The Branding Iron

by Katharine Newlin Burt

  CHAPTER XII

  THE LEOPARDESS

  Pierre stood before the cheap bureau of his ugly hotel bedroom turninga red slip of cardboard about in his fingers. The gas-jet sputteringabove his head threw heavy shadows down on his face. It was the faceof hopeless, heartsick youth, the muscles sagging, the eyes dull, thelips tight and pale. Since last night when the contemptuous glitter ofJoan's smile had fallen upon him, he had neither slept nor eaten.Jasper had joined him at the theater exit, had walked home with him,and, while he was with the manager, Pierre's pride and reserve hadheld him up. Afterwards he had ranged the city like a prairie wolf,ranged it as though it had been an unpeopled desert, free to hisstride. He had fixed his eyes above and beyond and walked alone inpain.

  Dawn found him again in his room. What hope had sustained him, whatmemory of Joan, what purpose of tenderness toward her--these hopes andmemories and purposes now choked and twisted him. He might have foundher, his "gel," his Joan, with her dumb, loving gaze; he might havetold her the story of his sorrow in such a way that she, who forgaveso easily, would have forgiven even him, and he might have comfortedher, holding her so and so, showing her utterly the true, unchanged,greatly changed love of his chastened heart. This girl, this love ofhis, whom, in his drunken, jealous madness, he had branded and drivenaway, he would have brought her back and tended her and made it up toher in a thousand, in ten thousand, ways. Pierre knelt by his bed, hisblack head buried in the cover, his arms bent above it, his handsclenched. Out there he had never lost hope of finding her, but here,in this peopled loneliness, with a memory of that woman's heartlesssmile, he did at last despair. In a strange, torturing way she hadbeen like Joan. His heart had jumped to his mouth at first sight ofher. And just there, to his shoulder where her head reached, hadJoan's dear black head reached too. Pierre groaned aloud. The pictureof her was so vivid. Not in months had the reality of his "gel" comeso close to his imagination. He could feel her--feel her! O God!

  That was the sort of night he had spent and the next day he passed ina lethargy. He had no heart to face the future now that the greatpurpose of his life had failed. Holliwell's God of comfort andforgiveness forsook him. What did he want with a God when that onecomrade of his lonely, young, human life was out there lost by his owncruelty! Perhaps she was dead. Perhaps the wound had killed her. Forall these years she might have been lying dead somewhere in the snow,under the sky. Sharp periods of pain followed dull periods of stupor.Now it was night again and a recollection of Jasper's theater tickethad dragged him to a vague purpose. He wanted to see again that womanwho had so vivified his memory of Joan. It would be hateful to see heragain, but he wanted the pain. He dressed and groomed himselfcarefully. Then, feeling a little faint, he went out into theclattering, glaring night.

  Pierre's experience of theater-going was exceedingly small. He hadnever been in so large a play-house as this one of Morena's; he hadnever seen so large and well-dressed an audience; never heard a fulland well-trained orchestra. In spite of himself, he began to bedistracted, excited, stirred. When the curtain rose on the beautifultropical scene, the lush island, the turquoise sea, the realisticstrip of golden sand, Pierre gave an audible oath of admiration andsurprise. The people about him began to be amused by the excitement ofthis handsome, haggard young man, so graceful and intense, sodifferent with his hardness and leanness, the brilliance of his eyes,the brownness of his skin. His clothes were good enough, but theyfitted him with an odd air of disguise. An experienced eye wouldinevitably have seen the appropriateness of flannel shirt, gay silkneck-handkerchief, boots, spurs, and _chaparreras_. Pierre wasentirely unaware of being interesting or different. At that moment,caught up in the action of the play, he was as outside of himself as achild.

  The palms of stage-land stirred, the ferns swayed; between then: tall,vivid greenness came Joan with her tread and grace and watchful eyesof a leopardess, her loose, wild hair decked with flowers: these andher make-up and her thinness disguised her completely from Pierre, butagain his heart came to his throat and, when she put her hands up toher mouth and called, his pulses gave a leap. He shut his eyes. Heremembered a voice calling him in to supper. "Pi-erre! Pi-erre!" Hecould sniff the smoke of his cabin fire. He opened his eyes. Ofcourse, she wasn't Joan, this strange, gaunt creature. Besides, hiswife could never have done what this woman was doing. Why, Joancouldn't talk like this, she couldn't act to save her soul! She was assimple as a child, and shy, with the unself-conscious shyness of wildthings. To be sure, this "actress-lady" was making-believe she was awild thing, and she was doing it almighty well, but Joan had been thereality, and grave and still, part of his own big, grave, mountaincountry, not a fierce, man-devouring animal of the tropics. Pierrelived in the play with all but one fragment of his brain, and thatremembered Joan. It hurt like a hot coal, but he deliberately ignoredthe pain of it. He followed the action breathlessly, applauded withcontagious fervor, surreptitiously rid himself of tears, and when, inthe last scene, the angry, jealous woman sprang upon her tamer, hemuttered, "Serve you right, you coyote!" with an oath of the cow-campthat made one of his neighbors jump and throttle a startled laugh.

  The curtain fell, and while the applause rose and died down and roseagain, and the people called for "Jane West! Jane West!" thestage-director, a plump little Jew, came out behind the footlights andheld up his hand. There was a gradual silence.

  "I want to make an interesting announcement," he said; "the author of'The Leopardess' has hitherto maintained his anonymity, but to-night Ihave permission to give you his name. He is in the theater to-night.The name is already familiar to you as that of the author of a popularnovel, 'The Canyon': Prosper Gael."

  There was a stir of interest, a general searching of the house,clapping, cries of "Author! Author!" and in a few moments Prosper Gaelleft his box and appeared beside the director in answer to the calls.He was entirely self-possessed, looked even a little bored, but he wasvery white. He stood there bowing, a graceful and attractive figure,and he was about to begin a speech when he was interrupted by arenewed calling for "Jane West!" The audience wanted to see the starand the author side by side. Pierre joined in the clamor.

  After a little pause Jane West came out from the opposite wing,walking slowly, dressed in her green gown, jewels on her neck and inher hair. She did not look toward the audience at all, nor bow, norsmile, and for some reason the applause began to falter as though thesensitive mind of the crowd was already aware that here something mustbe wrong. She came very slowly, her arms hanging, her head bent, hereyes looking up from under her brows, and she stood beside ProsperGael, whose forced smile had stiffened on his lips. He looked at herin obvious fear, as a man might look at a dangerous madwoman. Theremust have been madness in her eyes. She stood there for a strange,terrible moment, moving her head slightly from side to side. Then shesaid something in a very low tone. Because of the extraordinarycarrying quality of her voice--the question was heard by every onethere present:

  "_You_ wrote the play? _You_ wrote the play?"

  She said it twice. She seemed to quiver, to gather herself together,her hands bent, her arms lifted. She flew at Prosper with all thesudden strength of her insanity.

  There was an outcry, a confusion. People rushed to Gael's assistance.Men caught hold of Joan, now struggling frantically. It was a dreadfulsight, mercifully a brief one. She collapsed utterly, fell forward,the strap of her gown breaking in the grasp of one of the men who heldher. For an instant every one in the audience saw a strange doublescar that ran across her shoulder to the edge of the shoulder-blade.It was like two bars.

  Pierre got to his feet, dropped back, and hid his face. Then he wasup, and struggling past excited people down the row, out into theaisle, along it, hurrying blindly down unknown passages till somehowhe got himself into that confused labyrinth behind the scenes. Here apale, distracted scene-shifter informed him that Miss West had alreadybeen taken home.

  Pierre got the address, found his way out to the street, hailed ataxicab, and threw hi
mself into it. He sat forward, every muscletight; he felt that he could take the taxicab up and hurl it forward,so terrible was his impatience.

  An apartment house was a greater novelty to him even than a theater,but, after a dazed moment of discovering that he did not have to ringor knock, but just push open the great iron-scrolled door and stepinto the brightly lighted, steam-heated marble hall, he decided thatthe woman at the desk was a person in authority, and to her headdressed himself, soft hat gripped in his hand, his face set to hideexcitement.

  The girl was pale and red-eyed. They had brought Miss West in a fewminutes ago, she told him, and carried her up. She was stillunconscious; poor thing! "I don't think you could see her, sir. Mr.Morena is up there, and Mr. Gael, and a doctor. A trained nurse hasbeen sent for. Everything in the world will be done. She's such anelegant actress, ain't she? I've often seen her myself. And so kindand pleasant always. Yes, sir. I'll ask, if you like, but I'm surethey won't allow you up."

  She put the receiver to her ear, pushed in the black plug, and Pierrelistened to her questions.

  "Can Miss West see any one? Can an old friend"--for so Pierre hadnamed himself--"be allowed to see her? No. I thought not." This, witha sympathetic glance at Pierre. "She is not conscious yet. Dangerouslyill."

  "Could I speak to the doctor?" Pierre asked hoarsely.

  "The gentleman wants to know if he can speak to the doctor. Certainlynot at present. If he will wait, the doctor will speak to him on theway out."

  Pierre sat on the bench and waited. He leaned forward, elbows onknees, head crushed in both hands, and the woman stared at himpitilessly--not that he was aware of her scrutiny. His eyes lookedthrough his surroundings to Joan. He saw her in every pose and inevery look in which he had ever seen her, and, with a very sick andfrightened heart, he saw her, at the last, pass by him in her furcoat, throwing him that half-contemptuous look and smile. She didn'tknow him. Was he changed so greatly? Or was the change in her soenormous that it had disassociated her completely from her old life,from him? He kept repeating to himself Holliwell's stern, admonishingspeech: "However changed for the worse she may be when you do findher, Pierre, you must remember that it is your fault, your sin. Youmust not judge her, must not dare to judge her. Judge yourself.Condemn yourself. It is for her to forgive if she can bring herself todo it."

  So now Pierre fought down his suspicions and his fears. He had notrecognized Prosper. The man who had come in out of the white night,four years ago, had worn his cap low over his eyes, his collar turnedup about his face, and, even at that, Pierre, in his drunken stupor,had not been able to see him very clearly. This Prosper Gael who hadstood behind the footlights, this Prosper Gael at whom Joan, from someunknown cause, had sprung like a woman maddened by injury, was aperson entirely strange to Pierre. But Pierre hated him. The man haddone Joan some insufferable mischief, which at the last had driven herbeside herself. Pierre put up a hand, pressing it against his eyes. Hewanted to shut out the picture of that struggling girl with her torndress and the double scar across her shoulder. If it hadn't been forthe scar he would never have known her--his Joan, his gentle, silentJoan! What had they been doing to her to change her so? No, not they.He. He had changed her. He had branded her and driven her out. It washis fault. He must try to find her again, to find the old Joan--if sheshould live. The doctor had said that she was desperately ill. O God!What was keeping him so long? Why didn't he come?

  The arrival of the trained nurse distracted Pierre for a few moments.She went past him in her gray cloak, very quiet and earnest, and theelevator lifted her out of sight.

  "Were you in the theater to-night?" asked the girl at the desk, seeingthat he was temporarily aware of her again.

  "Yes, ma'am."

  She was puzzled by his appearance and the fashion of his speech. Hemust be a gentleman, she thought, for his bearing was gentle andassured and unself-conscious, but he wore his clothes differently andspoke differently from other gentlemen. That "Yes, ma'am," especiallydisturbed her. Then she remembered a novel she had read and her mindjumped to a conclusion. She leaned forward.

  "Say, aren't you from the West?"

  "Yes, ma'am."

  "You weren't ever a cowboy, were you?"

  Pierre smiled. "Yes, ma'am. I was raised in a cow-camp. I was a cowboytill about seven years ago when I took to ranchin'."

  "Where was that?"

  "Out in Wyoming."

  "And you've come straight from there to New York?" She pronounced it"Noo Yoik."

  "No, ma'am. I've been in Alasky for two years now. I've been in alumber-camp."

  "Gee! That's real interesting. And you knew Miss West before she cameEast, then?"

  "Yes, ma'am." But there was a subtle change in Pierre's patient voiceand clear, unhappy eyes, so that the girl fell to humming and bottled upher curiosity. But just as soon as he began to brood again she gave upher whole mind to staring at him. Gee! He was brown and strong and thin!And a good-looker! She wished that she had worn her transformation thatevening and her blue blouse. He might have taken more interest in her.

  A stout, bald-headed man, bag in hand, stepped out of the elevator,and Pierre rippled to his feet.

  "Are you the doctor?"

  "Yes. Oh, you're the gentleman who wanted to see Miss West. She's cometo, but she is out of her head completely ... doesn't know any one.Can you step out with me?"

  Pierre kept beside him and stood by the motor, hat still in his hand,while the doctor talked irritably: "No. You certainly can't see her,for some time. I shall not allow any one to see her, except the nurse.It will be a matter of weeks. She'll be lucky if she gets back hersanity at all. She was entirely out of her head there at the theater.She's worn out, nerves frayed to a frazzle. Horribly unhealthy lifeand unnatural. To take a country girl, an ignorant, untrained, healthyanimal, bring her to the city and force her under terrific pressureinto a life so foreign to her--well! it was just a piece of d----dbrutality." Then his acute eye suddenly fixed itself on the manstanding on the curb listening.

  "You're from the West yourself?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Knew her in the old days--eh?"

  "Yes, sir." Pierre's voice was faint and he put a hand against themotor.

  "Well, why don't you take her back with you to that life? You're notfeeling any too fit yourself, are you? Look here. Get in and I'll dropyou where you belong."

  Pierre obeyed rather blindly and leaned back with closed eyes. Thedoctor got out a flask and poured him a dose of brandy.

  "What's the trouble? Too much New York?"

  Pierre shook his head and smiled. "No, sir. I've been bothered anddidn't get round to eating and sleeping lately."

  "Then I'll take you to a restaurant and we'll have supper. I needsomething myself. And, look here, I'll make you a promise. Just assoon as I consider her fit for an interview with any one, I'll let yousee Miss West. That helps you a whole lot, doesn't it?"

  But there were other powers, besides this friendly one, watching overJoan, and they were bent upon keeping Pierre away. Day after sickeningday Pierre came and stood beside the desk, and the girl, each time alittle more careless of him, a little more insolent toward him--forthe cowboy would not notice her blue blouse and her transformation andthe invitation of her eyes--gave him negligent and discouraginginformation.

  "Miss West was better, but very weak. No. She wouldn't see any one.Yes, Mr. Morena could see her, but not Mr. Landis, certainly not Mr.Pierre Landis, of Wyoming."

  And the doctor, being questioned by the half-frantic Westerner,admitted that Mr. Morena had hinted at reasons why it might bedangerous for the patient to see her old friend from the West. Pierrestood to receive this sentence, and after it, his eyes fell. Thedoctor had seen the quick, desperate moisture in them.

  "I tell you what, Landis," he said, putting a hand on Pierre'sshoulder. "I'm willing to take a risk. I'm sure of one thing. MissWest hasn't even heard of your inquiries."

  "You mean Morena's making it up--about her not bei
ng willing to seeme?"

  "I do mean that. And no doubt he's doing it with the best intentions.But I'm willing to take a risk. See those stairs? You run up them tothe fifth floor. The nurse is out. Gael is in attendance; that is,he's in the sitting-room. She doesn't know of his presence, hasn'tbeen allowed to see him. Miss West's door--the outside one--is ajar.Go up. Get past Gael if you can. Behave yourself quietly, and if yousee the least sign of weakness on the part of Miss West, or if sheshows the slightest disinclination for your company, come down--I'mtrusting you--as quickly as you can and tell me. I'll wait. Have Iyour promise?"

  "Yes, sir," gasped Pierre.

  The doctor smiled at the swift, leaping grace of his Western friend'sascent. He was anxious concerning the result of his experiment, butthere was a memory upon him of a haunted look in Joan's eyes thatseemed the fellow to a look of Pierre's. He rather believed inintuitions, especially his own.

  CHAPTER XIII

  THE END OF THE TRAIL

  At the top of the fourth flight of steps, Pierre found himself facinga door that stood ajar. Beyond that door was Joan and he knew not whatexperience of discovery, of explanation, of punishment. What he hadsuffered since the night of his cruelty would be nothing to what hemight have to suffer now at the hands of the woman he had loved andhurt. That she was incredibly changed he knew, what had happened tochange her he did not know. That she had suffered greatly was certain.One could not look at the face of Jane West, even under its disguiseof paint and pencil, without a sharp realization of profound andembittering experience. And, just as certainly, she had gone far aheadof her husband in learning, in a certain sort of mental and socialdevelopment. Pierre was filled with doubt and with dread, with analmost unbearable self-depreciation. And at the same time he wasfilled with a nameless fear of what Joan might herself have become.

  He stood with his hand on the knob of that half-opened door, bent hishead, and drew some deep, uneven breaths. He thought of Holliwell asthough the man were standing beside him. He stepped in quietly, shutthe door, and walked without hesitation down the passageway into thelittle, sunny sitting-room. There, before the crackling, open fire,sat Prosper Gael.

  Prosper, it seemed, was alone in the small, silent place. He wassitting on the middle of his spine, as usual, with his long, thin legsstretched out before him and a veil of cigarette smoke before hiseyes. He turned his head idly, expecting, no doubt, to see the nurse.

  Pierre, white and grim, stood looking down at him.

  The older man recognized him at once, but he did not change hisposition by a muscle, merely lounged there, his head against the sideof the cushioned chair, the brilliant, surprised gaze changing slowlyto amused contempt. His cigarette hung between the long fingers of onehand, its blue spiral of smoke rising tranquilly into a bar ofsunshine from the window.

  "The doctor told me to come up," said Pierre gravely. He was aware ofthe insult of this stranger's attitude, but he was too deeply stirred,too deeply suspenseful, to be irritated by it. He seemed to be movingin some rare, disconnected atmosphere. "I have his permission tosee--to see Miss West, if she is willing to see me."

  Prosper flicked off an ash with his little finger. "And you believethat she is willing to see you, Pierre Landis?" he asked slowly.

  Pierre gave him a startled look. "You know my name?"

  "Yes. I believe that four years ago, on an especially cold and snowynight, I interrupted you in a rather extraordinary occupation and gavemyself the pleasure of shooting you." With that he got to his feet andstood before the mantel, negligently enough, but ready to hisfingertips.

  Pierre came nearer by a stride. He had been stripped at once of hisair of high detachment. He was pale and quivering. He looked atProsper with eyes of incredulous dread.

  "Were you--that man?" A tide of shamed scarlet engulfed him and hedropped his eyes.

  "I thought that would take the assurance out of you," said Prosper."As a matter of fact, shooting was too good for you. On that night youforfeited every claim to the consideration of man or woman. I have theright of any decent citizen to turn you out of here. Do you stillmaintain your intention of asking for an interview with Miss JaneWest?"

  Pierre, half-blind with humiliation, turned without a word and madehis way to the door. He meant to go away and kill himself. The purposewas like iron in his mind. That he should have to stand and, becauseof his own cowardly fault, to endure insult from this contemptuousstranger, made of life a garment too stained, too shameful to be worn.He was in haste to be rid of it. Something, however, barred his exit.He stumbled back to avoid it. There, holding aside the curtain in thedoorway, stood Joan.

  This time there was no possible doubt of her identity. She was wrappedin a long, blue gown, her hair had fallen in braided loops on eitherside of her face and neck. The unchanged eyes of Joan under her broadbrows looked up at him. She was thin and wan, unbelievably broken andtired and hurt, but she was Joan. Pierre could not but forget death atsight of her. He staggered forward, and she, putting up her arms, drewhim hungrily and let fall her head upon his shoulder.

  "My gel! My Joan!" Pierre sobbed.

  Prosper's voice sawed into their tremulous silence.

  "So, after all, the branding iron is the proper instrument," he said."A man can always recognize his estray, and when she is recognized shewill come to heel."

  Joan pushed Pierre from her violently and turned upon Prosper Gael.Her voice broke over him in a tumult of soft scorn.

  "You know nothing of loving, Prosper Gael, not the first letter ofloving. Nobody has learned that about you as well as I have. Now,listen and I will teach you something. This is something that _I_ havelearned. There are worse wounds than I had from Pierre, and it is bythe hands of such men as you are that they are given. The hurts youget from love, they heal. Pierre was mad, he was a beast, he brandedme as though I had been a beast. For long years I couldn't think ofhim but with a sort of horror in my heart. If it hadn't been for you,I might never have thought of him no other way forever. But what youdid to me, Prosper, you with your white-hot brain and your gray-coldheart, you with your music and your talk throbbing and talking andwhining about my soul, what you did to me has made Pierre's iron avery gentle thing. I have not acted in the play you wrote, the playyou made out of me and my unhappiness, without understanding just whatit was that you did to me. Perhaps if it hadn't been for the play, Imight even have believed that you were capable of something betterthan that passion you had once for me--but not now. Never now can Ibelieve it. What you make other people suffer is material for your ownsuccess and you delight in it. You make notes upon it. Pierre was madthrough loving me, too ignorantly, too jealously, but what you did tome was through loving me too little. That was a brand upon my brainand soul. Sometimes since then that scar on my shoulder has seemed tome almost like the memory of a caress. I went away from Pierre,leaving him for dead, ready for death myself. When you left me, youleft me alive and ready for what sort of living? It has been Pierre'slove and his following after me that have kept me from low and beastlythings. I've run from him knowing I wasn't fit to be found by him, butI've run clean and free." She began to tremble. "Will you say anythingmore to me and to my man?"

  Prosper's face wore its old look of the winged demon. He was cold inhis angry pain.

  "Just one thing to your man, perhaps, if you will allow me, butperhaps you'll tell him that yourself. That his method is the rightone, I admit. But in one respect not even a brand will altogetherpreserve property rights. Morena could say something on that score. Socould I...."

  "Hush!" said Joan; "I will tell him myself. Pierre, I left you fordead and I went away with this man, and after a while, because Ithought you were dead, and because I was alone and sorrowful and weak,and because, perhaps, of what my mother was, I--I--" She fell awayfrom Pierre, crouched against the side of the door, and wrapped thecurtain round her face. "He told me you were dead--" The words camemuffled.

  Pierre had let her go and turned to Prosper. His own face was a maskof r
age. Prosper knew that it was the Westerner's intention to kill.For a minute, no longer, he was a lightning channel of death. ButPierre, the Pierre shaped during the last four difficult years, turnedupon his own writhing, savage soul and forced it to submit. It was asthough he fought with his hands. Sweat broke out on him. At last, hestood and looked at Prosper with sane, stern eyes.

  "If that's true what you hinted, if that's true what she was tryin' totell, if it's even partly true," he said painfully, "then it was methat brought it upon her, not you--an' not herself, but me."

  He turned back to Joan, drew the curtain from her face, drew down herhands, lifted her and carried her to the couch beside the fire.

  There she shrank away from him, tried to push him back.

  "It's true, Pierre; not that about Morena, but the rest is true. It'strue. Only he told me you were dead. But you weren't--no, don't takemy hands, I never did have dealings with Holliwell. Indeed, I lovedonly you. But you must have known me better than I knew myself. For Iam bad. I am bad. I left you for dead and I went away."

  He had mastered her hands, both of them in one of his, and he drewthem close to his heart.

  "Don't Joan! Hush, Joan! You mustn't. It was my doings, gel, all ofit. Hush!"

  He bent and crushed his lips against hers, silencing her. Then shegave way and clung to him, sobbing.

  After a while Pierre looked up at Prosper Gael. All the patience andthe hunger and the beauty of his love possessed his face. There wassimply no room in his heart for any lesser thing.

  "Stranger," he said in the grave and gentle Western speech, "I'll haveto ask you to leave me with my wife."

  Prosper made a curious, silent gesture of self-despair and went out,feeling his way before him.

  It was half an hour later when the doctor came softly to the door andheld back the curtain in his hand. He did not say anything and, aftera silent minute, he let fall the curtain and moved softly away. He wasreassured as to the success of his experiment. He had seen Joan'sface.

  THE END