CHAPTER VIII.
There was a belt of timber, principally oak and hickory, on the Himesplace, and one afternoon the old man informed his wife that "a youngfeller was comin' to help him for a week or so fellin' trees andcuttin' 'em up into cord wood."
"More work for me, I s'pose," she said, in a sullen tone.
"He'll board and lodge here. You kin git a room ready fer him and setan extry plate onto the table. He'll be here to supper to-night if he'sa man o' his word," was the nonchalant reply. And Mr. Himes steppedfrom the kitchen door and walked off in the direction of the barn.
Belinda's face brightened as she went upstairs and busied herself inmaking a bed in a little room usually appropriated to the use of thehired man, when they had one. They had now been without one for sometime, and she was inexpressibly weary of the uncongenial society of herold husband. Any change, she thought, must be for the better.
She was bustling about, setting her table while the supper was cookingover the fire, when the outer door opened, and a man's step--not thatof her husband, yet strangely familiar--crossed the threshold. Sheturned to see whose it was, then uttered a low cry full of terror,while her cheek blanched and the dish in her hand fell to the floorwith a crash and lay in fragments at her feet.
For several minutes they stood silently gazing into each other's eyes,hers dilating with fear, his stern and gloomy, a grim smile upon hislips.
"Yis, it's me," he said at last; "an' what have ye to say fer yersilf,false, desateful, treacherous crayther that ye are?"
"They told me ye was killed," she answered, in a shaking voice,staggering back and dropping into a chair, but never taking her eyesfrom his face; "shot down dead in one o' them awful battles; and Ithought it must be your ghost."
"I'm a livin' man an' no ghost," he returned, with a mocking laugh."An' ye soon comforted yersilf wid ould Himes and his house an' farm,did ye?"
"What could I do? When you was gone, the rest was all alike to me. I'dno home, nobody in the wide world to care for me," she sobbed, coveringher face with her hands; "and he said he'd be so good to me--I shouldhave everything I wanted. But it isn't so; he's an awful man to livewith; and I'm just heart broke, that I am!"
"An' if 'twas all to do over agin, ye wadn't give me up fer the likeso' him--house an' farm an' all?" he queried, drawing a step nearer andbending toward her with an eager look in his eyes, while his tonessoftened till they were almost affectionate.
"Never!" she cried, passionately. "I'd take you without a penny soonerthan him with all the gold of Californy." And her face, lifted to his,was full of yearning love and entreaty.
"I knowed it, me own darlint, jewel o' me heart!" he cried, claspingher in his arms and heaping fond caresses upon her. "It's an evil fatethat's come atween us; but him that's robbed me's an ould man, an' I'myoung, an' mabbe my turn'll come when he's took out o' the way."
"Go! go! run! he'll be here in a minute, maybe, and kill you if hefinds you here!" she cried, hastily releasing herself and pushing himfrom her.
"Kill me! ha! ha! that wake ould man! Do yees think I'd come off secondbest in a foight wid the loikes o' him?" he asked, with a scornfullaugh. "But yees needn't be afeard, B'lindy; I'm the chap as he's hiredto help him chop down his trees."
"Oh!" she exclaimed, with a look of relief. "But we must behavecautious, Phelim--mustn't let him suspect as we've ever set eyes oneach other till now."
He assented to the wisdom of her proposition, and as footsteps wereheard approaching from without, moved quickly to the farther side ofthe room, and as the master of the house came in, seemed very muchengaged with the county paper which he found lying on the window-sill.
Belinda was stooping over the fire, stirring something stewing in a pan.
"Supper not ready?" Himes asked, in a surly tone. Then, catching sightof the new-comer, "Ah! so you're here, O'Rourke! Well, set up to thetable. I guess we'll have something to eat after a bit."
By previous arrangement, Teddy McManus was to temporarily supplyPhelim's place with Bangs, thus leaving Phelim at liberty to stay awayas long as should seem advisable for their common interest. Heaccordingly spent several weeks in the employ of Farmer Himes, fellingtrees and cutting wood all day in company with the old man, and often,in the long evenings, enjoying a stolen interview with Belinda when acall upon some neighbor or a visit to the nearest town had taken herhusband out of the way.
The woman's conscience troubled her sorely at times; she knew she wasdoing very wrong, now that she was the wife of another man, to let thisone talk to her in the old lover-like way; that was proper enough whileshe was free to bestow her heart and hand upon him. But she stifled thereproaches of the inward monitor, and went on in the evil course thatmust end in sorrow and shame.
But O'Rourke had a purpose in coming there aside from his passion forher and wish to obtain the money paid him for his work. He was inBangs's employ still, though in a new capacity.
"I've a little job on hand that mabbe you cud help me wid, me jewel,"he said to Belinda one evening in the second week of his stay.
"What's that?" she asked, looking up from her sewing in some surpriseand apprehension.
"Nothin' to fright ye," he returned, laughing. "It's jist this, medarlint. There's a gintleman as wants to foind out, fer some raison o'his own, if yer ould man's got a margage--I belave that's what theycall it--on Lakeside, the farm belongin' till the Heaths."
"How should I know if he has?" she returned. "He never tells me nothin'about his business, and I don't know what a margage is."
"It's a paper wid writin' onto it, darlint, and one as it wudn't be o'no use at all at all to take," he explained; "not till me nor thegintleman I was spakin' av, though mabbe it moight fer the folks it'sdrawed against."
"Would you know it if you saw it?"
"Sorra a bit, jewel, but ye wad; ye can rade writin'."
"Yes; but I tell you I don't know what sort of a thing it is."
"Somethin' loike this jist--tellin' that money's owed on the farm, an'if it ain't paid by sich a toime, the feller what holds the margage cansell 'em out and git his money."
"Then anybody that had the paper could do that, couldn't he?" sheasked, with increasing interest.
"No, not if he stole it, the gintleman tould me; the writin's got to befixed to suit, wid the roight name ontil it. He'll be afther buyin' it,I belave, whin he foinds out all about it; an' he'll pay me a purtypenny if I foind out an' let him intil the sacret."
"But what made him think it was here?"
"Well, a friend o' his'n see the ould man over there, an' somethin' putit intil her head as it moight be he wuz afther money, the folksseemin' kind o' distressed loike."
Mr. Himes's return broke off the conversation, but it was renewed byPhelim at the first opportunity, and at length Belinda was prevailedupon to promise to make an examination of her husband's papers if shecould in any way manage to get possession of the key to the strong boxin which they were kept. This key he carried on his person during theday and put carefully under his pillow at night. She had never beenpermitted to touch it, nor did it seem likely she ever would be.
But one day, having torn his coat, he brought it to her to mend.
"Mind you do it right away," he said, "for I'll have to wear my Sundayone till it's done. I can't chop wood in that, so I'll just step overto Harkness's to ask what cord wood's a sellin' fer now inPrairieville."
Dropping the coat the moment the door closed on him, Belinda ran to thefront window and watched him stealthily as he crossed the yard and wentout at the gate; then, hurrying back, she searched the pockets of thecoat.
Yes, the key was there. She drew it out with a gleeful laugh. There wasnothing she enjoyed with a keener relish than prying into whatever heparticularly desired to keep secret from her. First satisfying herselfthat he had not discovered his loss and turned back to retrieve it, shehastened to make use of this "lucky chance."
It so happened that the first paper she opene
d proved to be the one shewas in search of. She read enough to make sure of that, gloated forseveral minutes over rolls of bank-notes and piles of gold and silvercoin, feeling strongly tempted to help herself; but deterred by thealmost certain conviction that her husband knew to a cent how much wasthere, she hurriedly shut down the lid, relocked the box, and went backto her work.
Well for her that she did; for scarcely had she taken the first stitchin the garment when the old man rushed in in breathless haste andsnatched it from her hands.
"What's that for?" she asked, her black eyes snapping.
"Have ye been makin' free with this?" he demanded, shaking the key inher face. "It'll not be good for ye if ye have."
"With that?" she cried, in well-feigned surprise. "I only wish I'dknowed it was there. But if you jerk my work out o' my hands agin, yemay do yer mendin' yerself."
He started upon his errand a second time, and only waiting until he waswell out of sight, she threw a shawl over her head and ran to the wood,where Phelim's axe was descending with ringing strokes upon a fallentree. They ceased at her approach.
"What is it?" he asked; "have ye come til me fer purtection from thatould brute baste?"
"No," she answered, with a scornful laugh, "he hasn't got so far as tostrike me yet."
Then she went on to tell of her chance opportunity; how she hadimproved it, and the discovery she had made.
"Good! good!" he cried, his eyes gleaming with satisfaction and withgreed. "But ye're sure now the margage is on the Heath property?"
"Yes; certain sure. You'll not get me into trouble about it?"
"Niver a bit, me darlint. And so that's where the ould divil kapes hismoney, is it? How much do ye s'pose he has there?"
"I didn't dare look," she answered, evasively, "and he'll take goodcare I don't never get hold o' that key again. You may count on that.Now I must run back and do that mendin' afore he gits home."
She flew back to the house and worked with nervous haste; the mendingmust be done before her husband's return, lest his suspicions should bearoused. She had just completed her task, thrown the coat over achair-back and set about getting supper, when he came in.
He gave her a sharp, suspicious glance, and passed on into the nextroom, where the strong-box was. He had been thinking on his homewardwalk that perhaps she had found and made use of the key in those fewminutes that it was out of his possession.
He would find out, he said to himself, and if a dollar of his preciousstore were missing, he would demand its instant return. Fortunately shecould not have had time and opportunity to spend it.
Belinda awaited with a quaking heart the result of his examination.What if she had unwittingly disarranged the papers! What might he notdo to her in his fury if such were the case!
It seemed a long while that he was there. Evidently he must be countinghis money. How glad she was that she had resisted the temptation totake a little! At last he came out with a satisfied, triumphant lookthat banished her fears.
Early the next week Phelim O'Rourke returned to Prairieville, the timeof his engagement with Mr. Himes having expired.
The Tragedy of Wild River Valley Page 8
