by Unknown
The second night was a repetition of the first. The three were divided into two camps. Whaley or Jessie McRae watched West every minute. There was a look in his eye they distrusted, a sulky malice back of which seemed to smoke banked fires of murderous desire. He lay on the floor and slept a good deal in short cat-naps. Apparently his dreams were not pleasant. He would growl incoherently through set teeth and clench great hairy fists in spasms of rage. Out of these he wakened with a start to glare around suspiciously at the others. It was clear the thought was in the back of his mind that they might destroy him while he was asleep.
Throughout the third day the storm continued unabated. Whaley and West discussed the situation. Except for a few pounds of fish, their provisions were gone. If the blizzard did not moderate, they would soon face starvation.
During the night the wind died down. Day broke clear, a faint and wintry sun in the sky.
To West the other man made a proposal. "Have to get out and hunt food. We'll find caribou in some of the coulées along the creek. What say?"
The convict looked at him with sly cunning. "How about this girl? Think I'm gonna leave her to mush out an' put the police on my trail? No, sir. I'll take her snowshoes with me."
Whaley shrugged his shoulders. "She couldn't find her way home if she had shoes. But please yourself about that."
West's shifty gaze slid over him. The proposal of a hunt suited him. He must have a supply of food to carry him to Lookout. Whaley was a good shot and an expert trailer. If there were caribou or moose in the vicinity, he was likely to make a kill. In any event there would be hundreds of white rabbits scurrying through the woods. He decided craftily to make use of the gambler, and after he was through with him--
The men took with them part of the tea and enough fish to feed the dogs once. They expected to find game sufficient to supply themselves and stock up for a few days. Whaley insisted on leaving Jessie her rifle, in order that she might shoot a rabbit or two if any ventured near the cabin. She had three frozen fish and a handful of tea.
Before they started Whaley drew Jessie aside. "Can't say how long we'll be gone. Maybe two days--or three. You'll have to make out with what you've got till we get back." He hesitated a moment, then his cold, hard eyes held fast to hers. "Maybe only one of us will come back. Keep your eyes open. If there's only one of us--and it's West--don't let him get into the house. Shoot him down. Take his snowshoes and the team. Follow the creek down about five miles, then strike southwest till you come to Clear Lake. You know your way home from there."
Her dark eyes dilated. "Do you think he means to--to--?"
The man nodded. "He's afraid of me--thinks I mean to set the police on his trail. If he can he'll get rid of me. But not yet--not till we've got a couple of caribou. I'll be watching him all the time."
"How can you watch him while you're hunting?"
He lifted his shoulders in a shrug. It was quite true that West could shoot him in the back during the hunt. But Whaley knew the man pretty well. He would make sure of meat before he struck. After the sled was loaded, Whaley did not intend to turn his back on the fellow.
Jessie had not been brought up in the North woods for nothing. She had seen her brother Fergus make many a rabbit snare. Now she contrived to fashion one out of some old strips of skin she found in the cabin. After she had bent down a young sapling and fastened it to a fallen log, she busied herself making a second one.
Without snowshoes she did not find it possible to travel far, but she managed to shoot a fox that adventured near the hut in the hope of finding something to fill its lean and empty paunch.
Before leaving, Whaley had brought into the house a supply of wood, but Jessie added to this during the day by hauling birch poles from the edge of the creek.
Darkness fell early. The girl built up a roaring fire piled the wood up against the door so that nobody could get in without waking her. The rifle lay close at hand. She slept long and soundly. When she shook the drowsiness from her eyes, the sun was shining through the window.
She breakfasted on stew made from a hindquarter of fox. After she had visited her snares and reset one that had been sprung, she gathered balsam boughs for a bed and carried them to the house to dry before the fire. Whaley had left her a small hatchet, and with this she began to shape a snowshoe from a piece of the puncheon floor. All day she worked at this, and by night had a rough sort of wooden ski that might serve at need. With red-hot coals, during the long evening, she burned holes in it through which to put the straps. The skin of the fox, cut into long strips, would do for thongs. It would be a crude, primitive device, but she thought that at a pinch she might travel a few miles on it. To-morrow she would make a mate for it, she decided.
Except for the bed of balsam boughs, her arrangements for the night were just as they had been the first day. Again she built up a big fire, piled the wood in front of the door, and put the rifle within reach. Again she was asleep almost at once, within a minute of the time when she nestled down to find a soft spot in the springy mattress she had made.
Jessie worked hard on the second ski. By noon she had it pretty well shaped. Unfortunately a small split in the wood developed into a larger one. She was forced to throw it aside and begin on another piece.
A hundred times her eyes had lifted to sweep the snow field for any sign of the hunters' return. Now, looking out of the window without much expectation of seeing them, her glance fell on a traveler, a speck of black on a sea of white. Her heart began to beat a drum of excitement. She waited, eyes riveted, expecting to see a second figure and a dog-team top the rise and show in silhouette.
None appeared. The man advanced steadily. He did not look backward. Evidently he had no companion. Was this lone traveler West?
Jessie picked up the rifle and made sure that it was in good working order. A tumultuous river seemed to beat through her temples. The pulses in her finger-tips were athrob.
Could she do this dreadful thing, even to save honor and life, though she knew the man must be twice a murderer? Once she had tried and failed, while he stood taunting her with his horrible, broken-toothed grin. And once, in the stress of battle, she had wounded him while he was attacking.
The moving black speck became larger. It came to her presently with certainty that this was not West. He moved more gracefully, more lightly, without the heavy slouching roll.... And then she knew he was not Whaley either. One of her friends! A little burst of prayer welled out of her heart.
She left the cabin and went toward the man. He waved a hand to her and she flung up a joyful gesture in answer. For her rescuer was Onistah.
Jessie found herself with both hands in his, biting her lower lip to keep back tears. She could not speak for the emotion that welled up in her.
"You--all well?" he asked, with the imperturbable facial mask of his race that concealed all emotion.
She nodded.
"Good," he went on. "Your father pray the Great Spirit keep you safe."
"Where is Father?"
He looked in the direction from which he had come. "We go Jasper's cabin--your father, red soldier, American trader, Onistah. You gone. Big storm--snow--sleet. No can go farther. Then your father he pray. We wait till Great Spirit he say, 'No more wind, snow,' Then we move camp. All search--go out find you." He pointed north, south, east, and west. "The Great Spirit tell me to come here. I say, 'Sleeping Dawn she with God, for Jesus' sake, Amen.'"
"You dear, dear boy," she sobbed.
"So I find you. Hungry?"
"No. I shot a fox."
"Then we go now." He looked at her feet. "Where your snowshoes?"
"West took them to keep me here. I'm making a pair. Come. We'll finish them."
They moved toward the house. Onistah stopped. The girl followed his eyes. They were fastened on a laden dog-train with two men moving across a lake near the shore of which the cabin had been built.
Her fear-filled gaze came back to the Indian. "It's West and Mr. Whaley. What'll we
do?"
Already he was kneeling, fumbling with the straps of his snowshoes. "You go find your father. Follow trail to camp. Then you send him here. I hide in woods."
"No--no. They'll find you, and that West would shoot you."
"Onistah know tricks. They no find him."
He fastened the snow-webs on her feet while she was still protesting. She glanced again at the dog-train jogging steadily forward. If she was going, it must be at once. Soon it would be too late for either of them to escape.
"You will hide in the woods, won't you, so they can't find you?" she implored.
He smiled reassurance. "Go," he said.
Another moment, and she was pushing over the crust along the trail by which the Blackfoot had come.
CHAPTER XXVII
APACHE STUFF
The hunters brought back three caribou and two sacks of rabbits, supplies enough to enable West to reach Lookout. The dogs were stronger than when they had set out, for they had gorged themselves on the parts of the game unfit for human use.
Nothing had been said by either of the men as to what was to be done with Jessie McRae, but the question was in the background of both their thoughts, just as was the growing anger toward each other that consumed them. They rarely spoke. Neither of them let the other drop behind him. Neither had slept a wink the previous night. Instead, they had kept themselves awake with hot tea. Fagged out after a day of hard hunting, each was convinced his life depended on wakefulness. West's iron strength had stood the strain without any outward signs of collapse, but Whaley was stumbling with fatigue as he dragged himself along beside the sled.
The bad feeling between the partners was near the explosion point. It was bound to come before the fugitive started on his long trip north. The fellow had a single-track mind. He still intended to take the girl with him. When Whaley interfered, there would be a fight. It could not come too soon to suit West. His brooding had reached the point where he was morally certain that the gambler meant to betray him to the police and set them on his track.
Smoke was rising from the chimney of the hut. No doubt the McRae girl was inside, waiting for them with a heart of fear fluttering in her bosom. Whaley's thin lips set grimly. Soon now it would be a show-down.
There was a moment's delay at the door, each hanging back under pretense of working at the sled. There was always the chance that the one who went first might get a shot in the back.
West glanced at the big mittens on the other's hands, laughed hardily, and pushed into the cabin. A startled grunt escaped him.
"She's gone," he called out.
"Probably in the woods back here--rabbit-shooting likely. She can't have gone far without snowshoes," Whaley said.
The big man picked up the ski Jessie had made. "Looky here."
Whaley examined it. "She might have made a pair of 'em and got away. Hope so."
The yellow teeth of the convict showed in a snarl. "Think I don't see yore game? Playin' up to McRae an' the red-coats. I wouldn't put it by you to sell me out."
The gambler's ice-cold eyes bored into West. Was it to be now?
West was not quite ready. His hands were cold and stiff. Besides, the other was on guard and the fugitive was not looking for an even break.
"Oh, well, no use rowin' about that. I ain't gonna chew the rag with you. It'll be you one way an' me another pretty soon," he continued, shifty eyes dodging.
"About the girl--easy to find out, I say. She sure didn't fly away. Must 'a' left tracks. We'll take a look-see."
Again Whaley waited deferentially, with a sardonic and mirthless grin, to let the other pass first. There were many tracks close to the cabin where they themselves, as well as the girl, had moved to and fro. Their roving glances went farther afield.
Plain as the swirling waters in the wake of a boat stretched the tracks of a snowshoer across the lower end of the lake.
They pushed across to examine them closer, following them a dozen yards to the edge of the ice-field. The sign written there on that white page told a tale to both of the observers, but it said more to one than to the other.
"Some one's been here," West cried with a startled oath.
"Yes," agreed Whaley. He did not intend to give any unnecessary information.
"An' lit out again. Must 'a' gone to git help for the girl."
"Yes," assented the gambler, and meant "No."
What he read from the writing on the snow was this: Some one had come and some one had gone. But the one who had come was not the one who had gone. An Indian had made the first tracks. He could tell it by the shape of the webs and by the way the traveler had toed in. The outward-bound trail was different. Some one lighter of build was wearing the snowshoes, some one who took shorter steps and toed out.
"See. She run out to meet him. Here's where her feet kept sinkin' in," West said.
The other nodded. Yes, she had hurried to meet him but that was not all he saw. There was the impression of a knee in the snow. It was an easy guess that the man had knelt to take off the shoes and adjust them to the girl's feet.
"An' here's where she cut off into the woods," the convict went on. "She's hidin' up there now. I'm hittin' the trail after her hot-foot."
Whaley's derisive smile vanished almost before it appeared. What he knew was his own business. If West wanted to take a walk in the woods, it was not necessary to tell him that a man was waiting for him there behind some tree.
"Think I'll follow this fellow," Whaley said, with a lift of the hand toward the tracks that led across the lake. "We've got to find out where he went. If the Mounted are hot on our trail, we want to know it."
"Sure." West assented craftily, eyes narrowed to conceal the thoughts that crawled through his murderous brain. "We gotta know that."
He believed Whaley was playing into his hands. The man meant to betray him to the police. He would never reach them. And he, Bully West, would at last be alone with the girl, nobody to interfere with him.
The gambler was used to taking chances. He took one now and made his first mistake in the long duel he had been playing with West. The eagerness of the fellow to have him gone was apparent. The convict wanted him out of the way so that he could go find the girl. Evidently he thought that Whaley was backing down as gracefully as he could.
"I'll start right after him. Back soon," the gambler said casually.
"Yes, soon," agreed West.
Their masked eyes still clung to each other, wary and watchful. As though without intent Whaley backed away, still talking to the other. He wanted to be out of revolver range before he turned. West also was backing clumsily, moving toward the sled. The convict wheeled and slid rapidly to it.
Whaley knew his mistake now. West's rifle lay on the sled and the man was reaching for it.
The man on the ice-field did the only thing possible. He bent low and traveled fast. When the first shot rang out he was nearly a hundred fifty yards away. He crumpled down into the snow and lay still.
West's hands were cold, his fingers stiff. He had not been sure of his aim. Now he gave a whoop of triumph. That was what happened to any one who interfered with Bully West. He fired again at the still huddled heap on the lake.
Presently he would go out there and make sure the man was dead. Just now he had more important business, an engagement to meet a girl in the woods back of the house.
"Got him good," he told himself aloud. "He sure had it comin' to him, the damned traitor."
To find the McRae girl could not be difficult. She had left tracks as she waded away in the deep snow. There was no chance for her to hide. Nor could she have gone far without webs. The little catamount might, of course, shoot him. He had to move carefully, not to give her an opportunity.
As he went forward he watched every tree, every stick of timber behind which she might find cover to ambush him. He was not of a patient temperament, but life in the wilds had taught him to subdue when he must his gusty restlessness. Now he took plenty of time. He was in a
hurry to hit the trail with his train and be off, but he could not afford to be in such great haste as to stop a bullet with his body.
He called to her. "Where you at, Dawn? I ain't aimin' to hurt you none. Come out an' quit devilin' me."
Then, when his wheedling brought no answer, he made the forest ring with threats of what he would do to her when he caught her unless she came to him at once.
Moving slowly forward, he came to the end of the tracks that had been made in the snow. They ended abruptly, in a thicket of underbrush. His first thought was that she must be hidden here, but when he had beat through it half a dozen times, he knew this was impossible. Then where was she?
He had told Whaley that she could not fly away. But if she hadn't flown, what had become of her? There were no trees near enough to climb without showing the impressions of her feet in the snow as she moved to the trunk. He had an uneasy sense that she was watching him all the time from some hidden place near at hand. He looked up into the branches of the trees. They were heavy with snow which had not been shaken from them.