CHAPTER

I. The Teacher and the Freak of the Strange Thoroughbred

II. The Leaning Tower

III. The Camp at the Headwaters

IV. "Ther Biggest Coward in ther Woods"

V. Stratton's Way

VI. Mose

VII. The Instrument of Tyee Sahgalee

VIII. "I'm Going to Make Him White"

IX. Uncle Silas

X. Lem and the *Phantom*

XI. The House-Raising

XII. A Face in the Night

XIII. The Pressure of the Thumb-Screw

XIV. The Salmon-trollers

XV. The Man in the Tide-rip

XVI. The Fiery Lane

XVII. The Man Who Bungled

XVIII. Water-logged

XIX. "Andromeda Has Found a Perseus"

XX. The Grand Coup

XXI. Hide and Seek

XXII. For Little Silas

XXIII. "As Long as We Two Live"

XXIV. "A Man Of Straw"

XXV. The Rockslide

XXVI. The Judge

XXVII. Lem Creates Fiction

XXVIII. The Pressure of the Wilderness

XXIX. The Crack of Doom

XXX. The Lost Prospect

*LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS*

"He looked down into her lifted face, believing yet not believing" . . .

Frontispiece

"She paused, swaying in the hot gale"

"'I like you as well as I could like any American with un-American

ways'"

"He turned and looked into the fire"

*THE HEART OF THE RED FIRS*

*CHAPTER I*

*THE TEACHER AND THE FREAK OF THE

STRANGE THOROUGHBRED*

The children were putting away their books. The afternoon sun,

streaming through the uncurtained windows, made patches of heat on the

hewn cedar flooring, and the new, unpainted desks sent forth pitch and

the fragrance of fir. Suddenly a shadow crossed one of these squares of

light, and Lem Myers, who was seated nearest the raised sash, whispered

an audible warning: "Mose, your dad's comin'."

The boy sprang to his feet and stood facing the open door. The intruder

entered without ceremony. He had the lank black hair and mustache, eyes

flashing under shaggy brows, of the Canadian-French, and the powerful

shoulders and sinewy frame of a voyageur of the Hudson Bay Company. Two

hounds which followed him, stopped with their forepaws on the threshold

and reconnoitered the room suspiciously.

He strode directly up the aisle to the waiting boy, and laying a hand

roughly on his neck, said, with growing heat, "Din' I tell you doan' tek

dat gun? Oui, two, t'ree tam I ees say let eet 'lone."

Mose rocked under the grasp but he bore it with the silent fortitude

inherited from an Indian mother; the white in him only found expression

in the dull glow of his cheek, the tense arms and the hands clenched at

his sides.

"Din' I say A'm goin' t'rash you? Nawitka, for sure. T'ief! Cultus

Siwash!" And with a climax of invective, hurled forth in a mixture of

French, English and Indian, the man raised his hand and struck a hard

blow.

Before he could repeat it the teacher stepped between them. She had a

bright, speaking face, eyes that laughed or stormed on occasion, a mouth

mobile, alluring, with charm of lurking merriment, and a chin delicately

square, that lifted when she spoke, with an indescribable air of

decision.

"How do you do, Mr. Laramie," she said, and offered her hand, while, at

the same time, with the other palm she impelled Mose back into his seat.

"You are just in time to hear us sing."

He had ignored the hand, but she quickly placed her chair for him,

smiling, and commenced in a clear, full mezzo:

"We now are youthful sailors, we are not far from shore,

But soon we mean to journey the ocean o'er and o'er."

She lifted her music book from her desk and found the place for him, but

he refused it with a shake of his head, and taking the seat with

manifest reluctance, pulled his old squirrel-skin cap over his brows,

scowling first at her, then more darkly at Mose, and finally in general

at the school.

The children swelled the chorus lustily. And the Canadian liked music.

It was his vulnerable point. He began to beat time to this brisk

measure with his clumsy boot; cautiously at first, then with great

vigor, while his voice broke into a hoarse hum.

The song was hardly finished when she tapped the bell for dismissal.

"It ees gre't museek," said Laramie, rising. "Oui, a gre't song." His

glance moved, challenging possible contradiction, and rested on Mose's

seat. It was vacant. "Dem it," he cried with returning wrath.

But the teacher went swiftly down the aisle before him. "Here is your

gun," she said, and dragged it from behind the door. Her voice trembled

a little; entreaty rose through the courage in her eyes.

He took the rifle, turning it in his brawny hands to give it a close

scrutiny. When, with a final click of the hammer, he raised his glance,

the entreaty was gone; she stood with her arms folded, chin high,

watching him. It was as though she measured him.

His mouth worked in an unaccustomed smile. "Say, Mees," he said, "what

ees dis you tole dose chillun 'bout de eart' ees roun? You mek fun for

dem, yaas?"

There was a silent moment while the amazement came and went in her face;

a touch of merriment dimpled her mouth. Then, "It is quite true," she

answered, gravely, "the earth is round."

"Roun'? Sacre, Mees, but we mus' fall off."

She shook her head. "Come, I will show you." And she led the way back

to her desk, and taking a small globe in her hands, went through the

usual explanation slowly, simply, with infinite patience, as she would

have told a little child. But Laramie had convictions of his own. He

had seen the great Pacific, oh, yes, often, when he had journeyed for

the fur company to Nootka; and he had watched ships approach from the

far horizon, but to see the masts first proved nothing; a vessel was

most all sail. And it was true that once he had met a sailor who said

he had taken a ship at Quebec and sailed straight on and on, and without

turning back had found himself again at home. But plainly the man had

lied, for how could one make la bon voyage up the Fraser, through the

big lakes and down the St. Lawrence in a great vessel? Bah, every one

knew it could only be done in a canoe. "De eart' roun'?" he concluded.

"No, no, Mees, you doan' mek me beli've dat. But it ees gre't joke;

oui, a gre't joke, ha, ha. Well, good-by, Mees. Tek care yourse'f."

He shouldered the gun and strode away through the door. At the same

time there was the snapping of a twig and a glimpse of retreating bare

heels at the corner of the house, and while the Canadian moved down the

river trail a pair of keen eyes, set in a ferret-shaped face, peered at

him from behind the angle. They were the eyes of Lem Myers. When he

had satisfied himself that Laramie was truly on his way he came

cautiously to the threshold. The teacher was seated at her desk using

her pencil with rapid, decisive strokes. He crossed the floor to the

platform before she was conscious of his presence.

"Well, Lem," and she smiled down at him, "are you waiting for me?"

"Wal, yes; thort I'd wait an' see it out." He slipped up behind her

chair to look over her shoulder, bending his head as she moved her hand,

the better to follow her work. "Oh, gee," he exclaimed suddenly,

slapping his knees, "gee. You're a-settin' here a-makin' er picture of

him, an' I 'lowed all ther time you was scared."

"Scared?" She suspended her pencil to look at him.

"Yes, Mose was gone an' ther wan't nobody else ter hit."

"Hit? Do you mean he might have struck me?" She rose to her feet,

facing the boy. "Do you-- Do men in this settlement ever strike the

women?"

He gave her a sidelong glance and thrust his hands deep into his

trousers pockets. "You bet," he answered.

There was a brief silence, then she said, and the vibration had not gone

from her voice, "No, Lem, I was not afraid, but I might have been if I

had known. Where I have lived men never strike women; they have other

ways. I was just thinking of Mose. I wanted to ask Mr. Laramie not to

be hard with him."

"Oh, don't you bother 'bout Mose. He kin take care hisself. He's got

more muscle now'n any other boy in ther hull deestrict, an' it won't be

long 'fore he kin turn in an' thrash ther ole man."

There was another silence; the merriment again dimpled her mouth and she

looked off through the open door. Lem stooped and picked up a loose

sheet that had fluttered from the sketchbook to the floor. "Gee," he

said, "gee, but you kin draw."

"Yes?" Her glance returned and rested on the sheet interestedly. "What

is it, Lem?"

"Why, it's er picture of ther timber-cruiser an' that ther black horse

o' his. Here's ther same nice little star atween ther eyes, an' I've

seen him fling up his head an' point one ear jes that erway."

"So you know Colonel," she said, flushing, yet pleased at the

recognition. "Mr. Forrest bought him when he was a colt. He broke him,

and I am the only woman who ever mounted him."

"I 'low then you kin ride some. Ther ain't never be'n no sech stepper

in this hull deestrict. Mill Thornton calc'lated he hed er prize when

he raised ther sorrel filly, but gee, I've seen ther black leave her

clear out o' sight in less'n er minute."

The teacher laughed softly. "I know, I know, the beauty. And his

master, Lem. Did you ever see such a man in the saddle? So straight,

so easy, so ready at just the right instant with a quiet word, or else

that soft whistle."

"He kin ride," admitted Lem. "I've never seen him fizzle, an' he's be'n

out here off an' on considerable; timber-cruisin' first an' then

prospectin'. He 'lowed last year he'd struck er gold mine or

somethin'."

"I know," she repeated, "I know. It was only a few miles from here he

found those splendid indications."

"Yes," said the boy with his impish smile, "an' lost 'em."

"The mineral is there," she said with an upward tilt of her chin. "The

ore he brought down assayed remarkably rich. But he had broken his

compass that day and a heavy mist settled over every peak and spur.

There was absolutely nothing to mark a course from. Still, it's there,

Lem, locked in the heart of the hills. He will find it again,

sometime."

She went over and took her hat from its peg on the wall, and Lem

followed, waiting on the steps while she locked the door.

"There will be no more timber-cruising when he takes his position at the

new mills," she said as they started up the trail; "no more chances to

prospect. But he is coming out to the settlement before he goes to

Seattle, for a last trip into the hills, and, if your mother can go with

us, he intends to take me, to see the Cascades at close range, and the

canyon and the leaning tower, and spend a night or two in his favorite

camp at the headwaters."

A few rods from the schoolhouse the trail to the Myers clearing, which

was her boarding-place, began an abrupt ascent across the face of a

burned over ridge. They made the first part in silence, then she paused

to look back on the desolate waste. "Oh," she said, "it's like the end

of the world. It's always so wretchedly hot on this dead side-hill; the

gravel shifts so underfoot. It's very different on the Tumwater road."

"Whar's that?" asked Lem.

"Why, it's the way from Olympia to the Tumwater mills where Mr. Forrest

has lived since he was a small boy. And it's through the woods and down

a great ridge, with glimpses of blue sea between the firs, and always,

even in warmest weather, a cool, salt breeze. The lower falls of the

Des Chutes plunge into the Sound there, at Tumwater, and their thunder

fills the gorge. We used to go down often, walking or riding, and

sometimes when the wind and tide were right, we sailed. I suppose, Lem,

you never have seen a yacht?"

"Wal, no, I dunno's I hev."

"Then you have missed a great deal. But the first time I go down to the

Sound I'll take you; and Mr. Kingsley, my brother-in-law, will have us

aboard the _Phantom_. Then, out past the old monastery on Priest Point,

we'll catch a swinging breeze, and all the running waves will toss their

whitecaps,--you'll like that, even if the scud whips your face,--and

someone, my sister perhaps, will start 'The White Squall.' It's the

best sea song, made for the accompaniment of water on a cleaving keel."

For a moment she forgot the boy. She stood looking off across the

charred stumps and skeletons of trees, as though she saw far away that

blue sea she loved, and expected to hear that rush and gurgle along a

moving keel. And he, this urchin who had lived his life among the

weasels and squirrels in the heart of the great forest, who knew nothing

of whitecaps, to whom scud was a new and vague torment, waited with his

ferret eyes upon her, sharp chin lifted, lips apart. Her glance fell.

Their eyes met and she laughed. "Would you like to make that trip down

to Puget Sound, Lem?"

He dropped his head, and slipping back to his place at her heels as she

resumed the climb, answered with brief emphasis, "You bet."

At the top of the ridge the trail entered the forest. The boughs of the

friendly firs clasped overhead; a carpet of needles was underfoot. Moss

rioted everywhere, on logs, rocks, the trunks of the living trees.

Still, it was less insistent than the salal, which pushed its stiff

glossy leaves through dense growths of alder and hazel, and the fern,

which sent up slender stems, forming a lattice for honeysuckle and pea,

and high above her head spread umbrella fronds. It was cooler and she

quickened her pace. Lem began to whistle, then to answer the birds, and

presently she, too, was calling, cautiously at first, taking lessons

from the boy, and all the wood was full of voices.

At length there was the noise of running water and they came down to a

brook. It was their half-way place. Mid-channel, Lem had built a water

wheel. He had set a squirrel trap on the bank, and a larger one for

mink, and had made a bench for the teacher, by rolling a short log

against a trunk, securing it with stakes. She seated herself and he

waded out into the stream. He plucked a leaf from an overhanging bough,

and shaping a drinking-cup, brought her a draught. She laid her hat in

her lap and resting her head on the trunk, idly watched him while he

examined the traps, and drew from a hollow cedar his alder pole,

equipped with primitive line, and baited the hook with a grasshopper.

But while he tried pool and shallow ineffectually, her glance moved

absently up-stream, and presently she sang in a soft undertone:

She shone in the light of de - clin -

ing day, And each sail was

set, And each heart .. was ... gay:

[Illustration: Music fragment]

The noise of running water became the music of the sea; the bole on

which she leaned was a heaving mast, and the stir of hemlock boughs

above changed to the bellying of voluminous canvas. Once more the moon

hung low over the Tumwater hills, silvering the cove, and on the port

bow the Des Chutes plunged out of blackness and swayed, sparkling, like

a curtain of roped pearls between beetling cliffs. Her sister's

contralto, swelled by Kingsley's tenor, took up the chorus, but clearer,

close beside her, subduing his fine baritone to her own voice, sang Paul

Forrest.

At last she drew a full breath and returned to the present. She brushed

her hand across her eyes and looked at Lem. The next instant she was on

her feet. She ran down the bank and out upon the stepping-stones,

watching the boy. "Play him, Lem," she cried softly, "play him, tire

him. Don't be in a hurry."

"Gee, gee!" Lem set his teeth between the exclamations, and gripped the

pole in both hands. "Oh, gee!"

He began to move down-stream, splashing ankle-deep, plunging over his

knees in hollows. His steps quickened. He tripped on a sunken snag,

recovered, fell sprawling across a dipping log, and was up instantly,

steadying, playing the jerking line.

"That's right, Lem, slowly, tire him. Now--" She clasped her hands

over an imaginary rod, lifted in unison, and as though she felt that

great weight on the boy's line--"Now. Oh, you haven't, you haven't lost

him?"

The chagrined sportsman stood regarding his remaining bit of string.

Then he threw the pole down disgustedly and returned to the crossing, He

gave the teacher one sidelong look and dropped his eyes.

"Never mind, Lem," she said. "It was fine. The gamiest I ever saw."

He lifted his head. "You kin bet on that," he answered. "Ther's jes one

of him in this here creek. He's ther great Tyee. But gee, gee, I don't

see how he hed water 'nough ter keep him erfloat."

The teacher laughed softly. She started on over the stream, but,

lifting her glance from the dripping boy, she met suddenly the amused

gaze of an auditor who had stopped on the bank. His mount, a dappled

chestnut with a silver mane, the alert head, depth of chest, long, sleek

body and nimble limbs of a thoroughbred, was, in that forest settlement,

remarkable, but the man himself possessed a striking personality. He

carried his large frame with almost military erectness and yet with the

freedom of young muscles bred to the saddle. He wore cavalry boots and

English-made riding-clothes, and his coat opened on an immaculate silk

shirt bosom. His face, stamped with inherited fineness of living, was

undeniably handsome, but his lip took a mocking curve when he smiled,

his chin had length rather than breadth, and in his eyes, which were

singularly light under black lashes and brows, smouldered a magnetic

heat; they drew or repelled.

The rise from the brook was abrupt, the path narrow, and the teacher

waited on a larger stone while the stranger rode down into the ford. He

removed his hat with the usual salutation of the trail, and crushing it

carelessly under his arm, would have passed directly on, but the horse,

suspicious of some movement of Lem's, made a sudden detour that brought

him almost upon her. She started to spring to another rock, her foot

slipped, and to steady herself she threw up her hand. It came in

contact with the chestnut's bridle below the bit. Instantly he reared,

wheeled, and coming down, gripped the bank with his forefeet, and was

off like a bird.

Lem crawled out of the pool into which he had plunged to avoid those

striking hoofs, and the teacher hurried on over the crossing. But,

unexpectedly, at the top of the bank she met the rider returning, and

she and the boy crowded quickly into the salal to give him room. He

still carried his hat under his bridle arm; a rifle in a leather case

swung, undamaged, from the saddle; a small canvas-covered pack rested,

unbroken, above the crupper, and the thoroughbred paced gently down into

the stream and moving on slowly, trotted up the opposite side and

disappeared among the firs.

"He kin ride," said Lem at last. "An' I 'low that ther chestnut kin

travel. But he'd be mighty oncertain in er race. Ef it kem to it,"--he

paused to follow the teacher back into the trail,--"ef it kem to it, I

dunno but what I'd resk my pile on ther timber-cruiser an' ther black."

*CHAPTER II*

*THE LEANING TOWER*

Suddenly Forrest, who had taken the lead, turned and laid his hand on

his horse's rein. "Back, Colonel," he said, "back. Steady, now,

steady."

The trail, which ran between the edge of a windfall and the brink of a

cliff, was cut off by a slide.

Presently, when there was room, the teacher slipped down from the

saddle, and Forrest turned the black and led him into a small open on

the level shoulder to which they had climbed. Below them they heard the

voices of the settlers urging Ginger, the other horse, up the sharp

incline; then, with a final clatter of tin and scraping of hoofs, he

appeared over the spur. He dropped his muzzle abjectly to the heather,

showing covertly the whites of his eyes; his legs seemed to shorten like

set posts, while Mrs. Myers, who followed closely, stopped to look at

the pack. She tucked in a loose end of canvas and made a new hitch in a

length of rope. She had a deft yet masculine touch, and it was her

husband's standing tribute that she knew more about packing than he did;

when Marthy fixed a load, it stayed.

There was nothing weak and little effeminate about Martha. Her scant

cotton gown, without decoration, was shortened above a streak of coarse

gray hose; her shoes were of calf, heavy, unshapely, and her hat, Eben's

winter one, had seen protracted service. It shaded a face darkened by

exposure to wind and sun, and seamed not by age but habitual anxiety.

The settler mounted a log and cast a slow glance along the windfall.

There were mighty firs, centuries old, with their trunks hurled in air;

boles of ancient cedars snapped mid-length; giant hemlocks held uptilted

and forming a breastwork for living trees; gnarled roots locking with

green branches; all dropped together like jackstraws, the playthings of

Titan winds. Presently Martha joined him and they began to work along

the labyrinth, picking a course for the horses.

Forrest had tied the black, and, taking advantage of the delay, led the

teacher to a better view-point of the canyon, which swept below them,

rounding the opposite ridge in the shape of a crescent. A granite

tower, crowning a higher cliff, held the curve. It was a curious pile,

of boulders fitted nicely, block on block, with loophole and parapet,

and the whole structure tilted slightly, leaning towards the precipice.

The girl seated herself on a stone in the shade of a stunted fir, and

Forrest, a little worn from the long tramp, threw himself on the ground,

putting aside his hat and resting his head on his hand, his elbow on the

earth, while he looked off down the gorge. "Somewhere in there," he

said, "beyond that curve, I ought to find my lost prospect. The mother

lode should crop out in one of those lower bluffs towards the Des

Chutes. The thunder of the river reached me not long before,--I

remember that clearly,--but I wish the place I staked that day had only

been in range of that fine old landmark, the tower."

She looked down thoughtfully into the wooded gorge. "In such a tangle

you might pass the place a dozen times. Your stakes must have been

overgrown in a few weeks with fern and salal, or shoots of alder. It's

really beginning again."

"Almost." He set his square jaw and a vertical line deepened between

his eyes. "Still, it's there and sooner or later I'll find it. But I

must make the most of this trip; I can't hope for many days off at the

Freeport mills. That's the worst of it,"--he smiled, shaking his

head,--"no more timber-cruising; nothing to take me out-of-doors."

"Do you know, I can't think of Tumwater, the mills, the falls, the ridge

road, without remembering you? You've been a part of it, Paul; the

spirit of it all."

"That's nice of you." He gave her a swift look of appreciation. His

eyes, a deep, clear hazel, were his most expressive feature; they put

weight and character into his slightest remark. "But a man must step

out of his cradle, sometime, and Judge Kingsley has made me a fine

offer. He is sure to gain the election,--no man is better known, or as

popular in the whole territory; no one has the interests of the country

more at heart. And when he goes to Congress he means to leave the

Freeport mills under my management altogether; that is with the

co-operation of Philip."

"The co-operation of Philip? Do you think because Phil Kingsley has put

his money into that property it will make any difference?"

"The Judge thinks it will be the making of him."

"Phil Kingsley's gain," she said slowly, "is always someone else's loss.

You ought to know it."

Forrest laughed, his short, pleasant laugh. "I think," he said, "you

can trust me to take care of myself. Of course you know," he went on

presently, "Phil means to live at the mills. His uncle opposes it. If

he goes to Washington the house at Olympia will have to be leased to

strangers or closed, and it will be a miserable place, at the mills, for

your sister and little Si. She had better take a house over the harbor

at Seattle. But she is going to live at Freeport. Like you she is

determined."

"Freeport is different. It's just a bleak, wind-swept beach, shut off

from the green earth by a towering bluff. Indeed, I wouldn't live there.

Here, I have the woods and mountains all around. And I love the

Nisqually. It's freedom."

"Your sister will be disappointed. She still hopes that when the

novelty of all this has worn off, you will be ready to come back and

make your home with her."

She shook her head. "I never can do that again. I can't help

disapproving of Philip. The habit grows. I object to him more and

more. We often quarrel--now."

Forrest laughed softly. "Of course you do; of course. But the Judge,"

he went on gravely, "is miserable. He says if you won't let him help

you it isn't necessary to bury yourself out here in the wilderness, in a

nest of outlaws. If you are determined to be independent, you could

teach or paint, or put your music to advantage in town."

"Oh," she answered, "he doesn't see. I was meant for a pioneer, Paul;

it's in the blood. You ought to understand. I love the great spaces,

just as you do, and your life in the big out-of-doors."

A soft enthusiasm shone in her face; she looked off absently at the

tower. Her hands were clasped loosely on her knee, and the sunlight,

sifting between the boughs of the fir, brought out the gold in her hair;

the wind roughened it under her close velvet cap, and twisted it into

minute spirals about her neck and ears. The young man watching her set

his lips over a quick breath and turned his eyes away. She loved these

things, yes, but as a bird loves light and air; not as he loved them, to

work for them, to build, reclaim, spend himself for them, fight if the

time came. No, not for one foolish moment could he expect it of her.

"Was ever anything as nicely balanced as that tower?" he said. "To look

like a touch would send it toppling and yet to withstand the gales that

sweep these hills. But the eternal forces are busy around it; some day

it will go."

"It's wonderful," she answered. "It looks like it had been built there

to protect the gorge. What a stronghold it would make."

"Stronghold? For whom?"

"Why, for Pete Smith, Dick Slocum, any of them."

"Who is Slocum?"

She shook her head slowly. "I don't really know. But he came in while

we were at dinner the night before last. His clothes were torn and his

hat gone, and there were twigs and needles clinging to his hair. He was

very hungry. The sheriff and a posse were hunting him. They had passed

up the trail half an hour before, and he hurried, scowling at every one,

and before any one spoke was gone, taking part of the meal in his

hands."

"Freeport couldn't be as bad as this. Own you were afraid."

"Afraid? No, why should I have been? It was Dick Slocum who was

frightened. He was running away. Mr. Myers said he had shot a man.

But," she admitted grudgingly, "I was afraid of Pete Smith, and of the

bear."

"Smith?" He changed his position a little, dropping his arm and resting

his shoulder against a rock. "What of Smith? I thought he was safe in

the penitentiary."

"He escaped. It was very stormy the night he came back. Trees were

falling on the ridge, and after school Lem and I went home with Mose.

Mr. Laramie was away with his traps, and his wife, you know, is a

Yakima, the daughter of Yelm Jim. It would have been all right if the

boys hadn't entertained me with stories of the rising, but they were

dreadful to hear with the wind whistling, boughs soughing, rain driving

on the shingles, and just the light of the backlog in the fireplace.

When Lem followed Mose off to bed in the barn loft I was a little

unnerved.

"There were two beds in the room; mine was curtained. But I couldn't

sleep. I kept listening and waiting for something to happen. There was

a rifle on the wall near the door; I began to wish I had it. Mose's

mother was surely asleep, I heard her regular breathing from the other

bed, and finally I crept over softly and took the gun down. It was

heavy and I let the stock strike the floor. Still she didn't move, and

I hurried back and stood it inside the curtains where I could reach it

instantly, felt safer then and at last went to sleep."

She paused, looking off again absently to the tower. It was as though

she saw that room, the sleeping squaw, she herself in the curtained bed

with the rifle at hand. "It must have been nearly morning when I

wakened. There was still light from the smouldering backlog, and between

the curtains I saw Mose's mother standing near the door and talking to a

man. His clothes were wet and torn as if he had pushed through

underbrush; an old, soft hat shaded his face, and perhaps it was the

shadows or the flicker of the firelight, but it seemed the most hideous

face in the world. She pointed to my corner and he started towards me.

My heart leaped, But she stopped him. He spoke to her in Yakima,

throwing off her hand and stamping his foot. Then she came over

cautiously and looked in at me. I pretended I was asleep, but the

perspiration started; I could have screamed. I quite forgot the gun

until I felt she had taken it and was going quickly back to the man."

She paused again to give her listener a swift look with the mounting fun

in her eyes. "He took the rifle," she added, "and went out."

Her laugh was irresistible.

"And it was Smith?" he asked directly,

"Yes, it was all explained the next morning when Lem noticed the vacant

place on the wall and said, 'I see Pete's out again; he's be'n fur his

gun.'"

Forrest laughed again at her perfect mimicry of the boy, then he turned

his face again to the gorge. He thought of a good many things, but he

felt the futility of saying any of them. He only asked finally, "And

what of the bear?"

"Oh, he was berrying, I suppose, and I happened to overtake him on the

trail, I had been down the river making a sketch of Yelm Jim, fishing,

and Lem had gone home without me. I noticed the bear moving ahead of me

towards the creek, but I thought he was just a great pig until he

lumbered around to look at me. And the moment I caught his profile, you

may be sure I turned and went flying back to the river, on over the log

where I had left the old chief--he gave me right of way--and into the

midst of the Laramie barn-raising. 'Come, quick,' I said, 'I have seen

a bear.' And they all came; two had guns. But he was gone; he hadn't

left a track, and I found myself, suddenly, standing there under the

scrutiny of the whole settlement. It was only my second week, then, and

teachers, up the Nisqually, are more unusual than bears."

But the amusement went out of Forrest's face. "You should have at least

the security of a good horse. You must take Colonel. I can't use him

at the new mills," he explained quickly, "and I don't want to sell him.

He never knew another master. Will you keep him while I stay at

Freeport?"

"I keep Colonel? Oh, there's nothing I should like better; nothing.

You are the best, the most generous man I ever knew." She leaned a

little towards him, all delight, eagerness, charm. "I can't ever hope

to repay you, Paul, but I'd be glad of the opportunity to do

anything--anything in the world--for you."

"I wish I could be sure of that. See here,"--his voice deepened and

shook,--"I don't ask you to come to Freeport, or anywhere, until I can

offer you something worth while, only--if you care enough for me to wait

for me, Alice--tell me so."

She drew back; the delight went out of her face; she rose in

consternation to her feet. "You," she faltered. "You-- Oh, what made

you, Paul? What made you?"

"How could I help it?" He, too, rose and stood looking down into her

flushed face. "I always have loved you, Alice,--don't you know

it?--even when you were a small girl and I carried your books to school.

Once I was late and you came up the road to meet me.--Don't you

remember?--It was my last year at the Academy, when you were twelve.

You were reading your first Waverley novel, and you told me that

morning, some day your knight would come riding down the ridge. I never

forgot. I was the better horseman for it. Long afterwards, when I

bought Colonel, I thought of it. I always meant to be that knight."

He smiled, half ashamed of that boyish dream, but she drew herself

straight and turned her eyes again to the tower. "You," she said, "whom

I have known my whole life through."

"Yes, does that count so much against me?"

"I'm so sorry. You've been the best friend I ever had; the one I could

always depend on. Oh, I wish--I wish it hadn't happened."

He laid his hand, bracing himself a little, on the bole of the fir, and

turned his own face away, looking off once more down the canyon. Myers,

coming back to the edge of the windfall, called, but neither of them

answered. Presently she reached and broke a sprig from a lower bough and

began slowly to strip it of its needles. "But I see--I see--how much

I've been to blame," she said. "I can't forgive myself, ever. I never

thought of you--in--that way, Paul. You never seemed--like other men.

And I see--I see--I shouldn't have spoken, as I did just now, about

Colonel."

"Why, it's all right." He swung around and looked at her. "It's all

right. Don't let it trouble you; don't give it another thought. And,

of course, you will keep Colonel."