In the city of Winnipeg on a brilliant day toward the end of winter, a
broad-shouldered, ruddy youth, with dancing blue eyes and a capacious
smile, came running down a side street, and catching a certain
fence-post at full speed, swung himself inside the gate with the
dexterity of old practice; sprang up the steps and banged on the door.
It was opened questioningly by a little mouse of a woman, with great
brown eyes, and gray strands mixing in her bright, brown hair.
The boy flung his arms around her like a bear. "Mother!" he cried
breathlessly.
"Charley! My boy!" she gasped.
He picked her up bodily; and, kicking the door shut, carried her into
the cheerful sitting room, where geraniums bloomed on the sunny
window-sill, and a fire danced in the grate.
"I'm bigger than you are now!" he chuckled joyously. He put her in her
chair; and waltzed about the room, touching the well-remembered objects.
"By Jolly! the very same pictures, the good old sofa!" he sang. "Oh,
it's good to be home!"
The mother held out her arms. "My boy! My boy!" was all she could say.
Dropping to his knees, he embraced her again. "You dear old lady," he
cried. "What a trouble I always was! It's your turn to have a good time
now!"
"It's enough to have you back," she murmured.
He gyrated about the room again. "Say, I feel as giddy as a puppy after
a bath! Imagine trolley-cars and baby-carriages and show windows and
silver knives and forks after two years in the North. Say, I've clean
forgot how to eat stylish!"
"How long are you going to stay?" she murmured.
He came to a stand beside her. "I'm not going back," he said in a deeper
tone. "It's a bully country and I had a whale of a time--but I belong
here! I'm going to take care of you now, and bring up the kids. I'm a
man now,"--his face changed comically--"Don't laugh!" he begged. "I used
to say that all the time; but it's different now; you'll see! I've had
experience!"
She held out her arms to him again. "Tell me, my son," she whispered.
He dropped to the floor beside her; and laid his head against her knee.
There, in front of the fire, while the sun went down, and the early
winter twilight gathered, he told her the story.
"When Garth rode away leaving me and Rina in the poplar bluff," he
said--reaching that part in due course--"I didn't know much what was
happening. But say, that Rina, she's an out-o'-sight nurse! She brought
me around in great shape; and the second day afterward I was as peart as
you please. That same day the fellows from the Crossing turned up; Jim
Plaskett, the policeman, and three others. It was Jim made them come,
soon as he heard the story. Jim's a peacherino! One of these lean, quiet
chaps you can depend on; decent, too, clean-mouthed--Oh! Jim's looked up
to, I can tell you!
"They wanted me to rest a while yet, till they came back. But they had
plenty of spare horses, and Rina and I wouldn't stand for being left
behind. We rode like sixty all next day, and camped only fifteen miles
from Death River. We found the bones of Garth's horse on the way--picked
clean; and the note he left every place he camped. You ought to have
heard Jim Plaskett crack up Garth's pluck--and Jim knows!
"We reached the canyon about half-past six in the morning. I'd heard of
that place from the Indians. Say, it was a fearsome spot! a kind of
crooked, gaping split in the prairie like the pictures in Dante's
Inferno. The walls were as bare and hard and cold as black ice; and way
down in the bottom there was a horrible jelly-like water swirling around
without making any noise. Seems if you couldn't breathe good when you
got into the place! Minded me of the receiving vault in the cemetery.
"There was a risky little path going down, and we kept right on. Across
the river, there was a break in the wall where a creek came down a
steep, wild-looking ravine. At the bottom of it we could see a tepee and
a tent; but no people. Some said they saw a body in the ravine, but you
couldn't rightly make out."
Charley paused and shuddered. "Say, it was horrible!" he whispered.
"Glad I don't have dreams! When we got down near the water suddenly we
saw old Mary Co-que-wasa come climbing over a heap of stones that was
piled on the flat; and she was bent almost double, half lifting, half
dragging a man by a rope under his arms. It was Nick Grylls. He looked
dead.
"We shouted at her; and she looked up just once. I saw her face plain.
It wasn't surprised or glad or anything--just stupid like a breed. She
never stopped walking. She stepped right off the flat rock into the deep
water with the man on her back; and they went out of sight; and some
bubbles came up."
He stopped, staring into the fire. His mother caught him to her breast.
"Oh, my son! what sights were these!" she murmured.
"Mary was a deep one!" Charley said slowly. "You couldn't tell about
her! I never heard her open her mouth!
"We hustled down to the edge of the water," he resumed presently. "Jim
Plaskett threw off his coat; and went in after them. But it was no use;
the current carried them down; and it was too cold to stay in more than
a minute or two. We never saw them again.
"Jim landed on the other side; and brought us back the raft that was
there; and we all crossed. There was nobody in the tents--blankets in a
heap, as if they'd sprung out of bed suddenly. We started to climb the
ravine. It _was_ a body lying there on the rocks; it was Mabyn. Rina was
halfway to it, before any of us saw. He wasn't dead; but had a bullet
through both legs.
"Say that place was full of horrors! It stunk of gunpowder; and there
was little thin layers of smoke hanging quiet between the walls. I was
near out of my head, thinking what had become of them. We shouted all
the time; and by and by we got a faint kind of an answer back. By Jolly!
I went up those rocks like a cat! I found them behind a whopping big
rock. Garth was stretched out all bloody and she was trying to get his
coat off; and she couldn't. She looked up at me with a face like chalk;
and when she saw who it was, she just gave a little cry like a baby, and
keeled over. Oh, it was pitiful! I carried her down to the river. I
wouldn't let anybody else touch her.
"Well, to make a long story short, we decided to raft it down the river
to Fort Ochre, instead of trying to win overland to the Crossing. Garth
had a ball through his shoulder and a gashed hand; and Mabyn was pretty
low. It was longer that way, but we could carry them comfortable.
"We built another raft and started next morning. Jim Plaskett, Mabyn and
Rina went on the first; and Sandy Arkess, Garth, Natalie and I followed
on the other. The other two fellows were to drive all the horses back
over the prairie. Say, that was quite a journey! Garth was getting
better; and we all felt pretty good, sitting round and swapping yarns,
and looking at the scenery, while the current carried us down. When we
got out of the gorge, coming down so quietly as we were, we saw any
amount of game. Got a moose right on the bank! Gee! that was good meat!
And at night, say it was out o' sight! sitting there talking about going
home, and watching the trees march past, and a bang-up show of Northern
lights up above! It was pretty cold.
"There was the Dickens of a pow-pow at the Fort, when we got there at
last! It's great sport being a hero! The Bishop and his party were
there, just ready to start for home, and you never saw such a surprised
man, when he saw Garth coming in from the other direction. And the old
woman--I mean Mrs. Bishop--took to Natalie like her long-lost mother.
"Their party was obliged to start at once for fear of the river's
closing on them; and Garth insisted on sending Natalie out with the old
lady. She kicked like anything at leaving him there wounded; and I
braced him, too, to let her stay; but he told me it was for the sake of
her good name. I didn't quite see that--why any one who _knew_
Natalie!--but I suppose he knew best.
"Garth and I stayed at Fort Ochre. The Inspector came down the river;
and there was an official investigation. I was right in the thick of it.
Gee! but it was sport! Colonel Whinyates is a great little chap--cheeks
as red as church cushions, and eyes that pop like gooseberries! It was
great to hear him bawl at the witnesses. But he's all right. Him and I
were good friends!
"Garth told his story and I told mine, and Rina and Plaskett. And
Natalie had left what they call a disposition behind her. Everything was
all straight, but Garth clinched the matter by calling Mabyn to testify.
He was carried in on a stretcher. And blamed if he didn't tell the
truth! He'd had a close call, you see, and had what Garth called a
change of heart. It was Rina did it; day and night she never left him!
"The investigation ended in a love feast--that's what Garth called it.
Old Colonel shook hands with Garth and me, and said we were heroes, by
Gad! He's a bird. Garth wouldn't prosecute Mabyn; and he was let out
from under arrest.
"The winter had set in by that time; and Garth and I couldn't get out
till the ice formed. It was pretty slow up there, you bet! and, as Garth
said, our hearts were outside. We talked about Natalie all the time.
Mabyn got well, and he and Rina set off for their place with a
dog-train. Garth gave them a bang-up outfit! Mabyn was a decent head,
after he got well; and Rina certainly was happy about it. I forgot to
tell you that Mabyn's mother had died in the fall; and there was no need
for him to go out.
"The first mail got through in January, and we heard from Natalie at last.
Bully news! Garth had sent her another one of those dispositions--Mabyn
swore to it--in the November mail; and it seems that was all she needed in
order to have the courts annul the old marriage they had gone through
together. Natalie has been a free woman since Christmas!
"We came out with the mail man next day, you bet! That was six weeks ago,
and here we are! Garth is waiting for me down at the station. I wanted
him to come up; but he said he guessed you would want me to yourself
for a while. Gee! I must be hustling! Train goes at six-thirty!"
"But where are you going?" she asked in dismay.
Charley kissed her. "East to Millerton, to the wedding, of course! Back
in two weeks! Oh, what larks! What do you think! I'm going to be best
man. Garth is getting me a silk tile and a frock coat! Oh, Crikey!
Good-bye!"
The door slammed.