By the end of the fifth day the two young men were nearing the end of
their ride through the Windermere Valley. They had made the trip in
leisurely fashion, for the weather was superb and every hour was one of
supreme delight; furthermore, their mounts, secured from a livery barn
at Golden, were none of the best. As the sun was making toward the
horizon the riders topped the crest of a long incline, from which the
lofty tops of the fir trees of Pine Croft could be seen.
“Hold up, Dalton,” cried Paul. “There among the firs is Pine Croft, and
your eyes are resting upon the finest bit of mountain scenery in all
British Columbia; my father, who had seen the best, used to say the
finest in the world.”
Dalton sat entranced. His vocabulary of wonder and admiration had long
ago been exhausted.
“I wish I had saved up a big adjective or two,” he said. “Your father
must have been right, for anything finer is beyond my powers of
imagination.”
“Pine Croft Ranch sweeps up over those hills on the left,” said Paul,
“and about five miles down the river. Every mile, every yard, is dear to
me, how dear I never knew till this moment. Do you wonder I love it?”
“Paul,” said Dalton slowly, “I’d spend my last dollar if necessary in
helping you to redeem it. We will get that old robber and make him come
through. Never fear.”
“Let’s go,” shouted Paul, digging his spurs into his nag.
“Hurrah! I’m with you,” cried Dalton, and down the long incline they
sped at a perilous pace. A perilous pace it proved for Paul, for at a
little dry waterway his beast struck some loose stones, stumbled and
pitched headlong, hurling Paul far before him, head first, upon the
stony road, where he lay in a huddled heap.
Dalton hastened to him, laid him out upon his back and proceeded to put
into operation such methods of resuscitation as he had often practised
on the football field. But there was no response from the unconscious
Paul.
“Good Lord!” he cried, looking wildly about. “He’s dead.” He sprang to
his feet, caught his horse, and was about to mount, with the idea of
seeking help at the Pine Croft Ranch, when he heard the sound of horse
hoofs and, turning, saw coming down a line which they had passed a rider
cantering toward the road. With his fingers to his lips he sent forth a
piercing whistle and stood waving at the rider, who immediately swung
into a gallop. “A girl, by Jove!” he said to himself. “And a corker.”
“An accident, eh?” she inquired, leaping from her horse. “Why, it’s
Paul!” The girl flung herself down by him and took his head into her
lap. “Oh, is he dead?” she cried, lifting a pale and terror-stricken
face to Dalton. “Here! Why do you stand gawking there? Get water.”
“Where(?” gasped Dalton, gazing about wildly.
“Follow that lane to a well and bring a bucketful. And for Heaven’s sake
move!”
Flinging himself on his horse, Dalton followed the direction pointed
out, found the well and a bucket standing beside it and dashed back with
the bucket half full of water. A dash of water in his face, a deep
sobbing breath, and Paul opened his eyes, gazed without recognition at
the face hanging over him and closed them again.
“Paul! Oh, Paul!” cried the girl in an ecstasy of fear. “Speak to me!
Don’t you know me?”
Again Paul opened his eyes, let them rest a moment on the girl’s face,
then said with a quiet smile, “Hello, Adelina!”
“Oh, Paul,” cried the girl, drawing up his head to her breast, while the
tears came flowing from her eyes, “I was afraid you were dead.”
Her voice seemed to arouse him. “Dead! What’s wrong with me?” he said,
sitting up and swaying stupidly.
“Lie still,” ordered Adelina sharply. “Don’t move for a few minutes.”
“I wouldn’t if I were you,” said Dalton. Adelina caught the look which
Paul flashed up at his friend. Her face flushed scarlet, but Dalton
remained gravely serene.
“You stay there where you are till I tell you to move,” commanded
Adelina imperiously.
“Quite right,” said Dalton heartily. “Stay right there.”
“And perhaps you might feel if any of his bones are broken,” said
Adelina severely, flashing an indignant look out of her lustrous eyes at
that young man.
“Oh, certainly,” said Dalton, grabbing hold of a leg. “That’s all right,
eh, Paul?” he inquired, manipulating that member of his anatomy
gingerly.
“Oh, get out, Dalton. My bones are all right. Nothing wrong with me. I
have often been pitched like this before. So have you, Adelina.”
“Have seen ’em killed, too,” said Adelina, with a shudder. “But thank
Heaven you’re not that,” she added with a little laugh that somehow did
not go with her pale face and strained tone of voice.
“Now let me up, Adelina. I’m fit enough,” said Paul, raising himself on
his elbow. Adelina put her strong arms under his shoulders and helped
him to his feet.
“Come in and rest for a bit, Paul,” she said. “I don’t think you ought
to go on. Besides, there is no one at home to look after you.”
But Paul could not bring himself to accept her invitation. Nor would he
insult her by seeking to make excuse, for he knew that she knew the
reason why he would not enter the Sleeman abode.
“I am quite all right, Adelina, and Dalton and I wish to get settled
down in our quarters tonight.”
Adelina made no reply, but she made little effort to hide her
disappointment.
“Let me carry the bucket back for you,” said Dalton. “Shall we walk?” he
added, taking the bridle of her horse.
“No,” said Adelina. “I hate walking. And you don’t need to come.” But
Dalton insisted upon riding home with her.
“Why didn’t you go in with her, Paul?” said Dalton on his return. “She
was quite cut up by your refusal, I could see—quite grumpy with me. I
was not on her horizon, in fact. Stunning girl she is, old boy. Who is
she, anyway?”
“Why, Dalton, I must have had my senses knocked out! That’s Adelina
Sleeman.”
“What! Old Sleeman’s daughter? Good Lord, what a beastly fix!”
“Fix? She is a fine girl, one of the best,” said Paul.
“And I’ve got to put the screws to that—to her father tomorrow.”
“Let’s go on, Dalton. We will attend to that tomorrow.”
“Takes all the satisfaction out of my trip,” grunted Dalton. “Must go
over this case again.”
“Don’t see why. All you want is justice.”
“My dear boy, you haven’t grasped the niceties of the legal profession.
There is justice and justice. And there are various methods of obtaining
justice. I have been cherishing a fond expectation of seeing that old
robber squirm and wriggle like a bug on a pin. But now—well, you can’t
get any pleasure from seeing your prospective father-in-law squirm.”
“What the deuce are you talking about?” exclaimed Paul.
“Just what I have been saying. We have parted from the future Mrs.
Richard Dalton, unless she’s pre-empted. By Jove! old boy, what about
you? Begad! are you in there? Great Heavens! Now that I think of it, she
was rather terribly broken up over your supposed demise. Jove, that
explains everything—her grief, her rage at me, her curt dismissal. Say
the word, old man, and I back off the scene, hiding my wounds, smiling a
twisted smile, I believe it is, set lips, serene face, while a vulture
gnaws at my inwards. Oh, I’ll play the game——”
“Oh, you bally ass,” said Paul, mounting his horse, “cut it out! We were
boy and girl together.”
“Ah, that’s the fatal fact,” groaned Dalton.
“Don’t be an idiot. She does not care a hoot of a horned owl for me, in
that way, I mean. You are free to make old Sleeman your father-in-law,
for all I care,” said Paul with a grin. “But she is a fine girl, all the
same, mighty good sport.”
“Hold! No need for trumpets on that motif. Through all the corridors of
my soul they are sounding her praises. But you—you! Honor bright now!
Are you out of it? Once and for all. Your hand on it, old man, I mean
it,” said Dalton, pulling up horse and reaching out his hand to Paul.
“Honor bright! Go in and win your father-in-law, for all I care,” said
Paul.
“Oh, darn the father-in-law!” said Dalton, with a grimace. “But thank
the Lord you don’t marry your father-in-law. All right. She may turn me
down. Doubtless will on my first attempt. But hear my solemn vow—well,
never mind. Now for plan of campaign. Tomorrow we approach the old
villain. But stay! He must have some redeeming qualities to be the
father of a girl, a goddess, by Jove! like that. I shall set myself to
discover them. Never fear! I am still your lawyer and shall handle your
case with all fidelity and zeal, but with the soft pedal, my boy, the
soft pedal. I shall smile and smile and make him think I am saving him
from the clutches of stern retributive justice. Those I O U’s, for
instance, according to your father’s record, have obviously been met. It
will be mine to suggest that by some slight aberration of memory that
fact has escaped him. He will fall on my neck with gratitude. Jove! I’m
surrendering a lot of fun, but she’s worth it. Must recast my brief,
eh?”
“Well, that’s your job, and good luck with the girl, Dalton. Here we are
at Pine Croft. A lonely place, old man, but such as it is you are
welcome. Here is Tom. Hello, Tom! All fit?”
“Good! Good!” grunted Tom, running toward Paul and grasping his hand.
“Little chief come again!”
“Tom is one of my father’s old friends, Dalton. Taught me all I know
about the woods and things in them. Tom, my friend, Mr. Dalton.”
“Huh! Good! Good man!” said Tom, giving Dalton a keen look and offering
his hand.
“You are all right, Dalton. Tom is careful with his friendship.”
“Mighty glad to have Tom for a friend,” said Dalton, shaking the old
Indian’s hand warmly.
“How is supper, Tom?” said Paul. “Any prairie chicken? Partridge?”
“Huh! Chicken! partridge! deer!”
“Great Cæsar’s ghost! Tom, you don’t mean to say you’ve got all that?”
cried Paul.
“Huh!” grunted Tom, delighted. “Plenty, plenty on mountain.”
“Oh, I say, old boy! What about four o’clock tomorrow morning, eh?” said
Paul.
“Tomorrow? No! Business first. Tonight and tomorrow to business. After
that I’m your man. By the way, does the young lady by any chance handle
a gun?”
“Handle a gun? Rather! At least, she could six years ago.”
“Paul! Paul!” said Dalton solemnly. “What have I done that the gods
should so order my lot?”
After supper, while Paul and old Tom went over the guns and the hunting
gear and made all preparations for a week’s hunt, Dalton buried himself
in his papers, seeking to discover how he might utilise the soft pedal
without injuring his case, with the result that before they went to
sleep he had his new campaign fully planned.
“It’s all right, Paul,” he said. “We will get him all the same, but with
considerably less suffering to the old sinner.”
“I am not anxious to make him suffer, Dalton. I have got over that a
bit. He will get all he deserves, but not from me,” said Paul.
“Paul, you are a long way better man than I am,” said Dalton. “When I
see what you have lost through that old devil’s crime, I tell you I see
red. And I can’t understand how you take it as you do.”
Paul sat silently smoking for some minutes, looking into the fire.
“It is because of what all this brings back to me, Dalton, that I am
able to keep my hands off him and perhaps one day—to forgive him—not
yet, not yet—but perhaps some day. That’s my mother’s chair you are
sitting in——No! No! Sit down; I want you to sit there,” he added as
Dalton sprang up from the chair. He rose and took from a side table a
Bible. “This was her Bible, Dalton,” he said, his voice vibrating with
emotion. “I am going to read her last lesson to me.” Dalton laid his
pipe down while Paul read to him the immortal words which have set for
men whose hearts are hot with the passion for vengeance the ideal of the
Master of mankind. “I say not unto you until seven times, but until
seventy times seven.” Then, turning the pages to the story of His
Passion, he read again, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what
they do.”
“I have not arrived yet, Dalton, at the mountain peak, God knows. For
seven years I have been funking it, as utterly beyond me. But tonight I
glimpse it far up in the clouds. Here my mother learned to forgive, here
my father found forgiveness, and here I begin to feel how much I need
forgiveness. There’s a lot of humbug in me, Dalton.”
“Oh, darn it all, Paul, cut that out, unless you want to condemn me to
hell straightway.”
“I’m not thinking of you. Every man must work this out for himself and
in his own relations. There is that man near me here I have long wanted
to kill. As God is above, Dalton, I have waked up at night in that far
North country, wet with sweat, my hands clutched in the bed clothes, my
heart pounding with the joy of choking to death the man who brought
about my father’s death. Tonight in this room I feel myself in the
presence of my mother and in His presence Who was more to her than all
in the world, and that’s saying something, for she loved greatly. I feel
mean and contemptible. Her last words were, ‘Tell Daddy till seventy
times seven.’ Dalton, I have been saying the Lord’s Prayer night and
morning for seven years, and every time dodging the issue under a
pretence that in seeking vengeance I was only seeking justice. Justice
is not hatred, bitter, hot, heart-racking hatred. Justice is a holy
thing, with its foundation in the heart of the Eternal God, and lies
next to mercy. I have been a self-deceiving hypocrite. Never in these
seven years could I have gone to Sleeman and said, ‘Sleeman, I only seek
justice upon you.’ I knew I wanted more than that. God help me! I wanted
to feel my fingers in his throat and see his eyes turn back in his head.
That is the test of religion. I believe in God, I hold the thought of
Him close to that of my mother, I know Him, He has stayed by me all
these years—and yet—and yet—” he paused abruptly. “That will do for just
now, Dalton. I have been a wicked fool. I am seeing things a bit
differently tonight.”
Dalton was standing aghast all this time. This was a new Paul to him,
not the cool, controlled, self-contained man he had known and esteemed,
but a man shaken with passions deeper than he had ever seen in any human
being. His face was white, his eyes ablaze with a light that goes only
with madness, his sinewy hands were opening and shutting in convulsive
clutchings. It was easy to believe that those fingers could tear life
from any man’s throat.
“Good God, Gaspard! I never dreamed you had this thing in you. Look
here, old chap, I suggest you let me settle this thing tomorrow with
this man. I mean—I think—well, what’s the use going through all this
thing as you must when you see him? Besides, I can handle this without
you.”
Paul threw himself down in his chair and with shaking fingers began
filling his pipe.
“That’s all about that, Dalton,” he said in a voice still trembling. “I
think I shall take your offer. It just occurs to me—what would you say
if I went off and left you alone to handle this thing, and I went north
to Fort Reliance for my brother and sister? I could do it in about two
weeks. You could potter about here with Tom. There’s good shooting. What
do you say?”
Dalton sat smoking, his mind working swiftly. It would be a good thing
for Paul to be out of the way for a few days. It would be rather lonely
for himself, of course, but there flooded before his mind’s eye a vision
of flashing black eyes and curving lips, altogether alluring. There were
possibilities in the new situation.
“A good idea, Paul,” he said enthusiastically. “I would only hinder you
on that trip north. And when you returned we could still do a bit of a
shoot, eh?”
Long into the night they talked over their new plans, coming at last to
the determination that in two days Paul should set off on his northward
trip, leaving Dalton to conclude his business with Sleeman alone.
They were still lingering over a lazy breakfast when a cheery call from
the hill at the rear drew them out of doors, to find Adelina, a radiant
vision of picturesque loveliness, superbly mounted and vibrant with
life.
“Ah! our patient is apparently happily convalescent,” she cried, waving
them a salute.
“And able to partake of some slight nourishment, as I can testify,”
replied Dalton, his eyes glowing with the admiration which he took no
pains to conceal.
“Then what do you say to a preliminary survey of the beauty spots of our
little valley, eh, Paul?”
“I am tied up with some matters demanding attention, but if you can take
Dalton off my hands I shall be more than grateful,” said Paul.
“Ungrateful beast!” said Dalton. “I too have matters of grave importance
demanding my instant attention, but I fling them to the winds in the
presence of such an opportunity.”
“Gratitude is one of the rare virtues, Mr. Dalton,” said Adelina, hardly
looking his way. “I can understand Paul’s pre-occupation. But really,
Paul, can’t you postpone some of this business for a day at least?”
“Awfully sorry, Adelina. As a matter of fact, I am getting ready for a
trip to the north to see my brother and sister.”
“Your brother and sister? Oh, yes, of course. And where are they?”
“Up at Fort Reliance at a mission school. I may bring them back with
me.”
“Bring them back?” she said, astonished. “What can you do with them
here? But that’s none of my business,” she added hurriedly. “You can’t
give me—you can’t take this one day off?” She turned her horse about so
as to hide her face from Dalton, who moved away to admire the view of
the valley, and bent slightly over her saddle toward him.
Paul came over to her and, with his hand on her horse’s neck, looked
steadily into her eyes. “It is awfully good of you, Adelina,” he said,
“but I don’t believe I ought. You know—you see——”
“Ought!” said the girl, and for her life she could not quite keep the
bitterness out of her voice. “I know when you put that horrid word in
that there is an end to all persuasion. I suppose you know Peg is home,”
she added, her eyes holding his as she waited for what she expected and
dreaded to see in them. Her expectation and her dread were not
disappointed, for quickly though Paul turned his head he was not quick
enough to hide the leap of light into his eyes, nor with all his
steadiness of control could he prevent the swift grip of his fingers in
her horse’s mane. She sat back straight in her saddle.
“Peg? Home? I thought she—I thought they were still in England,” he said
in a low tone.
“You will hardly pass through the valley without seeing her, Paul,” said
Adelina, smiling down at him uncertainly.
“No, I would not do that. I must see them.”
“And your business? Your pressing business?” said Adelina, still
smiling.
“My business?” said Paul gravely. “The Pelhams are our oldest friends.”
“And dearest?”
“And dearest, Adelina,” he said, regarding her with grave, kind eyes.
Then after a slight hesitation, “Is her—is the young man with her?”
Adelina’s face was full of pity. “Yes, Paul, he is here.”
“I want to see him too,” he said.
“I’m afraid—Paul—you are too late,” she said, once more leaning down
toward him, with a rush of warm emotion in her eyes.
He was too simply honest to pretend ignorance of her meaning. To his
immense surprise her words came like a heavy blow to him. He held
himself rigidly quiet for a moment or two.
“Too late!” he muttered, looking far across the valley. “I don’t know.
I’m not sure—of myself. I wish I were sure. I don’t know. But,” here he
straightened his shoulders, “I will know today. She was such a child,
Peggy!”
Adelina sat very still on her horse, regarding him intently.
“Good-bye, Paul,” she said abruptly, her voice low and a little
unsteady. “And the best of luck.”
Her voice recalled his eyes from the far hills.
“What? Oh, thank you, Adelina,” he said, taking her outstretched hand in
both of his. “You are a good fellow.”
“So are you, old chap,” she said, pulling her hand away. “And now I
shall take charge of Mr. Dalton, if he will have me.”
“Gratefully, humbly, eternally, now and forever more, amen,” fervently
said Dalton, coming back to them.
“Sounds satisfactory, doesn’t he, eh, Paul?”
“You will find him entirely so,” said Paul, with emphasis. “But be
careful of him. Don’t put him over the jumps too soon.”
“I’ll take care of him,” said Adelina with a grin. “He looks fragile.”
“I am,” said Dalton. “I feel myself going all to pieces.”
“I wouldn’t if I were you,” said Adelina, with a saucy toss of her head.
From the front door Paul watched them ride down the drive, Dalton
mounted on Paul’s cow broncho.
“Sits his horse well,” he said, his eyes on Dalton’s well knit figure.
“He is a man and he has won out. But, by Jove, he will need to be a man
to be worthy of her, if he can get her.” He turned back to the house.
“Tom,” he called out, “will you please have Dad’s horse for me this
afternoon? I am going for a bit of a ride.”