The Hunted Woman Part 14

With a low whistle Aldous took off his hat. He ran a hand through his blond-gray hair. Then he replaced his hat and drew two cigars from his pocket. MacDonald accepted one. Aldous' eyes were glittering; his lips were smiling.

"They are, are they, Donald? They're going to kill us?"

"They're goin' to try," amended the old hunter, with another curious chuckle in his ghostly beard. "They're goin' to try, Johnny. That's why I told you not to go to the cabin. I wasn't expecting you for a week.

To-morrow I was goin' to start on a hike for Miette. I been watching through my telescope from the mountain up there. I see Quade come in this morning on a hand-car. Twice I see him and Rann together. Then I saw Blackton hike out into the bush. I was worrying about you an' wondered if he had any word. So I laid for him on the trail--an' I guess it was lucky.

I ain't been able to set my eyes on Joe. I looked for hours through the telescope--an' I couldn't find him. He's gone, or Culver Rann is keeping him out of sight."

For several moments Aldous looked at his companion in silence. Then he said:

"You're sure of all this, are you, Donald? You have good proof--that Joe has turned traitor?"

"I've been suspicious of him ever since we come down from the North,"

spoke MacDonald slowly. "I watched him--night an' day. I was afraid he'd get a grubstake an' start back alone. Then I saw him with Culver Rann. It was late. I heard 'im leave the shack, an' I followed. He went to Rann's house--an' Rann was expecting him. Three times I followed him to Culver Rann's house. I knew what was happening then, an' I planned to get him back in the mountains on a hunt, an' kill him. But I was too late. The shot came through the window. Then he disappeared. An'--Culver Rann is getting an outfit together! Twenty head of horses, with grub for three months!"

"The deuce! And our outfit? Is it ready?"

"To the last can o' beans!"

"And your plan, Donald?"

All at once the old mountaineer's eyes were aflame with eagerness as he came nearer to Aldous.

"Get out of Tete Jaune to-night!" he cried in a low, hissing voice that quivered with excitement. "Hit the trail before dawn! Strike into the mountains with our outfit--far enough back--and then wait!"

"Wait?"

"Yes--wait. If they follow us--_fight!_"

Slowly Aldous held out a hand. The old mountaineer's met it. Steadily they looked into each other's eyes.

Then John Aldous spoke:

"If this had been two days ago I would have said yes. But to-night--it is impossible."

The fingers that had tightened about his own relaxed. Slowly a droop came into MacDonald's shoulders. Disappointment, a look that was almost despair settled in his eyes. Seeing the change, Aldous held the old hunter's hand more firmly.

"That doesn't mean we're not going to fight," he said quickly. "Only we've got to plan differently. Sit down, Donald. Something has been happening to me. And I'm going to tell you about it."

A little back from the fire they seated themselves, and Aldous told Donald MacDonald about Joanne.

He began at the beginning, from the moment his eyes first saw her as she entered Quade's place. He left nothing out. He told how she had come into his life, and how he intended to fight to keep her from going out of it. He told of his fears, his hopes, the mystery of their coming to Tete Jaune, and how Quade had preceded them to plot the destruction of the woman he loved. He described her as she had stood that morning, like a radiant G.o.ddess in the sun; and when he came to that he leaned nearer, and said softly:

"And when I saw her there, Donald, with her hair streaming about her like that, I thought of the time you told me of that other woman--the woman of years and years ago--and how you, Donald, used to look upon her in the sun, and rejoice in your possession. Her spirit has been with you always. You have told me how for nearly fifty years you have followed it over these mountains. And this woman means as much to me. If she should die to-night her spirit would live with me in that same way. You understand, Donald. I can't go into the mountains to-night. G.o.d knows when I can go--now. But you----"

MacDonald had risen. He turned his face to the black wall of the forest.

Aldous thought he saw a sudden quiver pa.s.s through the great, bent shoulders.

"And I," said MacDonald slowly, "will have the horses ready for you at dawn. We will fight this other fight--later."

CHAPTER XII

For an hour after Donald MacDonald had pledged himself to accompany Joanne and Aldous on their pilgrimage to the grave in the Saw Tooth Range the two men continued to discuss the unusual complications in which they had suddenly become involved, and at the same time prepared themselves a supper of bacon and coffee over the fire. They agreed upon a plan of action with one exception. Aldous was determined to return to the town, arguing there was a good strategic reason for showing himself openly and without fear.

MacDonald opposed this apprehensively.

"Better lay quiet until morning," he expostulated. "You'd better listen to me, an' do that, Johnny. I've got something in my shoulder that tells me you'd better!"

In the face of the old hunter's misgiving, Aldous prepared to leave. It was nearly ten o'clock when he set back in the direction of Tete Jaune, Donald accompanying him as far as the moonlit amphitheatre in the forest. There they separated, and Aldous went on alone.

He believed that Joanne and the Blacktons would half expect him to return to the bungalow after he had seen MacDonald. He was sure that Blackton, at least, would look for him until quite late. The temptation to take advantage of their hospitality was great, especially as it would bring him in the company of Joanne again. On the other hand, he was certain that this first night in Tete Jaune held very large possibilities for him. The detective instinct in him was roused, and his adventurous spirit was alive for action. First of all, he wanted proof of what MacDonald had told him.

That an attempt had been made to a.s.sa.s.sinate the old mountaineer he did not for an instant doubt. But had Joe DeBar, the half-breed, actually betrayed them? Had he sold himself to Culver Rann, and did Rann hold the key to the secret expedition they had planned into the North? He did not, at first, care to see Rann. He made up his mind that if he did meet him he would stop and chat casually with him, as though he had heard and seen nothing to rouse his suspicions. He particularly wanted to find DeBar; and, next to DeBar, Quade himself.

The night carnival was at its height when Aldous re-entered the long, lighted street. From ten until eleven was the liveliest hour of the night.

Even the restaurants and soup-kitchens were crowded then. He strolled slowly down the street until he came to a little crowd gathered about the bear equestrienne. The big canvas dance-hall a few doors away had lured from her most of her admirers by this time, and Aldous found no difficulty in reaching the inner circle. He looked first for the half-breed. Failing to find him, he looked at the woman, who stood only a few feet from him.

Her glossy black curls were a bit dishevelled, and the excitement of the night had added to the vivid colouring of her rouged lips and cheeks. Her body was sleek and sinuous in its silken vesture; arms and shoulders were startlingly white; and when she turned, facing Aldous, her black eyes flashed fires of deviltry and allurement.

For a moment he stared into her face. If he had not been looking closely he would not have caught the swift change that shot into the siren-like play of her orbs. It was almost instantaneous. Her slow-travelling glance stopped as she saw him. He saw the quick intake of her breath, a sudden compression of her lips, the startled, searching scrutiny of a pair of eyes from which, for a moment, all the languor and coquetry of her trade were gone. Then she pa.s.sed him, smiling again, nodding, sweeping a hand and arm effectively through her handsome curls as she flung a shapely limb over the broad back of the bear. In a garish sort of way the woman was beautiful, and this night, as on all others, her beauty had nearly filled the silken coin-bag suspended from her neck. As she rode down the street Aldous recalled Blackton's words: She was a friend of Culver Rann's. He wondered if this fact accounted for the strangeness of the look she had given him.

He pa.s.sed on to the dance-hall. It was crowded, mostly with men. But here and there, like so many faces peering forth from living graves, he saw the Little Sisters of Tete Jaune Cache. Outnumbered ten to one, their voices rang out in shrill banter and delirious laughter above the rumble of men.

At the far end, a fiddle, a piano, and a clarinet were squealing forth music. The place smelled strongly of whisky. It always smelled of that, for most of the men who sought amus.e.m.e.nt here got their whisky in spite of the law. There were rock-hogs from up the line, and rock-hogs from down the line, men of all nationalities and of almost all ages; teamsters, trail-cutters, packers, and rough-shod navvies; men whose daily task was to play with dynamite and giant powder; steel-men, tie-men, and men who drilled into the hearts of mountains. More than once John Aldous had looked upon this same scene, and had listened to the trample and roar and wild revelry of it, marvelling that to-morrow the men of this saturnalia would again be the builders of an empire. The thin, hollow-cheeked faces that pa.s.sed and repa.s.sed him, rouged and smiling, could not destroy in his mind the strength of the picture. They were but moths, fluttering about in their own doom, contending with each other to see which should quickest achieve destruction.

For several minutes Aldous scanned the faces in the big tent-hall, and nowhere did he see DeBar. He dropped out, and continued leisurely along the lighted way until he came to Lovak's huge black-and-white striped soup-tent. At ten o'clock, and until twelve, this was as crowded as the dance-hall. Aldous knew Lovak, the Hungarian.

Through Lovak he had found the key that had unlocked for him many curious and interesting things a.s.sociated with that powerful Left Arm of the Empire Builders--the Slav. Except for a sprinkling of Germans, a few Italians, and now and then a Greek or Swiss, only the Slavs filled Lovak's place!--Slavs from all the Russias and the nations south: the quick and chattering Polak; the thick-set, heavy-jowled Croatian; the silent and dangerous-eyed Lithuanian. All came in for Lovak's wonderful soup, which he sold in big yellow bowls at ten cents a bowl--soup of barley, rice, and cabbage, of beef and mutton, of everything procurable out of which soup could be made, and, whether of meat or vegetable, smelling to heaven of garlic.

Fifty men were eating when Aldous went in, devouring their soup with the utter abandon and joy of the Galician, so that the noise they made was like the noise of fifty pigs at fifty troughs. Now and then DeBar, the half-breed, came here for soup, and Aldous searched quickly for him. He was turning to go when his friend, Lovak, came to him. No, Lovak had not seen DeBar. But he had news. That day the authorities--the police--had confiscated twenty dressed hogs, and in each porcine carca.s.s they had found four-quart bottles of whisky, artistically imbedded in the leaf-lard fat.

The day before those same authorities had confiscated a barrel of "kerosene." They were becoming altogether too officious, Lovak thought.

Aldous went on. He looked in at a dozen restaurants, and twice as many soft-drink emporiums, where phonographs were worked until they were cracked and dizzy. He stopped at a small tobacco shop, and entered to buy himself some cigars. There was one other customer ahead of him. He was lighting a cigar, and the light of a big hanging lamp flashed on a diamond ring. Over his sputtering match his eyes met those of John Aldous. They were dark eyes, neither brown nor black, but dark, with the keenness and strange glitter of a serpent's. He wore a small, clipped moustache; his hands were white; he was a man whom one might expect to possess the _sang froid_ of a devil in any emergency. For barely an instant he hesitated in the operation of lighting his cigar as he saw Aldous. Then he nodded.

"h.e.l.lo, John Aldous," he said.

"Good evening, Culver Rann," replied Aldous.

For a moment his nerves had tingled--the next they were like steel. Culver Rann's teeth gleamed. Aldous smiled back. They were cold, hard, rapierlike glances. Each understood now that the other was a deadly enemy, for Quade's enemies were also Culver Rann's. Aldous moved carelessly to the gla.s.s case in which were the cigars. With the barest touch of one of his slim white hands Culver Rann stopped him.

"Have one of mine, Aldous," he invited, opening a silver case filled with cigars. "We've never had the pleasure of smoking together, you know."

"Never," said Aldous, accepting one of the cigars. "Thanks."

As he lighted it, their eyes met again. Aldous turned to the case.

"Half a dozen 'n.o.blemen,'" he said to the man behind the counter; then, to Rann: "Will you have one on me?"

"With pleasure," said Rann. He added, smiling straight into the other's eyes, "What are you doing up here, Aldous? After local colour?"