“Yes, if I start now.”
“All right. Two ladies. You’re to bring them to the house, not here. Mrs. Ray knows about them. And — get back here as soon as you can.”
He closed his door again, sat down on the bed and opened the other letter. His hand shook as he unfolded it. He was so scared and excited that he could scarcely decipher the angular, girlish penmanship:
* * * * *
“To dear Captain Darragh, our champion and friend —
”It is difficult for me, Monsieur, to express my happiness and my deep
gratitude in the so cold formality of the written page.
”Alas, sir, it will be still more difficult to find words for it when
again I have the happiness of greeting you in proper person.
”Valentine has told you everything, she warns me, and I am, therefore,
somewhat at a loss to know what I should write to you.
“Yes, I know very well what I would write if I dare. It is this: that I wish you to know — although it may not pass the censor — that I am most impatient to see you, Monsieur. Not because of kindness past, nor with an unworthy expectation of benefits to come. But because of friendship, — the deepest, sincerest of my WHOLE LIFE.
“Is it not modest of a young girl to say this? Yet, surely all the world which was once en regle, formal, artificial, has been burnt out of our hearts by this so frightful calamity which has overwhelmed the world with fire and blood.
“If ever on earth there was a time when we might venture to express with candour what is hidden within our minds and hearts, it would seem, Monsieur, that the time is now.
“True, I have known you only for one day and one evening. Yet, what happened to the world in that brief space of time — and to us, Monsieur — brought us together as though our meeting were but a blessed reunion after the happy intimacy of many years. … I speak, Monsieur, for myself. May I hope that I speak, also, for you?
“With a heart too full to thank you, and with expectations indescribable — but with courage, always, for any event, — I take my leave of you at the foot of this page. Like death — I trust — my adieu is not the end, but the beginning. It is not farewell; it is a greeting to him whom I most honour in all the world. … And would willingly obey if he shall command. And otherwise — all else that in his mind — and heart — he might desire.
“THEODORICA.”
* * * * *
It was the most beautiful love-letter any man ever received in all the history of love.
And it had passed the censor.
* * * * *
III
It was afternoon when Darragh awoke in his bunk, stiff, sore, confused in mind and battered in body.
However, when he recollected where he was he got out of bed in a hurry and jerked aside the window curtains.
The day was magnificent; a sky of royal azure overhead, and everywhere the silver pillars of the birches supporting their splendid canopy of ochre, orange, and burnt-gold.
Wier, hearing him astir, came in.
“How long have you been back! Did you meet the ladies with your flivver?” demanded Darragh, impatiently.
“I got to Five Lakes station just as the train came in. The young ladies were the only passengers who got out. I waited to get their two steamer trunks and then I drove them to Harrod Place — —”
“How did they seem, Ralph — worn-out — worried — ill?”
Wier laughed: “No, sir, they looked very pretty and lively to me. They seemed delighted to get here. They talked to each other in some foreign tongue — Russian, I should say — at least, it sounded like what we heard over in Siberia, Captain—”
“It was Russian. … You go on and tell me while I take another hot bath! — —”
Wier followed him into the bath-room and vaulted to a seat on the deep set window-sill:
“ — When they weren’t talking Russian and laughing they talked to me and admired the woods and mountains. I had to tell them everything — they wanted to see buffalo and Indians. And when I told them there weren’t any, enquired for bears and panthers.
“We saw two deer on the Scaur, and a woodchuck near the house; I thought they’d jump out of the flivver — —”
He began to laugh at the recollection: “No, sir, they didn’t act tired and sad; they said they were crazy to get into their knickerbockers and go to look for you — —”
“Where did you say I was?” asked Darragh, drying himself vigorously.
“Out in the woods, somewhere. The last I saw of them, Mrs. Ray had their hand-bags and Jerry and Tom were shouldering their trunks.”
“I’m going up there right away,” interrupted Darragh excitedly. “ —
Good heavens, Ralph, I haven’t any clothes here, have I?”
“No, sir. Bu those you wore last night are dry — —”
“Confound it! I meant to send some decent clothes here —— All right; get me those duds I wore yesterday —— and a bite to eat! I’m in a hurry, Ralph — —”
He ate while dressing, disgustedly arraying himself in the grey shirt, breeches, and laced boots which weather, water, rock, and brier had not improved.
In a pathetic attempt to spruce up, he knotted the red bandanna around his neck and punched Salzar’s slouch hat into a peak.
“I look like a hootch-running Wop,” he said. “Maybe I can get into the house before I meet the ladies — —”
“You look like one of Clinch’s bums,” remarked Wier with native honesty.
Darragh, chagrined, went to his bunk, pulled the morocco case from under the pillow, and shoved it into the bosom of his flannel shirt.
“That’s the main thing anyway,” he thought. Then, turning to Wier, he asked whether Eve and Stormont had awakened.
It appeared that Trooper Stormont had saddled up and cantered away shortly after sunrise, leaving word that he must hunt up his comrade, Trooper Lannis, at Ghost Lake.
“They’re coming back this evening,” added Wier. “He asked you to look out for Clinch’s step-daughter.”
“She’s all right here. Can’t you keep an eye on her, Ralph?”
“I’m stripping trout, sir. I’ll be around here to cook dinner for her when she wakes up.”
Darragh glanced across the brook at the hatchery. It was only a few yards away. He nodded and started for the veranda:
“That’ll be all right,” he said. “Nobody is coming here to bother her.
… And don’t let her leave, Ralph, till I get back — —”
“Very well, sir. But suppose she takes it into her head to leave — —”
Darragh called back, gaily: “She can’t: she hasn’t any clothes!” And away he strode in the gorgeous sunshine of a magnificent autumn day, all the clean and vigorous youth of him afire in anticipation of a reunion which the letter from his lady-love had transfigured into a tryst.
For, in that amazing courtship of a single day, he never dreamed that he had won the heart of that sad, white-faced, hungry child in rags — silken tatters still stained with the blood of massacre, — the very soles of her shoes still charred by the embers of her own home.
Yes, that is what must have happened in a single day and evening. Life passes swiftly during such periods. Minutes lengthen into days; hours into years. The soul finds itself.
Then mind and heart become twin prophets, — clairvoyant concerning what hides behind the veil; comprehending the divine clair-audience what the Three Sisters whisper there — hearing even the whirr of the spindle — the very snipping of the Eternal Shears!
* * * * *
The soul finds itself; the mind knows itself; the heart perfectly understands.
He had not spoken to this young girl of love. The blood of friends and servants was still rusty on her skirt’s ragged hem.
Yet, that night, when at last in safety she had said good-bye to the man who had secured it for her, he knew that he was in love with her. And, at such crises, the veil that hid
es hearts becomes transparent.
At that instant he had seen and known. Afterward he had dared not believe that he had know.
But hers had been a purer courage.
* * * * *
As he strode on, the comprehension of her candour, her honesty, the sweet bravery that had conceived, created, and sent that letter, thrilled this young man until his heavy boots sprouted wings, and the trail he followed was but a path of rosy clouds over which he floated heavenward.
* * * * *
And half an hour later he came to his senses with a distinct shock.
Straight ahead of him on the trail, and coming directly toward him, moved a figure in knickers and belted tweed.
Flecked sunlight slanted on the stranger’s cheek and burnished hair, dappling face and figure with moving, golden spots.
Instantly Darragh knew and trembled.
But Theodorica of Esthonia had known him only in his uniform.
As she came toward him, lovely in her lithe and rounded grace, only friendly curiosity gazed at him from her blue eyes.
Suddenly she knew him, went scarlet to her yellow hair, then white: and tried to speak — but had no control of the short, rosy upper lip which only quivered as he took her hands.
The forest was dead still around them save for the whisper of painted leaves sifting down from a sunlit vault above.
Finally she sad in a ghost of a voice: “My — friend. …”
“If you accept his friendship. …”
“Friendship is to be shared. … Ours mingled — on that day. … Your share is — as much as pleases you.”
“All you have to give me, then.”
“Take it … All I have. …” Her blue eyes met his with a little effort. All courage is an effort.
Then that young man dropped on both knees at her feet and laid his lips to her soft hands.
In trembling silence she stood for a moment, then slowly sank on both knees to face him across their clasped hands.
So, in the gilded cathedral of the woods, pillared with silver, and azure-domed, the betrothal of these two was sealed with clasp and lip.
Awed, a little fearful, she looked into her lover’s eyes with a gaze so chaste, so oblivious to all things earthly, that the still purity of her face seemed a sacrament, and he scarcely dared touch the childish lips she offered.
But when the sacrament of the kiss had been accomplished, she rested one hand on his shoulder and rose, and drew him with her.
Then his moment came: he drew the emblazoned case from his breast, opened it, and, in silence, laid it in her hands. The blaze of the jewels in the sunshine almost blinded them.
That was his moment.
The next moment was Quintana’s.
* * * * *
Darragh hadn’t a chance. Out of the bushes two pistols were thrust hard against his stomach. Quintana’s face was behind them. He wore no mask, but the three men with him watched him over the edges of handkerchiefs, — over the sights of levelled rifles, too.
The youthful Grand Duchess had turned deadly white. One of Quintana’s men took the morocco case from her hands and shoved her aside without ceremony.
Quintana leered at Darragh over his levelled weapons:
“My frien’ Smith!” he exclaimed softly. “So it is you, then, who have twice try to rob me of my property!
“Ah! You recollec’? Yes? How you have rob me of a pacquet which contain only some chocolate?”
Darragh’s face was burning with helpless rage.
“My frien’, Smith,” repeated Quintana, “do you recollec’ what it was you say to me? Yes? … How often it is the onexpected which so usually happen? You are quite correc’, l’ami Smith. It has happen.”
He glanced at the open jewel box which one of the masked men held, then, like lightning, his sinister eyes focussed on Darragh.
“So,” he said, “it was also you who rob me las’ night of my property.
… What you do to Nick Salzar, eh?”
“Killed him,” said Darragh, dry lipped, nerved for death. “I ought to have killed you, too, when I had the chance. But — I’m white, you see.”
At the insult flung into his face over the muzzles of his own pistols,
Quintana burst into laughter.
“Ah! You should have shot me! You are quite right, my frien’. I mus; say you have behave ver’ foolish.”
He laughed again so hard that Darragh felt his pistols shaking against his body.
“So you have kill Nick Salzar, eh?” continued Quintana with perfect good humour. “My frien’, I am oblige to you for what you do. You are surprise? Eh? I is ver’ simple, my frien’ Smith. What I want of a man who can be kill? Eh? Of what use is he to me? Voila!”
He laughed, patted Darragh on the shoulder with one of his pistols.
“You, now — you could be of use. Why? Because you are a better man than was Nick Salzar. He who kills is better than the dead.”
Then, swiftly his dark features altered:
“My frien’ Smith,” he said, “I have come here for my property, not to kill. I have recover my property. Why shall I kill you? To say that I am a better man? Yes, perhaps. Bu also I should be oblige to say that also I am a fool. Yaas! A poor damfool.”
Without shifting his eyes he made a motion with one pistol to his men. As they turned and entered the thicket, Quintana’s intent gaze became murderous.
“If I mus’ kill you I shall do so. Otherwise I have sufficient trouble to keep me from ennui. My frien’, I am going home to enjoy my property. If you live or die it signifies nothing to me. No! Why, for the pleasure of killing you, should I bring your dirty gendarmes on my heels?”
He backed away to the edge of the thicket, venturing one swift and evil glance at the girl who stood as though dazed.
“Listen attentively,” he said to Darragh. “One of my men remains hidden very near. He is a dead shot. His aim is at your — sweetheart’s — body. You understan’?”
“Yes.”
“Ver’ well. You shall not go away for one hour time. After that — —” he took off his slouch hat with a sweeping bow— “you may go to hell!”
Behind him the bushes parted, closed.
Jose Quintana had made his adieux.
* * * * *
Episode Nine
The Forest and Mr. Sard
* * * * *
I
When at last Jose Quintana has secured what he had been after for years, his troubles really began. In his pocket he had two million dollars worth of gems, including the Flaming Jewel.
But he was in the middle of a wilderness ringed in by hostile men, and obliged to rely for aid on a handful of the most desperate criminals in Europe.
Those openly hostile to him had a wide net spread around him — wide of mesh too, perhaps; and it was through a mesh he meant to wriggle, but the net was intact from Canada to New York.
Canadian police and secret agents held it on the north: this he had learned from Jake Kloon long since.
East, west and south he knew he had the troopers of the New York State Constabulary to deal with, and in addition every game warden and fire warden in the State Forests, a swarm of lain clothes men from the Metropolis, and the rural constabulary of every town along the edges of the vast reservation.
Just who was responsible for this enormous conspiracy to rob him of what he considered his own legitimate loot Quintana did not know.
Sard’s attorney, Eddie Abrams, believed that the French police instigated it through agents of the United States Secret Service.
Of one thing Quintana was satisfied, Mike Clinch had nothing to do with stirring up the authorities. Law-breakers of his sort don’t shout for the police or invoke State or Government aid.
As for the status of Darragh — or Hal Smith, as he supposed him to be, a well-born young man gone wrong. Europe was full of that kind. To Quintana there was nothing suspicious about Hal Smith. On the contrary, his clever recklessness confirmed that polish
ed bandit’s opinion that Smith was a gentleman degenerated into a crook. It takes an educated imagination for a man to do what Smith had done to him. If the common crook has any imagination at all it never is educated.
Another matter worried Jose Quintana: he was not only short on provisions, but what remained was cached in Drowned Valley; and Mike Clinch and his men were guarding every outlet to that sinister region, excepting only the rocky and submerged trail by which he had made his exit.
That was annoying; it cut off provisions and liquor from Canada, for which he had arranged with Jake Kloon. For Kloon’s hootch-runners now would be stopped by Clinch; ad not one among them knew about the rocky trail in.
All these matters were disquieting enough: but what really and most deeply troubled Quintana was his knowledge of his own men.
He did not trust one among them. Of international crookdom they were the cream. Not one of them but would have murdered his fellow if the loot were worth it and the chances of escape sufficient.
There was no loyalty to him, none to one another, no “honour among thieves” — and it was Jose Quintana who knew that only in romance such a thing existed.
N, he could not trust a single man. Only hope of plunder attached these marauders to him, and merely because he had education and imagination enough to provide what they wanted.
Anyone among them would murder and rob him if opportunity presented.
Now, how to keep his loot; how to get back to Europe with it, was the problem that confronted Quintana after robbing Darragh. And he determined to settle part of that question at once.
About five miles from Harrod Place, within a hundred rods of which he had held up Hal Smith, Quintana halted, seated himself on a rotting log, and waited until his men came up and gathered around him.
For a little while, in utter silence, his keen eyes travelled from one visage to the next, from Henri Picquet to Victor Georgiades, to Sanchez, to Sard. His intent scrutiny focussed on Sard; lingered.
If there was anybody he might trust, a little way, it would be Sard.
Then a polite, untroubled smile smoothed the pale, dark features of Jose
Quintana:
“Bien, messieurs, the coup has been success. Yes? Ver’ well; in turn, then, en accord with our custom, I shall dispose myse’f to listen to your good advice.”
Works of Robert W Chambers Page 1023
