CHAPTER XII

“WHEN ALL THE WORLD IS YOUNG, LAD!”

I

LOUIS HAMMOND returned to the camp that morning after he had parted with Josephine Stone down on the beach near Amethyst Island in a seventh heaven of ecstatic speculation. It was his first genuine love affair. The thrill of having held the svelte, firm form of that lovely creature yielding in the embrace of his arms was still upon him. He had discovered a new world—mating youth’s own wonder world, where the blue sky, the waving trees and the dancing water take on a new significance and seem to weave out of a sympathetic gladness the song of Eden’s first splendrous dawn. Ah, the magic and the poetry that come with the first sweep of Cupid’s wand in the early flush of manhood. . . . Youth that has yet to encounter it dreams not of the completeness of its power. . . . Middle life sighs for the dream that has vanished. . . . Age secretly revels in its memory as a miser gloats over his hoarded treasure. If, as the glum-faced realists tell us, it is all illusion—then, let Illusion reign!

“When all the world is young, lad, And every field is green; And every goose a swan, lad, And every lass a queen, Then hey for boot and horse, lad, And round the world away; Young blood must have its course, lad, And every dog his day.”

Already young Hammond was looking forward to their next meeting—the very next morning, in fact, he planned to again saunter down to Amethyst Island on a chance of gaining a few hours of her exquisite society. She—she must be his own completely.

But always our profoundest dreams are ephemeral when grim Reality stalks in the background. Later, the natural law of moods brought to Hammond the inevitable reaction. He was smitten with a sense of duty unperformed. He could not exactly define it, but he had a feeling of uselessness, a vague notion that he was drifting nowhere. What indeed had a man, situated as he was at present, to offer a girl of Josephine Stone’s evident refinement and high aspirations? So far as appearances were concerned he was nothing more than a vagrant biding his time on the pulp limits at the whim of a man who had dropped out of sight.

An inner voice demanded he should make a herculean effort to find his bearings at once. So far as he was concerned, things had drifted as long as he intended to allow them.

He must work out a plan of action—must find the answer to the conflicting incidents of the past few weeks and meanwhile secure real and useful employment. He had it! No doubt the officials in charge of the Kam City Company’s pulp mill would instal him in the position Norman T. Gildersleeve had promised him that night on the train. First, he must find a means of getting to the city. It should not be a very difficult feat to steal aboard one of the outgoing tugs. Yet, if he did succeed in doing that very thing, what might be the possibilities of his getting back to see Josephine Stone? What if she should stand in need of his help and protection?

Hammond was on the horns of a dilemma, with the problem ever recurring to him: What was Josephine Stone doing here, and what could there be in common between her and the pulp camp superintendent?

The road to a mental solution of these questions proved as baffling as an attempt to find the reason for the numerous weird experiences he had gone through since the night he had made the deal with Norman T. Gildersleeve. All those circumstances, he conceived, had been too remarkable to be the result of mere accident. Human ingenuity was somewhere at work with its own ends in view, and, back of it all, Hammond was convinced, a sinister drama was being woven into the texture of affairs with a design of bringing some terrific climax about. All these apparent things must be the by-play of hidden plot and counter-plot.

However, what was the use of trying to analyse situations that seemed to lead nowhere? Hammond wanted action—and, he was _going to have it_. . . . He would wait till to-morrow, see Josephine Stone in the morning and find out definitely if she felt quite sure of her own safety in this wild place. Then, if everything appealed to him as well, he would stow away on the tug for town in the afternoon. Once off the tug at Kam City he would be a free citizen and he could make a trip back to Amethyst Island at his pleasure in a motorboat.

But the way was made easier for Hammond to reach Kam City than he for the moment hoped, with subsequent events seemingly gauged for his further bewilderment.

II

Coming in from a stroll in the bush in the late afternoon, Hammond was considerably surprised to discover patrols of the Canadian Mounted Police pacing the waterfront. Being hungry, he went direct to the dining-camp, expecting to learn from Sandy Macdougal, the cook, just what new crisis had arisen necessitating the presence of the police.

But he had finished the meal before the head cook came striding in. “Say, Hammond,” he opened, “the Big Boss told me to tell you he wanted to see you at his office as soon as you came in. Must be something all-fired important, for he seemed to be fussy about it, which is odd for him.”

Hammond hurried over. The interview was short. The superintendent handed him an envelope bearing his name in firm spencerian handwriting. “It contains a personal pass on any of the North Star tugs for the season,” he announced. “You are at liberty now to use it at your pleasure.”

The younger man concealed his amazement in a quiet “Thank you.”

“Better take the first tug in the morning,” suggested Acey Smith. “There’s a possibility of the afternoon tugs being off the run.”

“Oh, well, the following day will do as well,” returned the elated Hammond. “My business in the city is not so pressing that a day’s delay will matter.”

The superintendent passed Hammond his cigarette case and lit a cigarette himself. “I’d take the early tug to-morrow if I were you,” he insisted quietly. “There’s no telling what may happen the tug service between here and the city after to-morrow.”

“You’re not thinking of laying up the boats?”

“No—_not_ us.” Smith studied Hammond idly, a curious, not unfriendly frown puckering his brows as he added: “Playing Sir Galahad seems to impair a journalist’s nose for news, doesn’t it, Hammond?”

That shot went home under the skin, but before Hammond could frame a rejoinder Acey Smith spoke up again. “I was going to say,” he remarked, “that should the tugs not be running when you are ready to return from the city that pass will be good on any make-shift service the company inaugurates to take the place of the big boats. Incidentally, I am leaving myself to-morrow on a trip to Montreal, and I’ll not be returning to camp for several days or perhaps a week. For the meantime, I have instructed Mr. Mooney, the assistant superintendent, to take care of your wants while our guest.”

Hammond was somewhat nettled by all this new show of attention and hospitality. He felt like telling the pulp camp superintendent to go to the devil, but he said “Thanks” again instead.

“Oh, just a minute, Hammond!”

Hammond paused at the door as Acey Smith strode over and passed him a newspaper. “The morning edition of the _Star_,” he indicated. “There is an item on the front page that may interest you—considerably.”

The wispy, mocking light that came over Acey Smith’s face when he uttered that last word was lost on Hammond for the moment. He walked back to his quarters in a fighting mood, all the more poignant because he had had to suppress it. Smith seemed to take such a fiendish enjoyment out of making him feel like a child he was studying for the sheer fun of the thing. Too, Hammond’s professional pride had been stung by the other’s broad insinuation that he, for a newspaper man, was wofully asleep to what was going on around him. It had gone the deeper because it was coupled with that vague hint about his attentions to Josephine Stone—at least that was what Hammond had taken the reference to Sir Galahad to mean.

What was going on at the limits? Why were all these mounted police out here? Why did the workmen, muttering in groups, fall so silent when he came near? Undoubtedly, a crisis of some sort was near at hand and he _had_ missed a big piece of news that was breaking right under his nose. He began to concede to himself that he was deserving of the keenest of Acey Smith’s sarcasm. He had needed something like that to bring him down out of the clouds.

At first he was for going down and striking up a conversation with some of the police. On second thought he didn’t—he knew from experience how absolutely close-mouthed Canadian mounted policemen were about their orders. There was little that Sandy Macdougal would not know; he’d ask Sandy first.

But Sandy hadn’t come over from the cook camp when Hammond entered their shack. He had built up the fire in the little heater and lit his pipe when he bethought him of the _Star_ that Acey Smith had passed him.

Under the wall lamp Hammond spread out the paper, then he jumped to his feet as his eyes were caught by a lower corner scare-line heading:—

POLICE LOOKING FOR YOUNG STRANGER SEEN WITH N. T. GILDERSLEEVE BEFORE MILLIONAIRE DISAPPEARED FROM TRAIN

Unknown Youth Travelling Alone Was in Pulp Magnate’s Stateroom, Coloured Porter Tells Authorities—Suspicion of Foul Play?

Mysterious Note Delivered En Route

In the body of the article Hammond read a badly-garbled description of himself and an equally highly-elaborated story of his interview with Gildersleeve. The coloured porter’s powers of imagination were in excellent working order, for he told of a loud altercation going on inside the stateroom before he entered, and that both men were standing glaring at each other with drawn, white faces when he was admitted.

It was all very ridiculous to one on the inside as to what really had happened, but quite on a par with most of the wild raft of useless clues brought to the surface by the police dragnet in mystery cases. Hammond might have laughed outright but for another thought that occurred to him.

He was under suspicion of having something to do with Gildersleeve’s disappearance!

So this was why Acey Smith had so suddenly become liberal with a pass over on the tug! The minute Hammond touched foot on Kam City docks he was very liable to be arrested and thrown into jail on suspicion of being concerned in a plot to do away with Gildersleeve. He would afterwards have to go through one of those small town police “third degrees,” usually more brutal and stupid than they were effective.

Smith had known that before he made out the pass—then he had given him the paper with this news in it so that he’d see how dangerous it would be for him to attempt to visit Kam City just now.

It was a proof of the superintendent’s fiendish notion of what constituted a good joke—but no, that couldn’t be it. Smith had been too insistent on Hammond’s taking the early tug. Acey Smith was too keen a reader of character to doubt that he, Hammond, would face the music rather than skulk around the pulp camp a fugitive from justice. Smith had some other motive, thought Hammond—there was no doubt about that now. Despite his obvious iniquity, there was a strong element of Canadian sportsmanship in Acey Smith’s make-up, Hammond had seen proofs of that. More likely he took this off-hand method of warning Hammond what he’d be up against when he landed in Kam City. That was more like Acey Smith whom most men feared, others hated and few could find it in their hearts to exactly detest. . . . More, if the superintendent had merely wanted to complicate matters for Hammond he would only have had to send word to Kam City that he, Hammond, was over at the limits, and the authorities would come after him. Piecing it all together, the young man now sensed that for some deeper reason the Big Boss of the timber limits was anxious to see him go over to Kam City.

But, be that as it might be, Hammond’s mind was fully made up. He was now more determined than ever to make the trip to Kam City on the morrow. He quite realised what an ugly position he might be placed in through the erratic evidence of the coloured porter, but he was chafing to have the whole thing over with. He could stand continued inaction no longer. If the police arrested him, well and good: he’d take a chance on the trend of events and his own evidence bringing the truth to the surface. True, his contract with Norman T. Gildersleeve called for his keeping secret the fact that he had been engaged by the millionaire to stay on the Nannabijou limits until he received other instructions, but Gildersleeve must truly have disappeared or he would take steps of some sort or other to prevent Hammond’s arrest on a false charge. He could find no conscientious reason why he should hold out longer.

He glanced at his watch. It was nearly ten o’clock. He decided not to wait up for Sandy Macdougal, for he would have to arise early to catch the morning tug. To-morrow surely would be an eventful day.

III

Hammond was partially awakened by the cook prowling around with his bottle and a metal cup. Hammond declined Sandy’s invitation to join him in a “night-cap” and turned over to go to sleep again.

“Heard the big news, Hammond?” the cook asked.

Hammond rolled over again under the blankets at that. “No, Sandy,” he replied. “What’s being pulled off on the limits anyway?”

Macdougal tossed down his “three fingers” and gazed meaningly at the rusty stove-pipe. “There’s going to be something drop around this layout before many days are over,” he said finally.

“Yes?” encouraged Hammond.

“You’ll keep anything I tell you under your hat?”

“Sure, if you say so.”

“Strike and blue hell to pay,” informed the cook solemnly. “Whole caboodle will throw down tools—tugmen, waterfront men, pole-cutters and all.”

“H’m, so that’s it—that’s why the mounted police are over here,” reflected Hammond. “What’s the grievance?”

“More pay and shorter hours. Ain’t that what they always say?”

“But I thought the North Star Company were always ready to consider the demands of the men?”

“Maybe they will this time,” replied Macdougal, “but I got a hunch they won’t. There’s something phony about this whole business. They’ve let a whole flock of bolsheviks and O.B.U. agitators into the camps and never even tried to stop them holdin’ meetings, and the foremen have been bullin’ the men the past few days just as if they wanted to egg them on. Besides I mistrust that faraway glint in Acey Smith’s wicked eyes these days. Whenever you see the Big Boss goin’ around like as if he was in a trance and he looks at you with that queer little devil-grin playin’ at the corners of his mouth there’s new hellery on foot, you can bank on that.”

“Then you think the North Star’s out to break the strike?”

“I don’t know,” Macdougal was rapidly divesting himself of mackinaw and shoepacks, “but I’ve a hunch Acey Smith has the dope from the higher-ups and that it ain’t for a settlement.”

Having so pronounced himself, the cook blew out the light and plunged into his bunk.

IV

Hammond awoke to find the little shack flooded with daylight. That meant that it was late—much too late to catch the morning tug. He had neglected to tell Sandy Macdougal to call him, and he was not by nature an early riser.

Nevertheless, if he acknowledged the truth to himself, he was not as disappointed about it as he should have been under the circumstances. There would surely be another tug in to-day, he reflected—and the delay would give him an opportunity to slip over to Amethyst Island before he left.

After breakfast, he set out along the lakeshore trail in high spirits. At the bridge over the Nannabijou River he was brought up short by a mountie. “Let me see your pass,” requested the young man in uniform.

Hammond had to acknowledge that he hadn’t any, that he hadn’t known one was necessary.

“Sorry then,” politely informed the policeman, “but the waterfront beyond here is out of bounds for any one not holding a pass signed by Inspector Little and the camp superintendent. That’s orders.”

Considerably abashed, Hammond struck back for the camp. He would try Acey Smith for a waterfront pass. Likely, in view of the superintendent’s previous anxiety to have him leave on the early boat, he would be refused point-blank, but it was worth finding out.

He turned at a shrill tooting out beyond the field of boomed pulpwood. A tug was just coming in the gap. They must be running wild to-day—and perhaps this would be the last one in before the strike was called. He had better take it over to Kam City, he reflected.

The tug had docked when Hammond reached the camp’s “main street,” and he noted that along with a number of questionable-looking men in city garb the dark-eyed girl in the sable furs, known as Yvonne, descended the gang-plank. Acey Smith was not in his office nor anywhere about the docks.

Two members of the mounted force examined the passes of the passengers as they came off the dock. The men dispersed into the upper reaches of the camp, while the girl paused to talk to a tall, black-whiskered man in an over-long rusty black coat who went down to meet her.

Hammond was sure he saw first impatience then anger come into Yvonne’s dark face as the Rev. Nathan Stubbs conversed with her in guarded undertones. Suddenly she swept away from him with a stamp of her little foot and went direct to the office of Acey Smith, where she entered without rapping.

The tug took off little freight and took on less. Its whistle gave a sharp warning blast.

Hammond raced down to the dock. The deck-hands were actually pulling up the gang-plank and unsnubbing the hawsers.

He held out his pass for the mounties to see as he went by, conscious that some one was racing at his heels. A strong hand reached out and clutched at his shoulder, and he flung it off unceremoniously. The gang-plank was up, but he cleared the space between the edge of the dock and the tug’s low deck in a flying leap.

He turned to see the Rev. Nathan Stubbs being unceremoniously yanked back off the dock by policemen as he continued to gesticulate in a wild, appealing fashion at Hammond.