The Man in the Twilight Part 16

The financier settled himself more comfortably in his chair, and returned his cigar to his gross mouth.

"Tell me," he demanded.

"Easy. Things are moving our way."

The dark eyes glanced over the table for the gold cigarette box that always stood there.

"Help yourself," the banker ordered rather than invited.

Idepski needed no second bidding.

"You got all my code messages?" he asked. "Good," as the Swede nodded.

"Then you know the position of the mill. Say, that feller Harker needs a sort of apology from me--also from you. The mill's a wonder. And he's the guy that's fixed it that way. You haven't a thing in Skandinavia comparable. I'd say you haven't a feller on your side capable of touching the fringe of that tough's genius for organisation. It's him.

Not Martin--I mean Standing."

"And Standing?"

But Idepski was not to be deflected from his purpose.

"That's all right," he said easily. "I'm coming to him presently. I gave you, at times, the whole length and breadth, and size, and capacity of the Sachigo of to-day. You got all that stuff. But I've saved up the plum. There's a new man come into it. His name's Sternford--Bull Sternford. Guess it's him I need to tell you about before I pa.s.s on to the other. It's taken me a while to locate all I needed. And I guess I had luck or I wouldn't have got it all yet."

For once the man's smile reached his eyes.

"What's his position--in Sachigo?" h.e.l.lbeam demanded.

"Right on top of the business side of it."

"A financial man?"

The banker's interest was obviously stirred. But Idepski shook his dark head.

"That's the queer of it," he said. "He's a youngster straight out of the forest with no sort of record except as a pretty tough fighting proposition. Here, let me hand it to you in my own way, and I'll answer any sort of question after. I got men chasing up the forest camps. You know that. Well, I get their reports right here in this city at my office. They're read carefully, and anything that looks good is coded, and sent on to me wherever I am. Well, right after I located this feller, Sternford, coming into Sachigo, I got word of some stuff reported from one of your own camps way out north-west of Lake St. Anac.

Guess it's about the farthest north in that direction, and it's cut off from any other camp by a hundred miles. On the face of it the stuff didn't seem to need more than a single thought. It was to say my man was quitting the camp. He'd sifted it right through, but there wasn't a 'jack' in the camp with any sort of story worth wasting paper on. There wasn't a trace of our man that way, and he proposed drawing another cover. At the end of his report was one of those notes these boys never seem able to resist mixing up with their official work. It told me of one of those sc.r.a.ps that happened in the camps, and he seemed mighty struck by it. It was between the camp boss, Arden Laval, and a kid called Sternford. Say, when I read that name I jumped. I felt like handing my feller promotion right away. Well, his story was good anyway.

It seems this camp boss is about the biggest bluff in the sc.r.a.p way known to that country. The kid licked him. They fought nearly two hours, 'rough and tough.' And the kid would have killed his man, but for the interference of a missionary feller called Father Adam. He broke 'em loose with a gun, and when he got 'em loose he took the kid right away so he shouldn't hand out the homicide he reckoned to. This report was more than two months old when I got it. Anyway I got it after a feller called Bull Sternford, a queer name by the way, had jumped in on the Sachigo proposition."

The agent flung away his cigarette and helped himself afresh.

"Well," he went on, smiling, "I guess it didn't take me thinking five seconds. I set the wires humming asking a description of this fighting kid. I got it. It was my man. The feller at Sachigo. Well?"

Idepski's smiling interrogation was full of satisfaction.

"Go on." The watchful eyes of the financier seemed to have narrowed.

"Now, by what chance does this feller, Bull Sternford, come straight from one h.e.l.l of a sc.r.a.p in a far-off camp belonging to Skandinavia to run the business end of Sachigo? What happened after that fool missionary got him away? And--"

Idepski broke off, pondering. He flicked his cigarette ash without regard for the carpet.

h.e.l.lbeam stirred in his chair impatiently. His lips seemed to become more prominent. His small eyes seemed to become smaller.

"You ask that, yes? You?" he snorted. "A child may answer that thing.

You think? Oh, yes, you think." The hand supporting his cigar made a gesture that implied everything disparaging. "Our man--this Martin--has gone out of Sachigo because--of you? I tell you, no! Does a man give up the money, the big plan he makes, at the sight of an--agent? He took you in his hand and sent you to the swine life of the forest where he could have crushed you like that." He gripped the empty air. "Then he goes--where? You say he fears and quits. What does he fear? You?" The man shook his head till his cheeks were shaken by the violence of his movement. "He goes somewhere. But he does not quit. That is clear. Oh, yes. The mill goes on. It grows and prospers. The man Harker remains.

Where comes the money for Sachigo to grow? Trade? Yes, some. But not all. I know these things. The mill goes on--the same as with Martin there. So Martin does not quit. He--just goes. Then who sets this Bull Sternford in the mill? Why? He says, 'This man can do the things I need.' Well? Say quick to your man, 'Do not leave this camp of Skandinavia.' Martin is there, or near by. He must know this Father Adam, too. He must be in touch with him. Maybe he watches the Skandinavia work. Maybe he plays his game so. Maybe he goes from Sachigo for that reason. Yes?"

The financier's undisguised contempt left the agent apparently undisturbed.

"That's the simple horse sense of it," Idepski retorted promptly. "I get all that. But you're wrong when you say, Martin's playing any other game than lying low because of one h.e.l.l of a scare. I know him. You think you know him because you can't get away from judging a man from your end.

However, that don't matter a shuck. I've told that man of mine to stop around. Don't worry. I told him that right away. I told him to watch this missionary." He shook his head. "Nothing doing. The missionary has quit. As I said, I'm right back from Sachigo. I didn't come back just to hand you this stuff. I'm on my way up to this camp of yours. We've been hunting this guy eight years--blind. Now there's a streak of daylight.

I'm going for that streak myself. Anyway, it's liable to be pleasanter work than lumbering in the booms at Sachigo, and wondering when that feller Bat Harker, was going to locate me through a lumber-jack's outfit. And while I'm up there I mean to learn all I can of this Father Adam. I don't look for much that way. He's just a missioner that every feller in the forest's got a good word for, and anyway, it don't seem to me the feller who jumped in on you, and touched your bank roll is the sort to pa.s.s his time handlin' out tracts to the b.u.ms of the forest. I came in on my way to pa.s.s you these things. I go north again to-night.

I'll be away quite a while, and, shut off up there, you'll not be likely to get word easy. But you'll hear things when I've got anything to hand you."

A sardonic light crept into h.e.l.lbeam's eyes as he listened to the final a.s.surance.

"So," he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed with a nod.

The agent rose to go.

"Meanwhile," he said, leaning over the desk, "it might be well for you to get a grip on the fact that Sachigo's going right on. It's the greatest groundwood proposition in the world. I know enough of Harker to realise his capacity to make it do just what he needs. And as for that other--this Sternford kid--why, I gather he's a pretty live wire that's set there for a reason. The slogan up there's much what it was, only the words are changed."

h.e.l.lbeam sucked his cigar and removed it from his lips.

"Changed? How?" he demanded, without suspicion.

"It was 'Canadian trade for the Canadians,'" Idepski said, his dark eyes snapping maliciously. "It's more personal since the fighting kid came along. It reminds me of the German slogans of the war. It's 'To h.e.l.l with the Swedes, we'll drive 'em _into_ the sea.'"

The financier nodded. His armour was impenetrable.

"The Germans said much," he said.

"That's all right, these folks aren't Germans," came the prompt retort, as Idepski picked up his hat and gloves.

"No." h.e.l.lbeam remained seated. It was not his way to speed a departing visitor. "I'm glad. Oh, yes." He smiled into the other's face, and his meaning was obvious. "You go to this camp. You find this missionary.

That's work for you. The other--" his eyes dropped to the papers on the desk before him--"this mill, this Sachigo is for me. It is much nearer to the sea than the Skandinavia. Oh, yes."

CHAPTER V

THE PROGRESS OF NANCY

The girl reached out a hand in response to the ring of the telephone. It was slim and white; and her finger nails displayed that care which suggests a healthy regard for the niceties of a woman's life.

"Hullo! Yes?"

She remained silently intent upon the rapidly spoken message coming down to her over the wire. Her deep, hazel eyes were soberly regarding the blotting pad, upon which an idle pencil was describing a number of meaningless diagrams.

"Yes," she replied, after a while. "Oh, yes. All reports are in. I've gone through them all, and my summary is being prepared now. They're a pretty bad story. Yes. What's that? How? Oh, yes. Some of the camps are in pretty bad shape, I'd say. Output's fallen badly. Output! Yes. All sorts of reasons and--" she laughed, "--to me, none quite satisfactory.