CRIMSON MOUNTAIN (26 page)

“Oh,
Faber!”
said the stranger. “Yes, Faber. He’s not a man who stops to find out very much about people he takes into his circle if they happen to please him socially. Did you find that so?”

Laurel looked thoughtful. “Perhaps,” she said hesitantly, surprised that he knew Adrian Faber. “I’m not sure. I never thought about that. I haven’t known him so long. Perhaps you’re right. I don’t know who was responsible for bringing Mr. Winter and Mr. Rainey into the social circles; they just appeared one day, and everybody accepted them as a matter of course. I heard they were former war correspondents from abroad. Germany perhaps. They claimed to be American-born. But I heard yesterday that Mr. Winter is in charge of things up at the plant. Of course I don’t know if that is true. I heard also that the two men, Gratz and Schmidt, have been arrested. It seems to be part of the rumors that are going around among the schoolchildren. I cannot vouch for it. Gratz and Schmidt are rather unpleasant-looking men, very rough and uncouth. I only saw them a couple of times. The man I would be most likely to suspect is that strange, watchful, sullen man with the gimlet eyes, Mr. Byrger. He’s no American, I’m sure of that. He says he’s an inventor and tries to give the impression he is making some mysterious secret up there that is going to win the war—for somebody! He doesn’t say who.”

“Yes?” said the visitor grimly with that unbelieving rising inflection that creates immediate doubt in the mind of the listener.

It was then that they came to the two white headstones, gleaming there in the late afternoon sunshine, the roses long since dead and turned brown like the ground around them.

Colonel Brown gave a quick glance around. “Wait a minute!” he said. He got out of the car and went over by the stone wall, taking a close look at the place. His trained eyes saw disturbances in the ground that had been well camouflaged, but all he said when he came back to the car was, “Well, now let’s get on. The old Pilgrim house is next, isn’t it? Across the road?”

He took out a diagram that Pilgrim had evidently drawn for him and studied it. He surveyed the sad, drab home of the Pilgrims with grave eyes, scarcely pausing over it, and then they went on toward the road where the plant had been built. Laurel was surprised as she drew nearer the plant to see how amazingly large the building was, although it seemed such a short time since it was started. Six weeks they said such things were taking now, and being used even before they were entirely finished. They passed down the far road where they would not be seen by anybody working at the plant. Then whistles blew for changing shifts, and her companion gave the word to drive faster.

“There is a lower road here somewhere,” he said. “It turns off to the right and goes around to Carrollton by way of the junction. Pilgrim told me about it. We’d better go back that way. We’ll be less likely to meet workmen returning for the night to their boarding places.”

“Yes,” said Laurel, and she found herself following the old rough road up which she had come that first day to meet the cattle, and the man who saved her life.

Somehow it seemed as if this stranger were someone she had known long ago. His serious, quiet manner put her at her ease. She wanted to ask him some questions, but she figured that it was not her business, and that just because she had happened on some evidence that was going to be valuable, it did not give her the right to pry out other things.

But as they neared the station where Colonel Brown had asked her to drop him for the train, she mustered courage to ask, “Was Mr. Pilgrim well when you saw him?”

He turned to her with a lighting of his eyes. “Yes,” he said, “he is very well, and I had almost forgotten a most important commission he gave me. I was to give you greeting from him and best wishes. I also promised him that I would inform you that you have done a most important bit of detective work that may save the government much time and hard work to search out some of the people who are trying to undo us in favor of our enemies. Let me also say that I do appreciate the way you have helped me this afternoon. Do you anticipate that what you have done will cause you any annoyance or curious questioning from people who have no right to ask?”

“Oh no,” Laurel said with a smile. “I think not. We have met very few people I know, and they may not have even noticed that there was a stranger with me. I explained to the young people in whose home I board that I would have a caller this afternoon whom I was taking for a drive around to show the sights of the vicinity, and that I might not get home in time for dinner, so they need not be worried. But now since you are leaving on that train, I shall be home in plenty of time for the evening meal, and I shall not be subjected to questioning. The father of the family is very much opposed to his children telling any rumors they have heard or asking any questions. He seems to have true breeding, although he is a poor, hardworking man. So I shall just go in as usual, and nothing will happen, I’m sure. But you don’t know how relieved I am to have this matter off my mind. I have been so worried lest I ought to do something and didn’t know what to do.”

“Well, you certainly did the right thing and selected the best man you could have found to confide in. Not only because he has rare good sense and is a man to be trusted utterly, but also because he knows this place, this situation, and can advise as well as pass on information. He is a valuable man, and I suspect is in line for promotion soon.”

“Oh,” said Laurel with a catch in her voice, “does that mean that he will be sent far away—perhaps overseas?”

Brown smiled. “Of course I have no authority to make positive statements, but I should say not. He is too valuable a man to waste that way. We need him right here. His technical training has been very fine and will be worth a great deal in defense work. He is a mechanical genius, and it doesn’t take the government long to discover people like that!”

Laurel’s eyes were shining now. She loved to hear Phil Pilgrim praised, and her heart rejoiced over the possibility that he might not have to go overseas.

“Thank you for telling me that!” she said, her face aglow.

“And there is one other thing I’d like to say before I leave you, and that is that I think Phil Pilgrim knows how to select his friends, if I may judge by the one I have been with this afternoon. I do hope I have not imposed upon your time too much, and I shall be glad to have you call on me at any time if there should arise an occasion where I could help you in any way. You certainly have rendered efficient help today. Now, it’s about time for my train, and I guess I’d better get out and say good-bye. I hope I shall see you again!”

When he was gone, Laurel sat thoughtfully a minute or two before she started her car for home. What a pleasant experience it had been. It was almost like seeing Pilgrim again to meet someone who admired him so much!

Then she went smiling back to the house, put away her car, and went up to her room, stopping in the dining room only long enough to call to Mrs. Gilbert that she was home and hungry as a bear for that chicken dinner she had heard about.

It was hard for her to bring her thoughts down to study that evening because there were so many things to think about, and her face was very happy when she went down to dinner.

“You had a good time, didn’t you?” whispered Nannie happily. “I’m glad. I
like
you to be happy.”

“You dear child!”she said as she went over to her chair, reflecting about this dear, plain family in which she was living, whom she was growing to love, and who were beginning to love her. Could anything be better than that? It made up for all lack of service and luxury. She was glad she had come here. She wanted to stay here as long as she stayed in this town, if they would let her, and she saw by the light in all their faces that they wanted her.

She ate the delicious supper and enjoyed every bite. The tender chicken that had been simmering all the afternoon. The delicate dumplings, rows and rows of them around the big generous platter, in the sea of delicious gravy. Could anybody have a better supper? Little white onions that had been growing on the garden lot behind the house, creamed now, and sweet as honey. Delightful pickles that had come out of Mother Gilbert’s big kettle that very fall, made from tender little cucumbers grown in that same garden. Fluffy white potatoes, also garden products. If that same dinner were being served in a grand hotel or some fine restaurant, it would be at a fabulous price.This simple boardinghouse where things were crude, and cheap, had yet the most delicious food that Laurel had ever tasted. Not fancy, but very fine and wholesome and delicious. Oh, she wouldn’t go back to Mrs. Price’s house, not even if she had it all to herself.

Later in the evening, Mrs. Gilbert talked about how pleased they were to have her with them. “My man has made up his mind that we are doing wrong to give up our parlor to board another man. He says we are to put the things back. He doesn’t like it that we have no place for us to gather after supper. He says you, a real lady, have no place to take your friends when they come to see you, so you have to take them out to ride.”

“Oh, my dear!” said Laurel. “I don’t need a parlor. I seldom will have visitors. This man who came today was only bringing me a message from a dear friend of mine and had to go on his way by the afternoon train. You must not feel you have to give up a room that you could use for another one or two boarders. Please, I wouldn’t like to feel that I had done that to you. I would feel I had to go away if I were hampering you in what you felt you ought to do.”

“No!” said Mrs. Gilbert. “You are not hampering us. Pop feels the children have a right to a parlor. He didn’t like it after we took the parlor things out and put them in the loft of the barn. He’s going to bring them back tonight. And what’s more, he says you haven’t got a fitting room for a real lady like you. We want you should take the big room over the parlor. The children are there now, but we got them places fixed, and they want
you
to have the big room.”

“Oh, but Mrs. Gilbert, I wouldn’t give up my little room for anything!” said Laurel. “I
love
it! Why, you don’t know how I feel about my view of Crimson Mountain. I wouldn’t give that up for anything. No, don’t tell me the next room has the same view. It
doesn’t!
I tried it the other day, and I couldn’t see the same trees. I want to stay right where I am if you please. You may fix your parlor if you feel you want it for yourselves, but I’m perfectly satisfied without one.”

“Well, my dear, then we want it for ourselves, if you’d rather we put it that way.”

So they settled it at last, and Laurel went up to her room and lay down on her hard, little cot, looking out on old Crimson, watching till the moon went down like a great gold piece and old Crimson was dark, except for those watch lights around the plant. She smiled in the darkness as she thought of her beloved who had first shown her the heart of Crimson Mountain, who had made her see the story of his hard young life just by pointing to an old gray farmhouse and two gleaming white headstones. She felt close to him tonight because the man who admired and trusted him had been with her. She lay there thinking over all that he had said about Phil Pilgrim and wondering if his predictions would really come true. Her heart throbbed with a sweet thrill, and she realized how she loved him. How short a time she had known him as measured by the calendar, but how sure she was that he was all she believed.

She no longer worried now about that plant with its dynamite and the two quiet graves. She had put the whole matter into the hands of that quiet man who had taken over, and she need not think of it anymore. Something would be done by the government if it really needed doing.

So the days went by and everything went calmly on. Mrs. Frisbie and Mrs. Gilbert were attending the Tuesday Bible classes now and loved them. Mrs. Gray had been to call on them and loved them. Laurel was beginning to feel that she had a very nice circle of friends, although to tell the truth, they were not many of them her age, unless she could count the adoring Nannie and the devoted Sam. She had almost forgotten Adrian Faber and the crowd who followed him.

And then one night at supper, after an exciting day in which rumors ran riot that more dynamite had been stolen, one of the male boarders who worked in the plant reported they had finished their first consignment of work. It was a lot of strange gadgets that belonged to the much-discussed “mysterious invention,” which was going to do something great for aviation. They were ready for shipment to the plant that was making the planes they were to complete.

Then the next morning, Sam came back to breakfast from his morning route and announced that the government was sending a special detachment from the army to protect the plant on Crimson Mountain. He said that the three old farmhouses in the region of the plant were to be used for barracks for the army men, and they were to stay up there and look after things. This announcement was of such importance that even Mr. Gilbert couldn’t object to its being told, so Sam had full freedom for the time to report all he knew. It was a great thing that real soldiers were to be established on their mountain, and the town began to take on importance.

Laurel wondered and pondered and prayed about it, but she said not a word, of course, to anybody about the momentous visit of Colonel Brown, nor whether his visit had had anything to do with placing the soldiers there, but she couldn’t help thinking that it had.

Laurel liked to think there were soldiers on her mountain. She hoped they would protect the graves of the two old people who were so dear to Phil Pilgrim. She wondered if the soldiers would be told about those graves and the discovery that they had been used as a place of concealment for stolen explosives. Then she wondered who those soldiers were. Probably very young men who had to be put through an easy job before going into more serious war work. Yet if the things they were making in the plant were important and a secret, it seemed as if the people who protected them should be people who understood the seriousness of the business.