The Man in the Twilight by Ridgwell Cullum

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The girl drew a deep breath, and, to the man, it seemed in the nature of
relief. A great anxiety for her stirred him.

"I'm glad you said that," she said. Then she gazed reflectively up at
the old ramparts. "No. It's no crime to fight when you're convinced.
Besides it's right, too, to fight for your side at any time. That's how
I see it. You'll fight for yours--"

"Any old how." Bull's eyes were deeply regarding. They were very gentle.
"Here," he went on, "fight has a clear, definite meaning for me. I
fight to win. I'll stop at nothing. It's always a game of 'rough and
tough' with me. Gouge, chew, and all the rest of it. Frankly, there's a
devil inside me, when it's fight. I want you to know this, so your
scruples needn't worry you."

"Yes."

Nancy's gaze was turned seawards.

"And you sail--to-morrow? When do you return?" she asked a moment later.

Bull smilingly shook his head.

"We are at war," he said.

The girl's eyes came back. She, too, smiled.

"I forgot." Then she added: "You go by the _Empress_?"

"Yes."

They had both contrived to make it difficult. The barrier was growing.
Both realised it, and Nancy was stirred more than she knew. She had seen
this man and hurried over to him. She had purposely denied him for two
weeks, but the sight of him on the promenade had been irresistible.
Now--now she hardly knew what to say; and yet there were a hundred
things struggling in her mind to find expression. She was paralysed by
the memory of the recent interview she had had with her employers--the
great financial head of her house included--wherein she had learned all
that the coming war meant personally to herself. She would have given
worlds at that moment to have been able to blot out that memory. But she
had no power to do so. It loomed almost tragically in its significance
in the presence of this man.

Bull found it no less difficult. He had striven to make things easy for
her. He had no second thought. And now he realised the thing he had
done. His words had only served to fling an irrevocable challenge, and
thus, finally and definitely, made the longed-for approach between them
impossible.

He drew a deep breath.

"Yes. I sail on the _Empress_."

"And you are glad--of course?"

Bull laughed.

"Some ways."

"You mean--?"

"Why, I shouldn't be sailing if things weren't going my way," he said.
Then he turned about and his movement was an invitation. "But let's quit
it," he said. "Let's forget--for the moment. You don't know what this
meeting has meant to me. I wanted to see you, if only to say 'good-bye.'
I thought I wasn't going to."

They moved down the promenade together.

Nancy did her best. They talked of everything but the impending war, and
the meaning of it. But the barrier had grown out of all proportion. And
a great unease tugged at the heart of each. At length, as they came back
towards the hotel, Nancy felt it impossible to go on. And with downright
truth she said so.

"It must be 'good-bye'--now," she said. "This is all unreal. It must be
so. We're at war. We shall be at each other's throats presently. Well, I
just can't pretend. I don't want to think about it. I hate to remember
it. But it's there in my mind the whole time; and it worries so I don't
know the things I'm saying. It's best to say 'good-bye' and 'bon voyage'
right here. And whatever the future has for us I just mean that."

She held out her hand. It was bare, and soft, and warm, as the man took
possession of it.

"I feel that way, too," he said. "But--" he broke off and shook his
head. "No. It's no use. You've the right notion of this. Until this
war's fought out there is nothing else for it. You'll go right back to
your camp and I'll go to mine. And we'll both work out how we can best
beat the other. But let's make a compact. We'll do the thing we know to
hurt the other side the most we can. If need be we'll neither show the
other mercy. And we'll promise each to take our med'cine as it comes,
and cut out the personal hate and resentment it's likely to try and
inspire. We'll be fighting machines without soul or feeling till peace
comes. Then we'll be just as we are now--friends. Can you do it? I can."

For all the feeling of the moment Nancy laughed.

"It sounds crazy," she exclaimed.

"It is crazy. But so is the whole thing."

"Yes. Oh, it surely is. It's worst than crazy." Passion rang in the
girl's voice. Then the hazel depths smiled and set the man's pulses
hammering afresh. "But I'll make that compact, and I'll keep it. Yes.
Now, 'good-bye,' and a happy and pleasant trip."

Their hands fell apart. Bull had held that hand, so soft and warm and
appealing to him, till he dared hold it no longer.

"Thanks," he said. "Good-bye. I can set out with a good heart--now."

* * * * *

It was again the luncheon hour. It was also the hour at which the
_Empress_ was scheduled to sail. Nancy was again on the Terrace. But now
she was standing on the edge of the promenade--alone. She was gazing
down at the grey waters of the great river, searching with eager eyes,
and listening for the "hoot" of the vessel's siren. This was the last
departure the _Empress_ would make from Quebec for the season. By the
time she returned across the ocean the ice would deny her approach, and
she would make port farther seawards.

Nancy had come there in her leisure just out of simple interest, she
told herself. The man was nothing to her. Oh, no. She felt a certain
regret that they were at war. She felt a certain pity that it was
necessary that so brave a man's hopes must be crushed and all his plans
broken, but that was all. She told herself these things very
deliberately.

And so she had hurried over her mid-day meal, lest she should miss the
sight of the _Empress_ steaming out, with Bull Sternford aboard.

The day was cold and grey. There was snow in the heavy clouds, and the
north wind was bitter. But it mattered nothing. Waiting there the girl's
feet in their overshoes grew cold. Her hands were cold. Even her slim,
graceful body under its outer covering of fur was none too warm. But her
whole interest was absorbed and she remained so till the appointed time.

Oh, yes. It was simply interest in the departure of the vessel that held
her. Just the same, as it was simply interest that stirred her heart and
set it a-flutter, as the sound of the ship's siren came up to her from
below. And surely it was only a 'God-speed' to the departing vessel that
was conveyed in the fluttering handkerchief she held out and waved, as
the graceful giant passed out into the distant mid-channel.

CHAPTER XVI

ON BOARD THE _Empress_

It was the second day out and the passengers on the _Empress_ had
already settled down to their week's trip.

The sea was calm, with just that pleasant, lazy swell which the Atlantic
never really loses. The decks were thronged with a happy company of men
and women determined not to lose one single moment of the bodily ease
which the clemency of the weather vouchsafed to them.

Bull Sternford was amongst them. Engulfed in a heavy fur overcoat, he
stood lounging against the lee rail of the wide promenade deck,
contemplating the oily swell of the waters. His great stature was
somewhat magnified by his voluminous coat, with its deep, upturned
storm-collar. There was that about him to attract considerable
attention. But he remained unconscious of it, and his aloofness was by
no means studied.

Deep emotion was stirring. A man of iron nerve and purpose, a man of
cool deliberation under the harshest circumstances, just now Bull was
afflicted like the veriest weakling with alternating hope and doubt, and
something approaching indecision. The youth in him was plunged in that
agony of desire which maddens with delight and drives headlong to
despair. His whole horizon of life had changed. Old scenes, old dreams,
had been suddenly blotted out. And in their place was the wonderful
vision of a girl with vivid hair and gentle eyes. Nancy--Nancy McDonald.
The name was always with him now, unspoken, unwhispered even; but
occupying every waking thought.

It was a time of reckless resolve, of hot-headed planning. He knew in
his sober moments how almost impossible was the position. But these were
not sober moments. He told himself, in his headlong way, that if Nancy
was chained in the heart of Hell he would seek her out, and claim her.
She should be his even though every infernal power were arrayed against
him. His eyes were alight with a fierce smile, as he contemplated the
grey waters. It was a smile of conscious strength, of reckless purpose.
Well, he was ready. He was--

"Guess we'll git this sort of stuff all the way."

Bull started and swung around. A fur-coated man with a dark
close-cropped beard was leaning over the rail beside him. He was
expensively clad. His astrachan collar was turned up about his neck to
shut out something of the biting winter air; and a cap of similar fur
was pressed low down over his dark head. Bull noted the man's
appearance, and his reply was promptly forthcoming.

"Maybe," he admitted without interest.

"Sure we will. It's always that way with the _Empress's_ last trip of
the season from Quebec. I most generally make it for that reason. Your
first trip?"

"No."

"It's my nineteenth. You see," the stranger went on, "I can't spare
summer time. I'm too full gettin' orders out. I'm in the lumber
business. It's only with the freeze up I can quit my mills. Have a
cigar?"

Bull had no alternative. The man was there to talk, and his desire to do
so was frankly displayed.

"I won't smoke, thanks," Bull replied without offense. "It's too near
dinner."

"Dinner? There's a ha'f hour to the dressing bugle." The stranger
returned the elaborate case stuffed full of large, expensive cigars to
his pocket, and drew out a gold cigarette case instead. "Still I don't
blame you a thing. Cigars? Me for a cigarette all the time. I don't
guess any feller ever heard tell of tobacco, till he'd inhaled a good,
plain Virginia Cigarette."

Bull looked on while the man wasted half-a-dozen matches lighting his
beloved cigarette. He was not without interest. There was a slightly
Jewish caste about his face which was frankly smiling, and lit with
shrewd, twinkling dark eyes. He conveyed, too, somewhat blatantly, an
atmosphere of abounding prosperity.

Bull laughed as the cigarette was finally lighted.

"That's better," he said. "Now--you can inhale."

"Sure I can." The man's smile was full of amiability. "Inhale anything.
Say, up in the camps I've inhaled tea-leaves rolled in cracker paper
before now. Ever hit a lumber camp?"

"Yes."

"But not out West? British Columbia?"

"No. Only Quebec."

The stranger shook his head disparagingly.

"Quebec! Psha! Quebec ain't a thing. It ain't a circumstance," he said
complacently. "No, sir. The West. That's the place for lumbering. B.C.
West of the Rockies. Man, it's the world's greatest proposition. The
place you can spend a lifetime cutting ninety foot baulks, and lose
track of where you cut. Quebec's mostly small stuff," he went on
contemptuously, "pulp-wood an' that." He shook his head. "It's no place
for capital. And, anyway, the Frenchies have got the whole darn place
taped out. Oh, they're wise--the Frenchies. If a feller's lookin' to get
ahead of 'em he needs to stake out the Arctic, where you'd freeze the
ears of a brass image. The Frenchies got it all. The only big stuff lies
on Labrador, anyway. I know. I prospected. No, it's me for the big
hills, West. The big hills and the big waterways that 'ud leave Quebec
rivers looking like a leak in a bone dry bar'l. My name's Aylin P.
Cantor, Vancouver, B.C. Maybe you know the name?"

Bull shook his head.

"I'm not--"

"Oh, it don't matter," interjected Mr. Cantor. "You see, the West's one
hell of a long way--west. I just didn't get your--"

"Oh, my name's Sternford."

Mr. Cantor's face beamed.

"Why I'm glad to know you, Mr. Sternford," he exclaimed. Then a quick,
enquiring upward glance of his shrewd eyes suggested recollection. "But
say--you ain't Sternford of Labrador? The groundwood outfit up at--up
at--"

"Sachigo?"

"That's it, sure. Guess I'd lost the name a moment."

Bull nodded amusedly.

"Yes. That's where I hail from. And, as you say, there's big stuff up
there, too."

"Big? Why I'd say. Well, now! That's fine! I've heard tell big yarns of
Labrador. It's just great meeting--"

The man broke off at the sound of the first blast of the dressing bugle.

"Why, it's later than I guessed," he said. "Anyway, you'll take a
cocktail with me? This vessel's good and wet, thanks be to Providence,
and the high seas being peopled with fish instead of cranks. I hadn't a
notion I was goin' to run into a real lumberman on this trip. It's done
me a power of good."

* * * * *

Aylin P. Cantor was a diverting creature for all his appearance of
ostentatious prosperity. Good fortune had undoubtedly been his, and his
whole being seemed to have become absorbed in the trade which had so
generously treated him. Before the cocktail was consumed Bull had
listened to a long story of British Columbia, and forests of
incomparable extent. He had also learned that a country estate, miles in
extent, outside the city of Vancouver, and the luxuries associated with
the multi-millionaire had fallen to the lot of Aylin P. Cantor. But
somehow there was no offence in it all. The man was just a bubbling
fount of enthusiasm and delight that this was so. He simply had to talk
of it.

But the acquaintance was not to terminate over a cocktail. Shipboard
offers few avenues of escape to the man seeking to avoid another. So it
came that Bull found himself sipping a brandy, reputed to be one hundred
years old, over his coffee after dinner, while Aylin P. Cantor told him
the story of how it came into his possession at something far below its
market value.

Later, again, while the auction pool was being sold, he found himself
ensconced on a lounge in a far corner of the smokeroom beside his
fellow craftsman, still listening chiefly, and absorbing fact and
anecdote pertaining to a successful lumberman's life. And it was nearly
eleven o'clock, and the pool had been sold, and the bulk of the
occupants of the smoking-room were contemplating their last rubber of
Auction Bridge, when the busy-minded westerner consented to abandon his
particular venue for a brief contemplation of the despised East.

"Oh, I guess there's money in your territory, too," he condescended at
last. "I ain't a word to say against the stuff I've heard tell of
Labrador. But you're froze up more'n ha'f the year. That's your
trouble."

"Yes."

Bull nodded over the latter portion of his third cigar which Mr. Cantor
had not permitted him to escape.

"Sure," the man laughed. "Oh, the stuff's there. I know that. But
Labrador needs a mighty big nerve to exploit. I heard it all from a
feller I met when I was prospecting Quebec. You see, I had the notion of
playing a million dollars in the Quebec forests once. But I weakened. I
kind of fancied my chance against the Frenchies didn't amount to cold
water on a red hot cookstove. I cut it out and hunted my own patch,
West, again. But I guess I'd have fallen for the stories of Labrador, if
it hadn't been for the feller who put me wise."

"Who was that?" Bull had lost interest, but the man invited the enquiry.

"Oh, a sort of missionary crank," Cantor returned indifferently. "You
know the sort. We got 'em out West, too. They hound the boys around,
chasin' them heavenwards by a through route they guess they know about."
He laughed. "But the boys bein' just boys, the round up don't ever seem
to make good; and that through trip looks most like a bum sort of
freight in the wash-out season. Outside his missioner business I guess
the guy was pretty wise, though. And his knowledge of the lumber play
left me without a word. He knew it all--an' I guess he told it to me."

Bull laughed. But the laugh was inspired by the thought that there could
be found in the world a man who could leave Aylin P. Cantor without a
word on the subject of lumber.

"I'd like to make a guess at that feller," he said. "There's just one
man I know who's a missionary in Quebec who knows anything about
Labrador. Did he call himself, 'Father Adam?'"

"That's the thing he did."

"Ah, I thought so." Bull's smile had passed. "Where did you meet him?"
he went on after a moment.

"On the Shagaunty. The Skandinavia Corporation territory. He told me
he'd just come along through from Labrador."

"Oh, yes?"

Mr. Cantor laughed.

"Why he took me to his crazy shanty and handed me coffee. And he talked.
My, how he talked."

"Did he know you were--prospecting?"

There was no lack of interest in Bull now. His steady eyes were alight,
as he watched the stewards moving amongst the tables, setting the place
straight for the night.

"Yes. I told him."

Cantor's dark eyes were questioning. As Bull remained silent he went on.

"Why? Is he interested for the Skandinavia to keep folk out?"

Bull shook his head.

"No. It isn't that. He's a queer feller. No, I'd say he's got just one
concern in life. It's the boys. But you're right, he knows the whole
thing--the whole game of lumbering in Eastern Canada. And if he told
you and warned you, I'd say it was for your good as he saw it. No. He's
no axe to grind, and though you found him on the Skandinavia's
territory, I don't think he likes them. I'm sure he doesn't. Still, he's
not concerned for any employer. He just comes and goes handing out his
dope to the boys, and--You know the forest-jacks. They're a mighty tough
proposition. Well, it's said they feel about Father Adam so if a hair of
his head was hurt they'd get the feller who did it, and they'd cut the
liver out of him, and pass what was left feed for the coyotes."

Mr. Cantor nodded.

"Yes, I sort of gathered something of that from the folks I hit up
against. It seems queer a feller devoting his life to bumming through
the forests and seekin' shelter where you couldn't find shelter from a
summer dew. He's got no fixed home. Maybe he's sort of crazed."

Bull was prompt in his denial.

"Saner than you or me," he said. "You know I'd want to smile if I didn't
know the man. But I know him, and--but there we all owe him a deal, we
forest men. And maybe I owe him more than anyone."

"How's that?"

Mr. Cantor's question came sharply. Even Bull, tired as he was, noted
the keenly incisive tone of it. He turned, and his steady eyes regarded
the dark face of the lumberman speculatively. Then he smiled, and picked
up his glass and drained the remains of his whisky and soda.

"Why, he's more power for peace with the lumber-jacks of Quebec than if
he was their trade leader," he said, setting his empty glass down on the
table. "We employers owe him there's never any sort of trouble with the
boys."

"I see." Mr. Cantor gazed out across the nearly empty room, and a
shadowy smile haunted his eyes. "And if there was trouble? Could you
locate him in time?"

"We shouldn't need to. He'd be there."

The lumberman stirred, and persisted with curious interest.

"But he must have a place where you folks can get him? This coming and
going. It's fine--but--"

Bull stood up and stretched himself.

"Oh, he's got a home, all right. It's the forests."

Mr. Cantor threw up his hands and laughed.

"Who is he, anyway? A sort of Wandering Jew? A ghost? A spook? That sort
of thing beats me. He's got to be one of the two things. He's either a
crank--you say he ain't--or he's dodging daylight."

But Bull had had enough. Deep in his heart was a feeling that no man had
any right to pry into the life of Father Adam. Father Adam had changed
the whole course of his life. It was Father Adam who had made possible
everything he was to-day--even his association with Nancy McDonald. He
shook his head unsmilingly.

"Father Adam's one good man," he said. "And I wouldn't recommend anyone
to hand out anything to the contrary within hearing of the men of the
Quebec forests. Good-night."

He strode away. And Mr. Cantor followed him, slight and bediamonded in
his evening clothes. And somehow the dark eyes gazing on the broad back
of the man from Labrador had none of the twinkling shrewdness the other
had originally observed in them. They were quite cold and very hard. And
there was that in them which suggested the annoyance inspired by a long
evening of effort that had ended in complete failure.

The man's dark, foreign-looking features had lost every semblance of
their recent good-natured enthusiasm.

CHAPTER XVII

THE LONELY FIGURE AGAIN

The laden sled stood ready for the moment of starting on the day's long
run. Five train dogs, lean, powerful huskies, crouched down upon the
snow. They gave no sign beyond the alertness of their pose and the
watchfulness of their furtive eyes. Their haunches were tucked under
them. And their long, wolfish muzzles, so indicative of their parentage,
were pressed down between great, outstretched forepaws.

The man studied every detail of his outfit. He knew the chances, the
desperate nature of the long winter trail. He had no desire to increase
the hardship of it all by any act of carelessness.

Behind him lay the mockery of a camping ground. It was a minute,
isolated bluff of stunted, windswept trees, set in a white, wide
wilderness of barren land. Perhaps there was some half a hundred of
them. But that was all. They had served, but only by reason that their
shelter had satisfied habit, which, even in the men of the long trail,
will not be denied.

He turned away. Everything was to his satisfaction. So his tall,
fur-clad figure passed in amongst the dwarf trees.

The dogs remained crouching, their fierce eyes gazing out over the
desolate expanse of winter's playground. It lay at a great altitude,
several thousands of feet above the level of the sea. The sky was drab.
It was bitter with threat. It was unrelieved by any break in the
menacing winter cloud. It was a snow sky which only refrained from
releasing its burden by reason of the high, top wind that drove the
heavy masses relentlessly. The earthly prospect was no more inviting. It
was wide, and flat, and devoid of vegetation. There were no hills
anywhere, and the skyline was just a vanishing point similar to the
horizon of the open sea. One vast, wide field of snow and ice spread out
in every direction, and made desolation complete.

When the man re-appeared he was armed with a sturdy "gee-pole," and at
his belt was coiled a heavy-thonged, short-stocked driving whip.

Without a word he thrust the pole under the front of the sled runners,
and a sharp command broke from his lips. The effect was instantaneous.
Each dog sprang at his "tug." The man heaved on his pole. There was a
moment of straining, then the holding ice gave up its grip, and the sled
shot forward.

The man stood for a moment beating his mitted hands. Then he took his
place on the sled, buried his legs and feet under the heavy seal robes
set ready, and so the long-waited command to "mush" was hurled at the
waiting beasts.

The dogs leapt at their work and the sled swept forward with a rush. A
blinding flurry of snow dust rose in its wake, enveloping it, and the
dogs raced on, yelping with the joy of activity. Their great muscles
were aquiver with the eager spirit which is bred of the wild. And so
they would continue to run, for their load was light, and the
heavy-thonged whip was playing in skilful hands, and they knew, and
feared, and obeyed its constant threat.

The way lay across the frozen bosom of a great lake, no less than an
inland sea, and a hundred miles must be travelled before night, or the
snow, overtook them. It was a hard run. But it must be accomplished.
Failure? But failure must not be considered. No man could contemplate
failure and face the winter trail in the barren desolation of the lofty
interior of Labrador's untracked wild.

The austerity of the country was well-nigh overwhelming. The nakedness
of it all suggested a skeleton world robbed of everything that could
make existence possible. It suggested a world that was sick, and aged,
and too unfruitful to harbour aught but the fierce elemental storms of
the northern winter. And the cold of it ate into the bones of the lonely
figure passing through the great silence like a ghost.

* * * * *

The night was deathly still. A thermometer would have registered
something colder than sixty degrees below zero. Not a breath of wind
stirred. The only sound that came was the doleful note of a prowling
wolf in the forest belt near by, and the booming protest of the trees
against the bitterness of winter.

The sky was ablaze with a myriad jewels in a velvet setting. And a cold
wealth of aurora lit the northern heavens. Camp had been pitched well
wide of the nearby forests, and three men sat crouching over the fire.
There was little enough to differentiate between them. They were white
men, and all were clad, from their heads to the soles of their seal hide
moccasins, in heavy furs. The dark outlines of two sleds showed up a few
yards away, but the dogs, themselves, were not visible. Weary with their
day's run they had betaken themselves to their nightly snow burrows to
dream over past battles, past labours.

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