I sat there in the cabin doorway for a long time, the props upon which
I had builded hope and confidence suddenly knocked away. George was
gone; Dr. Olson was gone. And there was no trace of them left behind,
no trace of where they had gone, or why, or how. They had disappeared
from our ken. We were out of touch with them. And upon them had been
built our hopes.
Far off on some hilltop a wolf barked suddenly. I pictured Brack with
his sneering eyes laughing at me. It was all his work, of course. If
it had not been—if the abandonment of the cabins had been
accidental—Dr. Olson, knowing that I would return there sometime,
would have managed to leave a note or sign to tell the why and where
of the going.
But the captain, also knowing that we would come back to the cabins,
had taken proper precautions. There was no note, no sign. There was no
hope, no chance to escape him. That was the lesson he had prepared for
us with these empty cabins.
The wolf barked again, and I thought of Betty alone in the cave and
sprang up. And there was something selfish in the speed with which I
traveled back over the ridge, for the nearness of her was a stay to my
waning confidence and courage.
Nearing the cave I moved more cautiously, not wishing to blunder
through the mask of brush we had made to hide the opening. Fumbling in
the darkness I found the overhanging rock, and then the opening which
I had left as a door in the brush. I paused a moment before crawling
inside, and as I did so Betty’s voice came faintly from the canoe:
“Is that you, Gardy? And are you all right?”
“I am,” I replied, as I entered. “And you?”
“Fine and dandy. But—oh, you were away an awful long time.”
“Yes. It was farther than I thought.”
“And did you see George? And what did you find out?”
“A lot of things,” I mumbled with assumed sleepiness. “Everything’s
all right. No need to worry. But I’m so tired, so sleepy I can’t talk
now. Forgive me, but I’ll have to wait until morning before telling
about it.”
“You poor boy!” I heard her sit up.
“Oh, I’m all right,” I protested as I lay down on my nest of boughs. I
was sitting up an instant later. “Here; what’s this? You’ve put the
blanket on my bed.”
“Only half of it. I ripped it in two while you were gone. It wasn’t
fair——”
“You’re going to take it back.”
“No, sir. I’m as warm as a cat back here. I’ll never forgive you if
you make me take it back after my feeling so noble for giving it to
you. So there.”
“Now really——”
“No, sir! You lie right down and cover yourself up and get the sleep
you need so much. You wouldn’t deprive me of feeling like a heroine,
would you? Of course not. Good night.”
“Good night.”
She chuckled softly as she lay down.
“I called you ‘Gardy,’ Mr. Pitt; did you notice that? Shocking, isn’t
it? After a few days’ acquaintance. I wonder—I wonder if cave-people
ever had more than one name.”
And after awhile her soft, steady breathing as she slept made me glad
I had withheld the bad news for the morrow.
* * * * *
I awoke the next morning at the first gray light of dawn and slipped
out while Betty still slept. I was now as eager to find some sign of
human nearness as the morning before I had been eager to assure myself
of the isolation of our hiding-place. A sight of the yacht, of any
one, of Brack even, would have been a relief from the growing
sensation that we had been left completely alone.
I went down to the bay and followed its indentations for more than a
mile, making no effort at concealment, in another fruitless search for
the yacht. I went over the ridge to the cabins and stood in the
clearing before them and shouted recklessly. And when the hills had
mockingly echoed back my futile shouts, I knew the calmness of
resignation to the worst. We were alone, and we must exist, and
escape, if escape we could, solely by our own efforts.
I gathered a pocketful of stones and half a dozen clubs and went back
to our spring to hunt for grouse. My good fortune of the day before
was not to be repeated. Birds in plenty there were. They flushed from
beneath my feet, flew past my head, and sat in rows on branches and
looked down upon me. I found, however, that it is one thing to hurl a
club into a covey huddled under a bush, and quite another to knock a
bird out of a tree, and in desperation I finally used the pistol to
bring down the single bird which I thought was to comprise our
breakfast that morning.
In the primitive morning stillness the noise of the shot was like a
crack of lightning, splitting the silence and echoing through the
hills. But by this time I was convinced that we were alone there in
Kalmut Valley, and that no one was near enough to hear the report.
As I reentered the cave Betty sprang up, asking:
“Well? Who and what did you see at the cabins last night?”
While I sought for a way to break the news without any unnecessary
alarm to her she continued:
“It’s bad news, of course. I felt that last night. You’d never have
been selfish enough to go to sleep without telling me if the news had
been good. What is it, Mr. Pitt?”
“I am sorry to say that I didn’t see any one at the cabins,” I
replied. “There was no one there. There was nothing there. The cabins
were stripped bare. Everything in them was gone—food, everything.”
“Then thank goodness for the bird,” she said quietly. “Where do you
think George and everybody, and everything has gone?”
“Oh, Brack’s taken them and all the stuff away some place. But where I
can’t imagine. I really don’t believe the yacht’s in the fiord at all,
so it doesn’t seem they could be on board. Brack may have headquarters
somewhere on shore.”
“But what could be his object in taking everything away from the
cabins?”
“To leave us without food or anything to help us.”
“Hm,” said Betty, her chin in her hands. “I was thinking of something
else.”
“What?”
“Brack knew you’d go back and have a look at the cabins. He thinks
we’re in the open wilderness without a shelter over our heads. Well,
when you find that the cabins have been stripped, deserted, apparently
abandoned for good, wouldn’t it be natural for us to rush to them for
shelter?”
“Certainly.”
“Well, couldn’t he be watching, and when we were in—” her hand pounced
onto a sprig of birch and crushed it—“just like that?”
“A trap!” I cried. “I never thought of that. Of course. And with no
food, even if we were safe at first, we’d have to give in in the end.”
“Which we’ll never, never do, of course,” she said firmly. She looked
around at the fir and birch boughs hung in the cave. “I don’t think I
care to move just at the present. While this apartment is not as roomy
or light as it might be, I am quite fascinated with its interior
decorations, as well as its safety. No; Mr. Brack must find other
tenants for his cabins. I think we shall remain right here.”
I laughed in sheer relief at the serio-comic air with which she said
this.
“Betty,” I said, “aren’t you even a little bit afraid?”
“Oh, yes, Gardy,” she said, instantly serious. “Aren’t you? I’m lots
afraid. But we mustn’t let that bother us, must we?”
“Emphatically, no! We mustn’t let anything bother us. You mustn’t let
anything worry you. We’ll get along, somehow; I don’t know how, but I
know we will——”
“Of course we will!”
“And when it comes to Captain Brack——”
“Are we downhearted?” demanded Betty, and together we answered: “No!”
It was immediately after this that we once more saw the captain. I was
preparing to go out and clean the bird, and as I parted the branches a
boat from the yacht, rowed by four men, with Brack at the rudder, came
rushing down the fiord and steered for the beach directly below where
we were hidden.
Betty saw me start and sprang to my side. Neither of us said a word
while we watched the boat come to land. As the men sprang out and
hurried into the brush we drew back to the rear of the cave, sat down
on the canoe, and looked at each other.
“It’s my fault,” I whispered. “I shouldn’t have fired that shot. They
heard it. Don’t give up, though. They haven’t found us yet.”
“I wonder if they are coming here?” she whispered back.
I went back to the opening and peered cautiously through the branches.
The men, even Captain Brack, were crouched down in the shelter of a
huge boulder, and Brack was giving them directions.
Immediately they scattered, and began to work up the hill. They did
not come directly toward the cave but went slightly to the north, in
the direction where I had fired my pistol.
The caution with which they moved puzzled me. They crouched and ran
from tree to tree, keeping in cover as much as possible, peering
around carefully, their rifles always ready. Brack brought up the
rear. The other men appeared almost frightened and it seemed that only
his presence drove them forward.
“They’re searching the hill, but they’re not coming in this
direction,” I whispered as I drew back to Betty. “Apparently they
don’t know the exact location of this cave.”
“Do you think they will find it?”
“How can I tell? It’s wonderfully hidden.”
“If they do find it, what will you do?”
I did not reply. I did not know what I would do. But one thing I did
know: Brack would not lead us away as his prisoners.
“Gardy,” she whispered, “if they are going to find us tell me, because
there’s something I’ve got to tell you if—if—anything happens.”
“Nothing is going to happen to you,” I whispered assuringly. “Be easy
on that. Nothing will happen to you.”
“Even if they do find us?”
“Even if they do find us. Hush now. We’d better not even whisper.”
We sat waiting in silence, our eyes upon the brush-mask across the
cavern’s mouth. We were cornered. There was nothing to do but sit and
wait for what fate might allot us. Each second I expected to see a
face peering through the brush, and to hear the shout that would
announce our discovery. But the seconds, infinitely long and
throbbing, passed and became minutes, and still we had no sign of
Brack and his men.
It was at least half an hour after the men had started up the hill
that a spruce grouse, flushed from the ground, flashed across the
opening, so close that its wings touched the brush. By the rising
flight of the bird I knew that it had been flushed but a few yards
away, and, I judged, by some one who was coming toward the cave. They
would be here soon now.