It happened that Cash was just returning to the cabin from the Blind
Ledge claim. He met Bud almost at the doorstep, just as Bud was fumbling
with the latch, trying to open the door without moving Lovin Child in
his arms. Cash may or may not have been astonished. Certainly he did
not betray by more than one quick glance that he was interested in Bud's
return or in the mysterious burden he bore. He stepped ahead of Bud and
opened the door without a word, as if he always did it just in that way,
and went inside.
Bud followed him in silence, stepped across the black line to his own
side of the room and laid Lovin Child carefully down so as not to waken
him. He unbuttoned the coat he had wrapped around him, pulled off the
concealing red cap and stared down at the pale gold, silky hair and the
adorable curve of the soft cheek and the lips with the dimples tricked
in at the corners; the lashes lying like the delicate strokes of an
artist's pencil under the closed eyes. For at least five minutes he
stood without moving, his whole face softened into a boyish wistfulness.
By the stove Cash stood and stared from Bud to the sleeping baby,
his bushy eyebrows lifted, his gray eyes a study of incredulous
bewilderment.
Then Bud drew a long breath and seemed about to move away from the bank,
and Cash turned abruptly to the stove and lifted a rusty lid and peered
into the cold firebox, frowning as though he was expecting to see fire
and warmth where only a sprinkle of warm ashes remained. Stubbornness
held him mute and outwardly indifferent. He whittled shavings and
started a fire in the cook stove, filled the teakettle and set it on
to boil, got out the side of bacon and cut three slices, and never once
looked toward the bunk. Bud might have brought home a winged angel, or
a rainbow, or a casket of jewels, and Cash would not have permitted
himself to show any human interest.
But when Bud went teetering from the cabin on his toes to bring in
some pine cones they had saved for quick kindling, Cash craned his neck
toward the little bundle on the bunk. He saw a fat, warm little hand
stir with some baby dream. He listened and heard soft breathing that
stopped just short of being an infantile snore. He made an errand to his
own bunk and from there inspected the mystery at closer range. He saw
a nose and a little, knobby chin and a bit of pinkish forehead with the
pale yellow of hair above. He leaned and cocked his head to one side to
see more--but at that moment he heard Bud stamping off the snow from
his feet on the doorstep, and he took two long, noiseless strides to the
dish cupboard and was fumbling there with his back to the bunk when Bud
came tiptoeing in.
Bud started a fire in the fireplace and heaped the dry limbs high. Cash
fried his bacon, made his tea, and set the table for his midday meal.
Bud waited for the baby to wake, looking at his watch every minute or
two, and making frequent cautious trips to the bunk, peeking and peering
to see if the child was all right. It seemed unnatural that it should
sleep so long in the daytime. No telling what that squaw had done to it;
she might have doped it or something. He thought the kid's face looked
red, as if it had fever, and he reached down and touched anxiously the
hand that was uncovered. The hand was warm--too warm, in Bud's opinion.
It would be just his luck if the kid got sick, he'd have to pack it
clear in to Alpine in his arms. Fifteen miles of that did not appeal
to Bud, whose arms ached after the two-mile trip with that solid little
body lying at ease in the cradle they made.
His back to that end of the room, Cash sat stiff-necked and stubbornly
speechless, and ate and drank as though he were alone in the cabin.
Whenever Bud's mind left Lovin Child long enough to think about it, he
watched Cash furtively for some sign of yielding, some softening of that
grim grudge. It seemed to him as though Cash was not human, or he would
show some signs of life when a live baby was brought to camp and laid
down right under his nose.
Cash finished and began washing his dishes, keeping his back turned
toward Bud and Bud's new possession, and trying to make it appear that
he did so unconsciously. He did not fool Bud for a minute. Bud knew that
Cash was nearly bursting with curiosity, and he had occasional fleeting
impulses to provoke Cash to speech of some sort. Perhaps Cash knew
what was in Bud's mind. At any rate he left the cabin and went out and
chopped wood for an hour, furiously raining chips into the snow.
When he went in with his arms piled full of cut wood, Bud had the baby
sitting on one corner of the table, and was feeding it bread and
gravy as the nearest approach to baby food he could think of. During
occasional interludes in the steady procession of bits of bread from the
plate to the baby's mouth, Lovin Child would suck a bacon rind which
he held firmly grasped in a greasy little fist. Now and then Bud would
reach into his hip pocket, pull out his handkerchief as a make-shift
napkin, and would carefully wipe the border of gravy from the baby's
mouth, and stuff the handkerchief back into his pocket again.
Both seemed abominably happy and self-satisfied. Lovin Child kicked
his heels against the rough table frame and gurgled unintelligible
conversation whenever he was able to articulate sounds. Bud replied
with a rambling monologue that implied a perfect understanding of Lovin
Child's talk--and incidentally doled out information for Cash's benefit.
Cash cocked an eye at the two as he went by, threw the wood down on his
side of the hearth, and began to replenish the fire. If he heard, he
gave no sign of understanding or interest.
“I'll bet that old squaw musta half starved yah,” Bud addressed the baby
while he spooned gravy out of a white enamel bowl on to the second slice
of bread. “You're putting away grub like a nigger at a barbecue. I'll
tell the world I don't know what woulda happened if I hadn't run across
yuh and made her hand yuh over.”
“Ja--ja--ja--jah!” said Lovin Child, nodding his head and regarding Bud
with the twinkle in his eyes.
“And that's where you're dead right, Boy. I sure do wish you'd tell me
your name; but I reckon that's too much to ask of a little geezer like
you. Here. Help yourself, kid--you ain't in no Injun camp now. You're
with white folks now.”
Cash sat down on the bench he had made for himself, and stared into the
fire. His whole attitude spelled abstraction; nevertheless he missed no
little sound behind him.
He knew that Bud was talking largely for his benefit, and he knew
that here was the psychological time for breaking the spell of silence
between them. Yet he let the minutes slip past and would not yield.
The quarrel had been of Bud's making in the first place. Let Bud do the
yielding, make the first step toward amity.
But Bud had other things to occupy him just then. Having eaten all his
small stomach would hold, Lovin Child wanted to get down and explore.
Bud had other ideas, but they did not seem to count for much with Lovin
Child, who had an insistent way that was scarcely to be combated or
ignored.
“But listen here, Boy!” Bud protested, after he had for the third time
prevented Lovin Child from backing off the table. “I was going to take
off these dirty duds and wash some of the Injun smell off yuh. I'll tell
a waiting world you need a bath, and your clothes washed.”
“Ugh, ugh, ugh,” persisted Lovin Child, and pointed to the floor.
So Bud sighed and made a virtue of defeat. “Oh, well, they say it's bad
policy to take a bath right after yuh eat. We'll let it ride awhile, but
you sure have got to be scrubbed a plenty before you can crawl in with
me, old-timer,” he said, and set him down on the floor.
Lovin Child went immediately about the business that seemed most
important. He got down on his hands and knees and gravely inspected the
broad black line, hopefully testing it with tongue and with fingers to
see if it would yield him anything in the way of flavor or stickiness.
It did not. It had been there long enough to be thoroughly dry and
tasteless. He got up, planted both feet on it and teetered back and
forth, chuckling up at Bud with his eyes squinted.
He teetered so enthusiastically that he sat down unexpectedly and with
much emphasis. That put him between two impulses, and while they battled
he stared round-eyed at Bud. But he decided not to cry, and straightway
turned himself into a growly bear and went down the line on all fours
toward Cash, growling “Ooooooo!” as fearsomely as his baby throat was
capable of growling.
But Cash would not be scared. He refused absolutely to jump up and back
off in wild-eyed terror, crying out “Ooh! Here comes a bear!” the way
Marie had always done--the way every one had always done, when Lovin
Child got down and came at them growling. Cash sat rigid with his face
to the fire, and would not look.
Lovin Child crawled all around him and growled his terriblest. For some
unexplainable reason it did not work. Cash sat stiff as though he had
turned to some insensate metal. From where he sat watching--curious to
see what Cash would do--Bud saw him flinch and stiffen as a man does
under pain. And because Bud had a sore spot in his own heart, Bud felt a
quick stab of understanding and sympathy. Cash Markham's past could not
have been a blank; more likely it held too much of sorrow for the salve
of speech to lighten its hurt. There might have been a child....
“Aw, come back here!” Bud commanded Lovin Child gruffly.
But Lovin Child was too busy. He had discovered in his circling of Cash,
the fanny buckles on Cash's high overshoes. He was investigating them as
he had investigated the line, with fingers and with pink tongue, like
a puppy. From the lowest buckle he went on to the top one, where Cash's
khaki trousers were tucked inside with a deep fold on top. Lovin Child's
small forefinger went sliding up in the mysterious recesses of the fold
until they reached the flat surface of the knee. He looked up farther,
studying Cash's set face, sitting back on his little heels while he did
so. Cash tried to keep on staring into the fire, but in spite of himself
his eyes lowered to meet the upward look.
“Pik-k?” chirped Lovin Child, spreading his fingers over one eye and
twinkling up at Cash with the other.
Cash flinched again, wavered, swallowed twice, and got up so abruptly
that Lovin Child sat down again with a plunk. Cash muttered something in
his throat and rushed out into the wind and the slow-falling tiny white
flakes that presaged the storm.
Until the door slammed shut Lovin Child looked after him, scowling, his
eyes a blaze of resentment. He brought his palms together with a vicious
slap, leaned over, and bumped his forehead deliberately and painfully
upon the flat rock hearth, and set up a howl that could have been heard
for three city blocks.