The Snowshoe Trail Part 33

The man's arms tightened around her. He lowered his lips close to hers.

There in the shadow of death her breast pressed to his, the locks of iron that held his heart's secret were shattered, the veil of his temple was rent. "Virginia," he asked his voice throbbing, "do you want me to tell you something--the truest thing in all my life? I thought I could keep it from you, but I can't. I can't keep it any more----"

Her arm went up and encircled his neck, and she drew his head down to hers. "Yes, Bill," she told him, "I want you to tell me. I think I know what it is."

"I love you. That's it; it never was and it never can be anything else." The words, long pent-up, poured from his lips in a flood.

"Virginia, I love you, love you, love you--my little girl, my little, little girl----"

She drew his head down and down until her own lips halted the flow of his words. "And I love you, Bill," she told him. "No one but you."

All the sweetness and tenderness of her glorious and newly wakened love was in the kiss that she gave him. Yet the man could not believe. The human soul, condemned to darkness, can never believe at first when the light breaks through. His heart seemed to halt in his breast in this instant of infinite suspense.

"You do?" he whispered at last, in inexpressible wonder. "Did you say that you loved _me_--you so beautiful, so glorious--Don't tell me that in pity----"

"I love you, Bill," she told him earnestly, then laughed softly at his disbelief. She kissed him again and again, softly as moonlight falls upon meadows. The man's heart leaped and flooded, but no more words would come to his lips. He could only sit with his strong arms ever holding her closer to his breast, kissing the lips that responded so tenderly and lingeringly, swept with a rapture undreamed of before.

Ever her soft, warm arm held his lips to hers, as if she could not let him go.

The seconds, thrilled with a wonder ineffable, pa.s.sed into minutes.

Virginia had no sensation of pain from her wound. The fear of death oppressed her no more. She knew that she had come to her appointed place at last, a haven and shelter no less than that to which the white ship comes in from the tempestuous sea. This was her fate,--happiness and peace at last in her woodsman's arms.

They were no different from other lovers such as cling and kiss in the glory of a summer moon, in gardens far away. Their vows were the same, the mystery and the wonder no less. The savage realm into which they were cast could not oppress them now. They forgot the drifts unending, the winter forests stretching interminably from range to range about them, the pitiless cold, ever waiting just without the cabin door. Even impending death itself, in the glory of this night, could cast no shadow upon their spirit.

In the moment of their victory the North had defeated them, but in the instant of defeat they had found infinite and eternal victory. No blow that life could deal, no weapon that this North should wield against them, could crush them now. They were borne high above the reach of these. They had discovered the great Secret, the eternal Talisman against which no curse can blast or no disaster break the spirit.

They had their secret, whispered exultations, like all lovers the length and breadth of the world. Virginia told him that in her own heart she had loved him almost from the first day but how she had not realized it, in all its completeness, until now. Bill told her of the wakening of his own love, and how he had confessed it to himself the night they had played "Souvenir" in the complaint of the wind.

He tried to explain to her his doubts and fears,--how he had looked at her as a being from another world. "I could imagine my loving you, from the first," he told her, "but never you giving your love to me."

"And who is more worthy of it--of anybody's love--than you?" she replied, utilizing a sweetheart's way, much more effective than words, to stop his lips. Then she told him of his bravery, his tenderness and steadfastness; how there was no feeling of descent in giving her love to him. She told him that in fact his education was as good as hers if not superior, that his natural breeding and gentleness were the equal of that of any man that moved in her own circle. She could find protection and shelter in his strong arms, and in these months in the North she had learned that this was the most important thing of all. He could provide for her, too, with the wealth of his mine,--a point not to be forgotten. Her standards were true and sensible, she was down to the simple, primitive basis of things, and she did not forget that provision for his wife was man's first responsibility and the first duty of love.

Only once did Bill leave her,--to cover the crack of the door and build up the fire. When he returned, her warm little flood of kisses was as if he had been absent for weary hours.

But her thoughts had been busy, even in this moment. All at once she drew his ear close to her lips.

"Bill, will you listen to me a minute?" she asked.

"Listen! I'll listen to every word----"

"Some way--I've taken fresh heart since we--since we found out we loved each other. It seems to me that this love wasn't given to us, only to have us die in a few days--from this awful wound and you from hunger. We're only three days' journey--and there must be some way out."

"G.o.d knows I wish you could find one. But I can't see--and you don't know the way--and we have no food."

"But listen--this wound isn't very bad. I know I can't walk--it will start bleeding if I do--but if I can get any attention at all soon, I know it won't be serious. Bill, have you found out--you can trust me, in a pinch?"

Remembering that instant when the match had flared and her pistol had shot so remorselessly and so true, he didn't hesitate over his answer.

"Sweetheart, I'd trust you to the last second."

"Then trust me now. Listen to every word I say and do what I tell you.

I think I know the way--at least a fighting chance--to life and safety."

x.x.xIII

Whispering eagerly, Virginia told Bill the plan that would give them their fighting chance. His mind, working clear and true, absorbed every detail. "It depends first," she said, "whether or not you can crawl through the little window of the cabin."

Bill remembered his experience in the smoke-filled hut and he kissed her, smiling. "I've got into smaller places than that, in my time," he told her. "I can take the little window right out. I put it in myself."

They were not so awed by their dilemma that they couldn't have gay words. "You got into my heart, too, Bill--a great dealer smaller place than the window," she whispered. "The next thing--are Harold's snowshoes in this room?"

"So it depends on Harold, does it? I believe his snowshoes are here.

Harold left rather hurriedly--and I don't think he took them."

"What everything depends on--is getting out. Getting out quickly.

The longer we stay here, without food, the more certain death is. I know I can't walk and you can't see. We have no food--except enough for one meal, perhaps--but we've got to take a chance on that. Bill, Harold is waiting, right now--probably in the little cabin where he sleeps--for a chance to get those shoes. He's helpless without them.

When he gets them, he can go to the Yuga--enlist more of his breed friends--and wait in ambush for us, just as he said. He's hoping we've forgotten about them. I am sure he didn't take the shoes. They were behind the stove last night."

To make sure, Bill groped his way across the cabin and found not only Harold's shoes, but his own and Virginia's, bringing them all back to her side.

"What's now, Little Corporal?" he asked.

"As soon as it gets light enough for him to see, I want you to go out the cabin door. Turn at once into the brush at your right, so he can't shoot you with the rifle. Then come around to the side of the cabin and re-enter through the window. You can feel your way, and I can guide you by my voice, but you mustn't go more than a few feet or you'll get bewildered. The moment he thinks you are gone, he'll come--not only to get his snowshoes but to gloat over me. I know him now! I can't understand why I didn't know him before. And then--we've got to take him by surprise."

"And then----?"

Quickly, with few words, she told him the rest of her plot. It was wholly simple, and at least it held a fighting chance. He was not blind to the deadly three-day battle that they would have to wage against starvation and cold, in case this immediate part of their plot was a success. But the slightest chance when death was the only alternative was worth the trial.

Very carefully and softly Bill went to work to loosen the window so that he could take it out. It was secured by nails, but with such tools as he had in the cabin, he soon had it free. Then he lifted out the window, putting it back loosely so that he could remove it in a second's time. There was no wisdom in leaving it open until morning. The bitter cold without was waiting for just that chance.

He secured certain thongs of rawhide--left over from the moose skin that he had used for snowshoe webs--and put them in his coat pocket.

Then he made a little bed for the girl, on the floor and against the wall, exactly in front and opposite the doorway. It was noticeable, too, that he restored her pistol to her hand.

"I don't think you'll need it," he told her, "but I want you to have it anyway--in case of an emergency."

There was nothing to do thereafter but to build up the fire and wait for dawn.

In reality, Virginia had guessed the situation just right. In the adjoining cabin, scarcely one hundred yards away, Harold waited and watched his chance to recover his snowshoes. He was wise enough to care to wait for daylight. He wanted no further meeting with Bill in the darkness. But in the light he would have every advantage; he could see to shoot and his blind foe could not return his fire.

After all, he had only to be patient. Vengeance would be swift and sure. When the morning broke he would come into his own again, with never a chance for failure. One little glance along his rifle sights, one quarter-ounce of pressure on the trigger,--and then he could journey down to the Yuga and his squaw in happiness and safety. It would be a hard march, but once there he could get supplies and return to jump Bill's claim. Everything would turn out right for him after all.

The fact that his confederates were slain mattered not one way or another. Pete had gone out with a bullet through his lungs; Virginia had dealt him that. Joe's neck had been broken when Bill had hurled him against the cabin wall. But in a way, these things were an advantage.

There was sufficient food in the cabin for one meal for the three of them, and that meant it was three meals for one. A day's rations, carefully spent, would carry him the two day's march to the Yuga.

Besides, the breeds would not be present to claim their third of the mine. He wondered why he hadn't handled the whole matter himself, in the first place. He would have been fully capable, he thought. As to Virginia,--he hadn't decided about Virginia yet. He didn't know of her wound, or his security would have seemed all the more complete.

Virginia might yet listen to reason and accompany him down to the Yuga.

He had only to wait till dawn.

But Harold's thought was not entirely clear. The fury in his brain and the madness in his blood distorted it,--just a little. Otherwise he might have conceived of some error in his plans. He would have been a little more careful, a little less sure. His insane and devastating longing for vengeance, as well as his late drunkenness, cost him the fine but essential edge of his self-mastery.