CHAPTER X

THE ESCAPE

Mrs. McBirney sat at her loom. Eyes, hands and feet were busy; but no matter how busy she kept them she could not keep her mind and heart at ease. She had come back home when she found that the search for her missing girl would be a long one, and from early morning till late at night she kept about her tasks. She had a theory that there was nothing like work to help a troubled mind to forgetfulness, and she put her theory to the full test.

Pa McBirney went about his tasks, too, and his face grew careworn as he saw the old restlessness and torment coming back in his wife’s face.

“That’s just the way she carried on after your sister Mollie passed away,” he said to Jim. “You wouldn’t think she’d take Azalea’s loss so hard, but then it’s kind o’ emptied her life again.”

“Well,” said Jim in an old way he sometimes had, “if she knew Azalea was dead and safe, perhaps she wouldn’t feel so dreadful bad. But not knowing where a body is—that’s what I call tormenting. When I think of the things that might be happening to Azalea—her maybe going hungry or being beat with sticks, or goodness knows what all—it makes me as nervous as a bat. Hi’s just the same way, too.”

Hi’s broken arm had made it impossible for him to return to the mill, and he was spending his time with the McBirneys. He seemed to be actually greedy to learn all he could of this pleasant home. He listened to all Ma McBirney had to say, as if her words were gold; he watched Pa McBirney about his work; he played chess with Jim and studied Jim’s schoolbooks under Mrs. McBirney’s direction.

Mrs. McBirney wrote home to his mother for him, and told her all that had happened to him. At first Hi objected.

“My uncle Hank Sisson will be after her first chance he gets, to find out where I am, and if she knows, he’ll worm it out of her,” the boy objected.

“That’s neither here nor there, Hi,” Ma McBirney had insisted. “She’s just aching to know what’s happening to her boy, and I’m going to let her know. Why, you ought to be with your ma, Hi. Somehow or other we’ve got to get the family down here. Now, when your arm’s well, you can go back to the mill, and perhaps some of the other children are old enough to take a hand too; and what with all the tourists that come to Lee, your ma could sure find work—washing, or sewing, or some such thing.”

“Oh, my, wouldn’t that be fun!” sighed Hi.

“See here, Mary,” Pa McBirney had broke in, “what makes you lift up that boy’s hopes the way you do? Like as not they’ll all be dashed to earth.”

“What a-way should they be dashed for, father? Ain’t it right that Hi and his ma should be together? And don’t you believe that what’s right will come to pass?”

Pa shook his head doubtfully. “I don’t know as that has been according to my experience,” he said.

“Of course it has, Thomas. You know it has! And everything’s going to come right for Hi—and for Azalea, Thomas—and for you and Jim and me! You’ll see! You mustn’t break down my faith, Thomas.”

And Thomas McBirney, looking at her face with its look as of a light burning through it, knew that he must not, indeed.

The second Saturday after Azalea’s disappearance, a letter came to the Lee post office for Pa McBirney from Haystack Thompson. It read like this.

“Deer Nabor:

“How many wagons did the Sisson All Star Combinashun have when you saw them last? Adres me with the show.

“C. W. Thompson.”

Pa McBirney made use of the telegraph for the first time in his life, being moved to the act by the insistence of Mr. Carson. He responded briefly:

“There were three wagons. Why? Wire my expense.”

And the answer came:

“Because now he’s got two only. I am fiddling for the show.”

“Good old Haystack!” cried Mr. Carson when he read the telegraphic message. And he himself ventured on a dispatch to Mr. Thompson.

“Keep on fiddling,” he wired. “The third wagon will come back.”

Then Mr. Carson rode home hard with the news to his Carin; and Mr. McBirney put his tired horses up the long mountain road to carry the word to his Mary. And Azalea’s friends took heart, and hoped on and prayed on; and the sheriff made his more or less languid inquiries, and the newspapers printed articles, and hundreds of people who did not know Azalea at all were very much interested.

But all this was not greatly helping Azalea through the long days. They kept out of sight as much as possible—Betty Bowen and her odd “family.” By creeping along old roads and only stopping at the most out-of-the-way villages they seemed to escape the curiosity of the people. Indeed, many of those they came across seemed not to have energy enough for anything so lively as curiosity. Azalea always had taken an interest in the world, and the best part of the old life had been, to her, the quiet journeys along the roads, with the glimpses they gave of farmhouses and cabins and little towns. Now that she had come to know so many warmhearted new people, and that her own heart was aglow with the remembrance of it all, her interest in the homes she passed was keener than ever. So long as she was allowed to sit where she could look out, she did not greatly mind the days. In spite of the constant watch kept over her, and of the fact that she had not dreamed it would be so long before she was restored to her friends, she would not be downcast, and it was only when Bet gave the word that they were to halt and go into camp for a day that the girl found life unendurable.

To be sure she grew very weary of going over and over the same thoughts; of wondering and wondering why no one came to her aid; of thinking what would happen to her when they had caught up with Sisson and his show. But when the dread and the fear were at their worst, she remembered certain words that Ma McBirney had spoken to her.

“No matter what comes to you, Azalea,” she had told her once, “you keep your heart full of God’s light and of God’s love, and nothing can really harm you. You mind what I say, child. You do that and the angels of the Lord will compass you about.”

If Betty Bowen had been her enemy she could have broken the child’s heart, or let her become exposed to some of those vague dangers which Azalea half imagined. But she was not her enemy. In her tired, discouraged way she seemed to like her. And she admired her. She used to command the child to sing and Azalea sang the sweet songs she had learned from Carin and from Ma McBirney.

They had crept up into the mountains by roundabout ways, and were now feeling their way toward the Sisson All Star Combination, the precise location of which they did not know. When Azalea learned that, in spite of herself, she began to feel anxious. Little by little the courage in her heart oozed out, leaving her a sad and trembling child. If the old-time wanderings with the show had been hateful to her when she was with her mother, she knew they would be much, much more so now that she was alone and unfriended. It is possible for children to feel black despair, and something like that came to Azalea. It was evident to her that her friends had failed to get on her track, and in the long, idle, sodden hours of thought, she decided that her escape depended on herself.

Little by little the watch set over her had grown less strict. She had made no attempt to get away, and Betty and her son had come to count her in as a part of their company. They could not, indeed, imagine what would become of her should she leave them. Sour and bitter as their natures were, they really could not help liking this winsome girl, whose voice and manner seemed to speak to them day by day of better things than they had ever known. And liking her, they no doubt felt that she liked them. At least, as they traveled together, or made camp in some wild, beautiful mountain cove, or worked side by side around the camp fire, she gave no sign that was not friendly. Even Tige had come to watch her in a spirit of defense rather than of attack.

So one night when they had been sitting late before the camp fire, and she had gone into the tent to go to bed, she crept beneath the canvas at the rear and stole away through the woods. If it had not been for the crackling of the camp fire, she might have been overheard; and if it had not been for the growing weakness which kept poor weary Bet drowsing sleepily there before the blaze, her escape would soon have been discovered. But as it was, not even the alert Tige had a hint of her going. He lay snoring and nuzzling before the fire, dimly aware that his master was near, and asking for no greater happiness. And that master sat there beside him, his head in his hands, thinking thoughts that for him were strange indeed. He had come back from a life of wandering and self-indulgence to prey upon his mother. She was a clever one—so he put it—and if she wanted him to keep out of mischief, let her find some way to care for him! But now, after these weeks in the company of the young girl who looked out at life with kind and trusting eyes, and who was polite even to the woman who kept her prisoner, Rafe began to see things in a different light. He had meant to torment that girl, and he had thought that he would have pleasure in doing it. But he had, someway, not been able to carry out his intention. She had seen through him—had believed in his good nature in spite of everything. And he knew now that he wanted to be the way she thought him. He wanted her to think of him as something besides a bully and jailer. He wished his mother were different from what she was; wished from the bottom of his heart that the two of them were something better than wandering vagabonds. If they had lived in a proper house, if his father had not left them, if he could have had a sister like Azalea, he would have made a very different fellow of himself from what he was.

He wondered if, after all, it was too late. There were things he knew how to do. If his mother would give up this wandering and settle down in some quiet little place and keep Azalea with her, and if they could have really good things to eat, and a hearth to sit before rainy nights, and clothes that were decent and clean, why perhaps, after all, a fellow could “get shet” of the drinking of corn whiskey and the gambling and all. Rafe was young still, and the little kind angel of his better impulses had not all been slain by his black selfishness and his coarse appetites. So he sat and dreamed before the fire, and was somehow washed almost innocent again by the great sea of goodness that forever stretches about us, and in which we may, if we will, bathe and purify ourselves. The night and the stars, the wind and the fire were there to help him find himself. And while he dreamed, Azalea clipped on through the thick-growing laurel, skirted a little spring-fed pond, and finding the wagon-road, fled down the mountain with feet that felt as light as feathers—as light as her heart. All of her courage had come rushing back. She said to herself that she would never be taken again—never. She was not going to have her life spoiled. It was her life and she meant to “run it” to suit herself. And as she fled, it seemed as if the little brown, thin hands of her dead mother were held out to help her; and as if the strong, kind hands of Ma McBirney were stretched in welcome; and the good, freckled hands of Jim and Hi beat together in encouragement.

Yes, they were patting “juba” for her, were Jim and Hi, and to the patter, patter, her feet sped on. She was not afraid of the night. She liked it. The stars saw what she was doing and were glad. The night bird that called out, kept the woods from being too solitary. The very wind was in her favor, and pushed at her back. Sometimes she stopped to rest, and she would have liked to sleep. But it seemed foolish to do that. The point now, was to get safe away.

“I was caught napping once,” she said to herself with a dry little laugh, “but I don’t mean to be again.”

Along toward morning she came on a little village—one she had not seen before. There was not a light anywhere, but the houses clustered together like comfortable sheep in the darkness, and she felt happier for being among them. Now that she was safe with these other human creatures, her weariness and sleepiness almost overcame her. It was growing chilly as the morning air quickened—though as yet there was no hint in the sky of coming light—and she shivered in her thin clothes. She still wore the white frock that had been so dainty and sweet the day of the Singing, but which was now a dusty rag. Her hat she had left behind her. The hair Ma McBirney had taught her to brush every night was full of the dust of the road. All of that pleasant cleanliness which she recently had been taught, had been of necessity lost in the life she had been leading. She felt ashamed as she thought how she would look to strangers, who probably would think her a miserable vagabond. However, her state could be remedied in time. Now the thing was to get in out of the cold; for she was drenched with sweat and her damp clothes clung to her.

She turned into one of the little yards, and going around to the rear of the house, tried the handle of a shed door. It yielded, and she stepped into a dark little room smelling of firewood. At the far side was an open door, and she groped her way to it and stood on a little framed-in porch with wire netting on the one exposed side. And there, neatly made, was a cot bed, waiting, it seemed, for some weary child to crawl in between its warm blankets. Azalea took off her worn and dusty shoes and her disgraceful frock, and stretched herself between the comforts. The next moment she was sound asleep.

* * * * *

A few hours later, the Sisson All Star Combination, rattling down the mountain side, came upon the wagon and the tent of Betty Bowen, ranged side by side in a comfortable little pocket away back from the road—the same road that Azalea had taken a mile lower down, after her hurried taking of the short cuts.

Sisson greeted the encampment with a whoop, and brought Rafe, shock-headed and heavy-eyed, from his bed of straw in the wagon.

“Well,” said Sisson, “you ain’t getting up early to hang out the wash, be you? Where’s Bet? Where’s the girl?”

Rafe pointed at the tent with his thumb.

“In there, I reckon. We all sat late last night around the fire.”

“Huh! Mighty social, ain’t you? Had any trouble with that girl?”

Rafe frowned and shook his head.

“Well, get ’em out of the tall grass,” commanded Sisson. “I want to see ’em.”

Rafe went to the tent door and called, but Bet was sleeping heavily, and her son, looking at her jaded face, hesitated to arouse her. It was Azalea whom Sisson wanted to see, and Rafe said to himself that Sisson would have to treat her well, or there would be trouble. He could see the girl’s bed bunched up as if she were rolled underneath the bed clothes, but when he called there was no answer, and at last, half frightened, he went over to awaken her. But when he got closer he discovered there was no one in the bed. The clothes were tossed up as if some one lay there, and he saw at a glance that they had been purposely made to look that way. For a minute his heart sank; and then, suddenly, with a strange new unselfishness, it lightened. Azalea had slipped from Sisson’s clutches after all. Rafe drew his belt a little tighter, pushed his hat on the back of his head, and going out, faced the company.

“The girl’s lit out,” he said briefly.

“What?” screamed Sisson. And before Rafe could say more, a man—the tallest, it seemed to Rafe, that he ever had set his eyes upon, came stalking around from behind one of the wagons. He was hatless, and revealed a startling shock of hair, and underneath his arm he carried a fiddle in its case.

“What you say, you speckled cub?” he roared.

“The girl’s lit out,” Rafe repeated. He grinned at them cheerfully, and was still grinning as Sisson advanced with fight in his eye.

“Ain’t you onto your job any better than that?” he yelled, still coming on. Rafe looked almost languid as he watched him, but just as Sisson got ready for a rush at him, the great arm of the young mountaineer shot forward, striking his “boss” cleanly between the eyes. And down in the dust went the head of the Sisson All Star Combination. Every one except the man with the violin laughed. He seemed hardly to have noticed Sisson’s downfall. He turned his piercing eyes on the young man and said in a voice as cold and keen as a sword-edge:

“Tell me where the girl is.”

That new, strange gathering of little good angels conspired again to make Rafe answer:

“I don’t know, sir. She went into that tent last night. That’s the last I seen of her. I didn’t set the dog to watch last night—I got tired of treating that little thing like she was a convict. So she’s slipped away.”

Something very like applause came from the All Stars, and it grew a little louder as Bet, having been awakened by the noise, appeared at the door. They were giving her credit, she understood, for having connived at the child’s escape.

“But she may be near at hand,” continued the man with the fiddle.

“I reckon not, sir. Her bed was fixed up to look like she was in it. She’s lit out all right.”

“Then I’ll do the same,” said Haystack Thompson. He reached in one of the wagons and drew out a few clothes tied in a square of homespun. “So long, folks,” he said. “Hope you’ll enjoy yourselves.”

The All Stars stared and forgot their manners, so that “Haystack” had to make his way on down the mountain with no one to say goodbye.

“So he was spying out the girl the whole time!” said they to each other.

But what they thought or knew was of no consequence to Haystack now. He swung on down the road, peering here and there, and hallooing at the top of his lungs every few minutes.

“Zalie! Zalie McBirney!” he shouted. “Where you hiding? This is ole Haystack come to take you home. Don’t be afeard, Zalie. Answer up, that’s a good girl.”

But no answer came; and a couple of hours later when he had reached the contented little town of Barrington, he went to the telegraph office and with the help of the obliging young operator sent this message to Mr. Carson.

“Found the third wagon, but not the girl. Search party going out to-day.”