_ CHAPTER XV. FATHER JOSE PROBES
It was a startled community that awoke next morning at Fort Mowbray. The news was abroad at the earliest hour, and it reached Jessie Mowbray in the kitchen, as she made her appearance to superintend the preparation of breakfast. The Indian wench told her, with picturesque embellishments, such as are reserved for the native tongue. Jessie listened to the story of the descent of the Bell River Indians to the region of the Fort with feelings no less disturbed than those of the colored woman. They were no longer mistress and servant. They were just two women confronting a common danger.
But the news of the arrival of John Kars, wounded, swiftly overwhelmed all other considerations in Jessie's mind. Breakfast was left in the hands of the squaw while the girl hastened to her mother's room.
Ailsa Mowbray listened to the girl's story with no outward signs of fear. She had passed through the worst fires that could assail her a year ago. Nothing the warlike Indians could threaten now could reproduce the terror of that time.
The story of it came in a rush. But it was not until Jessie told of John Kars, and his wounded condition, that the real emotions of the moment were revealed. She implored her mother to permit her to go at once and minister to him, to learn the truth about his condition, to hear, first hand, of the catastrophe that had happened. Nor did she passively yield to her mother's kindly admonishment.
"Why, child," she said, in her steady smiling way, "this country's surely got right into your veins. You're like an unbroken colt. You're as wild as any of those kiddies you figger to teach over at the Mission. It's not for a child of mine to wait around on any man living. Not even John Kars. Guess he's got Dr. Bill and Father Jose, anyway. Maybe they'll get along over later."
The girl flushed scarlet.
"Oh, mother," she cried in distress, "don't--just don't think that way of me. I--love him, and wouldn't help it if I could. But he's sick. Maybe he's sick to death. Men--men can't fix sick folk. They can't--sure."
The mother looked into the girl's eyes with gentle tolerance, and a certain amusement.
"Not even Dr. Bill, who's had sick folk on his hands most all his life?" she demanded. "Not even Jose, who's nursed half the kiddies at the Mission one time or another?" She shook her head. "Besides, you only know the things Susan's handed you out of her fool head. And when Susan talks, truth isn't a circumstance. I wouldn't say but what John Kars hasn't got shot up at all--till I see him."
For all her easy manner she was troubled. And when Jessie had taken herself back to the kitchen the ominous lines, which had gathered in her face since her husband's murder, deepened. Distress looked out of the eyes which gazed back at her out of her mirror as she stood before it dressing her hair in the simple fashion of her life.
Bell River! She had learned to hate and fear its very name. Her whole destiny, the destiny of all belonging to her seemed to be bound up in that fateful secret which had been her husband's, and to which she had been only partially admitted. Somehow she felt that the day must come when she would have to assert her position to Murray, and once and for all break from under the evil spell of Bell River, which seemed to hang over her life.
But the shadow of it all lifted when later in the day John Kars and Dr. Bill presented themselves. Kars' wound was almost completely healed, and Jessie's delight knew no bounds. The mother reflected her daughter's happiness, and she found herself able to listen to the story of the adventures of these men without anything of the unease which had at first assailed her.
Their story was substantially that which had been told to Murray, and it was told with a matter-of-fact indifference, and made light of, in the strong tones of John Kars, on whom danger seemed to have so little effect. As Mrs. Mowbray listened she realized something of the strength of this man. The purpose in him. The absolute reliance with which he dealt with events as they confronted him. And so her thoughts passed on to the girl who loved him, and she wondered, and more than ever saw the hopelessness of Murray's aspirations.
The men took their departure, and, at Kars' invitation, Jessie went with them to inspect their outfit. The mother was left gazing after them from the open doorway. For all the aging since her husband's death, she was still a handsome woman in her simple morning gown of a bygone fashion.
She watched the three as they moved away in the direction of the woodland avenue, which, years ago, she had helped to clear. Her eyes and thoughts were on the man, and the girl at his side. Bill had far less place in them.
She was thinking, and wondering, and hoping, as, perhaps, only a mother can hope. And so engrossed was she that she did not observe the approach of Father Jose, who came from the Indian camp amongst the straight-limbed pine woods. It was only when the little man spoke that she bestirred herself.
"A swell pair, ma'am," he said, pausing beside the doorway, his keen face smiling as his eyes followed the rapid gait of the girl striving to keep pace with her companion's long strides.
"You mean the men?"
There was no self-consciousness in Ailsa Mowbray. The priest shook his head.
"Jessie and Kars."
The woman's steady eyes regarded the priest for a moment.
"I--wonder what you're--guessing."
The priest's smile deepened.
"That you'd sooner it was he than--Murray McTavish."
The woman watched the departing figures as they passed out of view, vanishing behind the cutting where the trees stopped short.
"Is it to be--either of them?"
"Sure." The man's reply came definitely. "But Murray hasn't a chance. She'll marry Kars, or no one around this Mission."
The woman sighed.
"I promised Murray to--that his cause shouldn't suffer at my hands. Murray's a straight man. His interests are ours. Maybe--it would be a good thing."
"Then he asked you?"
The little priest's question came on the instant. And the glance accompanying it was anxious.
"Yes."
For some moments no word passed between them. The woman was looking back with regret at the time when Murray had appealed to her. Father Jose was searching his heart to fortify his purpose.
Finally he shook his white head.
"Ma'am," he said seriously, "it's not good for older folks to seek to fix these things for the young people who belong to them. Not even mothers." Then his manner changed, and a sly, upward, smiling glance was turned upon the woman's face above him. "I haven't a thing against Murray. Nor have you. But I'd hate to see him marry Jessie. So would you. I--I wonder why."
The mother's reply came at once. It came with that curious brusqueness which so many women use when forced to a reluctant admission.
"That's so," she said. "I should hate it, too. I didn't want to say it. I didn't want to admit it--even to myself. You've made me do both, and--you've no right to. Murray was Allan's trusted friend and partner. He's been our friend--my friend--right along. Why should I hate the thought of him for Jessie? Can you tell me?" She shook her head impatiently. "How could you? I couldn't tell myself."
The shadow had deepened in Ailsa Mowbray's eyes. She knew she was unjust. She knew she was going back on her given word. She despised the thought. It was treachery. Yet she knew that both had become definite in her mind from the moment when Jessie had involuntarily confided her secret to her.
Father Jose shook his head.
"No. I can't tell you those things, ma'am," he said. "But I'm glad of them. Very glad."
He drew a deep breath as his gaze, abstracted, far off, was turned in the direction where his Mission stood in all its pristine, makeshift simplicity. The mother turned on him sharply as his quiet reply reached her.
"Why?" she demanded. "Why are you glad?"
Her eyes were searching his clean-cut profile. She knew she was seeking this man's considered judgment. She knew she was seeking to probe the feeling and thought which prompted his approval, because of her faith in him.
"Because Jessie's worth a--better man."
"Better?"
"Surely."
For all his prompt reply Father Jose remained searching the confines of the woodland clearing in his curiously abstracted fashion.
"You see, ma'am," he went on presently, helping himself to a pinch of snuff, and shutting the box with a sharp slam, "goodness is just a matter of degree. That's goodness as we folk of the earth understand it. We see results. We don't see the motive. It's motive that counts in all goodness. The man who lives straight, who acts straight when temptation offers, may be no better than--than the man who falls for evil. I once knew a
saint who was hanged by the neck because he murdered a man. He gave his life, and intended to give it, for a poor weak fellow creature who was being tortured out of her senses by a man who was no better than a hound of Hell. That man was made of the same stuff as John Kars, if I know him. I can't see Murray McTavish acting that way. Yet I could see him act like the other feller--if it suited him. Murray's good. Sure he's good. But John Kars is--better."
The mother sighed.
"I feel that way, too." Then in a moment her eyes lit with a subtle apprehension, as though the man's words had planted a poison in her heart that was rapidly spreading through her veins. "But there's nothing wrong with Murray? I mean like--like you said."
The little priest's smile was good to see.
"Not a thing, ma'am," he said earnestly. "Murray's gold, so far as we see. It's only that we see just what he wants us to see. Kars is gold, too, but--you can see clear through Kars. That's all."
The woman's apprehensions were allayed. But she knew that, where Jessie was concerned, the little Padre had only put into words those unspoken, almost unrealized feelings which had been hers all along.
She moved out of the doorway.
"Alec's up at the Fort. Maybe he's fretting I'm not up there to help." She smiled. "Say, the boy's changed since--since he's to get his vacation. He hasn't a word against Murray--now. And I'm glad. So glad."
The Padre had turned to go. He paused.
"I'd be gladder if it was John Kars he was making the trail with," he said, in his direct fashion. Then he smiled. "And at this moment maybe Murray's risking his life for us."
"Yes."
The mother sighed. The disloyalty of their feelings seemed deplorable, and it was the priest who came to her rescue.
"But it can't be. That's all."
"No. It would affront Murray."
Father Jose nodded.
"Murray mustn't be affronted--with so much depending on him."
"No." Ailsa Mowbray's eyes lit with a shadow of a smile as she went on. "I feel like--like a plotter. It's terrible."
For answer Father Jose nodded. He had no word to offer to dispel the woman's unease, so he hurried away without further spoken word between them.
Ailsa Mowbray turned toward the path through the woods at the foot of the hill. As she made her way up towards the Fort her thoughts were painfully busy. What, she asked herself, again and again, was the thing that lay at the back of the little priest's mind? What--what was the curious, nebulous instinct that was busy at the back of her own? _