CHAPTER XXIII
BERTHA'S FLIGHT
Before she had fairly recovered her poise next day Lucius brought to hera letter from Humiston--a suave, impudent note wherein he expressed thehope that she was well, and went on to plead in veiled phrase: "I'msorry you did not stay to see the rest of my pictures. I meant it all asa compliment to your innate good taste and purity of thought. I expectedyou to see them as I painted them--in pure artistic delight. Youmisunderstood me. I hope you will let me see you again. You mustremember you promised to let me make a portrait sketch of you."
Although not skilled in polite duplicity, Bertha was able to readbeneath the serene insolence of these lines something so diabolicallyrelentless that she turned cold with fear and repulsion. She had noexperience which fitted her to deal with such a pursuer, and sheshuddered at the rustling of the paper in her hand as she had oncequivered in breathless terror of a rattlesnake stirring in the leavesnear the door of her tent. Her first impulse was to lay the whole affairbefore the Captain, but the knowledge of his deadly temper when rouseddecided her to slip out at the other side of this fearsome thicket andleave the serpent in possession. She longed to return to the West. Thelittle group of people in the Springs allured her; they were to betrusted. Congdon and Crego and Ben--these men she knew and respected.Her joy of the big outside Eastern world had begun to pass, and shedreaded to encounter again the bold eyes and coarse compliments of themen who loaf about the hotels and clubs.
She turned to Haney as he came into her room, and said: "Mart, I want togo home--to-day."
"All right, Bertie, I'm ready--or will be, as soon as I pick up the oldfather. But don't you want to see that show we've got tickets for?"
"No, I've had enough of this old town. I'm crazy to go home."
"Home it is, then." He called sharply; "Lucius!" The man appeared,impassive, noiseless, unhurried. The Captain issued his orders: "Thrunme garbage into a thrunk, and call some one to help the missus; we'regoin' to hit the sunset trail to-night. 'Phone me old dad besides, andhave him come over at wanst. Here we emigrate westward by the nextexpress."
The man quietly took control of the situation, and in a few moments theCaptain's commands were being carried out with the precision of amilitary camp.
Bertha, alarmed by Humiston's letter, refused to go down to the publicdining-room. A fear that she might encounter the painter possessed her,and the thought of him was at once a shame and torment; therefore, shehad her luncheon sent up, and Lucius himself found time to wait uponthem.
As they were in the midst of their meal, Haney remarked rather thanasked: "Of course, you're going back with us, Lucius."
"I have thought of it, sir, but it isn't in our contract."
"We can put it in," said Bertha.
"We can't do without you now," added Mart.
Lucius seemed pleased. "Thank you for that, Captain. I don'tparticularly care for the West, but I find service with you agreeable."
Haney chuckled. "Service, do ye call it? Sure, man, 'tis you are incommand. I'm but a high private in the rear rank."
Lucius's yellow face flushed and his eyes wavered. "I hope I haven'tassumed--"
"Assumed! No, 'tis we who are obligated. We need you as bad as aplainsman needs a guide in the green timber; and if you don't mind asteady job of looking after us social tenderfeet, I'm willing to make itright with you--and Mrs. Haney feels just the way I do."
"Sure, Mart--only trouble with Lucius is, he leaves so little for me todo. He's _too_ handy--if anything."
"That'll wear off," replied Haney. "Well, then, it's all settled but theprice, and I reckon we can fix that. If I can't pay cash, I'll let youin on the mine."
Lucius smiled. "Thank you, Captain; it's not entirely a question of paywith me; my wants are few."
Bertha seized the moment to put a question she had been minded manytimes to ask. "Lucius, what's your plan? You can't intend to do this allyour life? Tell us your ambition--maybe we can help you."
He looked away, and a deeper shadow fell over his face. "I had ambitionsonce, Mrs. Haney, but my color was against me. Yes, I think I'll stay asI am. There is a certain security in being valet. You white people knowexactly where to find me, and I know just how to meet you. In myprofession it was different--I was always being cursed for presumption."
"What was your profession?" asked Haney.
"I studied law--and practised for a year or two in Washington; but Ididn't like my position; I was neither white nor colored, so when I gota good chance I went out to service with a senator as body-servant." Hestopped abruptly as though that were all of his tale.
Haney said: "Well, if you can put up with an ignorant old hill-climberlike meself, I'll be grateful, and I'll try not rub your fur the wrongway."
Lucius became very earnest for the first time. "There, sir, is one pointupon which I must insist. If I go with you, you are to treat me just asyou have been doing--as a trusted servant. I'm sorry I told you anythingabout myself. My service thus far has been very pleasant, verysatisfactory, and unless we can go on in the same way, I must leave."
"Very well," replied Haney. "It's all settled--you're adjutant-generalof the Haneys' forces."
After Lucius went away Bertha said, thoughtfully: "I wish he hadn't toldus that; I can't order him around the way I've been doing."
Haney smiled. "Did ye order him around? I niver chanced to hear ye doanything but ask him questions. 'Lucius, will ye do this?' 'Lucius,won't ye do that?'"
Bertha was troubled, and found herself embarrassed by the mulatto'sservices. She now perceived sadness beneath the quiet lines of his faceand hard-won culture in the tones of his voice. The essential tragedy ofhis defeat grew more poignant to her as she watched him getting thetrunks strapped, surrounded by maids and porters. How could she havemisread his manner? He was performing his duties, not with quiet gusto,but in the spirit of the trained nurse.
This mountain girl had always regarded Illinois as "the East," but aftera few weeks in New York City she now looked away to Chicago as a Westerntown. She was glad to face the sunset sky again, and yet as she wheeledaway to the train she acknowledged a regret. Under the skilful guidanceof Lucius she had seen a great deal of the splendid and furiousManhattan. She had gazed with unenvious admiration on the palaces ofupper Fifth Avenue and the Park. Together with Haney she had spun upRiverside Drive, past Grant's Tomb, and on through Washington Heights,with joy of the far-spreading panorama. She had visited the Battery andsailed the shining way to Staten Island in silent awe of the ship-filledbay. She had heard the sunset-guns thunder at Fort Hamilton, and hadthreaded the mazes of the Brooklyn Navy-Yard, and each day themast-hemmed island widened in grandeur and thickened with threads ofhuman purpose, making the America she knew very simple, very quiet, andvery remote.
Night by night she had gone to the music-halls and theatres, and hermind had been powerfully wrought upon by what she had seen and heard. Inall these trips Haney had heroically accompanied his wife, though hefrequently dropped asleep in his seat; and he, too, left the city withregret, though he said, "Thank God, I'm out of it," as they settled intotheir seats in the ferry. "'Tis not the night traffic that wears medown--I'm used to being on the night shift; 'tis the wild pace Luciussets by day. Faith, 'twas the aquarium in the morning and the circus inthe afternoon. Me dreams have been wan long procession of misbegottenfish, ballet-dancers, dirty monkeys, and big elephants the nights. 'Tisa great city, but I am ready to return to me peaceful perch above thefaro-board; I think 'twould rest me soul to see a game of craps."
"Why didn't you order Lucius to let up on the sight-seeing business?"Bertha said.
"And expose me weak knees to me nigger? No, no, Mike."
"I wanted you to let me rummage about alone."
"You did. But I could not allow that, neyther. So long as I can sit theroad-cart or run me arms into a biled shirt I'll stay by, darlin'. 'Tisnot safe for you to go about alone in the hell-broth of these Easternstreets. Besides, while I'm losin' weight I'
m lighter on me feet thanwhen I came. I've enjoyed me trip, but it does seem sinful to think ofour big house standing empty and the horses 'stockin'' in their stalls,and I'm glad we're edgin' along homeward."
"So am I," Bertha heartily agreed, even as she looked lovingly back uponthe mighty walls and towers which filled the sky behind her. It was agloriously exciting place to live in, after all. "Some day I may comeback," she promised herself, but the thought of Humiston lurking like awolf in the shadow came to make her going more and more like an escape.
The elder Haney amused her by his frank comment on everything that wasstrange to him. His new teeth, which did not fit him very securely,troubled him greatly, and he spoke with one hand held alertly, ready tocatch them if they fell, but his smile was a radiant grin, and hisshrewd old face was good to look at as he faced the splendors of thelimited express.
"'Tis foine as a bar-room," said he. "To be whisked about over the worldlike this is no hairdship. Bedad, if I'd known how aisy it was I'd avisited McArdle befoore." He pretended to believe that everybodytravelled this way, and that Mart was merely doing the ordinary in thematter of meals and state-room; and as he wandered from end to end ofthe train and found only luxurious coaches, and people taking theirease, he had all the best of the argument. Lucius he regarded as a manof his own level, and they held long confabulations together--thecolored man accepting this comradeship in the spirit of democracy inwhich it was given. Mart, for his part, sat looking out of the window,dreaming of the past.
As she neared Chicago next day Bertha thought with pleasure of seeingthe Mosses again. Now that Humiston was eliminated, she had only thepleasantest memories of the people she had met in the smoky city. It wasas if in a dark forest of lofty trees she had found a pleasant mead onwhich the warm sunlight fell. The mellow charm of the studios was madeall the more appealing by reason of the drab and desolate waste throughwhich she was forced to pass to attain the light and laughter of thosehigh places.
Chicago had grown more gloomily impressive, and at the same time--byreason of her knowledge of the larger plans and mightier enterprises ofNew York--it seemed simpler, and Bertha re-entered the hotel which hadonce dazzled her in confidence, finding it cheerful and familiar. Sheliked it all the better because it was less pretentious. It gave her apleasant sense of getting back home to have the men in buttons smile andsay, "Glad to see you, Mrs. Haney." The head clerk was very cordial; heeven found time to come out and shake hands. "I can't give you preciselyyour old quarters," he said, "but I can fix you out on the next floor.I'm sure you'll be very comfortable." Thereupon she took up her quietlyluxurious life at the point where she had dropped it some weeks before.
There lay in this Western girl a strongly marked tendency towards theculture and refinement of the East; and, though she had grown up farfrom anything aesthetic in home-life, she instinctively knew and lovedthe beautiful in nature, the right thing in art; and now that she wasabout to leave the East for the West--perhaps to abandon the town forthe village--she found herself aching with a hunger which had hithertobeen unconscious. She was torn with desire to go and a longing to stay.New York, Paris, the world, was open before her if only she were contentto take Marshall Haney's money and use it to these ends.
That night as she lay in her bed hearing the rumble and jar of thecity's traffic, her mind recalled and dwelt upon the wonderful scenes,especially the beautiful pictures which her eyes had gleaned from theEast. The magical, glittering spread of Manhattan harbor, the silversweep of the Hudson at West Point, the mighty panorama from Grant'sTomb, the silken sheen of Fifth Avenue on a rainy night, the crash andglitter of upper Broadway, the splendid halls of art, literature, andespecially of music and the drama--all these came back one by one toclaim a place beside her peaks and canons, sharing the glory of thepurple deeps and the snowy heights of the mountains she had hithertoloved so single-heartedly and so well.
She saw Sibley now for what it was--a village almost barren of beauty--agood, kindly, homey place, but so little and so dull! To go back thereto live was quite impossible. "If I quit Mart I must find something todo here--in the East. I can't stand Sibley."
She longed for the Springs because of her home there and because ofBen--but she realized that it possessed, after all, but very limitedopportunities for the purchase of culture. The great centres had begunto exercise dominion over her. She had ever been a lonely little soul,with no confidante of her own sex. Speech had never been fluent withher, and she was still elliptical, curt, and in a sense inexpressive.She had no chatter, and the ways of women were in many directions aliento her. Miss Franklin had been her teacher, and yet, while respectingher, she had never learned to love her. Next to Ben Fordyce she leanedupon the judgment and sympathy of the sculptor, whose fine eyes wereaglow with a high purpose. She was certain that he was both good andwise.
Mart was much amused at his father, who refused to sleep a second nightat the hotel. "It's too far from the street," said he. "I think I'll gostay with Fan if ye'll lay out the course that leads to her dure." SoLucius went with him, bearing a message from Haney: "Tell Fan I'll beover to see her to-morrow. I'm too tired to go to-day," and the fatherhurried away in joyous relief.
"'Tis unnatural to see a son of mine in such Babylonish splendor," heconfided to Lucius. "Faith, it gives me a turn every time I see himunwind a bill from that big wad he carries in his pocket. 'Tis likepalin' a red onion to him--nothing more."
The Captain was up early next day, and eager to see how his sister wasgetting along in her new house, and to please him Bertha went with him.The transposition of the McArdles, like most charitable enterprises, hadnot been entirely a success. The children had blubbered at being tornaway from their playmates and the alleys and runways which theyinfested. They were like lusty rats suddenly let loose in a fine newbarn with no dark corners, no burrows, no rotten planks, chips, orcoal-heaps to dig into or hide beneath. The alleys in Glenwood wereleafy lanes, the streets parked and concreted, and the school-yardunnaturally clean and shaded by fine young trees--which no one wasallowed to climb.
Furthermore, there was work to do in the garden--and this was onerous tothe boys. Then, too, they had to fight their battles all over again.However, they did this with pleasure, establishing dreadful reputationsamong the neat, knickerbocker "sissies" who were foolish enough to crossthem. Dress, Mrs. McArdle declared, was now a real trial. The girls hadto be "in trim all the time," and the boys were as violently in contrastto their fellows as a litter of brindle barn-kits beside a well-groomedtabby-cat's family. "I'm clean worn out with it, Mart," she confessed."We've been here two weeks the day, and the children howlin' the wholetime to go back and McArdle workin' himself to the figger of a spoonwith a mind to polish the lawn and get the garden into seed."
But Mart only smiled. "'Tis good discipline, Fan."
Haney senior was delighted with his daughter's household. "Faith, theroar and tumble of the whelps brings back to me me own wife and childer.Them was good days. 'Twas hard skirmishin' some weeks for bacon andp'taties, but I got 'em someway, and you ate ivery flick of it--snappin'and snarlin', but happy as a box of pups."
His son and daughter looked at each other and laughed; then Mart said:"'Tis a sad memory the father has, a most inconvenient and embarrassingmind."
They all stayed to dinner, and Bertha rolled up her sleeves and helpedin the kitchen while the Captain went to market with Lucius. McArdlehaving got a half-day off, came home highly wrought up again at thoughtof meeting Captain Haney and his handsome wife. He looked distinctlyless care-worn, though he confessed that it was hard to rise at the hournecessary to reach his work at seven. Bertha's heart warmed to him. In acertain dreamy, speculative turn of eye he was like her father--a maninventing new forms as naturally as other minds copy worn models. He wasgaining in conversational powers, as he came to know Mart better, andtook occasion to lay before him the plans for several inventions, smallin themselves, but of possible value, so Lucius said.
There was something hearty, w
holesome, and satisfying in this visit, andBertha went away with increased liking for the McArdles. "I'm glad yougave them a boost, Mart," she said, as they left the house, "and youfixed it fine. Mac talked to me a half-hour explaining that you hadn'tput it on a charity basis--just sold the house on long time."
"That was Lucius's idea. Wasn't it, Lucius?"
Lucius did not appear to hear.
They were whirring down an avenue bordered by elms in expanding leaf,the sky was filled with big white clouds like those which come and goover the great domes of the Rockies, and the air was warm and sweet, notyet dusked by the city's chimneys. Bertha's heart rose on joyous wing."Let's call and take the Mosses for a ride," she suggested.
"With all the pleasure in the world," he replied; and when they drew upbefore the side door of the huge block, Bertha sprang out and hurried inwithout waiting for Lucius to accompany her.
Mrs. Moss came to the studio door, and Bertha's shining face so wroughtupon her that she seized her and kissed her with sincere pleasure. "Joe,here's Mrs. Haney."
Moss was modelling a small figure on a stand near one of the windows,but left his work and came towards her with beaming smile. "What acoincidence! We were just discussing you. How do you do? Shake myarm--my hands are muddy." She took his outbent wrist and shook it withfrank heartiness. He explained: "I said you'd come back; Julia declared,'No. Once she tastes the glories of New York, good-bye to Chicago andthe West.'"
Bertha interrupted: "I want you to lay off and go out for a whirl in ourmachine."
"How gay!" cried Moss. "I ought to be working, for my rent is comingdue; but what's the diff? Here goes! Come on, Julia, we'll shut up shopand let art wag."
Julia was doubtful. "You know you promised--"
"Of course I did--that's the prerogative of the artist. Come on, now;I'll work to-night."
"To-night is the Hall's circus party."
"So it is! Well, no matter. I'm hungry for some whizzing, lashing, cool,clear air."
Dodging behind a screen in the corner, like an actor "doing a stunt," hereappeared a few moments later with clean hands, wearing a gray jacketand cap. "Hurry, hurry!" he called. He was like a lad invited to gofishing or swimming.
"I've been all 'balled up' since you went away," he explained--"took acontract to produce a certain line of ornamental reliefs; it never paysto be mercenary. But there it is! I was greedy, I went out formoney--now behold me in the grasp of a business agreement. Can't sleep,can't breathe country air--had to work all day Sunday."
"It'll pay some of our debts, though," explained Mrs. Moss, "and buy thechildren's summer suits."
"Summer suits! Why summer suits? I only had one complete suit a yearwhen I was a child--and that was a buff."
All the way down the elevator he gazed admiringly at Bertha. "My, my!how fit you look. Julia, why don't you get a hat and cloak like that?"
"Why don't I? Do you know why?" Then as they came out in sight of the'mobile she said, "Why don't you furnish me an auto-car like this?"
"I will," he said, as though the notion had just risen in his mind."I'll secure one this week."
Mart, who had taken a seat with Lucius, was touched and warmed by theirhearty greeting, and they rolled away up the street as merry asschool-children--even the self-contained Lucius smiled at Joe's oddturns of speech. Bertha's heart swelled with the keen delight of givingpleasure to her friends. This was, indeed, the chief of all the wondrouspowers of money--it enabled one to be hospitable, to possess a homewherein visitors were always welcome, to own a car in which dear friendscould ride; for the moment her resolution to give it all up weakened.
Moss was delirious with joy as they went sweeping up the Lake ShoreDrive. He took off his cap and stood up in the car in order to drinkdeep of the wind that came over the water, crisp and clean andcrystalline.
On the park mead the boys were playing ball, and the combination ofgreen grass and soft and feathery foliage was very beautiful. Thewater-fowl were out, the captive cranes crying, and the drives were fullof carriages and cars. It was all very cheering, with death and winterfar away.
Moss, sobering somewhat, began to set forth his plan for making Chicagoa new and greater Venice by bringing the lake into all the cityboulevards and spanning these waterways with stately bridges of a newtype, "designed by Joe Moss, of course," he added; "'twould make Venicelook like a faded print in a lovely old song-book."
His talk took hold of Bertha's imagination--not because she cared to seeChicago adorned, but because he was so singularly altruistic in hisconcernments. That a man should live to make the world more beautifulwas a wondrous discovery for her. He was not specially troubled aboutthe physical welfare or the morals of the average citizen, but thecity's grossness, its willingness to perpetuate ugly forms, rasped him,angered him.
She was eager to tell him of her own change of view, but waited tilltheir ride was over and they were seated in the studio and a moment'sprivate conversation was possible. Tingling with the stimulus of hisfragmentary exclamations, she impulsively began: "If I were a poor girlwho wanted to earn a living in the world, what would you advise me todo?"
"Get married!" His answer was jocular, but, observing her displeasure,he added: "I'm sorry I said that in just that tone, but at the same timeI really mean it. A woman can do other things, but marry she must if sheis to fulfil her place in the world--and be happy."
She was balked and disappointed, he perceived, and he was forced to gofurther: "I certainly wouldn't advise any girl to study painting orsculpture in the hope of making a living by it. The only side of artthat isn't hopelessly out of the running is the decorative--homedecoration is a sure and worthy profession. People don't feel keen needof sculpture, but they do like pretty walls and nice furniture. I knowseveral highly successful women decorators--but I wouldn't advise thatwork for any one as an easy way to make a living, for the decorativesense is either a gift at birth or acquired after hard study."
"Do they teach it over there?" She nodded towards the lake. "I liked itover there," she said, wistfully. "You see I didn't get much of a showat school. I began to stay out to help mother when I was fourteen. Imissed a whole lot. I'd kind o' like to make it up now if I could."
Moss was eager to probe a little deeper. "Your life is thrillinglyromantic to us--the kind of thing we read of. Congdon writes that youhave a superb home. I should think you'd hate to leave it, even for avisit."
Her hands strained together as if in resistance to an impulse ofpleading; then she answered: "Yes--but then, you see, it isn't reallymine--it's the Captain's."
"Yours by marriage."
"That's what people say--but I don't know. Sometimes I think I have noright to any part of it. You have to earn what you own, don't you?"
What was this doubt at her heart? The unexplained emotion in her voicemoved him profoundly. He cautiously approached. "Of course, we knowFrank Congdon--he likes to 'string' us Easterners and we take his yarnswith due discount. I suppose Captain Haney, like many other Western men,is ready to try his luck now and again, and in that sense really is agambler."
She faced him squarely. "No, he has been the real thing. He kept asaloon--when I first knew him, but he gave it all up for me. I wouldn'tpromise to marry him till he did. Everybody out there knows his career,and most people think he got his money underhand, but he tells me hedidn't, and I take his word. Every dollar he spends on me or on our homecomes out of some mines he owns. I told him I wouldn't touch a dollar ofthe saloon money--and I won't. Some folks think I don't care, but I do.I don't like the saloon business, and he got out and he's livin'straight now, as straight as any man. It's pretty hard on him, too,though he won't admit it. He must get awful sick of sittin' round theway he does. I tell him he needn't cut out all his old cronies on myaccount. He says he ain't sufferin', but it's like shuttin' a bronco upin the corral and lettin' the herd go back into the hills."
"Perhaps he thinks you're better fun than any of his cronies."
She ignored the implied com
pliment and went on:
"All the same, it's drawin' mighty close lines on him. You can't take aman living a free-and-easy life the way he was and wing him all at onceand tie him down to a chair without seein' some suffering. Don't youknow it?"
"Does he complain?"
"Not a whimper. Sometimes I wish he would. No, he just waits--but I'mafraid he'll get lonesome some day and break loose and go back to thegame."
In this way the sculptor had come very close to her secret, and she wastrembling to deeper confidence, when he said, very gently: "Of course,it does seem a little strange to me that one so young and charming asyou are should be married to a man of his type, but I suppose he was ahandsome figure before his--accident."
Her eyes glowed. "He was one of the grandest-looking men! I never likedhis trade--and I mistrusted him, at first; but when he cut himself outof the whole business--for me--I couldn't help likin' him; he was sobig-hearted and free-handed. We needed his help, all right. Mother wassick, and my brother's ranch was playing to hard luck. But don't think Imarried him for his money--I liked him then, and, besides--well, I_thought_ I was doing the right thing--but now--well, I'm guessing." Sheended abruptly, and in the tremor of that final word Moss read hersecret. She had never loved her husband. Pity and a kind of loyalty toher word had carried her to his side, and now a sense of duty bound herthere.
With sincere sympathy, he said: "We all do wrong at times that good maycome out of it. You could not foresee the future--the best of us can_only guess_ at the effect of any action. You did the best you knew atthe moment. The question you have to face now has only slight relationto the past. No one can enter wholly into another's perplexity--I'm noteven sure of a single one of my inferences--but if you are thinkingof--separation, I would say, meet this crisis as bravely as you met theother. But I don't believe we should decide any such question selfishly.I am not of those who always seek the side on which lies personalhappiness, because a happiness that is essentially selfish won't last.The Captain lives only for you--any one can see that. What he does foryou springs from deep affection. What would happen to him--if you lefthim?"
He paused a moment and watched her subduing her tears; then added: "Iwon't say I was unprepared for what you've said, for the entirerelationship, from our first meeting, seemed too abnormal to bealtogether happy. Money will buy a great many desirable things, but ithas its limits. At the same time, it is too much to expect of you--Ifyour feeling for him has changed--"
His delicacy, his sympathy for her, was made apparent by the unusualhesitation of his speech, and she would have broken down completely hadnot Julia Moss called out: "Joe, turn on the lights--it's getting dark."
Conscious of Bertha's emotion, he did not immediately do as he wasbidden. "I wish you'd talk this over with Julia," he ended gently;"she's a very wise little woman."
Bertha shook her head. "I didn't intend to talk it over with you. Idon't know what possessed me. I had no business to say what I did."
He reassured her. "All you've told me and the part I've guessed is quitesafe. I will not even permit Julia to share your confidence till you arewilling to speak to her yourself."
As he slowly lighted the studio Bertha was surprised and a littletroubled to find that two or three other visitors had slipped in throughthe dusk, and were grouped about the tea-table, and that the Captain wasagain the centre of an eager-eyed group. "They treat him as if he werean Eskimo," she thought bitterly, and rose to join the circle andprotect him from their inquisition.
Haney was feeling extremely well, and talked with so much of his oldtime vigor and slash of epithet that his little audience was quiteentranced. He enlarged upon the experiences of a year he had spent inAlaska. "Mining up there in them days made gambling slow business," hesaid. (He had told Bertha that he had made an attempt to get out of "thetrade," but she was content to have him put it on less self-righteousgrounds.) He contrived to make his hearers feel very keenly thepitiless, long-drawn ferocity of that sunless winter. He made it plainwhy men in that far land came together in vile dens to drink and gamble,and Moss glowed with the wonder and delight of those great boys whocould rush away to the arctic edge of the world and die with laughingcurses on their lips.
"What did you all do it for?" he asked, bluntly. "For money?"
"Partly--but more for the love of doing something hard. No man but amiser punishes himself for love of gold--it's for love of what the stuffwill buy, that men fight the snows."
While Haney talked of these things Bertha's eyes were musingly turned onthe face of the sculptor, and her mind was far from the scenes whichMart so vividly described. This side of his life no longer amusedher--on the contrary she shrank from any disclosure of his savagecareer. She was now as unjust in her criticism as she had been fond inher admiration, and when with darkening brow she cut short his garrulousflow of narrative Julia perceived her displeasure.
Haney apologized, handsomely. "It's natural for the ould bedraggledeagle in the cage with a club on his wrist to dream of the circles heused to cut and the fish he set claw to. In them days I feared no man'sweight, and no night or stream. 'Twas all joyous battle to me, and now,as I sit here on velvet with only to snap me fingers for anything Iwant, I look back at thim fierce old times with a sneaking kind o' wishto live 'em all over again. Bertie knows me weakness. I would talkforever did she lave me go on; but 'tis no blame to her--it was a cruel,bad, careless life."
"When I come West," said Moss, sincerely, "we'll go camping together,and every night by the fire we'll smoke and you can tell me all aboutyour journeys. I assure you they are epic to me."
Dr. Brent, a little later, put in a private word to Bertie. "Now you'regoing back into the high country and you'll find it necessary to watchthe Captain pretty closely. I suspect he'll find his heart thumpingbriskly when he reaches the Springs. He may stand that altitude allright, but don't let him go higher. He will be taking chances if he goesabove six thousand feet. You'd better have Steel of Denver come down andexamine him to see how he stands the first few days. I mention Steelbecause I know him--I've no doubt there are plenty of good men in theSprings."
"What'll I do if he's worse?"
"Bring him back here or go to sea level--only beware of high passes."
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