Shadow Mountain

by Dane Coolidge

  CHAPTER XIX

  THE ENIGMA

  The heights and depths of life are sounded by emotions--cold reason lagsbehind. As thought cannot compass, so words cannot describe theanguished spirit's flight; and whether it soars to ecstasy or sinks todespair it comes back wide-eyed and silent. So any action which has beenprompted by passion cannot be explained by a calculating mind, and toseek a reason where none exists is to stray still farther from thetruth. Virginia Huff was poor and waited on the table for what she couldeat and get to wear; and when she returned stock which was worth twelvehundred dollars without even a note of thanks it was not for any reasonof the mind. It was a reason of the feelings, the soul, the human ego,which drives our minds and bodies to their tasks; a reason that soaredup like a flaming aurora and stabbed the darkened sky with hate andpassion. It was nothing to reason about, and yet Wiley reasoned.

  He put down the stocks and lit his lamp and examined the packagecarefully. Then he looked inside for some note of explanation andpaused and swore to himself. No note was there, nor any sign that thestocks had ever passed through her hands. He rose up craftily andstepped out the door, passing silently from house to house, and thenas he came back he threw his door open and examined the snow fortracks. If Death Valley Charley had failed of his mission, if he hadneglected to place the shares in her stocking and then sneaked back toget rid of them--but Wiley put all thought of Charley aside for therein the snow was the print of a woman's shoe. Small and dainty it wasand he knew in his heart that Virginia had been there and gone. Shemight have been watching him as he sat at his work, she might even bewatching him now; but again something told him that, however she hadcome, she had gone away in a rage. The stab of the high heel, theheedless step into a mud-puddle, the swinging stride down the trail;all spoke of defiance, of a coming in the open and a return withoutfear of man or devil. She had come there to see him and, finding himaway, she had thrown down the papers and gone home. And that was theanswer to his love.

  Wiley sat down by the fire and tried to account for it. He imaginedhimself a woman, young and beautiful, but poor; working hard, asVirginia now worked, for her board and keep. Before her there wasnothing--her father was dead or lost, her mother a hopeless scold, herfortune irretrievably gone--and yet she closed the only door out. As anearnest of his love, without asking anything in return, he had restoredto her a portion of her stock; and she had promptly flung it back. HadCharley made some break in his method of presentation? But no, she wouldnot mind if he had; it was something deeper, behind. He battered hisbrain, recalling every little incident that might have turned her heartagainst him, and it all brought him back to the trial.

  When he had had her mother arrested for coming into his office anddemanding--what was it she had demanded? He remembered the six-shooter,and the deputy and Blount, and the Widow's rage and tears; andVirginia's return and all she had said to him--but what was it hermother had demanded? Her stock! All her stock! The stock she had refusedto sell for ten cents a share and then had turned around and put up withBlount as security on a quick-action note. She had demanded it all back,without reason, without compensation, simply because she was a womanwith a gun; and because he had invoked the law to protect him in hisrights Virginia had sworn she would kill him. Wiley rose up swiftly andpulled the curtain across the window, and then he considered the matteragain.

  It was not like Virginia to resort to any violence--she had beenhumiliated too often by her mother's--but she must still think he haddeprived her of her rights. By what process of reasoning could theyfix the blame on him for this stock which had been purloined byBlount, was beyond his strictly masculine mind; but women sometimesthink by jumps. They skip a few processes, like a mathematicalprodigy, and then arrive at some mammoth result. But, even if theyexaggerated their grievance--was there anything behind it, any peg onwhich to hang this senseless hate?

  Well, of course he had deceived them about the mine. He had known itcontained scheelite the moment he picked up that white rock thatVirginia had placed in her collection, but naturally he had notannounced it from the house-tops. With the Widow as a partner, or evenas a stockholder, the best-natured man in the state of Nevada could nothave worked the Paymaster at a profit. For that reason alone he had beenfully justified in letting her freeze herself out; and if Virginia hadtaken his advice--but then, the poor girl had been distracted. She hadbeen worn out and discouraged, hag-ridden by her mother and facing atrip to the city; and she had sold out for what she could get. She was agood girl, a brave girl, and a sweet and lovely one too; and it wasfoolish to blame her for anything. The thing to do, after all, was tofind ways and means of bringing her back to her own. Just a word fromVirginia and he could change her whole life, he could get back all herstock and her mother's as well and pour money into their laps--but firsthe must win her love. He must teach her to trust him, break down hersuspicion and show her that he was her friend.

  Wiley thought a long time and the next morning at dawn he was up in hiscar and away. Virginia was a child. She did not reason about this andthat, but was swayed by the impulses of the moment. Her life was ruled,not by her head but by her heart; and he had forgotten until that momentthe sacks full of cats that he had taken from her house to the ranch.They were all her pets, and he had taken them as a trust when she wasabout to start for Los Angeles; but the mine had made him forget. Theywere safe at the ranch, with his sisters to look after them; but howmany times since their estrangement began must some question have risento her lips as to how they were, or if he would bring them back, orwhether any had died or been lost? Yet she had turned her head away andrefused to speak to him, even to demand back the pets she loved.

  The road was bad out across the desert, and on through Vegas to theranch, but he came thundering back the next night. He had left the mineto run itself, for his thoughts were of Virginia, but as he slowed downat the sand-wash and listened for the pumps he noticed that the enginehad stopped. Well, he had an engineer and that was his business--to keepthe sump-hole pumped out; perhaps he had shut down for repairs. But thebig thing, after all, was to restore Virginia her pets and win his wayto a place in her heart. He drove boldly up the street and stoppedbefore the house, but nobody came to the door. He waited a while, thenleapt out uncertainly and released the mother of Virginia's pet kittens.She ran under the house and, as no one came out, Wiley let the rest ofthem go and turned disconsolately back towards the mine. If he had everthought, when he had the Widow arrested, that Virginia was going to takeit so hard--but then, of course, it had been absolutely necessary--andjust wait till she found her kittens!

  There was trouble in the engine-house. He knew that the minute he sawthe dancing torches in the dark, and he went up the trail on the run;but when he saw the wreckage, and the gear-wheel dismounted, he burstinto a wailing curse. The mine had been all right, pumps operating,hoist running, when he had left the day before; but the minute heturned his back---- "What's the matter?" he demanded and then,pushing the engineer aside, he flashed a torch on the wreck. Wedged inthe gearing of the shattered gear-wheel was a pair of engineer'soveralls. They had jammed tight in the teeth and the resistlessdriving of the engine had cracked the great gear-wheel like aneggshell. Held solid by its base in the bolted concrete there had notbeen a half-inch's play and, since something must give, and theopposing wheel had stood, the enormous casting had smashed. Theengineer and his helpers were pottering about, trying guiltily toremove the cause of the accident, but one look was enough to tellWiley Holman that his mine was closed down for a week. No weldingcould ever repair that broken gear-wheel--he would have to wire foranother.

  "Whose overalls are those?" he asked at last as the men sought to evadehis eye and the engineer himself confessed ownership.

  "They're an old pair of mine," he explained, "that got caught when I waswiping up the grease."

  "What? Wiping up grease when the machinery was in motion? Why didn't youwait until it stopped?"

  "Well--I didn't; that's all. There was a big
puddle of grease gatheringdirt underneath there--and I thought I'd wipe it up."

  "I see," observed Wiley and his eyes narrowed down as he caught thearoma of whiskey. "Well, clear up this mess," he said at last andhurried to his office to telephone. A single line of wire stretchedout across the plain, connecting Keno with Vegas and the world, andwithin half an hour he had dictated a rush order to be wired to hissupply-house in Los Angeles. If money would buy it he would grab a newgear-wheel and have it shipped out by express; but if there was nonein stock he would have to wait for it; and the machine-shops weremonths behind. Yet his whole mine was shut down on account of thisaccident and, if he only had the money, he could almost afford to buya new engine and be done with it. He stopped and thought if there wasone in the country that he could get hold of, second-hand, and then hethrust the matter aside. The problem of getting an engine on theground was one that could be worked out later, but in the meanwhilethe water was rising in the sump and the pumps would soon besubmerged. There were two shifts of miners who would have to bedischarged and--yes, the engine crew, too. It was against all therules for an engineer to be wiping up his engine while it was running,and it was only by a miracle that the engineer himself had escapedunhurt from the smash?

  But was it a miracle? A swift stab of suspicion made Wiley's heart standstill. Was this the first treacherous move in Blount's battle to winback the mine? Had Blount, or some agent, suggested to the engineer thatan accident would be followed by a reward; and then had not theengineer, when no one was looking, fed his overalls into the gearings?He was a surly young brute and he met Wiley's eyes with a stare thatbordered on defiance, yet there was nothing to be gained by accusinghim. If Blount had bribed his men it was best to get rid of them withoutthe faintest suggestion of suspicion; and then take on a new crew,shipped in from San Francisco or some equally distant place.

  Wiley went underground with his men, opening up the air-cocks in thepumps, and bringing out the powder and steel; and then the next morning,just before the stage went out, he gave them all their time. They had acertain constraint, a sullen silence in his presence, that argued themagainst him at heart and, since the mine was closed down for some timeto come, he made a clean sweep of them all. Yet it pained him somehow,being new at the game, to see all these miners against him and as theypiled their rolls on the stage he lingered to see them off. He had paidthem union wages and treated them right but now, with their time-checksin their pockets, they looked past him in stony silence. It puzzled himsomehow, leaving him vaguely uneasy; but just as the stage pulled out hefound the answer to his enigma. On the gallery of the Huff house as theautomobile sped past there was a sudden flash of white and as Virginiaappeared the young engineer rose up drunkenly and wafted her a kiss.After that the answer was plain.