While he talked he had been opening his suitcase, and now took out a compact emergency bag which experience had taught him never to go away without, and at whose shining, unfamiliar contents Smiles' eyes opened with fascinated amazement. Taking out a stethoscope, Donald bade the giant open his soft, homemade shirt, and planted the transmitting disk against the massive chest, padded with wonderful, bulging muscles.

"O-ho," he said under his breath, as he finally laid the instrument aside; for his intently listening ears had caught the faint, but clearly discernible sound of a systolic murmur, deep within.

"Air the trouble 'Aunt' ... what the other doctor said hit was?" questioned Rose.

"Angina pectoris? He may have had a touch of that last winter of course, but my guess is that it's something a bit different now."

"I haint erfeered ter hyar the truth," rumbled Jerry, straightening up like a soldier before the court martial.

"Well," answered the doctor, "I should say that you have a touch of another jaw-breaking Latin phrase, namely, an aneurism of the thoracic aorta."

"Hit shor' sounds powerful bad," grunted Jerry. "But then I reckon thet doctors likes ter use big words."

"Right. For instance, we prefer to call an old-fashioned cold in the head, 'Naso-pharyngitis.' The worse it sounds, the more credit we get for curing it, you see. Well, 'sticks and stones may break our bones, but words will never hurt us,' so don't let that Latin expression worry you. Just take things a bit easy, don't overdo physically or get overexcited, and you'll be good for many a moon yet," he added lightly.

Jerry fastened up his shirt with big, fumbling fingers and walked slowly outside, while Rose, tears of pity shedding a misty luminousness over her eyes, stepped close to Donald and laid her hand appealingly on his arm, "Is it something pretty bad, Doctor Mac?" she breathed.

"Well, it's apparently a mild case ... so far."

"But the trouble ... is it ... is it dangerous?"

He hesitated an instant, then responded quietly, "Nurses have to know the truth, of course, and I am sure that you have a brave little heart, so I'm not afraid to tell you that it is bad. It is almost sure to be fatal, in time, but not necessarily soon. If he will take things easy, as I told him to, he'll live for a considerable time yet; but we mustn't allow him to get very greatly excited, or do any very heavy work."

Suddenly very white, but calm and tearless, Smiles answered, "I reckon I can help him better if I know all about it, doctor. I got to help him, you know. He's all I have now in the whole world."

"Of course you're going to help him—we both are—but ... you have me, little sister, and your life work," he answered with awkward tenderness. "Now let us see if I can make you understand what I believe the trouble to be. In its incipient—that is, its early stages, it would be rather hard to tell from angina pectoris, for the symptoms would be much the same—pain about the heart and shortness of breath. But one can get over the latter, and feel perfectly well between attacks."

He picked up from his open suitcase a folded newspaper which he had tossed in half read, on leaving the city, and drew for her a crude diagram of the heart and major arteries.

"This biggest pipe which goes downward from the heart is called the great artery, and it and its branches—just like a tree's—carry the blood into all parts of the body, except the lungs. Another name for it is the descending thoracic aorta, and that is where grandfather's trouble is. If you knew something about automobile tires I would explain it by saying that he had a blow-out, but it's something like this. The pipe has an outer surface and an inner lining. At one time or another something happened to injure and weaken the former—disease does it sometimes—perhaps it may have been a severe strain or crushing blow on his chest."

"A big tree fell on him early last winter," cried Rose, with sudden enlightenment. "His chest is so big and strong that he didn't think that it hurt him, 'cept to lame him considerable."

"That may have caused the trouble. Well, what happens is this. The blood is pumped by the heart through that weakened pipe, and, little by little, it forces the lining out through the weakened spot, making something like a bubble filled with blood. In time that might grow until you could actually see the swelling, and all the time, the containing tissue is getting thinner and thinner. Now you can yourself guess the reason why he mustn't do anything to over-exert his heart. Hard work, or great excitement, makes our hearts beat faster, and sends the blood through that big artery with extra force and ..."

"The bubble might ... break," whispered "Smiles," with a frightened look on her young face.

"Yes. We call it a rupture of the aneurism, and when that happens mortal life ends."

"Oh," she shuddered slightly. "I must keep him very quiet, Doctor Mac. I am strong and can do all the work. You tell him that he mustn't do anything, please, doctor."

"I'm not sure that that would be the wisest plan, Rose. He has been so strong and active all his life it would break his great heart to be tied down like an invalid. I'm sure that he would be happier doing things, even if as a result he didn't live quite so long. Don't you think so, yourself?"

She nodded, and he continued, "Of course he is so big and strong he can do common, simple tasks without anything like the amount of exertion required by an ordinary man, and, so long as he doesn't strain himself, or get very much excited, we may reasonably expect him to live for a good while yet. Besides, as the aneurism progresses there will come a steady, boring pain and increased shortness of breath, which will themselves help to keep him quiet."

"But can't I give him some medicine?"

"The best medicine that he can possibly have will be your happy, comforting smile and tender love, my child."

She furtively wiped a stray tear from her cheek and smiled bravely up into his face, in a wordless pledge that to the administration of this treatment she would devote herself without stint.

"May I ... may I have that paper," she answered appealingly, as he started to crumple it up, preparatory to tossing it into the fireplace. "We don't often have city papers to read, you know."

"Why, of course; I didn't think," he answered, smoothing it out and handing it to her. She took it eagerly, and had read barely a minute before she cried, delightedly, "Why, Doctor Mac. You're in this paper. Oh, did you read what it says?"

"Hang it," thought Donald, "I forgot all about that fool story, or I wouldn't have given it to her." But she was already reading the brief article aloud, slowly but with appreciatory expression.

EXCEPTIONAL FEE PAID BOSTON DOCTOR

Dr. Donald MacDonald Operates on Multi-Millionaire's Child

What is rumored to have been one of the biggest fees paid to a physician in recent years, was received lately by the brilliant young children's specialist of this city, Dr. Donald MacDonald.

A few weeks ago he was summoned to Newport in consultation with local and New York physicians over the five-year-old daughter of J. Bentley Moors, the millionaire copper king, and finally saved the child's life by performing successfully one of the most difficult operations known to surgery—the removal of a brain tumor.

The child had already totally lost the power of speech, and had sunk into a comatose state, the operation being performed at Dr. MacDonald's suggestion as a final desperate resort.

His associates on the case are unstinted in their praise of his skill, and declare that few other surgeons in America could have carried it through with any hope of success.

The child was completely cured, and in his gratitude her father sent the young doctor a check which—it is said—represented an amount larger than many men earn in a lifetime.

"What does 'comatose' mean, Doctor Mac?" asked Smiles.

"It means a condition during which the body appears to be lifeless. A tumor is a growth—in that particular case here, inside the skull, which pressed on the child's brain, paralyzing, or shutting off, all the senses."

"Oh, wasn't it wonderful to do what you did ... it was almost like the miracles our dear Lord performed, for you gave sight to the blind and raised up one who was almost dead. I am so glad for that little child and her dear father, and I don't wonder that he gave you a lot of money. Was it ... was it as much as a ... a thousand dollars?" she asked in an awed tone.

"Yes, indeed, much more than that, in fact."

"Not five thousand?"

Donald laughed. "The newspaper men, who had somehow or other got wind of the story—goodness knows how—tried mighty hard to get me to tell them how much, but I wouldn't. However, since I know that you can keep a secret, I will tell you. It was just ten times the amount of your last guess."

"Oh!" she gasped, as the result of the multiplication dawned upon her. "Why, it was a fortune, and ... and I know you."

"Of course it pleased me," was his answer, "but not half as much as the result of the operation, dear. If a doctor is really in earnest, and bound up in his work, he never thinks whether the little sufferer stretched before him in bed, or on the operating table, has a father worth a million dollars, or one in the poorhouse. That is the reason why we have to charge for our services by a different standard from men in almost any other kind of work. The rich man has to help pay for the poor man, whether he wants to or not. I meant to charge that very rich man enough so that I could give myself to a great many poor children without charging them anything, perhaps; but he had a big heart and sent me that check for several times what I should have charged without even waiting for me to make out a bill. And his letter, which came with it, said that even fifty thousand dollars was poor compensation for a life worth more to him than all the money in the whole world."

"A little child's life is more precious than all the gold that ever was," said Smiles seriously, "for only God can give it."



CHAPTER XIV

SOWING THE WIND

The noonday meal was a rather quiet, constrained affair. None of the three was in a talkative mood, Donald was still distrait, Big Jerry obviously in physical and mental distress, and Rose too full of troubled sympathy for conversation. Frequently Donald caught her gaze fixed on the old man's face with an expression of unutterable love; and as often, when she saw him watching her, her face lighted for a moment with a tender, compassionate smile.

The eagerly anticipated vacation and reunion had truly begun badly, and it was with a sense of relief that Donald finished the simple dinner, and announced that he guessed he would go for a little tramp in the woods, while Rose was performing her household tasks.

"Hain't yo' ergoin' ter tote yo'r rifle-gun?" queried Big Jerry, as he noticed that the doctor was leaving the house without a weapon.

"No, not this trip. I'm not in a mood for hunting. All I want is a walk,—and a stout club and Mike will be protection enough against anything in these woods. Good-by, Smiles. I'll be back before supper-time, hungry as a bear."

He left the clearing for the virgin woods at random, striding along briskly and with rising spirits, and at first unmindful of the direction that he was taking.

In fact he had, subconsciously—even in his recreation—refused to follow the easiest way, and had struck out on the up-mountain trail.

* * * * *

For a while Donald walked on, regardless of whither. Then the consciousness of the fact that he was in a—to him—unknown part of the mountain, and nearing the summit, brought with it a recollection of the words spoken that morning by little Lou, "Judd air erway ergin ... up in the mountain."

Still, he kept on, for, although he told himself that he had not the slightest intention of seeking the mountaineer, or the solution of Smiles' troubled look, and most certainly was not courting trouble, purposeless curiosity impelled him higher and higher into the hitherto unexplored fastnesses. Now the timberlands lay beneath him, for, although the hardy laurel continued in profusion, albeit somewhat dried and withered, the trees were thinning out and becoming more scraggly, and more frequently the naked rocks, split and seamed, thrust themselves up through the baked soil, "like vertebrae in the backbone of the mountain," thought Donald. Now they were toned and softened by moss and lichen; now barren of vegetation, rugged and gaunt, split asunder by the ancient elements. In the distress which had come like a cloud over the sunlight of his spirits, so gayly anticipative a few hours previous, they flung a wordless challenge to the battling instinct in the man, and he accepted it with the thought that the best balm for troubled minds is strenuous bodily action.

Eager and joyous over the new game, Mike tore about, panting, and dashing from side to side through the underbrush on real, or imaginary, scents, now stopping to dig madly for a moment, then racing on to catch up with his master, who frequently had to haul him over the precipitous crags by the shaggy hair on his muscular back.

The air was cooler here, and as invigorating as wine; the sky was a transparent blue.

At last, somewhat tired of pushing his way over rocks and through virgin underbrush with no objective, he was on the point of turning to retrace his footsteps, when Mike stopped short with nose a-quiver and bristles lifting on his neck.

"What's up?" asked the man. As usual he addressed the dog as though he were a sentient being. "Trouble ahead? Some wild animal there, old boy?"

But, instead of retreating, he grasped his cudgel more firmly, and cautiously parted the thick bushes in front of him.

To his surprise, Donald found that he was almost on the edge of a sharp declivity leading down into a natural bowl-like hollow, so shut in with high rocks and underbrush that it was, in effect, a retreat almost as good as a cave for concealment. And that it was so used, or had been at some time, was made evident by the presence of a rude hut, little more than a lean-to since one end was wholly open, which snuggled against the further bank.

With growing curiosity and caution, he worked his way along the edge, for now a faint odor of wood-smoke reached his nostrils, and there came to his ears the sound of some one, or something, moving within the shelter, a presence which the dog had apparently detected much sooner than had his master.

At length he reached a point of vantage, partly hidden by a cleft rock, from which he could look fully into the interior of the shack. It was obviously not a habitation, although a fire was burning briskly within it. Near by stood a small keg or two, what appeared to be a large tub or vat, and, over the fire, was a queer metal object, the shape of which caused Donald to wonder for a brief instant if necromancy still existed, and he had stumbled upon the retreat of a mountain wizard. Almost immediately, however, the true explanation flashed through his mind.

It was a crude illicit distillery—the hidden "still" of a mountain moonshiner! At the same moment a tall man in typical mountain costume moved into view and bent over the fire.

In his interest Donald had forgotten Mike; but, at the appearance of the man, his companion gave voice to a sharp and hostile challenge.

The furtive toiler turned like a flash, and, seizing the rifle which leaned against the wall near at hand, sprang out and levelled it at the intruder whose head was visible above the rock, for he had been too much surprised to move.

"Put up yo'r hands!" he cried, and Donald complied with the order without perceptible hesitation, at the same time pushing into full sight. The man below was Judd!

For a moment neither spoke, and the silence was pregnant with serious possibilities. Then Donald regained partial control of his shaken self-possession, and with his hands still held above his head, slid awkwardly down into a sitting posture on the edge of the bank.

"Do you know, Judd," he remarked at last, with an assumption of coolness. "I thought that sort of thing had ceased to exist, even in these wild mountains," and he nodded toward the distillery.

"I allows thet yo' hev er habit of thinkin' wrong," was the surly response. "You haint no doctor man. Thet's er blind. Yo' be er revenuer, I reckon, an' es sich I've got ter put er bullet inter ye."

"Don't be a fool," snapped Donald, even in this dangerous predicament unable to resort to conciliatory words when addressing Judd. "I'm nothing of the sort, and you know it."

There was another spell of nerve-racking silence. Then the outlaw said slowly, "I reckon yo' speaks ther truth. Yo' haint smart ernough fer er revenuer. One er them wouldn't come er still-huntin' 'thout er rifle-gun, an' with er barkin' dawg."

"Well, I'm glad that's settled," answered Donald, uttering a forced laugh. "My arms are getting tired, held up like this, and, as you have a rifle and I haven't, I suggest that I be allowed to resume a more natural position."

Without waiting for the permission, he dropped his hands to the bank beside him.

Donald's action placed Judd in an obviously unpleasant dilemma. He knew it, and therein lay the intruder's best chance.

"I haint never shot er man in cold blood erfore, but I reckon I've got ter do hit now," he said sullenly. "Yo' know too damned much erbout sartain things what don't consarn ye."

"If they don't concern me—as I am willing to admit—why waste a bullet?" answered Donald, mentally sparring for time. "As a law-abiding citizen I might reasonably feel that you still ought to be put out of existence; but, it's no hunt of mine, since I'm not a federal officer. I haven't any particular desire to get a bullet through me, and I know perfectly well that you don't care for the thought of adding the crime of murder to the misdemeanor of illicit liquor making."

"I haint erfeerd ter shoot ye," blustered Judd, and added significantly, "Yo're body wouldn't never be found, and yo' wouldn't be ther first pryin' stranger what got lost in these hyar hills, and warn't never heard of more."

"Admitted. But what's to be gained in taking the chance? I'm ready—yes, anxious—to give you my word of honor that I'll forget what I've stumbled on here this afternoon. Come, be reasonable, Judd."

"Wall, ef you'll swa'r thet ..." began the mountaineer dubiously.

"I do," broke in Donald with undisguised eagerness. "I solemnly swear never to tell a soul about the existence of this still, so help me God. There, I hope that satisfies you. You need not be afraid of my not keeping my oath, but just the same, I think you're a fool to do this. You're almost sure to be caught at it, sooner or later, and a federal prison isn't a particularly pleasant place."

"I don't reckerlect hevin' asked any advice from yo'," was Judd's surly reply.

"Well, I don't expect that you'll follow it," answered the other, as he scrambled to his feet. "And since we don't seem to hit it off very well together, I guess I'll be starting along."

"No yo' won't ... leastwise not yet!" Judd's words came with crisp finality, and were reinforced by a quick movement of his rifle to the hip. "I haint through with ye yet, stranger. Last year I warned ye fair thet this hyar mountain war an on-healthy place fer ye. 'Pears like yo' didn't believe hit, but I means thet ye should this time. Erfore yo' goes I'll hear ernother sworn promise from ye, an' I reckon yo' kin guess what hit air."

"I can. And you're not going to get it. No, by God, not if you put a coward's bullet into me for refusing," burst out Donald, with his pent-up anger breaking its bounds at the other's dictatorial demands. "I agreed that what you did with your time wasn't my business, but what I do with mine, is. And I don't take orders from you in the matter, understand?"

The mountaineer's lips drew back, his body quivered, and the finger on the rifle's trigger trembled.

Above him, Donald stood equally tense and pale. He felt that he should be praying as he had never prayed before, but wrath possessed his spirit wholly, and his mind was completely concentrated on that lean forefinger, whose slightest tension meant death. Moments like these come but once in the lifetime of the average man, if, indeed, they ever come at all; but, when they do, when he suddenly finds himself face to face with some cataclysmic upheaval in human or external nature that threatens to rend the thin but impenetrable curtain which separates him from eternity, the salient characteristic of his being is unmasked and stands forth, naked. If he be at heart a coward, even though he may honestly never have suspected himself of cowardice, he will try to flee, or cringe and grovel for mercy; if his soul is stayed upon the immortal and everlasting truths, he will face what Fate may hold with the resigned fortitude which was the martyrs'; but, if he is merely a man, strong with the courage of the beast, refined and strengthened in the fires of intellect, he will be more likely to stand his ground unflinchingly and cast his defiance in the teeth of the danger which threatens, wrathful, but unafraid.

Donald was of the latter breed. He made no move; but the cords and veins in his muscular neck and hands swelled visibly, and his dark gray eyes took on a steely glint, as they bored steadily into Judd's glowering black ones.

Suddenly, with a deep oath, the mountaineer dropped the butt of his gun to the ground. Both men breathed a deep sigh, and the latter said: "No, I kaint shoot an unarmed man, even ef he air a skunk. But hark ye. I warns ye now fer the last time. Clar out uv this hyar mountain terday, er go armed an' ready, fer, by Gawd A'mighty, I aims ter shoot ye dead the next time I meets ye. Hit's yo' er me now."

When the other dropped his weapon, Donald had almost decided to make an attempt to clear the atmosphere by telling him again that his suspicions were utterly groundless and that, so far from having any intention of stealing the affections of the mountain child whom Judd loved, he was betrothed to another. But, at the challenge to fight, something, which he could neither explain afterwards nor control then, swept away the half-formed resolve, and the heat of primal hate sent a burning flush through him and drove cool reason utterly from its throne.

"If you didn't have that gun, you damned coward, I'd come down there this instant, and thrash you within an inch of your worthless life," he shouted, heedless of consequences; too angry to care what might happen. And simultaneously, spurred on by his own blind passion, he slid down the bank and, with fists clenched, advanced on Judd. A yard ahead of him bristled Mike, a canine fury with gleaming teeth bared and muscles tensed for a spring. His master's quarrel was his also.

"Call off thet damned dawg, ef yo' don't want fer him ter git shot," raged the other, white with anger. "I reckon thet the time hes come fer me ter teach ye a lesson; p'raps then a rifle bullet won't be nowise necessary. Yo' tie up thet devil, an' I'll hev it out with ye, now." Wrath robbed him, too, of all caution and he flung his gun far to one side as Donald, with hands that trembled so violently that he could barely tie the knots, slipped his handkerchief through Mike's collar and fastened him securely to a stout bush. Then he faced the infuriated mountaineer.

"Hit's yo' er me," panted the latter, assuming a pantherlike crouch.

"Let it go at that," answered the city man, dropping naturally into a fighting position.

The veneer of our vaunted civilization is, at the best, thin, and every man, in whose veins runs red blood, has within him pent-up volcanic forces which require but little awakening to produce a soul-shattering upheaval. Donald knew that his being shouted aloud for battle—why, he didn't pause to analyze. Judd knew full well what he was fighting for. It was the woman whom his heart had claimed as his mate, regardless of what his chances of winning her were.

In college days, Donald had been a trained athlete, and he was still exceptionally powerful, although city life and his confining work had robbed his muscles of some of the flexibility and strength which had once been theirs, and were now possessed by those of his opponent. In weight, and knowledge of the science of boxing, he far surpassed Judd; but these odds were evened by the fact that his mind—thoroughly aroused though it was—held only a desire to punish the other severely, whereas Judd's passion burned deeper; blood-lust was in his heart and he saw red. Nothing would satisfy him short of killing the man who seemed to be the personification of his failure to win Smiles.

The mountaineer opened the fight with a furious rush. Donald instinctively side-stepped, and met it with a jolting short-arm blow to the other's lean jaw, which sent the aggressor to the ground.

Like a flash he was up again, wild to close with his rival and get his fingers about his throat. There, in the little natural amphitheatre, with only the ancient trees as silent witnesses, was staged again the oft-fought fight between the boxer and the battler, but the decision was not to rest on points. No Marquis of Queensberry rules governed, no watchful referee was present to disqualify one or the other for unfair tactics.



CHAPTER XV

REAPING THE WHIRLWIND

It was not long before Donald realized that, whatever had been Judd's primary purpose, he was now fighting to kill, and he sought desperately to drive home a blow which would knock him out. But, with all his greater skill, it was not easily to be accomplished. The mountaineer was tough, agile and actuated by a rage which mere punishment only increased. And punishment he took aplenty; while Donald remained almost unscathed, as he met rush after rush, and a storm of wildly flailing blows, with an unbroken defence.

Nor was it long before the other realized that absolute necessity called for him to break through that guard, and clinch with his opponent, if he were to hope to be successful in carrying out his design. Gathering his physical forces for a final desperate assault—which right and left hand blows on his already battered, bleeding face could not check—he broke through Donald's defence, and flung his sinewy arms about his rival.

For a moment both men clung desperately to one another, their breath coming in labored gasps.

Then, suddenly, the mountaineer twisted his leg about one of Donald's, catching him off his guard, and they went heavily to the ground together.

Whatever had been the city man's advantage when they were on their feet, he shortly discovered that the woodman's great agility and crude skill in wrestling gave him the upper hand in this more primitive method of combat. Over and over they rolled, gasping for breath, and, although Donald exerted his great, but now rapidly failing, strength, more than once he felt the clutch of the other's lean, powerful fingers gripping his throat and shutting off his breath, before he could tear them free.

The end came suddenly.

During a deadly grapple—with first one man, then the other, on top—Donald called into play the last of his nervous reserve force, and, with a mighty effort, broke free, and flung Judd face downward on the ground. The latter's right arm was extended, and, grasping the sweaty wrist, he drew it up and back, at the same instant crowding his knee into the spine of the prostrate man.

Judd cursed and wriggled frantically; but only succeeded in grinding his battered face into the torn turf. It was some seconds before the conqueror could gain breath enough to speak. At last he panted out, "Now I've got you. If you move I'll dislocate your shoulder like this!" An involuntary shriek of agony was wrung from the defeated man's bleeding lips.

"I'll let you up when ..."

"Oh, ooooh!" came a startled, terrified cry from above him. Donald lifted his eyes, and saw Rose standing on the bank where he had stood.

For an instant he remained as though turned to stone, staring at the girl with growing dismay. Finally he got slowly to his feet, instinctively gave partial aid to Judd as he too struggled up, his burning eyes also fixed on Smiles. It seemed as though the two dishevelled, dirt-covered and bleeding men typified the brute in nature, and stood arraigned there before the spirit of divine justice, for the slender girl's white dress, and no less white face, against the background of dark green, made her appear almost like an ethereal being.

Her breast was rising and falling rapidly as was indicated by the palpitating movement of her hand pressed close against it; her lips were parted and her large, shadowy eyes filled with uncomprehending fear and pain.

"What ... what do hit mean?" she whispered.

As Judd made no answer Donald finally succeeded in summoning up an unnatural laugh and lied reassuringly, "It ... it isn't anything serious, Smiles. Judd and I got into a dispute over ... over which was the better wrestler, and I have been showing him a few city tricks."

"Thet air a lie!" The mountaineer's words lashed out like a physical blow, and the crimson flamed into the other's cheeks—and those of Smiles as well.

"Hit air er lie," he repeated with a rasping voice, as he dashed the blood and dirt from his lips. "We war fightin' ter kill, an' I reckon yo' kin guess what hit war erbout," he added, flinging the last words up at the girl.

Once again Donald attempted to save her still greater distress by a white lie. "I chanced to stumble on his hidden still, Smiles, and he thought that I would betray him."

"Oh, Juddy," cried the girl wringing her hands, "I've been erfeerin' this. In course I knowed erbout hit, fer yo' showed me the still yerself, but I've been worryin', and hit war ter warn ye ... ter beg ye ter quit fer leetle Lou's sake erfore hit war too late thet I came. Yo' must quit, oh please, Judd." In her eagerness she ran down the bank and toward him. "I knows thet Doctor Mac wouldn't tell, but hit's a warnin'."

As though hypnotized, Judd gazed into her pleading face, with his passion for her overwhelming that other one, which had so short a time before swayed him. He stepped to meet her with a gesture of hopelessness, and, realizing that he was for the moment forgotten, Donald moved softly to the mountaineer's rifle, ejected the cartridges from the magazine and pocketed them unobserved.

"I kaint quit, Rose," answered Judd, looking into her face with a hungry expression. "I kaint stop. Hit's my work, an' hit pays better then ever hit done. I wants ter make money ... fer yo'. Besides, ef hit hadn't ha' been fer the white liquor what I sell ter the storeman down in Fayville, I wouldn't have been able ter sell yo'r baskets for ye. I wouldn't hev had no money ter give ..."

He checked his impetuous, unconsidered words too late. The girl's quick mind delved into his unspoken thought. She started and stepped back, crying, "'To give?' Judd Amos, war hit yo' thet paid me ther extry price on them baskets?"

Confused and distressed, the other remained silent until she repeated her question insistently. Then he answered pleadingly, "I loves ye, Smiles. Yo' know hit, an' so does he. I wanted ter holp ye, an' 'twar ther only way."

Even while Donald—rejoicing in the opportunity to regain his self-possession—had stood apart from the other two, none of the conversation had escaped him. With his wrath now fanned to flame afresh by Judd's apparent falsehood, he, too, burst into hot words without pausing to consider the effect of them on the girl, "What? You dare attempt to curry favor with her by lyingly claiming credit for the additional money her work brought, you cur? You didn't know that I held the cards to call that outrageous bluff, too, did you? You didn't know that I bought every one of those baskets, and told the storekeeper what price to pay for them, did you?"

No sooner had the anger-impelled words left his lips than Donald felt heartily ashamed of himself, and wished that he might unsay them. Half afraid, he turned his eyes toward the girl to find his fears realized. Her eyes were flaming from her deathly white face, and a mingled look of hurt pride and bitter scorn struggled for supremacy on her lips.

"Yo' ... yo' think I would accept yo'r charity?" she cried. "Yo' think I would take money gifts from any man? I allows ter pay ye both every cent uv thet money; and I hates ye ... I hates ye both."

For an instant she stood trembling with anger and mortification, then turned and sped up the bank and away into the woods.

Judd sank down with a muffled groan, but Donald, shocked at the result of his ill-advised and hasty words, forgot his late adversary and sprang in pursuit, crying, "Smiles. Dear child, wait. I want to talk with you, to explain...."

He ran over rock and crag blunderingly into the forest in the direction she had taken, and, as he disappeared, Mike, who, during the combat, had continually raged at his leash in futile frenzy, made a last desperate effort, snapped the leather collar, although the effort drew a yelp of pain from him, and tore after him.

He passed his master and overtook the fleeing girl, sagaciously sensing the situation; but, as she paid no heed to his appealing barks and tugs at her skirt, but merely ran the faster, he turned back to await his lord. Body-weary and discomforted, Donald likewise gave up the chase as the sound of Smiles' flight grew more distant and died away.

Eventually she too dropped into a walk, and finally stopped altogether, with a deep, gasping sob. Throwing herself down at the foot of an ancient tree, she pressed her flushed face hard against the rough bark, her mind in a wretched turmoil.

For the first time in Smiles' young life her eyes had been opened, and she had looked upon the brute passions of men, had tasted the bitter gall of trust abused, had felt an anger which brought with it the desire to hurt another as she herself had been hurt.

Stabbed to the quick of her soul, she lay on the moss-bedded roots of the impassive tree, her body quivering with soundless, shuddering sobs.

She hated herself, the two men—and Judd less than Donald, for she had known and excused his shortcomings, while in her childish eyes Dr. MacDonald had been all that was noble, a super-man, an idol whose feet were now clay. She hated the world where such things were possible.

For a long time Rose lay as she had fallen, hardly moving, and when—pale and dry-eyed—she did arise to return to the cabin through the twilight shadows, something beautiful, but indefinable, which had gone to make up the fresh, childlike charm of her face, had vanished.

Meanwhile, Donald walked heavily on with bowed head, heedless of the direction he took. The sound of rushing waters finally struck upon his ear, and his heated, dirt-covered body turned instinctively in their direction. A few minutes brought him to the river at a point where it tore through a narrow ravine of rock, in dashing cataract and noisy rapid. Donald, with increasing lameness, made his way painfully along the craggy bank until it descended to the river's edge, and, kneeling beside the leaping waters, he plunged his bruised, aching hands and face into them gratefully.

As he stood up again at last, his ears caught faintly above the river's tumult the distant crack of a rifle, followed immediately by another sound nearer at hand on the bank above him.

It was the agonized yelp of pain from a dog. Donald sprang erect, his heart seeming to lift with a convulsive action, and crowd his throat. He well knew that canine cry, now filled with mortal agony.

Almost blind with reborn rage and fear, Donald sprang up the steep bank, scrambling, stumbling, heedless of boughs which lashed across his face, and rocks which bruised his legs. He reached the top, and, parting the bushes, found what he had sought—and feared to find. On the stubbly grass lay little Mike, whining and biting at a spot on his side where the tawny hair was already matted and dark with flowing blood.

Made speechless by the clutching pressure in his throat, and suddenly dizzy from a mist which rose before his eyes, the man bent and lifted the panting animal—his bosom friend and faithful companion through many days and nights—in his trembling arms.

Mike painfully turned his head and licked his master's drawn face. The next instant came the sound of crashing underbrush, and, through vistas, Donald saw a man approaching them on a lumbering run. It was Big Jerry. His beard and clothing were dishevelled, and, as he drew near, his deep, gasping breaths became audible. From his ghastly gray and working face his deep eyes looked forth with an expression which spelt pain of body and wrack of mind.

Donald stood up, with the dog clasped to his breast, and a terrible expression on his countenance.

"Mike ... my friend ... shot ... he is dying," came his words, in an unnatural voice. "God have mercy on the man who did it. I shall not!"

The giant's frame seemed to collapse visibly; two big tears started from his eyes and ran down the furrows of his cheeks as he moved closer and laid his big, shaking hand on the dog's head.

"I done hit," he answered dully.

Mike licked the wrinkled hand which moved in slow caress over his jaws.

"You?" whispered Donald in amazed unbelief.

"Gawd help me, yes. I shot him ... I wish hit hed er been myself," returned the old man, between breaths which came in deep, body-shaking gasps.

Slowly the doctor bent, laid his chum back on the ground, and knelt beside him until the fast glazing eyes—which never wavered from his—closed forever, and the pain-tortured little body lay still. Big Jerry, too, sank down and dropped his massive head onto his hands, while his frame rose and fell with convulsive heaving.

"Hit war this erway," he began to speak at last, and told his story in broken, laboring sentences. "I war erhuntin' with ... with yo'r rifle-gun in the woods thar beyond ther ravine. Jest es I war startin' fer the cabin, I seen ... I seen a man erstandin' hyar on the bank, er peerin' down towards the river, thar. I looked whar he war erlookin', an' seen ye down thar, bathin' yo'r face in ther water. The man war ertotin' a rifle-gun, an' uv a sudden he drapped ter his knee an' raised hit, an' I knowed he war kalkerlatin' ter shoot ye.

"I tried fer ter shout, ter cry out a warnin' ter ye, but my voice hed somehow lost hits power, an' wouldn't kerry above the noise of the falls. Thar war but one thing fer ter do, an' hit called fer powerful quick action.

"Yo' war my foster-son, an' ef 'twar yo'r life er his'n I allowed I knowed whar my duty lay. But I didn't aim fer ter kill him.... I wish ter Gawd I hed. 'Taint boastin' none fer me ter say ter ye thet I aimed only fer ter shoot the arm what war holdin' the gun.

"In course hit takes time fer ter tell ye all this, but I acted like I thought. Then ..." he paused, and went on only with a supreme effort, "then, jest as I started the trigger-pull, I seen ... I seen leetle Mike spring out o' the bushes straight at ... at the man. I seen him, I tells ye, erfore I fired. My mind told me not ter pull thet trigger, an' ... an' I done hit. My aim war true, but ..." he stopped altogether.

"The man," asked Donald at length, through clenched teeth. "What happened to him?"

"He turned et the crack of my gun. He ... he seen me, and run off inter the wood thar."

There ensued a long silence. Then Donald's hand stretched out and grasped that of the sorrowing giant.

"Jerry," he said steadily. "Don't feel so bad, it wasn't your fault. You did all that man could do. You were trying to ... to save my life, just as ... as Mike was, God bless the little dog. He must have realized that Judd was following me by the exercise of a sense beyond our knowledge, and rushed back to attack him—for my sake."

"Yo' said ... yo' said ... 'Judd.' How did yo' come ter know 'twar him?"

With new and deepened remorse, Donald sadly outlined the chief incidents of the quarrel, without, however, mentioning the discovery of the still, or the immediate cause of the combat.

"Gawd help us all ef er new feud hes broken out hyar," said Jerry solemnly, as he finished. "But yo' air my friend, enjyin' ther hospitality of my roof, an' from this day Judd Amos air my mortal enemy, even though he be my next neighbor."

Donald sadly removed his coat, and, wrapping it around the body of his chum, arose, and the silent, painful journey home was begun.



CHAPTER XVI

THE AFTERMATH

Supper was over. With kindly hands night had laid her deep purple mantle over the new-made mound back of the cabin, hiding it from the grieving gaze of the three who sat before the door in painful silence beneath the star-pierced dome of heaven. In the poignancy of her own sorrow, and her overwhelming sympathy for Donald, when she had come to a realization of the meaning of the bundle which he brought out of the woods and laid so tenderly down on the grass before the cabin's stoop, every vestige of Smiles' anger had instantly vanished.

"Oh, the pity, the uselessness of it," cried Donald's heart, as his thoughts again and again turned back to the tragic series of events which had made the afternoon a thing of horror. The bitter culmination,—the death of Mike, poor, courageous, self-sacrificing little Mike—was the most needless of all, for, although he had not mentioned the fact to Big Jerry, Donald knew that in all human probability Judd's rifle was empty of cartridges. And, although Jerry himself uttered no word of complaint, the physician knew, only too well, that the gripping excitement, against which he had warned the old man only a few hours earlier, had brought its inevitable aftermath. The giant's breath came with labored, audible gasps, and his very appearance told the story of the increased pain within his breast. For these disasters—as well as the mortal enmity of the young mountaineer and the heart-ache of the innocent girl—he, and he alone, was to blame. Donald groaned under his breath.

The silence was finally ended by Smiles crying out bitterly, "Oh, Doctor Mac, I can't understand why grandfather pulled that trigger, and shot dear little Mike. He saw him spring at Judd."

"It wasn't in any wise his fault, dear heart. He could not possibly have helped it. You see our brains are telegraph stations from which the nerves run like wires, carrying messages to all the different parts of our bodies. Big Jerry had sent a command to his finger, ordering it to pull the trigger, and the muscles had started to obey. The second message countermanding the first—quick as it was—came too late to halt the purely muscular action; that is all."

"Another good evening, my friends," came a cheery voice, and the mountain minister approached out of the shadows, and joined them. "I am just back from a journey into the wilderness, like John the Baptist's, and ... Why, what's wrong? Do I see the ghost of a sorrow sitting amid this group, which should be so happy?"

"Oh, Mr. Talmadge," cried Rose, jumping up and stepping to his side as he paused. "Many ghosts are here to-night. I think that you took God away with you on your journey, for His spirit has not been in Webb's Gap this afternoon."

"Tell me, what has happened, my dear?" he answered quietly, as he seated himself within the circle.

Then, step by step, the whole unhappy story was haltingly poured into his ears, save only that Smiles consciously refrained from mentioning the cause which Judd had—by implication—given for the quarrel and Donald kept his promise and made no allusion to his finding of the still. Since the minister asked no questions and made no comment concerning the cause, it is fair to assume that he guessed the truth and wisely held his own counsel. When he had brought the patchwork recital to an end, the doctor laughed with a bitter note.

"You see how much good the brief glimpse which I had last night of the eternal light did me! Before one full day has elapsed, I sound a lower depth in primitive, brutal passion then I ever had before in my life. I am sick at heart when I think how quickly and easily I could forget everything which goes to make up civilization. There was no excuse for it—that's the worst part. I was infinitely more to blame than Judd, even leaving out of consideration the fact that a greater degree of self-restraint and forbearance should reasonably have been expected of me, a city-bred man, than of him, a more primitive son of the hills."

Donald placed his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands with a stifled sound, which might have been groan or curse, and very gently Smiles' hand stole up in the darkness and stroked his tumbled hair, until the man's own fumblingly sought and held it close, to find mute comfort in her warm clasp.

"Perhaps I understand better than you think the reasons which underlie these most unhappy events," answered the old man slowly. There was no rebuke in his quiet voice.

"Although it is true, doctor, that the deeper we get into the heart of primal nature, the closer we get to the heart of nature's God, it is equally true that the nearer we also get to the primal in man.

"I cannot help feeling that the city's laws and conventions trammel the spirit in its free exercise of self, which is ill; but yet the inbred realization of those very laws and conventions, and the fear of consequences if they are broken, act as a salutary check on the primitive passions inherited by every one of us from our savage ancestors.

"Of course, I know that, in places where men are crowded together, such man-made laws and conventions are wise and necessary; but the life which results is not—cannot be—full and natural as it may be in an isolated place like this, when honest obedience is paid to the still higher laws of God—and it is for that obedience which all of us must strive constantly.

"You failed in the test to-day; but, believe me, there are many in these mountains who, lacking all the advantages of training and education which are yours, meet it. Their lives are lived under nature's higher laws in perfect sincerity, and, although they might not conform to the standards of so-called civilization, they are surely purer in God's sight than those of millions who pattern theirs by printed precept."

"I reckon," murmured Smiles, "that St. Peter had to put many black marks on three books to-day ... yes, mine too, for I was wickedly angry. It was hate that made me run away from Doctor Mac, and if I hadn't done it, M ... M ... Mike wouldn't have been shot." She leaned her head against Donald's arm, and cried softly.

"'The wages of sin is death,'" said the minister. "And he paid the penalty for you, Dr. MacDonald, sacrificing himself because of his great love. Poor little Mike. Such faithful animals as he must have souls, and his is now in its own paradise."

No one spoke for a little, and then Mr. Talmadge continued to muse aloud.

"Mere repentance, such as the doctor now feels, is not enough. You remember the parable of the woman who drove the evil spirit from her fleshly temple, and swept it clean, but failed to fill its place with another guest, and seven other devils came and repossessed it? So it is always with human life, Dr. MacDonald. Nature abhors a vacuum, and so does the spirit. If a man does not fill his soul—swept free of past evil by repentance—with that which is actively good, the repentance is of little avail."

"Yes, yes, I can readily understand that, for it has a parallel in bodily illness," answered Donald, somewhat impatiently. "We all know that, when the sick physical being is freed of its disease, it is left weak and an easy prey for new troubles. We can bring back to it the strength to resist by giving nerve-and tissue-building food and tonics, but how is the spirit to be ..."

"How persistently the earth-man kicks against the pricks," cried Mr. Talmadge. "Child, your friend will not lift his eyes from the maze of doubt. You pledged yourself to help him. Help him now."

Her face suddenly glowing with light, Rose turned to Donald eagerly, and said without hesitation, "Oh, Doctor Mac, don't you see? The answer is so clear, so simple that even I know it. The dear God spirit is everywhere, just waiting for you to call it to your aid. Please pray to Him to give you new strength so that you may not be weak again, and I will pray, too."

"Yes," supplemented the minister, "'Whence cometh my help? My help cometh even from the Lord, which hath made heaven and earth.'"

Donald was strongly moved at the eager interest in him which these two displayed. Shifting uncomfortably he replied, "I need His help, I know; but ... but I guess I have forgotten how to pray for it."

"Open your heart with sincerity, and He will enter and bestow the strength you need in order to take up your task anew, and carry on until your purpose here on earth has been accomplished. That is all that prayer need be, for He is ever more ready to give than we to receive. Verbal petitions are vain and empty things; honest communion with Him is prayer."

He arose, content to say no more, and to leave the sorely troubled spirit of the stranger to Smiles' tender ministrations. "I am deeply sorry for you in your distress, Dr. MacDonald, but although there is small comfort in the remark, I cannot help but feel that what has happened was ordained to complete your lesson, so that you may leave these hills with a new understanding and higher purpose in life. Good night, and God be with you all."



CHAPTER XVII

THE PARTING PLEDGE AND PASSING DAYS

"Doctor Mac," began Smiles timidly, at length. "I'm sorry for what I said to you this afternoon, and I want to take it back. I guess when you're angry you don't see things as they are, and I'm sure that you were only being very, very kind to me when you ... you bought those baskets. I love you for it, really I do, and if ... if you want me to keep the money, and it would hurt your feelings if I...."

"Of course I want you to keep it, dear. Yesterday you took me for a foster-brother, and I hope that you will always let me do for you as I would for a real flesh-and-blood sister."

"I promise, and I will always do the same for you if I can, dear Don," she whispered softly, adding, "but somehow to-night—oh please don't laugh at me now—somehow to-night I feel more like ... like a mother, than a sister to you."

"And I truly think you are—a spiritual mother, little woman. I need you much more than you need me, I guess."

"Do you know," he went on, after a moment, "I am beginning to believe that I was wrong this afternoon when I said that ... that Judd lied about adding to the money he received for your baskets. Of course I have no way of making sure, unless you have kept accounts, but I actually begin to think that he did."

"I know it," she replied promptly; but with a troubled voice. "Judd has been very wicked, but he doesn't lie. I think that he meant it the way ... the way you did, too; but he's different and I mean to give it all back to him." There was another pause, and then Smiles said gently, "Donald, it makes my heart ache like, to tell you this, but I've got to now. I want that you should go away early to-morrow morning."

"What?" he burst out angrily, springing to his feet. "And have him believe that I ran away from him again? No, how can you ask it, Rose?"

"It isn't that. We know, and he knows now, that you're not afraid of him. But this mountain is his home, and, if you stay here, there is sure to be more trouble, and I couldn't bear that, Don. Even if one of you wasn't ... wasn't hurt in the body, wicked thoughts would hurt your souls. I know it is so, and you must go ... but, oh, how I am going to miss you."

For a moment Donald stood tense; then his body relaxed weakly and he answered, "Yes, you are right, Smiles. It is up to me to go; but I know that some day these clouds are going to be lifted somehow, and we shall see each other again and be happy together."

"I know it, too," she answered, with a sob catching her breath. As she spoke, the clouds, which had been covering the moon for some time, broke, letting the cool, white light flood the mountain side like a promise, and her face lit up with the old wondrous smile. "Of course we will," she cried. "Why, I mean to be your own special nurse some day, and help you always. Good-night, dear Don."

She turned and ran quickly into the cabin, so that he should not see the tears which followed the smile.

"Rose war right erbout yo'r goin',—I reckon she air allus right," came Big Jerry's voice. "Yo' hev got ter go; but I'm ergoin' ter miss ye powerful, likewise, lad."

"But I'll see you again, too, before long. I've got some of my sense back, and I mean to write Judd that I am engaged to a girl in the city—not that I want his friendship after what has happened, however—and I will be down here again, for a few days at least, when the atmosphere has cleared—perhaps early this winter."

"Taint likely yo'll ever see me ergin on earth, son," Jerry said heavily. "Reckon I'm most done fer."

"Your heart? Is it very bad?" queried Donald.

"I allows hit's nigh ter bustin'," was the steady response. "But mebbe I'll last some while yet—I hopes so, fer leetle Smiles' sake. I haint blind ter what hes happened, an' I knows thet the time air comin' when she's es plumb sartain ter fly erway from this hyar mountain es a homein' dove; fer she hes heard the call uv her city blood, an' hit haint ter be denied. But I reckon she haint ready ter leave the old nest yet, so I aims ter stay on erwhile longer ... fer her, though hit haint goin' ter be in no wise easy fer ter do."

The younger man knew not what answer to make to this affecting declaration; but the necessity of a reply was forestalled, for Big Jerry stepped closer and continued earnestly, "Since yo' wished fer ter be a son ter me, I air ergoin' ter treat ye es sich, an' tell ye something thet I've done fer the leetle gal, an' thet she don't yet know erbout.

"Back in the spring when I seen thet her mind war made up ter be a nurse, an' I knowed thet my own time war comin', I sold the timber rights ter these hyar woods ter a city lumber company fer a thousand dollars. They haint ergoin' ter cut fer some years yet, an' by thet time I won't be hyar ter grieve, an' Smiles won't neither.

"Thet money, an' a leetle more what I hev saved, air ter be hern ... hit's in er savin' bank down ter the city now. But thet haint all I wants ye ter know. The reverend drawed a last will an' testiment fer me, leavin' this hyar land ter her—she haint blood kin of mine, yo' know, nor adopted by law-an' I reckons hit will be val'able some day, fer a city stranger told me oncet thet thar's coal on hit. So my leetle gal haint ergoin' ter start her new life penniless, an' ... an' now I wants ter name ye ter be her guardeen till she air growed up. I hopes yo'll accept ther charge, fer I trusts ye, son."

"Accept? Indeed I will, and it makes me mighty happy to realize that I mean something to both of you. I've been playing that she was my sister, but now she will really be as much to me as though she were."

The two men clasped hands again in full understanding, and as a symbol of a trust bestowed and accepted.

* * * * *

At sunrise the following morning Donald once more turned his face toward the valley, whence he had climbed lightheartedly less than two days previous. He had come with a beloved companion. He went alone, save for crowding memories—some bright, but far more black as storm-clouds and shot with malignant flashes of lightning.

His vacation—a travesty on the name—was ended; the castle which his dreams had built on this remote mountain was a shattered ruin. Yet, through the dark series of crowding events, ran a fine thread of gleaming gold, and Donald felt that it had not been broken by his departure. No, it was spun by Destiny to stretch on and on into the unseen future, at once for him a guide-line to a higher manhood, and a tie binding his life to that of the girl whose pathway—starting so far removed from his—had so strangely converged with it.

To continue his hunting trip in another location, with Mike no longer his companion in it, was unthinkable. The empty spaces made the void in his heart unbearable, and he at once returned to Boston and joined his family at their summer home, to their amazement and delight.

But the man now returned to them after little more than a week's absence was vastly different from the one who had left. All marked the alteration in him, and over and over in family council tried, vainly, to account for it, for Donald had withheld far more than he told of his experiences, and minimized what he did tell.

But he knew, as well as they, that a new chord had been struck within him, and by its vibrations his whole life was being tuned anew. Something of the old boyishness and impetuosity was gone, a new purposefulness—not of the will but rather of the spirit—had supplanted it and engendered an unwonted serenity. Was it born of the words of the strange mountain prophet, or the impelling appeal of the no-less-strange mountain child, whose mysterious smile, though seen less frequently than on his first visit, still cast a spell over his senses, even in memory? He could not say.

Whatever uncertainties had disturbed his heart before, when his thoughts had turned upon her, none now remained. The die was cast. Smiles had made her place in his life, and would always occupy it, but merely as a dear charge and comrade. Half-child, half-woman, she still appealed to him in both capacities as perhaps none other ever had; yet he could now admit that fact frankly, and at the same time tell himself that there was, there could be, nothing else.

With the mists of uncertainty dispelled, and his mind purged of the passions which had, so unexpectedly, possessed it, Donald's life returned to its old ruts. His work absorbed him as before, he accepted Marion as more fully a part of his life than she had previously been, and, in so doing, found an unexpected contentment. If, at times, he still felt that she was not all that he might desire, at least she was of his class and he understood her thoroughly.

"My work furnishes enough of romance for me," he sometimes thought. "And, if I want to remain a civilized human being, I had better stick to the life in which I was brought up. I never suspected how much of a 'cave man' I was until I got into the heart of the primitive. Whew! Supposing I had killed Judd that afternoon! There were a few moments when it would have been a pleasure to have done it. Or supposing he had killed me! He wanted to, right enough. Puck was right."

And so, while the months passed, Fortune smiled on the brilliant young physician, and daily laid new tributes of wealth, honor and affection at his feet.

* * * * *

In the mountain cabin it was otherwise.

Changes, born of the travail of tragic happenings, cast their ever-lengthening shadows over Smiles' life, blotting out the golden sunlight of childhood, and overlaying it with the deeper tones of womanhood.

Judd, her companion since baby days, she no longer called "friend," and he, for his part, steadily avoided her and the cabin which had once been a second home to him. Big Jerry, uncomplaining ever, day by day grew more feeble and pain-wracked, and so became more and more a dear burden to her. Only Mr. Talmadge, of her real intimates, remained unchanged in his relations with her, unless it was that in his deep and understanding sympathy he brought her greater spiritual and mental comfort than ever. The other neighbors were kind always, in their rough, well-meaning way; but he was her chief guide and comforter, and in him, and the books which Donald conscientiously sent to her every few weeks, she found the strength to carry forward.

So, in the never-ending tasks which her daily life provided, and which she performed with distress in her heart, but a smile on her lips, Rose saw the weeks come and go, bringing in their slow-moving, but inexorable, train, autumn, fall and another winter.



CHAPTER XVIII

THE ADDED BURDEN

It was mid-winter. The twilight sky—cold and pale, more green than blue—brought the thought of new-made ice. Stripped long since of their verdure, the wooded Cumberlands lay, like naked, shivering giants, across whose mighty recumbent torsos the biting winds swept relentlessly.

In contrast with the desolation without, inside Big Jerry's cabin all was as bright, warm and homelike as a merry fire, the soft glow of the evening lamp and the presence of the heart of the spot—the girl herself—could make it.

Thankful for the blessings of the cheery home and her grandfather's presence in it still, and softly humming an old ballad which he loved, Rose was busily engaged in preparing an early supper, when she was interrupted by the sound of a low, uncertain knock on the door.

She opened it, wonderingly, and the firelight leaped out into the night and disclosed the unshaven face and gaunt form of Judd.

Save on rare occasions, and then at a distance, she had not seen him since that fateful day on the mountain's summit, when his passionate love and hate, intermingled, had driven him to commit the great offence against the unwritten laws of the feudal clan, by attacking one upon whom the sacred mantle of hospitality had been placed, by which act he had incurred Jerry's enmity, and made himself love's outlaw.

The months had dealt harshly with him. Not only was his clothing frayed and soiled; but his face was so unnaturally pale that the deep-set eyes beneath their lowering black brows seemed to burn like embers, and there were many new lines on his countenance not graven there by wind and weather.

Shocked at the change in him, and suddenly filled with womanly compassion which sounded the knell of anger, Rose called, gently, "Judd! Why, Judd! Come in."

He shook his head. "I reckon I haint welcome in this hyar cabin, Smiles, an' taint on my own ercount thet I comes ter ye."

"Why, what is the trouble?" was her startled inquiry.

"Hit ... hit air leetle Lou. I erlows she's sick er somethin'."

"Lou? Tell me quick, Judd. What is the matter with her?"

"I don't rightly know." The answer was made with obvious distress. "She haint been her sunshiny self fer quite some time, an' ter-night ... wall, she air actin' so sorter ... queer, thet I got skeered."

"I'll go over home with you at once," said Rose, as she hastily caught up and drew a shawl about her head and shoulders. "Grandpap," she called softly through the door to the old man's bedroom, "I'm ergoin' out fer er leetle time. One of ther neighbors air sick. Don't fret, fer I'll be back right soon, dear."

There was a brief, rumbled reply; and, closing the door behind her on the warm comfort within, the girl joined the mountaineer in the crispy evening, now almost dark. She shivered a little, and he marked the involuntary act, and drew back a step.

In silence they walked rapidly up the narrow path, slippery from a recent fall of light snow. Once Rose slipped, and instantly Judd's sinewy arm was about her waist, steadying her. Then, as she regained her balance and started forward, it tightened and drew her suddenly to him in a passionate, crushing embrace. She made no effort to struggle free, or voice her heart's protest against this outrage, but stood with her body rigid and unyielding within the circle of his arm until he slowly released her, mumbling, "I reckon I air plumb ershamed of myself, Smiles. I didn't go fer ter do hit, an' I knows thet I haint deservin' ter tetch so much es ther hem of yo'r skirt."

She did not answer, and neither spoke again until his cabin was reached.

When the door was opened, Smiles caught sight of the child sitting motionless on a stool near the fireplace. Her lips were parted and in her eyes was an odd look of semi-vacuity.

"Lou!" cried Rose, pausing in alarmed astonishment.

A light of recognition sprang into the child's eyes, she stood up a trifle unsteadily, and said, with a low throaty laugh of delight, "Hit air my Smiles. I awful glad ter see...." She started toward her friend; but her course suddenly veered to the left, waveringly, and her wandering gaze fell upon the now sadly battered doll lying in one corner. "To see ye, Mike," was the ending of her sentence, as she trotted to Donald's gift and began to cuddle it.

"Yo' haint erbeen ter see Lou fer er long, long ..." The piping voice trailed off into silence.

"Why, Lou, sweetheart. What is the matter? Don't you know your own Smiles?" pleaded the deeply distressed girl, as she gathered the child to her breast.

The baby's hands dropped the doll unceremoniously and sought her friend's cheeks. Looking up with big eyes into the face drawn close to her own, she replied in a strangely slow, hesitant manner. "In course I remembers ye, Smiles. Yo' air the nurse what lives with ... with thet thar doctor man ... in the big city, whar air monkeys thet ... clumb sticks an' ... an' doll babies what close thar eyes ... an' say ... an' say ... My head hurts me, Smiles, hit do."

She lay still in the loving arms for an instant, and then wriggled free and, sliding to the floor, picked up and began to rock the doll again, the while crooning a wordless lullaby.

With anxiety growing akin to terror, Smiles felt the irregular pulse, as Donald had taught her how to do, and pressed her hand to the pale cheek and forehead.

"She is sick, Judd, and I'm kind of frightened, too. You can't take care of her here, and I mean to take her home with me, right now. I reckon you had better go down to the village and get Dr. Johnston, quick."

The man had started, with words of protest trembling on his lips; but, as his look turned on his little sister, as she now leaned drowsily against the girl's knees, he stifled them unspoken, while a spasm of pain crossed his worn face. With a dull nod of acquiescence he held out his arms to receive the child, whom Rose had lifted and wrapped in a blanket from her little bed that had been brought in near the fire.

The return journey was quickly and silently made, and, delivering the slight bundle to Smiles when her cabin was reached, Judd set off into the night, concern lending wings to his feet.

"Grandpap, hit's Smiles back ergin'," called the girl softly. "An' I've brought leetle Lou Amos. She haint feelin' right well, an' I allows I hev got ter take keer of her here."

The old man uttered a low growl of protest, which caused Rose to run to him and tenderly lay her hand on his lips, with the words, "Hush, grandpap. The baby haint in nowise ter blame fer ... fer what Judd done. In course we hev got ter keer fer her."

Big Jerry nodded an abashed assent, and said no more.

Smiles undressed her new charge, who struck uncertain terror to her heart by drowsily talking on and on, in snatches of unrelated sentences running the gamut of her limited experiences and with the childish words often failing, half formed. She put the baby in her own bed, and, after the belated supper had been eaten and cleared away, and the old man made as comfortable as possible for the night, Smiles lay down beside the baby, whose silence and more regular breathing indicated that she was at last asleep.

The morrow's sun was well above the valley horizon before Judd returned with the country doctor, and again the former refused to enter the cabin. While the physician remained, he paced back and forth, back and forth, with weary, nervous strides; but even in his stress of mind he unconsciously kept out of view from the window in Big Jerry's room.

At last Rose and Dr. Johnston reappeared, and, breathing hard, Judd hastened to join them.

"It's brain fever, the doctor says, Judd," said Smiles at once. "He's left some medicine for me to give her, and you know that I'll nurse her for you like she was my own baby."

"Air hit ... air hit bad, doctor?" asked the mountaineer, with a catch in his voice.

"Well, of course it ain't an ... er ... exactly easy thing to cure, but I reckon she'll get well of it. By the way, Amos, how long has she been a-goin' on like that?"

"I kaint rightly say, doctor. She hes acted kind er strange-like fer quite er spell, now thet I comes ter think on hit; but I didn't pay no pertickler attention to hit ontil er day er two back," answered the man contritely.

"Hmmm," said the doctor. "Oh, I guess we can pull her through all right, and I will get up here as often as I can. Well, I reckon I'll be stepping along back."

* * * * *

But little Lou did not fulfil the country practitioner's optimistic prophecy. The change in her condition, as day after day crept by, growing longer and colder, was almost imperceptible; but it was steadily for the worse. The mountain winter closed in with unusual rigors, and Smiles' cabin continued to be a hospital where she passed her hours ministering equally to the keen-minded, but bodily tortured old man—whose heart pained constantly and with growing severity, and whose breathing became daily more labored—and the child whose mind steadily became more clouded and her physical functions more weak.

Like a gaunt, miserable dog which had been driven from his home, Judd haunted the cabin. When she stole out one morning, to speak with him about Lou, Smiles cried, "Oh, if Doctor Mac were only here now! He would know what to do, I'm sure."

Judd's hands, blue with cold, clenched so violently that the knuckles grew a bloodless white, and the look of pain, lying deep down in his eyes, changed to a flash of burning hate.

"Don't never speak thet man's name ter me, gal."

The words were spoken in a harsh voice and he strode abruptly away.

At more and more infrequent intervals, the village doctor made his toilsome way up the slippery mountain side, sat regarding the little patient with a hopelessly puzzled look, and finally departed, shaking his head; but he never failed to leave behind him another bottle of obnoxious medicine on the chance that if one did not produce an improvement, another might. Even to the girl it was all too apparent, however, that he was aiming blindly into the dark.

There came a time when the child spoke scarcely at all, save to moan piteously something about the pain in her head; her emaciated legs barely carried her on her uncertain course; her vague, sweet eyes turned inward more and more; and it was with the greatest difficulty, and only by the exercise of infinite patience that Smiles could feed her. The little mountain blossom was wilting and fading slowly away.

On the afternoon of the first day of January Dr. Johnston spent a long time at the cabin, striving against the impossible to solve the problem which confronted him like an appalling mystery, far too deep to be pierced by the feeble ray of science at his command.

At last he arose with a gesture of finality, and announced to the anxiously waiting girl, "I reckon I'm done. I won't go so fur as to say that a city specialist might not be able to help her; but hanged if I can. The trouble is too much for me, and I guess Lou is just a-goin' to die."

Sudden tears welled into Smiles' luminous eyes, and ran unheeded down her cheeks, now unnaturally thin and wan.

"Hit haint so," she cried in a choked voice. "Lou haint ergoin' ter die, Dr. Johnston!"

Suddenly she stopped, as her thoughts flew backward on the wings of memory. Her eyes grew larger, a strange light came into them. Then, speaking slowly, almost as though the words were impelled by a will other than her own, she added with a tone of absolute certainty:

"Yo' allows yo' don't know what the trouble air, but I does."

The doctor was startled and looked as though he thought that he was about to have another patient on his hands.

"Hit air a brain tumor thet she hes got, I knows it, an' I knows one of the few doctor men in this hyar country what kin cure hit. He air ergoin' ter cure hit fer me, an' leetle Lou haint ergoin' ter die."

Uncertain what to make of this outburst, the doctor departed rather hastily. Smiles caught up her shawl and ran immediately to Judd's lonely, cheerless abode, which she entered without a thought of knocking. She found the man sitting dejectedly before a feeble fire.

He sprang up, voiceless terror apparent in the look which he turned upon her white face, but, without pausing for any preliminaries, Rose said, "The doctor, he's been ter see our little Lou again, Judd. He allows thet he can't do anything more for her, and thet she has got ter die."

The man—whose whole world was now centred in the child to whom he had, for a year, been father and mother as well as brother—sank down on his chair and buried his face in his hands.

"I knowed hit," he muttered in a dead voice.

"Hit haint so," cried the girl, who had by this time wholly relapsed into the mountain speech, as she frequently did still, when laboring under the stress of emotion. "Hit haint so, Judd. We kin save her. We hev got ter save her."

"Thar haint no way." The words were tuned to despair.

"Thar air a way. Thar's one man who kin save Lou's life fer ye, an' we must get him ter do hit.".

She had mentioned no name, but Judd sprang swiftly erect, fists clenched and shaking above his head. "Do yo' think thet I'd be beholden ter thet man, after what I done ter him? Do yo' think thet I'd accept even my sister's life et his hands? I hates him like I does the devil what, I reckon, air ergoin' ter git my soul!"

"Judd!" cried the girl, "yo' don't know what yo'r ersayin'. Hit's blasphemy. Ef Doctor Mac kin save Lou's life—an' he kin—yo'd be a murderer,—yes, a murderer uv yo'r own flesh an' blood, ter forbid him."

Spent by the force of his previous passionate outburst, the man sank tremblingly back into the chair again.

"I kaint do hit, Smiles," he answered piteously. "I kaint do hit, an' hit's a foolish thought anyway. He wouldn't come hyar. Hit takes money fer ter git city doctors, an' I haint got none."

"He will come ef I asks him, an' I hev money, Judd," she said with a pleading voice.

"No, no, no. Ef Lou dies, I reckon I'll kill myself, too; but I forbids ye ter call the man I wronged, an' hates."

Slowly the girl turned away, with a compassionate glance at the bent, soul-tortured youth, went out of the cabin, and softly closed the door.



CHAPTER XIX

"SMILES'" APPEAL

It was snowing when she stepped outside,—a soft, white curtain of closely woven flakes rapidly dimming the early evening glow and bringing nightshades on apace. The wind, too, was rising; its first fitful gusts drove the snow sweeping in whirling flurries across the open spaces, and then whistled off through the leafless trees.

Rose shivered. The wind greeted her boisterously. It clutched her shawl in hoydenish jest, tore one end of it free from her grasp, and ran its invisible, icy fingers down her neck.

The cabin of the nearest neighbor—Pete Andrews—was only a few rods distant; but, before the girl reached it in the face of the momentarily increasing storm, she was panting, and her face, hair and clothing were plastered with clinging flakes.

"Mis' Andrews, I hates ter ask er favor of ye such er powerful mean night; but I needs help," said Smiles, as soon as the door had been opened, letting her in, together with a whirl of snow which spread itself like a ghost on the rough floor.

"Yo' knows thet I'd do enything in ther world fer ye, Rose gal. I reckon I owes ye my life since when ... when Gawd Almighty tuck my baby back ter thet garden er His'n in Paradise," answered the frail, weary-looking woman, whose eyes quickly suffused with tears.

"Hit haint repayment I'm askin' of ye, but er favor, Mis' Andrews. I wants ye ter help me save ther life of another mountin flower, what's nigh faded plum erway."

"Lou Amos?" asked the woman. She had already turned to get her own shawl.

"Yes, hit's leetle Lou. She air powerful sick, an' I wants fer ye ter stay ter-night with her an' grandpap, ef yo' will. Thar haint nothing ter do but stay with them."

"In course I'll do hit fer ye, Smiles," was the ready answer, and her lank, slouching husband nodded a silent assent, as she turned to him.

"But what air yo' reckonin' ter do? Yo' kaint go nowhar in this hyar storm. I don't recollect hits like on the mountain, no time."

The girl did not answer; but held the door open while the other stepped out, only to catch her breath and flatten herself against the cabin's wall as a sheet of mingled sleet and snow struck her. By continually assisting one another, the two made their way slowly over to Jerry's home; and, when they paused within its shelter, Rose held her companion's arm a moment, and said, "Thar haint no use tryin' ter prevent me, Mis' Andrews, cause I'm ergoin' ter do hit. I'm ergoin' down ter Fayville, an' send a telegram message fer er city doctor thet I knows, ter come hyar an' make Lou well. Don't go fer ter tell grandpap whar I've gone er he'll worry erbout me, an' thar haint no cause ter. The storm's et my back, an' hits all down hill goin'. I hates ter tell a lie ter him, but I allows I've got ter, this one time."

In sudden terror over the mad plan, the older woman began to protest; but Rose shook off her detaining hand, and put an end to the sentence by leading the way hastily into the cabin.

"Thar's a leetle child what needs my help, an' I've got ter take keer of her fer er while, grandpap," Smiles said at once. "Mis' Andrews hes come over fer ter stay with ye and Lou, now haint thet kind uv her? I'll git back es soon es ever I kin, but don't yo' fret ef hit haint erfore yo' goes ter bed ... or even till mornin' time."

She furtively obtained a few bills from her precious store, kissed the old man's haggard, wrinkled cheek, and the white forehead of the baby who lay on the bed, almost inert save for the restless moving of her head from side to side, and the low moans which came with almost every breath, and hurried out into the storm.

In later years Rose could be induced to speak only with the greatest reluctance of that journey down the snow-swept mountain path—for the blizzard was as fierce as it was rare—and even the recollection of it brought a look of terror into her eyes.

There was flying horror abroad that night, and the demented trees quivered and tossed their great arms so wildly that they cracked and broke, to fall crashing in the path. Yet, accomplish the five mile long, perilous descent, in the midst of lashing sleet and snow, over a slippery, tortuous path, she did. With her clothing torn by flaying branches and clutching wind, and drenched by icy water as the snow melted; with her hands and lips blue, and her feet numb; with her wavy hair pulled loose from its braids and plastered wetly against her colorless cheeks; she eventually stumbled into the rude building which contained the railroad and telegraph office at the terminus of the branch line at Fayville. Then she fell, half unconscious, into the arms of the astonished agent, who came to the door when he heard her stumble weakly against it.

"Good God, child, where did you come from?" he cried.

Smiles' lips moved faintly, and he caught an echo of the words which she had been repeating mechanically, over and over, "She haint ergoin' ter die!"

"I reckon she ain't, if human will can save her ... whoever she is," muttered the man, as he laid the exhausted girl on a rude waiting bench, poured between her bruised lips a few drops of smuggled whiskey from a pocket flask, and then unceremoniously cut her shoe lacings and removed her sodden, icy boots.

After a moment, she sat weakly up, and—punctuated by gasps drawn by exquisite pain—managed to pant out, "I've got to send a telegram ... to-night ... now. Oh, please, Mister, don't wait for anything."

"There, there. We'll take care of your message all right. Don't worry, little woman," he answered, reassuringly. "But I ain't a-goin' ter send a tick till you're thawed out. My missus lives upstairs, an' she'll fix you up."

He half-carried, half-helped the weary girl up the narrow stairs, and, having surrendered her into the charge of a kindly and solicitous woman, hastened to rekindle the wood fire in the stove. As its iron top began to regain the ruddy glow which had scarcely faded from it, Rose crept near, holding out her bent, stiffened hands.

"Now, take it easy, little girl," cautioned the agent. "Not too close at first."

"And take off your dress and stockings, dear," said his wife. "Don't give no thought to him,—we've got three daughters of our own, most growed up."

The agent departed, with a heavy clamping of feet on the stairs, and gratefully—but with hands which were so numb that she had to give up in favor of the woman—Rose obeyed; and soon her teeth stopped their chattering, and the red blood of youth began once more to course through her veins, while her drenched, simple undergarments sent up vaporous white flags which indicated that the watery legions of the storm king were fast surrendering to their ancient enemy—Fire.

The older woman wrapped a blanket about the girl, as her husband came upstairs again with a pad of telegram blanks, and said, "Now, I'll write out the message you've got to send for you, if you want me to."

"Thank you, sir. I'm obliged to you and your missus. I reckon you can put the words better than I can, for I haint ... I have never sent one before. It's for Dr. Donald MacDonald, who lives on Commonwealth Avenue, up north in Boston city. And I want to tell him that little Lou Amos is most dying from a brain tumor. And tell him that she is nearly blind and 'comatose'...."

"That word's a new one to me, how do you spell it?" interrupted the agent, with pencil plowing through his rumpled hair.

"I ... I guess I've forgotten. Spell it like it sounds, and he'll know. And tell him that I will pay him all the money I've got, if he'll only come quick."

"How shall I sign it? It has to have your name, you know."

"Say it's from his foster-sister, Rose."

Laboriously the man wrote out the message, and the floor was littered with discarded attempts before he was satisfied; but in time the distant, slow clicking of the telegraph key below was sending not only the child's eager appeal to its destination many hundred miles north, but a message of renewed hope into the heart of Smiles.

"It will cost you more'n a dollar," said the man, as he appeared again. "But if you haven't got that much, why ..."

"I've got it right here," responded the girl, turning on him for an instant a glowing smile of gratitude for his halting offer. "I'm truly more'n obliged to you, sir ... and your wife. I reckon God meant that you should be here to-night to help save the life of a dear little child," she added simply.

"Now I'll just put on my things and be startin' back home."

"Startin' home? Well, I reckon not. You're a-goin' to stay right here to-night, and let my woman put you straight to bed. That's what you're a-goin' to do."

Smiles' protests were all in vain, and soon the weary body and mind were relaxed in the sleep which follows hard on the heels of exhaustion.

* * * * *

It was close on to midnight when Dr. Donald MacDonald reached his apartment after a rare theatre party with his fiancee. His day's work had been exacting, and he was doubly tired. The thought of bed held an almost irresistible appeal.

As he inserted his latch key in the lock, he heard the telephone bell in his office ringing insistently; his heart sank, and cried a rebellious answer.

Combined force of habit and the call of duty caused him to hasten to the instrument, however, without stopping to remove hat or coat, and to his ear came a small, distant voice saying, "A telegram for Dr. Donald MacDonald. Is he ready to receive it?"

"Yes ... Hold on a minute until I get a pencil.... All right, go ahead."

"It is dated from Fayville, Virginia, January 1, 1914. 8:30 P.M. Are you getting it?"

"Yes, yes. Go on," cried the man, with increasing heart pulsations.

"'Dr. Donald MacDonald, Commonwealth Ave., Boston, Mass. Lou Amos dying of brain tumor almost blind and 'k-o-m-o-t-o-s-e'"—she spelt it out—"'Come at once if possible I will pay.' It is signed, 'Your foster-sister Rose.' Did you get it? Yes? Wait a moment, please, there is another one dated and addressed the same. The message reads, 'Girl came alone down mountain in howling blizzard. Case urgent. Signed, Thomas Timmins, Station Agent.' That is all."

"Thank you. Good-night," said Donald mechanically, as he replaced the receiver.

Through the partly open folding door he could dimly see that enticing bed, with his pajamas and bath robe laid across it. It seemed to him as though it were calling to his weary body with a siren's voice, or had suddenly acquired the properties of the cup of Tantalus. He hesitated, and moved a step toward it. Then the vision of Rose as he had last seen her, with the ethereal smile trembling on lips that struggled bravely to laugh, and in deep misty eyes, came between it and him.

Still clad in hat and overcoat, he seated himself at the desk and called up first the information bureau of the South Terminal Station, then his young associate, Dr. Philip Bentley, in whose charge he was accustomed to leave his regular patients when called away from the city for any length of time; and finally a house used as a semi-club by trained nurses.

When his last call was answered he asked, "Is Miss Merriman registered with you now? This is Dr. MacDonald speaking."

After a wait of several minutes, during which he felt himself nod repeatedly, a sleepy voice spoke over the wire, "This is Miss Merriman, Dr. MacDonald. I'm just off a case."

"Good. I'm lucky ... that is if you're game to take another one immediately."

"Yes, doctor. Do you want me to-night?"

"No, to-morrow ... this morning, that is, will do. I shall want you to meet me at the South Station, New York train, at seven o'clock."

"Yes, doctor. What sort of a case is it?"

"Same as the last you assisted me in—brain tumor. But we're going further this trip ... the jumping-off place in Virginia. It's up in the mountains, so take plenty of warm clothes."

"Very well, doctor." Then there came a little laugh, for these two were excellent friends now, and the query, "Another record-breaking fee?"

"I'll tell you to-morrow," he replied. "Don't forget, seven o'clock train for New York. Good-night."

"Good-night, doctor."

Donald turned away from the desk, and for a moment stood motionless.

"God bless her brave, trusting, little heart," he said half aloud.

And he was not thinking of Miss Merriman.



CHAPTER XX

THE ANSWER

More than once Rose caught herself wondering if, after that day was done, she would ever be able to smile again. In obedience to the doctor's prescription for Big Jerry, which it was ever her first duty to fill, she never looked towards him—as he sat bent over before the fire, eyes heavy with pain, breath coming in deep rasps, but lips set firmly against a word of complaint—without sending him a message of love and compassion through the intangible medium of that smile. Yet, as the weary hours dragged on with plodding feet, it seemed to her as though each new one was not an interest payment on a fund of happiness stored within her heart, but a heavy dipping into the principal itself.