The Man in the Twilight Part 58

It was all so single-minded and simple. It was all so beautifully pathetic. Nancy had found a careless household rapidly decaying through mannish indifference to comfort. She understood. These men were completely absorbed in the service of the great mills, and nothing else mattered to them. Oh, yes, that was understandable. She knew the feeling. She knew how it robbed its victim of every other consideration in life. So she had flung herself into the task of re-ordering the household of which she had been forced to become a part, that she might yield them comfort in their labours and help herself in her own effort to obtain peace of mind.

She had transformed an untidy, uncared-for bachelor habitation into a wholesome, clean establishment of well-ordered life. She had lifted a lazy Chinaman into a reasonable specimen of comparative energy, and saw to it that meals were well and carefully served, and partaken of at regular hours by men who quickly discovered the futility of protest.

But her work by no means ended there. From one end to the other the house was swept and garnished, and the neglect of years disposed of.

Bedrooms were transformed from mere sleeping places to luxury. Linen was duly laundered, and clothing was brushed, and folded, and mended in a fas.h.i.+on such as its owners had never thought possible. She was utterly untiring in her labours, and in the process of them she steadily moved on towards the thing she craved for herself.

The men realised the tremendous effort of it all. And Bull Sternford, for all his absorption in his work, had watched with troubled feelings.

His love for Nancy had perhaps robbed him of that vision which should have told him of the necessity, in her own interests, for that which the girl was doing. So there were times when he had protested, times when he felt that simple humanity demanded that she should not be permitted to submit herself to so rough a slavery. But Nancy had countered every protest with an irresistible appeal.

"Please, please don't stop me," she had cried, almost tearfully. "It's just all I can do. It's my only hope. Always, till now, I've lived for myself and ambitions. You know where they have led me--Ah, no. Let me go on in my own way. Let me nurse him back to health. Let me do these things. However little I'm able to do there's some measure of peace in the doing of it."

So the days and weeks had dragged on, and now the time of Nancy's imprisonment was drawing to its inevitable close. With Spring, and the coming of the _Myra_, she would have to accept her freedom and all it meant. She would be expected to return to her home in Quebec, and to those who had employed her and sent her on her G.o.dless mission. She understood that. But she had no intention of returning to Quebec. She had no intention of returning to the Skandinavia.

During the long hours of her labours she had searched deeply for the thing the future must hold for her. It was the old process over again.

That great searching she had once done at Marypoint. But now it was all different. There had been no sense of guilt then, and the only man who had been concerned in her life had been that unknown stepfather, whom, in her child's heart, she had learned to hate. It had been simple enough then. Now--now--

But she had faced the task with all the splendid, impetuous courage that was hers. There was no shrinking. Her mind was swiftly and irrevocably made up. She would abandon the Skandinavia for ever. She would abandon everything and follow those dictates which had prompted her so often in the past. Father Adam's self-sacrificing example was always before her.

The forests. Those submerged legions which peopled them. Was there not some means by which she could join in the work of rescue? She would talk to Father Adam. She felt he would help her. She wanted nothing for herself. If only the rest of her life could be translated into some small imitation of the life of that good man, then, indeed, she felt her atonement might be counted as something commensurate.

It was not until her decision had been taken that she permitted herself to seek beyond it. But once it was taken the crus.h.i.+ng sense of added desolation well-nigh paralysed her. Somehow, never before had she understood. But now--now the sacrifice of it all swept upon her with an overwhelming rush. Bull Sternford. Bull Sternford, the man whom with all her power she had striven to defeat, the man whose strength and force of character had so appealed to her, the man who must hate her as any clean-minded man must hate a loathsome reptile, she would never see him again.

Oh, she knew now. She made no attempt at denial. It would have been quite useless. She loved him. From the moment she had looked into his honest eyes, and realised his kindly purpose on her behalf at their first meeting, she had loved him. She must cut him out of her life. It was the penalty she must pay for her crimes.

And now the moment had arrived when she must put her plans into operation. Time was pressing. The season was advancing. So she had chosen the hour at which she served tea to Father Adam as the best in which to seek his advice and support.

The light tap on Father Adam's door was answered instantly. Nancy pa.s.sed into the room with trepidation in her heart, but the hand bearing the tea tray was without a tremor.

The man whose life belonged to the twilight of the northern forests was seated in a deep rocker-chair under the window through which the setting sun was pouring its pleasant spring light. He had been reading. But his book was laid aside instantly, and he stood up and smiled the thanks which his words hastily poured forth.

"You know, Nancy, you're completely spoiling me," he said. "I'm going to hate my forest coffee out of a rusty pannikin. I don't know how I'm going on when I pull my freight out of here."

The girl's responsive smile faded abruptly as she set the tray on the table beside the chair.

"When are you going to--pull your freight?" she asked, with a curious, nervous abruptness.

For a moment the man's eyes were averted. Then he straightened up his tall, somewhat stooping figure. He flung his lean shoulders back, and opened his arms wide. And as he did so he laughed in the pleasant fas.h.i.+on which Nancy had grown accustomed to.

He was the picture of complete health. His dark face was pale. His black hair and spa.r.s.e beard were untouched by any sign of the pa.s.sage of years. There was not an ounce of superfluous flesh under the curiously clerical garments he lived in.

"Why, right away, child," he said, with simple confidence. "I'll just need to wait for a brief 'freeze-up' to get through the mud around Sachigo. Once on the highlands inside there'll be snow and ice for six weeks or more. I told Sternford this morning I was ready to pull out.

You see, thanks to you I've cheated the folk who reckoned to silence me.

I'm well, and strong, and the boys of the forest are--needing me. Every day I remain now I'll be getting soft under the unfailing kindness of my nurse."

Nancy poured out the tea. There were two cups on the tray and the man was swift to notice it. She smiled up at him.

"Won't you sit down?" she urged. "You see, I've brought a cup for myself. I--I want to have a long talk with you. I, too, have got to 'pull my freight.'"

Father Adam obeyed. His dark eyes were deeply observant as he surveyed the pretty face with its red glory of hair. That which was pa.s.sing in his mind found no betrayal. But his thought had suddenly leapt, and he waited.

Nancy pa.s.sed him his cup and set the toast within his reach. Then she pulled up a chair for herself and sat down before the tea tray.

"Yes," she went on, "that's why I brought my cup. I must get away." She smiled a little wistfully. "My imprisonment is over. Mr. Sternford set me free long ago, but--well, anyway I'm going now, and that's why I wanted to talk to you."

She seemed to find the whole thing an effort. But as the man's dark eyes remained regarding her, and no word of his came to help her, she was forced to go on.

"You know my story," she said. "You've heard it all from Mr. Sternford.

I know that. You told me so, didn't you?"

The man inclined his dark head.

"Yes," he said. "I know your story--all of it."

"Yes." The girl's tea remained untouched. Suddenly she raised one delicate hand and pa.s.sed her finger tips across her forehead. It was a gesture of uncertainty. Then, quite suddenly, it fell back into her lap, and, in a moment, her hands were tightly clasped. "Oh, I best tell you at once. Never, never, never as long as I live can I go back to the Skandinavia. All the years I've been with them I've just been lost in a sort of dream world of ambition. I haven't seen a thing outside it. I've just been a blind, selfish woman who believed in everybody, and most of all in herself and her selfish aims. Can you understand? Will you? Oh, now I know all it meant. Now I know the crime of it. And the horror of the thing I've done, and been, has well-nigh broken my heart. Oh, I'm not really bad, indeed I'm not. I didn't know. I didn't understand. I can never forgive myself. Never, never! And when I think of the blood that has been shed as the result of my work--"

"No." The man's voice broke in sharply. "Put that right out of your mind, child. None of the blood shed is your doing. None of it lies at your door. It lies at the door of others. It lies at the door of two men only. The man who first set up this great mill at Sachigo, and the man whose hate of him desired its destruction. The rest, you, those others, Bull Sternford and Harker, here, are simply the p.a.w.ns in the battle which owes its inception to those things that happened years ago. I tell you solemnly, child, no living soul but those two, and chiefly the first of the two, are to blame for the things that have happened to-day. Set your mind easy. No one blames you. No one ever will blame you. Not even the great G.o.d to whom we all have to answer. I know the whole story of it. It is my life to know the story of these forests. Set your mind at rest."

"Oh, I wish I could think so. I wish I could believe. I feel, I feel you are telling me this to comfort me. But you wouldn't just do that?"

The man shook his head.

"It's the simple truth," he said. Then he reached for his tea and drank it quickly. "But tell me. You will never go back to the Skandinavia?

I--am glad. What will you do?"

"That's why I've come to you now."

The tension had eased. Nancy's distress gave way before the man's strong words of comfort. She, too, drank her tea. Then she went on.

"You know, Father--"

The man stirred in his chair. It was a movement of sudden restlessness as if that appellation on her lips disturbed him.

"--I want to--I want to--Oh, how can I tell you? You are doing the thing I want to help in. All my life I felt the time would come when I must devote myself to the service and welfare of others. I think it's bred in me. My father, my real father, he, too, gave up his life to those who could not help themselves. Well, I want to do the same in however humble fas.h.i.+on. These men, these wonderful men of the forests whom you spend your life in succouring. Can I not serve them, too? Is there no place for me under your leaders.h.i.+p? Can I not go out into the forests? I am strong. I am strong to face anything, any hards.h.i.+p. I have no fear. The call of these forests has got right into my blood. Don't deny me," she appealed. "Don't tell me I'm just a woman with no strength to withstand the rigours of the winter. I couldn't stand that. I have the strength, and I have the will. Can you? Will you help me?"

The girl's appeal was spoken with all the ardour of youthful pa.s.sion.

There was no sham in it. No hysterical impulse. It was irresistibly real.

The man's eyes were deeply regarding her. But he was thinking far less of her words than of the girl herself. Her amazing beauty, the pa.s.sionate youth and strength. The perfection of her splendid womanhood.

These things held him, and his mind travelled swiftly back over years to other scenes and other emotions.

When at last he spoke his words came slowly and were carefully considered.

"I think, perhaps, I can help you," he said. "You are determined? You want to help those who need help? The men of the forests?" He shook his head. "I don't see why you shouldn't help the men of these forests who--need your help."

Nancy drew a deep breath. A wonderful smile sprang into her pretty eyes.

It was a glad smile of thanks such as no words of hers could have expressed.