Time passed, and she still marched to and fro. The half-breed was nodding over the fire, and his two companions were sound asleep. Under her fur parka she felt the butt of the pistol which Stane had given her, when the attack on the cabin had commenced. She looked at the three men, and with her hand on the pistol-butt the thought came to her mind that it would be a simple thing to kill them in their sleep, and to take the dogs and so effect her escape. They were murderers; they deserved to die; and she felt that she could kill them without compunction. But her eyes swept the dark circle of trees, and for a moment she stared into the darkness with fixed gaze, then her hand slipped from the pistol, and she put from her the thought that had come to her. It was not fear of the darkness or any terror at the hazards of the frozen wilderness that deterred her from the attempt; it was just that there was within her a fierce, overwhelming desire, to meet the man who was the ultimate cause of her lover's death.
When the half-breed rose, and ordered her to resume her place on the sledge, she did so without demur, making herself as comfortable as possible. She was bound to the sledge again, though, when they resumed the journey, she was less like a mere bale than she had been, and was free to lift the blanket which now was thrown over her head for protection from the extreme cold more than for any other reason. But only once before the dawn did she avail herself of this privilege to look about her, and that was when the second halt was made. She lifted the blanket to learn the cause of the delay; and made the discovery that the dog-harness having become entangled in the branch of a fallen tree, had broken and the halt was necessary for repairs. She dropped her head-covering again and lay there in the darkness, wild thoughts mingling with her grief. She chafed at the delay. Her one anxiety was for the meeting that should involve a terrible justice; the man should die as her lover had died; and her own hand should inflict upon him the recompense of God.
The sullen dawn of the Northern winter had broken when she lifted the blanket again. They were still in the forest, having lost the trail in the darkness, and presently a fresh halt was necessary, and whilst two of the men prepared a meal, her chief captor went off through the woods as she guessed to discover their whereabouts. He returned in the course of half an hour and said something to his companion which Helen did not understand; and after a rather leisurely meal they harnessed up once more.
After a time the forest began to open out. They struck a frozen river and descending the bank and taking to its smooth surface, their speed accelerated. The banks of the river widened, and in a little time they swept clear of them on to the open plain of what she easily guessed was a frozen lake. They turned sharply to the right, and a few minutes afterwards a whirl of snow caused her to cover her face. Some considerable time passed before she looked forth again. They were travelling at a great rate. The snow was flying from the shoes of the man who broke the trail. The half-breed who was acting as driver was urging the dogs with both whip and voice, and occasionally he cast an anxious look over his shoulder. Wondering why he should do so Helen also looked back. Then her heart gave a great leap. Behind them was another dog-team with two men. Was it possible that after all the half-breed was mistaken, or that he had told her a lying tale?
She did not know, she could not tell, she could only hope, and her hope was fed by her captor's evident anxiety. He whipped the dogs cruelly, and his glances back became more frequent. Helen also looked back and saw that the sled behind was gaining on them. Was it indeed her lover in pursuit, or were these men who had witnessed the attack on the cabin, and had fired the shots which had compelled the attackers to take flight? Anything now seemed possible, and as the half-breed's anxiety grew more pronounced, her own excited hopes mounted higher.
The snow came again, a blinding whirl that blotted out the whole landscape, then the half-breed gave a sharp order, and the Indian in front breaking trail turned ashore. The half-breed looked back, and then forward, and gave a grunt of satisfaction. The girl also looked forward. They were approaching a tree-crowned bluff, which was apparently their goal. Then suddenly, bewildering in its unexpectedness, came the flash and crack of a rifle from the bushes in shore.
"Sacree!" cried the half-breed, and the next moment three rifles spoke, and he pitched over in the snow, whilst the man at the gee-pole also fell.
The man breaking the trail in front, swerved from the bluff, and the dogs swerved after him, almost upsetting the sledge. Again a rifle, and the remaining man went down. The dogs, in excitement or fear, still moved forward, and Helen strove to free herself, but a moment later the sledge halted abruptly as two of the dogs fell, shot in their traces. She had a momentary vision of two men running towards her from the shore, then the snow came down in a thick veil. Dimly she caught the outline of one of the men by her sled, and the next moment a voice she remembered broke on her ears through the clamour of the wind.
"Thank God, Helen! I am in time."
And she looked up incredulously to find Gerald Ainley looking down at her.
* * *
When Stane set his face to the storm he knew there was a difficult task before him, and he found it even more difficult than he had anticipated. The wind, bitingly cold, drove the snow before it in an almost solid wall. The wood sheltered him somewhat; but fearful of losing himself, and so missing what he was seeking, he dared not turn far into it, and was forced to follow the edge of it, that he might not wander from the lake. Time after time he was compelled to halt in the lee of the deadfalls, or shelter behind a tree with his back to the storm, whilst he recovered breath. He could see scarcely a yard before him, and more than once he was driven to deviate from the straight course, and leave the trees in order to assure himself that he had not wandered from the lake side.
The bitter cold numbed his brain; the driving snow was utterly confusing, and before he reached his objective he had only one thing clear in his mind. Blistering though it was, he must keep his face to the wind, then he could not go wrong, for the storm, sweeping down the lake, came in a direct line from the bluff in the shadow of which the tragedy which he had witnessed, had happened. As he progressed, slowly, utter exhaustion seemed to overtake him. Bending his head to the blast he swayed like a drunken man. More than once as he stumbled over fallen trees the impulse to sit and rest almost overcame him; but knowing the danger of such a course he forced himself to refrain. Once as he halted in the shelter of a giant fir, his back resting against the trunk, he was conscious of a deadly, delicious languor creeping through his frame, and knowing it for the beginning of the dreaded snow-sleep which overtakes men in such circumstances, he lurched forward again, though he had not recovered breath.
He came to a sudden descent in the trail that he was following. It was made by a small stream that in spring flooded down to the lake but which now was frozen solid. In the blinding snow-wrack he never even saw it, and stepping on air, he hurtled down the bank, and rolled in a confused heap in the deep snow at the bottom. For a full minute he lay there, out of the wind and biting snow-hail, feeling like a man who has stumbled out of bitter cold to a soft couch in a warm room. A sense of utter contentment stole upon him. For some moments he lost all his grip on realities; time and circumstances and the object of his quest were forgotten. Visions, momentary but very vivid, crowded upon him, and among them, one of a girl whom he had kissed in the face of death. That girl-Yes, there was something. His mind asserted itself again, his purpose dominated his wavering faculties, and he staggered to his feet.
"Helen!" he muttered. "Helen!"
He faced the bank of the stream on the other side from that which had caused his downfall. Then he paused. There was something-twenty seconds passed before he remembered. His rifle! It was somewhere in the snow, he must find it, for he might yet have need of it. He groped about, and presently recovered it; then after considering for a moment, instead of ascending to the level, he began to walk downstream, sheltered by the high banks. It was not so cold in the hollow, and though a smother of sand-like particles of snow
blew at the level of his head, by stooping he was able to escape the worst of it. His numbed faculties began to assert themselves again. The struggle through the deep soft snow, out of reach of the wind's bitter breath, sent a glow through him. His brain began to work steadily. He could not be far from the bluff now, and the stream would lead him to the lake. How much time he had lost he did not know, and he was in a sweat of fear lest he should be too late after all. As he struggled on, he did not even wonder what was the meaning of the attack that he had witnessed; one thing only was before his eyes, the vision of the girl he loved helpless in the face of unknown dangers.
The banks of the stream lowered and opened suddenly. The withering force of the blast struck him, the snow buffeted him, and for a moment he stood held in his tracks, then the wind momentarily slackened, and dimly through the driving snow he caught sight of something that loomed shadowlike before him. It was the bluff that he was seeking, and as he moved towards it, the wind broken, grew less boisterous, though a steady stream of fine hard snow swept down upon him from its height. The snow blanketed everything, and he could see nothing; then he heard a dog yelp and stumbled forward in the direction of the sound. A minute later, in the shelter of some high rocks, he saw a camp-fire, beside which a team of dogs in harness huddled in the snow, anchored there by the sled turned on its side, and by the fire a man crouched and stared into the snow-wrack. As he visioned them, Stane slipped the rifle from the hollow of his arm, and staggered forward like a drunken man.
The man by the fire becoming aware of him leaped suddenly to his feet. In a twinkling his rifle was at his shoulder, and through the wild canorous note of the wind, Stane caught his hail. "Hands up! You murderer!"
Something in the voice struck reminiscently on his ears, and this, as he recognized instantly, was not the hail of a man who had just committed a terrible crime. He dropped his rifle and put up his hands. The man changed his rifle swiftly for a pistol, and began to advance. Two yards away he stopped.
"Stane! by-!"
Then Stane recognized him. It was Dandy Anderton, the mounted policeman, and in the relief of the moment he laughed suddenly.
"You, Dandy?"
"Yes! What in heaven's name is the meaning of it all? Did you see anything? Hear the firing? There are two dead men out there in the snow." He jerked his head towards the lake. "And there was a dog-team, but I lost it in the storm. Do you know anything about it, Stane? I hope that you had no hand in this killing?"
The questions came tumbling over each other all in one breath, and as they finished, Stane, still a little breathless, replied:
"No, I had no hand in that killing. I don't understand it at all, but that sledge, we must find it, for to the best of my belief, Miss Yardely is on it."
"Miss Yardely! What on earth--"
"It is a long story. I haven't time to explain. We were attacked and she was carried off. Come along, Dandy, and help me to find her."
The policeman shook his head and pointed to the whirling snow. "No use, old man, we couldn't find a mountain in that stuff, and we should be mad to try. We don't know which way to look for her, and we should only lose ourselves and die in the cold."
"But, man, I tell you that Helen--"
"Helen is in the hands of the good God for the present, my friend. I did not know she was with that sledge, and though I had only a glimpse of it, I will swear that the sledge was empty."
"There were two men ran out after the firing," cried Stane. "I saw them just before the snow came. They were making for the sledge. Perhaps they took Helen--"
"Sit down, Stane, and give me the facts. It's no good thinking of going out in that smother. A man might as well stand on Mount Robson and jump for the moon! Sit down and make me wise on the business, then if the storm slackens we can get busy."
Stane looked into the smother in front, and reason asserted itself. It was quite true what Anderton said. Nothing whatever could be done for the present; the storm effectually prevented action. To venture from the shelter of the bluff on to the open width of the lake was to be lost, and to be lost in such circumstances meant death from cold. Fiercely as burned the desire to be doing on behalf of his beloved, he was forced to recognize the utter folly of attempting anything for the moment. With a gesture of despair, he swept the snow from a convenient log, and seated himself heavily upon it.
The policeman stretched a hand towards a heap of smouldering ashes, where reposed a pan, and pouring some boiling coffee into a tin cup, handed it to Stane.
"Drink that, Hubert, old man, it'll buck you up. Then you can give me the pegs of this business."
Stane began to sip the coffee, and between the heat of the fire and that of the coffee, his blood began to course more freely. All the numbness passed from his brain and with it passed the sense of despair that had been expressed in his gesture, and a sudden hope came to him.
"One thing," he broke out, "if we can't travel, neither can anybody else."
"Not far-at any rate," agreed Anderton. "A man might put his back to the storm, but he would soon be jiggered; or he might take to the deep woods; but with a dog-team he wouldn't go far or fast, unless there was a proper trail."
"That's where they'll make for, as like as not," said Stane with another stab of despair.
"They-who? Tell me, man, and never bother about the woods. There's a good two hundred miles of them hereabouts and till we can begin to look for the trail it is no good worrying. Who are these men--"
"I can't say," answered Stane, "but I'll tell you what I know."
Vividly and succinctly he narrated the events that had befallen since the policeman's departure from Chief George's camp on the trail of Chigmok. Anderton listened carefully. Twice he interrupted. The first time was when he heard how the man whom he sought had been at Chief George's camp after all.
"I guessed that," he commented, "after I started on the trail to the Barrens, particularly when I found no signs of any camping place on what is the natural road for any one making that way. I swung back yesterday meaning to surprise Chief George, and rake through his tepees."
The second time was when he heard of the white man who had offered the bribe of the guns and blankets for the attack on the cabin, and the kidnapping of the girl.
"Who in thunder can have done that?" he asked.
"I don't know," answered Stane, and explained the idea that had occurred to him that it was some one desiring to claim the reward offered by Sir James.
"But why should you be killed?"
"Ask the man who ordered it," answered Stane with a grim laugh.
"I will when I come up with him. But tell me the rest, old man."
Stane continued his narrative, and when he had finished, Anderton spoke again. "That solitary man with the team whom you saw coming down the lake, must have been me. I turned into the wood a mile or two on the other side of this bluff to camp out of the snow which I saw was coming. Then it struck me that I should do better on this side, and I worked towards it. I was just on the other side when the shooting began, and I hurried forward, but the snow came and wiped out everything, though I had an impression of a second dog-team waiting by the shore as I came round. When I looked for it I couldn't find it; and then I tumbled on this camp, and as there was nothing else to be done until the snow slackened I unharnessed."
Stane looked round. "This would be the place where the man, who was to have paid the kidnappers their price, waited for them."
"And paid them in lead, no doubt with the idea of covering his own tracks completely."
"That seems likely," agreed Stane.
"But who--" Anderton broke off suddenly and leaped to his feet. "Great Christopher! Look there!" Stane looked swiftly in the direction indicated, and as the veil of snow broke for a moment, caught sight of a huddled form crawling in the snow.
"What--" he began.
"It's a man. I saw him distinctly," interrupted the policeman, and then as the snow swept down again he ran from the shelter of the camp.
A minute and a half later he staggered back, dragging a man with him. He dropped the man by the fire, poured some coffee into a pannikin, and as the new-comer, with a groan, half-raised himself to look round, he held the coffee towards him.
"Here, drink this, it'll do you--" he interrupted himself sharply, then in a tone of exultation he cried: "Chigmok!"
"Oui!" answered the man. "I am Chigmok! And thou?"
"I am the man of the Law," answered Anderton, "who has been at your heels for weeks."
"So!" answered the half-breed in native speech, with a hopeless gesture, "It had been better to have died the snow-death, but I shall die before they hang me, for I am hurt."
He glanced down at his shoulder as he spoke, and looking closely the two white men saw that the frozen snow on his furs was stained.
"Ah!" said the policeman, "I hadn't noticed that, but we'll have a look at it." He looked at Stane, who was eyeing the half-breed with a savage stare, then he said sharply: "Give me a hand, Stane. We can't let the beggar die unhelped, however he may deserve it. He's a godsend anyway, for he can explain your mystery. Besides it's my duty to get him back to the Post, and they wouldn't welcome him dead. Might think I'd plugged him, you know."
Together they lifted the man nearer the fire, and examined the injured shoulder. It had been drilled clean through by a bullet. Anderton nodded with satisfaction. "Nothing there to kill you, Chigmok. We'll bandage you up, and save you for the Law yet?"
They washed and dressed the wound, made the half-breed as comfortable as they could; then as he reposed by the fire, Anderton found the man's pipe, filled it, held a burning stick whilst he lit it, and when it was drawing nicely, spoke:
"Now, Chigmok, you owe me something for all this, you know. Just tell us the meaning of the game you were playing. It can't hurt you to make a clean breast of it; because that other affair that you know of is ample for the needs of the Law."
A Mating In The Wilds Page 7