Chapter 17

"I s'posed you knew. The North Pass has been paying blackmail to the Yukon steamboat companies for three years. When you built the line it practically put 'em out of the Dawson market, understand?"

"Of course."

Now that Mr. Bulker's mind was running along well-worn grooves, his intoxication became less apparent.

"Those Frisco steamboat men got together and started a rate war against the railroad; they hauled freight to Dawson by way of St. Michaels at a loss. Of course Illis and his crowd had to meet competition, and it nearly broke 'em the first two seasons. Gee, they were the mad ones! Finally they fixed up an agreement--had to or go bust--and of course the Native Sons put it over our English cousins. They agreed to restore the old rate, and each side promised to pay the other a royalty of ten dollars a ton on all the freight it hauled to Dawson and up-river points. You can guess the result, can't you? The steamboat companies let Illis haul all the freight and sat back on their haunches and took their profit. For every ton he hauled he slipped 'em ten round American dollars, stamped with the Goddess of Liberty. Oh, it was soft! When they had him fairly tied up they dry-docked their steamboats, to save wear and tear. He paid 'em a thousand dollars a day for three years. If that ain't blackmail, it's a first cousin to it by marriage."

"Didn't the Interstate Commerce Commission get wise?"

"Certainly not. It looks wise, but it never GETS wise. Oh, believe me, Poultney Illis is hopping mad. I s'pose he's over here now to renew the arrangement for another three years on behalf of his stock-holders. Let's have a dram." Bulker sat back and stared as through a mist at his companion, enjoying the effect of his disclosure.

O'Neil was indeed impressed--more deeply than his informant dreamed. Out of the lips of a drunken man had come a hint which set his nerves to tingling. He knew Illis well, he knew the caliber of the Englishman, and a plan was already leaping in his brain whereby he might save the S. R. & N.

It lacked an hour of midnight when O'Neil escaped from Bulker and reached his room. Once inside, he seized the telephone and rang up hotel after hotel, inquiring for the English capitalist, but without result. After a moment's consideration he took his hat and gloves and went out. The matter did not permit of delay. Not only were his own needs imperative, but if Poultney Illis had come from London to confer with his rivals there was little time to spare.

Remembering the Englishman's habits, O'Neil turned up the Avenue to the Waldorf, where he asked for the manager, whom he well knew.

"Yes, Mr. Illis is here," he was informed, "but he's registered under a different name. No doubt he'll be glad to see you, however."

A moment later Murray recognized the voice of Illis's valet over the wire and greeted him by name. Another brief delay, and the capitalist himself was at the 'phone.

"Come right up," he said; and O'Neil replaced the receiver with a sigh of relief.

Illis greeted him warmly, for their relations had been close.

"Lucky you found me," he said. "I'm going back on the next sailing."

"Have you signed up with the Arctic Navigation Company?" Murray inquired; and the other started.

"Bless me! What do you mean?"

His caller laughed. "I see you haven't. I don't think you will, either, after you've talked with me."

Without the tremor of an eyelash Illis exclaimed:

"My word! What are you driving at?"

"That agreement over freight rates, of course."

The Briton eyed him for a moment, then carefully closed the door leading from his sitting-room, and, seating himself, lit a cigar.

"What do you know about that matter?" he asked, quietly.

"About all there is to know--enough, at least, to appreciate your feelings."

"I flattered myself that my affairs were private. Where did you get your information?"

"I'll tell you if you insist, although I'd rather not. There's no danger of its becoming public."

Illis showed his relief. "I'm glad. You gave me a start. Rotten fix for a man to be in. Why, I'm here under an assumed name! Fancy! But--" he waved his hand in a gesture which showed his acceptance of the inevitable.

"You haven't made your new agreement?"

"I'm to meet Blum and Capron to-morrow."

"Why didn't you take the S. R.& N. when I cabled you last month?"

"I couldn't. But what has that to do with the matter?"

"Don't you see? It's so plain to me that I can't understand how you failed to realize the value--the necessity of buying my road."

"Explain, please."

"Gladly. The North Pass & Yukon is paying a fabulous blackmail to the river-lines to escape a ruinous rate war."

"Right! It's blackmail, as you say."

"Under the present agreement you handle the Dawson freight and keep out of the lower river; they take the whole Tanana valley and lower Yukon."

"Correct."

"Didn't it occur to you that the S.R.& N., which starts four hundred miles west of the North Pass and taps the Tanana valley, can be used to put the river steamers of that section out of business?"

"Let's have a look at the map." Mr. Illis hurried into an adjoining room and returned with a huge chart which he unrolled upon the table. "To tell you the truth, I never looked at the proposition from that angle. Our people were afraid of those glaciers and the competition of the Copper Trust. They're disgusted, too, with our treatment."

"The Trust is eliminated. Kyak harbor is wiped off the map, and I'm alone in the field."

"How about this fellow Gordon?"

"He'll be broke in a year. Incidentally, that's my trouble."

"But I'm told you can't pass the glaciers."

"I can. Parker says he'll have the bridge done by spring."

"Then I'd bank on it. I'd believe Parker if I knew he was lying. If you both agree, I haven't the slightest doubt."

"This is a bigger proposition than the North Pass, Mr. Illis. You made money out of that road, but this one will make more." He swiftly outlined the condition of affairs, even to the attitude assumed by the Heidlemanns; and Illis, knowing the speaker as he did, had no doubt that he was hearing the exact truth. "But that's not all," continued O'Neil. "The S. R. & N. is the club which will hammer your enemies into line. That's what I came to see you about. With a voice in it you can control the traffic of all central Alaska and force the San Francisco crowd to treat the N. P. & Y. fairly, thereby saving half a million a year."

"It's a big undertaking. I'm not sure our crowd could swing it."

"They don't have to. There's a quick profit of two million to be had by selling to the Trust next spring. You can dictate your own terms to those blackmailers to-morrow, and then make a turn-over in nine months. It doesn't matter who owns the S. R. & N. after it's completed. The steamboat men will see their profits cut. As it is now, they can make enough out of their own territory to haul freight into yours for nothing."

"I dare say you'll go to them if we don't take you up, eh?"

"My road has its strategic value. I must have help. If you don't come to my rescue it will mean war with your line, I dare say."

Mr. Illis sat back, staring at the ceiling for a long time. From the street below came the whir and clatter of taxicabs as the midnight crowd came and went. The city's nocturnal life was at its height; men had put aside the worries of the day and were devoting themselves to the more serious and exhausting pastimes of relaxation. Still the white-haired Briton weighed in his mind the matter of millions, while the fortunes of Murray O'Neil hung in the balance.

"My people won't buy the S. R. & N.," Illis finally announced. "But I'll put it up to them."

"I can't delay action if there's a chance of a refusal. I'll have to see Blum and Capron," said O'Neil.

"I'll cable full details within the hour. We'll have an answer by to-morrow night."

"And if they refuse?" O'Neil lit a cigar with steady fingers.

"Oh, if they refuse I'll join you. We'll go over the matter carefully in the mean time. Two million you said, didn't you?"

"Yes. There's two million profit for you in nine months." His voice was husky and a bit uneven, for he had been under a great strain.

"Good! You don't know how resentful I feel toward Blum and his crowd. I--I'm downright angry: I am that."

Illis took the hand which his caller extended, with an expressionless face.

"I'm glad I found you," confessed O'Neil. "I was on my last legs. Herman Heidlemann will pay our price when the last bridge-bolt is driven home, and he'll pay with a smile on his face--that's the sort of man he is."

"He won't pay if he knows I'm interested. We're not exactly friendly since I sold out my smelter interests. But he needn't know--nobody need know."

Illis called his valet and instructed him to rouse his secretary and ring for some cable blanks.

"I think I'll cable, too," Murray told him. "I have some 'boys' up there who are working in the dark with their teeth shut. They're waiting for the crash, and they'd like to hear the good news."

His fingers shook as he scrawled the name of Doctor Gray, but his eyes were bright and youth was singing in his heart once more.

"Now let's get down to business," said Mr. Illis. "We'll have to talk fast."

It was growing light in the east when O'Neil returned to the Holland House; but he felt no fatigue, and he laughed from the pure joy of living, for his dream seemed coming true.

XIX

MISS APPLETON MAKES A SACRIFICE

Tom Slater came puffing up the hill to the Appleton bungalow, plumped himself into a chair, and sighed deeply.

"What's the matter? Are you played out?" asked Eliza.

"No. I'm feeling like a colt."

"Any news from Omar Khayyam?"

"Not a word."

Eliza's brows drew together in a worried frown, for none of Murray's "boys" had awaited tidings from him with greater anxiety than she.

It had been a trying month for them all. Dr. Gray, upon whom the heaviest responsibility rested, had aged visibly under the strain; Parker and Mellen and McKay had likewise become worn and grave as the days passed and they saw disaster approaching. Even Dan was blue; and Sheldon, the light-hearted, had begun to lose interest in his commissary duties.

After the storm at Kyak there had been a period of fierce rejoicing, which had ended abruptly with the receipt of O'Neil's curt cablegram announcing the attitude of the Trust. Gloom had succeeded the first surprise, deepening to hopeless despondency through the days that followed. Oddly enough, Slater had been the only one to bear up; under adversity he blossomed into a peculiar and almost offensive cheerfulness. It was characteristic of his crooked temperament that misfortune awoke in him a lofty and unshakable optimism.

"You're great on nicknames, ain't you?" he said to Eliza, regarding her with his never-failing curiosity. "Who's this Homer Keim you're always talking about?"

"He isn't any more: he WAS. He was a cheerful old Persian poet."

"I thought he was Dutch, from the name. Well! Murray's cheerful too. Him and me are alike in that. I'll bet he isn't worrying half so much as Doc and the others."

"You think he'll make good?"

"He never fails."

"But--we can't hold on much longer. Dan says that some of the men are getting uneasy and want their money."

Tom nodded. "The men are all right--Doc has kept them paid up; it's the shift bosses. I say let 'em quit."

"Has it gone as far as that?"

"Somebody keeps spreading the story that we're busted and that Murray has skipped out. More of Gordon's work, I s'pose. Some of the sore-heads are coming in this evening to demand their wages."

"Can we pay them?"

"Doc says he dassent; so I s'pose they'll quit. He should have fired 'em a week ago. Never let a man quit--always beat him to it. We could hold the rough-necks for another two weeks if it wasn't for these fellows, but they'll go back and start a stampede."

"How many are there?"

"About a dozen."

"I was afraid it was worse. There can't be much owing to them."

"Oh, it's bad enough! They've been letting their wages ride, that's why they got scared. We owe them about four thousand dollars."

"They must be paid," said Eliza. "It will give Mr. O'Neil another two weeks--a month, perhaps."

"Doc's got his back up, and he's told the cashier to make 'em wait."

Eliza hesitated, and flushed a little. "I suppose it's none of my business," she said, "but--couldn't you boys pay them out of your own salaries?"

Mr. Slater grinned--an unprecedented proceeding which lent his face an altogether strange and unnatural expression.

"Salary! We ain't had any salary," he said, cheerfully--"not for months."

"Dan has drawn his regularly."

"Oh, sure! But he ain't one of us. He's an outsider."

"I see!" Eliza's eyes were bright with a wistful admiration. "That's very nice of you men. You have a family, haven't you, Uncle Tom?"

"I have! Seven head, and they eat like a herd of stock. It looks like a lean winter for 'em if Murray don't make a sale--but he will. That isn't what I came to see you about; I've got my asking clothes on, and I want a favor."

"You shall have it, of course."

"I want a certificate."

"Of what?"

"Ill health. Nobody believes I had the smallpox."

"You didn't."

"Wh-what?" Tom's eyes opened wide. He stared at the girl in hurt surprise.

"It was nothing but pimples, Tom."

"Pimples!" He spat the word out indignantly, and his round cheeks grew purple. "I--I s'pose pimples gave me cramps and chills and backache and palpitation and swellings! Hunh! I had a narrow escape--narrow's the word. It was narrower than a knife-edge! Anything I get out of life from now on is 'velvet,' for I was knocking at death's door. The grave yawned, but I jumped it. It's the first sick spell I ever had, and I won't be cheated out of it. Understand?"

"What do you want me to do?" smiled the girl.

"You're a writer: write me an affidavit--"

"I can't do that."

"Then put it in your paper. Put it on the front page, where folks can see it."

"I've quit The Review. I'm doing magazine stories."

"Well, that'll do. I'm not particular where it's printed so long as--"

Eliza shook her head. "You weren't really sick, Uncle Tom."

At this Mr. Slater rose to his feet in high dudgeon.

"Don't call me 'Uncle,'" he exclaimed. "You're in with the others."

"It wouldn't be published if I wrote it."

"Then you can't be much of a writer." He glared at her, and slowly, distinctly, with all the emphasis at his command, said: "I had smallpox--and a dam' bad case, understand? I was sick. I had miseries in every joint and cartage of my body. I'm going to use a pick-handle for a cane, and anybody that laughs will get a hickory massage that'll take a crooked needle and a pair of pinchers to fix. Thank God I've got my strength back! You get me?"

"I do."

He snorted irately and turned to go, but Eliza checked him.

"What about those shift bosses?" she asked.

Slater rolled his eyes balefully. "Just let one of 'em mention smallpox," he said, "and I'll fill the hospital till it bulges."

"No, no! Are you going to pay them?"

"Certainly not."

Eliza considered for a moment. "Don't let them see Dr. Gray," she said, at length. "He has enough to worry him. Meet them at the train and bring them here."

"What for? Tea?"

"You boys have done all you can; I think it's time Dan and I did something."

Tom stared. "Are YOU going to pay 'em?" he asked, gruffly.

"Yes. Mr. O'Neil needs time. Dan and I have saved four thousand dollars. I'd offer it to Dr. Gray--"

"He wouldn't take it."

"Exactly. Send Dan up here when you see him."

"It doesn't seem exactly right." Tom was obviously embarrassed. "You see, we sort of belong to Murray, and you don't, but--" He shook his head as if to rid himself of unwelcome emotion. "Women are funny things! You're willing to do that for the chief, and yet you won't write me a little affidavit!" He grunted and went away, still shaking his head.

When Eliza explained her plan to Dan she encountered an opposition that shocked and hurt her.

"I won't do it!" he said, shortly.

"You--WHAT?"

"We can't build the S. R.

"Yes, and made you love him, too," said Dan, roughly. "I can see that."

Eliza lifted her head and met his eyes squarely.

"That's true! But why not? Can't I love him? Isn't it my privilege to help him if I want to? If I had two million dollars instead of two thousand I'd give it to him, and--and I wouldn't expect him to care for me, either. He'll never do that. He couldn't! But--oh, Danny, I've been miserable--"

Dan felt a certain dryness of the throat which made speech oddly difficult. "I don't see why he couldn't care for you," he said, lamely.

Eliza shook her head hopelessly. "I'm glad it happened," she said--"glad. In writing these articles I've tried to make him understood; I've tried to put my whole soul into them so that the people will see that he isn't, wouldn't be, a thief nor a grafter. I've described him as he is--big, honorable, gentle--"

"I didn't know you were writing fiction," said her brother, impatiently.

"I'm not. It's all true. I've cried over those articles, Dan. I've petted them, and I've kissed his name--oh, I've been silly!" She smiled at him through a sudden glimmer of tears.

Dan began to wonder if his sister, in spite of her exemplary conduct in the past, were after all going to have hysterics. Women were especially likely to, he reflected, when they demanded the impossible. At last he said, uncomfortably: "Gee, I thought I was the dippy member of the family!"

"It's our chance to help him," she urged. "Will you--?"

"No! I'm sorry, Sis, but my little bit wouldn't mean anything to him; it means everything to me. Maybe that's selfish--I don't care. I'm as mad over Natalie as you seem to be over him. A week's delay can't make any difference now--he played and lost. But I can't afford to lose. He'll make another fortune, that's sure--but do you think I'll ever find another Natalie? No! Don't argue, for I won't listen."

He left the house abruptly, and Eliza went into the white bedroom which O'Neil had fitted up for her. From the remotest corner of her lowest bureau drawer she drew a battered tin box, and, dividing the money it contained into two equal parts, placed one in the pockets of her mannish jacket.

It was dark when Tom Slater arrived, at the head of a group of soiled workmen whom he ushered into the parlor of the bungalow.

"Here's the bunch!" he announced, laconically.

As the new-comers ranged themselves uncomfortably about the wall Dan Appleton entered and greeted them with his customary breeziness.

"The pay-master is busy, and Doc Gray has a surgical case," he said, "so I'll cash your time-checks. Get me the box, will you, Sis?"

He had avoided Eliza's eyes upon entering, and he avoided them now, but the girl's throat was aching as she hurried into her bedroom and hastily replaced the rolls of greenbacks she had removed from the tin box.

When he had finished paying off, Dan said, brusquely:

"Now we mustn't have any loafing around town, understand?"

"We can't get back to-night," said one of the men.

"Oh yes, you can. I ordered an engine out."

"We hear--there's talk about quitting work," another ventured. "Where's O'Neil?"

"He's in the States buying a steamship," answered Dan, unblushingly. "We can't get stuff fast enough by the regular boats."

"Good! That sounds like business. We don't want to quit."

"Now hurry! Your parlor-car is waiting."

When he and Eliza were alone he turned to her with a flush of embarrassment. "Aren't we the darnedest fools, Sis? I wouldn't mind if we had done the chief any good, but we haven't." He closed the lid of the tin box, which was nearly empty now, and pushed it away from him, laughing mirthlessly. "Hide that sarcophagus where I can't see it," he commanded. "It makes me sick."

Eliza flung her arm about his neck and laid her cheek against his. "Poor Danny! You're a brick!"

"It's the bread-line for us," he told her.

"Never mind. We're used to it now." She laughed contentedly and snuggled her face closer to his.

It was on the following morning that O'Neil's cablegram announcing the result of his interview with Illis reached Omar. Dr. Gray brought the news to the Appleton bungalow while Dan and his sister were still at breakfast. "Happy Tom" came puffing and blowing at his heels with a highly satisfied I-told-you-so expression on his round features.

"He made it! The tide has turned," cried the doctor as he burst in waving the message on high. "Yes!" he explained, in answer to their excited questions. "Murray got the money and our troubles are over. Now give me some coffee, Eliza. I'm all shaky."

"English money!" commented Slater. "The same as we used on the North Pass."

"Then he interested Illis!" cried Dan.

"Yep! He's the white-winged messenger of hope. I wasn't worried for a minute," Tom averred.

The breakfast which followed was of a somewhat hysterical and fragmentary nature, for Eliza felt her heart swelling, and the faithful Gray was all but undone by the strain he had endured. "That's the first food I've tasted for weeks," he confessed. "I've eaten, but I haven't tasted; and now--I'm not hungry." He sighed, stretched his long limbs gratefully, and eyed the Appletons with a kindly twinkle. "You were up in the air, too, weren't you? The chief will appreciate last night's affair."

Eliza colored faintly. "It was nothing. Please don't tell him." At the incredulous lift of his brows she hastened to explain: "Tom said you men 'belonged' to Mr. O'Neil and Dan was an outsider. That hurt me dreadfully."

"Well, he can't say that now; Dan is one of Murray's boys, all right, and you--you must be his girl."

At that moment Mellen and McKay burst into the bungalow, demanding the truth behind the rumor which had just come to their ears; and there followed fresh explanations and rejoicings, through which Eliza sat quietly, thrilled by the note of genuine affection and loyalty that pervaded it all. But, now that the general despondency had vanished and joy reigned in its place, Tom Slater relapsed into his habitual gloom and spoke forebodingly of the difficulties yet to be encountered.

"Murray don't say how MUCH he's raised," he remarked. "It may be only a drop in the bucket. We'll have to go through all this again, probably, and the next time he won't find it so easy to sting a millionaire."

"We'll last through the winter anyhow--"

"Winter!" Slater shook his bald head. "Winter is hard on old men like me."

"We'll have the bridge built by spring, sure!" Mellen declared.

"Maybe! I hope so. I wish I could last to see it, but the smallpox undermined me. Perhaps it's a mercy I'm so far gone; nobody knows yet whether the bridge will stand, and--I'd hate to see it go out."

"It won't go out," said the engineer, confidently.

"Maybe you're right. But that's what Trevor said about his breakwater. His work was done, and ours isn't hardly begun. By the way, Murray didn't say he HAD the money; he just said he expected to get it."

"Go out and hang your crepe on the roundhouse," Dan told him; "this is a jubilee. If you keep on rejoicing you'll have us all in tears." When the others had gone he turned to Eliza. "Why don't you want O'Neil to know about that money, Sis?" he asked, curiously. "When I'm a hero I like to be billed as one."

"Please!" She hesitated and turned her face away. "You--you are so stupid about some things."

On the afternoon of this very day Curtis Gordon found Natalie at a window staring out across the sound in the direction of Omar. He laid a warm hand upon her shoulder and said:

"My dear, confess! You are lonesome."

She nodded silently.

"Well, well! We mustn't allow that. Why don't you run over to Omar and see your friend Miss Appleton? She has a cheerful way with her." "I'm afraid things aren't very gay over there," said Natalie, doubtfully.