Part 19 (1/2)
The man was amazed. Evidently the stress and excitement of the morning had brought out the fanciful and poetic side of the girl's nature.
”We don't look for good luck,” she told him. ”We don't expect to live forever. We know what death is, and that it is sure to come, and that misfortune comes always--in the snow and the cold and the falling tree--and when we have good luck we're glad--we don't take it for granted. Living up here, where life is real, we've learned that we have to make the best of things in order to be happy at all.”
”And you mean--you're going to try to make the best of _this_?” His voice throbbed ever so slightly, because he could not hold it even.
”There's nothing else I can do,” she replied. ”You've taken me here and as yet I don't see how I can get away. This doesn't mean I've gone over to your side.”
He nodded. He understood _that_ very well.
”I'm just admitting that at present I'm in your hands--helpless--and many long weeks in before us,” she went on. ”I'm on my father's side, last and always, and I'll strike back at you if the chance comes. Expect no mercy from me, in case I ever see my way to strike.”
The man's eyes suddenly gleamed. ”Don't you know--that you'd have a better chance of fighting me--if you didn't put me on guard?”
”I don't think so. I don't believe you'd be fooled that easy.
Besides--I can't pretend to be a friend--when I'm really an enemy.”
For one significant instant the man looked down. This was what he had done--pretended friends.h.i.+p when he was a foe. But his was a high cause!
”I'm warning you that I'm against you to the last--and will beat you if I see my way,” the girl went on. ”But at the same time I'm going to make the best of a bad situation, and try to get all the comfort I can. I'm in your hands at present, and we're foes, but just the same we can talk, and try to make each other comfortable so that we can be comfortable ourselves, and try not to be any more miserable than we can help. I'm not going to cry any more.”
As she talked she was slowly unwrapping the little parcel she had brought. Presently she held it out to him.
It was just a box of homemade candy--fudge made with sugar and canned milk--that she had brought for their day's picnic. But it was a peace offering not to be despised. A heavy load lifted from Ben's heart.
He waited his chance, guiding the boat with care, and then reached a brown hand. He crushed a piece of the soft, delicious confection between his lips. ”Thanks, Beatrice,” he said. ”I'll remember all you've told me.”
XXIII
It is a peculiar fact that no one is more deeply moved by the great works and phenomena of nature than those who live among them. It is the visitor from distant cities, or the callow youth with tawdry clothes and tawdry thoughts who disturbs the great silences and austerity of majestic scenes with half-felt effusive words or cheap impertinences.
Oddly enough, the awe that the wilderness dweller knows at the sight of some great, mysterious canyon or towering peak seems to increase, rather than decrease, with familiarity. His native scenes never grow old to him. Their beauty and majesty is eternal.
Perhaps the reason lies in the fact that the native woodsman knows nature as she really is: living ever close to her he knows her power over his life. Perhaps there is a religious side to the matter, too. In the solitudes the religious instincts receive an impulse that is impossible to those who know only the works of man. The religion that this gives is true and deep, and the eye instinctively lifts in reverence to the manifestations of divine might.
When the swirling waters carried the canoe down into the gorge of the Yuga both Ben and Beatrice were instinctively awed and stilled. Ever the walls of the gorge grew more steep, until the sunlight was cut off and they rode as if in twilight. The stone of the precipices presented a marvellous array of color; and the spruce, almost black in the subdued light, stood in startling contrast. Ben saw at once that even were they able to land they could not--until they had emerged from the gorge--climb to the highlands. A mountain goat, most hardy of all mountaineers, could scarcely scale the abrupt wall.
During this time of half-light they saw none of the larger forest creatures that at first had gazed at them with such wonder from the banks. The reason was simply that they could not descend and ascend the steep walls.
Mostly Ben had time only for an occasional glimpse at the colossus above him. His work was to guide the craft between the perilous boulders.
Occasionally the river slackened its wild pace, and at such times he stretched his arms and rested his straining eyes.
Both had largely forgotten the danger of the ride. Because she was trying bravely to make the best of a tragic situation Beatrice had resolved to keep danger from her thoughts. Ben had known from the first that danger was an inevitable element in his venture, and he accepted it just as he had considered it,--with entire coldness. Yet both of them knew, in their secret thoughts, that the balance of life and death was so fine that the least minor incident might cast them into darkness. It would not have to be a great disaster, a wide departure from the commonplace. They were traveling at a terrific rate of speed, and a sharp rock too close to the surface would rip the bottom from their craft. Any instant might bring the shock and shudder of the end.
There would scarcely be time to be afraid. Both would be hurled into the stream; and the wild waters, pounding against the rocks, would close the matter swiftly. It awed them and humbled them to realize with what dispatch and ease this wilderness power could snuff out their mortal lives. There would be no chance to fight back, no element of uncertainty in the outcome. Here was a destiny against which the strength of man was as thistledown in the wind! The thought was good spiritual medicine for Ben, just as it would have been for most other men, and his egoism died a swift and natural death.
One crash, one shock, and then the darkness and silence of the end! The river would rage on, unsatiated by their few pounds of flesh, storming by in n.o.ble fury; but no man would know whither they had gone and how they had died. The walls of the gorge would not tremble one whit, or notice; and the spruce against the sky would not bow their heads to show that they had seen.
But the canyon broke at last, and the craft emerged into the sunlight.
It was good to see the easy slope of the hills again, the spruce forests, and the forms of the wild creatures on the river bank, startled by their pa.s.sing. Noon came and pa.s.sed, and for lunch they ate the last of the fudge. And now a significant change was manifest in both of them.