Bindloss Harold
Thrice Armed

CHAPTER XXX
AN EYE FOR AN EYE

The Shasta lay safely tied up to a buoy in Vancouver Inlet, and a quartermaster stood at her gangway with instructions to see that no stranger got on board, when Jimmy sat talking to his sister and Jordan in the room beneath her bridge. It was an hour since she had steamed in, and except for an occasional clinking in her engine-room, where Fleming was still busy, there was silence on board her, though the scream of saws and the rattle of freight-car wheels came off faintly across the still water. The two ports were open wide, but none of those who sat in the little room noticed that the light was fading. Jordan and Eleanor were listening with close attention while Jimmy concisely related how he had fallen in with and towed Merril's steamer. At last he broke off with an abrupt movement when a splash of oars grew louder.

"Another boat!" he said. "We'll have every curious loafer in the city pulling off by and by."

Then the voice of the quartermaster reached them as he answered somebody who called to him from the approaching boat.

"No," he said, "you can't see Captain Wheelock – he's busy. Keep her off that ladder."

There was evidently another question asked, and the man answered impatiently: "I can't tell you anything about the Adelaide 'cept that she's coming along under easy steam. Should be here in a day or two."

Jordan glanced at Jimmy. "The men you brought down are talking already, and we haven't much time for fixing our program. When do you expect her?"

"I don't exactly know. We came away before she did when the breeze fell, but her second engineer seemed quite confident he could bring her along at seven or eight knots. He wasn't sure whether his high-pressure engine would stand anything more."

Then it was significant that both of them looked at Eleanor, who had insisted on coming with Jordan, and who was apparently waiting to take her part in the discussion. One could have fancied from their faces that they would have preferred to be alone just then and were a trifle uneasy concerning the course their companion might think fit to pursue. She leaned back in her chair watching them, with a little hard smile which seemed to suggest that she knew what they were thinking. Still, she said nothing, and Jordan spoke again.

"You are sure of the Adelaide's skipper and that miner fellow?" he asked. "They wouldn't go back on you if Merril tried to buy them off?"

"I think I can be sure of them," said Jimmy reflectively. "The skipper is not the kind of man I would take to, but, in some respects, at least, he's straight; and, anyway, he's bitter enough against Merril to back us in anything we may decide to do. You see, the man who gets his boat ashore is practically done for nowadays, whether it's his own fault or not; and I fancy we can count on the miner, too. After what those fellows had to go through to get the gold they were bringing home, they're not likely to have much sympathy with Merril. In fact, if the others understood how near they came to seeing it go down in the Adelaide, it would be a little difficult to keep them from laying hands on him. In any case, there's the engineer's statement – one can't get over that."

Eleanor stretched out her hand for the paper, and there was a vindictive sparkle in her eyes as she glanced at it.

"Charley," she said with portentous quietness, "it seems to me that the possession of this document places Merril absolutely in your hands. You are not afraid to make the utmost use of it?"

Jordan glanced at Jimmy in a fashion the latter understood. There was something deprecatory in it, and it appeared to suggest that he wished his comrade to realize that he was under compulsion and could not help himself. Then he turned to the girl with a certain air of resolution.

"No," he said, "I don't think I am afraid, but I want you to understand that I am manager of the Shasta Company, and have first of all to consider the interests of my associates, the men who put their money into the concern. There is Jimmy, too."

"Jimmy!" and Eleanor laughed a little, bitter laugh, which had a trace of contempt in it. "Pshaw! Jimmy's love affairs don't count now. I think he feels that, too. After all, there is a trace of our mother's temper in him if one can awaken it."

She turned and looked at her brother, who closed one hand tightly. "Oh, I know; the girl has graciously condescended to smile on you, and no doubt you are almost astonished, as well as grateful, that she should go so far. Still, where did the money that made her a dainty lady of station come from? Must I tell you that a second time, Jimmy?"

She stopped a moment, and gripped the paper hard in firm white fingers. "This is mine. I bought it. You know what it cost me, Charley; and what has Jimmy done in comparison with that? Do you think anything would induce me to spare Merril now that I have this in my hands?"

Jimmy looked up sharply, and saw the flush of color in her cheek, and that the blood had crept into his comrade's face. His own grew suddenly hot.

"Ah!" he said, with a thrill of anger in his voice, "I begin to understand. She got the information you acted on out of that brute, Carnforth. You knew that, Charley, and you – you countenanced it."

He half rose from his seat with a brown hand stretched out as if to tear the paper from the girl, but while Jordan swung around toward him Eleanor laughed.

"Sit down," she said imperiously, "you simple-minded fool! Do you think I would let Charley's opinion influence me in an affair of this kind?"

Jordan made a gesture of resignation. "She would not," he said. "That's the simple fact. But go on, Eleanor – or shall I tell him? Anyway, it must be done."

The girl silenced him, and though the next two or three minutes were, perhaps, as unpleasant as any Jimmy had ever spent in his life, it was with a certain deep relief that he heard his sister out. Before she stopped she held up a white hand.

"Once," she said, "once only, he held my wrist. That was all, Jimmy; but I feel it left a mark. If it could be removed that way, I would burn it out. Now you know what the thing cost me – but I did it."

The men would not look at each other, and if Eleanor had left them then it would have been a relief to both. Her suppressed passion had stirred and shaken them, and they realized that the efforts they had made were, after all, not to be counted in comparison with what the girl had done.

It was Jordan who spoke first. "Well," he said, with the air of one anxious to get away from a painful subject, "we have got to be practical. The question is, how are we to strike Merril? Seems to me, in the first case, we'll hand him a salvage claim. I'll fix it at half her value, anyway, and he'll never fight us when he hears of the engineer's statement. So far as I know, he can't recover under his policy, and we could head him off from going to the underwriters if he can. The next point is – are the miner fellow and the Adelaide's skipper likely to take any independent action on their own account? I don't think that's very probable."

"Nor do I," said Jimmy. "It isn't wise of a skipper to turn around on a man like Merril, unless it's in a court where he has the law behind him, and the prospector would scarcely attempt to do anything alone. Besides, without the document to produce, they would have very little to go upon – and what is more to the purpose, both of them promised to let me handle the thing."

Jordan nodded as if satisfied. "That," he said, "makes it easier. We're going to collect our money on the salvage claim, and when Merril has raised it he'll have strained his resources, so he won't count very much as an opponent of the Shasta Company. The man's crippled already."

The fact that his comrade was apparently not desirous of proceeding to extremities afforded Jimmy a vast relief, but it vanished suddenly when Eleanor broke in.

"Can't you understand that the affair must be looked at from another point of view as well as the commercial one?" she asked.

It was a difficult question, and when neither of them answered her the girl went on:

"It doesn't seem to occur to you that what you suggest amounts to covering up a conspiracy and allowing a scoundrel to escape his deserts," she said. "There is another point, too. You will have to inform the police about the Robertson affair, Jimmy, and his connection with Merril is bound to appear when they lay hands on him."

"That," said Jimmy, with a trace of dryness, "is hardly likely. The man will be heading for the diggings by this time if he isn't drowned, and there's very little probability of the police getting hold of him there."

Eleanor laughed, a very bitter laugh, as she fixed her eyes on him.

"So you are quite content with Charley's plan – to extort so many dollars from Merril?" she said. "It has one fatal defect; it does not satisfy me."

"Now – " commenced Jordan, but the girl checked him with a gesture.

"I want him crushed, disgraced, imprisoned, ruined altogether."

"Anyway, I owe it to my associates to make sure of the money first."

"And after that you feel you have to stand by Jimmy?"

The man winced when she flung the question at him; but when he did not answer she appeared to rouse herself for an effort, leaning forward a trifle with a gleam in her eyes and the red flush plainer in her cheek.

"Still," she said, "if Jimmy is what I think him, he will not ask it of you. I want him to go back six years to the time he came home – from Portland, wasn't it, Jimmy? – and stayed a few weeks with us. Was there any shadow upon us then, though your father was getting old? I want you to remember him as he was when you went away, a simple, kindly, abstemious, and fearless man. It surely can't be very hard."

Jimmy face grew furrowed, and he set his lips tight; but he said nothing, and the girl went on:

"It was not so the next time you came back. Something had happened in the meanwhile. The bondholder had laid his grasp on him. He was weakening under it, and the lust of drink was crushing the courage out of him. Still, you must remember that it was his one consolation. Then came the awful climax of the closing scene. I had to face it with Charley – you were away – but you must realize the horror it brought me."

Jordan turned toward her abruptly. "Eleanor," he said, with a trace of hoarseness in his voice, "let it drop. You can't bear the thing a second time."

She stopped him with a frown. "I want you to picture him deluding Prescott with one of the pitiful, cunning excuses that drunkards make. Wasn't it horrible in itself that he should have sunk to that? Then it shouldn't be very hard to imagine him bribing a lounger outside to buy him the whisky, and the carousal afterward with a stranger, a dead-beat and outcast low enough to profit by his evident weakness. Still, he was your father, Jimmy. Then there was the groping for matches and the upsetting of the lamp. Somebody brought Charley, and when he came your father lay with the clothes charred upon his burned limbs, still half-crazed with drink and mad with pain. Must I tell you once more what I saw when Charley brought me? I am willing, if there is nothing else that will rouse you. You have heard it before, but I want to burn it into your brain, so that however hard you try you can't blot out that scene."

Jimmy's face was grim and white, but while he sat very still his comrade rose resolutely.

"Eleanor," he said, "if you attempt to recall another incident of that horrible night I shall carry you by main force out of the room."

The girl turned to him with a little gesture. "Then I suppose I must submit. You have a man's strength and courage in you – or I think you would be afraid to marry me; but one could fancy that Jimmy has none. The daughter of the man who ruined his father has condescended to be gracious to him. Still, I have a little more to say. She is his daughter, his flesh and blood, Jimmy, and his pitiless, hateful nature is in her. That is the woman you wish to marry. The mere notion of it is horrible. Still, you can't marry her, Jimmy. You must crush her father, and drag him to his ruin. After all, there is a little manhood somewhere in you. You will take the engineer's statement to the underwriters and the police. You must – you have to."

Jimmy stood up slowly, with the veins swollen on his forehead and a gray patch in his cheek. "Eleanor," he said hoarsely, "I believe there is a devil in you; but I think you are right in this. Jordan, will you hand me that paper?"

He stood still for at least a minute when his comrade passed it to him, and the girl watched him with a little gleam in her eyes. His face was furrowed, and looked worn as well as very hard. There was not a sound in the little room, and the splash of the ripples on the Shasta's plates outside came in through the open ports with a startling distinctness. Jordan felt that the tension was becoming almost unendurable. Then Jimmy turned slowly toward his sister, and though the pain was still in his face it had curiously changed. There was a look in his blue eyes that sent a thrill of consternation through her. They were very steady, and she knew that she had failed.

"I can't do it. It was not the girl's fault, and she shall not be dragged through the mire," he said. Then he looked at his comrade. "What I am going to do may cost you a good deal of money, and my appointment to the Shasta is, of course, in your hands. I am going straight from here to Merril's house."

"Well," said Jordan simply, "it may cost us both a good deal, but I guess I must face it. If I were fixed as you are, that is just what I should do."

Jimmy said nothing, but he went out swiftly, and Eleanor turned to her companion with a very bitter smile when the door closed behind him.

"Ah!" she said, "has that girl beguiled you too? You had Merril in your hands, and instead of crushing him you are going to smooth his troubles away."

"No," said Jordan dryly, "I don't quite think Jimmy will do that. In some respects, I understand him better than you do. He wants to save the girl all the sorrow and disgrace he can, but he is going to run her father out of this city. Jimmy's not exactly clever, and it's quite likely he'll mix up things when he meets Merril; but, for all that, I guess he'll carry out just what he means to do. Somehow, he generally does. That's the kind of man he is."

He stopped a moment, and a smile crept into his eyes. "I don't know what the result will be, and it may be the break-up of the Shasta Company; but I can't blame Jimmy."

"Ah!" said Eleanor, "you, the man I counted on, are turning against me as well as my brother."

Then the sustaining purpose seemed to die out of her, and she sank back suddenly in her chair with her face hidden from him. Jordan crossed the little room, and stooping beside her slipped an arm about her.

"My dear," he said, "you can count on me always and in everything but this. It's because of what you are to me that I'm standing by Jimmy."

CHAPTER XXXI
MERRIL CAPITULATES

Merril was not in his house when Jimmy reached it, but it appeared that he was expected shortly, and the latter, who resolved to wait for him, was shown into a big artistically furnished room. He sat there at least ten minutes, alone and grim in face, with a growing disquietude, for his surroundings had their effect on him. The house was built of wood, but expense had not been spared, and those who have visited the Western cities know how beautiful a wooden dwelling can be made. Jimmy looked out through the open windows on to a wide veranda framed with a slender colonnade of wooden pillars supporting fretted arches of lace-like delicacy. The floor of the room, which was choicely parquetted in cunningly contrasted wood, also caught his eye, and there were Indian-sewn rugs of furs on it of a kind that he knew was rarely purchased in the north, except on behalf of Russian princes and American railroad kings. The furniture, he fancied by the timber, was Canadian-made, but it had evidently been copied from artistic European models; and though he was far from being a connoisseur in such things, they had all a painful significance to him just then.

They suggested wealth and taste and luxury; and it seemed only fitting that the woman he loved should have such a dwelling, while he realized that it was his hand which must deprive her of all the artistic daintiness to which she had grown accustomed and no doubt valued. He, a steamboat skipper of low degree, had, like blind Samson, laid a brutal grasp upon the pillars of the house, and he could feel the trembling of the beautiful edifice. This would have afforded him a certain grim satisfaction, had it not been for the fact that it was impossible to tell whether the woman he would have spared every pain might not be overwhelmed amid the ruin when he exerted his strength. It must be exerted. In that he could not help himself.

While he sat there with a hard, set face, she came in, dressed, as he realized, in harmony with her surroundings. Her gracious patrician quietness and her rich attire troubled him, and he felt, in spite of all Eleanor had said, that it would be a vast relief if he could abandon altogether the purpose that had brought him there, though to do so would, it was evident, set the girl further apart from him than ever, since her father's station naturally stood as a barrier between them. Still, he remembered what he owed the men who had sent him on board the Shasta– Jordan, Forster, old Leeson, and two or three more; he could not turn against them now.

Anthea stood still just inside the door, looking at him half-expectant, but with something that was suggestive of apprehension in her manner, and Jimmy felt the hot blood creep into his face when he moved quietly forward and kissed her. In view of what he had to do, it would, he felt, have been more natural if she had shrunk from him in place of submitting to his caress. She appeared to recognize the constraint that was upon him, for she turned away and sat down a little distance from him.

"Jimmy," she said, "I'm glad to see you back. I have been lonely without you – and a little uneasy. Indeed, though I don't know exactly why, I am anxious now."

Then she looked at him steadily. "It is the first time you have been here. Something unusual must have brought you. Jimmy, is it war?"

The man made a deprecatory gesture. "I'm afraid it is," he said. "I don't think there can be any compromise."

"Ah!" said the girl, with a start, "you don't look like a man who has come to offer terms."

Jimmy was still standing, and he leaned somewhat heavily on the back of a chair. "I have to do something that I shrink from, but it must be done. If there were no other reason, I daren't go back on the men who have confidence in me; that is – not altogether, though in a way – I am now betraying them. Anthea, you will not let this thing stand between us?"

"No;" and the girl's voice was steady, though a trifle strained. "At least, not always. Still, I have felt that some day I should have to choose whom I should hold to – my father or you. It is very hard to face that question, Jimmy."

"Yes," said Jimmy gravely; "I am afraid you must choose to-night. You know how much I want you, but I have sense enough to recognize that I may bring trouble on both of us if I urge you to do what you might afterward regret."

Anthea said nothing for almost a minute, and because of the restraint he had laid upon himself Jimmy understood the cost of her quietness. It seemed necessary that both should hold themselves in hand. Then she turned to him again.

"You are quite sure there can be no compromise?"

"It is for many reasons out of the question. In fact, I think the decisive battle will be fought to-night. I have strained every point to make it easier for you, or I should not have come at all, and it is very likely that my comrades will discard me when they hear what I have done. I am willing to face their anger, but, to some extent, at least, I must keep my bargain with them."

He moved a pace or two, and stood close by her chair looking down at her. "If you understood everything, you would not blame me."

Anthea glanced at him a moment, and he fancied that a shiver ran through her. "I do not blame you now, though it is all a little horrible. I cannot plead with you, and if I did I see that you would not listen. You must do what you feel you have to."

Neither of them spoke for a while, though Jimmy felt the tension was almost unendurable. It was evident that the girl felt it too, for he could see the signs of strain in her face. So intent were they that neither heard the door open, and Jimmy turned with a little start when the sound of a footstep reached them. Merril was standing not far away, little, portly, and immaculately dressed, regarding them with an inscrutable face.

"I understand you wish to see me, Mr. Wheelock," he said. "Anthea, you will no doubt allow us a few minutes."

The girl rose and moved toward the door, but before she went out she turned for a moment and glanced at Jimmy. Then it closed softly, and he saw that Merril was regarding him with a sardonic smile.

"I heard that you had made my daughter's acquaintance, but I was not aware that it had gone as far as I have some grounds for supposing now," he said.

"That," said Jimmy quietly, "is a subject I may mention by and by. In the meanwhile I have something to say that concerns you at least as closely. As it has a bearing on the other question, we might discuss it first."

"I am at your service for ten minutes;" and Merril pointed to a chair.

Jimmy sat down, but said nothing for a few moments. Apart from the trouble that he must bring upon Anthea, he felt that it was a big and difficult thing he had undertaken. He was a steamboat skipper, and the man in front of him one skilled in every art of commercial trickery whose ability was recognized in that city. Still, he felt curiously steady and sure of himself, for Jimmy, like other simple-minded men, as a rule appeared to advantage when forced suddenly to face a crisis. He felt, in fact, much as he had done when he stood grimly resolute on the Shasta's bridge while the Adelaide, sheering wildly, dragged her toward the spouting surf. Then he turned to Merril.

"I called on you once before to make a request," he said.

"And your errand is much the same now, though one could fancy that you feel you have something to back it?" his companion suggested dryly.

"No," said Jimmy, "I have nothing to ask you for this time. Instead, I am simply going to mention certain facts, and leave you to act on the information in the only way open to you; that is, to get out of Vancouver as soon as possible. I am giving you the opportunity in order to save Miss Merril the pain of seeing you prosecuted. You are in our hands now."

Merril scarcely moved a muscle. "You are prepared to make that assurance good?"

"I am;" and Jimmy's voice had a little ring in it. "If you will give me your attention I'll try to do it. You have no news of the Adelaide yet, and, to commence with, you will have to face the fact that she is not on the rocks. She was just ready to steam south with a derangement of her high-pressure engine when I last saw her."

Though his companion's face was almost expressionless, Jimmy fancied that this shot had reached its mark, and he proceeded to relate what had happened since he fell in with the Adelaide. He did it with some skill, for this was a subject with which he was at home, and he made the feelings of her skipper and second engineer perfectly clear. Then, though he had not mentioned Robertson's confession, he sat still, wondering at Merril's composure.

"It sounds probable," said the latter, with a little smile. "You expect the skipper and the second engineer to bear you out? No doubt they promised, but when they get here the thing will wear another aspect. In fact, in all probability it will look too big for them. You see, they have merely put a certain construction upon one or two occurrences. It's quite likely they will be willing to admit that it is, after all, the wrong one."

"Since we intend to claim half the value of the Adelaide, they would have to answer on their oath in court."

Merril shook his head. "Half her value! I commence to understand," he said. "An appeal to the court is, as a rule, expensive, as I guess you know. It is generally wiser to be reasonable and make a compromise."

The suggestion was so characteristic of the man that Jimmy lost a little of his self-restraint.

"There will be no compromise in this case," he said. "If it were necessary we would drag you through every court in the land; but, as a matter of fact, there will be no need for that. You made a mistake in your opinion of the courage of your skipper and your second engineer. You also made a more serious one in putting the screw too hard on Robertson.".

"Ah!" said Merril sharply, at last, "there is something more?"

Jimmy took a paper from his pocket, and gravely handed it to him. "I am quite safe in allowing you to look at it. It wouldn't be advisable for you to make any attempt to destroy it. You will excuse my mentioning that."

Merril unfolded the document, and Jimmy noticed that the half-contemptuous toleration died out of his face as he read it. Then he quietly handed it back, and sat very still for at least a minute before he turned to his companion again.

"That rather alters the case. You have something to go upon. Do you mind telling me what course you purpose to take?"

"As I mentioned, I don't purpose to take any. Still, the Shasta Company will send in a claim for salvage to-morrow, and afterward sue you – or whoever you entrust with your affairs – unless it is met. The Adelaide should also be here in the course of the next day or two, and you will have your skipper and second engineer, as well as the miner who witnessed the statement, to face. They appear determined on raising as much unpleasantness as possible, though they were willing to hold back until I had taken the first steps."

He stopped a moment, and then leaned forward in his chair with a little forceful gesture. "Though it would please me to see you prosecuted and disgraced, I will at least take no steps to prevent your getting out of this city quietly."

"Ah!" said Merril, "you no doubt expect something for that concession?"

"No," and Jimmy stood up, "I expect nothing. It would hurt me to make a bargain of any kind with you, and it would, I think, be illegal. Still, I have the honor of informing you that I purpose to marry Miss Merril as soon as it appears convenient to her, in spite of any opposition that you may think fit to offer."

Merril showed neither astonishment nor anger. Instead he smiled quietly, and his companion surmised that he had already with characteristic promptness decided on his course of action.

"You have no objections to my sending for her?"

Jimmy said he had none, and five minutes later Anthea appeared. She stood near the door looking at the men, and saw that Jimmy's face was darkly flushed. Her father, however, appeared almost as composed as usual. Jimmy felt that he dare not look at her, and the tense silence, which lasted a few moments, tried his courage hard. It cost him an effort to hold himself in hand when Merril turned to the girl.

"I understand from Mr. Wheelock that you are willing to marry him. Is that the case?" he said.

"Yes," replied Anthea simply, while the blood crept into her cheeks. "That is, I shall be willing when circumstances permit."

"Then, in the meanwhile, at least, you would consider my wishes?"

Anthea glanced at Jimmy. "I think he understands that."

Merril said nothing for almost half a minute, and sat still regarding them with a sardonic smile, though his eyes were gentler than usual.

"Well," he said at last, "that is no more than one would have expected from you. Mr. Wheelock is, however, quite prepared to disregard my opposition. In fact, one could almost fancy that he will be a little grieved when I say that I do not mean to offer any."

Jimmy was certainly astonished, for he had at least expected that the man would make an attempt to play upon the girl's feelings. However, he said nothing, and Merril turned to her again.

"Well, I fancy that he has shown himself capable of looking after you, and there is a certain forceful simplicity in his character that, when I consider him as my daughter's husband, somewhat pleases me. With moderate good fortune it may carry him a long way."

It seemed an almost incomprehensible thing to Jimmy that the man should show no trace of vindictiveness, and perhaps the latter guessed it, for he laughed softly.

"Mr. Wheelock," he said, "as you have no doubt guessed, I never had much faith in the conventional code of morality, but since you seem determined to marry Anthea, I am in one respect glad that you evidently have, though that is perhaps not a very logical admission. I was out after money, and allowed no other consideration to influence me. It is probable that I should have accumulated a good deal of it had not everything gone against me lately. Well, if I showed no pity, I at least seldom allowed any rancor to betray me into injudicious action when other people treated me as I should have treated them; but, after all, that is not the question, and we will be practical. You will not see or write to Anthea for six months from to-day, and then if neither of you has changed your mind you can understand that you have my good-will. She will advise you of her address – in Toronto – in the meanwhile. It is not a great deal to promise."

Jimmy glanced at the girl, and turned again to Merril when she nodded.

"I pledge myself to that," he said.

"Then," said Merril, "you will leave us now. I have a good deal to say to Anthea."

Jimmy moved away without a word, and went down the corridor with every nerve in him tingling.