The Snowshoe Trail Part 7

He had never been put to a greater test. Every ounce of his strength was needed. The tendency of the stream was to carry him into the center of the current, he was heavily clothed and shod, and the girl, exhausted, was scarcely able to give aid at all. More than once he felt himself weakening. Once a sharp pain, keen as a knife wound, smote his thigh, and he was shaken with despair at the thought that swimmer's cramps--dreaded by all men who know the water--were about to put an end to the struggle. In the icy depths his bodily heat was flowing from him in a frightfully rapid stream.

Closer and closer he swam, and at last only thirty feet of fast, deep water stretched between. But it seemed wholly impossible to make this last stretch. The sharp pain stabbed him again, and it seemed to him that his right leg only half responded to the command of his nerves. In a moment more they would be flung again into the cascades.

"I'm afraid I can't make it," he said, too softly for Virginia to hear.

He wrenched once more toward the sh.o.r.e.

But the river G.o.ds were merciful, after all. A jack pine had fallen on the sh.o.r.e, struck down by a dead tree that had fallen beyond, and its green spire, still clothed with needles, lay half-submerged, forty feet out into the stream. Bill's arm encountered it, then s.n.a.t.c.hed at it in a final, spasmodic impulse of his muscles. And his grip held fast.

For an instant they were tossed like straws in the water, but gradually he strengthened his grip. He caught a branch with his free hand, then slowly pulled up on it. "Hang on," he breathed. "Only a moment more."

He drew himself and the girl up on the slender trunk, then crawled along it toward the sh.o.r.e. Now they were half out of the water. And in a moment later they both felt the river bottom against their knees.

He drew her to the bank, staggered and fell, and for a moment both of them lay lifeless to the soft caress of the snow. But Bill did not dare lose consciousness. He was fully aware that the fight was only half won. And despair swept the girl when her clear thought returned to tell her they had emerged upon the opposite sh.o.r.e from the party, and that they were drenched through and lost in the night and storm,--endless, weary paces from warmth and shelter.

Before the thought had gone fully home she saw that Bill was on his feet. The twilight had all but yielded to the darkness, yet she saw that he still stood straight and strong. It was not that he had already recovered from the desperate battle in the river. Strong as he was, for himself he had only one desire--to lie still and rest and let the terrible cold take its toll. But he was the guide, the forester, and the girl's life was in his care.

"Get off your clothes," he commanded. "All of them--the darkness hides you--and I'll wring 'em out. If I don't you can't live to get to the cabin. Your stockings first."

The thought of disobedience did not even come to her. He was fighting for her life; no other issue remained.

"Rub your skin all over with your hands," he went on, "and keep moving.

Above all things keep the blood going in your veins. Rub as hard as you can--I can't make a fire here--with no ax--in the snow."

Already she had tossed him her drenched stockings, and he was wringing them in his strong hands. She rubbed her legs dry with her palms, and put the stockings back on. Then she drew off her coats and outing suit, and he wrung them as dry as he could. Then quickly she dressed again.

"Now--fast as you can walk toward the cabin."

He was not sure that he could find it in the darkness. He hoped to encounter the moose trail where it left the ford; beyond that he had to rely on his woodsman's instincts. He was soaked through and exhausted and he knew from the strange numbness of his body that he was slowly being chilled to death. It was a test of his own might and endurance against the cruel elements and a power beyond mere physical strength came to his aid.

They forced their way through the evergreen thickets of the river bank, walking up the stream toward the ford. He broke through the brushy barriers with the might of his body; he made a trail for her in the snow. The darkness deepened around them. The snow fell ever heavier, and the winds soughed in the tree tops.

After the first half-mile all consciousness of effort was gone from the girl. She seemed to move from a will beyond her own, one step after another over that terrible trail. She lost all sense of time, almost of ident.i.ty. Strange figures, only for such eyes as might see in the darkness, they fought their way on through the drifts.

But they conquered at last. Partly by the feel of the snow under his feet, partly by his woodsman's instincts, but mostly because the forest G.o.ds were merciful, Bill kept to the moose trail that led from the ford to the cabin. And the man was swaying, drunkenly, when he reached the door.

His cold hands could scarcely draw out the rusted file that acted as a brace for the chain. Yet his voice was quiet and steady when he spoke.

"There are blankets in there, plenty of 'em," he told her. "It's my main supply cabin. Spread some of them out and take off your clothes--all of 'em--and get between them. I'll build a fire as fast as I can."

She turned to obey. She heard him take down an ax that had been left hanging on the cabin walls and heard his step in the snow as he began to cut into kindling some of the pieces of cordwood that were heaped outside the door. She undressed quickly, then lay shivering between the warm, heavy blankets.

In a moment the man faltered in, his arms heavy with wood. She heard him fumbling back of the little stove, then a match gleamed in the gloom. She had never seen such a face as this before her now. Its lines were deep and incredibly dark: utter fatigue was inscribed upon the drawn features and in the dark, dull eyes. She was suddenly shaken with horror at the thought that perhaps she was looking upon the first shadow of death itself.

He had cut the kindling with his knife, inserted the candle end, and a little blaze danced up. She watched him feed the fire with strange, heavy motions. He took a pan down from the wall, then went out into the darkness.

Haunted by fears, it seemed to her she waited endless hours for him to return again. When he came the pan was filled with water from a little stream that flowed behind the cabin. He put it on the stove to heat.

She dozed off, then wakened to find him sitting on the edge of her bed, holding a cup of some steaming liquid. Vaguely she noticed that he had taken off his wet clothes and had put on a worn overcoat that had been hanging back of the stove, wrapping two thick blankets over this. He put his left arm behind her and lifted her up, then fed her spoonfuls of the hot liquid. She didn't know what it was, other than it contained whisky.

"Take some of it yourself," she told him at last.

He shook his head and smiled,--a wistful yet manly smile that almost brought tears to her eyes. That smile was the last thing that she remembered. The warm, kindly liquor stole through her veins, and she dropped into heavy slumber.

In the stress of that first hour after the disaster of the river, Lounsbury and Vosper had a chance to test the steel of which they were made. This was the time for inner strength, and courage, and beyond all things else, for self-discipline. But only the forest creatures, such little folk as watch with beady eyes from the coverts all the drama of the wilderness, beheld how they stood that test.

For the first few seconds Lounsbury sat upon his horse and simply stared in mute horror. Then he half-climbed, half-fell from the saddle, and followed by Vosper, started running down the river bank. Immediately he lost sight of Virginia and Bill. Almost at once thereafter the cold and the darkness got into his spirit and appalled him.

"They're lost, they're lost," he cried. "There's not a chance on earth to get 'em out."

The branches tripped him and he fell sprawling in the snow. He got up and hastened on. Vosper, his thews turning to mushroom stalks within him, could only follow, swearing hoa.r.s.ely. At each break of the trees they would clamber down to the water's edge and look over the tumultuous wastes, and each time the twilight was deeper, the snow flurries heavier. And soon they came to a steep bank which they could not descend.

"It's a death trip. I knew it was a death trip," Lounsbury moaned.

"And what's the use of going farther. They haven't a chance on earth."

They did, however, push on a short distance down the river. Lounsbury was of the opinion it was very far indeed. In reality it was not two hundred yards in all. And they halted once more to stare with frightened eyes at the stream.

"It ain't the first this river's taken," Vosper told him. "And they never even found their bodies."

"And we won't find these, now," Lounsbury replied. They waited a little while in silence, trying to pierce the shadows. "What do you suppose we'd better do?" he questioned.

"I don't know. What can we do?"

"There's no chance of saving them. They're gone already. No swimmer could live in that stream. Why did we ever come--it was a wild-goose chase at best. If they did get out they'd be lost--and couldn't find their way. It seems to me the wisest thing for us to do is to go back--and build a big fire--so they can find their way in if they did get out."

It was a worthy suggestion! The voice of cowardice that had been speaking in Lounsbury's craven soul had found expression in words at last. He was frightened by the storm and the darkness, and he was cold and tired, and a beacon light for the two wanderers in the storm was only a subterfuge whereby he might justify their return to camp. The understrapper understood, but he didn't disagree. They were two of a kind.

It was not that they did not know their rightful course. Both were fully aware that such a fire as they could build could only gleam a few yards through the heavy spruce thicket. They knew that braver men would keep watch over that dreadful river for half the night at least, calling and searching, ready to give aid in the feeble hope that the two exhausted swimmers might come ash.o.r.e.

"Sure thing," Vosper agreed. "It'll be hard to make a good fire in the snow, and we can't build one at all if them pack horses has got away by now."

"You mean--we'd die?" Lounsbury's eyes protruded.

"The ax is in the pack. We wouldn't have a chance."

Lounsbury turned abruptly, scarcely able to refrain from running. The pack horses, however, hadn't left their tracks. And now the brave Mulvaney had gained the sh.o.r.e and was standing motionless, gazing out over the troubled waters. No man might guess the substance of his thoughts. He scarcely glanced at the two men.

They unpacked the animals, and by sc.r.a.ping off the snow and by the aid of the keen ax and a candle-stub soon lighted a fire. To satisfy the feeble voice of his conscience Lounsbury himself cut wood to make it blaze high. They made their coffee and cooked an abundant meal.

They stretched the tent in the evergreen thicket, and after supper they sat in its mouth in the glow of the fire. Its crackle drowned out the voices of the wilderness about them,--such accusations as the Red G.o.ds pour out upon the unworthy. And for all their shelter they were wretched and terrified, crushed by the might of the wilderness about them,--futile things that were the scorn of even the beasts.

"Of course we'll never find the bodies," Lounsbury suggested at last.

"No chance, that I can see. The winter's come to stay. We won't be able to get any men from Bradleyburg to help us look for 'em. They couldn't get through the snow."

"You think--" Lounsbury's voice wavered, "you think--we can get back all right ourselves?"