A Damaged Reputation Page 7

  VII.

  ALLONBY'S ILLUSION.

  The shanty was draughty as well as very damp, and the glass of theflickering lamp blackened so that the light was dim. It, however, servedto show one-half of Allonby's face in silhouette against the shadow, ashe sat leaning one elbow on the table, with a steaming glass in front ofhim. Brooke, who was stiff and weary, lay in a dilapidated canvas chairbeside the crackling fire, which filled the very untidy room witharomatic odors. It was still apparently raining outside, for there was aheavy splashing on the shingled roof above, and darkness had closed downon the lonely valley several hours ago, but while Brooke's eyes wereheavy, Allonby showed no sign of drowsiness. He sat looking straight infront of him vacantly.

  "You will pass your glass across when you are ready, Mr. Brooke," hesaid, and the latter noticed his clean English intonation. "The night isyoung yet, that bottle is by no means the last in the shanty, and it is,I think, six months since I have been favored with any intelligentcompany. I have, of course, the boys, but with due respect to thedemocratic sentiments of this colony they are--the boys, and the factthat they are a good deal more use to the country than I am does notaffect the question."

  Brooke smiled a little. His host was attired somewhat curiously in afrayed white shirt and black store jacket, which was flecked with cigarash, and had evidently seen better days, though his other garments wereof the prevalent jean, and a portion of his foot protruded through oneof his deerhide slippers. His face was gaunt and haggard, but it wasjust then a trifle flushed, and though his voice was still clear andnicely modulated, there was a suggestive unsteadiness in his gaze. Theman was evidently a victim of indulgence, but there was a trace ofrefinement about him, and Brooke had realized already that he hadreached the somewhat pathetic stage when pride sinks to the vanity whichprompts its possessor to find a curious solace in the recollection ofwhat he has thrown away.

  "No more!" he said. "I have lived long enough in the bush to find outthat is the way disaster lies."

  Allonby nodded. "You are no doubt perfectly right," he said. "I had,however, gone a little too far when I made the discovery, and by thattime the result of any further progress had become a matter ofindifference to me. In any case, a man who has played his part withcredit among his equals where life has a good deal to offer one andintellect is appreciated, must drown recollection now and then when hedrags out his days in a lonely exile that can have only one end. I amquite aware that it is not particularly good form for me to commiseratemyself, but it should be evident that there is nobody else here to do itfor me."

  Brooke had already found his host's maudlin moralizings becomingmonotonous, but he also felt in a half-contemptuous fashion sorry forthe man. He was, it seemed to him, in spite of his proclivities, in therestricted sense of the word, almost a gentleman.

  "If one may make the inquiry, you came from England?" he said.

  Allonby laughed. "Most men put that question differently in thiscountry. They talk straight, as they term it, and apparently considerbrutality to be the soul of candor. Yes, I came from England, becausesomething happened which prevented me feeling any great desire to spendany further time there. What it was does not, of course, matter. I cameout with a sheaf of certificates and several medals to exploit themineral riches of Western Canada, and found that mineralogical scienceis not greatly appreciated here."

  He rose, and taking down a battered walnut case, shook out a littlebundle of greasy papers with a trembling hand. Then a faint gleam creptinto his eyes as he opened a little box in which Brooke saw several biground pieces of gold. The dulness of the unpolished metal made theinscriptions on them more legible, and he knew enough about such mattersto realize that no man of mean talent could have won those trophies.

  "They would, I fancy, have got you a good appointment anywhere," hesaid.

  "As a matter of fact, they got me one or two. It is, however,occasionally a little difficult to keep an appointment when obtained."

  Brooke could understand that there were reasons which made that likelyin his host's case, but he had by this time had enough of the subject.

  "What are you going to do with the ore I brought you?" he said.

  Allonby's eyes twinkled. "Enrich what we raise here with it."

  "It is a little difficult to understand what you would gain by that."

  Allonby smiled suggestively. "I would certainly gain nothing, but ThomasP. Saxton seems to fancy the result would be profitable to him."

  "But does the Dayspring belong to Saxton?"

  Allonby emptied his glass at a gulp. "As much as I do, and he believeshe has bought me soul and body. The price was not a big one--a very fewdollars every month, and enough whisky to keep me here. If that failedme, I should go away, though I do not know where to, for I cannot usethe axe. He is, however, now quite willing to part with the Dayspring,which has done little more than pay expenses."

  A light commenced to dawn on Brooke, and his face grew a trifle hot."That is presumably why he arranged that I should bring the ore downpast the few ranches near the trail at night?"

  "Precisely!" said Allonby. "You see, Saxton wants to sell the mine toanother man--because he is a fool. Now the chief recommendation a minehas to a prospective purchaser is naturally the quality of the ore to begot out of it."

  "But the man who proposed buying it would send an expert to collectsamples for assaying."

  Allonby's voice was not quite so clear as it had been, but he smiledagain. "It is not quite so difficult for a mine captain who knows hisbusiness to contrive that an expert sees no more than is advisable. Agood deal of discretion is, however, necessary when you salt a poor minewith high-grade ore. It has to be done with knowledge, artistically. Youdon't seem quite pleased at being mixed up in such a deal."

  Brooke was a trifle grim in face, but he laughed. "I have no doubt that,considering everything, it is a trifle absurd of me, but I'm not," hesaid. "One has to get accustomed to the notion that he is being made useof in connection with an ingenious swindle. That, however, is a matterwhich rests between Saxton and me, and we may talk over it when I goback again. Why did you call him a fool?"

  Allonby leaned forward in his chair, and his face grew suddenly eager."I suppose you couldn't raise eight thousand dollars to buy the minewith?"

  Brooke laughed outright. "I should have some difficulty in raisingtwenty until the month is up."

  "Then you are losing a chance you'll never get again in a lifetime," andAllonby made a little gesture of resignation. "I would have liked you tohave taken it, because I think I could make you believe in me. That iswhy I showed you the medals."

  Brooke looked at him curiously for a moment or two. It was evident thatthe man was in earnest, for his gaunt face was wholly intent, and hisfingers were trembling.

  "It is a very long time since I had the expectation of ever callingeight thousand dollars my own, and if I had them I should feel verydubious about putting them into any mine, and especially this one."

  Allonby leaned forward further, and clutched his arm. "If you have anyfriends in the Old Country, beg or borrow from them. Offer them twentyper cent.--anything they ask. There is a fortune under your feet. Ofcourse, you do not believe it. Nobody I ever told it to would evenlisten seriously."

  "I believe you feel sure of it, but that is quite another thing," andBrooke smiled.

  Allonby rose shakily, and leaned upon the table with his fingerstrembling.

  "Listen a few minutes--I was sure of attention without asking for itonce," he said. "It was I who found the Dayspring, not by chanceprospecting, but by calculations that very few men in the province couldmake. I know what that must appear--but you have seen the medals.Tracing the dip and curvature of the stratification from the Elktail andtwo prospectors' shafts, I knew the vein would approach the level here,and I put five thousand dollars--every cent I could scrapetogether--into proving it. We struck the vein, but while it should havebeen rich, we found it broken, displaced, and poor. There had, you see,been a dis
turbance of the strata. I borrowed money, worked night andday, and starved myself--did everything that would save a dollar fromthe rapidly-melting pile--and at last we struck the vein again, andstruck it rich."

  He stopped abruptly and stood staring vacantly in front of him, whileBrooke heard him noisily draw in his breath.

  "You can imagine what that meant!" he continued. "After what hadhappened in England I could never go back a poor man, but a good deal isforgiven the one who comes home rich. Then, while I tried to keep myhead, we came to the fault where the ore vein suddenly ran out. It brokeoff as though cut through with a knife, and went down, as the men whoknew no better said, to the centre of the earth. Now a fault is a verycurious thing, but one can deduce a good deal when he has studied them,and a big snow-slide had laid bare an interesting slice of thefoundations of this country in the valley opposite. It took me a monthto construct my theory, and that was little when you consider thefactors I had to reckon with--ages of crushing pressure, denudation bygrinding ice and sliding snow, and Titanic upheavals thousands of yearsago. The result was from one point of view contemptible. With about fourthousand dollars I could strike the vein again."

  "Of course you tried to raise them?"

  Allonby made a grimace. "For six long years. The men who had lent memoney laughed at me, and worked the poor ore back along the inclineinstead of boring. Somebody has been working it--for about five cents onthe dollar--ever since, and when I told them what they were letting slipall of them smiled compassionately. I am of course--though once it wasdifferent--a broken man, with a brain clouded by whisky, only fit to runa played-out mine. How could I be expected to find any man a fortune?"

  His brain, it was evident, was slightly affected by alcohol then, butthere was no mistaking the genuineness of his bitterness. It was toodeep to be maudlin or tinged with self-commiseration now. The littlehopeless gesture of resignation he made was also very eloquent, andwhile the rain splashed upon the roof Brooke sat silent regarding himcuriously. The dim light and the flickering radiance from the fire werestill on one side of his face, forcing it up with all its gauntness ofoutline, but the weakness had gone out of it, and for once it was strongand almost stern. Then a little sardonic smile crept into it.

  "A fortune under our feet--and nobody will have it! It is one of Fate'sgrim jests," he said. "I spent a month making a theory, and every day ofsix years--that is when I was capable of thinking--has shown mesomething to prove that theory right. Now Saxton wants to swindleanother man into buying the mine for--you can call it a song."

  He poured out another glass with a shaking hand, and then turnedabruptly to his companion. "Put on your rubber coat and come with me,"he said.

  Brooke would much rather have retired to sleep, but the man'searnestness had its effect on him, and he rose and went out into therain with him. Allonby came near falling down the shaft when they stoodat its head, but Brooke got him into the ore hoist and sent him down,after which he descended the running chain he had locked fast hand overhand. The level, as he had been told, was close to the surface, andwhile Allonby walked unsteadily in front of him with a blinking candlein his hat, they followed it into the face of the hill. Twice hiscompanion stumbled over a piece of the timbering, and the light wentout, while Brooke wondered uneasily if there was another sinkinganywhere ahead as he lighted it again. He knew a little about mining,since he had on one or two occasions earned a few dollars assisting inthe driving of an adit.

  Finally, Allonby stopped and leaned against the dripping rock, as hetook off his hat and held the candle high above his head. Then he turnedand pointed down the gallery the way they had come.

  "Look at it!" he said, thickly. "Until we struck the ore where you seethe extra timbering, I counted the dollars every yard of it cost me as Iwould drops of my life's blood. I worked while the men slept, and livedlike a Chinaman. There was a fortune within my grasp if those dollarswould hold out until I reached it--and fortune meant England, and I oncemore the man I had been. Then--we came to that."

  He swung round and pointed with a wide, dramatic gesture which Brookefancied he would not have used in his prosperous days, to a bare face ofrock. It was of different nature to the sides of the tunnel, and hadevidently come down from above. Brooke understood. The strata hiscompanion had been working in had suddenly broken off and gone down,only he knew where. He sat down on a big fallen fragment, and there wassilence for a space, emphasized by the drip of water in the blackness ofthe mine. Brooke was very drowsy, but the scene, with its loneliness andthe haggard face of his companion showing pale and drawn in thecandle-light, had a curious effect on him, and in the meanwhilecompelled him to wakefulness.

  "You know where that broken strata has dipped to?" he said, at last.

  Allonby, who laughed in a strained fashion, sat down abruptly, andthrust a bundle of papers upon his companion. "Almost to a fathom. Ifyou know anything of geology, look at these."

  Brooke, who unrolled the papers, knew enough to recognize that, even ifhis companion had illusions, they were the work of a clever man. Therewas skill and what appeared to be a high regard for minute accuracy inevery line of the plans, while he fancied the attached calculationswould have aroused a mathematician's appreciation. He spent severalminutes poring over them with growing wonder, while Allonby held thecandle, and then looked up at him.

  "They would, I think, almost satisfy any man, but there is a weakpoint," he said.

  Allonby smiled in a curious fashion. "The one the rest split on? I seeyou understand."

  "You deduce where the ore ought to be--by analogy. That kind ofreasoning is, I fancy, not greatly favored in this country by practicalmen. They prefer the fact that it is there established by the drill."

  Allonby made a little gesture of impatience. "They have driven shaftand adit for half a lifetime, most of them, and they do not know yetthat one law of Nature--the sequence of cause and effect--is immutable.I have shown them the causes--but it would cost five thousand dollars todemonstrate the effect. Well, as no one will ever spend them, we will goback."

  He had come out unsteadily, but he went back more so still, as though asustaining purpose had been taken from him, and, as he fell down now andthen, Brooke had some difficulty in conveying him to the foot of theshaft. When he had bestowed him in the ore hoist, and was about toascend by the chain, Allonby laughed.

  "You needn't be particularly careful. I shall come down herehead-foremost one of these nights, and nobody will be any the worseoff," he said. "I lost my last chance when that vein worked out."

  Then Brooke went up into the darkness, and with some difficulty hove hiscompanion to the surface. They went back to the shanty together, and asAllonby incontinently fell asleep in his chair, Brooke retired to thebunk set apart for him. Still, tired as he was, it was some little timebefore he slept, for what he had seen had made its impression. Theshanty was very still, save for the snapping of the fire, and thebroken-down outcast, who held the key of a fortune the men of thatprovince were too shrewd to believe in, slept uneasily, with head hungforward, in his chair. Brooke could see him dimly by the dying light ofthe fire, and felt very far from sure that it was a delusion he laboredunder.

  When he awakened next morning Allonby was already about, and looked athim curiously when he endeavored to reopen the subject.

  "It is not considerate to refer next morning to anything a man with myshortcomings may have said the night before," he said. "I think youshould recognize that fact."

  "I'm sorry," said Brooke. "Still, it occurred to me that you believedvery firmly in the truth of it."

  Allonby smiled drily. "Well," he said, "I do. What is that to you?"

  "Nothing," said Brooke. "I shall, as I think I told you, be worth aboutthirty dollars when the month is out. What is the name of the man Saxtonwishes to sell the mine to?"

  "Devine," said Allonby, and went out to fling a vitriolic reproof at aminer who was doing something he did not approve of about the windlass,while Brooke, who saw no more of him, d
eparted when he had made hisbreakfast.