Suppers were always over with early in Adonia. The red west was banded
with half on hour's April daylight when the new waitress finished her
work. She hurried up to her room; she locked her door with the
panic-stricken air of one who desires to shut out danger.
She was in no mood to question the worthiness of the impulse which had
sent her into the north, but she was realizing in fuller measure the
difficulties with which she must deal. In the dining room she had felt
recklessly intrepid and the utter mystification of Buck Crowley had
amused her. But she had had plenty of opportunity in her Vose-Mern work
to know the nature of Crowley--he had the shell of an alligator and the
scruples of a viper and would double-cross a twin brother if the project
could help the fortunes of Buck himself.
Once more she admitted that she was afraid. It was if she had touched
levers and had started machinery which she could not stop; she had
launched two men at each other and had observed the first ominous
clinches--and Crowley had warned her that she was in the region of
"he-men." But Crowley was not of a sort to use the manly weapons of the
frank fighters of the north.
With the sense of hiding away from impending trouble, sorry for her
share in starting it, she sat by the window, put her forehead on her
arms, wept weakly, and told herself that she was a very poor article of
a heroine.
However, the sunset soothed and invited her when she wiped her eyes. She
beheld the honest outdoors of the forest country. She was hungry for
those open places of earth. She knew that her resolution was ebbing the
longer she hid herself in that hole of a room, like a terrified animal.
She put on a hat and a wrap and started out.
She was perfectly well aware of the gantlet she must run.
Crowley was patrolling the porch; she issued from a side door of the
tavern, but she was obliged to pass him in order to get into the street.
His high sign to her was peremptory and unmistakable--Mr. Crowley had
business with her! Right then, in spite of her planned intent to bluff
out the situation just as long as she could at that distance from Mern,
she was not in a state of mind to meet Crowley.
She heard steps behind her and was accosted, but her frown of
apprehensiveness became a smile of welcome when she turned and beheld
Latisan; the welcome was not so much from interest in Latisan as from
the sense that she would have a respite from Crowley.
"If you're going to look the place over, won't you allow me to go
along?" he pleaded. "I'll follow behind like a terrier, if you tell me
to. I want to keep you from being bothered by anybody."
She showed concern and looked about her.
"Oh, by that cheap drummer, I mean. You needn't ever be afraid of
woodsmen up here. I was watching him when you came out. If it wasn't for
starting a lot of tattle I'd beat him up on the street."
"Really, you'd better come along with me, Mr. Latisan, out of the reach
of any such temptation."
"Perhaps you'd like to get a view of the falls from the best point," he
suggested, as they walked on.
When they turned into a path and disappeared from Crowley's ken the
latter buttoned his coat and started leisurely on their trail.
On the edge of the gorge there was a niche in the cliff, a natural seat
padded with moss. Latisan led her to the spot. He did not indulge his
longing to sit beside her; he stood at a little distance, respectfully,
and allowed her to think her thoughts. Those thoughts and her memories
were very busy just then; she was glad because the everlasting diapason
of the falls made conversation difficult.
Until then, in her reflections, she had been considering Ward Latisan
merely as her stricken grandfather's staff of hope, an aid so essential
that the Comas had determined to eliminate him. She surveyed him as he
stood there in his own and fitting milieu and found him reassuringly
stalwart as a dependable champion.
Alone with him, making estimate with her eyes and her understanding, she
was conscious that her first surprise at sight of the real Latisan was
giving way to deepening interest.
She reflected again on the character which had been given this man by
Rufus Craig, and remembered more vividly what she had written about him
for the guidance of the Vose-Mern agency.
There must be something wrong in Craig's estimate! She felt that she had
an eye of her own for qualities in a man, and this man's clean sincerity
had impressed her in their first meeting in the New York cafeteria.
He turned from his survey of the waters and met her gaze. "I was pretty
much flustered that day in New York, Miss Jones. I was more so to-day at
the railroad station. I don't know how to act with girls very well," he
confessed naively. "I want to say something right here and now. There
are mean stories going the rounds about me up in this country. I'm
afraid you'll hear some of them. I don't want you--I don't want
everybody to think I'm what they are trying to make out I am--they lied
over Tomah way to hurt me in business. But perhaps you don't care one
way or the other," he probed, wistfully.
He found encouragement in her expression and went on. "I was away at
Tech, taking a special course, and they lied about me. I was trying to
make something more of myself than just a lumberjack. And I thought
there was a chance for me to help things on the Tomah after I learned
something about engineering. I was doing my best, that's all, and the
liars saw their opening and took it. If you hear the stories I hope you
won't believe them."
Hastily she looked away from his earnest and imploring eyes and gave her
attention to the turbid freshet flood, shredded into a yellow and
yeasty riot of waters.
Her recollection of childhood became clearer now that she was back
beside the cataract which was linked with all her early memories. He did
not venture to disturb her with more talk.
She remained there until the chill from the air and the mist from the
falling waters and the growing dusk warned her.
They were back at the edge of the village street before he spoke again.
"The falls are pretty wild now; they're beautiful in the summer when the
water is low. When I was a boy I footed it over here from the Tomah a
few times and sat in that niche and listened to the song the waters
seemed to sing. It was worth the long hike. Being there just now brought
back something I'd almost forgotten. One day the waters sung me to sleep
and when I woke up there was a little girl dancing in front of me and
pointing her finger, and I looked at myself and saw she had made a chain
of daisies and hung it around my neck and had stuck clover blooms all
over me. And when she saw that I was awake she scampered off with some
other children. Queer how the funny little thoughts like that pop up in
a person's mind!"
Fresh from the scene, softened by her ponderings, Lida felt the surge of
an impulse to tell him that the same memory had come to her while she
sat in the niche. She was the child who had made the daisy chain--who
had been bolder than the other children in approaching the sleeping
stranger. And she was not ready to agree with him that the memory was
"queer." She wished she could confess her identity to him right then,
because the confession would enable her to bring up a topic which had
been interesting her very much--how personalities, meeting as strangers,
often prompt each other through subtle psychic qualities of past
association; there were instances in the books she had read where
persons claimed to have recognized each other from past incarnations;
but Lida did not believe that stuff, she had told herself. As to the
mutual remembrance of the daisy chain--that was different--it seemed
quite natural. She could remember just how comically that boy's nose
twitched when she was waking him up with a buttercup blossom.
Latisan was conscious of a queer unwillingness to have her leave him. He
wondered what excuse he could offer to prolong the companionship of the
evening. He wanted to link up her affairs with his in some way, if he
could--that there might be something in common between them. To solicit
her aid--her counsel; it is the first hankering of a man in his striving
toward a woman's favor.
In this case, the drive master, desperately casting about for an excuse,
was guilty of something like an enormity in venturesomeness. His own
business was calling him to the big house on the ledges; in his new
state of softened spirit he was dreading any run-in with Echford Flagg.
Perhaps gossip had already carried to Flagg the reason why the drive
master had not hastened to report about the dynamite victory. To exhibit
the actual reason for the delay, in her own winning person, seemed a
very proper thing to do according to Latisan's clouded judgment of the
moment.
"Let me tell you!" he urged. "I've got to run up to Flagg's on business.
You'll have something to talk to him about--those friends----"
"No, no!" She hurried on toward the tavern.
He ventured to clasp her arm, detaining her. "He's a poor, sick old man.
A little talk with you will do him good."
Her memory was vivid. "But you told me in New York that he won't have a
woman near his house."
"He's different nowadays," persisted Latisan. "He's sick and it will be
a treat for him to have a girl say some kind words. I want him to meet
you----"
But she shook off his hand and resolutely kept on her way. "I must go
in. I'm tired after my long journey--and my work." There were loafers in
front of the tavern. "I'm very much obliged to you, Mr. Latisan," she
called so that all could hear, "for your kindness in showing me the way
to the falls. Good night!" She disappeared.
There was nothing for Latisan to do but to brave the old tiger of the
big house alone. Outside of his desire to keep her with him as long as
possible, he had wanted her to go along into the presence of Flagg as a
guaranty of the peace; he did not believe that Flagg would launch
invective in the hearing of the girl; furthermore, Latisan was conscious
of a proud anxiety to exhibit her.
Flagg tipped the shade of the lamp so that Latisan's face was
illuminated when the drive master was in the room.
"Shaved!" snorted the tyrant. "All duded up and beauing around a table
girl. I know all about it. Latisan, you----"
"Just a moment, Mr. Flagg!"
"Shaved, right in the start of the driving season! Shut up! I can see
what's happening. I heard you had brought the dynamite. But somebody
else told me. Yes, told me other news! I can't depend on you any longer
to bring me reports. But you're planting something worse than dynamite
under yourself. Parading a girl and keeping me waiting and----"
"Let me warn you, sir. Only my pride in doing a job I have set out to do
is keeping me on with you. If you insult that young lady by another word
I'll quit you cold, here and now!"
There was a moment of silence.
Rickety Dick, sitting on his stool with a cat in his arms, wriggled as
uneasily as did the cat, who had been alarmed by the high voices.
"Talk about dynamite being dangerous!" muttered Flagg. "There's
something else----"
But when he looked into Latisan's countenance he lowered the shade of
the lamp and did not state what the something else was.
"If you know about the dynamite, sir, there's no need of my saying
anything. It's on its way north. I shall start for headwaters at
daybreak. I'll be down to report as soon as possible."
"When you get up on the drive, you stay there, Latisan."
"It's my pledged word that I must report to you in person. You insisted
on it. I don't propose to give you any chance for come-backs. I shall
report, Mr. Flagg."
He walked out.
Soon he heard the pattering of feet behind him on the ledges and he was
hailed cautiously by the quavering voice of old Dick.
"Who is she, Mr. Latisan? Who is that girl?" panted Dick; "I saw her
when she walked with you. I was side of the road."
"And ran and tattled to Flagg, eh?"
"No--no, sir! It was old Dempsey who came and gossiped. But what's her
name?"
"Patsy Jones."
"Are you sure?"
"I'm sure because she told me so," retorted the drive master. "Her word
goes with me."
"But--but----"
"But what?" Latisan's manner was ominous.
"Of course she knows who she is," faltered old Dick. "And my eyesight
ain't clear--and it was a long time ago--and my memory ain't good, of
course, and----"
"And your wits don't seem to be of the best, either," snapped the young
man. "You and Flagg better keep your tongues off that young lady. Do you
understand?"
"Yes, Mr. Latisan. Yes, sir!"
Latisan stepped back and took hold of Dick by the sleeve of the ragged
jacket. "Who did you think she was?"
"I guess I didn't really think--I only dreamed," was the old man's
stammering reply. "If you say she's Patsy Jones that's enough for me."
"She says that she is--and that makes it so." Latisan strode on his way.
Rickety Dick lifted his arms, then he lowered them without his "Praise
the Lord!"