OUT OF THE DARK
With her eyes smarting and her cheeks burning, for hours Jeanette lay
wide awake.
She was alone in her bedroom. After her illness Via had moved into the
adjoining room which previously had been reserved at the lodge for
guests.
The evening before Jeanette finally decided to discuss with her father
the subject so near her heart. The summer days were passing swiftly.
Already Mr. and Mrs. Barret were beginning to plan to return to the
East, taking Margery and their son to be ready for the opening of
school.
Between his mother and his guardian and Cecil Perry the question was
being argued: Should Cecil go back to a preparatory school with the
idea of entering college, or remain in the West, purchase a ranch and
become a ranchman.
His mother favored the first suggestion. Fascinated she might be
temporarily with the freer, wider outdoor life of the West, but her
interests and more intimate friendships were in the East where she
had spent all her previous time. For Cecil she desired a literary or
artistic career. With their wealth he need be in no hurry to acquire
money or fame. The fact that Cecil had changed so completely with only
a few months' residence in a different environment was a daily surprise
to his mother. He wished to become a ranchman and his guardian upheld
him in his desire. Cecil had grown older, stronger, more self-reliant
since his visit, his mother recognized. Her real objection to his
remaining in the West was chiefly the enforced separation from her. At
present her plan was to stay on at the Rainbow Castle until shortly
before the Christmas holidays. Then she would go back, open her New
York house and have Jeanette Colter as one of her Christmas guests.
In the meantime Jeanette would enter boarding school with Margery
Barret.
This arrangement, dear to any girl's heart, had been overthrown this
night by what Jeanette considered her father's obstinacy and false
pride.
In their interview during the evening he had refused positively even
to consider seriously Mrs. Perry's offer.
"Do you suppose for a moment, Jeanette, that I would decline to permit
your stepmother to pay your expenses at school and would then accept
the favor from an entire stranger?"
Observing Jeanette's expression, he added:
"If it were absolutely necessary for your health or happiness, perhaps
I would agree to see things differently. I have thought over the entire
situation and decided it is better that you remain at home another
year. Had you not brought up the subject, I should not have spoken of
it for the present. Now I wish you to realize that I am displeased by
your state of mind, as well as your behavior. It is my wish and my
intention that you continue to live in your own home until you acquire
a new attitude toward your stepmother. If you do not appreciate her,
the fault lies not in _her_ but in _you_. Say and think
nothing more concerning this boarding-school project. I will not
discuss the question with you again."
Small wonder that Jeanette was in a state of bitter and intense
rebellion against all family authority, especially her own.
She had not dared openly to defy her father. He was a man of quiet,
firm will, a manager of men for many years, men of strange histories
and temperaments who had come to live and work on the Rainbow Ranch.
Yet neither had Jeanette submitted. His own daughter, a portion of this
same strong will she had inherited from him.
To-night as she lay awake staring ahead in the darkness her thoughts
were not engaged with the idea of submission; rather was she planning
how to accomplish her own end.
Should she tell Mrs. Perry of her father's refusal? In this case, and
in defiance of his authority, would Mrs. Perry still be willing to come
to her assistance? In spite of the affection she undoubtedly felt for
her, Jeanette feared not.
Could she conceal from Mrs. Perry her father's point of view? This
appeared still more impossible, since in all probability her father
would thank Mrs. Perry for her kindness and at the same time decline to
acquiesce.
As she lay quietly in bed totally unable to sleep, Jeanette seemed to
be facing a stone wall in which there was no opening or loophole of
escape. She was not old enough to realize there may be invisible ways
around or through such walls which time alone shows us.
When at last Jeanette fell asleep she had almost lost hope.
Sleeping more soundly than usual, she found herself waking with a sense
of depression more profound than before. As she sat up in bed her eyes
were burning uncomfortably and an instant later she was struggling for
breath.
She gazed about her. Even in the darkness she could discern that the
atmosphere of the room showed a queer haze. A smell penetrated her
nostrils and her senses awoke. The room was filling with smoke.
At once Jeanette got into her slippers and dressing gown. She had the
type of mind that responds best to sudden demands.
When she and her father had sat late arguing with each other in the
living-room of the lodge, as the night was cool, a small fire had been
burning. One of the windows stood open. No one feared intruders and the
windows were rarely closed unless the weather demanded it.
The wind may have blown a spark from the fire and a blaze started in
the living-room, or the trouble may have originated in the kitchen.
Subconsciously was Jeanette discussing this problem with herself as she
rushed into the adjoining room to waken Via. If she and Via were less
intimate than formerly, Via was still her first thought.
Remaining long enough to see that her sister was fully aroused and to
tie a wet towel about her mouth, Jeanette then fled to Lina and Eda.
Next she entered her stepmother's room.
Already Jack was becoming aroused to a sensation of discomfort and
foreboding. She was out of bed and awake as she beheld Jeanette's
outline.
In her bedroom Jeanette found the smoke denser than in the others.
She and her stepmother ran at once toward the smaller connecting
bedroom. For the first time Jeanette had the sensation of stifling, of
fighting her way through a thick gathering of choking gray clouds.
Neither one of them spoke.
Mr. Colter slept in this smaller room and no sound had come from him.
At present his wife and daughter found themselves wondering why he had
not awakened and warned them. Always he had been the shelter and strong
force in every crisis in their lives.
Reaching him first and catching him firmly by the shoulder, Jack
struggled to arouse him. She found his body already limp and inert. The
room was become a thick cloud. Located immediately above the fireplace
in the living-room, the smoke probably had penetrated here first and
then spread into the other parts of the house.
"We must get your father out of here, Jeanette, I cannot waken him,"
Jack announced, her throat so filled with smoke she could scarcely
speak.
Jeanette somehow made her way into the bathroom, returning with damp
towels. One she tied about her own nostrils and lips, another she
adjusted about her father's face, the third she offered her stepmother.
The woman and girl pulled at the heavy figure.
They were both strong, but he was a man six feet in height, big-boned
and muscular.
Nevertheless, half supporting, half carrying him, they got him to the
door and through the short hall and down the stairs.
Neither the woman nor girl knew how they managed. Although the fire
actually had started in the living-room, downstairs the smoke was not
so heavy.
Moreover, the front door stood open and Lina rushed indoors to help
them, having spied the struggling figures through the gloom.
Outside Eda stood gazing with wide-open, terrified blue eyes at the
Rainbow Lodge. No one else had been aroused, as no one else was
sleeping in the house.
So far no flames had appeared.
Placing the still inert figure at a safe distance from the house, Mrs.
Colter and Jeanette drew in deep breaths of the August night air.
Jeanette remained close to her father. She was suffering from deep
waves of compunction for her state of mind toward him a few hours
before. When would he speak or move?
Mrs. Colter was closer to the old lodge. Lina, with presence of mind at
last aroused, had run toward the rear of the house to ring the alarm
bell.
Suddenly with a cry, Eda flung her arms about her stepmother.
"Via! Where is Via?" she exclaimed. "I have been waiting and watching
for her. Every one else is safe, only Via."
Mrs. Colter held the little girl fast.
"Via!" she called, peering through the darkness.
A little tongue of flame had crept out of one of the windows.
There was no answer, no sign of the delicate figure, the wistful face
of the Ranch Girl whom her stepmother and entire family loved best.
With a swift movement the older woman disentangled herself from the
little girl's arms.
In another moment she had gone inside the burning house.
Jeanette, leaning over her father, did not immediately observe this. He
was trying to speak.
"Something has happened, I don't know what. Are my girls safe?" he
queried.
Jeanette felt a thrill of pleasure. Her father's first thought had been
for them, not for his wife! She could not know that he believed himself
to be addressing Jack.
She turned her head.
What had become of her stepmother and where was Via? Why had she failed
to realize until this instant that she had not seen Via since she
aroused her from bed and bade her run swiftly down the smoke-filled
hall?
"Eda, where is Via? You must have seen her!" cried Jeanette, clutching
the little girl's shoulders with hot, nervous hands.
Eda pointed toward the house.
"She has never come out. I have been calling and calling, and waiting
and waiting." Her voice rose to a thin wail. "Mother has gone to find
her," she added, with a slightly happier note.
Jeanette became aware that her stepmother had disappeared.
She looked despairingly about her.
At some distance she could see the outlines of dark figures and hear
the pattering of a horse's hoofs. Lina's bell, which she continued
ringing, was bringing friends to their aid at last.
Several minutes must elapse before they could reach the house.
In the meantime her stepmother and Via were amid the smoke and flames.
Would her stepmother alone be able to find and rescue Via?
Even as she felt the heat of the burning house Jeanette shivered. Her
courage had deserted her. She had done her share. Had she not warned
every member of her family and seen them safely out of doors?
No, there was Via. She had been warned, but something had occurred.
Perhaps she had fainted or become stifled from the smoke.
Well, her stepmother was searching for her and the lodge was small,
so by this time she must have been discovered. Her stepmother had not
hesitated to go back into the house a second time. Everybody agreed she
always had been singularly courageous and Jeanette never had made any
such claim for herself.
"But Via--Via, of all persons! I must do what I can to save her!"
Jeanette flung up her arms over her head in a curious gesture. With
her short hair, her gallant figure and look of high resolve of courage
gained not by impulse but by prayer, she might have been a young Joan
of Arc. A moment she stood, then dashed into the burning building.
"Don't go in, not you!" she heard Eda crying after her.
* * * * *
The next words Jeanette distinguished were uttered by a different voice.
"She is coming around all right, mother, don't be so frightened."
The voice was Cecil Perry's. He was standing near, bending over her.
Her head lay in Mrs. Perry's lap. A wet handkerchief was gently wiping
the smoke and grime from her face.
About them Jeanette seemed to see a small multitude of friends and
neighbors and the men employed on the Rainbow Ranch.
"Mother and Via?" she inquired, not conscious that she was using the
name she had vowed to herself never to employ.
"They are better off than you are. You are not to worry," Cecil
answered comfortingly and with a new note of respect in his voice that
Jeanette never had heard before.