Part 10 (2/2)
”Nothing in sight, is there?” Bill said thoughtfully. ”If the sun was out, now. Funny I can't spot that Soda Creek Trail.”
”Don't you know this country at all?” she asked gloomily.
”I thought I did,” he replied. ”But I can't seem to get my bearings to work out correctly. I'm awfully sorry to keep you in such a pickle.
But it can't be helped.”
Thus he disarmed her for the time being. She could not find fault with a man who was doing his best to help her. If Roaring Bill were unable to bear straight for the Meadows, it was unfortunate for her, but no fault of his. At the same time, it troubled her more than she would admit.
”Well, we won't get anywhere standing on this hill,” he remarked at length.
He took up the lead rope and moved on. They dropped over the ridge crest and once more into the woods. Roaring Bill made his next halt beside a spring, and fell to unlas.h.i.+ng the packs.
”What are you going to do?” Hazel asked.
”Cook a bite, and let the horses graze,” he told her. ”Do you realize that we've been going since daylight? It's near noon. Horses have to eat and rest once in a while, just the same as human beings.”
The logic of this Hazel could not well deny, since she herself was tired and ravenously hungry. By her watch it was just noon.
Bill hobbled out his horses on the gra.s.s below the spring, made a fire, and set to work cooking. For the first time the idea of haste seemed to have taken hold of him. He worked silently at the meal getting, fried steaks of venison, and boiled a pot of coffee. They ate. He filled his pipe, and smoked while he repacked. Altogether, he did not consume more than forty minutes at the noon halt. Hazel, now woefully saddle sore, would fain have rested longer, and, in default of resting, tried to walk and lead Silk. Roaring Bill offered no objection to that. But he hit a faster gait. She could not keep up, and he did not slacken pace when she began to fall behind. So she mounted awkwardly, and Silk jolted and shook her with his trotting until he caught up with his mates. Bill grinned over his shoulder.
”You're learning fast,” he called back. ”You'll be able to run a pack train by and by.”
The afternoon wore on without bringing them any nearer Cariboo Meadows so far as Hazel could see. Traveling over a country swathed in timber and diversified in contour, she could not tell whether Roaring Bill swung in a circle or bore straight for some given point.
She speculated futilely on the outcome of the strange plight she was in. It was a far cry from pounding a typewriter in a city office to jogging through the wilderness, lost beyond peradventure, her only company a stranger of unsavory reputation. Yet she was not frightened, for all the element of unreality. Under other circ.u.mstances she could have relished the adventure, taken pleasure in faring gypsy fas.h.i.+on over the wide reaches where man had left no mark. As it was--
She called a halt at four o'clock.
”Mr. Wagstaff!”
Bill stopped his horses and came back to her.
”Aren't we _ever_ going to get anywhere?” she asked soberly.
”Sure! But we've got to keep going. Got to make the best of a bad job,” he returned. ”Getting pretty tired?”
”I am,” she admitted. ”I'm afraid I can't ride much longer. I could walk if you wouldn't go so fast. Aren't there any ranches in this country at all?”
He shook his head. ”They're few and far between,” he said. ”Don't worry, though. It isn't a life-and-death matter. If we were out here without grub or horses it might be tough. You're in no danger from exposure or hunger.”
”You don't seem to realize the position it puts me in,” Hazel answered.
A wave of despondency swept over her, and her eyes grew suddenly bright with the tears she strove to keep back. ”If we wander around in the woods much longer, I'll simply be a sensation when I do get back to Cariboo Meadows. I won't have a shred of reputation left. It will probably result in my losing the school. You're a man, and it's different with you. You can't know what a girl has to contend with where no one knows her. I'm a stranger in this country, and what little they do know of me--”
She stopped short, on the point of saying that what Cariboo Meadows knew of her through the medium of Mr. Howard Perkins was not at all to her credit.
Roaring Bill looked up at her impa.s.sively. ”I know,” he said, as if he had read her thought. ”Your friend Perkins talked a lot. But what's the difference? Cariboo Meadows is only a fleabite. If you're right, and you know you're right, you can look the world in the eye and tell it collectively to go to the devil. Besides, you've got a perverted idea. People aren't so ready to give you the bad eye on somebody else's say-so. It would take a lot more than a flash drummer's word to convince me that you're a naughty little girl. Pshaw--forget it!”
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