by Holman Day
CHAPTER XVII
THE AFFAIR AT DURFY'S CAMP
"The boss was a-thinkin' to swat him, but allowed he had better not, For 'twas trouble bad that Dumphy had, whatever it was he'd got."
When the timber barons came in sight of the camp at noon, Tommy Eye,returned emissary, was seated on the edge of the wangan platform withattitude and countenance of alarmed expectancy. By his side was oldChristopher Straight, the guide who had accompanied Dwight Wade fromCastonia settlement.
"I done it--I said as you said for me to say," Tommy began, eagerly,"and Mr. Straight here will tell you the same. I said it first to oldNoah up there, and he was startin' off with his animiles like as theydone with the ark stranded, and he swore me up hill and down, and--"
"Shut up!" barked the Honorable Pulaski, in a perfectly fiendish temperafter the sights of that forenoon. "Did you bring that girl? And if youdidn't, why not?"
"I can tell you better, perhaps, Mr. Britt," broke in old Christopher,calmly. "She has been left on Mr. Wade's hands, and Mr. Wade feels thathe ought to be careful. Warden Lane, who had charge of her, seems tohave lost his wits. All last night--it was an awful night, gentlemen,on Jerusalem--he was out on the ledges raving and howling. I think thata matter that Mr. Barrett will understand was troubling up hisconscience, if that's the word for it. This mornin' he seemed to beclean out of his head. He knocked the saplin's off his cages and let outthe animals, and they followed him off down into the woods--"
"Moose, bobcat, fisher-cat--" But Tommy ceased his enumeration to dodgea vicious sweep of Britt's palm.
"I guess he left the place for good, seeing he took his rifle and hispack," continued the guide. "I thought the timber owners might like toknow that their fire station is abandoned. As for the girl," he hastenedto add, "Mr. Wade told me to say that for reasons that Mr. Britt wouldunderstand he didn't think she ought to come here."
"Because she's lost her head over my boss, MacLeod, eh?" demanded Britt.
"You saw yourself that the girl wasn't to be controlled easily when theyoung man was present," said Christopher, mildly. "So he believes ifthere is business to be talked to her and about her it will be better tomeet somewhere else."
"The blasted coward is afraid to come with her or let her come," sneeredthe Honorable Pulaski. "Well, we'll go up there; and we'll take a fewmen along and find out who's runnin' this thing--a college dude or themen who own these timber lands." Mr. Barrett would have advised morepacificatory talk. But Mr. Britt was in a mood too generally unamiablethat day to heed prudence and wise counsel.
"You'll have only your own trouble for your trip," remarked Straight."This man here said that Mr. Barrett was all ready to leave the woods.Mr. Wade has left the top of the mountain with the girl, and will meetMr. Barrett to the south of Pogey Notch. You'll not have to go out ofyour way, sir," he explained.
"Well, where?" snapped Britt.
"I'm here prepared to lead Mr. Barrett to the place, and I suggest thatif he's ready we'll be on our way. You'll probably want to fetch theHalf-way House at nightfall, sir."
This patent distrust of Pulaski Britt and his designs angered thatgentleman quite beyond the power of even his profanity. But he knewChristopher Straight too well to attempt to bulldoze that hard-eyed oldwoodsman.
"Is this select assembly too good to have me come along?" he inquired,his thick lips curling under his beard.
"I think Mr. Wade will be glad to have you there," said Christopher,mildly. "He didn't say anything to the contrary. He expects Mr. Barrettto have some one to keep him company as far as the stage road, though hethought it probably would be a woodsman. But Mr. Wade gave particularinstructions about any crowd comin' along, and he'll not meet any one ifyour boss MacLeod is in the party. That's straight talk. He's had allthe trouble with your boss that he cares for."
After a withering survey of Straight, which the old guide endured withmuch composure, Britt beckoned Barrett away with a jerk of his head, andthe two strolled behind the horse-hovel.
"There you have it, John," he snarled, more ireful as a champion thanthe unhappy principal. "It's a put-up job. He's goin' to plaster thegirl onto you. It's his play. He's goin' to use it for all it's worth."
"It will be better for me to take her out than to have him chase alongafter me with the girl and the story--if that's the way he feels; andit's plain that he means to make trouble," said Barrett, moodily. "I canput her away somewhere in a boarding-school, and--"
The Honorable Pulaski broke upon this doleful capitulation withcontemptuous brusqueness.
"You talk like a fool, John! Take that girl outside these woods and giveher an education? File her teeth so that she can set 'em into yourthroat? You teach her to read and to write and to know things, andthat's what it will amount to in the end. The girl has got to stayhere!" He embraced the big woods in a vigorous gesture. "She belongshere! And the only way to keep her here is to put her in the hands of aman that--"
Colin MacLeod had followed them to their retreat behind the hovel, andwas standing at a little distance, looking at them.
"Come here, Colin!" And Britt advanced to meet him and clutched his arm,the arm that Dwight Wade had dislocated in that memorable battle inCastonia. "Boy, if you are a coward, now is your time to own it. OldStraight has come down here to tell us that Wade has that girl in hishands. He knows what she's worth. He wants to meet Barrett and myself.You can guess why. He proposes to get hold of that money. He knows wecontrol it. We can't help ourselves if she chooses to stay with him."
The able old liar of the Umcolcus knew his man as the harper knows hisinstrument. He felt the muscles ridge under his clutch.
"He has sent word that he won't have you at the meeting. Ask Straight!He'll give you the message. The dude knows he wouldn't stand the show ofa snowball in tophet with you there where the girl could see you. Ifyou're a coward, say so, and we'll look further."
"By ----, I'm no coward, and you know it!" growled the boss.
"He's licked you once and cut you out with one girl," persisted Britt."The whole Umcolcus knows that! When they find out that he's got awaywith a girl that has been in love with you, and with ten thousanddollars in the bargain, why, boy, even Tommy Eye will dare to put up hisfists to you!"
In MacLeod's tumultuous mind it was no longer love's choice between NinaIde and Kate Arden; it was the hard, bitter passion of the primitiveman--the instinct to grasp what a foe is coveting for the sake ofhumiliating that foe. Again MacLeod felt himself thrust forth bycircumstances to be the champion of his kind. That man from the city wasof the other sort.
"Mr. Britt," he choked, "let me at him once more!"
"Oh, that will be all right!" said the baron; "but we're not pulling offa prize-fight, MacLeod. Scraps are interestin' enough when there isn'tmore important business on hand. There happens to be business just now.The whole idea is, are you ready to marry the girl?"
MacLeod had approached them grimly resolved to be defiant on that point.The flicker in his eyes now was the shadow of that resolution departing.
"If it's him against me again," he snarled, "I'll marry a quill-pig andask no questions."
"Not exactly cheerful talk to hear from a prospective bridegroommarryin' money and good looks," commented the Honorable Pulaski, dryly;"but a promise is a promise, MacLeod, and I never knew you to break oneyou made me. Shake!"
By the way in which both Barrett and MacLeod turned inquiring gaze onhim, the Umcolcus baron understood that he was tacitly elected autocratof the situation, and he proceeded about his task with the brisknesscharacteristic of his habit of command.
"John, you get your dinner, bid us an affectionate farewell, and goalong with old Straight. Go alone. Tell him you left all your duffel atWithee's camp and don't need any guide. I'll look after the rest of it.Chris Straight can hide his dude and the girl, but he can't pull up theground behind him."
They started off promptly after the noon snack, the taciturn Christopheroffering no comment on Mr. Barre
tt's amiable compliance, and apparentlyblandly unsuspicious that the Honorable Pulaski concealed guile under ademeanor which had suddenly become pacific.
Men who had made their warfare more by craft and less by brute strengthwould have been more wily. John Barrett and Pulaski Britt had alwaysbeen too confident of their own power to think subterfuge necessary.Barrett, especially, as he strode along at the heels of old Christopher,was so well content with his own first essay in duplicity that histaking-down was correspondingly humiliating. They were resting, he andthe old guide, after a tough scramble around a blowdown that they hadencountered a mile or so from Britt's camps.
With a jerk of his chin Christopher indicated a far-off sound on theback trail.
"Pretty busy, that woodpecker is, Mr. Barrett!"
"Stumpage John" assented, wondering at the same time how such an oldwoodsman could misinterpret that chip-chop. "The fool Indian ought tomake allowance for a blowdown," he reflected, angrily. "He's followingtoo close."
"In this world you expect cheap men to lie and cheat," remarkedChristopher, serenely. "But you don't hardly expect State senators andcandidates for governor to be that sort."
"What the devil do you mean?" demanded Barrett, with heat.
"I mean that Britt's Indian, Newell Sockbeson, is following us andmakin' a double-blaze for--well, I suppose it's so that Pulaski Brittand his men can chase us up. As to why, you probably know better than Ido, Mr. Barrett."
The timber baron stared at this disconcerting old plain-speaker withoutfinding fit words for reply.
"It can hardly be that he's goin' to all that trouble simply to get thegirl. Mr. Wade is ready to turn the girl over to you, Mr. Barrett. Whyis it that men ain't willin' to play fair in this world? What doesPulaski Britt want to meddle in this thing for?"
"I think you're wrong about the Indian following us," paltered themillionaire. "You're only guessin' about that, Straight."
"When I see Pulaski Britt talk to an Indian, when I see that Indian packa lunch, take a camp-axe, and hide at the mouth of the trail, I don'thave to guess, Mr. Barrett. Some of us old fellows of the woods see awhole lot of things without seemin' to take much notice." He got up offthe tree-trunk where he had been sitting and made ready to take thetrail again, swinging his pack to his shoulders.
"There wouldn't have been any misunderstanding if Wade had sent the girlback by the messenger," protested Barrett. "And if he didn't havesomething up his sleeve he would have done so. The girl is nothing tohim, and he's meddling in affairs that are none of his business."
"You'd better save that talk and tell it to him," said the old guide,grimly. "I'm going to take you to where we arranged to meet if every manthat Britt can rake and scrape on his ten townships comes followin' atmy back. I've thought it over, and the more witnesses there are to somethings the better it is for all concerned--or the worse!"
And reflecting on what these words might mean, and now a little dubiousas to the sagacity of Pulaski Britt in handling delicate negotiations,"Stumpage John" plodded on with less content in his heart.
Two miles farther down the trail, at a place that Barrett recognized asthe old Durfy camps, Straight signalled by discharging his rifle, andDwight Wade came into sight with the girl. Foolish Abe of the Skeetsfollowed far behind like a sheepish dog, uncertain whether to expectkick or caress.
"You may as well know first as last that the whole pack is followin' alittle way behind," snorted old Christopher, in disgust. "Britt sent anIndian to snuff the trail and blaze the way. I did your errand, that'sall. You've got time to get away. You may want to keep on tryin' to dobusiness with a crowd that ain't square. I don't!" He turned and walkedaway, sat down, and filled his pipe.
"I had Straight explain to you why it was better to meet privatelyhere," declared Wade, with honest resentment glowing in his eyes. "ButI'm not going to run. I've had hard work to get this young woman toconsider your proposition to educate her, Mr. Barrett." He held her bythe hand, and spoke out with a candor that convinced the lumberman thathere there was neither reservation nor complicity. The girl eyed himsulkily, without interest, as she looked at all outsiders. "I have toldthis young woman that you, as a timber-land owner, are sorry for all thetroubles that the Skeets and Bushees have had in years past, and want tomake up in some way. I've told her you're ready to send her to some goodboarding-school. As she can't read or write, she doesn't know what thismeans, and she can't express her thanks. But I'm sure that later she'llunderstand your kindness and generosity. The girl is untrained, and sheknows it. I hope you'll overlook any lack of gratitude, Mr. Barrett.She'll know how to express it some day."
John Barrett, looking into a face which recalled the face of thedaughter whom he loved and cherished in his city home, felt one throb ofstrange emotion, and then realized in all his selfish nature thataffection is more a matter of habit and cultivation than an affair ofinstinct. After one thrill his soul shrank from her. He had not expectedthe girl to be so like. He caught himself wishing that he had not madethe compact with the inexorable Britt, and listened for the noise of themen-pack with shame and some regret. On the other hand, this girl,unkempt for all her beauty, insolent with the insolence of ignorance,staring at him from under her knitted brows, was impossible, hereflected, as an asset of a man with a reputation to preserve and anambition to fulfil. Instead of feeling the instinct of tenderness, helooked at this wild young thing of the woods with uneasy fear in hisshifting eyes.
With honest resentment, Wade noted the baron's reluctance to make hisword good.
"You think I'm a meddler, Mr. Barrett," he said, coming close to theother, "but don't think that I'm satisfying any personal grudge when Iask that you care for this poor girl! Perhaps you would have done soanyway, without my suggestion. I hope so."
"I think I could arrange my own business without any outside help," saidBarrett, dryly. He began to feel that he could get out of the situationbetter if he aroused his own resentment.
"Mr. Barrett, it was chance that put the girl in my way and taught meher story. I've been Don Quixote enough to see her through this thing.I'm sorry it happens to be you on the other side. I'm afraid you don'tgive me credit for unselfishness."
"I'll allow you all the credit you deserve," said "Stumpage John,"sullenly. "I understand, without your telling me, that you are gentlemanenough to keep this matter behind your teeth on account of my family. Ithank you, Wade. I'll take charge of the girl from now on."
He looked back up the trail anxiously, and the young man's gazefollowed. A man loafed into sight from among stubs blackened by fire.
"There's Newell Sockbeson," remarked old Christopher. "I heard himmaking his last blaze a few minutes ago."
"I don't know just what your plan is, Mr. Barrett," said Wade, the redin his cheeks. "I've been hoping that you trusted me to act thegentleman, even if I couldn't act the friend. Mr. Straight and I standhere as witnesses that you have taken charge of this girl." He now spokelow. "But you haven't told me that you indorse the little plan I adoptedto relieve you from any explanations and to make the thing seem naturalto her."
Wade's face showed that he expected a frank promise.
"Mr. Straight will go to the stage road with you," added the young man.At this hint of watchfulness the face of Barrett darkened. "As aschool-teacher, I know something of the boarding-schools of the State,and I'll--" The timber baron's temper flamed at this plain intent toadvise.
"I've taken charge of the girl, I say! Your responsibility ends. Youwere apologizing a moment ago for meddling. Now, don't go to--"
"I didn't apologize," replied Wade, with decision. "And I don't intendto. And my responsibility ends only when I know that this unfortunatecreature is placed in a good school to get the advantages that she hasbeen robbed of all these years."
The hot retort from Barrett ended in his throat with a cluck. "Thedevil!" he blurted, staring down the trail.
Dwight Wade, whirling to look to the south, could not indorse thatsentiment. Close at hand was Nina
Ide, riding a horse with the grace ofa boy, whose attire she had adopted with a woods girl's scorn ofconventions. Wade hurried to meet her, cap in hand and eager questionson his lips. The color mounted to her face, and she shook out the foldsof a poncho, looped across the saddle, and draped it over her knees.
"No, it's not strange, either," she broke in to say. "Your partner--andthat's father--had to come up here on business, and I've come along withhim, just as I always do when he comes here in the partridge season."She patted a gun-butt. "But I didn't expect to find fire and smoke andlightning and rain and tornadoes up here, any more than I looked for youat Pogey Notch when you were supposed to be exploring for a winter'soperation on Enchanted. Now you will have to explain to your partnerhere!" And he turned from her smiling face to shake hands with RodburdIde.
"Every man who can handle brush and mattock is expected to be at thehead of a fire in time of trouble!" chirped the "Mayor of Castonia." Hetipped back his head to beam amiably on his partner. "Did it get throughonto us, Wade?"
"The rain stopped it half-way up Pogey."
"Then God was good to us! Isn't that so, Mr. Barrett?" And the cheerfullittle man trotted along to grip the hand of "Stumpage John." Thatgentleman glowered sullenly, and tried to explain his gloom by mutteringabout "blowdowns" being worse than fires. He looked ill. As he came downthe trail a fever had been rising in his blood. He went away by himself,and sat down feeling faint and weak.
"Old Enchanted is all right," said Ide. "There's a thousand acres ofblack growth there, every tree standin' with its arm about its brother.You mustn't let 'em devil you, Mr. Barrett!" he called.
Mr. Barrett, his lowering gaze on Wade, agreed mentally.
"Well, this is certainly a convention of the timber interests!" criedthe brisk little autocrat of Castonia. He pointed up the trail, wherethe Honorable Pulaski D. Britt was advancing alone.
Wade withdrew unobstrusively, and stood beside Nina Ide. Perhaps hehoped that her talk might bring some word of Elva Barrett.
But at last even Rodburd Ide's cheery consciousness became impressed bythe fact that neither Britt nor Barrett seemed to relish any chat ontimber topics. And he broke upon a constrained silence to suggest toWade that they proceed--taking it for granted that now his partner's waylay to the north, along with his own.
"There's--there's--" Wade stammered, and now for the first time Ide andhis daughter marked the girl of the Skeet settlement leaning moodilyagainst the side of the Durfy hovel, the unkempt Abe hoveringapprehensively in the background.
"Ah ha!" piped Ide. "There are the remnants, eh? We met the rest of thecolony hiperin' out of the woods. They've gone to Little Lobster, girl,and the old woman is worryin' about you."
Wade stared straight at Barrett. The timber baron understood thechallenge of his eyes. He was commanded to declare his intentions. Inspite of himself, he scowled. It was a scowl of recalcitrancy. And theyoung man, angered by the presence of Britt and the evident appearanceof treachery, shot his bolt.
"There is a piece of good-fortune for this poor girl, Mr. Ide. Mr.Barrett proposes to educate her, and he's going to take her with him outof the woods."
"She has been gettin' a lot of attention lately," blurted the HonorablePulaski, with malice and derision. "For the past three or four days,Rodburd, your young partner here has been her steady company. They havejust come strollin' alone together down the Lovers' Lane from JerusalemKnob." He fixed his keen eyes on the astonished face of Nina Ide. Hisnarrow nature believed that, like other girls, she could be stirred toquick jealousy. And knowing her influence over her father, he foresawtrouble ahead for the partnership between Ide and Wade. "Seems to be inthe air up this way now for the young men to gallivant through the woodswith the Skeet girl. Wade here seems to have cut out Colin MacLeod."Then the coarse old jester sneered into the indignant face Wade turnedto him.
"It will be a good thing for her to go to school," said Ide, a littlepuzzled by the evident antagonism of these men. "It will be kind of you,Mr. Barrett."
"Say, look here, Ide," cried Britt, in his irritation suddenly decidingto play the strong hand with this young interloper, "your friend Wadehere, being a school-teacher, seems to have school on the brain. He alsoseems to be full of ready-made plans for men older and better than heis. From things that come to me, he has picked up a lot of foolishnessabout these Skeets and Bushees and this girl since he's been cruisin'round these woods. Mr. Barrett and myself have made arrangements to takecare of the rest of that pauper settlement, and the Skeets probably toldyou so when you met them."
Ide nodded acknowledgment.
"We'll look after the girl, too." He walked up to Wade and snapped hisfingers, unable to resist his desire to bully. "Now, young fellow,you've been stickin' your nose pretty deep into other men's business.Take it out, or I'll twist it off your face. Any one would think thatthis girl matter was runnin' the world in these parts. There's been toomuch talk about what's of no consequence. Go along with your partner.You're on my land. Keep movin'."
But all of Dwight Wade's stubborn obstinacy rose in his breast; all hisyouthful chivalry flamed in his face.
"I've no more business with you, Britt!" he said, significantly; andBritt's face flamed with the remembrance of a certain knock-down blow."My business is with you, Mr. Barrett, and you know what it is. You keepthe word that you've given me about this girl, or I'll set you beforethe people of this State in your right colors--and you needn't croakblackmail to me, for you can't frighten me."
"I--I--don't see that it's any business of yours--of yours, Wade,"stammered the pacificatory Ide, catching the courage of protest from therather indignant face his daughter turned on the young man.
"And I don't see that it is the business of any of you!" stormed KateArden. She came close to the group of men and stood with brown handspropped on her hips, her head thrown back, and the insolent stare of herblack eyes seeking face after face. "I'll be passed about from hand tohand no longer. I don't want any old purple-faced fool to send me toschool." Barrett winced. "And as for you," she sneered, turning on Wade,"you attend to your own business until I ask you to help me in mine."
The Honorable Pulaski saw his opportunity.
"Colin MacLeod!" he bawled.
And with a rush that betrayed his impatience, the boss of the Busterscame out of his hiding-place up the trail.
The girl gave a sharp cry of joy at sight of him.
But MacLeod, half-way to them, saw the girl on the horse and stopped assuddenly as he had started. Even at that distance they noted that hisface worked with piteous embarrassment.
"You've given in your promise, MacLeod! Don't forget that!" roaredBritt. "There's the boy for you, my girl! He wants to marry you. Go withhim!"
"And you'll be a fool of a gir-rl if ye do!" squalled a voice. It wasTommy Eye, yelling from the top of the Durfy hovel, to which he hadclambered unobserved. "I know I'm a drunk. I know I ain't worth anythingto anybody!" he gabbled. "But ye saved my life once, Mr. Wade, when Ididn't know it!" He flapped entreating hands at Wade, and that young manstepped in front of the furious Britt with such determination on hisface that the woods tyrant halted. "But ye'll be a fool gir-rl, I say! Iwas under the bunk last night when they planned it. He don't love ye! Iheard him say so. He called you names! Colin MacLeod, ye ain't the liarenough to stand out here and say ye didn't."
MacLeod, his adoring eyes on Nina Ide, had no word to say. The featuresof Kate Arden, who stared at him with her heart in her eyes, twistedwith a promise of bitter tears. This, then, was the girl of Castonia,with whom they had taunted her!
"It's only for grudge and money he's goin' to marry you!" persistedTommy. "May I rest forever in purgatory with no masses for my soul ifthat ain't the truth!"
With the instinct of the animal repulsed, the girl read more in the faceof MacLeod than she understood from the declaration of Tommy Eye.
She looked from face to face again, but the flame was gone from hereyes. There they stood, the silent, hostile, bitter phala
nx fromoutside--oppressors and scorners. There she stood--alone!
And she fell face down upon the ground--the only mother she had everknown--a heart-broken, weary, lonely, sobbing child.
Nina Ide reached her before the others moved. Twice the girl fought herway out of her arms. Twice the sympathetic little mother-heart of theCastonia beauty conquered the rebel and retook her, whispering to hereagerly. And she held her tear-streaked face close to her shoulder, andpatted the grimy little fingers between which tears were trickling.There was something inexpressibly pathetic even in the unkemptness ofthe stricken girl, in her torn dress and the brown skin of face andhands, touched here and there by the stain of exposure to the blackenedforest. And in her loneliness, feeling for the first time in her lifereal sympathy from one of her sex, gathering with grateful nostrils thefaint perfume that whispered of the refinement and comfort that herheart had sought almost unconsciously and had never found, at last thegirl ceased her struggles and clung to her new friend. The waif's trueinstinct was proving this friend's sincerity more surely than thewhispered assurances proved it. And Nina Ide bent to her ear, andmurmured:
"We will hate him together, poor little girl! He is not a good man tohave a girl's love."
"When the hysterics are all over," remarked the Honorable Pulaski,sarcastically, "we'll take the young woman off your hands."
"You'll not take her off _my_ hands!" retorted Nina, with spirit. "She'sgoing back home with me."
"You haven't got any rights over her!" barked Britt.
"Perhaps, then, Mr. Barrett is ready to stand up and say what his rightsare," suggested Wade, with bitter hint of retaliation in his tones.
Barrett, pale with the illness that was seizing him, grew paler yet withanger and terror, for he feared exposure.
The Honorable Pulaski picked up the gage of battle with all the alacrityof his irascible nature.
"For a dog-fight, that girl will be as good a bone as anything else!" hegrowled, under his breath. And then he whirled on his heel and bellowed:
"Wake up there, MacLeod! If you can't make love to the girl you aregoin' to marry, I reckon you can at least fight a little to get her!Call in the crew!"
He walked up to Ide. "Better call off your girl, Rod," he advised,bluffly. "This isn't any of her business, or yours either."
"I figure that a Skeet girl belongs as much to us as to you," snappedthe doughty little man from Castonia. "If my girl takes interest enoughin her to invite her home, I think you'd better let her go."
"Well, I've got a crew of a hundred men posted back here a few rods inthe woods to back me up when I say she stays right where she belongs."His tone was offensive, and Rodburd Ide's anger flared.
"My business just now in here, Britt, is to bring a hundred men for ourEnchanted operation. They're down there by the brook eating lunch. Idon't want any trouble over this, but there's some nasty reason back ofthis girl matter, and I won't stand for any persecution of a helplesscreature. My men back me when I say she goes home with my girl. Hello,men for the Enchanted! Up this way in a hurry!"
The look that Nina flashed at her father was inspiration for him!
As his men came into sight over the bank the crew of Britt trampedtowards them down the trail.
"Nina," said Ide, "you'll have to go back now. Chris Straight will gowith you. Take the girl on the horse with you, and let Chris lead by theheadstall. You'll go all safe. Hurry away from here! But after you getstarted, take your time to the Half-way House. There's no one going toget past down this trail to chase you and bother you."
There was determination in the voice of the little man, and his daughterkissed him at the same time that Dwight Wade was patting his shoulder.
Wade ran along by the side of the horse for a little way, and, when heturned, eagerly kissed Nina Ide's gloved hand.
"God bless you for a little saint!" he gasped. "You'll understand thissome day, perhaps."
"I understand that she is alone and needs a friend," sheresponded--"just as you needed a friend when you were only Britt's'chaney man.'" She smiled archly at him and passed out of sight, oldChristopher tugging at the bits of the horse.
Wade went back in the forefront of the thronging crew of the men forEnchanted.
"As I said, Britt, I don't want trouble," repeated Rodburd Ide, "butyou'll please remember that the lower corner of your township is here atDurfy's camp. I reckon the men for the Enchanted will camp right here onthe trail for a few hours. The man that tries to push past to trouble mydaughter or her friend will get hurt."
"They are goin' past just the same!" shouted Britt, fiercely.
"My God, Pulaski, think of consequences!" pleaded "Stumpage John," inlow tones. He arose with difficulty and staggered to Britt's side. Histones quavered with weakness. "I'd be ruined by the story of what it wasall about. I'm sick. I only want to get home. I don't want to seetrouble here."
Britt glared at his associate, at Wade, Ide, and at last at ColinMacLeod, who was staring in the direction of Nina Ide.
The tyrant snorted his disgust.
"Take the combination of a candidate for governor, some fool women,crazy men, love-sick idiots, and"--his eyes swept the scene in vainsearch for Tommy Eye--"a pooch-mouthed blabber, and it's enough to trigany decent, honest, sensible woods fight ever yarded down. Barrett,you're right! You'd better get home and get on your long-tailed coat andplug hat as soon as you can. You and your private"--he sneered theword--"business don't seem to fit in up here."
He folded his arms and, with his men behind him, stood looking over thecrew for the Enchanted, who, cheerfully and without question, stoodblocking the way.
"It may not happen just now," he grunted, "but it's on my mind to saythat some day these two gangs will get together when there isn't agovernor's boom to step on, nor women to get mussed up."
And the gaze of fury that he bent on Dwight Wade was returned withinterest.
An imaginative man might have seen the new spirit of the woods facingthe old.
But there was no imaginative man there--there were only men who chewedtobacco and wondered what it all meant.