Part 51

Manson glowered at him with quick suspicion. "What's that?"

"Your left hand knows what your right hand doeth--every time,--at least it's so in St. Marys. You're too big to get under a bushel basket. Every one saw that you were dabbling in real estate for years, and made a good clean up, but you seemed so darned ashamed of it that no one cared to discuss it with you. And all the time you were our prize package disbeliever. What's the use? It's your own affair, but why don't you make a lightning change like the man in the circus last week? Your friends would welcome it. You're not the man we used to know."

"If it's my own affair," came back Manson with growing resentment, "why not leave it at that? Did you never make any money out of a thing you didn't believe in?"

"Yes," said Filmer slowly, "I have, but after that I believed in it, and said so. It was only fair to the fellow behind it."

Manson went stolidly back to his square stone office, where he took out his broker's statement for the previous month and stared at it silently. Already he knew the figures by heart. Another two point rise in Consolidated stock and he would realize his net profit of one hundred thousand dollars. He ran over his own scribbled figures on the back of the statement, as he had gone over them many times before. They were quite right. For weeks past his selling order had been in, been acknowledged, and now at any moment the thing might be done. It might even have already been done. The blood rushed to his head at the thought. How many other chief constables, he wondered, had amassed fortunes from behind their forbidding gray stone walls? Then he thought of his wife and children, and his eyes softened, while the broker's statement in his big hand trembled ever so slightly. He smiled at that, and it came to his mind that perhaps statements in other men's hands sometimes trembled at the thought of their wives and children and the fortunes that--and here Manson felt vaguely uncomfortable and, getting up, slowly locked his desk.

Just at that moment, Filmer, who had returned to his office, was sitting staring at a half-section of steel rail that lay in his hand. It was smooth and highly polished, a thin slice of the very first product of Clark's last and greatest undertaking. He experienced a quite extraordinary sensation at feeling the thing, and it snatched his mind back seven years till again in the Town Hall he heard a magnetic voice assuring the citizens that the town lacked just three essentials--experience, money and imagination, and that the speaker would supply them all. It was a far cry from that evening to the deep drone of the rail mill, and Filmer, detaching himself from the picture in which he formed a part, began now to perceive its dramatic vitality. Were Clark taken out the whole thing seemed to fall to pieces.

And up at the See House, the bishop was examining just such another section of rail, while the gold of his episcopal ring shone beside the gray of steel. To him it meant many things, but chiefly it was prophetic of that which would soon put an end to the detachment and loneliness of the scattered communities to which he ministered. Holding the thing thus, his heart went out to Clark, and he yearned with a great longing over the spirit of this man who so reveled in the joy of creation. His eyes wandered to the Evangeline. She lay at anchor just off shore. A thin film of smoke slid from her funnel, and he could see the Indian pilot swabbing down her smooth teak decks. Then, in sudden impulse, he smiled and, laying the rail section on top of a half finished sermon, wrote a short note, and, calling his man servant, instructed him to wait for an answer.

A little later the note reached Clark in his office, where he sat motionless under the sway of a slight reaction. At the moment he did not want to work. He was continuously conscious of ribbons of red hot rails that streamed like fluted snakes from under the gigantic rolls, and they seemed to be boring their way into his brain. He had shipped thousands of tons to the railway company and there were thousands more to go. In a week or so he would get a formal acceptance of his product, and then-- He stretched himself a little wearily and pressed his eyes till a red and compelling blur brought its transient solace. And just then his secretary came in with the bishop's note.

Dear Mr. Clark:

I am off this afternoon for a five day cruise of visits amongst the islands of Lake Huron. Won't you come with me? I know it would be good for me and think it might give you what I'm sure is a much needed rest. My Mercury, I mean the hired man, awaits your answer.

Yours faithfully, JAMES, ALGOMA.

P. S. I never attempt to proselytize my guests.

For a moment he puzzled over the signature, and finally made out that it was the bishop's Christian name followed by that of his diocese, for this was the first letter he had received from the prelate. Then he felt a sudden throb of impulse. He had a natural liking for the bishop and this, with his insatiable appetite for new experiences, prompted an acceptance. He touched the bell, and his secretary reappeared.

"I am going away for five days," he paused, adding with a smile--"on missionary work. I haven't any idea where we are going and don't want to be disturbed. I'll be back before we receive the results of the United Railway Company's tests. That's all."

It was mid-afternoon when the Evangeline, gliding smoothly over the polished surface of the bay, drew in towards the Consolidated dock, and Clark, watching from the shadow of a mountain of bales of pulp assembled for shipment, saw the Indian pilot amidship at the wheel and the bishop, in a big, coarse, straw hat, standing in the slim bow, a coil of rope in his hands and a broad smile on his big sunburnt face.

"Catch!" The bight of the rope whistled through the air and struck smartly at his guest's feet.

The latter laughed, picked it up and made fast. It struck him suddenly that it was curious the bishop should be throwing him a rope. Then he reflected that it was the bishop and not himself who needed help.

The former was very gay, his kindly face alight with amusement and anticipation. Presently came a throb from the engine room, and the Evangeline sheered off down the river, past the new St. Marys where staring red brick buildings shouldered up out of the old time houses, past the See Mouse, while a flag fluttered jerkily down from the tall mast at whose top it flew when the bishop was at home, past the American side, where Clark's big power house stretched its gray length at the edge of the river, and on till they came to the long point that closes the upper reach, and just then both men turned and looked up stream at the vanishing bulk of the huge structures beside the rapids, and the flat line of tremulous foam that marked the rapids themselves. The voice of them was, at this distance, mute.

The yacht glided on and still neither spoke, Clark was full of the thought that, for the second time in seven years, he had deliberately left his work. Four hours ago the thing would have seemed grotesque, but glancing at the bishop's broad back, he realized that here was a friendly interceptor to whom he had been wise to yield. The miles slid smoothly by, and still neither talked. Each was busy with the contented reflection that in the other he had found one who possessed the gift of understanding silence.

The Evangeline rested that evening not far from where Clark had anchored so recently. He sat motionless, breathing in the welcome benison of the spot, till the Indian pilot put out port and starboard lamps whose soft red and green shone steadily into the gathering dusk.

"Is there a mission here?" asked the visitor presently.

"No, but there's the best bass fishing in Lake Huron," grunted the bishop placidly, already busy with rods and bait. "The mission is ten miles on. Now we're going to catch our breakfast--there's an excellent spot just opposite that big cedar."

Clark had not fished much, but he loved it, like most men of intellect, and discovered that he had been steered straight into the best fishing he had ever known. They were small mouthed bass, deep of belly and high of back, and they fought in the brown water over the twitching minnows that dangled from the Evangeline bow and stern.

"I'm glad you came." The bishop smoothed down the spines of a big three pounder ere he gripped it.

"Best thing I ever did. Fishing is a clerical pursuit, isn't it?"

The bishop nodded without turning his head. "Yes, but it's not always for money. We have to bait our hooks according to the season of men's minds. By the way, some of my best friends are in your country."

"Yes?"

"Had a church in Chicago for ten years,--there at the time of the great fire--it stopped a few blocks from my house. I had to marry a devoted couple a day or two later and the wedding fee was a bunch of candles. Glad to get them; whole city in darkness and it seemed suitable that the parson's house should reflect light. You remind me of one of my friends at that time."