Part 18

"It's behind me now, and the folks I left down there in Vancouver are alive and waiting for me. It's--kind of wonderful, but Ned Jordan fixed it all. Well, I'm not the only one who'll bless the _Champlain_ and him."

Niven felt curiously moved as he went down into the hold, and long afterwards the memory of the lonely man staring south across the dusky sea from the bows of the _Champlain_ returned to him. Just then, however, his blood was tingling with exultation. He, too, was going home, and there were folks in England waiting to welcome him.

Next day it was blowing tolerably fresh, but though the spray whirled about them and the seas frothed white behind, not an inch of canvas was taken in, and it was with a little smile in his haggard face that Tom Allardyce held the wheel. As it happened the favouring wind swept south with them, and one morning a cry brought every man on deck.

"There, that's _British Columbia_," said Stickine when the lads stared over the rail. "She'd most have licked the C.P.R. steamer."

Looking east the lads could see a great white rampart lifted high against the sky. Drifting mists cut it off from the world below, and here and there the fires of sunrise burned up from behind it through the hollows between the peaks. No light, however, touched the western snow as yet, and it shone ethereally majestic in its blue-white purity. Then a single golden ray streamed heavenward like a flash of a celestial beacon, and the lads watched it in wondering silence held still almost in awe, and forgot the limitless sweep of prairie, rock and forest that lay between those mountains' eastern slope and Montreal, until Stickine'e voice reminded them that they had still work to do.

"She'd go home faster, boys, with another foot of main-sheet in," he said, cheerily.

It was a week later when one night they crept past Port Parry before a faint wind. Ahead the lights of Victoria blinked at them, and every now and then a smoky haze drove athwart the moon, while Appleby, watching the dusky shore slide by, could almost have fancied it was once more the night he and Niven had been blown away from the _Aldebaran_. She was not there, however, and though the scene was the same he and his comrade had changed. They had seen things few men have looked upon up in the misty seas, and the spirit of the silent North had set its stamp on them, giving them gravity in place of boyish exuberance, and for the quality Niven had esteemed as dash the sterner, colder courage of steadfastness.

Presently a sailing-boat came flitting towards them, and a man in her waved his liaud.

"Hello, Jordan! Going straight across?" he said.

"Oh, yes," said Jordan, who seemed to recognize the voice. "I'm getting along as fast as I can, though there's not much wind. Have you anything for us?"

"No," said the man. "I just wanted to make sure of you. Holway of Vancouver asked me to wire him if I saw you pass."

"Well," said Jordan, "what has it to do with him?"

"I don't know," said the other man, as the boat dropped astern. "Still, he seemed quite anxious to hear when you were coming."

Jordan turned to Stickine. "There's something I don't understand. I don't owe a dollar to Holway or anybody."

Niven heard a little chuckle, and drew Appleby away as he saw that Donegal was grinning at them. "I fancy Ned Jordan will get a surprise to-morrow. It's you and I Holway is anxious about," said he.

An hour later Jordan called them into the little cabin. "We'll be in to-morrow, and have got to have a talk," he said. "Now, I've a use onboard the _Champlain_ for lads like you, and would be open to take you again next season, but"--and he looked at Niven--"you'll be hearing from your folks in the old country?"

"Yes, sir," said Niven, checking a smile with difficulty, as he glanced at Appleby. "I fancy they will want me home again."

"It would cost a good many dollars to take you there, and this is a great country for a young man who wants to make his living," said Jordan. "You figure they will send you them?"

"Yes, sir," said Niven gravely. "I believe they will."

"Well," said Jordan, "in the meanwhile you can come home with me. That leaves your partner out, and he turned to Appleby. "Now, if you're open to sail north again it's quite likely I might get you something to do this winter on the wharf or in a mill, and I guess Mrs. Jordan could find room in the house for you."

Appleby felt the kindliness which had prompted this offer to one whom the skipper evidently believed to be a destitute lad, and his face flushed a little.

"It is very good of you, sir, but I fancy my contract with the shipowners is binding still," he said. "Anyway, I would like to write and ask Mr. Niven."

Jordan nodded. "One has to do the square thing. Take your time, my lad, and I'll put you in the way of earning your keep in the meanwhile."

Then Niven stood up. "I fancy he will go ashore with me to-morrow, sir," he said. "That is why, as I may not have another opportunity, I want to thank you for the kindness you have shown us both. I believe that others, as well as Appleby and I, will always be grateful to you."

Jordan looked at him curiously, and then made a little gesture of impatience. "Now, that's a kind of talking I've no use for, and you've earned everything you got out of me. You'll let me know what you're going to do to-morrow, Appleby."

They went back to their duties, Niven chuckling over something with evident delight, and it was next day when they crept past the pines on Beaver Point, into view of the clustering roofs of Vancouver. As they slid into the blue inlet a boat came pulling towards them, and while the mainsail peak swung down a gentleman climbed on board. Jordan, who recognized him as one of the wealthiest merchants of that city, nodded in salute, and then stared at him in astonishment.

"You'll know me, Captain Jordan, though I've not had the pleasure of talking to you before," he said. "I've come for the two lads you picked up, and with your permission I'd like to take them now. Niven's father has asked me to look after them, and you'll find them at my house any time you want them the next few days."

Jordan seemed to gasp, Stickine nodded, and Donegal smiled curiously as he glanced at the skipper.

"I could let them off their work to-day, though they're not through yet," said Jordan. "Still, I was figuring on their going along with me. They might worry Mrs. Holway, and my wife is used to lads from the schooners."

The merchant, who laid his hand on Niven's shoulder, laughed a little. "I scarcely fancy they'll go to sea as sealers again," he said. "Boys, we'll go right along, and you needn't worry about your things. We'll get you an outfit at a store in the city."

The lads shook hands with Jordan, who had apparently not yet recovered from his astonishment, and only looked at them gravely when Niven said, "Thank you for letting us off, sir, and I'll just bid you good-morning now, because we're coming down to see you and the boys again."

Then they sprang into the boat, and Jordan shook his head bewilderedly as they pulled away. "Well, I'm jim-banged--and that lad was talking straight all the while," he said. "Going along to stay with one of the biggest men in Vancouver City!"

"Sure," said Donegal, "an' who would take better care av the son av a ducal earl?"

In the meanwhile Niven and Appleby went home with Mr. Holway to a very pretty wooden house on the hill above the city, where they revelled in the luxury of a bath with hot water and clean towels, and new clothes, though it took them an hour or two to get used to the tight collars that galled their necks. The merchant and his wife were also very kind to them, and when they concluded the recountal of their adventures late that night, Niven said, "Now, there's one thing I would like, and that would be to do something for all of them. I feel quite sure my father would be pleased with it."

Mr. Holway nodded. "I believe he would. In fact, he wrote me to make the skipper any recompense that appeared advisable. The trouble, however, is that things are different here from what they are in the old country, and these men earn dollars enough themselves to resent any attempt to pay them for a kindness."

"Still, it could be managed somehow," said Niven.

"Yes," said Mr. Holway, "I believe it could. We can find out if the skipper wants, for example, a good sextant, and I've a notion that the men would be pleased if you gave them a farewell dinner. It would show that you still looked upon yourself as one of them."

"Yes," said Niven, "that would be the best thing."

When they next saw Jordan he was squaring accounts with the men, and apparently too busy to do more than nod to them. They accordingly waited among the rest, who were dressed much as they were in neat, new clothes, and had only the bronze in their, faces and the steadiness of their eyes, to show they were from the sea, until at last he drew his pen through two lines on the roll on the table in front of him.

"Christopher Niven and Thomas Appleby," he said, holding out two little piles of silver coins with a few bills beneath them on a document. "Look through that, and tell me if it's all quite straight before you sign it."

Niven flushed a trifle as he said, "I don't fancy we should take the dollars, sir."

Jordan looked at him somewhat grimly. "I've a good deal to put through, and no use for talking," he said. "You made the deal the night I found you, and they're yours, my lad."

The lads took the dollars, and found Mr. Holway waiting for them when they went out. He glanced at the handfuls of coin, and laughed a little as he asked, "Whose are all those dollars?"

"They're mine," said Niven, with a trace of pride in his smile. "I've earned them, and I fancy it would astonish the folks at home. My father used to tell me now and then that I'd never have a shilling that wasn't given me. Now take me to one of your biggest shops, because I'm going to buy my mother a brooch or a bracelet with the first money I ever earned in my life."

The merchant nodded gravely. "I fancy that would only be the square thing," he said. "Now, I was keeping myself and my sister when I was younger than you."

The bracelet was bought, and during the day Niven sent a note down to the schooner, while on the next evening they and the sealers sat down to a very elaborate dinner in a big room of the Canadian Pacific Hotel. They were all of them present, and nobody appeared in any way uncomfortable or ill at ease in his unusual clothes, for the life they led had made them men, which is very much the same and occasionally a greater thing than gentlemen. In fact, Niven felt curiously abashed when before they went into the dining room he spread out before them the things he had brought. There was a silver-mounted sextant for Jordan, a knife that most sealers coveted with an inlaid handle for Stickine, a watch for Donegal, and boxes of tobacco for every one of the rest.

"I'd like you to take these little things just to remember us by," he said diffidently. "I wouldn't have asked you if they had been of any value, but it would be good of you to keep them, because you have, though of course it isn't for that, done a good deal for Appleby and me."

Donegal's eyes twinkled. "Tis twice, anyway, I've run ye round the deck wid a rope's end, and I would have licked ye often if 'twould have been of any use," he said. "Sure, we'll take them and remember ye. 'Tis not every day the son av a ducal earl goes sealing with me."

Then they went in to dinner, and when Niven had insisted on Jordan taking the head of the table most of them made a somewhat astonishing meal, that is, to those who did not know how the sealers ate and worked. Afterwards there were a few speeches, but these were to the point and short.

"Mr. Niven and boys," said Jordan. "I've had a good company with me this run, and the next time I go to sea I don't want a better one. I'm counting the lads in, and we'll feel kind of lonely without them when they go back to the old country. That's 'bout all. I'm not much use at talking."

Then Donegal stood up and rubbed his coppery hair. "Sure," he said, "'tis rough on me. They're taking my bhoys away--just when me and Stickine was licking them into men. Still, I'll be bearing it better if 'tis credit they're doing us in the old country. Boys, ye will not go back on Donegal, and if sealing has taught ye anything 'tis this that's at the bottom of the scheme: 'Thrue hearts is worth more than silver spoons,' an if that's not quite what the pote said it's what he was meaning."

It was getting late, and there was a pause in the laughter, when Niven rose up. "I wish I could talk as I want to--but now when I've so much to tell you I can't," he said, standing with flushed face and eyes shining at the foot of the table. "Still, before we go I want you to join in a last good wish with me. Boys, here's long life to Ned Jordan."

There was a roar, and the voices rang through it one by one. "The man who beat the Russians and the Americans too. The skipper who never went back on his crew. Ned Jordan of the _Champlain_ who brought me home again!"

Niven long remembered them standing about the long table with the sea-bronze in their faces and the pride in their eyes that were turned on Jordan. At last he once more stood up awkwardly.

"Boys," he said simply, "I couldn't have done nothing without the rest of you, and with the same men behind me it wouldn't be very much to do it all again."

Then they went out, shaking hands with Niven and Appleby, who stood in the great hall of the hotel, to bid farewell to them. Last of all came Jordan, and he stopped a moment.

"I've been wrong a good many times in my life, Mr. Niven, and that makes it the easier to tell you I was more club-headed than usual 'bout you," he said. "Still, I figure there's nothing but good feeling between us now, and you'll not forget Ned Jordan if you come back again."

Then he went down the pathway, and the two lads stood still, until from out of the darkness down by the water-front a voice they knew raised a song and the last of it came faintly up to them--

"Shining gold in heaps, I'm told, On the bunks of Sacramento."

Niven glanced at Appleby, and his voice was not quite steady as he said, "Starting home to-morrow--and we'll not see any of them again. Well, I'm sorry."

"Yes," said Appleby quietly. "I feel that way too."

*CHAPTER XXII*

*THE RESULT OF THE CHOICE*

The Montreal express was waiting to commence its six days' eastward journey when Appleby and Niven stood in the C.P.R. station next afternoon. The lads, however, scarcely noticed the great locomotive and long cars, or the roofs of the city that rose row and row up the face of the hill with the ragged spires of the sombre pines towering high above them. They were looking out on the blue inlet which, streaked in places by the smoke of the mills, lay shining in the sun, with dusky forests and a lofty line of snow beyond. Broad in the foreground rode the _Champlain_, looking very small and dainty with her bare masts standing high above the sweep of bulwarks, and they could recognize the men stripping the canvas off her. Behind her with the beaver ensign streaming at her peak another schooner was beating in, and Niven smiled curiously as he followed her with his eyes.

"It's the _Argo_," he said. "We'll be off in a minute or two--and of course I'm glad we're going home. Still, it hurts a little to leave it all behind."

Appleby nodded, for he fancied he knew what Niven was feeling, and it was with a faint sigh he turned towards the cars.

"It will be a long time before I forget the _Champlain_," he said. "Still, you see we couldn't be sealers."

Then a big bell commenced ringing, and Mr. Holway came up. "Here are your ticket coupons right through to Liverpool, and the Allan boat will sail an hour or two after you get to Montreal," he said. "Better take your places."

They shook hands with him while the big engine panted, and swung themselves on to the platform of the nearest car. It lurched forward, Mr. Holway waving his hand to them, slid away behind, wharf and mill went by, but they still stood out on the platform looking back at the _Champlain_, until with a sudden roar of wheels the train swept into the shadow of the pines that shut out blue inlet and schooner from their sight. Then Niven sighed a little and Appleby looked at him with a curious little smile.

"That's the last of her, Chriss," he said. "We've got to look forward now."

They were, however, soon too occupied for any vague regrets, and that journey from ocean to ocean over British soil excited their wonder and now and then brought them a little thrill of pride. Hour by hour the cars went lurching through the shadow of great pine-forests, and up an awful chasm with a river foaming far away below, swung over dizzy trestles, and past flashing glaciers through a tremendous desolation of rock and ice and snow that no man's foot had ever trodden. Still, the valleys were sprinkled with little wooden towns from which there rose the scream of saws and the smoke of mines, while when two great engines hauled them slowly in snake-like curves up to the Selkirk passes the lads stood gazing in silent awe at the white peaks above them.

"The men who built this road would stick at nothing," said Niven with a little gasp of wonder as he glanced back at the shining metals which lay apparently straight beneath him.

Later, with a roar of wheels flung back from the dark rocks that had for centuries barred off from the prairie the wild mountain land, they climbed the Kicking Horse defile beside a frothing river, and went roaring down into the rolling hills on the Rockies' eastern side. These, too, swept back and faded, and they were racing eastwards straight as the crow flies across the prairie.

Little wooden stations, herds of sheep and cattle, lonely mounted men seen miles away, were left behind, and still hour by hour the great white levels stretched away. From the dawn that flushed red before them until the sunset flamed behind, the gaunt telegraph poles and shining metals that led straight on came flying back to them, and there was no change in the white waste the moonlight shone upon. Then they ran through yellow stubble where the splendid wheat had been, past lonely homesteads, lines of toiling teams, and clouds of dust and blue smoke where the thrashers were working in the field, until they rolled across a great river into Winnipeg City.

There they stopped an hour or two, and afterwards ran past vast blue lakes into the forests again, swept across wooden bridges over frothing rivers, until the lads clinging to the platform looked down on an inland sea when the dusty cars went lurching along the Superior shore over a road riven out of the adamantine granite that had been paid for with brave men's lives. By and by they came out of the wilderness again, and swept through green Ontario past wooden farms and orchards into Montreal, where they had decided to join the steamer, though they could have done so nearer the sea. They were, however, stiff and aching, and glad to stretch their limbs, while Niven stared about him in wonder as they walked through Montreal and stopped a moment outside the great cathedral.

"It's a city of palaces and churches, and there's no dust and smoke at all," he said. "I never fancied they'd places of this kind in Canada. Well, we'll go on to the steamer as soon as we've worked out the kinks we got in the cars."

The steamer went down the river soon after they reached her, and it was an hour or two before the lads felt at home on board her. She seemed so big and high above the water after the _Champlain_, and they felt almost abashed and out of place amidst the luxury of the great saloons. That did not, however, last long, and there was much to occupy them, the huge rafts of timber with houses on them, barges piled with hay until they resembled a drifting farmyard, the countless islands they steamed among, and the tin-roofed villages along the wooded shores. Then they stopped where the river narrows under the battlements of Quebec, and saw the crowded roofs of the city climb the slopes of the plateau where Wolfe won that great Dominion for England.

After that the river grew broader, until at last they rolled out past the rocks of Labrador into the Atlantic, and it was scarcely a fortnight since they left Vancouver when one night the liner steamed into the Mersey. Rows of lights blinked at them through the smoke and drizzle, whistles screamed, steamers crowded with passengers went by, and at last the tender swung alongside. Then amidst the bustle and confusion a gentleman forcing his way through the groups of travellers grasped Appleby's hand, and he saw his comrade, who did not seem abashed as he once would have done, being hugged publicly by Mrs. Niven.

In another minute she had turned to Appleby, and Mr. Niven led both of them under a big electric light. He stared hard at them, and then smiled at his wife.

"Well," he said slowly, "these are not the lads we sent away. The sea has done a good deal for them, and if I hadn't been looking for him I would scarcely have known my son."

It was a very happy party the tender took ashore, and for several days Mrs. Niven, who regaled the lads with dainties and fussed over them, would scarcely let Chriss out of her sight. On the third night, however, Mr. Niven called them into his own room.

"And now it's about time we had a little talk," he said with a trace of dryness in his smile, as, lighting a cigar, he laid the box on the table. "You can take one if you like. No doubt you know the flavour by this time, and it would take a good deal to hurt you now."

Chriss grinned at Appleby. "As a matter of fact we found that out at Sandycombe, sir, though the results were very far from encouraging," he said.

"No?" said Mr. Niven.

Appleby laughed. "I lost a good chance of winning the quarter-mile, and Chriss spent two Saturdays writing lines."

"I understand," said Mr. Niven dryly, "that you didn't get many luxuries on board the _Aldebaran_."

"We didn't," said Chriss. "Still, after a month or so, there wasn't much we couldn't eat except the stuff in one barrel the pickle had run out of. Appleby tried it once when we hadn't had anything worth mentioning for a week. Tom, how long did you revel in that pork?"

"About two minutes," said Appleby. "Eating it wasn't quite as nice as skinning holluschackie."

Mr. Niven nodded, but there was a twinkle in his eyes, and once more he noticed the steadiness with which they returned his gaze, and that though they smiled there was a new gravity in their sea-tanned faces.

"I fancy you have found out how much one can do without, and that is a good deal gained," he said. "Still, all that is beside the question, for I want to know right off how you like the sea, and I've no use for anything but the straightest kind of talking."

Chriss seemed a trifle astonished. "That was just how Ned Jordan spoke," he said.

Mr. Niven laughed. "You may remember that I have been over a good deal of Canada on business and in Vancouver. In fact, you may do so too. It depends on your answer to my question."

Chriss sat silent for almost a minute in place of speaking at once, which is more than he would have done before he went to sea. Then he answered very slowly.

"Well, I like the sea, and would be willing to go back again, but not--if it could be helped--in the _Aldebaran_. Still, after what I have seen of it, I fancy I could be quite content to live ashore if there were other things for me to do."