THE NEXT DAY
Sam was awakened by the rising sun. He arose sore in spirit and
unrefreshed. It promised to be a brilliant day, with a gentle breeze
from the west. Such a wind would blow him to the foot of the lake, the
nearest shore, and, observing it, he immediately started to drag the
logs he had collected down to the water's edge, careless now if Bela
discovered what he was about. Let her try to stop him if she dared!
Building a raft promised to be no easy task. He was without hammer and
nails, and he had not been long enough in the country to learn how it
might be done without. His only tool was a pocket knife.
After several fruitless experiments, he hit upon the scheme of lashing
the logs together with withes of willow. It promised to be an all-day
job, and a clumsy one at the best. Still, if the wind held fair and
light, it might serve. Raising a mast presented another problem. He
deferred consideration of that until he got the raft built.
After a while Bela appeared around the shore, bringing his breakfast.
Sam essayed taking a leaf out of her book by making believe to be
oblivious of her. She put the plate down and watched him for a while.
Sam, under her gaze, became horribly conscious of the crudeness of his
handiwork, but he worked ahead, whistling.
Finally she said scornfully: "You can't get to shore on that."
No answer from Sam.
"When you sit down, her bend in the middle. Water come over you. Raft
got be hard lak a floor."
Another silence.
"W'en wind blow she all bus' up."
No answer being forthcoming, Bela shrugged and sat down in the sand as
if she meant to spend the morning there. She gazed across the lake.
Sam scowled and fidgeted. Something told him that when it came to
holding one's tongue, Bela could beat him hollow. He worked doggedly
on, careful never to look in her direction.
After a while the astonishing girl rose and said calmly: "I tak you to
shore in my canoe now."
Sam dropped his willow strips and stared. "Eh?"
"I say I ready tak you to shore now," she repeated.
"What does this mean?" Sam demanded.
She shrugged slightly. "Ask no question. Come, if you want."
"To what shore?" he demanded suspiciously.
"Anywhere. Better go to little river, I guess. Wind blow us there
to-day. Maybe blow hard after."
"What are you up to now?" he muttered.
She had already turned up the beach. "I go get ready," she said over
her shoulder. "Better come quick."
She disappeared around the shore, leaving him much perturbed in mind.
In a minute or two he stole after to see if she were indeed getting
ready. It was true. Watching from behind the willows, he saw her tie a
poplar pole in the bow of the dugout and stay it with a rope.
Upon this rude mast she bound a yard, from which hung one of her
blankets with a rope tied to each of the lower corners. Afterward she
stowed her baggage in the boat. She worked with a determined swiftness
that suggested some particular urgency.
Finally she started back along the beach, whereupon Sam turned and,
hastening ahead of her, resumed operations on the raft as if he had
never dropped them.
"Now I guess you know why we goin' to the shore," she stated abruptly.
"I'm hanged if I do!" returned Sam.
"You got strong eyes and not see not'ing?" she asked scornfully.
"Look!"
Following the direction of her pointing finger across the lake, he
made out a black spot on the water, between them and the head of the
river.
"Those men comin' here," she said. "I am think before maybe come
to-day. Yesterday I guess they ride down the river and get Johnny
Gagnon's boat."
When she pointed it out, the object was clear enough. The rise and
fall of oars was suggested. Sam watched it doubtfully. He was ready to
welcome relief in any form from his hateful situation, but was this
relief?
"How do you expect to sail to the river when they're coming from
there?" he asked.
"I wait till come close," she replied eagerly. "Then go round ot'er
side of island. They never catch me wit' my sail. Johnny Gagnon's boat
got no sail."
Her eagerness made him suspicious. What had she up her sleeve now? he
wondered. While he could scarcely regard Jack, Shand, and Joe in the
light of deliverers, his galled pride forbade him to put himself in
her hands again. He suddenly made up his mind.
"Go ahead!" he said harshly. "Go anywhere you like! I stay here!"
Bela changed colour, and a real fear showed in her eyes. She moved
toward him involuntarily.
"They kill you if they find you here," she said.
"Not if they don't find you here, too."
"They kill you!" she insisted. "Two days they are after us. All tam
talk together what they goin' do when they catch us, and get more mad.
If they find me gone away, they get more mad again. W'en they catch
you, they got kill you for 'cause they say so many times. You are on
this little island. Nobody know. Nobody see. They are safe to kill
you. You don' go wit' me, you never leave here."
Sam, knowing the men, could not but be shaken by her words. He paled a
little, but, having announced his decision to her, pride would not
allow him to take it back.
"Go on," he said. "I stay."
The old walled look came back over Bela's face. She sat down in the
sand, clasping her knees.
"I not go wit'out you," she announced.
Sam affected to shrug.
"Just as you like. You won't help my chances any by staying here."
"They kill you, anyhow," she said in a level voice. "After they kill
you they get me. They not kill me."
Sam started and looked at her aghast. A surprising pain stabbed him.
He remembered the looks of the men upon Bela's first appearance in the
cabin. Now, after two days' pursuit they would scarcely be more humane
than then. The thought of that beautiful creature being delivered over
to them was more than he could bear.
"Bela--for God's sake--don't be a fool!" he faltered.
A subtle smile appeared on her lips. She was silent.
His pride made another effort. "Ah, you're only bluffing!" he said
harshly. "You can't get me going that way."
She looked at him with a strange, fiery intensity. "I not bluffin',"
she replied quietly. "I do w'at I say. If I want say I put my hand in
the fire, I hold it there till it burn off. You know that."
In his heart he did know it, however he might rage at being forced to
do what she wanted him to do.
"I don't care!" he cried. "You can't lead me by the nose! I'm my own
master. I didn't get you into this. You'll have to take your chance as
I take mine."
Bela said nothing.
Out of sheer bravado Sam set to work again to bind his logs together.
His hand shook. There was little likelihood now that he would need a
raft.
The approaching boat had already covered half the distance to the
island. They could now make out three figures in it, one steering,
each of the other two wielding an oar. The lake was glorious in the
strong sunshine. All the little ripples to the east were tipped with
gold.
Five minutes passed, while obstinacy contended silently with
obstinacy. Bela sat looking at nothing with all the stoicism of her
red ancestors; Sam maintained his futile pretence of business.
Occasionally he glanced at her full of uncertainty and unwilling
admiration. Bela never looked at him.
At the end of that time the boat was less than a quarter of a mile
offshore. They saw the steersman point, and the two oarsmen stop and
look over their shoulders. Evidently they had discovered the two
figures on the beach, and wondered at their supineness. They came on
with increased energy.
Bela held the best cards. Sam finally threw down his work with an
oath.
"I can't stand it!" he cried shakily. "I don't care about myself, but
I can't see a woman sacrificed--even if it's your own mulishness! I
don't care about you, either--but you're a woman. You needn't think
you're getting the best of me. I'll hate you for this--but I can't
stand it!"
Bela sprang up swiftly and resolutely.
"Come!" she exclaimed. "I don' care what mak' you come, if you come!"
She pointed to the longest way round the shore. "This way," she
directed. "I want them follow this way so I sail back ot'er side."
As they ran around the beach, a faint shout reached them from the
water. As soon as they had passed out of sight of the boat, Bela
pulled Sam into the bushes, and they worked back under cover to a
point whence they could watch their pursuers in comparative safety.
"Maybe they goin' land this side," she suggested. "If they land, run
lak hell and jomp in my boat."
Sam never thought of smiling.
Five minutes of breathless suspense succeeded. Suppose the men landed
and, dividing, went both ways around the beach, what would they do?
However, it appeared that they intended to row around the island and,
as they thought, cut off Bela's escape by water. But the watchers
could not be sure of this until the boat was almost upon them. Finally
Bela looked at Sam, and they dashed together for the dugout.
All was ready for the start, the boat pointing, bow first, into the
lake. In the excitement of the last few minutes they had forgotten
Sam's blankets. It was too late to think of them now.
Sam got in first and, obeying Bela's instructions, braced his feet
against the bottom of the mast. She pushed off and paddled like a
wild woman until she could weather the island under her square sail.
They succeeded in making the point before the rowboat appeared from
around the other side of the island. Finally the white blanket, with
its wide black bars, caught the wind, and Bela ceased paddling.
To Sam it seemed as if they stopped moving upon the stilling of that
vigorous arm. He looked anxiously over his shoulder. She was watching
their progress through the water with an experienced eye.
"Never catch us if the wind hold," she said calmly. "Johnny Gagnon's
boat ver' heavy boat."
They had a start of upward of a quarter of a mile when their perplexed
pursuers, having almost completed a circuit of the island, finally
caught sight of them sailing blithely down the lake. A great roar of
anger came down the wind to them.
"Let them curse," said Bela. "Cursin' won't catch us. Already they
rowin' half an hour. Get tire' soon."
"They've got a spare man to change to," Sam reminded her. He was now
as keen to give them the slip as Bela. The mainland ahead promised
freedom; not only freedom from his late masters, but freedom from her,
too.
Looking over their shoulders, they saw the steersman change to one of
the oars. Thereafter the rowboat came on with renewed speed, but the
dugout seemed to draw steadily ahead.
Sam's heart rose. Bela, however, searching the wide sky and the water
for weather signs, began to look anxious.
"What is it?" asked Sam.
"Wind goin' down," she replied grimly.
Sure enough, presently the heavy sail began to sag, and they could
feel the dugout lose way under them. They groaned involuntarily. At
the same moment their pursuers perceived the slackening of the wind
and shouted in a different key.
The wind freshened again, and once more died away. Now the dugout
forged ahead; now the rowboat began to overhaul them. It was nip and
tuck down the lake between sail and oars.
The shore they were making for began to loom nearer, but the puffs of
wind were coming at longer and longer intervals, and finally they ran
into a glassy calm, though they could see slants of wind all about
them, a situation to drive pursued sailors frantic.
Bela paddled manfully, but her single blade was no match for two long
oars. The sail was a handicap now. Bela had staked everything on it,
and they could not take it down without capsizing the dugout. The
oarsmen came rapidly, with derisive shouts in anticipation of a speedy
triumph.
"You've got your gun," muttered Sam. "You're a better shot than any of
them. Use it while you have the advantage."
She shook her head. "No shoot. Too moch trouble mak' already."
"Plug their boat, then," said Sam.
She still refused. "They die in cold water if boat sink."
"We might as well jump overboard, then," he said bitterly.
"Look!" she cried suddenly. "Wind comin', too!"
Behind the rowboat a dark-blue streak was creeping over the surface of
the lake.
"Ah, wind, come quick! Come quick!" Bela murmured involuntarily. "A
candle for the altar! My rabbit-skin robe to Pere Lacombe!"
At the same time she did not cease paddling.
The rowers saw the breeze coming, too, and, bending their backs, sent
the water flying from their oars. They managed to keep ahead of it.
Both boats were now within a furlong of the river-head. The race
seemed over. The rowboat drew even with the dugout, and they looked
into their pursuers' faces, red with exertion and distorted in cruel
triumph.
The steersman was Joe. "Don't stop," he yelled to the heaving oarsmen,
"or she'll give us the slip yet! Get ahead and cut her off! You damned
dish-washer, we've got you now!" he added for Sam's benefit.
With a sharp crack, Big Jack's oar broke off short. He capsized
backward into Shand, knocking him off his seat as well. At the same
instant the whispering breeze came up and the blanket bellied out.
Shand and Jack were for the moment inextricably entangled in the
bottom of the boat. Emotional Joe cursed and stamped and tore at his
hair like a lunatic. Loud laughter broke from Sam and Bela as they
sailed away.
Joe beside himself, snatched up his gun and opened fire. A bullet went
through the blanket. Bela and Sam instinctively ducked. Perhaps they
prayed; more likely they did not realize their danger until it was
over. Other shots followed, but Joe was shooting wild. He could not
aim directly at Sam, because Bela was between. He emptied his magazine
without doing any damage.
In the reaction that followed Bela and Sam laughed. In that moment
they were one.
"Feels funny to have a fellow slinging lead at you, eh?" said Sam.
"Musq'oosis say after a man hear bullet whistle he is grown," answered
Bela.
A few minutes later the river received them. There was a straight
reach of a third of a mile, followed by innumerable, bewildering
corkscrew bends all the way to the head of the rapids, thirty miles or
more. Out in the lake behind them their pursuers were struggling
forward, sculling with the remaining oar.
Bela watched anxiously to see what they would do when they got in the
river. If they knew enough to go ashore and take to the land trail, it
was possible that even on foot they might cut her off at a point below
where the trail touched the river.
Apparently, however, they meant to follow by water. At the last sight
she had of them before rounding the first bend they were still
sculling.
The river pursued its incredibly circuitous course between cut banks
fringed with willows. All the country above, invisible to them in the
dugout, was a vast meadow. A steady, smooth current carried them on.
On the outside of each bend the bank was steep to the point of
overhanging; on the inside there was invariably a mud flat made gay
with water flowers. So crooked was the river that Jack-Knife Mountain,
the only object they could see above the willows, was now on their
right hand, now on their left.
On the turns they sometimes got a current of wind in their faces and
came to a dead stop. Now that they no longer required it, the wind was
momentarily strengthening.
"Wouldn't it be better to take the sail down?" Sam suggested.
"Can't tak' it down wi'out land on shore," Bela answered sullenly.
Sam comprehending what was the matter, chuckled inwardly. On the next
bend, seeing her struggles with the baffling air-currents, he asked
teasingly:
"Well, why don't you go ashore and take it down?"
"If I land, you promise not run away?" she said.
Sam laughed from a light heart. "Not on your life!" he said. "I'm my
own master now."
Bela had no more to say.
"Where are you bound for?" Sam presently asked.
"Down river," she answered.
"I'll have to be leaving you," said Sam mockingly. "I'm going the
other way. To the head of the lake."
"If you go back they catch you."
"I'll lie low till they're thrown off the scent. I'll walk around the
north shore."
"If you stay with me little while, pretty soon we meet police comin'
up," she suggested. "Then they can't touch you."
"Much obliged," replied Sam. "I've no fancy to be jumped on at night
again and tied up like a roasting fowl."
"I promise I not do that again," said Bela.
"Sure!" retorted Sam. "No doubt you've got plenty other tricks just as
good."
"If you look at me you see I speak truth," she murmured. "I your
friend, Sam."
The threatened break in her voice brought all his old disquiet surging
up again. As he put it, he suspected her of "trying to put one over on
him again." "I don't want to look at you!" he returned with a harsh
laugh.
An adverse puff of wind blew them into an overhanging willow-bush,
which became entangled with the sail and the stay-rope. Sam saw his
chance. Seizing the branches, he pulled himself to his feet and
managed to swing ashore at the cost only of wet ankles.
A sharp cry was wrung from Bela. "Sam, don't go!"
Gaining a sure footing on the bank, he faced her, laughing. "Well, how
about it now?"
There was nothing inscrutable about her face then. It worked with
emotion like any woman's.
"Don't go by yourself!" she pleaded. "You not know this country. You
got not'ing. No grub! No gun! No blanket!"
"I can walk it in two days or three," he said. "I'll build a fire to
sleep by. You can give me a little grub if you want. I'll trade my
pocket-knife for it. It's all I've got. You got me into this, anyhow."
"No sell grub," she answered sullenly. "Give all you want if you come
with me."
"Very well, keep it then," he snapped, turning away.
Her face broke up again. "No, no! I not mad at you!" she cried
hurriedly. "I give you food. But wait; we got talk." She drove the
canoe on a mud-bank beyond the willows and scrambled out.
Sam, scowling and hardening at her approach, was careful to keep his
distance. He suspected her of a design to detain him by force.
"There's been too much talk," he growled. "You'd better hustle on
down. They'll be here soon."
"Sam, don' go!" she begged. "W'at you do at head of lake? Not get no
job but cook. Stay wit' me. We got boat and gun and blankets. We need
no more. I show you all w'at to do. I show you fishin' and huntin'.
When winter come I show you how to trap good fur. You will be rich
with me. I not bot'er you no more. I do everything you want."
In her distress Sam's angry eyes chose to see only chagrin at the
prospect of his escaping her. At the same time her beseeching face
filled him with a wild commotion that he would not recognize. His only
recourse lay in instant flight.
"Cut it out! What good does it do?" he cried harshly. "I tell you I'm
going to the head of the lake."
"All right, I tak' you there," she said eagerly. "More quick as you
can walk, too. Half a mile down the river there is a little backwater
to hide. We let those men go by and then come back. I do w'at you
want, Sam."
"Will you give me a little grub, or won't you?" he insisted. "I'd
rather starve than go with you!"
She burst into tears. "All right, I give you food," she said. She
turned back to the dugout, and, throwing back the cover of the
grub-box, put what bread and smoked fish she had left into a cotton
bag.
Sam awaited her, raging with that intolerable bitterness that a tender
and obstinate man feels at the sight of a woman's tears.
She offered him the little package of food, and a blanket as well.
"Tak' my ot'er blanket," she said humbly. "I can get more."
He impatiently shook his head, refusing to meet the lovely, imploring
eyes. "Here," he said, offering the pocket-knife. "For the food."
With a fresh burst of weeping she knocked it out of his hand, and
covered her face with her arm. Sam strode away, blinded and deafened
by the confusion of his feelings. His face was as stubborn as stone.