Chapter 11

Little by little gathering courage, she began to pour out her soul for the man she loved. "I never love any man but you, 'Erbe't," so ran the naïve confession; "the breed boys, they always come aroun' and show off. I not lak them. They foolish and dirty; they eat same lak cocouche; and they know not'ing; but they think themself so fine. They mak' me sick! My mot'er say to me; 'You eighteen year old, Rina; w'en you go to marry?' I say to my mot'er, 'I never marry a pig-man; I want to stay to you.'"

Her voice changed, borrowing the soft, passionate music of the nightingale she had never heard. "Then bam-bye w'en the spring come, an' we pitch by Ostachegan creek, an' the crocus flowers are coming up on Sah-ko-da-tah prairie so many as stars in the sky--then you come by our camp, 'Erbe't; and you so poor an' sick I feel ver' bad for you! An' you talk so pretty, and know so much, my heart him fly straight out of my breast like a bird, 'Erbe't; an' perch on your shoulder; an' him go everywhere you go; an' I got no heart any more. I empty lak a nest in the snow-time!

"So you stay to us," she went on, "and I mad to see all the men mock at you, an' treat you bad, an' mak' you eat after all have finished, and mak' you lie outside the fire. They t'ink themself better than a white man, hey! All the time you ask me to come away from the camp with you; an' you t'ink I don' want to come, but you don' know. Many, many nights I not sleep, 'Erbe't. I want so bad to come to the ot'er side of the tepee where you are, but I hold to my mot'er's blanket!"

The man looked up. "Hm! You did, eh?" he exclaimed. "If I had known!"

"But I t'ink I mos' not let you see I love you. So I mak' show I don' care at all. An' it hurt me ver' moch in my empty breast, 'Erbe't. But why I do it?--I want you so to marry me! an' bam-bye you marry me; an' I so scare and happy lak I was lose my head! Four days I married now! You not mad at me, 'Erbe't, 'cause I mak' you marry me?"

He shrugged. "What's the diff?" he said carelessly.

Rina dared to let her arm creep around his shoulders. "But bam-bye you ver' glad you marry me," she whispered. "For I mak' me ver' nice! I white woman now. I go no more to the breeds. I spik only Engliss now; we will sit in chairs and eat pretty with knives and forks; and always say good morning and good night, lak white people. 'Erbe't, you will teach me all the ways of white people, lak they do outside? I want so bad to be ver' nice, jus' lak white woman!"

"Sure!" said Mabyn vaguely.

Rina was silent for a while. "'Erbe't," she said at last, "you never tell me about your folks; about your house where you live outside. Please tell me."

He muttered, and writhed uncomfortably on the bench. "What's the use of bringing that up?" he said at last. "You wouldn't understand if I tried to tell you."

"Loving makes me onderstan' moch," she softly pleaded.

He was silent.

"Have you any sisters outside, 'Erbe't?" she gently persisted.

"No," he said.

"Your mot'er, she is not dead?"

"No."

"She mos' be ver' nice, I think."

"She's a lady!" he blurted out.

Rina nodded wisely. "I know what that is," she said. "A lady is a ver' nice woman." Her voice dropped very low. "'Erbe't," she whispered, with infinite, passionate desire in her voice--stroking his cheek, "will you teach me to be a lady?"

He laughed. "You 'tend to your work about the place," he said, "and don't bother your head over that."

Tears slowly welled up in Rina's eyes, and stole one after another down her cheeks. "I do so ver' moch want to be a lady," she whispered, more to herself than to him. He did not know she wept, she was so still.

By and by she raised her head, and shook the tears away. "To-morrow, I will begin to fix things nice for you, 'Erbe't," she said with renewed, soft tenderness.

He vented his hopeless, jeering chuckle. "Nice!" he echoed. "My God, Rina! What are you going to begin on?"

"I show you!" she said eagerly. "I have a whole tanned buckskin my father give to me when I go 'way; and my mot'er, she give silk, all colours. I make seven, eight, maybe ten pairs of glove, with cuffs; and work them with silk flowers! No woman can work so good with silk than me! I work all the time there is light; and when all are done I get forty dollar in trade at the store! And I buy cartridges and traps and grub, and another skin to work. Not any more will you be poor, 'Erbe't!"

"Lord! How will we ever drag out the winter in this God-forsaken spot!" he grumbled--unconsciously shifting the initiative to her shoulders.

Her arm tightened about him. "We will do fine!" she said eagerly. "We will mak' moch money. There is no plentier place for fur; and we will have it all! Me, I can set traps and snares as good as Michel Whitebear. Maybe I will get a silver fox, or a black one. I know the fox! In the spring we will have plenty good credit at the store. We can travel to the Settlement then, and you will not be lonesome. There are many white men. We could stay in the Settlement all summer; and I would cook meals for the freighters and the travellers and mak' more money. I am a good worker, 'Erbe't. Everybody say so!"

Mabyn partly roused himself. "That's not a bad idea," he said. "Under cover of the restaurant, it would be dead easy to run in a little whiskey over the Berry Mountain trail, and make a pot of money. Fifty cents a drink, by Gad!"

Rina drew away from him. "I will not help you do that, 'Erbe't," she said quietly.

"You'll do what I tell you to do," he said coolly.

Rina remained silent. Her breast heaved and trembled with terror at her own temerity in defying her husband--but there were both firmness and reproach in her attitude. It was more than the weak Mabyn could bear for long in silence.

"Good God!" he burst out. "Have I married a breed to tell me what I ought to do, and ought not to do? Better learn once for all, my girl, that I'm the head of this outfit, and I mean to do whatever I damned please!"

Rina sat gripping her hands together in her lap to control their trembling. Her head was bowed. "I am only a breed girl," she said. "You are my 'osban', and you can beat me, and you can kill me, but I would not cry out, or think bad of you. But you cannot mak' me help you to mak' a pig of you again. I will mak' you to have good credit, an' to be a rich and strong man, an' you can go back and spit on the poor breeds that mock you before. I will not help you trade in whiskey; whiskey mak' you poor, an' sick, an' crazy!"

Mabyn got up. "God! Women are all alike, white or brown!" he muttered indifferently. "Come on in."

But he had yielded the point. The regeneration of Herbert Mabyn had been undertaken.

XIV

THE LAST STAGE

The hours of the afternoon that followed their encounter with Tom Lillywhite were long and heavy ones for Natalie and Garth. A haggard misunderstanding rode between them on the trail. Denied the all-explaining, all-healing touch of hands--or lips, the unreasonable despair of lovers seized on each; and the sunny way was plunged in murk. They rode, and camped, and ate their supper in silence; and in silence they turned in for the night. But there was little sleep for either; they lay apart, each nursing a burden of unhappiness; unable to say now what it was all about, only dreadfully conscious that they were divided.

As soon as it was light enough to see, a pale and heavy-lidded Natalie crept noiselessly out of her tent. In front of the door she saw Garth on his knees preparing to build a fire; but the hand that held the hatchet-helve had dropped nervelessly to the ground; and his eyes, fixed and staring in the torpor of miserableness, had forgotten what he had set out to do. At the sight, a rapturous peace came back to Natalie's harried soul; for, she thought, if he were so unhappy as that, he must love her in spite of all. And Garth, looking up, saw the tenderness break in her weary face, and he understood it all too. The forest sprang into leaf again for them; and presently the sun came gaily up. They became as wildly and unreasonably happy as they had just been miserable; and not a word was exchanged either way. It was not necessary. That they did not fling themselves into each other's arms at that moment, must surely be written down to their credit somewhere.

They made but a leisurely progress this day and the next. The labour of the journey was greater than at any time hitherto, for in addition to the ordinary routine of making and breaking camp twice a day, Garth had now the four horses to look after. Catching them was a task of uncertain duration, even though they were turned out hobbled; in particular, the exasperating Timoosis developed the proficiency of a very circus horse, in walking on his hind legs. And once caught, there was all the business of saddling, packing and drawing the hitch.

Besides, there was that in both their hearts which delayed them even more. No ardently desired goal awaited them at the end of this journey; on the contrary they dreaded what they were to find. The last few miles of the way together, before the inevitable came between them, was therefore very dear; and it became ever easier to say "Let's camp!" and harder to say "Let's move!"

Their boisterous jollity on the trail gave place to much quiet happiness; and there was ceaseless friendly contention, where Garth's every thought was for Natalie; and hers for him. Each was on his mettle to be worthy of the other's best. Above all they avoided the insidious danger of contact; but inevitably sometimes in the business of the camp, their hands did meet--and each to himself stored up and told over the events like secret treasures. In every labour Natalie insisted on taking her share like a man; and Garth never ceasing to upbraid her, yet loved her for it prodigiously.

Day by day, now, the leaves of the more exposed trees were yellowing; and on the second night of their journey across the portage, the first heavy frost of the season descended. Garth, under his sail-cloth at the door of the tent, awoke covered with rime.

Toward the end of the third day they had their never-to-be-forgotten first glimpse of the mighty Spirit, the dream river of the North, whose name evokes the thought of a garden in a bleak land. The unvarying flatness of the portage with its standing pools, and the interminable lofty wood that had hemmed them in for three days, had given them the sense of travelling on the bottom of the world, and that somewhere ahead must be a hill to climb. What then was their astonishment this afternoon, when, without warning they emerged from among the trees on an abrupt grassy terrace, and beheld the great river lying nearly a thousand feet _below_.

It was a view inimitably gorgeous and sublime. Coming so suddenly upon it they caught their breaths and gazed in silence; for there was nothing fitting to say. The high point on which they stood overlooked a deep and narrow gorge at their left, through which a little river fell to the great stream; and across this they could look up the vast trough for miles. In the distance the river seemed to rise, until one would say it issued molten from the low-hung sun itself.

It had an individual and peculiar look, like no watercourse they had seen. Its course drew a sharp line between the wooded country and the prairie. Like a figure dressed in motley, the steep southern bank was everywhere dark and wooded, while the other side, sweeping up in countless fantastic knolls and terraces, was bare, except for the brown grass, and patches of scrub-like hair in the hollows. Far back from the opposite rim of the vast trough swept the unmeasured prairie, as flat, in the whole prospect, as the country they had lately traversed.

It was the wealth of colour that most of all bewitched their eyes. The river itself was of an odd, insistent green--emerald tinged with milk; the islands on its bosom hung out the rich bottle-green of spruce; the grass on the north bank was beaver-brown; the wild-rose scrub glowed blood-crimson in the hollows; and the aspen bluffs, touched with frost, were as yellow as saffron. The wild and beautiful panorama was made complete in their eyes by a great golden eagle perched on the brink of the immediate foreground and, like themselves, gazing over. Though but a hundred yards or so distant, he contemptuously disregarded their arrival. When Garth, full of curiosity, came closer, he spread his vast wings and drifted indifferently out into space.

For a long time they gazed at the scene without speaking. It was Natalie who finally expressed their common thought.

"Wouldn't it be sweet," she said wistfully, "if our journey had no other object but to see this! With what satisfied hearts we could now turn back!"

Skirting the edge of the steep, presently the Settlement came into view far below, a hut or two along the river, hugging the base of the cliffs. The trail zigzagged gradually down, frequently doubling on itself; and whereas the eagle might have descended in a minute, it promised to be more like half an hour for them.

Garth, following his previous policy, did not intend to expose Natalie to the stares of the Settlement, until he had at least reconnoitred. Before coming on the houses, therefore, he led his little caravan off through the bush to the left; and descended to the shore of the smaller stream they had seen from above. Here, in a private glade beside the noisy brown water, they pitched their camp; and Garth, leaving Natalie armed against all eventualities, proceeded into the Settlement.

His inevitable first question at the store elicited the information that the Bishop had gone up the river to Binchinnin, Ostachegan Creek and Fort St. Pierre. Next, the name of Herbert Mabyn called forth contemptuous shrugs. None of the men could give certain information of his whereabouts, though Clearwater Lake was mentioned again. He had not been in to the post for four months; and there was a handful of letters waiting for him. Garth was referred to the breeds across the river for better news. It was clearly intimated that all self-respecting white men had cast Mabyn off.

Inquiring the means of crossing the river, the ferry was pointed out to Garth, a barge propelled with sweeps. It must be tracked up-stream for a quarter of a mile before starting across, to allow for the current, he was told. The trader offered to help him when he was ready. Garth thanking him, privately resolved to cross before the Settlement was astir next morning. He saw that his own reticence in answering questions inspired the three simultaneously with the idea that he was a detective from outside, in pursuit of Herbert Mabyn for some early sin; and he let it go at that.

* * * * *

Garth roused Natalie long before dawn; and they crossed the river by the first greenish light of the East. Garth handled one sweep, Natalie the other; and their labour was great. The incorrigible Timoosis, who never neglected an opportunity to make trouble, balked furiously at the ferry; and, finally driven on board and tied, managed to work the other horses up to a high state of excitement during the passage.

Finally, when they had almost made the other shore, he succeeded in breaking his halter; and, leaping over the stern, perversely struck out for the shore they had left. Cy and Caspar, horses of no character, blindly leaped after him. For a moment a dire disaster threatened; for Timoosis, borne down by the weight of his pack, could scarcely keep his head above water; and they thought they had lost both their horse and their camp equipment. But the self-contained Emmy, who had not budged during all the excitement, merely turned her head, and sent an imperious whinny in the direction of her offspring; whereupon Timoosis, with true coltish inconsistency, turned about, and came meekly swimming after the barge, followed by the other two. Since the shore was not above twenty-five yards off he managed to win it pack and all, and staggered up on the beach, chilled, exhausted, and much chastened in mind. Warned by previous experiences, they never trusted him with anything perishable, so the damage to his pack was slight.

After an hour's travelling, they halted by the trail at sunrise to eat, and to dry out what had been wet. This part of the trail traversed the heavily wooded bottom-lands, before starting to climb the grassy steeps of the further bank. As they sat on a log discussing their bread and cocoa, a rollicking song came, as a sound comes fluctuating through the woods, now from this side, now from that, and curiously deadened. It finally resolved itself into the air of _Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay_ with words in Cree. While it still seemed some distance away, suddenly the singer rode upon them; and reining up his horse, called the song into his surprised throat.

He was the handsomest native they had met, a young fellow of twenty-odd, lean and broad-shouldered, with flashing black eyes and high-bridged nose. His stiff-brimmed "Stetson" was tilted at a dashing angle; he had a scarlet silk handkerchief about his throat; and he sat his horse like a young prince of the woods. Whether pure redskin or breed it was impossible for them to tell; certainly there was no visible evidence of a white admixture; but in spite of his strange and savage air, there was something instantly likeable about the young man--according to Natalie he was the first native they had met who seemed human. He rode a fine black horse as bravely accoutred as would become the captain of a round-up.

He seemed disposed to be friendly; and Garth invited him to share their meal. As politeness demanded, he broke a small piece of bread, and drank some cocoa, which was plainly not at all to his taste. When he sat down he had the grace to take off his hat, something else they had not seen before in a native.

His name, he volunteered, was Gene Lafabe. Since his English was about on a par with Garth's Cree, communication was difficult. In his simplicity, the young man was continually forgetting they could not understand his language; and when Garth shook his head, only shouted the louder.

"You know Herbert Mabyn?" Garth asked.

Gene vigorously nodded his head, adding a stream of information, which, had they only understood, would have materially altered their subsequent line of action.

Garth shook his head hopelessly. "Where is he?" he asked.

Gene pointed north. "Clearwater Lake," he said; and in the twinkling of an eye, counted seventy-five with his ten fingers.

"Where is the trail?" Garth asked.

Gene shrugged. "Nomoya!" he said. "No trail!"

Garth had an inspiration. "Can you take us there?" he asked.

Considerable patience and good-humour were called for from both sides, in the arduous course of arriving at an understanding; but finally a bargain was struck. Gene, in addition to the credentials of his person, bore a highly satisfactory letter of recommendation from the company trader at the Crossing. Whatever his errand in the first place may have been, he never gave it another thought; and in half an hour blithely turned his horse's head, and took the lead on the trail.

Gene looked at every considerable tree, every little gulley, and every rise in the ground with the eye of an old friend. In a mile or so, at a place marked in no way that Garth could see, he abruptly turned out of the trail; and led them with an air of certainty through the apparently trackless woods. The trees ended at the steep rise that marked the bottom of the northern bank; and thereafter they climbed the grass.

By a devious route known to himself Gene led them through many little grassy ravines, and over ridges, gradually upward. There was no sense or order in the arrangement of the knolls and terraces and spurs of turf--the ground seemed to be pushed up anyhow, like bubbles on the surface of yeasty dough. For a while they would be swallowed in a cup-like hollow; then, surmounting a ridge, they would have a brief glimpse of the distant river behind. It was only when they reached the top that, looking back over the turbulent rounded masses of earth, they were able to comprehend the great height to which they had climbed.

Reaching level ground, Gene with a shout set off at a lope in a bee line across the prairie; and Garth bringing up the packhorses in the rear, caused the sedate Emmy to put her best foot foremost. Meanwhile, with pocket-compass and memorandum book, he made notes of the route they took; and when opportunity offered tied a strip of white cotton to a bush. It was his intention to dismiss Gene before coming to Mabyn's hut; and he wished to be sure of the way back. The guide, comprehending what he was doing, gave him to understand that Emmy could bring them back over their own tracks--unless snow should fall. But Garth was neglecting no precautions.

Garth and Natalie deplored to each other the inadequacy of their means of communication with their guide. The bright-eyed Gene had a hundred things to point out to them on the prairie, most of which they could only guess at. For one thing, he made them understand he was following in the tracks of two cayuses that had gone that way three days before. One was lame, he said, and the other dragged a travoise. All this he learned from certain marks in the grass, which the other two could not see at all. In all ways Gene proved himself a very pearl among guides. Garth, merely from watching him, learned as much trail-craft these two days as he had picked up during the weeks preceding; and Natalie confessed that his cooking put her utterly to shame.

Such was the energy of their pace that they reached the last waterhole before coming to Clearwater Lake early next afternoon. Here Garth decided to camp; for he had determined with Natalie to time their arrival at Mabyn's hut for the morning; so that after the briefest stay, they could immediately start back. Clearwater Lake was only three miles distant; and Gene was able to point out a poplar bluff marking the rise behind which it lay.

Neither Garth nor Natalie obtained much sleep that night; only Gene, wrapped in his rabbit-skin robe beyond the fire, slept the sleep of the savage or the child. They were all astir at dawn; and after eating, they parted; Gene careering south without a care on his mind; while Garth and Natalie turned their apprehensive faces toward the lake. What they were to find there they did not know; but intuition warned them it would be sufficiently painful.

When they reached the brow of the last hill, and the lake stretched vividly below them, they had no eyes for the loveliness of the prospect. The little hut at the head of the water far to the left was the first thing they saw; and it was charged with a significance that obliterated everything else. Facing the early sunlight it stood revealed with startling distinctness; and even at the distance had a ghastly look; gray, artificial and decayed in the midst of the mellow autumn loveliness.

"I will picket the packhorses down at the edge of the water," Garth said; "and we'll ride on without them. It will provide us with an obvious excuse to return immediately."

Natalie scarcely heard. Her eyes were fixed on the distant shack. "What do you suppose it hides from us?" she whispered. "Death, misery, or disgrace?"

Garth could scarcely forbear groaning in the pain of his solicitude for her. "Oh, Natalie!" he said hoarsely, "I haven't done right to expose you to this!"

"I made you!" she said quickly. "Besides, it's not a question of right or wrong. As you said we would, we have only done the best we could, under the circumstances that arose."

"At least let me ride on ahead a little," he begged. "You stay with the outfit. I will hurry back."