the eastward ridge, and its yellow light poured into the room, casting
dim shadows over the white walls, and bringing up before me row on row
of spectre desks. The chair I sat in, the table on which I leaned were
real enough. They were part of my to-day, but that dim-lighted room
was the school-house of my boyhood. The fourth of those spectre desks
measuring back from the stove, was where Tim and I sat day after day
together, with heads bowed over open books and eyes aslant. That was
not the same Tim who had passed me a while before, swaggering and
singing in the joy of his conquest; that was not the same Tim who had
stood before me that very afternoon in all the pomp of well-cut
clothes, drawing on his whitened hands a pair of woman's gloves; that
was not the same Tim who by his artful lies had won what had been
denied my stupid, blundering devotion. My Tim was a sturdy little
fellow whose booted legs scarce touched the floor, whose tousled black
head hardly showed above the desk-top. His cheeks would turn crimson
at the thought of woman's gloves on those brown hands. His tongue
would cleave to his mouth in a woman's presence, let alone his lying to
her. That was the real Tim--the rare Tim. To my eyes he was but a
small boy; to my mind he was a mighty man. The first reader that
presented such knotty problems to his intellectual side was but part of
the impedimenta of his youth, and was no fair measure of his real size.
That very day he had fought with me and for me; not because I was in
the right, but because I was his brother.
A lean, cadaverous boy from along the mountain, a born enemy of the
lads of the village, had dared me. I endured his insults until the
time came when further forbearance would have been a disgrace, and then
I closed with him. In the front of the little circle drawn about us,
right outside there in the school-yard, Tim stood. As we pitched to
and fro, the cadaverous boy and I, Tim's shrill cry came to me, and
time and again I caught sight of his white face and small clinched
hands waving wildly. I believe I should have whipped the cadaverous
boy. I had suffered his foul kicks and borne him to the ground; in a
second I should have planted him fairly on his back, but his brother,
like him a lank, wiry lad and singly more than my match, ran at me. My
head swam beneath his blows, and I released my almost vanquished enemy
to face the new foe with upraised fists. Then Tim came. A black head
shot between me and my towering assailant. It caught him full in the
middle; he doubled like a staple and with a cry of pain toppled into
the snow. This gave me a brief respite to compel my fallen enemy to
capitulate, and when I turned from him, his brother was still
staggering about in drunken fashion, gasping and crying, "Foul!" Tim
did not know what he meant, but was standing alert, with head lowered,
ready to charge again at the first sign of renewed attack. He knew
neither "fight foul" nor "fight fair"; he knew only a brother in
trouble, and he had come to him in his best might.
That was the real Tim!
"I guess me and you can whip most anybody, Mark," he said, as he looked
up at me from his silly spelling-book that day.
"As long as we stick together, Tim," I whispered in return.
He laughed. Of course we would always stand together.
That was long ago. Life is an everlasting waking up. We leave behind
us an endless trail of dreams. The real life is but a waking moment.
After all, it was the real Tim who had gone singing by as I crouched in
the shadow of the school-house. The comrade of my school-days, who had
fought for me with eyes closed and with the fury of a child, the
companion of the hunt, racing with me over the ridges with Captain
singing on before us, the brother at the fireside at night, poring over
some rare novel--he was only a phantom. Between me and the real man
there was no bond. He had grown above the valley; I was becoming more
and more a part of it, like the lone pine on Gander Knob, or the
piebald horse that drew the stage. His clothes alone had made wider
the breach between us. At first I had admired him. I was proud of my
brother. But Solomon in all his glory was dressed in his best; from
Dives to Lazarus is largely a matter of garments. Tim had made himself
just a bit better than I, when he donned his well-fitting suit and
pulled on his silly gloves. Beside him I was a coarse fellow, and to
me he was not the old Tim.
This fine man had come back to the valley to take from me all that made
life good. He had struck me over the heart and stunned me and then
gone singing by. In Mary's eyes he was the better man of the two. To
my eyes he was, and I hated him for it. He could go his way and I
should go mine, for we must stand alone. In the morning he would go
away and leave me with the Tim I loved, with the boy who sat with me at
yonder desk, who raced with me over the ridges, who read with me at the
fireside.
The shadows deepened in the school-room, for a curtain of clouds was
sweeping across the moon. Peering through the window, over the flats,
I saw a light gleaming steadily at the head of the village street. It
was my light burning in the window, and I knew that Tim was there,
waiting for me. All the past rose up to tell me that he was still the
comrade of my school-days, my companion of the hunt, my brother of the
fireside.
My head sank to the table and my hands clasped my eyes to shut out the
blackness. But the blackness came again.
XVII
Tip Pulsifer leaned on my gate. Crowning the post at his side was his
travelling bandanna, into which he had securely clasped by one great
knot all his portable possessions. It was very early in the morning,
in that half-dark and half-dawn time, when the muffled crowing begins
to sound from the village barns and the dogs crawl forth from their
barrels and survey the deserted street and yawn. Tip was not usually
abroad so early, but in his travelling bandanna and solemn face, as he
leaned on his elbows and smoked and smoked, I saw his reason for
getting out with the sun. He was taking flight. The annual Pulsifer
tragedy had occurred; the head of the house had tied together his few
goods, and, vowing never to trouble his wife again, had set his face
toward the mountain. But on my part I had every reason to believe that
Tip would show surprise when I hobbled forth from the misty gloom.
[Illustration: Tip Pulsifer leaned on my gate.]
Just a few minutes before I had awakened. I had lifted my head from my
desk, half-dazed, and gazed around the school-room. I had rubbed my
eyes to drive away the veils that hid my scholars from me. I had
pounded the floor with a crutch and cried: "It's books." The silence
answered me. I had not been napping in school, nor was I dreaming.
The long, miserable night flashed back to me, and I stamped into the
misty morning. Weary and dishevelled, I was crawling home, purposeless
as ever, now vowing I would break with my brother, now quickening my
steps that I might sooner wish him all the joy a brother should. A few
dogs greeted me and then Tip, calmly smoking as though it were my usual
time to be about of a morning.
"You are going over the mountain, Tip?" said I.
"Yes," he answered, throwing open the gate. "This is the last Six
Stars will see of me. I'm done. The missus was a-yammerin' and
a-yammerin' all day yesterday. If it wasn't this, it was that she was
yammerin' about. Says I, 'I'm done. I'm sorry,' says I, 'but I'm
done.' At the first peek of day I starts over the mountain. This is
as fur as I've got. You've kep' me waitin'."
"Me--I've kept you waiting?" I cried. "Do you think I'm going over the
mountain, too?"
"No," said Tip, with a grim chuckle. "You ain't married. You've
nothin' to run from, 'less you've been yammerin' at yourself; then the
mountain won't do you no good. I didn't figure on your company, but
Tim kep' me."
"Is Tim out at this hour?" I asked.
"At this hour?" Tip retorted. "You'll have to get up earlier to catch
him. He's gone--up and gone--he is."
I sat down very abruptly on the door-step. "Tim gone?" I said.
"Gone--and he told me to wait and say good-by to you--to tell you he'd
set late last night for you, till he fell asleep. He was sleepin' when
I come, Mark. I peeped in the window and there he was, in that chair
of yours, fast asleep. I rapped on the window and he woke up with a
jump. He was off on the early train, he said, and had just time to
cover the twelve mile with that three-legged livery horse that brought
him out. He was awful put out at not findin' you. He thought you was
in bed, but you wasn't, and I told him mebbe you'd gone up to the
Warden's to lend a hand with Weston."
For the first time Tip eyed me inquisitively.
"I was up the road," I said evasively. "But tell me about Tim--did he
leave no word?"
"He left me," said Tip, grinning. "He hadn't time to leave nothin'
else. We figgered he'd just cover that twelve mile and make the train.
That's why I'm here. As we was hitchin' he told me particular to wait
till you come; to tell you good-by; to tell you he'd watched all
night--waited and waited till he fell asleep."
"And overslept in the morning so he had no time to drop me even a
line--I understand," said I. "And now, Tip, having performed your
duty, you are going over the mountain?"
"To Happy Walley," Tip cried, lifting the stick he always carried in
these nights and pointing away toward Thunder Knob. "I'm done with
Black Log. I'm goin' where there is peace and quiet."
"You lead the life of a hermit?" I suggested.
"A what?" Tip exclaimed.
"You live in a cave in the woods and eat roots and nuts and meditate,"
I explained.
"You think I'm a squirrel," snapped the fugitive. "No, sir, I live
with my cousin John Shadrack's widder."
"Ah!" I cried. "It's plain now, Tip, you deceiver. So there's the
attraction."
"The attraction?" Tip's brow was furrowed.
"Mrs. John Shadrack," I said.
The fugitive broke into a loud guffaw. He leaned over the gate and let
his pipe fall on the other side and beat the post violently with his
hands.
"I allow you've never seen John Shadrack's widder," said he.
"I'd like to, Tip. Will you take me with you to Happy Valley?"
The smile left Tip's face, and he gazed at me, open-mouthed with
astonishment.
"You would go over the mountain?" he said, drawling every word.
Over the mountain there is peace! It is cold and gray there in the
early morning, and the hills are bleak and black, but I remember days
when from this same spot I've watched the deep, soft blue and green;
I've sat here as the hills were glowing in the changing evening lights
and our valley grew dark and cold. What a fair country that must be
where the sun sets! And we stay here in our dim light, in our dull
monotones, when, to the westward, there's a land all capped with clouds
of red and gold. There is Tip's Valley of Peace. John Shadrack's
widow may not be a celestial being, but that is my sunset country. In
journeying to it, I shall leave myself behind; in the joy of the road,
in the changing landscape and skyscape, in the swing of the buggy and
the rattle of the wheels, I shall forget myself and Mary and Tim for a
time, and when I come back it will be with wound unhealed, but the
throbbing pain will have passed, and I can face them with eyes clear
and speech unfaltering.
"I'll go with you to Happy Valley, Tip," I said, rising and turning to
the door. "You hitch the gray colt in the buggy and----"
"We are goin' to ride," cried Tip. He had always made his flights
afoot before that, and the prospect of an easy journey caused him to
smile.
"Do you think I'll walk?" I growled. "Get the gray colt and I'll give
you a lift over the mountain, but I'll bring you back on Monday, too."
Tip shook his head sullenly at this threat. "While you hitch, I'll
drop a line to Perry Thomas to take the school. Now hurry."
Tip shuffled away to the barn, and I went into the house, and, after
making a hasty breakfast and getting together a few clothes, sat down
at the table, where Tim had rested his drowsy head all night. I wrote
two notes. One was to Perry and was very brief. The other was brief,
but it was to Mary. When I took up the pen it was to tell her all I
knew and felt. When at last I sealed the envelope it was on a single
sheet of paper, bearing a few formal words, while the scuttle by the
fireplace held all my fine sentiments in the torn slips of paper I had
tossed there. I told Mary that I knew that she did not care for me and
had found herself out. If it was her wish, we would begin again where
we were that night when I saw her first, and I would guide myself into
the future all alone, half happy anyway in the knowledge that it was
best for her and best for Tim. Was I wrong, a single word would bring
me back. I was to be away for three days, and when I returned I should
look by the door-sill for her answer. If none was there, it was all I
had a right to expect. If one was there--I quit writing then--it
seemed so hopeless.
* * * * * *
Tip and I crossed Thunder Knob at noon. As we turned the crest of the
hill and began the descent into the wooded gut, my companion looked
back and waved his hand.
"Good-by to Black Log," he cried. "It's the last I'll ever see of you."
He turned to me and tried to smile, but a deep-set frown took
possession of his face, and he hung his head in silence, watching the
wheels as we jolted on and on.
We wound down the steep way into the gut, following a road that at
times seemed to disappear altogether, and leave us to break our way
through the underbrush. Then it reappeared in a broken corduroy that
bridged a bog for a mile, and lifted itself plainly into view again
with a stony back where we began to climb the second mountain. The sun
was ahead of us when we reached the crest of that long hill. Behind
us, Thunder Knob lifted its rocky head, hiding from us the valley of
our troubles. Before us, miles away, all capped with clouds of gold
and red was the sunset country, but still beyond the mountains. The
gray colt halted to catch his breath, and with the whip I pointed to
the west, glowing with the warm evening fires.
"Yonder's Happy Valley, Tip," I said, "miles away still. It will take
us another day to reach it."
"It will take you forever to reach it," was the half-growled retort.
"I ain't chasin' sunsets. Here's Happy Walley--my Happy Walley, right
below us, and the smoke you see curlin' up th'oo the trees is from the
John Shadrack clearin'."
A great wall, hardly a mile away, as the crow flies, the third mountain
rose, bare and forbidding. Below us, a narrow strip of evergreen wound
away to the south as far as our eyes could reach, and at wide intervals
thin columns of smoke sifting through the trees marked the abodes of
the dwellers of Tip's Elysium. Peace must be there, if peace dwells in
a land where all that breaks the stillness seems the drifting of the
smoke through the pine boughs. The mountain's shadow was over it and
deepening fast, warning us to hurry before the road was lost in
blackness. But away off there in the west, where a half score of peaks
lifted their summits above the nearer ranges, all purple and gold and
red, a heap of cloud coals glowed warm and beautiful over the sunset
land. My heart yearned for that land, but I had to turn from the
contemplation of its distant joys to the cold, gloomy reality below me.
The whip fell sharply across the gray colt's back, and he jumped ahead.
Down the steep slope, over rocks and ruts we clattered, the buggy
swinging to and fro, and Tip holding fast with both hands, muttering
warnings. The gray colt broke into a run. All my strength failed to
check him. Faster and faster we went, and now Tip was swearing. I
prayed for a level stretch or a bit of a hill, for the wagon had run
away too, and where the wagon and the horse join in a mad flight there
must come a sudden ending to their career. The mountain-road offered
me no hope. Steeper and steeper it was as we dashed on. Tip became
very quiet. Once I glanced from the fleeing horse to him, and I saw
that his face was white and set.
"Get out, Tip," I cried. "Jump back, over the seat."
"Not me," said he, grimly. "We come to Happy Walley together, me and
you, and together we'll finish the trip."
He lent a hand on the reins, but it was useless, for the wagon and the
horse were running away together, and there was nothing to do but to
try to guide them.
"Pull closer to the bank at the bend ahead," Tip cried.
Almost before the warning passed his lips we had shot around the
projecting rock, where the road had been cut from the mountain-side.
We were near our journey's end then, for at the foot of the embankment
that sheered down at our left we heard the swish of a mountain-stream.
The horse went down. There was a cry from Tip--a sound of splintering
wood--something seemed to strike me a brutal blow. Then I lay back,
careless, fearless, and was rocked to sleep.
[Illustration: The horse went down.]
XVIII
She sat smoking.
Had I never heard of her before, had I opened my eyes as I did that day
to see her sitting before me, I should have exclaimed, "It's John
Shadrack's widder!"
So, with the crayon portrait, gilt-framed, that hung on the wall behind
her, I should have cried, "And that is John Shadrack!"
This crayon "enlargement" presented John with very black skin and
spotless white hair. His head was tilted back in a manner that made
the great bushy beard seem to stick right out from the frame, and gave
the impression that the old man was choking down a fit of uproarious
laughter. I knew, of course, that he had been posed that way to better
show his collar and cravat. Though Tip had described him to me as a
rather gloomy, taciturn person, the impression gained in the long
contemplation of his picture as I lay helpless on the bed never
changed. To me he was the ideal citizen of Happy Valley, and the
acquaintance I formed then and there with his wife served only to
endear him to me.
She sat smoking. I contemplated her a very long while and she gazed
calmly back. A score of times I tried to speak, but something failed
me, and when I attempted to wave my hand in greeting to her I could not
lift it from the bed.
At last strength came.
"This is John Shadrack's house?" I said.
"Yes," said she, "and I'm his widder."
[Illustration: "And I'm his widder."]
She came to my side and stood looking down at me very hard. I saw a
woman in the indefinable seasons past fifty. In my vague mental
condition, the impression of her came slowly. First it was as though I
saw three cubes, one above the other, the largest in the middle. Then
these took on clothing, blue calico with large polka dots, and the
topmost one crowned itself with thin wisps of hair, parted in the
middle and plastered down at the side. So, little by little, John
Shadrack's widow grew on me, till I saw her a square little old woman,
with a wrinkled, brown face, a perpetual smile and a pipe that snuffled
in a homely, comfortable way.
I smiled. You couldn't help smiling when Mrs. John Shadrack looked
down at you.
"It's been such a treat to have you," she cried. "I've been enjoyin'
every minute of your visit."
This was puzzling. How long Mrs. John Shadrack had been entertaining
me, or I had been entertaining her, I had not the remotest idea. A
very long while ago I had seen a spire of smoke curling through the
trees in Happy Valley, and I had been told that it was from her hearth.
Then we had gone plunging madly down the hill to it, Tip, the gray colt
and I. We had turned a sharp bend, we had heard the swish of a
mountain-stream. There my memory failed me. I had awakened to find
myself helpless on a bed, strangely hard, but, oh, so restful! Then
she had appeared, sitting there smoking.
"You are the first stranger as has been here since the tax collector
last month," she said, beginning to clear away the mystery. "I love
strangers."
"How long have I been here?" I asked.
"Since last Wednesday," she answered.
"And this is what?"
"The next Saturday. I've had you three days. You was a bit wrong here
sometimes." She tapped her head solemnly. "But I powwowed."
"You powwowed me," I cried with all the spirit I could muster, for such
treatment was not to my liking. I never had any faith in charms.
"Of course," she replied. "Does you think I'd let you die? Why, when
me and Tip pulled you out of the creek you was a sight, you was, and
you was wrong here." Again she tapped her head. "You needn't
complain. Ain't you gittin' well agin? Didn't the powwow do it?"
Hardly, I thought. I must have recovered in spite of it. But the old
woman spoke with pride of her skill, and if she had not saved me by her
occult powers, she had at least helped to drag me from the creek. For
that I was grateful, so I smiled to show my thanks.
"What did you powwow for?" I asked, after a long while.
She had seated herself on the edge of the bed and was contemplating me
gravely.
"Everything," she answered. "I never had a case like yours. I never
had a patient who was run away with, and kicked on the head, and
drownded. So I says to Tip, I says, 'I'll do everything. I'll treat
for asthmy, erysipelas and pneumony, rheumatism and snake-bite, for the
yallers and----'"
"Hold on," I pleaded. "I haven't had all that."
"You mought have had any one of 'em," she said firmly. "You should 'a'
seen yourself when we found you down there in the creek. Can't you
feel that bandage?" She lifted my hand to my head gently. I seemed to
have a great turban crowning me. "That's where you was kicked," she
went on. "You otter 'a' seen that spot. I used my Modern Miracle
Salve there. It's worked wonderful, it has. I was sorry you had no
bones broken so I could 'a' tried it for them, too."
"I'm satisfied with what I have," said I quietly. "It was pretty lucky
I got off as well as I did after a runaway, and the creek and the
kick." Then, to myself, I added, "And the powwowing and the salve."
I tried to lift my head, but could not. At first I thought it was the
turban, but a sharp pain told me that there was a spot there that might
be well worth seeing. For a long time I lay with my eyes closed,
trying not to care, and when I opened them again, John Shadrack's widow
was still on the edge of the bed, smoking.
"Feel better now?" she asked calmly.
"Yes," I answered. "The ache has gone some."
"I was powwowin' agin!" she said. "Couldn't you hear me saying Dutch
words? Them was the charm."
"I guess I was sleeping," I returned a bit irritably.
How the store would have smiled could it have seen me there on the bed,
in that bare little room in John Shadrack's widow's clutches! Many a
night, around the stove, Isaac Bolum, and Henry Holmes and I had had it
tooth and nail over the power of the powwow. In the store there was
not always an outspoken belief in the efficacy of the charm, but there
was an undercurrent of sentiment in favor of the supernatural. Against
this I had fought. Perhaps it was merely for the joy of the argument
that so often I had turned a fire of ridicule on the dearest traditions
of the valley. Time and again, when some credulous one had lifted his
voice in honest support of a silly superstition, I had jeered him into
a grumbled, shamefaced disavowal. Once I sat in the graveyard at
midnight, in the full of the moon, just to convince Ira Spoonholler
that his grandfather was keeping close to his proper plot. And here I
was, prone and helpless, being powwowed not for one ailment, but for
all the diseases known in Happy Valley. How I blessed Tip! When we
started he should have told me of the powers of our hostess. I would
rather have undergone a hundred runaways than one week with that old
woman muttering her Dutch over my senseless form. But I liked the good
soul. Her intentions were so excellent. She was so cheery. Even now
she was offering me a piece of gingerbread.
I ate it ravenously.
Then I asked, "Where is Tip?"
"He's gone down the walley to my brother-in-law, Harmon Shadrack's.
He's tryin' to borry a me-yule."
"A what?"
"A me-yule. The colt was dead beside you in the creek. Him and me
fixed up the buggy agin, and he's gone to borry Harmon's me-yule so as
you uns can git back to Black Log."
"Tip's left Black Log forever," I said firmly.
Then John Shadrack's widow laughed. She laughed so hard that she blew
the ashes out of her pipe, and they showered down over my face, and
made me wink and sputter.
"There--there," she said solicitously, dusting them away with her hand.
"But it tickled me so to hear you say Tip wasn't goin' back. Why, he's
been most crazy since you come. He's afraid his wife'll marry agin
before he gits home. I've been tellin' him how nice it was to have you
both, and that jest makes him roar. He's never been away so long
before."
"He thinks maybe Nanny will give him up this time?"
"Exact."
The old woman smoked in silence a long while. Then she said suddenly,
"She must be a lovely woman."
"Who?" I asked.
"Tip's wife."
"Who told you?" I demanded.
"Tip."