Part 19

Digging his hand into his pocket, he brought it forth full of yellow grains, which he emptied carelessly into Joe's twitching palm. The heads of the four white men came together, and the four pairs of eyes showed the same insane glitter.

"This is the stuff!" cried Joe, pouring the grains with a voluptuous pleasure from palm to palm. "Sweeter than booze! sweeter than women! It'll buy you plenty of both! Gad! I'll keep a great chest of it always by me, and come dig in it every day for the pleasure of the feel and the heft of it!"

"Can we get it out through the cave?" asked Jim.

"Sure!" said Philippe. "It's easy going."

"How about the girl?" demanded Joe.

"She is there with her family."

"How many?"

"An old man, a young man, two boys, and four women."

"H'm! They could make it awkward for us," said Joe frowning.

"They not care for gold," said Philippe, with an innocent, stolid air. "Wash a little, and let it lie. When I tell Nahnya you all here, him feel bad. Him say no use. Him say not fight you."

"Come on, then!" cried Joe excitedly. "Let's lose no time!"

"Come on!" echoed Stack and Crusoe Campbell. The desire was no less strong in Jim Sholto's face. He looked at Kitty uneasily.

Philippe hung back. "I paddle half the night!" he said, with an admirable assumption of the disgruntled servant. "I walk all day. Am I a steam-engine? I got eat and sleep now."

"Sleep?" cried Joe. "Man, there's a fortune waiting for every one of us in there!"

"I got sleep, me," Philippe repeated stubbornly. "The gold is there to-morrow just the same, I guess."

"Damn these redskins!" cried Joe. "They're all alike!"

"Go yourself," said Philippe. "The way is free. Don' blame me if you fall in the hole, or get lost."

A heated argument resulted. Philippe was inexorable. He knew well enough that the white men would not venture into the bowels of the earth without him. Philippe finally picked up his blanket, and carrying it apart lay down and affected to go to sleep. The others were obliged to resign themselves to wait.

Meanwhile Jim Sholto was in a quandary. He could not bear to have Kitty camping with that rough crew, and he was jealous of leaving her a moment alone with Ralph, yet he could not tear himself away from the vicinity with such riches waiting to be gathered. He could not but compare the ease of washing gold in a stream with the strenuous labour of smelting ore in little home-made furnaces.

He compromised with himself by establishing his camp a few hundred yards away from Joe's. It was the spot where the operation had been performed on old Marya's arm. Ralph was secretly gladdened by the choice of the spot. It was not far for Nahnya to come. During the rest of the afternoon Ralph and Kitty slept. Jim occupied himself in building a shelter of branches to house Kitty throughout the night.

There was not much conversation around this campfire. It irked Ralph to be obliged to accept Jim's grim hospitality, but there was no help for it. Immediately after supper Kitty disappeared within her shelter, and Jim soon lay down in his blanket athwart the entrance. He made no objection to Ralph's dragging his bed to a little distance. If Ralph had escaped altogether, Jim would have been only too well pleased.

When Jim's snores began to displace the heavy stillness of the forest, Ralph rose and dragged his blankets still farther away. Jim had tied him in such a manner that his left arm was free from the elbow. He arranged his bed after a fashion directly in the trail, and lay down to wait. It was about nine o'clock. It would not be dark until after ten. He knew that Nahnya could not venture out of the cave until then, and that he must give her time to make a detour of the other camp.

He lay in a kind of fever watching for evidences of darkness with avid eyes. One cannot measure the subtle stages of the passing of day any better than its coming. It goes and it comes and all is said. Thus to Ralph counting the crawling minutes it seemed as if the bright sky clung obstinately to its brightness, and as if the dim spacious aisles of the forest refused to grow dimmer. Losing patience at last, he closed his eyes and tossed restlessly. When he opened them again, behold! it was nearly dark.

His heart began to beat, and his mouth went dry. In every whisper of the leaves he thought he heard the brush of her skirt. The tiny, furry footfalls that began to stir among the pine needles suggested her creeping moccasins, now on this side, now on that. A dozen times he started to a sitting position, sure he heard her, only to fall back disappointed. The thought that something might finally prevent her from coming turned him sick with apprehension.

She came as softly as a breath through the forest, and dropped on her knees beside him, without his having heard her coming. His eyes were well-used to the darkness, and he could make her out faintly; her graceful head outlined against a patch of sky overhead; her two hands pressed hard to her breast in a way that he knew. He heard, or fancied he heard, her heart's quick beating. A great peace succeeded the torture of suspense.

"You've come!" he breathed.

"I am mad! I am foolish!" she faltered.

He apprehended that the slightest thing would send her flying back again. By turning a little he managed to reach her hand and to pull it down to his lips. Her fingers crept eagerly inside his, as she had never allowed them to do before. She had confessed nothing with her voice yet, but her whole being breathed a passionate warmth over him that made him dizzy with happiness.

"Nahnya, darling, untie my hands," he whispered.

"No!" she said tremulously.

He pleaded with her urgently.

Her trembling hand stroked his cheek with a touch like flower petals. "Ah, do not make me fight you now," she begged. "I so tire of fighting you, Ralph. You know if I let you free, you not let me go back. I must go back! Do not make me sorry I come!"

"This is harder to bear than Joe Mixer's tortures!" he bitterly complained.

She tried to disengage the hand he clung to. "If you say that, I must go now," she whispered sadly.

It terrified him. "No! No! Anything you want!" he said swiftly.

"Let me stay quiet by you a little," she whispered. "Let me love you quiet a little."

"Tell me you love me, and I'm satisfied," he said.

She sank down beside him and kissed him softly on the lips. "I love you! I love you! I love you!" she murmured, with such passion as he had never dreamed of hearing on the lips of a woman. "I love you the first time I see you! Always it near kill me to make out I do not love you! I love you till I die!"

They were silent for a space, clinging to each other, cheek to cheek in the darkness, their breasts tossing on stormy sighs.

He said brokenly at last: "Nahnya, this is the strongest thing in the world. Nothing else matters. You must not leave me!"

She partly raised herself, and put a gentle hand over his mouth. "In your heart you know I mus' go," she whispered. "In your heart you know ver' well there mus' not be anything between you and me! Do not spoil our little time together by speaking of it!"

His head rolled impatiently on the ground. "I cannot live without you," he muttered. "I will not live without you!"

She kissed him. "Yes, you will," she said softly. "You will promise me now to live the best life you can. Because I am going to live, and always I want think of you living brave and happy and curing the sick!"

"Happy!" he said bitterly.

"It will come," she said, with quiet certainty.

"Put your hand in my pocket," he said. "There is something there for you."

She found the necklace and kissed it. "I will always wear it," she said.

She lay down beside him again, on the edge of his blanket, but not touching him, except that she caught his free hand and pressed it hard to her cheek. "Often I am think the same," she whispered. "I think what is the use of living a life like mine! But always something stop me from ending it. Something make me to go on living, sad as life is. Death is for those who are shamed, I think. I am not shamed. You are not shamed."

"You're braver than I," he murmured.

"You're plenty brave," she whispered, kissing his hand. "To-day I see you think you are shamed because you think you bring trouble on me. You think you will jus' step off the little bridge----"

"How did you know that?" he cried, astonished.

"I see it in your eyes," she said simply. "I love you. Often I know what you are thinking. That is why I say I come to-night. I want tell you I love you! I want tell you I think you are strong and brave. I glad you love me! I glad you love me hard enough to come back when I tell you no. I not sorry for anything. It is not your fault that the other men come after you, or that you told the secret when you were sick. That was going to happen. Such things are not understood by us. You mus' not be shamed. I not have you shamed, because you are my brave, good man!"

"You're an angel of comfort," he murmured. "I was ashamed!"

"Promise me now that you will make the best life you can," she whispered.

"I promise," he said.

Her quiet voice broke. "Oh, my darling love!" she cried. "Always, always I will be thinking of you! Wherever you are my spirit will go to you to love you and make you happy. You are my husband and my baby, too! Oh! I cannot speak more! How can I let you go! How can I let you go!"

She clung to him, her warm tears running down his face. He could not speak. He soothed her silently. She fought down the sobs. By and by she said quaintly:

"That is over."

When she got her breath back she partly raised herself, and said: "Another promise, Ralph."

"What?"

"Kitty."

He moved restlessly.

"Be good to her," she pleaded. "She is jus' sweet!"

"Impossible!" he said. "She's too much mixed up in this. I never want to see her again!"

"By and by maybe you change," said Nahnya softly. "If it was not for me you would marry Kitty. She is the one for you."

"Never!" cried Ralph.

The soft hand was clapped over his mouth again. "Do not swear it!" she said. "Who can tell how you feel by and by? Take what comes. You will like her, I think. Not like this----" Her voice shook again. "I not want it just like this. But it will be good. And if you feel kind to her you will remember that I wished it, and it will not be false to me. Promise me, if you feel good and kind to Kitty you will marry her!"

"It will never be!" he cried.

"Then what harm to promise me?" she said quickly. "It make me a little happy."

"Very well, if I change I will marry her," he said sullenly. "But I will never change!"

"Kitty will be good to you," murmured Nahnya, "and watch you, and take care of you almost as good as me. Kitty--will have babies! I think of that--it is a pain and a gladness, too!"

"Nahnya," he said, "you hurt me!"

She clung to him again. "No!" she breathed in a voice as tender and thrilling as starlight; "my love will not hurt you; it will make you strong! It will be a more wonderful love because we cannot be together. It will be more real than what you see! It will shelter you like a house over your head, and comfort you like a fire in winter! Whenever you close your eyes I will be there, waiting for you! Good-bye, my brave man, my darling love!"

She was gone before he realized she was going.

XXIII

THE LAST SCENE

Joe Mixer and his men sat up late counting the golden harvest they expected to reap; consequently next morning the sun was high in the sky before the fat man woke. The instant consciousness returned to him the thought of "Gold!" sprang up in his mind as if written in letters of the metal. He sat up knuckling the sleep from his eyes. Instead of the breakfast that usually awaited him, he saw Crusoe and Stack still slumbering beside him. He awakened them with no gentle urgency.

"What's the matter with you!" he bawled with his own picturesque expletives. "It's past six o'clock, and we were going to start at five!"

Crusoe, the cook, looked around him in a dazed way. "The breed said he'd wake me," he said; "I left it to him."

They saw Philippe's tumbled blanket on the ground beyond Stack. "He's gone off, damn him!" cried Joe. "Hunting a puny rabbit most like! They're all alike! Look sharp with the breakfast!"

While Crusoe cooked, Joe and Stack collected and packed the camp impedimenta. In his eagerness to get away, the fat man was as active as a stripling. When breakfast was ready, and the half-breed had not yet returned, his anger was boundless. The camp atmosphere was lurid. As yet he did not suspect any treachery, for as a result of his experience with the race he had withheld Philippe's pay, and even a breed does not run off with money owing him. Besides, he had left his good blanket behind him.

After breakfast they scattered to look for him, awaking the forest with their hails. Crusoe found tracks made that morning in the ravine. Joe and Stack joined him, and they followed the tracks toward the mouth of the cave.

"Maybe he got up early to get in ahead of us," said Stack, paling at his own suggestion.

"By Gad! if he has----" cried Joe.

But the tracks led them beyond the drift-pile.

"It's game he's after," said Joe, reassured.

Crusoe, who was a pace in advance, had stopped, and was examining the creek bed attentively. "There's another track here," he said suddenly; "a small foot--a woman's foot! That's his game!"

The three men looked at each other with growing suspicions. "Get along after them!" cried Joe harshly.

But none of them moved. They had become aware simultaneously of a curious rumbling sound high above them. It approached with terrific swiftness, ending with a mighty crash above, that caused each man instinctively to make himself small, and guard his head with his arms. A great boulder leaped across the ravine, high over their heads, and smashed into the forest on the other side.

Of one accord the three turned and fled down the ravine, little Stack in advance, leaping from stone to stone like an antelope. A shower of pebbles peppered their heads and shoulders harmlessly. Outside the danger zone they halted.

"By Gad! that was a close shave!" said Joe, wiping his face. "They say those stones just naturally work themselves loose on the mountain, and no man can tell when they'll fall!"

"Maybe somebody started it," suggested Stack. His teeth were chattering.

Panic seized them again. They did not stop running until they had climbed the bank of the ravine, and stood in their own camp. From this point nearly the whole of the mountain side was visible. They searched it excitedly.

"It's true!" cried Stack at last. "I see him! I see two of them up there!"

"My binoculars!" shouted Joe.

His hands shook, and it took him a long time to focus the glasses. Stack stood at his elbow instructing him shrilly where to look. Crusoe stood with hanging jaw, looking up like a clown.

Immediately above the entrance to the cave there was a precipitous cliff some seventy-five or a hundred feet high. On top of that was a flat ledge or terrace reaching back. The floor of this terrace was hidden from them, but behind it rose a long, steep bare slide of rubble fully two thousand feet in the air, ending in a ridge or hog-back of broken rock-masses, which extended up at right angles to the base of the final peak of naked rock, the thumb. It was upon the ridge, working among the rock-masses with pine poles for levers, that Stack's sharp eyes had spotted the two tiny figures.

Joe finally got them within the field of his glasses. A frightful rage took possession of him. His face turned purple. He frothed at the mouth and stamped on the ground like a madman. Stack slyly took the binoculars out of his hand or he would have dashed them to the ground. From his broken exclamations and curses the others gathered that he had recognized Philippe and Nahnya. Stack satisfied himself as to the identity of the figures.

Another great stone started to roll down the gigantic slide. They saw it coming before they heard the noise of its passage. They gazed fascinated. As it gathered its terrific way it started to leap higher and higher in the air like a mad elf. It struck the rock ledge with a deafening crash, and like its predecessor bounded high over the ravine and shattered the trees on the other side. The force suggested by the soaring of these tons of matter lightly through the air struck awe into the souls of the beholders. The silence following the final crash of the projectile was broken by a long, dull rumble of the smaller stones displaced in its course. A long cloud of yellow dust arose behind it.

Other rocks, small and large, followed. Stack, through the binoculars, watched the two on the height working desperately with their levers. Joe Mixer had exhausted himself in his transports. He now looked up dumb and suffering with rage, his thick lips snarling and his nails pressed into his palms. Suddenly a light broke on his face, and he cried out:

"There's no danger! The cliff makes a screen. Look, how all the rocks jump clear of the gulch. Come on back!"

Stack had seen this before, but had kept it to himself. Both Stack and Crusoe turned white with terror at the thought of venturing up the ravine beneath that bombardment.

"You white-livered cowards!" cried Joe; "you skulkers! you shivering curs! I'll go alone! And I'll keep what I find!"

No one denied Joe Mixer brute courage. Paying no more attention to the descent of the rocks, he methodically separated a portion of their food for himself, and rolling it within his blanket, strapped the pack on his back. Fastening a belt of ammunition around his waist, he picked up his rifle, and went doggedly down the bank and up the bed of the ravine. All the gold in the world would not have tempted the others to follow.

While he was in the ravine the two on the mountain succeeded in wresting loose a bigger mass of rock than any before. It came down with a frightful impetus. The noise of its coming leaped out of nothingness and stunned the ears. When it struck the ledge of rock they felt the shock below. Joe crouched under a boulder. The mass made a gaping wound in the forest where it earthed itself.

The succeeding rumble from above did not subside, but slowly deepened and increased in volume. Stack, looking up, saw an incredible, an insupportable sight, as in some hideous nightmare. The whole face of the mountain was in motion. He screamed, and cast himself on his face, covering his head with his thin arms. Crusoe followed his example. Joe, hearing the ominous sounds above his head, wavered. The shrill sound of terror decided him. He started to run back down the ravine, but too late. A cataract of broken rocks came pouring over the lip of the cliff.

When Jim Sholto found Ralph that morning he saw at a glance that he had a desperately sick man to deal with. The exertion and the terrible excitement following too soon upon his fever had brought about a relapse. Jim carried him into camp, and Kitty did what little she could for his comfort. Humanity forbade Jim's leaving her alone with the patient, though he chafed to be away with the other men after the gold. To this he owed his life.

They were attending to Ralph when they heard the fall of the first stone. It was a sound they were not unfamiliar with in their own camp, and caused them no perturbation. When several others followed in close succession, Jim looked up.

"That's funny!" he said. "I never knew so many to fall together."

A minute later they heard Stack's scream. Jim jumped up.

"Somebody's caught!" he said grimly.

"Don't go!" cried Kitty sharply.

She had no need to speak. Jim was rooted to the spot. "A whole landslide!" he murmured.

During the next few seconds chaos succeeded. There was a rushing sound as of millions of great wings beating the air, and a shock under which the earth rocked nauseatingly. The uproar was such that human ear could not encompass it. It was like mountainous seas breaking over their heads. Kitty and her father clutched the earth. It shook under their bodies like a jelly. Ralph knew nothing of what was happening. A tremendous silence succeeded, broken only by the detached tapping of falling rocks here and there. Then a brief, terrible wind swept screaming through the forest and was gone. A strange, thick, yellow fog stole among the tree trunks; it left an acrid taste in the nostrils.

As soon as the uproar subsided Jim was for going to see what had happened. Kitty clung to him hysterically. Not until half an hour had passed would she let him leave her, and then only upon his repeated assurances that no further disturbance was likely to occur for the present. Anything that had not been shaken loose by that terrible shock would stick, he said. Kitty herself refused to leave Ralph.

Jim had not gone two hundred yards before he began to meet with evidences of the cataclysm in the scattered rocks and broken trees. A little farther on he came to the edge of the flood of rocks that had poured down from the mountain, obliterating the forest up to this point. He circled the base of the gigantic heap until he came to a point where he could overlook the entire height. This was on the edge of the ravine behind Joe Mixer's camp.

Jim stood, struck to the soul with amazement. The genii had waved their wands and the face of the earth was changed. There was no stream below him; above where he stood there was no longer any gulch or any cliff rising above it. The mountain had stepped forward and stamped them out. A great new spur of raw rubble reeking with yellow dust now reached across in front of him, blotting out the forest like grass as far as he could see on that side. The entrance to the Bowl of the Mountains was somewhere under the middle of the mountain; no man could tell now where it had been, so complete was the change. Joe Mixer's camp had not been in the direct line of the slide, but tons and tons of rock had overflowed at the sides like a liquid, and the place where the fire had been was drowned fathoms deep.

Jim remembered the scream they had heard. "Nothing to do here!" he thought grimly. He returned to Kitty.

Nahnya and Philippe reached a little plateau of rock after a long climb, and sat down to breathe themselves. Their faces were calm. For the moment they were concerned only with their journey. On every side great snowy peaks looked down on them over each other's shoulders. The white fields dipped almost to the level where they sat. Behind them, and far below, the forest ended in the throat of a valley; before them lay a shallower valley of a bleak aspect. It supported only a little scrub and a variegated carpet of moss, and the gorges on either hand were choked with ice.

"This is a divide," Nahnya said. She spoke in Cree. "St. Jean Bateese tell me this trail. The water out of that valley go to the Burning River, he say. It is five days' journey from here."

"I have heard of that river," said Philippe. "It goes to the place of the rising sun, and joins with the Great River of the Ice."

The sun had disappeared some time since behind the peaks on their left hand. Philippe cast a look at the threatening sky. "It will rain to-night," he said. "Let us go down. There is nothing here to make a shelter. There is no wood for a fire."

"Wait a little," Nahnya said. "We must talk--what we do after."

Her simple-sounding words had an electric effect. Both faces changed subtly; hers became wary; his sullen. They avoided each other's eyes.

"We will do what comes," said Philippe, feigning unconcern. "We will walk to the Burning River, and make a raft and float to the Great River of the Ice. Then we can go where we want."