The Ledge on Bald Face Part 16

"It isn't that, oh no, it isn't _that_!" she said. "I--I _liked_ it.

There!" she panted. Then she sprang to her feet and faced him. And in the gloom he could see her eyes flaming with some intense excitement, from a face ghost-white.

"But--I won't let you make me love you, Tug Blackstock. I won't!--I won't! I won't let you change all my plans, all my ambitions. I won't give up all I've worked for and schemed for and sold my very soul for, just because at last I've met a real man. Oh, I'd soon spoil your life, no matter how much you love me. You'd soon find how cruel, and hard, and selfish I am. An' I'd ruin my own life, too. Do you think I could settle down to spend my life in the backwoods? Do you think I have no dreams beyond the spruce woods of Nipsiwaska County? Do you think you could imprison _me_ in Brine's Rip? I'd either kill your brave, clean soul, Tug Blackstock, or I'd kill myself!"

Utterly bewildered at this incomprehensible outburst, Blackstock could only stammer lamely:

"But--I thought--ye kind o' liked Brine's Rip."

"_Like_ it!" The uttermost of scorn was in her voice. "I hate, hate, hate it! I just live to get out into the great world, where I feel that I belong. But I must have money first. And I'm going to study, and I'm going to make myself somebody. I wasn't born for this." And she waved her hand with a sweep that took in all the backwoods world.

"I'm getting out of it. It would drive me mad. Oh, I sometimes think it has already driven me half mad."

Her tense voice trailed off wearily, and she sat down again--this time further away.

Blackstock sat quite still for a time. At last he said gently:

"I do understand ye now, Mary."

"You _don't_," interrupted Mary.

"I felt, all along, I was somehow not good enough for you."

"You're a million miles _too_ good for me," she interrupted again, energetically.

"But," he went on without heeding the protest, "I hoped, somehow, that I might be able to make you happy. An' that's what I want, more'n anything else in the world. All I have is at your feet, Mary, an' I could make' it more in time. But I'm not a big enough man for you.

I'm all yours--an' always will be--but I can't make myself no more than I am."

"Yes, you could, Tug Blackstock," she cried. "Real men are scarce, in the great world and everywhere. You could make yourself a master anywhere--if only you would tear yourself loose from here."

He sprang up, and his arms went out as if to seize her. But, with an effort, he checked himself, and dropped them stiffly to his side.

"I'm too old to change my spots, Mary," said he. "I'm stamped for good an' all. I am some good here. I'd be no good there. An' I won't never resk bein' a drag on yer plans."

"You could--you could!" urged Mary almost desperately.

But he turned away, with his lips set hard, not daring to look at her.

"Ef ever ye git tired of it all out there, an' yer own kind calls ye back--as it will, bein' in yer blood--I'll be waitin' for ye, Mary, whatever happens."

He strode off quickly up the sh.o.r.e. The girl stared after, him till he was quite out of sight, then buried her face in the fur of Jim, who had willingly obeyed a sign from his master and remained at her side.

"Oh, my dear, if only you could have dared," she murmured. At last she jumped up, with an air of resolve, and wandered off, apparently aimlessly, into the recesses of the mill, with one hand resting firmly on Jim's collar.

III

Two days later Mary Farrell left Brine's Rip. She hugged and kissed Woolly Billy very hard before she left, and cried a little with him, pretending to laugh, and she took her three big trunks with her, in the long-bodied express waggon which carried the mails, although she said she would not be gone more than a month at the outside.

Tug Blackstock eyed those three trunks with a sinking heart. His only comfort was that he had in his pocket the key of Mary's little shop, which she had sent to him by Woolly Billy. When the express waggon had rattled and b.u.mped away out of sight there was a general feeling in Brine's Rip that the whole place had gone flat, like stale beer, and the saws did not seem to make as cheerful a shrieking as before, and Black Saunders, expert runner of logs as he was, fell in because he forgot to look where he was going, and knocked his head heavily in falling, and was almost drowned before they could fish him out.

"There's goin' to be some bad luck comin' to Brine's Rip afore long,"

remarked Long Jackson in a voice of deepest pessimism.

"It's come, Long," said the Deputy.

That same day the wind changed, and blew steadily from the mills right across the village. But it brought no change in the weather, except a few light showers that did no more than lay the surface dust. About a week later it shifted back again, and blew steadily away from the village and straight across the river. And once more a single night-watchman was regarded as sufficient safeguard against fire.

A little before daybreak on the second night following this change of wind, the watchman was startled by a shrill scream and a heavy splash from the upper end of the great pool where the logs were gathered before being fed up in the saws. It sounded like a woman's voice. As fast as he could stumble over the intervening deals and rubbish he made his way to the spot, waving his lantern and calling anxiously. There was no sign of any one in the water. As he searched he became conscious of a ruddy light at one corner of the mill.

He turned and dashed back, yelling "Fire! Fire!" at the top of his lungs. A similar ruddy light was spreading upward in two other corners of the mill. Frantically he turned on the nearest chemical extinguisher, yelling madly all the while. But he was already too late. The flames were licking up the dry wood with furious appet.i.te.

In almost as little time as it takes to tell of it the whole great structure was ablaze, with all Brine's Rip, in every varying stage of _deshabille_, out gaping at it. The little hand-fire-engine worked heroically, squirting a futile stream upon the flames for a while, and then turning its attention to the nearest houses in order to keep them drenched.

"Thank G.o.d the wind's in the right direction," muttered Zeb Smith, the storekeeper and magistrate. And the pious e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n was echoed fervently through the crowd.

In the meantime Tug Blackstock, seeing that there was nothing to do in the way of fighting the fire--the mill being already devoured--was interviewing the distracted watchman.

"Sure," he agreed, "it was a trick to git you away long enough for the fires to git a start. Somebody yelled, an' chucked in a big stick, that's all. An', o' course, you run to help. You couldn't naturally do nothin' else."

The watchman heaved a huge sigh of relief. If Blackstock exonerated him from the charge of negligence, other people would. And his heart had been very heavy at being so fatally fooled.

"It's Harner's Bend all right, that's what it is!" he muttered.

"Ef only we could prove it," said Blackstock, searching the damp ground about the edges of the pool, which was lighted now as by day.

Presently he saw Jim sniffing excitedly at some tracks. He hurried over to examine them. Jim looked up at him and wagged his tail, as much as to say, "So you've found them, too! Interesting, ain't they!"

"What d'ye make o' that?" demanded Blackstock of the watchman.

"_Boy's_ tracks, sure," said the latter at once.

The footprints were small and neat. They were of a double-soled larrigan, with a low heel of a single welt.

"None of _our_ boys," said Blackstock, "wear a larrigan like that, especially this time o' year. One could run light in that larrigan, an' the sole's thick enough to save the foot. An' it's good for a canoe, too."

He rubbed his chin, thinking hard.

"Yesterday," said the watchman, "I mind seein' a young half-breed, he looked like a slip of a lad, very dark complected, crossin' the road half-a-mile up yonder. He was out o' sight in a second, like a shadder, but I mind noticin' he had on larrigans--an' a brown slouch hat down over his eyes, an' a dark red handkerchief roun' his neck. He was a stranger in these parts."

"That would account for the voice, like a woman's," said Blackstock, following the tracks till they plunged through a tangle of tall bush.

"An' here's the handkerchief," he added triumphantly, grabbing up a dark red thing that fluttered from a branch. "Harner's Bend knows somethin' about that boy, I'm thinkin'. Now, Bill, you go along back, an' don't say nothin' about this, _mind_! Me an' Jim, we'll look into it. Tell old Mrs. Amos and Woolly Billy not to fret. We'll be back soon."

He slipped the leash into Jim's collar, gave him the red handkerchief to smell, and said, "Seek him, Jim." And Jim set off eagerly, tugging at the leash, because the trail was so fresh and plain to him, and he hated to be held back.

The trail led around behind the village, and back to the river bank about a mile below. There it followed straight down the sh.o.r.e. It was evident to Blackstock that his quarry would have a canoe in hiding some distance further down. There was no time to be lost. It was now almost full daybreak, and he could follow the trail by himself. After all, it was only a boy he had to deal with. He could trust Jim to delay him, to hold him at bay. He loosed the leash, and Jim bounded forward at top speed. He himself followed at a leisurely loping stride.

As he trotted on, thinking of many things, he took out the red handkerchief and examined it again. He smelt it curiously. His nose was keen, like a wild animal's. As he sniffed, a pang went through him, clutching at his heart. He sniffed again. His long stride shortened. He dropped into a walk. He thought over, word by word, his conversation with Mary that night beside the mill. His face went grey.

After a brief struggle he shouted to Jim, trying to call him back. But the eager dog was already far beyond hearing. Then Blackstock broke into a desperate run, shouting from time to time. He thought of Jim's ferocity when on the trail.

Meanwhile, the figure of a slim boy, very light of foot, was speeding far down the river bank, clutching a brown slouch hat in one hand as he ran. He had an astonishing crop of hair, wound in tight coils about his head. He was panting heavily, and seemed nearly spent. At last he halted, drew a deep sigh of relief, pressed his hands to his heart, and plunged into a clump of bushes. In the depth of the bushes lay a small birch-bark canoe, carefully concealed. He tugged at it, but for the moment he was too weary to lift it. He flung himself down beside it to take breath.