CHAPTER V
BERTHA'S UPWARD FLIGHT
Bertha was eating her supper, after a hard day's work in her littlehotel, when a little yellow envelope was handed to her. The words of themessage were few, but they were meaning-full: "Come at once. Mart hurt,not expected to live." It was signed by Williams. While still she satstunned and hesitant, under the weight of this demand, another and muchmore explicit telegram came: "Johnson, superintendent, is ordered tofetch you with special train. Don't delay. Mart needs you--is callingfor you. Come at once!"
The phrase "is calling for you" reached her heart--decided her. Sherose, and, with a word of explanation to her housekeeper, put on herhat, and threw a cloak over her arm. "I've got to go to Cripple. CaptainHaney is sick, and I've got to go to him. I don't know when I'll beback," she said. "Get along the best you can." Her face was white butcalm, and her manner deliberate. "Send word to mother that Mart is hurt,and I've gone up to see him. Tell her not to worry."
To her night clerk, who had come on duty, she quietly remarked: "Ireckon you'll have to look after things to-morrow. I'll try to get backthe day after. If I don't, Lem Markham will take my place." While stillshe stood arranging the details of her business a short, dark manstepped inside the door, and very kindly and gravely explained hiserrand. "I'm Johnson, the division superintendent. They've telegraphedme for a special, and I'm going to take you up myself. Mart is a friendof mine," he added, with some feeling.
She thanked him with a look and a quick clasp of his hand, and togetherthey hurried into the street and down to the station, where a locomotivecoupled to a single coach stood panting like a fierce animal, a cloud ofspark-lit smoke rolling from its low stack. The coach was merely a shortcaboose; but the girl stepped into it without a moment's hesitation, andthe engine took the track like a spirited horse. As the fireman got upspeed the car began to rock and roll violently, and Johnson remarked tothe girl: "I guess you'd better take my chair; it's bolted to the floor,and you can hang on when we go round the curves."
She obeyed instantly, and with her small hands gripping the arm-rests ofthe rude seat cowered in silence, while the clambering monster rushedand roared over the level lands and labored up the grades, shrieking nowand again, as if in mingled pain and warning. Johnson and the brakeman,for the most part, kept to the lookout in the turret, and the girl rodealone--rode far, passing swiftly from girlhood to womanhood, so full ofenforced meditation were the hours of that ride. It seemed that she wasleaving something sweet and care-free behind her, and it was certainthat she was about to face death. She had one perfectly clearconception, and that was that the man who had been most kind to her, andto whom she had given her promise of marriage, was dying and neededher--was calling for her through the night.
Burdened with responsibility from her childhood, accustomed to make herown decisions, she had responded to this prayer, knowing dimly that thisjourney denoted a new and portentous experience--a fundamental change inher life.
She had admired and liked Haney from the first, but her feeling even yetwas very like that of a boy for a man of heroic statue--her regard hadvery little of woman's passion in it. She was appalled and benumbed bythe thought that she was soon to look upon him lying prone. That shemight soon be called upon to meet those bold eyes closing in death shehad been warned, and yet she did not shrink from it. The nurse, latentin every woman, rose in her, and she ached with desire of haste, longingto lay her hand upon the suffering man in some healing way. Hiskindness, his gentleness, during the days of his final courtship hadsunk deep--his generosity had been so full, so free, so unhesitating.
She thought of her mother, and as a fuller conception of the alarm andanxiety she would feel came to her, she decided to send her a telegram."She will know it was my duty to go," she decided. "As for thehotel--what does it matter now?" Nothing seemed to matter, indeed, savethe speed of her chariot.
The night was long, interminably long. Once and again Johnson came downout of his perch, and spoke a few clumsy words of well-meaningencouragement, but found her unresponsive. Her brain was too busy withtaking leave of old conceptions and in mastering new duties to beotherwise than vaguely grateful to her companions. Her mind was clear onone other point--this journey committed her to Marshall Haney. Therecould be no further hesitation. "Some time, soon, if he lives, I mustmarry him," she thought, and the conception troubled her with a newrevelation of what that relationship might mean. She felt suddenly verysmall, very weak, and very helpless. "He must be good to me," shemurmured. And then, as the words of his prayer to her came back, sheadded: "And I'll be good to him."
Far and farther below her shone the lights in the little hotel, and thebusy and jocund scenes of her girlish life receded swiftly. At thismoment her desk and the little sitting-room where the men lounged seemeda haven of peace and plenty, and the car, rocking and plunging throughthe night, was like a ship rising and falling on wild seas under unknownstars.
* * * * *
The clear light of the mountain dawn was burnishing brass into gold asthe locomotive with its tolling bell slid up the level track at the endof its run, and came to a stealthy halt beside the small station.
"Here we are!" called Johnson from his turret, and Bertha rose, stiffand sore with the long night's ride, her resolution cooled to a kind ofpassive endurance. "I'm ready!" she called back.
Williams met her at the step. "It's all right, sis. Mart's stillhere--and waiting for you."
Instantly, at sight of his ugly, familiar, friendly face, she becamealert, clear-brained. "How is he?"
"Pretty bad."
"What's it all about? How did it happen?"
"I'll clear that up as we go," he replied, and led the way to acarriage.
Once inside, she turned her keen gaze upon him. "Now goahead--straight."
He did so in the blunt terms of a man whose life had been always on theborder, and who has no nice shading in act or word.
"Is he dying?" she asked at the first pause.
"I'm afraid he is, sister," he replied, gently. "That's what's made thenight seem long to us; but you're here and it's all right now."
That she was to look on him dying had been persistently in her mind, butthat she was to see him mangled by an assassin added horror to herdread. In spite of her intrepid manner, she was still girl enough toshudder at the sight of blood.
Williams went on. "He's weak, too weak to talk much, and so I'm going totell you what he wants. He wants you to marry him before he dies."
The girl drew away. "Not this minute--to-night?"
"Yes; he wants to give you legal rights to all he has, and you've got todo it quick. No tellin' what may happen." His voice choked as he saidthis.
Bertha's blood chilled with dismay. Her throat filled and her bosomswelled with the effort she made at self-control, and Williams, watchingher with bright eyes of admiration, hurried on to the end. "Everythingis ready. There is a priest, if you want him, and Judge Brady with acivil ceremony, if that will please you better, or we'll get aProtestant minister; it's for you to say. Only the knot must be tiedgood and tight. I told the boys you'd take a priest for Mart's sake. Hesays: 'Make it water-proof.' He means so that no will-breaking brothersor cousins can stack the cards agin you. And now it's up to you, littlesister. He has only a few hours anyway, and I don't see that you canrefuse, specially as it makes his dying--" He stopped there.
The street was silent as they drew up to the saloon door, and onlySlater and one or two of his friends were present when Bertha walkedinto the bar-room, erect as a boy, her calm, sweet face ashen white inthe electric light. For an instant; she stood there in the middle of thefloor alone, her big dark eyes searching every face. Then Judge Brady, akindly, gray-haired man, advanced, and took her hand. "We're very gladto see you," he gravely said, introducing himself. Williams, who hadentered the inner room, returned instantly to say: "Come, he's waiting."
Without a word the bride entered the presence of her groom, and thedocto
r, bending low to the gambler, said: "Be careful now, Mart. Don'ttry to rise. Be perfectly still. Bertie has come."
Haney turned with a smile--a tender, humorous smile--and whispered:"Bertie, acushla mavourneen, come to me!"
Then the watchers withdrew, leaving them alone, and the girl, bendingabove him, kissed him. "Oh, Captain, can't I do something? I _must_ dosomething."
"Yes, darlin', ye can. You can marry me this minute, and ye shall. I'mdyin', girl--so the doctor says. I don't feel it that way; but, anyhow,we take no chances. All I have is for you, and so--"
She put her hand ever his lips. "You must be quiet. I understand, and Iwill do it--but only to make you well." She turned to the door, and hervoice was clear as she said to those who waited: "I am ready."
"Will you have Father Kearney?" asked Williams.
She turned towards Haney. "Just as he says."
The stricken miner, ghastly with the pain brought on by movement,responded to the doctor's question, only by a whisper: "Thepriest--first."
The girl heard, and her fine, clear glance rested upon the face of thepriest. Tears were on her cheeks, but a kind of exultation was in hertone as she said: "I am willing, father."
With a look which denoted his appreciation of the girl's courage, thepriest stepped forward and led her to her place beside her bridegroom.She took Haney's big nerveless hand in her firm grasp, and together theylistened to the solemn words which made them husband and wife. It seemedthat the gambler was passing into the shadow during the opening prayer,but his whispered responses came at the proper pauses, and only when thefinal benediction was given, and the priest and the judge fell backbefore the rush of the young doctor, did the wounded man's eyes close infinal collapse. He had indeed reached the end of his endurance.
The young wife spoke then, imperiously, almost fiercely, asking: "Why ishe lying here? This is no place for him."
The doctor explained. "We were afraid to move him--till you came. Infact, he wouldn't let me move him. If you say so now, we will take himup." With these words the watchers shifted their responsibility to hershoulders, uttering sighs of deep relief. Whatever happened now, Mart'swill had been secured. At her command they lifted the table on which herhusband lay, and the wife walked beside it, unheeding the throngs ofsilent men walling her path. Every one made way for her, waited uponher, eager to serve her, partly because she was Marshall Haney's wife,but more because of her youth and the brave heart which looked from herclear and candid eyes.
She showed no hesitation now, gave out no word of weakness; on thecontrary, she commanded with certainty and precision, calling to her aidall that the city afforded. Not till she had summoned the best surgeonsand was sure that everything had been done that could be done did shepermit herself to relax--or to think of rest or her mother.
When she had sunk to sleep upon a couch beside her husband's bed,Williams, with a note of deep admiration, demanded of the surgeon:"Ain't she a little Captain? Mart can't die now, can he? He's got toomuch to live for."
Money Magic: A Novel Page 5
