CHAPTER XX
AT THE DIKE
Marion caught her closely to her heart. "I knew you would go if I gotyou angry, dear. But you are so slow to anger. Mr. McCloud is just thesame way. Mr. Smith says when he does get angry he can do anything. Heis very like you in so many ways."
Dicksie was wiping her eyes. "Is he, Marion? Well, what shall Iwear?"
"Just your riding-clothes, dear, and a smile. He won't know what youhave on. It is you he will want to see. But I've been thinking ofsomething else. What will your Cousin Lance say? Suppose he shouldobject?"
"Object! I should like to see _him_ object after losing the fighthimself." Marion laughed. "Well, do you think you can find the waydown there for us?"
"I can find any way anywhere within a hundred miles of here."
On the 20th of June McCloud did have something of an army of men inthe Crawling Stone Valley. Of these, two hundred and fifty were inthe vicinity of the bridge, the abutments and piers of which werebeing put in just below the Dunning ranch. Near at hand Bill Dancing,with a big gang, had been for some time watching the ice anddynamiting the jams. McCloud brought in more men as the rivercontinued to rise. The danger line on the gauges was at lengthsubmerged, and for three days the main-line construction camps hadbeen robbed of men to guard the soft grades above and below thebridge. The new track up and down the valley had become a highway ofescape from the flood, and the track patrols were met at every curveby cattle, horses, deer, wolves, and coyotes fleeing from the waste ofwaters that spread over the bottoms.
Through the Dunning ranch the Crawling Stone River makes a far bendacross the valley to the north and east. The extraordinary volume ofwater now pouring through the Box Canyon exposed ten thousand acres ofthe ranch to the caprice of the river, and if at the point of itstremendous sweep to the north it should cut back into its old channelthe change would wipe the entire body of ranch alfalfa lands off theface of the valley. With the heat of the lengthening June days a vaststeam rose from the chill waters of the river, marking in ominouswindings the channel of the main stream through a yellow sea which,ignoring the usual landmarks of trees and dunes, flanked the currentbroadly on either side. Late in the afternoon of the day that Dicksiewith Marion sought McCloud, a storm drifted down the Topah TopahHills, and heavy showers broke across the valley.
At nightfall the rain had passed and the mist lifted from the river.Above the bluffs rolling patches of cloud obscured the face of themoon, but the distant thunder had ceased, and at midnight the valleynear the bridge lay in a stillness broken only by the hoarse calls ofthe patrols and far-off megaphones. From the bridge camp, which lay onhigh ground near the grade, the distant lamps of the track-walkerscould be seen moving dimly.
Before the camp-fire in front of McCloud's tent a group of men,smoking and talking, sat or lay sprawled on tarpaulins, dryingthemselves after the long day. Among them were the weather-beatenremnants of the old guard of the mountain-river workers, men who hadridden in the caboose the night that Hailey went to his death, and hadfought the Spider Water with Glover. Bill Dancing, huge, lumbering,awkward as a bear and as shifty, was talking, because with no apparenteffort he could talk all night, and was a valuable man at keeping thecamp awake. Bill Dancing talked and, after Sinclair's name had beendropped from the roll, ate and drank more than any two men on thedivision. A little apart, McCloud lay on a leather caboose cushiontrying to get a nap.
"It was the day George McCloud came," continued Dancing, spinning acontinuous story. "Nobody was drinking--Murray Sinclair started thatyarn. I was getting fixed up a little for to meet George McCloud, soI asked the barber for some tonic, and he understood me for to saydye for my whiskers, and he gets out the dye and begins to dye mywhiskers. My cigar went out whilst he was shampooing me, and mywhiskers was wet up with the dye. He turned around to put down th'bottle, and I started for to light my cigar with a parlor-match, and,by gum! away went my whiskers on fire--burnt jus' like a tumbleweed.There was the barbers all running around at once trying for to chokeme with towels, and running for water, and me sitting thereblazing like a tar-barrel. That's all there was to that story. I wentover to Doc Torpy's and got bandaged up, and he wanted me for to go tothe hospit'l--but I was going for to meet George McCloud." Billraised his voice a little and threw his tones carelessly over towardthe caboose cushion: "And I was the on'y man on the platform whenhis train pulled in. His car was on the hind end. I walked back andwaited for some one to come out. It was about seven o'clock in theevening and they was eating dinner inside, so I set up on the fencefor a minute, and who do you think got out of the car? That boylaying right over there. 'Where's your dad?' says I; that's exactlywhat I said. 'Dead,' says he. 'Dead!' says I, surprised-like. 'Dead,'says he, 'for many years.' 'Where's the new superintendent?' saysI. 'I'm the new superintendent,' says he. Well, sir, you could haveblowed me over with a air-hose. 'Go 'way,' I says. 'What's thematter with your face, Bill?' he says, while I was looking at him;now that's straight. That was George McCloud, right over there,the first time I ever set eyes on him or him on me. The assertionwas met with silence such as might be termed marked.
SCENE FROM THE PHOTO-PLAY PRODUCTION OF "WHISPERINGSMITH." (C) _American Mutual Studio_.]
"Bucks told him," continued Bill Dancing, in corroborative detail,"that when he got to Medicine Bend one man would be waiting for tomeet him. 'He met me,' says Bucks; 'he's met every superintendentsince my time; he'll meet you. Go right up and speak to him,' Buckssays; 'it'll be all right.'"
"Oh, hell, Bill!" protested an indignant chorus.
"Well, what's er matter with you fellows? Didn't you ask me to tellthe story?" demanded Dancing angrily. "If you know it better than Ido, tell it! Give me some tobacco, Chris," said Bill, honoring withthe request the only man in the circle who had shown no scepticism,because he spoke English with difficulty. "And say, Chris, go down andread the bridge gauge, will you? It's close on twelve o'clock, andhe's to be called when it reaches twenty-eight feet. I said the boycould never run the division without help from every man on it, andthat's what I'm giving him, and I don't care who knows it," said BillDancing, raising his voice not too much. "Bucks says that any man thatc'n run this division c'n run any railroad on earth. Shoo! now who'sthis coming here on horseback? Clouding up again, too, by gum!"
The man sent to the bridge had turned back, and behind his lanternDancing heard the tread of horses. He stood at one side of thecamp-fire while two visitors rode up; they were women. Dancing stooddumb as they advanced into the firelight. The one ahead spoke: "Mr.Dancing, don't you know me?" As she stopped her horse the light of thefire struck her face. "Why, Mis' Sinclair!"
"Yes, and Miss Dunning is with me," returned Marion. Bill staggered."This is an awful place to get to; we have been nearly drowned, andwe want to see Mr. McCloud."
McCloud, roused by Marion's voice, came forward. "You were asleep,"said she as he greeted her. "I am so sorry we have disturbed you!" Shelooked careworn and a little forlorn, yet but a little considering thestruggle she and Dicksie had made to reach the camp.
Light blazed from the camp-fire, where Dicksie stood talking withDancing about horses.
"They are in desperate straits up at the ranch," Marion went on, whenMcCloud had assured her of her welcome. "I don't see how they can saveit. The river is starting to flow into the old channel and there's abig pond right in the alfalfa fields."
"It will play the deuce with things if it gets through there," musedMcCloud. "I wonder how the river is? I've been asleep. O Bill!" hecalled to Dancing, "what water have you got?"
"Twenty-eight six just now, sir. She's a-raising very, very slow, Mr.McCloud."
"So I am responsible for this invasion," continued Marion calmly."I've been up with Dicksie at the ranch; she sent for me. Just thinkof it--no woman but old Puss within ten miles of the poor child! Andthey have been trying everywhere to get bags, and you have all thebags, and the men have been buzzing around over there for a week likebumblebees and doing just about as much goo
d. She and I talked it allover this afternoon, and I told her I was coming over here to see you,and we started out together--and merciful goodness, such a time as wehave had!"
"But you started out together; where did you leave her?"
"There she stands the other side of the fire. O Dicksie!"
"Why did you not tell me she was here!" exclaimed McCloud.
Dicksie came into the light as he hastened over. If she was uncertainin manner, he was not. He met her, laughing just enough to relieve thetension of which both for an instant were conscious. She gave him herhand when he put his out, though he felt that it trembled a little."Such a ride as you have had! Why did you not send me word? I wouldhave come to you!" he exclaimed, throwing reproach into the words.
Dicksie raised her eyes. "I wanted to ask you whether you would sellus some grain-sacks, Mr. McCloud, to use at the river, if you couldspare them?"
"Sacks? Why, of course, all you want! But how did you _ever_ get here?In all this water, and two lone women! You have been in dangerto-night. Indeed you have--don't tell me! And you are both wet; Iknow it. Your feet must be wet. Come to the fire. O Bill!" he calledto Dancing, "what's the matter with your wood? Let us have a fire,won't you?--one worth while; and build another in front of my tent. Ican't believe you have ridden here all the way from the ranch, two ofyou alone!" exclaimed McCloud, hastening boxes up to the fire forseats.
Marion laughed. "Dicksie can go anywhere! I couldn't have ridden fromthe house to the barns alone."
"Then tell me how _you_ could do it?" demanded McCloud, devouringDicksie with his eyes.
Dicksie looked at the fire. "I know all the roads pretty well. We didget lost once," she confessed in a low voice, "but we got out again."
"The roads are all underwater, though."
"What time is it, please?"
McCloud looked at his watch. "Two minutes past twelve."
Dicksie started. "Past twelve? Oh, this is dreadful! We must startright back, Marion. I had no idea we had been five hours coming fivemiles."
McCloud looked at her, as if still unable to comprehend what she hadaccomplished in crossing the flooded bottoms. Her eyes fell back tothe fire. "What a blaze!" she murmured as the driftwood snapped androared. "It's fine for to-night, isn't it?"
"I know you both must have been in the water," he insisted, leaningforward in front of Dicksie to feel Marion's skirt.
"I'm not wet!" declared Marion, drawing back.
"Nonsense, you are wet as a rat! Tell me," he asked, looking atDicksie, "about your trouble up at the bend. I know something aboutit. Are the men there to-night? Given up, have they? Too bad! Do openyour jackets and try to dry yourselves, both of you, and I'll take alook at the river."
"Suppose--I only say suppose--you first take a look at me." The voicecame from behind the group at the fire, and the three turnedtogether.
"By Heaven, Gordon Smith!" exclaimed McCloud. "Where did you comefrom?"
Whispering Smith stood in the gloom in patience. "Where do I look asif I had come from? Why don't you ask me whether I'm wet? And won'tyou introduce me--but this is Miss Dicksie Dunning, I am sure."
Marion with laughter hastened the introduction.
"And you are wet, of course," said McCloud, feeling Smith's shoulder.
"No, only soaked. I have fallen into the river two or three times,and the last time a big rhinoceros of yours down the grade, a sectionforeman named Klein, was obliging enough to pull me out. Oh, no! I wasnot looking for you," he ran on, answering McCloud's question; "notwhen he pulled me out. I was just looking for a farm or a ladder orsomething. Klein, for a man named Small, is the biggest Dutchman Iever saw. 'Tell me, Klein,' I asked, after he had quit dragging meout--he's a Hanoverian--'where did you get your pull? And how aboutyour height? Did your grandfather serve as a grenadier under oldFrederick William and was he kidnapped?' Bill, don't feed my horse fora while. And Klein tried to light a cigar I had just taken from mypocket and given him--fancy! the Germans are a remarkable people--andsat down to tell me his history, when some friend down the line beganbawling through a megaphone, and all that poor Klein had time to saywas that he had had no supper, nor dinner, nor yet breakfast, andwould be obliged for some by the boat he forwarded me in." And, inclosing, Whispering Smith looked cheerfully around at Marion, atMcCloud, and last and longest of all at Dicksie Dunning.
"Did you come from across the river?" asked Dicksie, adjusting her wetskirt meekly over her knees.
"You are soaking wet," observed Whispering Smith. "Across the river?"he echoed. "Well, hardly, my dear Miss Dunning! Every bridge is outdown the valley except the railroad bridge and there are a few thingsI don't tackle; one is the Crawling Stone on a tear. No, this wasacross a little break in this man McCloud's track. I came, to befrank, from the Dunning Ranch to look up two women who rode away fromthere at seven o'clock to-night, and I want to say that they gave methe ride of my life," and Whispering Smith looked all around thecircle and back again and smiled.
Dicksie spoke in amazement. "How did you know we rode away? You werenot at the ranch when we left."
"Oh, don't ask him!" cried Marion.
"He knows everything," explained McCloud.
Whispering Smith turned to Dicksie. "I was interested in knowing thatthey got safely to their destination--whatever it might be, which wasnone of my business. I happened to see a man that had seen them start,that was all. You don't understand? Well, if you want it in plainEnglish, I made it my business to see a man who made it _his_ businessto see them. It's all very simple, but these people like to make amystery of it. Good women are scarcer than riches, and more to beprized than fine gold--in my judgment--so I rode after them."
Marion put her hand for a moment on his coat sleeve; he looked atDicksie with another laugh and spoke to her because he dared not looktoward Marion. "Going back to-night, do you say? You never are."
Dicksie answered quite in earnest: "Oh, but we are. We must!"
"Why did you come, then? It's taken half the night to get here, andwill take a night and a half at least to get back."
"We came to ask Mr. McCloud for some grain-sacks--you know, they havenothing to work with at the ranch," said Marion; "and he said we mighthave some and we are to send for them in the morning."
"I see. But we may as well talk plainly." Smith looked at Dicksie."You are as brave and as game as a girl can be, I know, or youcouldn't have done this. Sacks full of sand, with the boys at theranch to handle them, would do no more good to-morrow at the bend thanbladders. The river is flowing into Squaw Lake above there now. Ahundred men that know the game might check things yet if they're thereby daylight. Nobody else, and nothing else on God's earth, can."
There was silence before the fire. McCloud broke it: "I can put thehundred men there at daylight, Gordon, if Miss Dunning and her cousinwant them," said McCloud.
Marion sprang to her feet. "Oh, will you do that, Mr. McCloud?"
McCloud looked at Dicksie. "If they are wanted."
Dicksie tried to look at the fire. "We have hardly deserved help fromMr. McCloud at the ranch," she said at last.
He put out his hand. "I must object. The first wreck I ever had onthis division Miss Dunning rode twenty miles to offer help. Isn't thattrue? Why, I would walk a hundred miles to return the offer to her.Perhaps your cousin would object," he suggested, turning to Dicksie;"but no, I think we can manage that. Now what are we going to do? Youtwo can't go back to-night, that is certain."
"We must."
"Then you will have to go in boats," said Whispering Smith.
"But the hill road?"
"There is five feet of water across it in half a dozen places. I swammy horse through, so I ought to know."
"It is all back-water, of course, Miss Dunning," explained McCloud."Not dangerous."
"But moist," suggested Whispering Smith, "especially in the dark."
McCloud looked at Marion. "Then let's be sensible," he said. "You andMiss Dunning can have my tent as soon as we have su
pper."
"Supper!"
"Supper is served to all on duty at twelve o'clock, and we're on duty,aren't we? They're about ready to serve now; we eat in the tent," headded, holding out his hand as he heard the patter of raindrops. "Rainagain! No matter, we shall be dry under canvas."
Dicksie had never seen an engineers' field headquarters. Lanternslighted the interior, and the folding-table in the middle was strewnwith papers which McCloud swept off into a camp-chest. Two double cotswith an aisle between them stood at the head of the tent, and, spreadwith bright Hudson Bay blankets, looked fresh and undisturbed. Abox-table near the head-pole held an alarm-clock, a telegraph key, anda telephone, and the wires ran up the pole behind it. Leather jacketsand sweaters lay on boxes under the tent-walls, and heavy boots stoodin disorderly array along the foot of the cots. These McCloud, withapologies, kicked into the corners.
"Is this where you stay?" asked Dicksie.
"Four of us sleep in the cots, when we can, and an indefinite numberlie on the ground when it rains."
Marion looked around her. "What do you do when it thunders?"
The two men were pulling boxes out for seats; McCloud did not stop tolook up. "I crawl under the bed--the others don't seem to mind it."
"Which is your bed?"
"Whichever I can crawl under quickest. I usually sleep there." Hepointed to the one on the right.
"I thought so. It has the blanket folded back so neatly, just as ifthere were sheets under it. I'll bet there aren't any."
"Do you think this is a summer resort? Knisely, my assistant, sleepsthere, but of course we are never both in bed at the same time; he'sdown the river to-night. It's a sort of continuous performance, youknow." McCloud looked at Dicksie. "Take off your coat, won't you,please?"
Whispering Smith was trying to drag a chest from the foot of the cot,and Marion stood watching. "What are you trying to do?"
"Get this over to the table for a seat."
"Silly man! why don't you move the table?"
Dicksie was taking off her coat. "How inviting it all is!" shesmiled. "And this is where you stay?"
"When it rains," answered McCloud. "Let me have your hat, too."
"My hair is a sight, I know. We rode over rocks and up gullies intothe brush----"
"And through lakes--oh, I know! I can't conceive how you ever got hereat all. Your hair is all right. This is camp, anyway. But if you wanta glass you can have one. Knisely is a great swell; he's just fromschool, and has no end of things. I'll rob his bag."
"Don't disturb Mr. Knisely's bag for the world!"
"But you are not taking off your hat. You seem to have something onyour mind."
"Help me to get it off my mind, will you, please?"
"If you will let me."
"Tell me how to thank you for your generosity. I came all the way overhere to-night to ask you for just the help you have offered, and Icould not--it stuck in my throat. But that wasn't what was on my mind.Tell me what you thought when I acted so dreadfully at Marion's."
"I didn't deserve anything better after placing myself in such a foolposition. Why don't you ask me what I thought the day you acted sobeautifully at Crawling Stone Ranch? I thought that the finest thingI ever saw."
"You were not to blame at Marion's."
"I seemed to be, which is just as bad. I am going to start the 'phonesgoing. It's up to me to make good, you know, in about four hours witha lot of men and material. Aren't you going to take off your hat?--andyour gloves are soaking wet."
McCloud took down the receiver, and Dicksie put her hands slowly toher head to unpin her hat. It was a broad hat of scarlet felt rolledhigh above her forehead, and an eagle's quill caught in the blackrosette swept across the front. As she stood in her clingingriding-skirt and her severely plain scarlet waist with only a blackascot falling over it, Whispering Smith looked at her. His eyes didnot rest on the picture too long, but his glance was searching. Hespoke in an aside to Marion. Marion laughed as she turned her headfrom where Dicksie was talking again with McCloud. "The best of itis," murmured Marion, "she hasn't a suspicion of how lovely she reallyis."