The Huntress

While rage gnawed at Husky's vitals, and he tried not to show it, Big Jack shook the cup with cool confidence and tossed the dice on the floor. Strange if he could not beat three! The little cubes rolled, staggered, and came to a stop. For a second the four stared incredulously. A pair of ones!

An extraordinary change took place in Husky. He grunted and blinked. Suddenly he threw back his head and roared with laughter. Big Jack steeled himself, shrugged, and rose. Going to the fire-place, he tapped the ashes out of his pipe and prepared to fill it again.

"'Tain't for me to kick," he said coolly; "since I got it up!" Jack deserved better at the hands of fortune.

The cup passed to Joe again. He shook it interminably.

"Ah, shoot!" growled Shand.

Whereupon Joe put down the cup and prepared to engage in another snarling argument. Only a combined threat from the three to put him out of the game forced him to play. He got five, and suddenly became quiet and anxious.

Shand threw four, whereupon Joe's little soul rebounded in the air again. Husky got eight. Shand rose without a word and crossed the room to the door.

"Wait till the game is over," said Big Jack quietly. "We'll all go out together and save trouble."

Young Joe, once more in possession of the cup, was unable to get up sufficient nerve to make the fateful cast. He shook it as if he meant to wear a hole in the tin. He offered to let Husky shoot first, and when he refused tried to pick a quarrel with him.

Finally Big Jack drew out his watch. "Ten seconds," he said, "or you forfeit. Are you with me, Shand?"

"Sure!" muttered the other.

Joe, with a groan of nervous apprehension, made his cast. He got a ten. Another reaction took place in him.

"Let me see you beat that!" he cried offensively. "I'm all right!" He smirked at the girl.

Husky picked up the dice and with one hasty shake tossed them out. By this time he had had as much suspense as he could stand. His nervous cast sent the cubes flying wide. One turned up a five between them. The other rolled beyond Joe. They had to crawl on hands and knees to see it. Six black spots were revealed.

"Eleven!" roared Husky. "I win!"

Joe's self-control gave way altogether. Tears were in his voice. "Do it over!" he cried. "You got to do it over! It wasn't on the table! You never shook the cup! I won't stand for it!"

Husky, having won, blissfully calmed down. "Ah, you short sport," he contemptuously retorted, "you deserve to lose!"

Joe sprang up with a tearful oath. "I won't stand for it!" he cried. "I said I wouldn't stand by a throw of the dice. You've got to fight me!"

Big Jack, expecting something of the kind, intervened from one side, Shand from the other. Joe's arms were promptly pinned behind him. He struggled impotently, tears of rage coursing down his cheeks.

"You fool!" said Jack. "We told you we'd see fair play done. What can you do against the three of us? If he had lost we would have done the same for you. Go outside, or we'll drag you."

Joe finally submitted. They released him. Still muttering, he went out without looking back.

"Come on!" said Big Jack brusquely to Sam. "You are the contract."

Another and an unexpected mutiny awaited them here. Sam very promptly arose from among his tins and turned on Big Jack. He had become as pale as Shand, but his eyes were hot enough. His lips were compressed to a thin line.

"Yes, I heard it!" he cried. "And a rotten, cowardly frame-up I call it! We never lacked for hospitality from her people. And this is the way you repay it. With your mouth full of talk about fair play, too. You make me sick!"

For an instant they stared at him flabbergasted. For the masters to be bearded by a humble grub-rider was incredible. Husky, the one most concerned, was the first to recover himself. Flushing darkly, he took a step toward Sam with clenched fists.

"Shut up, you cook!" he harshly cried. "It's none of your put! You stick to dish-washing and let your betters alone, if you know what's good for you!"

Sam's pale cheeks flamed and paled again. Instead of falling back, he took another step toward Husky.

"You can't shout me down, you bully," he said quietly in his face. "You know I'm right. And you all know it."

Husky towered over the slight figure.

"Get out," he roared, "before I smash you!"

"Go ahead!" said Sam, without budging. "I'm not afraid of you!"

For the first time, the girl seemed really interested. Her nostrils were slightly distended. Her glance flew from face to face. There was a pregnant pause. Husky's great fist was raised. But not having struck on the instant, he could not strike at all. Under the blaze of the smaller man's eyes, his own glance finally bolted. He turned away with an assumption of facetiousness.

"Take him away," he said to his mates, "before I kill him."

An audible breath escaped the girl. She turned back to the fire.

Jack and Shand looked disconcerted by Sam's accusation; nevertheless, obsessed by their fetish of fair play, they had to see the thing through. Jack in particular, having proposed the game and having lost, was bound by his code to assist Husky.

They seized Sam between them and started to drag him toward the door. Sam struggled desperately and vainly in their grasp. Joe, attracted by the raised voices, had run in again. He, for his own ends, showed a disposition to help Sam. Jack overawed him with a look.

"Come along," he commanded.

The girl showed no further concern in the matter. Sam, observing her, suddenly ceased to struggle.

Outside the door they released him. When the four of them were joined together, they paused for a moment to decide which direction they should take.

"That sand-bank at the mouth of the creek," suggested Jack.

The sound of a shot rang muffled in the cabin behind them.

For an instant they were stupefied. A strange joy lightened Sam's breast. Dropping their bundles, they ran back, and, flinging the door open, stood back warily, half expecting to be received with a fusillade.

The smell of gunpowder assailed their nostrils. The light of the fire revealed Husky's burly figure sprawling on his back, with his feet among the tin dishes on the hearth. The girl was not to be seen.

They cautiously ventured in. She was not behind the door. She could not have gone out by the door without their knowing it, for they had been within ten paces. Both windows were intact. The only possible place of concealment within the shack was the bed. A swift investigation proved that there was nothing in it or under it.

The old feeling of awe of the supernatural returned. They avoided each other's eyes. The figure on the floor stirred a little and groaned. A dark, wet stain was spreading on his shirt. Jack dropped to his knees beside him.

"Through the shoulder," he said to the others. "No vital organ."

"Can you hear me?" he asked of the wounded man.

"A she-devil!" muttered Husky. "A devil!"

"Where did she go?"

"I don't know. Everything turned black. A devil – had a gun in her dress! Speaks English, too. Understood every word!"

None of Husky's mates had any skill in surgery. Like men in the flush of their strength, they refused to harbour the thought of injury or disease, and had come to the wilderness ill provided.

Jack, lacking antiseptics or healing medicaments, bound up the shoulder roughly. They laid Husky on the bed and endeavoured to forget him. Jack, Shand, and Joe elected to sleep in the stable to escape the injured man's stertorous breathing and his groans. They took care to bar themselves in against the terrors of the night.

Sam was glad to see them go. Their endless and futile discussion of what had happened tried his temper.

In the morning Husky was feverish. His mates shrugged and left him to Sam. Their attitude toward the injured one was as naive as that of children or animals.

Sam had no love for the gross figure on the bed, who, he felt, had earned what he got. Nevertheless, he did what offices humanity suggested; washing the wound and redressing it; bringing ice from the lake shore to mitigate his fever. He had to smile at Husky's changed tone in his lucid moments.

"Do you think this will croak me?" he continually asked. "Lord, I ain't ready to die! I leave it to you, cook; shouldn't a man have some warning of his end? Lord, if I get over this I'll lead a different life! I swear I will! Lord, think of dying in a God-forsaken place like this without a parson to clear the track for you! It ain't fair to catch you like this. Not even a Bible in the outfit!"

"I have a Bible," said Sam grimly.

"Get it for me; there's a good fellow," begged Husky.

Sam did so. "Do you want me to read it to you?" he asked.

"No use," said Husky. "Couldn't never get the hang of it. But let me have it here in bed with me. That's something."

As the day wore on the patient grew worse, and the other men became more and more chary of approaching him. However, toward the end of the afternoon, a cold squall of rain drove them indoors in spite of themselves.

They squatted on the floor at the farthest possible distance from the bed and half-heartedly dealt the cards for euchre. Meanwhile Sam busied himself baking bread, trying to remember what he could of the girl's deft technique. He could think of her now with a pleasant warmth about the heart. She had redeemed her sex in his eyes.

Careless of whether he heard them, the men joked outrageously about Husky's condition. It was their way of hiding their helpless terror.

"Well, old Husk is bound for the heavenly shore, I guess," said Jack.

"We'll give him a bang-up funeral," suggested Joe. "Spill a little booze and carve a board to put at his head. It's the least we can do for a pal."

"When Husk gets to the golden gates," Jack went on, "if Peter tries to hold him up, he'll say, 'What is it worth to you, old man?'"

This well-known saying of their partner produced a subdued laugh all around.

Black Shand remarked in his curt way: "Husky wouldn't get along in heaven. Ain't got no ear for music."

"He'd be in trouble down below, too," said Jack. "He'd undertake to show the Old Boy himself how to build a fire."

Outside the pine branches thrashed wildly, and gusts of rain were flung against the panes of the little window above the players' heads. Water found its way through more than one place in the sod roof and dripped sullenly on the floor. From time to time the game shifted, seeking a dry spot.

On such a day the pioneers were keenly conscious of their isolation. The emptiness of the land seemed to press upon their breasts, hindering free breathing. Moreover, their nerves were still jangling as a result of the night's events.

Such was their situation when, without warning, the latch of the door clicked.

They froze in their card-playing attitudes, turning horrified eyes in the direction of the sound. The door opened inward, and a ghastly moment passed before they could see what was behind it. Then each man's breath escaped with a little sound of amazement and awe.

It was Bela.

CHAPTER VI

A FRESH SURPRISE

Raindrops sparkled like diamonds in Bela's dark hair and upon her glowing cheeks. She was, as ever, composed and inscrutable. In one swift glance around she took in the whole scene – the cardplayers under the window, Sam arrested at his pan of dough, and the injured man breathing hard upon the bed.

She went toward the latter with a noiseless, gliding motion.

"Mak' water hot," she said coolly over her shoulder to Sam. "Get clean rags for bandage."

Jack and his mates, hearing the English speech, glanced at each other meaningly. Nevertheless, speech humanized her, and they relaxed.

There was no leaping up of the unholy fires of the night before. They regarded her with great, new respect. They remained sitting motionless, absorbed in her every move, like the spectators of a play.

At the sound of her voice the injured man opened his eyes with a grunt. Seeing her, he rolled away as far as he could get on the bed, crying out in mingled pain and terror:

"Keep her away! Keep her away! Don't let her get me!"

Bela fell back with a scornful smile.

"Tell him I not hurt him," she said to Sam, who had gone to her. "Tell him I come to mak' him well."

Sam sought in vain to reassure Husky.

"I won't let her touch me!" the injured man cried. "She's a witch!"

"Let be," she said to Sam, shrugging. "I tell you w'at to do."

Under her direction Sam cut away his own rude bandage from Husky's shoulder and washed the wound. The bullet had gone cleanly through. Meanwhile Bela was macerating some leaves she had brought. She showed Sam how to apply the mass to the wound before rebandaging it. Husky strained away.

"Poison! Poison!" he cried. "Keep her away from me!"

"You crazy!" said Bela impatiently. "Look at me!"

She chewed some of the poultice and swallowed it before Husky's eyes.

"Are you afraid, too?" she asked Sam.

He shook his head, smiling, and ate one of the leaves.

But Husky, notwithstanding the evidence of his eyes, continued to cry out and to resist their ministrations.

"All right," said Bela at last. "I can't do not'ing. He got die, I guess." She started for the door.

A swift reaction passed over Husky. All in the same breath with his protests he began to beg her not to desert him. She came back, and he made no further objections to having her dress and bind his wound.

When it was all done, she made for the door again as coolly as she had come. Sam experienced a sudden sinking of the heart.

"Are you going?" he cried involuntarily.

Big Jack jumped up at the same moment. "Don't go yet," he begged.

Jack and the others had recovered sufficiently from the shock of their surprise to discuss in whispers what they should say to her.

"I come back to-morrow," said Bela. "I go home now to get medicine."

"Where do you live?" asked Jack.

"I not tell you," she answered coolly.

The sound of a snicker behind him brought a scowl to Jack's face. "I could easily find out," he muttered.

"If you follow me, I not come back," she announced.

"No offence," said Jack hastily. "But – it's darned funny. I leave it to you. Your coming and going like this. How did you get out last night?"

"I not tell you," she said again.

"'Tain't no wonder Husky's a bit leary of you. We all think – "

"What you think?" she asked mockingly.

"Well, we think it's funny," Jack repeated lamely.

"I don't care what you think," she retorted.

"Tell me one thing," said Jack. "What did you come here for first off?"

"Yes, I tell you what I come for," the girl said with a direct look. "I want see what white men lak. My fat'er him white man. I never see him. Him good man, good to women. So I think all white men good to women. I think no harm. I come here. I play trick for to mak' fun and be friends. Now I know ot'er white men not lak my fat'er. Now I look out for myself."

Big Jack had the grace to scowl shamefacedly and look away.

"Say, that's right," he muttered. "You're dead right, sister. We got in wrong. I'm sorry. These other fellows, they're sorry, too. We made it up together to tell you we was sorry. Give us a chance to show you we ain't plumb rotten."

The girl dimpled like a white woman. No walled look then.

"All right," she said. "I come to-morrow early. I be your friend."

When the next squall swooped down from the southerly hills, Bela set off in her dugout from the mouth of the creek. The wind helped carry her in the direction she wanted to go, and the sheets of rain hid her from the view of anyone who might be looking out from the shack.

Her Indian upbringing had taught her to disregard bodily comfort. Streaming like a mermaid, she crouched in her canoe, paddling with the regularity of a machine.

In two hours she had reached the other shore. By this time it had cleared, and the late sun was sending long, golden rays down the lake.

She found a scene of industry in the village, for the fishing had started in earnest. The women were splitting and cleaning the day's catch, and hanging the fish on racks to cure in the smoke of the fires. No surprise was elicited by her arrival. Bela had always gone and come as she chose.

Outside Charley's teepee she found her mother. Loseis's eyes lighted up at the sight of her, but she said nothing. She followed her into the teepee and unexpectedly seized and kissed her. They were mutually embarrassed. Bela had not learned to kiss among the tribe. Charley came in scowling.

"The fish are running," he said. "Everybody is working now. If you not work you get no fish."

"Keep your fish," said Bela.

In that teepee she was mum as to her adventures. Having changed her clothes in her own little bower in the pines, she sought out Musq'oosis and told him her story.

Musq'oosis was a little sore. He listened, smoking impassively and tending his share of the fish hanging in the smoke. Meanwhile the sun went down in troubled crimson splendour over the pines, presaging more squalls.

When she came to the end he said sententiously: "You foolish go alone. You want a man."

Bela was mum.

"What you want of me now?" he asked.

"Grease for the wound," said Bela. "A little food for myself."

"All right. I give you. You goin' back?"

"To-night."

"I go with you," suggested Musq'oosis.

Bela shook her head a little sullenly.

She had good reasons, but it was difficult to explain them.

"I got go alone," she said.

"All right," replied Musq'oosis huffily. "Why you want talk to me?"

Bela glanced at him appealingly. "You speak me good words," she said. "You moch my friend. But I go alone. I can't tell it good. When I alone I keep myself moch secret lak you tell me. They not see me come and go; think I got magic. They scare of me."

"All right," repeated Musq'oosis. "I lak sleep in my teepee. What you goin' do when you go back?"

"When the bishop come I goin' marry the cook," said Bela calmly.

"Um," grunted Musq'oosis. "Is he the bigges'?"

"No," answered Bela. "He littles'. I watch him. He got stronges' eye."

"So?"

"He is a pretty man," she said, suddenly lowering her head. "He mak' me want him bad. His eyes lak the sky at tam wild roses come. Hair bright lak mink-skin. He has kindness for women lak my fat'er got."

"H-m!" growled Musq'oosis; "you talk lak white woman."

"Tell me how to get him," said Bela simply.

Musq'oosis affected scorn. "Wa! All tam ask me what to do. Then go do what you lak, anyhow."

"You have good words," she put in meekly.

"I tell you before," grumbled Musq'oosis. "Don't let him see you want him or he never want you."

"I think he not want me moch," said Bela dejectedly. "Not lak ot'er men."

"Wait a while," encouraged Musq'oosis. "Hard wood slow to catch, but burn longer. I tell you again – keep your mouth shut. Don't let anythin' on. If ot'er men think you want the cook, they kill him maybe. White men sometam crazy lak that. You mus' all same mak' friends wit' all. Ask moch question. Watch them well. When you know their ways, you know what to do. Bam-by maybe you get your man to leave the ot'ers. Then it is easy."

"I do all you tell me," promised Bela.

"Come home to-morrow night," he said.

She rebelled at this. "No. I lak stay there. I can't be paddling over every day. Too far."

"Are you a fool?" asked Musq'oosis, exasperated. "Where you goin' stay at night?"

"I got little cache by the creek," she replied. "They no good in the bush. Can't see not'ing. I fool them all I lak. They never find me."

"Watch yourself," advised Musq'oosis. "It's a dangerous game."

"I got my little gun," she returned, tapping her breast. "They plenty scare of me now."

As soon as it cleared up Young Joe casually remarked that he guessed he'd wash his shirt and let it dry before the fire while he slept. Big Jack and Shand both allowed that it was a good idea, and presently the three of them were squatting together by the creek, sousing their garments in the icy water.

Later Jack and Joe made a dicker to cut each other's hair. Shand, hearing of this, was obliged to part with a necktie to get Jack to cut his also. A general shave ended the ablutions. This was remarkable, for Joe had shaved only the day before.

"A fellow hadn't ought to let himself get careless up in the bush," he opined.

There was a great beating and shaking of clothes, and a combined cleaning of the shack. Sam made a broom out of willow branches; Jack cut some poles, out of which he designed to make a chair after supper.

"She's got to have something to sit in when she's watching beside Husky's bed like," he said.

It did not occur to him that Bela had probably never in her life before sat in a chair.

"You're damned lucky to get her to nurse you after you brought it on yourself," Joe said to Husky.

Husky was now looking forward to her return no less than the others. He had taken a turn for the better, and no longer thought of dying.

After supper a high degree of amity prevailed in the shack. Joe and Shand helped with the chair, and then they all planned to make a table next day.

"Shand, lend a hand with this piece while I drive a nail, will you?" requested Jack politely.

"Sure thing! Say this is going to be out o' sight! You certainly have a good knack of making things, Jack."

"Oh, so-so. I ought to have a flat piece to put on the seat."

"I'll go out to the stable and see if I can find a box-cover."

"You stay here. I'll go," said Joe.

Sam, washing the dishes, harkened to this, and smiled a little grimly to himself, wondering how long it would last.

They retired early. The bed was given up to Husky, and the other four rolled up in their blankets across the room like a row of mummies. Calm brooded over the shack throughout the night.

Sam had not had so much time as the others to make himself presentable the night before, so he got up extra early for that purpose. Issuing out of the shack with soap, towel, razor, and glass, the first thing he beheld on rounding the shack was Bela. She was kneeling on a piece of wood to protect her knees from the wet ground, tearing and rolling some pieces of cotton for bandages.

She was dressed differently to-day – all in buckskin.

The newly risen sun was behind her, shooting misty beams across a lake of mother-of-pearl. The artist, latent in every man, arrested Sam, forcing him to wonder and admire.

Bela looked up calmly. "I waitin' till the men get up," she remarked.

"I'll call them," he offered, making a move to turn.

"Let them sleep," commanded Bela. "It is early."

Sam became uncomfortably conscious of his unkempt condition. "You caught me unawares," he said. "I haven't washed up yet."

She glanced at him sidewise. Had he known it, he did not appear altogether at a disadvantage with his fair hair tousled and his shirt open at the throat.

"I don't care," she said, with a child's air of unconcern.

Presently she caught sight of the razor. "You got hair grow on your chin, too? That is fonny thing. Ot'er day I watch the curly-head one scrape his face. He not see me. What for you want scrape your face?"

Sam blushed. "Oh, it looks like a hobo if you don't," he stammered.

She repeated the word with a comical face. "What is hobo?"

"Oh, a tramp, a loafer, a bum."

"I on'erstan'," she said. "We got hoboes, too. My mot'er's 'osban' is a hobo."

She looked at his chin again. "Bishop Lajeunesse not scrape his chin," she stated. "Got long hair, so. He is fine man."

Sam, not knowing exactly what to say, remained silent. He found it difficult to accommodate himself to a conversational Bela. She was much changed in the morning light from the inscrutable figure of the fire-side. Ten times more human and charming, it is true, but on that account the more disconcerting to a young man, without experience of the sex. Moreover, her beauty took his breath away. Bela watched his blushes with interest.

"What mak' your face hot?" she asked. "There is no fire."

He could not but believe she was making fun of him. "Ah! cut it out!" he growled.

"White men fonny," said Bela, rolling her strips of cotton.