A Master's Degree Part 24

The paper fell from Victor Burleigh's hands. The world, that ten minutes ago was a rose-hued sunset land, was a dreary midnight waste now. The one barrier between himself and Elinor had fallen only to rise up again.

Then came Satan into the game. "n.o.body knew this but Gresh! Who had saved Bug's life? Who had cared for him and would always care for him?

Why should Bug, little, loving Bug, come now to spoil his hopes? If Bug knew he would be first to give it all to his beloved Vic."

And then came Satan's ten strike. "No need to settle things now. Wait and think it over." And Vic decided in a blind way to think it over.

In the rotunda he met Trench, old Trench, slow of step but a lightning calculator.

"Where are you going?" he exclaimed, as he saw Vic's face.

"I'm going to the whirlpool before I'm through," Vic said, hoa.r.s.ely.

Trench caught him in a powerful grip and shoved him to the foot of the rotunda stairs.

"No,-you re-not-going-to-the-whirlpool,"' he said, slowly. "You're going up to the top of the dome right against that _Ad Astra per Aspera_ business up there, and open the west window and look out at the world the Lord made to heal hurt souls by looking at. And you are going to stay up there until you have fought the thing out with yourself, and come down like Moses did with the ten Commandments cut deep on the tables of your stony old heart. If you don't, you'll not need to go to old Lagonda's pool. By the holy saints, I'll take you there myself and plunge you in just to rid the world of such a fool. You hear me! Now, go on! And remember in your tussle that that big S cut over the old Sunrise door out there stands for Service. That's what will make your name fit you yet, Victor."

Vic slowly climbed up to where an hour ago the sudden opportunity for the fruition of his young life and hope had been brought to him. Lost now, unless--n.o.body would ever know and Bug could lose nothing. He opened the west window and looked out at the Walnut Valley, dim and shadowy now, and the silver prairies beyond it and the gorgeous crimson tinted sky wherefrom the sun had slipped. And then and there, with his face to the light, he wrestled with the black Apollyon of his soul. And every minute the temptation grew to keep the funds "in trust," and to keep on caring for the boy he had cared for since babyhood. He clinched his white teeth and the tiger light was in his eyes again as the longing for Elinor's love overcame him. He pictured her as only one sunset ago she had looked up into his eyes, her face transfigured with love's sweetness, and he wished he might keep that picture forever. But, somehow, between that face and his own, came the picture of little Bug alone in the wretched dugout, reaching up baby arms to him for life and safety; on his baby face a pleading trustfulness.

Victor unb.u.t.toned his cuff and slipped up his sleeve to the scar on his arm.

"Anybody can see the scar I put there when I cut out the poison," he said to himself, at last. "n.o.body will see the scar on my soul, but I'll cut out the poison just the same. I did not save that baby boy from the rattlesnakes only to let him be crushed by the serpent in me. Trench was right, the S over the doorway down there stands for Service as well as for Sacrifice and Strife. Dr. Fenneben says they all enter into the winning of a Master's Degree. Shall I ever get mine earned, I wonder?"

He looked once more at the west, all a soft purple, gray-veiled with misty shadows, save over the place where the sun went out one shaft of deepest rose hue tipped with golden flame was cleaving its way toward the darkening zenith. Then he closed the window and went downstairs and out into the beautiful December twilight.

In all Kansas in that evening hour no man breathed deeper of the sweet, pure air, nor walked with firmer stride, than the man who had gone out under the carved symbol of the college doorway, Victor Burleigh of the junior cla.s.s at Sunrise.

SUPREMACY

Make thyself free of Manhood's guild, Pull down thy barns and greater build, Pluck from the sunset's fruit of gold, Glean from the heavens and ocean old, From fireside lone and trampling street Let thy life garner daily wheat, The epic of a man rehea.r.s.e, Be something better than thy verse, And thou shalt hear the life-blood flow From farthest stars to gra.s.s-blades low.

--LOWELL

CHAPTER XIII. THE MAN BELOW THE SMOKE

_And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors_.

ELINOR WREAM was standing at the gate as Victor Burleigh came striding up the street.

"Where are you going so fast, Victor?" she asked. "Everybody is in a rush this evening. We had a telegram from the East this afternoon. Uncle Joshua is very ill, and Uncle Lloyd had to get away on short notice. Old Bond Saxon went by just now, but," lowering her voice, "he was awfully drunk and slipped along like a snake."

"Have you seen Bug?" Victor asked. "Dennie says he left a little while ago to find his ball he lost out north this afternoon. He wouldn't tell where, because he had promised not to."

"No, I have not seen him. But don't be uneasy about Bug. He never plays near the river, nor the railroad tracks, and he always comes in at the right time," Elinor said, comfortingly.

"I know he always has before, but I want to find him, anyhow." The affectionate tone told Elinor what a loving guardianship was given to the unknown orphan child.

"There was a man here to see Uncle Lloyd just after he left this evening. The same man that brought a little package for you the night we came home. I suppose he comes from your part of the state out West, for he seemed to know you and Bug. He asked me if Bug ever played along the river and if he was a shy child. He was a strange-looking man, and I thought he had the cruelest face I ever saw, but I am no expert on strange faces."

Victor did not wait for another word.

"I must find Bug right away. You can't think what he is to me, Elinor,"

and he hurried away.

At the bend in the Walnut Vic saw Bug's little scarlet stocking cap beside the flat stone. The twilight was almost gone, but the glistening river reflected on the torn bushes above the bank-full stream.

The crushing agony of the first minutes made them seem like hours. And then the college discipline put in its work. Vic stopped and reasoned.

"Bug isn't down there. He never goes near the river. That strange man is Tom Gresh. He killed my father and he's laid a trap for me. He doesn't want to kill Bug. He wants to keep him to workout vengeance and hate on me. He says he'll send me to my father if I go near him. Well, I'm going so near he'll not doubt who I am, and I'll have Bug unharmed if I have to send Gresh where my father could not go even with water to cool his tongue. A man may fight with a man as he would fight with a beast to save himself or something dearer than himself from beastly destruction, Fenneben says. That's the battle before me now, and it's to the death."

The tiger light was in the yellow eyes as never before and the stern jaw was set, as Victor Burleigh hurried away. And this was the man who, such a little while ago, was debating with himself over the quiet possession of Bug Buler's inheritance. Truly the Mastery comes very near to such as he.

It was with tiger-like step and instinct, too, that the young man went leaping up the dark, frost-coated glen. About the mouth of the cave the blackness was appalling. It seemed a place apart, cursed with the frown of Nature. Yet in the April time, the sweetest moments of Vic's young life had been spent in this very spot that now showed all the difference between Love and Hate.

As he neared the opening of the cavern he guarded his footsteps more carefully. The jungle beast was alert within him and the college training was giving way to the might of muscle backed by a will to win.

A dim light gleamed in the cave and he watched outside now, as Gresh on the April day had watched him inside. Down by a wood fire, whose smoke was twisting out through a crevice overhead somewhere, little Bug was sitting on Tom Gresh's big coat, the fire lighting up his tangle of red-brown curls. His big brown eyes looking up at the man crouching by the fire were eyes of innocent courage, and the expression on the sweet child-face was impenetrable.

"He's a Burleigh. He's not afraid," Vic thought, exultingly. "That's half my battle. I had it out with the rattlesnakes. I'll do better here."

At that moment the outlaw turned toward the door and leaped to his feet as Vic sprang inside.

Bug started up with outstretched arms.

"Keep out of the way, Bug," Vic cried, as the two men clinched.

And the struggle began. They were evenly matched, and both had the sinews of giants. The outlaw had the advantage of an iron strength, hardened by years of out-door life. But the college that had softened the country boy somewhat gave in return the quick judgment and superior agility of the trained power that counts against weight before the battle is over. But withal, it was terrible. One fighter was a murderer by trade, his hand steady for the blackest deeds, and here was a man he had waited long months to destroy. The other fighter was in the struggle to save a life dear to him, a life that must vindicate his conscience and preserve his soul's peace.

Across the stone-floored cave they threshed in fury, until at the farther wall Gresh flung Vic from him against the jagged rock with a force that cut a gash across the boy's head. The blood splashed on both men's faces as they renewed the strife. Then with a quick twist Burleigh threw the outlaw to the floor and held him in a clutch that weighed him down like a ledge of rock; and it was pound for pound again.

Away from the ma.s.s of burning coals the blackness was horrible. Beyond that fire Bug sat, silent as the stone wall behind him. Gresh gained the mastery again, and with a grip on Vic's throat was about to thrust his head, face downward, into the burning embers. Vic understood and strove for his own life with a maniac's might, for he knew that one more wrench would end the thing.

"You first, and then the baby; I'll roast you both," Gresh hissed, and Vic smelled the heat of the wood flame.

But who had counted on Bug? He had watched this fearful grapple, motionless and terror-stricken, and now with a child's vision he saw what Gresh meant to do. Springing up, he caught the heavy coat on which he had been sitting and flung it on the fire, smothering the embers and putting the cavern into complete darkness.

Vic gained the vantage by this unlooked for movement and the grip shifted. The fighters fell to the floor and then began the same kind of struggle by which Burleigh had out-generaled big, unconquerable Trench one day. The two had rolled and fought in college combat from the top of the limestone ridge to the lower campus and landed with Burleigh gripping Trench helpless to defend further. That battle was friend with friend. This battle was to the death. The blood of both men smeared the floor as they tore at each other like wild beasts, and no man could have told which oftenest had the vantage hold, nor how the strife would end.

But it did end soon. The heavy coat, that had smothered the fire and saved Vic, smoldered a little, then flared into flame, lighting the whole cave, and throwing out black and awful shadows of the two fighters. They were close to the hole in the inner wall now. Gresh's face in that unsteady glare was horrible to see. He loosed his hold a second, then lunged at Vic with the fury of a mad brute. And Vic, who had fought the devil in himself to a standstill three hours ago, now caught the fiend outside of him for a finishing blow, and the strength of that last struggle was terrific.

Up to this time Vic had not spoken.

"I killed the other snakes. I'll kill you now," he growled, as he held the outlaw at length in a conquering grip, his knees on Gresh's breast, his right hand on Gresh's throat.

In that weird light the conqueror's face was only a degree less brutal than the outlaw's face. And Burleigh meant every word, for murder was in his heart and in his clutching fingers. Beneath the weight of his strength Gresh slowly relaxed, struggling fiercely at first and groping blindly to escape. Then he began to whine for mercy, but his whining maddened his conqueror more than his blows had done. For such strife is no mere wrestling match. Every blow struck against a fellowman is as the smell of blood to the tiger, feeding a fiendish eagerness to kill.

Beside, Burleigh had ample cause for vengeance. The creature under his grip was not only a bootlegger through whose evil influence men took other lives or lost their own; he had slain one innocent man, Vic's own father, and in the room where his dead mother lay had robbed Vic's home of every valuable thing. He had sworn vengeance on all who bore the name of Burleigh. What fate might await Bug, Vic dared not picture. One strangling grip now could finish the business forever, and his clutch tightened, as Gresh lay begging like a coward for his own worthless life.