He stopped short, in sheer incapacity, to go further. Jenny had not
always been easy to understand, but she was wholly incomprehensible now.
She picked up the pigeons and was about to speak, but she glanced at the
bedroom door, where her exhausted visitor had stretched himself on her
bed, and beckoned her uncle to another room.
"There's a plate of vittles ready for you in there," she said. "I'll
tell you as you eat."
He followed her into the little living-room adorned by the trophies of
his earlier achievements with gun and rifle, and sat down at the table,
where some food lay covered by a clean white cloth.
"No one'll ever look after me as you've done, Jinny," he said, as he
lifted the cloth and saw the palatable dish ready for him. Then he
remembered again about to-morrow and the Dog Nose Rapids.
"What's it all about, Jinny? What's that about my canoeing a man down to
Bindon?"
"Eat, uncle," she said more softly than she had yet spoken, for his words
about her care of him had brought a moisture to her eyes. "I'll be back
in a minute and tell you all about it."
"Well, it's about took away my appetite," he said. "I feel a kind of
sinking." He took from his pocket a bottle, poured some of its contents
into a tin cup, and drank it off.
"No, I suppose you couldn't take a man down to Bindon," she said, as she
saw his hand trembling on the cup. Then she turned and entered the other
room again. Going to the cupboard, she hastily heaped a plate with food,
and, taking a dipper of water from a pail near by, she entered her
bedroom hastily and placed what she had brought on a small table, as her
visitor rose slowly from the bed.
He was about to speak, but she made a protesting gesture.
"I can't tell you anything yet," she said. "Who was it come?" he asked.
"My uncle--I'm going to tell him."
"The men after me may git here any minute," he urged anxiously.
"They'd not be coming into my room," she answered, flushing slightly.
"Can't you hide me down by the river till we start?" he asked, his eyes
eagerly searching her face. He was assuming that she would take him down
the river: but she gave no sign.
"I've got to see if he'll take you first," she answered.
"He--your uncle, Tom Sanger? He drinks, I've heard. He'd never git to
Bindon."
She did not reply directly to his words. "I'll come back and tell you.
There's a place you could hide by the river where no one could ever find
you," she said, and left the room.
As she stepped out, she saw the old man standing in the doorway of the
other room. His face was petrified with amazement.
"Who you got in that room, Jinny? What man you got in that room? I
heard a man's voice. Is it because o' him that you bin talkin' about no
weddin' to-morrow? Is it one o' the others come back, puttin' you off
Jake again?"
Her eyes flashed fire at his first words, and her breast heaved with
anger, but suddenly she became composed again and motioned him to a
chair.
"You eat, and I'll tell you all about it, Uncle Tom," she said, and,
seating herself at the table also, she told him the story of the man who
must go to Bindon.
When she had finished, the old man blinked at her for a minute without
speaking, then he said slowly: "I heard something 'bout trouble down at
Bindon yisterday from a Hudson's Bay man goin' North, but I didn't take
it in. You've got a lot o' sense, Jinny, an' if you think he's tellin'
the truth, why, it goes; but it's as big a mixup as a lariat in a steer's
horns. You've got to hide him sure, whoever he is, for I wouldn't hand
an Eskimo over, if I'd taken him in my home once; we're mountain people.
A man ought to be hung for horse-stealin', but this was different. He
was doing it to save a man's life, an' that man at Bindon was good to his
little gal, an' she's dead."
He moved his head from side to side with the air of a sentimental
philosopher. He had all the vanity of a man who had been a success in a
small, shrewd, culpable way--had he not evaded the law for thirty years
with his whiskey-still?
"I know how he felt," he continued. "When Betsy died--we was only four
years married--I could have crawled into a knot-hole an' died there. You
got to save him, Jinny, but"--he came suddenly to his feet--"he ain't
safe here. They might come any minute, if they've got back on his trail.
I'll take him up the gorge. You know where."
"You sit still, Uncle Tom," she rejoined. "Leave him where he is a
minute. There's things must be settled first. They ain't going to look
for him in my bedroom, be they?"
The old man chuckled. "I'd like to see 'em at it. You got a temper,
Jinny; and you got a pistol too, eh?" He chuckled again. "As good a
shot as any in the mountains. I can see you darin' 'em to come on. But
what if Jake come, and he found a man in your bedroom"--he wiped the
tears of laughter from his eyes--"why, Jinny--!"
He stopped short, for there was anger in her face. "I don't want to hear
any more of that. I do what I want to do," she snapped out.
"Well, well, you always done what you wanted; but we got to git him up
the hills, till it's sure they're out o' the mountains and gone back.
It'll be days, mebbe."
"Uncle Tom, you've took too much to drink," she answered. "You don't
remember he's got to be at Bindon by to-morrow noon. He's got to save
his friend by then."
"Pshaw! Who's going to take him down the river to-night? You're goin'
to be married to-morrow. If you like, you can give him the canoe. It'll
never come back, nor him neither!"
"You've been down with me," she responded suggestively. "And you went
down once by yourself."
He shook his head. "I ain't been so well this summer. My sight ain't
what it was. I can't stand the racket as I once could. 'Pears to me I'm
gettin' old. No, I couldn't take them rapids, Jinny, not for one frozen
minute."
She looked at him with trouble in her eyes, and her face lost some of its
colour. She was fighting back the inevitable, even as its shadow fell
upon her. "You wouldn't want a man to die, if you could save him, Uncle
Tom--blown up, sent to Kingdom Come without any warning at all; and
perhaps he's got them that love him--and the world so beautiful."
"Well, it ain't nice dyin' in the summer, when it's all sun, and there's
plenty everywhere; but there's no one to go down the river with him.
What's his name?"
Her struggle was over. She had urged him, but in very truth she was
urging herself all the time, bringing herself to the axe of sacrifice.
"His name's Dingley. I'm going down the river with him--down to Bindon."
The old man's mouth opened in blank amazement. His eyes blinked
helplessly.
"What you talkin' about, Jinny! Jake's comin' up with the minister, an'
you're goin' to be married at noon to-morrow."
"I'm takin' him"--she jerked her head towards the room where Dingley was
--"down Dog Nose Rapids to-night. He's risked his life for his friend,
thinkin' of her that's dead an' gone, and a man's life is a man's life.
If it was Jake's life in danger, what'd I think of a woman that could
save him, and didn't?"
"Onct you broke off with Jake Lawson--the day before you was to be
married; an' it's took years to make up an' agree again to be spliced.
If Jake comes here to-morrow, and you ain't here, what do you think he'll
do? The neighbours are comin' for fifty miles round, two is comin' up a
hundred miles, an' you can't--Jinny, you can't do it. I bin sick of
answerin' questions all these years 'bout you and Jake, an' I ain't goin'
through it again. I've told more lies than there's straws in a tick."
She flamed out. "Then take him down the river yourself--a man to do a
man's work. Are you afeard to take the risk?"
He held out his hands slowly and looked at them. They shook a little.
"Yes, Jinny," he said sadly, "I'm afeard. I ain't what I was. I made a
mistake, Jinny. I've took too much whiskey. I'm older than I ought to
be. I oughtn't never to have had a whiskey-still, an' I wouldn't have
drunk so much. I got money--money for you, Jinny, for you an' Jake, but
I've lost what I'll never git back. I'm afeard to go down the river with
him. I'd go smash in the Dog Nose Rapids. I got no nerve. I can't hunt
the grizzly any more, nor the puma, Jinny. I got to keep to common
shootin', now and henceforth, amen! No, I'd go smash in Dog Nose
Rapids."
She caught his hands impulsively. "Don't you fret, Uncle Tom. You've
bin a good uncle to me, and you've bin a good friend, and you ain't the
first that's found whiskey too much for him. You ain't got an enemy in
the mountains. Why, I've got two or three--"
"Shucks! Women--only women whose beaux left 'em to follow after you.
That's nothing, an' they'll be your friends fast enough after you're
married tomorrow."
"I ain't going to be married to-morrow. I'm going down to Bindon
to-night. If Jake's mad, then it's all over, and there'll be more
trouble among the women up here."
By this time they had entered the other room. The old man saw the white
petticoat on the chair. "No woman in the mountains ever had a petticoat
like that, Jinny. It'd make a dress, it's that pretty an' neat. Golly,
I'd like to see it on you, with the blue skirt over, and just hitched up
a little."
"Oh, shut up--shut up!" she said in sudden anger, and caught up the
petticoat as though she would put it away; but presently she laid it down
again and smoothed it with quick, nervous fingers. "Can't you talk sense
and leave my clothes alone? If Jake comes, and I'm not here, and he
wants to make a fuss, and spoil everything, and won't wait, you give him
this petticoat. You put it in his arms. I bet you'll have the laugh on
him. He's got a temper."
"So've you, Jinny, dear, so've you," said the old man, laughing. "You're
goin' to have your own way, same as ever--same as ever."