Part 8 (2/2)

Before the echo had died away, Nellie Shuter ran out of her tent toward her father's; but before she could reach it Joe Swan emerged from it, his ma.s.sive hands grasping the rope, which was now wound tightly around her father's throat. In vain Shuter struggled to utter another cry, and to thrust away the avenging hand which grasped the rope.

With a terrified scream Nellie sprang upon Joe and endeavored to stop his march toward the derrick in the near distance, the ponderous arm of which stretched enticingly out some nine feet above the ground.

Without swerving an inch to the right or the left, Joe hurried on toward it, while with his disengaged hand, and without apparently using any force, he kept Nellie aside.

Before he had got half-way to it, however, shouts fell upon his ears, and glancing hastily backward, he saw over a hundred laborers running toward him. For a brief s.p.a.ce he stopped, measured with his eyes the distance he was from the arm of the derrick and his pursuers, then stooped, threw Shuter across his shoulder, and started off on a brisk run. Nellie made another desperate effort to stop him, but this time he pushed her to the earth and sped on.

Despite his great weight, and the burden which enc.u.mbered him, he was the first to reach the derrick--although the crowd had been close behind him when he began to run. He had deftly thrown the end of the rope over the arm of the derrick, and was about to hoist Shuter into mid-air, when the crowd was upon him. The rope was wrenched from his hands, and the noose unloosened from the man's throat. ”For heaven's sake, what does all this mean?” asked a foreman, turning toward Joe.

Before he could reply Shuter gasped, ”He's mad, he's mad; he ran into my tent, and without a word wound that rope about my neck and then tried to hang me.” As he looked at his implacable enemy he edged towards the foreman.

”He pretends,” began Joe, in a compressed voice, ”that he don't know why I was going to hang him; he's a liar; yes, a million times worse than a liar--he's a murderer! I thought I'd save you the trouble of helping me to string him up, for when you hear what he's done you'll riddle him full of holes and string him up as well!”

The crowd had now gathered about the speaker, and were gazing at him with growing excitement. ”There's a lot of you,” Joe went on, ”who saw him last night, in that gambling whiskey dive of his, try to draw his knife on Harry Langdon, and heard him shout after me that he'd have a reckoning some other time with that cub of mine; and, boys, he's kept his word, for Harry lies in his tent there, dead, stabbed to the heart, in the dead of night, through the folds of the tent, by that cuss there that you were so afraid I'd string up.”

Angry exclamations followed this fierce tirade, and a rush was made for Shuter.

”It's a lie! I swear it's a lie! I never stabbed the lad!”

But his words were cut short by the rope, which was again being wound around his throat. As they dragged him towards the derrick Nellie once more threw herself across her father's body and begged piteously for mercy. The sight of the girl's intense grief somewhat cooled the unreasoning rage which had been kindled in their hearts by Joe's rude eloquence, and they hesitated as though they hardly knew what to do.

”Let's see the body before we string him up, anyway,” cried a voice.

The fairness of the proposition appealed to the men--more especially as they had begun to realize that they had acted impulsively. There was a general move toward the tent where the body lay.

In the rush none of them noticed the rapid approach of the Indian girl, who so prodigally, and unasked, had given her heart to the murdered boy. As they entered the tent she was close behind Joe, whose huge body hid Shuter and his daughter, who were in front of him, from her view.

As Joe stepped forward to remove the coat he had thrown across the dead face, a low cry, full of the keenest apprehension and fear, sounded behind him. Turning, his eyes fell upon the Indian girl, who was crouching close at his feet, her palsied hands raised as though to guard off some deadly apparition or danger, while her eyes, full of the most intense fear and horror, were fixed on Nellie Shuter.

Joe's temper had been sorely tried, and laying his hand heavily on her shoulder, he said fiercely, ”What's the meaning of this?”

Instead of trying to escape from his grasp, she caught him hysterically by the arm, and pointing at Nellie, said wildly, in her queer broken English, ”See, see, de Great Spirit send her back to me!

She's dead.”

As Nellie stood and continued to gaze in amazement at her, the insane terror of the Indian girl rose to an ungovernable height, and burying her face in the gra.s.s, she screamed to Joe to send her away. The deep superst.i.tion in her nature--bred by her people--had been stronger than the love of revenge or the fear of punishment. Joe was the first to read the meaning of her superst.i.tious horror, knowing as he did her hatred of Nellie and her love for Harry. And suddenly pointing at the grovelling figure, he said in a shocked voice: ”Boys, I see it all now; she's the murderer. She meant to stab Nellie, her rival, and would have done it if we hadn't in the darkness last night pitched our tent next to Nellie's. The tents are alike, and she mistook ours for hers.”

The mention of Harry's name brought a gleam of reason to the distracted girl's face, and springing to her feet--apparently now forgetful of Nellie's presence--she begged Joe to take her from the tent to Harry. Not for a moment did she appear to realize the dreadful mistake she had made.

”He's there!” said Joe, pitilessly, pointing to the stretcher.

Thinking in her half-crazed manner that he was sleeping through it all, she ran to the stretcher, and tore away the sheet that covered the face she loved. It was not till she had caught the dear head to her bosom and pressed her face to his, that the truth broke upon her clouded mind. They had been drawing near her; but as she let his head fall back, they all--except Joe--drew away from her; the heart-broken, insane look on her face was more than they could bear. As she stood, wildly pressing her hands to her forehead, Joe pointed at the gash in the tent and then at the blood-stained clothing at Harry's side. Then with fascinated gaze they watched the rapid changes which sped across her face, for reason had not yet altogether flown, and they saw that she was recalling the fearful mistake she had made. Suddenly her hands slid to her side, and in doing so encountered the handle of the knife which lay concealed beneath her blanket. That was the connecting link which brought home to her the whole truth of the tragedy, and with a cry that haunted many of them for years afterwards, she drew the knife, gave one glance at the stained blade that had robbed her of him for whom she would willingly have died, stabbed again and again the fatal gash in the canvas, and then throwing away the knife, caught up the lifeless body in her arms and began madly to chant a wild, weird song which her people sang when they had triumphed over their enemies.

She was so violently insane when she reached Winnipeg that they decided a trial was unnecessary, so she was placed at once in an asylum.

After they had buried his little mate on the great silent prairie, Joe tried to forget and to do his work as usual; but the odor of the newly-severed sod, the cracking of the drivers' whips, the shouting to the stubborn mules, the stampede over the prairie at noon, the hateful sight of Shuter and his daughter--in fact, everything around him--made the longing for the company of his little driver so keen that he could not bear it, and a week after his death he drew his wages and slipped away, none knew whither.

A Daughter of the Church.

<script>