Beatrice knew one thing and one alone: that she must not give way to the
devastating terror in her heart. There was mighty work to do, and she
must keep strong. Her only wish was to kneel beside him, to lift the
bleeding head into her arms and let the storm and the darkness smother
her existence; but her stern woods training came to her aid. She began
the stupendous task of freeing him from the imprisoning tree limbs.
The pine knots flickered feebly; and by their light she looked about for
Ben's axe. Her eyes rested on the broken gun first: then she saw the
blade, shining in the rain, protruding from beneath a broken bough. She
drew it out and swung it down.
Some of the lesser limbs she broke off, with a strength in her hands she
did not dream she possessed. The larger ones were cut away with blows
incredibly strong and accurate. How and by what might she did not know,
but almost at once the man's body was free except for the tree trunk
that wedged him against a dead log toward which he had leaped for
shelter.
She seemed powerless to move it. Her shoulders surged against it in
vain. A desperate frenzy seized her, but she fought it remorselessly
down. Her self-discipline must not break yet. Seeing that she could not
move the tree itself, she thrust with all her power against the dead log
beside which Ben lay. In a moment she had rolled it aside.
Then for the first time she went to her knees beside the prone form.
Ben was free of the imprisoning limbs, but was his soul already free of
the stalwart body broken among the broken boughs? She had to know this
first; further effort was unavailing until she knew this. Her hand stole
over his face.
She found no reassuring warmth. It was wet with the rain, cold to the
touch. His hair was wet too, and matted from some dreadful wound in the
scalp. Very softly she felt along the skull for some dreadful fracture
that might have caused instant death; but the descending trunk had
missed his head, at least. Very gently she shook him by the shoulders.
Her stern self-control gave way a little now. The strain had been too
much for human nerves to bear. She gathered him into her arms, still
without sobbing, but the hot tears dropped on to his face.
"Speak to me, Ben," she said quietly. The wind caught her words and
whisked them away; and the rain played its unhappy music in the tree
foliage; but Ben made no answer. "Speak to me," she repeated, her tone
lifting. "My man, my baby--tell me you're not dead!"
Dead! Was that it--struck to the earth like the caribou that fell before
his rifle? And in that weird, dark instant a light far more bright than
that the flickering pine knots cast so dim and strange over the scene
beamed forth from the altar flame of her own soul. It was only the light
of knowledge, not of hope, but it transfigured her none the less.
All at once she knew why she had hurled the poisoned cup from his hand,
even though her father's life might be the price of her weakness. She
understood, now, why these long weeks had been a delight rather than a
torment; why her fears for him had gone so straight to her heart. She
pressed his battered head tight against her breast.
"My love, my love," she crooned in his ear, pressing her warm cheek
close to his. "I do love you, I do, I do," she told him confidingly, as
if this message would call him back to life. Her lips sought his, trying
to give them warmth, and her voice was low and broken when she spoke
again. "Can't you hear me, Ben--won't you try to come back to me? If
you're dead I'll die too--"
But the man did not open his eyes. Would not even this appeal arouse him
from this deep, strange sleep in which he lay? He had always been so
watchful of her--since that first day--so zealous for her safety. She
held him closer, her lips trembling against his.
But she must get herself in hand again! Perhaps life had not yet
completely flickered out; and she could nurse it back. She dropped her
ear to his breast, listening.
Yes, she felt the faint stirring of his heart. It was so feeble, the
throbs were so far apart, yet they meant life,--life that might flush
his cheeks again, and might yet bring him back to her, into her arms. He
was breathing, too; breaths so faint that she hardly dared to believe in
their reality. And presently she realized that his one hope of life lay
in getting back to the fire.
For long hours he had been lying in the cold rain; a few more minutes
would likely extinguish the spark of life that remained in his breast.
Her hand stole over his powerful frame, in an effort to get some idea of
the nature of his wounds.
One of his arms was broken; its position indicated that. Some of his
ribs were crushed too--what internal injuries he had that might end him
before the morning she did not know. But she could not take time to
build a sledge and cut away the brush. She worked her shoulder under his
body.
Wrenching with all her fine, young strength she lifted him upon her
shoulder; then, kneeling in the vines, she struggled for breath. Then
thrusting with her arm she got on her feet.
His weight was over fifty pounds greater than her own; but her woods
training, the hard work she had always done, had fitted her for just
such a test as this. She started with her burden toward the cave.
She had long known how to carry an injured man, suspending him over her
shoulder, head pointed behind her, her arms clasping his thigh. With her
free arm she seized the tree branches to sustain her. She had no light
now; she was guided only by the faint glow of the fire at the cavern
mouth.
After a hundred feet the load seemed unbearable. Except for the fact
that she soon got on the well-worn moose trail that followed the creek,
she could scarcely have progressed a hundred feet farther. As it was,
she was taxed to the utmost: every ounce of her reserve strength would
be needed before the end.
At the end of a hundred yards she stopped to rest, leaning against a
tree and still holding the beloved weight upon her shoulder. If she laid
it down she knew she could not lift it again. But soon she plunged on,
down toward the beacon light.
Except for her love for him, and that miraculous strength that love has
always given to women, she could not have gone on that last, cruel
hundred yards. But slowly, steadily, the circle of light grew brighter,
larger, nearer; ever less dense were the thickets of evergreen between.
Now she was almost to the glade; now she felt the wet grass at her
ankles. She lunged on and laid her burden on her bed.
Then she relaxed at his feet, breathing in sobbing gasps. Except for the
crackle of the fire and the beat of the rain, there was no sound in the
cave but this,--those anguished sobs from her wracked lungs.
But far distant though Ben was and deep as he slept--just outside the
dark portals of death itself--those sounds went down to him. He heard
them dimly at first, like a far-distant voice in a dream, but as the
moments passed he began to recognize their nature and their source. Sobs
of exhaustion and distress--from the girl that was in his charge. He lay
a long time, trying to understand.
On her knees beside him Beatrice saw the first flutter of his eyelids.
In awe, rather than rapture, her arms crept around him, and she kissed
his rain-wet brow. His eyes opened, looking wonderingly into hers.
She saw the first light of recognition, then a half-smile, gentle as a
girl's, as he realized his own injuries. Of course Ben Darby would smile
in such a moment as this; his instincts, true and manly, were always to
try to cheer her. Presently he spoke in the silence.
"The tree got me, didn't it?" he asked.
"Don't try to talk," she cautioned. "Yes--the tree fell on you. But
you're not going to die. You're going to live, live--"
He shook his head, the half-smile flickering at his lips. "Let me talk,
Beatrice," he said, with just a whisper of his old determination. "It's
important--and I don't think--I have much time."