With a soft rush of wings an owl dropped from the interior blackness of
the midnight forest and settled on a stub thrust from a dead tree at the
edge of the clearing.
Beelzebub, scampering sinuously from clump to clump of the long grass,
flattened himself to a shadow as the owl launched silently from the
limb, legs pointing downward and curved talons rigid. Wide, shadowy
wings darkened the moonlit haze where Beelzebub crouched, tail
twitching, and ears laid back. Suddenly he sprang away in long, lithe
bounds; a mad patter of feet on the cabin porch and he scrambled to his
fastness in the eaves.
Slowly the great bird circled to the limb again, where he sat motionless
in the summer night, a silver-and-bronze epitome of melancholy patience.
Below him a leafless clump of branches moved up and down, although there
was no breeze stirring. The owl saw but remained motionless. Stealthily
the branches moved from beneath the shadow of the trees, and a buck
stepped to the clearing, his velvet-sheathed antlers rocking above his
graceful neck. Cautiously he lifted a slender foreleg and advanced,
muzzle up, scenting the warm night air. Down to the river he went,
pausing at times, curiously intent on nothing, then advancing a stride
or two until he stood thigh-deep in the stream. Leisurely he waded down
shore, lifting a muzzle that dripped silvery beads in the moonlight.
Above him on the slope of the bank a door opened and closed softly. He
stiffened and licked his nostrils. With the slight breeze that rippled
toward him over the wavering grasses, he turned and plunged toward the
shore, whirling into a dusky cavern of tangled cedars. With a swishing
of branches he was gone.
"Ding thet deer," said Swickey, as she hesitated on the cabin porch. She
listened intently. Sonorous and regular strains from her father's room
assured her that he had not been disturbed.
She stepped carefully along the porch and into the dew-heavy grass,
gathering the blanket closely about her. Beelzebub's curiosity overcame
his recent scare and he clambered hastily from his retreat, tail
foremost, dropping quickly to the ground. Here was big game to stalk;
besides, the figure was reassuringly familiar despite its disguise. The
trailing end of the blanket bobbed over the hummocks invitingly.
"_Ouch!_ Beelzebub, you stop scratchin' my legs!" Swickey raised a
threatening forefinger and the kitten rollicked away in a wide circle.
She took another step. Stealthily the kitten crept after her. What live,
healthy young cat could resist the temptation to catch that teasing
blanket end? He pounced on it and it slipped from her nervous fingers
and slid to the ground, leaving her lithe, brown young body bathed in
the soft light of the summer moon. She dropped to her knees and
extracted Beelzebub from the muffling folds. Then she administered a
spanking that sent him scampering to his retreat in the eaves, where he
peeked at her saucily, his wide round eyes iridescent with mischief. She
gathered the blanket about her and resumed her journey, innocently
thankful in every tense nerve that the cabin in which David Ross slept
was on the other side of the camp. Patiently she continued on her way,
keeping a watchful eye on Beelzebub's possible whereabouts until she
arrived at the smallest of the three buildings. She took the silver
pieces from her mouth, where she had placed them for safe-keeping while
admonishing the kitten, and rapped on the pane of the open window.
David Ross had found it impossible to sleep during the early hours of
the night. The intense quiet, acting as a stimulant to his overwrought
nerves, tuned his senses to an expectant pitch, magnifying the slightest
sound to a suggestiveness that was absurdly irritating. The roar of the
rapids came to him in rhythmic beats that pulsed faintly in his ears,
keeping time with his breathing. A wood-tick gnawed its blind way
through the dry-rot of a timber, _T-chick_--_T-chick_--_T-chick_--It
stopped and he listened for it to resume its dreary progress. From the
river came the sound of some one or something wading in the shallows.
Each little noise of the night seemed to float on the undercurrent of
that deep _hum-m-m_ of the rapids, submerged in its heavier note at
times, at times tossed above it, distinctly audible, always following
the rushing waters but never entirely lost beyond hearing. Finally, he
imagined the river to be a great muffled wheel turning round and round,
and the sounds that lifted from its turning became visible as his eyes
closed heavily. They were tangible annoyances, imps in stagged trousers
and imps in calico dresses. The imps danced away to the forest and the
dream-wheel of the river stopped abruptly. So abruptly that its great
iron tire flew jangling across the rocks and fell a thousand miles away
with a faint _clink, clink, clink_.
He sat up in bed listening. _Clink, clink_. He went to the window,
leaned out, and gazed directly down into the dusky face of Swickey.
Without preamble she began.
"I shot a b'ar yest'day."
"You did! Well, that's pretty good for a girl."
"My Pop guv me the money fur the ile."
"Yes, but why did you come out to-night to tell me? Aren't you afraid?"
"Afraid of what?" she asked, with an innocence that despite itself was
ironical.
"That's so. There's nothing to be afraid of, is there?"
She hesitated, drawing the blanket closer about her.
"Nothin'--'cept you."
"Afraid of me? Why, that's funny."
"I was sca'd you'd laugh at me." Then she whispered, "I dassent tetch my
clothes, 'cause Pop would have waked up, so I jest put on this, and
come."
"That's all right, Swickey. I'm not going to laugh."
"I say thanks fur thet."
Such intensely childish relief and gratitude as her tone conveyed,
caused David to feel a sense of shame for having even smiled at her
pathetically ridiculous figure. He waited for her to continue. Reassured
by his grave acceptance of her confidence, she unburdened her heart,
speaking with hesitant deliberation and watching his face with a
sensitive alertness for the first sign of ridicule.
"You're goin' to Tramworth in the mornin', ain't you?"
"Yes."
"I reckon you could buy me a book if I guv the money-dollar fur it?"
"A book! What kind of a book, Swickey?"
"Big as you kin git fur this," she said, thrusting the moist dollar into
his hand; "a book what tells everything, to sew on buttins and make
clothes and readin' and writin' and to count ca'tridges fur a
hun'red--and everything!"
"Oh, I see!" His voice was paternally gentle. "Well, I'll try to get one
like that."
"And a pair of 'specs'"--she hesitated as his white, even teeth gleamed
in the moonlight--"fur Pop," she added hurriedly.
"All right, Swickey, but I--"
"His'n don't work right."
"But I don't just know what kind of 'specs' your father needs. There are
lots of different kinds, you know."
Her heart fell. So this man with "larnin'"--his man who could fight
Fisty Harrigans and make dead kittens come alive and jump right up,
didn't know about "specs." Why, her Pop knew all about them. He had said
his didn't work right.
The troubled look quickly vanished from her face, however, as a
tremendous inspiration lifted her over this unexpected difficulty.
"Git 'specs,'" she whispered eagerly, "what Pop kin skin a b'ar with
'thout cuttin' his hand." There! what more was necessary except the
other silver piece, which she handed to David with trembling fingers as
he assured her he would get "just that kind." In her excitement the coin
slipped and fell jingling to the cabin floor.
"I--beg--your--pardon."
She had heard David say that and had memorized it that afternoon in the
seclusion of the empty kitchen, with Beelzebub as the indifferent object
of her apology. She cherished the speech as a treasure of "larnin'" to
be used at the first opportunity. Ross missed the significance of her
politeness, although he appreciated it as something unusual under the
circumstances.
"You won't tell Pop?" she asked appealingly.
"No, I won't tell him."
She retraced her steps toward the main camp, bankrupt in that her
suddenly acquired wealth was gone, but rich in the anticipated joy that
her purchases would bring to her father and herself accurate eyesight
and "book-larnin'."
David wanted to laugh, but something deeper than laughter held him
gazing out of the window, across the cabin roofs to where the moon was
rocking in the haze of the tree-tops on the distant hills. Long after
she had regained her bedroom and crept hurriedly beneath the blanket to
fall asleep and dream of Beelzebubs wearing bright new "specs" and
chasing little girls across endless stretches of moonlight, he was still
gazing out of the window, thinking of his little friend and her trust.