Chapter 52

THE BIG MAN

Darkness settled over the North country. The sky had cleared, the wind gone down, and the air was soft and balmy with the feel of spring. A million stars sparkled overhead and above the intense blackness of the pines the moon rose, flooding the timberland with the mystery of her soft radiance.

Ethel tossed uneasily in her cot and glanced across to where her aunt and Mrs. Sheridan slumbered heavily. Then she arose and stood at the window gazing out on the moonlit clearing with its low, silent buildings, and clean-cut, black shadows.

Noiselessly she dressed and stole into the silvery world. Utterly wretched, dispirited, heartsick, she wandered aimlessly, neither knowing nor caring whither her slow, dragging steps carried her.

Somewhere in the distance, sounding faint and far, came the shouts of men. Unconsciously she wandered toward the river. On the edge of a high bluff overlooking the rollways and the rushing waters she paused, leaning wearily against the bole of a giant birch.

Thanks to the quick action of Bill Carmody Moncrossen's scheme of fouling the upper drive had taken no toll of human life. The few rollways that were broken out, however, were sufficient to cause a nasty jam, and far below where the girl stood the men of both crews worked furiously among the high-piled logs.

Weird and unreal it seemed to Ethel as she gazed down upon the flare of huge fires built upon the bank, the tiny flash of lanterns and the flicker of torches, where the men swarmed out upon the uncertain footing.

Rough calls of rough men sounded above the crash and pound of logs and the roar of the rushing waters. Now and then a scrap of rude chantey reached her ears, a hoarse oath, or a loud, clear order in a voice she knew so well.

It was like some eery fantasy, born of an overwrought brain. And yet she knew it was real--intensely real. Down there among the flashing lights men played with death--big, rough men who laughed loud as they played, and swore mighty oaths, and sang wild, full-throated songs.

From the shadow almost at her side came the sound of a half-stifled sob. She started. There was a soft footfall on the leaf-mold, and before her stood Jeanne Lacombie. The soft moonlight touched with silvery sheen the long hairs of the great, white wolf-skin which the girl wore thrown loosely across her shoulders.

As Ethel gazed upon the wild, dark beauty of the Indian girl her tiny fists clenched, and her breath came in short, quick gasps.

Why was she here? Had she followed to taunt her to her face? A mighty rage welled up within her, her shoulders stiffened, and as she faced the girl her blue eyes flashed.

And then the Indian girl spoke, and at the first words of the soft, rich voice, the rage died in her heart. She looked closely, and in the dark, liquid eyes was a look the white girl will never forget.

She listened, and with few words and all the dramatic eloquence of the pure Indian the half-breed girl told of the rescue from the river; of her own love for M's'u' Bill, "The-Man-Who-Cannot-Die"; of his firm rejection of that love; of her pursuit of him when he started for the land of the white man; of the scene at the camp-fire when old Wa-ha-ta-na-ta called him "The One Good White Man"; of the broken knife; of The Promise; of her peril at the hand of Moncrossen, and of the cold-blooded shooting of her brother.

And then she told of Bill's all-absorbing love for her, Ethel. And of how he always loved her, even when he believed she hated and despised him; of his deep hurt and the misery of his soul when he believed that she was to marry another.

Until suddenly there in the moonlight the girl of the city saw for the first time the bigness of the man--_her man_. She saw him as he was now and as he had been in the making--the man who had been dubbed "Broadway Bill, the sport"; the "souse," who had "soaked a cop" and then "beat it in a taxi."

And then the man who, without name or explanation, had won the regard of such a keen judge of men as Appleton, and who, under the stigma of theft, held that regard without question; the man who beat the booze game after he had lost his heart's desire, and had been sneered at as a coward and a quitter; the man who having gained his heart's desire, in the very bigness of him, had unhesitatingly risked wrecking his whole life's happiness to keep his promise to an old, toothless, savage crone; and who, in brute fashion, bare-fisted, had all but pounded the life from the body of the hulking Moncrossen in defense of a woman's honor.

And _this_ was the man who, eighteen short months before, had turkey-trotted upon the sidewalk in front of a gay resort, and had "pulled it too raw even for Broadway!"

The flood-gates of her soul opened, as is the way of women in all the world. The great sobs came, and with them tears, and in the tree-filtered moonlight the two girls--the tutored white girl and the half-savage Indian--women both--wept in each other's arms.

* * * * *

Up the trail from the river, almost at their feet, wearily climbed a man, dog-tired from physical exertion; and worn out with responsibility and heart-rack he toiled slowly up the steep ascent.

At the top he paused and removed his cap to let the cool air blow against his throbbing temples. At the sight of the two forms he drew back; but at the same moment they saw him.

With one last, long look, and no word of farewell save a dry, choking sob, the Indian girl glided silently into the darkness of the forest, which was her home, and the home of her people.

On the edge of the bluff the other stood silhouetted against the star-flecked sky. She, too, gazed at the man who stood motionless in the moonlight. Then with a lithe, quick movement she opened her arms to him, her lips parted, and in the blue eyes blazed the love of all the ages.

As her body poised to meet his the man sprang toward her. His arms closed about her, their lips met; and for a long, long time they looked deep into each other's eyes.

Then slowly the tiny fingers closed about his, the girl raised them reverently to her lips and covered with kisses the great, bruised, and swollen hands.

THE END