That Girl Montana Part 44

"Only a moment!" he said, pleadingly. "It never can be that--that I would be anything to you, little girl--never, never! But--just once--let me tell you a truth that shall never hurt you, I swear! I love you! No other word but that will tell your dearness to me. I--I never would have said it, but--but what you risked for me has broken me down. It has told me more than your words would tell me, and I--Oh, G.o.d! my G.o.d!"

She shrank from the pa.s.sion in his words and tone, but the movement only made him catch her arm and hold her there. Tears were in his eyes as he looked at her, and his jaws were set firmly.

"You are afraid of me--of me?" he asked. "Don't be. Life will be hard enough now without leaving me that to remember. I'm not asking a word in return from you; I have no right. You will be happy somewhere else--and with some one else--and that is right."

He still held her wrist, and they stood in silence. She could utter no word; but her mouth trembled and she tried to smother a sob that arose in her throat.

But he heard it.

"Don't!" he said, almost in a whisper--"for G.o.d's sake, don't cry. I can't stand that--not your tears. Here! be brave! Look up at me, won't you? See!

I don't ask you for a word or a kiss or a thought when you leave me--only let me see your eyes! Look at me!"

What he read in her trembling lips and her shrinking, shamed eyes made him draw his breath hard through his shut teeth.

"My brave little girl!" he said softly. "You will think harshly of me for this some day--if you ever know--know all. But what you did this morning made a coward of me--that and my longing for you. Try to forgive me. Or, no--you had better not. And when you are his wife--Oh, it's no use--I can't think or speak of that--yet. Good-by, little girl--good-by!"

CHAPTER XXIV.

LEAVING CAMP.

Afterward, 'Tana never could remember clearly the incidents of the few days that followed. Only once more she entered the cabin of death, and that was when Mr. Haydon and Mr. Seldon returned with all haste to the camp, after meeting with Captain Leek and the Indian boatman.

Then, as some of the men offered to go with them to view the remains of the outlaw, she came forward.

"No. I will take them," she said.

When Mr. Haydon demurred, feeling that a young girl should be kept as much as possible from such scenes, she had laid her hand on Seldon's arm.

"Come!" she said, and they went with her.

But when inside the door, she did not approach the blanket-covered form stretched on the couch; only pointed toward it, and stood herself like a guard at the entrance.

When Seldon lifted the Indian blanket from the face, he uttered a startled exclamation, and looked strangely at her. She never turned around.

"What is it?" asked Mr. Haydon.

No one replied, and as he looked with anxiety toward the form there, his face grew ashen in its horror.

"Lord in heaven!" he gasped; "first her on that bed and now _him_! I--I feel as if I was haunted in this camp. Seldon, is it--is it--"

"No mistake possible," answered the other man, decidedly. "I could swear to the ident.i.ty. It is George Rankin!"

"And Holly, the renegade!" added Haydon, in consternation; "and Lord only knows how many other aliases he has worn. Oh, what a sensation the papers would make over this if they got hold of it all. My! my! it would be awful! And that girl, Montana, as she calls herself, she has been clever to keep it quiet as she has, for--Oh, Lord!"

"What is the matter now? You look fairly sick," said the other, impatiently. "I didn't fancy you'd grieve much over his death."

"No, it isn't that," said Haydon, huskily. "But that girl--don't you see she was accused of this? And--well seeing who he is, how do we know--"

He stopped awkwardly, unable to continue with the girl herself so near and with Seldon's warning glance directed to him.

She leaned against the wall, and apparently had not heard their words.

Seldon's face softened as he looked at her; and, going over, he put his hand kindly on her hair.

"I am going to be your uncle, now," he said in a caressing tone. "You have kept up like a soldier under some terrible things here; but we will try to make things brighter for you now."

She smiled in a dreary way without looking at him. His knowledge of the terrible things she had endured seemed to her very limited.

"And you will go now with us--with Mr. Haydon--back to your mother's old home, won't you?" he said, in a persuasive way. "It is not good, you know, for a little girl not to know any of her relations, or to bear such shocking grudges," he added, in a lower tone.

But she gave him no answering smile.

"I will go to your house if you will have me," she said. "You and Max are my friends. I will go only with people I like."

"You know, my dear," said Mr. Haydon, who heard her last words. "You know I offered you a home in my house until such time as you got to school, and--and of course, I'll stick to it."

"Though you are a little afraid to risk it, aren't you?" she asked, with an unpleasant smile. "Haven't you an idea that I might murder you all in your beds some fine night? You know I belong to a country where they do such things for pastime. Aren't you afraid?"

"That is a very horrible sort of pleasantry," he answered, and moved away from the dead face he had been staring at. "I beg you will not indulge in it, especially when you move in a society more refined than these mining camps can afford. It will be a disadvantage to you if you carry with you customs and memories of this unfinished section. And after all, you do not belong here, your family was of the East. When you go back there, it would be policy for you to forget that you had ever lived anywhere else."

Mr. Haydon had never made so long a speech to her before, and it was delivered with a certain persistence, as if it was a matter of conscience he would be relieved to have off his mind.

"I think you are mistaken when you say I do not belong here," she answered, coolly. "Some of my family have been a good many things I don't intend to be. I was born in Montana; and I might have starved to death for any help my 'family' would have given me, if I hadn't struck luck and helped myself here in Idaho. So I think I belong out here, and if I live, I will come back again--some day."

She turned to Seldon and pointed to the dead form.

"They will take him away to-day--I heard them say so," she said quietly.

"Let it be somewhere away from the camp--not near--not where I can see."

"Can't you forget--even now, 'Tana?"

"Does anybody ever forget?" she asked. "When people say they can forget and forgive, I don't trust them, for I don't believe them."

"Have you any idea who killed him?" he asked. "It is certainly a strange affair. I thought you might suspect some one these people know nothing of."

But she shook her head. "No," she said. "There were several who would have liked to do it, I suppose--people he had wronged or ruined; for he had few friends left, or he would not have come across to these poor reds to hide.

Give old Akkomi part of that gold; he was faithful to me--and to him, too.

No, I don't know who did it. I don't care, now. I thought I knew once; but I was wrong. This way of dying is better than the rope; and that is what the law would have given him. He would have chosen this--I know."

"Did you ever in your life hear such cold-blooded words from a girl?"

demanded Haydon, when she left them and went to Harris. "Afraid of her?

Humph! Well, some people would be. No wonder they suspected her when she showed such indifference. Every word she says makes me regret more and more that I acknowledged her. But how was I to know? She was ill, and made me feel as if a ghost had come before me. I couldn't sleep till I had made up my mind to take the risk of her. Max sung her praises as if she was some rare untrained genius. Nothing gave me an idea that she would turn out this way."

"'This way' has not damaged you much so far," remarked Mr. Seldon, dryly.

"And as she is not likely to be much of a charge on your hands, you had better not borrow trouble on that score."