The Valley of the Giants | Page 5

On past the landing where the big bull donkey- engine stood (for with the march of progress, the logging donkey- engine had replaced the ox-teams, while the logs were hauled out of the woods to the landing by means of a mile-long steel cable, and there loaded on the flat-cars of a logging railroad to be hauled to the mill and dumped in the log-boom) he went, up the skid-road recently swamped from the landing to the down timber where the crosscut men and barkpeelers were at work, on into the green timber where the woods-boss and his men were chopping.
"Come with me, McTavish," he said to his woods-boss. They passed through a narrow gap between two low hills and emerged in a long narrow valley where the redwood grew thickly and where the smallest tree was not less than fifteen feet in diameter and two hundred and fifty feet tall. McTavish followed at the master's heels as they penetrated this grove, making their way with difficulty through the underbrush until they came at length to a little amphitheatre, a clearing perhaps a hundred feet in diameter, oval-shaped and surrounded by a wall of redwoods of such dimensions that even McTavish, who was no stranger to these natural marvels, was struck with wonder. The ground in this little amphitheatre was covered to a depth of a foot with brown, withered little redwood twigs to which the dead leaves still clung, while up through this aromatic covering delicate maidenhair ferns and oxalis had thrust themselves. Between the huge brown boles of the redwoods woodwardia grew riotously, while through the great branches of these sentinels of the ages the sunlight filtered. Against the prevailing twilight of the surrounding forest it descended like a halo, and where it struck the ground John Cardigan paused.
"McTavish," he said, "she died this morning."
"I'm sore distressed for you, sir," the woods-boss answered. "We'd a whisper in the camp yesterday that the lass was like to be in a bad way."
Cardigan scuffed with his foot a clear space in the brown litter. "Take two men from the section-gang, McTavish," he ordered, "and have them dig her grave here; then swamp a trail through the underbrush and out to the donkey-landing, so we can carry her in. The funeral will be private."
McTavish nodded. "Any further orders, sir?"
"Yes. When you come to that little gap in the hills, cease your logging and bear off yonder." He waved his hand. "I'm not going to cut the timber in this valley. You see, McTavish, what it is. The trees here--ah, man, I haven't the heart to destroy God's most wonderful handiwork. Besides, she loved this spot, McTavish, and she called the valley her Valley of the Giants. I--I gave it to her for a wedding present because she had a bit of a dream that some day the town I started would grow up to yonder gap, and when that time came and we could afford it, 'twas in her mind to give her Valley of the Giants to Sequoia for a city park, all hidden away here and unsuspected.
"She loved it, McTavish. It pleased her to come here with me; she'd make up a lunch of her own cooking and I would catch trout in the stream by the dogwoods yonder and fry the fish for her. Sometimes I'd barbecue a venison steak and--well, 'twas our playhouse, McTavish, and I who am no longer young--I who never played until I met her--I-- I'm a bit foolish, I fear, but I found rest and comfort here, McTavish, even before I met her, and I'm thinking I'll have to come here often for the same. She--she was a very superior woman, McTavish--very superior. Ah, man, the soul of her! I cannot bear that her body should rest in Sequoia cemetery, along with the rag tag and bobtail o' the town. She was like this sunbeam, McTavish. She--she--"
"Aye," murmured McTavish huskily. "I ken. Ye wouldna gie her a common or a public spot in which to wait for ye. An' ye'll be shuttin' down the mill an' loggin'-camps an' layin' off the hands in her honour for a bit?"
"Until after the funeral, McTavish. And tell your men they'll be paid for the lost time. That will be all, lad."
When McTavish was gone, John Cardigan sat down on a small sugar-pine windfall, his head held slightly to one side while he listened to that which in the redwoods is not sound but rather the absence of it. And as he listened, he absorbed a subtle comfort from those huge brown trees, so emblematic of immortality; in the thought he grew closer to his Maker, and presently found that peace which he sought. Love such as theirs could never die... The tears came at last.
At sundown