsty?" replied her mistress, glancing at
her blue serge gown, her second best, and with her hands striving
to tuck in some of her wayward curls.
"Och, yess, and not much at that!" replied Kirsty, with the idea of
relieving her young mistress of unnecessary fears.
Then Moira, putting on her grand air, stepped into the parlour, and
saw standing there and awaiting her, a young man with a thin and
somewhat hard face, a firm mouth, and extraordinarily keen, grey
eyes. Upon her appearing the young man stood looking upon her
without a word. As a matter of fact, he was struggling with a
problem; a problem that was quite bewildering; the problem, namely,
"How could hair ever manage to get itself into such an arrangement
of waves and curls, and golden gleams and twinkles?" Struggling
with this problem, he became conscious of her voice gravely
questioning him. "You were wishing to see my brother?" The young
man came back part way, and replied, "Oh! how does it--? That is--.
I beg your pardon." The surprise in her face brought him quite
to the ground, and he came at once to his business. "I am Mr.
Martin," he said in a quick, sharp voice. "I know your brother and
Mr. Dunn." He noted a light dawn in her eyes. "In fact, I played
with them on the same team--at football, you know."
"Oh!" cried the girl, relief and welcome in her voice, "I know you,
Mr. Martin, quite well. I know all about you, and what a splendid
quarter-back you are." Here she gave him both her hands, which Mr.
Martin took in a kind of dream, once more plunged into the mazes of
another and more perplexing problem, viz., Was it her lips with
that delicious curve to them? or her eyes so sunny and brown (or
were they brown?) with that alluring, bewitching twinkle? or was it
both lips and eyes that gave to the smile with which she welcomed
him its subtle power to make his heart rise and choke him as it
never had been known to do in the most strenuous of his matches?
"I'm awfully glad," he heard himself say, and her voice replying,
"Oh, yes! Allan has often and often spoken of you, Mr. Martin."
Mr. Martin immediately became conscious of a profound and grateful
affection to Allan, still struggling, however, with the problem
which had been complicated still further by the charm of her soft,
Highland voice. He was on the point of deciding in favour of her
voice, when on her face he noted a swift change from glad welcome
to suspicion and fear, and then into her sunny eyes a sudden
leaping of fierce wrath, as in those of a lioness defending her
young.
"Why do you look so?" she cried in a voice sharp and imperious.
"Is it my brother--? Is anything wrong?"
The shock of the change in eyes and voice brought Martin quite to
himself.
"Wrong? Not a bit," he hastened to say, "but just the finest thing
in the world. It is all here in this letter. Dunn could not come
himself, and there was no one else, and he thought Cameron ought to
have it to-day, so here I am, and here is the letter. Where is
he?"
"Oh!" cried the girl, clasping her hands upon her heart, her voice
growing soft, and her eyes dim with a sudden mist. "I am so
thankful! I am so glad!" The change in her voice and in her eyes
so affected Mr. Martin that he put his hands resolutely behind his
back lest they should play him tricks, and should, without his
will, get themselves round her and draw her close to his heart.
"So am I," he said, "awfully glad! Never was so glad in all my
life!" He was more conscious than ever of bewilderment and
perplexity in the midst of increasing problems that complicated
themselves with mist brown eyes, trembling lips, and a voice of
such pathetic cadences as aroused in him an almost uncontrollable
desire to exercise his utmost powers of comfort. And all the while
there was growing in his heart a desperate anxiety as to what would
be the final issue of these bewildering desires and perplexities;
when at the extremity of his self-control he was saved by the
girl's suggestion.
"Let us go and find my brother."
"Oh, yes!" cried Martin, "for heaven's sake let us."
"Wait until I get my hat."
"Oh! I wouldn't put on a hat," cried he in dismay.
"Why?" enquired the girl, looking at him with surprised curiosity.
"Oh! because--because you don't need one; it's so beautiful and
sunny, you know." In spite of what he could do Mr. Martin's eyes
kept wandering to her hair.
"Oh, well!" cried Moira, in increasing surprise at this strange
young man, "the sun won't hurt me, so come, let us go."
Together they went down the avenue of rugged firs. At the highway
she paused. Before them lay the Glen in all the splendid sweep of
its beauty.
"Isn't it lovely!" she breathed.
"Lovely!" echoed Martin, his eyes not on the Glen. "It is so
sunny, you know."
"Yes," she answered quickly, "you notice that?"
"How could I help it?" said Martin, his eyes still resting upon
her. "How could I?"
"Of course," she replied, "and so we call it the Glen Cuagh Oir,
that is the 'Glen of the Cup of Gold.' And to think he has to
leave it all to-morrow!" she added.
The pathetic cadences in her voice again drove Martin to despair.
He recovered himself, however, to say, "But he is going to Canada!"
"Yes, to Canada. And we all feel it so dreadfully for him, and,"
she added in a lower voice, "for ourselves."
Had it been yesterday Martin would have been ready with scorn for
any such feeling, and with congratulations to Cameron upon his
exceptionally good luck in the expectation of going to Canada; but
to-day, somehow it was different. He found the splendid lure of
his native land availed not to break the spell of the Glen, and as
he followed the girl in and out of the little cottages, seeking her
brother, and as he noted the perfect courtesy and respect which
marked her manner with the people, and their unstudied and
respectful devotion to their "tear young leddy," this spell
deepened upon him. Unconsciously and dimly he became aware of a
mysterious and mighty power somehow and somewhere in the Glen
straining at the heart-strings of its children. Of the nature and
origin of this mysterious and mighty power, the young Canadian knew
little. His country was of too recent an origin for mystery, and
its people too heterogeneous in their ethnic characteristics to
furnish a soil for tribal instincts and passions. The passionate
loves and hatreds of the clans, their pride of race, their
deathless lealty; and more than all, and better than all, their
religious instincts, faiths and prejudices; these, with the mystic,
wild loveliness of heather-clad hill and rock-rimmed loch, of
roaring torrent and jagged crags, of lonely muir and sunny pasture
nuiks; all these, and ten thousand nameless and unnamable things
united in the weaving of the spell of the Glen upon the hearts of
its people. Of how it all came to be, Martin knew nothing, but
like an atmosphere it stole in upon him, and he came to vaguely
understand something of what it meant to be a Highlander, and to
bid farewell to the land into whose grim soil his life roots had
struck deep, and to tear himself from hearts whose life stream and
his had flowed as one for a score of generations. So from cot to
cot Martin followed and observed, until they came to the crossing
where the broad path led up from the highroad to the kirkyard and
the kirk. Here they were halted by a young man somewhat older than
Martin. Tall and gaunt he stood. His face, pale and pock-marked
and lit by light blue eyes, and crowned by brilliant red hair, was,
with all its unloveliness, a face of a certain rugged beauty; while
his manner and bearing showed the native courtesy of a Highland
gentleman.
"You are seeking Mr. Allan?" he said, taking off his bonnet to the
girl. "He is in yonder," waving his hand towards the kirkyard.
"In yonder? You are sure, Mr. Maclise?" She might well ask, for
never but on Sabbath days, since the day they had laid his mother
away under the birch trees, had Allan put foot inside the kirkyard.
"Half an hour ago he went in," replied the young Highlander, "and
he has not returned."
"I will go in, then," said the girl, and hesitated, unwilling that
a stranger's eyes should witness what she knew was waiting her
there.
"You, Sir, will perhaps abide with me," suggested Mr. Maclise to
Martin, with a quick understanding of her hesitation.
"Oh, thank you," cried Moira. "This is Mr. Martin from Canada, Mr.
Maclise--my brother's great friend. Mr. Maclise is our schoolmaster
here," she added, turning to Martin, "and we are very proud of him."
The Highlander's pale face became the colour of his brilliant hair
as he remarked, "You are very good indeed, Miss Cameron, and I am
glad to make the acquaintance of Mr. Martin. It will give me great
pleasure to show Mr. Martin the little falls at the loch's end, if
he cares to step that far." If Mr. Martin was conscious of any
great desire to view the little falls at the loch's end, his face
most successfully dissembled any such feeling, but to the little
falls he must go as the schoolmaster quietly possessed himself of
him and led him away, while Miss Cameron, with never a thought of
either of them, passed up the broad path into the kirkyard. There,
at the tower's foot, she came upon her brother, prone upon the
little grassy mound, with arms outspread, as if to hold it in
embrace. At the sound of his sister's tread upon the gravel, he
raised himself to his knees swiftly, and with a fierce gesture, as
if resenting intrusion.
"Oh, it is you, Moira," he said quietly, sinking down upon the
grass. At the sight of his tear-stained, haggard face, the girl
ran to him with a cry, and throwing herself down beside him put her
arms about him with inarticulate sounds of pity. At length her
brother raised himself from the ground.
"Oh, it is terrible to leave it all," he groaned; "yet I am glad to
leave, for it is more terrible to stay; the very Glen I cannot look
at; and the people, I cannot bear their eyes. Oh," he groaned,
wringing his hands, "if she were here she would understand, but
there is nobody."
"Oh, Allan," cried his sister in reproach.
"Oh, yes, I know! I know! You believe in me, Moira, but you are
just a lassie, and you cannot understand."
"Yes, you know well I believe in you, Allan, and others, too,
believe in you. There is Mr. Dunn, and--"
"Oh, I don't know," said her brother bitterly, "he wants to believe
it."
"Yes, and there is Mr. Martin," she continued, "and--Oh, I forgot!
here is a letter Mr. Martin brought you."
"Martin?"
"Yes, your Martin, a strange little man; your quarter-back, you
know. He brought this, and he says it is good news." But already
Allan was into his letter. As he read his face grew white, his
hand began to shake, his eyes to stare as if they would devour the
very paper. The second time he read the letter his whole body
trembled, and his breath came in gasps, as if he were in a physical
struggle. Then lifting arms and voice towards the sky, he cried in
a long, low wail, "Oh God, it is good, it is good!"
With that he laid himself down prone upon the mound again, his face
in the grass, sobbing brokenly, "Oh, mother, mother dear, I have
got you once more; I have got you once more!"
His sister stood, her hands clasped upon her heart--a manner she
had--her tears, unnoted, flowing down her cheeks, waiting till her
brother should let her into his joy, as she had waited for entrance
into his grief. His griefs and his joys were hers, and though he
still held her a mere child, it was with a woman's self-forgetting
love she ministered to him, gladly accepting whatever confidence he
would give, but content to wait until he should give more. So she
stood waiting, with her tears flowing quietly, and her face alight
with wonder and joy for him. But as her brother's sobbing continued,
this terrible display of emotion amazed her, startled her, for since
their mother's death none of them had seen Allan weep. At length he
raised himself from the ground and stood beside her.
"Oh, Moira, lassie, I never knew how terrible it was till now. I
had lost everything, my friends, you, and," he added in a low
voice, "my mother. This cursed thing shut me out from all; it got
between me and all I ever loved. I have not for these months been
able to see her face clear, but do you know, Moira," here his voice
fell and the mystic light grew in his eyes, "I saw her again just
now as clear as clear, and I know I have got her again; and you,
too, Moira, darling," here he gathered his sister to him, "and the
people! and the Glen! Oh! is it not terrible what a crime can do?
How it separates you from your folk, and from all the world, for,
mind you, I have felt myself a criminal; but I am not! I am not!"
His voice rose into an exultant shout, "I am clear of it, I am a
man again! Oh, it is good! it is good! Here, read the letter, it
will prove to you."
"Oh, what does it matter at all, Allan," she cried, still clinging
to him, "as if it made any difference to me. I always knew it."
Her brother lifted her face from his breast and looked into her
eyes. "Do you tell me you don't want to know the proof of it?" he
asked in wonder. "No," she said simply. "Why should I need any
proof? I always knew it."
For a moment longer he gazed upon her, then said, "Moira, you are a
wonder, lassie. No, you are a lassie no longer, you are a woman,
and, do you know, you are like mother to me now, and I never saw
it."
She smiled up at him through her tears. "I should like to be," she
said softly. Then, because she was truly Scotch, she added, "for
your sake, for I love you terribly much; and I am going to lose
you."
A quiver passed through her frame, and her arms gripped him tight.
In the self-absorption in his grief and pain he had not thought of
hers, nor considered how with his going her whole life would be
changed.
"I have been a selfish brute," he muttered. "I have only thought
of my own suffering; but, listen Moira, it is all past; thank God,
it is all past. This letter from Mr. Rae holds a confession from
Potts (poor Potts! I am glad that Rae let him off): it was Potts
who committed the forgery. Now I feel myself clean again; you
can't know what that is; to be yourself again, and to be able to
look all men in the face without fear or shame. Come, we must go;
I must see them all again. Let us to the burn first, and put my
face right."
A moment he stood looking down upon his mother's grave. The
hideous thing that had put her far from him, and that had blurred
the clear vision of her face, was gone. A smile soft and tender as
a child's stole over his face, and with that smile he turned away.
As they were coming back from the burn, Martin and the schoolmaster
saw them in the distance.
"Bless me, man, will you look at him?" said the master in an
awestruck tone, clutching Martin's arm. "What ever is come to
him?"
"What's up," cried Martin. "By Jove! you're right! the Roderick
Dhu and Black Douglas business is gone, sure!"
"God bless my soul!" said Maclise in an undertone. "He is himself
once more."
He might well exclaim, for it was a new Allan that came striding up
the high road, with head lifted, and with the proud swing of a
Highland chieftain.
"Hello, old man!" he shouted, catching sight of Martin and running
towards him with hands outstretched, "You are welcome"--he grasped
his hands and held them fast--"you are welcome to this Glen, and to
me welcome as Heaven to a Hell-bound soul."
"Maclise," he cried, turning to the master, "this letter," waving
it in his hand, "is like a reprieve to a man on the scaffold."
Maclise stood gazing in amazement at him.
"They accused me of crime!"
"Of crime, Mr. Allan?" Maclise stiffened in haughty surprise.
"Yes, of base crime!"
"But this letter completely clears him," cried Martin eagerly.
Maclise turned upon him with swift scorn, "There was no need, for
anyone in this Glen whatever." The Highlander's face was pale, and
in his light blue eyes gleamed a fierce light.
Martin flashed a look upon the girl standing so proudly erect
beside her brother, and reflecting in her face and eyes the
sentiments of the schoolmaster.
"By Jove! I believe you," cried Martin with conviction, "it is not
needed here, but--but there are others, you know."
"Others?" said the Highlander with fine scorn, "and what difference?"
The Glen folk needed no clearing of their chief, and the rest of
the world mattered not.
"But there was myself," said Allan. "Now it is gone, Maclise, and
I can give my hand once more without fear or shame."
Maclise took the offered hand almost with reverence, and, removing
his bonnet from his head, said in a voice, deep and vibrating with
emotion,
"Neffer will a man of the Glen count it anything but honour to take
thiss hand."
"Thank you, Maclise," cried Allan, keeping his grip of the master's
hand. "Now you can tell the Glen."
"You will not be going to leave us now?" said Maclise eagerly.
"Yes, I shall go, Maclise, but," with a proud lift of his head,
"tell them I am coming back again."
And with that message Maclise went to the Glen. From cot to cot
and from lip to lip the message sped, that Mr. Allan was himself
again, and that, though on the morrow's morn he was leaving the
Glen, he himself had promised that he would return.
That evening, as the gloaming deepened, the people of the Glen
gathered, as was their wont, at their cottage doors to listen to
old piper Macpherson as he marched up and down the highroad. This
night, it was observed, he no longer played that most heart-
breaking of all Scottish laments, "Lochaber No More." He had
passed up to the no less heart-thrilling, but less heartbreaking,
"Macrimmon's Lament." In a pause in Macpherson's wailing notes
there floated down over the Glen the sound of the pipes up at the
big House.
"Bless my soul! whisht, man!" cried Betsy Macpherson to her spouse.
"Listen yonder!" For the first time in months they heard the sound
of Allan's pipes.
"It is himself," whispered the women to each other, and waited.
Down the long avenue of ragged firs, and down the highroad, came
young Mr. Allan, in all the gallant splendour of his piper's garb,
and the tune he played was no lament, but the blood-stirring
"Gathering of the Gordons." As he came opposite to Macpherson's
cottage he gave the signal for the old piper, and down the highroad
stepped the two of them together, till they passed beyond the
farthest cottage. Then back again they swung, and this time it was
to the "Cock of the North," that their tartans swayed and their
bonnets nodded. Thus, not with woe and lamentation, but with good
hope and gallant cheer, young Mr. Allan took his leave of the Glen
Cuagh Oir.
CHAPTER VIII
WILL HE COME BACK?
It was the custom in Doctor Dunn's household that, immediately
after dinner, his youngest son would spend half an hour in the
study with his father. It was a time for confidences. During this
half hour father and son met as nearly as possible on equal terms,
discussing, as friends might, the events of the day or the plans
for the morrow, school work or athletics, the latest book or the
newest joke; and sometimes the talk turned upon the reading at
evening prayers. This night the story had been one of rare beauty
and of absorbing interest, the story, viz., of that idyllic scene
on the shore of Tiberias where the erring disciple was fully
restored to his place in the ranks of the faithful, as he had been
restored, some weeks before, to his place in the confidence of his
Master.
"That was a fine story, Rob?" began Doctor Dunn.
"That it was," said Rob gravely. "It was fine for Peter to get
back again."
"Just so," replied his father. "You see, when a man once turns his
back on his best Friend, he is never right till he gets back
again."
"Yes, I know," said Rob gravely. For a time he sat with a shadow
of sadness and anxiety on his young face. "It is terrible!" he
exclaimed.
"Terrible?" inquired the Doctor. "Oh, yes, you mean Peter's fall?
Yes, that was a terrible thing--to be untrue to our Master and
faithless to our best Friend."
"But he did not mean to, Dad," said Rob quickly, as if springing to
the fallen disciple's defence. "He forgot, just for a moment, and
was awfully sorry afterwards."
"Yes, truly," said his father, "and that was the first step back."
For a few moments Rob remained silent, his face sad and troubled.
"Man! It must be terrible!" at length he said, more to himself
than to his father. The Doctor looked closely at the little lad.
The eager, sensitive face, usually so radiant, was now clouded and
sad.
"What is it, Rob? Is it something you can tell me?" asked his
father in a tone of friendly kindness.
Rob moved closer to him. The father waited in silence. He knew
better than to force an unwilling confidence. At length the lad,
with an obvious effort at self-command, said:
"It is to-morrow, Daddy, that Cameron--that Mr. Cameron is going
away."
"To-morrow? So it is. And you will be very sorry, Rob. But, of
course, he will come back."
"Oh, Dad," cried Rob, coming quite close to his father, "it isn't
that! It isn't that!"
His father waited. He did not understand his boy's trouble, and so
he wisely refrained from uttering word that might hinder rather
than help. At length, with a sudden effort, Rob asked in a low,
hurried voice:
"Do you think, Dad, he has--got--back?"
"Got back?" said his father. "Oh, I see. Why, my boy? What do
you know of it? Did you know there was a letter from a man named
Potts, that completely clears your friend of all crime?"
"Is there?" asked the boy quickly. "Man! That is fine! But I
always knew he could not do anything really bad--I mean, anything
that the police could touch him for. But it is not that, Dad.
I have heard Jack say he used to be different when he came down
first, and now sometimes he--" The lad's voice fell silent. He
could not bring himself to accuse his hero of any evil. His father
drew him close to his side.
"You mean that he has fallen into bad ways--drink, and things like
that?"
The boy hung his head; he was keenly ashamed for his friend. After
a few moments' silence he said:
"And he is going away to Canada to-morrow, and I wonder, Dad, if he
has--got--back? It would be terrible-- Oh, Dad, all alone and
away from--!"
The boy's voice sank to a whisper, and a rush of tears filled his
eyes.
"I see what you mean, my boy. You mean it would be terrible for
him to be in that far land, and away from that Friend we know and
love best."
The lad looked at his father through his tears, and nodded his
head, and for some moments there was silence between them. If the
truth must be told, Doctor Dunn felt himself keenly rebuked by his
little son's words. Amid the multitude of his responsibilities,
the responsibility for his sons' best friend he had hardly
realised.
"I am glad that you spoke of it, Rob; I am glad that you spoke of
it. Something will be done. It is not, after all, in our hands.
Still, we must stand ready to help. Good-night, my boy. And
remember, it is always good to hurry back to our best Friend, if
ever we get away from Him."
The boy put his arms around his father's neck and kissed him good-
night; then, kissing him again, he whispered: "Thank you, Daddy."
And from the relief in his tone the father recognised that upon him
the lad had laid all the burden of his solicitude for his friend.
Later in the evening, when his elder son came home, the father
called him in, and frankly gave him the substance of the
conversation of the earlier part of the evening.
Jack laughed somewhat uneasily. "Oh, Rob is an awfully religious
little beggar; painfully so, I think, sometimes--you know what I
mean, Sir," he added, noticing the look on his father's face.
"I am not sure that I do, Jack," said his father, "but I want to
tell you, that as far as I am concerned, I felt distinctly rebuked
at the little chap's anxiety for his friend in a matter of such
vital import. His is a truly religious little soul, as you say,
but I wonder if his type is not more nearly like the normal than
is ours. Certainly, if reality, simplicity, sincerity are the
qualities of true religious feeling--and these, I believe, are the
qualities emphasised by the Master Himself--then it may indeed be
that the boy's type is nearer the ideal than ours."
At this point Mrs. Dunn entered the room.
"Anything private?" she enquired with a bright smile at her
husband.
"Not at all! Come in!" said Doctor Dunn, and he proceeded to
repeat the conversation with his younger son, and his own recent
comment thereupon.
"I am convinced," he added, "that there is a profundity of meaning
in those words, 'Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as
a little child, he shall not enter therein,' that we have not yet
fathomed. I suspect Wordsworth is not far astray when he suggests
that with the passing years we grow away from the simplicity of our
faith and the clearness of our vision. There is no doubt that to
Rob, Jesus is as real as I am."
"There is no doubt of that," said his wife quickly.
"Not only as real, but quite as dear; indeed, dearer. I shall
never forget the shock I received when I heard him one day, as a
wee, wee boy, classifying the objects of his affection. I remember
the ascending scale was: 'I love Jack and Daddy just the same,
then mother, then Jesus.' It was always in the highest place,
Jesus; and I believe that the scale is the same to-day, unless
Jack," she added, with a smile at her son, "has moved to his
mother's place."
"Not much fear of that, mother," said Jack, "but I should not be
surprised if you are quite right about the little chap. He is a
queer little beggar!"
"There you are again, Jack," said his father, "and it is upon that
point I was inclined to take issue with you when your mother
entered."
"I think I shall leave you," said the mother. "I am rather tired,
and so I shall bid you good-night."
"Yes," said the father, when they had seated themselves again, "the
very fact that to you, and to me for that matter, Rob's attitude of
mind should seem peculiar raises the issue. What is the normal
type of Christian faith? Is it not marked by the simplicity and
completeness of the child's?"
"And yet, Sir," replied Jack, "that simplicity and completeness is
the result of inexperience. Surely the ideal faith is not that
which ignores the facts and experiences of life?"
"Not exactly," replied his father, "yet I am not sure but after
all, 'the perfect love which casteth out fear' is one which ignores
the experiences of life, or, rather, classifies them in a larger
category. That is, it refuses to be disturbed by life's experiences,
because among those experiences there is a place for the enlarged
horizon, the clearer vision. But I am not arguing about this
matter; I rather wish to make a confession and enlist your aid.
Frankly, the boy's words gave me an uneasy sense of failure in my
duty to this young man; or, perhaps I should say, my privilege. And
really, it is no wonder! Here is this little chap actually carrying
every day a load of intense concern for our friend, as to whether,
as he puts it himself, 'he has come back.' And, after all, Jack, I
wonder if this should not have been more upon our minds? The young
man, I take it, since his mother's death has little in his home life
to inspire him with religious faith and feeling. If she had been
alive, one would not feel the same responsibility; she was a
singularly saintly woman."
"You are quite right, Sir," said Jack quickly, "and I suspect you
rather mean that I am the one that should feel condemned."
"Not at all! Not at all, Jack! I am thinking, as every man must,
of my own responsibility, though, doubtless, you have yours as
well. Of course I know quite well you have stuck by him splendidly
in his fight for a clean and self-controlled life, but one wonders
whether there is not something more."
"There is, Sir!" replied his son quickly. "There undoubtedly is!
But though I have no hesitation in speaking to men down in the
Settlement about these things, you know, still, somehow, to a man
of your own class, and to a personal friend, one hesitates. One
shrinks from what seems like assuming an attitude of superiority."
"I appreciate that," said his father, "but yet one wonders to what
extent this shrinking is due to a real sense of one's own
imperfections, and to what extent it is due to an unwillingness to
risk criticism, even from ourselves, in a loyal attempt to serve
the Master and His cause. And, besides that, one wonders whether
from any cause one should hesitate to do the truly kind and
Christian thing to one's friend. I mean, you value your religion;
or, to put it personally, as Rob would, you would esteem as your
chief possession your knowledge of the Christ, as Friend and
Saviour. Do not loyalty to Him and friendship require that you
share that possession with your dearest friend?"
"I know what you mean, Sir," said Jack earnestly. "I shall think
it over. But don't you think a word from you, Sir--"
His father looked at his son with a curious smile.
"Oh, I know what you are thinking," said his son, "but I assure you
it is not quite a case of funk."
"Do you know, Jack," said his father earnestly, "we make our
religion far too unreal; a thing either of forms remote from life,
or a thing of individualistic emotion divorced from responsibility.
One thing history reveals, that the early propagandum for the faith
was entirely unprofessional. It was from friend to friend, from
man to man. It was horizontal rather than perpendicular."
"Well, I shall think it over," said Jack.
"Do you know," said his father, "that I have the feeling of having
accepted from Rob responsibility for our utmost endeavour to bring
it about that, as Rob puts it, 'somehow he shall get back'?"
It was full twenty minutes before train time when Rob, torn with
anxiety lest they should be late, marched his brother on to the
railway platform to wait for the Camerons, who were to arrive from
the North. Up and down they paraded, Dunn turning over in his mind
the conversation of the night before, Rob breaking away every three
minutes to consult the clock and the booking clerk at the wicket.
"Will he come to us this afternoon, Jack, do you think?" enquired
the boy.
"Don't know! He turned down a football lunch! He has his sister
and his father with him."
"His sister could come with him!" argued the boy.
"What about his father?"
Rob had been close enough to events to know that the Captain
constituted something of a difficulty in the situation.
"Well, won't he have business to attend to?"
His brother laughed. "Good idea, Rob, let us hope so! At any rate
we will do our best to get Cameron and his sister to come to us.
We want them, don't we?"
"We do that!" said the boy fervently; "only I'm sure something will
happen! There," he exclaimed a moment later, in a tone of
disappointment and disgust, "I just knew it! There is Miss Brodie
and some one else; they will get after him, I know!"
"So it is," said Dunn, with a not altogether successful attempt at
surprise.
"Aw! you knew!" said Rob reproachfully.
"Well! I kind of thought she might turn up!" said his brother,
with an air of a convicted criminal. "You know she is quite a
friend of Cameron's. But what is Sir Archibald here for?"
"They will just get him, I know," said Rob gloomily, as he followed
his brother to meet Miss Brodie and her uncle.
"We're here!" cried that young lady, "to join in the demonstration
to the hero! And, my uncle being somewhat conscience-stricken over
his tardy and unwilling acceptance of our superior judgment in the
recent famous case, has come to make such reparation as he can."
"What a piece of impertinence! Don't listen to her, Sir!" cried
Sir Archibald, greeting Dunn warmly and with the respect due an
International captain. "The truth is I have a letter here for him
to a business friend in Montreal, which may be of service. Of
course, I may say to you that I am more than delighted that this
letter of Potts has quite cleared the young man, and that he goes
to the new country with reputation unstained. I am greatly
delighted! greatly delighted! and I wish the opportunity to say
so."
"Indeed, we are all delighted," replied Dunn cordially, "though, of
course, I never could bring myself to believe him guilty of crime."
"Well, on the strength of the judgment of yourself and, I must
confess, of this young person here, I made my decision."
"Well," cried Miss Brodie, "I gave you my opinion because it was my
opinion, but I confess at times I had my own doubts--"
Here she paused abruptly, arrested by the look on young Rob's face;
it was a look of surprise, grief, and horror.
"That is to say," continued Miss Brodie hastily, answering the
look, and recognising that her high place in Rob's regard was in
peril, "the whole thing was a mystery--was impossible to solve--I
mean," she continued, stumbling along, "his own attitude was so
very uncertain and so unsatisfactory--if he had only been able to
say clearly 'I am not guilty' it would have been different--I mean--
of course, I don't believe him guilty. Don't look at me like
that, Rob! I won't have it! But was it not clever of that dear
Mr. Rae to extract that letter from the wretched Potts?"
"There's the train!" cried Dunn. "Here, Rob, you stay here with
me! Where has the young rascal gone!"
"Look! Oh, look!" cried Miss Brodie, clutching at Dunn's arm, her
eyes wide with terror. There before their horrified eyes was young
Rob, hanging on to the window, out of which his friend Cameron was
leaning, and racing madly with the swiftly moving train, in
momentary danger of being dragged under its wheels. With a cry,
Dunn rushed forward.
"Merciful heavens!" cried Miss Brodie. "Oh! he is gone!"
A porter, standing with his back towards the racing boy, had
knocked his feet from under him. But as he fell, a strong hand
grabbed him, and dragged him to safety through the window.
Pale and shaking, the three friends waited for the car door to be
opened, and as Rob issued in triumphant possession of his friend,
Miss Brodie rushed at him and, seizing him in her strong grasp,
cried:
"You heartless young rascal! You nearly killed me--not to speak of
yourself! Here," she continued, throwing her arms about him, and
giving him a loud smack, "take that for your punishment! Do you
hear, you nearly killed me! I had a vision of your mangled form
ground up between the wheels and the platform. Hold on, you can't
get away from me! I have a mind to give you another!"
"Oh, Miss Brodie, please," pleaded Cameron, coming forward to Rob's
rescue, "I assure you I was partly to blame; it is only fair I
should share his punishment."
"Indeed," cried Miss Brodie, the blood coming back into her cheeks
that had been white enough a moment before, "if it were not for
your size, and your--looks, I should treat you exactly the same,
though not with the same intent, as our friend Mr. Rae would say.
You did that splendidly!"
"Alas! for my size," groaned Cameron--he was in great spirits--"and
alas! for my ugly phiz!"
"Who said 'ugly'?" replied Miss Brodie. "But I won't rise to your
bait. May I introduce you to my uncle, Sir Archibald Brodie, who
has a little business with you?"
"Ah! Mr. Cameron," said that gentleman, "that was extremely well
done. Indeed, I can hardly get back my nerve--might have been an
ugly accident. By the way, Sir," taking Cameron aside, "just a
moment. You are on your way to Canada? I have a letter which I
thought might be of service to you. It is to a business friend of
mine, a banker, in Montreal, Mr. James Ritchie. You will find him
a good man to know, and I fancy glad to serve any--ah--friend of
mine."
On hearing Sir Archibald's name, Cameron's manner became distinctly
haughty, and he was on the point of declining the letter, when Sir
Archibald, who was quick to observe his manner, took him by the arm
and led him somewhat further away.
"Now, Sir, there is a little matter I wish to speak of, if you will
permit. Indeed, I came specially to say how delighted I am that
the--ah--recent little unpleasantness has been removed. Of course
you understand my responsibility to the Bank rendered a certain
course of action imperative, however repugnant. But, believe me, I
am truly delighted to find that my decision to withdraw the--ah--
action has been entirely justified by events. Delighted, Sir!
Delighted! And much more since I have seen you."
Before the overflowing kindliness of Sir Archibald's voice and
manner, Cameron's hauteur vanished like morning mist before the
rising sun.
"I thank you, Sir Archibald," he said, with dignity, "not only for
this letter, but especially for your good opinion."
"Very good! Very good! The letter will, I hope, be useful,"
replied Sir Archibald, "and as for my opinion, I am glad to find
not only that it is well founded, but that it appears to be shared
by most of this company here. Now we must get back to your party.
But let me say again, I am truly glad to have come to know you."
BOOK TWO
CHAPTER I
HO FOR THE OPEN!
Mr. James Ritchie, manager of the Bank of Montreal, glanced from
the letter in his hand to the young man who had just given it to
him. "Ah! you have just arrived from the old land," he said, a
smile of genial welcome illuminating his handsome face. "I am
pleased to hear from my old friend, Sir Archibald Brodie, and
pleased to welcome any friend of his to Canada."
So saying, with fine old-time courtesy, the banker rose to his
splendid height of six feet two, and shook his visitor warmly by
the hand.
"Your name is--?"
"Cameron, Sir," said the young man.
"Yes, I see! Mr. Allan Cameron--um, um," with his eyes on the
letter. "Old and distinguished family--exactly so! Now, then, Mr.
Cameron, I hope we shall be able to do something for you, both for
the sake of my old friend, Sir Archibald, and, indeed, for your own
sake," said the banker, with a glance of approval at Cameron's
upright form.
"Sit down, Sir! Sit down! Now, business first is my motto. What
can I do for you?"
"Well, first of all," said Cameron with a laugh, "I wish to make a
deposit. I have a draft of one hundred pounds here which I should
like to place in your care."
"Very well, Sir," said the banker, touching a button, "my young man
will attend to that."
"Now, then," when the business had been transacted, "what are your
plans, Mr. Cameron? Thirty-five years ago I came to Montreal a
young man, from Scotland, like yourself, and it was a lonely day
for me when I reached this city, the loneliest in my life, and so
my heart warms to the stranger from the old land. Yes," continued
Mr. Ritchie, in a reminiscent tone, "I remember well! I hired as
errand boy and general factotum to a small grocer down near the
market. Montreal was a small city then, with wretched streets--
they're bad enough yet--and poor buildings; everything was slow and
backward; there have been mighty changes since. But here we are!
Now, what are your plans?"
"I am afraid they are of the vaguest kind," said Cameron. "I want
something to do."
"What sort of thing? I mean, what has been the line of your
training?"
"I am afraid my training has been defective. I have passed through
Edinburgh Academy, also the University, with the exception of my
last year. But I am willing to take anything."
"Ah!" said the banker thoughtfully. "No office training, eh?"
"No, Sir. That is, if you except a brief period of three or four
months in the law office of our family solicitor."
"Law, eh?--I have it! Denman's your man! I shall give you a
letter to Mr. Denman--a lawyer friend of mine. I shall see him
personally to-day, and if you call to-morrow at ten I hope to have
news for you. Meantime, I shall be pleased to have you lunch with
me to-day at the club. One o'clock is the hour. If you would
kindly call at the bank, we shall go down together."
Cameron expressed his gratitude.
"By the way!" said Mr. Ritchie, "where have you put up?"
"At the Royal," said Cameron.
"Ah! That will do for the present," said Mr. Ritchie. "I am sorry
our circumstances do not permit of my inviting you to our home.
The truth is, Mrs. Ritchie is at present out of the city. But we
shall find some suitable lodging for you. The Royal is far too
expensive a place for a young man with his fortune to make."
Cameron spent the day making the acquaintance of the beautiful,
quaint, if somewhat squalid, old city of Montreal; and next
morning, with a letter of introduction from Mr. Ritchie, presented
himself at Mr. Denman's office. Mr. Denman was a man in young
middle life, athletic of frame, keen of eye, and energetic of
manner; his voice was loud and sharp. He welcomed Cameron with
brisk heartiness, and immediately proceeded to business.
"Let me see," he began, "what is your idea? What kind of a job are
you after?"
"Indeed," replied Cameron, "that is just what I hardly know."
"Well, what has been your experience? You are a University man, I
believe? But have you had any practical training? Do you know
office work?"
"No, I've had little training for an office. I was in a law office
for part of a year."
"Ah! Familiar with bookkeeping, or accounting? I suppose you
can't run one of these typewriting machines?"
In regard to each of these lines of effort Cameron was forced to
confess ignorance.
"I say!" cried Mr. Denman, "those old country people seriously
annoy me with their inadequate system of education!"
"I am afraid," replied Cameron, "the fault is more mine than the
system's."
"Don't know about that! Don't know about that!" replied Mr. Denman
quickly; "I have had scores of young men, fine young men, too, come
to me; public school men, university men, but quite unfit for any
practical line of work."
Mr. Denman considered for some moments. "Let us see. You have
done some work in a law office. Now," Mr. Denman spoke with some
hesitation; "I have a place in my own office here--not much in it
for the present, but--"
"To tell the truth," interrupted Cameron, "I did not make much of
the law; in fact, I do not think I am suited for office work. I
would prefer something in the open. I had thought of the land."
"Farming," exclaimed Mr. Denman. "Ah!--you would, I suppose, be
able to invest something?"
"No," said Cameron, "nothing."
Denman shook his head. "Nothing in it! You would not earn enough
to buy a farm about here in fifteen years."
"But I understood," replied Cameron, "that further west was cheaper
land."
"Oh! In the far west, yes! But it is a God-forsaken country! I
don't know much about it, I confess. I know they are booming town
lots all over the land. I believe they have gone quite mad in the
business, but from what I hear, the main work in the west just now
is jaw work; the only thing they raise is corner lots."
On Cameron's face there fell the gloom of discouragement. One of
his fondest dreams was being dispelled--his vision of himself as a
wealthy rancher, ranging over square miles of his estate upon a
"bucking broncho," garbed in the picturesque cowboy dress, began to
fade.
"But there is ranching, I believe?" he ventured.
"Ranching? Oh yes! There is, up near the Rockies, but that is out
of civilization; out of reach of everything and everybody."
"That is what I want, Sir!" exclaimed Cameron, his face once more
aglow with eager hope. "I want to get away into the open."
Mr. Denman did not, or could not, recognise this as the instinctive
cry of the primitive man for a closer fellowship with Mother
Nature. He was keenly practical, and impatient with everything
that appeared to him to be purely visionary and unbusiness-like.
"But, my dear fellow," he said, "a ranch means cattle and horses;
and cattle and horses means money, unless of course, you mean to be
simply a cowboy--cowpuncher, I believe, is the correct term--but
there is nothing in that; no future, I mean. It is all very well
for a little fun, if you have a bank account to stand it, although
some fellows stand it on someone's else bank account--not much to
their credit, however. There is a young friend of mine out there
at present, but from what I can gather his home correspondence is
mainly confined to appeals for remittances from his governor, and
his chief occupation spending these remittances as speedily as
possible. All very well, as I have said, for fun, if you can pay
the shot. But to play the role of gentleman cowboy, while somebody
else pays for it, is the sort of thing I despise."
"And so do I, Sir!" said Cameron. "There will be no remittance in
my case."
Denman glanced at the firm, closed lips and the stiffening figure.
"That is the talk!" he exclaimed. "No, there is no chance in
ranching unless you have capital."
"As far as I can see," replied Cameron gloomily, "everything seems
closed up except to the capitalist, and yet from what I heard at
home situations were open on every hand in this country."
"Come here!" cried Denman, drawing Cameron to the office window.
"See those doors!" pointing to a long line of shops. "Every last
one is opened to a man who knows his business. See those
smokestacks! Every last wheel in those factories is howling for a
man who is on to his job. But don't look blue, there is a place
for you, too; the thing is to find it."
"What are those long buildings?" inquired Cameron, pointing towards
the water front.
"Those are railroad sheds; or, rather, Transportation Company's
sheds; they are practically the same thing. I say! What is the
matter with trying the Transportation Company? I know the manager
well. The very thing! Try the Transportation Company!"
"How should I go about it?" said Cameron. "I mean to say just what
position should I apply for?"
"Position!" shouted Denman. "Why, general manager would be good!"
Then, noting the flush in Cameron's face, he added quickly, "Pardon
me! The thing is to get your foot in somehow, and then wire in
till you are general manager, by Jove! It can be done! Fleming
has done it! Went in as messenger boy, but--" Denman paused.
There flashed through his mind the story of Fleming's career; a
vision of the half-starved ragged waif who started as messenger
boy in the company's offices, and who, by dint of invincible
determination and resolute self-denial, fought his way step by step
to his present position of control. In contrast, he looked at the
young man, born and bred in circles where work is regarded as a
calamity, and service wears the badge of social disfranchisement.
Fleming had done it under compulsion of the inexorable mistress
"Necessity." But what of this young man?
"Will we try?" he said at length. "I shall give you a letter to
Mr. Fleming."
He sat down to his desk and wrote vigourously.
"Take this, and see what happens."
Cameron took the letter, and, glancing at the address, read, Wm.
Fleming, Esquire, General Manager, Metropolitan Transportation &
Cartage Company.
"Is this a railroad?" asked Cameron.
"No, but next thing to it. The companies are practically one. The
transition from one to the other is easy enough. Let me know how
you get on. Good-by! And--I say!" cried Mr. Denman, calling
Cameron back again from the door, "see Mr. Fleming himself.
Remember that! And remember," he added, with a smile, "the
position of manager is not vacant just yet, but it will be. I give
you my word for it when you are ready to take it. Good-by! Buck
up! Take what he offers you! Get your teeth in, and never let
go!"
"By George!" said Denman to himself as the door closed on Cameron,
"these chaps are the limit. He's got lots of stuff in him, but he
has been rendered helpless by their fool system--God save us from
it! That chap has had things done for him ever since he was first
bathed; they have washed 'em, dressed 'em, fed 'em, schooled 'em,
found 'em positions, stuck 'em in, and watched that they didn't
fall out. And yet, by George!" he added, after a pause, "they are
running the world to-day--that is, some of them." Facing which
somewhat puzzling phenomenon, Denman plunged into his work again.
Meantime Cameron was making his way towards the offices of the
Metropolitan Transportation & Cartage Company, oppressed with an
unacknowledged but none the less real sense of unfitness, and
haunted by a depressing sense of the deficiency of his own training,
and of the training afforded the young men of his class at home. As
he started along he battled with his depression. True enough, he
had no skill in the various accomplishments that Mr. Denman seemed
to consider essential; he had no experience in business, he was not
fit for office work--office work he loathed; but surely there was
some position where his talents would bring him recognition and
fortune at last. After all, Mr. Denman was only a Colonial, and
with a Colonial's somewhat narrow view of life. Who was he to
criticise the system of training that for generations had been in
vogue at home? Had not Wellington said "that England's battles were
first won on the football fields of Eton and Rugby," or something
like that? Of course, the training that might fit for a
distinguished career in the British army might not necessarily
insure success on the battle fields of industry and commerce. Yet
surely, an International player should be able to get somewhere!
At this point in his cogitations Cameron was arrested by a memory
that stabbed him like a knife-thrust; the awful moment when upon
the Inverleith grounds, in the face of the Welsh forward-line, he
had faltered and lost the International. Should he ever be able to
forget the agony of that moment and of the day that followed? And
yet, he need not have failed. He knew he could play his position
with any man in Scotland; he had failed because he was not fit. He
set his teeth hard. He would show these bally Colonials! He would
make good! And with his head high, he walked into the somewhat
dingy offices of the Metropolitan Transportation & Cartage Company,
of which William Fleming, Esquire, was manager.
Opening the door, Cameron found himself confronted by a short
counter that blocked the way for the general public into the long
room, filled with desks and chairs and clicking typewriting
machines. Cameron had never seen so many of these machines during
the whole period of his life. The typewriter began to assume an
altogether new importance in his mind. Hitherto it had appeared to
him more or less of a Yankee fad, unworthy of the attention of an
able-bodied man of average intelligence. In Edinburgh a "writing
machine" was still something of a new-fangled luxury, to be
apologised for. Mr. Rae would allow no such finicky instrument in
his office. Here, however, there were a dozen, more or less,
manipulated for the most part by young ladies, and some of them
actually by men; on every side they clicked and banged. It may
have been the clicking and banging of these machines that gave to
Cameron the sense of rush and hurry so different from the calm
quiet and dignified repose of the only office he had ever known.
For some moments he stood at the counter, waiting attention from
one of the many clerks sitting before him, but though one and
another occasionally glanced in his direction, his presence seemed
to awaken not even a passing curiosity in their minds, much less to
suggest the propriety of their inquiring his business.
As the moments passed Cameron became conscious of a feeling of
affront. How differently a gentleman was treated by the clerks in
the office of Messrs. Rae & Macpherson, where prompt attention and
deferential courtesy in a clerk were as essential as a suit of
clothes. Gradually Cameron's head went up, and with it his choler.
At length, in his haughtiest tone, he hailed a passing youth:
"I say, boy, is this Mr. Fleming's office?"
The clicking and banging of the typewriters, and the hum of voices
ceased. Everywhere heads were raised and eyes turned curiously
upon the haughty stranger.
"Eh?" No letters can represent the nasal intonation of this
syllabic inquiry, and no words the supreme indifference of the
boy's tone.
"Is Mr. Fleming in? I wish to see him!" Cameron's voice was loud
and imperious.
"Say, boys," said a lanky youth, with a long, cadaverous
countenance and sallow, unhealthy complexion, illumined, however,
and redeemed to a certain extent by black eyes of extraordinary
brilliance, "it is the Prince of Wales!" The drawling, awe-struck
tones, in the silence that had fallen, were audible to all in the
immediate neighbourhood.
The titter that swept over the listeners brought the hot blood to
Cameron's face. A deliberate insult a Highlander takes with calm.
He is prepared to deal with it in a manner affording him entire
satisfaction. Ridicule rouses him to fury, for, while it touches
his pride, it leaves him no opportunity of vengeance.
"Can you tell me if Mr. Fleming is in?" he enquired again of the
boy that stood scanning him with calm indifference. The rage that
possessed him so vibrated in his tone that the lanky lad drawled
again in a warning voice:
"Slide, Jimmy, slide!"
Jimmy "slid," but towards the counter.
"Want to see him?" he enquired in a tone of brisk impertinence, as
if suddenly roused from a reverie.
"I have a letter for him."
"All right! Hand it over," said Jimmy, fully conscious that he was
the hero of more than usual interest.
Cameron hesitated, then passed his letter over to Jimmy, who,
reading the address with deliberate care, winked at the lanky boy,
and with a jaunty step made towards a door at the farther end of
the room. As he passed a desk that stood nearest the door, a man
who during the last few minutes had remained with his head down,
apparently so immersed in the papers before him as to be quite
unconscious of his surroundings, suddenly called out, "Here, boy!"
Jimmy instantly assumed an air of respectful attention.
"A letter for Mr. Fleming," he said.
"Here!" replied the man, stretching out his hand.
He hurriedly glanced through the letter.
"Tell him there is no vacancy at present," he said shortly.
The boy came back to Cameron with cheerful politeness. The "old
man's" eye was upon him.
"There is no vacancy at present," he said briefly, and turned away
as if his attention were immediately demanded elsewhere by pressing
business of the Metropolitan Transportation & Cartage Company.
For answer, Cameron threw back the leaf of the counter that barred
his way, and started up the long room, past the staring clerks, to
the desk next the door.
"I wish to see Mr. Fleming, Sir," he said, his voice trembling
slightly, his face pale, his blue-gray eyes ablaze.
The man at the desk looked up from his work.
"I have just informed you there is no vacancy at present," he said
testily, and turned to his papers again, as if dismissing the
incident.
"Will you kindly tell me if Mr. Fleming is in?" said Cameron in a
voice that had grown quite steady; "I wish to see him personally."
"Mr. Fleming cannot see you, I tell you!" almost shouted the man,
rising from his desk and revealing himself a short, pudgy figure,
with flabby face and shining bald head. "Can't you understand
English?--I can't be bothered--!"
"What is it, Bates? Someone to see me?"
Cameron turned quickly towards the speaker, who had come from the
inner room.
"I have brought you a letter, Sir, from Mr. Denman," he said
quietly; "it is there," pointing to Bates' desk.
"A letter? Let me have it! Why was not this brought to me at
once, Mr. Bates?"
"It was an open letter, Sir," replied Bates, "and I thought there
was no need of troubling you, Sir. I told the young man we had no
vacancy at present."
"This is a personal letter, Mr. Bates, and should have been brought
to me at once. Why was Mr.--ah--Mr. Cameron not brought in to me?"
Mr. Bates murmured something about not wishing to disturb the
manager on trivial business.
"I am the judge of that, Mr. Bates. In future, when any man asks
to see me, I desire him to be shown in at once."
Mr. Bates began to apologise.
"That is all that is necessary, Mr. Bates," said the manager, in a
voice at once quiet and decisive.
"Come in, Mr. Cameron. I am very sorry this has happened!"
Cameron followed him into his office, noting, as he passed, the red
patches of rage on Mr. Bates' pudgy face, and catching a look of
fierce hate from his small piggy eyes. It flashed through his mind
that in Mr. Bates, at any rate, he had found no friend.
The result of the interview with Mr. Fleming was an intimation to
Mr. Bates that Mr. Cameron was to have a position in the office of
the Metropolitan Transportation & Cartage Company, and to begin
work the following morning.
"Very well, Sir," replied Mr. Bates--he had apparently quite
recovered his equanimity--"we shall find Mr. Cameron a desk."
"We begin work at eight o'clock exactly," he added, turning to
Cameron with a pleasant smile.
Mr. Fleming accompanied Cameron to the door.
"Now, a word with you, Mr. Cameron. You may find Mr. Bates a
little difficult--he is something of a driver--but, remember, he is
in charge of this office; I never interfere with his orders."
"I understand, Sir," said Cameron, resolving that, at all costs, he
should obey Mr. Bates' orders, if only to show the general manager
he could recognise and appreciate a gentleman when he saw one.
Mr. Fleming was putting it mildly when he described Mr. Bates as
"something of a driver." The whole office staff, from Jimmy, the
office boy, to Jacobs, the gentle, white-haired clerk, whose desk
was in the farthest corner of the room, felt the drive. He was not
only office manager, but office master as well. His rule was
absolute, and from his decisions there was no appeal. The general
manager went on the theory that it was waste of energy to keep a
dog and bark himself. In the policy that governed the office there
were two rules which Mr. Bates enforced with the utmost rigidity--
the first, namely, that every member of the staff must be in his or
her place and ready for work when the clock struck eight; the
other, that each member of the staff must work independently of
every other member. A man must know his business, and go through
with it; if he required instructions, he must apply to the office
manager. But, as a rule, one experience of such application
sufficed for the whole period of a clerk's service in the office of
the Metropolitan Transportation & Cartage Company, for Mr. Bates
was gifted with such an exquisiteness of ironical speech that the
whole staff were wont to pause in the rush of their work to listen
and to admire when a new member was unhappy enough to require
instructions, their silent admiration acting as a spur to Mr.
Bates' ingenuity in the invention of ironical discourse.
Of the peculiarities and idiosyncrasies of Mr. Bates' system,
however, Cameron was quite ignorant; nor had his experience in the
office of Messrs. Rae & Macpherson been such as to impress upon him
the necessity of a close observation of the flight of time. It did
not disturb him, therefore, to notice as he strolled into the
offices of the Metropolitan Transportation & Cartage Company the
next morning that the hands of the clock showed six minutes past
the hour fixed for the beginning of the day's work. The office
staff shivered in an ecstasy of expectant delight. Cameron walked
nonchalantly to Mr. Bates' desk, his overcoat on his arm, his cap
in his hand.
"Good morning, Sir," he said.
Mr. Bates finished writing a sentence, looked up, and nodded a
brief good morning.
"We deposit our street attire on the hooks behind the door,
yonder!" he said with emphatic politeness, pointing across the
room.
Cameron flushed, as in passing his desk he observed the pleased
smile on the lanky boy's sallow face.
"You evidently were not aware of the hours of this office,"
continued Mr. Bates when Cameron had returned. "We open at eight
o'clock."
"Oh!" said Cameron, carelessly. "Eight? Yes, I thought it was
eight! Ah! I see! I believe I am five minutes late! But I
suppose I shall catch up before the day is over!"
"Mr. Cameron," replied Mr. Bates earnestly, "if you should work for
twenty years for the Metropolitan Transportation & Cartage Company,
never will you catch up those five minutes; every minute of your
office hours is pledged to the company, and every minute has its
own proper work. Your desk is the one next Mr. Jacobs, yonder.
Your work is waiting you there. It is quite simple, the entry of
freight receipts upon the ledger. If you wish further instructions,
apply to me here--you understand?"
"I think so!" replied Cameron. "I shall do my best to--"
"Very well! That is all!" replied Mr. Bates, plunging his head
again into his papers.
The office staff sank back to work with every expression of
disappointment. A moment later, however, their hopes revived.
"Oh! Mr. Cameron!" called out Mr. Bates. Mr. Cameron returned to
his desk. "If you should chance to be late again, never mind going
to your desk; just come here for your cheque."
Mr. Bates' tone was kindly, even considerate, as if he were anxious
to save his clerk unnecessary inconvenience.
"I beg your pardon!" stammered Cameron, astonished.
"That is all!" replied Mr. Bates, his nose once more in his papers.
Cameron stood hesitating. His eye fell upon the boy, Jimmy, whose
face expressed keenest joy.
"Do you mean, Sir, that if I am late you dismiss me forthwith?"
"What?" Mr. Bates' tone was so fiercely explosive that it appeared
to throw up his head with a violent motion.
Cameron repeated his question.
"Mr. Cameron, my time is valuable; so is yours. I thought that I
spoke quite distinctly. Apparently I did not. Let me repeat: In
case you should inadvertently be late again, you need not take the
trouble to go to your desk; just come here. Your cheque will be
immediately made out. Saves time, you know--your time and mine--
and time, you perceive, in this office represents money."
Mr. Bates' voice lost none of its kindly interest, but it had grown
somewhat in intensity; the last sentence was uttered with his face
close to his desk.
Cameron stood a moment in uncertainty, gazing at the bald head
before him; then, finding nothing to reply, he turned about to
behold Jimmy and his lanky friend executing an animated war
pantomime which they apparently deemed appropriate to the occasion.
With face ablaze and teeth set Cameron went to his desk, to the
extreme disappointment of Jimmy and the lanky youth, who fell into
each other's arms, apparently overcome with grief.
For half an hour the office hummed with the noise of subdued voices
and clicked with the rapid fire of the typewriters. Suddenly
through the hum Mr. Bates' voice was heard, clear, calm, and coldly
penetrating:
"Mr. Jacobs!"
The old, white-haired clerk started up from Cameron's desk, and
began in a confused and gentle voice to explain that he was merely
giving some hints to the new clerk.
"Mr. Jacobs," said Mr. Bates, "I cannot hear you, and you are
wasting my time!"
"He was merely showing me how to make these entries!" said Cameron.
"Ah! Indeed! Thank you, Mr. Cameron! Though I believe Mr. Jacobs
has not yet lost the power of lucid speech. Mr. Jacobs, I believe
you know the rules of this office; your fine will be one-quarter of
a day."
"Thank you!" said Mr. Jacobs, hurriedly resuming his desk.
"And, Mr. Cameron, if you will kindly bring your work to me, I
shall do my best to enlighten you in regard to the complex duty of
entering your freight receipts."
An audible snicker ran through the delighted staff. Cameron seized
his ledger and the pile of freight bills, and started for Mr.
Bates' desk, catching out of the corner of his eye the pantomime of
Jimmy and the lanky one, which was being rendered with vigor and
due caution.
For a few moments Cameron stood at the manager's desk till that
gentleman should be disengaged, but Mr. Bates was skilled in the
fine art of reducing to abject humility an employee who might give
indications of insubordination. Cameron's rage grew with every
passing moment.
"Here is the ledger, Sir!" he said at length.
But Mr. Bates was so completely absorbed in the business of saving
time that he made not the slightest pause in his writing, while the
redoubled vigor and caution of the pantomime seemed to indicate the
approach of a crisis. At length Mr. Bates raised his head. Jimmy
and the lanky clerk became at once engrossed in their duties.
"You have had no experience of this kind of work, Mr. Cameron?"
inquired Mr. Bates kindly.
"No, Sir. But if you will just explain one or two matters, I think
I can--"
"Exactly! This is not, however, a business college! But we shall
do our best!"
A rapturous smile pervaded the office. Mr. Bates was in excellent
form.
"By the way, Mr. Cameron--pardon my neglect--but may I inquire just
what department of this work you are familiar with?"
"Oh, general--"
"Ah! The position of general manager, however, is filled at
present!" replied Mr. Bates kindly.
Cameron's flush grew deeper, while Jimmy and his friend resigned
themselves to an ecstasy of delight.
"I was going to say," said Cameron in a tone loud and deliberate,
"that I had been employed with the general copying work in a
writer's office."
"Writing? Fancy! Writing, eh? No use here!" said Mr. Bates
shortly, for time was passing.
"A writer with us means a lawyer!" replied Cameron.
"Why the deuce don't they say so?" answered Mr. Bates impatiently.
"Well! Well!" getting hold of himself again. "Here we allow our
solicitors to look after our legal work. Typewrite?" he inquired
suddenly.
"I beg your pardon!" replied Cameron. "Typewrite? Do you mean,
can I use a typewriting machine?"
"Yes! Yes! For heaven's sake, yes!"
"No, I cannot!"
"Bookkeep?"
"No."
"Good Lord! What have I got?" inquired Mr. Bates of himself,
in a tone, however, perfectly audible to those in the immediate
neighbourhood.
"Try him licking stamps!" suggested the lanky youth in a voice
that, while it reached the ears of Jimmy and others near by,
including Cameron, was inaudible to the manager. Mr. Bates caught
the sound, however, and glared about him through his spectacles.
Time was being wasted--the supreme offense in that office--and Mr.
Bates was fast losing his self-command.
"Here!" he cried suddenly, seizing a sheaf of letters. "File these
letters. You will be able to do that, I guess! File's in the
vault over there!"
Cameron took the letters and stood looking helplessly from them to
Mr. Bates' bald head, that gentleman's face being already in close
proximity to the papers on his desk.
"Just how do I go about this?--I mean, what system do you--"
"Jim!" roared Mr. Bates, throwing down his pen, "show this con--
show Mr. Cameron how to file these letters! Just like these blank
old-country chumps!" added Mr. Bates, in a lower voice, but loud
enough to be distinctly heard.
Jim came up with a smile of patronising pity on his face. It was
the smile that touched to life the mass of combustible material
that had been accumulating for the last hour in Cameron's soul.
Instead of following the boy, he turned with a swift movement back
to the manager's desk, laid his sheaf of letters down on Mr. Bates'
papers, and, leaning over the desk, towards that gentleman, said:
"Did you mean that remark to apply to me?" His voice was very
quiet. But Mr. Bates started back with a quick movement from the
white face and burning eyes.
"Here, you get out of this!" he cried.
"Because," continued Cameron, "if you did, I must ask you to
apologise at once."
All smiles vanished from the office staff, even Jimmy's face
assumed a serious aspect. Mr. Bates pushed back his chair.
"A-po-pologise!" he sputtered. "Get out of this office, d'ye
hear?"
"Be quick!" said Cameron, his hands gripping Mr. Bates' desk till
it shook.
"Jimmy! Call a policeman!" cried Mr. Bates, rising from his chair.
He was too slow. Cameron reached swiftly for his collar, and with
one fierce wrench swept Mr. Bates clear over the top of his desk,
shook him till his head wobbled dangerously, and flung him crashing
across the desk and upon the prostrate form of the lanky youth
sitting behind it.
"Call a policeman! Call a policeman!" shouted Mr. Bates, who was
struggling meantime with the lanky youth to regain an upright
position.
Cameron, meanwhile, walked quietly to where his coat and cap hung.
"Hold him, somebody! Hold him!" shouted Mr. Bates, hurrying
towards him.
Cameron turned fiercely upon him.
"Did you want me, Sir?" he inquired.
Mr. Bates arrested himself with such violence that his feet slid
from under him, and once more he came sitting upon the floor.
"Get up!" said Cameron, "and listen to me!"
Mr. Bates rose, and stood, white and trembling.
"I may not know much about your Canadian ways of business, but I
believe I can teach you some old-country manners. You have treated
me this morning like the despicable bully that you are. Perhaps
you will treat the next old-country man with the decency that is
coming to him, even if he has the misfortune to be your clerk."
With these words Cameron turned upon his heel and walked
deliberately towards the door. Immediately Jimmy sprang before
him, and, throwing the door wide open, bowed him out as if he were
indeed the Prince of Wales. Thus abruptly ended Cameron's
connection with the Metropolitan Transportation & Cartage Company.
Before the day was done the whole city had heard the tale, which
lost nothing in the telling.
Next morning Mr. Denman was surprised to have Cameron walk in upon
him.
"Hullo, young man!" shouted the lawyer, "this is a pretty business!
Upon my soul! Your manner of entry into our commercial life is
somewhat forceful! What the deuce do you mean by all this?"
Cameron stood, much abashed. His passion was all gone; in the calm
light of after-thought his action of yesterday seemed boyish.
"I'm awfully sorry, Mr. Denman," he replied, "and I came to
apologise to you."
"To me?" cried Denman. "Why to me? I expect, if you wish to get a
job anywhere in this town, you will need to apologise to the chap
you knocked down--what's his name?"
"Mr. Bates, I think his name is, Sir; but, of course, I cannot
apologise to him."
"By Jove!" roared Mr. Denman, "he ought to have thrown you out of
his office! That is what I would have done!"
Cameron glanced up and down Mr. Denman's well-knit figure.
"I don't think so, Sir," he said, with a smile.
"Why not?" said Mr. Denman, grasping the arms of his office chair.
"Because you would not have insulted a stranger in your office who
was trying his best to understand his work. And then, I should not
have tried it on you."
"And why?"
"Well, I think I know a gentleman when I see one."
Mr. Denman was not to be appeased.
"Well, let me tell you, young man, it would have been a mighty
unhealthy thing for you to have cut up any such shine in this
office. I have done some Rugby in my day, my boy, if you know what
that means."
"I have done a little, too," said Cameron, with slightly heightened
colour.
"You have, eh! Where?"
"The Scottish International, Sir."
"By Jove! You don't tell me!" replied Mr. Denman, his tone
expressing a new admiration and respect. "When? This year?"
"No, last year, Sir--against Wales!"
"By Jove!" cried Mr. Denman again; "give me your hand, boy! Any
man who has made the Scottish Internationals is not called to stand
any cheek from a cad like Bates."
Mr. Denman shook Cameron warmly by the hand.
"Tell us about it!" he cried. "It must have been rare sport. If
Bates only knew it, he ought to count it an honour to have been
knocked down by a Scottish International."
"I didn't knock him down, Sir!" said Cameron, apologetically; "he
is only a little chap; I just gave him a bit of a shake," and
Cameron proceeded to recount the proceedings of the previous
morning.
Mr. Denman was hugely delighted.
"Serves the little beast bloody well right!" he cried enthusiastically.
"But what's to do now? They will be afraid to let you into their
offices in this city."
"I think, Sir, I am done with offices; I mean to try the land."
"Farm, eh?" mused Mr. Denman. "Well, so be it! It will probably
be safer for you there--possibly for some others as well."
CHAPTER II
A MAN'S JOB
Cameron slept heavily and long into the day, but as he awoke he was
conscious of a delightful exhilaration possessing him. For the
first time in his life he was a free man, ungoverned and unguided.
For four dreary weeks he had waited in Montreal for answers to his
enquiries concerning positions with farmers, but apparently the
Canadian farmers were not attracted by the qualifications and
experience Cameron had to offer. At length he had accepted the
advice of Martin's uncle in Montreal, who assured him with local
pride that, if he desired a position on a farm, the district of
which the little city of London was the centre was the very garden
of Canada. He was glad now to remember that he had declined a
letter of introduction. He was now entirely on his own. Neither
in this city nor in the country round about was there a soul with
whom he had the remotest acquaintance. The ways of life led out
from his feet, all untried, all unknown. Which he should choose he
knew not, but with a thrill of exultation he thanked his stars the
choosing was his own concern. A feeling of adventure was upon him,
a new courage was rising in his heart. The failure that had
hitherto dogged his past essays in life did not dampen his
confidence, for they had been made under other auspices than his
own. He had not fitted into his former positions, but they had not
been of his own choosing. He would now find a place for himself
and if he failed again he was prepared to accept the responsibility.
One bit of philosophy he carried with him from Mr. Denman's farewell
interview--"Now, young man, rememer," that gentleman had said after
he had bidden him farewell, "this world is pretty much made already;
success consists in adjustment. Don't try to make your world,
adjust yourself to it. Don't fight the world, serve it till you
master it." Cameron determined he would study adjustments; his
fighting tendency, which had brought him little success in the past,
he would control.
At this point the throb of a band broke in upon his meditations and
summoned him from his bed. He sprang to the window. It was circus
day and the morning parade, in all its mingled and cosmopolitan
glory, was slowly evolving its animated length to the strains of
bands of music. There were bands on horses and bands on chariots,
and at the tail of the procession a fearful and wonderful instrument
bearing the euphonious and classic name of the "calliope," whose
chief function seemed to be that of terrifying the farmers' horses
into frantic and determined attempts to escape from these horrid
alarms of the city to the peaceful haunts of their rural solitudes.
Cameron was still boy enough to hurry through his morning duties in
order that he might mix with the crowd and share the perennial
delights which a circus affords. The stable yard attached to his
hotel was lined three deep with buggies, carriages, and lumber
waggons, which had borne in the crowds of farmers from the country.
The hotel was thronged with sturdy red-faced farm lads, looking hot
and uncomfortable in their unaccustomed Sunday suits, gorgeous in
their rainbow ties, and rakish with their hats set at all angles
upon their elaborately brushed heads. Older men, too, bearded and
staid, moved with silent and self-respecting dignity through the
crowds, gazing with quiet and observant eyes upon the shifting
phantasmagoria that filled the circus grounds and the streets
nearby. With these, too, there mingled a few of both old and young
who, with bacchanalian enthusiasm, were swaggering their way
through the crowds, each followed by a company of friends good-
naturedly tolerant or solicitously careful.
Cameron's eyes, roving over the multitude, fell upon a little group
that held his attention, the principal figure of which was a tall
middle aged man with a good-natured face, adorned with a rugged
grey chin whisker, who was loudly declaiming to a younger companion
with a hard face and very wide awake, "My name's Tom Haley; ye
can't come over me."
"Ye bet yer life they can't. Ye ain't no chicken!" exclaimed his
hard-faced friend. "Say, let's liquor up once more before we go to
see the elephant."
With these two followed a boy of some thirteen years, freckled
faced and solemn, slim and wiry of body, who was anxiously striving
to drag his father away from one of the drinking booths that dotted
the circus grounds, and towards the big tent; but the father had
been already a too frequent visitor at the booth to be quite
amenable to his son's pleading. He, in a glorious mood of self-
appreciation, kept announcing to the public generally and to his
hard-faced friend in particular--
"My name's Tom Haley; ye can't come over me!"
"Come on, father," pleaded Tim.
"No hurry, Timmy, me boy," said his father. "The elephants won't
run away with the monkeys and the clowns can't git out of the
ring."
"Oh, come on, dad, I'm sure the show's begun."
"Cheese it, young feller," said the young man, "yer dad's able to
take care of himself."
"Aw, you shut yer mouth!" replied Tim fiercely. "I know what
you're suckin' round for."
"Good boy, Tim," laughed his father; "ye giv' 'im one that time.
Guess we'll go. So long, Sam, if that's yer name. Ye see I've
jist got ter take in this 'ere show this morning with Tim 'ere, and
then we have got some groceries to git for the old woman. See
there," he drew a paper from his pocket, "wouldn't dare show up
without 'em, ye bet, eh, Tim! Why, it's her egg and butter money
and she wants value fer it, she does. Well, so long, Sam, see ye
later," and with the triumphant Tim he made for the big tent,
leaving a wrathful and disappointed man behind him.
Cameron spent the rest of the day partly in "taking in" the circus
and partly in conversing with the farmers who seemed to have taken
possession of the town; but in answer to his most diligent and
careful enquiries he could hear of no position on a farm for which
he could honestly offer himself. The farmers wanted mowers, or
cradlers, or good smart turnip hands, and Cameron sorrowfully had
to confess he was none of these. There apparently was no single
bit of work in the farmer's life that Cameron felt himself
qualified to perform.
It was wearing towards evening when Cameron once more came across
Tim. He was standing outside the bar room door, big tears silently
coursing down his pale and freckled cheeks.
"Hello!" cried Cameron, "what's up old chap? Where's your dad, and
has he got his groceries yet?"
"No," said Tim, hastily wiping away his tears and looking up
somewhat shyly and sullenly into Cameron's face. What he saw there
apparently won his confidence.
"He's in yonder," he continued, "and I can't git him out. They
won't let him come. They're jist making 'im full so he can't do
anything, and we ought to be startin' fer home right away, too!"
"Well, let's go in anyway and see what they are doing," said
Cameron cheerfully, to whom the pale tear-stained face made strong
appeal.
"They won't let us," said Tim. "There's a feller there that chucks
me out."
"Won't, eh? We'll see about that! Come along!"
Cameron entered the bar room, with Tim following, and looked about
him. The room was crowded to the door with noisy excited men, many
of whom were partially intoxicated. At the bar, two deep, stood a
line of men with glasses in their hands, or waiting to be served.
In the farthest corner of the room stood Tim's father, considerably
the worse of his day's experiences, and lovingly embracing the
hard-faced young man, to whom he was at intervals announcing, "My
name's Tom Haley! Ye can't git over me!"
As Cameron began to push through the crowd, a man with a very red
face, obviously on the watch for Tim, cried out--
"Say, sonny, git out of here! This is no place fer you!"
Tim drew back, but Cameron, turning to him, said,
"Come along, Tim. He's with me," he added, addressing the man.
"He wants his father."
"His father's not here. He left half an hour ago. I told him so."
"You were evidently mistaken, for I see him just across the room
there," said Cameron quietly.
"Oh! is he a friend of yours?" enquired the red-faced man.
"No, I don't know him at all, but Tim does, and Tim wants him,"
said Cameron, beginning to push his way through the crowd towards
the vociferating Haley, who appeared to be on the point of backing
up some of his statements with money, for he was flourishing a
handful of bills in the face of the young man Sam, who apparently
was quite willing to accommodate him with the wager.
Before Cameron could make his way through the swaying, roaring
crowd, the red-faced man slipped from his side, and in a very few
moments appeared at a side door near Tom Haley's corner. Almost
immediately there was a shuffle and Haley and his friends
disappeared through the side door.
"Hello!" cried Cameron, "there's something doing! We'll just slip
around there, my boy." So saying, he drew Tim back from the crowd
and out of the front door, and, hurrying around the house, came
upon Sam, the red-faced man, and Haley in a lane leading past the
stable yard. The red-faced man was affectionately urging a bottle
upon Haley.
"There they are!" said Tim in an undertone, clutching Cameron's
arm. "You get him away and I'll hitch up."
"All right, Tim," said Cameron, "I'll get him. They are evidently
up to no good."
"What's yer name?" said Tim hurriedly.
"Cameron!"
"Come on, then!" he cried, dragging Cameron at a run towards his
father. "Here, Dad!" he cried, "this is my friend, Mr. Cameron!
Come on home. I'm going to hitch up. We'll be awful late for the
chores and we got them groceries to git. Come on, Dad!"
"Aw, gwan! yer a cheeky kid anyway," said Sam, giving Tim a shove
that nearly sent him on his head.
"Hold on there, my man, you leave the boy alone," said Cameron.
"What's your business in this, young feller?"
"Never mind!" said Cameron. "Tim is a friend of mine and no one is
going to hurt him. Run along, Tim, and get your horses."
"Friend o' Tim's, eh!" said Haley, in half drunken good nature.
"Friend o' Tim's, friend o' mine," he added, gravely shaking
Cameron by the hand. "Have a drink, young man. You look a'
right!"
Cameron took the bottle, put it to his lips. The liquor burned
like fire.
"Great Caesar!" he gasped, contriving to let the bottle drop upon a
stone. "What do you call that?"
"Pretty hot stuff!" cried Haley, with a shout of laughter.
But Sam, unable to see the humour of the situation, exclaimed in a
rage, "Here, you cursed fool! That is my bottle!"
"Sorry to be so clumsy," said Cameron apologetically, "but it
surely wasn't anything to drink, was it?"
"Yes, it jest was something to drink, was it?" mocked Sam,
approaching Cameron with menace in his eye and attitude. "I have a
blanked good notion to punch your head, too!"
"Oh! I wouldn't do that if I were you," said Cameron, smiling
pleasantly.
"Say, Sam, don't get mad, Sam," interposed Haley. "This young
feller's a friend o' Tim's. I'll git another bottle a' right.
I've got the stuff right here." He pulled out his roll of bills.
"And lots more where this comes from."
"Let me have that, Mr. Haley, I'll get the bottle for you," said
Cameron, reaching out for the bills.
"A' right," said Haley. "Friend o' Tim's, friend o' mine."
"Here, young feller, you're too fresh!" cried the red-faced man,
"buttin' in here! You make tracks, git out! Come, git out, I tell
yeh!"
"Give it to him quick," said Sam in a low voice.
The red-faced man, without the slightest warning, swiftly stepped
towards Cameron and, before the latter could defend himself, struck
him a heavy blow. Cameron staggered, fell, and struggled again to
his knees. The red-faced man sprang forward to kick him in the
face, when Haley interposed--
"Hold up there, now! Friend o' Tim's, friend o' mine, ye know!"
"Hurry up," said Sam, closing in on Haley. "Quit fooling. Give
'im the billy and let's get away!"
But Haley, though unskilled with his hands, was a man of more than
ordinary strength, and he swung his long arms about with such
vigour that neither Sam, who was savagely striking at his head, nor
the red-faced man, who was dancing about waiting for a chance to
get in with the "billy," which he held in his hand, was able to
bring the affair to a finish. It could be a matter of only a few
moments, however, for both Sam and his friend were evidently
skilled in the arts of the thug, while Haley, though powerful
enough, was chiefly occupying himself in beating the air. A blow
from the billy dropped one of Haley's arms helpless. The red-faced
man, following up his advantage, ran in to finish, but Haley
gripped him by the wrist and, exerting all his strength, gave a
mighty heave and threw him heavily against Sam, who was running in
upon the other side. At the same time Cameron, who was rapidly
recovering, clutched Sam by a leg and brought him heavily to earth.
Reaching down, Haley gripped Cameron by the collar and hauled him
to his feet just as Sam, who had sprung up, ran to the attack.
Steadied by Haley, Cameron braced himself, and, at exactly the
right moment, stiffened his left arm with the whole weight of his
body behind it. The result was a most unhappy one for Sam, who,
expecting no such reception, was lifted clear off his feet and
hurled to the ground some distance away. The exhilaration of his
achievement brought Cameron's blood back again to his brain.
Swiftly he turned upon the red-faced man just as that worthy had
brought Haley to his knees with a cruel blow and was preparing to
finish off his victim. With a shout Cameron sprang at him, the man
turned quickly, warded off Cameron's blow, and then, seeing Sam
lying helpless upon the ground, turned and fled down the lane.
"Say, young feller!" panted Haley, staggering to his feet, "yeh
came in mighty slick that time. Yeh ain't got a bottle on ye, hev
yeh?"
"No!" said Cameron, "but there's a pump near by."
"Jest as good and a little better," said Haley, staggering towards
the pump. "Say," he continued, with a humourous twinkle in his
eye, and glancing at the man lying on the ground, "Sam's kinder
quiet, ain't he? Run agin something hard like, I guess."
Cameron filled a bucket with water and into its icy depths Haley
plunged his head.
"Ow! that's good," he sputtered, plunging his head in again and
again. "Fill 'er up once more!" he said, wiping off his face with
a big red handkerchief. "Now, I shouldn't wonder if it would help
Sam a bit."
He picked up the bucket of water and approached Sam, who meantime
had got to a sitting position and was blinking stupidly around.
"Here, ye blamed hog, hev a wash, ye need it bad!" So saying,
Haley flung the whole bucket of water over Sam's head and
shoulders. "Fill 'er up again," he said, but Sam had had enough,
and, swearing wildly, gasping and sputtering, he made off down the
lane.
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