CHAPTER XIV
THE DRONE OF THE HIVE
A black cloud of smoke was rolling up from the funnel of the Stanley D. as Bill Wagstaff piloted Hazel from the grimy Bella Coola hotel to the wharf.
"There aren't many passengers," he told her. "They're mostly cannery men. But you'll have the captain's wife to chaperon you. She happens to be making the trip."
When they were aboard and the cabin boy had shown them to what was dignified by the name of stateroom, Bill drew a long envelope from his pocket.
"Here," he said, "is a little money. I hope you won't let any foolish pride stand in the way of using it freely. It came easy to me. I dug it out of Mother Earth, and there's plenty more where it came from. Seeing that I deprived you of access to your own money and all your personal belongings, you are entitled to this any way you look at it. And I want to throw in a bit of gratuitous advice—in case you should conclude to go back to the Meadows. They probably looked high and low for you. But there is no chance for them to learn where you actually did get to unless you yourself tell them. The most plausible explanation—and if you go there you must make some explanation—would be for you to say that you got lost—which is true enough—and that you eventually fell in with a party of Indians, and later on connected up with a party of white people who were traveling coastward. That you wintered with them, and they put you on a steamer and sent you to Vancouver when spring opened.
"That, I guess, is all," he concluded slowly. "Only I wish"—he caught her by the shoulders and shook her gently—"I sure do wish it could have been different, little person. Maybe you'll have a kindlier feeling for this big old North when you get back into your cities and towns, with their smoke and smells and business sharks, where it's everybody for himself and the devil take the hindmost. Maybe some time when I get restless for human companionship and come out to cavort in the bright lights for a while, I may pass you on a street somewhere. This world is very small. Oh, yes—when you get to Vancouver go to the Ladysmith. It's a nice, quiet hotel in the West End. Any hack driver knows the place."
He dropped his hands, and looked steadily at her for a few seconds, steadily and longingly.
"Good-by!" he said abruptly—and walked out, and down the gangplank that was already being cast loose, and away up the wharf without a backward glance.