Dan Portway sat in the shade cast by a large hemlock, an extinct pipe
between his lips, and his chin resting upon his hands, gazing down upon
his companion, whose head and breast alone were in the shade, for the
sun seemed to have veered farther round since they ate their meal
together, and then lay down to rest until the heat had grown less. They
were upon the steep slope of one of the mountains which shot up rugged
and bare on all sides, and sank down in dangerous gulches, like rocky
crevices in the earth, their precipitous sides sometimes going down
sheer to where water gushed, and roared, and sprang from rock to rock,
hundreds of feet below. Wherever a sheltered spot offered itself for
foothold, the pines and hemlocks had risen, like dark green cones,
towards the deep blue skies, their heads glistening in the sunshine, and
exhaling a perfume that floated upon the mountain breezes far and wide.
It was one of Nature's solitudes in the Far West, and the two men, as
their rifles and accoutrements showed, had climbed up there in search of
the game which found a home in these wilds.
They had had a long tramp and climb that day, but neither bear nor
mountain sheep had fallen before their bullets, and they found
themselves at last miles away from the pine grove where they had set up
their tent, with the sombre boughs above and the pine-needles forming a
thick bed below. The surroundings were glorious. It was the ideal
haunt of a mountain hunter, and here a month before, on a farewell
excursion, before obeying the recall he had received, George Harrington
had revisited the neighbourhood which he had discovered far up in the
mountains years before, when prospecting for gold.
The days had glided by, and evening after evening he had come to the
determination that after the next day he would begin to move in the
direction of civilisation, and hunt and shoot as he went; but, in spite
of the fact that they had come twice over upon Indian signs there was so
much fascination in the place that he always determined upon leaving in
another day or two.
When George Harrington started upon his trip it was in company with an
experienced guide, but the man had fallen ill and gone back to one of
the towns, and just as Harrington was in despair, he had come suddenly
upon a man whom he had twice before encountered and with whom he had
hunted. Hearing from George the quandary in which he was placed, Dan
Portway, a man of good birth and education, who had emigrated to the
West a couple of years before and found the hunting life in the
mountains more to his taste than straightforward labour, at once
volunteered to accompany him. The offer was eagerly accepted, for it
seemed suicidal to go alone, and as Dan had proved himself to be
companionable, a clever shot, and well versed in hunting craft, the time
had glided pleasantly away without their once encountering a soul.
Two men with a similarity of tastes cannot chum together in a little
tent here and there in the mountains without becoming confidential,
hence it was that before long George Harrington pretty well knew his
companion's impecunious history--that is, as much as he chose to tell,
and on the other hand, not only had Portway, apparently without pumping,
learned Harrington's position, but had received an invitation to
accompany him to England.
"Have another day," Portway would say laughingly; "at present you are
free. Who can say when you will enjoy such another succession of climbs
as you have out here."
"True," Harrington said thoughtfully.
"When you get back, of course, it will be pleasant to inherit the money;
but what about the wife?"
"Well," said Harrington sternly, "what about her?"
"I mean," said Portway hastily, "how do you know what she may be like?
Take another view of the case--pass me the tobacco pouch--I am a selfish
man as well as a poor one. You are giving me a delightful trip, finding
me in food, a horse, rifle and ammunition, everything I could wish for,
including a glass of prime old Bourbon whiskey. So I say, let's keep it
on as long as we can. By the way, how long have we been out here?"
"Going on for six weeks."
"Which are like six days."
"Ah, well," said Harrington over and over again, "we will not give up
yet."
This conversation, or one very similar, occurred again and again before
the day waned.
Dan Portway sat with his chin in his hands gazing down at the sleeping
figure in the shade.
When Dan Portway smiled, his was a pleasant though rather a coarse face,
and his changeful life had made him a man full of information, but when
he did not smile his face was not a pleasant one, vice in more than one
form having left its mark. When he looked at Harrington waking, he
invariably smiled; but Harrington was sleeping, and Dan Portway did not
smile now.
But he sat thinking of his companion's prospects--wealth, a handsome
wife, a life of luxury--and compared these prospects with his own. As
he watched the sleeper's frank, sun-browned face, he recalled everything
he had told him about home, his father and grandfather. He noted the
ring upon his finger--a heavy gold circle roughly beaten out of a piece
of virgin gold. He took in his lineaments, and compared their ages, and
he thought of the letters Harrington had among his traps in the tent
miles away beneath the pines.
There were other little things, too, there in the saddlebags, all of
which seemed to fit in with a misty chaotic set of ideas which floated
through his brain. Lastly, his eyes seemed to be fascinated by his
companion's breast as he lay there with his head thrown back, his
flannel shirt all open at the collar and chest, and as he gazed a ray of
sunlight shot between the boughs, and fell right upon the white skin.
Dan Portway leaned a little more forward, and his gaze grew more intent,
till all at once he let himself fall sidewise on the soft pine-needles.
For Harrington had made a restless motion, and then suddenly sprung up.
"Oh, hang it!" he cried. "Hi! Dan--bears!"
"Eh? Where?" cried Portway, in an excited whisper, as he rose to his
knees and grasped the rifle at his side.
"In Noah's ark, for aught I know," cried Harrington, laughing. "Don't
seem as if we're to find a grizzly. I just woke up in time to spoil
your dinner."
"What do you mean?"
"Cannibal dinner. I was being roasted. Sun is hot."
As he spoke he gave his breast a vicious rub and buttoned the collar of
his shirt.
"Come along. We'll go round the other side of the hill and get back to
camp. No bear to-day, but we may get a sheep."
"All right," was the reply; and Dan Portway's countenance seemed to have
been transformed; "will you lead?"
"Yes," said the other, as he carefully examined his rifle, while
Portway's eyes contracted, and he glanced at his own rifle as if he were
calculating odds.
"Come along, old chap, we've a long road to go," said Harrington, as he
led the way.
"Yes," said Portway beneath his breath, as, instead of walking boldly
and uprightly, he seemed to slouch along behind his companion.
The climb was so stiff, and in places so dangerous, that for some time
after no word was spoken. But at last they reached a shelf on the
mountain, running along by a profound ravine, down to the bottom of
which it was possible to climb, but the task was risky.
"Bad to tumble here, Dan," said Harrington suddenly.
"Yes," said the other, with an involuntary shiver, and he drew nearer to
his companion, who suddenly stopped at a projecting portion of the
shelf, and, shading his eyes, began to scan the prospect toward where,
in a perfect chaos of rocks, the sinking sun was gilding the glorious
scene.
"We can easily get round to camp this way," said Harrington, after a few
moments, and he took a step or two onward. "Mind how you come, Dan.
Hist! No gammon. Bears, by Jove?"
He pointed to a spot not a dozen yards away, where there were
unmistakable traces of a grizzly having made his lair, and dragging
round the little glass which hung from his shoulder, he adjusted it as
he rested his rifle against the rock, raised it to his eyes, and began
to search the hills and hollows for the game they sought.
He was leaning quite over the gulch, which fell almost perpendicularly
beneath them, his back to Portway, who was behind, and who, acting upon
the sudden impulse born of his cogitations while the other slept,
suddenly raised his rifle with both hands back over his head, and drove
the plated butt with all his force crash upon his companion's head.
There was a wild cry, and the next moment Portway was leaning forward at
the very edge of the precipice gazing down at the fallen body, which
plunged and rolled, and then stopped upon a mass of rock, two hundred
feet below, motionless.
Portway seemed as if turned to stone for the moment, then, rifle in
hand, he ran back a dozen yards, and began to descend, slipping,
leaping, and displaying wondrous activity in the perilous descent, till
he reached the spot where George Harrington lay, and examined the
inanimate form, seeing that the eyes were closed and that the blood was
welling from a terrible gash over the eyes.
Portway raised his rifle, lowered it, shook his head, and glanced round,
before standing the piece against the side of the precipice, as he saw
that below them the gulch went down sheer at least five hundred feet.
Then, bending over his victim, he tore open his breast, gazed for a few
moments at the blue stain, which stood out plainly on the white skin,
and then rapidly emptied the pockets of his trousers. As he did so his
eyes fell again on the glittering plain gold ring upon Harrington's
finger. This he hurriedly transferred to his own, seeing as he did so
that a name was roughly scratched within, and then, setting his teeth,
he gave a glance round, a heedless precaution in that solitary place,
caught the poor fellow by arm and waistband, raised him, and in another
moment would have thrust him over into the gulf, when a smile full of
cunning crossed his face.
Dropping the body he drew his bowie-knife, he muttered the one word
"Indian," and taking the crisp curling hair with his left hand, he
prepared to give the last refined piece of diabolism to his deed by
contriving that if the body were found the first wandering tribe in the
neighbourhood should get the blame.
There was no sign of compunction, no quiver of muscle or nerve; the head
was dragged up, and the next moment the point of the keen hunting-knife
divided the skin of the scalp, and the bright steel shone red in the
soft western glow.