When the dawn came full and bright over Clearwater, Bill and his party
were ready to start. When Harold had been thoroughly cowed and his full
instructions were given him, the thongs had been put about his ankles
and removed from his wrists, and he was permitted to do the packing.
That procedure was exceedingly simple; all available blankets were piled
on the sled and made into a bed for Virginia, and the ax, candles, and
such cooking utensils as were needed were packed in front. And then
they had a short but decisive interview with Harold.
"I won't go--I'll die first," he cried to Virginia. "Besides, you
don't dare to use force on me; you don't know the way and Bill can't
see. You know if you kill me you'll die yourself."
"Fair enough," Virginia replied sweetly. "But take this little word of
advice. Bill and I were all reconciled to dying when we thought of
you--and we don't mind it now if we're sure you are going along. Don't
get any false ideas about that point, Harold. We're not going to spare
you on any chance of saving ourselves. We are going to give you a
little more foot room, and fix up your hands a little, and then you are
going to pull the sled. When we camp at night you're going to cut the
wood. Don't think for a minute I'm going to be afraid to shoot if you
disobey one order--if you take one step against us. You are at our
mercy; we are not at yours. And Bill will tell you I can shoot
straight. Perhaps you learned that fact last night."
Yes, Harold had learned. He had learned it very well.
"If I think you're trying to cheat us--to lead us out of the way
toward your breed friends--you're going to have a chance to learn it
better," she went on, never a quaver in her voice. "I won't wait to
make sure--I'll shoot you through the neck as easy and as quick as I'd
shoot a grouse. I haven't forgotten what you did last night; I'm just
eager for a chance to pay you for it." Her voice grew more sober.
"This is a warning--the only one and the last one that you will get.
I'm going to watch you every minute and tie you up at night. And the
fact that we can't go on without you won't have a jot of influence if
you take a step against us. We may die ourselves, but you know that
you'll also die."
This was not the sheltered, incapable girl of society that addressed him
now. These words were those of the woodswoman; the eyes that gazed into
his were unwavering and hard. He knew that she was speaking true. The
courage for retaliation oozed out of him as mud oozes into a river.
They lengthened the thong that tied his ankles together, giving him room
for a full walking step but not enough to leap or run. They put on his
hands a pair of awkward mittens that had been stiffened by mud and
water, and lashed them to his wrists. Then they slipped the thong of
the sled across his shoulders and under his arms like loops of a kyack.
They were ready to go.
The forest was laden with the early-morning silence; the trees stood
draped in snow. It was cold, too,--the frost gathered quickly on the
mufflers that they wore about their lips. All too well they knew what
lay before them. Without food to keep their bodies nourished and warm,
they could scarcely hope to make the town; their one chance was that
somewhere on the trail they would encounter game. How long a chance it
was, this late in winter, they knew all too surely. But for all this
knowledge Bill and Virginia were cheerful.
"I haven't much hope," Bill told her when she was tucked into the bed on
the sled. "But it's the only chance we have."
She smiled at him. "At least, Bill, we'll have done everything we
could. Good-by, little cabin--where I found happiness. Sometime
perhaps we'll come back to you!"
The man bent and kissed her, and she gave the word for Harold to start.
Slowly they headed toward the river. The crust was perfect; Harold
could hardly feel the weight of the sled. Bill mushed behind, guided by
the gee-pole. The white-draped trees they had known so well spoke no
word of farewell.
Could they win through? Were they to know the hardship of the journey,
starvation and bitter cold, only to find death in some still, enchanted
glen of the forest that stretched in front? Was fate still jesting with
them, whispering hope only to shatter them with defeat? Were they to
know hunger and exhaustion, pain and travail, until finally their bodies
dropped down and yielded to the cold? They could not keep up long
without the inner fuel of food.
Their chance of finding game seemed hopelessly small, even at first.
Before they reached the frozen river it seemed beyond the possibilities
of miracle. Even the tracks of the little people--such ferocious
hunters as marten and ermine--were gone from the snow. There were no
tracks of caribou or moose; the grouse had seemingly buried in the
drifts. The only creatures that had not hidden away from the winter
cold were the wolves and the coyotes, furtive people that could not be
coaxed into the range of Virginia's pistol. For all her outward
optimism her heart grew heavy with despair.
They crossed the river, coming out where the old moose trail had gone
down the ford. Here they had seen the last of Kenly Lounsbury and
Vosper, almost forgotten now. Virginia told Harold to stop an instant
as she recalled those vents of months before.
"So much has happened since then," she said, "If only they had
left----"
Her words died away in the middle of the sentence, and for a moment she
sat gazing with wide and startled eyes. For all that sight was just
beginning to return to him, Bill was strangely and unexplainably
startled, too, probably sensing the suspense indicated in the girl's
tones. Harold turned, staring.
He could not see what Virginia saw, at first. She pointed, unable to
speak. In a little thicket of young spruce there was a curiously shaped
heap of snow, capped by a done of snow that extended under the
sheltering branches of a young tree. Instantly Harold understood. Some
long bundle had been left there before the snow came; when it had been
thrown down its end had caught in the branches of a young tree where
only a small amount of snow could reach it. "See what it is," Virginia
ordered.
The man drew the sled nearer and with desperate energy began to knock
away the snow. His first discovery was a linen tent,--one that would
have been familiar indeed to Bill. But digging further he found a heavy
bundle, tied with a rope and rattling curiously in his arms.
At Virginia's directions he laid it in the snow and pulled the sled up
where she could open it. Bill stood beside her, not daring to guess the
truth.
"Oh, my darling!" she cried at last, drawing his head down to hers. She
couldn't say more. She could only laugh and sob, alternately, as might
one whose dearest prayers had been granted.
The bundle was full of food,--dried meat and canned goods and a small
sack of flour. They were some of the supplies that to save himself the
work of caring for, the faithless Vosper had discarded when, with Kenly,
he had turned back from the river.
* * * * *
At the end of three bitter days, Bill Bronson stood once more on the
hill that looked down upon the old mining camp. The twilight was
growing in the glen beneath; already it had cast shadows in Virginia's
eyes. She sat beside him on the sled.
It had been cruel hardship, the three days' journey, but they had made
it without mishap. At night they had built great fires at the mouth of
their tent, but they had not escaped the curse of the cold. The days
had been arduous and long. But they had conquered; even now they were
emerging from the dark fringe of the spruce.
Virginia was on the rapid road toward recovery from her wound. It had
not been severe; while she was lying still on the sled it had had every
chance to heal. A few stitches by the doctor in Bradleyburg, a thorough
cleansing and bandaging, and a few more days in bed would avert all
serious consequences. Bill's sight had grown steadily better as the
days had passed; already the Spirits of Mercy had permitted him, at
close range, to behold Virginia's face.
A half-mile back, just before they approached the first fringe of the
spruce forest, they had met a trapper just starting out on his line; and
he had gladly consented to take Harold the rest of the way into town.
It is one of the duties of citizenship in the North, where the
population is so scant and the officers so few, to take an active part
in law enforcement,--and this trapper was glad of the opportunity to
assist them in the care of the prisoner. He was to be lodged in prison
at the little mining camp to face a charge of attempted murder,--a
crime that in the northwest provinces is never regarded lightly.
"And you weren't drowned!" the trapper marveled, when he had got his
breath. "We've been mournin' you for dead--for months."
"Drowned--not a bit of it," Virginia answered gayly. "And don't mourn
any more."
The trapper said he wouldn't and hastened off with his prisoner,
delighted indeed to be the first to pass the good word of their
deliverance through Bradleyburg. Bill was well known and liked through
all that portion of the North, and his supposed death had been a real
blow to the townspeople.
Bill felt wholly able to follow the broad snowshoe track the half-mile
farther into town. The footsteps of the men had grown faint and died
away,--and Virginia and he were left together on the hill.
They had nothing to say at first. They simply watched the slow
encroachment of the twilight. Lights sprang up one and one over the
town. Bill bent, and the girl raised her lips to his.
"We might as well go on," he said. "You're cold--and tired."
"Yes. I can't believe--I'm saying good-by to the spruce."
"And you're not, Virginia!" The man's voice was vibrant and joyful.
"We'll have to come back often, to oversee the running of the
mine--half of every year at least--and we can stay at the old cabin
just the same. The woods are beautiful in summer."
"They're beautiful now."
And they were. She told the truth. For all their savagery, their
fearful strength, their beauty could not be denied.
They saw the church spire, tall and ghostly in the twilight, and Bill's
strong arms pressed the girl close. She understood and smiled happily.
"Of course, Bill," she told him. "There is no need to wait. In a few
days I'll be strong enough to stand beside you--at the altar."
So it was decided. They would be married in the quaint, old town of
Bradleyburg, in the shadow of the spruce.
They would return, these two. The North had claimed them--but had not
mastered them--and they would come back to see again the caribou
feeding in the forest, the whirling snows, and the spruce trees lifting
their tall heads to the winter stars. They would know the old
exultation, the joy of conflict; but no blustering storm or wilderness
voice could appall them now. In the security and harbor of their love,
no wind was keen enough to chill them, no darkness appall their spirits.
The Northern Lights were beginning their mysterious display in the
twilight sky. Far away a coyote howled disconsolately,--a cry that
was the voice of the North itself. And the two kissed once more and
pushed on down to Bradleyburg.