The Greater Power

“It was very pleasant while it lasted, but–and it’s a pity–the music has stopped,” he said. “What we are now listening to is the turmoil of a Canadian river.”

Laura laughed, though there was a wistfulness in her eyes. “Oh, I understand, but couldn’t you have let me forget it just for to-night?” she said. “I suppose that privilege was permitted to Cinderella.”

The man felt curiously sorry for her as he remembered how hard her life was at the lonely ranch, but he knew she would not be pleased if he expressed his thoughts.

“Well,” he observed reflectively, “a thing often looks most attractive when it’s forbidden you, or a long way off, and, you see, there are always compensations. In fact, I’m beginning to come across quite a few of them.”

He broke off for a moment, and Laura, who noticed that he looked at her, fancied she understood in what direction his thoughts were drifting; but he went on again with a laugh.

“After all,” he said, “there are exiles who realize that they are in various ways better off than in all probability they would have been had they stayed in the land they were driven out of.”

“Ah,” answered Laura, “would you go back if you were given the opportunity?”

“No,” Nasmyth asserted slowly, “I don’t think I should do that–now.”

Again she understood him, the more clearly because she saw by the slight wrinkling of his forehead, during the significant pause, that he had grappled with the question. She did not think he was altogether in love with her, but she knew, at least, that he did not wish to go away while she was left behind in Canada. It seemed desirable to change the subject, and she touched the lace.

“I have to thank you for this,” she said. “It has given me pleasure.” Then–and the words were wholly unpremeditated–she added: “I wanted to look well–just for once–to-night.”

She was sorry, a moment later, when she saw the quick change in the man’s expression, for she remembered that they had always seemed to understand what the other meant. It was clear that the qualification just for once had not misled him, but, after all, it seemed to her that he must presently realize that the admission was not one a reticent woman really in love with him would have made.

“Oh,” he said, “you are always beautiful.” Then his manner became deprecatory. “I didn’t think you’d mind. In one way what I owe you makes me a privileged person. I felt that I could venture–”

This, too, was clear to her, and though she considered his attitude the correct one, it jarred a little upon her. She was content that they should be merely comrades, or, at least, that was what she had endeavoured to convince herself, but, after all, there was no reason why he should emphasize the fact.

“Yes,” she replied quickly, “I think I understand.” Then once more she changed the subject. “I want to compliment you on building the dam.”

Nasmyth laughed, but there was a light in his eyes. “I should never have built it, if it hadn’t been for you. Still”–and he made her a reverent bow–“I owe you a good deal more than that.”

Laura made no response to this. She had thrilled at his achievement, when she had heard the manager’s speech, and it became still plainer that there was a certain hazard in dwelling upon his success. She could also be practical.

“In one way,” she said, “I suppose the result was not quite so satisfactory?”

“It certainly wasn’t. Of course, the work is not quite completed yet, but after settling up everything, the interim payment left me with about fifteen dollars in hand.”

Laura was not astonished at this, but she was more than a little perplexed, for she fancied that the lace she was wearing must have cost a good deal more than fifteen dollars. Still, she had no wish to make it evident that he had been extravagant; and, while she considered the matter, a man appeared in the doorway.

“I guess you two have got to come right out,” he said. “What d’you figure you were asked here for?”

Nasmyth held his arm out, but when Laura would have laid her hand upon it, the man broke in with a grin.

“No, sir,” he said severely, “Miss Waynefleet’s going right round. Now you’re coming along with me, and we’ll show them how to waltz.”

Laura smiled good-humouredly, and he swept her into the dance, while Nasmyth was seized upon by a girl, who drove him through it much as she did her brother’s steers in the Bush.

“A bump or two don’t count for much. What you want to do is to hump yourself and make things hum,” said Nasmyth’s partner, when another couple jostled them.

Nasmyth expressed his concurrence in a gasp, and contrived to save her from another crash, but when the dance was over, he felt limp, and was conscious that his partner was by no means satisfied with him.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Still, I really think I did what I could.”

The girl regarded him half compassionately. “Well,” she said, “it wasn’t very much, but I guess you played yourself out building that blamed dam.”

CHAPTER VIII

BY COMBAT

Nasmyth’s partner condescended, as she said, to give him another show, but he escaped from that dance with only a few abrasions, and, though he failed to obtain another with Laura, he contrived to enjoy himself. All his Bush friends were not primitive. Some of them had once played their parts in much more brilliant functions. They had cultivated tastes, and he had learned to recognize the strong points of those who had not. After all, kindly hearts count for much, and it was not unnatural that, like other exiles who have plodded up and down that rugged land, he should think highly of the hard-handed men and patient women who willingly offer a night’s shelter and a share of their dried apples, salt pork, and grindstone bread to the penniless wanderer.

What was more to the purpose, a number of the guests at the dance had swung the axe by his side, and fought the river with him when the valley was filled with the roar of water.

They had done their work gallantly, when it seemed out of the question that they would ever receive the money he had promised them, from sheer pride in their manhood, and to keep their word, and now they danced as determinedly.

There are no cramping conventions and very few shams–and the shams in those forests, it must be confessed, are as a rule imported ones. In fact, there was that evening, among all those in the pulp-mill, only one man who seemed to disassociate himself from the general good-will. That man was Waynefleet. He wore his old velvet jacket as a cloak of superciliousness–or, at least, that was how it seemed to the Bush-ranchers, who recognized and resented an effete pride in the squeak of his very ancient lacquered shoes. It is possible that he did not mean to make himself in any way offensive, and merely desired to indicate that he was graciously willing to patronize their bucolic festivities. There would have been something almost pathetic in his carefully preserved dignity had it not been so obtrusively out of place; and when they stood watching him for a moment or two, Gordon expressed Nasmyth’s thoughts.

“How a man of that kind ever came to be Laura Waynefleet’s father is more than I can figure out!” he said. “It’s a question that worries me every time I look at him. Guess she owes everything to her mother; and Mrs. Waynefleet must have been a mighty patient woman.”

Nasmyth smiled, but Gordon went on reflectively: “You folks show your sense when you dump your freaks into this country,” he said. “It never seems to strike you that it’s a little rough on us. What’s the matter with men like Waynefleet is that you can’t teach them sense. I’d have told him what I thought of him once or twice when I saw the girl doing his work up at the ranch if I’d figured it would have made any impression.”

“I expect it would have been useless,” remarked Nasmyth. “After all, I’m not sure that it’s exactly your business.”

Gordon watched Laura Waynefleet as she swung through a waltz on the arm of a sinewy rancher, and his eyes softened curiously.

“Only on the girl’s account,” he admitted. “I’m sorry for her. Stills the blamed old image isn’t actively unkind.”

Then he saw the sudden contraction of Nasmyth’s face, and turned toward him. “Now,” he said, “I want you to understand this thing. If it would be any comfort to her, I’d let Miss Waynefleet wipe her boots on me, and in one way that’s about all I’m fit for. I know enough to realize that she’d never waste a moment thinking of a man like me, even if I hadn’t in another way done for myself already.”

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