That Girl Montana

by Ryan, Marah Ellis

  ’Tana tried to smile at the cheerful picture, but the smile was not a merry one. Her attention was given to Lyster and Overton, whom she could see from the tent door.

  How tall and strong Dan looked! Was she to believe that story of him heard last night? The very possibility of it made her cheeks burn at the thought of how she had stood with his arm around her. And he had pitied her that night. “Poor little girl!” he had said. Was his pity because he saw how much he was to her, while he himself thought only of some one else? One after another those thoughts had come to her through the sleepless night, and when the day came she could not face him to speak to him of the simplest thing. And of the money she must have, she could not ask him at all. She wished she could have courage to go to him and tell him the thing she had heard; but courage was not strong in her of late. The fear that he might look indifferently on her and say, “Yes, it is true—what then?”—the fear of that was so great that she had walked by the water’s edge, as the sun rose, and felt desperate enough to think of sleep under the waves, as a temptation. For if it was true—

  The two older women watched her, and decided that she was not yet strong enough to think of long journeys. Her hands would tremble at times, and tears, as of weakness, would come to her eyes, and she scarcely appeared to hear them when they spoke.

  She never walked through the woods as of old, though sometimes she would stand and look up at the dark hills with a perfect hunger in her eyes. And when the night breeze would creep down from the heights, and carry the sweet wood scents of the forest to her, she would close her eyes and draw in long breaths of utter content. The strong love for the wild places was as second nature to her; yet when Max would ask her to go with him for flowers or mosses, her answer was always “no.”

  But she would go to the boat sometimes, though no longer having strength to use the paddle. It was a good place to think, if she could only keep the others from going, too, so she slipped away from Max and the women and went down. A chunky, good-looking fellow was mending one of the canoes, and raised his head at her approach, nodding to her and evidently pleased when she addressed him.

  “Yes, it is a shaky old tub,” he agreed, “but I told Overton I thought it could be fixed to carry freight for another trip; so he put me at it.”

  “You are new in camp, aren’t you?” she asked, not caring at all whether he was or not. She was always friendly with the workmen, and this one smiled and bowed.

  “We are all that, I guess,” he said. “But I came up the day Haydon and Seldon came. I lived with Seldon down the country, and was staggered a little, I tell you, when I found Overton was in charge, and had struck it rich. But no man deserves good luck more.”

  “No,” she agreed. “Then you knew him before?”

  “Yes, indeed—over in Spokane. He don’t seem quite the same fellow, though. We thought he would just go to the dogs after he left there, for he started to drink heavily. But he must have settled in his own mind that it wasn’t worth while; so here he is, straight as a string, and counting his dollars by the thousands, and I’m glad to see it.”

  “Drink! He never drinks to excess, that we know of,” she answered. “Doesn’t seem to care for that sort of thing.”

  “No, he didn’t then, either,” agreed this loquacious stranger, “but a woman can drive as good men as him to drink; and that is about the way it was. No one thought any worse of Overton, though—don’t think that. The worst any one could say was that he was too square—that’s all.”

  Too square! She walked away from him a little way, all her mind aflame with his suggestions. He had taken to drink and dissipation because of some woman. Was it the woman whose name she had heard last night? The key to the thing puzzling her had been dropped almost at her feet, yet she feared to pick it up. No teaching she had ever received told her it was unprincipled to steal through another the confidence he himself had not chosen to give her. But some instinct of justice kept her from further question.

  She knew the type of fellow who was rigging up the canoe, a light-headed, assuming specimen, who had not yet learned to keep a still tongue in his head, but he did not impress her as being a deliberate liar. Then, all at once, she realized who he must be, and turned back. There was no harm in asking that, at any rate.

  “You are the man whom Overton sent to put Harris to bed last night, are you not?” she asked.

  He nodded, cheerfully.

  “And your name is Jake Emmons, of the Spokane country?”

  “Thet’s who,” he assented; “that’s where I came across Lottie Snyder, Overton’s wife, you know. I was running a little stage there for a manager, and she—”

  “I am not asking you about—about Mr. Overton’s affairs,” she said, and she sat down, white and dizzy, on the overturned canoe. “And he might not like it if he knew you were talking so free. Don’t do it again.”

  “All right,” he agreed. “I won’t. No one here seems to know about the bad break he made over there; but, Lord! there was excuse enough. She is one of those women that look just like a little helpless baby; and that caught Overton. Young, you know. But I won’t whisper her name in camp again, for it is hard on the old man. But, as you are partners, I guessed you must know.”

  “Yes,” she said, faintly; “but don’t talk, don’t—”

  “Say! You are sick, ain’t you?” he demanded, as her voice dropped to a whisper. “Say! Look here, Miss Rivers! Great snakes! She’s fainted!”

  When she opened her eyes again, the rough roof of her cabin was above her, instead of the blue sky. The women folks were using the camp restorative—whisky—on her to such good purpose that her hands and face and hair were redolent of it, and the amount she had been forced to swallow was strangling her.

  The face she saw first was that of Max—Max, distressed and anxious, and even a little pale at sight of her death-like face.

  She turned to him as to a haven of refuge from the storm of emotion under which she had fallen prostrate.

  It was all settled now—settled forever. She had heard the worst, and knew she must go away—away from where she must see that one man, and be filled with humiliation if ever she met his gaze. A man with a wife somewhere—a man into whose arms she had crept!

  “Are you in pain?” asked Miss Lavina, as ’Tana groaned and shut her eyes tight, as if to bar out memory.

  “No—nothing ails me. I was without a hat, and the sun on my head made me sick, I suppose,” she answered, and arose on her elbow. “But I am not going to be a baby, to be watched and carried around any more. I am going to get up.”

  Just outside her door Overton stood; and when he heard her voice again, with its forced independent words, he walked away content that she was again herself.

  “I am going to get up,” she continued. “I am going away from here to-morrow or next day—and there are things to do. Help me, Max.”

  “Best thing you can do is to lie still an hour or two,” advised Mrs. Huzzard, but the girl shook her head.

  “No, I’m going to get up,” she said, with grim decision; and when Lyster offered his hand to help her, she took it, and, standing erect, looked around at the couch.

  “That is the last time I’m going to be thrown on you for any such fool cause,” she said, whimsically. “Who toted me in here—you?”

  “I? Not a bit of it,” confessed Lyster. “Dan reached you before any of the others knew you were ill. He carried you up here.”

  “He? Oh!” and she shivered a little. “I want to talk to Harris. Max, come with me.”

  He went wonderingly, for he could see she was excited and nervous. Her hand trembled as it touched his, but her mouth was set so firmly over the little white teeth that he knew it was better to humor her than fret her by persuading her to rest.

  But once beside Harris, she sat a long time in silence, looking out from the doorway across the level now active with the men of the works. Not until the two cousins had walked across to their other shelter did she speak, a
nd then it was to Harris.

  “Joe, I am sick,” she confessed; “not sick with the fever, but heartsick and headsick. You know how and maybe why.”

  He nodded his head, and looked at Lyster questioningly.

  “And I’ve come in here to tell you something. Max, you won’t mind. He can’t talk, but knows me better than you do, I guess; for I’ve come to him before when I was troubled, and I want to tell him what you said to me in the boat.”

  Max stared at her, but silently agreed when he saw she was in earnest. He even reached out his hand to take hers, but she drew away.

  “Wait till I tell him,” she said, and turned to the helpless man in the chair. “He asked me to marry him—some day. Would it be right for me to say yes?”

  “’Tana!” exclaimed Lyster; but she raised her hand pleadingly.

  “I haven’t any other person in the world I could go to and ask,” she said. “He knows me better than you do, Max, and I—Oh! I don’t think I should be always contented with your ways of living. I was born different—a heap different. But to-day it seems as if I am not strong enough to do without—some one—who likes me, and I do want to say ’yes’ to you, yet I’m afraid it is only because I am sick at heart and lonely.”

  It was a declaration likely to cool the ardor of most lovers, but Lyster reached out his hand to her and laughed.

  “Oh, you dear girl,” he said, fondly. “Did your conscience make it necessary for you to confess in this fashion? Now listen. You are weak and nervous; you need some one to look after you. Doesn’t she, Harris? Well, take me on trial. I will devote myself to your interests for six months, and if at the end of that time you find that it was only sickness and loneliness that ailed you, and not liking me, then I give you my word I’ll never try to hold you to a promise. You will be well and strong by that time, and I’ll stand by the decision you make then. Will you say ’yes,’ now?”

  She looked at Harris, who nodded his head. Then she turned and gave her hand to Max.

  “Yes,” she said. “But if you should be sorry—”

  “Not another word,” he commanded; “the ’yes’ is all I want to hear just now; when I get sorry I’ll let you know.”

  And that is the way their engagement began.

  * * *

  CHAPTER XXI.

  LAVINA AND THE CAPTAIN.

  As the day wore on, ’Tana became more nervous and restless. With the dark, that man was to come for the gold she had promised.

  Lyster brought it to her, part in money, part in free gold, and as he laid it on the couch, she looked at him strangely.

  “How much you trust me when you never even ask what I am to do with all this!” she said. “Yet it is enough to surprise you.”

  “Yes, it is,” he agreed. “But when you are ready you will tell me.”

  “No, I will not tell you,” she answered, “but it is the last thing—I think—that I will keep from you, Max. It is a debt that belongs to days before I knew you. What did Overton say?”

  “Not much, maybe he will leave for the upper works this evening or to-morrow morning.”

  “Did you—did you tell him—”

  “That you are going to belong to me? Well, no, I did not. You forgot to give me permission.”

  Her face flushed shyly at his words.

  “You must think me a queer girl, Max,” she said. “And you are so good and patient with me, in spite of my queer ways. But, never mind; they will not last always, I hope.”

  “Which?—my virtues or your queerness?” he asked.

  She only smiled and pushed the gold under the pillow.

  “Go away now for a little while. I want to rest.”

  “Well, rest if you like; but don’t think. You have been fretting over some little personal troubles until you fancy them heavy enough to overbalance the world. But they won’t. And I’m not going to try and persuade you into Haydon’s house, either, now that you’ve been good to me; unless, of course, you fall in love with Margaret, and want to be with her, and it is likely to happen. But Uncle Seldon and my aunts will be delighted to have you, and you could live as quiet as you please there.”

  “So I am likely to fall in love with Margaret, am I?” she asked. “Why? Does everybody? Did you—Max? Now, don’t blush like that, or I’ll be sure of it. I never saw you blush so pretty before. It made you almost good looking. Now go; I want to be alone.”

  “Sha’n’t I send one of the ladies up?”

  “Not a soul! Go, Max. I am tired.”

  So he went, in all obedience, and he and the cousins had a long talk about the girl and the danger of leaving her alone another night. Her sudden illness showed them she was not strong enough yet to be allowed to guide herself.

  “I shall try hard to get her to leave to-morrow, or next day,” said Lyster. “Where is Dan? I would like to talk to him about it, but he has evidently disappeared.”

  “I don’t know what to think of Dan Overton,” confessed Mrs. Huzzard. “He isn’t ever around, chatty and sociable, like he used to be. When we do see him, he is nearly always busy; and when he isn’t busy, he strikes for the woods.”

  “Maybe he is still searching for new gold mines,” suggested Miss Lavina. “I notice he does seem very much engaged in thought, and is of a rather solitary nature.”

  “Never was before,” protested her cousin. “And if these gold finds just twist a person’s nature crosswise, or send them into a fever, then I hope the good Lord’ll keep the rest of them well covered up in future.”

  “Lorena Jane,” said Miss Lavina, in a reproachful tone, “it is most essential that you free yourself from those very forcible expressions. They are not a bit genteel.”

  “No, I reckon they ain’t, Lavina; and the more I try the more I’m afraid I never will be. Land sakes, if folks would only teach their young ones good manners when they are young, what a sight of mortified feelings would be saved after a while!”

  Lyster left them in the midst of the very earnest plea for better training, for he espied a new boat approaching camp. As it came closer, he found that among the other freight it carried was the autocrat of Sinna Ferry—Captain Leek.

  “What a God-forsaken wilderness!” he exclaimed, and looked around with a supercilious air, suggesting that he would have given the Creator of the Kootenai country valuable points if he had been consulted. “Well, my dear young fellow, how you have managed to exist here for three weeks I don’t know.”

  “Well, we had Mrs. Huzzard,” explained Max, with a twinkle in his eye; “and she is a panacea for many ills. She has made our wilderness very endurable.”

  “Yes, yes; excellent woman,” agreed the other, with a suspicious look. “And ’Tana? How is she—the dear girl! I really have been much grieved to hear of her illness; and at the earliest day I could leave my business I am here to inquire in person regarding her health.”

  “Oh!” and Max struggled with a desire to laugh at the change in the captain’s attitude since ’Tana was a moneyed individual instead of a little waif. Poor ’Tana! No wonder she looked with suspicion on late-coming friends.

  “Yes, she is better—much better,” he continued, as they walked up from the boat. “I suppose you knew that a cousin of Mrs. Huzzard, a lady from Ohio, has been with us—in fact, came up with our party.”

  “So I heard—so I heard. Nice for Mrs. Huzzard. I was not in town, you know, when you rested at the Ferry. I heard, however, that a white woman had come up. Who is she?”

  They had reached the tent, and Mrs. Huzzard, after a frantic dive toward their very small looking glass, appeared at the door with a smile enchanting, and a courtesy so nicely managed that it nearly took the captain’s breath away. It was the very latest of Lavina’s teachings.

  “Well, now, I’m mighty—hem!—I’m extremely pleased that you have called. Have a nice trip?”

  But the society tone of Mrs. Huzzard was so unlike the one he had been accustomed to hearing her use, that the captain could only stare, and b
efore he recovered enough to reply, she turned and beckoned Miss Slocum, with the idea of completing the impression made, and showing with what grace she could present him to her cousin.

  But the lately acquired style was lost on him this time, overtopped by the presence of Miss Lavina, who gazed at him with a prolonged and steady stare.

  “And this is your friend, Captain Leek, of the Northern Army, is it?” she asked, in her very sharpest voice—a voice she tried to temper with a smile about her lips, though none shone in her eyes. “I have no doubt you will be very welcome to the camp, Captain Leek.”

  Mrs. Huzzard had surely expected of Lavina a much more gracious reception. But Mrs. Huzzard was a bit of a philosopher, and if Lavina chose to be somewhat cold and unresponsive to the presence of a cultured gentleman, well, it gave Lorena Jane so much better chance, and she was not going to slight it.

  “Come right in; you must be dead tired,” she said, cordially. “Mr. Max, you’ll let Dan know he’s here, won’t you—that is, when he does show up again, but no one knows how long that will be.”

  “Yes, I am tired,” agreed the captain, meekly, and not quite at his ease with the speculative eyes of Miss Slocum on him. “I—I brought up a few letters that arrived at the Ferry. I can’t make up my mind to trust mail with these Indian boatmen Dan employs.”

  “They are a trial,” agreed Mrs. Huzzard, “though they haven’t the bad effect on our nerves that one or two of the camp Indians have—an awful squaw, who helps around, and an ugly old man, who only smokes and looks horrible. Now, Lavina—she ain’t used to no such, and she just shivers at them.”

  “Yes—ah—yes,” murmured the captain.

  “Lavina says she knew folks of your name back in Ohio,” continued Mrs. Huzzard, cheerfully, in order to get the two strangers better acquainted. “I thought at first maybe you’d turn out to know each other; but she says they was Democrats,” and she turned a sharp glance toward him, as if to read his political tendencies.