XXV
THE CALL
Jimmy fastened his skin coat, and going to the door of the section-man's hut, looked up the track. The railroad and an angry river occupied the bottom of the gorge, but the water was low and a rapid throbbed on a dull note. Jimmy knew its slack beat was ominous; the frost had stopped the streams that not long since leaped out from the glaciers.
He shivered, for the cold was keen and the coat he had got at Green Lake was old. Besides, he was tired; he had started before daybreak from his shack, but when he reached the railroad the moon was on the rocks. In the shadow, the snow that streaked the mountain-side was blue; across the gorge broken crags shone like polished steel and the small pines growing in the cracks sparkled with frost. Not far off, a dark hole in a slanted white bank indicated the mouth of a snow shed, but Jimmy knew the stones and snow had come down the hill.
When he looked up, his view on one side was cut by the top of a precipice; it was like looking up from a deep pit. Farther along the gorge, the rocks got indistinct and melted in the moon's pale reflections. No track but the railroad pierced the mountains, although the wide chain was broken by narrow valleys running north and south. Jimmy had come up the line from the valley he occupied, and by another some distance off one could reach Green Lake. The nearest station was twelve miles away, at the end of Graham's section.
Jimmy had arrived half an hour since, but had not found Graham, although his stove was burning. Peter Jardine had stated he could trust the man, who had begun to clear a ranch at Green Lake but had stopped when his money was gone. In the mountains, ranching is a slow and laborious job, and men whose means are small are forced at times to follow another occupation.
By and by a lantern twinkled at the mouth of the snow shed and a man came up the track.
"Hello!" he said. "I've got some news and wondered if you'd blow in, but I wanted to take a look at the rock-cut before the freight comes through. Did you make supper?"
Jimmy said he had cooked some flapjacks, although he felt he ought to wait until his host arrived.
"Shucks!" remarked Graham. "Jardine's my neighbor and he allows you're his friend. But the cold's fierce. Let's get in."