A TELEGRAM AND A CALLER
"You say," asked Maitland, as they surveyed the canyon, "that she went
down the stream?"
"She said she was goin' down. I showed her how to cut across the
mountains an' avoid the big bend, I've got no reason to suspicion that
she didn't go w'ere she said."
"Nevertheless," said Maitland, "it is barely possible that she may have
changed her mind and gone up the canyon."
"Yep, the female mind does often change unexpected like," returned the
other, "but w'ether she went up or down, the only place for us to look,
I take it, is down, for if she's alive, if she got out of the canyon and
is above us, nacherly she'd follow it down yere an' we'd a seed her by
this time. If she didn't git out of the canyon, why, all that's left of
her is bound to be down stream."
Maitland nodded, he understood.
"We'd better go down then," continued Kirkby, whose reasoning was
flawless except that it made no allowance for the human-divine
interposition that had been Enid Maitland's salvation. "An' if we don't
find no traces of her down stream, we kin come back here an' go up."
It was a hard desperate journey the two men took. One of them followed
the stream at its level, the other tramped along in the mountains high
above the high water mark of the day before. If they had needed any
evidence of the power of that cloud burst and storm, they found it in
the canyon. In some places where it was narrow and rocky, the pass had
been fearfully scoured; at other places the whole aspect of it was
changed. The place was a welter of up-rooted trees, logs jammed together
in fantastic shapes; it was as if some wanton besom of destruction had
swept the narrow rift.
Ever as they went they called and called. The broken obstructions of the
way made their progress slow; what they would have passed over
ordinarily in half a day, they had not traversed by nightfall and they
had seen nothing. They camped that night far down the canyon and in the
morning with hearts growing heavier every hour they resumed their
search.
About noon of the second day they came to an immense log jam where the
stream now broadened and made a sudden turn before it plunged over a
fall of perhaps two hundred feet into the lake. It was the end of their
quest. If they did not find her there, they would never find her
anywhere, they thought. With still hearts and bated breath they climbed
out over the log jam and scrutinized it. A brownish gray patch concealed
beneath the great pines caught their eyes. They made their way to it.
"It's a b'ar, a big grizzly," exclaimed Kirkby.
The huge brute was battered out of all semblance of life, but that it
was a grizzly bear was clearly evident. Further on the two men caught
sight suddenly of a dash of blue. Kirkby stepped over to it, lifted it
in his hand and silently extended it to Maitland. It was a sweater, a
woman's sweater. They recognized it at once. The old man shook his head.
Maitland groaned aloud.
"See yere," said Kirkby, pointing to the ragged and torn garment where
evidences of discoloration still remained, "looks like there'd bin blood
on it."
"Heavens!" cried Maitland, "not that bear, I'd rather anything than
that."
"W'atever it is, she's gone," said the old man with solemn finality.
"Her body may be in these logs here--"
"Or in the lake," answered Kirkby gloomily; "but w'erever she is we
can't git to her now."
"We must come back with dynamite to break up this jam and--"
"Yep," nodded the old man, "we'll do all that, of course, but now, arter
we search this jam o' logs I guess there's nothin' to do but go back,
an' the quicker we git back to the settlement, the quicker we can git
back here. I think we kin strike acrost the mountains an' save a day an'
a half. There's no need of us goin' back up the canyon now, I take it."
"No," answered the other. "The quicker the better, as you say, and we
can head off George and the others that way."
They searched the pile eagerly, prying under it, peering into it,
upsetting it, so far as they could with their naked hands, but with
little result, for they found nothing else. They had to camp another day
and next morning they hurried straight over the mountains, reaching the
settlement almost as soon as the others. Maitland with furious energy at
once organized a relief party. They hurried back to the logs, tore the
jam to pieces, searched it carefully and found nothing. To drag the lake
was impossible; it was hundreds of feet deep and while they worked it
froze. The weather had changed some days before, heavy snows had already
fallen, they had to get out of the mountains without further delay or
else be frozen up to die. Then and not till then did Maitland give up
hope. He had refrained from wiring to Philadelphia, but when he reached
a telegraph line some ten days after the cloud burst, he sent a long
message east, breaking to his brother the awful tidings.
And in all that they did he and Kirkby, two of the shrewdest and most
experienced of men, showed with singular exactitude how easy it is for
the wisest and most capable of men to make mistakes, to leave the plain
trail, to fail to deduce the truth from the facts presented. Yet it is
difficult to point to a fault in their reasoning, or to find anything
left undone in the search.
Enid had started down the canyon, near the end of it they had discovered
one of her garments which they could not conceive any reason for her
taking off. It was near the battered body of one of the biggest
grizzlies that either man had ever seen, it held evidence of blood
stains upon it still, they had found no body, but they were as
profoundly sure that the mangled remains of the poor girl lay within the
depths of that mountain lake as if they had actually seen her there. The
logic was all flawless.
It so happened that on that November morning, when the telegram was
approaching him, Mr. Stephen Maitland had a caller. He came at an
unusually early hour. Mr. Stephen Maitland, who was no longer an early
riser, had indeed just finished his breakfast when the card of Mr. James
Armstrong of Colorado was handed to him.
"This, I suppose," he thought testily, "is one of the results of Enid's
wanderings into that God-forsaken land. Did you ask the man his
business, James?" he said aloud to the footman.
"Yes, sir; he said he wanted to see you on important business, and when
I made bold to ask him what business, he said it was none of mine, and
for me to take the message to you, sir."
"Impudent," growled Mr. Maitland.
"Yes, sir; but he is the kind of a gentleman you don't talk back to,
sir."
"Well, you go back and tell him that you have given me his card, and I
should like to know what he wishes to see me about, that I am very busy
this morning and unless it is a matter of importance--you understand?"
"Yes, sir."
"I suppose now I shall have the whole west unloaded upon me; every
vagabond friend of Robert's and people who meet Enid," he thought, but
his reveries were shortly interrupted by the return of the man.
"If you please, sir," began James hesitatingly, as he re-entered the
room, "he says his business is about the young lady, sir."
"Confound his impudence!" exclaimed Mr. Maitland, more and more annoyed
at what he was pleased to characterize mentally as western assurance.
"Where is he?"
"In the hall, sir."
"Show him into the library and say I shall be down in a moment."
"Very good, sir."
It was a decidedly wrathful individual who confronted Stephen Maitland a
few moments afterwards in the library, for Armstrong was not accustomed
to such cavalier treatment, and had Maitland been other than Enid's
father he would have given more outward expression of his indignation
over the discourtesy in his reception.
"Mr. James Armstrong, I believe," began Mr. Maitland, looking at the
card in his hand.
"Yes, sir."
"Er--from Colorado?"
"And proud of it."
"Ah, I dare say. I believe you wished to see me about--"
"Your daughter, sir."
"And in what way are you concerned about her, sir?"
"I wish to make her my wife."
"What!" exclaimed the older man in a voice equally divided between
horror and astonishment. "How dare you, sir? You amaze, me beyond
measure with your infernal impudence."
"Excuse me, Mr. Maitland," interposed Armstrong quickly and with great
spirit and determination, "but where I come from we don't allow anybody
to talk to us in this way. You are Enid's father and a much older man
than I, but I can't permit you to--"
"Sir," said the astounded Maitland, drawing himself up at this bold
flouting, "you may be a very worthy young man, I have no doubt of it,
but it is out of the question. My daughter--"
Again a less excited hearer might have noticed the emphasis on the
pronoun.
"Why, she is half way engaged to me now," interrupted the younger man
with a certain contemptuous amusement in his voice. "Look here, Mr.
Maitland, I've knocked around the world a good deal, I know what's what,
I know all about you Eastern people, and I don't fancy you any more than
you fancy me. Miss Enid is quite unspoiled yet and that is why I want
her. I'm well able to take care of her too; I don't know what you've got
or how you got it, but I can come near laying down dollar for dollar
with you and mine's all clean money, mines, cattle, lumber, and it's
all good money. I made it myself. I left her in the mountains three
weeks ago with her promise that she would think very seriously of my
suit. After I came back to Denver--I was called east--I made up my mind
that I'd come here when I'd finished my business and have it out with
you. Now you can treat me like a dog if you want to, but if you expect
to keep peace in the family you'd better not, for I tell you plainly
whether you give your consent or not I mean to win her. All I want is
her consent, and I've pretty nearly got that."
Mr. Stephen Maitland was black with wrath at this clear, unequivocal,
determined statement of the case from Armstrong's point of view.
"I would rather see her dead," he exclaimed with angry stubbornness,
"than married to a man like you. How dare you force yourself into my
house and insult me in this way? Were I not so old a man I would show
you, I would give you a taste of your own manner."
The old man's white mustache fairly quivered with what he believed to be
righteous indignation. He stepped over to the other and looked hard at
him, his eyes blazing, his ruddy cheeks redder than ever. The two men
confronted each other unblenchingly for a moment, then Mr. Maitland
touched a bell button in the wall by his side. Instantly the footman
made his appearance.
"James," said the old man, his voice shaking and his knees trembling
with passion, which he did not quite succeed in controlling despite a
desperate effort, "show this--er--gentleman the door. Good morning, sir,
our first and last interview is over."
He bowed with ceremonious politeness as he spoke, becoming more and more
composed as he felt himself mastering the situation. And Armstrong, to
do him justice, knew a gentleman when he saw him, and secretly admired
the older man and began to feel a touch of shame at his own rude way of
putting things.
"Beg pardon, sir," said the footman, breaking the awkward silence, "but
here is a telegram that has just come, sir."
There was nothing for Armstrong to do or say. Indeed, having expressed
himself so unrestrainedly to his rapidly increasing regret, as the old
man took the telegram he turned away in considerable discomfiture, James
bowing before him at the door opening into the hall and following him as
he slowly passed out. Mr. Stephen Maitland mechanically and with great
deliberation and with no premonition of evil tidings, tore open the
yellow envelope and glanced at the dispatch. Neither the visitor nor
the footman had got out of sight or hearing when they heard the old man
groan and fall back helplessly into a chair. Both men turned and ran
back to the door, for there was that in the exclamation which gave rise
to instant apprehension. Stephen Maitland now as white as death sat
collapsed in the chair gasping for breath, his hand on his heart. The
telegram lay open on the floor. Armstrong recognized the seriousness of
the situation, and in three steps was by the other's side.
"What is it?" he asked eagerly, his hatred and resentment vanished at
the sight of the old man's ghastly, stricken countenance.
"Enid!" gasped her father. "I said I would rather see her--dead, but--it
is not true--I--"
James Armstrong was a man of prompt decision. Without a moment's
hesitation he picked up the telegram; it was full and explicit, thus it
read:
"We were encamped last week in the mountains. Enid went down the
canyon for a day's fishing alone. A sudden cloud burst filled the
canyon, washed away the camp. Enid undoubtedly got caught in the
torrent and was drowned. We have found some of her clothing but not
her body. Have searched every foot of the canyon. Think body has got
into the lake now frozen. Snow falling, mountains impassable, will
search for her in the spring when the winter breaks. I am following
this telegram in person by first train. Would rather have died a
thousand deaths than had this happen. God help us."
"ROBERT MAITLAND."
Armstrong read it, stared at it a moment frowning heavily, passed it
over to the footman and turned to the stricken father.
"Old man, I loved her," he said simply. "I love her still, I believe
that she loves me. They haven't found her body, clothes mean nothing,
I'll find her, I'll search the mountains until I do. Don't give way,
something tells me that she's alive, and I'll find her."
"If you do," said the broken old man, crushed by the swift and awful
response to his thoughtless exclamation, "and she loves you, you shall
have her for your wife."
"It doesn't need that to make me find her," answered Armstrong grimly.
"She is a woman, lost in the mountains in the winter, alone. They
shouldn't have given up the search; I'll find her as there is a God
above me whether she's for me or not."
A good deal of a man this James Armstrong of Colorado, in spite of many
things in his past of which he thought so little that he lacked the
grace to be ashamed of them. Stephen Maitland looked at him with a
certain respect and a growing hope, as he stood there in the library
stern, resolute, strong.
Perhaps--