Until he felt the warm thrill of the girl's arm under his hand Philip
did not realize the hazard he had taken. He turned suddenly to confront
Bram. He would not have known then that the wolf-man was mad, and
impulsively he reached out a hand.
"Bram, she's starving," he cried. "I know now why you wanted that
stuff! But why didn't you tell me! Why don't you talk, and let me know
who she is, and why she is here, and what you want me to do?"
He waited, and Bram stared at him without a sound.
"I tell you I'm a friend," he went on. "I--"
He got no farther than that, for suddenly the cabin was filled with the
madness of Bram's laugh. It was more terrible than out on the open
Barren, or in the forest, and he felt the shudder of the girl at his
side. Her face was close to his shoulder, and looking down he saw that
it was white as death, but that even then she was trying to smile at
Bram. And Bram continued to laugh--and as he laughed, his eyes blazing
a greenish fire, he turned to the stove and began putting fuel into the
fire. It was horrible. Bram's laugh--the girl's dead white face, AND
HER SMILE! He no longer asked himself who she was, and why she was
there. He was overwhelmed by the one appalling fact that she WAS here,
and that the stricken soul crying out to him from the depths of those
eyes that were like wonderful blue amethysts told him that Bram had
made her pay the price. His muscles hardened as he looked at the huge
form bending over the stove. It was a splendid opportunity. A single
leap and he would be at the outlaw's throat. With that advantage, in
open combat, the struggle would at least be equal.
The girl must have guessed what was in his mind, for suddenly her
fingers were clutching at his arm and she was pulling him away from the
wolf-man, speaking to him in the language which he could not
understand. And then Bram turned from the stove, picked up a pail, and
without looking at them left the cabin. They could hear his laugh as he
joined the wolves.
Again Philip's conclusions toppled down about him like a thing made of
blocks. During the next few moments he knew that the girl was telling
him that Bram had not harmed her. She seemed almost hysterically
anxious to make him understand this, and at last, seizing him by the
hand, she drew him into the room beyond the curtained door. Her meaning
was quite as plain as words. She was showing him what Bram had done for
her. He had made her this separate room by running a partition across
the cabin, and in addition to this he had built a small lean-to outside
the main wall entered through a narrow door made of saplings that were
still green. He noticed that the partition was also made of fresh
timber. Except for the bunk built against the wall, a crude chair, a
sapling table and half a dozen bear skins that carpeted the floor the
room was empty. A few garments hung on the wall--a hood made of fur, a
thick mackinaw coat belted at the waist with a red scarf, and something
done up in a small bundle.
"I guess--I begin to get your meaning," he said, looking straight into
her shining blue eyes. "You want to impress on me that I'm not to wring
Bram Johnson's neck when his back is turned, or at any other time, and
you want me to believe that he hasn't done you any harm. And yet you're
afraid to the bottom of your soul. I know it. A little while ago your
face was as white as chalk, and now--now--it's the prettiest face I've
ever seen. Now, see here, little girl--"
It gave him a pleasant thrill to see the glow in her eyes and the eager
poise of her slim, beautiful body as she listened to him.
"I'm licked," he went on, smiling frankly at her. "At least for the
present. Maybe I've gone loony, like Bram, and don't realize it yet. I
set out for a couple of Indians, and find a madman; and at the madman's
cabin I find YOU, looking at first as though you were facing straight
up against the door of-of-well, seeing that you can't understand I
might as well say it--OF HELL! Now, if you weren't afraid of Bram, and
if he hasn't hurt you, why did you look like that? I'm stumped. I
repeat it--dead stumped. I'd give a million dollars if I could make
Bram talk. I saw what was in his eyes. YOU saw it--and that pretty pink
went out of your face so quick it seemed as though your heart must have
stopped beating. And yet you're trying to tell me he hasn't harmed you.
My God--I wish I could believe it!"
In her face he saw the reflection of the change that must have come
suddenly into his own.
"You're a good fifteen hundred miles from any other human being with
hair and eyes and color like yours," he continued, as though in
speaking his thoughts aloud to her some ray of light might throw itself
on the situation. "If you had something black about you. But you
haven't. You're all gold--pink and white and gold. If Bram has another
fit of talking he may tell me you came from the moon--that a
chasse-galere crew brought you down out of space to keep house for him.
Great Scott, can't you give me some sort of an idea of who you are and
where you same from?"
He paused for an answer--and she smiled at him. There was something
pathetically sweet in that smile. It brought a queer lump into his
throat, and for a space he forgot Bram.
"You don't understand a cussed word of it, do you?" he said, taking her
hand in both his own and holding it closely for a moment. "Not a word.
But we're getting the drift of things--slowly. I know you've been here
quite a while, and that morning, noon and night since the chasse-galere
brought you down from the moon you've had nothing to put your little
teeth into but meat. Probably without salt, too. I saw how you wanted
to throw yourself down on that pile of stuff on the floor. Let's have
breakfast!"
He led her into the outer room, and eagerly she set to work helping him
gather the things from the floor. He felt that an overwhelming load had
been lifted from his heart, and he continued to tell her about it while
he hurried the preparation of the breakfast for which he knew she was
hungering. He did not look at her too closely. All at once it had
dawned upon him that her situation must be tremendously more
embarrassing than his own. He felt, too, the tingle of a new excitement
in his veins. It was a pleasurable sensation, something which he did
not pause to analyze just at present. Only he knew that it was because
she had told him as plainly as she could that Bram had not harmed her.
"And if he HAD I guess you'd have let me smash his brains out when he
was bending over the stove, wouldn't you?" he said, stirring the mess
of desiccated potato he was warming in one of his kit-pans. He looked
up to see her eyes shining at him, and her lips parted. She was
delightfully pretty. He knew that every nerve in her body was straining
to understand him. Her braid had slipped over her shoulder. It was as
thick as his wrist, and partly undone. He had never dreamed that a
woman's hair could hold such soft warm fires of velvety gold. Suddenly
he straightened himself and tapped his chest, an inspiring thought
leaping into his head.
"I am Philip Raine," he said. "Philip Raine--Philip Raine--Philip
Raine--"
He repeated the name over and over again, pointing each time to
himself. Instantly light flashed into her face. It was as if all at
once they had broken through the barrier that had separated them. She
repeated his name, slowly, clearly, smiling at him, and then with both
hands at her breast, she said:
"Celie Armin."
He wanted to jump over the stove and shake hands with her, but the
potatoes were sizzling. Celie Armin! He repeated the name as he stirred
the potatoes, and each time he spoke it she nodded. It was decidedly a
French name--but half a minute's experiment with a few simple sentences
of Pierre Breault's language convinced him that the girl understood no
word of it.
Then he said again:
"Celie!"
Almost in the same breath she answered:
"Philip!"
Sounds outside the cabin announced the return of Bram. Following the
snarl and whine of the pack came heavy footsteps, and the wolf-man
entered. Philip did not turn his head toward the door. He did not look
at first to see what effect Bram's return had on Celie Armin. He went
on casually with his work. He even began to whistle; and then, after a
final stir or two at the potatoes, he pointed to the pail in which the
coffee was bubbling, and said:
"Turn the coffee, Celie. We're ready!"
He caught a glimpse of her face then. The excitement and color had
partly died out of it. She took the pail of coffee and went with it to
the table.
Then Philip faced Bram.
The wolf-man was standing with his back to the door. He had not moved
since entering, and he was staring at the scene before him in a dull,
stupid sort of way. In one hand he carried a pail filled with water; in
the other a frozen fish.
"Too late with the fish, Bram," said Philip. "We couldn't make the
little lady wait. Besides, I think you've fed her on fish and meat
until she is just about ready to die. Come to breakfast!"
He loaded a tin plate with hot potatoes, bannock-bread and rice that he
had cooked before setting out on the Barren, and placed it before the
girl. A second plate he prepared for Bram, and a third for himself.
Bram had not moved. He still held the pail and the fish in his hands.
Suddenly he lowered both to the floor with a growl that seemed to come
from the bottom of his great chest, and came to the table. With one
huge hand he seized Philip's arm. It was not a man's grip. There was
apparently no effort in it, and yet it was a vise-like clutch that
threatened to snap the bone. And all the time Bram's eyes were on the
girl. He drew Philip back, released the terrible grip on his arm, and
shoved the two extra plates of food to the girl. Then he faced Philip.
"We eat ze meat, m'sieu!"
Quietly and sanely he uttered the words. In his eyes and face there was
no trace of madness. And then, even as Philip stared, the change came.
The giant flung back his head and his wild, mad laugh rocked the cabin.
Out in the corral the snarl and cry of the wolves gave a savage
response to it.
It took a tremendous effort for Philip to keep a grip on himself. In
that momentary flash of sanity Bram had shown a chivalry which must
have struck deep home in the heart of the girl. There was a sort of
triumph in her eyes when he looked at her. She knew now that he must
understand fully what she had been trying to tell him. Bram, in his
madness, had been good to her. Philip did not hesitate in the impulse
of the moment. He caught Bram's hand and shook it. And Bram, his laugh
dying away in a mumbling sound, seemed not to notice it. As Philip
began preparing the fish the wolf-man took up a position against the
farther wall, squatted Indian-fashion on his heels. He did not take his
eyes from the girl until she had finished, and Philip brought him a
half of the fried fish. He might as well have offered the fish to a
wooden sphinx. Bram rose to his feet, mumbling softly, and taking what
was left of one of the two caribou quarters he again left the cabin.
His mad laugh and the snarling outcry of the wolves came to them a
moment later.