CHAPTER XVII
From the cabin McKay went first to the great rock that jutted from thebroken shoulder of Cragg's Ridge, and as they stood there Peter heardthe strange something that was like a laugh, and yet was not a laugh, onhis master's lips. But his scraggly face did not look up. There wasan answering whimper in his throat. He had been slow in sensing thesignificance of the mysterious thing that had changed his old home sincemonths ago. During the hours of afternoon, and these moonlit hours thatfollowed, he tried to understand. He knew this was home. Yet the greengrass was gone, and a million trees had changed into blackened stubs.The world was no longer shut in by deep forests. And Cragg's Ridge wasnaked where he and Nada had romped in sunshine and flowers, and out ofit all rose the mucky death-smell of the flame-swept earth. These thingshe understood, in his dog way. But what he could not understand clearlywas why Nada was not in the cabin, and why they did not find her, eventhough the world was changed.
He sat back on his haunches, and Jolly Roger heard again the whimperinggrief in his throat. It comforted the man to know that Peter remembered,and he was not alone in his desolation. Gently he placed a soot-grimedhand on his comrade's head.
"Peter, it was from this rock--right where we're standing now--that Ifirst saw her, a long time ago," he said, a bit of forced cheer breakingthrough the huskiness of his voice. "Remember the little jackpine clumpdown there? You climbed up onto her lap, a little know-nothing thing,and you pawed in her loose curls, and growled so fiercely I could hearyou. And when I made a noise, and she looked up, I thought she was themost beautiful thing I had ever seen--just a kid, with those eyes likethe flowers, and her hair shining in the sun, an' tear stains on hercheeks. Tear stains, Pied-Bot--because of that snake who's dead overthere. Remember how you growled at me, Peter?"
Peter wriggled an answer.
"That was the beginning," said Jolly Roger, "and this--looks like theend. But--"
He clenched his fists, and there was a sudden fierceness in thegrotesque movement of his shadow on the rock.
"We're going to find her before that end comes," he added defiantly."We're going to find her, Pied-Bot, even if it takes us to thesettlements--right up into the face of the law."
He set out over the rocks, his boots making hollow sounds in thedeadness of the world about them. Again he followed where once had beenthe trail that led to Mooney's shack, over on the wobbly line of railthat rambled for eighty miles into the wilderness from Fort William. TheP. D. & W. it was named--Port Arthur, Duluth & Western; but it hadnever reached Duluth, and there were those who had nicknamed it Poverty,Destruction & Want. Many times Jolly Roger had laughed at the queerstories Nada told him about it; how a wrecking outfit was always carriedbehind on the twice-a-week train, and how the crew picked berries inseason, and had their trapping lines, and once chased a bear half wayto Whitefish Lake while the train waited for hours. She called it the"Cannon Ball," because once upon a time it had made sixty-nine milesin twenty-four hours. But there was nothing of humor about it as JollyRoger and Peter came out upon it tonight. It stretched out both waysfrom them, a thin, grim line of tragedy in the moonlight, and from wherethey stood it appeared to reach into a black and abysmal sea.
Once more man and dog paused, and looked back at what had been. Andthe whine came in Peter's throat again and something tugged inside him,urging him to bark up into the face of the moon, as he had often barkedfor Nada in the days of his puppyhood, and afterward.
But his master went on and Peter followed him, stepping the uneven tiesone by one. And with the black chaos of the world under and about them,and the glorious light of the moon filling; the sky over their heads,the journey they made seemed weirdly unreal. For the silver and goldof the moon and the black muck of the fire refused to mingle, and whileover their heads they could see the tiniest clouds and beyond to thefarthest stars, all was black emptiness when they looked about them uponwhat once had been a living earth. Only the two lines of steel caughtthe moon-glow and the charred ends of the fire-shriven stubs that roseup out of the earth shroud and silhouetted themselves against the sky.
To Peter it was not what he failed to see, but what he did not hearor smell that oppressed him and stirred him to wide-eyed watchfulnessagainst impending evil. Under many moons he had traveled with his masterin their never-ending flight from the law, and many other nights withneither moon nor stars had they felt out their trails together. Butalways, under him and over him on all sides of him, there had been LIFE.And tonight there was no life, nor smell of life. There was no chirp ofnight bird, or flutter of owl's wing, no plash of duck or cry of loon.He listened in vain for the crinkling snap of twig, and the whisperof wind in treetops. And there was no smell--no musk of mink that hadcrossed his path, no taste in the air of the strong scented fox, nosubtle breath of partridge and rabbit and fleshy porcupine. And evenfrom the far distances there came no sound, no howl of wolf, no castanetclatter of stout moose horns against bending saplings--not even the howlof a trapper's dog.
The stillness was of the earth, and yet unearthly. It was even as ifsome fearsome thing was smothering the sound of his master's feet. ToMcKay, sensing these same things that Peter sensed, came understandingthat brought with it an uneasiness which changed swiftly into thechill of a growing fear. The utter lifelessness told him how vast thedestruction of the fire had been. Its obliteration was so great no lifehad adventured back into the desolated country, though the conflagrationmust have passed in the preceding autumn, many months ago. The burnedcountry was a grave and the nearest edge of it, judged from thesepulchral stillness of the night, was many miles away.
For the first time came the horror of the thought that in such a fireas this people must have died. It had swept upon them like a tidal wave,galloping the forests with the speed of a race horse, with only thisthin line of rail leading to the freedom of life outside. In placesonly a miracle could have made escape possible. And here, where Nada hadlived, with the pitch-wood forests crowding close, the fire must haveburned most fiercely. In this moment, when fear of the unspeakable sethis heart trembling, his faith fastened itself grimly to the little oldgray Missioner, Father John, in whose cabin Nada had taken refuge manymonths ago, when Jed Hawkins lay dead in the trail with his one-eyedface turned up to the thunder and lightning in the sky. Father John, onthat stormy night when he fled north, had promised to care for Nada, andin silence he breathed a prayer that the Missioner had saved her fromthe red death that had swept like an avalanche upon them. He toldhimself it must be so. He cried out the words aloud, and Peter heardhim, and followed closer, so that his head touched his master's leg ashe walked.
But the fear was there. From a spark it grew into a red-hot spot inJolly Roger's heart. Twice in his own life he had raced against deathin a forest fire. But never had he seen a fire like this must have been.All at once he seemed to hear the roar of it in his ears, the rollingthunder of the earth as it twisted in the cataclysm of flame, thehissing shriek of the flaming pitch-tops as they leapt in lightningfires against the smoke-smothered sky. A few hours ago he had stoodwhere Father John's Cabin had been and the place was a ruin of char andash. If the fire had hemmed them in and they had not escaped--
His voice cried out in sudden protest.
"It can't be, Peter. It can't be! They made the rail--or the lake--andwe'll find them in the settlements. It couldn't happen. God wouldn't lether die like that!"
He stopped, and stared into the moon-broken gloom on his left. Somethingwas there, fifty feet away, that drew him down through the muck whichlay knee deep in the right-of-way ditch. It was what was left of thecutter's cabin, a clutter of burned logs, a wind scattered heap ofash. Even there, within arm's reach of the railroad, there had been nosalvation from the fire.
He waded again through the muck of the ditch, and went on. Mentallyand physically he was fighting the ogre that was striving to achievepossession of his brain. Over and over he repeated his faith that Nadaand the Missioner had escaped and he would find them in the settlements
.Less than ever he thought of the law in these hours. What happened tohimself was of small importance now, if he could find Nada alive beforethe menace caught up with him from behind, or ambushed him ahead.Yet the necessity of caution impinged itself upon him even in therecklessness of his determination to find her if he had to walk into thearms of the law that was hunting him.
For an hour they went on, and as the moon sank westward it seemed toturn its face to look at them; and behind them, when they looked back,the world was transformed into a black pit, while ahead--with the glowof it streaming over their shoulders--ghostly shapes took form, andvision reached farther. Twice they caught the silvery gleam of lakesthrough the tree-stubs, and again they walked with the rippling murmurof a stream that kept for a mile within the sound of their ears. Buteven here, with water crying out its invitation to life, there was nolife.
Another hour after that Jolly Roger's pulse beat a little faster as hestrained his eyes to see ahead. Somewhere near, within a mile or two,was the first settlement with its sawmill and its bunkhouses, its onestore and its few cabins, with flat mountains of sawdust on one sideof it, and the evergreen forest creeping up to its doors on the other.Surely they would find life here, where there had been man power to holdfire back from the clearing. And it was here he might find Nada andthe Missioner, for more than once Father John had preached to thered-cheeked women and children and the clear-eyed men of the Finnishcommunity that thrived there.
But as they drew nearer he listened in vain for the bark of a dog, andhis eyes quested as futilely for a point of light in the wide canopy ofgloom. At last, close together, they rounded a curve in the road, andcrossed a small bridge with a creek running below, and McKay knew hisarm should be able to send a stone to what he was seeking ahead. Andthen, a minute later, he drew in a great gasping breath of unbelief andhorror.
For the settlement was no longer in the clearing between him and therim-glow of the moon. No living tree raised its head against the sky, nosign of cabin or mill shadowed the earth, and where the store had been,and the little church with its white-painted cross, was only a chaos ofempty gloom.
He went down, as he had gone to the tie cutter's cabin, and for manyminutes he stared and listened, while Peter seemed to stand withoutbreathing. Then making a wide megaphone of his hands, he shouted. It wasan alarming thing to do and Peter started as if struck. For there wereonly ghosts to answer back and the hollowness of a shriven pit for thecry to travel in. Nothing was there. Even the great sawdust piles hadshrunk into black scars under the scourge of the fire.
A groaning agony was in the breath of Jolly Roger's lips as he went backto the railroad and hurried on Death must have come here, death suddenand swift. And if it had fallen upon the Finnish settlement, with itsstrong women and its stronger men, what might it not have done in thecabin of the little old gray Missioner--and Nada?
For a long time after that he forgot Peter was with him. He forgoteverything but his desire to reach a living thing. At times, where theroad-bed was smooth, he almost ran, and at others he paused for a littleto gather his breath and listen. And it was Peter, in one of theseintervals, who caught the first message of life. From a long distanceaway came faintly the barking of a dog.
Half a mile farther on they came to a clearing where no stubs of treesstood up like question marks against the sky, and in this clearing was acabin, a dark blotch that was without light or sound. But from behind itthe dog barked again, and Jolly Roger made quickly toward it. Here therewas no ash under his feet, and he knew that at last he had found anoasis of life in the desolation. Loudly he knocked with his fist at thecabin door and soon there was a response inside, the heavy movement of aman's body getting out of bed, and after that the questioning voice ofa woman. He knocked again and the flare of a lighted match illumined thewindow. Then came the drawing of a bar at the door and a man stood therein his night attire, a man with a heavy face and bristling beard, and alamp in his hand.
"I beg your pardon for waking you," said Jolly Roger, "but I am justdown from the north, hoping to find my friends back here and I have seennothing but destruction and death. You are the first living soul I havefound to ask about them."
"Where were they?" grunted the man.
"At Cragg's Ridge."
"Then God help them," came the woman's voice from back in the room.
"Cragg's Ridge," said the man, "was a burning hell in the middle of thenight."
Jolly Roger's fingers dug into the wood at the edge of the door.
"You mean--"
"A lot of 'em died," said the man stolidly, as if eager to rid himselfof the one who had broken his sleep. "If it was Mooney, he's dead. An'if it was Robson, or Jake the Swede, or the Adams family--they're dead,too."
"But it wasn't," said Jolly Roger, his heart choking between fear andhope. "It was Father John, the Missioner, and Nada Hawkins, who livedwith him--or with her foster-mother in the Hawkins' cabin."
The man shook his head, and turned down the wick of his lamp.
"I dunno about the girl, or the old witch who was her mother," he said,"but the Missioner made it out safe, and went to the settlements."
"And no girl was with him?"
"No, there was no girl," came the woman's voice again, and Peter jerkedup his ears at the creaking of a bed. "Father John stopped here thesecond day after the fire had passed, and he said he was gathering upthe bones of the dead. Nada Hawkins wasn't with him, and he didn't saywho had died and who hadn't. But I think--"
She stopped as the bearded man turned toward her.
"You think what?" demanded Jolly Roger, stepping half into the room.
"I think," said the woman, "that she died along with the others. Anyway,Jed Hawkins' witch-woman was burned trying to make for the lake, andlittle of her was left."
The man with the lamp made a movement as if to close the door.
"That's all we know," he growled.
"For God's sake--don't!" entreated Jolly Roger, barring the door withhis arm. "Surely there were some who escaped from Cragg's Ridge andbeyond!"
"Mebby a half, mebby less," said the man. "I tell you it burned likehell, and the worst of it came in the middle of the night with a windbehind it that blew a hurricane. We've twenty acres cleared here, withthe cabin in the center of it, an' it singed my beard and burned herhair and scorched our hands, and my pigs died out there from the heat ofit. Mebby it's a place to sleep in for the night you want, stranger?"
"No, I'm going on," said Jolly Roger, the blood in his veins runningwith the chill of water. "How far before I come to the end of fire?"
"Ten miles on. It started this side of the next settlement."
Jolly Roger drew back and the door closed, and standing on the railroadonce more he saw the light go out and after that the occasional barkingof the settler's dog grew fainter and fainter behind them.
He felt a great weariness in his bones and body now. With hope struckdown the exhaustion of two nights and a day without sleep seized uponhim and his feet plodded more and more slowly over the uneven ties ofthe road. Even in his weariness he fought madly against the thought thatNada was dead and he repeated the word "impossible--impossible" so oftenthat it ran in sing-song through his brain. And he could not keep awayfrom him the white, thin face of the Missioner, who had promised on hisfaith In God to care for Nada, and who had passed the settler's cabinALONE.
Another two hours they went on and then came the first of the greentimber. Under the shelter of some balsams Jolly Roger found a restingplace and there they waited for the break of dawn. Peter stretched outand slept. But Jolly Roger sat with his head and shoulders against thebole of a tree, and not until the light of the moon was driven away bythe darkness that preceded dawn by an hour or two did his eyes close inrestless slumber. He was roused by the wakening twitter of birds and inthe cold water of a creek that ran near he bathed his face and hands.Peter wondered why there was no fire and no breakfast this morning.
The settlement was only a little way ahead and i
t was very early whenthey reached it. People were still in their beds and out of only onechimney was smoke rising into the clear calm of the breaking day. Fromthis cabin a young man came, and stood for a moment after he had closedthe door, yawning and stretching his arms and looking up to see whatsort of promise the sky held for the day. After that he went to a stableof logs, and Jolly Roger followed him there.
He was unlike the bearded settler, and nodded with a youthful smile ofcheer.
"Good morning," he said. "You're traveling early, and--"
He looked more keenly as his eyes took in Jolly Roger's boots andclothes, and the gray pallor in his face.
"Just get in?" he asked kindly. "And--from the burnt country?"
"Yes, from the burnt country. I've been away a long time, and I'm tryingto find out if my friends are among the living or the dead. Did you everhear of Father John, the Missioner at Cragg's Ridge?"
The young man's face brightened.
"I knew him," he said. "He helped me to bury my brother, three yearsago. And if it's him you seek, he is safe. He went up to Fort William aweek after the fire, and that was in September, eight months past."
"And was there with him a girl named Nada Hawkins?" asked Jolly Roger,trying hard to speak calmly as he looked into the other's face.
The youth shook his head.
"No, he was alone. He slept in my cabin overnight, and he said nothingof a girl named Nada Hawkins."
"Did he speak of others?"
"He was very tired, and I think he was half dead with grief at what hadhappened. He spoke no names that I remember."
Then he saw the gray look in Jolly Roger's face grow deeper, and saw thedespair which could not hide itself in his eyes.
"But there were a number of girls who passed here, alone or withtheir friends," he said hopefully. "What sort of looking girl was NadaHawkins?"
"A--kid. That's what I called her," said Jolly Roger, in a dead, coldvoice. "Eighteen, and beautiful, with blue eyes, and brown hair that shecouldn't keep from blowing in curls about her face. So like an angel youwouldn't forget her if you'd seen her--just once."
Gently the youth placed a hand on Jolly Roger's arm.
"She didn't come this way," he said, "but maybe you'll find hersomewhere else. Won't you have breakfast with me? I've a stranger inthe cabin, still sleeping, who's going into the fire country from whichyou've come. He's hunting for some one, and maybe you can give himinformation. He's going to Cragg's Ridge."
"Cragg's Ridge!" exclaimed Jolly Roger. "What is his name?"
"Breault," said the youth. "Sergeant Breault, of the Royal NorthwestMounted Police."
Jolly Roger turned to stroke the neck of a horse waiting for its morningfeed. But he felt nothing of the touch of flesh under his hand. Cold asiron went his heart, and for half a minute he made no answer. Then hesaid:
"Thanks, friend. I breakfasted before it was light and I'm hitting outinto the brush west and north, for the Rainy River country. Please don'ttell this man Breault that you saw me, for he'll think badly of mefor not waiting to give him information he might want. But--youunderstand--if you loved the brother who died--that it's hard for me totalk with anyone just now."
The young man's fingers touched his arm again.
"I understand," he said, "and I hope to God you'll find her."
Silently they shook hands, and Jolly Roger hurried away from the cabinwith the rising spiral of smoke.
Three days later a man and a dog came from the burned country intothe town of Fort William, seeking for a wandering messenger of God whocalled himself Father John, and a young and beautiful girl whose namewas Nada Hawkins. He stopped first at the old mission, in whose shadowthe Indians and traders of a century before had bartered their wares,and Father Augustine, the aged patriarch who talked with him, murmuredas he went that he was a strange man, and a sick one, with a littlemadness lurking in his eyes.
And it was, in fact, a madness of despair eating out the life in JollyRoger's heart. For he no longer had hope Nada had escaped the fire, eventhough at no place had he found a conclusive evidence of her death. Butthat signified little, for there were many of the missing who had notbeen found between the last of September and these days of May. Whathe did find, with deadly regularity, was the fact that Father John hadescaped--and that he had traveled to safety ALONE.
And Father Augustine told him that when Father John stopped to restfor a few days at the Mission he was heading north, for somewhere onPashkokogon Lake near the river Albany.
There was little rest for Peter and his master at Fort William town.That Breault must be close on their trail, and following it with themerciless determination of the ferret from which he had been named,there was no shadow of doubt in the mind of Jolly Roger McKay. So afteroutfitting his pack at a little corner shop, where Breault would be slowto enquire about him, he struck north through the bush toward Dog Lakeand the river of the same name. Five or six days, he thought, wouldbring him to Father John and the truth which he dreaded more and more tohear.
The despondency of his master had sunk, in some mysterious way, intothe soul of Peter. Without the understanding of language he sensed theoppressive gloom of tragedy behind and about him and there was a wolfishslinking in the manner of his travel now, and his confidence was goingas he caught the disease of despair of the man who traveled with him.But constantly and vigilantly his eyes and scent were questing aboutthem, suspicious of the very winds that whispered in the treetops. Andat night after they had built their little cooking fire in the deepestheart of the bush he would lie half awake during the hours of darkness,the watchfulness of his senses never completely dulled in the stupor ofsleep.
Since the night they had stopped at the settler's cabin Jolly Roger'sface had grown grayer and thinner. A number of times he had tried toassure himself what he would do in that moment which was coming when hewould stand face to face with Breault the man-hunter. His caution, afterhe left Fort William, was in a way an automatic instinct that worked forself-preservation in face of the fact that he was growing less and lessconcerned regarding Breault's appearance. It was not in his desireto delay the end much longer. The chase had been a long one, with itsthrills and its happiness at times, but now he was growing tired andwith Nada gone there was only hopeless gloom ahead. If she were dead hewanted to go to her. That thought was a dawning pleasure in his breast,and it was warm in his heart when he tied in a hard knot the buckskinstring which locked the flap of his pistol holster. When Breaultovertook him the law would know, because of the significance of thisknot, that he had welcomed the end of the game.
Never in the northland had there come a spring more beautiful than thisof the year in which McKay and his dog went through the deep wilds toPashkokogon Lake. In a few hours, it seemed, the last chill died out ofthe air and there came the soft whispers of those bridal-weeks betweenMay and Summer, a month ahead of their time. But Jolly Roger, for thefirst time in his life, failed to respond to the wonder and beauty ofthe earth's rejoicing. The first flowers did not fill him with the oldjoy. He no longer stood up straight, with expanding chest, to drink inthe rare sweetness of air weighted with the tonic of balsams and cedarspruce. Vainly he tried to lift up his soul with the song and bustleof mating things. There was no longer music for him in the flood-timerushing of spring waters. An utter loneliness filled the cry of theloon. And all about him was a vast emptiness from which the spirit oflife had fled for him.
Thus he came at last to a stream in the Burntwood country which ran intoPashkokogon Lake; and it was this day, in the mellow sunlight of lateafternoon, that they heard coming to them from out of the dense forestthe chopping of an axe.
Toward this they made their way, with caution and no sound, until in alittle clearing in a bend of the stream they saw a cabin. It was a newlybuilt cabin, and smoke was rising from the chimney.
But the chopping was nearer them, in the heart of a thick cover ofevergreen and birch. Into this Jolly Roger and Peter made their way andcame within a dozen step
s of the man who was wielding the axe. It wasthen that Jolly Roger rose up with a cry on his lips, for the man wasFather John the Missioner.
In spite of the tragedy through which he had passed the little gray manseemed younger than in that month long ago when Jolly Roger had fled tothe north. He dropped his axe now and stood as if only half believing,a look of joy shining in his face as he realized the truth of what hadhappened. "McKay," he cried, reaching out his hands. "McKay, my boy!"
A look of pity mellowed the gladness in his eyes as he noted the changein Jolly Roger's face, and the despair that had set its mark upon it.
They stood for a moment with clasped hands, questioning and answeringwith the silence of their eyes. And then the Missioner said:
"You have heard? Someone has told you?"
"No," said Jolly Roger, his head dropping a little. "No one has toldme," and he was thinking of Nada, and her death.
Father John's fingers tightened.
"It is strange how the ways of God bring themselves about," he spoke ina low voice. "Roger, you did not kill Jed Hawkins!"
Dumbly, his lips dried of words, Jolly Roger stared at him.
"No, you didn't kill him," repeated Father John. "On that same night ofthe storm when you thought you left him dead in the trail, he stumbledback to his cabin, alive. But God's vengeance came soon.
"A few days later, while drunk, he missed his footing and fell from aledge to his death. His wife, poor creature, wished him buried in sightof the cabin door--"
But in this moment Roger McKay was thinking less of Breault the Ferretand the loosening of the hangman's rope from about his neck than he wasof another thing. And Father John was saying in a voice that seemed faraway and unreal:
"We've sent out word to all parts of the north, hoping someone wouldfind you and send you back. And she has prayed each night, and each hourof the day the same prayer has been in her heart and on her lips. Andnow--"
Someone was coming to them from the direction of the cabin--someone, agirl, and she was singing,
McKay's face went whiter than the gray ash of fire.
"My God," he whispered huskily. "I thought--she had died!"
It was only then Father John understood the meaning of what he had seenin his face.
"No, she is alive," he cried. "I sent her straight north through thebush with an Indian the day after the fire. And later I left word foryou with the Fire Relief Committee at Fort William, where I thought youwould first enquire."
"And it was there," said Jolly Roger, "that I did not enquire at all!"
In the edge of the clearing, close to the thicket of timber, Nada hadstopped. For across the open space a strange looking creature had racedat the sound of her voice; a dog with bristling Airedale whiskers, anda hound's legs, and wild-wolf's body hardened and roughened by months offighting in the wilderness. As in the days of his puppyhood, Peter leaptup against her, and a cry burst from Nada's lips, a wild and sobbing cryof PETER, PETER, PETER--and it was this cry Jolly Roger heard as he toreaway from Father John.
On her knees, with her arms about Peter's shaggy head, Nada staredwildly at the clump of timber, and in a moment she saw a man break outof it, and stand still, as if the mellow sunlight blinded him, and madehim unable to move. And the same choking weakness was at her own heartas she rose up from Peter, and reached out her arms toward the grayfigure in the edge of the wood, sobbing, trying to speak and yet sayingno word.
And a little slower, because of his age, Father John came a momentlater, and peered out with the knowledge of long years from a thicketof young banksians, and when he saw the two in the open, close ineach other's arms, and Peter hopping madly about them, he drew out ahandkerchief and wiped his eyes, and went back then for the axe which hehad dropped in the timber clump.
There was a great drumming in Jolly Roger's head, and for a time hefailed even to hear Peter yelping at their side, for all the world wasdrowned in those moments by the breaking sobs in Nada's breath and thewild thrill of her body in his arms; and he saw nothing but the upturnedface, crushed close against his breast, and the wide-open eyes, and thelips to kiss. And even Nada's face he seemed to see through a silverymist, and he felt her arms strangely about his neck, as if it was allhalf like a dream--a dream of the kind that had come to him beside hiscampfire. It was a little cry from Nada that drove the unreality away.
"Roger--you're--breaking me," she cried, gasping for her breath in hisarms, yet without giving up the clasp of her own arms about his neck inthe least; and at that he sensed the brutality of his strength, and heldher off a little, looking into her face.
Pride and happiness and the courage in his heart would have slunk awaycould he have seen himself then, as Father John saw him, coming fromthe edge of the bush, and as Nada saw him, held there at the end of hisarms. Since the day he had come with Peter to Cragg's Ridge the bladeof a razor had not touched his face, and his beard was like a brush,and with it his hair unkempt and straggling; and his eyes were red fromsleeplessness and the haunting of that grim despair which had dogged hisfootsteps.
But these things Nada did not see. Or, if she did, there must have beensomething beautiful about them for her. For it was not a little girl,but a woman who was standing there before Jolly Roger now--Nada grownolder, very much older it seemed to McKay, and taller, with her hair nolonger rioting free about her, but gathered up in a wonderful way on thecrown of her head. This change McKay discovered as she stood there, andit swept upon him all in a moment, and with it the prick of somethingswift and terrorizing inside him. She was not the little girl of Cragg'sRidge. She was a WOMAN. In a year had come this miracle of change, andit frightened him, for such a creature as this that stood before himnow Jed Hawkins would never have dared to curse or beat, and he--RogerMcKay--was afraid to gather her back into his arms again.
And then, even as his fingers slowly drew themselves away from hershoulders, he saw that which had not changed--the wonder-light in hereyes, the soul that lay as open to him now as on that other day inIndian Tom's cabin, when Mrs. Captain Kidd had bustled and squeaked onthe pantry shelf, and Peter had watched them as he lay with his brokenleg in the going down of the sun. And as he hesitated it was Nadaherself who came into his arms, and laid her head on his breast, andtrembled and laughed and cried there, while Father John came up andpatted her shoulder, and smiled happily at McKay, and then went on tothe cabin in the clearing. For a time after that Jolly Roger crushed hisface in Nada's hair, and neither said a word, but there was a strangethrobbing of their hearts together, and after a little Nada reached up ahand to his cheek, and stroked it tenderly, bristly beard and all.
"I'll never let you run away from me again--Mister--Jolly Roger," shesaid, and it was the little Nada of Cragg's Ridge who whispered thewords, half sobbing; but in the voice there was also something verydefinite and very sure, and McKay felt the glorious thrill of it as heraised his face from her hair, and saw once more the sun-filled worldabout him.
The Country Beyond: A Romance of the Wilderness Page 17
