The Strength of the Pines Part 12

But there was no need of the grizzly continuing its pursuit. Everything had turned out quite well for him, after all. A wolf is ever so much more filling than any kind of seasonal fawn; and the old gray pack leader was imprisoned and helpless in one of Hudson's traps.

In the first gray of morning, Dave Turner started back toward his home.

"I'll go with you to the forks in the trail," Hudson told him. "I want to take a look at some of my traps, anyhow."

Turner had completed his business none too soon. At the same hour--as soon as it was light enough to see--Bruce was finishing his breakfast in preparation for the last lap of his journey. He had pa.s.sed the night by a spring on a long ridge, almost in eye range of Hudson's camp. Now he was preparing to dip down into the Killer's glen.

Turner and Hudson followed up the little creek, walking almost in silence. It is a habit all mountain men fall into, sooner or later,--not to waste words. The great silences of the wild places seem to forbid it.

Hudson walked ahead, Turner possibly a dozen feet behind him. And because of the carpet of pine needles, the forest creatures could hardly hear them come.

Occasionally they caught glimpses of the wild life that teemed about them, but they experienced none of the delight that had made the two-day tramp such a pleasure to Bruce. Hudson thought in terms of pelts only; no creature that did not wear a marketable hide was worth a glance.

Turner did not feel even this interest.

The first of Hudson's sets proved empty. The second was about a turn in the creek, and a wall of brush made it impossible for him to tell at a distance whether or not he had made a catch. But when still a quarter of a mile distant, Hudson heard a sound that he thought he recognized. It was a high, sharp, agonized bark that dimmed into a low whine. "I believe I've got a coyote or a wolf up there," he said. They hastened their steps.

"And you use that little pea-gun for wolves?" Dave Turner asked. He pointed to the short-barreled, twenty-two caliber rifle that was slung on the trapper's back. "It doesn't look like it would kill a mosquito."

"A killer gun," Hudson explained. "For polishin' 'em off when they are alive in the traps. Of course, it wouldn't be no good more'n ten feet away, and then you have to aim at a vital spot. But I've heard tell of animals I wouldn't want to meet with that thirty-thirty of yours."

This was true enough. Dave had heard of them also. A thirty-thirty is a powerful weapon, but it isn't an elephant gun. They hurried on, Dave very anxious to watch the execution that would shortly ensue if whatever animal had cried from the trap was still alive. Such things were only the day's work to Hudson, but Dave felt a little tingle of antic.i.p.ation.

And the thought d.a.m.ned him beyond redemption.

But instead of the joy of killing a cowering, terror-stricken animal, helpless in the trap, the wilderness had made other plans for Hudson and Dave. They hastened about the impenetrable wall of brush, and in one glance they knew that more urgent business awaited them.

The whole picture loomed suddenly before their eyes. There was no wolf in the trap. The steel had sprung, certainly, but only a hideous fragment of a foot remained between the jaws. The bone had been broken sharply off, as a man might break a match in his fingers. There was no living wolf for Hudson to execute with his killer gun. Life had gone out of the gray body many minutes before. The two men saw all these things as a background only,--dim details about the central figure. But the thing that froze them in their tracks with terror was the great, gray form of the Killer, not twenty feet distant, beside the mangled body of the wolf.

The events that followed thereafter came in such quick succession as to seem simultaneous. For one fraction of an instant all three figures stood motionless, the two men staring, the grizzly half-leaning over his prey, his head turned, his little red eyes full of hatred. Too many times this night he had missed his game. It was the same intrusion that had angered him before,--slight figures to break to pieces with one blow. Perhaps--for no man may trace fully the mental processes of animals--his fury fully transcended the fear that he must have instinctively felt; at least, he did not even attempt to flee. He uttered one hoa.r.s.e, savage note, a sound in which all his hatred and his fury and his savage power were made manifest, whirled with incredible speed, and charged.

The lunge seemed only a swift pa.s.sing of gray light. No eye could believe that the vast form could move with such swiftness. There was little impression of an actual leap. Rather it was just a blow; the great form, huddled over the dead wolf, had simply reached the full distance to Hudson.

The man did not even have time to turn. There was no defense; his killer-gun was strapped on his back, and even if it had been in his hands, its little bullet would not have mattered the sting of a bee in honey-robbing. The only possible chance of breaking that deadly charge lay in the thirty-thirty deer rifle in Dave's arms; but the craven who held it did not even fire. He was standing just below the outstretched limb of a tree, and the weapon fell from his hands as he swung up into the limb. The fact that Hudson stood weaponless, ten feet away in the clearing, did not deter him in the least.

No human flesh could stand against that charge. The vast paw fell with resistless force; and no need arose for a second blow. The trapper's body was struck down as if felled by a meteor, and the power of the impact forced it deep into the carpet of pine needles. The savage creature turned, the white fangs caught the light in the open mouth. The head lunged toward the man's shoulder.

No man may say what agony Hudson would have endured in the last few seconds of his life if the Killer had been given time and opportunity.

His usual way was to linger long, sharp fangs closing again and again, until all living likeness was destroyed. The blood-l.u.s.t was upon him; there would have been no mercy to the dying creature in the pine needles. Yet it transpired that Hudson's flesh was not to know those rending fangs a second time. Although it is an unfamiliar thing in the wilderness, the end of Hudson's trail was peaceful, after all.

On the hillside above, a stranger to this land had dropped to his knee in the shrubbery, his rifle lifted to the level of his eyes. It was Bruce, who had come in time to see the charge through a rift in the trees.

XVII

There were deep significances in the fact that Bruce kept his head in this moment of crisis. It meant nothing less than an iron self-control such as only the strongest men possess, and it meant nerves steady as steel bars.

The bear was on Hudson, and the man had gone down, before Bruce even interpreted him. Then it was just a gray patch, a full three hundred yards away. His instinct was to throw the gun to his shoulder and fire without aiming; yet he conquered it with an iron will. But he did move quickly. He dropped to his knee the single second that the gun leaped to his shoulder. He seemed to know that from a lower position the target would be more clearly revealed. The finger pressed back against the trigger.

The distance was far; Bruce was not a practiced rifle shot, and it bordered on the miraculous that his lead went anywhere near the bear's body. And it was true that the bullet did not reach a vital place. It stung like a wasp at the Killer's flank, however, cutting a shallow flesh wound. But it was enough to take his dreadful attention from the mortally wounded trapper in the pine needles.

He whirled about, growling furiously and biting at the wound. Then he stood still, turning his gaze first to the pale face of Dave Turner thirty feet above him in the pine. The eyes glowed in fury and hatred.

He had found men out at last; they died even more easily than the fawn.

He started to turn back to the fallen, and the rifle spoke again.

It was a complete miss, this time; yet the bear leaped in fear when the bullet thwacked into the dust beside him. He did not wait for a third.

His caution suddenly returning to him, and perhaps his anger somewhat satiated by the blow he had dealt Hudson, he crashed into the security of the thicket.

Bruce waited a single instant, hoping for another glimpse of the creature; then ran down to aid Hudson. But in driving the bear from the trapper's helpless body he had already given all the aid that he could.

Understanding came quickly. He had arrived only in time for the Departure,--just a glimpse of a light as it faded. The blow had been more than any human being could survive; even now Hudson was entering upon that strange calm which often, so mercifully, immediately precedes death.

He opened his eyes and looked with some wonder into Bruce's face. The light in them was dimming, fading like a twilight, yet there was indication of neither confusion nor delirium. Hudson, in that last moment of his life, was quite himself.

There was, however, some indication of perplexity at the peculiar turn affairs had taken. "You're not Dave Turner," he said wonderingly.

Dim though the voice was, there was considerable emphasis in the tone.

Hudson seemed quite sure of this point, whether or not he knew anything concerning the dark gates he was about to enter. He wouldn't have spoken greatly different if he had been sitting in perfect health before his own camp fire and the shadow was now already so deep his eyes could scarcely penetrate it.

"No," Bruce answered. "Dave Turner is up a tree. He didn't even wait to shoot."

"Of course he wouldn't." Hudson spoke with a.s.surance. The words dimmed at the end, and he half-closed his eyes as if he were too sleepy to stay awake longer. Then Bruce saw a strange thing. He saw, unmistakable as the sun in the sky, the signs of a curious struggle in the man's face.

There was a singular deepening of the lines, a twitching of the muscles, a queer set to the lips and jaws. They were as much signs of battle as the sound of firing a general hears from far away.

The trapper--a moment before sinking into the calm of death--was fighting desperately for a few moments of respite. There could be no other explanation. And he won it at last,--an interlude of half a dozen breaths. "Who are you?" he whispered.

Bruce bowed his head until his ear was close to the lips. "Bruce Folger," he answered,--for the first time in his knowledge speaking his full name. "Son of Matthew Folger who lived at Trail's End long ago."

The man still struggled. "I knew it," he said. "I saw it--in your face.

I see--everything now. Listen--can you hear me?"

"Yes."

"I just did a wrong--there's a hundred dollars in my pocket that I just got for doing it. I made a promise--to lie to you. Take the money--it ought to be yours, anyway--and hers; and use it toward fighting the wrong. It will go a little way."

"Yes," Bruce looked him full in the eyes. "No matter about the money.

What did you promise Turner?"

"That I'd lie to you. Grip my arms with your hands--till it hurts. I've only got one breath more. Your father held those lands only in trust--the Turners' deed is forged. And the secret agreement that I witnessed is hidden--"

The breath seemed to go out of the man. Bruce shook him by the shoulders. Dave, still in the tree, strained to hear the rest.

"Yes--where?"

"It's hidden--just--out--" The words were no longer audible to Dave, and what followed Bruce also strained to hear in vain. The lips ceased moving. The shadow grew in the eyes, and the lids flickered down over them. A traveler had gone.

Bruce got up, a strange, cold light in his eyes. He glanced up. Dave Turner was climbing slowly down the tree. Bruce made six strides and seized his rifle.

The effect on Dave was ludicrous. He clung fast to the tree limbs, as if he thought a bullet--like a grizzly's claws--could not reach him there.

Bruce laid the gun behind him, then stood waiting with his own weapon resting in his arms.