The Snowshoe Trail Part 2

The idea was simply to keep them in formation till they were launched forth upon the trail. Vosper, the cook, led three horses with riding saddles at the end of the line.

Virginia had changed to outing clothes when she emerged into the street, leaving her tailored suit in charge of the innkeeper. Bill beamed at her appearance. "Miss Tremont," he began, doing the honors, "this is Mr. Vosper, who will cook the beans."

Both nodded, the girl smiling rather impersonally, and Bill noticed a horrifying omission. Vosper actually lacked the intelligence to remove his hat! The first instinct of the woodsman was to march toward him and inflict physical violence for such an insult to his queen, but he caught himself in time. Vosper, damaged in the encounter, would likely refuse to make the trip, upsetting all their plans.

But at that instant Bill forgot all about it. He suddenly noticed his employers' clothes. And he gazed in open-mouthed astonishment.

Both Virginia and Lounsbury were well gotten up according to their idea of proper garb for outdoor people. The man wore knickerbockers with gold stockings, riding habit and stock, the girl a beautifully tailored, fine-textured lady's riding habit. Both were immediately conscious of the guide's stare, and Virginia was aware of a distinct embarra.s.sment.

Something, somewhere, had evidently gone wrong. Lounsbury took refuge in hauteur.

"Well?" he demanded icily.

"Excuse me," Bill replied. "But those aren't--are those the clothes you're going to wear on the trip?"

"We're not parading for any one's benefit, I hope," was the sarcastic answer. "These are our rough clothes. Have you any objections to 'em?"

The guide's eyes puckered about the corners. "No, sir--not any objections--and they'd be all right for a day or two--until bad weather. But they are hardly the togs for the North. What you want is a good pair of slicker pants, both of you, and plenty of wool inside.

Also a rubber coat of some kind, over sheepskin. In the first good snow those clothes would just melt away. If you'll come with me, I'll help you lay in some--and I'll pack 'em right on one of the horses for the time of need. There's a store adjoining the hotel----"

Virginia's confusion had departed, giving way to mirth, but Lounsbury was swollen and purple with wrath. "You--you----" he began. His face grew crafty. "I suppose you get a commission on every garment you sell."

Bill turned rather quiet eyes on the man; and for one little instant the craven that dwelt under Lounsbury's skin told him he had said one sentence too many; but he took heart when Bill looked away. "I'll keep what I've got on," he announced. "I'm not used to being told what kind of clothes to wear. Virginia, we'll start on."

"Wait just a minute, Uncle," the girl replied coolly. She turned to Bill. "You say these won't do at all?"

"They'll be torn off of you in the brush, Miss Tremont. And they won't turn the cold and the snow, either. This is the North, you know."

"Then I, for one, am going to take your advice. Please help me pick out the things, Bronson."

They left Lounsbury fuming in the road, and they had a rather enjoyable ten minutes searching through Fargo's stock for suitable garb. He selected a pair of slicker pants to wear over riding trousers, a coat lined with sheepskin, boy's size, and an awkwardly made but effective rubber coat for outside wear when the snow lay on the branches. It was not, Virginia decided, quite like choosing gowns at her modiste's; yet she was bright-eyed and laughing at the end.

Bill unhitched a pack, inserted the bundle of clothes, then bracing his boots against the horse's side pulled and tugged until the pack was right again. "You'll be glad you've got these things before the trip is done," he prophesied. He pointed to the North, an unlooked for sobriety upon his face.

Far against the horizon the clouds were beginning to spread, dark and gray and strange, over the northern hills. These were not the clouds of summer rains. They were the first banners of an enemy--a grim and dreadful foe who had his ramparts in the wilds, and his ambush laid for such feeble creatures as would dare to brave his fastness.

Bill Bronson gave his last directions, tightened the last cinch, and slipped his rifle into the saddle scabbard. "There's just one thing more--the choice of horses," he said. "Miss Tremont, of course you can take your pick." His tone was trustful. "Of course that will be all right with the other gentlemen--for you to have the best and safest horse."

Strangely, neither of the two men seemed to greet this suggestion with especial enthusiasm. "I want a good and a safe horse," Lounsbury said evenly. "Of course you must provide Miss Tremont with the same."

The woodsman sighed, ever so softly. He returned to Vosper, but if the latter had any suggestions to offer, the hard eyes of the guide caused him to think better of them. "I'm sorry to say that good horses--and safe horses--aren't to be found in the same animal up here," Bill explained. "If you have a good horse--one that'll take the mud and swim the river and stand up under the day's march--he'll likely have too much sense and spirit to be safe. He'll more than likely prance around when you get on and buck you off if he thinks he can get away with it. If you've got a safe horse, one that's scared to death of you, he won't be a good horse--a yellow cuss that has to be dragged through every mud-puddle. These are all Indian ponies, the best that can be got up here, but they're not old ladies' driving mares. Miss Tremont, the best horse in this bunch is my bay, Mulvaney--but n.o.body can ride him but me. I'd love to let you ride him if you could, and after a day or two I'd be willing for you to try it. But he doesn't know what fear is, and he doesn't know when to give up."

The man spoke soberly. It was wholly plain that Mulvaney was very dear to his heart. Men do not ride over the caribou trails without engendering strong feelings toward their mounts. Sometimes it is love.

And not unusually it is detestation.

"That little black there--Buster, we call him--is the next best bet.

It's an important choice you're making, and I'll tell you about him. He threw a man off once, and when I got him he was supposed to be the most vicious animal in the Northwest. The truth is, he hasn't got a vicious hair on his head. But he will try to get away, and he will dance a bit when you first get on and wheel in circles, and he's hard to catch in the morning. But he's sure-footed and courageous and strong; he'll take you up hills where the others can't go. The other two horses--Colt and Scotty--maybe seem safer, but they haven't got the life Buster has, nor the sense."

Bill reached to pet the black Buster, and the animal s.h.i.+ed nervously.

Virginia walked up to him and seized his bridle rein. In an instant she had vaulted into the saddle.

He wheeled and plunged at first, but soon she quieted him. In none too good humor, Lounsbury made his selection, and Vosper took what was left.

Bill led his animal to Virginia's side.

"And are there any special instructions--before we start?" he asked.

"I can give you some special instructions," Lounsbury interrupted. "I didn't come up here to risk my life on a wild mustang in the mountains.

I want you to pick easy trails--you can if you've just got energy enough to try."

A half-smile lingered a moment at the woodsman's lips. There was no choice of trails into Clearwater. He might have told Lounsbury that once they were out of sight of the roofs of the town they were venturing into the Unknown, a land where the caribou and the moose made trails through the forest but where men came not, a land of beasts rather than men, of primeval grandeur but savage might. "Have you any orders to give?" he asked the girl again.

"None. All I can do is tell you what I have already done--and then let you do the best you can. As you know, he left six years ago."

"I know. I saw him when he came through."

His eyes were fast upon her, and he saw her start. Her face seemed to flame. Stranger as he was to the hearts of women, Bill could understand. It was word of her lover, a message from the dead, and it moved her to the depths. But he couldn't understand the curious weight of depression that descended upon him.

"You did?" she answered quickly. "Was he all right--then?"

"All right, but that was just after he came to the North. I was camping on this side of Grizzly River, and he stayed to eat with me. He said his name was Lounsbury. I've never heard of him since."

The surface lights died in her eyes. "Then that doesn't help us much, except to know that he got that far, at least," she went on. "I'll tell you the whole thing, simply; maybe it will help you in deciding where to look for him. He was twenty-seven then--and he'd spent the fortune his father left him. He had to have more, and he came up here--to look for gold.

"Like many other men--before him," Bill interrupted gravely.

"He had some sort of definite plan--a vacation place to go--but he never told me what it was. He told me he was going into Clearwater. He had to have money--he was in debt and besides, he was engaged to marry me. The last word I ever heard of him was a note he wrote from Bradleyburg. I was just a girl then--and I've waited ever since.

His friends, his aunt, sometimes even his uncle thought that he was dead. I've always felt, just as sure as I am here, that he was still alive--and in some trouble--and he couldn't come back. Mr. Lounsbury has hired detectives, but none of them have ever made a real search.

He's financing this trip now--I've been able to persuade him at last to make one great try to find him. What's what we've hired you to do."

"It's a big order," Bill spoke softly. "There's just one thing we can do--to look into the country where he's gone and try to trace him.

Every man who goes through Clearwater leaves his mark--there's not so many of them that their trails get crossed. My plan would be to watch for the camps he made--there'd be some sign of 'em yet--the trees he cut and the trails he blazed--and trace him clear to the Valley of the Yuga."

"And what is there?"

Bill's ears, trained to the silences of the woodland, caught the almost imperceptible tremor in her voice. "There are a few Indians who have their tents there--trappers and fishers--and I know how to get things out of 'em. If he's pa.s.sed that way, they'd know about it. If he hasn't--something has happened to him--somewhere between here and there. He couldn't have remained out of sight so long."

"I want you to make every try. I can't bear--to give up."

Even this woodsman, knowing men to the heart but stranger to the world of women, knew that she meant what she said. She wasn't of the mold that gives up quickly. For all her cool exterior, her impersonal voice, the grace and breeding that went clear to her finger tips, he had some measure of understanding of an ardor and an intensity that might have been native to his own wilderness. Not often has girlhood love stood such a test as this,--six years of silence. He could not doubt its reality; no small or half-felt emotion could have propelled her forth into these desolate wastes. Her love had gone deep and it lived.

He answered very gravely and humbly, perhaps a even a little sadly: "I'll do everything I can to find him for you, Miss. I'll get your sweetheart for you if it can be done."

To Vosper and Lounsbury the two little sentences were just the a.s.surances of a hired employee, half-felt and forgotten soon. But Virginia heard more clearly. She had a vague feeling that she was a witness to a vow. It seemed to her that there was the fire of a zealot in his dark eyes, and by token of some mystery she did not understand, this strong man had seen fit to give her his oath. She only knew that he spoke true, that by a secret law that only strong men know he would be as faithful to this promise as if he had given bond.

IV