The Hunted Woman

by James Oliver Curwood

  CHAPTER VIII

  John Aldous confessed to himself that he did not quite understand, in spiteof the effort Stevens had made to impress upon him, the importance of notgoing to Tete Jaune. He was bewildered over a number of things, and feltthat he needed to be alone for a time to clear his mind. He left Stevens,promising to return later to share a couple of blankets and a part of histepee, for he was determined to keep his promise to Joanne, and not returnto his own cabin, even though Quade had left Miette. He followed a moonlittrail along the river to an abandoned surveyors' camp, knowing that hewould meet no one, and that in this direction he would have plenty ofunbroken quiet in which to get some sort of order out of the chaotic tangleof events through which he had passed that day.

  Aldous had employed a certain amount of caution, but until he had talkedwith Stevens he had not believed that Quade, in his twofold desire toavenge himself and possess Joanne, would go to the extraordinary endspredicted by the packer. His point of view was now entirely changed. Hebelieved Stevens. He knew the man was not excitable. He was one of thecoolest heads in the mountains. And he had abundant nerve. Thought ofStimson and Stimson's wife had sent the hot blood through Aldous like fire.Was Stevens right in that detail? And was Quade actually planning the sameend for him and Joanne? Why had Quade stolen on ahead to Tete Jaune? Whyhad he not waited for to-morrow's train?

  He found himself walking swiftly along the road, where he had intended towalk slowly--a hundred questions pounding through his brain. Suddenly athought came to him that stopped him in the trail, his unseeing eyesstaring down into the dark chasm of the river. After all, was it so strangethat Quade would do these things? Into his own life Joanne had come like awonderful dream-creature transformed into flesh and blood. He no longertried to evade the fact that he could not think without thinking of Joanne.She had become a part of him. She had made him forget everything but her,and in a few hours had sent into the dust of ruin his cynicism andaloneness of a lifetime. If Joanne had come to him like this, making himforget his work, filling him more and more with the thrilling desire tofight for her, was it so very strange that a beast like Quade wouldfight--in another way?

  He went on down the trail, his hands clenched tightly. After all, it wasnot fear of Quade or of what he might attempt that filled him withuneasiness. It was Joanne herself, her strange quest, its final outcome.With the thought that she was seeking for the man who was her husband, aleaden hand seemed gripping at his heart. He tried to shake it off, but itwas like a sickness. To believe that she had been the wife of another manor that she could ever belong to any other man than himself seemed likeshutting his eyes forever to the sun. And yet she had told him. She hadbelonged to another man; she might belong to him even now. She had come tofind if he was alive--or dead.

  And if alive? Aldous stopped again, and looked down into the dark pitthrough which the river was rushing a hundred feet below him. It tore infrothing maelstroms through a thousand rocks, filling the night with a lowthunder. To John Aldous the sound of it might have been a thousand milesaway. He did not hear. His eye saw nothing in the blackness. For a fewmoments the question he had asked himself obliterated everything. If theyfound Joanne's husband alive at Tete Jaune--what then? He turned back,retracing his steps over the trail, a feeling of resentment--of hatred forthe man he had never seen--slowly taking the place of the oppressive thingthat had turned his heart sick within him. Then, in a flash, came thememory of Joanne's words--words in which, white-faced and trembling, shehad confessed that her anxiety was not that she would find him dead, butthat _she would find him alive_. A joyous thrill shot through him as heremembered that. Whoever this man was, whatever he might have been to heronce, or was to her now, Joanne did not want to find him alive! He laughedsoftly to himself as he quickened his pace. The tense grip of his fingersloosened. The grim, almost ghastly part of it did not occur to him--thefact that deep in his soul he was wishing a man dead and in his grave.

  He did not return at once to the scenes about Quade's place, but went tothe station, three quarters of a mile farther up the track. Here, in acasual way, he learned from the little pink-faced Cockney Englishman whowatched the office at night that Stevens had been correct in hisinformation. Quade had gone to Tete Jaune. Although it was eleven o'clock,Aldous proceeded in the direction of the engineers' camp, still anotherquarter of a mile deeper in the bush. He was restless. He did not feel thathe could sleep that night. The engineers' camp he expected to find indarkness, and he was surprised when he saw a light burning brightly inKeller's cabin.

  Keller was the assistant divisional engineer, and they had become goodfriends. It was Keller who had set the first surveyor's line at Tete Jaune,and it was he who had reported it as the strategic point from which to pushforward the fight against mountain and wilderness, both by river and rail.He was, in a way, accountable for the existence of Tete Jaune just where itdid exist, and he knew more about it than any other man in the employ ofthe Grand Trunk Pacific. For this reason Aldous was glad that Keller hadnot gone to bed. He knocked at the door and entered without waiting for aninvitation.

  The engineer stood in the middle of the floor, his coat off, his fat,stubby hands thrust into the pockets of his baggy trousers, his red faceand bald cranium shining in the lamplight. A strange fury blazed in hiseyes as he greeted his visitor. He began pacing back and forth across theroom, puffing volumes of smoke from a huge bowled German pipe as hemotioned Aldous to a chair.

  "What's the matter, Peter?"

  "Enough--an' be damned!" growled Peter. "If it wasn't enough do you thinkI'd be out of bed at this hour of the night?"

  "I'm sure it's enough," agreed Aldous. "If it wasn't you'd be in yourlittle trundle over there, sleeping like a baby. I don't know of any onewho can sleep quite as sweetly as you, Peter. But what the devil _is_ thetrouble?"

  "Something that you can't make me feel funny over. You haven't heard--aboutthe bear?"

  "Not a word, Peter."

  Keller took his hands from his pockets and the big, bowled pipe from hismouth.

  "You know what I did with that bear," he said. "More than a year ago I madefriends with her up there on the hill instead of killing her. Last summer Igot her so she'd eat out of my hands. I fed her a barrel of sugar betweenJuly and November. We used to chum it an hour at a time, and I'd pet herlike a dog. Why, damn it, man, I thought more of that bear than I did ofany human in these regions! And she got so fond of me she didn't leave toden up until January. This spring she came out with two cubs, an' as soonas they could waddle she brought 'em out there on the hillside an' waitedfor me. We were better chums than ever. I've got another half barrel ofsugar--lump sugar--on the way from Edmonton. An' now what do you think thatdamned C.N.R. gang has done?"

  "They haven't shot her?"

  "No, they haven't shot her. I wish to God they had! They've _blown herup!_"

  The little engineer subsided into a chair.

  "Do you hear?" he demanded. "They've blown her up! Put a stick of dynamiteunder some sugar, attached a battery wire to it, an' when she was lickingup the sugar touched it off. An' I can't do anything, damn 'em! Bears ain'tprotected. The government of this province calls 'em 'pests.' Murder 'emon sight, it says. An' those fiends over there think it's a good joke onme--an' the bear!"

  Keller was sweating. His fat hands were clenched, and his round, plump bodyfairly shook with excitement and anger.

  "When I went over to-night they laughed at me--the whole bunch," he went onthickly. "I offered to lick every man in the outfit from A to Z, an' Iain't had a fight in twenty years. Instead of fighting like men, a dozen ofthem grabbed hold of me, chucked me into a blanket, an' bounced me forfifteen minutes straight! What do you think of _that_, Aldous?Me--assistant divisional engineer of the G.T.P.--_bounced in a blanket_!"

  Peter Keller hopped from his chair and began pacing back and forth acrossthe room again, sucking truculently on his pipe.

  "If they were on our road I'd--I'd chase every man of them out of thecountry. Bu
t they're not. They belong to the C.N.R. They're out of myreach." He stopped, suddenly, in front of Aldous. "What can I do?" hedemanded.

  "Nothing," said Aldous. "You've had something like this coming to you,Peter. I've been expecting it. All the camps for twenty miles up and downthe line know what you thought of that bear. You fired Tibbits because, asyou said, he was too thick with Quade. You told him that right beforeQuade's face. Tibbits is now foreman of that grading gang over there. Twoand two make four, you know. Tibbits--Quade--the blown-up bear. Quadedoesn't miss an opportunity, no matter how small it is. Tibbits and Quadedid this to get even with you. You might report the blanket affair to thecontractors of the other road. I don't believe they would stand for it."

  Aldous had guessed correctly what the effect of associating Quade's namewith the affair would be. Keller was one of Quade's deadliest enemies. Hesat down close to Aldous again. His eyes burned deep back. It was notKeller's physique, but his brain, and the fearlessness of his spirit, thatmade him dangerous.

  "I guess you're right, Aldous," he said. "Some day--I'll even up on Quade."

  "And so shall I, Peter."

  The engineer stared into the other's eyes.

  "You----"

  Aldous nodded.

  "Quade left for Tete Jaune to-night, on a hand-car. I follow him to-morrow,on the train. I can't tell you what's up, Peter, but I don't think it willstop this side of death for Quade and Culver Rann--or me. I mean that quiteliterally. I don't see how more than one side can come out alive. I want toask you a few questions before I go on to Tete Jaune. You know everymountain and trail about the place, don't you?"

  "I've tramped them all, afoot and horseback."

  "Then perhaps you can direct me to what I must find--a man's grave."

  Peter Keller paused in the act of relighting his pipe. For a moment hestared in amazement.

  "There are a great many graves up at Tete Jaune," he said, at last. "Agreat many graves--and many of them unmarked. If it's a _Quade_ graveyou're looking for, Aldous, it will be unmarked."

  "I am quite sure that it is marked--or _was_ at one time," said Aldous."It's the grave of a man who had quite an unusual name, Peter, and youmight remember it--Mortimer FitzHugh."

  "FitzHugh--FitzHugh," repeated Keller, puffing out fresh volumes of smoke."Mortimer FitzHugh----"

  "He died, I believe, before there was a Tete Jaune, or at least before thesteel reached there," added Aldous. "He was on a hunting trip, and I havereason to think that his death was a violent one."

  Keller rose and fell into his old habit of pacing back and forth across theroom, a habit that had worn a path in the bare pine boards of the floor.

  "There's graves an' graves up there, but not so many that were there beforeTete Jaune came," he began, between puffs. "Up on the side of White KnobMountain there's the grave of a man who was torn to bits by a grizzly. Buthis name was Humphrey. Old Yellowhead John--Tete Jaune, they calledhim--died years before that, and no one knows where his grave is. We hadfive men die before the steel came, but there wasn't a FitzHugh among 'em.Crabby--old Crabby Tompkins, a trapper, is buried in the sand on theFrazer. The last flood swept his slab away. There's two unmarked graves inGlacier Canyon, but I guess they're ten years old if a day. Burns was shot.I knew him. Plenty died after the steel came, but before that----"

  Suddenly he stopped. He faced Aldous. His breath came in quick jerks.

  "By Heaven, I do remember!" he cried. "There's a mountain in the Saw ToothRange, twelve miles from Tete Jaune--a mountain with the prettiest basinyou ever saw at the foot of it, with a lake no bigger than this camp, andan old cabin which Yellowhead himself must have built fifty years ago.There's a blind canyon runs out of it, short an' dark, on the right. Wefound a grave there. I don't remember the first name on the slab. Mebby itwas washed out. But, so 'elp me God, _the last name was FitzHugh_!"

  With a sudden cry, Aldous jumped to his feet and caught Keller's arm.

  "You're sure of it, Peter?"

  "Positive!"

  It was impossible for Aldous to repress his excitement. The engineer staredat him even harder than before.

  "What can that grave have to do with Quade?" he asked. "The man died beforeQuade was known in these regions."

  "I can't tell you now, Peter," replied Aldous, pulling the engineer to thetable. "But I think you'll know quite soon. For the present, I want you tosketch out a map that will take me to the grave. Will you?"

  On the table were pencil and paper. Keller seated himself and drew themtoward him.

  "I'm damned if I can see what that grave can have to do with Quade," hesaid; "but I'll tell you how to find it!"

  For several minutes they bent low over the table, Peter Keller describingthe trail to the Saw Tooth Mountain as he sketched it, step by step, on asheet of office paper. When it was done, Aldous folded it carefully andplaced it in his wallet.

  "I can't go wrong, and--thank you, Keller!"

  After Aldous had gone, Peter Keller sat for some time in deep thought.

  "Now I wonder what the devil there can be about a grave to make him sohappy," he grumbled, listening to the whistle that was growing fainter downthe trail.

  And Aldous, alone, with the moon straight above him as he went back to theMiette Plain, felt, in truth, this night had become brighter for him thanany day he had ever known. For he knew that Peter Keller was not a man tomake a statement of which he was not sure. Mortimer FitzHugh was dead. Hisbones lay under the slab up in that little blind canyon in the shadow ofthe Saw Tooth Mountain. To-morrow he would tell Joanne. And, blindly, hetold himself that she would be glad.

  Still whistling, he passed the Chinese laundry shack on the creek, crossedthe railroad tracks, and buried himself in the bush beyond. A quarter of anhour later he stole quietly into Stevens' camp and went to bed.