The Man in the Twilight. Cullum Ridgwell

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СКАЧАТЬ a pore, lonesome kiddie, was toted right off to school so she couldn't butt in on you. You've never seen her, have you? And she was blood of the woman that set you nigh crazy. Only her father was another feller. No, Les." He shook his head, and went on filling his pipe. "No, Les, this mill and all about it can go hang if that pore, lone kiddie is wiped out of your reckoning. Maybe I'm queer about things. Maybe I'm no account anyway when it comes to the things of life mostly belonging to Sunday School. But I'd as lief go back to the woods I came from, as handle a proposition for you that don't figger that little gal in it. You best take that as all I've to say. There's a heap more I could say. But it don't matter. You're feelin' bad. Things have hit you bad. And you reckon they're going to hit you worse. Maybe you're right. Maybe you're wrong. Anyway these things are for you, though I'd be mighty thankful to help you. You want to go out of it all. You want to follow up some queer notion you got. You reckon it's going to give you peace. I hope so. I do sure. The thing you've said goes with me without shouting one way or the other. It grieves me bad. But that's no account anyway. But there's that gal standing between us, and she's going to stand right there till you've finished the things you're maybe going to say."

      For a moment the men looked into each other's eyes. It was a tense moment of sudden crisis between them.

      "Well?"

      Bat's unyielding interrogation came sharply. Standing nodded.

      "I hadn't thought, Bat," he said. Then he drew a deep breath. "I surely hadn't, but I guess you're right. She's my stepdaughter. And I've a right to do the thing you say. Yes. It's queer when I think of it," he went on musingly. "When I married her mother the girl didn't seem to come into our reckoning. She was at school, and I never even saw her. Then her mother wanted her left there, anyway till her schooling was through. Everything was paid. I saw to that. But—yes, I guess you're right. It's up to me, and I'll fix it."

      "The mill?"

      "She shall have equal share when the time comes."

      "When the whole work's put through?"

      "Yes. And meanwhile she'll be amply provided for." Standing spread out his hands deprecatingly. "You see, we did things in a hurry, Bat. There was always Hellbeam. And my Nancy understood that. I wonder—"

      Bat smoked on thoughtfully, and presently the other roused himself from the pre-occupation into which he had fallen.

      "Does that satisfy?" he demanded.

      Bat nodded.

      "I'll do the darnedest I know, Les," he said in his sturdy fashion. Fix that pore gal right. Hand her the share she's a right to—when the time comes along. Do that an' I'll not rest till the Skandinavians are left hollerin'. That kid's your daughter, for all she ain't flesh and blood of yours, an' you ain't ever see her. And anyway she's flesh of your Nancy, which seems to me hands her even a bigger claim."

      He moved away from his leaning post and his back was turned to hide that which looked out of his eyes.

      "I'm grieved," he went on, in his simple fashion, "I'm so grieved about things I can't tell you, Les. I always guessed to drive this thing through with you. I always reckoned to make good to you for that thing you did by me. Well, there's no use in talkin'. You reckon this notion of yours'll make you feel better, it's goin' to hand you—peace. That goes with me. Oh, yes, all the time, seein' you feel that way. But—say, we best get right home—or I'll cry like a darn-fool kid."

Chapter V—Nancy Mcdonald

       Table of Contents

      Charles Nisson was standing at the window. His eyes were deeply reflective as he watched the gently falling snow outside. He was a sturdy creature in his well-cut, well-cared-for black suit. For all he was past middle life there was little about him to emphasise the fact unless it were his trim, well-brushed snow-white hair, and the light covering of whisker and beard of a similar hue. He looked to be full of strength of purpose and physical energy.

      His back was turned on the pleasant dining-room of his home in Abercrombie, a remote town in Ontario, where he and his wife had only just finished breakfast. Sarah Nisson was sitting beside the anthracite stove which radiated its pleasant warmth against the bitter chill of winter reigning outside. She was still consuming the pages of her bulky mail.

      A clock chimed the hour, and the wife looked up from her letter. She turned a face that was still pretty for all her fifty odd years, in the direction of the man at the window.

      "Ten o'clock, Charles," she reminded him. Then her enquiring look melted into a gentle smile. "The office has less attraction with the snow falling."

      "It has less attraction to-day, anyway," the lawyer responded without turning. A short laugh punctuated his prompt reply.

      "You mean the Nancy McDonald business?"

      Sarah Nisson laid her mail aside.

      "Yes." The lawyer sighed and turned from his contemplation of the snow. He moved across to the stove. "I'm a bit of a coward, Sally," he went on, holding out his hands to the warmth. "The lives of other people are nearly as interesting as they are exasperating. They seem just as foolishly ordered as we believe our own to be well and truly ordered. I don't know who it was said 'all men are fools,' or liars, or something, but I guess he was right. Yes, we're all fools. I really don't know how we manage to get through a day, let alone a lifetime, without absolute disaster. We spend most of our time abusing Providence for the result of our own shortcomings, when really we ought to be mighty polite and thankful to the blind good fortune that lets us dodge the results of our follies."

      "All of which I suppose has to do with the way Leslie Martin, or Leslie Standing, as he calls himself now, is acting."

      "Well, most of it."

      The man's eyes had become seriously reflective again.

      Sarah Nisson nodded her pretty head. She leant her ample proportions towards the stove and emulated her husband's attitude, warming her plump hands. Her brown eyes were twinkling, and her broad, unlined brow was calmly serene. Her iron-grey hair was as carefully dressed as though she were still in the twenties, moreover it was utterly untouched by any of the shams so beloved of the modern woman of advancing years.

      "The death of his poor wife almost seems to have unhinged him," she said, with a troubled pucker of her brows. "But—but I don't wonder, I really don't. She was the sweetest girl. Poor soul. And that bonny wee boy. But there, I can't bear to think of it all. You mustn't blame him too much, Charles. I guess you don't in your heart. It's just as his attorney you feel mad about things. It's best to remember you were his friend first, and only his adviser, and man of business, after. The whole thing makes me feel I want to cry. And that poor girl coming to see you to-day. The other Nancy, I mean. I don't think I'd feel so bad about things if it wasn't for her. You know, I like Leslie. And I was as fond of his wife as I just could be, for all she made a fool of herself when she married that hateful James McDonald, who was no better than a revolutionary. Thank goodness he died and got out before he could do any harm. But I do think Leslie and poor Nancy were selfish about her child. I don't believe it was so much him as Nancy. From the moment Leslie came on the scene it was she who kept the poor child at college. She never even let him see her. And she's such a bonny girl, too. Do you know, I believe Nancy's death, and even the death of the baby boy, wouldn't have meant half so much to Leslie if he'd had Nancy's own girl with him. She'd have got herself right into his heart with her bonny ways, and her hazel СКАЧАТЬ