Jack turned in filled with a nagging sense of discomfort. He felt
dimly that he ought to have been happy, but it was very clear that he
was not. It was all very well for her to say: "Don't bother about the
future," but his stubborn mind was not to be so easily satisfied. It
was true he had not committed himself in so many words, but with girls
of Linda's kind he supposed a kiss was final. So the future had to be
considered. It was now more than ever imperative that his name be
cleared. She didn't seem to care much whether he were honest or not.
There was the rub. He scowled, and rolled over to woo sleep on the
other side.
In the end he fell asleep, and dreamed a fantastic dream. He was King
David, wearing a long gray beard and a white gown. He was at sea in a
motor-sailboat of extraordinary construction, having a high, ornate
cabin, over which the boom had to be lifted whenever they came about.
There was a beturbaned lascar at the tiller, whom he, King David,
treated with great contumely. Linda was along, too, also clad in
biblical costume with a silver band around her brow. She was strangely
meek, and she plucked continually at his sleeve.
A great storm came up; the waves tossed, the boat was knocked about,
and he couldn't get a spark in his engine. He suspected that the
lascar knew much better than he what to do, but out of sheer, kingly
wilfulness he went contrary to everything the brown man suggested. Nor
would he heed the insistent plucking at his sleeve.
Then suddenly a mermaid uprose beside the boat, and the sea was
miraculously stilled. Her long, black, silky hair hung before her
face, and streamed over her deep bosom and her lovely arms. All would
be well if he could but distinguish her face, he felt. He leaned
farther and farther over the rail, while the fretful plucking at his
sleeve continued. He implored the mermaid to push back her hair.
Then he awoke. Some one was pulling at his sleeve, and a voice was
whispering: "Jack, wake up!"
He sprang to a sitting position, throwing out his arms. They closed
around a bony little frame encased in a rough coat. He recoiled.
"It's only me," said the small voice.
The fire had burned down to dull embers, and Jack at first could see
nothing. "Who are you?" he demanded.
"Davy Cranston."
"Davy Cranston?" repeated Jack. It was a moment or two before his
dream-muddled brain conceived the identity that went under this name.
"What does this mean? What do you want? How did you get here?" he
demanded in great surprise.
"It was Mary said we had to come," the boy replied abashed.
The girl's name had the effect of ringing a bell in Jack's
understanding. "Mary? Where is she?" he asked quickly.
"We're camped up on the bench," the boy replied. "She's waiting for
us. Come to our camp, and we can talk."
Jack was ready in a moment, and they set off. The afterglow was under
the north star, and by that Jack knew it was midnight. The camp was
wrapped in perfect stillness. When they got clear, and began to climb
the trail, a little fiery eye beckoned them ahead.
In answer to Jack's further questions the boy could only reply that
"Mary had a warning," which only heightened the questioner's wonder and
curiosity.
The camp was pitched on the edge of the low bench above the river-flat,
and they saw her, from a little distance, crouching by the fire that
made a little crimson glory under the branches. She was listening with
bent head to hear if there was one pair of footsteps approaching or
two. Behind her the two little A-tents were pitched side by side,
their open doors like mouths yawning in the firelight.
As they came within radius of the light she lifted her face, and Jack
without knowing why he should be, was staggered by the look in her deep
eyes, an indescribable look, suggesting pain proudly borne, and present
gladness.
"You're all right?" she murmured, searching for what she might read in
his face.
"Surely!" said Jack wonderingly. Further speech failed him. The sight
of her threw him into a great uneasiness that he was at a loss to
account for. She was nothing to him, he told himself a little angrily.
But he could not keep his eyes off her. She had changed. She looked
as if her spirit had travelled a long way these few days and learned
many difficult lessons on the road. She had an effect on him as of
something he had never seen before, yet something he had been waiting
for without knowing it. And this was only Mary Cranston that he
thought he knew!
"There was a danger," she said quietly. "I did not know if we would be
in time to save--to help you."
"Danger? Save me?" Jack repeated, looking at her stupidly. "Good God!
How did you know that?" he presently added.
Mary's agitation broke through her self-contained air. To hide it she
hastily busied herself picking up the dishes, and packing them in the
grub-box. Fastening the box with its leather hasp, she carried it into
her tent. She did not immediately reappear.
"Where have you come from?" Jack demanded of Davy.
"Swan Lake."
"Have you been there ever since you left the fort?"
The boy nodded. "Tom Moosehorn's three children got the measles," he
explained. "They are pitching at Swan Lake. Tom came to the fort to
ask my father for medicine, and when Mary heard that his children were
sick, she said she would go and nurse them, because Tom's wife is a
foolish squaw, and don't know what to do for sickness. And I went to
take care of Mary."
"Where is Swan Lake?" asked Jack.
"Northwest of the fort, two days' journey," said Davy. "We were there
a week, and then the kids got well. On the way back home Mary had a
warning, She said she felt a danger threatening you." Shyness overcame
the boy here. "You--you were friendly to us," he stammered. "So we
wanted to come to you. We didn't know where you were, but Mary said
the warning came from the south, so we left the trail, and hit straight
across the prairie till we came to the river trail. There we found
your tracks, and followed them here."
"A warning!" said Jack, amazed. "What do you mean?"
"I don't know," the boy said simply. "Mary has them."
Mary returned to the fire with a composed face. All three of the
youngsters were embarrassed for speech. How could they find words to
fit the strange feelings that agitated them.
Jack, gazing at Mary's graceful pose, on her knees by the fire,
suddenly exclaimed: "Why, it was you, all the time!"
"What was?" asked Mary.
"The mermaid."
"What's a mermaid?" Davy wanted to know.
Mary answered before Jack could. "An imaginary creature, half woman,
half fish."
"Why, how did you know?" asked Jack unthinkingly.
"Do you think I know nothing?" she said, with the ghost of a smile.
He had the grace to redden.
They made Jack tell them his dream. They laughed, and the tension was
relieved. They were all grateful for something else to talk about.
There was one thing in the dream that Jack left out.
"Who was the woman who kept pulling at your sleeve?" asked Mary.
Jack lied. "Nobody I know," he said lightly. "One of King David's
five hundred wives, I suppose."
Davy laughed, but Mary looked affronted. "You're confusing David with
Solomon," she said coldly.
Jack looked at her uneasily. This was she whom he had dismissed merely
as one of the girls of the country!
"And he sat up and hugged me as if I was a girl," Davy put in with
relish.
Jack and Mary looked away from each other and blushed, but for
different reasons.
They could not long keep away from the subject that filled their minds.
"Blest if I can understand it," murmured Jack.
They knew to what he referred. "Nobody can," said Mary.
"You must have had this warning several days ago."
"Three days," said Mary.
"Nothing happened to me three days ago. Nothing until to-day----"
"Ah!" she said sharply.
"That was an accident," said Jack. "My horse shied on High Rock, and
jumped over the ledge. I caught on a tree."
Mary's eyes brooded over him, and her hands went to still her breast.
"Was there any one behind you?" she asked quickly.
"Yes, Garrod."
"Perhaps it was no accident."
Jack stared at the fire. "Perhaps not," he said slowly. After a while
he added. "Still I don't understand."
"Many of the people have such warnings," Mary said quietly.
Jack frowned. "You are not a savage," he said.
"We are one fourth Indian," Mary said with a kind of relentless pride.
"It is silly to make-believe that we're not."
Jack went on to tell them in detail what had happened during the day,
suppressing, however, all that related to Linda. One thing led to
another; he could hardly have explained how it came about, but Mary's
eyes drew out what he had believed was locked deep in his heart, the
story of his early days, and of Garrod's treachery that he had just
found out. Sister and brother had little to say to the story, but
their shining eyes conveyed unquestioning loyal assurance to him. It
needed no words to tell him they knew he was no thief. Jack
experienced a sense of relief such as he had not felt since the moment
of his making the ugly discovery. When he considered the net of
circumstance that bound him round sometimes he was almost ready himself
to doubt his honesty.
"I knew there was something behind," Mary murmured. "It was the day
you found him out that I had my warning. I'm glad we came. Maybe we
can help you"--she looked at him questioningly--"if you will let us
stay."
"As long as you like," said Jack. "It's my idea we'll all be turning
back in a couple of days. In the meantime Davy can help with the
horses. We're short-handed."
"Couldn't we camp here by ourselves?" asked Mary quickly.
Jack shook his head. "It would look queer," he said. "You had better
ride into our camp in the morning as if you'd just come."
Mary presently sent him home. The fire had paled, and the trees began
to rise out of the graves of darkness at the touch of the ghostly wand
of dawn. The youngsters' pale and slightly haggard faces had a strange
look to each other like things that had been left over from yesterday
by mistake, and were hopelessly out of place this morning.
Jack lingered awkwardly. "Look here," he blurted out, "I haven't
thanked you for coming. I don't know how. But you know what I feel!"
Sister and brother looked exquisitely uncomfortable, and absurdly
alike. "There's nothing to be thanked for," murmured Mary. "Of course
we came! That's what I had the warning for."
They shook hands. Mary's hand lay for an instant in Jack's passive and
cold. But later she pillowed her cheek on that hand because he had
touched it.
The permanent camp, that Sir Bryson had graciously permitted to be
called Camp Trangmar, had been laid out with considerably more care
than their nightly stopping-places. The main tent, with its three
little wings, was erected at the top of the clearing, facing the river.
A canvas had been stretched in front to make a veranda. On the
right-hand side of the open square was Humpy's cooking outfit under
another awning, with Humpy's tent and Jack's lean-to beyond. Across
the square was Jean Paul's little tent and the ragged brown canvas that
sheltered the Indians. The camp was ditched and drained according to
the best usage, and around the whole was stretched a rope on poplar
posts, to keep the straying horses from nosing around the tents in
their perpetual search for salt.
After breakfast next morning Sir Bryson issued a command for Jack to
wait upon him. As Jack approached, Linda and Mrs. Worsley were sitting
under the awning, each busy with a bit of embroidery. Jack, who had
been for a swim in the river, looked as fresh as a daisy. As he passed
inside Linda smiled at him with a frankness that disconcerted him
greatly. If she was going to give the whole thing away to everybody
like this! However, Mrs. Worsley gave no sign of having seen anything
out of the ordinary.
It transpired that Sir Bryson wished to make a little exploration up
the river. He inquired about a boat, and Jack offered him his own
dugout that he had cached at this point on his way down the river. Sir
Bryson was very much concerned about the speed of the current, but Jack
assured him the Indians were accustomed to making way against it.
Sir Bryson cast a good deal of mystery about his little trip, and made
it clear that he had no intention of taking Jack with him. Jack, who
had a shrewd idea of his object, had no desire to be mixed up in it.
He swallowed a grin and maintained a respectful air. He had discovered
that there was more fun to be had in playing up to the little
governor's grand airs than in flouting him. Afterward he would enact
the scene by the fire, sure of an appreciative audience in Humpy Jull.
It was arranged that Sir Bryson should start in an hour, and that his
party should take a lunch against an all-day trip.
As Jack came out Linda rose to meet him. "We will have the whole day
to ourselves," she said softly.
Jack was nonplussed. Somehow, such a frank avowal dampened his own
ardour. He glanced at Mrs. Worsley to see if she had heard, and his
face stiffened. At this moment a diversion was created by the sound of
horses' hoofs on the trail.
They looked around the tent to see Mary and Davy trotting down the
little rise that ended at the camp, followed by two pack-ponies. Linda
had not seen Mary before. Her eyes widened at the sight of another
girl, and a very pretty one, riding into camp, and quickly sought
Jack's face. A subtle and unbeautiful change passed over her at what
she fancied she read there.
Sir Bryson, attracted by the sound, came out of the tent. "Who are
they?" he asked Jack.
"The son and the daughter of the trader at Fort Cheever."
"Very pretty girl," said Sir Bryson condescendingly. "Pray bring them
to me that I may make them welcome," he said as he went back.
Jack vaulted over the fence, and the three youngsters shook hands again
with beaming smiles. Jack forgot that in order to keep up their little
fiction he should have appeared more surprised to see them. Linda
looked on with darkening eyes. Jack led the horses around the square
to the place next his own tent, where they were unpacked, unsaddled,
and turned out. He then brought Mary and Davy back. Linda was not in
evidence.
Within the tent Sir Bryson welcomed them as graciously as a king.
"Very glad to see you," he said. "Which way are you travelling?"
Davy's adolescence was painfully embarrassed in the presence of the
great man, but as the man of his party he blushed and faced him out.
"We are going home," he said. "My sister has been nursing some sick
Indians at Swan Lake."
Sir Bryson did not know of course that Camp Trangmar was not on the
direct road between Swan Lake and Fort Cheever. "Ah!" he said, "most
worthy of her, I'm sure. I trust you will remain with us a few days
before you go on."
"If I can help around," said Davy. "Jack Chanty said you were
short-handed."
"Excellent! Excellent!" said Sir Bryson.
Jack made a move toward the door, and Davy and Mary promptly followed.
Sir Bryson fussed among his papers with an annoyed expression. As much
as anything pertaining to his official position he enjoyed dismissing
people. Consequently when they left before they were sent he felt a
little aggrieved.
Outside, Sidney Vassall and Baldwin Ferrie were now with the two
ladies. Linda was reclining languorously in the folding chair, with
her little feet crossed in front of her. She was pale and full of fine
lady airs. Any one but Jack would have known that there was trouble
brewing.
"Introduce your friends," she said to Jack in a clear, high voice.
Jack was only conscious of an extreme discomfort. He was oppressed by
a sense of guilt that he resented. The air seemed full of electricity
ready to discharge on some one's head. He looked very stiff and boyish
as he spoke the names all round: "Miss Cranston, Davy Cranston; Miss
Trangmar, Mrs. Worsley, Captain Vassall, Mr. Ferrie!"
They all smiled on the embarrassed newcomers, and made them welcome.
In particular Linda's smile was overpoweringly sweet. Without changing
her position she extended a languid little hand to Mary.
"So nice of you to come and see us," she drawled. "I hope you will
remain with us until we go back."
To Jack this sounded all right. He felt relieved. Even yet he did not
see what was coming. Mary's perceptions were keener. With a slightly
heightened colour she stepped forward, took the hand with dignity, and
let it fall.
"Thank you," she said quietly. "Not more than a day or two."
"But we need you," Linda insisted, "both of you. Your brother can help
the men who are nearly worked to death, and if you would only help Mrs.
Worsley and me with our things, you know, and other ways----"
Mrs. Worsley looked quickly at Linda, astonished and indignant, but
Linda affected not to see. As Jack realized the sense of what she was
saying, a slow, dark red crept under his skin, and his face became as
hard as stone.
Mary took it smilingly. Her chin went up a little, and she drew a slow
breath before she answered. "I'm sorry," she said quietly, "but I have
no experience with ladies' things."
There was a faint ring of irony in the last two words, and excepting
Jack, who was too angry to see anything, it was evident to the others
that Mary had returned just a little better than she got. Linda
evidently felt so, for naked malice peeped out of her next speech.
"We would be so glad to teach you, wouldn't we, Kate? And it would be
so useful for you to know!"
Mrs. Worsley bent over her work, blushing for her young friend.
Mary continued to look at Linda steadily, and it was finally Linda's
eyes that were obliged to stray away. "Thank you," said Mary, "but we
will be expected at home in a few days."
"Oh, sorry," said Linda casually. She nodded at Mary, and smiled the
inattentive smile that women mean to stab with. "Kate, do show me this
next stitch," she said, affecting a sudden absorption in her work.
Mrs. Worsley ignored the question. Her face was now almost as red as
Jack's. What passed between these two ladies when they presently found
themselves alone may be guessed.
Jack, Mary, and Davy crossed the little square. There was a commotion
going on inside Jack that he could not in the least analyze. He was
furiously angry, but his sidelong glances at Mary dashed his anger, and
made him fall to wondering if he had rightly understood what had
happened. For Mary, instead of being humiliated and indignant as one
might suppose, was actually smiling. She carried her head high, and
the shine of triumph was in her eye. What was a man to make of this?
Jack could only long in vain for a head to knock about.
The explanation was simple. "How silly I was to be so afraid of her,"
Mary was thinking. "To give herself away like that! She's a poor
thing! I'm a better woman than she, and she knows it now. She can be
jealous of me after this." Behind these thoughts another peeped like
an elf through a leafy screen, but since the maiden herself refused to
see it in its hiding-place it is not fair to discover it to the world.
Mary refused to refer in any way to what had happened, and Jack was
therefore tongue-tied. All he could do was to show his sympathy in the
ardour of his muscular efforts on her behalf. He put up their two
tents, and stowed their baggage; he cut a wholly unnecessary amount of
balsam for Mary's bed, and chopped and carried wood for their fire,
until she stopped him. All this was observable to Linda watching from
afar under her lashes, and in the meantime Kate was not sparing her.
Jack forgot all about Sir Bryson's order until a peremptory message
recalled it. After he had embarked the governor, Baldwin Ferrie, and
three Indians in the dugout, he swung an axe over his shoulder, and set
off up the trail to chop down a tree or two, and "think things out," as
he would have said. The operations of the human consciousness that go
under the name of thinking differ widely in the individual. Meanwhile
it should be mentioned that Jean Paul and Garrod had started on
horseback with the object of finding a camp of Sapi Indians that was
said to be not far away. They were gone all day. Jack hardly thought
of them.
In a grove of pines beside the trail Jack swung his axe, and the blows
rang. His design was to make a flagstaff for the centre of the camp.
There was an immense satisfaction in stretching his muscles and
planting the blade true. The blood coursed through his veins, and he
tingled to his finger-tips. He felt so much better that he thought he
had solved his problems. This was what Jack called "thinking things
out."
He was engaged in chopping the limbs from a trunk with the stern air of
concentration that was characteristic of him, when something caused him
to look up, and he saw Linda standing near with an appealing aspect.
He frowned and went on chopping. Linda sat down on a stump and looked
away with an unsuccessful attempt at unconcern. How astonished Vassall
or Baldwin Ferrie would have been could they have seen their imperious
little mistress then.
There was a long silence except for the light strokes of Jack's axe as
he worked his way up the stem. Jack enjoyed a great advantage because
he was busy. It was Linda who was finally obliged to speak.
"Haven't you anything to say?" she murmured.
"No," said Jack promptly. The light branches did not offer him a
sufficient outlet for his pent-up feelings, and he wantonly attacked
the bole of the biggest tree in sight. Linda watched the swing of his
lithe body with a sort of stricken look. There was another silence
between them.
"Jack, I'm sorry," she said at last in a small voice.
Jack was not so easily to be appeased. "You shouldn't come away from
camp alone with me like this," he said. "Followed me," was what he had
in mind, but he spared her pride that.
"I don't care what anybody thinks," she said quickly.
"I do," said Jack.
"Afraid of being compromised?" she asked with a little sneer.
"That's a silly thing to say," he answered coolly. "You know what I
mean. I don't intend to give your father and the other men a chance to
throw 'thief' in my teeth. When I've cleared myself I'll walk with you
openly."
"I was sorry," she said like a child. "I couldn't rest until I had
told you."
Jack was silent and uncomfortable. Whenever she sounded the pathetic
and childlike note, the male in him must needs feel the pull of
compassion and he resented it.
"Don't you care for me any more?" she murmured.
Jack frowned, and aimed a tremendous blow at the tree.
Real terror crept into her voice. "Jack," she faltered.
"I don't take anything back," he said stubbornly. "I'll tell you when
I feel like telling you, but I won't have it dragged out of me."
He returned to his tree, and she prodded the pine needles with the toe
of her boot. After a while she returned to the charge.
More like a child than ever, she said: "Jack, I acted like a little
beast. But I said I was sorry."
"That's all very well," said Jack, "but you can't expect to make me so
mad I can't see straight, and then have it all right again just for the
asking."
"You're ungenerous," she said, pouting.
"I don't know what you mean," he said obstinately. "I have to be what
I am."
There was another silence. They were just where they had started.
Indeed no progress was possible without an explosion and a general
flare-up. It was Jack who brought it on by saying:
"It's not to me you should be saying you're sorry."
Linda sprang up pale and trembling, and the flood gates of invective
were opened. It is no advantage to a jealous woman to be a governor's
daughter. Linda in a passion lacked dignity. Her small face worked
like a child's preparing to bawl, and her gestures were febrile. What
is said at such moments is seldom worth repeating. Jack did not hear
the words; it was her tone that stung him beyond endurance. But at
last a sentence reached his understanding.
"How dare you bring her here, and install her under my eyes?"
"Bring her here? What do you mean?" he demanded in a voice that forced
her to attend.
"Oh, you know very well what I mean!" she cried. "You knew she was
coming this morning. I saw it in your face. You didn't even pretend
that you were surprised. And you took her part against me all the way
through."
There was enough truth in this to make Jack furiously angry in turn.
His voice silenced hers.
"I did take her part!" he cried. "And I'd do it again. What have you
got to complain of? Just like a girl to fly into a rage and blame
everybody all around, just to cover her own tracks! What did you mean
by offering to engage her as your maid? You don't want a maid. You
only did it to insult her! I was ashamed of you. Everybody was
ashamed of you. If you're suffering for it now, it's no more than you
ought."
Under all this and more she sat with an odd, still look from which one
would almost have said she enjoyed having him abuse her.
And so they both emptied themselves of angry speech, and the inevitable
moment of reaction followed. Both Linda and Jack began to feel that
they had said too much.
"I'm sorry," she said humbly. "It's true, I was only jealous of her,
because you seemed so glad to see her."
"If it's any good to you to hear it," said Jack sheepishly, "she's
nothing to me--that way." Even as he said it his heart accused him.
"Besides," said Linda irrelevantly, "she's mad about you."
"That's nonsense!" said Jack. Nevertheless he quickly turned to pick
up his axe in order to hide the telltale red that crept into his face.
"It's all right now, isn't it?" said Linda coaxingly. "Come and kiss
me."
He obediently went, and, stooping, kissed her upturned lips. But for
both of them the delicious sweetness had flown. Jack could not forget
how ugly her face had looked in a passion, and Linda remembered how he
had worked for Mary.
"You didn't do it like that last night," she said, pouting.
"I felt differently last night," said Jack doggedly. "How can I get up
any enthusiasm when you make me do it?"
Her breast began to heave again. "You said you had forgiven me," she
said.
"Oh, don't let's begin that again," said Jack with a dismayed look. "I
haven't anything to forgive you. If you want to make things really all
right, you can do it in a minute!"
She sprang up again. "I won't! I won't!" she cried passionately.
"It's her coming that has made the difference since last night! How
dare you suggest that I apologize to her! I'd die rather! I hate you!
Don't ever speak to me again!"
Of a sudden she was gone like a little tempest among the trees. Jack
sat down on the trunk he had cut, and rested his chin in his palms,
terribly troubled in his mind. This sort of thing was new to him, and
it seemed of much greater moment than it was.
Pretty soon she came flying back again, and casting herself in his
arms, clung to him like a baby, weeping and whimpering.
"Take care of me, Jack! I don't know what I'm doing or saying!"
His arms closed about her, and he patted her shoulder with an absurd,
sheepish, paternal air of concern. What else could he do? "There,
it's all right!" he said clumsily. "Don't distress yourself. It'll be
all right!"
"And you won't make me apologize to her?" she implored.
"No," he said with a shrug. "I don't suppose it would do any good if
you did."
Linda lay perfectly still. A sense of sweet satisfaction stole into
her breast. It had been a hard fight, but she _had_ made him do what
she wanted.
"Hanged if I know what's going to become of us," thought Jack gloomily.