Chapter 5

She didn't know why her breath suddenly caught in awe. Some way the scene before her eyes scarcely seemed real. The thickets hid the stream to the right and left, and all she could see was the stretch of gray water immediately in front. It was wide and fretful, and in the half-light someway vague and ominous. It had reached up about the trunks of some of the young spruces on the river bank, and the little trees trembled and bent, stirred by the waters; and they seemed like drowning things dumbly signaling for help. Because the farther bank was almost lost in the dusk the breadth of the stream appeared interminable. In reality it was a full ninety yards at the shallower head of the rapids where the moose trail led down to the water.

The roar of the river had come so gradually to her ear that now she was hardly aware of it; indeed the wilderness seemed weighted with silence. But it was true that she heard a terrifying roar farther down the stream. Yet just beyond, perhaps a mile from the opposite bank, lay camp and rest,--a comfortable cabin, warmth and food. She hoped they would hurry and make the crossing.

But Bill halted at the water's edge, and she rode up beside him. He seemed to be studying the currents. The pack train caught up, and Lounsbury's horse nudged at the flank of her own animal. "Well?" Lounsbury questioned. "What's the delay? We're in a hurry to get to camp."

"It's pretty high," Bill replied softly. "I've never tried to cross when it was so high as this." It was true. The rains and the snow had made the stream a torrent.

"But, man, we can't camp here. No horse feed--no cabin. We've got to go on."

"Wait just a minute. Time is precious, but we've got to think this thing out. We can put up a tent here, and cold as it is, make through the night someway. I'm not so sure that we hadn't ought to do it. The river looks high, and it may be higher than it looks--it's hard to tell in the twilight. Ordinarily I cross at the head of the rapids--water less than three feet deep. But it isn't the depth that counts--it's the swiftness. If the river is much over three feet, a horse simply can't keep his feet--and Death Canyon is just below. To be carried down into that torrent below means to die--two or three parties, trying to ship furs down to the Yuga, have already lost their lives in that very place. The shallows jump right off into ten feet of water. It'll be tough to sleep out in this snow, but it's safer. But if you say the word we'll make the try. At least I can ride in and see how it goes--whether it's safe for you to come."

Lounsbury didn't halt to ask him by what justice he should take this risk--why he should put his own life up as a pawn for their comfort and safety. Nor did Bill ask himself. Such a thought did not even come to him. He was their guide, they were in his charge, and he followed his own law.

"Try it, anyway," Lounsbury urged.

Bill spoke to his horse. The animal still stood with lowered head. For one of the few times in his life Bill had to speak twice,--not sharply, if anything more quietly than at first. The the brave Mulvaney headed into the stream.

As Bill rode into those gray and terrible waters, Virginia's first instinct was to call him back. The word was in her throat, her lips parted, but for a single second she hesitated. It was part of the creed and teachings of the circle in which she moved to put small trust in instinct. By a false doctrine she had been taught that the deepest impulses of her heart and soul were to be set aside before the mandates of convention and society; that she must act a part rather than be herself. She remembered just in time that this man was not only an employee, a lowly guide to whom she must not plead in personal appeal. She had been taught to stifle her natural impulses, and she watched in silence the water rise about the horse's knees.

But only for a second the silence endured. The the reaction swept her in a great flood. The generous, kindly warmth of her heart surged through her in one pulse of the blood; and all those frozen enemies of her being--caste and pride of place and indifference--were scattered in an instant. "Oh, come back!" she cried. "Bronson--Bill--come back. Oh, why did I ever let you go!"

For Bill did not look around. Already the sound of the waters had obscured the voices on the shore. Again she called, unheard. Then she lashed her horse with the bridle rein.

The animal strode down into the water. Vosper, his craven soul whimpering within him, had fallen to the last place in the line, but Lounsbury tried to seize her saddle as she pushed forward.

"Where are you going, you little fool?" he cried. "Come back."

The girl turned her head. Her face was white. "You told him to go in," she replied. "Now--it's the sporting thing--to follow him."

The water splashed about her horse's knees. Lounsbury called again, commandingly, but she didn't seem to hear. She lifted her feet from the stirrups as Bill had done before her, and the angry waters surged higher.

Already she knew the strength of the river. She felt its sweeping force against the animal's frame: the brave Buster struggling hard to keep his feet. Ahead of her, a dim ghost in the half-light, Bill still rode on toward the opposite shore. And now--full halfway across--he was in the full force of the current.

It was all too plain that his horse was battling for its life. The stream had risen higher than Bill had dreamed, and the waters beat halfway at the animal's side. He knew what fate awaited him if he should lose his foothold. Snorting, he threw all of his magnificent strength against the current.

It was such a test as the animal had never been obliged to endure before. He gave all that he had of might and courage. He crept forward inch by inch, feeling his way, bracing against the current, nose close to the water. In animals, just the same as in men, there are those that flinch and those that stand straight, the courageous and the cowardly, the steadfast and the false,--and Mulvaney was of the true breed. Besides, perhaps some of his rider's strength went into his thews and sustained him. Slowly the water dropped lower. He was almost to safety.

At that instant Bill glanced around, intending to warn his party not to attempt the crossing. He saw the dim shape of Virginia close behind him, riding into the full strength of the current.

All color swept in an instant from his face, leaving it gray and ashen as the twilight itself. Icy horror, groping and ghastly, flooded his veins as he saw that he was powerless to aid her. Yet his mind worked clear and sure, fast as lightning itself. Even yet it was safer for her to turn back than attempt to make the crossing. He knew that Buster's strength was not that of Mulvaney, and he couldn't live in the deepest, swiftest part of the river that lay before her.

"Turn back," he said. "Turn your horse, Virginia--easy as you can."

At the same instant he turned his own horse back into the full fury of the torrent. It had been his plan to camp alone on the other side of the river, returning to the party in the better light of the morning; but there was not an instant's hesitation in turning to battle it again. His brave horse, obedient yet to his will, ventured once more into that torrent of peril. Virginia, cool and alert, pressed the bridle rein against her horse's neck to turn him.

On the bank Lounsbury and Vosper gazed in fascinated terror. Buster wheeled, struggling to keep his feet. Mulvaney pushed on, clear to the deepest, wildest portion of the stream. And then Virginia's horse pitched forward into the wild waters.

Perhaps the animal had simply made a misstep, possibly an irregularity in the river bottom had upset his balance. The waters seemed to pounce with merciless fury, and struck with all their power.

In the half-light it was impossible even for Bill to follow the lightning events of the next second. He saw the horse struggle, flounder, then roll on his back from the force of the current. It swept him down as the wind sweeps a straw. And he saw Virginia shake loose from the saddle.

He had but an instant's glimpse of a white face in the gray water, of hair that streamed; an instant's realization of a faint cry that the waters obscured. And then he sprang to her aid.

He could do nothing else. When the soul of the man was made it was given a certain strength, and certain basic laws were laid down by which his life was to be governed. That strength sustained him now, those laws held him in bondage. He could be false to neither.

He knew the terror of that gray whirlpool below. He had every reason to believe that by no possible effort of his could he save the girl; he would only throw away his own life too. The waters were icy cold: swiftly would they draw the life-giving heat from their bodies. Soaked through, the cold of the night and the forest would be swift to claim them if by any miracle they were able to struggle out of the river. Yet there was not an instant's delay. The full sweep of his thoughts was like a flash of lightning in the sky; he was out of the saddle almost the instant that the waters engulfed her. He sprang with his full strength into the stream.

On the bank the two men saw it as in a dream: the horse's fall, the upheaval of the water as the animal struggled, a flash of the girl's face, and then Bill's leap. They called out in their impotence, and they gazed with horror-widened eyes. But almost at once the drama was hidden from them. The twilight dropped its gray curtains between; besides, the waters had swept their struggling figures down the stream and out of their sight.

Already the river looked just the same. Mulvaney, riderless, was battling toward them through the torrent, but the stress and struggle of the second before had been instantly cut short. There was no spreading ripples, no break in the gray surface of the stream to show where the two had fallen. The stream swept on, infinite, passionless for all its tumult, unconquerable,--like the River of Death that takes within its depths the souls of men, never to yield them, never to show whence they have gone.

The storm recommenced, the wind wailed in the spruce tops, and the snow sifted down into the gray waters.

VII

Bill Bronson had no realization of the full might of the stream until he felt it around his body. The waters were fed from the snowfields on the dark peaks, and every nerve in his system seemed to snap and break in the first shock of immersion. But he quickly rallied, battling the stream with mighty strokes.

He knew that if the rescue were accomplished, it would have to be soon. The torrent grew ever wilder as it sped down the canyon: no human being could live in the great, black whirlpool at its mouth. Besides, the cold would claim him soon. Just a few little instants of struggle, and then exhaustion, if indeed the icy waters did not paralyze his muscles.

He swam with his eyes open, full in the current, and with a really incredible speed. And by the mercy of the forest gods almost at once he caught a glimpse of Virginia's dark tresses in the water.

She was ten feet to one side, toward the Gray Lake shore of the river, and several feet in front. The man seemed simply to leap through the water. And in an instant more his arm went about her.

"Give yourself to the current," he shouted. "And hang on to me."

He knew this river. They were just entering upon a stretch of water dreaded of old by the rivermen that had sometimes plied down the stream in their fur-laden canoes,--a place of jagged rocks and crags and bowlders that were all but submerged by the waters. To be hurled against their sharp edges meant death, certain and speedily. He knew that his mortal strength couldn't avail against them. But by yielding to the current he thought that he might swing between them into the open waters below. His arm tightened about the girl's form.

He had not come an instant too soon. Already she had given up. A fair swimmer, she had been powerless in the rapids. She had not dreamed but that the trail of her life was at an end. She was cold and afraid and alone, and she had been ready to yield. But the sight of the guide's strong body beside her had thrilled her with renewed hope.

Even in the shadow of death she was aware of the strong wrench of his muscles as he swam, the saving might of his powerful frame. She knew that he was not afraid for himself, but only for her. Even death, with all its shadow and mystery, had not broken his spirit or bowed his head: he faced it as he faced the wilderness and the whole dreadful battle of life,--strongly, quietly, with never-faltering courage. And the girl found herself partaking of his own strength.

Up to now she had not entered into comradeship with this man. But had held herself on a different plane. But he was a comrade now; no matter the outcome, even if they should find the inhospitable Death at the end of their trial, this relationship could never be destroyed. They fought the same fight, in the same shadow. Now she would not have to enter the dark gates of Eternity alone and afraid. Here was a comrade; she knew the truth at the first touch of his arm. He could buoy up her spirit with his own.

"If I let go of you, can you hang on to my shoulder?" he asked her.

"Yes----"

He tried to look into her face, to see if she spoke the truth. But the shadows were almost impenetrable now, and the air was choked with falling snow.

"Then put your hand on my shoulder. I can't make progress the way I'm holding you now. I'll try to work in to the nearest shore."

She seized his shoulder, but nearly lost her grasp in a channel of swift water. Her fingers locked in the cloth of his shirt. And he began, a little at a time, to cross the sixty feet of wild water between them and the shore.

He had never been put to a greater test. Every ounce of his strength was needed. The tendency of the stream was to carry him into the center of the current, he was heavily clothed and shod, and the girl, exhausted, was scarcely able to give aid at all. More than once he felt himself weakening. Once a sharp pain, keen as a knife wound, smote his thigh, and he was shaken with despair at the thought that swimmer's cramps--dreaded by all men who know the water--were about to put an end to the struggle. In the icy depths his bodily heat was flowing from him in a frightfully rapid stream.

Closer and closer he swam, and at last only thirty feet of fast, deep water stretched between. But it seemed wholly impossible to make this last stretch. The sharp pain stabbed him again, and it seemed to him that his right leg only half responded to the command of his nerves. In a moment more they would be flung again into the cascades.

"I'm afraid I can't make it," he said, too softly for Virginia to hear. He wrenched once more toward the shore.

But the river gods were merciful, after all. A jack pine had fallen on the shore, struck down by a dead tree that had fallen beyond, and its green spire, still clothed with needles, lay half-submerged, forty feet out into the stream. Bill's arm encountered it, then snatched at it in a final, spasmodic impulse of his muscles. And his grip held fast.

For an instant they were tossed like straws in the water, but gradually he strengthened his grip. He caught a branch with his free hand, then slowly pulled up on it. "Hang on," he breathed. "Only a moment more."

He drew himself and the girl up on the slender trunk, then crawled along it toward the shore. Now they were half out of the water. And in a moment later they both felt the river bottom against their knees.

He drew her to the bank, staggered and fell, and for a moment both of them lay lifeless to the soft caress of the snow. But Bill did not dare lose consciousness. He was fully aware that the fight was only half won. And despair swept the girl when her clear thought returned to tell her they had emerged upon the opposite shore from the party, and that they were drenched through and lost in the night and storm,--endless, weary paces from warmth and shelter.

Before the thought had gone fully home she saw that Bill was on his feet. The twilight had all but yielded to the darkness, yet she saw that he still stood straight and strong. It was not that he had already recovered from the desperate battle in the river. Strong as he was, for himself he had only one desire--to lie still and rest and let the terrible cold take its toll. But he was the guide, the forester, and the girl's life was in his care.

"Get off your clothes," he commanded. "All of them--the darkness hides you--and I'll wring 'em out. If I don't you can't live to get to the cabin. Your stockings first."

The thought of disobedience did not even come to her. He was fighting for her life; no other issue remained.

"Rub your skin all over with your hands," he went on, "and keep moving. Above all things keep the blood going in your veins. Rub as hard as you can--I can't make a fire here--with no ax--in the snow."

Already she had tossed him her drenched stockings, and he was wringing them in his strong hands. She rubbed her legs dry with her palms, and put the stockings back on. Then she drew off her coats and outing suit, and he wrung them as dry as he could. Then quickly she dressed again.

"Now--fast as you can walk toward the cabin."

He was not sure that he could find it in the darkness. He hoped to encounter the moose trail where it left the ford; beyond that he had to rely on his woodsman's instincts. He was soaked through and exhausted and he knew from the strange numbness of his body that he was slowly being chilled to death. It was a test of his own might and endurance against the cruel elements and a power beyond mere physical strength came to his aid.

They forced their way through the evergreen thickets of the river bank, walking up the stream toward the ford. He broke through the brushy barriers with the might of his body; he made a trail for her in the snow. The darkness deepened around them. The snow fell ever heavier, and the winds soughed in the tree tops.

After the first half-mile all consciousness of effort was gone from the girl. She seemed to move from a will beyond her own, one step after another over that terrible trail. She lost all sense of time, almost of identity. Strange figures, only for such eyes as might see in the darkness, they fought their way on through the drifts.

But they conquered at last. Partly by the feel of the snow under his feet, partly by his woodsman's instincts, but mostly because the forest gods were merciful, Bill kept to the moose trail that led from the ford to the cabin. And the man was swaying, drunkenly, when he reached the door.

His cold hands could scarcely draw out the rusted file that acted as a brace for the chain. Yet his voice was quiet and steady when he spoke.

"There are blankets in there, plenty of 'em," he told her. "It's my main supply cabin. Spread some of them out and take off your clothes--all of 'em--and get between them. I'll build a fire as fast as I can."

She turned to obey. She heard him take down an ax that had been left hanging on the cabin walls and heard his step in the snow as he began to cut into kindling some of the pieces of cordwood that were heaped outside the door. She undressed quickly, then lay shivering between the warm, heavy blankets.

In a moment the man faltered in, his arms heavy with wood. She heard him fumbling back of the little stove, then a match gleamed in the gloom. She had never seen such a face as this before her now. Its lines were deep and incredibly dark: utter fatigue was inscribed upon the drawn features and in the dark, dull eyes. She was suddenly shaken with horror at the thought that perhaps she was looking upon the first shadow of death itself.

He had cut the kindling with his knife, inserted the candle end, and a little blaze danced up. She watched him feed the fire with strange, heavy motions. He took a pan down from the wall, then went out into the darkness.

Haunted by fears, it seemed to her she waited endless hours for him to return again. When he came the pan was filled with water from a little stream that flowed behind the cabin. He put it on the stove to heat.

She dozed off, then wakened to find him sitting on the edge of her bed, holding a cup of some steaming liquid. Vaguely she noticed that he had taken off his wet clothes and had put on a worn overcoat that had been hanging back of the stove, wrapping two thick blankets over this. He put his left arm behind her and lifted her up, then fed her spoonfuls of the hot liquid. She didn't know what it was, other than it contained whisky.

"Take some of it yourself," she told him at last.

He shook his head and smiled,--a wistful yet manly smile that almost brought tears to her eyes. That smile was the last thing that she remembered. The warm, kindly liquor stole through her veins, and she dropped into heavy slumber.

* * * * *

In the stress of that first hour after the disaster of the river, Lounsbury and Vosper had a chance to test the steel of which they were made. This was the time for inner strength, and courage, and beyond all things else, for self-discipline. But only the forest creatures, such little folk as watch with beady eyes from the coverts all the drama of the wilderness, beheld how they stood that test.

For the first few seconds Lounsbury sat upon his horse and simply stared in mute horror. Then he half-climbed, half-fell from the saddle, and followed by Vosper, started running down the river bank. Immediately he lost sight of Virginia and Bill. Almost at once thereafter the cold and the darkness got into his spirit and appalled him.

"They're lost, they're lost," he cried. "There's not a chance on earth to get 'em out."

The branches tripped him and he fell sprawling in the snow. He got up and hastened on. Vosper, his thews turning to mushroom stalks within him, could only follow, swearing hoarsely. At each break of the trees they would clamber down to the water's edge and look over the tumultuous wastes, and each time the twilight was deeper, the snow flurries heavier. And soon they came to a steep bank which they could not descend.

"It's a death trip. I knew it was a death trip," Lounsbury moaned. "And what's the use of going farther. They haven't a chance on earth."

They did, however, push on a short distance down the river. Lounsbury was of the opinion it was very far indeed. In reality it was not two hundred yards in all. And they halted once more to stare with frightened eyes at the stream.

"It ain't the first this river's taken," Vosper told him. "And they never even found their bodies."

"And we won't find these, now," Lounsbury replied. They waited a little while in silence, trying to pierce the shadows. "What do you suppose we'd better do?" he questioned.

"I don't know. What can we do?"

"There's no chance of saving them. They're gone already. No swimmer could live in that stream. Why did we ever come--it was a wild-goose chase at best. If they did get out they'd be lost--and couldn't find their way. It seems to me the wisest thing for us to do is to go back--and build a big fire--so they can find their way in if they did get out."

It was a worthy suggestion! The voice of cowardice that had been speaking in Lounsbury's craven soul had found expression in words at last. He was frightened by the storm and the darkness, and he was cold and tired, and a beacon light for the two wanderers in the storm was only a subterfuge whereby he might justify their return to camp. The understrapper understood, but he didn't disagree. They were two of a kind.