The Plunderer Page 10

  CHAPTER X

  TROUBLE STALKS ABROAD

  August had come, with its broiling heat at midday and its chill atnight, when the snow, perpetual on the peaks, sent its cold breezesdownward to the gulches below. Here and there the grass was dying. Thelines on Dick's brows had become visible; and even Mathews' resolutesanguinity was being tested to the utmost. The green lead was barelypaying expenses. There had come no justification for a night shift,and use of all the batteries of the mill, for the ledge of ore wasgradually, but certainly, narrowing to a point where it musteventually pinch out.

  Five times, in as many weeks, Dick had crossed the hill and waited forMiss Presby. Twice he had been bitterly disappointed, and three timesshe had cantered around to meet him. Their first meeting had beenconstrained. He felt that it was due to his own bald discovery thathe wanted her more than anything in life, and was debarred fromtelling her so. In the second meeting she had been the good comrade,and interested, palpably, in the developments at the Croix d'Or.

  "You should sink, I believe," she had said hesitatingly, as if with adelicate fear that she was usurping his position. "I know thisdistrict very well, indeed; and there isn't a mine along this rangethat has paid until it had gone the depth. Do I talk like a miner?"

  She laughed, in cheerful carelessness as if his worries meant butlittle to her.

  "You see, I've heard so much of mines and mining, although my fatherseldom talks of them to me, that I know the geological formation andhistory of this district like a real miner. I played with nothing butminers' children from the time I was so high, pigtails and pinafores,until I was this high, short skirts and frocks."

  She indicated the progressive stages of her growth with her ridingcrop, as if seeing herself in those younger years.

  "Then my father sent me to an aunt, in New York, with instructionsthat I was to be taught something, and to be a lady. I believe I usedto eat with my knife when I first went to her home."

  She leaned back and laughed until the tears welled into her eyes.

  "She was a Spartan lady. She cured me of it by rapping my knuckleswith the handle of a silver-plated knife. My, how it hurt! I feelit yet! I wonder that they were not enlarged by her repeatedadmonitions."

  Dick looked at them as she held them reminiscently before her, andhad an almost irresistible desire to seize and crush the long,slender, white fingers in his own. But the end of the meeting hadbeen commonplace, and they had parted again without treading onembarrassing ground.

  Dick had heard no more from the owner of the Rattler, save indirectly,nor met him since the strained passage of the bridge; but mess-housegossip, creeping through old Bells, who recognized no superiors, andcalmly clumped into the owner's quarters whenever he felt inclined,said that the neighboring mine was prodigiously prosperous.

  "I heard down in Goldpan," he squeaked one night, "that Wells Fargotakes out five or six bars of bullion for him every mill clean-up. Andyou can bet none of it ever gets away from that old stiff."

  "But how does this news leak out?" Dick asked, wondering at such atale, when millmen and miners were distinguished for keeping inviolatethe secrets of the property on which they worked.

  "Wells Fargo," the engineer answered. "None of the boys would sayanything. He pays top wages and hires good men. Got to hand that tohim. He brags there ain't no man so high-priced that he can't makemoney off'n him--Bully Presby does. And they ain't no better minerthan him on earth. He can smell pay ore a mile underground--BullyPresby can."

  The old man suddenly looked at the superintendent, and said: "Say,Bill. You been down to the camp a few times, ain't you?"

  "Yes, we've been down there several times. Why?"

  "Well, I suppose you know they's a lot of talk goin' around that theCross is workin' in good pay now?"

  "Oh, I've heard it; but don't pay any attention when it's not so."

  Bells Park leaned farther over, and lowered his shrill, garrulousvoice to a thin murmur.

  "Well, I cain't tell you what it is, but I want to give you the rightlead. When that gets to goin' on about newcomers in the BlueMountains--fellers like you be--look out for storms."

  "Go on! You're full of stuff again!" Bill gibed, with his heartylaugh. "If we'd listened to all the mysterious warnin's you've handedus since we came up here, Bells, we'd been like a dog chasin' his tailaround when it happened to be bit off down to the rump and no place toget hold of. Better look out! Humph!"

  The old engineer got up in one of his tantrums, fairly screamed withrage, threatened to leave as soon as he could get another job, andthen tramped down the hill to the cabin he occupied with the otherengineer. But that was not new, either, for he had made the samethreat at least a half-dozen times, and yet the men from the Coeurd'Alenes knew that nothing could drive him away but dismissal.

  It was but two or three days later that the partners, coming from theassay-house to the mess late, discovered a stranger talking to the menoutside under the shade of a great clump of tamaracks that nestled atthe foot of a slope. They passed in and sat down at their table,wondering who the visitor could be. The cook's helper, a mute, servedthem, and they were alone when they were attracted by a shrill, softhiss from the window. They looked, and saw Bells Park. Nothing buthis head, cap-crowned, was visible as he stood on tiptoe to reach theopening.

  "I told you to look out," he said warningly. "Old Mister Trouble'scome. Don't give anything. Stand pat. A walkin' delegate from Denver'shere. God knows why. Look out."

  His head disappeared as if it were a jack-in-the-box, shut down; andthe partners paused with anxious eyes and waited for him to reappear.Dick jumped to his feet and walked across to the window. No one was insight. He went to the farther end of the mess-house and peered througha corner of the nearest pane. Out under the tamaracks the stranger wasorating, and punctuating his remarks with a finger tapping in a palm.His words were not audible; but Dick saw that he was at leastreceiving attention. He returned to the table, and told Bill what hehad seen. The latter was perturbed.

  "It looks as if we were goin' to have an argument, don't it?" heasked, voicing his perplexity.

  "But about what?" Dick insisted. "We pay the union scale, and, while Idon't know, I believe there isn't a man on the Cross that hasn't acard."

  "Well," replied his partner, "we'll soon see. Finished?"

  As they walked to the office, men began to hurry across the gulchtoward the hoist, others toward the mill, and by the time they were intheir cabin the whistle blew. It was but a minute later that theyheard someone striding over the porch, and the man they assumed to bethe walking delegate entered. He was not of the usual stamp, butappeared intent on his errand. Save for a certain air of craftiness,he was representative and intelligent. He was quietly dressed, andgave the distinct impression that he had come up from the mines, andhad known a hammer and drill--a typical "hard-rock man."

  "Gentlemen," he said, "I am representing the Consolidated Miners'Association."

  He drew a neat card from a leather case in his pocket, and presentedit, and was asked to seat himself.

  "What can we do for you?" Dick asked, wasting no time on words.

  "I suppose this mine is fair?"

  "Yes. It is straight, as far as I know."

  "It has no agreement."

  "But we are ready to sign one whenever it is presented."

  The delegate drew a worn wallet from his pocket, extracted a paper,and tendered it.

  "I anticipated no trouble," he said, but without smiling or giving anysign of satisfaction. "Would you mind looking that over, and seeing ifit meets with your approval?"

  Dick stepped to the high desk at the side of the room which he hadbeen utilizing as a drawing board, laid the sheet out, and beganreading it, while Bill stood up and scanned it across his shoulders.Bill suddenly put a stubby finger on a clause, and mumbled: "That'snot right."

  Dick slowly read it; and, before he had completed the involvedwording, the finger again clapped down at another section. "Nor that.D
on't stand for it!"

  "What do you want, anyhow?" Bill demanded, swinging round and facingthe delegate.

  The latter looked at him coolly and exasperatingly for a moment, thensaid: "What position do you occupy here, my man?"

  Dick whirled as if he had been struck from behind.

  "What position does he occupy? He is my superintendent, and my friend.Anything he objects to, or sanctions, I object to, or agree with.Anything he says, I'll back up. Now I'll let him do the talking."

  The delegate calmly flicked the ash from a cigar he had lighted,puffed at it, blew the smoke from under his mustache toward theceiling, and looked at the thin cloud before answering. It was as ifhe had come intent on creating a disturbance through studiedinsolence.

  "Well," he said, without noticing the hot, antagonistic attitude ofthe mine owner, "what do you think of the proffered agreement?"

  "I think it's no good!" answered Mathews, facing him. "It's drawn upon a number-one scale. This mine ain't in that class."

  "Oh! So you've signed 'em before."

  "I have. A dozen times. This mine has but one shift--the regular dayshift. It has but one engineer and a helper. It has but one millboss."

  "Working eight batteries?"

  "No. You know we couldn't work eight batteries with one small shift."

  "Well, you've got to have an assistant millman at the union scale, youknow," insisted the delegate.

  "What to do? To loaf around, I suppose," Bill retorted.

  "And you've got to have a turn up in the engine-house. You needanother hoisting engineer," continued the delegate, as if all thesematters had been decided by him beforehand.

  Dick thought that he might gain a more friendly footing by taking partin the conversation himself.

  "See here," he said. "The Croix d'Or isn't paying interest. Maybe wearen't using the requisite number of men as demanded under thisrating; but they are all satisfied, and----"

  "I don't know about that," interrupted the delegate, with an air ofinsolent assurance.

  "And if we can't go on under the present conditions, we may as wellshut down," Dick concluded.

  "That's up to you," declared the delegate, with an air of disinterest."If a mine can't pay for the working, it ought to shut down."

  The partners looked at each other. There was a mutual question as towhether it would be policy to throw the delegate out of the door.Plainly they were in a predicament, for the man was master, in hisway.

  "Look here," Bill said, accepting the responsibility, "this ain'tright. You know it ain't. We're in another class altogether. You oughtto put us, at present, under----"

  "It is right," belligerently asserted the delegate. "I've looked itall over. You'll agree to it, or I'll declare the Croix d'Or unfair."

  He had arisen to his feet as if arbitrarily to end the argument. For awonder, the veteran miner restrained himself, although there was ahard, glowing light in his eyes.

  "We won't stand for it," he said, restraining Dick with his elbow."When you're ready to talk on a square basis, come back, and we'll usethe ink. Until then we won't. We might as well shut down, first aslast, as to lose money when we're just breakin' even as it is. Thinkit over a while, and see if we ain't right."

  "Well, you'll hear from me," declared the delegate, as he put his haton his head and turned out of the door without any parting courtesy."Keep the card. My name's Thompson, you know."

  For a full minute after he had gone, the partners stared at each otherwith troubled faces.

  "Oh, he's a bluff! That's all there is to it," asserted Mathews,reaching into the corner for his rubber boots, preparatory to goingunderground. "He knows it ain't right, just as well as I do. If he canput this over, all right. If he can't he'll give us the otherrating."

  He left Dick making up a time-roll, and turned down the hill; and theydid not discuss it again until they were alone that night.

  It was seven o'clock the next evening when the partners observed anunusual stir in the camp. They came into the mess-house to find thatthe men had eaten in unusually short order; and from the benchoutside, usually filled at that hour with laughing loungers, there wasnot a sound. A strange stillness had invaded the colony of the Croixd'Or, almost ominous. Preoccupied, and each thinking over hisindividual trials, the partners ate their food and arose from thetable. Out on the doorstep they paused to look down the canyon, nowshorn of ugliness and rendered beautiful by the purple twilight. Thefaint haze of smoke from the banked fires, rising above the steelchimney of the boiler-house, was the only stirring, living spectaclevisible; save one.

  "What does that mean?" Bill drawled, as if speaking to himself.

  Far below, just turning the bend of the road, Dick saw a procession ofmen, grouped, or walking in pairs. They disappeared before heanswered.

  "Looks like the boys," he said, using the term of the camps for allmen employed. "I wonder where they are bound for? If it were paynight, I could understand. It would mean Goldpan, the dance halls, afight or two, and sore heads to-morrow; but to-night--I don't know."

  Bill did not answer. He seemed to be in a silent, contemplative moodwhen they sat in the rough easy-chairs on the porch in front of theoffice and looked up at the first rays of light on the splendid,rugged peak above. Dick's mind reverted to the lumberman's daughter,as does the needle veer to the magnet; and for a long time they satthere, until the fires of their cigars glowed like stars. The mooncame up, and the cross was outlined, dimly, above them, and againstthe background of black, cast upon the somber, starlit blue of thenight.

  From far below, as if steel had been struck upon stone, came a faint,ringing sound. Living in that strange world of acuteness to which menof the high hills are habituated, they listened, alert. Accustomed, asare all those dwellers of the lonesome spots, to heeding anything outof the ordinary, they strained their ears for a repetition. Clatteringup the roadway came the sound of a hard-ridden horse's hoofs, then hislabored breathing, and a soft voice steadying him to further effort.Into the shadows was injected something moving, some unfamiliar,living shape. It turned up the hill over the trail, and plungedwearily toward them. They jumped to their feet and stepped down offthe porch, advancing to meet the belated visitor. The horse, withlathering neck and distended nostrils, paused before them. The mooncleared the top of the eastern ridges with a slow bound, lowering theshadows until the sweat on the horse's neck glistened like a networkof diamond dust strewn on a velvet cloak. It also lighted to a pallidgleam the still face of the night rider. It was Lily Meredith.

  "I've come again," she said. "They're trying to make trouble for you,down there in the camp. Bells Park came out and told me about it. Theminers' union stirred up by that man from Denver. Bells said the onlychance you had was to come down there at once. They've split on youraccount--on account of the Croix d'Or. I've ridden two miles to warnyou, and to get you there before the meeting breaks up. Bells will tryand hold them until you can come and demand a hearing. If you don'tmake it they will scab the mine. You must hurry. It's your onlychance. I know them, the best friends in peace, and devils when turnedthe other way."

  She stopped abruptly and looked off at the moon, and then around overthe dark and silent camp. Only one light was visible, that in thecook's end of the mess-house, where that fat worthy lay upon his backand read a yellow-backed, sentimental novel. Faint and rumbling camethe subdued roar of the mill at the Rattler, beating out the gold forBully Presby; and through some vague prescience Dick was aware of itsnoise for the first time in weeks, and it conveyed a sense of menace.Everything was at stake. Everything watched him. He looked up at thewhite face of The Lily above him, and in the moonlight saw that hereyes were fixed, glowing, not on him or the scenes of the night, buton the aroused giant at his side.