Chapter 12

MERE BRUTE . . . OR JUST PLAIN MAN?

Ygerne, sitting very still, watched Drennen until he had passed around a bend in the river and was lost to her sight behind a clump of willows. His impassioned outburst had been too frenzied not to have moved her powerfully. But the expression in the eyes which followed him was too complex to give any key to the one emotion standing above the others in her breast. When she could see him no longer she rose and followed slowly.

Because the course of the Little MacLeod is full of twists and kinks, spine of ridge and depression of ravine thrusting the stream aside or welcoming it closer, she had no further view of him until they were both near the Settlement, Drennen himself already abreast of the first building at this end of the camp, his own dugout. She thought that he was going to stop at his cabin; then she saw that he had passed on. She had suspected that the man was delirious with the fever upon him; that his brain had reeled from the impact of the blows showered upon it and had staggered from its throne. Now the suspicion came to her that Drennen had come to her in his cups; that the thing which had loosened his tongue and distorted his vision was nothing more nor less than whiskey.

He was lurching as he walked, but bearing on swiftly. She had not been mistaken when she had thought that he had turned in toward his cabin. But in this his action had been involuntary. He had reeled, had paused as he caught and steadied himself, had gone on drunkenly.

There were a score of men up and down the short street. Already some of them had marked his coming. Ygerne turned hurriedly to the left, put the line of houses between her and the street, passing back doors quickly on her way to Père Marquette's.

Only once did Drennen stop. He ran his hand across his eyes as though to brush away some filmy fogginess of vision. There was impatience in the gesture. With a little grunt of satisfaction he went on. He had seen both Lemarc and Sefton talking with other men half way up the street.

As he passed Joe's he was lurching more and more, his walk grown markedly unsteady. His eyes were flaming and growing red; his face was splotched with colour, hot, angry colour; he was muttering to himself, little broken, feverish, illogical outpourings of the seething passion within him. He passed three men who were lounging and smoking. He did not turn his eyes toward them. They were the three big mining men, Madden and Hasbrook and Sothern. They saw him, their eyes following him quickly, each man with his own personal interest.

"Drunk, eh?" laughed Charlie Madden. "Suppose we draw straws to see who takes him in tow!"

Hasbrook's sharp featured face grew shrewd in speculation, his tongue clicking nervously. Marshall Sothern's shaggy brows lowered a bit; Madden and Hasbrook had looked from Drennen to each other and to him; he alone kept his eyes hard upon the man making his way with unsteady stubbornness up the street.

When a man stood in his way Drennen thrust out his arm, pushing him aside. His eyes grew ever the more terrible with the madness of the rage upon him, bloodshot and menacing. They lost Lemarc and Sefton, wandered uncertainly across the blurr of faces, glowered triumphantly as again they found the men he sought.

He drew up with a little jerk, not ten steps from the two men who as usual were standing close together. Such had been the strange impressiveness of his approach that now he was greeted by a deep silence. The only sound was his own hard breathing, then his words when he burst out violently.

As though his tongue were a poisoned whip he lashed them with it. Burning denunciation exploding within his heated brain was flung off in words to bite like spraying vitriol. His voice rose higher, shriller, grown more and more discordant. He cursed them until the blood ran into Lemarc's cheeks and seeped out of Sefton's. And when at last words failed and he choked a moment he flung himself upon them, bellowing inarticulate, half-smothered wrath.

Men drew back from before him. It was not their fight and they knew how and when to shrug their shoulders and watch. Lemarc, running his hand under his coat for his knife, was struck down before the hand could come in sight again. Drennen's searching fist had found the man's forehead and the sound of the blow was like a hammer beating against rock. Either Sefton had no arms upon him or had not the time to draw. He could only oppose his physical strength against the physical strength of a man who was an Antaeus from the madness and blood lust upon him. Sefton's white face went whiter, chalky and sick as Drennen's long arms encircled his body. Lemarc was rising slowly, his knife at last in his hand when Sefton's body, hurled far out, struck the ground.

Drennen was not fighting as a man fights. Rather were his actions those of some enraged, cautionless beast. Rushing at Lemarc he beat fiercely at a man who chanced to stand in his way, and the man went down. Lemarc was on his feet now, his knife lifted. And yet Drennen, bare handed, was rushing on at him. Sefton was up too, and there was a revolver in his hand. But Drennen, snarling, his fury blind and raging higher, took no heed of the weapon's menace. The thing in Lemarc's eyes, in Sefton's, was the thing a man must know when he sees it; and yet Drennen came on.

But another man saw and understood before it was too late. Marshall Sothern who had followed Drennen with long strides, was now close to his side. The old man's stalwart form moved swiftly, coming between Drennen and Sefton. With a quickness which men did not look for in a man of his age, with a strength which drove up from those who saw a little grunt of wonder, he put out his great arms so that they were about Drennen's body, below his shoulders, catching his arms and holding them tight against his ribs.

"Stop!" burst out Sothern's deep-lunged roar. "Can't you see the man is sick? By God, I'll kill any man who lays a hand on him!"

Speaking he hurled his greater weight against Drennen, driving him back. Perhaps just then the strength began to run out of the younger man's body; or perhaps some kindred frenzy was upon Marshall Sothern. Drennen, struggling and cursing, gave back; back another step; and then, wilting like a cut flower, went down, the old man falling with and upon him. As they fell Drennen lay still, his eyes roving wonderingly from face to face of the men crowding over him. Then his gaze came curiously to the face so near his own, the stern, powerful face of Sothern. An odd smile touched Drennen's lips fleetingly; he put out a freed arm so that it fell about Sothern's shoulders, his eyes closed and consciousness went out of him with a sigh.

"Bring him over to Marquette's."

It was Charlie Madden's voice. Madden and Hasbrook were crowding their way close to the two men in the centre of the group, but little behind Sothern in keeping their eyes upon the man because of whom they were here, for whom they were prepared to fight jealously.

"Stand back!"

Sothern's answer. He had risen, stooped a little, gathered Drennen up in his arms. After the way of men at such a time there was no giving back, rather a growing denseness of the packed throng.

"Don't you hear me?" boomed Sothern angrily. "I say stand back!"

Those directly in front of him, under his eyes, drew hesitantly aside, stepping obediently to right or left. Carrying his burden with a strength equal to that of a young Kootanie George, Marshall Sothern made his way through the narrow lane they made for him. But he did not turn toward Père Marquette's.

"Where are you taking him?" demanded Madden suspiciously, again forcing his way to Sothern's elbow. "That's not the way . . ."

"I'm taking him to his own home," said Sothern calmly. "The only home he's got, his dugout."

"Oho," cried Madden, suspicion giving place to certainty and open accusation, while Hasbrook, combing at his beard, was muttering in a like tone. "You'll take him off to yourself, will you? Where you can do as you damned please with him? Not much."

Marshall Sothern merely shook his head and moved on, thrusting Madden to one side with his heavy shoulder. He was carrying Drennen as one might carry a baby, an arm about the shoulders, an arm under the knees. Men offered to help him but he paid no heed to them. Leonine the man always looked; to-day he looked the lion bearing off a wounded whelp to its den.

Expostulating, Madden dogged his heels, the rest following. Lemarc and Sefton, speaking together, had dropped far behind; Hasbrook was close to Madden's elbow. So they passed down the street. Ygerne Bellaire, standing now in front of Marquette's, watched them wonderingly.

Sothern came first to the dugout. The door being open, he passed in without stopping. He laid the inert form down gently and came back to the door.

"Well?" he demanded, his steady eyes going to Madden.

Madden laughed sneeringly.

"If you think I'm going to stand for a high-handed play like this," he jeered, "you're damned well mistaken. You're not the only man who's got an interest in him. He doesn't belong to you, old man."

"They'd have killed him if it hadn't been for me," returned Sothern imperturbably. "Until he's on his feet and in his mind again he does belong to me. We haven't the pleasure of knowing each other very well, Charlie. But I can give you my word that when I say a thing I mean it. If you don't believe it . . . start something."

He stepped outside, closing the door after him softly. He brought out his pipe, knocked the dead tobacco from it and filled it afresh, lighting it before Madden and Hasbrook, consulting together in an undertone, had found anything to say. His eyes were calm and steady; there was even a hint of a smile in them as they rested upon Madden's eager, angry face. There had been no threat in his last words. But he had meant them.

There was but one door to the dugout; it was closed, and more than that, Marshall Sothern stood calmly in front of it. Drennen was inside and he was going to stay there. Madden muttered something; Sothern lifted his brows enquiringly and Madden did not repeat. The situation being neither without interest or humour, some of the men laughed. Madden considered swiftly: Drennen was unconscious; Sothern could do nothing with him immediately. He drew Hasbrook aside and the two went slowly up the street.

Sothern beckoned a man he knew in the crowd, a little fellow named Jimmie Andrews.

"Get a horse," he said quietly. "I want you to carry a couple of letters to Lebarge for me. If you can't get a horse any other way buy one. Come back as soon as you're ready to start. I'll have the letters ready."

He turned back into the dugout, closed the door and dropped the wooden bar into place. Jimmie Andrews went hastily after a horse and twenty minutes later rode out of MacLeod's Settlement, headed for the railroad. He carried a letter to the Superintendent of the Northwestern. The second letter was addressed to Dr. Thos. Levitt.

During the two days which followed the Settlement went tip-toe. No man of them saw David Drennen except now and then through the door when Marshall Sothern had opened it for the warm midday air. There were men in the street who offered wagers that he was going to die and, what was more to the point, that he would die without telling where he had found gold. Sothern ministered to him day and night, letting no one in, having his own meals sent here, sitting by the bunk or at the doorstep, smoking. When a passer-by asked, "How's he gettin' along?" Sothern's answer was always the same: "Slowly."

Drennen had been through much privation and hardship before his discovery, severe bodily punishment and fatigue thereafter. On top of physical suffering had been imposed the mental stress, the veritable mad agony and strife of the dual emotions which Ygerne had inspired in him. It was in the cards that he should come near death; but that he should not die. A man's destiny is characterised at times by an instinct of savagery; it tortures him until his sense of pain is dulled and lost in unconsciousness; then it lets him grow strong again for fresh tortures.

After the forty-eight hours had passed Jimmie Andrews had returned bringing the physician with him. Dr. Levitt had stayed twenty-four hours and had gone again, saying that there was nothing for him to do that Sothern could not do as well. He rather thought that Drennen's beautiful physique would pull him through. But it would take time, careful attention, rest and properly administered nourishment.

"Can't you get a woman to help?" he asked as he was going. "I don't give a damn what kind she is. One fool of a woman is worth a dozen men at times like this." He pocketed his fee, bestowed upon Sothern a gratuitous wink with the words, "I guess it's a good investment for you, eh? Madden and Hasbrook look as sore as saddle boils."

Drennen slept much but restlessly. When he was awake he stared with clouded, troubled eyes at the smoke-blackened ceiling or out of the door at the willows or into Sothern's rugged face. His fever raged high, his body burning with it, his brain a turbulent melting pot wherein strange fancies passed through odd, vaporous forms. He confused events of a far-off childhood with occurrences of yesterday. He was a little boy, gone black-berrying, and Ygerne Bellaire went with him. His dugout was a cabin in the Yukon where he had lived a year, or it was a speeding train carrying him away from an old home and into the wilderness. There were times when Marshall Sothern, bending over him, was an enemy, torturing him. Times when the old man was his own father and Drennen put out his hands to him, his face alight. Times when the sick man cursed and reviled him. Times when he broke into shouting song or laughter or raved of his gold. But most often did he speak the name Ygerne; now tenderly, now sneeringly, now with a love that yearned, now a hatred which shook him terribly and left him exhausted.

The doctor had gotten back to Lebarge before Marshall Sothern sent for Ygerne. She came without delay.

"This man is very sick," he told her, bending a searching look at her from under brows shaggy in thought. "He talks of you very much. Does he love you or does he hate you?"

She looked at him coolly, her gaze defying him to pry into matters which did not concern him. He understood the look and said calmly:

"I want him to get well. There are reasons why he has got to get well."

"I know," she laughed at him. "Good, golden reasons!"

"If he loves you, as I have a mind he does," Sothern went on quietly, "I think that you could do more to help him than any one else. If he hates you you might do more harm than good. That is why I asked."

"He is delirious?"

"A great deal of the time; not always."

Her brows puckered thoughtfully.

"I think," she said at last, "that he loves me and hates me . . . both! But I'll come in and see if I can be of any help. I, too, have good reasons for wanting him to live."

So the door to Drennen's dugout was opened to Ygerne Bellaire. But to no one else in the Settlement; Marshall Sothern saw to that. Madden came, Hasbrook came; but they did not get their feet across the rude threshold. They grumbled, Madden in particular. They accused Sothern of taking an unfair advantage; of keeping the delirious man under his own eye and ear that he might seek to steal his secret from him; of plotting with Ygerne to aid in the same end. But, say what they might outside, they did not come in.

"We'll see which is the greater, his love for me or his hate," the girl had said. She sat down by the bed, laying her hand softly upon the bared arm which Drennen had flung out. He turned, looking at her with frowning eyes. In silence she waited. Sothern, standing by the door, his eyes watchful as they passed back and forth from her face to Drennen's, was silent. For a score of seconds Drennen's gaze was unfaltering. Then, with a little sigh, he drew her hand close to him, rested his cheek against it and went to sleep. Sothern, looking now at the girl's face, saw it flush as though with pleasure.

Now she was at the dugout almost as much as Marshall Sothern. The long hours of the day she spent at the bedside, going to her own room only when it grew dark. And even in the night, once Sothern sent for her. Drennen had called for her; had grown violent when she was denied to him and would not be quieted when Sothern sought to reason with him. So Ygerne, dressing hurriedly, her sweater about her, came.

"Why do you come to me that way?"

Drennen had lifted himself upon his elbow, calling out angrily.

"What do you mean?" she asked wondering.

"In that miserable sweater!" he cried. "That's good enough for other women, not for you."

And he made her go back and put on the dress she had worn that night when she had dined with him. She argued with him but he insisted. He would have none of her in her sweater.

"Oh, well," she said, and went out. Sothern thought that she had gone for good. His eyes narrowed and stared speculatively when in a little she came in again. Drennen smiled, openly approved of the Ygerne whom he had sought to kiss, took her hands, kissed them and holding them grew quiet.

He grew stronger almost steadily after that. He had much fever and delirium, but his wounds healed and he ceased to lose ground as he had been doing. In his ravings he made much passionate love to Ygerne, his tones running from the gentleness of supplication to the flame of hot avowal. In lucid moments of sanity he accepted her presence as a quite natural condition, too utterly exhausted by the periods of delirium through which he had passed to ask questions. A few times, indeed, he railed at her as he had done when he had come upon her on the river bank. But for the most part his attitude answered over and over the question Ygerne had implied when first she had come to his side; his love was greater than his hate.

Then there came a day when David Drennen was the old David Drennen once more. He awoke with clear eyes and clear brain. He saw both Marshall Sothern and Ygerne Bellaire. He closed his eyes swiftly. He must think. As he thought, remembering a little, guessing more, a hard smile, the old bitter smile came to his lips. He opened his eyes again and lifted himself upon his elbow. The eyes which met Sothern's were as hard as steel; they ignored the girl entirely.

"I've been sick?" he said coolly. "Well, I'm not sick any longer. In a day or so I'll be around again. Then I'll pay you for your trouble."

And seeing from the look in Sothern's eyes that the rude insult had registered he laughed and turned his face away from them. Sothern and the girl stepped outside together, without a word.

"He is just plain brute!" the girl cried with passionate contempt.

The old man shook his head gravely. He laid his hand very gently upon her shoulder, his unexpected familiarity drawing a quick questioning look from her.

"Little girl," he said thoughtfully, "he's just plain man, that's all; man hammered and beaten awry by the vicious little gods of mischance. If there's anything good left in him it's his love for you. There is a time coming when I am going to wield the destinies of one of the greatest corporations in the West. My responsibility then, compared to yours now, will be as a grain of sand to Old Ironhead up yonder."