Part 8 (1/2)

When they stood waiting, each with a stout fir pole on his shoulder, he turned to the anxious lady, who seemed bent on going with him.

”It's quite out of the question for you to undertake that climb. We'll be back again in a few hours with the major and Miss Kinnaird,” he said.

Ida went up to him and touched his arm, and, for no very evident reason, the color crept into her face when he looked at her inquiringly.

”Can't the Indians find the way themselves?” she asked. ”You are scarcely fit to go.”

Weston shook his head.

”I must manage it somehow,” he said. ”They have nothing to eat up yonder, and the Indians might not find them until it's dark again.”

He broke off for a moment with a forced smile.

”Try to rea.s.sure Mrs. Kinnaird, and then go to sleep as soon as you can.”

In another minute he had limped away, and Mrs. Kinnaird found the girl looking down with a very curious expression at a little smear of blood on a smooth white stone. There were further red spots on the s.h.i.+ngle, and they led forward in the direction in which the rescue party had gone.

”Oh,” she said, ”he told me he had cut his foot, and he couldn't have waited long enough to eat anything.”

Then she gasped once or twice, for she was worn out to the verge of a break-down, and Mrs. Kinnaird, who saw how white her face was growing, slipped an arm about her and led her back toward the tent.

The afternoon pa.s.sed very slowly with the little, anxious lady, and every now and then she crept softly out of the tent and gazed expectantly up the steep hillside. Still, each time she did it, there was nothing that she could see except the long ranks of somber firs, and the oppressive silence was broken only by the sound of the river.

Then she slipped back quietly into the tent where Ida lay in a restless sleep. Now and then the girl moved a little, and once or twice she murmured unintelligibly. It was very hot, for the sunrays struck down upon the canvas between the firs, whose clogging, honey-like sweetness was heavy in the air.

By and by, however, it grew a little cooler, as the shadow of the great dark branches crept across the tent. Then they moved out upon the dazzling river and slowly covered it. Mrs. Kinnaird, rising once more in an agony of impatience, stumbled against one of the tent supports. The crutch and ridge-poles rattled, and Ida opened her eyes.

”Oh,” she said drowsily, ”you needn't be anxious. He is quite sure to bring them back.”

She apparently tried to rouse herself, and, failing, went to sleep again; but she left Mrs. Kinnaird a little comforted. The latter was observant, and she felt that Ida Stirling had a reason for her confidence which, she fancied, was not lightly given.

The sunlight had, however, faded off the valley when she rose for the last time from the seat she had found outside the tent, for there was no doubt now that a faint patter of feet on stones mingled with the clamor of the river. Almost as she did so, a few plodding figures appeared beneath the firs, and she saw that two of them carried a litter between them. Then she saw her husband walking very wearily, and she ran forward with a little cry. She grasped one of the poles between which a sagging blanket hung, and Weston, who held the ends of them, looked at her.

”Miss Kinnaird isn't hurt much,” he said harshly. ”Don't stop us now!”

Then she heard her daughter's voice bearing out this a.s.surance, and she went back with the plodding men, while her husband stumbled along wearily at her side. In a minute or two Weston, calling to one of the Indians, laid down his end of the poles, and, staggering away, sat down heavily. None of them troubled themselves about him, and Ida, who had risen when she heard their voices, helped to convey Miss Kinnaird into the tent. In the meanwhile one of the Indians growled to his comrade when he found the fire out, and stolidly proceeded to relight it, while Weston lay with his back against a fir and watched him with half-closed eyes. The Siwash, however, proved that he was capable of preparing a meal, and when it was finished, Arabella, who appeared much fresher than the major, proceeded to relate her adventures to Ida and her mother.

”It was rather horrible up on the range, and I was almost afraid they wouldn't get me down,” she said. ”I don't know how they did it, I'm sure. Parts of the way were simply awful. They had to cut the little trees down for yards at a time to get my blanket litter through, and there were places so steep that they could scarcely crawl down. The Indians, of course, had to be relieved now and then, and my father and the packer took turns with them.”

She looked at the major with a smile.

”When it was especially steep, I preferred an Indian and the packer.

Once, you know, you dropped me; but nothing seemed to disconcert that young man. He must have been horribly worn out, for he had been up twice, but he was so steady and rea.s.suringly quiet. I suppose a man of his kind would appreciate twenty dollars. He really deserves it.”

Ida frowned, and remembered the trail of blood on the white stones when the packer had started. Kinnaird made a little abrupt movement.

”I'm afraid that I was forgetting all about the man in my relief at getting you safely down,” he said. ”We owe him a good deal, and I'll go out presently and thank him; but there's another matter. Your knee ought to be attended to.”