The Promise Part 32

By the middle of June Bill was able to make short excursions to the river with the aid of the crutches which Blood River Jack crudely fas.h.i.+oned from young saplings.

With his increased freedom of movement his restlessness increased.

Somewhere along the river, he knew, the bird's-eye logs were banked, awaiting the arrival of Moncrossen and Stromberg to raft them to the railway, and he surmised that their coming would not be long delayed.

Over and over in his mind he turned schemes for outwitting the boss.

The strength was rapidly returning to his injured leg and he discarded one crutch, using the other only to help him over the rough places.

He was in no condition to undertake a journey to the railway, and in spite of Blood River Jack's expressed hatred of Moncrossen and friends.h.i.+p for himself, he hesitated about taking the half-breed into his confidence.

At length he could stand the suspense no longer. Each day's delay lessened his chance of success. He decided to act--to lay the matter before Blood River Jack and ask his cooperation, and if he refused, to play the game alone.

He came to this decision one afternoon while seated upon a great log overlooking the rus.h.i.+ng rapid. Beside him sat Jeanne, apparently deeply engrossed in the embroidering of a buckskin hunting-s.h.i.+rt.

After a long silence Bill knocked the dead ashes from his pipe, and his jaw squared as he looked out over the foaming white-water. He turned toward the girl and encountered the intense gaze of her dark eyes.

The neglected needlework lay across her knees, the small hands were folded, and the s.h.i.+ning needle glinted in the sun where it had been deftly caught into the yellow buckskin at the turning of an unfinished scroll.

"The logs which you seek," she said quietly, "are piled upon the bank of the river, half a mile below the rapids." The man regarded her with a startled glance.

"What do you know about these logs--and of what I was thinking?"

She answered him with a curious, baffling smile, and, ignoring his question, continued:

"You need help. I am but a girl and know naught of logs nor why these logs did not go down the river with the others. But in your face as you pondered from day to day I have read it. Is it not that you would prevent Moncrossen from taking these logs? But you know not how to do it, for the logs must go down the river and Moncrossen must come up the river?"

"You are a wonder!" he exclaimed in admiration. "That's exactly what's been bothering me." She blushed furiously under his gaze and, with lowering eyes, continued:

"I do not know how it can be managed, but Jacques will know. You may trust Jacques as you trust me. For we are your friends, and his hatred of Moncrossen is a real hatred."

She raised her eyes to his.

"Do you know why Jacques hates Moncrossen, and why Wa-ha-ta-na-ta hates all white men?" she asked. Bill shook his head and listened as the girl, with blazing eyes, told him of the death of Pierre, and then, of the horror of that night on Broken Knee.

At her words Bill Carmody's face darkened, and his great fists clenched until the nails bit deep into his palms. The steel-gray eyes narrowed to slits and, as the girl finished, he arose and gently lifted one of the little hands between his own.

"I, too, could kill Moncrossen for _that_," he said, and the tone of his voice was low, and soft, with a tense, even softness that sounded in the ears of the girl more terrible than a thousand loud hurled threats.

She looked up quickly into the face of the glinting eyes, her tiny hand trembled in his, and a sudden flush deepened the warm color of her neck.

"For me?" she faltered. "_Me?_" And, with a half-smothered, frightened gasp, tore her hand free and fled swiftly into the forest.

Bill stared a long time at the place where she disappeared, and, smiling, stooped and picked up her needlework where it had fallen at his feet.

He examined it idly for a moment and then more closely as a puzzled look crept into his eyes. The garment he held in his hand was never designed for a covering for the girl's own lithe body, nor was it small enough even for Jacques.

"She's worked on it every day for a month," he murmured, as he glanced from the intricate embroidered design to his own s.h.i.+rt of ragged flannel, and again he smiled--bitterly.

"She's a queer kid," he said softly, as he recovered his crutch; "and a mighty good kid, too."

CHAPTER x.x.x

CREED

That night the four sat late about the campfire.

Old Wa-ha-ta-na-ta, silent and forbidding, as usual, but with a sharp ear for all that was said, listened as they laid their plans.

At their conclusion the others sought their blankets, while Jacques took the trail for the camp of old Wabishke whose help was needed in the undertaking which was to involve no small amount of labor.

As the two women finished the preparation of breakfast the following morning, the half-breed appeared, followed closely by the old Indian trapper whose scarred lips broke into a hideous grin at the sight of Bill.

"This is Wabishke, of whom I spoke," said Jacques, indicating the Indian. Bill laughingly extended his hand, which the other took.

"Well! If it isn't my friend, the Yankee!" he exclaimed. "Wabishke and I are old friends. He is the first man I met in the woods." The Indian nodded, grunted, and pointed to his feet which were encased in a very serviceable pair of boots.

"Oh, I remember, perfectly," laughed Bill. "Have you still got my matches?" Wabishke grinned.

"You keel _loup-garou_ with knife?" he asked, as if seeking corroboration for an unbelievable story.

"I sure did," Bill answered. "The old gal tried to bite me."

The Indian regarded him with grave approval and, stepping to his side, favored him with another greasy hand-shake, after which ceremony he squatted by the fire and removing a half-dozen pieces of bacon from the frying-pan proceeded to devour them with evident relish.

Breakfast over, the three men accompanied by Jeanne set out for the river, leaving to old Wa-ha-ta-na-ta the work of the camp. Sliding a canoe into the water, they took their places, Jacques and Wabishke at the paddles, with Jeanne and Bill seated on the bottom amids.h.i.+ps.

Close to the opposite bank the canoe was headed down-stream and, under the swift, strong strokes of the paddles, glided noiselessly in the shadows. A few minutes later, at a sign from Jacques who was in the bow, Wabishke, with a deft twist of his paddle, slanted the canoe bankward.

With a soft, rustling sound the light craft parted the low hanging branches of killikinick and diamond willow, and buried its nose in the soft mud.

Peering through the tangle of underbrush the occupants of the canoe made out, some fifty yards below their position, a small clearing in the center of which, just above the high-water mark of the river, was a small pyramid of logs.

Seated beside the pile, with his back resting against the ends of the logs, sat a man holding a rifle across his knees.

Bill Carmody's fighting spirit thrilled at the sight. Here at last was action. Here were the stolen logs of bird's-eye, and guarding them was Creed!

While the others steadied the canoe he stepped noiselessly onto the bank, where he sank to his ankles in the mud, and, seizing hold of the bow shot the canoe out into the current.

Creed had been left in the woods by Moncrossen, ostensibly to guard the Blood River camp against pilfering Indians and chance forest fires, but his real mission was to keep watch on the bird's-eye until it could be safely rafted to the railway.

Moncrossen promised to return about the middle of June, and ten mornings Creed had skulked the three miles from the lumber camp to the logs, and ten evenings he had skulked fearfully back again, muttering futile curses at the boss's delay.

Creed was uneasy. Not since the evening the greener had walked into Hod Burrage's store at the very moment when he, Creed, was recounting to the interested listeners the circ.u.mstances attending his demise, had he been entirely free from a haunting, nameless fear.

True, as he told Blood River Jack, he had afterward seen with his own eyes, the greener go down under the rus.h.i.+ng jam where no man could possibly go down and live.