Westerfelt Part 12

Wambush stared into the mask of the speaker, and then reluctantly rode away.

Chapter VIII

When Harriet returned she found Westerfelt lying face downward on the floor. In his fall he had unconsciously clutched and torn down the curtain, and like a shroud it lay over him. She was trying to raise him, when the door opened and her mother appeared.

"What's the matter, Harriet?"

"He has fainted--I don't know, he may be dead. Look, mother!"

Mrs. Floyd raised Westerfelt's head and turned his face upward.

"No, he's still breathing." She opened his shirt hastily. "His wound has not broken; we must get him to bed again. How did he happen to be here?"

"He got up as soon as the Whitecaps came; I couldn't persuade him to go back."

"We must carry him to the bed," said Mrs. Floyd. As they started to raise him, Westerfelt opened his eyes, took a long breath, and sat up.

Without a word he rose to his feet, and between them was supported back to his bed.

"His feet are like ice," said Mrs. Floyd, as she tucked the blankets round him. "Why did you let him stand there?"

"It wasn't her fault, Mrs. Floyd," explained Westerfelt, with chattering teeth. "I knew they meant trouble, and thought I ought to be ready."

"You ought to have stayed in bed." Her eyes followed Harriet to the fireplace. "No, daughter," she said, "go lie down; I'll stay here."

"I'd rather neither of you would sit up on my account," protested Westerfelt; "I'm all right; I'll sleep like a log till breakfast. I don't want to be such a bother."

"You ain't a bit of trouble," replied Mrs. Floyd, in a tone that was almost tender. "We are only glad to be able to help. When I saw that cowardly scamp draw his pistol and knife on you, I could 'a' killed him. I've often told Harriet--"

"Mother, Mr. Westerfelt doesn't care to hear anything about him."

Harriet turned from the fire and abruptly left the room. Mrs. Floyd did not finish what she had started to say. Westerfelt looked at her questioningly and then closed his eyes. She went to the fireplace and laid a stick of wood across the andirons, and then sat down and hooded her head with a shawl.

When Westerfelt awoke it was early dawn. The outlines of the room and the different objects in it were indistinct. At the foot of his bed he noticed something which resembled a heap of clothing on a chair. He looked at it steadily, wondering if it could be part of the strange dreams which had beset him in sleep. As the room gradually became lighter, he saw that it was a woman. Mrs. Floyd, he thought--but no, the figure was slighter. It was Harriet. She had taken her mother's place just before daybreak. Her head hung down, but she was not asleep. Presently she looked up, and catching his eyes, rose and came to him.

"How do you feel now?" She touched his forehead with her soft, cool hand.

"I'm all right; I'll be up to breakfast."

"No, you won't; you must not; it would kill you."

"Pshaw! That pin-scratch?" He playfully struck his breast near the wound. "He'd have to cut deeper and rip wider to do me up."

She stifled a cry and caught his hand.

"You must not be so foolish." She started to turn away, but his fingers closed over hers.

"I'm sorry. I'll mind what you say, because you've been so good to me.

It seems mighty queer--Toot Wambush's girl takin' care of the very man he tried to wipe off of the face of creation. No wonder he--"

She twisted her hand from his clasp. "Why do you say _I'm his girl_?"

"Because they all do, I reckon; ain't you? Last night I heard him ask you to follow him."

"You never heard me say I would, did you?"

"No, but--"

"Well, then!" She went to the fireplace. He could not see her, but heard her stirring the fire with a poker, and wondered if her movement was that of anger or agitation, For several minutes neither of them spoke; then she came to him suddenly.

"I forgot," she said; "here's a newspaper and a letter. Will Washburn left them for you." She gave them to him and went to the window and raised the shade, flooding the room with the soft yellowing light from the east. Then she resumed her seat at the fire.

He opened his letter. The handwriting was very crude, and he did not remember having seen it before. Looking at the bottom of the last page, he saw that it was signed by Sue Dawson--Sally Dawson's mother.

It was not dated, and began without heading of any kind. It ran thus:

"So you left this place fur new pastures. But I Will be sworn you went off cause you could not see the sun ashinin on my Childs grave nor meet her old broke down mother face to face. I have wanted to meet you ever since she died, but I helt in. The reason I sent you word not to come to the Funeral was cause I knowed ef I saw you thar I would jump right up before the people and drag you with yore yaller Pumpkin face full of gilt right up to her Box an make you look at yore work. It was not out of respect fur yore feelings that I did not, nuther, fur I dont respect you as much as I do a decent egg-suckin dog, but I was afraid folks would suspicion the pore Child's secret, the secret that me an you an n.o.body else knows, that she took her own life to git out of the misery you put her in. She did not want them to know, an they shall not; besides, thar are Folks in this cussed Settlement mean enough to begrudge her the grave Lot she has becase of what she was driv to.

"Thar is one thing I want you to stop. I dont want you to hire Peter Slogan with Blood money, nur n.o.body else, to haul wood fur me. I knowed you did send a load, fur he is too lazy to think of anybody but hisself without thar was money in it. I accused him of it after I had toted the last Stick back to yore land whar he got it. He tried to deny it, but I saw the lie in his face an shamed it. Dont you bother about me. I will live a powerful sight longer than you want me to before I am through with You. You will never forgit how Sally died, ef you did not look at her pore little face in death nur help the neighbors fill her grave up.

"John Westerfelt, you killed my Child as deliberately as ef you had choked the life out of her with yore Bare hands. You hung after her night and Day, even after she had been cautioned that you was fickle, an then when you got her whole soul an hart you deliberately left her an begun flyin around Liz Lithic.u.m. I know yore sort. It is the runnin after a thing that amuses you, an as soon as you get it you turn agin it an spurn it under foot an laugh at it when it strugles in pain.

Lawsy me. G.o.d Almighty dont inflict good men with that Disease, but you will have it nawin at yore Hart tel you run across some huzzy that will rule you her way. Beware, John Westerfelt, you will want to marry before long; you are a lonely, selfish Man, an you will want a wife an childern to keep you company an make you forget yore evil ways, but it is my constant prayer that you will never git one that loves you. I am prayin for that very thing and I believe it will come. John Westerfelt, I am yore Enemy--I am that ef it drags me into the Scorchin flames of h.e.l.l.

"SUE DAWSON."

He refolded the letter, put it with quivering fingers back into its envelope, and then opened the newspaper and held it before his eyes.

There was a clatter of dishes and pans in the back part of the house.

A negro woman was out in the wood-yard, picking up chips and singing a low camp-meeting hymn. Now and then some one would tramp over the resounding floor, through the hall to the dining-room.

Harriet went to the door and closed it. Then she turned to him. The paper had slipped from his fingers and lay across his breast.

"What shall I get for your breakfast?" she asked. She moved round on the other side of the bed, wondering if it was the yellow morning light or his physical weakness that gave his face such a depressed, ghastly look.

"What did you say?" He stared at her absently.

"What would you like for breakfast?"

He looked towards his coat that hung on the foot of his bed.

"Don't bother about me; I'm going to get up."

"No, you must not." She caught his wrist. "Look how you are quivering; you ought not to have tried to read."

He raised the paper again, but it shook so that its rustling might have been heard across the room. She took it from him, and laid it on a chair by the bed. She looked away; the corners of his mouth were drawn down piteously and his lips were twitching.

"Please hand me my coat," he said.