# "Timber"/Chapter 30

CHAPTER XXX
Tuesday. Still the sun glared through the smoke of fires. Clouds appeared, banked in the west, broke and disappeared. Each noon the wind dropped and hauled from southwest to the north and for a few moments its draft was cooled; then it came again from the other quarter, hot and dry.
Humphrey Bryant came back on the morning train and, without changing from his best suit of black, drove in a buggy to Foraker's Folly.
Helen read failure in his face even before he spoke.
"This credit situation isn't a newspaper flurry," he said. "It's real. Nobody wants this loan, Helen—not for the present. And the Lord alone knows how long it'll take us to sober up financially."
She sat down weakly and for an hour he talked, trying to be optimistic but without much success.
And then the girl talked, told of what had happened at the mill, told of the daily letters of threat. The butcher in Pancake had refused her check and that stung her despite the fact that the garage man had gone out of his way to be nice to her. Dr. Pelly had driven in to tell her that there were friends left her, no matter how great the bitterness that her enemies stirred against her.
Thad Parker had walked over from his farm where the sprouting crops were burned by the hot sun and cut to death by sand blown by tireless winds. He stumblingly told how he himself had lain in wait at the mill at night. ​("I don't sleep much, now—since Jenny's sleeping out there under the oak tree.") He enumerated some of those in the community who were up in arms at the organized campaign against her. They were people of little influence.
That night Thad did not watch the mill. Raymer sat in the doorway of his tar-paper house, a shot gun handy, until the approach of dawn, when he went inside.
He had not seen a slowly-moving hulk come up to the edge of the brush and squat and wait, wait for hours, scarcely moving. But when Raymer went within the hulk moved back into the brush, wriggled prostrate on the far side of a charred log and went through the intrinsically innocent operation of lighting a cigar.
It crept forward again and waited; then rose and skulked in the shelter of the mill and appeared again on the dam, glow of the cigar hidden in the curve of a gnarled and unsteady hand—A crowbar prodded the earth, working down into the mud and muck. From his shirt bosom the man extracted very carefully a bundle of greasy cylinders and tamped them down into the opening his bar had made, keeping the long white tail which extended from the packet dry. He looked about and listened. His head bowed down, and with both hands he shielded the glow of the cigar, held it against that white tail—a sputter, a careful scuttling across the clearing and into the brush.
The sleepy chirping of the first birds was stilled by the heavy, muffled detonation. Mud and dry earth were thrown high. The gravel of the road which crossed the dam was broken and cracked. Water filled the crevices, began spilling through on the far side; the seep became ​a rush; the rush washed out a gutter. This breach widened and before half-dressed men ran from the shanties the pond was roaring through the broken dam, lowering rapidly as its own escape made drainage faster. The birds picked up their chirping again and broke into song, but before they began to fly against the orange heavens to the eastward the pond was drained and half the dam washed away.
On the carriage in the mill was found a soiled envelope addressed to Helen.
"So far we've gone easy. If you don't clear out at once we will show you what we can do.—Citizens' Committee."
It was hot in Detroit that morning as well, with a steady breeze from the southwest which kicked up white caps in the river and made the pines in Luke Taylor's garden moan steadily. The old man sat in his library with the photographs of the Foraker timber that Rowe had taken spread about him on the table, holding a telephone receiver to his ear.
"Hello—Hello—You, Rowe?"
He hitched forward as an assuring voice came into his ear.
"What the devil's wrong with you?"
"We've been delayed a bit, Mr. Taylor."
"Delayed? My God, ain't you got authority and money? What's delayed you?"
"The party isn't quite ready to close."
"Not ready! What's holdin' it up? Money?"
"Well, no—they haven't made up their minds."
"Oh, they haven't made up their minds they want ​to sell what I want to buy? I want to buy! Are you a dummy, Rowe, or just a dead one?"
"Money doesn't seem to be much of an object—"
"No object! My God, Rowe, now I know you're a dead one! You're no good; come on home. I'll go up and close the thing myself—no, stay there! I'll be up tomorrow—tomorrow—hear that?"
Phil Rowe emerged from the telephone booth in the Commercial House with the pallor of his face accentuated. To buy this pine had been to him the entry into his own, but Luke Taylor would not give him time. To have the old man close the deal himself would rob Rowe of his coveted glory. And so much depended on that! The drawing of the new will—his future—Marcia Murray—
He stood on the hotel steps. Helen's car was across the way and while he eyed it surlily the girl herself crossed the street. She moved slowly and her face beneath the hat of brown straw was dark and troubled. She disappeared through the door of the bank. Rowe remained there some time. For the days he had put in at Pancake, for his scheming, his duplicity, he had nothing* to show but the troubled look on that girl's face. He was in doubt, with desperation mounting quickly. Oh, for another fortnight, a week—a few days! But he could delay no longer. He started along the wooden sidewalk.
Jim Harris sat beside Wilcox the cashier and as Helen entered they stopped their talk and looked at the girl and then at one another. The sheriff was writing a check. Sim Burns lounged in a chair. Wes Hubbard scanned a calendar in obvious effort to appear unconscious of Helen's presence, and a farmer from down river watched her curiously.
​She passed on to the one teller's window, made a deposit, took a packet of papers from her skirt pocket and went into the tiny customers' room. Soon a step sounded on the threshold of the room and she looked up to face Philip Rowe as he removed his hat. His black hair glistened, his mohair suit was sleek, his black eyes glittered; his white skin seemed to shine, with smoothness, with slipperiness.
"Miss Foraker," he said and bowed, "may I come in?"
He did not wait for a reply but entered, drawing the door closed behind him and settled into the chair on the other side of the small table.
"I was going to call on you today," he said. "Then I heard about the accident last night and thought you might not have time. But since you are in town we may as well talk."
A pause. Her silence challenged him. He moistened his lips, picking at the blotter, eyes on his uneasy fingers.
"Perhaps I, being a stranger, am better able to judge your situation than you are—because I have perspective. I have seen people in similar circumstances, but I have never seen any one so hard pressed by public sentiment as you are—through no fault of your own, probably," with suavity.
"One cannot help admiring your pluck, but did you ever stop to consider that the line which divides pluck from—shall we say foolhardiness?—is not very distinct? It is courageous to fight not only your neighbors, but the laws of the state and the financial depression, but is it wise, Miss Foraker? Be honest with yourself. Do you hope to beat the game?"
He leaned forward, eyes on her face, steady and ​betraying none of the misgiving that the latent hostility in her stirred in him. She gave no indication of replying, so he went on.
"I came to you in good faith and asked for an option. Had my intentions not been of the best I would have waited, for every one knew of the storm that was gathering about you. I didn't want to take advantage of misfortune. I come to you again. Miss Foraker, asking you only to name a figure. It will mean a fortune to you. It will enable you to seek happiness and peace of mind in more congenial surroundings. We will not be niggardly. We will pay for value received."
The suggestion of a bitter smile moved the girl's lips.
"And if I hold out? If I tell you again that my forest is not for sale? What then?"
He settled back in his chair and laughed shortly.
"Then the trouble may become a little—rougher. You have been warned of that."
His insinuation broke through her growing temper, touching suspicion.
"That is your guess, you mean," watching him closely.
"Not a guess!" he flashed. "I happen to know!"
"You are bluffing," she challenged. "You are working in the dark." He leaned forward again.
"I know what you know, that you have been warned repeatedly that, step by step, the warnings have proved to have foundation, that—"
"What warnings?"
She laughed tantalizingly and he flashed: "Warnings of a committee of—"
He saw the triumphant smile sweep into her eyes with the leaping rage as she stood up quickly and cried: "So ​you know what no one else knows! I know of these warnings, my foreman knows, Humphrey Bryant, Doctor Pelly and a few others know, and for days they have tried to find who else knows. No one knows, but you and the other skulkers who have everything to gain by scaring me out!"
Guilt crimsoned his face. He stammered something which she did not hear as she stepped past him and opened the door. The sheriff, Hubbard, Burns and Harris were grouped about the cashier's desk; as she came out they looked at her and drew apart.
Rowe was beside her. "I don't know what you're talking about," he muttered, "but you're making a grave charge."
She wheeled to face him. "Grave is it? I hope the time will come when you'll realize how grave it is, when I can bring you to answer it!"
She stopped. Her scorching gaze ran from Rowe to that other group, to the three countrymen at the teller's window who had turned to watch. She was unaware that the street door had opened and another man stood behind her, staring at the scene.
"You, Citizens' Committee!" she said. "You blackmailers!"
They were all there, the interests which had schemed to undo her and the agencies they had used. For the first time she confronted them and all the pain and suspense which they had aroused was crystallized in righteous anger.
There was a stirring in the group, a muttering, but with a gesture, made imperious by her rage, she stilled them. She had not lifted her voice. She had spoken her ​charge lowly and it was the poignancy of her wrath which gave her control over those men—that, and the consciousness of their guilt!
"No, I'm going to talk now!" as Rowe stepped toward her and began to speak. "You've worked in the dark, you've struck from behind but don't flatter yourselves that you've covered your tracks. You men—Jim Harris and his tools—you are the ones I mean, and let there be no misunderstanding! You have made a joke of law and justice in this county. You have stooped to the use of dynamite and fire to drive me out so Pontiac Power might profit and so Luke Taylor might make worthless slashings out of a growing forest! That speaks well for you, doesn't it?" She laughed mirthlessly, "Chief Pontiac Power and a millionaire lumberman using bomb and torch and blackmail against a penniless girl!"
Harris stepped forward.
"You're putting yourself pretty thoroughly on record, young lady," he said. "You're going too far with your talk about lawlessness. You may find out that there's a law which will protect the good name of—"
"Good name!" she scoffed under her breath. "Good name? Is it your good name, Jim Harris? Is your name good, Mr. Rowe?"
"Hold your tongue!" Rowe cried in a shaking voice and his viciousness staggered her for the moment. "You will have an opportunity to prove these things you have said about these men, about me, about Mr. Taylor."
The leap of light in the eyes of the man behind Helen Foraker snapped Rowe's gaze from her face and as he stared over her shoulder the sinister quality in his expression deepened.
​"There are limits—" he began.
A step sounded beside Helen. Breathing rapidly, she turned and saw John Taylor standing there. She did not see the glare he gave Phil Rowe, did not detect the bewilderment in Rowe's face. Her heart paused in its wild measure. This was the man who had betrayed her, who had done more, even, than menace her forest. He belonged with these others—he, whose lips had been on hers!
Then he spoke.
"There are, Phil; you're right. There are limits to endurance. You've overstepped them."
His manner was quite easy, almost tolerant.
"So you—" Rowe began again.
"You will keep still now." John interrupted. "You will keep still," voice rising, "or I'll thrash you until you grovel on your knees before Miss Foraker!"
Rowe drew back. A choking sound came from his throat and he shook his head.
"If you know what's best for you, you'll keep out of this!" he cried, beside himself. "You've done enough now to damn you forever in the old man's eyes! You've blocked me for the last time, Taylor!"
John's hand was on his shoulder, gripping into the flesh. Rowe winced and twisted to be away from that grip, away from the blazing eyes.
He struck a quick blow, which glanced from John's cheek bone and then cried aloud as he was lifted from his feet and slammed against the wall. He felt fierce breath in his face as he struggled and cursed, felt hard fingers at his throat, felt a fist like a knot of wood bash into one eye, felt his lips burst like grapes at another blow and ​found himself bruised and bleeding on the floor while men scuffled about him and Taylor struck again and again and cried: "I'll break your spine—I'll kill you, Rowe!"
They were on Taylor, trying to hold him, scrambling and shouting as he flung them off to be at Rowe again. And then the sheriff, drawing his revolver, brought it down smartly on John's head—and the fight stopped.
John stood up, the sheriff holding his arm, shaking him.
"That ought to be pretty good," said Harris with a laugh. "You all heard him say, 'I'll kill you, Rowe,' And look at Rowe's face! That ought to be about assault with intent to do great bodily harm less than the crime of murder, hadn't it?" to the sheriff. "We don't want to bear down too hard!"
Taylor felt his head and blinked as clear consciousness came back. He was being led down the street, up the court house steps, through the echoing hall; a barred door was closing.
Helen Foraker had heard, had seen the enmity between Taylor and Rowe. She stared at John and as he dodged that first blow she turned and stumbled through the doorway and ran across the street, leaping into her car, fleeing for the sanctity of her forest where she could think and reason and try to straighten this thing out for herself.
She had driven him out, yet he had blocked Rowe in his purpose. He had betrayed her and today he had been her defender. The throbbing of her heart almost choked her: wild hope and abject misery blinded her.