Читать книгу The Heart of Cherry McBain (Douglas Durkin) (Literary Thoughts Edition) - Douglas Durkin - Страница 6

In another hour King was ready to take the trail again. Beside him stood Cherry, her own black horse waiting only a few yards away.

A dark cloud had risen in the north-east, and King glanced quickly about him at the skies and at the trees rustling noisily in the little breeze that had sprung up.

"It's like rain," he warned her quietly. "Perhaps you'd better not go this time."

The faintest suspicion of a frown passed quickly over her face, but that was all the reply his warning drew from her. Before he could help her she had stepped upon a low-cut stump and had sprung lightly into the saddle.

Keith McBain watched them from his seat near the doorway.

"I'll be looking for you early, my girl," he said.

"I'll be back before it begins to rain," she replied, and turning her horse about started towards the trail.

King got up at once, pausing a moment to bid the old man good-bye before he followed Cherry.

"Look after yourself," the old fellow replied, "and come in next trip. It'll be dull for you now – and we'd be glad to see you."

"I'll come," King replied. "I'd like to come – and I'd like to hear you talk again."

"And send that girl of mine back before she gets too far away," the old fellow called to King who had already started down the pathway.

The clouds that were gathering behind them as they rode westward seemed to hasten the coming of the darkness, although the sun was just setting when they started. Far up the right-of-way, along which the trail ran for a little distance, the western sky was a blaze of glory between the rows of tall trees that stood back from the grade on either side. Once or twice as they rode along King turned in his saddle to look again at the storm clouds gathering in the east. There was little fear of their being overtaken by the storm – it was still a long way off and was coming up very slowly. And yet King wondered that the girl should be so keen upon taking a ride when at any moment the dark bank of heavy thunder clouds might suddenly rush up and force her to ride back through a drenching rain, to say nothing of the thunder and lightning. But such a possibility apparently never entered the mind of Cherry McBain, or if it did she never showed the least concern about it. She urged her horse forward at a steady pace that made King hurry to keep up. Not till they had covered the whole length of the trail lying along the right-of-way and had gone some distance beyond where it turned into the woods and started up the hill did she draw rein. Then she brought her horse slowly to a walk and turned to look behind her. She had not spoken since she left the cabin, and as King drew up with her he ventured to ask if she didn't think she had gone far enough. The look she gave him by way of reply was enough to make him wish he had not spoken.

"Are you really so anxious to have me go back?" she asked.

It was King's turn to look at her in surprise. There was something more than surprise in his voice, however, when he spoke.

"I guess I must have said what wasn't in my mind to say," he replied very quietly. "I don't think you got me quite right there."

Suddenly she brought her horse to a standstill and slipped out of the saddle to the ground.

"Get down and walk for a little while," she said, looking about her as she spoke. "The rain is a long way off yet and I'm not afraid."

King responded by getting down at once. He stood for a moment with the bridle in his hand and waited for her to come up to him. Then they walked slowly side by side along the trail. For a few minutes they proceeded in silence, King waiting for her to begin.

"I was afraid you might want to send me back," she began at last, "and I didn't want to go. I wanted to talk to you. I want to tell you about my father. You saw him to-night, and you know there is something wrong – you couldn't help knowing that as well as I do."

She was not asking a question. She was merely stating a fact in which she confidently expected King's concurrence. The pause was not to give him an opportunity of replying. She wished only to collect her thoughts, to marshal the parts of the story she was about to tell him.

"My father is a railway construction contractor," she went on after she had walked a few yards without speaking. "The men love him – and they hate him – both at the same time. He's generous and he's straight, and he's good – but he's hard in his dealings and he crushes everyone who opposes him. For years he has taken railway contracts and worked in the woods. I was born in a mining camp out west, where my father was prospecting. When I began to grow up I was allowed to spend only a few weeks each summer in camp with him and mother. The rest of the summer I spent with my aunt in Winnipeg, where I went to school. But I never liked it. I always wanted to be with them in the camp. I loved the life and I loved the men and their rough ways. Most of all, I loved my father – my mother was very quiet and very sweet, but my father and I have always been chums."

She paused a moment to pick up a small stick from the road which she sent whirling along the trail ahead of her.

"One day something happened. My mother told me what she knew about it and my father knows that she told me, but he has never spoken to me about it. Two years ago he left my mother and me in the city and went to the coast with some others to look for gold. One of the men was Bill McCartney, who was a teamster for my father during the previous summer. In the spring they came back unexpectedly. Father had written us to tell us that he had made a good strike, but when he came back there was a change. McCartney was with him, and one night they sat all night long and there were loud words between them. In the morning my father told us that he had lost everything and that McCartney was going back to the coast again. He told mother something that made her cry, but he said, 'A bargain is a bargain – and I count this a good bargain.' Those are the only words I ever heard him speak about the affair. McCartney left that night. After that my mother grew sick – and she never got better. Later I came to camp to be with her, and one night she told me that she was dying – she said her heart was breaking – breaking for my father. She told me that some day McCartney would be back – that she hoped she might die before he came. She died last summer and McCartney came back just a few weeks later."

The muscles in King's arms grew rigid and his hands clenched fiercely as his mind rested upon the fragmentary story that Cherry McBain had told him. Instinctively he felt that Bill McCartney had been in some way the cause of the death of Keith McBain's wife.

"There was something more," she said, suddenly breaking in upon his musing. "When McCartney came back my father made him foreman of the camp and ever since then the control of the work has been gradually passing out of father's hands. To make matters worse, father has been drinking until his very mind is going. Some day, I am afraid, he will drink himself to death. And it is not all on account of the loss of my mother. There is something else. The bargain he made with McCartney did not work out satisfactorily. The claim turned out badly and McCartney came back dissatisfied. And now – though he has never said so openly – he has plans of a different kind. Once he met me alone on the trail – he had followed me without my knowing it – and when he tried to be pleasant to me in his own way, I told him to leave me. He grinned and took me by the arm and then – I struck him with my hand across the face. His expression never changed, but he warned me never to do that again – and he spoke of my father. The next day father came to me – his voice broken – his face haggard; he hadn't slept all night. And he told me not to make McCartney angry. He told me to stay away from him – go back to the city – anything, but to keep out of his way and give him no cause for anger. I told my father that I would not leave him – and I won't. But I can't go anywhere without that man shadowing me. I can't speak to one of the men but he comes and forces his attentions upon me, though he knows that I hate him. One thing – he has never offered to touch me again, and I have never had the heart to tell him what I think. I am always thinking of what may happen – and I can see the fear in my father's eyes."

She came a little closer to King and laid her hand on his arm.

"Some day," she said slowly, and her breast rose and fell fitfully as she spoke, "some day he will not wait any longer. I shall have to make my choice. Either I shall smile on him and accept his attentions – or I shall send him away and bring upon myself the complete ruin of a life that is already broken beyond hope of repair."

A faint rumbling of distant thunder caused them both to stop and look behind them.

"It is something new for me to be afraid. I never was afraid before – only there has been a change – a change that I don't like because I don't know how to meet it. The men in the camp have always been good to me. My mother was good to them and they liked her – and I have tried to be good to them. I have always thought they liked me too. But there are some – we meet them once in a while – who can't stand good treatment. They weren't born for it. And McCartney has got a few of that kind with him."

They had come to a ridge overlooking a valley, a sort of ravine, through which a small stream picked its straggling course between the hills. Dusk had already set in and the stream was only faintly visible.

Without announcing her intentions, Cherry dropped her bridle-rein and left her horse standing on the trail while she led the way to a knoll that commanded a better view of the ravine. For a long time she stood looking to the westward where only a faint arc of light was still left low upon the horizon. Her hat was in her hand and the quiet breeze that came from the east blew a few loose locks of her dark hair about her face. King gazed at her intently, and thought of McCartney.

He had picked up a stout tamarac stick on his way to the knoll. It was almost as thick as his wrist and was sound and dry. Without speaking a word and without twitching a muscle of his face he slowly bent the stick in his two hands until it began to snap. Then he twisted it until the frayed ends parted and he held the two ragged bits of stick in his hands. These he flung into a clump of bushes on the slope below.

Cherry looked at him quietly.

"No," she said slowly, "not that – not that. Some day it may have to come – some day I may call you – but not yet."

King smiled gravely.

"I told you last night about my brother, Dick," he said. "Well – Dick is dead."

"King!"

She had never before called him by his first name.

"Yes – I had a letter last night. It was waiting for me when I got down. But that's all gone now – it's past and settled. But this other thing – it has mixed me some. I didn't think I'd ever want to hit a man again. And I'm not looking for McCartney – not for any man," he said, and his eyes turned to the spot where he had thrown the broken stick. "But no man ever found me running – and Bill McCartney won't."

Cherry laid one hand on his arm and looked at him.

"He has gone to town with a lot of men to-night," she said. "They often ride in on Saturday night – that's why we have been able to ride and talk together. He will be there when you get to town – and all day to-morrow. And listen – I'm not afraid – not afraid for you, nor for me. But I don't want you to meet him yet."

King's reply came quietly and with great deliberation.

"I've been in that town since the first tent was pitched," he observed in a voice that was even and showed no excitement. "I've watched it grow up – and I've gone pretty much where I liked. I guess I'll go on in about the same way."

"Oh, I'm not afraid of that," Cherry replied. "I've told you I'm not afraid for you – and not for myself. But if the break should come – "

"I guess you don't need to worry about that," King remarked. "There won't be any break between me and McCartney – not till there's a reason for it."

Cherry went back again to the trail and taking the bridle-rein in her hand led the way down towards the river. King followed her until they came to the roughly-made bridge that spanned the little stream, a hurriedly constructed bridge of tamarac poles that had been thrown into place by the advance parties of railway workers.

"I have never gone farther than this," said Cherry, when they had come to the centre of the bridge. "I often ride out in the evenings and stand here for a while before going back. Some day I am going on to town, just to see what sort of place you have."

"This is the White Pine," said King. "I have crossed it often higher up. It gets very nasty after two or three days' rain."

Suddenly a flash of lightning reminded them that the storm was approaching. While they talked they had all but forgotten the black clouds rolling up from the east. Cherry got up at once upon the stout log that ran along the side of the bridge to keep the poles in place, and putting one foot into the stirrup drew herself up lightly into the saddle. When she was seated she turned and looked at King.

"We shall ride out again some time," she said, and gave him her hand.

He closed his big hand over her fingers for a moment without speaking. When he was about to turn away she clung still to his hand and looked at him very earnestly.

"Why don't you sometimes talk a little?" she asked.

The abruptness with which she asked the question brought the slow smile back to King's face.

"I'm not good at talking," he replied. "Besides – I like to hear you talk."

King had not ventured before in their short acquaintance to offer a compliment. He did not mean to compliment her now. He was speaking his mind simply, directly, sincerely.

She regarded him strangely for a moment in silence.

"Sometimes," she said at last, "sometimes I think – "

She paused a moment and then withdrew her hand suddenly and wheeling her horse about went off at a gallop down the trail, leaving him gazing after her in wonderment.

When she had passed out of sight he looked once at the clouds before getting into the saddle and then, getting up, he gave a sharp whistle that brought Sal bounding to him, and set off along the trail that led to town. Behind him the storm was coming up rapidly.

"It's you for it now," he said to his horse as he leaned forward and stroked the warm neck.

Only once after that did his voice break the silence of the long ride. The first drops of rain brought him suddenly out of his dreaming.

"If you could only talk!" he said to himself, and his voice was full of impatience.

But King Howden was no talker.