_ BOOK TWO
CHAPTER XXV. HARRY KING LEAVES THE MOUNTAIN
When the two men bade Amalia and her mother good night and took their way to the fodder shed, the snow was whirling and drifting around the cabin, and the pathway was obliterated.
"This'll be the last storm of the year, I'm thinking," said Larry. But the younger man strode on without making a reply. He bent forward, leaning against the wind, and in silence trod a path for his friend through the drifted heaps. At the door of the shed he stood back to let Larry pass.
"I'll not go in yet. I'll tramp about in the snow a bit until--Don't sit up for me--" He turned swiftly away into the night, but Larry caught him by the arm and brought him back.
"Come in with me, lad; I'm lonely. We'll smoke together, then we'll sleep well enough."
Then Harry went in and built up the fire, throwing on logs until the shed was flooded with light and the bare rock wall seemed to leap forward in the brilliance, but he did not smoke; he paced restlessly about and at last crept into his bunk and lay with his face to the wall. Larry sat long before the fire. "It's the music that's got in my blood," he said. "Katherine could sing and lilt the Scotch airs like a bird. She had a touch for the instrument, too."
But Harry could not respond to his friend's attempted confidence in the rare mention of his wife's name. He lay staring at the rough stone wall close to his face, and it seemed to him that his future was bounded by a barrier as implacable and terrible as that. All through the night he heard the deep tones of Madam Manovska's voice, and the visions of the poem passed through his mind. He saw the strange old man, the murderer, Cain, seated in the tomb, bowed and remorseful, and in the darkness still the Eye. But side by side with this somber vision he saw the interior of the cabin, and Amalia, glowing and warm and splendid in her rich gown, with the red firelight playing over her, leaning toward him, her wonderful eyes fixed on his with a regard at once inscrutable and sympathetic. It was as if she were looking into his heart, but did not wish him to know that she saw so deeply.
Towards morning the snow clouds were swept from the sky, and a late moon shone out clear and cold upon a world carved crisply out of molten silver. Unable longer to bear that waking torture, Harry King rose and went out into the night, leaving his friend quietly sleeping. He stood a moment listening to Larry's long, calm breathing; then buttoning his coat warmly across his chest, he closed the shed door softly behind him and floundered off into the drifts, without heeding the direction he was taking, until he found himself on the brink of the chasm where the river, sliding smoothly over the rocks high above his head, was forever tumbling.
There he stood, trembling, but not with cold, nor with cowardice, nor with fatigue. Sanity had come upon him. He would do no untoward act to hurt the three people who would grieve for him. He would bear the hurt of forever loving in silence, and continue to wait for the open road that would lead him to prison and disgrace, or maybe a death of shame. He considered, as often before, all the arguments that continually fretted him and tore his spirit; and, as before, he knew the only course to follow was the hard one which took him back to Amalia, until spring and the melting of the snows released him--to live near her, to see her and hear her voice, even touch her hand, and feel his body grow tense and hard, suffering restraint. If only for one moment he might let himself go! If but once again he might touch her lips with his! Ah, God! If he might say one word of love--only once before leaving her forever!
Standing there looking out upon the world beneath him and above him bathed in the immaculate whiteness of the snow, and the moonlight over all, he perceived how small an atom in the universe is one lone man, yet how overwhelmingly great in his power to love. It seemed to him that his love overtopped the hills and swept to the very throne of God. He was exalted by it, and in this exaltation it was that he trembled. Would it lift him up to triumph over remorse and death?
He turned and plodded back the inevitable way. It was still night--cold and silver-white. He was filled with energy born of great renunciation and despair, and could only calm himself by work. If he could only work until he dropped, or fight with the elements, it would help him. He began clearing the snow from the ground around the cabin and cut the path through to the shed; then he quietly entered and found Larry still calmly sleeping as if but a moment had passed. Finally, he secured one of the torches and made his way through the tunnel to the place where Larry and he had found the quartz which they had smelted in the evening.
There he fastened the torch securely in a crevice, and began to swing his pick and batter recklessly at the overhanging ledge. Never had he worked so furiously, and the earth and stone lay all about him and heaped at his feet. Deeper and deeper he fought and cut into the solid wall, until, grimed with sweat and dirt, he sank exhausted upon the pile of quartz he had loosened. Then he shoveled it to one side and began again dealing erratic blows with his spent strength, until the ledge hung dangerously over him. As it was, he reeled and swayed and struck again, and staggered back to gather strength for another blow, leaning on his pick, and this saved him from death; for, during the instant's pause, the whole mass fell crashing in front of him, and he went down with it, stunned and bleeding, but not crushed.
Larry Kildene breakfasted and worked about the cabin and the shed half the day before he began to wonder at the young man's absence. He fell to grumbling that Harry had not fed and groomed his horse, and did the work himself. Noon came, and Amalia looked in his face anxiously as he entered and Harry not with him.
"How is it that Mr. 'Arry have not arrive all this day?"
"Oh, he's mooning somewhere. Off on a tramp I suppose."
"Has he then his gun? No?"
"No, but he's been about. He cleared away all the snow, and I saw he had been over to the fall." Amalia turned pale as the shrewd old man's eyes rested on her. "He came back early, though, for I saw footprints both ways."
"I hope he comes soon, for we have the good soup to-day, of the kind Mr. 'Arry so well likes."
But he did not come soon, and it was with much misgiving that Larry set out to search for him. Finding no trails leading anywhere except the twice trodden one to the fall, he naturally turned into the mine and followed along the path, torch in hand, hallooing jovially as he went, but his voice only returned to him, reverberating hollowly. Then, remembering the ledge where they had last worked, and how he had meant to put in props before cutting away any more, he ran forward, certain of calamity, and found his young friend lying where he had fallen, the blood still oozing from a cut above the temple, where it had clotted.
For a moment Larry stood aghast, thinking him dead, but quickly seeing the fresh blood, he lifted the limp body and bound up the wound, and then Harry opened his eyes and smiled in Larry's face. The big man in his joy could do nothing but storm and scold.
"Didn't I tell ye to do no more here until we'd the props in? I'm thinking you're a fool, and that's what you are. If I didn't tell ye we needed them here, you could have seen it for yourself--and here you've cut away all underneath. What did you do it for? I say!" Tenderly he gathered Harry in his arms and lifted him from the débris and loosened rock. "Now! Are you hurt anywhere else? Don't try to stand. Bear on me. I say, bear on me."
"Oh, put me down and let me walk. I'm not hurt. Just a cut. How long have you been here?"
"Walk! I say! Yes, walk! Put your arm here, across my shoulder, so. You can walk as well as a week-old baby. You've lost blood enough to kill a man." So Larry carried him in spite of himself, and laid him in his bunk. There he stood, panting, and looking down on him. "You're heavier by a few pounds than when I toted you down that trail last fall."
"This is all foolishness. I could have made it myself--on foot," said Harry, ungratefully, but he smiled up in the older man's face a compensating smile.
"Oh, yes. You can lie there and grin now. And you'll continue to lie there until I let you up. It's no more lessons with Amalia and no more violin and poetry for you, for one while, young man."
"Thank God. It will help me over the time until the trail is open." Larry stood staring foolishly on the drawn face and quivering, sensitive lips.
"You're hungry, that's what you are," he said conclusively.
"Guess I am. I'm wretchedly sorry to make you all this trouble, but--she mustn't come in here--you'll bring me a bite to eat--yes, I'm hungry. That's what ails me." He drew a grimy hand across his eyes and felt the bandage. "Why--you've done me up! I must have had quite a cut."
"I'll wash your face and get your coat off, and your boots, and make you fit to look at, and then--"
"I don't want to see her--or her mother--either. I'm just--I'm a bit faint--I'll eat if--you'll fetch me a bite."
Quickly Larry removed his outer clothing and mended the fire and then left him carefully wrapped in blankets and settled in his bunk. When he returned, he found him light-headed and moaning and talking incoherently. Only a few words could he understand, and these remained in his memory.
"When I'm dead--when I'm dead, I say." And then, "Not yet. I can't tell him yet.--I can't tell him the truth. It's too cruel." And again the refrain: "When I'm dead--when I'm dead." But when Larry bent over him and spoke, Harry looked sanely in his eyes and smiled again.
"Ah, that's good," he said, sipping the soup. "I'll be myself again to-morrow, and save you all this trouble. You know I must have accomplished a good deal, to break off that ledge, and the gold fairly leaped out on me as I worked."
"Did you see it?"
"No, but I knew it--I felt it. Shake my clothes and see if they aren't full of it."
"Was that what put you in such a frenzy and made a fool of you?"
"Yes--no--no. It--it--wasn't that."
"You know you were a fool, don't you?"
"If telling me of it makes me know it--yes."
"Eat a little more. Here are beans and venison. You must eat to make up the loss. Why, man, I found you in a pool of blood."
"Oh, I'll make it up. I'll make it up all too soon. I'm not to die so easily."
"You'll not make it up as soon as you think, young man. You may lose a quart of blood in a minute, but it takes weeks to get it again," and Harry King found his friend was right.
That was the last snow of winter, as Larry had predicted, and when Harry crawled out in the sun, the earth smelled of spring, and the waterfall thundered in its downward plunge, augmented by the melting snows of the still higher mountains. The noise of it was ever in their ears, and the sound seemed fraught with a buoyant impulse and inspiration--the whirl and rush of a tremendous force, giving a sense of superhuman power. Even after he was really able to walk about and help himself, Harry would not allow himself to see Amalia. He forbade Larry to tell them how much he was improved, and still taxed his friend to bring him up his meals, and sit by him, telling him the tales of his life.
"I'll wait on you here no longer, boy," said Larry, at last. "What in life are you hiding in this shed for? The women think it strange of you--the mother does, anyway,--you may never quite know what her daughter thinks unless she wishes you to know, but I'm sure she thinks strange of you. She ought to."
"I know. I'm perfectly well and strong. The trail's open now, and I'll go--I'll go back--where I came from. You've been good to me--I can't say any more--now."
"Smoke a pipe, lad, smoke a pipe."
Harry took a pipe and laughed. "You're better than any pipe, but I'll smoke it, and I'll go down, yes, I must, and bid them good-by."
"And will you have nothing to tell me, lad, before you go?"
"Not yet. After I've made my peace with the world--with the law--I'll have a letter sent you--telling all I know. You'll forgive me. You see, when I look back--I wish to see your face--as I see it now--not--not changed towards me."
"My face is not one to change toward you--you who have repented whatever you've done that's wrong."
That evening Harry King went down to the cabin and sat with his three friends and ate with them, and told them he was to depart on the morrow. They chatted and laughed and put restraint away from them, and all walked together to watch the sunset from a crag above the cabin. As they returned Madam Manovska walked at Harry's side, and as she bade him good night she said in her broken English:--
"You think not to return--no? But I say to you--in my soul I know it--yet will you return--we no more to be here--perhaps--but you--yes. You will return."
They stood a moment before the cabin, and the firelight streamed through the open door and fell on Amalia's face. Harry took the mother's hand as he parted from them, but he looked in Amalia's eyes.
In the morning he appeared with his kit strapped on his back equipped for walking. The women protested that he should not go thus, but he said he could not take Goldbug and leave him below. "He is yours, Amalia. Don't beat him. He's a good horse--he saved my life--or tried to."
"You know well it is my custom to beat animals. It is better you take him, or I beat him severely."
"I know it. But you see, I can't take him. Ride him for me, and--don't let him forget me. Good-by!"
He waved his hand and walked lightly away, and all stood in the doorway watching him. At the top of a slight rise he turned again and waved his hand, and was lost to their sight. Then Larry went back to the shed and sat by the fire and smoked a lonely pipe, and the mother began busily to weave at her lace in the cabin, closing the door, for the morning air was chilly, and Amalia--for a moment she stood at the cabin door, her hand pressed to her heart, her head bowed as if in despair. Then she entered the cabin, caught up her silken shawl, and went out.
Throwing the shawl over her head she ran along the trail Harry had taken, until she was out of breath, then she paused, and looked back, hesitating, quivering. Should she go on? Should she return?
"I will go but a little--little way. Maybe he stops a moment, if only to--to--think a little," and she went on, hurrying, then moving more slowly. She thought she might at least catch one more fleeting glimpse of him as he turned the bend in the trail, but she did not. "Ah, he is so quickly gone!" she sighed, but still walked on.
Yes, so quickly gone, but he had stopped as she thought, to think a little, beyond the bend, there where he had waited the long night in the snow for Larry Kildene, there where he had sat like Elijah of old, despairing, under the juniper tree. He felt weary and old and worn. He thought his youth had gone from him forever, but what matter? What was youth without hope? Youth, love, life, all were to be relinquished. He closed his eyes to the wonder of the hills and the beauty before him, yet he knew they were there with their marvelous appeal, and he sat with bowed head.
"'Arry! 'Arry King!" He raised his head, and there before him were all that he had relinquished--youth, love, life.
He ran and caught her to him, as one who is drowning catches at life.
"You have leave me so coldly, 'Arry King." He pressed her cheek to his. "You did not even speak to me a little." He kissed her lips. "You have break my heart." He held her closer to his own. "Why have you been so cold--like--like the ice--to leave me so hard--like--like--"
"To save you from just this, Amalia. To save you from the touch of my hand--this is the crime I have fought against."
"No. To love is not crime."
"To dare to love--with the curse on my head that I feel as Cain felt it--is crime. In the Eye he saw it always--as I--I--see it. To touch you--it is like bringing the crime and curse on you, and through your beautiful love making you suffer for it. See, Amalia? It was all I could do to go out of your life and say nothing." His voice trembled and his hand quivered as it rested on her hair. "I sat here to fight it. My heart--my heart that I have not yet learned to conquer--was pulling me back to you. I was faint and old. I could walk no farther until the fight was won. Oh, Amalia--Amalia! Leave me alone, with the curse on my head! It is not yours."
"No, and it is not yours. You have repent. I do not believe that poem my mother is thinking so great. It is the terror of the ancient ones, but to-day, no more. Take this. It is for you I bring it. I have wear it always on my bosom, wear it now on yours."
She quickly unclasped from her neck a threadlike chain of gold, and drew from her bosom a small ivory crucifix, to which it was attached. Reaching up, she clasped it around his neck, and thrust the cross in his bosom. Then, thinking he meant to protest, she seized his hands and held them, and her words came with the impetuous rush of her thoughts.
"No charm will help, Amalia. I killed my friend."
"Ah, no, 'Arry King! Take this of me. It is not as you think for one charm I give it. No. It is for the love of Christ--that you remember and think of it. For that I wear it. For that I give it to you. If you have repent, and have the Christ in your heart, so are you high--lifted above the sin, and if they take you--if they put the iron on your hands--Ah, I know, it is there you go to give yourself up,--if they keep you forever in the prison, still forever are you free. If they put you to the death to be satisfied of the law, then quickly are you alive in Paradise with Christ. Listen, it is for the love that you give yourself up--for the sorrowfulness in your heart that you have killed your friend? Is not? Yes. So is good. See. Look to the hills, the high mountains, all far around us? They are beautiful. They are yours. God gives you. And the sky--so clear--and the bright sun and the spring life and the singing of the birds? All are yours--God gives. And the love in your heart--for me? God gives, yes, and for the one you have hurt? Yes. God gives it. And for the Christ who so loves you? Yes. So is the love the great life of God in you. It is yours. Listen. Go with the love in your heart--for me,--it will not hurt. It will be sweet to me. I carry no curse for you, as you say. It is gone. If I see you again in this world--as may be--is joy--great joy. If I see you no more here, yet in Paradise I will see you, and there also it will be joy, for it is the love that is all of life, and all of eternity, and lives--lives!"
Again he held her to his heart in a long embrace, and, when at last he walked down the trail into the desert, he still felt her tears on his cheek, her kisses on his lips, and her heart against his own. _