was something which told that the place was indeed home to him.
“Shore is a likely-lookin’ camp,” drawled Red, throwing his bridle.
“Been heah a long time, thet cabin.”
“Me an’ my pard was the first white men in these hyar hills,” replied
Slingerland. “He’s gone now.” Then he turned to Neale. “Son, you must
be tired. Thet was a ways to carry a girl nigh onto dead.... Look how
white! Hand her down to me.”
The girl’s hands slipped nervelessly and limply from their hold upon
Neale. Slingerland laid her on the grass in a shady spot. The three men
gazed down upon her, all sober, earnest, doubtful.
“I reckon we can’t do nothin’ but wait,” said the trapper.
Red King shook his head as if the problem were beyond him.
Neale did not voice his thought, yet he wanted to be the first person
her eyes should rest upon when she did return to consciousness.
“Wal, I’ll set to work an’ clean out a place fer her,” said Slingerland.
“We’ll help,” rejoined Neale. “Red, you have a look at the horses.”
“I’ll slip the saddles an’ bridles,” replied King, “an’ let ‘em go.
Hosses couldn’t be chased out of heah.”
Slingerland’s cabin consisted really of two adjoining cabins with a door
between, one part being larger and of later construction. Evidently he
used the older building as a storeroom for his pelts. When all these had
been removed the room was seen to be small, with two windows, a table,
and a few other crude articles of home-made furniture. The men cleaned
this room and laid down a carpet of deer hides, fur side up. A bed was
made of a huge roll of buffalo skins, flattened and shaped, and covered
with Indian blankets. When all this had been accomplished the trapper
removed his fur cap, scratched his grizzled head, and appealed to Neale
and King.
“I reckon you can fetch over some comfortable-like necessaries--fixin’s
fer a girl,” he suggested.
Red King laughed in his cool, easy, droll way. “Shore, we’ll rustle fer
a lookin’-glass, an’ hair-brush, an’ such as girls hev to hev. Our camp
is full of them things.”
But Neale did not see any humor in Slingerland’s perplexity or in the
cowboy’s facetiousness. It was the girl’s serious condition that worried
him, not her future comfort.
“Run out thar!” called Slingerland, sharply.
Neale, who was the nearest to the door, bolted outside, to see the girl
sitting up, her hair disheveled, her manner wild in the extreme. At
sight of him she gave a start, sudden and violent, and uttered a
sharp cry. When Neale reached her it was to find her shaking all over.
Terrible fear had never been more vividly shown, yet Neale believed she
saw in him a white man, a friend. But the fear in her was still stronger
than reason.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“My name’s Neale--Warren Neale,” he replied, sitting down beside her.
He took one of the shaking hands in his. He was glad that she talked
rationally.
“Where am I?”
“This is the home of a trapper. I brought you here. It was the best--in
fact, the only place.”
“You saved me--from--from those devils?” she queried, hoarsely, and
again the cold and horrible shade veiled her eyes.
“Yes--yes--but don’t think of them--they’re gone,” replied Neale,
hastily. The look of her distressed and frightened him. He did not know
what to say.
The girl fell back with a poignant cry and covered her eyes as if to
shut out a hateful and appalling sight. “My--mother!” she moaned,
and shuddered with agony. “They--murdered--her!... Oh! the terrible
yells!... I saw--killed--every man--Mrs. Jones! My mother--she fell--she
never spoke! Her blood was on me!... I crawled away--I hid!... The
Indians--they tore--hacked--scalped--burned!... I couldn’t die!--I
saw!... Oh!--Oh!--Oh!” Then she fell to moaning in inarticulate fashion.
Slingerland and King came out and looked down at the girl.
“Wal, the life’s strong in her,” said the trapper. “I reckon I know when
life is strong in any critter. She’ll git over thet. All we can do now
is to watch her an’ keep her from doin’ herself harm. Take her in an’
lay her down.”
For two days and nights Neale watched over her, except for the hours
she slept, when he divided his vigil with King. She had periods of
consciousness, in which she knew Neale, but most of the time she raved
or tossed or moaned or lay like one dead. On the third day, however.
Neale felt encouraged. She awoke weak and somber, but quiet and
rational. Neale talked earnestly to her, in as sensible a way as he knew
how, speaking briefly of the tragic fate that had been hers, bidding her
force it out of her mind by taking interest in her new surroundings. She
listened to him, but did not seem impressed. It was a difficult matter
to get her to eat. She did not want to move. At length Neale told her
that he must go back to the camp of the engineers, where he had work to
do; he promised that he would return to see her soon and often. She did
not speak or raise her eyes when he left her.
Outside, when Red brought up the horses, Slingerland said to Neale: “See
hyar, son, I reckon you needn’t worry. She’ll come around all right.”
“Shore she will,” corroborated the cowboy. “Time’ll cure her. I’m from
Texas, whar sudden death is plentiful in all families.”
Neale shook his head. “I’m not so sure,” he said. “That girl’s more
sensitively and delicately organized than you fellows see. I doubt
if she’ll ever recover from the shock. It’ll take a mighty great
influence.... But let’s hope for the best. Now, Slingerland, take care
of her as best you can. Shut her in when you leave camp. I’ll ride over
as often as possible. If she gets so she will talk, then we can find out
if she has any relatives, and if so I’ll take her to them. If not I’ll
do whatever else I can for her.”
“Wal, son, I like the way you’re makin’ yourself responsible fer thet
kid,” replied the trapper. “I never had no wife nor daughter. But I’m
thinkin’--wouldn’t it jest be hell to be a girl--tender an’ young an’
like Neale said--an’ sudden hev all you loved butchered before your
eyes?”
“It shore would,” said Red, feelingly. “An’ thet’s what she sees all the
time.”
“Slingerland, do we run any chance of meeting Indians?” queried Neale.
“I reckon not. Them Sioux will git fur away from hyar after thet
massacre. But you want to keep sharp eyes out, an’ if you do meet any,
jest ride an’ shoot your way through. You’ve the best horses I’ve seen.
Whar’d you git them?”
“They belong to King. He’s a cowboy.”
“Hosses was my job. An’ we can shore ride away from any redskins,”
replied King.
“Wal, good luck, an’ come back soon,” was Slingerland’s last word.
So they parted. The cowboy led the way with the steady, easy, trotting
walk that saved a horse yet covered distance; in three hours they were
hailed by a trooper outpost, and soon they were in camp.
Shortly after their arrival the engineers returned, tired, dusty,
work-stained, and yet in unusually good spirits. They had run the line
up over Sherman Pass, and now it seemed their difficulties were to
lessen as the line began to descend from the summit of the divide.
Neale’s absence had been noticed, for his services were in demand.
But all the men rejoiced in his rescue of the little girl, and were
sympathetic and kind in their inquiries. It seemed to Neale that his
chief looked searchingly at him, as if somehow the short absence
had made a change in him. Neale himself grew conscious of a strange
difference in his inner nature; he could not forget the girl, her
helplessness, her pathetic plight.
“Well, it’s curious,” he soliloquized. “But--it’s not so, either. I’m
sorry for her.”
And he remembered the strange change in her eyes when he had watched
the shadow of horror and death and blood fade away before the natural
emotions of youth and life and hope.
Next day Neale showed more than ever his value to the engineering
corps, and again won a word of quiet praise from his chief. He liked the
commendation of his superiors. He began to believe heart and soul in
the coming greatness of the railroad. And that strenuous week drove his
faithful lineman, King, to unwonted complaint.
Larry tugged at his boots and groaned as he finally pulled them off.
They were full of holes, at which he gazed ruefully. “Shore I’ll be done
with this heah job when they’re gone,” he said.
“Why do you work in high-heeled boots?” inquired Neale. “You can’t walk
or climb in them. No wonder they’re full of holes.”
“Wal, I couldn’t wear no boots like yours,” declared Red.
“You’ll have to. Another day will about finish them, and your feet,
too.”
Red eyed his boss with interest. “You-all cussed me to-day because I was
slow,” he complained.
“Larry, you always are slow, except with a horse or gun. And lately
you’ve been--well, you don’t move out of your tracks.”
Neale often exaggerated out of a desire to tease his friend. Nobody else
dared try and banter King.
“Wal, I didn’t sign up with this heah outfit to run up hills all day,”
replied Red.
“I’ll tell you what. I’ll get Casey to be my lineman. No, I’ve a better
idea. Casey is slow, too. I’ll use one of the niggers.”
Red King gave a hitch to his belt and a cold gleam chased away the lazy
blue warmth from his eyes. “Go ahaid,” he drawled, “an’ they’ll bury the
nigger to-morrow night.”
Neale laughed. He knew Red hated darkies--he suspected the Texan had
thrown a gun on more than a few--and he knew there surely would be a
funeral in camp if he changed his lineman.
“All right, Red. I don’t want blood spilled,” he said, cheerfully. “I’ll
be a martyr and put up with you.... What do you say to a day off? Let’s
ride over to Slingerland’s.”
The cowboy’s red face slowly wrinkled into a smile. “Wal, I shore was
wonderin’ what in the hell made you rustle so lately. I reckon nothin’
would suit me better. I’ve been wonderin’, too, about our little girl.”
“Red, let’s wade through camp and see what we can get to take over.”
“Man, you mean jest steal?” queried King, in mild surprise.
“No. We’ll ask for things. But if we can’t get what we want
that way--why, we’ll have to do the other thing,” replied Neale,
thoughtfully. “Slingerland did not have even a towel over there.
Think of that girl! She’s been used to comfort, if not luxury. I could
tell.... Let’s see. I’ve a mirror and an extra brush.... Red, come on.”
Eagerly they went over their scant belongings, generously appropriating
whatever might be made of possible use to an unfortunate girl in a wild
and barren country. Then they fared forth into the camp. Every one in
the corps contributed something. The chief studied Neale’s heated face,
and a smile momentarily changed his stern features--a wise smile, a
little sad, and full of light.
“I suppose you’ll marry her,” he said.
Neale blushed like a girl. “It--that hadn’t occurred to me, sir,” he
stammered.
Lodge laughed, but his glance was kind. “Sure you’ll marry her,” he
said. “You saved her life. And, boy, you’ll be a big man of the U. P.
some day. Chief engineer or superintendent of maintenance of way or some
other big job. What could be finer? Romance, boy. The little waif of
the caravan--you’ll send her back to Omaha to school; she’ll grow into a
beautiful woman! She’ll have a host of admirers, but you’ll be the king
of the lot--sure.”
Neale got out of the tent with tingling ears. He was used to the
badinage of the men, and had always retaliated with a sharp and ready
tongue. But this half-kind, half-humorous talk encroached upon what he
felt to be the secret side of his nature--the romantic and the dreamful
side--to which such fancies were unconscionably dear.
Early the next morning Neale and King rode out on the way to
Slingerland’s.
The sun was warm when they reached the valley through which ran the
stream that led up to the cabin. Spring was in the air. The leaves of
cottonwood and willow added their fresh emerald to the darker green
of the pine. Bluebells showed in the grass along the trail; there grew
lavender and yellow flowers unfamiliar to Neale; trout rose and splashed
on the surface of the pools; and the way was melodious with the humming
of bees and the singing of birds.
Slingerland saw them coming and strode out to meet them with hearty
greeting.
“Is she all right?” queried Neale, abruptly.
“No, she ain’t,” replied Slingerland, shaking his shaggy head. “She
won’t eat or move or talk. She’s wastin’ away. She jest sits or lays
with that awful look in her eyes.”
“Can’t you make her talk?”
“Wal, she’ll say no to ‘most anythin’. There was three times she asked
when you was comin’ back. Then she quit askin’. I reckon she’s forgot
you. But she’s never forgot thet bloody massacre. It’s there in her
eyes.”
Neale dismounted, and, untying the pack from his saddle, he laid it
down, removed saddle and bridle; then he turned the horse loose. He did
this automatically while his mind was busy.
“Where is she?” he asked.
“Over thar under the pines whar the brook spills out of the spring.
Thet’s the only place she’ll walk to. I believe she likes to listen to
the water. An’ she’s always afraid.”
“I’ve fetched a pack of things for her,” said Neale. “Come on, Red.”
“Shore you go alone,” replied the cowboy, hanging back. “Girls is not my
job.”
So Neale approached alone. The spot was green, fragrant, shady, bright
with flowers, musical with murmuring water. Presently he spied her--a
drooping, forlorn little figure. The instant he saw her he felt glad and
sad at once. She started quickly at his step and turned. He remembered
the eyes, but hardly the face. It had grown thinner and whiter than the
one he had in mind.
“My Lord! she’s going to die!” breathed Neale. “What can I do--what can
I say to her?”
He walked directly but slowly up to her, aware of her staring eyes, and
confused by them.
“Hello! little girl, I’ve brought you some things,” he said, and tried
to speak cheerfully.
“Oh--is--it you?” she said, brokenly.
“Yes, it’s Neale. I hope you’ve not forgotten me.”
There came a fleeting change over her, but not in her face, he thought,
because not a muscle moved, and the white stayed white. It must have
been in her eyes, though he could not certainly tell. He bent over to
untie the pack.
“I’ve brought you a lot of things,” he said. “Hope you’ll find them
useful. Here--”
She did not look at the open pack or pay any attention to him. The
drooping posture had been resumed, together with the somber staring at
the brook. Neale watched her in despair, and, watching, he divined that
only the most infinite patience and magnetism and power could bring her
out of her brooding long enough to give nature a chance. He recognized
how unequal he was to the task. But the impossible or the unattainable
had always roused Neale’s spirit. Defeat angered him. This girl was
alive; she was not hurt physically; he believed she could be made to
forget that tragic night of blood and death. He set his teeth and swore
he would display the tact of a woman, the patience of a saint, the skill
of a physician, the love of a father--anything to hold back this girl
from the grave into which she was fading. Reaching out, he touched her.
“Can you understand me?” he asked.
“Yes,” she murmured. Her voice was thin, far away, an evident effort.
“I saved your life.”
“I wish you had let me die.” Her reply was quick with feeling, and
it thrilled Neale because it was a proof that he could stimulate or
aggravate her mind.
“But I DID save you. Now you owe me something.”
“What?”
“Why, gratitude--enough to want to live, to try to help yourself.”
“No--no,” she whispered, and relapsed into the somber apathy.
Neale could scarcely elicit another word from her; then by way of
change he held out different articles he had brought--scarfs, a shawl,
a mirror--and made her look at them. Her own face in the mirror did not
interest her. He tried to appeal to a girl’s vanity. She had none.
“Your hair is all tangled,” he said, bringing forth comb and brush.
“Here, smooth it out.”
“No--no--no,” she moaned.
“All right, I’ll do it for you,” he countered. Surprised at finding
her passive when he had expected resistance, he began to comb out the
tangled tresses. In his earnestness he did not perceive how singular his
action might seem to an onlooker. She had a mass of hair that quickly
began to smooth out and brighten under his hand. He became absorbed in
his task and failed to see the approach of Larry King.
The cowboy was utterly amazed, and presently he grinned his delight.
Evidently the girl was all right and no longer to be feared.
“Wal, shore thet’s fine,” he drawled. “Neale, I always knowed you was a
lady’s man.” And Larry sat down beside them.
The girl’s face was half hidden under the mass of hair, and her head was
lowered. Neale gave Larry a warning glance, meant to convey that he was
not to be funny.
“This is my cowboy friend, Larry Red King,” said Neale. “He was with me
when I--I found you.”
“Larry--Red--King,” murmured the girl. “My name is--Allie.”
Again Neale had penetrated into her close-locked mind. What she said
astounded him so that he dropped the brush and stared at Larry. And
Larry lost his grin; he caught a glimpse of her face, and his own grew
troubled.
“Allie--I shore--am glad to meet you,” he said, and there was more
feeling in his voice than Neale had ever before heard. Larry was not
slow of comprehension. He began to talk in his drawling way. Neale heard
him with a smile he tried to hide, but he liked Larry the better for his
simplicity. This gun-throwing cowboy had a big heart.
Larry, however, did not linger for long. His attempts to get the girl
to talk grew weaker and ended; then, after another glance at the tragic,
wan face he got up and thoughtfully slouched away.
“So your name is Allie,” said Neale. “Well, Allie what?”
She did not respond to one out of a hundred questions, and this query
found no lodgment in her mind.
“Will you braid your hair now?” he asked.
The answer was the low and monotonous negative, but, nevertheless, her
hands sought her hair and parted it, and began to braid it mechanically.
This encouraged Neale more than anything else; it showed him that there
were habits of mind into which he could turn her. Finally he got her to
walk along the brook and also to eat and drink.
At the end of that day he was more exhausted than he would have been
after a hard climb. Yet he was encouraged to think that he could get
some kind of passive unconscious obedience from her.
“Reckon you’d better stay over to-morrow,” suggested Slingerland. His
concern for the girl could not have been greater had she been his own
daughter. “Allie--thet was her name, you said. Wal, it’s pretty an’ easy
to say.”
Next day Allie showed an almost imperceptible improvement. It might have
been Neale’s imagination leading him to believe that there were really
grounds for hope. The trapper and the cowboy could not get any response
from her, but there was certain proof that he could. The conviction
moved him to deep emotion.
An hour before sunset Neale decided to depart, and told Larry to get the
horses. Then he went to Allie, undecided what to say, feeling that he
must have tortured her this day with his ceaseless importunities.
How small the chance that he might again awaken the springs of life
interest. Yet the desire was strong within him to try.
“Allie.” He repeated her name before she heard him. Then she looked up.
The depths--the tragic lonesomeness--of her eyes--haunted Neale.
“I’m going back. I’ll come again soon.”
She made a quick movement--seized his arm. He remembered the close,
tight grip of her hands.
“Don’t go!” she implored. Black fear stared out of her eyes.
Neale was thunderstruck at the suddenness of her speech--at its
intensity. Also he felt an unfamiliar kind of joy. He began to explain
that he must return to work, that he would soon come to see her again;
but even as he talked she faded back into that dull and somber apathy.
Neale rode away with only one conviction gained from the developments
of the two days; it was that he would be restless and haunted until he
could go to her again. Something big and moving--something equal to his
ambition for his work on the great railroad--had risen in him and would
not be denied.
7
Neale rode to Slingerland’s cabin twice during the ensuing fortnight,
but did not note any improvement in Allie’s condition or demeanor. The
trapper, however, assured Neale that she was gradually gaining a little
and taking some slight interest in things; he said that if Neale could
only spend enough time there the girl might recover. This made Neale
thoughtful.
General Lodge and his staff had decided to station several engineers
in camp along the line of the railroad for the purpose of studying the
drift of snow. It was important that all information possible should be
obtained during the next few winters. There would be severe hardships
attached to this work, but Neale volunteered to serve, and the chief
complimented him warmly. He was to study the action of the snowdrift
along Sherman Pass.
Upon his next visit to Slingerland Neale had the project soberly in mind
and meant to broach it upon the first opportunity.
This morning, when Neale and King rode up to the cabin, Allie did not
appear as upon the last occasion of their arrival. Neale missed her.
Slingerland came out with his usual welcome.
“Where’s Allie?” asked Neale.
“Wal, she went in jest now. She saw you comin’ an’ then run in to hide,
I reckon. Girls is queer critters.”
“She watched for me--for us--and then ran?” queried Neale, curiously.
“Wal, she ain’t done nothin’ but watch fer you since you went away last.
An’, son, thet’s a new wrinkle fer Allie, An’ run? Wal, like a skeered
deer.”
“Wonder what that means?” pondered Neale. Whatever it meant, it sent
a little tingle of pleasure along his pulses. “Red, I want to have a
serious talk with Slingerland,” he announced, thoughtfully.
“Shore; go ahaid an’ talk,” drawled the Southerner, as he slipped his
saddle and turned his horse loose with a slap on the flank. “I reckon
I’ll take a gun an’ stroll off fer a while.”
Neale led the trapper aside to a shady spot under the pines and there
unburdened himself of his plan for the winter.
“Son, you’ll freeze to death!” ejaculated the trapper.
“I must build a cabin, of course, and prepare for severe weather,”
replied Neale.
Slingerland shook his shaggy head. “I reckon you ain’t knowin’ these
winters hyar as I know them. But thet long ridge you call Sherman
Pass--it ain’t so fur we couldn’t get thar on snow-shoes except in the
wust weather. I reckon you can stay with me hyar.”
“Good!” exclaimed Neale. “And now about Allie.”
“Wal, what about her?”
“Shall I leave her here or send her back to Omaha with the first
caravan, or let her go to Fort Fetterman with the troops?”
“Son, she’s your charge, but I say leave her hyar, ‘specially now you
can be with us. She’d die or go crazy if you sent her. Why, she won’t
even say if she’s got a livin’ relation. I reckon she hain’t. She’d be
better hyar. I’ve come to be fond of Allie. She’s strange. She’s like a
spirit. But she’s more human lately.”
“I’m glad you say that, Slingerland,” replied Neale. “What to do about
her had worried me. I’ll decide right now. I’ll leave her with you, and
I hope to Heaven I’m doing best by her.”
“Wal, she ain’t strong enough to travel fur. We didn’t think of thet.”
“That settles it, then,” said Neale, in relief. “Time enough to decide
when she is well again.... Tell me about her.”
“Son, thar’s nuthin’ to tell. She’s done jest the same, except fer thet
takin’ to watchin’ fer you. Reckon thet means a good deal.”
“What?”
“Wal, I don’t figger girls as well as I do other critters,” answered
Slingerland, reflectively. “But I’d say Allie shows interest in you.”
“Slingerland! You don’t mean she--she cares for me?” demanded Neale.
“I don’t know. Mebbe not. Mebbe she’s beyond carin’. But I believe you
an’ thet red memory of bloody death air all she ever thinks of. An’
mostly of it.”
“Then it’ll be a fight between me and that memory?”
“So I take it, son. But recollect I ain’t no mind-doctor. I jest feel
you could make her fergit thet hell if you tried hard enough.”
“I’ll try--hard as I can,” replied Neale, resolutely, yet with a certain
softness. “I’m sorry for her. I saved her. Why shouldn’t I do everything
possible?”
“Wal, she’s alone.”
“No, Allie has friends--you and King and me. That’s three.”