TURKEY RUN
A week before Christmas Mrs. William Holton gave a sleigh-ride and
skating-party for a niece from Memphis, and Phil was invited. She
mentioned the matter to her father, and asked him what she should do
about it.
He had come back from Indianapolis in good spirits, and told her that
the affairs of the traction company had been adjusted and that he hoped
there would be no more trouble. He seemed infinitely relieved by the
outcome, and his satisfaction expressed itself to her observing eyes in
many ways. The confidence reposed in him by his old friend, the counsel
of the Desbrosses Trust & Guaranty Company, had not only pleased him,
but the success that had attended his efforts to adjust the traction
company's difficulties without resorting to the courts had strengthened
his waning self-confidence. He even appeared in a new suit of clothes,
and with his beard cut shorter than he usually wore it,--changes that
evoked the raillery in which Phil liked to indulge herself. He was
promised the care of certain other Western interests of the Trust
Company, and he had been offered a partnership in Indianapolis by one of
the best lawyers in the state.
"Things are looking up, Phil. If another year had gone by in the old
way, I should have been ready for the scrap heap. But I miss the cooking
our poverty introduced me to; and I shan't have any more time for
fooling with excursions into Picardy with the Gray Knight. By the way, I
found some strange manuscript on my desk at the office to-day. If you've
take up the literary life you'll have to be careful how you leave your
vestigia in lawyers' offices. It was page eighteen of something that I
took the liberty of reading, and I thirsted for more."
She had not told him about "The Dogs of Main Street," wishing to wait
until she could put the magazine containing it into his hands. Under the
stimulus of the acceptance of her sketch she had been scratching
vigorously in her spare moments. Having begun with dogs she meditated an
attack upon man, and the incriminating page she had left behind in her
father's office was a part of a story she was writing based upon an
incident that had occurred at a reunion of Captain Wilson's regiment
that fall in Montgomery. A man who had been drummed out of the regiment
for cowardice suddenly reappeared among his old comrades with an
explanation that restored him to honored fellowship. Phil had elaborated
the real incident as Captain Wilson described it, and invested it with
the element of "suspense," which she had read somewhere was essential to
the short story.
Phil was living just now in a state of exaltation. She began a notebook
after the manner of Hawthorne's, and was astonished at the ease with
which she filled its pages. Now that her interest was aroused she saw
"material" everywhere. The high school had given her German and French,
and having heard her father say that the French were the great masters
of fiction, she addressed herself to Balzac and Hugo. The personalities
of favorite contemporaneous writers interested her tremendously, and she
sought old files of literary periodicals that she might inform herself
as to their methods of work. She kept Lamb and Stevenson on the stand by
her bed and read them religiously every night. There had never been any
fun like this! Her enjoyment of this secret inner life was so satisfying
that she wished no one might ever know of it. She wrote and rewrote
sentences and paragraphs, thrust them away into the drawers of the long
table in her room to mellow--she had got this phrase from Nan,--and then
dug them out in despair that they seemed so lifeless. She planned no end
of books and confidently set down titles for these unborn masterpieces.
Nan and Rose marked the change in her. At times she sat with her chin
in her hand staring into vacancy. The two women speculated about this
and wondered whether her young soul was not in the throes of a first
love affair.
Now that fortune smiled upon her father Phil's happiness marked new
attitudes, with no cloud to darken the misty-blue horizons of her
dreams. She meant to be very good to her father. And as to his marrying
Nan, she was giving much time to plots for furthering their romance.
"Fred Holton was looking for you the other day. I suppose you haven't
seen him."
"Yes; he came to Indianapolis and saw me at the hotel. I remember that
he was at your party, but I don't recall how you got acquainted with
him?"
Phil laughed.
"Oh, that last night we camped at Turkey Run I wandered off by myself
and met him in the funniest fashion, over by the Holton barn. They were
having a dance--Charlie and Ethel, and Fred was watching the revel from
afar, and saw me dancing like an idiot round the corn-shocks. And I
talked to him across the fence and watched the dance in the barn until
you blew the horn. I didn't tell you about it because it seemed so
silly--and then I thought you wouldn't like my striking up acquaintances
with those people. But Fred is nice, I think."
"He seems to be a very earnest young person. He came to me on a business
matter in a spirit that is to his credit."
Phil had decided, in view of Nan's unlooked-for arraignment, to give her
father another chance to express himself as to her further social
relations with the Holtons.
"Daddy dear, I want you to tell me honestly whether you have any feeling
about those people," she said when they were established at the fireside
for the evening. "Of course, you know that one's aunts were responsible
for asking them to Amy's party; it wasn't Amy's doings; but if you want
me to keep clear of them I'll do it. Please tell me the truth--just how
you feel about it."
"Phil," said Kirkwood, meeting her eyes steadily, "those aunts of yours
are silly women--with vain, foolish, absurd ideals. They didn't consult
me about asking the Holtons because I'm a stupid old frump, and it
didn't make any difference whether I'd like it or not. But I'm eternally
grateful that they did it; and I'm glad that other man came back just as
he did. For all those things showed me that the years have blotted out
any feeling I had against them. I haven't a bit, Phil. Maybe I ought to
have; but however that may be there's no bitterness in my soul. And I'm
glad I've discovered that; it's a greater relief to me than I can
describe."
His smile, the light touch he gave her hands, carried conviction. The
discussion seemed to afford him relief.
"So far as the Holtons concern me, there's peace between our houses.
It's perfectly easy for a man to shoot another who has done him a wrong;
but it doesn't help any, for,"--and he smiled the smile that Phil loved
in him--"for the man being dead can't know how much his enemy enjoys his
taking off! Murder, as a fine art, Phil, falls short right there."
He had not mentioned her mother; and Phil wondered whether she too
shared this amnesty. It was inconceivable that he should have forgiven
the man if he still harbored hatred of the woman.
With a sudden impulse she rose and caught his face in her hands.
"Why don't you marry Nan, daddy?"
She saw the color deepen in his cheeks and a startled look came into his
eyes.
"What madness is this, Phil?" he asked, with an effort at lightness.
"It means that I think it would be nice--nice for you and Nan and nice
for me. I can see her here, sitting right there in that chair that she
always sits in when she comes. I think it would be fun--lots of fun for
her to be here all the time, so we wouldn't always be trailing over
there."
He laughed; she felt that he was not sorry that she had spoken of Nan.
"Are we always trailing over there? I suppose they really are our best
friends. But there is Rose, you know. Wouldn't she look just as much at
home in her particular chair as Nan?"
"Well, Rose is fine, too, but Rose is different."
"Oh, you think there's a difference, do you?"
He picked up a book, turned over the leaves idly, and when he spoke
again it was not of Nan.
"If you want to go to Mrs. Holton's party it's all right, Phil. I
suppose most of the young people will be there."
"Yes; it's a large party."
"Then go and have a good time. And Phil--"
"Yes, daddy."
"Be careful what foolish notions you get into your head."
* * * * *
Mrs. William Holton undeniably did things with an air. It may have been
an expression of her relief at having disposed of Jack Holton so quickly
and effectively--he had vanished immediately after his interview with
William in the bank--that her sleigh-ride and skating-party as
originally planned grew into a function that well-nigh obscured Phil's
"coming-out." It began with a buffet luncheon at home, followed by the
ride countryward in half a dozen bob-sleds and sleighs of all
descriptions. It was limited to the young people, and Phil found that
all her friends were included. Ethel and Charles Holton had come over
from Indianapolis to assist their aunt in her entertainment.
"Mighty nice to find you here!" said Charles to Phil as he stood beside
her on the sidewalk waiting for their appointed "bob." "And you may be
sure I'm glad to get a day off. I tell you this business life is a
grind. It's what General Sherman said war is. I suppose your father told
you what a time we've been having straightening out the traction tangle.
Scandal--most outrageous lying--but that father of yours is a master
negotiator. He ought to be in the diplomatic service."
He looked at her guardedly with a quick narrowing of the eyes.
"Oh, I suppose it wasn't really so serious," said Phil indifferently.
"Father never brings business home with him and I only know that I don't
like having him away so much."
"Yes," said Holton, "I don't doubt that you miss him. But Montgomery is
getting gay. Over in Indianapolis there's more doing, of course, and
bigger parties; but they don't have the good old home flavor. It's these
informal gatherings of boys and girls who have known each other all
their lives that count."
It was the brightest of winter days, with six inches of snow, and cold
enough to set young blood tingling. They set off with a merry jingling
of bells and drove through town to advertise their gayety before turning
countryward. The destination was Turkey Run, that fantastic anomaly of
the Hoosier landscape, where Montgomery did much of its picnicking.
A scout sent ahead the day before had chosen a stretch of ice where the
creek broadened serenely after its bewilderingly tumultuous course
through the gorge. There the ice was even and solid and the snow had
been scraped away. In the defile, sheltered by its high rocky banks,
bonfires were roaring. The party quickly divided itself into twos--why
is it that parties always effect that subdivision with any sort of
opportunity?--and the skaters were off.
Phil loved skating as she loved all sports that gave free play to her
strong young limbs. The hero of the Thanksgiving football game had
attached himself to her, but Phil, resenting his airs of proprietorship,
deserted him after one turn.
As her blood warmed, her spirits rose. The exercise and the keen air
sent her pulses bounding. It was among the realizations of her new inner
life that physical exercise stimulated her mental processes. To-day
lines, verses, couplets--her own or fragments of her reading--tumbled
madly over each other in her head. No one ranged the ice more swiftly or
daringly. She had put aside her coat and donned her sweater--not the old
relic of the basketball team, but a new one from her fall outfit, which
included also the prettiest of fur toques. The color was bright in her
cheeks and the light shone in her eyes as she moved up and down the
course with long, even strides or let herself fly at the boundaries, or
turned in graceful curves. Skating was almost as much fun as swimming,
and even better fun than paddling a canoe.
She kept free of companions for nearly an hour, taunting those who tried
to intercept her, and racing away from several cavaliers who combined in
an effort to corner her. Then having gained the heights of her
imaginings, she was ready to be a social being once more.
Charles Holton, who had viewed her flights with admiration as he helped
the timid and awkward tyros of the company, swung into step with her.
"It's wonderful how you do it? Please be kind to me a mere mortal!"
He caught her pace and they moved along together at ease. Her mood had
changed and she let him talk all he liked and as he liked. They had met
twice at parties since she had snubbed him at Amzi's the night of her
presentation, and he had made it plain that he admired her. He
contrasted advantageously with the young gentlemen of Montgomery. He was
less afraid of being polite, or his politeness was less self-conscious
and showed a higher polish. He had twice sent her roses and once a new
novel, and these remembrances had not been without their effect. It was
imaginable that his tolerance of the simple sociabilities of Montgomery
was attributable to an interest in Phil, who dreamed a great deal these
days; and there was space enough in the ivory tower of her fancy to
enshrine lovers innumerable. Charles was a personable young man,
impressionable and emotional, and not without imagination of his own.
Her humor, and the healthy common-sense philosophy that flowered from
it, were the girl's only protection from her own emotionalism and
susceptibility. Even in the larger world of the capital there was no
girl as pretty as Phil, Charles assured himself; she was not only
agreeable to look at, but she piqued him by her indifference to his
advances. His usual cajoleries only provoked retorts that left him
blinking, not certain whether they were intended to humble him or to
stimulate him to more daring efforts.
"You're the only girl in the bunch who skates as though she loved it.
You do everything as though it was your last hour on earth and you meant
to make the most of it. I like that. It's the way I feel about things
myself. If I had your spirit I'd conquer the world."
"Well, the world is here to be conquered," said Phil. "What peak have
you picked to plant your flag on?"
"Oh, I want money first--you've got to have it these days to do things
with; and then I think I'd like power. I'd go in for politics--the
governor's chair or the senate. If father hadn't died he could have got
the governorship easy; he was entitled to it and it would have come
along just in the course of things. What would you like to do best of
all?"
"If I told you, you wouldn't believe it. I don't want a thing I haven't
got--not a single thing. On a day like this everything is mine--that
long piece of woods over there--black against the blue sky--and the
creek underfoot--I couldn't ask for a single other thing!"
"But there must be a goal you want to reach--everybody has that."
"Oh, you're talking about to-morrow! and this is to-day. And sufficient
unto the day is the joy thereof. If I ever told anybody what I mean to
do to-morrow, it would be spoiled. I'm full of dark secrets that I never
tell any one."
"But you might tell me--I'm the best possible person to tell secrets
to."
"I can't be sure of that, when I hardly know you at all."
"That's mighty cruel, you know, when I feel as though I had known you
always."
He tried to throw feeling into this, but the time and place and her
vigorous strides over the ice did not encourage sentiment.
"You oughtn't to tell girls that you feel you have known them always. It
isn't complimentary. You ought to express sorrow that they are so
difficult to know and play the card that you hope by great humility and
perseverance one day to know them. That is the line I should take if I
were a man."
He laughed at this. There were undoubted fastnesses in her nature that
were not easily attainable. She seemed to him amazingly mature in
certain ways, and in others she was astonishingly childlike.
"They say you're a genius; that you're going to do wonderful things," he
said.
"Who says it?" asked Phil practically, but not without interest.
"Oh, my aunt says it; she says other people say it."
"Well, my aunts haven't said it," remarked Phil. "According to them my
only genius is for doing the wrong thing."
"We needn't any of us expect to be appreciated in our own families.
That's always the way. You read a lot, don't you?"
"I like to read; but you can read a lot without being a genius. Geniuses
don't have to read--they know it all without reading. So there's that."
"I'll wager you write, too;--confess now that you do!"
"Letters to my father when he's away from home--one every night. But he
isn't away very much."
"But stories and things like that. Yes; don't deny it: you mean to be a
writer! I'm sure you can succeed at that. Lots of women do; some of the
best writers are women. You will write novels like--like--George Eliot."
Phil laughed her derision of the idea.
"She knew a lot; more than I could ever know if I studied all my life.
But there's only one George Eliot; I'm hardly likely--just Phil Kirkwood
in Montgomery, Indiana,--to be number two."
The direction of the talk was grateful to her. It was pleasant to feel
the warmth of his interest in her new secret aims without having to
acknowledge them. It was flattering that he surmised the line of her
interests, and spoke of them so kindly and sympathetically.
"I try to do some reading all the time," he went on; "but a business man
hasn't much chance. Still, I usually keep something worth while on the
center table, and when I travel I carry some good book with me. I like
pictures, too, and music; and those things you miss in a town like
Montgomery."
"Well, Montgomery is interesting just the same," said Phil defensively.
"The people are all so nice and folksy."
He hastened to disavow any intention of slurring the town. He should
always feel that it was home, no matter how far he might wander. He
explained, in the confidence that seemed to be establishing itself
between them, that there was a remote possibility that he might return
to Montgomery and go into the bank with his uncle, who needed
assistance. It was desirable, he explained, to keep the management of
the bank in the hands of the family.
"You know," he went on, "they printed outrageous stories about all of us
in the 'Advertiser.' They were the meanest sort of lies, but I'd like
you to know that we met the issue squarely. I've turned over to your
father as trustee all the property they claimed we had come by
dishonestly. The world will never know this, for your father shut up the
newspapers--it was quite wonderful the way he managed it all;--and, of
course, it doesn't make any difference what the world thinks. This was
my affair, the honor of my family, and a matter of my own conscience."
Her knowledge of the traction muddle was sufficient to afford a
background of plausibility for this highminded renunciation. There was
something likable in Charles Holton. His volubility, which had
prejudiced her against him in the beginning, seemed now to speak for a
frankness that appealed to her. There was no reason for his telling her
these things unless he cared for her good opinion; and it was not
disagreeable to find that this man, who was ten years her senior and
possessed of what struck her as an ample experience of life, should be
at pains to entrench himself in her regard.
As she made no reply other than to meet his eyes in a look of
sympathetic comprehension, he went on:--
"You won't mind my saying that we were all terribly cut up over Uncle
Jack's coming back here; but I guess we've disposed of him. I don't
think he's likely to trouble Montgomery very much. Uncle Will had it out
with him the day after he showed up so disgracefully at your party; and,
of course, Uncle Jack would never have done that if he had been himself.
He went to Indianapolis and tried to make a lot of trouble for all of
us, but that was where your father showed himself the fine man he is. I
guess it isn't easy to put anything over on that father of yours; he's
got the brains and character to meet any difficulty squarely."
Phil murmured her appreciation. They had paused in the middle of the
course and were idly cutting figures, keeping within easy conversational
range.
"Your initials are hard to do," said Holton, backing into line beside
her and indicating the letters his skates had traced on the surface. The
"P. K." was neatly done. Phil without comment etched a huge "C" and then
cut an "H" within its long loop.
"Splendid! You are the best skater I ever saw! I'd like to cut that out
and keep it in cold storage as a souvenir."
This did not please her so much as his references to her hidden
ambitions, and seeing that she failed to respond, and fearing one of her
taunts, he led the way toward the gorge. It was four o'clock, and
already shadows were darkening the deep vale where most of the skaters
had now gathered about the bonfires. Phil's popularity was attested by
the tone in which the company greeted her. She sat down on a log and
entered into their give-and-take light-heartedly, while Holton
unfastened her skates. He had found her coat and thrown it round her
shoulders. He was very thoughtful and attentive, and his interest in her
had not gone unremarked.
"We were just wondering," said one of the girls, "whether anybody here
was sport enough to scale that wall in the winter? We've saved that for
you, Phil."
Phil lifted her head and scanned the steep slope. She had scaled it
often; in fact one of her earliest remembered adventures had been an
inglorious tumble into the creek as the reward of her temerity. That was
in her sixth year when she had clambered up the cliff a few yards in
pursuit of a chipmunk.
"I haven't done that for several moons; but I have done it, children.
There wouldn't be any point in doing it, of course, if anybody else had
done it--I mean to-day, with ice all over the side."
"You mustn't think of it, Phil," said Mrs. Holton, glancing up
anxiously.
"I shan't think of it, Mrs. Holton, unless somebody says it can't be
done. I'm not going to take a dare."
"Just for that," said Charles, "I'm going to do it myself."
"Better not tackle it," said one of the college boys, eyeing the cliff
critically. "I've done it in summer, and it's hard enough then; but you
can see how the ice and snow cover all the footholds. You'd have to do
it with ropes the way they climb the Alps."
Holton looked at Phil as she sat huddled in her coat. It was in her eyes
that she did not think he would attempt it, and he resented her lack of
faith in his courage.
"I don't think," she remarked, helping herself to a sandwich, "that
anybody's going to be cruel enough to make me do it."
"If I do it," said Holton, "no one else will ever have to try it again
in winter. It will be like discovering the North Pole--there's nothing
in it for the second man."
"You're not going to try it! Please don't!" cried Mrs. Holton. "If you
got hurt it would spoil the party for everybody."
"Don't worry, Aunt Nellie. It's as easy as walking home."
He was already throwing off his overcoat, measuring the height and
choosing a place for his ascent.
Amid a chorus of protests and taunts he began climbing rapidly. Phil
rose and watched him with sophisticated eyes as he began mounting. She
saw at once that he had chosen the least fortunate place in the whole
face of the declivity for an ascent. There were two or three faintly
scratched paths, by which the adventurous sometimes struggled to the
top, and she had herself experimented with all of them; but Holton had
essayed the most precipitous and hazardous point for his attempt.
At the start he sprang agilely up the limestone which for a distance
thrust out rough shelves with ladder-like regularity; and when this
failed, he caught at the wild tangle of frozen shrubbery and clutched
the saplings that had hopefully taken root wherever patches of earth
gave the slightest promise of succor. As his difficulties increased a
hush fell upon the spectators.
He accomplished half the ascent, and paused to rest, clinging with one
hand to a slender maple. He turned and waved his cap, and was greeted
with a cheer.
"Better let it go at that!" called one of the young men. "Come on back."
Charles flung down a contemptuous answer and addressed himself to the
more difficult task beyond. Particles of ice and frozen earth detached
by his upward scramble clattered down noisily. Withered leaves, shaken
free from niches where the winds had gathered them, showered fitfully
into the valley. He began drawing himself along by shrubs and young
trees that covered a long outward curve in the face of the cliff. Those
below heard the crackle of frozen twigs, and the swish of released
boughs that marked his progress. Phil stood watching him with an
absorbed interest in which fear became dominant. Better than the others
Phil knew the perils of the cliff, the scant footholds offered by even
the least formidable points in the rough surface.
He was rounding the bulging crag with its sparse vegetation when, as he
seemed to have cleared it safely, a sapling that he had grasped for a
moment yielded, and he tumbled backward.
Those below could see his frantic struggles to check his descent as his
body shot downward with lightning-like swiftness. A short clump of
bushes caught and held him for an instant, then gave way, and they saw
him struggling for another hold. Then a shelf of rock caught him. He lay
flat for a moment afraid to move, and those below could not see him.
Then he sat up and waved his cap, and shouted that he was safe.
The awe-struck crowd hardly knew what Phil was doing until she had
crossed the ice and begun to climb. While Charles was still crashing
downward, she had run to a favorable point her quick eyes had marked and
was climbing up a well-remembered trail. The snow and ice had increased
its hazards, and an ominous crackling and snapping of twigs attended her
flight.
"Come back! Come back!" they called to her. Half a dozen young men
plunged after her; but already well advanced, she cried to them not to
follow.
"Tell him to stay where he is," she called; and was again nimbly
creeping upward. There was no way to arrest or help her, and she had
clearly set forth with a definite purpose and could not be brought back.
Cries of horror marked every sound as her white sweater became the
target of anxious eyes.
The white sweater paused, hung for tremulous instants, was lost and
discernible again. A frozen clod, loosened as she clutched at the
projecting roots of a young beech, ricocheted behind her. Her course,
paralleling that taken by Holton, was about ten yards to the left of it.
To those below it seemed that her ascent was only doubling the hour's
peril. Charles, perched on the rock that had seemingly flung out its arm
to save him, was measuring his chances of escape without knowing that
Phil was climbing toward him.
As she drew nearer he heard the sounds of her ascent, and peering over
saw the sweater dangling like a white ball from the cliff-side.
"Go down, Phil! You can't make it; nobody can do it! Tell the boys to
get a rope," he shouted. "Please go back!"
Already messengers had run for assistance, but the little canon in its
pocket-like isolation was so shut in that it was a mile to the nearest
house.
Along the tiny thread of a trail, transformed by sleet and snow until it
was scarcely recognizable, Phil pressed on steadily. Charles, seeing
that she would not go back, ceased his entreaties, fearing to confuse or
alarm her. Her hands caught strong boughs with certainty; the tiny twigs
slapped her face spitefully. Here and there she flung herself flat
against the rocky surface and crept guardedly; then she was up dancing
from one vantage-point to another, until finally she paused, clinging to
a sapling slightly above Holton. When she had got her breath she called
an "All right!" that echoed and reechoed through the valley.
"You thought you could do it, didn't you?" she said mockingly; "and now
I've had to spoil my clothes to get you off that shelf."
"For God's sake, stay where you are! There's nothing you can do for me.
The boys have gone round to bring a rope, and until they come you must
stay right there!"
Phil, still panting, laughed derisively.
"You're perfectly ridiculous--pinned to a rock like Prometheus--Simeon
on his pillar! But it wouldn't be dignified for you to let the boys haul
you up by a rope. You'd never live that down. They'll be years getting a
rope; and it would be far from comfortable to sit there all night."
While she chaffed she was measuring distances and calculating chances.
The shelf which had caught him was the broader part of a long edge of
outcrop. Phil beat among the bushes to determine how much was exposed,
but the ledge was too narrow for a foothold.
"Please stop there and don't move!" Holton pleaded. "If you break your
neck, I'd never forgive myself, and I'd never be forgiven."
Phil laughed her scorn of his fears and began creeping upward again. The
situation appealed to her both by reason of its danger and its humor;
there was nothing funnier than the idea of Charlie Holton immured on a
rock, waiting to be hauled up from the top of the cliff. She meant to
extricate him from his difficulties: she had set herself the task; it
was like a dare. Her quick eyes searching the rough slope noted a tree
between her and the shelf where Holton clung, watching her and
continuing his entreaties not to heed him, but to look out for her own
safety. Its roots were well planted in an earthy cleft and its
substantial air inspired confidence. It had been off the line of his
precipitous descent and he had already tried to reach it; but in the
cautious tiptoeing to which his efforts were limited by the slight
margin of safety afforded by the rock he could not touch it.
"If I swing down from that tree and reach as far as I can, you ought to
be able to catch my hand; and if you can I'll pull, and you can make
your feet walk pitty-pat up the side."
Her face, aglow from the climb, hung just above him. She had thrown off
her hat when she began the ascent and her hair was in disorder. Her eyes
were bright with excitement and fun. It was immensely to her
liking--this situation: her blood sang with the joy of it. She addressed
him with mocking composure.
"It's so easy it isn't right to take the money."
He protested that it was a foolish risk when he would certainly be
rescued in a short time. She, too, must remain where she was until the
ropes were brought.
"They never do that way in books," said Phil. "If I'd taken that tumble,
some man would have rescued me; and now that you're there, it's only
fair that I should pull you off. If I hadn't as good as told you you
couldn't, you wouldn't be there. That's the simple philosophy of that.
All ready! Here goes!"
Clinging to the tree with her knees to get a better grip she swung
herself down as far as possible. The sapling bent, but held stoutly.
Holton ceased protesting, held up his arms to catch her if she fell;
then as she repeated her "ready," he tiptoed, but barely touched her
finger-tips. She drew back slowly to gather strength for another effort.
It was the most foolhardy of undertakings. Only the tree, with its
questionable hold upon the cliff-side, held her above the gorge. She
strained her arms to the utmost; their finger-tips touched and she
clasped his hand. There was a tense moment; then her aid making it
possible, he dug his feet into the little crevices of the rocky surface
and began creeping up.
Once begun there was no letting go. The maple under their combined
weight curved like a bow. Phil set her teeth hard; her arms strained
until it seemed they would break. Then, as Holton began to aid himself
with his free hand, his weight diminished, and in one of these seconds
of relief, Phil braced herself for a supreme effort and drew him toward
her until he clutched the tree. He dragged himself up, and flung himself
down beside her. Neither spoke for several minutes. Those of the party
who remained below were now calling wildly to know what had happened.
"Trumpet the tidings that we are safe," said Phil when she had got her
breath.
"That was awful; horrible! What did you do it for? It was so absurd--so
unnecessary!" he cried, relief and anger mingling in his tone. "The
horror of it--I'll never get over it as long as I live."
"Forget it," said Phil. "It was just a lark. But now that it's over,
I'll confess that I thought for about half a second--just before you
began edging up a little--that I'd have to let go. But don't you ever
tell anybody I said so; that's marked confidential."
The note was obviously forced. Her heart still pounded hard and
weariness was written plainly in her face. Now that the stress of the
half-hour had passed, she was not without regret for what she had done.
Her father would not be pleased; her uncle would rebuke her sharply; her
aunts would shudder as much at the publicity her wild adventure was sure
to bring her as at the hazard itself. She was conscious of the
admiration in Holton's eyes; conscious, indeed, of something more than
that.
"I want to know that you did that for me: I must think so!" he said
hoarsely.
His lips trembled and his hands shook. Her foolhardiness had placed both
their lives in jeopardy. It pleased him to think that she had saved his
life--whereas in strictest truth she had only added to his peril.
"I didn't do it for you: I did it for fun," she replied shortly; and yet
deep down in her heart she did not dislike his words or the intense
manner in which he spoke them. Her dallyings with boys of her own age,
with only now and then a discreet flirtation with one of the college
seniors, comprised her personal experiences of romance.
"You are beautiful--wonderful! Yours is the bravest soul in the world. I
loved you the day I first saw you in your father's office. Phil--"
For a moment his hand lay upon hers that was trembling still from its
grip of the tree.
"We must climb to the top; the joke will be spoiled if we let them help
us," she cried, springing to her feet. "Come! The way will be easier
along the old path."
Across the vale some one hallooed to them. Her white sweater was clearly
printed against the cliff and a man on the edge of the farther side
stood with the light of the declining sun playing round him. The ravine
narrowed here and the distance across was not more than a hundred
yards.
Phil fluttered her handkerchief.
"It's Fred!" she said. "See! There by the big sycamore."
Fred waved his cap, then dropped his arm to his side and stood, a
sentinel-like figure, at the edge of his acres, etched in heroic outline
against the winter sky. His trousers were thrust into his boots; the
collar of the mackinaw coat he wore at his work was turned up about his
throat. He leaned upon an axe with which he had been cutting the coarser
brush in the fence corners. The wind ruffled his hair as he stood thus,
in the fading light. He had been busy all afternoon and quite unmindful
of his aunt's party, to which, for reasons sufficient to that lady, he
had not been bidden.
A sense of his rugged simplicity and manliness seemed to be borne to
Phil across the ravine. Something in Fred Holton touched her with a kind
of pathos--there was in him something of her father's patience, and
something of his capacity for suffering. As she looked he swung the axe
upon his shoulders and struck off homeward across the fields.
Charles sprang ahead of her and began the remainder of the ascent. It
was he who was now impatient.
"We must hurry unless you want the crowd to carry us up."
"Let me go ahead," she answered, ignoring the hand he reached down to
her, and eager to finish the undertaking. "There's nothing hard about
the rest of it and I know every inch of the path."