A VISIT IN THE NIGHT-TIME.
Yahka kelapie.
The snows had dropped a soft cloak over the Kootenai hills, and buried
the valleys in great beds of crystallized down. Rachel's prophecy had
proven a true one, for the clouds that day had been a visiting-card from
winter.
That day was two weeks gone now; so was Stuart's leave-taking, and at
the ranch life had dropped into the old lines, but with an impression of
brightness lost. Miss Margaret had not yet got over the habit of turning
quickly if anyone entered the room, and showing her disappointment in a
frown when it was not the one looked for.
Aunty Luce declared she "nevah did see a chile so petted on one who
wasn't no kin."
All of them discovered they had been somewhat "petted" on the genial
nature. Again the evenings were passed with magazines or cards; during
his stay they had revived the primitive custom of taking turns telling
stories, and in that art Stuart had proven himself a master, sometimes
recounting actual experiences of self or friends, again giving voice to
some remembered gem of literature; but, whatever the theme, it was given
life, through the sympathetic tendencies of the man who had so much the
timber of an actor--or rather an artist--the spirit that tends to
reproduce or create.
If Rachel missed him, she kept quiet about it, and ridiculed the rest if
any regrets came to her ears. No one minded that much; Rachel ridiculed
everyone--even herself. Sometimes she thought Fate seemed more than
willing to help her. One night, two weeks after that ride from the
"Place of the Tamahnous," she was struck with a new conviction of the
fact.
Andrews had gone to Holland's for the mail and domestic miscellany. A
little after sun-up he had started, and the darkness was three hours
old, and yet no sign or sound. The rest had finally given up the idea of
getting any letters that night, and had gone to bed. As usual,
Rachel--the night-owl of the family--was left the last guard at the warm
hearth. Upstairs she could hear Jim's voice in the "boys'" room, telling
Ivans some exploit whose character was denoted by one speech that made
its way through the ceiling of pine boards:
"Yes, sir; my horse left his'n half a length behind every time it hit
the ground."
Ivans grunted. Evidently he had listened to recitals from the same
source before, and was too tired for close attention; anyway, the
remarks of this Truthful James drifted into a monologue, and finally
into silence, and no sound of life was left in the house.
She had been reading a book Stuart had sent back to her by Hardy, the
day he left. She wondered a little why, for he had never spoken of it to
her. It was a novel, a late publication, and by an author whose name she
had seen affixed to magazine work; and the charm in it was
undeniable--the charm of quiet hearts and restful pictures, that proved
the writer a lover of the tender, sympathetic tones of life, rather than
the storms and battles of human emotions.
It held the girl with a puzzling, unusual interest--one that in spite of
her would revert from the expressed thoughts on the paper to the
personality of the man who had sent it to her, and she found in many
instances, a mystifying likeness.
She sat there thinking drowsily over it, and filled with the conviction
that it was really time to go to bed; but the big chair was so
comfortable, and the little simmer of the burning wood was like a
lullaby, and she felt herself succumbing, without the slightest
rebellion, to the restful influence. She was aroused by the banging of a
door somewhere, and decided that Andrews had at last returned; and
remembering the number of things he had to bring in, concluded to go out
and help him. Her impulse was founded as much on economy as generosity,
for the late hour was pretty good proof that Andrews was comfortably
drunk--also that breakages were likely to be in order.
It was cloudy--only the snow gave light; the air was not cold, but had
in it the softness of rain. Over it she walked quickly, fully awakened
by the thought of the coffee getting a bath of vinegar, or the mail
mucilaged together with molasses.
"Oh, here you are at last!" she remarked, in that inane way people have
when they care not whether you are here or in the other place. "You took
your own time."
"Well, I didn't take any other fellow's!" returned the man from the dark
corner where he was unsaddling the horse.
Andrews was usually very obsequious to Miss Rachel, and she concluded he
must be pretty drunk.
"I came out to help you with the things," she remarked from her post in
the door-way; "where are they?"
"I've got 'em myself," came the gruff tones again from the corner. "I
reckon I'll manage without help. You'd better skip for the house--you'll
catch cold likely."
"Why, it isn't cold--are you? I guess Aunty left a lunch for you. I'll
go and warm the coffee."
She started, and then stopped.
"Say, did you get any letters for me?"
"No."
With a grumble about her ill-luck, she started back toward the house,
the late arrival following a little ways behind with something over his
shoulder. Once she looked back.
"I rather think Andrews gets on dignified drunks," she soliloquized; "he
is walking pretty straight, anyway."
She set the coffee-pot on the coals and glanced at the bundle he had
dropped just inside the door--it was nothing but a blanket and a saddle.
"Well, upon my word!" she began, and rose to her feet; but she did not
say any more, for, in turning to vent her displeasure on Andrews, she
was tongue-tied by the discovery that it was not he who had followed her
from the stable.
"Genesee!" she breathed, in a tone a little above a whisper. "Alah mika
chahko!"
She was too utterly astonished either to move toward him or offer her
hand; but the welcome in her Indian words was surely plain enough for
him to understand. It was just like him, however, not to credit it, and
he smiled a grim understanding of his own, and walked over to a chair.
"Yes, that's who it is," he remarked. "I am sorry, for the sake of your
hopes, that it isn't the other fellow; but--here I am."
He had thrown his hat beside him and leaned back in the big chair,
shutting his eyes sleepily. She had never seen him look so tired.
"Tillikum, I am glad to see you again," she said, going to him and
holding out her hand. He smiled, but did not open his eyes.
"It took you a long time to strike that trail," he observed. "What
brought you out to the stable?"
"I thought you were Andrews, and that you were drunk and would break
things."
"Oh!"
"And I am glad to see you, Jack."
He opened his eyes then. "Thank you, little girl. That is a good thing
for a man to hear, and I believe you. Come here. It was a good thing for
me to get that word from Kalitan, too. I reckon you know all that,
though, or you wouldn't have sent it."
She did not answer, but stooped to lift the pot of coffee back from the
blaze. The action recalled him to the immediate practical things, and he
said:
"Think I can stay all night here?"
"I don't know of any reason to prevent it."
"Mowitza was used up, and I wanted a roof for her; but I didn't allow to
come to the house myself."
"Where would you have slept?"
"In my blanket, on the hay."
"Just as if we would let you do that on our place!"
"No one would have known it if you had kept away from the stable, and in
your bed, where you ought to be."
"Shall I go there at once, or pour your coffee first?"
"A cup of coffee would be a treat; I'm dead tired."
The coffee was drank, and the lunch for Andrews was appropriated for
Genesee.
"Have you come back to the Kootenai country for good?" she asked, after
furnishing him with whatever she could find in the pantry without
awakening the rest.
"I don't know--it may be for bad," he replied doubtfully. "I've taken
the trail north to sound any tribes that are hostile, and if troops are
needed they are to follow me."
"Up into this country?"
"I reckon so. Are you afraid of fighting?"
She did not answer. A new idea, a sudden remembrance, had superseded
that of Indian warfare.
"How long since you left Fort Owens?" she asked.
"Fifteen days. Why?"
"A friend of MacDougall's started in that direction about two weeks ago.
Davy sent a kind message by him; but you must have passed it on the
way."
"Likely; I've been in the Flathead country, and that's wide of the trail
to Owens. Who was the man?"
"His name is Stuart."
He set the empty cup down, and looked in the fire for a moment with a
steadiness that made the girl doubt if he had either heard or noticed;
but after a little he spoke.
"What was that you said?"
"That the man's name was Stuart."
"Young or old?"
"Younger than you."
"And he has gone to Fort Owens?"
"Started for there, I said."
"Oh! then you haven't much faith in a tenderfoot getting through the
hostiles or snow-banks?"
"How do you know he is a tenderfoot?"
He glanced up; she was looking at him with as much of a question in her
eyes as her words.
"Well, I reckon I don't," he answered, picking up his hat as if to end
the conversation. "I knew a man called Stuart once, but I don't know
this one. Now, have you any pressing reason for loafing down here any
longer? If not, I'll take my blanket and that lounge and get some sleep.
I've been thirty-six hours in the saddle."
In vain she tried to prevail on him to go upstairs and go to bed
"right."
"This is right enough for me," he answered, laying his hat and gloves on
a table and unfastening his spurs. "No, I won't go up to the men's room.
Good-night."
"But, Jack--look here--"
"I can't--too sleepy to look anywhere, or see if I did look;" and his
revolvers and belt were laid beside the growing collection on the table.
"But Hen will scold me for not giving you better lodging."
"Then he and another man will have a shooting-match before breakfast
to-morrow. Are you going?"
He was beginning to deliberately unfasten his neck-gear of scarlet and
bronze. She hesitated, as if to make a final protest, but failed and
fled; and as the door closed behind her, she heard another half-laughing
"Klahowya!"
Early in the morning she was down-stairs, to find Aunty Luce half wild
with terror at the presence of a stranger who had taken possession of
the sitting-room during the night.
"Cain't see his face for the blanket, honey," she whispered shrilly,
"but he's powerful big; an'--an' just peep through the door at the guns
and things--it's wah times right ovah again, shueh as I'm tellen' yo',
chile."
"Be quiet, Aunty, and get breakfast; it's a friend of ours."
"Hi-yi! I know all 'bout them kind o' friends, honey; same kind as comes
South in wah times, a trampen' into houses o' quality folks an sleepen'
whah they liked, an' callen' theyselves friends. He's a moven'
now!--less call the folks!"
The attempted yell was silenced by Rachel clapping her hand over the
full lips and holding her tightly.
"Don't be a fool!" she admonished the old woman impatiently. "I let the
man in last night; it's all right. Go and get him a good breakfast."
Aunty Luce eyed the girl as if she thought her a conspirator against the
safety of the house, and despite precautions, managed to slip upstairs
to Tillie with a much-garbled account of thieves in the night, and
wartimes, and tramps, and Miss Rache.
Much mystified, the little woman dressed quickly, and came down the
stairs to find her husband shaking hands quite heartily with Genesee.
Instantly she forgot the multitudinous reasons there were for banning
him from the bosom of one's family, and found herself telling him he was
very welcome.
"I reckon in your country a man would wait to hear someone say that
before stowing his horse in their stables, or himself in their beds," he
observed.
His manner was rather quiet, but one could see that the heartiness of
their greeting was a great pleasure, and, it may be, a relief.
"Do you call that a bed?" asked Tillie, with contemptuous warmth. "I do
think, Mr. Genesee, you might have wakened some of us, and given us a
chance to treat a guest to something better."
"I suppose, then, I am not counted in with the family," observed Rachel,
meekly, from the background. "I was on hand to do the honors, but wasn't
allowed to do them. I even went to the stable to receive the late-comer,
and was told to skip into the house, and given a general understanding
that I interfered with his making himself comfortable in the hay-mow."
"Did she go out there at night, and alone, after we were all in bed?"
And Tillie's tone indicated volumes of severity.
"Yes," answered Genesee; for Rachel, with a martyr-like manner, said
nothing, and awaited her lecture; "she thought it was your man Andrews."
"Yes, and she would have gone just as quickly if it had been
Indians--or--or--anybody. She keeps me nervous half the time with her
erratic ways."
"I rather think she's finding fault with me for giving you that coffee
and letting you sleep on the lounge," said Rachel; and through Tillie's
quick disclaimer her own short-comings were forgotten, at least for the
time. The little matron's caution, that always lagged woefully behind
her impulse, obtruded itself on her memory several times before the
breakfast was over; and thinking of the reasons why a man of such
character should not be received as a friend by ladies, especially
girls, she was rather glad when she heard him say he was to push on into
the hills as soon as possible.
"I only stopped last night because I had to; Mowitza and I were both
used up. I was trying to make MacDougall's, but when I crossed the trail
to your place, I reckoned we would fasten to it--working through the
snow was telling on her; but she is all right this morning."
Rachel told him of her visit to the old man, and his care of the cabin
on the Tamahnous ground; of rumors picked up from the Kootenai tribe
as to the chance of trouble with the Blackfeet, and many notes that were
of interest to this hunter of feeling on the Indian question. He
commented on her Chinook, of which she had gained considerable knowledge
in the past year, and looked rather pleased when told it had been gained
from Kalitan.
"You may see him again if I have to send for troops up here, and it
looks that way now," he remarked, much to the terror and satisfaction of
Aunty Luce, who was a house divided against itself in her terror of
Indian trouble and her desire to prove herself a prophetess.
Jim was all anticipation. After a circus or a variety show, nothing had
for him the charm that was exerted by the prospect of a fight; but his
hopes in that direction were cooled by the scout's statement that the
troops were not coming with the expectation of war, but simply to show
the northern tribes its futility, and that the Government was
strengthening its guard for protection all along the line.
"Then yer only ringin' in a bluff on the hostiles!" ventured the
sanguinary hopeful disgustedly. "I counted on business if the 'yaller'
turned out," meaning by the "yaller" the cavalry, upon whose
accoutrements the yellow glints show.
"Never mind, sonny," said Genesee; "if we make a bluff, it won't be on
an empty hand. But I must take the trail again, and make up for time
lost in sleep here."
"When may we look for you back?"
It was Hardy who spoke, but something had taken the free-heartiness out
of his tones; he looked just a trifle uncomfortable. Evidently Tillie
had been giving him a hint of second thoughts, and while trying to adopt
them they fitted his nature too clumsily not to be apparent.
His guest, however, had self-possession enough for both.
"Don't look for me," he advised, taking in the group with a
comprehensive glance; "that is, don't hurt the sight of your eyes in the
business; the times are uncertain, and I reckon I'm more uncertain than
the times. I'm obliged to you for the sleep last night, and the cover
for Mowitza. If I can ever do you as good a turn, just sing out."
Hardy held out his hand impulsively. "You did a heap more for us a year
ago, for which we never had a chance to make return," he said in his
natural, hearty manner.
"Oh, yes, you have had," contradicted Rachel's cool tones from the
porch; "you have the chance now."
Genesee darted one quick glance at her face. Something in it was
evidently a compensation, and blotted out the bitterness that had crept
into his last speech, for with a freer manner he took the proffered
hand.
"That's all right," he said easily. "I was right glad of the trip
myself, so it wasn't any work; but at the present speaking the days are
not picnic days, and I must 'git.' Good-bye, Mrs. Hardy, good-bye;
boys."
Then he turned in his saddle and looked at Rachel.
"Klahowya--tillikum," he said, lifting his hat in a final farewell to
all.
But in the glance toward her she felt he had said "thank you" as plainly
as he had in the Indian language called her "friend."
"Oh, dear!" said Tillie, turning into the house as he rode away. "I wish
the man had staid away, or else that we had known more about him when we
first met him. It is very awkward to change one's manner to him,
and--and yet it seems the only thing to do."
"Certainly," agreed Rachel, with an altogether unnecessary degree of
contempt, "it is the only thing for you to do."
Tillie sat down miserably under this stroke, the emphasis denoting very
plainly the temper of the speaker.
"Oh, don't be ugly, Rache," she begged. "I really feel wretched about
it. I thought at first all the freedom of social laws out here was so
nice but it isn't. It has a terrible side to it, when the greatest scamp
is of as much account as the finest gentleman, and expects to be
received on the same footing. He--he had no right to come imposing on us
at the first;" and with this addition to her defense, Tillie tried to
ensconce herself behind the barricade of injured faith, but feeling that
her protests were only weakening her argument.
"To the best of my recollection," said the girl, with a good deal of the
supercilious in her manner, "he neither came near us nor advanced any
desire for friendship on his own account. We hunted him up, and insisted
on talking natural history and singing songs with him, and pressing on
him many invitations to visit us, invitations which he avoided
accepting. He was treated, not as an equal of the other gentlemen, but
as a superior; and I believe it is the only time we ever did him
justice."
"Yes, he did seem very nice in those days; but you see it was all false
pretense. Think of the life that he had come from, and that he went back
to! It's no use talking, Rachel--there is only a right way and a wrong
way in this world. He has shown his choice, and self-respecting people
can only keep rid of him as much as possible. I don't like to hurt his
feelings, but it makes it very awkward for us that we have accepted any
favors from him."
"The obligation rests rather lightly on your shoulders to cause you much
fretting," said the girl bitterly; "and he thought so much of you,
too--so much."
Her voice, that began so calmly, ended a little uncertainly, and she
walked out of the door.
Hardy, coming in a moment later, found Tillie divided between penitence
and pettishness, and fighting her way to comfort through tears.
"I know I'm right, Hen, about the whole question," she whimpered, when
safely perched on the stronghold of his knee, "and that is what makes it
so aggravating."
"To know you're right?"
"No; but to have Rachel, who knows she is in the wrong, take that
high-handed way about the affair, and end up by making me feel ashamed.
Yes, she did, Hen--just that. I felt so ashamed I cried, and yet I knew
I was right all the time--now what are you laughing at?"