Meg of Mystery Mountain Part 18

"You're just hateful, both of you! I wish you would clear out of my sight and never come back!" With this angry remark, Jane closed her door with a bang.

With a dark glance in that direction, Gerald caught Julie by the hand.

"Come on, sis," he said. "You'n I'll clear out and we'll stay away till that Jane Abbott goes back East, that's what we'll do." The boy s.n.a.t.c.hed up his small gun and put the cartridges in his pocket. He took his cap and handed Julie her hat and then led her out of the door.

"Why, Gerald Abbott, where are we going?" the small girl held back, feeling sure that they ought not to leave their cabin home in this manner.

"First off we're going to find Dan and tell him just what happened. Then, second off, I don't 'zactly know what we will do, but I just won't stay here and have that horrid old Jane saying mean things to you all the time and us waiting on her and doing the work she ought to be doing. That's what."

The boy led his small sister along so rapidly that she tripped and would have fallen had he not turned and caught her. "Gee, I guess we'll have to go slower," he confessed as they started to climb the steep rocks that formed the outer edge of the mountain brook which tumbled in a series of little waterfalls, now and then tossing a mist of spray over them.

Julie began to glow with the pleasurable sense of adventure, supposing, of course, that Gerald knew where Dan had gone. At last she inquired.

"I sort o' think we'll find him up at the rim-rock," Gerald said stoutly.

"I'm pretty sure we will. He told me that's where he goes for his const.i.tootional. That means a hike to make him get strong, const.i.tootional does."

The girl's freckled face was aglow. "Oh, goodie!" she cried. "I'd love to climb 'way up there." Then she asked, a little anxiously: "Aren't you skeered we might meet a wildcat or a lion or a bear?"

Her small brother's courage was rea.s.suring. "I hope we will. That's what!

I'm a sharpshooter, I am, and the wildcat that meets us will wish he hadn't." Julie clung to his hand with a secure feeling that she was well protected. "Oh, look-it, will you?"

Gerry pointed ahead and above. "There's a tree that has fallen right across our brook. That's a nice bridge and if we can get up there we can go across on it."

"Is the rim-rock on the other side of our brook?" Julie inquired. Now Gerald had never climbed that high on their mountain before, and so he had no real knowledge of the exact location of the rock about which Dan had told them, but since it was on the very top, the small boy knew that if they kept on climbing, in time they would surely reach it.

The fallen tree was lying across the brook at a very steep ascent and it was with great difficulty that Gerald boosted his sister to the narrow ledge on which it rested. "Don't be scared," he said. "I'll get you across all right and then we'll begin calling for Dan."

CHAPTER XXIV.

JULIE AND GERALD LOST

It was nearly noon when Dan returned to the cabin. He gave a long whistle of astonishment when he saw the disordered living-room and heard no one about. Jane at once appeared in her doorway. Her face still showed evidence of her anger. "Dan," she said coldly, "my trunks are all packed.

Please put out a flag or whatever you should do to stop the stage. It pa.s.ses about one, does it not, on the way to Redfords?"

The lad went to the girl with outstretched hands. "Jane, dear, what has happened? Have you and the children had more trouble? Is it so hard for you to love them and be patient with their playfulness? You know it is nothing more." The girl's lips curled scornfully. "Love them?" she repeated coldly. "I feel far more as if I hated them. I don't believe love is possible to me. I even hate myself! Dan, there's something all wrong with me, and I'm going back East to Merry, who is about the only person living who can understand me."

There was an expression of tender rebuke in the gray eyes that were gazing at her. "You are wrong," the lad said seriously. "Father and I love you dearly, not only because we know that you are different from what you seem to be, but for Mother's sake." Then, turning and glancing again at the confusion, the lad said, "Tell me just what happened."

Jane did so, adding petulantly: "My head was beginning to ache. I had had an unpleasant encounter with your Meg Heger." Dan felt a sudden leaping of his heart. How strange, he thought, that for the first time in his life the name of a girl should so affect him. He had heard of love at first sight, but he had never believed in it. With an effort he again listened to Jane's indignant outpouring of words. "Don't say I deserved just such treatment," she protested. "No one knows it better than I do. I acknowledge that I am despicable and I hate myself. Honestly, Dan, I do, but I don't know how to change. I don't seem to really want to be different."

"That's just it, Jane." The boy had grown very serious. "Just as soon as you desire to be different you will at once begin to change. We are the sculptors of our own characters. We can set before ourselves a model of what we would like to be and carve accordingly." Then, as the clock was striking twelve, the lad suddenly inquired, "Jane, when did all this trouble with the children occur? I left at nine. You think it was about an hour after that?"

The girl nodded, then, glancing out of the wide front door, she exclaimed: "I wonder why they don't come back. I supposed, of course, that they had gone to find you. Gerald knew where you were going, didn't he?"

Dan shook his head. "He could not have known, for I did not myself.

Yesterday and the day before I climbed up to the rim-rock and planned doing it every morning as a strength restorative measure, but today, after we had been wondering how we were to get to the Packard ranch, I thought I would cross the mountain to the other side and look down into the valley, and see if I could, how much nearer was the trail which Jean Sawyer took on Sunday. But I found that it would be much too rough and hard for you, and so we will wait until we receive directions from Mr.

Packard. If you will prepare the lunch, I will go out and put up a white flag. Surely Mr. Wallace will know that I wish to speak to him. Then I will call the children to come home. They may be close, but since you told them that you wished you would never see them again, they are probably hiding, hoping that you are to go on the afternoon stage."

Jane was indeed miserable. Her flaring anger had often caused her to say things that afterwards she deeply repented. "Perhaps if I would go with you and call they would know that I did not mean all that I said," she ventured. But Dan was insistent that she, at least, prepare a lunch for herself.

"You must not start for the East without having a good hearty noon meal,"

he told her. As he spoke he was fastening an old pillow case to a pole.

Leaving the house, he placed it at the top of the stairway.

Then going to the brook, he began a series of halloos, but a hollow, distant echo was all that responded.

Dan, after a fruitless effort to call to the children, returned to the cabin, his face an ashen white. "Jane," he said, and his voice was almost harsh, "you will have to attend to stopping the stage if it comes soon.

Mr. Wallace can carry your baggage down without my a.s.sistance. I am going to hunt for those poor little youngsters who felt that they were turned out of their home. Goodbye."

Jane, with a low cry of agony, leaped forward with arms outstretched, but Dan had not given her another look, and by the time she reached the brook he was out of sight. The girl sank down on a boulder and sobbed bitterly.

"If they're lost I shall never forgive myself. Oh, how selfish, how unkind I have been, thinking only of Jane Abbott and her comfort. I can't go away now, and not know what has become of Julie and Gerald."

Then another thought caused her to rise and go slowly to the cabin. "They want me to go, all of them, even Dan. Perhaps it would be the best thing for me to do, and when they come back they will be glad to find that I have gone."

Almost unconsciously Jane began to put the living-room in order. She smoothed rugs and dragged the heavy furniture into the places it had formerly occupied. Then she went to the kitchen to prepare lunch. If Julie and Gerald had been climbing the mountains all the morning they would be starved, as she well knew. Again Jane Abbott pared potatoes and after studying upon the subject for some moments she made a fire in the stove and put on a kettle of water. In the midst of these preparations she was startled by the shrill blast of the horn carried by the stage driver. Oh, she could not go just then. She was nowhere near ready. Jane s.n.a.t.c.hed up a letter that she had that morning written to Merry and hurried down the stone steps. The surly driver took it with a grunt which seemed to express displeasure, although, as Jane knew, taking the mail to town was one of his duties.

When the big creaking stage had rocked around the corner, Jane suddenly felt as though a great load had been lifted from her heart. She had not really wanted to go at all. She wanted to be sure that all was well with the children, and more than that, she did so want to see Jean Sawyer again. But her pleasure was short lived, for, with a sense of oppression, she again recalled that they would all be disappointed to find her there, even Dan.

As the water in the tea kettle had not yet started to boil, Jane went to her room to change her dress to one more suitable for the work she had undertaken. Upon opening her trunk she saw, lying on top, a miniature picture delicately colored in a dainty frame of silver filigree. The girl lifted it and looked long into the truly beautiful face. Then with a half-sob she said aloud, "My mother!"

Instantly she recalled what Dan had said: "We are each of us sculptors of our own characters. We can choose a model and carve ourselves like it."

The girl sank on her knees, the picture held close to her cheek.

"Oh, mother, mother!" she sobbed, "I choose you for my model. Help me; I am sure you can help me to be more like you."

A strange sense of strength came to her as she arose. She had been struggling without a definite goal. She had known, the small voice within had often told her, that she was despicable, but she had not found a way to change, but surely Dan's suggestion would help her. She clearly remembered her mother, gentle, courageous and always loving.

With infinite tenderness Jane again addressed the miniature:

"Oh, mother, if you had only lived, you would have helped me carve a character more lovely, but alone I have made of it an ugly thing, but now, dearest one, I'll begin all over."

But even as the girl spoke she feared that it might be too late to ask Julie and Gerald to forgive her and try to love her.

CHAPTER XXV.

JANE'S RESOLVE

The lunch was prepared, the potatoes had cooked quite to pieces, but still the children did not return. Jane was becoming terrorized. She was startled when there came a sharp rapping at the front door. Running into the living-room, her hand pressed to her heart, she saw standing there a tall, uncouth-looking mountaineer. She believed, and rightly, that it was the trapper who lived near them.

He began at once: "Dan Abbott came to our place nigh an hour ago sayin'

the young 'uns was lost. Meg and me wasn't to home, but my woman said she'd tell whichever of us come fust and we'd help hunt. Ben't they back yet?"