A Woman Intervenes
- -
- 100%
- +
'It is invested in a mine.'
'A mine. Of all things in the world in which to sink money, a mine is the worst. Just what a woman or a fool would do! How do you expect to raise money on a mine in the present state of the market? What, in the name of wonder, made you put it into a mine? Whose mine did you buy?'
'I do not know whose it was, father, but I was willing to tell you all I knew at the time you asked me and if you ask me now what mine I bought, I will tell you.'
'Certainly I ask you. What mine did you buy?'
'I bought the mine for which John Kenyon was agent.'
The moment these words were said, her cousin sprang to his feet and glared at her like a man demented.
'You bought that mine—you? Then Wentworth lied to me. He said a Mr. Smith had given him the money.'
'I am the Mr. Smith, William.'
'You are the Mr. Smith! You are the one who has cheated me out of that mine!'
'My dear cousin, the less we say about cheating, the better. I am talking to my father just now, and I do not wish to be interrupted. Will you be so kind as to leave the room until my interview with him is over?'
'So you bought the mica-mine, did you! Pretending to be friendly with me, and knowing all the time that you were doing your best to cheat–'
'Come, come!' interrupted the old gentleman; 'William, none of this. If anyone is to talk roughly to Edith, it will be me, not you. Come, sir, leave the room, as she has asked you to do. Now, my daughter,' he continued, in a much milder tone of voice, after young Longworth had left the office, 'have you any ready money? It is no use saying the mine is worth a hundred thousand pounds, or a million, just now, if you haven't the ready money. Edith, my child,' he cried, 'sit down with me a moment, and I will explain the whole situation to you. It seems to me that ever since I stopped consulting you things have gone wrong. Perhaps, even if you have the money, it is better not to risk it just now; but one pound will do what two pounds will not do a year hence, or perhaps six months from now, when this panic is over.'
Edith sat down beside her father and heard from him exactly how things stood. Then she said:
'All you really need is about fifteen thousand pounds?'
'Yes, that would do; I'm sure that would carry me over. Can you get it for me, my child?'
'Yes, and more. I will try to get you the whole amount. Wait for me here twenty minutes or half an hour.'
George Wentworth was very much surprised when he saw Edith Longworth enter his office. It had been many months since she was there before, and he cordially held out his hand to the girl.
'Mr. Wentworth,' she began at once, 'have you any of the money the mica mine has brought you?'
'Yes. I invested the first year's proceeds, but, since I got the last amount, things have been so shaky in the City that it is still at the bank.'
'Will you lend me—can you lend me five thousand pounds of it?'
'Of, course I can, and will; and very glad I am to get the chance of doing so.'
'Then, please write me out a cheque for it at once, and whatever papers you want as security, make them out, and I will see that you are secured.'
'Look here, Miss Longworth,' said the young man, placing his hands on his hips and gazing at her, 'do you mean to insult me? Do you not know that the reason I am able to write out a cheque for five thousand pounds, that will be honoured, is entirely because you trusted your money to me and Kenyon without security? Do you think I want security? Take back the word, Miss Longworth.'
'I will—I will,' she said; 'but I am in a great hurry. Please write me out the cheque, for I must have it before the bank closes.'
The cheque was promptly written out and handed to her.
'I am afraid,' she said, 'I am not very polite to-day, and rather abrupt; but I will make up for it some other time.'
And so, bidding the young man good-bye, she drove to the bank, deposited the cheque, drew her own for thirty thousand pounds, and carried it to her father.
'There,' she said, 'is thirty thousand pounds, and I still own the mine, or, at least, part of it. All the money is made from the cheque you gave me, or, rather, two-thirds of it, because one-third was never touched. Now, it seems to me, father, that, if I am a good enough business woman to more than double my money in two years, I am a good enough business woman to be consulted by my father whenever he needs a confidant. My dear father, I want to take some of the burden off your shoulders.'
There were tears in her father's eyes as he put his arm round her waist and whispered to her:
'There is no one in all London like you, my dear—no one, no one. I'll have no more secrets from you, my own brave girl.'
CHAPTER XLI
Kenyon's luck, as he said to himself, had turned. The second year was even more prosperous than the first, and the third as successful as the second. He had a steady market for his mineral, and, besides, he had the great advantage of knowing the rogues to avoid. Some new swindles he had encountered during his first year's experience had taught him lessons that he profited by in the second and third. He liked his home in the wilderness, and he liked the rough people amongst whom he found himself.
Notwithstanding his renunciation of London, however, there would now and then come upon him a yearning for the big city, and he promised himself a trip there at the end of the third year. Wentworth had been threatening month after month to come out and see him, but something had always interfered.
Taking it all in all, John liked it better in the winter than in the summer, in spite of the extreme cold. The cold was steady and could be depended upon; moreover, it was healthful and invigorating. In summer, John never quite became accustomed to the ravages of the black fly, the mosquito, and other insect pests of that region. His first interview with the black fly left his face in such a condition that he was glad he lived in a wilderness.
At the beginning of the second winter John treated himself to a luxury. He bought a natty little French Canadian horse that was very quick and accustomed to the ice of the river, which formed the highway by which he reached Burntpine from the mine in the cold season. To supplement the horse, he also got a comfortable little cutter, and with this turn-out he made his frequent journeys between the mine and Burntpine with comfort and speed, wrapped snugly in buffalo robes.
If London often reverted to his mind, there was another subject that obtruded itself even more frequently. His increased prosperity had something to do with this. He saw that, if he was to have a third of the receipts of the mine, he was not to remain a poor man for very long, and this fact gave him a certain courage which had been lacking before. He wondered if she remembered him. Wentworth had said very little about her when he wrote, for his letters were largely devoted to enthusiastic eulogies of Jennie Brewster, and Kenyon, in spite of the confession he had made when his case seemed hopeless, was loath to write and ask his friend anything about Edith.
One day, on a clear sharp frosty winter morning, Kenyon had his little pony harnessed for his weekly journey to Burntpine. After the rougher part of the road between the mine and the river had been left behind, and the pony got down to her work on the ice, with the two white banks of snow on either side of the smooth track, John gave himself up to thinking about the subject which now so often engrossed his mind. Wrapped closely in his furs, with the cutter skimming along the ice, these thoughts found a pleasant accompaniment in the silvery tinkle of the bells which jingled around his horse's neck. As a general thing, he met no one on the icy road from the mine to the village. Sometimes there was a procession of sleighs bearing supplies for his own mine and those beyond, and when this procession was seen, Kenyon had to look out for some place by the side of the track where he could pull up his horse and cutter and allow the teams to pass. The snow on each side of the cutting was so deep that these bays were shovelled out here and there to permit teams to get past each other. He had gone halfway to the village, when he saw ahead of him a pair of horses which he at once recognised as those belonging to the hotel-keeper. He drew up in the first bay and awaited the approach of the sleigh. He saw that it contained visitors for himself, because the driver, on recognising him, had turned round and spoken to the occupants of the vehicle. As it came along, the man drew up and nodded to Kenyon, who, although ordinarily the most polite of men, did not return the salutation. He was stricken dumb with astonishment on seeing who was in the sleigh. One woman was so bundled up that not even her nose appeared out in the cold, but the smiling rosy face of the other needed no introduction to John Kenyon.
'Well, Mr. Kenyon,' cried a laughing voice, 'you did not expect to see me this morning, did you?'
'I confess I did not,' said John, 'and yet—.' Here he paused; he was going to say, 'and yet I was thinking of you,' but he checked himself.
Miss Longworth, who had a talent for reading the unspoken thoughts of John Kenyon, probably did not need to be told the end of the sentence.
'Are you going to the village?' she asked.
'I was going. I am not going now.'
'That's right. I was just about to invite you to turn round with us. You see, we are on our way to look at the mine, and, I suppose, we shall have to obtain the consent of the manager before we can do so.'
Miss Longworth's companion had emerged for a moment from her wraps and looked at John, but instantly retired among the furs again with a shiver. She was not so young as her companion, and she considered this the most frightful climate she had ever encountered.
'Now,' said John, 'although your sleigh is very comfortable, I think this cutter of mine is even more so. It is intended for two; won't you step out of the sleigh into the cutter? Then, if the driver will move on, I can turn, and we will follow the sleigh.'
'I shall be delighted to do so,' said the young woman, shaking herself free from the buffalo robe, and stepping lightly from the sleigh into the cutter, pausing, however, for a moment, before she did so, to put her own wraps over her companion. John tucked her in beside himself, and, as the sleigh jingled on, he slowly turned his pony round into the road again.
'I have got a pretty fast pony,' he said, 'but I think we will let them drive on ahead. It irritates this little horse to see anything in front of it.'
'Then we can make up speed,' said Edith, 'and catch them before they get to the mine. Is it far from here?'
'No, not very far; at least, it doesn't take long to get there with a smart horse.'
'I have enjoyed this experience ever so much,' she said; 'you see, my father had to come to Montreal on business, so I came with him, as usual, and, being there, I thought I would run up here and see the mine. I wanted,' she continued, looking at the other side of the cutter and trailing her well-gloved fingers in the snow—'I wanted to know personally whether my manager was conducting my property in the way it ought to be conducted, notwithstanding the very satisfactory balance-sheets he sends.'
'Your property!' exclaimed John, in amazement.
'Certainly. You didn't know that, did you?' she replied, looking for a moment at him, and then away from him. 'I call myself the Mistress of the Mine.'
'Then you are—you are–'
'Mr. Smith,' said the girl coming to his rescue.
There was a moment's pause, and the next words John said were not at all what she expected.
'Take your hand out of the snow,' he commanded, 'and put it in under the buffalo robe; you have no idea how cold it is here, and your hand will be frozen in a moment.'
'Really,' said the girl, 'an employee must not talk to his employer in that tone! My hand is my own, is it not?'
'I hope it is,' said John, 'because I want to ask you for it.'
For answer Miss Edith Longworth placed her hand in his.
Actions speak louder than words. The sleigh was far in advance, and there were no witnesses on the white topped hills.
'Were you astonished?' she said, 'when I told you that I owned the mine?'
'Very much so indeed. Were you astonished when I told you I wished to own the owner of the mine?'
'Not in the slightest.'
'Why?'
'Because your treacherous friend Wentworth sent me your letter applying for a situation. You got the situation, didn't you, John?'
THE END