By daylight next morning every man and most of the women among the new arrivals had disappeared into the hills—the women in spite of the by-laws of Lee's Creek, which discriminated against their sex. When a stampede starts it does not end with the location of one stream-bed, nor of two; every foot of valley ground for miles on every hand is pre-empted, in the hope that more gold will be found; each creek forms a new district, and its discoverers adopt laws to suit their whims. The women, therefore, hastened to participate in the discovery of new territory and in the shaping of its government, leaving but few of either sex to guard the tents and piles of provisions standing by the river-bank. In two days they began to return, and straggled in at intervals for a week thereafter, for many had gone far.
And now began a new era for Flambeau—an era of industry such as the frontier town had never known. The woods behind rang with the resounding discords of axes and saws and crashing timber, and new cabins appeared on every hand, rising in a day. The sluggish air was noisy with voices, and the edge of the forest receded gradually before the busy pioneers, replacing the tall timbers with little, high-banked homes of spruce and white-papered birch. From dawn till dark arose the rhythmic rasp of men whip-sawing floor lumber to the tune of two hundred dollars per thousand; and with the second steamer came a little steam sawmill, which raised its shrill complaint within a week, punctuating the busy day with its piping whistle.
The trail along the Flambeau, was dotted continuously with toiling human beasts of burden, that floundered laboriously beneath great packs of provisions and tools and other baggage, winding like an endless stream of ants through the hills to "No Creek" Lee Creek, where they re-enacted the scenes that were occurring in the town. Tents and cabins were scattered throughout the length of the valley, lumber was sawed for sluice-boxes, and the virginal breezes that had sucked through this seam in the mountains since days primeval came to smell of spruce fires and echo with the sounds of life.
A dozen tents were pitched on Lee's discovery claim, for the owner had been besieged by men who clamored to lease a part of his ground, and, yielding finally, he had allotted to each of them a hundred feet. Forth-with they set about opening their portions, for the ground was shallow, and the gold so near the surface that winter would interfere with its extraction; wherefore, they made haste. The owner oversaw them all, complacent in the certainty of a steady royalty accruing from the working of his allotments.
Every day there came into Flambeau exaggerated reports of new strikes in other spots, of strong indications and of rich prospects elsewhere. Stories grew out of nothing, until the camp took an hysterical pleasure in exciting itself and deceiving every stranger who came from north or south, for the wine of discovery was in them all, and it pleased them to distort and enlarge upon every rumor that came their way, such being the temper of new gold-fields. They knew they were lying, and that all other men were lying also, and yet they hearkened to each tale and almost deceived themselves.
Burrell sought Necia at an early day and, in presence of her father, told her that he had been approached by men who wished to lease the claims he held for her. It would prove an inexpensive way to develop her holdings, he said, and she would run no risk; moreover, it would be rapid, and insure a quick return, for a lease so near to proven territory was in great demand. After some discussion this was arranged, and Meade, as trustee, allotted her ground in tracts, as Lee had done. Poleon followed suit; but the trader chose to prospect his own claims, and to that end called in a train of stiff-backed Indian packers, moved a substantial outfit to the creek, and thereafter spent much of his time in the hills, leaving the store to Doret. He seemed anxious to get away from the camp and hide himself in the woods. Stark was almost constantly occupied at his saloon, for it was a mint, and ran day and night. Runnion was busy with the erection of a substantial structure of squared logs, larger than the trading-post, destined as a dance-hall, theatre, and gambling-house. Flambeau, the slumbrous, had indeed aroused itself, stretched its limbs, and sprung into vigorous, virile, feverish being, and the wise prophets were predicting another Dawson for it, notwithstanding that many blank spots had been found as the creek of Lee's finding bared its bedrock to the miners. These but enhanced the value of the rich finds, however, for a single stroke of good-fortune will more than offset a dozen disappointments. The truth is, the stream was very spotted, and Leo had by chance hit upon one of the bars where the metal had lodged, while others above and below uncovered a bed-rock as barren as a clean-swept floor. In places they cross-cut from rim to rim, drove tunnels and drains and drifts, sunk shafts and opened trenches without finding a color that would ring when dropped in the pan; but that was an old, old story, and they were used to it.
During these stirring weeks of unsleeping activity Burrell saw little of Necia, for he had many things to occupy him, and she was detained much in the store, now that her father was away. When they met for a moment they were sure to be interrupted, while in and around the house Alluna seemed to be always near her. Even so, she was very happy; for she was sustained by the constant hectic excitement that was in the air and by her brief moments with Meade, which served to gladden her and make of the days one long, delicious, hopeful procession of undisturbed dreams and fancies. He was the same fond lover as on that adventurous journey up Black Bear Creek, and wooed her with a reckless fire that set her aglow. And so she hummed and laughed and dreamed the days away, her happiness matching the peace and gladness of the season.
With Burrell, on the contrary, it was a season of penance and flagellations of spirit, lightened only by the moments when he was with her, and when she made him forget all else. This damnable indecision goaded him to self-contempt; he despised himself for his weakness; his social instincts and training, his sense of duty, and the amenities of life that proud men hold dear tugged steadily, untiringly at his reason, while the little imp of impulse sat grinning wickedly, ready to pop out and upset all his high resolutions. It raised such a tumult in his ears that he could not hear the other voices; it stirred his blood till it leaped and pounded, and then ran off with him to find this tiny brown and beaming witch who was at the bottom of it all.
No months in any clime can compare with an Arctic summer when Nature is kind, for she crowds into this short epoch all the warmth and brightness and splendor that is spread over longer periods in other lands, and every growing thing rejoices riotously in scent and color and profusion. It was on one of these heavenly days, spiced with the faintest hint of autumn, that Necia received the news of her good-fortune. One of her leasers came into the post to show her and Poleon a bag of dust. He and his partner had found the pay-streak finally, and he had come to notify her that it gave promise of being very rich, and now that its location was demonstrated, no doubt the other "laymen" would have it within a fortnight. As all of them were ready to begin sluicing as soon as the ground could be stripped, undoubtedly they would be able to take out a substantial stake before winter settled and the first frost closed them down.
She took the news quietly but with shining eyes, though her pleasure was no greater or more genuine than Poleon's, who grasped both her hands in his and shouted, gleefully:
Bien! I'm glad! You'll be riche gal for sure now, an' wear plaintee fine dress lak' I fetch you. Jus' t'ink, you fin' gol' on your place more queecker dan your fader, an' he's good miner, too. Ha! Dat's bully!
Oh, Poleon! I'll be a fine lady, after all, she cried—"just as I've dreamed about! Wasn't it beautiful, that pile of yellow grains and nuggets? Dear, dear! And part of it is mine! You know I've never had money. I wonder what it is like to be rich!"
How I'm goin' tell you dat?
Oh, well, they will find it on your claims very soon.
He shook his head. "You better knock wood w'en you say dat. Mebbe I draw de blank again; nobody can't tell. I've do de sam' t'ing before, an' dose men w'at been workin' my groun' dey're gettin' purty blue."
It's impossible. You're sure to strike it, or if you don't, you can have half of what I make—I'll be too wealthy, anyhow, so you might as well.
He laughed again, at which she suddenly remembered that he had not laughed very much of late, or else she had been too deeply absorbed in her own happiness to mark the lack of his songs and merriment.
When you do become a Flambeau king, she continued, "what will you do with yourself? Surely you won't continue that search for your far country. It could never be so beautiful as this." She pointed to the river that never changed, and yet was never the same, and to the forests, slightly tinged with the signs of the coming season. "Just look at the mountains," she mused, in a hushed voice; "see the haze that hangs over them—the veil that God uses to cover up his treasures." She drew a deep breath. "The breeze fairly tastes with clean things, doesn't it? Do you know, I've often wanted to be an animal, to have my senses sharpened—one of those wild things with a funny, sharp, cold nose. I'd like to live in the trees and run along the branches like a squirrel, and drink in the perfume that comes on the wind, and eat the tender, growing things. The sun is bright enough and the world is good enough, but I can't feel enough. I'm incomplete."
It's very fine, agreed the Canadian. "I don' see w'y anybody would care for livin' on dem cities w'en dere's so much nice place outside."
Oh, but the cities must be fine also, said she, "though, of course, they can't be as lovely as this. Won't I be glad to see them!"
Are you goin' away? he inquired, quickly.
Of course. Then glimpsing his downcast face, she hastened to add, "That is, when my claims turn out rich enough to afford it."
Oh, he said, with relief. "Dat's different. I s'pose it mus' be purty dull on dem beeg town; now'ere to go, not'in' to see 'cept lot of houses."
Yes, said Necia, "I've no doubt one would get tired of it soon, and long for something to do and something really worth while, but I should like to try it once, and I shall as soon as I'm rich enough. Won't you come along?"
I don' know, he said, thoughtfully; "mebbe so I stay here, mebbe so I tak' my canoe an' go away. For long tam' I t'ink dis Flambeau she's de promis' lan' I hear callin' to me, but I don' know yet for w'ile."
What kind of place is that land of yours, Poleon?
Ha! I never see 'im, but she's been cryin' to me ever since I'm little boy. It's a place w'ere I don' get too hot on de summer an' too col' on de winter; it's place w'ere birds sing an' flowers blossom an' de sun shine, an' w'ere I can sleep widout dreamin' 'bout it all de tam'.
Why, it's the land of content—you'll never discover it by travel. I'll tell you a secret, Poleon. I've found it—yes, I have. It lies here. She laid her hand on her breast. "Father Barnum told me the story of your people, and how it lives in your blood—that hunger to find the far places; it's what drove the voyageurs and coureur du bois from Quebec to Vancouver, and from the Mississippi to Hudson's Bay. The wanderlust was their heritage, and they pushed on and on without rest, like the salmon in the spring, but they were different in this: that they never came back to die."
Dat's me! I never see no place yet w'at I care for die on, an' I never see no place yet w'at I care for see again 'cept dis Flambeau. I lak' it, dis one, purty good so far, but I ain' know w'en I'm goin' get tire'. Dat depen's. There was a look of great tenderness in his eyes as he bent towards her and searched her face, but she was not thinking of him, and at length he continued:
Fader Barnum, he's goin' be here nex' Sonday for cheer up dem Injun. Constantine she's got de letter.
Why, that's the day after to-morrow! cried Necia. "Oh, won't I be glad to see him!"
You don' get dem kin' of mans on de beeg cities, said Poleon. "I ain' never care for preachin' much, an' dese feller w'at all de tam' pray an' sing t'rough de nose, dey mak' me seeck. But Fader Barnum—Ba Gar! She's the swell man."
Do you know, said Necia, wistfully, "I've always wanted him to marry me."
You t'inkin' 'bout marry on some feller, eh? said the other, with an odd grin. "Wal! w'y not? He'll be here all day an' night. S'pose you do it. Mos' anybody w'at ain' got some wife already will be glad for marry on you—an' mebbe some feller w'at has got wife, too! If you don' lak' dem, an' if you're goin' marry on SOMEBODY, you can be wife to me."
Necia laughed lightly. "I believe you WOULD marry me if I wanted you to; you've done everything else I've ever asked. But you needn't be afraid; I won't take you up." In all her life this man had never spoken of love to her, and she had no hint of the dream he cherished. He had sung his songs to her and told her stories till his frank and boyish mind was like an open page to her; she knew the romance that was the very fibre of him, and loved his exaggerated chivalry, for it minded her of old tales she had read; but that he could care for her save as a friend, as a brother—such a thought had never dawned upon her.
While they were talking a boat had drawn inshore and made fast to the bank in front of them. An Indian landed and, approaching, entered into talk with the Frenchman.
By-and-by Poleon turned to the girl, and said:
Dere's'hondred marten-skin come in; you min' de store w'ile I mak' trade wit' dis man.
Together the two went down to the boat, leaving Necia behind, and not long after Runnion sauntered up to the store and addressed her familiarly.
Hello, Necia! I just heard about the strike on your claim. That's fine and dandy.
She acknowledged his congratulations curtly, for although it was customary for most of the old-timers to call her by her Christian name, she resented it from this man. She chose to let it pass, however.
I had some good news last night myself, he continued. "One of my men has hit some good dirt, and we'll know what it means in a day or so. I'll gamble we're into the money big, though, for I always was a lucky cuss. Say, where's your father?"
He's out at the mine.
We've used up all of our bar sugar at the saloon, and I want to buy what you've got.
Very well, I'll get it for you.
He followed her inside, watching her graceful movements, and attempting, with his free-and-easy insolence, to make friendly advances, but, seeing that she refused to notice him, he became piqued, and grew bolder.
Look here, Necia, you're a mighty pretty girl. I've had my eye on you ever since I landed, and the more I see of you the better I like you.
It isn't necessary to tell me that, she replied. "The price of the sugar will be just the same."
Yes, and you're bright, too, he declared. "That's what I like in a woman—good looks and brains. I believe in strong methods and straight talk, too; none of this serenading and moonlight mush for me. When I see a girl I like, I go and get her. That's me. I make love like a man ought to—"
Are you making love to me? she inquired, curiously.
It's a little bit sudden, I know, but a man has to begin some time. I think you'd just about suit me. We'll both have money before long, and I'll be good to you.
The girl laughed derisively in his face.
Now don't get sore. I mean business. I don't wear a blue coat and use a lot of fancy words, and then throw you down when I've had my fun, and I don't hang around and spoil your chances with other men either.
What do you mean?
Well, I'm no soft-talking Southerner with gold buttons and highfalutin' ways. I don't care if you are a squaw, I'll take you—
Don't talk to me! she cried, in disgust, her voice hot with anger and resentment.
But he continued, unheeding: "Now, cut out these airs and get down to cases. I mean what I say. I know you've been casting sheep's eyes at Burrell, but, Lord! he wouldn't have you, no matter how rich you get. Of course, you acted careless in going off alone with him, but I don't mind what they're saying around camp, for I've made little slips like that myself, and we'd get along—"
I'll have you killed! she hissed, through her clinched teeth, while her whole body vibrated with passion. "I'll call Poleon and have him shoot you!" She pointed to the river-bank a hundred yards away, where the Canadian was busy assorting skins.
But he only laughed at her show of temper, and shrugged his shoulders as he answered her, roughly:
Understand me, I'm on the square. So think it over, and don't go up in the air like a sky-rocket.
She cried out at him to "Go—go—go!" and finally he took up his bundle, saying, as he stepped out slowly:
All right! But I'm coming back, and you'll have to listen to me. I don't mind being called a squaw-man. You're pretty near white, and you're good enough for me. I'll treat you right—why, I'll even marry you if you're dead set on it. Sure!
She could scarcely breathe, but checked her first inclination to call Poleon, knowing that it needed only a word from her to set that nut-brown savage at Runnion's throat. Other thoughts began to crowd her brain and to stifle her. The fellow's words had stabbed her consciousness, and done something for her that gentler means would not have accomplished; they had opened her eyes to a thing that she had forgotten—a hideous thing that had reared its fangs once before to strike, but which her dreams of happiness had driven out of her Eden. All at once she saw the wrong that had been done her, and realized from this brute's insult that those early fears had been well grounded. It suddenly occurred to her that in all the hours she had spent with her lover, in all those unspeakably sweet and intimate hours, there had never been one word of marriage. He had looked into her eyes and vowed he could not live without her, and yet he had never said the words he should have said, the words that would bind her to him. His arms and his lips had comforted her and stilled her fears, but after all he had merely made love. A cold fear crept over the girl. She recalled the old Corporal's words of a few weeks ago, and her conversation with Stark came back to her. What if it were true—that which Runnion implied? What if he did not intend to ask her, after all? What if he had only been amusing himself? She cried out sharply at this, and when Doret staggered in beneath a great load of skins he found her in a strange excitement. When he had finished his accounting with the Indian and dismissed him, she turned an agitated face to the Frenchman.
Poleon, she said, "I'm in trouble. Oh, I'm in such awful trouble!"
It's dat Runnion! I seen 'im pass on de store w'ile I'm down below. His brows knit in a black scowl, and his voice slid off a pitch in tone. "Wat he say, eh?"
No, no, it's not that. He paid me a great compliment. She laughed harshly. "Why, he asked me to marry him." The man beside her cursed at this, but she continued: "Don't blame him for liking me—I'm the only woman for five hundred miles around—or I was until this crowd came—so how could he help himself? No, he merely showed me what a fool I've been."
I guess you better tell me all 'bout dis t'ing, said Poleon, gravely. "You know I'm all tam' ready for help you, Necia. Wen you was little feller an' got bust your finger you run to me queeck, an' I feex it."
Yes, I know, dear Poleon, she assented, gratefully. "You've been a brother to me, and I need you now more than I ever needed you before. I can't go to father; he wouldn't understand, or else he would understand too much, and spoil it all, his temper is so quick."
I'm not w'at you call easy-goin' mese'f, the Canadian said, darkly, and it was plain that he was deeply agitated, which added to the girl's distress; but she began to speak rapidly, incoherently, her impulsiveness giving significance to her words, so that the man had no difficulty in following her drift. With quick insight he caught her meaning, and punctuated her broken sentences with a series of grave nods, assuring her that he knew and understood. He had always known, he had always understood, it seemed.
Don't think I'm unwomanly, Poleon, for I'm not. I may be foolish and faithful and too trusting, but I'm not—unmaidenly. You see, I've never been like other girls—and he was so fine, so different, he made me love him—it's part of a soldier's training, I suppose. It was so sweet to be near him, and to hear him tell of himself and all the world he knows—I just let myself drift. I'm afraid—I'm afraid I listened too well, and my ears heard more than he said—my head is so full of books, you know.
He should have know' dat, too, said Poleon.
Yes, she flared up. "He knew I was only an Indian girl."
The only color in Doret's face lay now in his cheeks, where the sun had put it; but he smiled at her—his warm, engaging smile—and laid his great brown hand upon her shoulder softly.
I've look' in hees eye an' I'm always t'ink he's good man. I don' never t'ink he'll mak' fun of poor little gal.
But he has, Poleon; that's just what he has done. She came near to breaking down, and finished, pathetically, "They're telling the story on the street, so Runnion says."
Dat's easy t'ing for feex, he said. "Runnion, she don' spread no more story lak' dat."
I don't care what they say. I want the truth. I want to know what he means, what his intentions are. He swears he loves me, and yet he has never asked me to marry him. He has gone too far; he has made a fool of me to amuse himself, and—and I couldn't see it until to-day. He's laughing at me, Poleon, he's laughing at me now! Oh, I can't bear it!
The Frenchman took up his wide hat from the counter and placed it carefully upon his head, but she stopped him as he moved towards the door, for she read the meaning of the glare in his eyes.
Wait till you understand—wait, I say! He hasn't done anything yet.
Dat's de trouble. I'm goin' mak' 'im do somet'ing.
No, no! It isn't that; it's these doubts that are killing me—I'm not sure—
I hear plaintee, he said. "Dere's no tam' for monkey roun'."
I tell you he may be honest, she declared. "He may mean to marry me, but I've got to know. That's why I came to you; that's what you must find out for me."
I'm good trader, Necia, said the Canadian, after a moment. "I'll mak' bargain wit' you now. If he say yes, he'll marry you, I don' ask no more; but if he say no, you geeve 'im to me. Is it go?"
She hesitated, while he continued, musingly, "I don' see how no man on all dis worl' could lef' you go." Then to her, "Wal, is it bargain?"
Yes, she said, the Indian blood speaking now; "but you must learn the truth, there must be no mistake—that would be terrible."
Dere ain' goin' be no mistak'.
If he should refuse, I—I'll marry SOME one, quick. I won't be laughed at by this camp; I won't be a joke. Oh, Poleon! I've given myself to him just as truly as if—well, he—he has taken my first kiss.
Doret smote his hands together at this and began to roll his head backward from side to side, as if in some great pain, but his lips were dry and silent. After a moment the spell left him, the fire died down, leaving only a dumb agony in its place. She came closer and continued:
I'll never let them point at me and say, 'There goes the squaw that—he threw away.'
You mak' dis very hard t'ing for me, he said, wearily.
Listen, she went on, lashing herself with pity and scorn. "You say Father Barnum will be here on Sunday. Well—I'll marry some one, I don't care who!" Then, with a sudden inspiration, she cried, "I'll marry you—you said I could be a wife to you."
He uttered a sharp cry. "You mean dat, Necia?"
Yes, she declared. "Why not? You'll do it for my sake, won't you?"
Would you stan' up wit' me 'longside of de pries', lovin' dat oder feller all de tam'? he asked, queerly.
Yes, YES! I'd rather it was you than anybody, but married I'll be on Sunday. I'll never let them laugh at me.
Doret held his silence for a moment, then he looked up and said, in level tones:
It's easy t'ing for go an' ask 'im, but you mus' hear hees answer wit' your own ears—den you can't t'ink I'm lyin'. I'll fetch 'im 'ere on dis place if you feex it for hide you'se'f behin' dose post. He indicated a bundle of furs that were suspended against a pillar, and which offered ample room for concealment. "Dere's goin' be no lies to-day."
He pulled himself together and went out, with the tired gait of an old man, his great shock head bowed low. A few moments later he returned.
I've sent li'l' Jean for 'im. You get in dere out of sight—an' wait.
When Burrell entered he wasted no time in greetings.
I know why you sent for me, Poleon. I've heard the news, and I would have been up anyhow to congratulate her very soon. I call it pretty fine.
Yes, dere's been beeg strike all right, an' Necia is goin' be riche gal.
I'm as pleased as if the claim were mine, and you feel the same way, of course.
The Frenchman nodded. "I love Necia very much, lak'—well, lak' I'm broder to her." The knowledge that she was listening made him very uncomfortable—in fact, this whole affair savored more of double-dealing and treachery than anything he had ever attempted, and it went sorely against his grain, but it had presented itself as the only way to help her, and he proceeded, groping haltingly for fit expression, "Dere's t'ing I want for talk 'bout wit' you, but I'm scare' you'll t'ink I'm butt in."
Nonsense, said Burrell. "I know you too well for that."
You know me for good man, eh? An' you know I ain' try for bre'k up oder fellers' biznesse, never! Wal, I'm come to you now lak' wan good man to 'noder biccause I'm got bad trouble on de min', an' you mus'n't get sore.
There's no danger, Poleon. Let's have it. If there is anything I can do, you may count on me.
Wal, he began, nervously, clearing his throat, "it's lak' dis. Dere's feller been talk some 'bout Necia, an' it ain' nice talk neider."
Who is he? exclaimed the soldier, in a tone that made the girl's heart leap.
Wait! Lemme tol' you w'at he say, den we'll talk 'bout feex 'im plaintee. He say dere's joke down on Stark's saloon dat Necia Gale is mak' fool of herse'f on you, an' dat you ain' care for marry her.
Runnion! cried Burrell, and started for the door. "I'll settle with him now for fair!" But Poleon blocked his way, and, observing him gravely, continued, in a tone that the other could not disregard nor mistake:
No, M'sieu', before you pass on dat place you'll tol' me if it's true.
True! the Lieutenant retorted, angrily. "What business is it of yours? This concerns me."
An' me, too! I'm w'at you call gardeen for Necia till John Gale come back, an' I'm broder of her, too. You promis' jus' now you don' get mad, an' I don' say she's Runnion neider w'at spik dose t'ing; dere's more dan 'im been talkin'. Is it true?
His sternness offended Burrell, for the soldier was not the kind to discuss his affairs in this way, therefore he drew back scowling.
Poleon Doret, he said, "it's not one's enemies who do him injury, it's his damned fool friends. I have learned to regard you highly because you are a brave man and an honest one, but it seems that you are a sentimental idiot."
Dem is tough word, Doret replied. "But dere's reason w'y I can't tak' on no madnesse. You say I'm hones'. Wal, I'm hones' now, an' I come to you wit' fair words an' I show my han' to you—I don' hoi' out no cards, M'sieu'—but I don' t'ink it is you who have play square, altogeder. I'm Necia's frien', an' I'll fight for her jus' so queecker lak' you, but I mus' know dis t'ing for sure, so if you have de good heart an' de courage of good man you'll tell me de truth. Do you have the feelin' for marry on her?"
The pause that followed was awkward for both of them, while the girl, who stood concealed near by, held her breath and buried her nails in her palms. Why did he hesitate? Would he never speak? It seemed not, for he swung between diverse emotions—anger that this outsider should question him on so intimate a matter, chagrin at the knowledge of having injured Necia, and rage, blind rage, at the thought of its becoming a bar-room topic. Gradually the conviction grew that it was not a question of idle curiosity with Doret, and the man's history recurred to him. No wonder he was interested in the girl, no wonder he wished to guard her; he had been a brother indeed, even as he said, and he could have no motive save an honorable one. It never occurred to the soldier that this Frenchman could harbor feelings akin to his own. The man was rough and foreign; his thoughts had been couched in harsher language, perhaps, than he intended; moreover, the fellow's high sense of honor was a byword—and of a sudden the desire to set himself right in this man's eyes dictated his answer.
I am amazed at myself for listening to you, he said, at last, "and quite shocked, in fact, at my answering your questions, but perhaps I'd better, after all. First, however, let me say that the little girl is just as pure now as she was before she knew me—"
Poleon threw up his hand. "M'sieu', dat's more closer to de insult dan w'at you call me jus' now. You don' need for spoke it."
You're right! There's no need to tell you that. As for showing her certain attentions—well, I admit that I have, as you know, but, thank God, I can say I've been a gentleman and addressed her as I would the fairest lady I've known.
An' you mean for marry, eh? probed the other.
Now, no man could have answered such a direct question easily, and in this case it was especially hard for the Kentuckian, who was torn between his ungovernable desire and that decision which cold reason had thrust upon him. He wanted to say, "Yes, I'll marry her to-morrow," but something bade him pause before he sacrificed upon this altar of a youthful love his life, his hopes, his ambitions. Had he not wrestled with himself for months in thinking it all out, until his mind was weary and listless with the effort? For the great test that tries a man's soul and compels him to know himself had not yet come to Meade Burrell; wherefore, he hesitated long.
I did not say so, he declared, at last. "It's a thing I can't well discuss, because I doubt if you could understand what I would say. This life of yours is different from mine, and it would be useless for me to explain the reason why I cannot marry her. Leaving out all question of my sentiment, there are insurmountable obstacles to such a union; but as to this talk, I think that can be stopped without annoyance to her, and as for the rest, we must trust to time to bring about a proper adjustment—"
A low, discordant sound of laughter arrested his words, and, turning, he beheld Necia standing revealed in the dimness.
What an amusing person you are! she said. "I've had hard work holding in all this time while you were torturing your mind and twisting the honest English language out of shape and meaning. I knew I should have to laugh sooner or later."
What is the meaning of this? he demanded. "Is it a joke?"
Indeed it is, she declared, laughing afresh, "and the best I've ever enjoyed. Wasn't it funny, Poleon"—she turned gayly to the Frenchman, but he stood like one petrified—"to see him debating coolly whether he cared for me enough to face the world with me, and trying to explain to you that he was too good to marry a squaw? Oh, you were very gentlemanly about it, sir, and you wouldn't have hurt my feelings for the world!"
Necia!
That's your Dixie chivalry, I suppose. Well, I've played with you long enough, Lieutenant Burrell, I'm tired of the game, and you interest me no longer.
You—you—say you've been playing with me! stammered the man. The bottom of things seemed suddenly to slide from under him; he was like one sinking in some hideous quagmire. He felt as if he were choking.
Why, of course, she cried, scornfully, "just as you took me up for amusement. You were such a fine, well-dressed, immaculate mound of conceit that I couldn't resist the temptation, and you hid your condescension so poorly that I thought you ought to be taken down a peg. I knew I was a squaw, but I wanted to see if I were not like other women, after all, and if you were not like other men." She was talking rapidly now, almost shrilly, for she had never attempted to act before, while he stood dazed and speechless, fumbling at his throat while she railed at him. "You needn't waste time debating whether I'm good enough for you, because I'm not—decidedly, I'm not your kind, and you are a joke to me."
He uttered an inarticulate cry, but she ran on unheeding, her eyes wide and glowing like coals, her lips chalk-white. "You see, it's time I stopped such foolishness, anyhow, for I'm to be married on Sunday."
You are going to be married? he muttered, laboriously.
Yes, to Poleon. Why, that's been understood for years.
He whirled upon the Canadian in a fury, and his words came hot and tumbling.
So you're in this, Doret. You're a part of this little farce. You trapped me here to make a fool of me, did you? Well, I can settle with you—
D-don't blame him! cried the girl, hysterically. "It is all my doing. He had no part in it."
Burrell wheeled back to the Frenchman again. "Is this true?"
Yes, said Doret, in a restrained voice. "Dis ain' no work of mine."
You're a liar! breathed the Kentuckian, now fairly wild with anger; but the other looked him squarely between the eyes and made no move.
M'sieu', he cried, "I'm livin' t'orty year, an' never took no nam' lak' dat before, but dere's reason here w'y I can't mak' no answer." He inclined his head towards the girl, and before Burrell could break out again he checked him.
It's no good mak' fight wit' lesser dan two people. You've tol' me dat you are gentleman. Wal, I ain' nobody but trapper an' trader, but I don' spoil de name of no good girl, an' I don' quarrel in presence of lady, so mebbe, affer all, dere's mistak' somew'ere, an' I'm gentleman mese'f 'stead of you.
Why, you aren't really angry, Lieutenant? mocked Necia. "It's only the joke of an ignorant half-breed girl whose sense of humor is all out of gear. You mustn't quarrel over a SQUAW!"
She taunted him like a baited badger, for this thing was getting beyond her control and the savage instincts of the wilderness were uppermost.
You are quite right, he replied. "I am very foolish, and the laugh is with you." His lips tried to frame a smile, but failed, and he added: "Your wit is not my kind, that is all. I beg you both to accept my congratulations on your nuptials. Undoubtedly, you will be happy together; two people with such similar ideas of humor must have much to enjoy in common." He bowed low and, turning, walked out.
The moment he was gone she cried, breathlessly:
You must marry me, Poleon. You've got to do it now.
Do you mean dat for sure? he said.
Can't you see there's nothing else for it, after this? I'll show him that he can't make me a toy to suit his convenience. I've told him I would marry you on Sunday, and I'll do it or die. Of course you don't love me, for you don't know what love is, I suppose; how—could you? She broke down and began to catch her breath amid coughing sobs that shook her slender body, though they left her eyes dry and feverish.
I—I'm very unhappy, b-but I'll be a good—wife to you. Oh, Poleon, if you only knew—
He drew a long breath. When he spoke his voice had the timbre of some softly played instrument, and a tremor ran through his words.
No! I don' know w'at kin' of love is dis, for sure. De kin' of love I know is de kin' I sing 'bout in my songs; I s'pose it's different breed to yours, an' I'm begin to see it don' live nowhere but on dem songs of mine. Dere's long tarn' I waste here now—five year—but to-morrow I go again lookin' for my own countree.
Poleon! she cried, looking up with startled eyes. "Not to-morrow, but Sunday—we will go together."
He shook his head. "To-morrow, Necia! An' I go alone."
Then you won't—marry me? she asked, in a hushed and frightened voice.
No! Dere's wan t'ing I can't do even for you, Necia, dere's wan t'ing I can't geeve, dat's all—jus' wan on all de worl'. I can't kill de li'l' god wit' de bow an' arrer. He's all dat mak' de sun shine, de birds sing, an' de leaves w'isper to me; he's de wan li'l' feller w'at mak' my life wort' livin' an' keep music in my soul. If I keel 'im dere ain' no more lef lak' it, an' I'm never goin' fin' my lan' of content, nor sing nor laugh no more. I'm t'inkin' I would rader sing songs to 'im all alone onderneat' de stars beside my campfire, an' talk wit' 'im in my bark canoe, dan go livin' wit' you in fine house an' let 'im get col' an' die.
But I told him I'd marry you—that I had always intended to. He'll believe I was lying, she moaned, in distress.
Dat's too bad—but dis t'ing ain' no doin's wit' me. Dere's wan t'ing in dis worl' mus' live forever, an' dat's love—if we kill 'im den it's purty poor place for stoppin' in. I'm cut off my han' for help you, Necia, but I can't be husban' to no woman in fun.
Your foolish head is full of romance, she burst out. "You think you're doing me a favor, but you're not. Why, there's Runnion—he wants me so much that he'd 'even marry me'!" Her wild laughter stabbed the man. "Was ever a girl in such a fix! I've been made love to ever since I was half a woman, but at thought of a priest men seem to turn pale and run like whipped dogs. I'm only good enough for a bad man and a gambler, I suppose." She sank to a seat, flung out her arms hopelessly, and, bowing her head, began to weep uncontrollably. "If—if—I only had a woman to talk to—but they are all men—all men."
Poleon waited patiently until her paroxysm of sobbing had passed, then gently raised her and led her out through the back door into the summer day, which an hour ago had been so bright and promising and was now so gray and dismal. He followed her with his eyes until she disappeared inside the log-house.
An' dat's de end of it all, he mused. "Five year I've wait—an' jus' for dis."
Meade Burrell never knew how he gained his quarters, but when he had done so he locked his door behind him, then loosed his hold on things material. He raged about the room like a wild animal, and vented his spite on every inanimate thing that lay within reach. His voice was strange in his own ears, as was the destructive frenzy that possessed him. In time he grew quieter, as the physical energy of this brutal impulse spent itself; but there came no surcease of his mental disquiet. As yet his mind grasped but dully the fact that she was to marry another, but gradually this thought in turn took possession of him. She would be a wife in two days. That great, roistering, brown man would fold her to himself—she would yield to him every inch of her palpitant, passionate body. The thought drove the lover frantic, and he felt that madness lay that way if he dwelt on such fancies for long. Of a sudden he realized all that she meant to him, and cursed himself anew. While he had the power to possess her he had dallied and hesitated, but now that he had no voice in it, now that she was irretrievably beyond his reach, he vowed to snatch her and hold her against the world.
As he grew calmer his reason began to dissect the scene that had taken place in the store, and he wondered whether she had been lying to him, after all. No doubt she had been engaged to the Frenchman, and had always planned to wed Poleon, for that was not out of reason; she might even have set out mischievously to amuse herself with him, but at the recollection of those rapturous hours they had spent together, he declared aloud that she had loved him, and him only. Every instinct in him shouted that she loved him, in spite of her cruel protestations.
All that afternoon he stayed locked in his room, and during those solitary hours he came to know his own soul. He saw what life meant: what part love plays in it, how dwarfed and withered all things are when pitted against it.
A man came with his supper, but he called to him to be gone. The night settled slowly, and with the darkness came such a feeling of despair and lonesomeness that Burrell lighted every lamp and candle in the place to dispel, in some measure, the gloom that had fallen upon him. There are those who believe that in passing from daylight to darkness a subtle transition occurs akin to the change from positive to negative in an electrical current, and that this intangible, untraceable atmospheric influence exerts a definite, psychical effect upon men and their modes of thought. Be this as it may, it is certain that as the night grew darker the Lieutenant's mood changed. He lost his fierce anger at the girl, and reasoned that he owed it to her to set himself right in her eyes; that in all justice to her he ought to prove his own sincerity, and assure her that whatever her own state of mind had been, she wronged him when she said he had made sport of her for his own pleasure. She might then dismiss him and proceed with her marriage, but first she must know this much of the truth at least. So he argued, insensible to the sophistry of his reasoning, which was in reality impelled by the hunger to see her and hear her voice again. He snatched his hat and bolted out, almost running in his eagerness.
An up-river steamboat was just landing as he neared the trading-post—a freighter, as he noted by her lights. In the glare at the river-bank he saw Poleon and the trader, who had evidently returned from Lee's Creek, and without accosting them he hurried on to the store. Peering in from the darkness, he saw Alluna; no doubt Necia was alone in the house behind. So he stumbled around to the back to find the window of her room aglow behind its curtain, and, receiving no answer to his knock, he entered, for it was customary at Gale's to waive ceremony. Inside the big room he paused, then stepped swiftly across and rapped at her door, falling back a pace as she came out.
Instead of speaking at once, as he had planned, to prevent her escaping, he was struck speechless, for the vision that met his eyes was that which he had seen one blithe spring morning three months before; but to-night there was no shawl to conceal her sweetly rounded neck and shoulders, whose whiteness was startling against the black of the ball-room gown. The slim gold chain hung around her neck and her hair was piled high, as before. He noted every smallest detail as she stood there waiting for him to speak, forgetful of everything else.
She had put on the gown again to see if, perchance, there might be some mark of her blood or breed that had escaped her previous scrutiny, and, as there was no one to observe her, she had attired herself slowly, absorbed in her whimsy. Her wistful beauty dazed the young man and robbed him of the words he had rehearsed; but as she made to flee from him, with a pitiful gesture, towards her room, the fear of losing her aroused him and spurred his wit.
Don't go away! I have something I must tell you. I've thought it over, and you've got to listen, Necia.
I am listening, she answered, very quietly.
Understand me, I'm not whining, and I'm willing to take my medicine. I couldn't talk or think very straight this afternoon, but you were wrong.
Yes, I know now, I was wrong. It was most unlady-like, wasn't it? But you see, I am only a little savage.
I don't mean that; I mean you were wrong when you said I had played with you. In the sight of God, I swear you were mistaken. You have made me love you, Necia. Can't you see?
She made no sign.
If you can't, I owe it to you and to myself to set you right. I am not ashamed to acknowledge my love, and even when you are married to Poleon I want you to know that I shall love you always.
Even yet she made no sign. Was he not merely repeating the same empty words with which he had so often beguiled her? There was no word of marriage: he still considered her unworthy, beneath him. The pain of it caused the girl to wince suddenly, and her sensitive face flinched, seeing which he broke out:
You do love me, Necia—you do; I see it in your eyes! And he started towards her with open arms, but she shrank away from him.
No, no! Don't touch me! she almost screamed.
My dear one, he breathed, "you must listen to me. You have nothing to fear, for I love you—love you—love you! You were made for me! You'll be my wife. Yes; you'll be married on Sunday, but to me, not to Poleon or any other man!"
Did she hear aright? Was he, her soldier lover, asking her, the Indian girl—?
You do love me, don't you? he pleaded. But still she could not speak, and he tried to read the answer in her swimming eyes.
You mean—you want to—marry me? she murmured, at last, hesitating shyly at the word that had come to play so momentous a part in her little world.
Indeed I do! he declared, with emphasis. "In spite of everything, anything. Nothing else matters."
Nothing?
Nothing! I'll quit the army. I'll give up the Service, and my people, too. I'll put everything back of me, and we'll start out anew—just you and I.
Wait a moment, she said, retreating a little from his eager, out-stretched arms. "Why do you need to do all that?"
Never mind why; it's as good as done. You wouldn't understand—
But I think I do understand now. Do I really mean all that to you?
Yes, and more!
Listen to me, said the girl, quietly. "I want you to talk slowly so I may not misunderstand. If you—marry me, must you forego all those great things you speak of—your profession, your family, your future?"
Don't let's talk about it, Necia; I've got you, and—
Please answer me, she urged. "I thought I understood, but I'm afraid I don't. I thought it was my being a breed that stood in the way—"
There's nothing in the way—
—that I wasn't good enough. I knew I could overcome that; I knew I could make myself grow to your level, but I didn't think my blood would fetter you and make this difference. I suppose I am putting it awkwardly, because I'm not sure that I quite understand it myself yet. Things seem different now, somehow, than they did before.
Nonsense! exclaimed the soldier. "If they don't bother me, Necia, why should you worry?"
Would you really have to give up your family—your sister? Would those people you are so proud of and who are so proud of you—would they cut you off?
There is no question of cutting off. I have no inheritance coming; I don't want any. I don't want anything except you, dear.
Won't you tell me? she persisted. "You see, I am dull at these things."
Well, what if they do? he conceded. "You more than make it up to me—you outweigh a thousand families."
And would your marriage to a—a—to me destroy your army career?
Well, it will really be much easier for both of us if I resign from the Service, he finally admitted. "In fact, I've decided to do so at once."
No, no! You mustn't do that. To-night you think I am worth the price, but a day will come—
He leaned forward and caught her hands in his.
—Meade, I can't let you do it.
I'd like to see you help yourself, he said, banteringly.
I can and I will. You must not marry me, Meade—it's not right—it can't be. She suddenly realized what this renunciation would mean, and began to shiver. To think of losing him now, after he had come to her freely—it would be very hard! But to her, too, there had come the revelation that love means sacrifice, and she knew now that she loved her soldier too well to let her shadow darken his bright future, too well to ruin him.
It will be over before you know it, she heard him saying, in a lame attempt at levity. "Father Barnum is an expert, and the operation won't occupy him ten minutes."
Meade, you must listen to me now, she said, so earnestly that it sobered him. "Do you think a girl could be happy if she knew a good man had spoiled his life for her? I would rather die now than let you do such a thing. I couldn't bear to see myself a drag on you. Oh, I know it would be wonderful, this happiness of ours, for a time, and then—" She was finding it more and more difficult to continue. "A prisoner grows to hate the chains that bind him; when that day came for you, I should hate myself. No, no! Believe me, it can't be. You're not of my people, and I'm not of yours."
At that moment they heard the voices of the trader and his squaw outside, approaching the house. The girl's breath caught in her throat, she flung herself recklessly upon her lover's breast and threw her arms around his neck in an agony of farewell.
Meade! Meade! my soldier! she sobbed, "kiss me good-bye for the last time!"
No, he said roughly.
But she dragged his face down to her burning lips.
Now you must go, she said, tearing herself away, "and, for my sake, don't see me again."
I will! I will! I'll ask your father for you to-night.
No, no! Don't; please don't! Wait till—till to-morrow—till I say the word! Promise me! On your love, promise!
Her eyes held such a painful entreaty that he nodded acquiescence as the door opened and her father and Alluna entered.
The old man greeted the Lieutenant affably, but as his glance fell on his daughter he stopped stock-still on the threshold.
I told you never to wear that dress again, he said, in a dry, harsh voice.
The girl made no answer, for her heart was breaking, but turned and went into her room. Burrell had an irresistible desire to tell Gale that he wanted his daughter for his wife; it would be an unwonted pleasure to startle this iron-gray old man and the shawled and shambling mummy of red, with the unwinking eyes that always reminded him of two ox-heart cherries; but he had given Necia his promise. So he descended to the exchange of ordinary topics, and inquired for news of the creek.
Necia's ground is getting better every hour, the trader said. "Yesterday they found a sixty-dollar pan."
Have you struck pay on yours?
No; Poleon and I seem to hold bad hands. Some of his laymen are quitting work. They've cross-cut in half a dozen places and can't find a color.
But surely they haven't fully prospected his claims yet; there must be plenty of room for a pay-streak somewhere, mustn't there?
It looks like he had drawn three blanks, said Gale, "although we can't tell for sure. They're breaking most as bad for me, too; but I've got a new hunch, and I'm running up a dreen to catch bed-rock along the left rim. I've got twenty men at work, and I'll know before long. You heard about Runnion, of course?"
Yes; the usual story—the bad men get the good mines, and the good ones get the hungry spots. Well, I might have been one of the unfortunates if I had staked for myself; but I hardly think so, I'm pretty lucky. He laughingly bade them good-night, content with himself and at peace with the world.
Gale went to Necia's door and called her, but when she appeared he was unprepared for the tragic face with which she greeted him.
Daughter, he said, "don't feel bad over what I said; I didn't mean to be cross with you, but—I don't like that dress."
Were you cross with me, daddy? she said, dully. "I didn't hear. What did you say?"
He looked at her in amazement. "Necia, little girl, what is the trouble?"
She was staring past him, and her fingers were fumbling helplessly with the lace of her gown, but she began to show signs of collapse.
I sent him away—I—gave him up, when he wanted me—wanted me—Oh, daddy! he wants to marry me—and I sent him away.
Alluna uttered a short, satisfied exclamation, and, looking at Gale meaningly, said:
It is good. It is good. He is a stranger.
But the man disregarded her interruption.
He asked you to marry him in—in—in spite of who you are and what I am?
Yes; he is ready to give up his ambition, his army, his future, his family, everything, for me—to sacrifice it all; and so, of course, I couldn't let him. She spoke simply, as if her father would surely understand and approve her action, while in her voice was a note of inevitable resignation. "You see, I never understood what my blood would mean to him until to-night. I've been selfish and thoughtless, I guess. I just wanted him, and wanted him to take me; but now that he is mine, I love him more than I thought. He is so dear to me that I can't drag him down—I can't—I can't!" She went to the open door and stood leaning against the casing, facing the cool outer darkness, her face hidden from them, her form sagging wearily, as if the struggle had sapped her whole strength.
Alluna crept to the trader and looked up at him eagerly, whispering:
This will end in a little while, John. She is young. She can go back to the Mission to-morrow. She will soon forget.
Forget! Do you think she can forget?
Any woman can forget. Only men remember.
It is the red blood in you—lying. You know you lie.
It is to save your life, she said.
I know; but it's no use. To Necia he said; "You needn't worry, little daughter." But her ears were deaf. "You needn't give him up, I say—this will end all right."
Seeing that she gave no sign of heeding, he stepped closer, and swung her about till she faced him.
Can't you trust me this one time? You always have before, Necia. I say he'll marry you, and it will all come out right.
She raised her hopeless eyes and strove gamely to meet his, then, failing, broke away, and turned back to the door. "I knew you couldn't understand. I—I—oh, God, I love him so!" With a cry like that of a wounded animal she fled out into the night, where she could give vent to her anguish unseen; for she had never wept before her father, but always crept away and hid herself until her grief was spent. Gale would have started after her, but Alluna dragged him back fiercely.
No, no! It means your life, John. Let the secret die, and she will forget. She is so young. Time will cure her—time cures everything. Don't tell her—don't tell any one—and, above all, don't tell that soldier! He would not believe, nor would she. Even I have doubted!
You?
Yes, John. And if I don't believe, what is a stranger to say? No man knowing you would believe the tale—without proof. Suppose she doubted—have you ever thought of that? Would you not rather have her die still loving you than live and disbelieve?
Yes, yes! Of course, I—I've thought of that, but—Woman, you're worse than a rattlesnake!
Even if he knew, he might not marry her. You at least are clean, and that other man was a devil. A brave man's life is too great a price to pay for a grief that will die in a year. Alluna was speaking swiftly in her own language, her body tense, her face ablaze, and no man seeing her could ever again have called her people stolid.
You think time will cure a love like that? he said.
Yes, yes!
That's all you know about it. Time may act that way perhaps in cities and such places, but out in the hills it is different. When you've got the breath of the forest in you, I say it is different. Time—why, I've lived fifteen years in the open with a living memory. Every night I've dreamed it over, every day I've lived it through; in every camp-fire I see a face, and every wind from the south brings a voice to me. Every stormy night a girl with eyes like Necia's calls to me, and I have to follow. Every patch of moonlight shows her smiling at me, just beyond, just in the shadow's edge. Love! Time! Why, Alluna, love is the only thing in the world that never dies, and time only makes it the more enduring.
He took up the white slouch hat he had thrown down when he came in, and stepped to the door.
Where are you going? inquired the squaw, fearfully.
To the barracks to give myself up!
She flung herself at him with a great cry, and seized him about the waist.
You never loved me, John, but I have been a good woman to you, although I knew you were always thinking of her—and had no thought of me. I have loved this girl because you loved her. I have hated your enemies because you hated them, and now I remember while you forget.
Forget! What do you mean?
Stark!
The man paused. "I did almost forget him—and after fifteen years!"
Let us kill him to-night; then we will go to the soldier together, side by side—I am your woman. Necia will look after the little ones.
Gale stared at her, and as he gazed the red pigment underneath her skin, the straight-hanging, mane-like hair, the gaudy shawl she never went without, the shapeless, skin-shod feet, the slovenly, ill-fitting garb of a mis-cast woman vanished, and he saw her as she was on a day long past, a slim, shy, silent creature, with great, watchful, trusting eyes and a soul unspoiled. No woman had ever been so loyal, so uncomplaining. He had robbed her of her people and her gods. He had shifted hither and yon at the call of his uncertain fortune, or at a sign of that lurking fear that always dogged him, and she had never left his side, never questioned, never doubted, but always served him like a slave, without asking for a part in that other love, without sharing in the caresses he had consecrated to a woman she had never seen.
By Heaven! You're game, Alluna, but there's a limit even to what I can take from you, he said, at last. "I don't ever seem to have noticed it before, but there is. No! I've got to do this thing alone to-night, all of it, for you have no place in it, and I can't let the little girl go on like this. The sooner that soldier knows the better." He leaned down and touched her brown mouth with his grizzled lips. "Thank you, Alluna, for making a man of me when I'd nearly forgotten. Now you stay here." He knew he could count on her obedience, and so he left her. When he had gone she drew the shawl up over her face and crouched in the doorway, straining her eyes after him through the dark. In time she began to rock and sway, and then to chant, until the night moaned with the death-song of her people.
Necia had no idea whither she went; her only thought was to flee from her kin, who could not understand, to hide under cover in some solitary place, to let the darkness swallow her up, so that she might give way to her grief and be just a poor, weak woman. So, with a dull and aching heart, she wandered, bareheaded, bare-necked, half-demented, and wholly oblivious to her surroundings, without sense of her incongruous attire or of the water that squeezed up through the soggy moss at her tread and soaked her frail slippers. On she stumbled blindly through the murk like some fair creature of light cast out and banished.
The night was cloudy and a wind came sighing from the north, tossing the girl's hair and tugging at the careless folds of her dress, but she heard nothing save the devil's tattoo that rang in her head, and felt nothing beyond the pain at throat and breast, which in time became so bitter that the tears were wrung from her dry eyes, and she began to weep in a pitiful woman fashion, as if her heart would burst. The first drops cleared a way for others, and soon she was sobbing freely, alone and without solace, lost in the night.
She had not succeeded in thoroughly isolating herself, however, for a man who was steering his course by the sense of feel and the wind's direction heard her and paused. His steps were muffled in the soft footing, so that she had no warning of his presence until he was near enough to distinguish her dimly where she leaned against the log wall of a half-completed cabin.
To his question, "What's the trouble here?" she made no answer, but moved away, whereupon he detained her. "There's something wrong. Who are you, anyhow?"
It's only Necia, Mr. Stark, said the girl, at which he advanced and took her by the arm.
What ails you, child? What in the world are you doing here? Come! It's only a step to my cabin; you must come in and rest awhile, and you'll soon be all right. Why, you'll break your neck in this darkness.
She hung back, but he compelled her to go with him in spite of her unwillingness.
Now, now, he admonished, with unusual kindliness for him; "you know you're my little friend, and I can't let you go on this way; it's scandalous. I won't stand for it. I like you too much."
In truth he had done things during these last few weeks to make her think so, having never missed an opportunity to stop and pass a word with her, at the same time showing her a queer courtesy and consideration quite foreign to his saturnine habits. She had never mentioned the fact to her father or the others, for she had developed a sort of sympathy for the man, and felt that she understood him better than they did.
He led her inside his cabin, and closed the door in the face of the night wind before he struck a light.
I can't stand to see you cry, he repeated, as he adjusted the wick. "Now, as soon as—" He stopped in astonishment, for he had turned to behold, instead of the little half-breed girl, this slender, sorrowful stranger in her amazingly wonderful raiment.
By— He checked himself insensibly, and stood motionless for a long time, while she wiped her eyes and, woman-like, straightened out her gown and smoothed her hair with little feminine touches.
I—I—hope you'll excuse me for acting this way, she smiled at him, piteously; then, observing his strange features, "Why, what is the matter, Mr. Stark; are you angry?"
His hawklike face was strained and colorless, his black eyes fierce and eager, his body bent as if to pounce upon a victim. In truth he was now the predatory animal.
No, he replied, as if her question carried no meaning; then, coming to himself, "No—no! of course not, but—you gave me a start. You reminded me of some one. How do you come to be dressed like that? I never knew you had such clothes?"
Poleon brought them from Dawson; they are the first I ever had.
He shook his head in a slow, puzzled fashion.
You look just like a white girl—I mean—I don't know what I mean. This time he roused himself fully, the effort being more like a shudder.
So I have always thought, she said, and her eyes filled again.
Your skin is like milk beneath your tan, and—I don't mean any disrespect, but—Well, I'm just so damned surprised! Come over here and sit down while I mix you something to put the heart back into you.
He shoved forward a big chair with a wolf-skin flung over it, into which she sank dejectedly, while he stepped to the shelves beside the Yukon stove and took down a bottle and some glasses. She glanced about with faint curiosity, but the interior of the cabin showed nothing out of the ordinary, consisting as it did of one room with a cot in the corner, upon which were tumbled blankets, and above which was a row of pegs. Opposite was a sheet-iron box-stove supported knee-high on a tin-capped framework of wood, and in the centre a table with oil-cloth cover. Around the walls were some cooking utensils, a few cases of canned goods, and clothes hanging in a row.
I'm not fixed up very well yet, he apologized; "I've been too busy at the saloon to waste time on living quarters. But it's comfortable enough for an old roadster like me, for I've bruised around the frontier so long that I've learned there's only three things necessary to a man's comfort—warm clothes, a full stomach, and a dry place to sleep. All the rest that goes to make a man content he has inside him, and I'm not the kind to be satisfied, no matter where I am or what I have. I never was that kind, so I just don't make the attempt."
He was talking to give her leeway, and when he had concocted a weak toddy, insisted that she must drink it, which she did listlessly, while he rambled on.
I've noticed a few things in my life, Miss Necia, and one of them is that it often does a heap of good to let out and talk things over; not that a fellow gains any real advantage from disseminating his troubles, but it serves to sort of ease his mind. Folks don't often come to me for advice or sympathy. I don't have it to give, but maybe it will help you to tell me what caused this night-marauding expedition of yours. Seeing that she hesitated, he went on: "I suppose there's a lot of reasons why you shouldn't confide in me—I don't like that old man of yours, nor any of your friends; but maybe that's why I'm interested. If any of them has upset you, I'll take particular pleasure in helping you get even."
I don't want to get even, and there is nothing to tell, said Necia, "except a girl's troubles, and I can't talk about them." She smiled a painful, crooked smile at him.
Your old man has been rough to you?
No, no! Nothing of that sort.
Then it's that soldier? he quizzed, shrewdly. "I knew you cared a heap for him. Don't he love you?"
Yes! That's the trouble; and he wants to many me; he swears he will in spite of everything.
See here! I don't quite follow. I thought you liked him—he's the kind most women go daffy over.
Like him! The girl trembled with emotion. "Like him! Why—why, I would do anything to make him happy."
I guess I must be kind of dull, Stark said, perplexedly.
Don't you see? I've got to give him up—I'm a squaw.
Squaw hell! With those shoulders?
Stark checked himself, for he found he was rejoicing in his enemy's defeat, and was in danger of betraying himself to the girl. In every encounter the young man had bested him, and these petty defeats had crystallized his antipathy to Burrell into a hatred so strong that he had begun to lie awake nights planning a systematic quarrel. For he was the kind of man who throve upon contentions: so warped in soul that when no man offered him offence he brooded over fancied wrongs and conjured up a cause for enmity, goading himself into that sour, sullen habit of mind that made him a dread and a menace to all who lacked his favor. His path was strewn from the border North with the husks of fierce brawls, and he bore the ineradicable mark of the killer, carrying always in his brain those scars that hate had seared. In his eyes forever slumbered a flame waiting to be blown to life, and when embroiled in feuds or bickerings a custom had grown upon him to fight these fights in secret many times, until of nights he would lie in solitary darkness writhing in spirit as he hounded his man to desperation, or forced him into a corner where he might slake his thirsty vengeance. After such black, sleepless hours he dragged himself from his battle-grounds of fancy, worn and weary, and the daylight discovered him more saturnine and moody, more menacing than ever.
He had brooded over his quarrel with Gale and the Lieutenant ever since their first clash, for in this place they furnished the only objects upon which his mania could work—and it was a mania, the derangement of a diseased, distorted mind. His regard for Necia was a careless whim, a rather aimless, satisfying hobby, not at all serious, entirely extraneous to his every-day life, and interesting only from its aimlessness, being as near to an unselfish and decent motive as the man had ever come. But it was not of sufficient consequence to stand out against or swerve the course of a quarrel; wherefore, he was gladdened by the news of Burrell's discomfiture.
So you like him too much to stand in his way, he said, meditatively. "How does your father look at it?"
He wants the Lieutenant to marry me. He says he will fix it up all right; but he doesn't understand. How could he?
You are doing just right, concurred the man, hypocritically, "and you'll live to be glad you stood out." Now that both his enemies desired this thing, he was set on preventing it, regardless of the girl. "How did the Lieutenant take it when you refused him?"
He wouldn't take it at all. He only laughed and declared he would marry me, anyhow. The very thought thrilled her.
Does he knew you love him?
The tender, sobbing laugh she gave was ample answer.
Well, what's your plan?
I—I—I don't know. I am so torn and twisted with it all that I can't plan, but I have thought I—ought—to go—away.
Good! he said, quickly, but his acquiescence, instead of soothing her, had the contrary effect, and she burst out impulsively:
Oh—I can't—I can't! I can't go away and never see him! I can't do it! I want to stay where he is! She had been holding herself in stubbornly, but at last gave way with reckless abandon. "Why wasn't I born white like other girls? I've never felt like an Indian. I've always dreamed and fancied I was different, and I am, in my soul—I know I am! The white is so strong in me that it has killed the red, and I'm one of father's people. I'm not like the other two; they are brown and silent, and as cold as little toads; but I'm white and full of life, all over. They never see the men and women that I see in my dreams. They never have my visions of the beautiful snow-white mother, with the tender mouth and the sad eyes that always smile at me."
You have visions of such things, eh?
Yes, but I came a generation late, that's all, and I've got that other woman's soul. I'm not a half-breed—I'm not me at all. I'm Merridy—Merridy! That's who I am.
Her face was turned away from him, so that she did not notice the frightful effect her words had upon Stark.
Where did you get—that name? His voice was pitched in a different key now. Then, after a moment, he added, "From the story I told you at the mine that night, I suppose?"
Oh no, she answered. "I've always had it, though they call me Necia. Merridy was my father's mother. I guess I'm like her in many ways, for I often imagine she is a part of me, that her spirit is mine. It's the only way I can account for the sights I see."
Your father's mother? he said, mechanically. "That's queer." He seemed to be trying to shake himself free from something. "It's heredity, I suppose. You have visions of a white woman, a woman named Merridy, eh?" Suddenly his manner changed, and he spoke so roughly that she looked at him in vague alarm.
How do you know? How do you know she was his mother?
He told me so—
Stark snarled. "He lied!"
I can show you her wedding-ring—I've always worn it. She fumbled for the chain about her neck, but it eluded her trembling fingers. "It has her name in it—'From Dan to Merridy.'"
Stark's hand darted forward and tore the thing from her shoulders, then he thrust it under the lamp and glared at the inscription, while his fingers shook so that he could barely distinguish the words. His eyes were blazing and his face livid.
Necia cried out, but he dropped the ornament and seized her fiercely, lifting her from the chair to her feet; then, with one swift, downward clutch, he laid hold of her dress at the left shoulder and ripped it half to her waist. A hoarse sound came from his throat, a cry half of amazement, half of triumph.
Let me go! Let me go! She struggled to free herself, but he held her in a viselike grip, while he peered closely at a blemish well down upon her back. Then he let her slip from his grasp, and, seized with terror, she staggered away from him. He was leaning heavily with both hands upon the table, his face working, his head drawn down between his shoulders, his thin lips grinning, his whole manner so terrifying that she shrank back till she brought up against the bark walls. She turned and made for the door, whereupon he straightened up and said, in a queer, commanding voice:
Wait—don't go! I—I—you— He licked his lips as if they were dust dry, passed an uncertain hand across his beaded brow, and, raising the water-pail beside the door to his mouth, drank heavily in great, noisy gulps.
Let me out of here! the girl demanded, imperiously.
Don't be scared, he said, more quietly now. "You must excuse me. You—you gave me an awful fright. Yes—that was it. Don't worry. I didn't mean any harm."
You hurt my shoulder, she said, almost ready to cry. "And you tore my dress," she added, angrily—"my fine dress. Are you crazy?"
You see, it's like this, that name of Merridy and that ring—well, the whole thing was so startling, I—I went off my head. It came sudden, and I thought—I thought—it don't matter what I thought, but I'm sorry. I'll apologize—and I'll get you a new dress, a whole lot of dresses, if you like. This seemed to amuse him, and he began to laugh silently.
His first impulse had been to tell her everything, but his amazement had rendered him speechless, and now he was thankful for it. Following his discovery of her identity, he had been stricken dumb, staring at her like one demented; then, as he was about to explain, his mind suddenly grasped the significance of this revelation and the advantage it gave him over his enemies; a plan began to unfold, vague at first, its details not worked out, but a plan whereby he could by keeping silent use this knowledge to serve his vengeful ends. In an instant his vision cleared and his brain became active and alert, like that of a man brought suddenly under the stimulus of strong liquor. Care must be exercised—she must not learn too much—for if she suspected the truth she would go to her soldier lover at once, and no power on earth could hold her back. That would block the vengeance that he saw shaping in the dank recesses of his distorted brain.
First, and above all, he must get the girl away from Flambeau.
I went clear off my head, he heard himself saying, "at that name of Merridy, that ring, and all. Why—why, I thought you might be the missing girl I told you of—you remember, that day up on Lee's Creek—so I had to see; but, dear me, I should have been more considerate—I should have explained. The trouble is I'm a nervous man, and I get impulsive streaks on me sometimes that I can't control. I'm sorry I spoiled your dress, but I'll get you another—you bet I will."
This explanation of his strange behavior seemed plausible enough to banish all personal fears from Necia's mind. Indeed, Stark had now become so gentle and apologetic in his demeanor that her woman's curiosity overcame her instinct to flee, and she ventured the question:
So you really thought I was that other girl?
I did for a minute. The mother was a—a—friend of mine, and so—I lost my head. But I'm all right now, and if you'll overlook my roughness we'll go back to your troubles.
These last few moments had driven her own worries from her mind, but he was bent on recalling them, and so continued, cautiously:
You were saying that you thought you'd go away. I think that's a good plan, and you'd be wise to do it for more reasons than one. It will give you time to think it all over and know your own mind—
I know my mind now, and yet—I don't want to go away.
—and it will give Burrell a chance to prove himself. He'll either show that he has got to have you at any cost, or that you are right in your decision. If the first should happen, you can come back to him; if the last—why, it will be better for you, anyhow. As long as you stay here neither one of you can see clearly.
She was touched by his interest, and realized the force of his argument, which, strange to say, seemed to second her own thoughts; yet she hesitated.
I want to help you—I'm going to help you—because I've got an interest in you like you were mine. Again he betrayed that strange, mirthless amusement.
There is no place for me to go, said Necia, blankly, "except the Mission, and I have no way of getting there."
Don't you worry. I'll furnish the means, and you'd better go to-night—she flinched—"yes, to-night; there's no use prolonging your agony. I'll get a boat ready and send a trusty man with you. The current is swift, and if he rows well you can make it by to-morrow evening. That's only one night out, and I'll put some blankets aboard so you can wrap up and have a sleep."
I feel as if I'd never sleep again, she sighed.
Now, now, this will come out all right yet. I'd take you down there myself, but I've got to stay here. I've got work to do. Yes, I've sure got work of importance ahead of me.
I must go back and get some clothes, she said, At which he would have demurred had he not seen that she could not travel in her present condition.
Very well. But don't let anybody see you.
Of course not.
It's getting late, and your folks will be abed. He looked at his watch. "Midnight! Be here in an hour, and I'll have the skiff ready."
The light of sacrifice was in Necia's eyes, and her cheeks were blanched with the pallor of a great resolution. She did not stop to reason why or how she had been led to this disposal of her future, but clutched desperately at Stark's plan of rescue from her agonizing predicament.
I'll be here in an hour, she said, simply.
He let her out, closed the door after her, and locked it; then, drawing a deep breath, he raised his clenched hands above his head, and gave a great sigh of exultation. Next he took out his six-shooter and examined it carefully. The shells did not suit him, so he filled the gun with new ones, loosened the three lower buttons of his vest, and slid the weapon inside his trousers band; then, facing the direction of Gale's trading-post, he spoke aloud.
I was a long time coming, Gaylord, but I'm here, and I've got you where I've wanted you these fifteen years—yes, and I've got you, too, Burrell! By God, this is my night!
His lithe body became panther-like in poise, his bearing that of the meat-eating animal, and his face set in a fierce, exultant cruelty as he blew out his light and left the cabin.
Lieutenant Burrell was considerably taken aback when, a quarter of an hour after the young lover's ecstatic return to his quarters, Gale knocked at his door, for the trader's visit, coupled with the late hour and his sombre countenance, forecast new complications.
He's here to object, but it won't go, thought the Lieutenant, as he made his visitor welcome.
It was the trader's first glimpse of the officer's quarters, and he cast a roving eye over the room, as if measuring the owner's character by his surroundings.
I've got to have a long talk with you, Burrell, he began, with an effort. "It's liable to take me an hour or two."
Then take this chair and be comfortable.
Meade swung his big reading-chair out beneath the hanging-lamp, and, going to the sideboard, brought back a bottle, some glasses, and a pouch of tobacco. Noting the old man's sigh of fatigue as he sat himself down heavily, he remarked, sympathetically:
Mr. Gale, you've made a long trip to-day, and you must be tired. If this talk is to be as lengthy as you say, why not have a drink with me now, and postpone it until to-morrow?
I've been tired for eighteen years, the other replied; "to-night I hope to get rested." He lapsed into silence, watching his host pour out two glasses of liquor, fill his pipe, and then stretch himself out contentedly, his feet resting on another chair—a picture of youthful strength, vitality, and determination. Beneath the Lieutenant's flannel shirt the long, slim muscles showed free and full, and the firm set of jaw and lip denoted a mind at rest and confident of itself. Gale found himself for a moment jealously regarding the youth and his enviable state of contentment and decision.
Well, let's get at it, the younger man finally said.
I suppose you'll want to interrupt and question me a heap, but I'll ask you to let me tell this story the way it comes to me, till I get it out, then we can go back and take up the queer stuff. It runs back eighteen or twenty years, and, being as it's part of a hidden life, it isn't easy to tell. You'll be the first one to hear it, and I reckon you're enough like other men to disbelieve—you're not old enough, and you haven't knocked around enough to learn that nothing is impossible, that nothing is strange enough to be unreasonable. Likewise, you'll want to know what, all this has to do with you and Necia—yes, she told me about you and her, and that's why I'm here. He paused. "You really think you love her, do you?"
Burrell removed his pipe and gazed at its coal impersonally.
I love her so well, Mr. Gale, that nothing you can say will affect me. I—I hesitated at first about asking her to be my wife, because—you'll appreciate the unusual—well, her unusual history. You see, I come from a country where mixed blood is about the only thing that can't be lived down or overlooked, and I've been raised with notions of family honor and pride of race and birth, and so forth, that might seem preposterous and absurd to you. But a heap of conceits like that have been bred into me from generations back; they run in the blood of every old family in my country, and so, I'm ashamed to say, I hesitated and tried to reason myself into giving her up, but I've had my eyes opened, and I see how little those things amount to, after all. I'm going to marry Necia, Mr. Gale. I'd like to do it the day after to-morrow, Sunday, but she isn't of age yet, and if you object, we'll have to wait until November, when she turns eighteen. We'd both like your consent, of course; I'd be sorry to marry her without it; but if you refuse, we'll be forced to displease you. He looked up and met the father's gaze steadily. "Now, I'll be glad to listen as long as you care to talk, but I don't think it will do any good."
The other man's lips framed a faint smile.
We'll see. I wish to God I'd had your decision when I was your age, this story would be different, and easier to tell. He waited a moment, then settled to his self-appointed task. "I was mining at the time up in the Mother Lode country of California, which was the frontier then, pretty much as this is now, only we had better things to eat. I came from the East, or my people did, but I was ranch-raised, and loved the hills and woods and places where you don't talk much, so I went to prospecting because it took me out where the sun was bright and I could see the wild things at play. I was one of the first men into a camp named Chandon—helped to build it, in fact, and got hold of some ground that looked real good. It was hard mining, however, and, being poor, I was still gripping my drill and hammer after the town had grown up.
A woman came out from the East—Vermont, it was—and school-teaching was her line of business, only she hadn't been raised to it, and this was her first clatter at the game; but things had broke bad for her people, and ended in her pulling stakes and coming West all alone. Her folks died and left her up against it, I gathered from what little she told me—sort of an old story, I guess, and usual too, only for her. She was plumb unusual.
He seemed to ponder this a moment, and then resumed:
"
It don't make any difference to you how I first saw her, and how I began to forget that anything else in the world was worth having but her. I'd lived in the woods all my life, as I said, and knew more about birds and bugs and bees than I did about women; I hadn't been broke proper, and didn't know how to act with them; but I laid out to get this girl, and I did fairly well. There's something wild in every woman that needs to be tamed, and it isn't like the wildness that runs in wood critters; you can win that over by gentleness, but you have to take it away from a woman. Every live thing that couldn't talk was my friend; but I made the mistake of courting my own kind the same way, not knowing that when two of any species mate the male must rule. I was too gentle. Even so, I reckon I'd have won out only for another man. Dan Bennett was his name—the kind that dumb animals hate, and—well, that takes his measure. His range adjoined mine, and, though I'd never seen him, I heard stories now and then—the sort of tales you can't tell to a good woman; so it worried me when I heard of his attentions to this girl. Still, I thought she'd surely find him out and recognize the kind of fellow he was; but, Lord! a woman, can't tell a man from a dog, and there wasn't any one to warn her. There were plenty of women who knew him, but they were the ones who flew by night, while she lived in the sunshine; and women of that kind don't make complaint, anyhow. This Bennett came from the town below, where he ran a saloon and a brace game or two; but being as he rode into our camp and out again in the night, and as I didn't drink nor listen to the music of the little rolling ball, why, we never met, even after he began coming to Chandon. Understand, I wasn't too good for those amusements; I just didn't happen to hanker after them, for I was living with the image of the little school-ma'am in my mind, and that destroyed what bad habits I'd formed.
""
It was along in the early spring that she began to see I had notions about her, but my damned backwardness wouldn't let me speak, and, in addition, I was getting closer to ore every shot at the mine, and was holding off until I could lay both myself and my goldmine at her feet, and ask her to take the two of us, so if one didn't pan out the other might. But it seemed like I'd never get into pay. The closer I got the harder I worked, and, of course, the less I saw of her, likewise the oftener Bennett came. I reckon no man ever worked like I did—two shifts a day, eighteen hours, with six to sleep. The skin came off of my hands, and I staggered when I came out into the daylight, for the rock was hard, and I had no money to hire a helper; but I was young and strong, and the hope of her was like drink and food and sleep to me. At last I struck it, and still I waited awhile longer till I could be sure. Then I went down to my little shack and put on my other clothes. I remember I'd gone so thin that they hung loose, and my palms were so raw I had hard work handling the buttons, and got my shirt all bloody, for I'd been in the drift forty hours, without sleep and breathing powder smoke, till my knees buckled and wobbled under me. To this day the smell of stale powder smoke makes a woman of me; but that morning I sang, for I was going for my bride, and the world was brighter than it has ever been for eighteen years. The little school-house was closed, at which I remembered that the term was over. I'd been living underground for weeks and lost track of the days, so that I had to count them up on my fingers. It took me a long time, for I was pretty tired in my head; but when I'd figured it out I went on to where she was boarding. The woman of the place came to the door, a Scotch-woman. She had a mole on her chin, I remember, a brownish-black mole with three hairs in it. She wore an apron, too, that was kind of checkered, and three buttons were open at the neck of her dress. I recall a lot more of little things about her, though the rest of what happened is rather dreamy.
"
I asked for Merridy, and she told me she'd gone away—gone with Bennett, the night before, while I was coughing blood from the powder smoke; that they were married in the front room, and that the bride looked beautiful. She had cried a bit on leaving Chandon, and—and—that was about all. I counted the buttons on the Scotchwoman's waist eight or ten times, and by-and-by she asked if I was sick. But I wasn't. She was a kind-hearted woman, and I'd been to her house a good deal, so she asked me to come in and rest. I wasn't tired, so I went away, and climbed back up to the little shack and the mine that I hated now.
The trader paused, and, reaching for the bottle, poured himself out a glass of brandy, which he spilled into his throat raw, then continued:
"
I turned into a kind of hermit after that, and I wasn't good to associate with. Men got so they shunned me, and I knew they told strange stories, because I heard them whisper when I went to the stores for grub once a month. I changed all over, till even my squirrels and partridges and other friends quit me; once in awhile I got out a ton or two of rock and sold it, but I never worked the mine or opened it up—I couldn't bear to go inside the drift. I tried it time and again, but the smell of its darkness drove me out; every foot of its ragged walls had left its mark on me, and my heart was torn and gouged and shivered worse than its seams and ledges. I could have sold it, but there was no place for me to go, and what did I want with money? I was shy of the world, like a crippled child that dreads the daylight, and I shrank from going out where people might see my scars; so I stayed there by myself nursing the hurt that never got any better. You see, I'd been raised among the hills and rocks, and I was like them in a way; I couldn't grow and alter and heal up. From time to time I heard of her, but the news, instead of gladdening me, as it would have gladdened some men, wrung out what bits of suffering were left in me, and I fairly ached for her. Nobody comes to see clearer than a woman deceived, so it didn't take her long to find out the kind of man Bennett was. He wasn't like her at all, and the reason he had courted her so hotly was just that he had had everything that rightly belongs to a man like him, and had sickened of it, so he wanted her because she was clean and pure and different; and realizing that he couldn't get her any other way, he had married her. But she was a treasure no bad man could appreciate, and so he tired quickly, even before the little one came.
""
When I heard that she had borne him a daughter I wrote her a letter, which took me a month to compose, and which I tore up. One day a story came to me that made me saddle my horse to ride down and kill him—and, mind you, I was a man who made pets of little wild, trusting things. But I knew she would surely send for me when her pain became too great, so I uncinched my gear and hung it up, and waited and waited and waited. Three long, endless years I waited, almost within sound of her voice, without a word from her, without a glimpse of her, and every hour of that time went by as slowly as if I had held my breath. Then she called to me, and I went. I tell you, I was thankful that day for the fortune that had made me take good care of my horse, for I rode like Death on a wind-storm. It grew moonlight as I raced down the valley, and the foam from the animal's muzzle lodged on my clothes, and made me laugh and swear that the morning sun would show Dan Bennett's blood in its place. I rode through the streets of Mesa, where they lived, and past the lights of his big saloon, where I heard the sound of devil's revelry and a shrill-voiced woman singing—a woman the like of which he had tried to make my Merridy. I never skulked or sneaked in those days, and no man ever made me take back roads, so I came up to his house from the front and tied my horse to his gate-post. She heard me on the steps and opened the door.
""
'You sent for me,' said I. 'Where is he?' But he had gone away to a neighboring camp, and wouldn't be back until morning, at which I felt the way a thief must feel, for I'd hoped to meet him in his own house, and I wasn't the kind to go calling when the husband was out. I couldn't think very clearly, however, because of the change in her. She was so thin and worn and sad, sadder than any woman I'd ever seen, and she wasn't the girl I'd known three years before. I guess I'd changed a heap myself; anyhow, that was the first thing she spoke about, and the tears came into her eyes as she breathed: 'Poor boy! poor boy! You took it very hard, didn't you?'""
"
'You sent for me,' said I. 'Which road did he take?'
'There's nothing you can do to him,' she answered back. 'I sent for you to make sure that you still love me.
"
'Did you ever doubt it?' said I, at which she began to cry, sobbing like a woman who has worn out all emotion. 'Can you feel the same after what I've made you suffer?' she said, and I reckon she must have read the answer in my eyes; for I never was much good at talking, and the sight of her, so changed, had taken the speech out of me, leaving nothing but aches and pains and ashes in its place. When she saw what she wished to know, she told me the story, the whole miserable story, that I'd heard enough of to suspect. Why she'd married the other man she couldn't explain herself, except that it was a woman's whim—I had stayed away and he had come the oftener—part pique and part the man's dare-devil fascination, I reckon; but a month had shown her how she really stood, and had shown him, too. Likewise, she saw the sort of man he was and the kind of life he lived. At last he got rough and cruel to her, trying every way to break her spirit; and even the baby didn't stop him—it made him worse, if anything—till he swore he'd make them both the kind he was, for her goodness seemed to rile and goad him; and, having lived with the kind of woman you have to beat, he tried it on her. Then she knew her fight was hopeless, and she sent for me.""
"
'He's a fiend,' she told me. 'I've stood all I can. He'll make a bad woman of me as sure as he will of the little one, if I stay on here, so I have decided to go and take her with me.'
'Where?' said I.
'Wherever you say,' she answered; and yet I did not understand, not till I saw the look in her eyes. Then, as it dawned on me, she broke down, for it was a terrible thing for a good woman to offer.
'"It's all for the little girl!' she cried. 'More than her life depends upon it. We must get her away from him.'"
She saw it was her only course, and went where her heart was calling.
The Lieutenant met the look of appeal in the trader's eyes, and nodded to imply his complete understanding and approval.
"
We love some women for their goodness, others we love for their frailness, but there never was one who combined the two like her, and, now that I knew she loved me, I began to believe again there was a God somewhere. I'd never seen the youngster, so she led me in where it was sleeping, and I remember my boots made such a devil of a thumping on the floor that she laid her slim white finger on her lips and smiled at me. All the fingers in the world began to choke at my throat, and all the blood in me commenced to pound at my heart, when I looked on that little sleeping kiddie. The tears began to roll out of my eyes, and, because they had been dry for four years, they scalded like melted metal. That was the only time I ever wept—the sight of her baby did it. 'I love her already,' I whispered, 'and I'll spend my life making her happy and making a lady of her,' which clinched what wavering doubt the mother had, and she began to plan quickly, the fear coming on her of a sudden that our scheme might fail. I was for riding away with both of them that night, back through the streets of Mesa and up into the hills, where I'd have held them single-handed against man or God or devil, but she wouldn't hear of it.
""
'We must go away,' she said, 'a long way from here, where the world won't find us and the little one can grow to womanhood without knowing. She must never learn who her father was or what her mother did. We will start all over, you and I and the baby, and forget. Do you love me well enough to do it?' I uttered a cry and took her in my arms, the arms that had ached for her all those years. Then I kissed her for the first time.""
"
The old man tried to light his pipe, which had gone out, but his fingers shook so that he dropped the match; whereupon, without speaking, Burrell struck another and held it for him. The trader drew a noisy puff or two in silence and shot his host a grateful glance.
"
Her plan was for me to take the youngster away that night, and for her to join us later, because pursuit was certain, and three could be traced where one might disappear; she would follow when the opportunity offered. I saw that he had instilled a terror into her, and that she feared him like death; but, as I thought it over, her scheme seemed feasible, so I agreed. I was to ride west that hour with the sleeping babe, and conceal myself at a place we selected, while she would say that the little one had wandered away and been lost in the canon, or anything else to throw Bennett off. After a time she would join us. Well—the little girl never waked when I took her in my arms, nor when the mother broke down again and talked to me like a crazy woman. Her collapse showed the terrible strain she had been living under, and the ragged edge where her reason stood. She had been brave enough to plan coolly till the hour for giving up her baby, but when that came she was seized with a thousand dreads, and made me swear by my love for her, which was and is the holiest thing in all my life, that if anything happened I would live for the other Merridy. I begged her again to come with me, but her fears held her back. She vowed, however, that Bennett should never touch her again, and I made her swear by her love for the babe that she would die before he ever laid hands on her. It woke a savage joy in me to think I had bested him, after all. I never thought of what I was giving up, of the clean name I was soiling, of the mine back there that meant a fortune anytime I cared to take it, for things like that don't count when a man's blood is hot, so I rode away in the yellow moonlight with a sleeping baby on my breast, where no child or woman had ever lain except for that minute before I left. She stood out from beneath the porch shadow and smiled her good-bye—the last I ever saw of her....
""
I travelled hard that night and swapped horses at daylight; then, leaving the wild country behind, I came into a region I didn't know, and found a Mexican woman who tended the child for me, for I was close by the place where Merridy was to come. Every night I went into the village in hopes that some word had arrived, and I waited patiently for a week. Then I got the blow. I heard it from the loafers around the little post-office first, but it dazed me so I wouldn't believe it till I borrowed the paper and read the whole story, with the type dancing and leaping before me. It took some hours for it to seep in, even after that, and for years I recalled every word of the damned lie as if it had been branded on me with hot irons. They called it a shocking crime, the most brutal murder California had ever known, and in the head-lines was my name in letters that struck me between the eyes like a hammer. Mrs. Dan Bennett had been foully murdered by me, in a fit of sudden jealousy, and I had disappeared with the baby! The husband had returned unexpectedly to find her dying, so he said, but too far gone to call for help, and with barely sufficient strength to tell him who did it and how! Then the paper went on with the tale of my courting her, and her turning me down for Bennett. It told how I had gone off alone up into the hills, turning into a bear that nobody, man or child, could approach. It said I had brooded there all this time till the mania got uppermost, and so came down to wreak my vengeance. They never even did me the credit of calling me crazy; I was a fiend incarnate, a beast without soul, and a lot of things like that; and, remember, I had never harmed a living thing in all my life. However, that wasn't what hurt. What turned me into a dull, dead, suffering thing was the knowledge that she was gone. For hours I couldn't get beyond that fact. Then came the realization that Bennett had done it, for I reasoned that he had dragged a hint of the truth from her by very force of the fear he held her in—and slain her. God!—the awful rage that came over me! But there was nothing to do; I had sworn to guard the little one, so I couldn't take vengeance on him. I couldn't go back and prove my innocence, for that would give the child to him. What a night I spent! The next day I saw I had been indicted by the grand jury and was a wanted man. From a distance I watched myself become an outlaw; watched the county put a price upon my head, which Bennett doubled; watched public opinion rise to such a heat that posses began to scour the mountains. What I noted in particular was a statement in the paper that 'The sorrowing husband takes his bereavement with the quiet courage which marks a brave man'! That roused me more than the knowledge that he had made me a wolf and set my friends on my track, which I hadn't covered very well, having ridden boldly. It happened that the Mexican woman couldn't read and talked little; still, I knew they'd find me soon—it couldn't be otherwise—so I made another run for it, swearing an oath, however, before I left that I'd come back and have that gambler's heart. It was lucky I went, for they uncovered my sign the next day, and the country where I'd hidden blazed like a field of dry grass. They were close on my heels, and they closed in from every quarter, but, pshaw! I knew the woods like an Indian, and the wild things were my friends again, which would have made it play if I'd been alone, but a girl child of three was harder to manage. So I cowered and skulked day after day like a thief or the murderer they thought me, working always farther into the hidden places, travelling by night with the little one asleep on my bosom, by day playing with her in some leafy glen, with my pursuers so close behind that for weeks I never slept; and my love for the child increased daily till it became almost an insanity.
""
She was the only woman thing I had ever possessed, and it seemed like my love for the mother came back and settled on her. And she loved me, too, and trusted me. Every little smile, every clasp of her tiny, dimpled fingers showed it, and tied her to me with another knot till the fear of losing her became greater than I could bear, till it kept the chill of death in my bones and filled my veins with glacier water. I became an animal, a cowardly, quailing coyote, all through the love of a child. We had close squeezes many times, but I finally won, in spite of the fact that they tracked us clear to the edge of the desert, for I had hit for the state line, knowing that Nevada was a wilderness, and feeling that I'd surely lose them there. And I did. But in doing it I nearly lost Merridy. You see, the constant travel and hardship was too much for a prattling baby, and she fell sick from the heat and the dust and the thirst. I'd been going and going till I was a riding skeleton, till my arms were crooked and dead from holding her, but this new thing frightened me like those men and dogs had never done. Here was a thing I couldn't hide from nor outride, so I doubled back and came boldly into the watered country again, expecting they would take me, of course, for a runaway man with a babe in his arms isn't hard to identify, but I didn't care. I was bound for the nearest ranch or mining-camp where a woman could be found; but, as luck would have it, I went through without trying. I had gone farther from men and things, however, than I thought, and this return pursuit was a million times worse than the other, for I couldn't go fast enough to shake Death, who ran with his hand on my cantle or rode on my horse's rump. It was then I found Alluna. She was with a hunting-party of Pah-Utes, who knew nothing of me nor of the white man's affairs, and cared less; and when I saw the little squaw I rode my horse up beside her, laid the sick child in her arms, then tumbled out of the saddle. They had a harder job to pull me through than they did to save Merridy, for I'd given the baby all the water and hadn't slept or rested for many years, so it seemed.
""
The little one was playing around several days before I got back my reason. Meanwhile the party had moved North, taking us with them, and, as it happened, just missing a posse who were returning from the desert. When I was able to get about I told Alluna that I must be going, but as I told her I watched her face, and saw the sign I wanted—the white girl had clutched at her like she had at me, and she couldn't give her up, so I made a dicker with her old man. It took all the money I had to buy that squaw, but I knew the kiddie must have a woman's care; and the three of us started out soon after, alone, and broke, and aimless—and we've been going ever since.
""
That's the heart of the story, Lieutenant, and that's how I started to drift. Since then we three have never rested. I left them once in Idaho and went back to Mesa, riding all the way, mostly by night, but Bennett was gone. He'd run down mighty fast after Merridy died, so I heard, growing sullen and uglier day by day—and I reckon I was the only one who knew why—till he had a killing in his place. It was unprovoked, and instead of stopping to face it out the yellow in him rose to the surface and he left before sunup, as I had left, making a clean getaway, too, for there was no such hullabaloo raised about killing a man as there was about—the other. So my trip was all for nothing. I was used to disappointment by now, so I took it quiet and went back to Alluna and the little one, knowing that some day we two men would meet. You see, I figured that God had framed a cold hand for me, but He would surely give me a pair before the game closed. Of course, never having seen Bennett, I was handicapped, and, added to that, he changed his name, so the search was mighty slow and blind, but I knew the day would come. And it would have come only for—this.
"
There isn't much more to tell. I did what most men would have done, I reckon, because I was just average in every way. I took Alluna, and together we drifted North, along the frontier, until we landed here. Every year the little girl got more beautiful and more like her mother, and every year we two loved her more. We changed her name, of course, for I've always had the dread of the law back of me, and then the other two kiddies came along; but we were living pretty easy, the woman contented and me waiting for Bennett, till you stepped in and Necia fell in love. That's another thing I never counted on. It seems like I've always overlooked the plainest kind of facts. I've held off telling you the last few weeks, hoping you two wouldn't make it necessary, for I reckon I'm sort of a coward; but she informed me to-night that she couldn't marry you, being what she thinks she is, and knowing the blood she has in her I knew she wouldn't. I figured it wouldn't be right to either of you to let you go it blind, and so I came in to tell you this whole thing and to give myself up.
Gale stopped, then poured himself another drink.
To give yourself up? echoed Burrell, vaguely. "How do you mean?" He had sat like one in a trance during the long recital, only his eyes alive.
I'm under indictment for murder, said the trader. "I have been for fifteen years, and there's no chance in the world for me to prove my innocence."
Have you told Necia? the young man inquired.
No, you'll have to do that—I never could—she might—disbelieve. What's more, you mustn't tell her yet. Wait till I give the word. It won't be long, perhaps a day. I want to go free a little while yet, for I've got some work to do.
Burrell rose to his feet and stamped the cramps from his muscles. He was deeply agitated, and his mind was groping darkly for light to lay hold of this new thing that confronted him.
Why, yes, yes—of course—don't come until you're ready, he muttered, mechanically, as if unaware of the meaning of his words. "To be sure, I'm a policeman, am I not? I had forgotten I was a jailer, and—and all that." He said it sneeringly, and with a measure of contempt for his office; then he turned suddenly to the trader, and his voice was rich and deep-pitched with feeling.
John Gale, he said, "you're the bravest man I ever knew, and the best." He choked a bit. "You sacrificed all that life meant when this girl was a baby, and now when she has come into womanhood you give up your blood for her. By God! You are a man! I want your hand!"
In spite of himself he could not restrain the moisture that dimmed his eyes as he gripped the toil-worn palm of this great, gray hulk of a man, so aged and bent beneath the burden of his life-long, fadeless love, who, in turn, was powerfully affected by the young man's impulsive outburst of feeling and his unexpected words of praise. The old man looked up a trifle shyly.
Then you don't doubt no part of it?
Certainly not.
Somehow, I always figured nobody would believe me if ever I told the whole thing.
The soldier gazed unseeingly into the flame of his lamp, and said:
I wonder if my love for the daughter is as great and as holy as your love for the mother. I wonder if I could give what you have given, if I had nothing but a memory to live with me. Then he inquired, irrelevantly; "But what about Bennett, Mr. Gale? You say you never found him?"
The trader answered, after a moment's hesitation, "He's still at large." At which his companion exclaimed, "I'd love to meet him in your stead!"
Gale seemed seized with a desire to speak, but, even while he hesitated, out of the silent night there came the sound of quick footsteps approaching briskly, as if the owner were in haste and knew whither he was bound. Up the steps they came lightly; then the room and the whole silence round about rang and echoed with a peremptory signal. Evidently this man rapped on the board door to awaken and alarm, for instead of his knuckles he used some hard and heavy thing like a gun-butt.
Lieutenant Burrell! Lieutenant Burrell! a gruff voice cried.
Who's there? called the young man.
Let me in! Quick! I've got work for you to do! Open up, I say! This is Ben Stark!
A day of shattered hopes is a desolate thing, but the night of such a day is desolate indeed. In all his life Poleon Doret had never sunk to such depths of despondency, for his optimistic philosophy and his buoyant faith in the goodness of life forbade it. Therefore, when darkness came it blotted out what little brightness and light and hope were left to him after Necia's stormy interview with the Lieutenant. The arrival of the freight steamer afforded him some distraction, but there was only a small consignment for the store, and that was quickly disposed of; so, leaving the other citizens of Flambeau to wrangle over their private merchandise, he went back to his solitary vigil, which finally became so unbearable that he sought to escape his thoughts, or at least to drown them for a while, amid the lights and life and laughter of Stark's saloon. Being but a child by nature, his means of distraction were primal and elementary, and he began to gamble, as usual with hard luck, for the cards had ever been unkind to him. He did not think of winnings or losings, however—he merely craved the occupation; and it was this that induced him to sit at a game in which Runnion played, although ordinarily he would not have tolerated even tacitly such a truce to his dislikes. As it was, he crouched in a corner, his hat pulled down over his brow, his swarthy face a darker hue beneath the shadow, losing steadily, only now and then showing a flash of white teeth as he saw his money go. What mattered loss to him? He had no more need of money now than Necia had of his love. He would spend the dollars he had eked and scraped and saved for her as she had spent the treasures of his heart, and now that the one had brought him no return he wished to be rid of the other, for he was shortly to go again in search of his "New Country," where no man needs gold half so much as a clean heart. It would be a long journey, far to the West and North—a journey that none of his kind had ever fared back from, and he wished to go light, as all good adventurers go.
Runnion annoyed him with his volubility, for the news of his good-fortune had fired the man with a reckless disregard for money, and he turned to gaming as the one natural recourse of his ilk. As the irony of fate would have it, he won what the Canadian lost, together with the stakes of various others who played for a time with him and then gave up, wagging their heads or swearing softly at the cards.
It was shortly after midnight that Stark came into the place. Poleon was not too absorbed in his own fortunes to fail to notice the extraordinary ferocity and exhilaration of the saloon-keeper, nor that his face was keener, his nostrils thinner, his walk more nervous, and his voice more cutting than usual when he spoke to Runnion.
Come here.
I'll be with you when I finish this hand, said the player, over his shoulder.
Come here! Stark snapped his command, and Runnion threw down his cards.
I'm right in the middle of a winning streak. You'll break my luck, Ben.
But the other only frowned impatiently, and, drawing the reluctant gambler aside, began to talk rapidly to him, almost within ear-shot of Poleon, who watched them, idly wondering what Stark had to say that could make Runnion start and act so queerly. Well, it was their affair. They made a bad pair to draw to. He knew that Runnion was the saloon-keeper's lieutenant and obeyed implicitly his senior's commands. He could distinguish nothing they said, nor was he at all curious until a knot of noisy men crowded up to the bar, and, forcing the two back nearer to the table where he sat, his sharp ears caught these words from Runnion's lips:
Not with me! She'd never go with me! and Stark's reply:
She'll go where I send her, and with anybody I tell her to.
The Frenchman lost what followed, for a newly dealt hand required study. He scanned his cards, and tossed them face up before the dealer; then he overheard Runnion say:
It's the only one in camp. He might sell it if you offered him enough. At this Stark called one of the men at the bar aside, and the three began to dicker.
Not a cent less, the third man announced, loudly. "There ain't another Peterborough in town."
It was Poleon's deal now, and when he had finished both Stark and Runnion had disappeared, also the man they had accosted, which pleased the Canadian, for now that Runnion was eliminated from the game he might win a little. A steady, unvarying run of bad hands is uninteresting, and does not occupy one's mind as well as an occasional change of luck.
Outside Runnion was saying again to Stark:
She won't go with me, Ben; she don't like me. You see, I made love to her, and she got mad and wanted me killed.
She'll never know who you are until it's too late to turn back, said the other, "and you are the only man I can trust to take her through. I can trust you—you owe me too much to be crooked."
Oh, I'll act square with you! But look here, what's all this about, anyhow? Why do you want that girl? You said you didn't care for her that way; you told me so yourself. Been having a change of heart, or is it your second childhood? He laughed disagreeably.
It's none of your business, said the gambler. "I want her, and that's enough. All you have to do is to take her to St. Michael's and keep her there till you hear from me. She thinks she is going to the Mission, and you needn't tell her otherwise until you get her aboard a steamer; then take her, no matter what kind of a fight she puts up. You've got a light-rowing skiff, and you'd better keep going till you're overtaken by a down-river boat. I want her as far away from here as possible. There's going to be some hell in this camp. Now, hike, and get yourself ready."
All right! But I ain't the safest kind of a chaperon for a good-looking girl.
Stark laid a cold hand on Runnion's shoulder, close up to his neck.
Get that out of your mind. She belongs to me.
You said just now—
Never mind what I said. She's mine, and you've got to promise to be straight with her. I've trusted you before, and if you're not on the level now, say so. It will save you a lot of trouble.
Oh! All right! exclaimed Runnion, testily. "Only it looks mighty queer."
He melted into the darkness and Stark returned to his cabin, where he paced back and forth impatiently, smiling evilly now and then, consulting his watch at frequent intervals. A black look had begun to settle on his face, but it vanished when Necia came, and he met her with a smile.
I was afraid you had weakened, he said. "Everything is ready and waiting. I've got the only canoe in the place, a Peterborough, and hired a good oarsman to put you through, instructing him to make as fast time as he can, and to board the first steamer that overtakes you. Too bad this freighter that just got in isn't going the other way. However, there's liable to be another any hour, and if one doesn't come along you'll find enough blankets and food in the skiff, so you needn't go ashore. You'll be there before you know it."
You are very kind, said the girl. "I can't thank you enough." She was clothed in her simple everyday dress, and looked again the sun-colored half-breed girl with the wide, dark eyes and the twin braids of crow-black hair.
You didn't run into anybody, eh?
She shook her head. Then he led her out into the darkness, and they stumbled down to the river's-bank, descending to the gravelly water's edge, where rows of clumsy hand-sawed boats and poling-skiffs were chafing at their painters. The up-river steamer was just clearing.
Stark's low whistle was answered a hundred yards below, and they searched out a darker blot that proved to be a man's figure.
Is everything ready? he inquired, at which the shadow grunted unintelligibly. So, holding Necia by the arm, Stark helped her back to a seat in the stern.
This man will take you through, he said. "You can trust him, all right."
The oarsman clambered in and adjusted his sweeps, then Stark laid a hand on the prow and shoved the light boat out into the current, calling softly:
Good-bye, and good-luck.
Good-bye, Mr. Stark. Thank you ever so much, the girl replied, too numb and worn out to say much, or to notice or care whither she was bound or who was her boatman. She had been swept along too swiftly to reason or fear for herself any more.
Half an hour later the scattered lights of the little camp winked and twinkled for the last time. Turning, she set her face forward, and, adjusting the cushions to her comfort, strained her tired eyes towards the rising and falling shadow of her boatman. She seemed borne along on a mystic river of gloom that hissed and gurgled about her, invisible but all-pervading, irresistible, monstrous, only the ceaseless, monotonous creak of the rowlocks breaking the silence.
Stark did not return to his cabin, but went back instead to his saloon, where he saw Poleon Doret still sprawling with elbows on the table, his hat pulled low above his sullen face. The owner of the place passed behind the bar and poured himself a full glass of whiskey, which he tossed off, then, without a look to right or left, went out and down towards the barracks. A light behind the drawn curtains of the officer's house told that his man was not abed, but he waited a long moment after his summons before the door was opened, during which he heard the occupant moving about and another door close in the rear. When he was allowed entrance at last he found the young man alone in a smoke-filled room with a bottle and two empty glasses on the table.
For at the sound of his voice Gale had whispered to Burrell, "Keep him out!" and the Lieutenant had decided to refuse his late visitor admittance when he lighted on the expedient of concealing the trader in the bedroom at the rear. It was only natural, he reasoned, that Gale should dislike to face a man like Stark before he had regained his composure.
Go in there and wait till I see what he wants, he had said, and, shutting the old man in, he had gone forth to admit Stark, resenting his ill-timed intrusion and inquiring brusquely the cause of it.
Before answering, Stark entered and closed the door behind him.
I've got some work for you, Lieutenant.
I guess it can wait till morning, said Meade.
No, it can't; it's got to be done to-night, right now! You represent the law, or at least you've taken every occasion to so declare yourself, and to mix in with little things that don't cut much figure; so now I've come to you with something big. It's a serious affair, and being as I'm a peaceful man I want to go by the law. His eyes mocked the words he uttered. "You're mighty prompt and determined when it comes to regulating such affairs. You seem to carry the weight of this whole community on your shoulders, so I'm here to give you some information."
Burrell ignored the taunt, and said, quietly: "It's a little late for polite conversation. Come to the point."
I've got a criminal for you.
What kind?
Murderer.
You've had a killing in your place, eh?
No, I've just made a discovery. I found it all out by accident, too—pure accident. By Heaven! You can't tell me there isn't a beneficent Providence overlooking our affairs. Why, this felon has lived here among us all this time, and only for the merest chance I never would have recognized him.
Well, well! Go on! snapped Burrell, impatiently.
He's a friend of yours, and a highly respected party. He's a glorious example to this whole river.
The officer started. Could it be? he wondered. Could knowledge of this affair have reached this man? He was uncomfortably aware of that presence in the back room, but he had to know the truth.
Who is the man?
He's your friend. He's— Stark paused, gloating over his enemy's suspense.
Go on. "He's everybody's friend. He's the shining mark of this whole country. He's the benevolent renegade, Squaw-man Gale."
John Gale?
Gaylord is his name, and I was a fool not to know it sooner.
How did you discover this? inquired Burrell, lamely. "What proof have you?"
The disclosure had not affected the soldier as Stark expected, and his anger began to lift itself.
That's neither here nor there; the man's a murderer; he's wanted in California, where I came from; he's been indicted, and there's a price on his head. He's hidden for fifteen years, but he'll hang as sure as I stand here.
Disclosures of a complex nature had so crowded on Burrell in the last few hours that he saw himself the centre of a most unfortunate and amazing tangle. Things were difficult enough as it was, but to have this man appear and cry for justice—this man above all others!—it was a complication quite unlocked for—a hideous mockery. He must gain time for thought. One false step might ruin all. He could not face this on the spur of the moment, so, shrugging his shoulders with an air of polite scepticism, he assumed a tone of good-natured raillery.
Fifteen years? Murder? John Gale a murderer? Why, that's almost—pardon me if I smile—I'm getting sleepy. What proof have you?
Proof! blazed the gambler. "Proof! Ask Gaylord! Proof! Why, the woman he murdered was my wife!"
It was Burrell's turn now to fall incoherent, and not only did his speech forsake him, but his thoughts went madly veering off into a wilderness where there was no trail, no light, no hope. What kind of a coil was this? What frightful bones were these he bared? This man was Bennett! This was Necia's father! This man he hated, this man who was bad, whose name was a curse throughout the length and breadth of the West, was the father of the girl he loved! His head began to whirl, then the story of the trader came back to him, and he remembered who and what the bearer of these later tidings was. He raised a pair of eyes that had become furious and bloodshot, and suddenly realized that the man before him, who persisted in saddling upon Gale this heinous crime, was the slayer of Necia's mother; for he did not doubt Gale's story for an instant. He found his fingers writhing to feel the creature's throat.
Proof! Stark was growling. "How much proof do you need? I've followed him for fifteen years. I've tracked him with men and dogs through woods and deserts and mining-camps. I've slept on his trail for five thousand miles, and now do you think I'm mistaken? He killed my wife, I say, and robbed me of my little girl! That's her in his house. That's her he calls Necia. She's my girl—MY GIRL, do you understand?—and I'll have his life."
It was hate that animated him, and nothing more. He had no joy in the finding of his offspring, no uplifted thought of justice. The thirst for revenge, personal, violent, utter, was all that prompted this man; but Burrell had no inkling yet of the father's well-shaped plans, nor how far-reaching they were, and could barely stammer:
So! You—you know?
Yes! She wears the evidence around her neck, and if that isn't enough I can furnish more—evidence enough to smother you. My name isn't Stark at all; I changed it years ago for certain reasons. I've changed it more than once, but that's my privilege and my own affair. Her name is Merridy Bennett.
I don't suppose you know I'm going to marry her, said the Kentuckian, irrelevantly.
No, replied the other, "I wasn't aware of the fact."
Well, I am. I'll be your son-in-law. He said this as if it were the statement of an astonishing truth, whereat Stark grinned, a mirthless, disquieting sort of grimace, and said:
There's a lot of things for you and me to settle up first. For one thing, I want those mines of hers.
Why?
Well, I'm her father, and she's not of age.
I'll think it over.
I'll take them, anyway, as her next of kin.
Burrell did not follow up this statement, for its truth was incontrovertible, and showed that the father's ill-will was too tangible a thing to be concealed; so he continued:
We'll adjust that after Gale is attended to; but, meanwhile, what do you want me to do?
I want you to arrest the man who killed my wife. If you don't take him the miners will. I've got a following in this camp, and I'll raise a crowd in fifteen minutes—enough to hang this squaw-man, or batter down your barracks to get him. But I don't want to do that; I want to go by the law you've talked so much about; I want you to do the trick.
At last Burrell saw the gambler's deviltry. He knew Stark's reputation too well to think that he feared a meeting with Gale, for the man had lived in hope of that these fifteen years, and had shaped his life around such a meeting; but this indirect method—the Kentuckian felt a flash of reluctant admiration for a man who could mould a vengeance with such cruel hands, and, even though he came from a land of feuds, where hate is a precious thing, the cunning strength of this man's enmity dwarfed any he had ever known. Stark had planned his settlement coldly and with deliberate malice; moreover he was strong enough to stand aside and let another take his place, and thus deny to Gale the final recourse of a hunted beast, the desperate satisfaction that the trader craved. He tied his enemy's hands and delivered him up with his thirst unsatisfied—to whom? He thrust a weapon into the hand of his other enemy, and bade this other enemy use it; worse than that, forced him to strike the man he honored—the man he loved. Burrell never doubted that Stark had carefully weighed the effect of this upon Necia, and had reasoned that a girl like her could not understand a soldier's duty if it meant the blood of a parent. If he refused to act, the gambler could break him, while every effort he made to protect Gale would but increase the other's satisfaction. There was no chance of the trader's escape. Stark held him in his hand. His followers would do his bidding. It was a desperate affair. Was it impossible, the Lieutenant wondered, to move this man from his purpose?
Have you thought of Necia? She loves Gale. What effect will this have on her?
Damn her! She's more his brat than mine. I want John Gaylord!
At this a vicious frenzy overtook Burrell, and he thought of the man behind yonder door, whom he had forgotten until these words woke something savage in him. Well! Why not? These two men had stalked each other clear into the farthest places, driven by forces that were older than the hills. Who was he to stand between such passions? This was ordained, it was the course of nature, the clash of elements, and this was a fair battle-ground, so why should he undertake to stop a thing decreed?
The gambler's words rang in his ears—"I want John Gaylord"—and before he knew what he was doing he had answered: "Very well. I'll give him to you," and crossed quickly to the door of his bedroom and flung it open. On the threshold he paused stock-still. The place was empty; a draught sucked through the open window, flirting with the curtain and telling the story of the trader's exit.
If you're looking for your coat, it's here, he heard Stark say. "Get into it, and we'll go for him."
The Lieutenant's mind was working fast enough now, in all conscience, and he saw with clear and fateful eyes whither he was being led, at which a sudden reckless disregard for consequences seized him. He felt a blind fury at being pulled and hauled and driven by this creature, and also an unreasoning anger at Gale's defection. But it was the thought of Necia and the horrible net of evil in which this man had ensnared them both that galled him most. It was all a terrible tangle, in which the truth was hopelessly hidden, and nothing but harm could come from attempting to unravel it. There was but one solution, and that, though fundamental and effective, was not to be expected from an officer of the law. Nevertheless, he chose it, for Ben Stark was too potent a force for evil to be at large, and needed extermination as truly as if he were some dangerous beast. He determined to finish this thing here and now.
Meade went to his bureau, took his revolver from the belt where he had hung it, and came out into the other room. Stark, seeing the weapon, exclaimed:
You don't need that; he won't resist you.
I've decided not to take him, said Burrell.
Decided not to take him? shouted the other. "Have you weakened? Don't you intend to arrest that man?"
No! cried the soldier. "I've listened to your lies long enough; now I'm going to stop them, once for all. You're too dangerous to have around."
They faced each other silently a moment; then Stark spoke in a very quiet voice, though his eyes were glittering:
What's the meaning of this? Are you crazy?
Gale was here just before you came, and told me who killed your wife. I know.
You do?
I do.
Well?
It's pretty late. This place is lonely. This is the simplest way.
The gambler fell to studying his antagonist, and when he did not speak Burrell continued:
Come, brace up! I'm giving you a chance.
But Stark shook his head.
Don't be afraid, insisted the Lieutenant. "There are no witnesses. If you get me, nobody will know, and your word is good. If not—it's much simpler than the other." Then, when the gambler still made no move, he insisted, "You wouldn't have me kill you like a rattlesnake?"
You couldn't, said the older man. "You're not that kind—and I'm not the kind to be cheated, either. Listen! I've lived over forty years, and I never took less than was coming to me. I won't begin to-night."
You'll get your share—
Bah! You don't know what I mean. I don't want you; it's him I'm after, and when I'm done with him I'll take care of you; but I won't run any risk right now. I won't take a chance on losing what I've risked so much to gain, what I've lived these fifteen years to get. You might put me away—there's the possibility—and I won't let you or any other man—or woman either, not even my girl—cheat me out of Gale. Put up your gun.
The soldier hesitated, then did as he was bidden, for this man knew him better than he knew himself.
I ought to treat you like a mad dog, but I can't do it while your hands are up. I'm going to fight for John Gale, however, and you can't take him.
I'll have his carcass hung to my ridge-pole before daylight.
No.
I say yes! Stark turned to go, but paused at the door. "And you think you'll marry Necia, do you?"
I know it.
Like hell you will! Suppose you find her first.
What do you mean? Wait—
But his visitor was gone, leaving behind him a lover already sorely vexed, and now harassed by a new and sudden apprehension. What venom the man distilled! Could it be that he had sent Necia away? Burrell scouted the idea. She wasn't the kind to go at Stark's mere behest; and as for his forcing her, why, this was not an age of abductions! He might aim to take her, but it would require some time to establish his rights, and even then there were Gale and himself to be reckoned with. Still, this was no time for idling, and he might as well make certain, so the young man put on his coat hurriedly, knowing there was work to do There was no telling what this night would bring forth, but first he must warn his friend, after which they would fight this thing together, not as soldier and civilian, but as man and man, not for the law, but against it. He smiled as he realized the situation. Well, he was through with the army, anyhow; his path was strange and new from this time henceforth, and led him away from all he had known, taking him among other peoples; but he did not flinch, for it led to her. Behind him was that former life; to-night he began anew.
Stark traced his way back to his cabin in a ten times fiercer mood than he had come, reviling, cursing, hating; back past the dark trading-post he went, pausing to shake his clenched fist and grind out an oath between his teeth; past the door of his own saloon, which was a-light, and whence came the sound of revelry, through the scattered houses, where he went more by feel than by sight, up to the door of his own shack. He fitted his key in the lock, but the door swung open without his aid, at which he remembered that he had only pulled it after him when he came away with Necia. He closed it behind him now, and locked it, for he had some thinking to do; then felt through his pockets for a match, and, striking it, bent over his lamp to adjust the wick. It flared up steady and strong at last, flooding the narrow place with its illumination; then he straightened up and turned towards the bed to throw off his coat, when suddenly every muscle of his body leaped with an uncontrollable spasm, as if he had uncovered a deadly serpent coiled and ready to spring. In spite of himself his lungs contracted as if with the grip of giant hands, and his breath came forth in a startled cry.
John Gale was sitting at his table, barely an arm's-length away, his gray-blue eyes fixed upon him, and the deep seams of his heavy face set as if graven in stone. His huge, knotted hands were upon the table, and between them lay a naked knife.
It was a heathenish time of night to arouse the girl, thought Burrell, as he left the barracks, but he must allay these fears that were besetting him, he must see Necia at once. The low, drifting clouds obscured what star-glow there was in the heavens, and he stepped back to light a lantern. By its light he looked at his watch and exclaimed, then held it to his ear. Five hours had passed since he left Gale's house. Well, the call was urgent, and Necia would understand his anxiety.
A few moments later he stood above the squaw, who crouched on the trader's doorstep, wailing her death song into the night. He could not check her; she paid no heed to him, but only rocked and moaned and chanted that strange, weird song which somehow gave strength to his fears.
What's wrong; where is Necia? Where is she? he demanded, and at last seized her roughly, facing her to the light, but Alluna only blinked owlishly at his lantern and shook her head.
Gone away, she finally informed him, and began to weave again in her despair, but he held her fiercely.
Where has she gone? When did she go? He shook her to quicken her reply.
I don' know. I don' know. Long time she's gone now. She trailed off into Indian words he could not comprehend, so he pushed past her into the house to see for himself, and without knocking flung Necia's door open and stepped into her chamber. Before he had swept the unfamiliar room with his eyes he knew that she had indeed gone, and gone hurriedly, for the signs of disorder betrayed a reckless haste. Hanging across the back of a chair was what had once been the wondrous dress, Poleon's gift, now a damp and draggled ruin, and on the floor were two sodden satin slippers and a pair of wet silk stockings. He picked up the lace gown and saw that it was torn from shoulder to waist. What insanity had possessed the girl to rip her garment thus?
She take her 'nother dress; the one I make las' summer, said Alluna, who had followed him in and stood staring as he stared.
When did she go, Alluna? For God's sake, what does this mean?
I don' know! She come and she go, and I don' see her; mebbe three, four hour ago.
Where's Gale? He'll know. He's gone after her, eh?
The upward glow of the lantern heightened the young man's pallor, and again the squaw broke into her sad lament.
John Gale—he's gone away with the knife of my father. I am afraid—I am afraid.
Burrell forced himself to speak calmly; this was no time to let his wits stampede.
How long ago?
Long time.
Did he come back here just now?
No; he went to the jail-house, and he would not let me follow. He don' come back no more.
This was confusing, and Meade cried, angrily:
Why didn't you give the alarm? Why didn't you come to me instead of yelling your lungs out around the house?
He told me to wait, she said, simply.
Go find Poleon, quick.
He told me to wait, she repeated, stoically, and Burrell knew he was powerless to move her. He saw the image of a great terror in the woman's face. The night suddenly became heavy with the hint of unspeakable things, and he grew fearful, suspecting now that Gale had told him but a part of his story, that all the time he knew Stark's identity, and that his quarry was at hand, ready for the kill; or, if not, he had learned enough while standing behind that partition. Where was he now? Where was Necia? What part did she play in this? Stark's parting words struck Burrell again like a blow. This life-long feud was drawing swiftly to some tragic culmination, and somewhere out in the darkness those two strong, hate-filled men were settling their scores. All at once a fear for the trader's life came upon the young man, and he realized that a great bond held them together. He could not think clearly, because of the dread thing that gripped him at thought of Necia. Was he to lose her, after all? He gave up trying to think, and fled for Stark's saloon, reasoning that where one was the other must be near, and there would surely be some word of Necia. He burst through the door; a quick glance over the place showed it empty of those he sought, but, spying Poleon Doret, he dragged him outside, inquiring breathlessly:
Have you seen Gale?
Have you seen Stark? Has he been about?
Yes, wan hour, mebbe two hour ago. W'y? Wat for you ask?
There's the devil to pay. Those two have come together, and Necia is gone.
Necia gone? the Canadian jerked out. "Wat you mean by dat? Were she's gone to?"
I don't know—nobody knows. God! I'm shaking like a leaf.
Bah! She's feel purty bad! She's go out by herse'f. Dat's all right.
I tell you something has happened to her; there's hell to pay. I found her clothes at the house torn to ribbons and all muddy and wet.
Poleon cried out at this.
We've got to find her and Gale, and we haven't a minute to lose. I'm afraid we're too late as it is. I wish it was daylight. Damn the darkness, anyhow! It makes it ten times harder.
His incoherence alarmed his listener more than his words.
Were have you look?
I've been to the house, but Alluna is crazy, and says Gale has gone to kill Stark, as near as I can make out. Both of them were at my quarters to-night, and I'm afraid the squaw is right.
But w'ere is Necia?
We don't know; maybe Stark has got her.
The Frenchman cursed horribly. "Have you try hees cabane?"
No.
Without answer the Frenchman darted away, and the Lieutenant sped after him through the deserted rows of log-houses.
Ha! Dere's light, snarled Doret, over his shoulder, as they neared their goal.
Be careful, panted Burrell. "Wait! Don't knock." He forced Poleon to pause. "Let's find out who's inside. Remember, we're working blind."
He gripped his companion's arm with fingers of steel, and together they crept up to the door, but even before they had gained it they heard a voice within. It was Stark's. The walls of the house were of moss-chinked logs that deadened every sound, but the door itself was of thin, whip-sawed pine boards with ample cracks at top and bottom, and, the room being of small dimensions, they heard plainly. The Lieutenant leaned forward, then with difficulty smothered an exclamation, for he heard another voice now—the voice of John Gale. The words came to him muffled but distinct, and he raised his hand to knock, when, suddenly arrested, he seized Poleon and forced him to his knees, hissing into his ear:
Listen! Listen! For God's sake, listen!
For the first time in his tempestuous life Ben Stark lost the iron composure that had made his name a by-word in the West, and at sight of his bitterest enemy seated in the dark of his own house waiting for him he became an ordinary, nervous, frightened man faced by a great peril. It was the utter unexpectedness of the thing that shook him, and before he could regain his balance Gale spoke:
I've come to settle, Bennett.
What are you doing here? the gambler stammered.
I was up at the soldier's place just now and heard you. I didn't want any interruptions, so I came here where we can be alone. He paused, and, when Stark made no answer, continued, "Well, let's get at it." But still the other made no move. "You've had all the best of it for twenty years," Gale went on, in his level voice, "but to-night I get even. By God! I've lived for this."
That shot in Lee's cabin? recalled Stark, with the light of a new understanding. "You knew me then?"
Yes.
Stark took a deep breath. "What a damned fool I've been!"
Your devil's magic saved you that time, but it won't stop this. The trader rose slowly with the knife in his hand.
You'll hang for this! said the gambler, unsteadily, at which Gale's face blazed.
Ha! exclaimed the trader, exultingly; "you can feel it in your guts already, eh?"
With an effort Stark began to assemble his wits as the trader continued:
You saddled your dirty work on me, Ben Stark, and I've carried it for fifteen years; but to-night I put you out the way you put her out. An eye for an eye!
I didn't kill her, said the man.
Don't lie. This isn't a grand jury. We're all alone.
I didn't kill her.
So? The yellow is showing up at last. I knew you were a coward, but I didn't think you'd be afraid to own it to yourself. That thing must have lived with you.
Look here, said Stark, curiously, "do you really think I killed Merridy?"
I know it. A man who would strike a woman would kill her—if he had the nerve.
Stark had now mastered himself, and smiled.
My hate worked better than I thought. Well, well, that made it hard for you, didn't it? he chuckled. "I supposed, of course, you knew—"
Knew? Gale's face showed emotion for the first time. "Knew what—?" His hands were quivering slightly.
She killed herself.
So help you God?
So help me God!
There was a long pause.
Why?
Say, it's kind of funny our standing here talking about that thing, isn't it? Well, if you want to know, I came home early that night—I guess you hadn't been gone two hours—and the surprise did it, more than anything else, I suppose—she hadn't prepared a story. I got suspicious, named you at random, and hit the nail on the head. She broke down, thought I knew more than I did, and—and then there was hell to pay.
Go on.
I suppose I talked bad and made threats—I was crazy over you—till she must have thought I meant to kill her, but I didn't. No. I never was quite that bad. Anyhow, she did it herself.
Gale's face was like chalk, and his voice sounded thin and dry as he said:
You beat her, that's why she did it.
Stark made no answer.
The papers said the room showed a struggle.
When the other still kept silent, Gale insisted:
Didn't you?
At this Stark flamed up defiantly.
Well, I guess I had cause enough. No woman except her was ever untrue to me—wife or sweetheart.
You didn't really think—?
Think hell! I thought so then, and I think so now. She denied it, but—
And you knew her so well, too. I guess you've had some bad nights yourself, Bennett, with that always on your mind—
I swore I'd have you—
—and so you put her blood on my head, and made me an outlaw. After an instant: "Why did you tell me this, anyhow?"
It's our last talk, and I wanted you to know how well my hate worked.
Well, I guess that's all, said Gale. So far they had watched each other with unwavering, unblinking eyes, straining at the leash and taut in every nerve. Now, however, the trader's fingers tightened on the knife-handle, and his knuckles whitened with the grip, at which Stark's right hand swept to his waist, and simultaneously Gale lunged across the table. His blade nickered in the light, and a gun spoke, once—twice—again and again. A cry arose outside the cabin, then some heavy thing crashed in through the door, bringing light with it, for with his first leap Gale had carried the lamp and the table with him, and the two had clenched in the dark.
Burrell had waited an instant too long, for the men's voices had held so steady, their words had been so vital, that the finish found him unprepared, but, thrusting the lantern into Poleon's hand, he had backed off a pace and hurled himself at the door. He had learned the knack of bunching his weight in football days, and the barrier burst and splintered before him. He fell to his knees inside, and an instant later found himself wrestling for his life between two raging beasts. The Lieutenant knew Doret must have entered too, though he could not see him, for the lantern shed a sickly gloom over the chaos. He was locked desperately with John Gale, who flung him about and handled him like a child, fighting like an old gray wolf, hoary with years and terrible in his rage. Burrell had never been so battered and harried and torn; only for the lantern's light Gale would doubtless have sheathed his weapon in his new assailant, but the more fiercely the trader struggled, the more tenaciously the soldier clung. As it was, Gale carried the Lieutenant with him and struck over his head at Stark.
Poleon had leaped into the room at Burrell's heels, to receive the impact of a heavy body hurled backward into his arms as if by some irresistible force. He seized it and tore it away from the thing that pressed after and bore down upon it with the ferocity of a wild beast. He saw Gale reach over the Lieutenant's head and swing his arm, saw the knife-blade bury itself in what he held, then saw it rip away, and felt a hot stream spurt into his face. So closely was the Canadian entangled with Stark that he fancied for an instant the weapon had wounded both of them for the trader had aimed at his enemy's neck where it joined the shoulder, but, hampered by the soldier, his blow went astray about four inches. Doret glimpsed Burrell rising from his knees, his arms about the trader's waist, and the next instant the combatants were dragged apart.
The Lieutenant wrenched the dripping blade from Gale's hand; it no longer gleamed, but was warm and slippery in his fingers. Poleon held Stark's gun, which was empty and smoking.
The fight had not lasted a minute, and yet what terrible havoc had been wrought! The gambler was drenched with his own blood, which gushed from him, black in the yellow flicker, and so plentifully that the Frenchman was befouled with it, while Gale, too, was horribly stained, but whether from his own or his enemy's veins it was hard to tell. The trader paid no heed to himself nor to the intruders, allowing Burrell to push him back against the wall, the breath wheezing in and out of his lungs, his eyes fastened on Stark.
I got you, Bennett! he cried, hoarsely. "Your magic is no good." His teeth showed through his grizzled muzzle like the fangs of some wild animal.
Bennett, or Stark, as the others knew him, lunged about with his captor, trying to get at his enemy, and crying curses on them all, but he was like a child in Poleon's arms. Gradually he weakened, and suddenly resistance died out of him.
Come away from here, the Lieutenant ordered Gale.
But the old man did not hear, and gathered himself as if to resume the battle with his bare hands, whereupon the soldier, finding himself shaking like a frightened child, and growing physically weak at what he saw, doubted his ability to prevent the encounter, and repeated his command.
Come away! he shouted, but the words sounded foolishly flat and inane.
Then Stark spoke intelligibly for the first time.
Arrest him! You've got to believe what I told you now, Burrell. He poured forth a stream of unspeakable profanity, smitten by the bitter knowledge of his first and only defeat. "You'll hang, Gaylord! I'll see your neck stretched, damn your heart!" To Poleon he panted, excitedly: "I followed him for fifteen years, Doret. He killed my wife."
Dat's damn lie! said the Frenchman.
No, it isn't. He's under indictment for it back in California. He shot her down in cold blood, then ran off with my kid. That's her he calls Necia. She's mine. Ain't I right, Lieutenant?
At this final desperate effort to fix the crime upon his rival, Burrell turned on him with loathing.
It's no use, Stark. We heard you say she killed herself. We were standing outside the door, both of us, and got it from your own lips.
Until this moment the man had stood on his own feet, but now he began to sag, seeing which, Poleon supported him to the bed, where he sank weakly, collapsing in every joint and muscle.
It's a job, he snarled. "You put this up, you three, and came here to gang me." An unnatural shudder convulsed him as his wounds bit at him, and then he flared up viciously. "But I'll beat you all. I've got the girl! I've got her!"
Necia! cried Burrell, suddenly remembering, for this affray had driven all else from his mind.
Stark crouched on the edge of his bunk—a ghastly, gray, grinning thing! One weapon still remained to him, and he used it.
Yes, I've got my daughter!
Where is she? demanded the trader, hoarsely. "Where's my girl?"
The gambler chuckled; an agony seized him till he hiccoughed and strangled; then, as the spell passed, he laughed again.
She's got you in her head, like the mother had, but I'll drive it out; I'll treat her like I did her—
Gale uttered a terrible cry and moved upon him, but Burrell shouldered the trader aside, himself possessed by a cold fury that intensified his strength tenfold.
Stop it, Gale! Let me attend to this. I'll make him tell!
Oh, will you? mocked the girl's father.
Where is she?
None of your damned business. Again he was seized with a paroxysm that left him shivering and his lips colorless. The blankets were soaked and soggy with blood, and his feet rested in a red pool.
Ben Stark, said the tortured lover, "you're a sick man, and you'll be gone in half an hour at this rate. Won't you do one decent thing before you die?"
Bah! I'm all right.
I'll get you a doctor if you'll tell us where she is. If you don't—I'll—let you die. For God's sake, man, speak up!
The wounded man strove to rise, but could not, then considered for a moment before he said:
I sent her away.
Where?
Up-river, on that freighter that left last night. She'll go out by Skagway, and I'll join her later, where I can have her to myself. She's forty miles up-river now, and getting farther every minute—oh, you can't catch her!
The three men stared at one another blankly.
Why did she go? said Gale, dully.
Because I told her who she was, and who you are; because she thinks you killed her mother; because she was glad to get away. Now that he was grown too weak to inflict violent pain, the man lied malevolently, gloating over what he saw in the trader's face.
Never mind, old man, I'll bring her back, said Burrell, and laid a comforting hand on Gale's shoulder, for the fact that she was safe, the fact of knowing something relieved him immensely; but Stark's next words plunged him into even blacker horror than the trader felt.
You won't want her if you catch her. Runnion will see to that.
Runnion!
Yes, I sent him with her.
The lover cried out in anguish, and hid his face in his hands.
He's wanted her for a long time, so I told him to go ahead—
None of them noticed Poleon Doret, who, upon this unnatural confession, alone seemed to retain sufficient control to doubt and to reason. He was thinking hard, straightening out certain facts, and trying to square this horrible statement with things he had seen and heard to-night. All of a sudden he uttered a great cry, and bolted out into the darkness unheeded by Gale and Burrell, who stood dazed and distraught with a fear greater than that which was growing in Stark at sight of his wounds.
The gambler looked down at his injuries, opened and closed the fingers of his hand as if to see whether he still maintained control of them, then cried out at the two helpless men:
Well, are you going to let me bleed to death?
It brought the soldier out of his trance.
Why—no, no! We'll get a doctor.
But Gale touched him on the shoulder and said:
He's too weak to get out. Lock him in, and let him die in the dark.
Stark cursed affrightedly, for it is a terrible thing to bleed to death in the dark, and in spite of himself the Lieutenant wavered.
I can't do that. I promised.
He told that lie to my girl. He gave her to that hound, said the trader, but Burrell shoved him through the door.
No! I can't do that. And then to the wounded man he said, "I'll get a doctor, but God have mercy on your soul." He could not trust himself to talk further with this creature, nor be near him any longer, for though he had a slight knowledge of surgery, he would sooner have touched a loathsome serpent than the flesh of this monstrous man.
He pushed Gale ahead of him, and the old man went like a driven beast, for his violence had wasted itself, and he was like a person under the spell of a strong drug. At the doctor's door Burrell stopped.
I never thought to ask you, he said, wearily; "but you must be hurt? He must have wounded you?"
I reckon he did—I don't know. Then the man's listless voice throbbed out achingly, as he cried in despair: "She believed him, boy! She believed his lies! That's what hurts." Something like a sob caught in his throat, and he staggered away under the weight of his great bereavement.
To the girl crouching at the stern of Runnion's boat it seemed as if this day and night would never end. It seemed as if the procession of natural events must have ceased, that there was no longer any time, for she had been suffering steadily for hours and hours without end, and began to wonder dreamily whether she had not skipped a day in her reckoning between the time when she first heard of the strike on her claim and this present moment. It occurred to her that she was a rich girl now in her own right, and she smiled her crooked smile, as she reflected that the thing she had longed for without hope of attainment had come with confusing swiftness, and had left her unhappier than ever....
Would the day never come? She pulled the rugs up closer about her as the morning chill made her shiver. She found herself keeping mechanical count with the sound of the sweeps—they must be making good speed, she thought, and the camp must be miles behind now. Had it been earlier in the season, when the river ran full of drift, they never could have gone thus in the dark, but the water was low and the chances of collision so remote as to render blind travel safe. Even yet she could not distinguish her oarsman, except as a black bulk, for it had been a lowering night and the approaching dawn failed to break through the blanket of cloud that hung above the great valley. He was a good boatman, however, as she gathered from the tireless regularity of his strokes. He was a silent man, too, and she was grateful for that. She snuggled down into her blanket and tried to sleep, but she only dozed for a minute, it seemed, to find her eyes fly wide open again. So, restless and tired of her lonely vigil, she gave a premonitory cough, and said to her companion:
You must be tired rowing so steadily?
Oh, I don't mind it, he replied.
At the sound of his voice she sat bolt upright. It couldn't be—if this were Runnion he would have spoken before! She ventured again, tremulously:
Have you any idea what time it is?
About three o'clock. I fancy.
Who are you? The question came like a shot.
Don't you know?
What are YOU doing here, Mr. Runnion?
I'm rowing, he answered, carelessly.
Why didn't you speak? A vague feeling of uneasiness came over her, a suspicion that all was not right, so she waited for him to explain, and when he did not, she repeated her question. "What made you keep still so long? You knew who I was?"
Well, it's the first time I ever took you on a midnight row, and I wanted to enjoy it.
The mockery in his voice quickened her apprehension. Of a sudden the fear of being misjudged impelled her to end this flight that had become so distasteful in a moment, preferring to face the people at the post rather than continue her journey with this man.
I've changed my mind, Mr. Runnion, she said. "I don't want to go down to the Mission. I want you to take me back."
Can't do it, he said; "the current is too swift."
Then set me ashore and I'll walk back. It can't be far to town.
Twenty-five miles. We've been out about three hours. He kept on rowing steadily, and although the distance they had gone frightened her, she summoned her courage to say:
We can make that easily enough. Come, run in to the bank.
He ceased rowing and let the boat drift with dragging sweeps, filled his pipe and lighted it, then took up his oars again and resumed his labors.
Please do as I ask you, Mr. Runnion. I've decided I don't want to go any farther. He laughed, and the sound aroused her. "Put me ashore this minute!" she cried, indignantly. "What do you mean?"
You've got a fierce temper, haven't you?
Will you do it or not?
When he made no answer, except to continue the maddening monotony of his movements, she was seized with a rash resolve to wrench the oars out of his hands, and made a quick motion towards him, at which he shouted:
Sit down! Do you want to upset us?
The unstable craft lurched and dipped dangerously, and, realizing the futility of her mad impulse, she sank back on her knees.
Put me ashore!
No, he said, "not till I'm ready. Now, keep your seat or we'll both drown; this ain't a ferry-boat." After a few strokes, he added, "We'll never get along together unless you tame that temper."
We're not going to get along together, Mr. Runnion—only as far as the Mission. I dare say you can tolerate me until then, can you not? She said this bitingly.
Stark told me to board the first boat for St. Michael's, he said, disregarding her sarcasm, "but I've made a few plans of my own the last hour or so."
St. Michael's! Mr. Stark told you—why, that's impossible! You misunderstood him. He told you to row me to the Mission. I'm going to Father Barnum's house.
No, you're not, and I didn't misunderstand him. He wants to get you outside, all right, but I reckon you'd rather go as Mrs. Runnion than as the sweetheart of Ben Stark.
Are you crazy? the girl cried. "Mr. Stark kindly offered to help me reach the Father at his Mission. I'm nothing to him, and I'm certainly not going to be anything to you. If I'd known you were going to row the boat, I should have stayed at home, because I detest you."
You'll get over that.
I'm not in the humor for jokes.
He rested again on his oars, and said, with deliberation:
Stark 'kindly offered' did he? Well, whenever Ben Stark 'kindly' offers anything, I'm in on the play. He's had his eye on you for the last three months, and he wants you, but he slipped a cog when he gave me the oars. You needn't be afraid, though, I'm going to do the square thing by you. We'll stop in at the Mission and be married, and then we'll see whether we want to go to St. Michael's or not, though personally I'm for going back to Flambeau.
During the hours while he had waited for Necia to discover his identity, the man's mind had not been idle; he had determined to take what fortune tossed into his lap. Had she been the unknown, unnoticed half-breed of a month or two before, he would not have wasted thought upon priests or vows, but now that a strange fate had worked a change in her before the world, he accepted it.
The girl's beauty, her indifference, the mistaken attitude of Stark urged him, and, strongest of all, he was drawn by his cupidity, for she would be very rich, so the knowing ones said. Doubtless that was why Stark wanted her, and, being a man who acknowledged no fidelity to his kind or his Creator, Runnion determined to outwit his principal, Doret, Burrell, and all the rest. It was a chance to win much at the risk of nothing, and he was too good a gambler to let it pass.
With his brusque declaration Necia realized her position—that she was a weak, lonely girl, just come into womanhood, so cursed by good looks that men wanted her, so stained by birth that they would not take her honestly; realized that she was alone with a dissolute creature and beyond help, and for the first time in her life she felt the meaning of fear.
She saw what a frail and helpless thing she was; nothing about her was great save her soul, and that was immeasurably vexed and worried. She had just lived through a grief that had made her generous, and now she gained her first knowledge of the man-animal's gross selfishness.
You are absolutely daft, she said. "You can't force me to marry you."
I ain't going to force you; you'll do it willingly.
I'll die first. I'll call the first man we see—I'll tell Father Barnum, and he'll have you run out of the country—it would only take a word from me.
If you haven't changed your mind when we get to his place, I'll run through without stopping; but there isn't another priest between there and St. Mike's, and by the time we get to the mouth of the river, I guess you'll say yes to most anything. However, I'd rather marry you at Holy Cross if you'll consent, and I'm pretty sure you will—when you think it over.
We won't discuss it.
You don't understand yet, he continued, slowly. "What will people say when they know you ran away with me."
I'll tell them the truth.
Huh! I'm too well known. No man on the river would ever have you after that.
You—you— Her voice was a-quiver with indignation and loathing, but her lips could not frame an epithet fit for him. He continued rowing for some time, then said:
Will you marry me?
No! If this thing is ever known, Poleon will kill you—or father.
For a third time he rested on his oars.
Now that we've come to threats, let me talk. I offered to marry you and do the square thing, but if you don't want to, I'll pass up the formality and take you for my squaw, the same as your father took Alluna. I guess you're no better than your mother, so your old man can't say much under the circumstances, and if he don't object, Poleon can't. Just remember, you're alone with me in the heart of a wilderness, and you've got to make a choice quick, because I'm going ashore and make some breakfast as soon as it's light enough to choose a landing-place. If you agree to come quietly and go through with this thing like a sensible girl, I'll do what's right, but if you don't—then I'll do what's wrong, and maybe you won't be so damned anxious to tell your friends about this trip, or spread your story up and down the river. Make up your mind before I land.
The water gurgled at the bow again, and the row-locks squeaked. Another hour and then another passed in silence before the girl noted that she no longer seemed to float through abysmal darkness, but that the river showed in muddy grayness just over the gunwale. She saw Runnion more clearly, too, and made out his hateful outlines, though for all else she beheld they might have been miles out upon a placid sea, and so imperceptible was the laggard day's approach that she could not measure the growing light. It was a desolate dawn, and showed no glorious gleams of color. There was no rose-pink glow, no merging of a thousand tints, no final burst of gleaming gold; the night merely faded away, changing to a sickly pallor that grew to ashen gray, and then dissolved the low-hung, distorted shadows a quarter of a mile inland on either hand into a forbidding row of unbroken forest backed by plain, morass, and distant hills untipped by slanting rays. Overhead a bleak ruin of clouds drifted; underneath the river ran, a bilious yellow. The whole country so far as the eye could range was unmarred by the hand of man, untracked save by the feet of the crafty forest people.
She saw Runnion gazing over his shoulder in search of a shelving beach or bar, his profile showing more debased and mean than she had ever noticed it before. They rounded a bend where the left bank crumbled before the untiring teeth of the river, forming a bristling chevaux-de-frise of leaning, fallen firs awash in the current. The short side of the curve, the one nearest them, protected a gravel bar that made down-stream to a dagger-like point, and towards this Runnion propelled the skiff. The girl's heart sank and she felt her limbs grow cold.
The mind of Poleon Doret worked in straight lines. Moreover, his memory was good. Stark's statement, which so upset Gale and the Lieutenant, had a somewhat different effect upon the Frenchman, for certain facts had been impressed upon his subconsciousness which did not entirely gibe with the gambler's remarks, and yet they were too dimly engraved to afford foundation for a definite theory. What he did know was this, that he doubted. Why? Because certain scraps of a disjointed conversation recurred to him, a few words which he had overheard in Stark's saloon, something about a Peterborough canoe and a woman. He knew every skiff that lay along the waterfront, and of a sudden he decided to see if this one was where it had been at dusk; for there were but two modes of egress from Flambeau, and there was but one canoe of this type. If Necia had gone up-river on the freighter, pursuit was hopeless, for no boatman could make headway against the current; but if, on the other hand, that cedar craft was gone—He ran out of Stark's house and down to the river-bank, then leaped to the shingle beneath. It was just one chance, and if he was wrong, no matter; the others would leave on the next up-river steamer; whereas, if his suspicion proved a certainty, if Stark had lied to throw them off the track, and Runnion had taken her down-stream—well, Poleon wished no one to hinder him, for he would travel light.
The boat WAS gone! He searched the line backward, but it was not there, and his excitement grew now, likewise his haste. Still on the run, he stumbled up to the trading-post and around to the rear, where, bottom up, lay his own craft, the one he guarded jealously, a birch canoe, frail and treacherous for any but a man schooled in the ways of swift water and Indian tricks. He was very glad now that he had not told the others of his suspicions; they might have claimed the right to go, and of that he would not be cheated. He swung the shell over his shoulders, then hurried to the bank and down the steep trail like some great, misshapen turtle. He laid it carefully in the whispering current, then stripped himself with feverish haste, for the driving call of a hot pursuit was on him, and although it was the cold, raw hours of late night, he whipped off his garments until he was bare to the middle. He seized his paddle, stepped in, then knelt amidships and pushed away. The birch-bark answered him like a living thing, leaping and dancing beneath the strokes which sprung the spruce blade and boiled the water to a foam, while rippling, rising ridges stood out upon his back and arms as they rose and fell, stretched and bent and straightened.
A half-luminous, opaque glow was over the waters, but the banks quickly dropped away, until there was nothing to guide him but the suck of the current and the sight of the dim-set stars. His haste now became something crying that lashed him fiercely, for he seemed to be standing still, and so began to mutter at the crawling stream and to complain of his thews, which did not drive him fast enough, only the sound he made was more like the whine of a hound in leash or a wolf that runs with hot nostrils close to the earth.
Runnion drove his Peterborough towards the shore with powerful strokes, and ran its nose up on the gravel, rose, stretched himself, and dragged it farther out, then looked down at Necia.
Well, what is it, yes or no? Do you want me for a husband or for a master? She cowered in the stern, a pale, fearful creature, finally murmuring:
You—you must give me time.
Not another hour. Here's where you declare yourself; and remember, I don't care which you choose, only you'd better be sensible.
She cast her despairing eyes up and down the river, then at the wilderness on either shore; but it was as silent and unpeopled as if it had been created that morning. She must have time; she would temporize, pretending to yield, and then betray him to the first comer; a promise exacted under duress would not be binding.
I'll go quietly, she said, in a faint voice.
I knew you'd see that I'm acting square. Come! Get the cramp out of yourself while I make a pot of coffee. He held out his hand to assist her, and she accepted it, but stumbled as she rose, for she had been crouched in one position for several hours, and her limbs were stiff. He caught her and swung her ashore; then, instead of putting her feet to the ground, he pressed her to himself roughly and kissed her. She gave a stifled cry and fought him off, but he laughed and held her the closer.
Ain't I good for one kiss? Say, this is the deuce of an engagement. Come, now—
No, no, no! she gasped, writhing like a wild thing; but he crushed his lips to hers again and then let her go, whereupon she drew away from him panting, dishevelled, her eyes wide and filled with horror. She scrubbed her lips with the back of her hand, as if to erase his mark, while he reached into the canoe and brought forth an axe, a bundle of food, and a coffee-pot; then, still chuckling, he gathered a few sticks of driftwood and built a fire. She had a blind instinct to flee, and sought for a means of escape, but they were well out upon the bar that stretched a distance of three hundred feet to the wooded bank; on one side of the narrow spit was the scarcely moving, half-stagnant water of a tiny bay or eddy, on the other, the swift, gliding current tugging at the beached canoe, while the outer end of the gravelled ridge dwindled down to nothing and disappeared into the river. At sight of the canoe a thought struck her, but her face must have shown some sign of it, for the man chanced to look at the moment, and, seeing her expression, straightened himself, then gazed about searchingly. Without a word he stepped to the boat, and, seizing it, dragged it entirely out upon the bar, where her strength would not be equal to shoving it off quickly, and, not content with this, he made the painter fast, then went back to his fire. The eagerness died out of her face, but an instant later, when he turned to the clearer water of the eddy to fill the coffee-pot, she seized her chance and sped up the bar towards the bank. The shingle under foot and her noisy skirts betrayed her, and with an oath he followed. It was an unequal race, and he handled her with rough, strong hands when he overtook her.
So! You lied to me! Well, I'm through with this foolishness. If you'll go back on your word like this you'll 'bawl me out' before the priest, so I'll forget my promise, too, and you'll be glad of the chance to marry me.
Let me go! she panted. "I'll marry you. Yes, yes, I'll do it, only don't touch me now!"
He led her back to the fire, which had begun to crackle. She was so weak now that she sank upon the stones shivering.
That's right! Sit down and behave while I make you something hot to drink. You're all in. After a time he continued, as he busied himself about his task: "Say, you ought to be glad to get me; I've got a lot of money, or I will have, and once you're Mrs. Runnion, nobody'll ever know about this or think of you as a squaw." He talked to her while he waited for the water to boil, his assurance robbing her of hope, for she saw he was stubborn and reckless, determined to override her will as well as to conquer her body, while under his creed, the creed of his kind, a woman was made from the rib of man and for his service. He conveyed it to her plainly. He ruled horses with a hard hand, he drove his dog teams with a biting lash, and he mastered women with a similar lack of feeling or consideration.
He was still talking when the girl sprang to her feet and sent a shrill cry out over the river, but instantly he was up and upon her, his hand over her mouth, while she tore at it, screaming the name of Poleon Doret. He silenced her to a smothered, sobbing mumble, and turned to see, far out on the bosom of the great soiled river, a man in a bark canoe. The craft had just swung past the bend above, and was still a long way off—so far away, in fact, that Necia's signal had not reached it, for its occupant held unwaveringly to the swiftest channel, his body rising and falling in the smooth, unending rhythm of a master-boatman tinder great haste, his arms up-flung now and then, as the paddle glinted and flashed across to the opposite side.
Runnion glanced about hurriedly, then cursed as he saw no place of concealment. The Peterborough stood out upon the bar conspicuously, as did he and the girl; but the chance remained that this man, whoever he was, would pass by, for his speed was great, the river a mile in width, and the bend sharp. Necia had cried Poleon's name, but her companion saw no resemblance to the Frenchman in this strange-looking voyager; in fact, he could not quite make out what was peculiar about the man—perhaps his eyes were not as sharp as hers—and then he saw that the boatman was naked to the waist. By now he was drawing opposite them with the speed of a hound. The girl, gagged and held by her captor's hands, struggled and moaned despairingly, and, crouching back of the boat, they might have escaped discovery in the gray morning light had it not been for the telltale fire—a tiny, crackling blaze no larger than a man's hat. It betrayed them. The dancing craft upon which their eyes were fixed whipped about, almost leaping from the water at one stroke, then came towards them, now nothing but a narrow thing, half again the width of a man's body. The current carried it down abreast of them, then past, and Runnion rose, releasing the girl, who cried out with all her might to the boatman. He made no sound in reply, but drove his canoe shoreward with quicker strokes. It was evident he would effect his landing near the lower end of the spit, for now he was within hearing distance, and driving closer every instant.
Necia heard the gambler call:
Sheer off, Doret! You can't land here!
She saw a gun in Runnion's hand, and a terrible, sickening fear swept over her, for he was slowly walking down the spit, keeping abreast of the canoe as it drifted. She could see exactly what would happen: no man could disembark against the will of an armed marksman, and if Poleon slackened his stroke, or stopped it to exchange his paddle for a weapon, the current would carry him past; in addition, he would have to fire from a rocking paper shell harried by a boiling current, whereas the other man stood flat upon his feet.
Keep away or I'll fire! threatened Runnion again; and she screamed, "Don't try it, Poleon, he'll kill you!"
At her words Runnion raised his weapon and fired. She heard the woods behind reverberate with the echoes like a sounding-board, saw the white spurt of smoke and the skitter of the bullet as it went wide. It was a long shot, and had been fired as a final warning; but Doret made no outcry, nor did he cease coming; instead, his paddle clove the water with the same steady strokes that took every ounce of effort in his body. Runnion threw open his gun and replaced the spent shell. On came the careening, crazy craft in a sidewise drift, and with it the girl saw coming a terrible tragedy. She started to run down the gravelled ridge behind her enemy, not realizing the value or moment of her action, nor knowing clearly what she would do; but as she drew near she saw Runnion raise his gun again, and, without thought of her own safety, threw herself upon him Again his shot went wide as he strove to hurl her off, but his former taste of her strength was nothing to this, now that she fought for Poleon's life. Runnion snarled angrily and thrust her away, for he had waited till the canoe was close.
Let me go, you devil! he cried, and aimed again; but again she ran at him. This time, however, she did not pit her strength against his, but paused, and as he undertook to fire she thrust at his elbow, then dodged out of his way. Her blow was crafty and well-timed, and his shot went wild. Again he took aim, and again she destroyed it with a touch and danced out of his reach. She was nimble and light, and quickened now by a cold calculation of all that depended upon her.
Three times in all she thwarted Runnion, while the canoe drove closer every instant. On the fourth, as she dashed at him, he struck to be rid of her, cursing wickedly—struck as he would have struck at a man. Silently she crumpled up and fell, a pitiful, draggled, awkward little figure sprawled upon the rocks; but the delay proved fatal to him, for, though the canoe was close against the bank, and the huge man in it seemed to offer a mark too plain to be missed, he was too close to permit careful aim. Runnion heard him giving utterance to a strange, feral, whining sound, as if he were crying like a fighting boy; then, as the gambler raised his arm, the Canadian lifted himself up on the bottom of the canoe until he stood stretched to his full height, and leaped. As Runnion fired he sprang out and was into the water to his knees, his backward kick whirling the craft from underneath him out into the current, where the river seized it. He had risen and jumped all in one moment, launching himself at the shore like a panther. The gun roared again, but Poleon came up and on with the rush of the great, brown grizzly that no missile can stop. Runnion's weapon blazed in his face, but he neither felt nor heeded it, for his bare hands were upon his quarry, the impact of his body hurling the other from his feet, and neither of them knew whether any or all of the last bullets had taken effect. Poleon had come like an arrow, straight for his mark the instant he glimpsed it, an insensate, unreasoning, raging thing that no weight of lead nor length of blade could stop. In his haste he had left Flambeau without weapon of any kind, for in his mind such things were superfluous, and he had never fought with any but those God gave him, nor found any living thing that his hands could not master. Therefore, he had rushed headlong against this armed and waiting man, reaching for him ever closer and closer till the burning powder stung his eyes. They grappled and fought, alone and unseen, and yet it was no fight, for Runnion, though a vigorous, heavy-muscled man, was beaten down, smothered, and crushed beneath the onslaught of this great naked fellow, who all the time sobbed and whined and mewed in a panting fury.
They swung half across the spit to the farther side, where they fell in a fantastic convulsion, slipping and sliding and rolling among the rocks that smote and gouged and bruised them. The gambler fought for his life against the naked flesh of the other, against the distorted face that snapped and bit like the muzzle of a wolf, while all the time he heard that fearful, inarticulate note of blood-hunger at his ear. The Canadian's clenched hands crushed whatever they fell upon as if mailed with metal; the fingers were like tearing tongs that could not be loosed. It was a frightful combat, hideous from its inequality, like the battle of a man against a maddened beast whose teeth tore and whose claws ripped, whose every move was irresistible. And so it was over shortly.
Poleon rose and ran to the fallen girl, leaving behind him a huddled and twisted likeness of a man. He picked her up tenderly, moaning and crooning; but as her limp head lolled back, throwing her pale, blind features up to the heavens, he began to cry, this time like a woman. Tears fell from his eyes, burning tears, the agony of which seared his soul. He laid her carefully beside the water's edge, and, holding her head and shoulders in the crook of his left arm, he wet his right hand and bathed her face, crouching over her, half nude, dripping with the sweat of his great labors, a tender, palpitating figure of bronzed muscle and sinew, with all his fury and hate replaced by apprehension and pity. The short moments that he worked with her were ages to him, but she revived beneath his ministrations, and her first frightened look of consciousness was changed to a melting smile.
W-what happened, Poleon? she said. "I was afraid!"
He stood up to his full height, shaking, and weak as the water that dripped from him, the very bones in him dissolved. For the first time he uttered words.
T'ank God, ba gosh! and ran his hand up over his wet face.
Where is he? She started to her knees affrightedly; then, seeing the twisted, sprawling figure beyond, began to shudder. "He—he's dead?"
I don' know, said Poleon, carelessly. "You feel it purty good now, eh, w'at?"
Yes—I—he struck me! The remembrance of what had occurred surged over her, and she buried her face in her hands. "Oh, Poleon! Poleon! He was a dreadful man."
He don' trouble you no more.
He tried—he—Ugh! I—I'm glad you did it! She broke down, trembling at her escape, until her selfishness smote her, and she was up and beside him on the instant. "Are you hurt? Oh, I never thought of that. You must be wounded!"
The Frenchman felt himself over, and looked down at his limbs for the first time, "No! I guess not," he said, at which Necia noticed his meagre attire, and simultaneously he became conscious of it. He fell away a pace, casting his eyes over the river for his canoe, which was now a speck in the distance.
Ba gosh! I'm hell of a t'ing for lookin' at, he said. "I'm paddle hard—dat's w'y. Sacré! how I sweat!" He hitched nervously at the band of his overalls, while Necia answered:
That's all right, Poleon. Then, without warning, her face froze with mingled repulsion and wonder. "Look! Look!" she whispered, pointing past him.
Runnion was moving slowly, crawling painfully into a sitting posture, uplifting a terribly mutilated face, dazed and half conscious, groping for possession of his wits. He saw them, and grimaced frightfully, cowering and cringing.
Poleon felt the girl's hand upon his arm, and heard her crying in a hard, sharp voice:
He needs killing! Put him away!
He stared down at his gentle Necia, and saw the loathing in her face and the look of strange ferocity as she met his eyes boldly.
You don't know what he—what he did, she said, through her shut teeth. "He—" But the man waited to hear no more.
Runnion saw him coming, and scrambled frantically to all-fours, then got on his feet and staggered down the bar. As Poleon overtook him, he cried out piteously, a shrill scream of terror, and, falling to his knees, grovelled and debased himself like a foul cripple at fear of the lash. His agony dispelled the savage taint of Alluna's aboriginal training in Necia, and the pure white blood of her ancestors cried out:
Poleon, Poleon! Not that! She hurried after him to where he paused above the wretch waiting for her. "You mustn't!" she said. "That would be murder, and—and—it's all over now."
The Frenchman looked at her wonderingly, not comprehending this sudden leniency.
Let him alone; you've nearly killed him; that's enough. Whereat Runnion, broken in body and spirit, began to beg for his life.
Wat's dat you say jus' now? Doret asked the girl. "Was dat de truth for sure w'at you speak?"
Yes, but you've done your work. Don't touch him again.
He hesitated, and Runnion, quick to observe it, added his entreaty to hers.
I'm beaten, Doret. You broke me to pieces. I need help—I—I'm hurt.
W'at you 'spec' I do wit' 'im? the Canadian asked, and she answered:
I suppose we'll have to take him where he can get assistance.
Dat skiff ain' carry all free of us.
I'll stay here, groaned the frightened man. "I'll wait for a steamer to pick me up, but for God's sake don't touch me again!"
Poleon looked him over carefully, and made up his mind that the man was more injured in spirit than in body, for, outside of his battered muscles, he showed no fatal symptoms. Although the voyageur was slower to anger than a child, a grudge never died in him, and his simple, self-taught creed knew no forgiveness for such men as Runnion, cherished no mercy for preying men or beasts. He glanced towards the wooded shores a stone's-throw above, then back at the coward he had beaten and whose life was forfeit under the code. There was a queer light in his eyes.
Leave him here, Poleon. We'll go away, you and I, in the canoe, and the first boat will pick him up. Come. Necia tugged at his wrist for fear she might not prevail; but he was bent on brushing away a handful of hungry mosquitoes which, warmed by the growing day, had ventured out on the river. His face became wrinkled and set.
Bien! he grunted. "We lef 'im here, biccause dere ain't 'nough room in de batteau, eh? All right! Dat's good t'ing; but he's seeck man, so mebbe I feex it him nice place for stop till dem boats come."
Yes, yes! Leave me here. I'll make it through all right, begged Runnion.
Better you camp yonder on de point, w'ere you can see dose steamboat w'en she comes 'roun' de ben'. Dis is bad place. He indicated the thicket, a quarter of a mile above which ran out almost to the cut bank. "Come! I help you get feex."
Runnion shrank from his proffered assistance half fearfully, but, reassured, allowed the Frenchman to help him towards the shore.
We tell it de first boat 'bout you, an' dey pick you up. You wait here, Necia.
The girl watched her rescuer guide Runnion up to the level of the woods, then disappear with him in the firs, and was relieved to see the two emerge upon the river-bank again farther on, for she had feared for an instant that Poleon might forget. There seemed to be no danger, however, for he was crashing through the brush in advance of the other, who followed laboriously. Once Runnion gained the high point, he would be able to command a view of both reaches of the river, and could make signals to attract the first steamboat that chanced to come along. Without doubt a craft of some sort would pass from one direction or the other by to-morrow at latest, or, if not, she and Poleon could send back succor to him from the first habitation they encountered. The two men disappeared again, and her fears had begun to prey on her a second time when she beheld the big Canadian returning. He was hurrying a bit, apparently to be rid of the mosquitoes that swarmed about him; and she marked that, in addition to whipping himself with a handful of blueberry bushes, he wore Runnion's coat to protect his shoulders.
Woof! Dose skeeter bug is hongry, he cried. "Let's we pass on de river queeck."
You didn't touch him again?
No, no. I'm t'rough wit' 'im.
She was only too eager to be away from the spot, and an instant later they were afloat in the Peterborough.
Dis nice batteau, Poleon remarked, critically. "I mak' it go fas'," and began to row swiftly, seeking the breeze of the open river in which to shake off the horde of stinging pests that had risen with the sun. "I come 'way queeck wit'out t'inkin' 'bout gun or skeeter net or not'in'. Runnion she's len' me dis coat, so mebbe I don' look so worse lak' I do jus' now, eh?"
How did you leave him? Is he badly injured?
No, I bus' it up on de face an' de rib, but she's feelin' good now. Yes. I'm leave 'im nice place for stop an' wait on de steamboat—plaintee spruce bough for set on.
She began to shudder again, and, sensitive to her every motion, he asked, solicitously, if she were sick, but she shook her head.
I—I—was thinking what—supposing you hadn't come? Oh, Poleon! you don't know what you saved me from. She leaned forward and laid a tiny, grateful hand on the huge brown paw that rested on his oar. "I wonder if I can ever forget?"
She noted that they were running with the current, and inquired:
Where are we going?
Wal, I can't pull dis boat 'gainst dat current, so I guess we pass on till I fin' my shirt, den bimebye we pick it up some steamboat an' go home.
Five miles below his quick eye detected his half-submerged "bark" lodged beneath some overhanging firs which, from the water's action, had fallen forward into the stream, and by rare good-fortune it was still upright, although awash. He towed it to the next sand-bar, where he wrung out and donned his shirt, then tipped the water from the smaller craft, and, making it fast astern of the Peterborough, set out again. Towards noon they came in sight of a little stern-wheeled craft that puffed and pattered manfully against the sweeping current, hiding behind the points and bars and following the slackest water.
It's the Mission, boat! cried Necia. "It's the Mission boat! Father Barnum will be aboard."
She waved her arms madly and mingled her voice with Poleon's until a black-robed figure appeared beside the pilot-house.
Father Barnum! she screamed, and, recognizing her, he signalled back.
Soon they were alongside, and a pair of Siwash deckhands lifted Necia aboard, Doret following after, the painter of the Peterborough in his teeth. He dragged both canoes out of the boiling tide, and laid them bottom up on the forward deck, then climbed the narrow little stairs to find Necia in the arms of a benignant, white-haired priest, the best-beloved man on the Yukon, who broke away from the girl to greet the Frenchman, his kind face alight with astonishment.
What is all this I hear? Slowly, Doret, slowly! My little girl is talking too furiously for these poor old wits to follow. I can't understand; I am amazed. What is this tale?
Together they told him, while his blue eyes now opened wide with wonder, now grew soft with pity, then blazed with indignation. When they had finished he laid his hand upon Doret's shoulder.
My son, I thank God for your good body and your clean heart. You saved our Necia, and you will be rewarded. As to this—this—man Runnion, we must find him, and he must be sent out of the country; this new, clean land of ours is no place for such as he. You will be our pilot, Poleon, and guide us to the spot.
It required some pressure to persuade the Frenchman, but at last he consented; and as the afternoon drew to a close the little steamboat came squattering and wheezing up to the bar where Runnion had built his fire that morning, and a long, shrill blast summoned him from the point above. When he did not appear the priest took Poleon and his round-faced, silent crew of two and went up the bank, but they found no sign of the crippled man, only a few rags, a trampled patch of brush at the forest's edge, and—that was all. The springy moss showed no trail; the thicket gave no answer to their cries, although they spent an hour in a scattered search and sounded the steamboat's whistle again and again.
He's try for walk it back to camp, said Doret. "Mebbe he ain' hurt so much, after all."
You must be right, said Father Barnum. "We will keep the steamer close to this shore, so that he can hail us when we overtake him."
And so they resumed their toilsome trip; but mile after mile fell behind them, and still no voice came from the woods, no figure hailed them. Doret, inscrutable and silent, lounged against the pilot-house smoking innumerable cigarettes, which he rolled from squares of newspaper, his keen eyes apparently scanning every foot of their slow way; but when night fell, at last, and the bank faded from sight, he tossed the last butt overboard, smiled grimly into the darkness, and went below.
"No Creek" Lee came into the trading-post on the following morning, and found Gale attending store as if nothing unusual had occurred.
Say! What's this about you and Stark? I hear you had a horrible run-in, and that you split him up the back like a quail.
We had a row, admitted the trader. "It's been a long time working out, and last night it came to a head."
Lord-ee! And to think of Ben Stark's bein' licked! Why, the whole camp's talkin' about it! They say he emptied two six-shooters at you, but you kept a-comin', and when you did get to him you just carved your initials on him like he was a bass-wood tree. Say, John, he's a goner, sure.
Do you mean he's—passing out?
Oh no! I reckon he'll get well, from what I hear, though he won't let nobody come near him except old Doc; but he's lost a battle, and that ends him. Don't you savvy? Whenever a killer quits second best, it breaks his hoodoo. Why, there's been men laying for him these twenty years, from here to the Rio Grande, and every feller he ever bested will hear of this and begin to grease his holster; then the first shave-tail desperado that meets him will spit in his eye, just to make a name for himself. No, sir! He's a spent shell. He's got to fight all his battles over again, and this time the other feller will open the ball. Oh, I've seen it happen before. You killed him last night, just as sure as if you'd hung up his hide to dry, and he knows it.
I'm a peaceable man, said Gale, on the defensive. "I had to do it."
I know! I know! There was witnesses—this dress-maker at the fort seen it, so I hear.
The other acquiesced silently.
Well! Well! Ben Stark licked! I can't get over that. It must 'a' been somethin' powerful strong to make you do it, John. It was as close to a question as the miner dared come, although he was avid with curiosity, and, like the entire town, was in a fret to know what lay back of this midnight encounter, concerning which the most exaggerated rumors were rife. These stories grew the more grotesque and ridiculous the longer the truth remained hidden, for Stark could not be seen, and neither Gale nor Burrell would speak. All that the people knew was that one lay wounded to death behind the dumb walls of his cabin, and that the other had brought him down. When the old man vouchsafed no more than a nod to his question, the prospector inquired:
Where's Poleon? I've got news for him from the creek.
I don't know; he's gone.
Back soon?
I don't know. Why?
His laymen have give up. They've cross-cut his ground and the pay ain't there, so they've quit work for good.
He drew a blank, eh?
Worse'n that—three of them. The creek is spotteder than a leopard. Runnion's men, for instance, are into it bigger than a house, while Poleon's people can't raise a color. I call it tough luck—yes, worse'n tough: it's hard-biled and pickled. To them as has shall it be given, and to them as hasn't shall be took even what they 'ain't got, as the poet says. Look at Necia! She'll be richer than a cream puff. Guess I'll step around and see her.
She's gone, said the trader, wearily, turning his haggard face from the prospector.
Gone! Where?
Up-river with Runnion. They got her away from me last night.
Sufferin' snakes! ejaculated Lee. "So that's why!" Then he added, simply, "Let's go and git her, John."
The trader looked at him queerly.
Maybe I won't—on the first boat! I'm eating my heart out hour by hour waiting—waiting—waiting for some kind of a craft to come, and so is Burrell.
What's he got to do with it? said the one-eyed miner, jealously. "Can't you and me bring her back?"
He'll marry her! God, won't there never be a boat!
For the hundredth time that morning he went to the door of the post and strained his eyes down-stream.
Well, well! Them two goin' to be married, said Lee. "Stark licked, and Necia goin' to be married—all at once. I hate to see it, John; he ain't good enough; she could 'a' done a heap better. There's a lot of reg'lar men around here, and she could 'a' had her pick. Of course, always bein' broke like a dog myself, I 'ain't kept up my personal appearance like I'd ought, but I've got some new clothes now, and you wouldn't know me. I bought 'em off a tenderfoot with cold feet, but they're the goods, and you'd see a big improvement in me."
He's a good man, said Gale. "Better than you or me, and he's all torn up over this. I never saw a man act so. When he learned about it I thought he'd go mad—he's haunted the river-bank ever since, raging about for some means of following her, and if I hadn't fairly held him he'd have set out single-handed."
I'm still strong in the belief that Necia could have bettered her hand by stayin' out awhile longer, declared Lee, stubbornly; "but if she wants a soldier, why, we'll get one for her, only I'd rather have got her somethin' real good and pronounced in the military line—like an agitant-gen'ral or a walkin' delegate."
While they were talking Burrell came in, and "No Creek" saw that the night had affected the youth even more than it had Gale, or at least he showed the marks more plainly, for his face was drawn, his eyes were sunken as if from hunger, and his whole body seemed to have fallen away till his uniform hung upon him loose, unkempt, and careless. It was as if hope had been a thing of avoirdupois, and when taken away had caused a shrinkage. He had interrogated Stark again after getting the doctor, but the man had only cursed at him, declaring that his daughter was out of reach, where he would take care to keep her, and torturing the lover anew by linking Runnion's name with the girl's till the young man fled from the sound of the monster's voice back to his own quarters. He strove to keep the image of Runnion out of his mind, for his reason could not endure it. At such times he cried aloud, cursing in a way that was utterly strange to a God-fearing man, only to break off and rush to the other extreme, praying blindly, beseechingly, for the girl's safe-keeping. At intervals an unholy impulse almost drove him to Stark's cabin to finish the work Gale had begun, to do it coldly as a matter of justice, for was he not the one who had put Necia into the hands of that ruffian? Greeting Lee mechanically, he said to Gale:
I can't wait much longer, and sank wearily into a seat. Almost the next instant he was on his feet again, saying to the trader, as he had said it a score of times already: "Runnion comes to me, Gale! You understand he's mine, don't you?"
The old man nodded. "Yes! You can take him."
Well, who do I git? asked Lee.
You can't come along, the trader said. "We may have to follow the hound clean to the States. Think of your mine—"
To hell with the mine! exploded the shaggy prospector. "I reckon I'm kind of a daddy to your gal, and I'm goin' to be in at the finish."
Back and forth paced the Lieutenant restlessly, pausing every now and then to peer down the river. Suddenly he uttered a cry, and with a bound Gale was beside him, Lee at his shoulder.
Look! Over the point! Down yonder! I saw smoke!
The three stared at the distant forest fringe that masked the bend of the river until their eyes ached, and the dark-green grew black and wavered indistinctly.
You're tired, my boy, said Gale.
Wait!
They obeyed, and finally over the tree-tops saw a faint streamer of
black.
It is! It is! cried the soldier. "I'm going for my war bag." And before the steamboat had hove into sight he was back with his scanty bundle of baggage, behaving like one daft, talking and laughing and running here and there. Lee watched him closely, then went behind the bar and poured out a stiff glass of whiskey, which he made Burrell drink. To Gale he whispered, a moment later:
Keep your eye on him, John—he'll go mad at this rate.
They waited, it seemed interminably, until at last a white hull slowly rounded the point, then shaped a course across the current towards the other bank, where the water was less swift. As it came fully into sight, Gale swore aloud in despair:
It's the Mission boat!
Well, what of that? said Burrell. "We'll hire it—buy it—take it!"
It's no use; she ain't got but three dog-power to her engines, Lee explained. "She's a down-river boat—has to run with the current to move."
We can't use her, Gale gave in, reluctantly. "She'd only lose time for us. We've got to wait for one of the A. C. boats."
Wait! cried Burrell. "Good God! we've done nothing but wait, WAIT, WAIT! Let's do something!"
You go back yonder and set down, commanded Lee. "We'll have a boat before long."
The arrival of the tiny Mission steamer was never of sufficient importance to draw a crowd to the riverbank, so the impatient men at the post relaxed interest in her as she came creeping up abreast of the town. It was little Johnny Gale who first saw Necia and Poleon on board, for he had recognized Father Barnum's craft at a distance, and stationed himself at the bank hand-in-hand with Molly to bid the good, kind old man welcome.
The men inside the house did not hear the boy crying Necia's name, for his voice was small, and they had gone to the rear of the store.
Understand! You leave Runnion to me, Burrell was saying. "No man shall lay hands on him except me—" His voice trailed away; he rose slowly to his feet, a strange light on his face. The others turned to see what sight had drawn his eyes. In the opening, all splendid with the golden sunlight, stood Necia and Poleon Doret, who had her by the hand—and she was smiling!
Gale uttered a great cry and went to meet them, but the soldier could move nothing save his lips, and stood dazed and disbelieving. He saw them dimly coming towards him, and heard Poleon's voice as if at a great distance, saw that the Frenchman's eyes were upon him, and that his words were directed to him.
I bring her back to you, M'sieu'!
Doret laid Necia's hand in that of her lover, and Burrell saw her smiling shyly up at him. Something gripped him chokingly, and he could utter no sound. There was nothing to say-she was here, safe, smiling, that was all. And the girl, beholding the glory in his eyes, understood.
Gale caught her away from him then, and buried her in his arms.
A woman came running into the store, and, seeing the group, paused at the door—a shapeless, silent, shawled figure in silhouette against the day. The trader brought the girl to her foster-mother, who began to talk in her own tongue with a rapidity none of them had ever heard before, her voice as tender as some wild bird's song; then the two women went away together around the store into the house. Poleon had told Necia all the amazing story that had come to him that direful night, all that he had overheard, all that he knew, and much that he guessed.
The priest came into the store shortly, and the men fell upon him for information, for nothing was to be gained from Poleon, who seemed strangely fagged and weary, and who had said but little.
Yes, yes, yes! laughed Father Barnum. "I'll tell you all I know, of course, but first I must meet Lieutenant Burrell and take him by the hand."
The story did not lose in his telling, particularly when he came to describe the fight on the gravel bar which no man had seen, and of which Poleon had told him little; but the good priest was of a militant turn, and his blue eyes glittered and flashed like an old crusader's.
It was a wondrous combat, he declared, with all the spirit of a spectator, "for Poleon advanced bare-handed and beat him down even as the man fired into his face. It is due to the goodness and mercy of God that he was spared a single wound from this desperado—a miracle vouchsafed because of his clean heart and his righteous cause."
But where is Runnion? broke in Burrell.
Nursing his injuries at some wood-cutter's camp, no doubt; but God be praised for that double spirit of generosity and forgiveness which prompted our Poleon to spare the wretch. No finer thing have I known in all my life, Doret, even though you have ever been an ungodly fellow.
The Frenchman moved uneasily.
Wal, I don' know; he ain' fight so dam' hard.
You couldn't find no trace of him? said Lee.
No trace whatever, Father Barnum replied; "but he will surely reach some place of refuge where we can pick him up, for the days are still mild and the woods full of berries, and, as you know, the streams overflow with salmon, which he can kill with a stick. Why, a man might live a fortnight without inconvenience!"
I'll be on the lookout for him, said the Lieutenant, grimly. "To-night I'll send Thomas and a couple of men down the river."
When the voluble old priest had at last exhausted his narrative he requested of Burrell the privilege of a few words, and drew him apart from the others. His face was shrewdly wrinkled and warm with understanding.
I had a long conversation with my little girl, for she is like a daughter to me, and I discovered the depth of her love for you. Do you think you are worthy of her?
No.
Do you love her as much as you should?
As much as I can. They don't make words or numbers big enough to tell you how dear she is to me.
Then why delay? To-morrow I leave again, and one never knows what a day may bring forth.
But Stark? the young man cried. "He's her father, you know; he's like a madman, and she's still under age."
I know very little of law outside of the Church, the Father observed, "but, as I understand it, if she marries before he forbids her, the law will hold him powerless. Now, he has never made himself known to her, he has never forbidden her anything; and although my conclusion may not be correct, I believe it is, and you have a chance if you make haste. At your age, my boy, I never needed a spur."
A spur? Good Lord! I'm from Kentucky.
Once she is yours before God, your hold will be stronger in the eyes of men. If I am wrong, and he takes her from you—well, may some other priest re-wed you two—I sha'n't!
Don't worry, laughed Burrell, ablaze at the thought. "You're the only preacher who'll kiss my bride, for I'm a jealous man, and all the Starks and all the fathers in the world won't get her away from me. Do you think she'll do it?"
A woman in love will do anything.
Burrell seized the little man by the hand. "If I had known more law you needn't have given me this hint."
I must go now to this Stark, said the Father; "he may need me. But first I shall talk with Necia. Poor child, she is in a difficult position, standing between the love of John Gale and the loyalty she owes her father. I—I fear I cannot counsel her as well as I ought, for I am very weak and human. You had better come with me; perhaps the plea of a lover may have more weight than the voice of reason." As they started towards the house, he continued, energetically: "Young man, I'm beginning to live once more. Do you know, sometimes I think I was not designed for this vocation, and, just between you and me, there was a day when—" He paused and coughed a trifle, then said, sharply, "Well, what are you waiting for?"
Together they went into the trader's house.
Back in the store there was silence after the priest and the soldier went out, which Gale broke at last:
This forgiveness talk is all right, I suppose—but I WANT RUNNION!
We'll git him, too, growled Lee, at which Poleon uttered a curt exclamation:
No!
Why not? said the miner.
Wal, the Canadian drawled, slowly, then paused to light the cigarette he had rolled in a bit of wrapping-paper, inhaled the smoke deeply to the bottom of his lungs, held it there a moment, and blew it out through mouth and nostrils before adding, "you'll jus' be wastin' tam'!"
Gale looked up from beneath his thatch of brow, and asked, quietly:
Why?
You 'member—story I tol' you wan day, two, t'ree mont' ago, Poleon remarked, with apparent evasion, "'bout Johnny Platt w'at I ketch on de Porcupine all et up by skeeter-bugs?"
I do, answered Gale.
Wal,—he met their eyes squarely, then drew another long breath from his cigarette—"I'm jus' hopin' nobody don' pick it up dis Runnion feller de same way. Mebbe dey fin' hees han's tie' behin' 'im wit' piece of hees shirt-"
Good God! cried the trader, starting to his feet. "You—you—"
—of course, I'm jus' s'posin'. He was feel purty good w'en I lef'. He was feel so good I tak' hees coat for keepin' off dem bugs from me, biccause I lef it my own shirt on de canoe. He's nice feller dat way; he give up easy. Ba gosh! I never see worse place for skeeters!
Gale fell silent, and "No Creek" Lee began to swear in little, useless, ineffective oaths, which were but two ways of showing similar emotions. Then the former stepped up and laid a big hand upon Poleon's shoulder.
That saves us quite a trip, he said, but "No Creek" Lee continued to swear softly.
It seemed that Poleon's wish was to be gratified, for no news of the missing man came through in the days that followed. Only at a fishing village far down the river, where a few native families had staked their nets and weirs for salmon, a hunter told a strange tale to his brothers—a tale of the white man's idiosyncrasies. In sooth, they were a strange people, he observed, surpassing wise in many things, yet ignorant and childish in all others, else why should a half-naked man go wandering idly through the thickets holding a knotted rag behind his back, and that when the glades were dense and the moss-chinks filled with the singing people who lived for blood? The elders of the village nodded their heads sagely, and commended the hunter for holding aloof from the inert body, for the foolishness of this man was past belief, and—well, his people were swift and cruel in their vengeance, and sometimes doubted an Indian's word, wherefore it were best to pay no heed to their ways and say nothing. But they continued to wonder why.
Father Barnum found the three still talking in the store when he had finished an hour's counsel with Necia, so came straight to the point. It was work that delighted his soul, for he loved the girl, and had formed a strong admiration for Burrell. Two of them took his announcement quietly, the other cried out strenuous objections. It was the one-eyed miner.
Right away! Not on your life! It's too onexpected. You've got to hold 'em apart for an hour, anyhow, till I get dressed. He slid down from his seat upon the counter. "What do you reckon I got all them clothes for?"
Come as you are, urged the Father, but Lee fought his point desperately.
I'll bust it up if you don't gimme time. What's an hour or two when they've got a life sentence comin' to 'em. Dammit, you jest ought to see them clothes! And by very force of his vociferations he succeeded in exacting the promise of a brief stay in the proceedings before he bolted out, the rags of his yellow mackinaw flapping excitedly.
The priest returned to Necia, leaving the trader and Poleon alone.
I s'pose it's best, said the former.
Yes!
Beats the deuce, though, how things work out, don't it?
I'm glad for see dis day, said the Frenchman. "He's good man, an' he ain' never goin' to hurt her none." He paused. "Dere's jus' wan t'ing I want for ask it of you, John—you 'member dat day we stop on de birch grove, an' you spik 'bout her an' tol' me dose story 'bout her moder? Wal, I was dreamin' dat tam', so I'm goin' ask it you now don' never tell her w'at I said."
Doesn't she know, my boy?
No; I ain' never spoke 'bout love. She t'inks I'm broder wit' her, an'—dat's w'at I am, ba Gar! He could not hold his voice even—it broke with him; but he avoided the old man's gaze. Gale took him by the shoulders.
There ain't nothing so cruel in the world as a gentle woman, said he; "but she wouldn't hurt you for all the world, Poleon; only the blaze of this other thing has blinded her. She can't see nothing for the light of this new love of hers."
I know! Dat's w'y—nobody onderstan's but you an' me—
Gale looked out through the open door, past the sun-lit river which came from a land of mystery and vanished into a valley of forgetfulness, past the forest and the hills, in his deep-set eyes the light of a wondrous love that had lived with him these many weary years, and said:
Nobody else CAN understand but me—I know how it is. I had even a harder thing to bear, for you'll know she's happy at least, while I— His voice trembled, but, after a pause, he continued: "They neither of them understand what you've done for them, for it was you that brought her back; but some time they'll learn how great their debt is and thank you. It'll take them years and years, however, and when they do they'll tell their babes of you, Poleon, so that your name will never die. I loved her mother, but I don't think I could have done what you did."
She's purty hard t'ing, for sure, but I ain' t'ink 'bout Poleon Doret none w'en I'm doin' it. No, I'm t'ink 'bout her all de tarn'. She's li'l' gal, an' I'm beeg, strong feller w'at don' matter much an' w'at ain' know much—'cept singin', an' lovin' her. I'm see for sure now dat I ain' fit for her—I'm beeg, rough, fightin' feller w'at can't read, an' she's de beam of sunlight w'at blin' my eyes.
If I was a fool I'd say you'd forget in time, but I've lived my life in the open, and I know you won't. I didn't.
I don' want to forget, the brown man cried, hurriedly. "Le bon Dieu would not let me forget—it's all I've got to keep wit' me w'en I'm lookin' for my 'New Countree.'"
You're not goin' to look for that 'New Country' any more, Gale replied.
To-day, said the other, quietly.
No.
To-day! Dis affernoon! De blood in me is callin' for travel, John. I'm livin' here on dis place five year dis fall, an' dat's long tarn' for voyageur. I'm hongry for hear de axe in de woods an' de moose blow at sundown. I want for see the camp-fire t'rough de brush w'en I come from trap de fox an' dem little wild fellers. I want to smell smoke in de dusk. My work she's finish here, so I'm paddle away to-day, an' I'll fin' dat place dis tam', for sure—she's over dere. He raised his long arm and pointed to the dim mountains that hid the valley of the Koyukuk, the valley that called good men and strong, year after year, and took them to itself, while in his face the trader saw the hunger of his race, the unslaked longing for the wilderness, the driving desire that led them ever North and West, and, seeing it, he knew the man would go.
Have you heard the news from the creeks?
No.
Your claims are blanks; your men have quit.
The Frenchman shook his head sadly, then smiled—a wistful little smile.
Wal, it's better I lose dan you—or Necia; I ain' de lucky kin', dat's all; an', affer all, w'at good to me is riche gol'-mine? I ain' got no use for money—any more.
They stood in the doorway together, two rugged, stalwart figures, different in blood and birth and every other thing, yet brothers withal, whom the ebb and flow of the far places had thrown together and now drew apart again. And they were sad, these two, for their love was deeper than comes to other people, and they knew this was farewell; so they remained thus side by side, two dumb, sorrowful men, until they were addressed by a person who hurried from the town.
He came as an apparition bearing the voice of "No Creek" Lee, the mining king, but in no other way showing sign or symbol of their old friend. Its style of face and curious outfit were utterly foreign to the miner, for he had been bearded with the robust, unkempt growth of many years, tanned to a leathery hue, and garbed perennially in the habit of a scarecrow, while this creature was shaved and clipped and curried, and the clothes it stood up in were of many startling hues. Its face was scraped so clean of whiskers as to be a pallid white, but lack of adornment ended at this point and the rest was overladen wondrously, while from the centre of the half-brown, half-white face the long, red nose of Lee ran out. Beside it rolled his lonesome eye, alive with excitement.
He came up with a strut, illumining the landscape, and inquired:
Well, how do I look?
I'm darned if I know, said Gale. "But it's plumb unusual."
These here shoes leak, said the spectacle, pulling up his baggy trousers to display his tan footgear, "because they was made for dry goin'—that's why they left the tops off; but they've got a nice, healthy color, ain't they? As a whole, it seems to me I'm sort of nifty." He revolved slowly before their admiring gaze, and while to one versed in the manners of the Far East it would have been evident that the original owner of these clothes had come from somewhere beyond the Susquehanna, and had either been a football player or had travelled with a glee club, to these three Northmen it seemed merely that here was the modish echo of a distant civilization.
Wat's de matter on your face? said Poleon. "You been fightin'?"
I ain't shaved in a long time, and this here excitement has kind of shattered my nerves. I didn't have no lookin'-glass, neither, in my shack, so I had to use a lard-can cover. Does it look bad?
Not to my way of thinkin', said Gale, allaying "No Creek's" anxiety. "It's more desp'rate than bad, but it sort of adds expression." At which the miner's pride burst bounds.
I'll kindly ask you to note the shirt—ten dollars a copy, that's all! I got it from the little Jew down yonder. See them red spear-heads on the boosum? 'Flower dee Lizzies,' which means 'calla lilies' in French. Every one of 'em cost me four bits. On the level—how am I?
I never see no harness jus' lak it mese'f! exclaimed Doret. "You look good 'nough for tin-horn gambler. Say, don' you wear no necktie wit' dem kin' of clothes?"
No, sir! Not me. I'm a rude, rough miner, and I dress the part. Low-cut, blushin' shoes and straw hats I can stand for, likewise collars—they go hand-in-hand with pay-streaks; but a necktie ain't neither wore for warmth nor protection; it's a pomp and a vanity, and I'm a plain man without conceit. Now, let's proceed with the obsequies.
It was a very simple, unpretentious ceremony that took place inside the long, low house of logs, and yet it was a wonderful thing to the dark, shy maid who hearkened so breathlessly beside the man she had singled out—the clean-cut man in uniform, who stood so straight and tall, making response in a voice that had neither fear nor weakness in it. When they had done he turned and took her reverently in his arms and kissed her before them all; then she went and stood beside Gale and the red wife who was no wife, and said, simply:
I am very happy.
The old man stooped, and for the first time in her memory pressed his lips to hers, then went out into the sunlight, where he might be alone with himself and the memory of that other Merridy, the woman who, to him, was more than all the women of the world; the woman who, each day and night, came to him, and with whom he had kept faith. The burden she had laid upon him had been heavy, but he had borne it long and uncomplainingly; and now he was very glad, for he had kept his covenant.
The first word of the wedding was borne by Father Barnum, who went alone to the cabin where the girl's father lay, entering with trepidation; for, in spite of the pleas of justice and humanity, this stony-hearted, amply hated man had certain rights which he might choose to enforce; hence, the good priest feared for the peace of his little charge, and approached the stricken man with apprehension. He was there a long time alone with Stark, and when he returned to Gale's house he would answer no questions.
He is a strange man—a wonderfully strange man: unrepentant and wicked; but I can't tell you what he said. Have a little patience and you will soon know.
The mail boat, which had arrived an hour after the Mission boat, was ready to continue its run when, just as it blew a warning blast, down the street of the camp came a procession so strange for this land that men stopped, eyed it curiously, and whispered among themselves. It was a blanketed man upon a stretcher, carried by a doctor and a priest. The face was muffled so that the idlers could not make it out; and when they inquired, they received no answer from the carriers, who pursued their course impassively down the runway to the water's edge and up the gang-plank to the deck. When the boat had gone, and the last faint cough of its towering stacks had died away, Father Barnum turned to his friends:
He has gone away, not for a day, but for all time. He is a strange man, and some things he said I could not understand. At first I feared greatly, for when I told him what had occurred—of Necia's return and of her marriage—he became so enraged I thought he would burst open his wounds and die from his very fury; but I talked a long, long time with him, and gradually I came to know somewhat of his queer, disordered soul. He could not bring himself to face defeat in the eyes of men, or to see the knowledge of it in their bearing; therefore, he fled. He told me that he would be a hunted animal all his life; that the news of his whipping would travel ahead of him; and that his enemies would search him out to take advantage of him. This I could not grasp, but it seemed a big thing in his eyes—so big that he wept. He said the only decent thing he could or would do was to leave the daughter he had never known to that happiness he had never experienced, and wished me to tell her that she was very much like her mother, who was the best woman in the world.
There was mingled rejoicing and lamentation in the household of John Gale this afternoon. Molly and Johnny were in the throes of an overwhelming sorrow, the noise of which might be heard from the barracks to the Indian village. They were sparing of tears as a rule, but when they did give way to woe they published it abroad, yelling with utter abandon, their black eyes puckered up, their mouths distended into squares, from which came such a measure of sound as to rack the ears and burden the air heavily with sadness. Poleon was going away! Their own particular Poleon! Something was badly askew in the general scheme of affairs to permit of such a thing, and they manifested their grief so loudly that Burrell, who knew nothing of Doret's intention, sought them out and tried to ascertain the cause of it. They had found the French-Canadian at the river with their father, loading his canoe, and they had asked him whither he fared. When the meaning of his words struck home they looked at each other in dismay, then, bred as they were to mask emotion, they joined hands and trudged silently back up the bank with filling eyes and chins a-quiver until they gained the rear of the house. Here they sat down all forlorn, and began to weep bitterly and in an ascending crescendo.
What's the matter with you tikes, anyhow? inquired the Lieutenant. He had always filled them with a speechless awe, and at his unexpected appearance they began the slow and painful process of swallowing their grief. He was a nice man, they had both agreed long ago, and very splendid to the eye, but he was nothing like Poleon, who was one of them, only somewhat bigger.
Come, now! Tell me all about it, the soldier insisted. "Has something happened to the three-legged puppy?"
Molly denied the occurrence of any such catastrophe.
Then you've lost the little shiny rifle that shoots with air? But Johnny dispelled this horrible suspicion by drawing the formidable weapon out of the grass behind him.
Well, there isn't anything else bad enough to cause all this outlay of anguish. Can't I help you out?
Poleon! they wailed, in unison.
Exactly! What about him?
He's goin' away! said Johnny.
He's goin' away! echoed Molly.
Now, that's too bad, of course, the young man assented; "but think what nice things he'll bring you when he comes back."
He ain't comin' back! announced the heir, with the tone that conveys a sorrow unspeakable.
He ain't comin' back! wailed the little girl, and, being a woman, yielded again to her weakness, unashamed.
Burrell tried to extract a more detailed explanation, but this was as far as their knowledge ran. So he sought out the Canadian, and found him with Gale in the store, a scanty pile of food and ammunition on the counter between them.
Poleon, said he, "you're not going away?"
Yes, said Doret. "I'm takin' li'l' trip."
But when are you coming back?
The man shrugged his shoulders.
Dat's hard t'ing for tellin'. I'm res'less in my heart, so I'm goin' travel some. I ain' never pass on de back trail yet, so I 'spect I keep goin'.
Oh, but you can't! cried Burrell. "I—I—" He paused awkwardly, while down the breeze came the lament of the two little Gales. "Well, I feel just as they do." He motioned in the direction of the sound. "I wanted you for a friend, Doret; I hate to lose you."
I ain' never got my satisfy yet, so I'm pass on—all de tam' pass on. Mebbe dis trip I fin' de place.
I'm sorry—because—well, I'm a selfish sort of cuss—and— Burrell pulled up blushingly, with a strong man's display of shame at his own emotion. "I owe all my happiness to you, old man. I can't thank you—neither of us can—we shall never live long enough for that, but you mustn't go without knowing that I feel more than I'll ever have words to say."
He was making it very hard for the Frenchman, whose heart was aching already with a dull, unending pain. Poleon had hoped to get away quietly; his heart was too heavy to let him face Necia or this man, and run the risk of their reading his secret, so a plaintive wrinkle gathered between his eyes that grew into a smile. And then, as if he were not tried sufficiently, the girl herself came flying in.
What's this I hear? she cried. "Alluna tells me—" She saw the telltale pile on the counter, and her face grew white. "Then it's true! Oh, Poleon!"
He smiled, and spoke cheerily. "Yes, I been t'inkin' 'bout dis trip long tam'."
When are you coming back?
Wal, if I fin' dat new place w'at I'm lookin' for I don' never come back. You people was good frien' to me, but I'm kin' of shif'less feller, you know. Mebbe I forget all 'bout Flambeau, an' stop on my 'New Countree'—you never can tol' w'at dose Franchemans goin' do.
It's the wander-lust, murmured Burrell to himself; "he'll never rest."
What a child you are! cried Necia, half angrily. "Can't you conquer that roving spirit and settle down like a man?" She laid her hand on his arm appealingly. "Haven't I told you there isn't any 'far country'? Haven't I told you that this path leads only to hardship and suffering and danger? The land you are looking for is there"—she touched his breast—"so why don't you stay in Flambeau and let us help you to find it?"
He was deeply grateful for her blindness, and yet it hurt him so that his great heart was nigh to bursting. Why couldn't she see the endless, hopeless yearning that consumed him, and know that if he stayed in sight and touch of her it would be like a living death? Perhaps, then, she would have given over urging him to do what he longed to do, and let him go on that search he knew was hopeless, and in which he had no joy. But she did not see; she would never see. He laughed aloud, for all the world as if the sun were bright and the fret for adventure were still keen in him, then, picking up his bundle, said:
Dere's no use argue wit' Canayen man. Mebbe some day I come paddle back roun' de ben' down yonder, an' you hear me singin' dose chanson; but now de day she's too fine, de river she's laugh too loud, an' de birds she's sing too purty for Francheman to stop on shore. Ba gosh, I'm glad! He began to hum, and they heard him singing all the way down to the river-bank, as if the spirit of Youth and Hope and Gladness were not dead within him.
"
Chanté, rossignol, chanté! Toi qui à le coeur gai; Tu as le coeur à rire Mai j' l' ai-tà pleurer, Il y a longtemps que j' t'aime Jamais je ne t'oublierai.
"[Footnote: "Sing, little bird, oh, sing away!
You with the voice so light and gay!
Yours is a heart that laughter cheers,
Mine is a heart that's full of tears.
Long have I loved, I love her yet;
Leave her I can, but not forget."]
A moment later they heard him expostulating with some one at the water's edge, and then a child's treble rose on high.
No, no! I'm goin', too! I'm goin', too-o-o-o—
Hey! John Gale! called Poleon. "Come 'ere! Ba gosh! You better horry, too! I can't hol' dis feller long."
When they appeared on the bank above him, he continued, "Look 'ere w'at I fin' on my batteau," and held up the wriggling form of Johnny Gale. "He's stow hisse'f away onder dem blanket. Sacré! He's bad feller, dis man—don' pay for hees ticket at all; he's reg'lar toff mug."
I want to go 'long! yelled the incorrigible stow-away. He had brought his gun with him, and this weapon, peeping forth from under Poleon's blanket, had betrayed him. "I want to go 'long!" shrieked the little man "I like you best of all!" At which Doret took him in his arms and hugged him fiercely.
Wal, I guess you don' t'ink 'bout dem beeg black bear at night, eh? But this only awoke a keener distress in the junior Gale.
Oh, maybe de bear will get you, Poleon! Let me go long, and I'll keep dem off. Two men is better dan one—please, Poleon!
It took the efforts of Necia and the trader combined to tear the lad from the Frenchman, and even then the foul deed was accomplished only at the cost of such wild acclaim and evidence of undying sorrow that little Molly came hurrying from the house, her round face stained and tearful, her mouth an inverted crescent. She had gone to the lame puppy for comfort, and now strangled him absent-mindedly in her arms, clutching him to her breast so tightly that his tongue lolled out and his three legs protruded stiffly, pawing an aimless pantomime. When Johnny found that no hope remained, he quelled his demonstrations of emotion and, as befitted a stout-hearted gentleman of the woods, bore a final present to his friend. He took the little air-gun and gave it into Poleon's hands against that black night when the bears would come, and no man ever made a greater sacrifice. Doret picked him up by the elbows and kissed him again and again, then set him down gently, at which Molly scrambled forward, and without word or presentation speech gave him her heart's first treasure. She held out the three-legged puppy, for a gun and a dog should ever go together; then, being of the womankind aforesaid, she began to cry as she kissed her pet good-bye on its cold, wet nose.
Wat's dis? said Poleon, and his voice quavered, for these childish fingers tore at his heart-strings terribly.
He's a very brave doggie, said the little girl. "He will scare de bears away!" And then she became dissolved in tears at the anguish her offering cost her.
Doret caressed her as he had her brother, then placed the puppy carefully upon the blankets in the canoe, where it wagged a grateful and amiable stump at him and regained its breath. It was the highest proof of Molly's affection for her Poleon that she kept her tear-dimmed eyes fixed upon the dog as long as it was visible.
The time had come for the last good-bye—that awkward moment when human hearts are full and spoken words are empty. Burrell gripped the Frenchman's hand. He was grateful, but he did not know.
Good-luck and better hunting! he said. "A heavy purse and a light heart for you always, Poleon. I have learned to love you."
I want you to be good husban', M'sieu'. Dat's de bes' t'ing I can wish for you.
Gale spoke to him in patois, and all he said was:
May you not forget, my son.
They did not look into each other's eyes; there was no need. The old man stooped, and, taking both his children by the hand, walked slowly towards the house.
Dis tam' I'll fin' it for sure, smiled Poleon to Necia.
Her eyes were shining through the tears, and she whispered, fervently:
I hope so, brother. God love you—always.
It was grief at losing a playmate, a dear and well-beloved companion. He knew it well, and he was glad now that he had never said a word of love to her. It added to his pain, but it lightened hers, and that had ever been his wish. He gazed on her for a long moment, taking in that blessed image which would ever live with him—in his eyes was the light of a love as pure and clean as ever any maid had seen, and in his heart a sorrow that would never cease.
Good-bye, li'l' gal, he said, then dropped her hand and entered his canoe. With one great stroke he drove it out and into the flood, then headed away towards the mists and colors of the distant hills, where the Oreads were calling to him. He turned for one last look, and flung his paddle high; then, fearing lest they might see the tears that came at last unhindered, he began to sing:
"
Chante, rossignol, chante! Toi qui a le coeur gai; Tu as le coeur a rire Mai j' l' ai-t-a pleurer.
"
He sang long and lustily, keeping time to the dip of his flashing paddle and defying his bursting heart. After all, was he not a voyageur, and life but a song and a tear, and then a dream or two?
I wish I might have known him better, sighed Meade Burrell, as he watched the receding form of the boatman.
You would have loved him as we do, said Necia, "and you would have missed him as we will."
I hope some time he will be happy.
As happy as you, my soldier?
Yes; but that he can never be, said her husband; "for no man could love as I love you."
"
Yours is a heart that laughter cheers, Mine is a heart that's full of tears. Long have I loved, I love her yet; Leave her I can, but not forget—
"came the voice of the singer far down the stream. And thus Poleon of the Great Heart went away.