brother's throat with deadly force, as though the spoken word
could be killed so; and as Christian struggled, lifted him clear
off his feet and flung him crashing backward. So furious was he,
that, as his brother lay motionless, he stirred him roughly with
his foot, till their mother came between, crying shame; and yet
then he stood by, his teeth set, his brows knit, his hands
clenched, ready to enforce silence again violently, as Christian
rose staggering and bewildered.
But utter silence and submission were more than he expected, and
turned his anger into contempt for one so easily cowed and held in
subjection by mere force. "He is mad!" he said, turning on his
heel as he spoke, so that he lost his mother's look of pained
reproach at this sudden free utterance of what was a lurking dread
within her.
Christian was too spent for the effort of speech. His hard-drawn
breath laboured in great sobs; his limbs were powerless and
unstrung in utter relax after hard service. Failure in his
endeavour induced a stupor of misery and despair. In addition was
the wretched humiliation of open violence and strife with his
brother, and the distress of hearing misjudging contempt expressed
without reserve; for he was aware that Sweyn had turned to allay
the scared excitement half by imperious mastery, half by
explanation and argument, that showed painful disregard of
brotherly consideration. All this unkindness of his twin he
charged upon the fell Thing who had wrought this their first
dissension, and, ah! most terrible thought, interposed between
them so effectually, that Sweyn was wilfully blind and deaf on her
account, resentful of interference, arbitrary beyond reason.
Dread and perplexity unfathomable darkened upon him; unshared, the
burden was overwhelming: a foreboding of unspeakable calamity,
based upon his ghastly discovery, bore down upon him, crushing out
hope of power to withstand impending fate.
Sweyn the while was observant of his brother, despite the
continual check of finding, turn and glance when he would,
Christian's eyes always upon him, with a strange look of helpless
distress, discomposing enough to the angry aggressor. "Like a
beaten dog!" he said to himself, rallying contempt to withstand
compunction. Observation set him wondering on Christian's
exhausted condition. The heavy labouring breath and the slack
inert fall of the limbs told surely of unusual and prolonged
exertion. And then why had close upon two hours' absence been
followed by open hostility against White Fell?
Suddenly, the fragments of the flask giving a clue, he guessed
all, and faced about to stare at his brother in amaze. He forgot
that the motive scheme was against White Fell, demanding derision
and resentment from him; that was swept out of remembrance by
astonishment and admiration for the feat of speed and endurance.
In eagerness to question he inclined to attempt a generous part
and frankly offer to heal the breach; but Christian's depression
and sad following gaze provoked him to self-justification by
recalling the offence of that outrageous utterance against White
Fell; and the impulse passed. Then other considerations counselled
silence; and afterwards a humour possessed him to wait and see how
Christian would find opportunity to proclaim his performance and
establish the fact, without exciting ridicule on account of the
absurdity of the errand.
This expectation remained unfulfilled. Christian never attempted
the proud avowal that would have placed his feat on record to be
told to the next generation.
That night Sweyn and his mother talked long and late together,
shaping into certainty the suspicion that Christian's mind had
lost its balance, and discussing the evident cause. For Sweyn,
declaring his own love for White Fell, suggested that his
unfortunate brother, with a like passion, they being twins in
loves as in birth, had through jealousy and despair turned from
love to hate, until reason failed at the strain, and a craze
developed, which the malice and treachery of madness made a
serious and dangerous force.
So Sweyn theorised, convincing himself as he spoke; convincing
afterwards others who advanced doubts against White Fell;
fettering his judgment by his advocacy, and by his staunch defence
of her hurried flight silencing his own inner consciousness of the
unaccountability of her action.
But a little time and Sweyn lost his vantage in the shock of a
fresh horror at the homestead. Trella was no more, and her end a
mystery. The poor old woman crawled out in a bright gleam to visit
a bed-ridden gossip living beyond the fir-grove. Under the trees
she was last seen, halting for her companion, sent back for a
forgotten present. Quick alarm sprang, calling every man to the
search. Her stick was found among the brushwood only a few paces
from the path, but no track or stain, for a gusty wind was sifting
the snow from the branches, and hid all sign of how she came by
her death.
So panic-stricken were the farm folk that none dared go singly on
the search. Known danger could be braced, but not this stealthy
Death that walked by day invisible, that cut off alike the child
in his play and the aged woman so near to her quiet grave.
"Rol she kissed; Trella she kissed!" So rang Christian's frantic
cry again and again, till Sweyn dragged him away and strove to
keep him apart, albeit in his agony of grief and remorse he
accused himself wildly as answerable for the tragedy, and gave
clear proof that the charge of madness was well founded, if
strange looks and desperate, incoherent words were evidence
enough.
But thenceforward all Sweyn's reasoning and mastery could not
uphold White Fell above suspicion. He was not called upon to
defend her from accusation when Christian had been brought to
silence again; but he well knew the significance of this fact,
that her name, formerly uttered freely and often, he never heard
now: it was huddled away into whispers that he could not catch.
The passing of time did not sweep away the superstitious fears
that Sweyn despised. He was angry and anxious; eager that White
Fell should return, and, merely by her bright gracious presence,
reinstate herself in favour; but doubtful if all his authority and
example could keep from her notice an altered aspect of welcome;
and he foresaw clearly that Christian would prove unmanageable,
and might be capable of some dangerous outbreak.
For a time the twins' variance was marked, on Sweyn's part by an
air of rigid indifference, on Christian's by heavy downcast
silence, and a nervous apprehensive observation of his brother.
Superadded to his remorse and foreboding, Sweyn's displeasure
weighed upon him intolerably, and the remembrance of their violent
rupture was a ceaseless misery. The elder brother, self-sufficient
and insensitive, could little know how deeply his unkindness
stabbed. A depth and force of affection such as Christian's was
unknown to him. The loyal subservience that he could not
appreciate had encouraged him to domineer; this strenuous
opposition to his reason and will was accounted as furious malice,
if not sheer insanity.
Christian's surveillance galled him incessantly, and embarrassment
and danger he foresaw as the outcome. Therefore, that suspicion
might be lulled, he judged it wise to make overtures for peace.
Most easily done. A little kindliness, a few evidences of
consideration, a slight return of the old brotherly imperiousness,
and Christian replied by a gratefulness and relief that might have
touched him had he understood all, but instead, increased his
secret contempt.
So successful was this finesse, that when, late on a day, a
message summoning Christian to a distance was transmitted by
Sweyn, no doubt of its genuineness occurred. When, his errand
proved useless, he set out to return, mistake or misapprehension
was all that he surmised. Not till he sighted the homestead, lying
low between the night-grey snow ridges, did vivid recollection of
the time when he had tracked that horror to the door rouse an
intense dread, and with it a hardly-defined suspicion.
His grasp tightened on the bear-spear that he carried as a staff;
every sense was alert, every muscle strung; excitement urged him
on, caution checked him, and the two governed his long stride,
swiftly, noiselessly, to the climax he felt was at hand.
As he drew near to the outer gates, a light shadow stirred and
went, as though the grey of the snow had taken detached motion. A
darker shadow stayed and faced Christian, striking his life-blood
chill with utmost despair.
Sweyn stood before him, and surely, the shadow that went was White
Fell.
They had been together--close. Had she not been in his arms, near
enough for lips to meet?
There was no moon, but the stars gave light enough to show that
Sweyn's face was flushed and elate. The flush remained, though the
expression changed quickly at sight of his brother. How, if
Christian had seen all, should one of his frenzied outbursts be
met and managed: by resolution? by indifference? He halted between
the two, and as a result, he swaggered.
"White Fell?" questioned Christian, hoarse and breathless.
"Yes?"
Sweyn's answer was a query, with an intonation that implied he was
clearing the ground for action.
From Christian came: "Have you kissed her?" like a bolt direct,
staggering Sweyn by its sheer prompt temerity.
He flushed yet darker, and yet half-smiled over this earnest of
success he had won. Had there been really between himself and
Christian the rivalry that he imagined, his face had enough of the
insolence of triumph to exasperate jealous rage.
"You dare ask this!"
"Sweyn, O Sweyn, I must know! You have!"
The ring of despair and anguish in his tone angered Sweyn,
misconstruing it. Jealousy urging to such presumption was
intolerable.
"Mad fool!" he said, constraining himself no longer. "Win for
yourself a woman to kiss. Leave mine without question. Such an one
as I should desire to kiss is such an one as shall never allow a
kiss to you."
Then Christian fully understood his supposition.
"I--I!" he cried. "White Fell--that deadly Thing! Sweyn, are you
blind, mad? I would save you from her: a Were-Wolf!"
Sweyn maddened again at the accusation--a dastardly way of
revenge, as he conceived; and instantly, for the second time, the
brothers were at strife violently.
But Christian was now too desperate to be scrupulous; for a dim
glimpse had shot a possibility into his mind, and to be free to
follow it the striking of his brother was a necessity. Thank God!
he was armed, and so Sweyn's equal.
[Illustration: The Race]
Facing his assailant with the bear-spear, he struck up his arms,
and with the butt end hit hard so that he fell. The matchless
runner leapt away on the instant, to follow a forlorn hope.
Sweyn, on regaining his feet, was as amazed as angry at this
unaccountable flight. He knew in his heart that his brother was no
coward, and that it was unlike him to shrink from an encounter
because defeat was certain, and cruel humiliation from a
vindictive victor probable. Of the uselessness of pursuit he was
well aware: he must abide his chagrin, content to know that his
time for advantage would come. Since White Fell had parted to the
right, Christian to the left, the event of a sequent encounter did
not occur to him. And now Christian, acting on the dim glimpse he
had had, just as Sweyn turned upon him, of something that moved
against the sky along the ridge behind the homestead, was staking
his only hope on a chance, and his own superlative speed. If what
he saw was really White Fell, he guessed she was bending her steps
towards the open wastes; and there was just a possibility that, by
a straight dash, and a desperate perilous leap over a sheer bluff,
he might yet meet her or head her. And then: he had no further
thought.
It was past, the quick, fierce race, and the chance of death at
the leap; and he halted in a hollow to fetch his breath and to
look: did she come? had she gone?
She came.
She came with a smooth, gliding, noiseless speed, that was neither
walking nor running; her arms were folded in her furs that were
drawn tight about her body; the white lappets from her head were
wrapped and knotted closely beneath her face; her eyes were set on
a far distance. So she went till the even sway of her going was
startled to a pause by Christian.
"Fell!"
She drew a quick, sharp breath at the sound of her name thus
mutilated, and faced Sweyn's brother. Her eyes glittered; her
upper lip was lifted, and shewed the teeth. The half of her name,
impressed with an ominous sense as uttered by him, warned her of
the aspect of a deadly foe. Yet she cast loose her robes till they
trailed ample, and spoke as a mild woman.
"What would you?"
Then Christian answered with his solemn dreadful accusation:
"You kissed Rol--and Rol is dead! You kissed Trella: she is dead!
You have kissed Sweyn, my brother; but he shall not die!"
He added: "You may live till midnight."
The edge of the teeth and the glitter of the eyes stayed a moment,
and her right hand also slid down to the axe haft. Then, without a
word, she swerved from him, and sprang out and away swiftly over
the snow.
And Christian sprang out and away, and followed her swiftly over
the snow, keeping behind, but half-a-stride's length from her
side.
So they went running together, silent, towards the vast wastes of
snow, where no living thing but they two moved under the stars of
night.
Never before had Christian so rejoiced in his powers. The gift of
speed, and the training of use and endurance were priceless to him
now. Though midnight was hours away, he was confident that, go
where that Fell Thing would, hasten as she would, she could not
outstrip him nor escape from him. Then, when came the time for
transformation, when the woman's form made no longer a shield
against a man's hand, he could slay or be slain to save Sweyn. He
had struck his dear brother in dire extremity, but he could not,
though reason urged, strike a woman.
For one mile, for two miles they ran: White Fell ever foremost,
Christian ever at equal distance from her side, so near that, now
and again, her out-flying furs touched him. She spoke no word; nor
he. She never turned her head to look at him, nor swerved to evade
him; but, with set face looking forward, sped straight on, over
rough, over smooth, aware of his nearness by the regular beat of
his feet, and the sound of his breath behind.
In a while she quickened her pace. From the first, Christian had
judged of her speed as admirable, yet with exulting security in
his own excelling and enduring whatever her efforts. But, when the
pace increased, he found himself put to the test as never had he
been before in any race. Her feet, indeed, flew faster than his;
it was only by his length of stride that he kept his place at her
side. But his heart was high and resolute, and he did not fear
failure yet.
So the desperate race flew on. Their feet struck up the powdery
snow, their breath smoked into the sharp clear air, and they were
gone before the air was cleared of snow and vapour. Now and then
Christian glanced up to judge, by the rising of the stars, of the
coming of midnight. So long--so long!
White Fell held on without slack. She, it was evident, with
confidence in her speed proving matchless, as resolute to outrun
her pursuer as he to endure till midnight and fulfil his purpose.
And Christian held on, still self-assured. He could not fail; he
would not fail. To avenge Rol and Trella was motive enough for him
to do what man could do; but for Sweyn more. She had kissed Sweyn,
but he should not die too: with Sweyn to save he could not fail.
Never before was such a race as this; no, not when in old Greece
man and maid raced together with two fates at stake; for the hard
running was sustained unabated, while star after star rose and
went wheeling up towards midnight, for one hour, for two hours.
Then Christian saw and heard what shot him through with fear.
Where a fringe of trees hung round a slope he saw something dark
moving, and heard a yelp, followed by a full horrid cry, and the
dark spread out upon the snow, a pack of wolves in pursuit.
Of the beasts alone he had little cause for fear; at the pace he
held he could distance them, four-footed though they were. But of
White Fell's wiles he had infinite apprehension, for how might she
not avail herself of the savage jaws of these wolves, akin as they
were to half her nature. She vouchsafed to them nor look nor sign;
but Christian, on an impulse to assure himself that she should not
escape him, caught and held the back-flung edge of her furs,
running still.
She turned like a flash with a beastly snarl, teeth and eyes
gleaming again. Her axe shone, on the upstroke, on the downstroke,
as she hacked at his hand. She had lopped it off at the wrist, but
that he parried with the bear-spear. Even then, she shore through
the shaft and shattered the bones of the hand at the same blow, so
that he loosed perforce.
Then again they raced on as before, Christian not losing a pace,
though his left hand swung useless, bleeding and broken.
The snarl, indubitable, though modified from a woman's organs, the
vicious fury revealed in teeth and eyes, the sharp arrogant pain
of her maiming blow, caught away Christian's heed of the beasts
behind, by striking into him close vivid realisation of the
infinitely greater danger that ran before him in that deadly
Thing.
When he bethought him to look behind, lo! the pack had but reached
their tracks, and instantly slunk aside, cowed; the yell of
pursuit changing to yelps and whines. So abhorrent was that fell
creature to beast as to man.
She had drawn her furs more closely to her, disposing them so
that, instead of flying loose to her heels, no drapery hung lower
than her knees, and this without a check to her wonderful speed,
nor embarrassment by the cumbering of the folds. She held her head
as before; her lips were firmly set, only the tense nostrils gave
her breath; not a sign of distress witnessed to the long
sustaining of that terrible speed.
But on Christian by now the strain was telling palpably. His head
weighed heavy, and his breath came labouring in great sobs; the
bear spear would have been a burden now. His heart was beating
like a hammer, but such a dulness oppressed his brain, that it was
only by degrees he could realise his helpless state; wounded and
weaponless, chasing that terrible Thing, that was a fierce,
desperate, axe-armed woman, except she should assume the beast
with fangs yet more formidable.
And still the far slow stars went lingering nearly an hour from
midnight.
So far was his brain astray that an impression took him that she
was fleeing from the midnight stars, whose gain was by such slow
degrees that a time equalling days and days had gone in the race
round the northern circle of the world, and days and days as long
might last before the end--except she slackened, or except he
failed.
But he would not fail yet.
How long had he been praying so? He had started with a
self-confidence and reliance that had felt no need for that aid;
and now it seemed the only means by which to restrain his heart
from swelling beyond the compass of his body, by which to cherish
his brain from dwindling and shrivelling quite away. Some
sharp-toothed creature kept tearing and dragging on his maimed
left hand; he never could see it, he could not shake it off; but
he prayed it off at times.
The clear stars before him took to shuddering, and he knew why:
they shuddered at sight of what was behind him. He had never
divined before that strange things hid themselves from men under
pretence of being snow-clad mounds or swaying trees; but now they
came slipping out from their harmless covers to follow him, and
mock at his impotence to make a kindred Thing resolve to truer
form. He knew the air behind him was thronged; he heard the hum of
innumerable murmurings together; but his eyes could never catch
them, they were too swift and nimble. Yet he knew they were there,
because, on a backward glance, he saw the snow mounds surge as
they grovelled flatlings out of sight; he saw the trees reel as
they screwed themselves rigid past recognition among the boughs.
And after such glance the stars for awhile returned to
steadfastness, and an infinite stretch of silence froze upon the
chill grey world, only deranged by the swift even beat of the
flying feet, and his own--slower from the longer stride, and the
sound of his breath. And for some clear moments he knew that his
only concern was, to sustain his speed regardless of pain and
distress, to deny with every nerve he had her power to outstrip
him or to widen the space between them, till the stars crept up to
midnight. Then out again would come that crowd invisible, humming
and hustling behind, dense and dark enough, he knew, to blot out
the stars at his back, yet ever skipping and jerking from his
sight.
A hideous check came to the race. White Fell swirled about and
leapt to the right, and Christian, unprepared for so prompt a
lurch, found close at his feet a deep pit yawning, and his own
impetus past control. But he snatched at her as he bore past,
clasping her right arm with his one whole hand, and the two swung
together upon the brink.
And her straining away in self preservation was vigorous enough to
counter-balance his headlong impulse, and brought them reeling
together to safety.
Then, before he was verily sure that they were not to perish so,
crashing down, he saw her gnashing in wild pale fury as she
wrenched to be free; and since her right hand was in his grasp,
used her axe left-handed, striking back at him.
The blow was effectual enough even so; his right arm dropped
powerless, gashed, and with the lesser bone broken, that jarred
with horrid pain when he let it swing as he leaped out again, and
ran to recover the few feet she had gained from his pause at the
shock.
The near escape and this new quick pain made again every faculty
alive and intense. He knew that what he followed was most surely
Death animate: wounded and helpless, he was utterly at her mercy
if so she should realise and take action. Hopeless to avenge,
hopeless to save, his very despair for Sweyn swept him on to
follow, and follow, and precede the kiss-doomed to death. Could he
yet fail to hunt that Thing past midnight, out of the womanly form
alluring and treacherous, into lasting restraint of the bestial,
which was the last shred of hope left from the confident purpose
of the outset?
"Sweyn, Sweyn, O Sweyn!" He thought he was praying, though his
heart wrung out nothing but this: "Sweyn, Sweyn, O Sweyn!"
The last hour from midnight had lost half its quarters, and the
stars went lifting up the great minutes; and again his greatening
heart, and his shrinking brain, and the sickening agony that swung
at either side, conspired to appal the will that had only seeming
empire over his feet.
Now White Fell's body was so closely enveloped that not a lap nor
an edge flew free. She stretched forward strangely aslant, leaning
from the upright poise of a runner. She cleared the ground at
times by long bounds, gaining an increase of speed that Christian
agonised to equal.
Because the stars pointed that the end was nearing, the black
brood came behind again, and followed, noising. Ah! if they could
but be kept quiet and still, nor slip their usual harmless masks
to encourage with their interest the last speed of their most
deadly congener. What shape had they? Should he ever know? If it
were not that he was bound to compel the fell Thing that ran
before him into her truer form, he might face about and follow
them. No--no--not so; if he might do anything but what he
did--race, race, and racing bear this agony, he would just stand
still and die, to be quit of the pain of breathing.
He grew bewildered, uncertain of his own identity, doubting of his
own true form. He could not be really a man, no more than that
running Thing was really a woman; his real form was only hidden
under embodiment of a man, but what it was he did not know. And
Sweyn's real form he did not know. Sweyn lay fallen at his feet,
where he had struck him down--his own brother--he: he stumbled
over him, and had to overleap him and race harder because she who
had kissed Sweyn leapt so fast. "Sweyn, Sweyn, O Sweyn!"
Why did the stars stop to shudder? Midnight else had surely come!