CHAPTER VI
THE BREAKING OF THE DAM
A faint grey light was creeping into the shanty when Nasmyth awoke again, and lay still for a minute or two, while his senses came slowly back to him. The first thing of which he was definitely conscious was a physical discomfort that rendered the least movement painful. He felt sore all over, and there was a distressful ache in one hip and shoulder, which he fancied was the result of falling on the log, or perhaps of having been hurled against the boulders by the rapids through which he had reached the bank. His physical condition did not trouble him seriously, for he had grown more or less accustomed to muscular weariness, and the cramping pains which spring from toiling long hours in cold water, and, although he made a grimace, as he raised himself a trifle, it was the sound outside that occupied most of his attention.
The door stood open, as he had left it, and a clean, cold air that stirred his blood came in, with the smell of fir and cedar, but what he noticed was the deeper tone in the roar of the river that seemed flung back in sonorous antiphones by the climbing pines. It had occurred to him on other occasions when he was in a fanciful mood that they were singing a majestic Benedicite, but just then he was uneasily conscious that there was a new note in the great reverberating harmonies. Stately pine and towering cedar had raised their voices, too, and a wild wailing fell through the long waves of sound from the highest of them on the crest of the hill. It was evident that a fresh breeze was blowing down the 57 valley, and, as it must have swept the hollow farther up among the ranges, which was filled with a deep blue lake, Nasmyth realized that it would drive at least another foot of water into the river as well as set adrift the giant logs that lay among the boulders. Even then they were, he fancied, in all probability driving down upon his half-finished dam.
Rousing himself with an effort, he clambered out of his bunk, and then gripped the little table hard, for his hip pained him horribly as his weight came upon it. Then, as he struggled into his clothing, there was a heavy thud outside, that was followed by a crashing and grinding, and a gasping man appeared in the door of the shanty.
“Big log across the run,” he cried, “three or four more of them coming along.”
Nasmyth, who said nothing, set his lips tight, and was out of the shanty in another moment or two. A glance at the river showed him that any effort he could make would, in all probability, be futile; but he and the others waded out into the flood and recommenced the struggle. That, at least, was a thing they owed to themselves, and they toiled for an hour or two very much as they had done in the darkness; only that fresh logs were now coming down on them every few minutes, and at last they recognized that they were beaten. Then they went back dejectedly, and Nasmyth sat down to breakfast, though he had very little appetite. He felt that all the strength he had would be needed that day.
After breakfast he lay among the boulders gnawing his unlighted pipe and watching the growing mass of driftwood that chafed and ground against the piles of the dam. Nothing, he recognized, could save the dam now. It was bound to go, for the piles were only partly backed with stone, and, in any case, men do not build in that new country as they do in England. Their needs 58 are constantly varying, and their works are intended merely to serve the purpose of the hour. It is a growing country, and the men in it know that the next generation will not be content with anything that they can do, and, what is more to the purpose, they themselves will want something bigger and more efficient in another year or two. Hence the dam was a somewhat frail and temporary structure of timber as well as stone, but it would probably have done what was asked of it had it been completed before the floods set in. As it was, Nasmyth knew that he would see the end of it before another hour slipped by.
It came even sooner than he had expected. There was a dull crash; the piles that rose above the flood collapsed, and the mass of grinding timber drove on across the ruined dam. Then Nasmyth rose, and, stretching himself wearily, went back to his shanty. He felt he could not face the sympathy of his workmen. He was still sitting there in a state of utter physical weariness and black dejection, when, towards the middle of the afternoon, the door was quietly opened, and Laura Waynefleet came in. She looked at him as he remembered she had done once or twice at the ranch, with compassion in her eyes, and he was a little astonished to feel that, instead of bringing him consolation, her pity hurt him. Then he felt the blood rise to his face, and he looked away from her.