twilight of one of the longest days of the year, Ruth sat reading in
the old place on the hill, where Jeffrey would be sure to find her.
Suddenly, when it was full dark, she knew that he would not come.
She did not try to argue with herself. She did not fight back the
nervous feeling that something had happened. She was sure that she had
been all day expecting it. When the moon came up over the hill and the
long purple shadows of the elm trees on the crest came stalking down
in the white light, she went miserably into the house and up to the
little room they had fitted up for her in the loft of her own home.
She cried herself into a wearied, troubled sleep. But with the
elasticity of youth and health she was awake at the first hint of
morning, and the cloud of the night had passed.
She dressed and hurried down into the yard where Norman Apgarth was
just stirring about with his milk pails. She was glad to face daylight
and action. A man had put his trust in her before all others. She was
eager to answer to his faith.
"Where is Brom Bones?" she demanded of the still drowsy Apgarth as she
caught him crossing the yard from the milk house.
"The colt? He's up in the back pasture, just around the knob of the
mountain. What was you calc'latin' to do with him, Miss?"
"I want to use him," said Ruth. "May I?"
"Use him? Certainly, if you want to. But, say, Miss, that colt ain't
been driv' since the Spring's work. An' he's so fat an' silky he's
liable to act foolish."
"I'm going to _ride_ him," said Ruth briefly, as she stepped to the
horse barn door for a bridle.
"Now, say, Miss," the man opposed feebly, "you could take the brown
pony just as well; I don't need her a bit. And I tell you that colt
is just a lun-_at_-ic, when he's been idle so long."
"Thank you," said Ruth, as she started up the hill. "But I think I'll
find work enough to satisfy even Brom Bones to-day."
The big black colt followed her peaceably down the mountain, and stood
champing at the door while she went in to get something to eat. When
she brought out a shining new side saddle he looked suspiciously at
the strange thing, but he made no serious objection as she fastened it
on. Ruth herself, when she had buckled it tight, stood looking
doubtfully at it. A side saddle was as new to her as it was to the
horse. She had bought it on her way home the other day, as a
concession to the fact that she was now a young lady who could no
longer go stampeding over the hills on a bare-backed horse.
She mounted easily, but Brom Bones, seeming to know in the way of his
kind that she was uneasy and uncomfortable, began at once to act
badly. His intention seemed to be to walk into the open well on his
hind feet. The girl caught a short hold on her lines and cut him
sharply across the ear. He wheeled on two feet and bolted for the
hill, clearing the woodshed by mere inches.
The path led straight up to the top of the slope. Ruth did not try to
hold him. The sooner he ran the conceit out of himself, she thought,
the better.
He hurled himself down the other slope, past the pool, and into the
trail which Jeffrey had taken yesterday. It was break-neck riding, in
a strange saddle. But the girl's anxiety rose with the excitement of
the horse's wild rush, so that when they reached the top of the divide
where she had last seen Jeffrey it was the horse and not the girl that
was ready to settle down to a sober and safer pace.
Her common sense told her that she was probably foolish; that Jeffrey
had merely stayed over night somewhere and that she would meet him on
the way. But another and a subtler sense kept whispering to her to
hurry on, that she was needed, that the good name, if not the life, of
the boy she loved was in danger!
She had found out from Mrs. Whiting just who were the men whom Jeffrey
had gone to see. But she did not know how she could dash up to their
doors and demand to know where he was. It was eleven miles up the
stony trail that followed Wilbur's Fork, and the girl's nerves now
keyed up to expect she knew not what jangled at every turn of the
road. Jeffrey had meant to come straight back this way to her. That he
had not done so meant that _something_ had stopped him on the way.
What was it?
On one side the trail was flanked by giant hemlocks and the underbrush
was grown into an impenetrable wall. On the other it ran sheer along
the edge of Wilbur's Fork, a rock-bottomed, rushing stream that
tumbled and brawled its way down the long slope of the country.
Time after time the girl shuddered and gripped her saddle as she
pushed on past a place where the undergrowth came right down to the
trail, and six feet away the path dropped off thirty feet to the rock
bed of the stream. She caught herself leaning across the saddle to
look down. A man might have stood in the brush as Jeffrey came
carelessly along. And that man might have swung a cant-stick once--a
single blow at the back of the head--and Jeffrey would have gone
stumbling and falling over the edge of the path. There would not be
even the sign of a struggle.
Once she stopped and took hold of her nerves.
"Ruth Lansing," she scolded aloud, "you're making a little fool of
yourself. You've been down there in that convent living among a lot of
girls, and you're forgetting that these hills are your own, that there
never was and never is any danger in them for us who belong here. Just
keep that in your mind and hustle on about your business."
When she came out into the open country near the head of the Fork she
met old Darius Wilbur turning his cattle to pasture. The old man did
not know the girl, but he knew the Lansing colt and he looked sharply
at the steaming withers of Brom Bones before he would give any
attention to her question.
"What's the tarnation hurry, young lady?" he inquired exasperatingly.
"Jeff Whiting? Yes, he was here yest'day. Why?"
"Did he start home by this trail?" asked Ruth eagerly. "Or did he go
on up country?"
"He went on up country."
Ruth headed Brom Bones up the trail again without a word.
"But stay!" the old man yelled after her, when she had gone twenty
yards. "He came back again."
Ruth pulled around so sharply that she nearly threw Brom Bones to his
knees.
"Didn't ask me that," the old man chortled, as she came back, "but if
I didn't tell you I reckon you'd run that colt to death up the
hills."
"Then he _did_ take the Forks trail back."
"Didn't do that, nuther."
"Then where _did_ he go? Please tell me!" cried the girl, the tears of
vexation rising into her voice.
"Why, what's the matter, girl? He crossed the Fork just there," said
the old man, pointing, "and he took over the hill for French Village.
You his wife? You're mighty young."
But Ruth did not hear. She and Brom Bones were already slipping down
the rough bank in a shower of dirt and stones.
In the middle of the ford she stopped and loosened the bridle, let the
colt drink a little, then drove him across, up the other bank and on
up the stiff slope.
She did not know the trail, but she knew the general run of the
country that way and had no doubt of finding her road.
Now she told herself that it was certainly a wild goose chase. Jeffrey
had merely found that he had to see some one in French Village and had
gone there and, of course, had spent the night there.
By the time she had come over the ridge of the hill and was dropping
down through the heavily wooded country toward French Village, she had
begun to feel just a little bit foolish. But she suddenly remembered
that it was Saint John the Baptist's day. It was not a holy day of
obligation but she knew it was a feast day in French Village. There
would be Mass. She should have gone, anyway. And she would hear with
her own ears the things they were saying about Jeffrey Whiting.
Arsene LaComb sat on the steps of his store in French Village in the
glory of a stiff white shirt and a festal red vest. The store was
closed, of course, in honour of the day. In a few minutes he would put
on his black coat, in his official capacity of trustee of the church,
and march solemnly over to ring the bell for Mass.
The spectacle of a smartly-dressed young lady whom he seemed to know
vaguely, riding down the dusty street on a shiny yellow side saddle on
the back of a big, vicious-looking black colt, made the little man
reach hastily for his coat of ceremony.
"M'm'selle Lansing!" he said, bowing in friendly pomp as Ruth drove
up.
"How do you do, Mr. LaComb? I came down to go to Mass. Can you tell me
what time it begins?"
"I shall ring the bell when I have put away your horse, M'm'selle."
Now no earthly power could have made Arsene LaComb deviate a minute
from the exact time for ringing that bell. But, he was a Frenchman.
His manner intimated that the ringing of all bells whatsoever must
await her convenience.
He stepped forward jauntily to help her down. Ruth kicked her feet
loose and slid down deftly.
"I am glad to see you again, Mr. LaComb," said Ruth as she took his
hand. "Did you see Jeffrey Whiting in the Village last night?"
A girl of about Ruth's own age had come quietly up the street and
stood beside them, recording in one swift inspection every detail of
Ruth from her little riding cap to the tips of her brown boots.
"'Cynthe," said the little man briskly, "you show Miss Lansing on my
pew for Mass." He took the bridle from Ruth's hand and led the horse
away to the shed in the rear of the store.
The fear and uneasiness of the early morning leaped back to Ruth. The
little man had certainly run away from her question. Why should he not
answer?
She would have liked to linger a while among the people standing about
the church door. She knew some of them. She might have asked questions
of them. But her escort led her straight into the church and up to a
front pew.
At the end of the Mass the people filed out quietly, but at the church
door they broke into volleys of rapid-fire French chatter of which
Ruth could only catch a little here and there.
"You will come by the _fête_, M'm'selle. You will not dance _non_, I
s'pose. But you will eat, and you will see the fun they make, one
_jolie_ time! Till I ring the Vesper bell they will dance." Arsene led
Ruth and the other girl, whom she now learned was Hyacinthe Cardinal,
across the road to a little wood that stood opposite the church. There
were tables, on which the women had already begun to spread the food
that they had brought from home, and a dancing platform. On a great
stump which had been carved rudely into a chair sat Soriel Brouchard,
the fiddler of the hills, twiddling critically at his strings.
It seemed strange to Ruth that these people who had a moment before
been so devout and concentrated in church should in an instant switch
their whole thought to a day of eating and merrymaking. But she soon
found their light-hearted gaiety very infectious. Before she knew it,
she was sputtering away in the best French she had and entering into
the fun with all her heart.
"Which is Rafe Gadbeau?" she suddenly asked Cynthe Cardinal. "I want
to know him."
"Why for you want to know him?" the girl asked sharply in English.
"Oh, nothing," said Ruth carelessly, "only I've heard of him."
The other girl reached out into the crowd and plucked at the sleeve of
a tall, beak-nosed man. The man was evidently flattered by Ruth's
request, and wanted her to dance with him immediately.
"No," said Ruth, "I do not know how to dance your dances, and we'd
only break up the sets if I tried to learn now. We've heard a lot
about you, Mr. Gadbeau, so, of course, I wanted to know you. And we've
heard some things about Jeffrey Whiting. I'm sure you could tell me if
they are true."
"You don' dance? Well, we sit then. I tell you. One rascal, this young
Whiting!"
Ruth bit back an angry protest, and schooled herself to listen quietly
as he led her to a seat.
As they left the other girl standing in the middle of the platform,
Ruth, looking back, caught a swift glance of what she knew was
jealous anger in her eyes. Ruth was sorry. She did not want to make an
enemy of this girl. But she felt that she must use every effort to get
this man to tell her all he would.
"One rascal, I tell you," repeated Gadbeau. "First he stop all the
people. He say don' sell nodding. Den he sell his own farm, him. He
sell some more; he got big price. Now he skip the country, right out.
An' he leave these poor French people in the soup.
"But I"--he sat back tapping himself on the chest--"I got hinfluence
with that railroad. They buy now from us. To-morrow morning, nine
o'clock, here comes that railroad lawyer on French Village. We sell
out everything on the option to him."
"But," objected Ruth, trying to draw him out, "if Jeffrey Whiting
should come back before then?"
"He don' come back, that fellow."
"How do you know?"
"I know, I-- He don' come back. I tell you that."
"Jeffrey Whiting will be here before nine o'clock to-morrow," she
said, turning suddenly upon him.
"Eh? M'm'selle, what you mean? What you know?" he questioned
excitedly.
"Never mind. I see Miss Cardinal looking at us," she smiled as she
arose, "and I think you are in for a lecture."
Through all the long day, while she ate and listened to the fun and
talked to Father Ponfret about her convent life, she did not let Rafe
Gadbeau out of her sight or mind for an instant. She knew that she had
alarmed him. She was certain that he knew what had happened to Jeffrey
Whiting. And she was waiting for him to betray himself in some way.
When Arsene LaComb rang the bell for Vespers, she waited by the bell
ringer to see that Gadbeau came into the church. He took his place
among the men, and then Ruth dropped quietly into a pew near the door.
When the people rose to sing the _Tantum Ergo_, she saw Gadbeau slip
unnoticed out of the church. She waited tensely until the singing was
finished, then she almost ran to the door.
Gadbeau, mounted on one of the ponies that had been standing all day
in the little woods, was riding away in the direction of the trail
which she had come down this morning. She fairly flew down the street
to Arsene LaComb's store. There was not a pony in the hills that Brom
Bones could not overtake easily, but she must see by what trail the
man left the Village.
Brom Bones was very willing to make a race for home, and she let him
have his head until she again caught sight of the man. She pulled up
sharply and forced the colt down to a walk. The man was still on the
main road, and he might turn any moment. Finally she saw him pull into
the trail that led over to Wilbur's Fork. Then she knew. Jeffrey was
somewhere on the trail between French Village and Wilbur's Fork. And
he was alive! The man was going now to make sure that he was still
there.
For an hour, the long, high twilight was enough to assure her that the
man was still following the trail. Then, just when the real darkness
had fallen, she heard a pony whinny in the woods at her left. The man
had turned off into the woods! She had almost passed him! She threw
herself out upon Brom Bones' neck and caught him by the nose. He threw
up his head indignantly and tried to bolt, but she blessed him for
making no noise. She drove on quietly a couple of hundred yards,
slipped down, and drew Brom Bones into the bushes away from the road
and tied him. She talked to him, patting his head and neck, pleading
with him to be quiet. Then she left him and stole back to where she
had heard the pony.
In the gloom of the woods she could see nothing. But her feet found
themselves on what seemed to be a path and she followed it blindly.
She almost walked into a square black thing that suddenly confronted
her. Within what seemed a foot of her she heard voices. Her heart
stopped beating, but the blood rang in her ears so that she could not
distinguish a word. One of the voices was certainly Gadbeau's. The
other-- It was!-- It was! Though it was only a mumble, she knew it was
Jeffrey Whiting who tried to speak!
She took a step forward, ready to dash into the place, whatever it
was. But the caution of the hills made her back away noiselessly into
the brush. What could she do? Why? Oh, _why_ had she not brought a
rifle? Gadbeau was sure to be armed. Jeffrey was a prisoner, probably
wounded and bound.
She backed farther into the bushes and started to make a circuit of
the place. She understood now that it was a sugar hut, built entirely
of logs, even the roof. It was as strong as a blockhouse. She knew
that she was helpless. And she knew that Jeffrey would not be a
prisoner there unless he were hurt.
She could only wait. Gadbeau had not come to injure Jeffrey further.
He had merely come to make himself sure that his prisoner was secure.
He would not stay long.
As she stole around away from the path and the pony she saw a little
stream of light shoot out through a chink between the logs of the hut.
Gadbeau had made a light. Probably he had brought something for
Jeffrey to eat. She pulled off the white collar of her jacket, the
only white thing that showed about her and settled down for a long
wait.
First she had thought that she ought to steal away to her horse and
ride for help. But she could not bear the thought of even getting
beyond the sound of Jeffrey's voice. She knew where he was now. He
might be taken away while she was gone. And, besides, Ruth Lansing had
always learned to do things for herself. She had always disliked
appealing for help.
Hour after hour she sat in the darkest place she could find, leaning
against the bole of a great tree. The light, candles, of course,
burned on; and the voices came irregularly through the living silence
of the woods. She did not dare to creep nearer to hear what was being
said. That did not matter. The important thing was to have Gadbeau go
away without any suspicion that he had been followed. Then she would
be free to release Jeffrey. She had no fear but that she would be able
to get him down to French Village in the morning. She could easily
have him there before nine o'clock.
When she saw by the stars that it was long past midnight she began to
be worried. Just then the light went out. Ah! The man was going away
at last! She waited a long, nervous half hour. But there was no sound.
She dared not move, for even when she shifted her position against
the tree the oppressive silence seemed to crackle with her motion.
Would he never come out? It seemed not. Was he going to stay there all
night?
Noiseless as a cat, she rose and crept to the door of the cabin.
Apparently both men were asleep within. She pushed the door ever so
quietly. It was firmly barred on the inside.
What could she do? Nothing, absolutely nothing! Oh, why, _why_ had she
not brought a rifle? She would shoot. She _would_, if she had it now,
and that man opened the door! It was too late now to think of riding
for help, too late!
She sank down again beside her tree and raged helplessly at herself,
at her conceit in herself that would not let her go for help in the
first place, at her foolishness in coming on this business without a
gun. The hours dragged out their weary minutes, every minute an age to
the taut, ragged nerves of the girl.
The dawn came stealing across the tree-tops, while the ground still
lay in utter darkness. Ruth rose and slipped farther back into the
bushes.
Suddenly she found herself upon her knees in the soft grass, and the
hot, angry tears of desperation and rage at herself were softened. Her
heart was lighted up with the glow of dawn and sang its prayer to God;
a thrilling, lifting little prayer of confidence and wonder. The
words that the night before would not form themselves for her now
sprang up ready in her soul--the words of all the children of earth,
to Our Father Who Art in Heaven--paused an instant to bless her lips,
then sped away to God in His Heaven. Fear was gone, and doubt, and
anxiety. She would save Jeffrey, and she would save the poor, befooled
people from ruin. God had told her so, as He walked abroad in the
_Glow_ of _Dawn_.
Two long hours more she waited, but now with patience and a sure
confidence. Then Rafe Gadbeau came out of the hut and strode down the
path to his pony.
Ruth rose stiff and wet from the ground and ran to the door, and
called to Jeffrey. The only answer was a moan. The door was locked
with a great iron clasp and staple joined by a heavy padlock. She
reached for the nearest stone and attacked the lock frantically. She
beat it out of all semblance to a lock, but still it defied her. There
was no window in the hut. She had to come back again to the lock. Her
hands, softened by the months in the convent, left bloody marks on the
tough brass of the lock. In the end it gave, and she threw herself
against the door.
Jeffrey was lying trussed, face down, on a bunk beside the furnace
where they boiled the sugar sap. His arms were stretched out and tied
together down under the narrow bunk. She saw that his left arm was
broken. For an instant the girl's heart leaped back to the rage of
the night when she had almost prayed for her rifle. But pity swallowed
up every other feeling as she cut the cords from his hands and
loosened the rope that they had bound in between his teeth.
"Don't talk, Jeff," she commanded. "I can see just what happened. Lie
easy and get your strength. I've got to take you to French Village at
once."
She ran out to bring water. When she returned he was sitting dizzily
on the edge of the bunk. While she bathed his head with the water and
gave him a little to drink, she talked to him and crooned over him as
she would over a baby for she saw that he was shaken and half
delirious with pain.
Brom Bones was standing munching twigs where she had left him. He had
never before been asked to carry double and he did not like it. But
the girl pleaded so pitifully and so gently into his silky black ear
that he finally gave in.
When they were mounted, she fastened the white collar of her jacket
into a sling for the boy's broken arm, and with a prayer to the
heathen Brom Bones to go tenderly they were off down the trail.
When they were half way down the trail Jeffrey spoke suddenly:
"Say, Ruth, what's the use trying to save these people? Let's sell
out while we can and take mother and go away."
"Why, Jeff, dear," she said lightly, "this fight hasn't begun yet.
Wait till we get to French Village. You'll say something different.
You'll say just what you said to the Shepherd of the North;
remember?"
Jeffrey said no more. The girl's heart was weak with the pain she knew
he was bearing, but she knew that they must go through with this.
All French Village and the farmers of Little Tupper country were
gathered in front of Arsene Lacomb's store. Rafe Gadbeau was standing
on the steps haranguing them. He had stayed with his prisoner as he
thought up to the last possible moment, so he stammered in his speech
when he saw a big black horse come tearing down the street carrying a
girl and a white-faced, black-headed boy behind her. Rogers, the
railroad lawyer beside him, said:
"Go on, man. What's the matter with you?"
The girl drove the horse right in through the crowd until Jeffrey
Whiting faced Rogers. Then Jeffrey, gritting his teeth on his pain,
took up his fight again.
"Rogers," he shouted, "you did this. You got Rafe Gadbeau and the
others to knock me on the head and put me out of the way, so that you
could spread your lies about me. And you'd have won out, too, if it
hadn't been for this brave girl here.
"Now, Rogers, you liar," he shouted louder, "I dare you, dare you, to
tell these people here that I or any of our people have sold you a
foot of land. I dare you!"
Rogers would have argued, but Rafe Gadbeau pulled him away. Gadbeau
knew that crowd. They were a crowd of Frenchmen, volatile and full of
potential fury. They were already cheering the brave girl. In a few
minutes they would be hunting the life of the man who had lied to them
and nearly ruined them.
A hundred hands reached up to lift Ruth from the saddle, but she waved
them away and pointed to Jeffrey's broken arm. They helped him down
and half carried him into Doctor Napoleon Goodenough's little office.
Ruth saw that her business was finished. She wheeled Brom Bones toward
home, and gave him his head.
For three glorious miles they fairly flew through the pearly morning
air along the hard mountain road, and the girl never pulled a line.
Breakfastless and weary in body, her heart sang the song that it had
learned in the Glow of Dawn.
IV
THE ANSWER