Corporal Cameron of the North West Mounted Police Part 23

"I am afraid they are of the vaguest kind," said Cameron. "I want something to do."

"What sort of thing? I mean, what has been the line of your training?"

"I am afraid my training has been defective. I have pa.s.sed through Edinburgh Academy, also the University, with the exception of my last year. But I am willing to take anything."

"Ah!" said the banker thoughtfully. "No office training, eh?"

"No, Sir. That is, if you except a brief period of three or four months in the law office of our family solicitor."

"Law, eh?--I have it! Denman's your man! I shall give you a letter to Mr. Denman--a lawyer friend of mine. I shall see him personally to-day, and if you call to-morrow at ten I hope to have news for you. Meantime, I shall be pleased to have you lunch with me to-day at the club. One o'clock is the hour. If you would kindly call at the bank, we shall go down together."

Cameron expressed his grat.i.tude.

"By the way!" said Mr. Ritchie, "where have you put up?"

"At the Royal," said Cameron.

"Ah! That will do for the present," said Mr. Ritchie. "I am sorry our circ.u.mstances do not permit of my inviting you to our home. The truth is, Mrs. Ritchie is at present out of the city. But we shall find some suitable lodging for you. The Royal is far too expensive a place for a young man with his fortune to make."

Cameron spent the day making the acquaintance of the beautiful, quaint, if somewhat squalid, old city of Montreal; and next morning, with a letter of introduction from Mr. Ritchie, presented himself at Mr.

Denman's office. Mr. Denman was a man in young middle life, athletic of frame, keen of eye, and energetic of manner; his voice was loud and sharp. He welcomed Cameron with brisk heartiness, and immediately proceeded to business.

"Let me see," he began, "what is your idea? What kind of a job are you after?"

"Indeed," replied Cameron, "that is just what I hardly know."

"Well, what has been your experience? You are a University man, I believe? But have you had any practical training? Do you know office work?"

"No, I've had little training for an office. I was in a law office for part of a year."

"Ah! Familiar with bookkeeping, or accounting? I suppose you can't run one of these typewriting machines?"

In regard to each of these lines of effort Cameron was forced to confess ignorance.

"I say!" cried Mr. Denman, "those old country people seriously annoy me with their inadequate system of education!"

"I am afraid," replied Cameron, "the fault is more mine than the system's."

"Don't know about that! Don't know about that!" replied Mr. Denman quickly; "I have had scores of young men, fine young men, too, come to me; public school men, university men, but quite unfit for any practical line of work."

Mr. Denman considered for some moments. "Let us see. You have done some work in a law office. Now," Mr. Denman spoke with some hesitation; "I have a place in my own office here--not much in it for the present, but--"

"To tell the truth," interrupted Cameron, "I did not make much of the law; in fact, I do not think I am suited for office work. I would prefer something in the open. I had thought of the land."

"Farming," exclaimed Mr. Denman. "Ah!--you would, I suppose, be able to invest something?"

"No," said Cameron, "nothing."

Denman shook his head. "Nothing in it! You would not earn enough to buy a farm about here in fifteen years."

"But I understood," replied Cameron, "that further west was cheaper land."

"Oh! In the far west, yes! But it is a G.o.d-forsaken country! I don't know much about it, I confess. I know they are booming town lots all over the land. I believe they have gone quite mad in the business, but from what I hear, the main work in the west just now is jaw work; the only thing they raise is corner lots."

On Cameron's face there fell the gloom of discouragement. One of his fondest dreams was being dispelled--his vision of himself as a wealthy rancher, ranging over square miles of his estate upon a "bucking broncho," garbed in the picturesque cowboy dress, began to fade.

"But there is ranching, I believe?" he ventured.

"Ranching? Oh yes! There is, up near the Rockies, but that is out of civilization; out of reach of everything and everybody."

"That is what I want, Sir!" exclaimed Cameron, his face once more aglow with eager hope. "I want to get away into the open."

Mr. Denman did not, or could not, recognise this as the instinctive cry of the primitive man for a closer fellows.h.i.+p with Mother Nature. He was keenly practical, and impatient with everything that appeared to him to be purely visionary and unbusiness-like.

"But, my dear fellow," he said, "a ranch means cattle and horses; and cattle and horses means money, unless of course, you mean to be simply a cowboy--cowpuncher, I believe, is the correct term--but there is nothing in that; no future, I mean. It is all very well for a little fun, if you have a bank account to stand it, although some fellows stand it on someone's else bank account--not much to their credit, however. There is a young friend of mine out there at present, but from what I can gather his home correspondence is mainly confined to appeals for remittances from his governor, and his chief occupation spending these remittances as speedily as possible. All very well, as I have said, for fun, if you can pay the shot. But to play the role of gentleman cowboy, while somebody else pays for it, is the sort of thing I despise."

"And so do I, Sir!" said Cameron. "There will be no remittance in my case."

Denman glanced at the firm, closed lips and the stiffening figure.

"That is the talk!" he exclaimed. "No, there is no chance in ranching unless you have capital."

"As far as I can see," replied Cameron gloomily, "everything seems closed up except to the capitalist, and yet from what I heard at home situations were open on every hand in this country."

"Come here!" cried Denman, drawing Cameron to the office window. "See those doors!" pointing to a long line of shops. "Every last one is opened to a man who knows his business. See those smokestacks! Every last wheel in those factories is howling for a man who is on to his job.

But don't look blue, there is a place for you, too; the thing is to find it."

"What are those long buildings?" inquired Cameron, pointing towards the water front.

"Those are railroad sheds; or, rather, Transportation Company's sheds; they are practically the same thing. I say! What is the matter with trying the Transportation Company? I know the manager well. The very thing! Try the Transportation Company!"

"How should I go about it?" said Cameron. "I mean to say just what position should I apply for?"

"Position!" shouted Denman. "Why, general manager would be good!"

Then, noting the flush in Cameron's face, he added quickly, "Pardon me!

The thing is to get your foot in somehow, and then wire in till you are general manager, by Jove! It can be done! Fleming has done it! Went in as messenger boy, but--" Denman paused. There flashed through his mind the story of Fleming's career; a vision of the half-starved ragged waif who started as messenger boy in the company's offices, and who, by dint of invincible determination and resolute self-denial, fought his way step by step to his present position of control. In contrast, he looked at the young man, born and bred in circles where work is regarded as a calamity, and service wears the badge of social disfranchis.e.m.e.nt.

Fleming had done it under compulsion of the inexorable mistress "Necessity." But what of this young man?

"Will we try?" he said at length. "I shall give you a letter to Mr.

Fleming."

He sat down to his desk and wrote vigourously.

"Take this, and see what happens."

Cameron took the letter, and, glancing at the address, read, Wm.

Fleming, Esquire, General Manager, Metropolitan Transportation & Cartage Company.