Read Ebook: The Woman from Outside [On Swan River] by Footner Hulbert

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Ebook has 685 lines and 23488 words, and 14 pages

river in its valley. He prayed that Imbrie might have many a rapid to buck that day.

On top of the bench the prairie rolled to the horizon with nothing to break the expanse of grass but patches of scrub. Stonor's heart, burdened as it was, lifted up at the sight. "After all, there's nothing like the old bald-headed to satisfy a man's soul," he thought. "If I only had Miles Aroon under me now!" Taking his bearings, he set off through the grass at the rolling walk he had learned from the Indians.

Of that long day there is little to report. The endless slopes of grass presented no distinguishing features; he was alone with the west wind's noble clouds. He came up on the wind on a brown bear with cream-coloured snout staying his stomach with the bark of poplar shoots until the berries should be ripe, and sent him doubling himself up with a shout. Time was too precious to allow of more than one spell. This he took beside a stream of clear water at the bottom of a vast coul?e that lay athwart his path. While his biscuits were baking he bagged a couple of prairie-chickens. One he ate, and one he carried along with him, "for Clare's supper."

At about four o'clock in the afternoon, that is to say, the time of the second spell, he struck the edge of the bench again, and once more the valley was spread below him. He searched it eagerly. The forest covered it like a dark mat, and the surface of the river was only visible in spots here and there. He found what he was looking for, and his heart raised a little song; a thin thread of smoke rising above the trees alongside the river, and at least a couple of miles in his rear.

"I'll get him now!" he told himself.

He debated whether to hasten directly to the river, or continue further over the prairie. He decided that the margin of safety was not yet quite wide enough, and took another line along the bench.

Three hours later he came out on the river's edge with a heart beating high with hope. The placid empty reach that opened to his view told him nothing, of course, but he was pretty sure that Imbrie was safely below him. His principal fear was that he had come too far; that Imbrie might not make it before dark. The prospect of leaving Clare unprotected in his hands through the night was one to make Stonor shudder. He decided that if Imbrie did not come up by dark, he would make his way down alongshore until he came on their camp.

Meanwhile he sought down-stream for a better point of vantage. He came to a rapid. The absence of tracks on either side proved positively that Imbrie had not got so far as this. Stonor decided to wait here. The man would have to get out to track his dug-out up the swift water, and Stonor would have him where he wanted him. Or if it was late when he got here, he would no doubt camp.

Stonor saw that the natural tracking-path was across the stream; on the other side also was the best camping-spot, a shelving ledge of rock with a low earth bank above. In order to be ready for them, therefore, he stripped and swam across below the rapid, towing his clothes and his pack on an improvised raft, that he broke up immediately on landing. Dressing, he took up his station behind a clump of berry-bushes that skirted the bank. Here he lay at full length with his gun in his hands. He made a little gap in the bushes through which he could command the river for a furlong or so.

He lay there with his eyes fixed on the point around which the dug-out must appear. The sun was sinking low; they must soon come or they would not come. On this day he was sure Imbrie would work to the limit. He smiled grimly to think how the man would be paddling with his head over his shoulder, never guessing how danger lay ahead. Oh, but it was hard to wait, though! His muscles twitched, the blood hammered in his temples.

In the end, when the dug-out did come snaking around the bend, he rubbed his eyes to make sure they did not deceive him. Though he had been waiting for it all that time, it had the effect of a stunning surprise. His heart set up a tremendous beating, and his breath failed him a little. Then suddenly, as they came closer, a great calm descended on him. He realized that this was the moment he had planned for, and that his calculations were now proved correct. For the last time he threw over the mechanism of his gun and reloaded it.

Imbrie was paddling in the stern, of course. The man looked pretty nearly spent, and there was little of his cynical impudence to be seen now. Clare lay on her stomach on the baggage amidships, staring ahead with her chin propped in her palms, a characteristic boy's attitude that touched Stonor's heart. Her face was as white as paper, and bore a look of desperate composure. Stonor had never seen that look; seeing it now he shuddered, thinking, what if he had not found them before nightfall!

Imbrie grounded the canoe on the shelf of rock immediately below Stonor, and no more than five paces from the muzzle of his gun. Clare climbed out over the baggage without waiting to be spoken to, and walked away up-stream a few steps, keeping her back turned to the man. Her head was sunk between her shoulders; she stared out over the rapids, seeing nothing. At the sight of the little figure's piteous dejection rage surged up in Stonor; he saw red.

Imbrie got out and went to pick his course up the rapids. He cast a sidelong look at Clare's back as he passed her. The man was too weary to have much devilry in him at the moment. But in his dark eyes there was a promise of devilry.

Having laid out his course he returned to the bow of the dug-out for his tracking-line. This was the moment Stonor had been waiting for. He rose up and stepped forward through the low bushes. Clare saw him first. A little gasping cry broke from her. Imbrie spun round, and found himself looking into the barrel of the policeman's Enfield. No sound escaped from Imbrie. His lips turned back over his teeth like an animal's.

Stonor said, in a voice of deceitful softness: "Take your knife and cut off a length of that line, say about ten feet."

No one could have guessed from his look nor his tone that an insane rage possessed him; that he was fighting the impulse to reverse his gun and club the man's brains out there on the rock.

Imbrie did not instantly move to obey.

"Look sharp!" rasped Stonor. "It wouldn't come hard for me to put a bullet through you!"

Imbrie thought better of it, and cut off the rope as ordered.

"Now throw the knife on the ground."

Imbrie obeyed, and stepped towards Stonor, holding the rope out. There was an evil glint in his eye.

Stonor stepped back. "No, you don't! Keep within shooting distance, or this gun will go off!"

Imbrie stopped.

"Miss Starling," said Stonor. "Come and tie this man's wrists together behind his back, while I keep him covered."

She approached, still staring half witlessly as if she saw an apparition. She was shaking like an aspen-leaf.

"Pull yourself together!" commanded Stonor with stern kindness. "I am not a ghost. I am depending on you!"

Her back straightened. She took the rope from Imbrie's hands, and passed a turn around his extended wrists. Stonor kept his gun at the man's head.

"At this range it would make a clean hole," he said, grinning.

To Clare he said: "Tie it as tight as you can. I'll finish the job."

When she had done her best, he handed his gun over and doubled the knots. Forcing Imbrie to a sitting position, he likewise tied his ankles.

"That will hold him, I think," he said, rising.

The words seemed to break the spell that held Clare. She sank down on the stones and burst into tears, shaking from head to foot with uncontrollable soft sobs. The sight unnerved Stonor.

"Oh, don't!" he cried like a man daft, clenching his impotent hands.

Imbrie smiled. Watching Stonor, he said with unnatural perspicacity: "You'd like to pick her up, wouldn't you?"

If Imbrie had wished to provoke the other man to an outburst, he got a little more than enough. He cringed from the other's blazing eyes, and said no more.

Stonor bent over Clare. "Don't, don't grieve so!" he murmured. "Everything is all right now."

"I know," she whispered. "It's just--just relief. I'm just silly now. To-day was too much--too much to bear!"

"I know," he said. "Come away with me."

He helped her to her feet and they walked away along the beach. Imbrie's eyes as they followed were not pleasant to see.

"Martin, I must touch you--to prove that you're real," she said appealingly. "Is it wrong?"

"Take my arm," he said. He drew her close to his side.

"Martin, that man cannot ever have been my husband. It is not possible I could ever have given myself to such a one!"

"I don't believe he is."

"Martin, I meant to throw myself in the river to-night if you had not come."

"Ah, don't! I can't bear it! I saw."

"Don't distress yourself so!"

"I'm not--now. I'm relieving myself. I've got to talk, or my head will burst. The thing that keeps things in broke just now. I've got to talk. I suppose I'm putting it all off on you now."

"I guess I can stand it," he said grimly.

She asked very low: "Do you love me, Martin?"

"You know I do."

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