"Wait--don"t go! I--I--you--" He licked his lips as if they were dust dry, pa.s.sed an uncertain hand across his beaded brow, and, raising the water-pail beside the door to his mouth, drank heavily in great, noisy gulps.
"Let me out of here!" the girl demanded, imperiously.
"Don"t be scared," he said, more quietly now. "You must excuse me.
You--you gave me an awful fright. Yes--that was it. Don"t worry. I didn"t mean any harm."
"You hurt my shoulder," she said, almost ready to cry. "And you tore my dress," she added, angrily--"my fine dress. Are you crazy?"
"You see, it"s like this, that name of Merridy and that ring--well, the whole thing was so startling, I--I went off my head. It came sudden, and I thought--I thought--it don"t matter what I thought, but I"m sorry. I"ll apologize--and I"ll get you a new dress, a whole lot of dresses, if you like." This seemed to amuse him, and he began to laugh silently.
His first impulse had been to tell her everything, but his amazement had rendered him speechless, and now he was thankful for it. Following his discovery of her ident.i.ty, he had been stricken dumb, staring at her like one demented; then, as he was about to explain, his mind suddenly grasped the significance of this revelation and the advantage it gave him over his enemies; a plan began to unfold, vague at first, its details not worked out, but a plan whereby he could by keeping silent use this knowledge to serve his vengeful ends. In an instant his vision cleared and his brain became active and alert, like that of a man brought suddenly under the stimulus of strong liquor. Care must be exercised--she must not learn too much--for if she suspected the truth she would go to her soldier lover at once, and no power on earth could hold her back. That would block the vengeance that he saw shaping in the dank recesses of his distorted brain.
First, and above all, he must get the girl away from Flambeau.
"I went clear off my head," he heard himself saying, "at that name of Merridy, that ring, and all. Why--why, I thought you might be the missing girl I told you of--you remember, that day up on Lee"s Creek--so I had to see; but, dear me, I should have been more considerate--I should have explained. The trouble is I"m a nervous man, and I get impulsive streaks on me sometimes that I can"t control. I"m sorry I spoiled your dress, but I"ll get you another--you bet I will."
This explanation of his strange behavior seemed plausible enough to banish all personal fears from Necia"s mind. Indeed, Stark had now become so gentle and apologetic in his demeanor that her woman"s curiosity overcame her instinct to flee, and she ventured the question:
"So you really thought I was that other girl?"
"I did for a minute. The mother was a--a--friend of mine, and so--I lost my head. But I"m all right now, and if you"ll overlook my roughness we"ll go back to your troubles."
These last few moments had driven her own worries from her mind, but he was bent on recalling them, and so continued, cautiously:
"You were saying that you thought you"d go away. I think that"s a good plan, and you"d be wise to do it for more reasons than one. It will give you time to think it all over and know your own mind--"
"I know my mind now, and yet--I don"t want to go away."
"--and it will give Burrell a chance to prove himself. He"ll either show that he has got to have you at any cost, or that you are right in your decision. If the first should happen, you can come back to him; if the last--why, it will be better for you, anyhow. As long as you stay here neither one of you can see clearly."
She was touched by his interest, and realized the force of his argument, which, strange to say, seemed to second her own thoughts; yet she hesitated.
"I want to help you--I"m going to help you--because I"ve got an interest in you like you were mine." Again he betrayed that strange, mirthless amus.e.m.e.nt.
"There is no place for me to go," said Necia, blankly, "except the Mission, and I have no way of getting there."
"Don"t you worry. I"ll furnish the means, and you"d better go to-night"--she flinched--"yes, to-night; there"s no use prolonging your agony. I"ll get a boat ready and send a trusty man with you. The current is swift, and if he rows well you can make it by to-morrow evening. That"s only one night out, and I"ll put some blankets aboard so you can wrap up and have a sleep."
"I feel as if I"d never sleep again," she sighed.
"Now, now, this will come out all right yet. I"d take you down there myself, but I"ve got to stay here. I"ve got work to do. Yes, I"ve sure got work of importance ahead of me."
"I must go back and get some clothes," she said, At which he would have demurred had he not seen that she could not travel in her present condition.
"Very well. But don"t let anybody see you."
"Of course not."
"It"s getting late, and your folks will be abed." He looked at his watch. "Midnight! Be here in an hour, and I"ll have the skiff ready."
The light of sacrifice was in Necia"s eyes, and her cheeks were blanched with the pallor of a great resolution. She did not stop to reason why or how she had been led to this disposal of her future, but clutched desperately at Stark"s plan of rescue from her agonizing predicament.
"I"ll be here in an hour," she said, simply.
He let her out, closed the door after her, and locked it; then, drawing a deep breath, he raised his clenched hands above his head, and gave a great sigh of exultation. Next he took out his six-shooter and examined it carefully. The sh.e.l.ls did not suit him, so he filled the gun with new ones, loosened the three lower b.u.t.tons of his vest, and slid the weapon inside his trousers band; then, facing the direction of Gale"s trading-post, he spoke aloud.
"I was a long time coming, g.a.y.l.o.r.d, but I"m here, and I"ve got you where I"ve wanted you these fifteen years--yes, and I"ve got you, too, Burrell! By G.o.d, this is my night!"
His lithe body became panther-like in poise, his bearing that of the meat-eating animal, and his face set in a fierce, exultant cruelty as he blew out his light and left the cabin.
CHAPTER XIV
A MYSTERY IS UNRAVELLED
Lieutenant Burrell was considerably taken aback when, a quarter of an hour after the young lover"s ecstatic return to his quarters, Gale knocked at his door, for the trader"s visit, coupled with the late hour and his sombre countenance, forecast new complications.
"He"s here to object, but it won"t go," thought the Lieutenant, as he made his visitor welcome.
It was the trader"s first glimpse of the officer"s quarters, and he cast a roving eye over the room, as if measuring the owner"s character by his surroundings.
"I"ve got to have a long talk with you, Burrell," he began, with an effort. "It"s liable to take me an hour or two."
"Then take this chair and be comfortable."
Meade swung his big reading-chair out beneath the hanging-lamp, and, going to the sideboard, brought back a bottle, some gla.s.ses, and a pouch of tobacco. Noting the old man"s sigh of fatigue as he sat himself down heavily, he remarked, sympathetically:
"Mr. Gale, you"ve made a long trip to-day, and you must be tired. If this talk is to be as lengthy as you say, why not have a drink with me now, and postpone it until to-morrow?"
"I"ve been tired for eighteen years," the other replied; "to-night I hope to get rested." He lapsed into silence, watching his host pour out two gla.s.ses of liquor, fill his pipe, and then stretch himself out contentedly, his feet resting on another chair--a picture of youthful strength, vitality, and determination. Beneath the Lieutenant"s flannel shirt the long, slim muscles showed free and full, and the firm set of jaw and lip denoted a mind at rest and confident of itself. Gale found himself for a moment jealously regarding the youth and his enviable state of contentment and decision.
"Well, let"s get at it," the younger man finally said.
"I suppose you"ll want to interrupt and question me a heap, but I"ll ask you to let me tell this story the way it comes to me, till I get it out, then we can go back and take up the queer stuff. It runs back eighteen or twenty years, and, being as it"s part of a hidden life, it isn"t easy to tell. You"ll be the first one to hear it, and I reckon you"re enough like other men to disbelieve--you"re not old enough, and you haven"t knocked around enough to learn that nothing is impossible, that nothing is strange enough to be unreasonable. Likewise, you"ll want to know what, all this has to do with you and Necia--yes, she told me about you and her, and that"s why I"m here." He paused. "You really think you love her, do you?"
Burrell removed his pipe and gazed at its coal impersonally.
"I love her so well, Mr. Gale, that nothing you can say will affect me.
I--I hesitated at first about asking her to be my wife, because--you"ll appreciate the unusual--well, her unusual history. You see, I come from a country where mixed blood is about the only thing that can"t be lived down or overlooked, and I"ve been raised with notions of family honor and pride of race and birth, and so forth, that might seem preposterous and absurd to you. But a heap of conceits like that have been bred into me from generations back; they run in the blood of every old family in my country, and so, I"m ashamed to say, I hesitated and tried to reason myself into giving her up, but I"ve had my eyes opened, and I see how little those things amount to, after all. I"m going to marry Necia, Mr.
Gale. I"d like to do it the day after to-morrow, Sunday, but she isn"t of age yet, and if you object, we"ll have to wait until November, when she turns eighteen. We"d both like your consent, of course; I"d be sorry to marry her without it; but if you refuse, we"ll be forced to displease you." He looked up and met the father"s gaze steadily. "Now, I"ll be glad to listen as long as you care to talk, but I don"t think it will do any good."
The other man"s lips framed a faint smile.
"We"ll see. I wish to G.o.d I"d had your decision when I was your age, this story would be different, and easier to tell." He waited a moment, then settled to his self-appointed task. "I was mining at the time up in the Mother Lode country of California, which was the frontier then, pretty much as this is now, only we had better things to eat. I came from the East, or my people did, but I was ranch-raised, and loved the hills and woods and places where you don"t talk much, so I went to prospecting because it took me out where the sun was bright and I could see the wild things at play. I was one of the first men into a camp named Chandon--helped to build it, in fact, and got hold of some ground that looked real good. It was hard mining, however, and, being poor, I was still gripping my drill and hammer after the town had grown up.
"A woman came out from the East--Vermont, it was--and school-teaching was her line of business, only she hadn"t been raised to it, and this was her first clatter at the game; but things had broke bad for her people, and ended in her pulling stakes and coming West all alone. Her folks died and left her up against it, I gathered from what little she told me--sort of an old story, I guess, and usual too, only for her.