Beyond the thicket of young jack pines Peter did not hurry. His feet
dragged, and he listened, hoping he would hear his father's voice
calling him back. In half an hour he did not travel far beyond the
evergreens. Then he knew his father was gone. He continued in the
direction of Five Fingers, recalling his promises. Tonight or tomorrow
his father would return. He hoped it would be tonight, for there was a
lump in his throat which he could not get rid of, and something in his
heart which frightened him with suspicions and fears which he was too
young to analyze. But he knew his father would not lie. He would come
back. He wondered what was written on the paper he was taking to Simon
McQuarrie. Probably it told about the wickedness of the police, and
Simon would help in some way. Other questions came into his mind now
that he was alone. Why hadn't his father gone on to Five Fingers with
him?
The chopping of the axes had ceased, but he knew he was heading in
the right direction. He came into openings filled with the stumps of
trees that had been cut down, and these clearings were carpeted with
white and pink spring flowers and masses of violets. He had never seen
such beautiful violets, or so many birds at this season of the year.
There were robins and thrushes and dozens of little warblers and brush
sparrows, and the cutting down of trees seemed to have brought all the
sapsuckers and woodpeckers and gaudily colored blue jays in the woods.
The sun was delightfully warm, too, though in another hour it would
be settling behind the tree tops. In this glory of peace and quiet
he proceeded quietly and cautiously, for his father had taught him
always to do that in the forest. So he came without sound of footfall
or crackling brush to the edge of a little opening beyond a thicket of
poplars and birch, and here he stopped suddenly and his heart jumped up
into his mouth.
Standing in a warm pool of sunlight not twenty feet away from his
concealment was a young girl. She was almost as tall as Peter and so
lovely to look upon that he stared at her in amazement and admiration.
He thought she had seen him, and his first vision was of her face
and a pair of beautiful dark eyes, laughing up at a red squirrel,
chattering in a tree top a few paces away. Then she sat down, gathering
her flowers about her, and eyes and face were lost to him in a mass of
shining, black hair that fell quickly about her, almost touching the
ground she was seated upon.
At first he was astonished. Then timidity and fear crept upon him and
he wanted to steal away as quietly as he had come. He drew back a step
and was preparing for the next when an unexpected interruption rooted
him to the spot. The wild and agonized yelping of a dog came from the
thick brush beyond the girl. Instantly she was on her feet, her slim
body quivering with the tension in which she waited. And then she
called, "Buddy--Buddy--come here!"
With a series of pain-filled yelps the creature called Buddy responded.
He darted out of the brush and came like a streak across the open. It
seemed to Peter the half-grown pup was all legs and head and tail, and
that from the sounds he made he must be mortally hurt. Whimpering and
crying, he cringed at the girl's feet and kissed the hand she reached
down to him. But she did not look at him. She had dropped her flowers
and her attitude was fierce and expectant as she waited.
Peter could see the bushes moving across the open and in a moment a boy
burst through them. He was half again as big as Peter, and he had a
stick in his hand. He followed the dog, half running, and Peter began
to hate him as he came. "Any person who will strike a dog should never
have been born," his father had taught him from the beginning; and
this boy with his thick red face and hulking body had been beating the
pup. He was panting triumph when he came up, and the pup slunk closer
between the feet of his mistress. The pursuer was at least two years
older than Peter. He had thick hands and little eyes and a bullet head,
and his eyes were glowing with wickedness.
For an instant Peter saw the girl's eyes. They were dark pools of
flaming fire. Then like a little tigress she was at the other. Her
hands struck at his face and for a moment the bully was caught at a
disadvantage. He dropped his stick and caught her in his arms. His
hands buried themselves in her hair, and Peter saw her blows becoming
more and more futile. The pup snarled and darted in at the boy's feet.
A kick sent him back howling.
Horror and rage possessed Peter when he saw the girl's head thrust
backward, and without a sound he ran out of his cover and caught her
assailant by the throat. Then, when the girl was freed, he struck.
That was another thing his father had taught him, to fight when it was
necessary to fight--_and always for a woman_. His fists struck hard and
furiously, and he heard a bellow of alarm and pain from the bully.
The older boy stumbled and fell, and Peter was on him like a cat. He
realized this was no time to "play the game fair." They rolled and
twisted on the ground, and blood streamed from the bully's nose and
mouth. Once Peter saw the girl. She was standing very near, her lips
parted, her wonderful eyes shining at him. That glimpse of her was a
mighty encouragement. He fought harder, driving his fists home, and
kicking. Then they were on their feet again.
It was the bully who renewed the battle. Mauled and bleeding, he had
recovered from the surprise attack and his greater bulk and weight
began to tell. Exhausted by two days and nights of hunger and flight,
Peter felt his strength going. He went down, and the bully flung
himself upon him. It was then Peter caught a second glimpse of the
girl. She had caught up the stick and was standing over them. He could
hear the stick as it struck blow after blow, and his enemy rolled over,
half stunned. They were both at the bully then, Peter with his fists
and the girl with her stick, and the older boy took to his heels in a
wild flight for the safety of the thicket out of which he had come a
few minutes before.
Peter wiped his nose and mouth with his sleeve and gasped hard to get
his breath. The girl was breathing hard, too, and she was looking at
him with such wonder and gladness in her eyes that he wished he was
back in the timber again. Then she came to him and began nursing his
face with a soft handkerchief, and said things which he could not
remember afterward, and Buddy the pup jumped up against him, wagging
his knotty tail and licking his hand.
Peter drew back and tried to grin. For a moment he had felt enormously
uncomfortable in the presence of this lovely little goddess of the
woods, with her soft handkerchief dabbing at his face. Now his old
cheer returned. He was glad the fight was over and was strongly
conscious that the girl had played no small part in the final victory.
So he said apologetically, "He'd got me if you hadn't come in with the
stick."
She stood back and looked at him. She was younger than he, probably not
more than thirteen, but to Peter she appeared to be infinitely older
in these first minutes of their acquaintance. It bothered him to meet
her eyes squarely, they were so big and dark and filled with soft fire,
like the velvety, jet-black hair that streamed in dishevelment about
her.
"He is twice as big as you," she retorted. "I hate him. He belongs with
the tug from Fort William, and every time he comes we have a fight."
"He's a--a woman-hitter," said Peter.
She accepted his compliment with a dignified nod of her head. Then she
stamped her foot and shook her stick in the direction the bully had
gone. "If he ever tries to do again what he tried today--I'll--I'll----"
"He won't while I'm around," helped out Peter, swelling with a bit of
pugnacious pride. "I wasn't in good shape, and I've been traveling
pretty hard, and we didn't have a lot to eat. I can lick him when I'm
fed up and rested."
The girl was almost womanly in her swift intuition. Her eyes glowed
softly at Peter.
"Who are you?" she asked gently. "I am Mona Guyon, and I live with
Josette and Pierre Gourdon at Five Fingers."
"I'm Peter," said the boy. "Peter McRae."
"Where you from?" was her next query.
Peter took time to swallow. His father had not told him how to answer
questions. Then he pointed.
"From away off there, miles and miles. My father brought me until we
could hear the axes, and then I came on alone. He's coming tonight or
tomorrow."
"Is your mother with him?"
"She's dead."
He was not looking at her when she came to him and took his hand,
and in all his life he had never felt such a warm, soft little hand
clinging to his own as Mona Guyon's.
"My mother is dead, too, Peter," she said. "And so is my father. They
were drowned--out there six years ago. It was Pierre Gourdon who
brought me in from the rock."
It was an uncomfortable moment, and yet something of joy passed into
Peter. His fingers, smoke-stained and soiled, tightened about Mona's
hand as they both looked off over the cuttings to the wall of the vast
forest that shut out Lake Superior from their view. They could plainly
hear the distant murmuring of the surf.
"I'm glad you've come," she said. "I hope you're going to live here.
Are you?"
"Maybe," said Peter.
"You're brave, and I like you. If you were that hateful Aleck Curry,
who looks like a toad----"
"I wouldn't be him," interrupted Peter.
"No, but if you _were_, and you tried to do what he did, I wouldn't hit
you with a stick."
Peter's mind floundered in a futile effort to understand.
"I can lick him tomorrow," he ventured.
With a little laugh she pulled him to the scattered flowers. He helped
her pick them up and put them into one big bouquet. Her soft hair
touched his hands and he found it easier to look into her eyes. His
heart beat fast and he was strangely happy. He forgot his swelling eye
and a stiffening lip, but he did think of his father. He would surely
beg his father to live at Five Fingers. It would be wonderful there,
with someone like Mona to know and fight for.
Then he thought of his message.
"I've got something for Simon McQuarrie," he said. "Dad told me to
hurry with it."
"And you're hungry."
She took his hand again, in a possessive and matter-of-fact way. There
was something maternal about it, something so sweetly glad and friendly
that a great wave of comradeship swept through Peter. He was no longer
nervous or afraid. Tonight or tomorrow his father would come, and they
would all be happy.
Through a glory of warm sunset they crossed the cut-over opens and
came soon to the crest of the green slope that looked down on a little
paradise hidden away in the heart of a great wilderness, a paradise of
green meadows, of water shimmering like silver in the sun, and of the
few log homes wherein lived the people whose paths Pierre Gourdon had
blazed through the forests many years before.
"That is Five Fingers," said Mona.
And down the slope she led the way with Peter, still holding him by the
hand.
He was speechless as they went. Everywhere he looked the earth was
gloriously green, and in this green were the scattered cabins, with
little spirals of smoke rising from their chimneys. He could smell this
smoke, faintly sweet with the perfume of jack pine pitch and cedar. He
saw the big, yellow dunes of sawdust about the mill, and in the mill
itself, which had only a roof and no sides, the huge steel saw that
was silent for the day blazed like a mirror in the sun. The lowing of
cattle came up from the green meadows, and he saw horses grazing, and
then his heart gave another jump, for between them and the little plain
where the settlement lay were a doe and fawn. His fingers tightened
suddenly about Mona's hand, and he stopped, an excited wonder escaping
in a cry from his lips. The girl laughed softly and freed her hand for
a moment to braid back her lustrous hair.
"That is Minna," she said. "We named her after Geertruda Poulin's last
baby. Pierre Gourdon allows no killing for miles and miles around here,
and the deer feed out of our hands and eat our hay with the cattle in
winter. Only----" Her lovely face clouded, and Peter saw a glow of
distress in her eyes. "The men kill porcupines because they eat our
chairs and doors and windows. But they bury them for me, over there
in my porcupine cemetery, and I plant flowers all around them. I love
porcupines."
"So do I," said Peter.
She took his hand again, and they continued down the slope. "Uncle
Pierre lets me have three of them for pets," she said. "I have a great
many pets, hundreds of them. All the birds and deer and bears and wild
things for as far as you can see belong to me, and none of them are
afraid of me. Uncle Pierre gave them to me, and no one harms them. No
one except Aleck Curry," she added with a quick note of fierceness
rising in her voice. "He would kill them all if he dared. I hate him!"
"I'll lick him if he doesn't leave them alone," offered Peter. "I can
do it when I'm fed up."
She squeezed his hand.
"That's their boat--down there--with the big scow. It comes from Fort
William four or five times each spring and summer to take the lumber
away. Aleck's father owns it, and I hate him, too. He laughs at Uncle
Pierre and wants to bring hunters up."
Peter was silent. A miracle was unfolding itself in his soul and under
his eyes. As they came near to the first of the cabins he thought again
of his father and his message.
"Where does Simon McQuarrie live?" he asked.
The girl pointed to a little cabin near the mill. "Over there. And
that's where I live--in the first of those two big cabins with the
rows of white stones around them. Uncle Pierre and Aunt Josette live
there, and Marie Antoinette and Joe in the other. Joe is Uncle Pierre's
boy, and Marie Antoinette is his wife. You'll love them. Everybody
does--except Aleck Curry."
"I smell bacon," suggested Peter.
The girl sniffed.
"It--it's from Simon McQuarrie's cabin," she announced, a little
disappointed. "Won't you come down to our place? Please!"
"I've got to see Simon," persisted Peter. "My father told me to see him
first."
Simon saw them coming. His hard Scotch face softened as he saw Mona,
and he scarcely noticed Peter until they were at his open door. Then
Mona said, releasing her proprietary hold on the boy's hand: "This is
Peter McRae. His father is out in the woods, and he's coming tonight or
tomorrow. Peter wants to see you about something and he's hungry. He
just whipped Aleck Curry, and that's why his eye is black and his lip
swollen. Good-by, Peter!"
There was something wholly and beautifully satisfying about Mona, and
Peter felt himself strangely alone when she left him and he found
himself in the cabin with Simon. And then a thing happened which would
have amazed all the people in Five Fingers could they have seen it,
for Simon McQuarrie, with his honest heart and hard face, had never
revealed himself a man of emotion. Yet scarcely had Mona gone when he
drew Peter into his arms, and his thin gray face shone with a strange
light as he looked over the boy's head into the sunset that flooded the
open door.
"Peter--Peter McRae," he said as if speaking to himself. "Helen's
boy--and Donald's. It's been a long time since I've seen you, Peter, a
long time. And----"
He held him off and looked at him in a way that puzzled Peter. "You
look like your mother, boy, when she was a little girl. I knew her
then."
Peter was fishing in his pocket.
"My father sent this to you," he said, giving Simon the bottle.
The Scotchman opened it, and Peter watched his face as he read what was
on the paper. He saw the lines about Simon's mouth harden and little
wrinkles gather about his eyes. Then he turned, crushing the paper
tightly in one hand, and added half a dozen slices of bacon to those
already in the pan on the stove. After that he read the paper very
deliberately a second time, and burned it. He cut more bread, brought
out a pie, and while he added finishing touches to a feast that made
Peter's eyes shine, he talked--but not about the paper in the bottle.
When supper was ready he ate little himself, but watched the boy. Peter
was starved. When he was done Simon rose to his feet and passed a big,
lean hand over the boy's fair hair. His heart ached. Yet a duty had
been imposed upon him, and he did not draw away from it. Words which
Donald McRae had heavily underscored in the message he had sent kept
repeating themselves in his mind, like a voice which he could not put
off or deny.
"Tell him _now_, tonight, as soon as he comes to you," Donald had
written. "Before the stars are over me again I want to feel that he
knows the truth, and understands, and has forgiven me. It may be I am a
coward because I do not tell him myself. But I cannot. I am afraid. I
want to think of him always as he has been. I cannot leave him with a
heart breaking or his faith dying. God will bless you, Simon. It is for
Peter's sake--and Helen's--even more than mine."
They sat down on a bench, facing the last of the sunset, and Simon put
his arm about the boy's shoulders. He tried to begin, and something
rose in his throat and choked him so he could not speak. He tried
again, and said:
"So Mona found you, and you fought Aleck Curry and whipped him?"
"She helped me," confessed Peter. "But I was empty. I can lick him now,
when I'm fed up."
Simon's arm tightened. His long fingers touched the boy's cheek gently.
"You like Mona?"
"Yes, sir."
Simon waited. Then he said:
"Do you want me to tell you a story, Peter--a story about another girl
like Mona, who lived a long, long time ago?"
Peter nodded, wondering whether Simon would then tell him something
about the letter that was in the bottle.
The story was short, for Simon McQuarrie was a cold and--most people
thought--an emotionless man. But his heart was beating painfully as he
began his tale.
"A long time ago there was another girl just like Mona, and just as
lovely and sweet, Peter, and there were three boys who grew up near
her. But one of these boys was almost a man, much older than the other
two, so that when the girl came to young womanhood he was really almost
old enough to be her father. And these three all loved her, every one
of them, but one of the three was very much like this Aleck Curry you
fought and had a heart in him that didn't know what clean love was.
Well, of course, she loved just _one_ of them, Peter, and he was the
best and noblest of the three. Her name was Helen."
"My mother's name," said Peter quickly.
"Yes, and the odd thing about it is the name of the man she married was
Donald, just like your father's. That's why I'm telling you the story,
Peter. It--it's queer."
Peter was silent.
"The man who was almost old enough to be her father was glad in a
way," went on Simon. "No one ever knew just how badly it broke him up,
but their happiness in time made him happy, and he was the best friend
they ever had. At least, I think he was. But the black-hearted one of
the three was different, and one day when Donald and the older man
were away he came to her cabin and insulted her, even though she had a
little baby in her arms. And just then the other two came back. What
would you have done, Peter?"
Peter's body had stiffened.
"If he was like Aleck Curry--I'd--I'd have killed him," he said.
Simon drew in a deep, slow breath.
"And that is just what happened, Peter. Donald killed him. He didn't
mean to do it. It was an accident. But it happened. And the other man
deserved it. He was better dead than alive. But it made a murderer of
Donald, and they hang murderers. So the older man cared for the woman
and the baby for three years, while Donald hid himself in the forests.
Then--Helen died. And Donald came back and took the boy, and for years
after that the law didn't know where he was, and they were happy
together, and would always have been happy if the law hadn't found him
again, and----"
Simon's voice choked. His arm hugged Peter until it hurt. And then he
finished, almost whispering the last words, "Peter, I know it's all
true, because the older man's name was Simon McQuarrie--and I'm Simon
McQuarrie--and--the boy's name--_was Peter_."
It was out. He bowed his grizzled cheek to the boy's face and fought
hard to choke back the thickening in his throat. It seemed a long time
to him that Peter did not move or speak. But he could feel the tremble
of the boy's body, and he knew that Peter understood.
"So he won't come back," he said, trying to bring a note of comfort
into his strained voice. "At least not for a long time, Peter. And
he wants you to live with me. That's what he wrote on the paper you
brought in the bottle."
Still Peter did not speak. He was staring through the door, and it was
hard for Simon to find more words.
"We'll take good care of you here, Peter."
Then Peter spoke.
"Dad won't come back tonight or tomorrow?"
"No."
"Nor ever?"
"Maybe he'll come, but it will be a long time."
"And they're after him, like they were back there in the woods. They
want to--_hang him_?"
"They won't catch him, Peter. That is why he left you here. He can
travel faster without you and is safe right now. But we must tell no
one else about him. We must keep it all between ourselves--a secret."
Peter slipped out quietly from under Simon's arm. He had no more
questions to ask, and Simon made no effort to follow him as he went out
into the last glow of the day. Slowly Peter walked past the mill and
the yellow sawdust piles toward the timber which axes had not touched
at the edge of the clearing. But he no longer took notice of the sunset
glow or the twitter of birds or wondered at the molten gleam of the
Middle Finger. He entered into the shadowing twilight of the forest and
for the first time a sob broke from his dry lips. Then he called his
father's name aloud, and the silence that followed emptied his heart of
its last hope. He sank down in a huddled heap beside a tree, and his
grief found vent in a low sobbing that broke strangely and terribly
in the gloomy stillness of the trees. It was in this hour that Peter
needed the comfort of a woman's arms. His world was gone. Without his
father he wanted to die.
The darkness crept closer about him. And then a little hand, timid,
soft, touched his cheek.
"Peter!"
It was Mona. Her beautiful eyes were glowing softly at him in the dusk
as he raised his head to look at her through his tears. She knelt down
beside him, and he choked back his sobs, struggling to hide his grief
and his tears from her. And then Buddy the pup snuggled under his arm
and kissed his cheek with his cool tongue. Mona was dabbing at his eyes
again with her little handkerchief, and her voice was soft and sweet in
its mothering gentleness.
It was then Peter forgot Simon's warning, and there in the deepening
gloom of the forest, with Mona close beside him, he told what it was in
his heart to tell--all about the police, and the fight and the running
away, and now the losing of his father.
"There isn't anyone else but my dad," he half sobbed at the end. "I
even lost my dog. I haven't got anything now--an' I wish I was dead!"
"You don't," she reproved, her two hands holding one of his own
tightly, "and you _have_ got someone. You've got me. I'll take care
of you. I will, Peter. I promise. And you can have Buddy, and all my
pets--everything I've got. And--he will come back. Your father, I mean.
All we got to do is wait." Her eyes were glowing at him in the dusk.
"Why, your father is alive and he _can_ come back," she said straight
from the heart. "Mine can't. He is dead. And so is my mother."
An emotion new and strange swept over Peter--a flash of dawning manhood
stirred to mysterious life by that note of something which had come
from Mona's lips, a woman of the future whispering to him, chivalry
calling, a boy's soul and a girl's rising for a moment above their
years to point out the way to a new tomorrow.
Peter's heart grew warm again. He rose to his feet, and Mona stood
beside him. In the darkness they were very close.
"I guess you're right," he said. "Dad won't stay away very long. And
I--I'm sorry about your father and mother, Mona. And if Aleck Curry
bothers you again, or kicks the dog----"
And so they went back through the dusk to Five Fingers, and this time
it was Peter who held firmly to Mona's hand.