The Man in the Twilight by Ridgwell Cullum

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In seven years the translation of the wilderness had been well-nigh
complete. Its vast desolation remained. That could never change under
human effort. It was one of the oldest regions of the earth's land,
driven and beaten and desolated under a climate beyond words in its
merciless severity. But now the place was peopled. Now human dwellings
dotted the forest foreshore of the cove. And the latter were the homes
of the workers who had come at the mill-owner's call to share in his
great adventure.

Then there was shipping in the cove. A fleet of merchant shipping
awaiting cargoes. There was a built inner harbour, with quays, and
warehouses. There were travelling cranes, and every appliance for the
loading of the great freighters with all possible dispatch. There were
light railways running in every direction. There were sheltering "booms"
in the river mouth crammed with logs, and dealt with by an army of river
men equipped with their amazing peavys with which they thrust, and
rolled, and shepherded the vast mass of hewn timber towards the
slaughterhouse of saws. Then, immediately surrounding the mill, there
was a veritable town of storehouses and offices and machine shops of
every description. There were power-houses, there were buildings in the
process of construction, and the laid foundations of others projected.
It was a world of active human purpose lost in the heart of an immense
solitude which it was nevertheless powerless to disturb.

"Yes, it's all too good to have things happen, Bat," Standing went on
presently. "Hark at the roar of the falls. What is it? Five hundred
thousand horsepower of water, summer and winter. Listen to the drone of
the grinders." He shook his head. "It's a great song, boy, and they
never get tired of singing it. There's only thirty-six of 'em at
present. Thirty-six. We'll have a hundred and thirty-six some day. Look
down there at the booms." He stood pointing, a tall, lean figure on the
hillside. "Tens of thousands of logs, and hundreds of men. We'll
multiply those again and again--one day. It's fine. The freighters lying
at anchor awaiting their cargoes. Some day we'll have our own ships--a
big fleet of 'em. See the smoke pennants floating from our smoke stacks.
They're the triumphant pennants of successful industry, eh? We can't
have too many such flags flying. One day we'll have trolley cars running
along the shores of the cove to bring the workers in to the mill. It'll
be like a veritable Atlantic City. Oh, it's a great big dream. There's
nothing amiss. No."

"Only the _Lizzie_ getting in."

Bat was without apparent appreciation. He was thinking only of the
message they had received, and the threat it contained.

Standing glanced round at the sturdy figure beside him. A half smile lit
his sallow features. Then he turned again and sought out the tubby
vessel approaching the wharf below. But it was only for a moment. Some
subtle thought impelled him, and he glanced back at the house on the
hillside he had just left, the house he had erected for the woman whose
devotion had taught him the real meaning of life.

It was a long, low, rambling, gabled building. It was an extensive
timber-built home with a wide verandah and those many vanities and
conceits of building that would never have been permitted had it been
intended for bachelordom. He remembered how Nancy and he had designed it
together. He remembered the delight with which they had looked forward
to its completion, and ultimately their boundless joy in the task of
its furnishing. He remembered how Nancy had insisted that it should
contain not only their home, but his own private office, from which he
could control the great work he had set his hand to. It had been her
ardent desire to be always near him, always there to support him under
the burden of his immense labours. And remembering these things a fierce
desire leapt within him, and he turned again to the man at his side.

"Yes, she's getting in, Bat," he said. "But I just wanted to get a peek
at things. Well, I've seen all I want, old friend. Now I'm ready. Fight?
Oh, yes, I'm ready to fight. Come on." And he laughed as he hurried down
the woodland trail to the water-side.

* * * * *

The two men had reached the quay-side, which was lined with bales of
wood-pulp stacked ready for shipment. Farther down its length the cranes
were rattling their chains, swinging their burdens out over the holds of
the vessel taking in its moist cargo. The stevedores were vociferously
busy, working against time. For, in the brief open season, time was the
very essence of the success demanded for the mills. The noise, the babel
of it all was usually the choicest music to Standing and his manager.

But just now they were less heeding. Their eyes were turned upon the
small steamer plugging its deliberate way over the water towards them.
It was a small, heavily-built tub of a vessel calculated to survive the
worst Atlantic storms.

Bat's face was without any expression of undue emotion. But the hard
lines about his clean-shaven mouth were sharply set. Standing was asurge
with an excitement that fired his dark eyes. His wide-brimmed hat was
thrust back from his forehead, and he stood with his hands thrust deeply
in the pockets of his moleskin trousers. His nervous fingers were
playing with loose coins and keys which they found irresistible.

The _Lizzie_ came steadily on.

"We'll know the whole game in minutes now."

Standing could keep silent no longer. Bat nodded.

"Yep."

Orders from the bridge of the packet boat rang out over the water. Then
Standing went on.

"I want to find Idepski aboard," he said. He was scarcely addressing his
companion. "It would be good to get Master Walter here, fifty-three
degrees north." A short, hard laugh punctuated his words. Then he turned
abruptly. "Who's running No. 10 camp?"

Just for an instant Bat withdrew his gaze from the approaching vessel.
He flashed a keen look of enquiry into the eyes of the questioner.

"Ole Porson," he said.

"I thought so. He's a good boy. He'll do."

Standing nodded. The cold significance of his tone was not lost on his
companion. Maybe Bat understood the thing that was passing in the
other's mind. At any rate he turned again to the broad-beamed tub
steaming so busily towards them.

"I see old Hardy on the bridge," Standing went on a moment later. Then
he added: "Fancy navigating the Labrador coast for forty years. No, I
couldn't do it. I wouldn't have the--guts."

Bat still remained silent. He understood. The other was talking because
it was impossible for him to refrain.

"They're standing ready to make fast," Standing said sharply. He drew a
quick breath. Then his manner changed and his words came pensively.
"Say, it's a queer life--a hell of a life. The sea folk, I mean. It's
about the worst on earth. Think of it, cooped within those timbers that
are never easy till they lie at anchor in the shelter of a harbour. I'd
just hate it. Their life? What is it? It's not life at all. Hard work,
hard food, hard times, and hard drinking--when they're ashore--most of
them. I think I can understand. They surely need something to drown the
memory of the threat they're always living under. No, they don't live.
They exist. Here, let's stand clear. They're coming right in."

* * * * *

The bustle of landing was in full swing. Even with so small a craft as
the _Lizzie_ there was commotion. Orders flew from lip to lip. Creaking
cables strained at unyielding bollards. Gangways clattered out from
deck, and ran down on to the quay with a crash. Hatches were flung open
and the steam winches rattled incessantly.

Standing and Harker were looking on from a vantage point well clear of
the work of unloading. The captain of the vessel, "Old Man" Hardy, was
with them. The seaman was beaming with that satisfaction which belongs
to the master when his vessel is safely in port.

"Oh, I guess it ain't been too bad a trip," he was saying. "Takin' the
'ins' with the 'outs,' I'd say it was a fairish passage, which is mostly
as it should be, seein' it's my last voyage in the old barge. Y'see, you
folks are kind of robbing me of this blessed old kettle," he explained,
with a grin that lit up the whole of his mahogany features. "Y'see we're
loaded well-nigh rail under with stuff for your mill, which don't leave
a dog's chance for the other folks along the coast. The Company guesses
they got to put on a two thousand tonner. The _Myra_. I haven't a kick
comin'. She's all a seaboat. Still, I'm kind of sorry, don't you know.
I've known the _Lizzie_ since she came off the stocks, which is mostly
forty years, and we're mighty good friends, which ain't allus the way.
I'd say, too, I'm getting old for a change. Still--."

Standing shook his head.

"What do they say? 'Hardy' by name, 'Hardy' by nature. The toughest and
best sailorman on the Labrador coast! Well, I'm sorry you don't feel
good about it. But," he added with a smile, "it means a good deal to us
getting a bigger packet."

Captain Hardy nodded.

"Thankee kindly. It's good to know folks reckon a fellow something more
than just part of a kettle of scrap like this old packet. But I'd have
been glad to finish my job with her. Still, times don't stand around
even in Labrador." He finished up with something in the nature of a
sigh.

The work going forward was full of interest. But it was not the work
that held Standing, or the watchful eyes of Bat Harker. Their sole
interest was in the personality of the crew and the five passengers,
mostly "drummers," from the great business houses of Quebec and
Montreal, who were struggling to land their trunks of samples and get
them off to the offices of the mill so as to complete their trade before
the _Lizzie_ put to sea again. Not one of these escaped their
observation.

"You seem to keep much the same crew right along, Hardy," Standing said
pleasantly. "I suppose they like shipping with a good skipper. I seem to
recognise most of their faces."

"Oh, yes. They're mostly the same boys," Hardy agreed, obviously
appreciating the compliment. "But I guess I lost four boys this trip.
They skipped half an hour before putting to sea. It happens that way now
and then, if they're only soused enough when they get aboard. They're a
crazy lot with rye under their belts. I just had to replace 'em with
some dockside loafers, or lie alongside another day."

Standing nodded. A man was moving down the gangway bearing a large,
grey, official-looking sack on his shoulders. He was a slight, dark man
with a curiously foreign cast about his features.

"The mail?" he enquired. And a curious sharpness flavoured his demand.
Then he added, with studied indifference. "One of your--dockside
loafers?"

Captain Hardy laughed. He continued to laugh as he watched the
unhandiness of the man staggering down the gangway under his burden.

"Yep. The mail," he said. "And I'd hate to set that feller to work on a
seaman's job. He's about as unhandy as a doped Chinaman. I'd say Masters
is playing safe keeping him from messing up the running gear while we're
discharging. Say, get a look at it."

A great laugh accompanied the old man's words as the foreign-looking
creature tripped on the gangway, and only saved himself from a bad fall
by precipitating his burden upon the quay. There was no responsive
laughter in Standing. And Bat Harker's features remained rigidly
unsmiling. Standing turned sharply.

"Maybe you can spare that boy to run those mails up to my office," he
said. "It's a good healthy pull up the hill for him, and my folks are
full to the neck with things. I'd be glad."

"Sure he can." Captain Hardy was only too delighted to be able to oblige
so important a customer of his company. He promptly shouted at the
landing officer.

"Ho, you! Masters! Just let that darn Dago tote them mails right up to
Mr. Standing's office. He ain't no sort of use out of hell down
here--anyway."

The mate's reply came back with an appreciative grin.

"Ay, sir," he cried, and forthwith hurled the order at the mail carrier
with a plentiful accompaniment of appropriate adjectives.

"Thanks," Standing turned away. His smiling luminous eyes were shining.
"I'll get right along up, Captain. There's liable to be things need
seeing to in that mail before you pull out. You'd best come along, too,
Bat," he added pointedly.

Standing hurried away. A sudden fierce passion was surging through his
veins. Nisson was right. He knew it--now. And in a fever of impatience
he was yearning to come to grips with those who would rob him of the
hopes in which his whole being was bound up.

CHAPTER III

IDEPSKI

The two men reached the office on the hillside minutes before the mail
carrier. They took the hill direct, passing hurriedly through the aisles
of scented woods which shadowed its face. The other, the stranger, was
left with no alternative but the roadway, zigzagging at an easier
incline.

Standing passed into the house. His confidential man of many races
looked up from his work. The quick, black eyes were questioning. He was
perhaps startled at the swift return of the man whom he regarded above
all others.

Standing spoke coldly, emphatically.

"There's a man coming along up. He's a sailorman, and he's dressed in
dirty dungaree, and he's carrying a sack of mail. Now see and get this
clearly, Loale. It's important. It's so important I can't stand for any
sort of mistake. When he comes you've got to send him right into my room
with the mail-bag. I want him to take it in _himself_. You get that?"

The half-breed's eyes blinked. It was rather the curious attitude of an
attentive dog. But that was always his way when the master of the
Sachigo Mill spoke to him.

Pete Loale was quite an unusual creature. He looked unkempt and unclean,
with his yellow, pock-marked skin, and his clothes that would have
disgraced a second-hand dealer's stores of waste. But for all his lack
in these directions there was that in the man which was more than worth
while. Out of his black eyes looked a world of intelligence. There was
also a resource and initiative in him that Standing fully appreciated.

"Sure I get that," he said simply. Then he repeated in the manner of a
child determined to make no mistake. "He's to take that mail-bag right
into your office--_himself_."

"That's it. Don't knock on my door. Don't let him think there's a soul
inside that room. Just boost him right in. You get that?"

The half-breed nodded.

"I'll just say: 'Here you! Just push that darn truck right inside that
room, an' don't worry me with it, I'm busy.' That how?" The man hunched
his slim shoulders into a shrug.

"See you do it--just that way," Standing said. Then he turned to Bat.
"We'll get inside," he went on. "He'll be right along."

They passed into the office. The door closed behind them and Standing
moved over to his seat at the crowded desk.

"Wal?"

Bat was still standing. He failed to grasp his friend's purpose. His wit
was unequal to the rapid process of the other's swiftly calculating
mind.

Standing littered his writing-pad with papers. He picked up a pen and
jabbed it in the inkwell. Then he flung it aside and adopted a
fountain-pen which he drew from his waistcoat pocket. His eyes lit with
a half-smile as he finally raised them to the rugged face before him.

"You sit right over there by that window, Bat," he said easily. "If you
get a look out of it you'll be amazed at the number of things to
interest you." He nodded as Bat moved away with a grin and took the
chair indicated. "That's it. Just sit around, and you won't see or even
hear the fellow with the mail fall in through the door. And maybe,
sitting there, you'll want to smoke your foul old pipe. Sort of pipe of
peaceful meditation. Yes, I'd smoke that pipe, old friend, but you can
cut out the peaceful meditation. You need to be ready to act quick when
I pass the word. It's going to be easy. So easy I almost feel sorry
for--Idepski."

"It _is_--Idepski?" Bat filled and lit his pipe.

"It surely is. No other. And--I'm glad. Now we'll quit talk, old friend.
Just smoke, and look out of that window, and--think like hell."

Bat's understanding of his friend was well founded. The extreme nervous
tension in Standing was obvious. It was in the wide, dark eyes. It was
in the constant shifting of the feet which the table revealed. For the
time, at least, the cowardice Standing claimed for himself was entirely
swamped. He was stirred by the headlong excitement of battle in a manner
that left Bat more than satisfied.

Once Bat turned from his contemplation of the piled-up country beyond
the valley. It was at the sound of Standing's fiercely scratching pen.
And his quick gaze took in the luxury of the setting for the little
drama he felt was about to be enacted.

It was a wide, pleasant room, built wholly of red pine, and polished as
only red pine will polish. There was a thick oriental carpet on the
floor, and all the mahogany furniture was upholstered in red morocco.
There were a few carefully selected pictures upon the walls, hung with
an eye to the light upon each. But it was not an extravagant room. It
suggested the homeland of Scotland, from which the owner of it all
hailed. The Canadian atmosphere only found expression in the great steel
stove which stood in one corner, and the splendid timber of which the
walls of the room were built.

But Bat's eyes swiftly returned to their allotted task, and his reeking
pipe did its duty with hearty goodwill. There was the sound of strident
voices in the outer room, and the rattle of the door handle turning with
a wrench.

The door swung open. The next moment there was the sound of a sack
pitched upon the soft pile of the carpet. And through the open doorway
the harsh voice of Loale pursued the intruder in sharp protest.

"Say, do you think you're stowing cargo in your darn, crazy old barge?"
he cried. "If you fancy throwing things around you best get out an' do
it. Guess you ain't used to a gent's office, you darn sailorman--"

But the door was closed with a slam and the rest of the protest was cut
off. Bat swung about in his chair to discover a picture not easily to be
forgotten.

Standing had left his desk. He was there with his back against the
closed door, and his lean figure towered over the shorter sailorman in
dungaree, who stood gazing up at him questioningly. The sight appealed
to the grim humour of the manager. He wanted to laugh. But he refrained,
though his eyes lit responsively as he watched the smile of irony that
gleamed in the mill-owner's eyes.

"Well, well." Standing's tone lost none of the aggravation of his smile.
"Say, I'd never have recognised you, Idepski, if it hadn't been that I
was warned you'd shipped on the _Lizzie_." He laughed outright. "I can't
help it. You wouldn't blame me laughing if you could see yourself. Last
time I had the pleasure of encountering you was in Detroit. That's years
ago. How many? Nearly seven. It seems to me I remember a bright-looking
'sleuth,' neat, clean, spruce, with a crease to his pant-legs like a
razor edge, a fellow more concerned for his bath than his religion. Say,
where did you raise all that junk? From old man Hardy's slop-chest?
Hellbeam makes you work for your money when you're driven to wallowing
in a muck-hole like the _Lizzie_. It isn't worth it. You see, you've run
into the worst failure you've made in years. But I only wish you could
see the sorry sort of sailorman you look."

Standing's right hand was behind him, and Bat heard the key turn in the
lock of the door. He waited. But the trapped agent never opened his
lips.

Idepski had seen Standing and the other down at the quay-side. He had
left them there when he started up the hill. Yet--A bitter fury was
driving him. He realised the trap that had been laid. He realised
something of the deadly purpose lying behind it. So he remained silent
under the scourge that was intended to hurt.

For all the filthy dungarees tucked into the clumsy legs of high leather
sea boots, the dirty-coloured handkerchief knotted about his neck, the
curious napless cloth cap with its peak pulled down over one eye, that
curious cap which seems to be worn by no one else in the world but
seafaring men, it was easy enough for Bat to visualise the dapper
picture, that other picture of Walter Idepski that Standing had
described. The man possessed a well-knit, sinuous figure which his
dungarees could not disguise. His alert eyes were good-looking. And,
cleaned of the black, stubbly growth of beard and whisker, an amazing
transformation in his looks would surely have been achieved. But Bat's
interest was less with these things than with the possible reaction the
man might contemplate.

For the moment, however, the situation was entirely dominated by
Standing, who displayed no sign of relaxing his hold upon it. He flung
out a pointing hand, and Bat saw it was grasping the door key.

"You'd best take that chair, Idepski," he ordered. "You've opened war on
me, but there's no need to keep you standing for it. You'll take that
seat against my writing table. But first, Bat, here, is going to relieve
you of the useless weapons I see you've got on you. Get those, Bat!
There's a gun and a sheath knife, and they're clumsily showing their
shape under his dungarees."

It was the word the mill-manager had awaited. He was on his feet in an
instant. Idepski stirred to action. He turned to meet him.

"Keep your darn hands off!" he cried fiercely. "By--"

His hand had flown to his hip. But he was given no time. Bat was on him
like an avalanche, an avalanche of furious purpose. The fighting spirit
in him yearned, and in a moment his victim was caught up in a crushing
embrace. There was a short, fierce struggle. But Idepski was no match
for the super lumber-jack.

While Bat held on, the tenacious hands of Standing tore the weapons he
had discovered from their hiding places. Then in a moment Idepski found
himself sprawling in the chair he had been invited to take.

Standing's appreciation was evident as he watched the man draw a gold
cigarette case from the breast pocket of his overalls as though nothing
had occurred. It was an act of studied coolness that did not for a
moment deceive, but it pleased. However, his next effrontery pleased the
mill-owner still more.

"Say, boys," Idepski observed quietly, as he opened the case and
extracted a cigarette. "I guess I'm kind o' glad you left me this. But I
don't figger you're out for loot, anyway." Then he glanced up at the man
watching him so interestedly. "Maybe you'll oblige me with a light," he
demanded, and cocked up the cigarette he had thrust between his lips
with an exaggerated impertinence.

The action was quite irresistible and Standing nodded.

"Sure," he said smilingly, and picked up the matchbox lying on his
table.

He struck a match and held it while the other obtained the required
light. Then he passed round the desk to the seat he had originally
occupied.

Idepski leant back in his chair, and luxuriated in a deep inhalation of
smoke. Bat watched him from his place at the window. Standing placed the
revolver and sheath knife he had taken possession of in a drawer in the
desk, and closed it carefully.

"Well, what's the play?" Idepski addressed himself solely to Standing.
"I guess you've said a deal calculated to rile, and your pardner's done
more," he went on. "Still--anyway we're mostly men and not school-kids.
What's the play?"

Standing, too, was leaning back in his chair.

"It's easy," he said, after a moment's thoughtful regard. Suddenly he
drew his chair up to the table, and, leaning forward, folded his arms
upon the littered blotting pad in front of him. "It's seven years since
Hellbeam--blazed the war trail," he said deliberately. "I know he's
persistent. He's angry. And he's the sort of man who doesn't cool down
easily. But it's taken him seven years to locate me here. And during all
that time I've been looking on, watching his every move." He shook his
head. "He's badly served, for all his wealth. He was badly served from
the start. You should never have let me beat you in that first race
across the border. I got away with every cent of the stuff, and--you
shouldn't have let me. You certainly were at fault. However, it doesn't
matter."

Idepski removed his cigarette from his lips and dropped the ash of it in
the waste basket.

"No. It doesn't matter, because I'll get you--in the end," he retorted
coldly.

"Perhaps."

Standing shrugged. But there was no indifference in his eyes. The acid
sharpness of Idepski's retort had driven straight home. If the agent
failed to detect it, the watchful eyes of Bat missed nothing. To him the
danger signal lay in the curious flicker of his friend's eyelids. The
sight impelled him. He jumped in and took up the challenge in the blunt
fashion he best understood.

"Guess you've got nightmare, boy," he said, with a sneering laugh. "I
ain't much at figgers, but it seems to me if it's taken you seven years
to locate us here, it's going to take you seventy-seven gettin' Standing
back across that border. Work it out."

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