It was late afternoon when they came into Lac Bain, and as soon as
Philip had turned over the colonel and his wife to Breed, he hurried to
his own cabin. At the door he encountered Buck Nome. The two men had
not met since a month before at Nelson House, and “there was but little
cordiality in Steele to say howdy to 'em,” explained Nome, pausing for a
moment. “Deuce of a good joke on you, Steele! How do you like the job
of bringing in an old colonel's frozen wife, or a frozen colonel's old
wife, eh?”
Every fiber in Steele's body grew tense at the banter in the other's
voice. He whirled upon Nome, who had partly turned away.
“You remember--you lied down there at Nelson to get just such a 'job' as
this,” he reminded. “Have you forgotten what happened--after that?”
“Don't get miffed about it, man,” returned Nome with an irritating
laugh. “All's fair in love and war. That was love down there, 'pon my
word of honor it was, and this is about as near the other thing as I
want to come.”
There was something in his laugh that drew Steele's lips in a tight line
as he entered the cabin. It was not the first time that he had listened
to Nome's gloating chuckle at the mention of certain women. It was this
more than anything else that made him hate the man.
Physically, Nome was a magnificent specimen, beyond doubt the handsomest
man in the service north of Winnipeg; so that while other men despised
him for what they knew, women admired and loved him--until, now and then
too late for their own salvation, they discovered that his moral code
was rotten to the core.
Such a thing had happened at Nelson House, and Philip felt himself
burning with a desire to choke the life out of Nome as he recalled the
tragedy there. And what would happen--now? The thought came to him like
a dash of cold water, and yet, after a moment, his teeth gleamed in a
smile as a vision rose before him of the love and purity which he had
seen in the sweet face of the colonel's wife. He chuckled softly to
himself as he dragged out a pack from under his bunk; but there was
no humor in the chuckle. From it he took a bundle wrapped in soft
birch-bark, and from this produced the skull that he had brought up with
him from the South. There was a tremble of excitement in his low laugh
as he glanced about the gloomy interior of the cabin.
From the log ceiling hung a big oil lamp with a tin reflector, and under
this he hung the skull.
“You'll make a pretty ornament, M'sieur Janette,” he exclaimed, standing
off to contemplate the white thing leering and bobbing at him from the
end of its string. “Mon Dieu, I tell you that when the lamp is lighted
Bucky Nome must be blind if he doesn't recognize you, even though you're
dead, M'sieur!”
He lighted a smaller lamp, shaved himself, and changed his clothes. It
was dark when he was ready for supper, and Nome had not returned. He
waited a quarter of an hour longer, then put on his cap and coat and
lighted the big oil lamp. At the door he turned to look back. The
cavernous sockets of the skull stared at him. From where he stood he
could see the ragged hole above the ear.
“It's your game to-night, M'sieur Janette,” he cried back softly, and
closed the door behind him.
They were gathered before a huge fire of logs in the factor's big
living-room when Philip joined the others. A glance told him why Nome
had not returned to the cabin. Breed and the colonel were smoking cigars
over a ragged ledger of stupendous size, which the factor had spread
out upon a small table, and both were deeply absorbed. Mrs. Becker was
facing the fire, and close beside her sat Nome, leaning toward her and
talking in a voice so low that only a murmur of it came to Steele's
ears. The man's face was flushed when he looked up, and his eyes shone
with the old fire which made Philip hate him.
As the woman turned to greet him Steele felt a suddenly sickening
sensation grip at his heart. Her cheeks, too, were flushed, and the
color in them deepened still more when he bowed to her and joined the
two men at the table. The colonel shook hands with him, and Philip
noticed that once or twice after that his eyes shifted uneasily in the
direction of the two before the fire, and that whenever the low laughter
of Mrs. Becker and Nome came to them he paid less attention to the
columns of figures which Breed was pointing out to him. When they rose
to go into supper, Philip's blood boiled as Nome offered his arm to Mrs.
Becker, who accepted it with a swift, laughing glance at the colonel.
There was no response in the older man's pale face, and Philip's fingers
dug hard into the palms of his hands. At the table Nome's attentions to
Mrs. Becker were even more marked. Once, under pretext of helping her to
a dish, he whispered words which brought a deeper flush to her cheeks,
and when she looked at the colonel his eyes were fixed upon her in stern
reproof. It was abominable! Was Nome mad? Was the woman--
Steele did not finish the thought in his own mind. His eyes encountered
those of the colonel's wife across the table. He saw a sudden, quick
catch of breath in her throat; even as he looked the flush faded from
her face, and she rose from her seat, her gaze still upon him.
“I--I am not feeling well,” she said. “Will you please excuse me?”
In an instant Nome was at her side, but she turned quickly from him to
the colonel, who had risen from his chair.
“Please take me to my room,” she begged. “Then--then you can come back.”
Once more her face turned to Steele. There was a pallor in it now that
startled him. For a few moments he stood alone, as Breed and Nome left
the table. He listened, and heard the opening and closing of a second
door.
Then a footstep, and Nome reappeared.
“By Heaven, but she's a beauty!” he exclaimed. “I tell you, Steele--”
Something in his companion's eyes stopped him. Two red spots burned in
Steele's cheeks as he advanced and gripped the other fiercely by the
arm.
“Yes, she is pretty--very pretty,” he said quietly, his fingers sinking
deeper into Nome's arm. “Get your hat and coat, Nome. I want to see you
in the cabin.”
Behind them the door opened and closed again, and Steele shoved past his
associate to meet Breed.
“Buck and I have a little matter to attend to over at the cabin,” he
explained. “When they--when the colonel returns tell him we'll be over
to smoke an after-supper pipe with him a little later, will you? And
give our compliments to--her.” With a half-sneer on his lips he rejoined
Nome, who stared hard at him, and followed him through the outer door.
“Now, what the devil does this mean?” Nome demanded when they were
outside. “If you have anything on your mind, Steele--”
“I have,” interrupted Philip, “and I'm going to relieve myself of it.
Pretty? She's as beautiful as an angel, Buck--the colonel's wife, I
mean. And you--” He laughed harshly. “You're always the lucky dog, Buck
Nome. You think she's half in love with you now. Too bad she was taken
ill just at the psychological moment, as you might say, Buck. Wonder
what was the matter?”
“Don't know,” growled Nome, conscious of something in the other's voice
which darkness concealed in his face.
“Of course, you don't,” replied Steele.
“That's why I am bringing you over to the cabin. I am going to tell you
just what happened when Mrs. Becker was taken ill, and when she turned
a trifle pale, if you noticed sharply. Buck. It's a good joke, a mighty
good joke, and I know you will thoroughly appreciate it.”
He drew a step back when they came near the cabin, and Nome entered
first. Very coolly Philip turned and bolted the door. Then, throwing off
his coat, he pointed to the white skull dangling under the lamp.
“Allow me to introduce an old friend of mine, Buck--M'sieur Janette, of
Nelson House.”
With a sudden curse Nome leaped toward his companion, his face flaming,
his hands clenched to strike--only to look into the shining muzzle of
Steele's revolver, with Steele's cold gray eyes glittering dangerously
behind it.
“Sit down, Nome--right there, under the man you killed!” he commanded.
“Sit down, or by the gods I'll blow your head off where you stand!
There--and I'll sit here, like this, so that the cur's heart within you
is a bull's-eye for this gun. It's M'sieur Janette's turn tonight,”
he went on, leaning over the little table, the red spots in his cheeks
growing redder and brighter as Nome cringed before his revolver.
“M'sieur Janette's--and the colonel's; but mostly Janette's. Remember
that, Nome. It's for Janette. I'm not thinking much about Mrs.
Becker--just now.”
Steele's breath came quickly and his lips were almost snarling in his
hatred of the man before him.
“It's a lie!” gasped Nome chokingly, his face ashen white. “You lie when
you say I killed--Janette.”
The fingers of Steele's pistol hand twitched.
“How I'd like to kill you!” he breathed. “You won his wife, Nome; you
broke his heart--and after that he killed himself. You sent a report
into headquarters that he killed himself by accident. You lied. It
was you who killed him--by taking his wife. I got his skull because I
thought I might need it against you to show that it was a pistol instead
of a rifle that killed him. And this isn't the first man you've sent to
hell, Nome, and is isn't the first woman. But your next won't be Mrs.
Becker!”
He thrust his revolver almost into the other man's face as Nome opened
his lips to speak.
“Shut up!” he cried. “If you open your dirty mouth again I'll be tempted
to kill you where you sit! Don't you know what happened to-night? Don't
you know that Mrs. Becker forgot herself, and remembered again, just in
time, and that you've taken a little blood from the colonel's heart as
you took all of it from--his?” He reached up and broke the string that
held the skull, turning the empty face of the thing toward Nome. “Look
at it, you scoundrel! That's the man you killed, as you would kill the
colonel if you could. That's Janette!”
His voice fell to a hissing whisper as he shoved the skull slowly across
the table, so close that a sudden movement would have sent it against
the other's breast.
“We've been fixing this thing up between us, Bucky--M'sieur Janette and
I,” he went on, “and we've come to the conclusion that we won't kill
you, but that you don't belong to the service. Understand?”
“You mean--to drive me out--” One of Nome's hands had stolen to his
side, and Steele's pistol arm grew tense.
“On the table with your hands, Bucky! There, that's better,” he laughed
softly.
“Yes, we're going to drive you out. You're going to pack up a few things
right away, Bucky, and you're going to run like the devil away from this
place. I'd advise you to go straight back to headquarters and resign
from the Northwest Mounted. MacGregor knows you pretty well, Bucky, and
knows one or two things you've done, even though your whole record is
not an open book to him. I don't believe he'll put any obstacles in
the way of your discharge although your enlistment hasn't expired.
Disability is an easy plea, you know. But if the inspector should think
so much of you that he is loath to let you go, then M'sieur Janette
and I will have to fix up the story for headquarters, and I don't mind
telling you we'll add just a little for interest, and that the woman and
the people at Nelson House will swear to it. You've the making of a good
outlaw, Bucky,” he smiled tauntingly, “and if you follow your natural
bent you'll have some of your old friends after you, good and hard.
You'd better steer clear of that though, and try your hand at being
honest for once. M'sieur Janette wants to give you this chance, and
you'd better make good time. So get a move on, Bucky. You'll need a
blanket and a little grub, that's all.”
“Steele, you don't mean this! Good God, man--” Nome had half risen to
his feet. “You don't mean this!”
With his free hand Philip took out his watch.
“I mean that if you are not gone within fifteen minutes I'll march you
over to Breed and the colonel, tell them the story of M'sieur Janette,
here, and hold you until we hear from headquarters,” he said quickly.
“Which will it be, Nome?”
Like one stunned by a blow Nome rose slowly to his feet. He spoke no
word as he carefully filled his pack with the necessities of a long
journey. At the door, as he opened it to go, he turned for just an
instant upon Steele, who was still holding the revolver in his hand.
“Remember, Bucky,” admonished Philip in a quiet voice, “it's all for the
good of yourself and the service.”
Fear had gone from Nome's face. It was filled now with a hatred so
intense that his teeth shone like the fangs of a snarling animal.
“To hell with you,” he said, “and to hell with the service; but
remember, Philip Steele, remember that some day we'll meet again.”
“Some day,” laughed Philip. “Good-by, Bucky Nome--deserter!”
The door closed and Nome was gone.
“Now, M'sieur Janette, it's our turn,” cried Steele, smiling
companionably upon the skull and loading his pipe. “It's our turn.”
He laughed aloud, and for some time puffed out luxurious clouds of smoke
in silence.
“It's the best day's work I've done in my life,” he continued, with his
eyes still upon the skull. “The very best, and it would be complete,
M'sieur, if I could send you down to the woman who helped to kill you.”
He stopped, and his eyes leaped with a sudden fire. “By George!” he
exclaimed, under his breath. His pipe went out; for many minutes he
stared with set face at the skull, as if it had spoken to him and its
voice had transfixed him where he stood. Then he tossed his pipe upon
the table, collected his service equipment and strapped it in his pack.
After that he returned to the table with a pad of paper and a pencil
and sat down. His face was strangely white as he took the skull in his
hands.
“I'll do it, so help me all the gods, I'll do it!” he breathed
excitedly. “M'sieur, a woman killed you---as much as Bucky Nome, a woman
did it. You couldn't do her any good--but you might--another. I'm going
to send you to her, M'sieur. You're a terrible lesson, and I may be a
beast; but you're preaching a powerful sermon, and I guess--perhaps--you
may do her good. I'll tell her your story, old man, and the story of the
woman who made you so nice and white and clean. Perhaps she'll see the
moral, M'sieur. Eh? Perhaps!”
For a long time he wrote, and when he had done he sealed the writing,
put the envelope and the skull together in a box, and tied the whole
with babiche string. On the outside he fastened another note to Breed,
the factor, in which he explained that he and Bucky Nome had found
it necessary to leave that very night for the West. And he heavily
underscored the lines in which he directed the factor to see that the
box was delivered to Mrs. Colonel Becker, and that, as he valued the
honor and the friendship of the service, and especially of Philip
Steele, all knowledge of it should be kept from the colonel himself.
It was eight o'clock when he went out into the night with his pack upon
his back. He grunted approval when he found it was snowing, for the
track of himself and Nome would be covered. Through the thickening gloom
the two or three lights in the factor's home gleamed like distant stars.
One of them was brighter than the others, and he knew that it came from
the rooms which Breed had fitted up for the colonel and his wife. As
Philip halted for a moment, his eyes drawn by a haunting fascination to
that window, the light grew clearer and brighter, and he fancied that he
saw a face looking out into the night--toward his cabin. A moment later
he knew that it was the woman's face. Then a door opened, and a figure
hurried across the open. He stepped back into the gloom of his own cabin
and waited. It was the colonel. Three times he knocked loudly at the
cabin door.
“I'd like to go out and shake his hand,” muttered Steele. “I'd like to
tell him that he isn't the only man who's had an idol broken, and that
Mrs. B.'s little flirtation isn't a circumstance--to what might have
happened.”
Instead, he moved silently away, and turned his face into the thin trail
that buried itself in the black forests of the West.