Doctor Powell, lured by Chappo's description of the cave on Jackson
trail, had reached the place an hour after Katherine and Donnie had
started for the Box. It was while examining the designs on the various
bits of pottery that he found fragments of broken geodes, and eagerly
continued his search, which was rewarded with several specimens that
were unbroken.
Powell, who was deeply interested in geology, knew there were few places
where the curious white crystals were found, and his delight was
augmented when he discovered two of them in which the water could be
distinctly heard; moisture which had fallen on hot lava that had
hardened too quickly to allow evaporation.
He was engaged in wrapping these rare specimens in his handkerchief,
when he heard his horse whinny, and as he moved to the entrance of the
cave, noticed Fox and Pet picking their way down the steep trail. He saw
the saddles and that the ponies were tied together, so concluded the
horses had broken away and were homeward bound, leaving Katherine and
Donnie afoot higher up on the trail.
Powell waited until the ponies stood beside his horse. Then he moved
quietly and secured them with his tie-rope, and mounted his horse to
lead the strays up the trail. He had no thought of any danger to
Katherine or Donnie, until a turn in the trail revealed the top of the
climb and a woman standing perilously near the edge of the cliff. He
dared not call out, for fear of startling her and precipitating a
tragedy; but he dropped the rope of the two horses and urged his own
forward.
Beads of perspiration stood on his forehead and his teeth bit into his
lower lip. The horse puffed and stumbled, for the big Spanish spurs
slashed its sides without mercy. Fox and Pet scrambled behind, the
tie-ropes dragging on the ground.
He reached the summit and closed his eyes, fearing he was too late. With
a throb of relief he saw Katherine still poised at the edge of the Box,
while bits of decomposed earth crumbled unnoticed beneath her feet. He
realized her danger. Chappo had spoken of the treacherous shale
overhanging the Box.
So engrossed was the woman that she did not hear him slip from his horse
and hasten noiselessly to her side; but, when his hand grasped her arm,
gently, yet firmly, she turned in shrinking fear that changed to piteous
appeal when she saw it was Powell, not Glendon, who stood beside her.
The man read the tragedy in her eyes. Slowly he drew her from the danger
point, speaking quietly as he did so.
"This place is not safe, Mrs. Glendon. A moment's dizziness might seize
anyone." The earth at the edge was crumbling as he spoke, a chunk of it
crashed down into the canyon below, and Powell drew her further back.
"That shale is rotten and liable to slide without an instant's warning.
I was in an Indian cave when I saw the ponies had gotten away from you
and Donnie."
She knew he was giving her a chance to evade explanations, but the woman
had reached a point where she scorned further subterfuge. When one faces
Eternity all else shrivels to insignificance. "I was not dizzy," she
replied in a dull monotone. Then turning on him passionately, she cried,
"Why did you come? Do you know Donnie is going away from me? In three
days more my boy will be taken out of my life and given to strangers who
care nothing for him? Why should we go on struggling? I am tired of it
all!"
In a flash he understood her purpose, and knew the horses had not
escaped accidentally.
"And you thought that you could keep him with you--down there?" Powell
asked in a voice unsteady with emotion.
She looked at him defiantly. "Yes, you may call it a crime; but I am
willing to bear the punishment if there is another world--if there is
another world! It is a worse crime to take a child from its mother and
give it to the father--no matter how unworthy he may be! I have borne
everything for the boy's sake; I could go on--bearing everything the
rest of my life--if I could only keep my boy!"
Her voice dropped. Powell saw that her hands and limbs were shaken with
tremors. "I love him enough to give him up with a smile, if I could know
that it was for his good. My only happiness lies in knowing I have done
the best I could for him."
He silently waited the reaction that must come. Her hands covered her
face; then a terrible sob shook her body. It was not the sharp cry of
remorse; but the terrible soul-rending cry of a heart that is near to
breaking, and the man beside her ached to take her in his arms and
comfort her as he would a child.
"Tell me about it," he said at last, and she raised her tear-stained
face.
Without reservation, she told the story of the long, bitter struggle to
reform her husband; the hope that the child would bring compensation and
finally the letter and her husband's decision which had driven her to
desperation.
"Yet, when it came to the point, you never would have been cowardly
enough to take your life and Donnie's," he asserted.
"I don't know," she faltered. "A swimmer who struggles against the tide
reaches a moment when further efforts are impossible. I have struggled,
prayed and fought until I am tired of it all. I want to stop thinking,
stop fearing the future--and sleep. It is sometimes easier to die than
to keep on living. Life is too hard, too bitter, too hopeless! You can't
understand."
"But I do understand!" replied Powell earnestly. "Sometimes one reaches
a stone wall where there is no way around, no way over it, yet, if we
have the courage to hold on, the wall topples when we least expect it.
What seems impossible today may be accomplished tomorrow. I am up
against the hardest wall in my life, but I shall not give up. In the
quest of the Grail there must be no faltering. We all see the vision
once in life."
He laid his hands on hers, compelling her to look into his eyes. "I have
heard a soldier whose bravery was beyond question, say that the impulse
to seek a place of safety during a battle is almost overpowering. Many
men have been unable to resist the temptation; and the pity is that
often one deserts his colours just when victory is at hand. You are
brave enough to face the bullets. Don't you know the man who deserts,
influences many others to drop their colours too? Carry your colours
bravely, comrade, that I may have the courage to go on with my
fight--won't you?"
She turned impulsively and laid her two hands in his close grasp that
imparted new courage. "I was a coward," she said, "but I promise I'll
not give up again! You can't realize how much you have helped me! I will
prove my gratitude by not running from the bullets."
The doctor smiled at her. "That's right," he said heartily; "but you
overrate what I have done. You would have won the battle by yourself."
He turned then, to see Donnie looking at them from sleep-heavy eyes.
"Hello, Rip Van Winkle," called the doctor.
With a cry of delight the child leaped up and running to Powell, threw
his arms about the man's neck. "Oh, you did come after all!" he cried
triumphantly. Then Katherine and Powell understood how the child missed
the man.
The boy's unrestrained gladness relieved the tension between his mother
and the doctor. Finally Powell rose.
"Do you know, I forgot that Chappo fixed a lunch for me? Let's see what
it is, Donnie. I'm getting hungry."
Katherine watched them make their way over the rough ground, the child's
hand held by the man. The mingled voices happy with laughter, floated
back to her from where the ponies were tied. There might be an
occasional gleam of sunshine in life, if only the child were not taken
from her, she thought hopefully. Then she saw them returning, carrying
various articles which the doctor had extricated from his big saddle
bags, and now deposited on the ground at her feet.
"Chappo knows I am a confirmed coffee-fiend," confessed Powell. "You
gather some sticks, Donnie, and we'll pretend your mother is a captive
queen whom we have rescued from the cannibals. I'm Crusoe and you're
Friday."
"Friday was black," objected Donnie.
"Well, that was an island. This is a mountain, so you can be a white
Friday here, you see."
When the fire crackled and the large cup which Chappo had provided for
boiling coffee, sang merrily, the remnants of Katherine's lunch were
added to what the Doctor had, so a plentiful meal was spread.
"The trail is rather bad," suggested Powell as they finished the
impromptu feast, "so we had better start before it grows late."
He tightened the cinches of the three saddles and adjusted the bridles
while Katherine and Donnie picked up the cups and spoons. She was
replacing a few articles in a sack hanging on her saddle when she felt
the rock and remembered the note she had written to her husband. Untying
the sack, she tore the paper into fragments that were caught by the
light evening breeze and tossed over the edge of the Box. She watched
them, then with a smile turned to Powell, who waited to lift her to her
pony's back. Donnie, already on his pony, followed his mother as Fox
picked his way down the trail behind Powell's horse.
Six miles away the Rim Rock rose over two thousand feet or more, the
massive, jagged sides reflecting a riotous confusion of colours from the
setting sun, until its vivid beauty merged into a soft blue-grey, like
the plumage on the breast of a wild dove.
Sometimes the boy and Powell talked together as they rode down the
trail, or the mother joined in the conversation, but all the time she
was conscious of a new strength, a sense of comradeship that she had
never before known in her entire life. Her heart was lighter than it had
been for many years when she, Powell and Donnie reached the gate of the
Circle Cross. To her surprise, Glendon slouched on the porch.
It was only Thursday and Glendon had said he would be absent until
Sunday night. She wondered what it meant.
Her eyes turned to the child and fear gripped her heart until it seemed
as if she were suffocating. But Powell's words came back to her, "Carry
your colours bravely, comrade"--She determined not to meet trouble
prematurely. After all, there probably was a very natural explanation of
the sudden return. Juan was coming up from the barn, carrying a pail of
fresh milk. It was the usual routine of the ranch. She put her fears
aside.
Powell opening the gate for Katherine and Donnie to ride through, raised
his hat courteously and spoke to Glendon. It was the best way to aid
Glendon's wife. The other man looked at him between half-closed eyes
that were a studied insult, and made no reply. Neither did he make any
effort to assist his wife.
The doctor helped her from her horse, then lifted Donnie to the ground,
paying no heed to Glendon's attitude. With a few words to the woman and
boy, Powell rode through the gate toward Hot Springs. His blood boiled,
and it required all his will-power to avoid turning back and mauling
Glendon as he deserved; but, he realized it would not help the woman.
Juan, having disposed of the milk-pail, hastened to lead the ponies to
the stable. Knowing that Glendon was in one of his most surly moods,
Katherine moved slowly up the steps of the porch, trying to choke back
her terrible dread. "Carry your colours," she heard.
Something of the new-born hope and peace shone in her eyes as she faced
her husband silently. He knew that she stood on heights he could not
attain, and from which he was powerless to drag her to his own level.
Enraged, he leaned closer. His unshaven face, bloodshot eyes, soiled
shirt and hot breath redolent of liquor, struck her senses like a
physical blow! With an effort she conquered the sickening repugnance,
recalling her promise to Powell to carry her colours bravely. She smiled
at her husband and was passing into the house, when he caught her arm in
a brutal clutch, jerking her back so that his face was close to her own.
"Took you by surprise, coming back today, didn't I?" he said meaningly.
The child stood with pale face and frightened eyes. "Thought I was out
of the way, and you sneaked off to meet your affinity, using your child
as a cloak! You can't fool me. If you and that dude think you are
pulling the wool over my eyes, you'll find yourselves mistaken. You can
tell him that, next time you and he arrange to meet each other. I
thought you'd fall for the trap when I fixed it up yesterday morning."
Her face flushed deep red. She had borne every ignominy possible; but
this accusation hurt like corroding acid. Her impulse to cry out in
self-defense faded as she looked steadily into his wavering eyes. Like a
whisper came the memory of Powell's words, "Carry your colours bravely."
Quietly she answered, "Down in your heart, Jim, you don't believe what
you say. Doctor Powell saved me and Donnie from death today. If he had
not been riding on the Jackson trail and found us when he did, the boy
and I would both have been lying at the bottom of the Box tonight."
"What were you doing up there?" he snarled, glaring at her. "More of
your melodramatic drivel, as usual? Powell for an audience!"
"I wonder if it would make any difference to you if you knew the truth?"
she said brokenly. "I am worn out struggling. The Box seemed the only
way."
Dumbly, as though she had reached the limit of physical as well as
mental endurance, she turned from him and entered the place she called
home.
For a second Glendon hesitated; then with an oath he called after her:
"You can't bluff me with threats of suicide. You haven't the nerve. I've
said my last word about sending the boy to Father. I'm going on Monday,
whether he's ready or not. I'll break your pride!"
Donnie's startled eyes widened and his face grew paler as he realized
that he was to be parted from his mother. With a stifled sob the child
stumbled blindly up the steps, past his father and threw himself into
his mother's arms.
"Marmee! Marmee! Don't let me go!"
Katherine clasped the boy tightly, her eyes were dry, but it seemed as
if her aching heart would burst with agony, knowing that she was
helpless.
"Oh, God, give me the courage to live!" was her unuttered prayer.