Ridgwell Cullum

“ It lies at the door of others. It lies at the door of two men only. The man who first set up this great mill at Sachigo, and the man whose hate of him desired its destruction. The rest, you, those others, Bull Sternford and Harker, here, are simply the pawns in the battle which owes its inception to those things that happened years ago. I tell you solemnly, child, no living soul but those two, and chiefly the first of the two, are to blame for the things that have happened to-day. Set your mind easy. No one blames you. No one ever will blame you. ”

“ Can you? I'll raise every sort of hell to fix you good and happy. And you and me, together, we'll just send this great Sachigo of ours booming sky high, and in a year I promise to hand you the wreckage that was once the Skandinavia. Marry me, dear, and I'll show you the thing a man can be and do. And I'll make you forget the ruffian I've had to act towards you. Will you let me help you to forget? Will you—?"
Nancy's eyes were frankly raised to the passionate gaze which revealed the depths of the man's great heart. ”

“ Bull laughed. He was in the mood to laugh—now.
"It sounds fine. Say—"
"Are you laughing at me?"
"There isn't a thing further from my thoughts." Bull's denial was sincere and prompt. "I'm glad you happened along. I'm glad you said those things. Fight this war—as I shall—with all that's in you. It don't matter a thing if you're right or wrong. Fight it square and hard for your folk, and there isn't a right man or woman, but who'll respect you, and think the better of you for it. A good fight's no crime when you're convinced you're right." ”

“ Murder! The horror of it all had driven her well-nigh demented when she gazed from the distance while the two men disposed of Arden Laval's body under the snow. The dogs? They had been left where they fell. The living had been cut loose from their trappings to roam the forests at their will, while the dead had remained to satisfy the fierce hunger of the savage forest creatures. Even the sled had been destroyed, and its wood used to make fire that the living might endure on those pitiless northern heights. ”

“ To the girl's imagination there could be no break in it until the eternal snows of the Arctic were reached.
The breadth of it all was a little overwhelming. Nancy was gazing upon just one portion of the Skandinavia's untouched forest limits, and somehow it left her with a feeling of protest.
She pointed with one gauntleted hand, stirred to an impulse she could not deny.
"It's too beautiful," she said. "It isn't fair: it's not right. To think it's all ours, and we have the right to destroy it." ”

“ If I'd killed him all the things and purposes I've worried with since I left college would have been just so much junk; and I'd have drifted into the life of a bum lumber-jack without any sort of notion beyond rye whiskey, and the camp women, and a well swung axe. You saved me from that. You saved me from myself. Well, you're real welcome to ask me any old thing, and I'll hand you all the truth there is in me. I'm an 'illegitimate.' I'm one of the world's friendless. I'm a product of a wealthy man's licence and unscruple. I'm an outcast amongst the world's honest born. ”

“ Maybe you know only part of the things I know about myself. If you knew them all I'd hate to think of the contempt you'd have to hand me. You see, Bat, I'm a coward, a terrible moral coward. Oh, I'm not scared of any man living when it comes to a fight. But my mind's full of ghosts and nightmares ready to jump at me with every doubt, every new effort where I can't figure the end. Years ago, when I was a youngster, I yearned for fortune. ”

“ Nancy was again on the Terrace. But now she was standing on the edge of the promenade—alone. She was gazing down at the grey waters of the great river, searching with eager eyes, and listening for the "hoot" of the vessel's siren. This was the last departure the Empress would make from Quebec for the season. By the time she returned across the ocean the ice would deny her approach, and she would make port farther seawards.
Nancy had come there in her leisure just out of simple interest, she told herself. The man was nothing to her. Oh, no. She felt a certain regret that they were at war. ”

“ The bunkhouses, the stores, the offices, the stables, they must all be ready before the coming of the "freeze-up." Summer is the time of preparation. Winter is the season when the lumber-jack's work must go forward without cessation or break of any sort. Not even the excuse of sickness can be accepted. There is no excuse. The lumber-jack must work, or sink to the dregs of a life that has already created in him a spirit of indifference to the laws of God and man. So the life of the forest is hard and fierce, and the battle of it all is long. ”

“ There were moments, even, when the things he beheld, the things he thought became distorted. But he knew that somewhere ahead a ghostly outfit of strangers was pursuing its evil work against him, and he meant to come up with it, and to wreak his vengeance in merciless, summary fashion. His purpose had become an obsession in the long sleepless days and nights he had endured.
It was war. It was bitter ruthless war on the barren hinterland of Labrador, where civilisation was unknown. Mercy? Nature never designed that terrible wilderness as a setting for mercy. ”

“ As you say, we start right in chasing happiness in the way we fancy. It seems to me the only real happiness in life is in doing. Ease, wealth, love, all the things folk talk and write about are just dreams of happiness that aren't real. Work, achievement, even if it's wrong-headed—that's life; that's happiness. That's why I'd say there's nothing foolish in a girl putting up with dangers and discomforts to bring two enterprises to an understanding, calculated to promote a greater achievement for both. It's my little notion of snatching a bunch of happiness for myself. ”

“ It was far out in the lost world of Northern Quebec. It was far, far beyond the widest-flung frontiers of civilisation. It was out there where man soon learns to forget his birthright, and readily yields to the animal in him.
It was a scene of mighty slaughter amongst the giants of the forest. Hundreds sprawled in the path of man's gleaming axe. Giants they were, hoary with age, and gnarled with the sinews built up by Nature to resist her fiercest storms. ”

“ Father Adam nodded.
"And those are the things a man's entitled to. Just those," he said. "If a man wants more it's up to him. He must earn it in competition with the rest of his fellows. If he can't earn it he must do without, or quit the honesty that entitles him to hold his head up in the world. There's no honesty in the things these men propose."
"That's so, Father."
There was decision in the man's agreement. But even as he spoke his gaze wandered in the direction of two small children, like bundles of fur, playing in the snow. ”

“ Bull's smile deepened. The girl's incredulity amused him. He understood. To her the Skandinavia Corporation was the beginning and end of all things. In her eyes it was the last word in power and influence and wealth. She knew nothing beyond—the Skandinavia. A man in her place would have received prompt and biting retort. But she was a girl, and Bull was young, and strong, and at the beginning of a great manhood. ”

“ Nancy's denial was almost sharp. It certainly was hurried. "I'm kind of glad I've seen you, though," she went on. "I've had it in mind I wanted to say things to you." A smile came back to her eyes. "You see, there are enemies and enemies. There's the enemy you can regard well. There's the enemy you can hate and despise. Well, I just want to say we're enemies who don't need to hate and despise—yet. I don't know how things'll be later. Maybe you'll learn to hate me good before we're through. But that's as maybe. I'm going to do my work for all I know for my folks. ”

“ You're just talking out of years of experience of a life you've probably learned to hate. Man, if that's your opinion of your fellows, then it's you who ought never to leave the forest you claim does its best to hide up folk from the eyes of the rest of the world. You're a camp boss. You're our head man in these forests. You're trusted, and we know your skill. Well, it seems to me you've a duty that goes further than just feeding the booms right. You've a moral duty towards these men you condemn. ”

“ The picture of Nancy, radiantly beautiful, seated at dinner with Bull Sternford had lit a fire of bitter hatred in his Teutonic heart. So he paced the room and permitted the fierce tide to flood the channels of sanity and set them awash with the ready evil of his impulse.
From the first moment of the girl's story of her successful effort with this man, Sternford, this vaunting rival, Peterman had been bitterly stirred. The man's change of plans at her bidding he had understood on the instant. The man from Labrador had not changed his plans at the bidding of the Skandinavia. ”

“ Hellbeam stirred in his chair impatiently. His lips seemed to become more prominent. His small eyes seemed to become smaller.
"You ask that, yes? You?" he snorted. "A child may answer that thing. You think? Oh, yes, you think." The hand supporting his cigar made a gesture that implied everything disparaging. "Our man—this Martin—has gone out of Sachigo because—of you? I tell you, no! Does a man give up the money, the big plan he makes, at the sight of an—agent? He took you in his hand and sent you to the swine life of the forest where he could have crushed you like that." ”

“ You see, Nancy, you're just a woman. You're just as tender and gentle—and—womanly, as God made you to be. He gave you a beautiful woman's heart, and a courage that was quite wonderful till it came into conflict with your heart. You had no right to be flung into this thing. And only a man of Peterman's lack of scruple could have done such a thing. Well, I'm not going to preach a long sermon, but I want to tell you some of the things I've got in my mind before I get the sleep I need. God knows that none of this thing you're blaming yourself for lies at your door. ”

“ The idea that Skandinavia could be crushed was quite unthinkable to Nancy. It was the great monopoly of the country. It was—but she felt that this lonely creature could have no real understanding of the power of her people.
"Surely," he returned quietly. "But that," he added, with a return of his pleasant smile, "is just the notion of one man. I should say it's no real account. Yes, you go there. You see this man. The battle of your people with him matters little. It will be good for you to see him. It—may help you. Who can tell? He's a white man, and a fighter. He's honest and clean. ”

“ His voice came back to the man at the table, while his eyes gazed down upon the waters of Farewell Cove, over the widespread roofs of the great groundwood mill, the building of which was the result of his seven years' sojourn on the Labrador coast.
"You've handed it me, Bat," he said, in a quick, nervous way. "I'll fight. I know. You guess I'm scared at Nisson's news. Maybe I am, I don't know. I'm not a man of iron guts. Maybe I never shall be. It's hell to me to feel a shadow dogging my every step. ”

“ There's the other things. Why should I go on living here, working, slaving, haunted by the terror of Hellbeam? With my boy, my wife, to fight for it was worth all the agony. But without them—why? Why in the name of sanity should I go on? To beat the Skandinavians out of Canada's trade, and claim it all for a country that doesn't care a curse? To build up a great name that in the end must be dragged in the mire of public estimation? Not on your life, Bat. ”

“ Bull's smile was no less whimsical.
"Yes. You've guts of iron, boy. And I've been looking years for just such a man."
"That sounds—tough," Bull laughed, but he was interested. "What's the job you want him for? Are you yearning to hand out a killing? Is it a trip—a trip to some waste space of God's earth that 'ud freeze up a normal heart? Do you want a feller to beat the laws of God and man? Guts of iron! It certainly sounds tough, and I'm not sure you've found the feller you're needing." ”

“ I hope I'm a feller of some guts—"
Father Adam nodded, and his eyes lit.
"Sure," was all he commented.
"Anyway, I feel like it," Bull laughed. "When I learned all these things I started right in to think. I thought like hell. I said to myself something like this: 'There's nothing to hold me where I am. There's no one around to care a curse. There's that feeling right inside the pit of my stomach makes me feel I want to make good. I want to build up around me all that my birth has refused me. A name, a life circle, a power, a—anyway, get right out and do things! ”

“ And if you knew the thing I know you wouldn't harden all up as you listen to the things I'm saying:—"
"But—"
Bull flung his cigar away with vicious force.
"Let me say this thing out," he went on. "There's a man in the forest I know, every jack knows. He's a feller who sort of lives in the twilight. You see, he sort of comes and goes; and no one knows a thing about him, except he haunts the forests like a shadow. Well, he's settin' the notion you feel into practice—in a way. He's out for the boys. To help 'em, physically, spiritually, the whole time. They love him. We all love him to death. ”

“ They were out for loot, they were out to grab the things and the power that other folks set up. Any old death that hit them they amply deserved. As for our folk who've gone under—well, we mustn't think too deeply that way. We all took our chances, and some had to go. I was ready to go. So was Bat. So were we all. We wanted victory, and we wanted it for those who survived. We honour our dead, but our lives must not be clouded by their going. It's war—human war. And just as long as the world lasts that war will always be. ”