The Trail of the Axe: A Story of Red Sand Valley

  CHAPTER V

  JIM TRUSCOTT RETURNS

  Dave was on the outskirts of the village when he fell in with ParsonTom. Tom was on ahead, but he saw the great lumbering figure swingingalong the trail behind him, and waited.

  "Hello, Dave," he greeted him, as he came up. "It's ages since I'veseen you."

  The master of the mills laughed good-naturedly.

  "Sure," he said, "my loafing days are over. I'll be ground hollowbefore I'm through. The grindstone's good and going. It's good to be atwork, Tom. I mean what you'd call at your great work. When I'm throughyou shall have the finest church that red pine can build."

  "Ah, it's good to hear you talk like that. I take it things are runningsmoothly. It's not many men who deserve to make millions, but I thinkyou are one of the few."

  Dave shook his head.

  "You're prejudiced about me, Tom," he replied smiling, "but I want thatmoney. And when I get it we'll carry out all our schemes. You know, theschemes we've talked over and planned and planned. Well, when the timecomes, we won't forget 'em----"

  "Like most people do. Hello!" The parson was looking ahead in thedirection of a small crowd standing outside Harley-Smith's saloon.There was an anxious look in his clear blue eyes, and somecomprehension. The crowd was swaying about in unmistakable fashion, andexperience told him that a fight was in progress. He had seen so manyfights in Malkern. Suddenly he turned to Dave--

  "Where are you going?" he inquired.

  "To the depot."

  "Good. I'll just cut along over there. That must be stopped."

  Dave gazed at the swaying crowd. Several men were running to join it.Then he looked down from his great height at the slim, athletic figureof his friend.

  "Do you want any help?" he inquired casually.

  Parson Tom shook his head.

  "No," he said, with a smile of perfect confidence. "They're children,all simple children. Big and awkward and unruly, if you like, but allchildren. I can manage them."

  "I believe you can," said Dave. "Well, so long. Don't be too hard onthem. Remember they're children."

  Tom Chepstow laughed back at him as he hurried away.

  "All right. But unruly children need physical correction as well asmoral. And if it is necessary I shan't spare them."

  He went off at a run, and Dave went on to the depot. He knew his frienddown to his very core. There was no man in the village who was theparson's equal in the noble art of self-defense. And it was part of hiscreed to meet the rougher members of his flock on their own ground. Heknew that this militant churchman would stop that fight, and, ifnecessary, bodily chastise the offenders. It was this wholesomemanliness that had so endeared the "fighting parson" to his people.They loved him for his capacity, and consequently respected him farmore than they would have done the holiest preacher that ever breathed.He was a man they understood.

  The spiritual care of a small lumbering village is not lightly to beentered upon. A man must be peculiarly fitted for it. In such a place,where human nature is always at its crudest; where muscle, and notintellect, must always be the dominant note; where life is livedwithout a thought for the future, and the present concern is only theindividual fitness to execute a maximum of labor, and so giveexpression to a savage vanity in the triumph of brute force, the manwho would set out to guide his fellows must possess qualities all toorare in the general run of clergy. His theology must be of thesimplest, broadest order. He must live the life of his flock, and teachalmost wholly by example. His preaching must be lit with a localsetting, and his brush must lay on the color of his people's every-daylife.

  Besides this, he must possess a tremendous moral and physical courage,particularly the latter, for to the lumber-jack nothing else soappeals. He must feel that he is in the presence of a man who is alwayshis equal, if not his superior, in those things he understands. TomChepstow was all this. He was a lumberman himself at heart. He knewevery detail of the craft. He had lived that life all his manhood'sdays.

  Then he possessed a rare gift in medicine. He had purposely studied itand taken his degrees, for no one knew better than he the strength thisadded to his position. He shed his healing powers upon his people, agift that reaped him a devotion no sanctity and godliness could everhave brought him. Parson Tom was a practical Christian first, andattended only to spiritual welfare when the body had been duly caredfor.

  Dave went on to the depot, where he despatched his messages. Then heextracted from Jenkins Mudley all the information he possessed upon thematter of the plate-layers' strike, and finally took the river trailback to the mills.

  His way took him across the log bridge over the river, and here hepaused, leaning upon the rail, and gazed thoughtfully down the woodlandavenue which enclosed the turbulent stream.

  Somehow he could never cross that bridge without pausing to admire thewonderful beauty of his little friend's surroundings. He always thoughtof this river as his friend. How much it was his friend only he knew.But for it, and its peculiarities, his work would be impossible. He didnot have to do as so many lumbermen have to, depend on the springfreshet to carry his winter cut down to his mill. The melting snows ofthe mountains kept the river flowing, a veritable torrent, during thewhole of the open season, and at such time he possessed in it anever-failing transport line which cost him not one cent.

  The hour he had allowed for his dinner was not yet up, and he felt thathe could indulge himself a little longer, so he refilled his pipe andsmoked while he gazed contemplatively into the depths of the dancingwaters below him.

  But his day-dreaming was promptly interrupted, and the interruption wasthe coming of Betty, on her way home to her dinner from the schoolhouseup on the hillside. He had seen her only once since the day thatbrought him the news of his contract. That was on the following Sunday,when he went, as usual, to Tom Chepstow's for supper.

  Just at that moment Betty was the last person he wanted to see. Thatwas his first thought when he heard her step on the bridge. He hadforgotten that this was her way home, and that this was herdinner-time. However, there was no sign of his reluctance in his facewhen he greeted her.

  "Why, Betty," he said, as gently as his great voice would let him, "Ihadn't thought to see you coming this way." Then he broke off andstudied her pretty oval face more closely. "What's wrong?" he inquiredpresently. "You look--you look kind of tired."

  He was quite right. The girl looked pale under her tan, and there wasan unusual darkness round her gentle brown eyes. She looked very tired,in spite of the smile of welcome with which she greeted him.

  "Oh, I'm all right, Dave," she said at once. But her tone wascheerless, in spite of her best effort.

  He shook his great head and knocked his pipe out.

  "There's something amiss, child. Guess maybe it's the heat." He turnedhis eyes up to the blazing sun, as though to reassure himself that theheat was there.

  Betty leant beside him on the rail. Her proximity, and the evidentsadness of her whole manner, made him realize that he must not staythere. At that moment she looked such a pathetic little figure that hefelt he could not long be responsible for what he said. He longed totake her in his arms and comfort her.

  He could think of nothing to say for a long time, but at last he brokeout with--

  "You'd best not go back to the school this afternoon."

  But the girl shook her head.

  "It's not that," she said. Then she paused. Her eyes were fixed on therushing water as it flowed beneath the bridge.

  He watched her closely, and gradually a conviction began to grow in hismind.

  "Dave," she went on at last, "we've always been such good friends,haven't we? You've always been so patient and kind with me when I havebothered you with my little troubles and worries. You never fail tohelp me out. It seems to me I can never quite do without your help.I--I"--she smiled more like her old self, and with relief the man sawsome of the alarming shadows vanishing from her face, "I don't think Iwant to, either. I've had a long talk with Susan
Hardwig this morning."

  "Ah!"

  The man's growing conviction had received confirmation.

  "What did that mean?" Betty asked quickly.

  Dave was staring out down the river.

  "Just nothing. Only I've had a goodish talk with Joe Hardwig."

  "Then I needn't go into the details. I've heard the news that DickMansell has brought with him."

  It was a long time before either spoke again. For Dave there seemed solittle to say. What could he say? Sympathy was out of the question. Hehad no right to blame Jim yet. Nor did he feel that he could hold outhope to her, for in his heart he believed that the man's news was true.

  With Betty, she hardly knew how to express her feelings. She hardlyknew what her feelings were. At the time Mrs. Hardwig poured her taleinto her ears she had listened quite impersonally. Somehow the storyhad not appealed to her as concerning herself, and her dominant thoughthad been pity for the man. It was not until afterward, when she wasalone on her way to the school, that the full significance of it cameto her; and then it came as a shock. She remembered, all of a sudden,that she was promised to Jim. That when Jim came back she was to marryhim. From that moment the matter had never been out of her mind;through all her school hours it was with her, and her attention hadbeen so distracted from her work that she found her small pupilsgetting out of hand.

  Yes, she was to marry Jim, and they told her he was a drunkard, agambler, and a "crook." She had given him her promise; she had sent himaway. It was her own doing. Her feelings toward him never came into herthoughts. During the long five years of his absence he had become asort of habit to her. She had never thought of her real feelings afterthe first month or two of his going. She was simply waiting for him,and would marry him when he came. It was only now, when she heard thisstory of him, that her feelings were called upon to assert themselves,and the result was something very like horror at her own position.

  She remembered now her disappointment at the first realization of allher hopes, when Jim had asked her to marry him. She had not understoodthen, but now--now she did. She knew that she had never really lovedhim. And at the thought of his return she was filled with horror anddread.

  She was glad that she had met Dave; she had longed to see him. He wasthe one person she could always lean on. And in her present trouble shewanted to lean on him.

  "Dave," she began at last, in a voice so hopeless that it cut him tothe heart, "somehow I believe that story. That is, in the main. Don'tthink it makes any difference to me. I shall marry him just the same.Only I seem to see him in his real light now. He was always weak, onlyI didn't see it then. He was not really the man to go out into theworld to fight alone. We were wrong. I was wrong. He should have stayedhere."

  "Yes," Dave nodded.

  "He must begin over again," she went on, after a pause. "When he comeshere we must help him to a fresh start, and we must blot his past outof our minds altogether. There is time enough. He is young. Now I wantyou to help me. We must ask him no questions. If he wants to speak hecan do so. Now that you are booming at the mills we can help him toreopen his mill, and I know you can, and will, help him by putting workin his way. All this is what I've been thinking out. When he comes, andwe are--married," there was the slightest possible hesitation beforethe word, and Dave's quick ears and quicker senses were swift to hearand interpret it, "I am going to help him with the work. I'll give upmy school. I've always had such a contingency in my mind. That's why Igot you to teach me your work when he first went away. Tell me, Dave,you'll help me in this. You see the boy can't help his weakness.Perhaps we are stronger than he, and between us we can help him."

  The man looked at her a long time in silence, and all the while hisloyal heart was crying out. His gray eyes shone with a light she didnot comprehend. She saw their fixed smile, and only read in them theassent he never withheld from her.

  "I knew you would," she murmured.

  It was her voice that roused him. And he spoke just as she turned awayin the direction of the schoolhouse trail, whence proceeded the soundof a horse galloping.

  "Yes, Betty--I'll help you sure," he said in his deep voice.

  "You'll help him, you mean," she corrected, turning back to him.

  But Dave ignored the correction.

  "Tell me, Betty," he went on again, this time with evident diffidence:"you're glad he's coming back? You feel happy about--about gettingmarried? You--love him?"

  The girl stared straight up into the plain face. Her look was sohonest, so full of decision, that her reply left no more to be said.

  "Five years ago I gave him my promise. That promise I shall redeem,unless Jim, himself, makes its fulfilment impossible."

  The man nodded.

  "You can come to me for anything you need for him," he said simply.

  Betty was about to answer with an outburst of gratitude when, with arush, a horseman came galloping round the bend of the trail andclattered on to the bridge. At sight of the two figures standing by therail the horse jibbed, threw himself on to his haunches, and then shiedso violently that the rider was unseated and half out of the saddle,clinging desperately to the animal's neck to right himself. And as hehung there struggling, the string of filthy oaths that were hurled atthe horse, and any and everybody, was so foul that Betty tried to stopher ears.

  Dave sprang at the horse and seized the bridle with one hand, with theother he grabbed the horseman and thrust him up into the saddle. Thefeat could only have been performed by a man of his herculean strength.

  "Cut that language, you gopher!" he roared into the fellow's ears as helifted him.

  "Cut the language!" cried the infuriated man. "What in hell are youstanding on a bridge spooning your girl for? This bridge ain't for thatsort of truck--it's for traffic, curse you!"

  By the time the man had finished speaking he had straightened up in thesaddle, and his face was visible to all. Dave jumped back, and Bettygave a little cry. It was Jim Truscott!

  Yes, it was Jim Truscott, but so changed that even Betty could scarcelybelieve the evidence of her eyes. In place of the bright,clever-looking face, the slim figure she had always had in her mindduring the long five years of his absence, she now beheld a bloated,bearded man, without one particle of the old refinement which had beenone of his most pronounced characteristics. It seemed incredible thatfive years could have so changed him. Even his voice was almostunrecognizable, so husky had it become. His eyes no longer had theirlook of frank honesty, they were dull and lustreless, and leeredmorosely. Her heart sank as she looked at him, and she remembered DickMansell's story.

  All three stared for a moment without speaking. Then Jim broke into alaugh so harsh that it made the girl shudder.

  "Well I'm damned!" he cried. "Of all the welcomes home this beats hell!"

  "Jim--oh, Jim!"

  The cry of horror and pain was literally wrung from the girl. Nor wasit without effect. The man seemed to realize his uncouthness, for hesuddenly took off his hat, and his face became serious.

  "I beg your pardon, Betty," he said apologetically. "I forgot where Iwas. I forgot that the Yukon was behind me, and----"

  "That you're talking to the lady you're engaged to be married to," putin Dave sharply.

  Dave's words drew the younger man's attention to himself. For a seconda malicious flash shone in the bloated eyes. Then he dropped them andheld out his hand.

  "How do, Dave?" he said coldly.

  Dave responded without any enthusiasm. He was chilled, chilled andhorrified, and he knew that Mansell's story was no exaggeration. Hewatched Jim turn again to Betty. He saw the strained look in the girl'seyes, and he waited.

  "I'll come along up to the house later," Jim said coolly. "Guess I'llget along to the hotel and get cleaned some. I allow I ain't fit forparty calls at a hog pen just about now. So long."

  He jabbed his horse's sides with his heels and dashed across thebridge. In a moment he was gone.

  It was some time before a word was spoken on the
bridge. Dave waswaiting, and Betty could find no words. She was frightened. She wantedto cry, and through it all her heart felt like lead in her bosom. Buther dominant feeling was fear.

  "Well, little Betty," said Dave presently, in that gentle protectingmanner he so often assumed toward her, "I must go on to the mills. Whatare you going to do?"

  "I'm going home," she said; and to the keenly sympathetic ears of theman the note of misery in her voice was all too plain.