"What"s his name?" Ben asked.
"The party is named Neilson."
Unfortunately the name had no mental a.s.sociations for Ben. It wakened no interest or stirred no memories. He had read the letter the copy of which he carried but once, and evidently the name of the man Ezram had been warned against had made no lasting impression on Ben"s mind.
"All right. Maybe I"ll look him up."
Ben turned, then made his way up the long, straggly row of unpainted shacks that marked the village street. A few moments later he was standing in the Morris home, facing the one friend that Hiram Melville had possessed on earth.
Ben stated his case simply. He was the partner of Hiram"s brother, he said, and he had been designated to take care of Fenris and such other belongings as Hiram had left. Morris studied his face with the quiet, far-seeing eyes of a woodsman.
"You"ve got means of identification?" he asked.
Ben realized with something of a shock that he had none at all. The letter he carried was merely a copy without Hiram"s signature; besides, he had no desire to reveal its contents. For an instant he was considerably embarra.s.sed. But Morris smiled quietly.
"I guess I won"t ask you for any," he said. "Hiram didn"t leave anything, far as I know, except his old gun and his pet. Lord knows, I"d let anybody take that pet of his that"s fool enough to say he"s got any claim to him, and you can be sure I ain"t going to dispute his claim."
"Fenris, then, is,--something of a problem?"
"The worst I ever had. His old gun is a good enough weapon, but I"m willing to trust you with it to get rid of Fenris. If you don"t turn out to be the right man, I"ll dig up for the gun--and feel lucky at that. I won"t be able to furnish another Fenris, though, and I guess n.o.body"ll be sorry. And if I was you--I"d take him out in a nice quiet place and shoot him."
He turned, with the intention of securing the gun from an inner room. He did not even reach the door. It was as if both of them were struck motionless, frozen in odd, fixed att.i.tudes, by a shrill scream for help that penetrated like a bullet the thin walls of the house.
Instinctively both of them recognized it, unmistakably, as the piercing cry of a woman in great distress and terror. It rose surprisingly high, hovered a ghastly instant, and then was almost drowned out and obliterated by another sound, such a sound as left Ben only wondering and appalled.
The sound was in the range between a growl and a bay, instantly identifying itself as the utterance of an animal, rather than a human being. And it was savage and ferocious simply beyond power of words to tell. Ben"s first thought was of some enormous, vicious dog, and yet his wood"s sense told him that the utterance was not that of a dog. Rather it contained that incredible fierceness and savagery that marks the killing cries of the creatures of the wild.
He heard it even as he leaped through the door in answer to the scream for aid. His muscles gathered with that mysterious power that had always sustained him in his moments of crisis. He took the steps in one leap, Morris immediately behind him.
"Fenris is loose," he heard the man say. "He"ll kill some one----!"
Ben could still hear the savage cries of the animal, seemingly from just behind the adjoining house. A girl"s terrified voice still called for help. And deeply appalled by the sounds, Ben wished that the rifle, such a weapon as had been his trust since early boyhood, was ready and loaded in his hands.
He raced about the house; and at once the scene, in every vivid detail, was revealed to him. Pressed back against the wall of a little woodshed that stood behind her house a girl stood at bay,--a dark-eyed girl whose beautiful face was drawn and stark-white with horror. She was screaming for aid, her fascinated gaze held by a gray-black, houndlike creature that crouched, snarling, twenty yards distant.
Evidently the creature was stealing toward her in stealthy advance more like a stalking cat than a frenzied hound. Nor was this creature a hound, in spite of the similarity of outline. Such fearful, lurid surface-lights as all of them saw in its fierce eyes are not characteristic of the soft, brown orbs of the dog, ancient friend to man, but are ever the mark of the wild beast of the forest. The fangs were bared, gleaming in foam, the hair stood erect on the powerful shoulders; and instantly Ben recognized its breed. It was a magnificent specimen of that huge, gaunt runner of the forests, the Northern wolf.
Evidently from the black shades of his fur he was partly of the Siberian breed of wolves that beforetime have migrated down on the North American side of Bering Sea.
A chain was attached to the animal"s collar, and this in turn to a stake that had been freshly pulled from the ground. This beast was Fenris,--the woods creature that old Hiram Melville had raised from cubdom.
There could be no doubt as to the reality of the girl"s peril. The animal was insane with the hunting madness, and he was plainly stalking her, just as his fierce mother might have stalked a fawn, across the young gra.s.s. Already he was almost near enough to leap, and the girl"s young, strong body could be no defense against the hundred and fifty pounds of wire sinew and lightning muscle that const.i.tuted the wolf. The bared fangs need flash but once for such game as this. And yet, after the first, startled glance, Ben Darby felt himself complete master of the situation.
No man could tell him why. No fact of his life would have been harder to explain, no impulse in all his days had had a more inscrutable origin.
The realization seemed to spring from some cool, sequestered knowledge hidden deep in his spirit. He knew, in one breathless instant, that he was the master--and that the girl was safe.
He seemed to know, again, that he had found his ordained sphere. He knew this breed,--this savage, blood-mad, fierce-eyed creature that turned, snarling, at his approach. He had something in common with the breed, knowing their blood-l.u.s.ts and their mighty moods; and dim, dreamlike memory reminded him that he had mastered them in a long war that went down to the roots of time. Fenris was only a fellow wilderness creature, a pack brother of the dark forests, and he had no further cause for fear.
"Fenris!" he ordered sharply. "Come here!" His voice was commanding and clear above the animal"s snarls.
There followed a curious, long instant of utter silence and infinite suspense. The girl"s scream died on her lips: the wolf stood tense, wholly motionless. Morris, who had drawn his knife and had prepared to leap with magnificent daring upon the wolf, turned with widening eyes, instinctively aware of impending miracle. Ben"s eyes met those of the wolf, commanding and unafraid.
"Down, Fenris," Ben said again. "Down!"
Then slowly, steadily, Ben moved toward him. Watching unbelieving, Morris saw the fierce eyes begin to lose their fire. The stiff hair on the shoulders fell into place, tense muscle relaxed. He saw in wonder that the animal was trembling all over.
Ben stood beside him now, his hand reaching. "Down, down," he cautioned quietly. Suddenly the wolf crouched, cowering, at his feet.
X
Ben straightened to find himself under a wondering scrutiny by both Morris and the girl. "Good Lord, Darby!" the former exclaimed. "How did you do it--"
Now that the suspense was over, Ben himself stood smiling, quite at ease. "Can"t say just how. I just felt that I could--I"ve always been able to handle animals. He"s tame, anyway."
"Tame, is he? You ought to have had to care for him the last few weeks, and you"d think tame. Not once have I dared go in reach of his rope. And there he is, crouched at your feet! I was always dreading he"d get away--" Morris paused, evidently remembering the girl. "Beatrice, are you hurt?"
The girl moved toward them. "No. He didn"t touch me. But you came just in time--" The girl"s voice wavered; and Ben stepped to her side. "I"m all right now--"
"But you"d better sit down," Ben advised quietly. "It was enough to scare any one to death--"
"Any one--but you--" the girl replied, her voice still unsteady. But she paused when she saw the warm color spread over Ben"s rugged, brown face.
And his embarra.s.sment was real. Naturally shy and una.s.suming, such effusive praise as this always disturbed him--just as it would have embarra.s.sed any really masculine man alive. Women, more extravagant in speech and loving flattery with a higher ardor, would have found it hard to believe how really distressed he was; but Morris, an outdoor man to the core, understood completely. Besides, Ben knew that the praise was not deserved. Excessive bravery had played no part in the scene of a moment before. He had been brave just as far as Morris was brave, leaping freely in response to a call for help: the same degree of bravery that can be counted on in most men, over the face of the earth.
Bravery does not lie alone in facing danger: there must also be the consciousness of danger, the conquest of fear. In this case Ben had felt no fear. He knew with a sure, true knowledge that he was master of the wolf. He knew the wolf"s response to his words before ever he spoke. And now all the words in the language could not convey to these others whence that knowledge had come.
He vaguely realized that this had always been some way part of his destiny,--the imposition of his will over the beasts of the forest. He had never tried to puzzle out why, knowing that such trial would be unavailing. He had instinctively understood such creatures as these.
To-day he felt that he knew the wild, fierce heart beating in the lean breast as a man might know his brother"s heart. The bond between them was hidden from his sight, something back of him, beyond him, enfolded within a secret self that was mysterious as a dream, and it reached into the countless years; yet it was real, an ancient relationship that was no less intimate because it could not be named. In turn, the wolf had seemed to know that this tall form was a born habitant of the forests, even as himself, one that would kill him as unmercifully as he himself would kill a fall, and whose dark eyes, swept with fire, and whose cool, strong words must never be disobeyed.
"You never seen this wolf before?" Morris asked him, calling him from his revery.
"Never."
"Then you must be old Hiram"s brother himself, to control him like you did. Lord, look at him. Crouching at your feet."
Suddenly Ben reached and took the wolf"s head between his hands. Slowly he lifted the savage face till their eyes met. The wolf growled, then, whimpering, tried to avert its gaze. Then a rough tongue lapped at the man"s hand.
"There"s nothing to be afraid of, now," he told the girl.
"He"s right, Beatrice," Morris agreed. "He"s tamed him. Even I can see that much. And I never saw anything like it, since the day I was born."
It was true: as far as Ben was concerned, the terrible Fenris--named by a Swedish trapper, acquaintance of Hiram Melville"s, for the dreadful wolf of Scandinavian legend--was tamed. He had found a new master; Ben had won a servant and friend whose loyalty would never waver as long as blood flowed in his veins and breath surged in his lungs. "Lay still, now, Fenris," he ordered. "Don"t get up till I tell you."
It seems to be true that as a rule the lower animals catch the meaning of but few words; usually the tone of the voice and the gesture that accompanies it interpret a spoken order in a dog"s brain. On this occasion, it was as if Fenris had read his master"s thought. He lay supine, his eyes intent on Ben"s rugged face.
And now, for the first time, Ben found himself regarding Beatrice. He could scarcely take his eyes from her face. He knew perfectly that he was staring rudely, but he was without the power to turn his eyes. Her dark eyes fell under his gaze.
The truth was that Ben"s life had been singularly untouched by the influence of women. Mostly his life had been spent in the unpeopled forest, away from women of all kinds; and such creatures as had admired him in Seattle"s underworld had never got close to him. He had had many dreams; but some way it had never been credible to him that he should ever know womanhood as a source of comradeship and happiness. Love and marriage had always seemed infinitely apart from his wild, adventurous life.