Carmen's Messenger Part 5

When he arrived at Montreal he went to the _Windsor_ as he had been told, but there was no letter or telegram waiting and none came during the day or two he stayed. On the evening before he sailed he was sitting in the large entrance hall, which is a feature of American and Canadian hotels, when he thought a man some distance off looked hard at him over his newspaper. Foster only caught a momentary glimpse of his face, because he held up the paper as if to get a better light and people were moving about between them; but he thought the man was Daly, and after a few moments carelessly crossed the floor.

A man sat at the spot he had marked and the chairs on both sides were unoccupied, but when Foster sat down in the nearest he saw the fellow was a stranger. This puzzled him, since he did not think he had been mistaken. It was, however, possible that Daly had been there, but had moved off quietly when Foster's view was obstructed. If so, he must have had an object for hiding, and Foster waited some minutes before he went to the office and examined the guestbook. Daly's name did not appear, and he found that n.o.body from the West had signed the book recently.

"I wanted to see if a man I know is staying here," he told the clerk.

"That's all right," said the other. "Quite a number of people have been looking for friends to-day."

Foster described Daly as well as he could, and asked if he had examined the book.

"No," said the clerk. "n.o.body just like that had the register while I've been about; but now I think of it, a man who might meet the bill stood by while another looked at the last page." Then he indicated a figure near the revolving door, "There! that's who he was with!"

As the man pushed the door round Foster saw his face, and knew him for the stranger who had occupied the chair in which he had expected to find Daly. He thanked the clerk and went back thoughtfully to his place, because it looked as if Daly had been there and the other had helped him to steal away. If this surmise was correct, they might be trying to follow Featherstone; but he was, fortunately, out of their reach, and Foster decided that he must not exaggerate the importance of the matter. After all, Daly might have come to Montreal on business, and the rotunda of a Canadian hotel is something of a public resort.

Still, he felt disturbed and presently gave the clerk the fur coat, telling him to deliver it when asked for. He felt it a relief to get rid of the thing.

Next day he sailed on an Empress liner, and on the evening after he reached England left the train at a lonely station in the North. It was not yet dark, and for a moment or two he stood on the platform looking about. There had been rain, and the air had a damp freshness that was unusual in Canada. In the east and north the sky was covered with leaden cloud, against which rounded hilltops were faintly marked.

Rugged moors rolled in long slopes towards the west, where the horizon was flushed with vivid saffron and delicate green. Up the middle of the foreground ran a deep valley, with blue shadow in its bottom and touches of orange light on its heathy sides. There were few trees, although a line of black firs ran boldly to the crest of a neighboring rise, and stone d.y.k.es were more common than the ragged hedges. Foster saw no plowed land, and nothing except heather seemed to grow on the peaty soil, which looked black as jet where the railway cutting pierced it. Indeed, he thought the landscape as savage and desolate as any he had seen in Canada, but as he did not like tame country this had a certain charm.

While he looked about a man came up. He was elderly and dressed with extreme neatness in old-fas.h.i.+oned dark clothes, but he had the unmistakable look of a gentleman's servant. Though there was a small car in the road, he was obviously not a professional chauffeur.

"You'll be Mr. Foster, sir, for the Garth?" he said.

Foster said he was and the man resumed: "Mr. Featherstone sent the car and his apologies. He had to attend the court, being a magistrate, and hoped you would excuse his not coming."

Then he picked up Foster's portmanteau and called a porter, who was moving some clanging milk cans, to bring his bag.

"Never mind; I'll take it," Foster told him.

"As you like, sir, but it's perhaps not quite usual in this country,"

the other answered in a deprecatory tone.

"I suppose I ought to have remembered that," Foster agreed smiling.

They crossed the platform, and while they waited for the bag the man said respectfully, "Might I ask if Mr. Lawrence was better when you left, sir? It was a disappointment to us when we heard he could not come home."

Foster liked the fellow. He was very formal, but seemed to include himself in his master's family.

"Yes," he said. "In fact, I expect he'll be quite well in a month or two. I suppose you were at the Garth before my partner left?"

"I've served Mr. Featherstone for thirty years, sir, and led Mr.

Lawrence's first pony and cleaned his first gun. It wasn't my regular duty, sir, but he was the only son and I looked after him. If I may say so, we were much upset when we heard that he was ill."

Then the bag was brought, and as the car ran across the moor Foster noted the smooth, hard surface of the wet road. The country was wild and desolate, but they had no roads like this in Canada, except perhaps in one or two of the larger cities. Indeed, in Western towns he knew, it was something of an adventure to cross the street during the spring thaw. The light got red and angry as they dipped into the valley; the firs on the hillcrest stood out black and sharp, and then melted into the gray background. A river pool shone with a ruby gleam that suddenly went out, and the dim water vanished into the shadow, brawling among the stones.

There was smooth pasture in the valley, broken by dark squares of turnip fields and pale stubble; but here and there the heath appeared again and wild cotton showed faintly white above the black peat-soil.

By and by a cross, standing by itself on the lonely hillside, caught Foster's eye, and he asked his companion about it.

"The Count's Cross, sir; a courtesy t.i.tle they held in the next dale.

He was killed in a raid on a tower down the water, before the Featherstones came."

"But did they bury him up there?"

"No, sir; they were all buried at night by the water of Langrigg, but when they were carrying him home in the mist by the hill road the Scots from the tower overtook them. The Count's men were wounded and their horses foundered, but the Scots let them go when they found that he was dead. About 1300, sir. Somebody put up the cross to commemorate it."

"They seem to have been a chivalrous lot," Foster remarked. "I wonder if that kind of thing would happen nowadays!"

"I'm afraid one couldn't expect it, sir," the old fellow answered and Foster smiled.

The cross faded into the hillside; it got dark and the valley narrowed.

Trees grew in sheltered spots; the faint, delicate tracery of birch branches breaking the solid, black ranks of the firs. The road wound along the river, which roared, half seen, in the gloom. Now and then they ran through water, and presently the glare of the headlamps bored through breast-high mist. There was a smell of wet soil and rotting leaves. It was very different from the tangled pine bush of Ontario and the stark bareness of the plains, but it was somehow familiar and Foster felt that he was at home.

By and by the moon came out, and the mist got thinner as they ran into an opening where the side of the glen fell back. Lights twinkled at the foot of a hill, and as they sped on the irregular outline of a house showed against a background of trees. It glimmered, long and low, in the moonlight, and then Foster lost it as they ran through a gate into the darkness of a belt of firs. A minute or two later, the car slowed and stopped after pa.s.sing round a bend.

A wide door stood hospitably open, and a figure upon the steps cut against the light. There were two more figures inside the hall, and as he got down Foster heard voices that sounded strangely pleasant and refined. Then a man whom he could not see well shook hands with him and took him in, and he stopped, half dazzled by the brightness.

The hall was large and a fire burned on a deep hearth. There were oil lamps on tall pillars, and in the background a broad staircase ran up to a gallery in the gloom. Foster, however, had not much time to look about, for as soon as he had given up his hat and coat his host led him towards the fire and two ladies came up. He knew one was his partner's mother and the other his sister, but although they were like Lawrence he remarked a difference that was puzzling until he understood its origin. Mrs. Featherstone had an unmistakable stamp of dignity, but her face was gentle and her look very friendly; her daughter was tall and Foster thought remarkably graceful, with an air of pride and reserve, although this vanished when she gave him a frank welcoming smile. Featherstone, who was older than his wife, had short, gray hair, and a lined, brown face, but looked strong and carried himself well.

Foster, who liked them at once, wondered rather anxiously whether he had pleased or disappointed them. But he imagined that they would reserve their opinion. They were, of course, not the people to show what they thought, and if he had felt any embarra.s.sment, they would have known how to put him at his ease. Still his type was, no doubt, new to them and his views might jar. He did not remember what they said, but they somehow made him feel he was not a stranger but a friend who had a claim, and when he went to his room he knew he would enjoy his stay with Featherstone's people.

VI

HIS COMRADE'S STORY

Foster spent the most part of the next day in the open air with his host. Featherstone had a quiet, genial manner and seemed to have read much, though he held the narrow views that sometimes mark the untraveled Englishman. He appeared to be scrupulously just and showed sound judgment about matters he understood, but he had strong prejudices and Foster did not think him clever. With his rather sensitive pride and fastidiousness he was certainly not the man to make his mark in Canada, and Foster began to understand certain traits of his comrade's that had puzzled him. Lawrence, although he had keener intelligence, was not quite so fine a type as his father, and in consequence stood rough wear better. But he too, in spite of his physical courage, now and then showed a supine carelessness and tried to avoid, instead of boldly grappling with, things that jarred.

They set out to go shooting, but Featherstone stopped to talk to everybody they met, and showed keen interest in such matters as the turnip crop and the price of sheep. It was clear that he was liked and respected. Sometimes he turned aside to examine tottering gates and blocked ditches, and commented to Foster upon the economics of farming and the burden of taxes. The latter soon gathered that there was not much profit to be derived from a small moorland estate and his host was far from rich. It looked as if it had cost him, and perhaps his family, some self-denial to send the money that had once or twice enabled Lawrence, and Foster with him, to weather a crisis.

At noon they were given a better lunch than Foster had often been satisfied with at a lonely farm, where Featherstone spoke of him as his son's partner, and seemed to take an ingenuous pride in making it known that Lawrence was prospering. This gave Foster a hint that he acted on later. They, however, shot a brace of partridges in a turnip field, a widgeon that rose from a reedy tarn, and a woodc.o.c.k that sprang out of a holly thicket in a bog. It was a day of gleams of sunlight, pa.s.sing showers, and mist that rolled about the hills and swept away, leaving the long slopes in transient brightness, checkered with the green of mosses and the red of withered fern. The sky cleared as they turned homewards, and when they reached the Garth an angry crimson glow spread across the west.

Tea was brought them in the hall and Foster, who had changed his clothes, which was a rare luxury in Canada, sat with much content in a corner by the hearth. He had been out in the raw wind long enough to enjoy the rest and warmth, and the presence of two English ladies added to the charm. Mrs. Featherstone was knitting, but Alice talked to her father about the shooting and what he had noted on the farms. Foster thought her cleverer than the others, but it was obvious that her interest was not forced. She understood agriculture and her remarks were singularly shrewd.

In a sense, this was puzzling, for she had, in an extra degree, the fastidious refinement that marked the rest, and with it a touch of quiet haughtiness. Although she often smiled, she was characterized by a restful calm, and her glance was steady and level. Alice was tall, with unusually regular features, brown eyes, and brown hair, but Foster could not a.n.a.lyze her charm, which was somehow strengthened by a hint of reserve. He was in the glow of the fire, and imagined that she once or twice gave him a glance of thoughtful scrutiny.

The room was getting dim, but lights had not been brought, and the red glow outside filled the large oblong of the cas.e.m.e.nt window. Dark fir branches cut against the lurid color and Foster, looking out, saw the radiance strike through the straight rows of trunks.

"Something like Ontario, isn't it?" said Featherstone, indicating the trees.

"Yes, in a way, but there's a difference," Foster replied. "In eastern Manitoba and Ontario the bush is choked and tangled, and runs nearly eight hundred miles. The small pines are half burned in places; in others they're wrecked and rotten, and lean across each other as if they were drunk. Then you can travel all day without finding an opening, unless it's a lonely lake or a river tumbling among the rocks."

"It sounds depressing," Mrs. Featherstone remarked. "We must hope you will find your stay here a pleasant change."

"The curious thing is that it doesn't feel strange. All I've seen so far, including the Garth, seems familiar."

"But perhaps that isn't remarkable. You are English and were, I dare say, brought up in the country and used to our mode of life."

Foster saw Alice glance at him and felt he must be frank.