Chapter 10

The Hot Blood of Youth

The spring warmed into summer, the summer melted into autumn. Autumn, in turn, chilled into the white world of winter. All thoughts of the little girl on the _Far West_ had slipped from the mind of Danvers, and even the memory of Miss Thornhill became faint--obliterated by the strenuous life of the service. Promotion came in his third year of service as a reward for intelligence and efficiency. Danvers was offered and accepted a commission. He felt that life was good. Fears and homesickness had long since disappeared; the longings for other and more congenial, refined and feminine associates came but seldom; still, the desire for the understanding of one alone, for a loved wife and a son to bear his name was not dead--it was simply dormant in that womanless land.

"The doctor will be here next week," announced Arthur Latimer, who had been bookkeeper in one of the trading-posts ever since he had come to Macleod, soon after Danvers was made a second lieutenant. "Colonel Macleod, I hear, has invited quite a party to visit him from Fort Benton."

"Yes. I heard from the doctor, too." Philip smiled at thought of his friend's surprise at his new rank.

It was not long before the visitors arrived, and, greatly to Danvers' surprise, Miss Thornhill, accompanied by her father, the major, was among them.

The first white woman that he had seen for three years! He had never before realized how dainty a lady is in comparison with her sisters of the lodges. They may be kin in the world relationship, but, oh! the difference one from the other. The squaws, standing stolidly by, were intolerable. As Eva walked consciously past with Colonel Macleod, attended by the staff officers, she gave no sign of recognition other than a heightened color and lowered eye-lashes; but Philip felt that she recognized him. Before the girl reached the barracks Mr. Burroughs entered the stockade. With the assurance of a favored acquaintance, he advanced and pressed the hand of Miss Thornhill.

Danvers turned away. So new a mood assailed him that he went outside the stockade and prowled along the outer wall, not waiting to do more than greet the doctor. How he longed for a touch of that dainty hand, for a word from Eva--from _any_ young woman of his own race! All the manhood, all the heart-hunger of the isolated years, surged within him. He smiled rather piteously. He had not realized that he was starving for the sight of fair skin, sunny hair and slender hands; for a bonny white face--white--white! That was it! A white face, a womanly face! He hardly noticed the muttered "How" of Pine Coulee as she passed, her young babe slung over her back. But he returned her salutation, and after they passed each other he recalled a look on her usually expressionless face that he had never seen there before.

"Here, Phil! Wait for us!" Latimer was calling, and Danvers soon forgot his perturbation in the pleasure of the doctor's presence and congratulations, as he came up with Arthur.

"Got so you can talk, eh?" asked the doctor, noting how the young men vied in their efforts to entertain him. "I told the colonel that I was coming up here to see you, fully as much as him--good friends as we are. You are good to look at, both of you."

"Arthur always could talk," smiled Danvers, "and I can--with my friends."

"How is Burroughs getting along?" asked the doctor, as the trader passed them, too absorbed, apparently, in the recollection of his meeting with Miss Thornhill to note either them or Pine Coulee, who followed him.

"Remarkably well, from a financial standpoint. His living with a squaw makes him popular with the Indians, and the colonel swears by him--thinks he's perfect."

"And the trade in whiskey?"

Latimer shrugged his shoulders expressively.

"That's Bob's squaw," said Arthur, after an awkward pause. "She's as proud as a peacock of that papoose. She rather lords it over her former associates of the lodges."

The doctor whistled. He knew Pine Coulee's story, but had not heard of the child. "Bob will want to marry some day," was his sole comment. "Has Me-Casto ever been caught?"

"No. When he does turn up, Robert Burroughs may look out for trouble."

"Why did Toe String Joe leave the Force?" asked the doctor presently. "He has been in Fort Benton for some little time."

"Drummed out of the service. But he wouldn't tell who supplied him with the whiskey. What is he doing now?"

"Joe is mining. He declares he will be a millionaire."

"He'll be a millionaire when Danvers turns American and runs for office," scoffed Latimer, remembering Joe's shiftless disposition and making the most improbable comparison that he could think of.

"He will never be one, then," said Philip, quietly. "I cannot think of anything that would make me break my allegiance to England. I am going to stay in the service--I like it! And as for American politics!... You know what I think of them." He smiled affectionately to atone for the words.

The glimpses that the troopers and younger officers caught of Eva Thornhill in the following week were few. Nevertheless a gust of love-madness swept through the ranks, from the officer commanding to the newest recruit. Nor were the townsmen behind in their attempts to win a part of the girl's time and thoughts--if not herself. Burroughs easily led in favor, and Lieutenant Danvers effaced himself. So rigidly did he do so that it was not long before Miss Thornhill found the flavor of rue in her Canadian visit. The smart lieutenant had made no advances, had sought no introduction. Eva demanded the homage of all, accustomed as she was to the frontier life where women were too rare to be neglected. No chaperon was thought of in the freedom of the frontier, and, indeed, none was needed among the innately chivalrous Westerners. This little world of Macleod revolved around her--all but the silent, unobtrusive Danvers, whose acquaintance seemed the more desirable in direct ratio to his aloofness. Eva resolved to win him, and Arthur Latimer was artfully sounded for the cause of his friend's indifference. The Southerner, already playing at love with the fair-haired belle, and at no pains to conceal it, readily undertook to find out.

"Why don't you meet Miss Thornhill?" he asked.

"I am very busy these days," interrupted the lieutenant, giving his excuse hastily. Not even to his friend could he disclose how he was drawn toward the only white representative of her sex at Macleod.

"But she wants to know you. She wants to meet you," insisted the loyal Arthur, who had sung Danvers' praises industriously and unselfishly.

"Why, Arthur!" Philip cried, gaily, to cover the tremor in his voice that would not be subdued when he learned that this haughty maid had thought of him. "If you are as much in love with Miss Thornhill as you pretend to be, you want to speak for yourself. But she evidently prefers Bob Burroughs, and I, for one, think I'll keep out of temptation." He slapped the ardent Southerner affectionately on the back. "No chance for either of us, old man! Don't talk of me to her! She will think us asses--amiable idiots!"

"I know there's no chance for me," replied Latimer, aggrieved. "What have I to offer a wife--I'm poor as the proverbial church mouse."

"Anyway, leave me out of your conversations."

"I'll see that you do not meet her!" returned the Missourian, in mock alarm. Then they laughed light-heartedly. "I know whom she'd choose--if she had the opportunity. Burroughs wouldn't stand a show, nor I either."

"There she is now." Danvers nodded toward the ford, where he had seen, for several moments, the trader and Eva riding easily.

"Bob's got his nerve! How about Pine Coulee and the child?" exploded Latimer.

"S-sh!" warned Philip, seeing a movement of the bullberry bushes near them.

As the young men looked toward the riders, whose mounts were close together and walking slowly, a dark face, with passionate eyes gleaming, pushed cautiously out from the sheltering branches, and Pine Coulee also watched the unconscious maid and the trader.

* * * * *

When Colonel Macleod, wishing to impress his American visitors, ordered the troops under his command to go through their cavalry exercises, Miss Thornhill sat on a glossy mare beside him, while troopers passed at a walk or trot, and wondered why she had found it so difficult to meet Lieutenant Danvers. As the lines of superb and faultlessly groomed men and horses swept past on the last mad gallop she forgot her brooding and clapped her hands enthusiastically.

"Oh, Colonel Macleod! That was splendid! Make them go on, and on!" she cried.

"Why, of course, if you wish," assented the gallant Macleod, forgetting that the rise of ground directly in front of him had the river on its farther slope.

"Phat's the colonel thinkin' of?" growled O'Dwyer, as no halt sounded.

"He's not thinkin' at all!" responded the man next in alignment, sourly. "A man can't think when a slip of a girl's near by."

"He's forgot the river!" groaned the fleshy Irishman, dreading the certain plunge.

Into the stream they dashed, many of the men over their heads, for there was no turning back.

As the horses balked, Lieutenant Danvers' stallion threshed viciously, hitting O'Dwyer, and then ceased to swim.

O'Dwyer groaned, "Me a-r-rm!"

It was over in an instant. Those on shore assisted Danvers and the Irishman to land. O'Dwyer was left in Philip's care, while the rest of the men rode back, as the review must not be interrupted.

Eva saw the break in the ranks.

"Lieutenant Danvers has dropped out," she exclaimed, and straightway bit her lip.

"Philip?" hastily asked the Fort Benton doctor, on a horse near by. "Then there has been an accident!"

The sergeant-major rode up to report, but the impulsive Eva did not wait for details. She touched her mare and was after the doctor.

"I'm so sorry!" cried the girl, as she met Danvers and O'Dwyer returning. "It's all my fault that you are wet--and hurt! Which one is hurt?" She turned provocative eyes to the dripping lieutenant.

"O'Dwyer has a sprained elbow," answered Philip, his heart dancing at her solicitude. "It was through my carelessness."

"Don't ye be belavin' a wor-rd he says, miss!" burst out O'Dwyer. "That is (beggin' yer pardon fer spakin' to the loikes of yez, an' me a private!), don't ye belave 'tis his fault. He kep' me from drownin', that's what he did!"

O'Dwyer had noted his idol's preoccupation since Miss Thornhill's advent, the self-imposed aloofness, and had drawn his own shrewd conclusions. He determined, here and now, to do Danvers a good turn, despite the frown on the doctor's face and Philip's frantic signaling. "Lieutenant Danvers is the finest feller God ever made!" he blurted, regardless.

"Oh, keep still! _Keep still!_" cried the exasperated Englishman. This misplaced loquacity!

Eva reached out suddenly, frankly.

"I think it's time we knew each other," she said, sweetly, and their hands met.

That touch! Never had the unsophisticated youth felt such a touch! A thrill of exquisite life went from her hand to his; from his hand to his feet and the vibrations went tingling back to the girl. For the first time Philip looked full into the blue eyes of Eva Thornhill.

"You're a fool, O'Dwyer!" Danvers heard the doctor remark, as they proceeded toward the fort. The humbled trooper, hitching his arm in the improvised sling which Philip had made, groaned doleful assent. Too late he remembered the barrack-room decision that Miss Thornhill was after every scalp in the Whoop Up Country.

And Eva Thornhill? Her opportunity had come, and she had taken it as a gift from the gods. Suddenly she knew that Philip was merged in her personality, and she reveled in the bloom of quickly grown, fully developed passion. By the time the lieutenant assisted her from her mare at the colonel's headquarters she was ready to think that there was nothing to keep them apart. So quickly, hotly, does young blood run!

Her answer to the question that was ready to slip from his tongue--what would it be? As Danvers lifted the flushing girl from her mount, her eyes gave promise beneath their long-lashed veiling that the answer would not be "no."

It was not many days before Major Thornhill took his daughter to task for her neglect of Mr. Burroughs.

"Don't you let go of Burroughs," he counseled, with brutal sordidness. "These young lawyers and lieutenants haven't a cent, so far as I can find out. Burroughs has money and will have more. Remember that an army officer never has anything to leave to his mourners."

Eva shrugged her shoulders; but her training showed her the wisdom of her father's advice, and she bestowed more favor on the trader than he had received for several days. However, she decided that one more ride with the lieutenant she must have, and so impetuous was Philip that she allowed him to say more than she intended he should. His wooing was eager, headlong.

As they drew near the town on their return from their long ride, the girl saw a squaw peering from the bushes beside the trail.

"Who is that squaw?" she asked, petulantly. "It seems to me that I never go out but she is near me!"

"Oh--er----" he stammered, losing, for a moment, his self-possession as he recognized Burroughs' property. He knew that the trader had pledged his intimates to secrecy as to his relations with Pine Coulee while Miss Thornhill was a visitor at Macleod, and he, while not pledged, would be the last one to bring her in any way to Eva's notice. "Oh," he began again, "she's a Blackfoot."

"That is evasion, pure and simple!" retorted his companion. "She wants either to speak to me--or to kill me, I've not decided which. Wait here! I am going to speak to her!"

"You are probably the first white woman she ever saw," Philip tried vainly to make a satisfactory explanation; but, to his consternation, Eva was gone.

Pine Coulee stood motionless as the fair-haired girl drew rein beside her. Never had she shown her Indian blood more clearly than in the stolid awaiting of her rival. Danvers drew nearer, fearing results.

"Do you speak English?" Pine Coulee was asked. "I think that you want to speak to me. What is it? What can I do for you?" The look of dejection on the dark face touched even Miss Thornhill.

Silence.

"What a big baby!" was Eva's next effort to gain good-will.

She was sure that the squaw could, at least, understand English; and the gleam of motherhood, kindling at her praise, confirmed her belief.

Silence.

"What is the baby's name?"

Silence prolonged. Eva turned away, impatient that her advances should be met so churlishly. Then, swift, malignant, Pine Coulee spoke:

"Him name Robert Burroughs! _Robert Burroughs!_" The words came with startling distinctness.

Eva's surprise was great. She shuddered uncontrollably.

Pine Coulee understood the incredulity in the girl's eyes, and rushed on, bitterly, in broken English:

"Yes. Robert Burroughs! Ask him!" pointing to Danvers with her lips, as Indians will. "Burroughs mine! You not have him! You take this man! You have everything--Pine Coulee have nothing but Bob and his baby! You sha'n't have him! No! No!" The squaw, crazed with jealousy, started towards Burroughs' house, but turned back with real dignity. "I hate you! Why you come to steal my man?"

Then she abruptly took her bitter way along the trail till--Burroughs blocked her. He gave her one look and rode forward.

"Your father sent me to look for you, Miss Thornhill," he began, as he drew rein. He resolved to carry the matter off boldly, if Eva referred to the Indian woman. "If you like, we will ride back together," he added, nodding to Danvers.

"No, no, no!" cried Eva, hysterically. "I'm afraid of--of that--squaw!" She pointed to Pine Coulee, who had followed Burroughs like a blighting shadow.

"Git out of here!" Burroughs emphasized his command to the squaw with a vicious kick. Not realizing how much the words would reveal, he added: "I tol' yeh ter stay in the house!"

"I'll care for Miss Thornhill, Burroughs," interrupted Danvers. "Let us pass, please! Take Pine Coulee back and leave decent white women to others."

"To you?" sneered the trader, with suddenly loosened rage at maid and man.

"Yes, to me!" proudly answered Philip, drawing closer to Eva's mount. The girl was scarlet with rage.

"Oh, it's that way, is it?" snarled Bob. "You told Miss Thornhill--that's plain to be seen!"

"He did not tell!" Eva slipped from her lover's protection and reined her horse toward Burroughs. "Lieutenant Danvers tried to shield you. She--she----" Eva looked at Pine Coulee, nursing her bruised forehead (for Burroughs had kicked to hurt) and changed her words. "The lieutenant never--he never intimated--such--a--horrid--thing. Of course you will understand that I no longer care for your acquaintance!" The reaction came and she begged: "Oh, Lieutenant Danvers, take me to father!"

"Oh, you don't, eh?" sneered the trader. "There are many years ahead of us both, and the time may come when you will want my help! And you," turning to Danvers, "I'll get even with you! If I can't win Eva Thornhill, you never shall, mark my words! I'll----"

"You dare to threaten--us? Get out of our way!"

With a touch Danvers quickly started both his horse and Miss Thornhill's. After a brief interval he slowed the pace.

"And now, darling, you must let me care for you always," urged Philip, after he had restored Eva to some semblance of calm. "Let me speak to your father to-night!" He talked on, encouraged by the girl's silent yielding and the long kiss he laid on her willing lips. She was told of his prospects, both in the army and in England, where his father and sister lived. He told her of his lovely American mother, who had died so young. He had enlisted, he said, for sheer love of a military life.

"Father wanted to buy a commission for me, but I knew I could get one--without money!" was the modest close.

The afternoon together ended by Philip's putting his mother's engagement ring on Eva's hand for their plighted troth. She looked at it a moment.

"I cannot wear this now," she said. "If we are engaged, I want it to be kept secret until next spring. Don't you see, dear," she rubbed her face caressingly on Philip's impatient hand, "that it will be better so? Father will be furious when he knows that I've given Mr. Burroughs his conge, and you'll come into your fortune when you are twenty-one next June. Father'll never consent until then. He'll make me miserable all winter!"