The Mountain Girl Part 32

Waiting and listening, sure Ca.s.sandra would not leave him all day without coming to him, even though Aunt Sally had taken him in charge, David's mind was full of her. If he closed his eyes, he saw her. If he opened them and watched Sally's meagre form and black sunbonnet moving about, he thought what it might be to see Ca.s.sandra there.

He could not and would not look at the future. The picture Hoke Belew had summoned up when he had suggested the taking of Ca.s.sandra away among people alien to her, he put from him. He would not see it nor think of it. The present was his, and it was all he had, perhaps all he ever would have; and now he would not allow one little joy of it to escape him. He would be greedy of it and have all the gladness of the moments as they came.

He could see her down below making ready for their visitors, and he knew she would not come until the last task was done, but meantime his patience was wearing away. Aunt Sally finished her work, and David could see her from where he lay, seated in the doorway with her pipe, looking out on the gently falling rain.

Without, all was very peaceful; only within himself was turmoil and impatience. But he knew that to remain calm and unmoved was to keep back his fever and hasten recuperation, so he closed his eyes and tried to live for the moment in the remembrance of that awakening when he had found her kneeling at his side. Thus he dropped to sleep, and again, when he awoke, he found Ca.s.sandra there as if in answer to his silent call.

She was seated quietly sewing, as if it were no unusual thing for her to visit him thus, and when his earnest gaze caused her to look up, she only smiled without perturbation and came to him.

"I sent Aunt Sally down to see mother while I could stay by you and do for you a little," she said.

Calm and restful she seemed, yet when he extended his free hand and took hers, he felt a tremor in her touch that delighted his heart. He brought it to his lips.

"I've been needing you all the morning. Aunt Sally has done everything--all she could. If I should let you have this hand again, would you go so far away from me that I could not reach you?"

"Not if you want me near."

"Then put away your sewing and bring your chair close to me, and let us talk together while we may."

She obeyed and sat looking away from him out through the open door. Were her eyes searching for the mountain top?

"You have thoughts--sweet, big thoughts, dear girl; put them in words for me now, while we are so blessedly alone."

"I can't say rightly what I think. Seems like if I had some other way--something besides words to tell my thoughts with, I could do it better; but words are all we have--and seems like when I want them most they won't come."

"That's the way with all of us. Don't you see you are still beyond my reach? Come. If you can't tell your thoughts in words, give them by the touch of your hands as you did a moment ago."

She did as he bade her and, leaning forward, took his hand in both her own.

"That's right. I'll teach you how to tell your thoughts without words.

Now, how came you to find us the other day?"

"I don't know myself. It was a strange way. First I rode down to Teasley's Mill to--to try to persuade them--Giles Teasley--to allow him to go free." She paused and put her hand to her throat, as her way was.

"I think, Doctor Thryng, I'd better build up the fire and get you some hot milk. Doctor Bartlett said you must have it often--and--to keep you very quiet."

"Not until you tell me now--this moment--what I ask you. You went to the mill to try to help Frale out of his trouble. Ca.s.sandra, have you loved that boy?"

Her face a.s.sumed its old look of masklike impa.s.sivity. "I reckoned he might hold himself steady and do right--would they only leave him be--and give him the chance--"

"Ca.s.sandra, answer me. Was it for love of him that you gave him your promise?"

Her face grew white, and for a moment she bowed her head on his hand.

"Please, Doctor Thryng, let me tell you the strange part first, then you can answer that question in your own way." She lifted her head and looked steadily in his eyes. "You remember that day we went to Cate Irwin's? When we came to the place where we can see far--far over the mountains--I laughed--with something glad in my heart. It was the same this time when I got to that far open place. All at once it seemed like I was so free--free from the heavy burden--and all in a kind of light that was only the same gladness in my heart.

"I stopped there and waited and thought how you said that time, 'It's good just to be alive,' and I thought if you were there with me and should put your hand on my bridle as you did that night in the rain, and if you should lead me away off--even into the 'Valley of the shadow of death' into those deep shadows below us I would go and never say a word.

All at once it seemed as if you were doing that, and I forgot Frale and kept on and on; and wherever it seemed like you were leading me, I went.

"It seemed like I was dreaming, or feeling like a hand was on my heart--a hand I could not see, pulling me and making me feel, 'This way, this way, I must go this way.' I never had been where my horse took me before. I didn't think how I ever could get back again. I didn't seem to see anything around me--only to go on--on--on, and at last it seemed I couldn't go fast enough, until all at once I came to your horse tied there, and I heard strange trampling sounds a little farther on where my horse could not go--and I got off and ran.

"I fell down and got up and ran again; and it seemed as if my feet wouldn't leave the ground, but only held me back. It seemed like they hadn't any more power to run--and--then I came there and I saw." She paused, covering her face with her hand as if to shut out the sight, and slipped to her knees beside him. "Oh, I saw your faces--all terrible--"

He put his arm about her and drew her close. "I saw you fall, and your face when it seemed like you were dying as you fought. I saw--" Her sobs shook her, and she could not go on.

"My beautiful priestess of good and holy things!" he said.

She leaned to him then and, placing her arms about him, ever mindful of his hurt, she lifted his head to her shoulder. The flood-gates of her reserve once lifted, the full tide of her intense nature swept over him and enveloped him. It was as light to his soul and healing to his body.

How often it had seemed as if he saw her with that halo of light about her, and now it was as if he had been drawn within its charmed radius, as surely he had.

"And then, dear heart, what did you do?"

"I thought you were killed, and almost--almost I cursed him. I hope now I wasn't so wicked. But I--I--called back from G.o.d the promise I had given him."

"And then--tell me all the blessed truth--and then--"

"You were bleeding--bleeding--and I took off your clothes--and I saw where you were bleeding your life away, and I tied my dress around you.

I tore it in pieces and wound it all around you as well as I could, and then I put your coat back on you, and still you didn't waken. It seemed as if you had stopped breathing. And then I saw the bruise on your head, and I thought maybe you were only stunned. I brought water from the branch and put your head on the wet cloth and bound it all around, but still you looked like he had killed you, and then--" he stirred in her arms to feel their clasp.

"And then--then--"

"I went for help," she said, in so low a tone it seemed hardly spoken.

"First you did something you have not told me."

She waited in a sweet shame he recognized and gloried in, but he wanted the confession from her lips.

"And then?"

"You said you would teach me to say things without words," she said tremulously.

"Not now. Later. Put everything you did in words. And then--"

"I thought you were dying." She drew in a long, sighing breath.

"And you kissed me. I have a right to know, for I missed them all--"

"I did, I did," she cried vehemently. "A hundred times I kissed you. I had called my promise back from G.o.d--and I dared it. I wasn't ashamed. I would have done it if all the mountain side had been there to see--but afterwards--when that strange doctor from Farington came, and I knew he must uncover you and find my torn dress around you--somehow, then I felt I didn't want for him to look at me, and I was glad to go away."

"Do you want to know what he said when he saw it? 'Whoever did this kept you alive, young man.' So you see how you are my beautiful bringer of good. You are--Oh, I have only one arm now. I am at a disadvantage. When I can stand on my feet, I will pay them all back--those kisses you threw away on me then. We shan't need words then, dearest. I'll teach you the sweet lesson. Your arms tremble; they are tired, dear. Could you let your head rest here and sleep as you did the other day? To think how I woke and found you beside me sleeping--"

"Let me go now. I have things I ought to do for you."

"Not yet. I have things I must say to you."

"Please, Doctor Thryng."

"My name is David. You must call me by it."

"Please, Doctor David, let me go."