The heavy log walls must have muffled the shot completely, for, contrary
to my expectations, no inquiring faces came poking in the door. In pure
defiance, I believe, Barreau kept his place by the fire, smoking
placidly till it wore on to ten o'clock. Then Montell, pursing up his
lips, put on his overcoat and left without a word. Shortly after that
Cullen came in, followed by Ben Wise. They slept in the store, one at
each end. At their entrance Barreau drew the _parka_ hood about his ears
and we took our departure.
The fire was down to a single charred stick, but the chill had not yet
laid hold of the air within, and we made ready for bed before the
numbing fingers of the frost made free with our persons. I stretched
myself on my bunk and wrapped the blankets and a rabbit-skin robe about
me, but Barreau sat on the edge of his bed, staring into the candle
flame as if he sought therein the answer to a riddle.
"If those Company men made the same proposition to Montell," he broke
out suddenly, "that they made to me, it is ten to one that Montell
stands ready to deliver the goods. That would account for the baldness
of that play to-night."
"You think he did mean it, then?" I had so far given Montell the benefit
of the doubt, despite a growing conviction that he had stumbled
purposely.
"Why, of course; that's obvious, isn't it?" Barreau declared. "You know
he did. Else why did you move that gun after he'd very artfully
contrived to point it my way?"
"So you were watching him, after all?" said I.
"I always watch him," he answered drily.
"I feel sure that he sees--or thinks he sees--the way clear, once I'm
attended to," Barreau continued. "I've been looking for this very thing.
It came to me that day we struck the pack-trail. You remember? I started
to tell you, and changed my mind."
I nodded. The incident was quite fresh in my memory--my juvenile egotism
had received a bump on that very occasion.
"It struck me with a sort of premonitory force, as I stood there looking
at those mule tracks," he went on, "that if the Company offered him the
same terms they did me he would jump at it. They offered me forty
thousand dollars to get out of the game, to give them a bill of sale of
my interest--_and they would take care of my partner_. You see? Now I'm
satisfied they wouldn't incorporate that last clause in any offer to
Montell. I'm not boasting when I say that from the beginning I've been
the thorn in the Company's flesh. Every time they've locked horns with
me, I've come out on top. They might offer him forty thousand, but he'd
have to guarantee them against me. And I think that performance to-night
is a sample of how he will try to clear the way."
"To put it baldly," I said. "You think he'll kill you out of hand--if he
gets a chance to do it in a way that won't prove a boomerang?"
"Exactly," Barreau observed.
"Then," I suggested, and even as the words were on my tongue I stood
amazed at the ruthless streak they seemed to uncover, "why not catch him
at it--and do the killing yourself. There's no law here to restrain
_him_, apparently. Be your own law--if you know you're _right_."
"I can't." Barreau muttered. "Not that my conscience would ever trouble
me. He's protected in a way he doesn't dream of. And he's too wary of me
to lay himself liable. If anything happens it will be an accident; you
know how it would have been to-night. You, sitting right there, could
not have declared it otherwise, no matter what your private opinion
might have been. He has pretty well calculated the chances. No, Mr.
Montell is not going to put himself in any position where I'd be clearly
justified in snuffing him out."
For a minute or so he sat silent, frowning at the candle on the table
between my bunk and his.
"How he would bait me," he went on presently, "if he knew that killing
him is the one thing I desire to avoid, at any cost! I hope it doesn't
come to that. It would be only just, but I have no wish to mete out
justice to him. His miserable life is safe from me, for her sake--no,
I'll be honest: for my own. I want him to live, till I can force him to
tell her a few truths that she will never believe except from his own
lips. I was a seven times fool for not doing that long before we reached
Benton. I could have forestalled all this. But I didn't suspect he was
tolling her on--for a purpose."
He stopped again. It was not the first time that Barreau had touched
upon that theme, and always his tongue had been stricken with a
semi-paralysis just short of complete revelation. In a general way it
was plain enough to me, from the verbal collisions between himself and
Montell on that same subject. And though I was humanly curious enough to
want the particulars at first hand, I made no effort to draw forth his
story. Hence I was surprised when he took up the thread of the
conversation where he had left off.
"One reads of these peculiar situations in books," he rested his chin in
the palms of his hands and stared abstractedly at me, "but they are
seldom encountered in everyday living. I dare say the world is full of
women, good women, beautiful, brilliant women, that I might have won.
Yet I must fall victim to an insane craving for an elfin-faced,
hot-tempered sprite who will have none of me. Six or seven years ago she
was a big-eyed school-girl, with a mop of unruly hair. Then all at once,
she grew up, and--and I've been the captive of her bow and spear ever
since. Love--the old, primal instinct to mate! It's a brutal force, Bob,
when it focuses all a man's being on one particular woman. I never told
her, but I'm sure she knew; I know she did. And she--well, a man never
can tell what a woman thinks or feels or will do or say, or whether she
means what she says when she says it. I don't know. But I've thought
that she did care--only she wouldn't admit it until I made her. She's
the type that wouldn't give herself to even the man she loved without a
struggle. And I'm just savage enough to be glad of that. I've only been
waiting till this spring and the end of this fur deal, so that we would
have the wherewith to live, before I cornered her and fought it out.
"But I've waited too long, I'm afraid. You see, Montell has always been
against me; that is, he has secretly been cutting the ground from under
my feet since he learned that I wanted _her_. The old fool looks into
his own heart and seeing perfect bliss in an alliance with 'blood' and
'money,' straightway determines that these two will insure her future
happiness--oh, I can read him, like an open book. He'd move the heavens
to bring about what he'd term 'a good match.'
"As it happens I can compare pedigrees with the best of them--Good
Lord!" he broke off and laughed ironically. "That's sickening; but I'm
trying to make the thing clear. Naive recital this, I must say. Well,
anyway, I measured up to the standard of breeding, but fell wofully
short on the financial requirements. And, somehow, foxy Simon grew
afraid that I was in a fair way to upset his cherished plans for Jess.
This was after we'd gone in together on this fur business. He had always
acted rather guardedly about Jessie and myself, but I had him there; so
long as she went out, I could meet her socially, and he could not
prevent. Then a year ago last summer the Hudson's Bay undertook to run
me out of this country. That bred the trouble on High River, and after
that I was really outlawed. I expect he began at once to figure how he
could turn that to his advantage--regarding me as a dishtowel that he
could wring dry and throw aside. He has nursed a direct, personal grudge
since the first season. Naturally, he wanted to dominate everything, and
I wouldn't let him. He thought himself the biggest toad in the puddle,
and it angered him when he found himself outsplashed. He made mistakes.
I corrected them, and held him down at every turn; I had to. It was a
ticklish job, and I made him move according to my judgment. Which was a
very bitter sort of medicine for a man of Montell's domineering stamp.
So he was not long in developing a rancorous dislike of me, which seems
to have thrived on concealment.
"Where I made the grand mistake was in letting him keep her from knowing
that we were partners in this business. Without giving the matter a
second thought I had kept our business strictly to myself. He hinted
that others might follow our lead, and at first we had visions of making
terms with the Hudson's Bay and building up a permanent trade here.
After two or three years of this I didn't think it well to plunge into
explanations last spring. I made a mistake there, however; the mistake,
I should say. Jessie had gone out a good deal the last two winters, both
in St. Louis and New Orleans, and she was becoming quite a belle. For
all that, I think--oh, well, it doesn't matter what I think. To make a
long story short, a day or two before the _Moon_ went upstream she told
me that she was going as far as Benton with her father. I, of course had
to rise to the occasion, be very properly surprised and inform her that
I, too, contemplated a trip on that same steamer. And I straightway
hunted Montell up and tried to have him dissuade her from the journey.
"I didn't fathom the purport of it, even then--although I knew that he
would welcome any chance to put me wrong in her eyes. It was too late, I
felt, to volunteer any details concerning my part in her father's
business up North. So I contented myself with his assurance and her
statement, that she would see him as far as Benton and then return on
the _Moon_.
"You see, I could easily imagine what would be her opinion of me, if she
learned all the unsavory details with which the Northwest has been
pleased to embellish the record of Slowfoot George. She has such a
profound scorn for anything verging on dishonesty, and according to the
sources of her information I've got some very shady things laid at my
door. I can't be anything but a moral degenerate, in her eyes. Oh, he
engineered it skilfully. If I had only waited at Benton till the
bull-train was ready to start!
"You know how her returning panned out. I believe now, that he intended
from the first that she should go on to MacLeod. I'd come to the
conclusion that he would knife me on the business end, and that was why
I wanted Walt Sanders with me. But it didn't occur to me that his plans
were so far-reaching. That unfortunate Police raid delivered me into his
hands at the psychological moment I was like a cornered rat that day she
came to the guardhouse and peered in on us through the cell door. I
couldn't help lashing back when she was so frankly contemptuous. I could
see so clearly how he had managed it. And having accomplished his
purpose he saw to it that escape was made easy, for he still needed me
up here. Mind you, it would have been pretty much the same if I had not
been taken by the Police. He would have seen that she was well posted
before she left MacLeod.
"The rest you have seen for yourself. She spoiled his plan a little,
perhaps, by coming all the way once she had started. That wasn't his
fault; he didn't want her to come here, especially after I picked up one
of her combs that night we came to the camp, and threatened him if he
didn't send her home. She _is_ wilful. And the only way he could have
kept her from coming to the Sicannie would have been to go back himself.
"If our presence here has puzzled her you may be sure he has made
satisfactory explanations. I am only biding my time. If I can hold him
down and stand off the Hudson's Bay till the furs come in, I can win out
so far as the money end is concerned. And if I am to lose her, by God
he'll pay for it! She shall know the truth if I have to choke it out of
him one word at a time."
"It looks like a big contract," I sympathized.
He made a gesture that might have meant anything, but did not reply.
Presently he reached for his tobacco. When his cigarette was lighted he
blew out the candle. By the glowing red tip I could follow his movements
as he settled himself and drew the bedding about him. "Oh, Bob," he
addressed me after a long interval.
"What is it?" I answered.
"If that old hound and I should get mixed up, you keep out of it.
Somebody will have to see that Jess gets out of this God-forsaken
country. You're woods-wise enough to manage that now."
"Why, of course I'd do that," I replied. It was a startling prospect he
held forth. "But I hope nothing like that happens."
"Anything might happen," he returned. "We're sitting on a powder-keg. I
can't guarantee that it won't blow up. Montell is a bull-headed brute,
and so am I. If he should throw a slug into me, I'd probably live long
enough to return the favor."
Then, after a pause: "I've been running on like an old woman. That rifle
business to-night jarred me like the devil. Maybe a decent night's rest
will scatter these pessimistic ideas. Here goes, Robert; good-night."
With which he turned his face to the wall, and did, I verily believe, go
at once to sleep. And he was still asleep, his head resting on one
doubled-up arm, when I got up and lighted the candle at seven in the
morning. My slumbers had been beset by disturbing visions of violent
deeds, the by-product of what I had seen and heard that evening;
Barreau, by his cheerful aspect on arising, had banished his troubles
while he slept.
The day dawned, clear and cold and very still. It passed, and another
followed, and still others, till I lost track of their number in the
frost-ridden cycle of time. Montell's momentous stumble grew to be a dim
incident of the past; sometimes I was constrained to wonder if, after
all, he had done that with malice aforethought. Upon divers occasions I
met and talked with Jessie, but I did not go to the house again, until
Barreau hinted, one day, that unless I continued the intimacy I had
accidentally begun, Montell would think I suspected him, that I was
taking Barreau's side.
"There is no use in your making an enemy of him," he said.
"Well," I replied, "I must say I don't altogether like his fatherly
manner. He makes me uncomfortable."
"Nevertheless," Barreau declared, "he has taken a fancy to you. He's
human. And seeing it's not your fight, you'd better not break off short
on that account. Better not antagonize him. It's different with me; I
have no choice."
Influenced more or less by Barreau's suggestion, I suppose, I found
myself giving assent that very afternoon when Montell asked me to the
cabin for supper and a session at cribbage. Over the meal and the
subsequent card-game he was so genial, so very much like other big
easy-going men that I had known, I could scarcely credit him as
cold-bloodedly scheming to defraud and, if necessary, murder another
man. Somehow, without any logical reason, I had always associated fat
men, especially big, fat men, with the utmost good-nature, with a sort
of rugged straightforward uprightness that frowned on anything that
savored of unfair advantage. I could not quite fathom Mr. Simon
Montell--nor George Barreau, either, so far as that goes.
Shortly after that, at the close of an exceeding bitter day, an Indian
came striding down the Sicannie to the post. When the guard at the big
gate let him in his first word was for the "White Chief," as Barreau was
known among the men of the lodges. Ben Wise came shouting this at the
door of our cabin, and we followed Ben to the store. The Indian shook
hands with Barreau. Then he drew his blanket coat closer about him and
delivered himself of a few short guttural sentences. Barreau stood
looking rather thoughtful when the copper-skinned one had finished. He
asked a few questions in the native tongue, receiving answers as brief.
And after another period of consideration he turned to me.
"Crow Feathers is sick," he said. "Pneumonia, I should judge, by this
fellow's description of the symptoms. The chances are good that he'll be
dead by the time I get there--if he isn't already. The medicine man
can't help him, so old Three Wolves has sent for me, out of his sublime
faith in my ability to do anything. I can't help him, but I'll have to
go, as a matter of policy. Do you want to come along, Bob? It won't be a
long jaunt, and it will give you some real snowshoe practice."
I embraced the opportunity without giving him a chance to reconsider
which he showed signs of doing later in the evening. Curiously enough
Montell also attempted to dissuade me from the trip.
"What's the use?" he argued. "You'll likely get your fingers or your
feet frozen. It's a blamed poor time of the year to go trapesin' around
the country. You better stay here where there's houses and fires."
The cold and other disagreeable elements didn't look formidable enough
to deter me, however; I wanted something to break the monotony. A trip
to Three Wolves' camp in mid-winter appealed very strongly to me, and I
turned a deaf ear to Montell's advice, and held Barreau strictly to the
proposal which he evinced a desire to withdraw.
That evening we got the dog harness ready, and rigged up a toboggan for
the trail, loading it with food, bedding, and a small, light tent. Two
hours before daybreak we started. There was a moon, and the land spread
away boldly under the silver flood, like a great, ghostly study in black
and white.
All that day our Indian led us up the Sicannie. There was no need to use
our snowshoes or to "break" trail, for we kept to the ice, and its
covering of snow was packed smooth and hard as a macadam roadway. By
grace of an early start and steady jogging we traversed a distance that
was really a two days' journey, and at dusk the lodges of Three Wolves'
band loomed in the edge of a spruce grove. Then our Indian shook hands
with Barreau and me, and swung off to the right.
"He says his lodge is over there in a draw," Barreau told me, when I
asked the reason for that.
The dogs of the camp greeted us with shrill yapping, and two or three
Indians came out. They scattered the yelping huskies with swiftly thrown
pieces of firewood, and greeted Barreau gravely. After a mutual exchange
of words Barreau vented a sharp exclamation.
"The devil!" he said, and followed this by stripping the harness from
the dogs.
"What now?" I asked, as I bent over the leader's collar.
"You'll see in a minute," he answered briefly, and there was an angry
ring in his voice.
The dogs freed and the toboggan turned on its side, he led the way to a
lodge pointed out by one of the hunters. A head protruded. It was
withdrawn as we approached, and some one within called out in Cree. And
when we had inserted ourselves through the circular opening I echoed
Barreau's exclamation. For sitting beside the fire which burned
cheerfully in the center, was Crow Feathers himself, smoking his pipe
like a man in the best of health. Nor was there any suggestion of
illness in the voice he lifted up at our entrance. Barreau fired a
question or two at him, and a look of mild interest overspread Crow
Feathers' aquiline face as he answered.
"It was a plant all the way through," Barreau declared, sitting down and
slipping off his mitts. "Three Wolves sent no message to me. Crow
Feathers never was sick in his life."
"I wonder who's responsible?" said I. "Do Indians ever play practical
jokes?"
He shrugged his shoulders at the suggestion. Crow Feathers' squaw pushed
a pot of boiled venison before us, and some bannock, and we fell upon
that in earnest. Not till we had finished and were fumbling for tobacco
_did_ Barreau refer to our wild-goose chase again.
"I'd like to have speech with that red gentleman who led us up here," he
said grimly. "It may be that Mr. Montell has unsheathed his claws in
earnest. If he has, I'll clip them, and clip them short."