Horace Chase Part 37

Barclay, forgetting the Chases, as a treeless s.p.a.ce in front gave her for a moment a wider view of the sky.

It was this change in the weather which had altered their plans.

Nicholas Willoughby's mountain perch, though an ideal spot when the sky was blue, would be dreary enough in a long autumn storm; the Barclays and their prospective son-in-law were therefore hastening back to the lowlands.

Dolly reached the summit. And as the road brought her nearer to The Lodge, she was a.s.sailed by sinister forebodings. The first enormous relief which had filled her heart as she read the story told by the carriage, was now darkened by dread of another sort. If Ruth too had seen Marion, if Ruth too had comprehended all--where was she? From the untroubled countenances of the descending party, Dolly was certain that they, at least, had had no glimpse of Ruth; no, not even Walter. Dolly believed that men were capable of every brutality. But Walter's expression, when he returned her bow, had not been that of a.s.sumed unconsciousness, or a.s.sumed anything; there was no mistaking it--he was happy and contented; he looked as though he were enjoying the rapid motion and his own skilful driving, but very decidedly also as though all the rest of his attention was given to the girl by his side. "He has not even seen her! And he cares nothing for her; it is all a mistake!

Now let me only find her and get her home, and no one shall _ever_ know!" Dolly had said to herself with inexpressible relief. But then had followed fear: _could_ she find her?

When the chimneys of The Lodge came into sight she drove her pony into the woods and tied him to a tree. Then she approached the house cautiously, going through the forest and searching the carpet of fallen leaves, trying to discover the imprint of footsteps. "If she came here (and I _know_ she did), is there any place from which, herself concealed, she could have had a glimpse of Marion? That thicket, perhaps? It stretches almost to the veranda." And limping to this copse, Dolly examined its outer edge closely, inch by inch. She found two places where there was a track; evidently some one had entered at one of the points, and penetrated to a certain distance; then had come out in a straight line, backward. Dolly entered the thicket herself and followed this track. It brought her to a spot whence she had a clear view of the veranda. All signs of occupation were already gone; the chairs and tables had been carried in, the windows had been closed and barred. "If she stood here and saw them, and then if she moved backward and got herself out," thought Dolly, "where did she go next?" When freed from the thicket, she knelt down and looked along the surface of the ground, her eyes on a level with it; she had seen the negroes find small articles in that way--a b.u.t.ton, or even a pin. After changing her place two or three times, she thought she discerned a faint indication of footsteps, and she followed this possible trail, keeping at some distance from it at one side so that it should not be effaced, and every now and then stooping to get another view of it, horizontally. For the signs were so slight that it was difficult to see them--nothing but a few leaves pressed down a little more than the others, here and there.

The trail led her to the edge of the plateau. And here at last was something more definite--flattened herbage, and a small sapling bent over the verge and broken, as though some one had borne a weight upon it. "She let herself slip over the edge," thought Dolly. "She is down there in the woods somewhere. Oh, how shall I find her!"

The October afternoon would be drawing to its close before long, and this evening there would be no twilight, for black clouds were covering the sky, and the wind was beginning to sway the boughs of the trees above. In spite of her lameness, Dolly let herself down over the edge.

There was no time to lose; she must find her sister before dark.

The slope below was steep; she tried to check her sliding descent, but she did not succeed in stopping herself until her clothes had been torn and her body a good deal bruised. When at last her slide was arrested, she began to search the ground for a second trail. But if there had been one, the leaves obscured it; not only were they coming down in showers from above, but the wind every now and then scooped up armfuls of those already fallen, and whirled them round and round in eddying spirals.

Keeping the peeled sapling above her as her guide, Dolly began to descend, going first to the right for several yards, then to the left, and pausing at the end of each zigzag to examine the forest beyond. With her crippled ankle her progress was slow. She lost sight, after a while, of the sapling. But as she had what is called the sense of locality, she was still able to keep pretty near the imaginary line which she was trying to follow. For her theory was that Ruth had gone straight down; that, once out of sight from that house, she had let herself go. Light though she was on her feet, she must have ended by falling, and then, if there was a second ledge below--"But I won't think of that!" Dolly said to herself, desperately.

She was now so far from the house that she knew she could not be heard.

She therefore began to call "Ruth! Ruth!" But there was no reply. "I will count, and every time I reach a hundred I will call. Oh why, just this one day, should it grow dark so early, after weeks of the clearest twilight?" Drops began to fall, and finally the rain came down in torrents. She crouched beside a large tree, using its trunk as a protection as much as she could. Her hat and jacket were soon wet through, but she did not think of herself, she thought only of Ruth--Ruth, who had been fading for months--Ruth, out in this storm.

"But I'll find her and take her back. And no one shall ever know,"

thought the elder sister, determinedly.

After what seemed a long time the rain grew less dense. The instant she could see her way Dolly resumed her search. The ground was now wet, and her skirts were soon stained as she moved haltingly back and forth, holding on by the trees. "Ruth! Ruth?" At the end of half an hour, when it was quite dark, she came to a hollow lined with bushes. She hesitated, but her determination to make her search thorough over every inch of the ground caused her to let herself down into it by sense of feeling, holding on as well as she could by the bushes.

And there at the bottom was the body of her sister.

"O G.o.d, _don't_ let her be dead!" she cried, aloud. Drying the palm of her hand, she unb.u.t.toned the soaked riding-habit and felt for the heart.

At first there seemed to be no beating. Then she thought she perceived a faint throb, but she could not be sure; perhaps it was only her intense wish transferred to the place. Ruth's hat was gone, her hair and her cold face were soaked. "If I could only _see_ her! Poor, poor little girl!" said Dolly, sobbing aloud.

Presently it began to rain again with great violence; and then Dolly, in a rage, seated herself on the soaked ground at the bottom of the hollow, took her sister's lifeless form in her arms, and held it close. "She is _not_ dead, for she isn't heavy; she is light. If she had been dead I _couldn't_ have lifted her." She dried Ruth's face. She began to chafe her temples and breast. After half an hour she thought she perceived more warmth, and her cramped arm redoubled its effort. The rain was coming down in sheets, but she did not mind it now, for she felt a breath, a sigh. "Ruth, do you know me? It is Dolly; no one but Dolly."

Ruth's eyes opened, though Dolly could not see them. Then she said, "Dolly, he loves some one else." That was all; she did not speak again.

The storm kept on, and they sat there together, motionless. Ruth's clothes were so wet that they were like lead. At length the black cloud from which that especial deluge had come moved away, and fitful moonlight shone out. Now came the anxious moment: would Ruth be able to walk?

At first it seemed as if she could not even rise, her whole body was so stiff. She was also extremely weak; she had eaten nothing since the night before, and the new life which had inspired her was utterly gone.

But Dolly, somehow, made herself firm as iron; standing, she lifted her sister to her feet and held her upright until, little by little, she regained breath enough to take one or two steps. Then slowly they climbed from the hollow. With many pauses they went down the mountain; from this point, fortunately, its slope was not quite so steep. How she did it Dolly never knew, but the moment came at last when she saw a lighted window, and made her way towards it. And the final moment also came when she arrived at a door. Her arm was still supporting her pale young sister, who leaned against her. Ruth had not spoken; she had moved automatically; her senses were half torpid.

The lighted window was that of Portia Crumb. Portia had not gone to bed.

But she was not sitting up on their account; she supposed that they had found shelter at one of several small houses that were scattered along the river road in the direction which they had taken. She was sitting up in order to minister to her "Dave." David Crumb's fits of drunkenness generally lasted through two days. When he came to himself, his first demand was for coffee, and his wife, who never could resist secretly sympathizing a little with the relief which her surly husband was able to obtain for a time from the grief which gnawed incessantly at her own poor heart--his wife always remained within call to give him whatever he needed. And, oddly enough, these vigils had become almost precious to Portia. For occasionally at these moments David of his own accord would talk of his lost boys--the only times he ever mentioned them or permitted his wife to do so. And now and then he would allow her to read her Bible to him, and even to sing a hymn perhaps, to which he would contribute in s.n.a.t.c.hes a growling repentant ba.s.s.

Portia's coffee-pot now stood on the hot coals of her kitchen fireplace; she had been occupying the time in spinning, and in chanting softly to herself, as the rain poured down outside:

[Ill.u.s.tration: musical notation:

Je -_ru_ -sa-lem, my hap-py _home_, Name ev-er de-ar tu

_me_, When _sh.e.l.l_ my la-ber-rs hev an end? Thy

joys when sh.e.l.l I see ? Thy-y joys when _sh.e.l.l-el_ I see?]

Then, hearing some one at the outer door, she had come to open it.

"Good Lors! Miss Dolly! Here!--lemme help you! Bring her right into the kitchen, an' put her down on the mat clost to the fire till I get her wet close off!"

CHAPTER XXIV

HORACE CHASE, having by hard work arranged his far-stretching affairs so that he could leave them, reached L'Hommedieu late in the evening of the day of Ruth's flight. He had not telegraphed that he was coming; his plan was to have his wife well on her way to New York and the Liverpool steamer almost before she knew it. She had always been fond of the unexpected; this fondness would perhaps serve him now. When he reached the old house, to which his money had given a new freshness, there was no one to meet him but Dolly's Diana. Diana, in her moderate, unexcited way, began to tell him what had happened. But she was soon re-enforced by Felicite, whose ideas (regarding the same events) were far more theoretic.

"Miss Franklin had a lunch prepared, and took it with her," Diana went on.

"Eet ended in a peekneek," interrupted Felicite. "The leaf was so red, and the time so beautiful, monsieur; no clouds, and the sky of a blue!

Then suddenlee the rain ees come. No doubt they have entered in a house to wait till morning."

"Which road did my wife take?" inquired Chase, his tone anxious.

"Ah, monsieur, no one _see_ herr, she go so early. Eet was herr joke--to escape a leetle from herr sistare, if eet is permit to say eet; pardon."

"Which way, then, did Miss Franklin go?" continued Chase, impatiently.

Both women pointed towards the left. "She went _down_ the street. _That_ way."

"Down the street? That's no good. What I want to know is which road she took after leaving town?"

But naturally neither Felicite nor Miss Pollikett could answer this question; they had not followed the phaeton.

Chase rang the bell, and sent for one of the stablemen. "Let Pompey and Zip go and ask at all the last houses (where the three roads that can be reached from the end of this street turn off) whether any one noticed Miss Franklin drive past this morning? They all know her pony and trap.

Tell Pompey to step lively, and if the people have gone to bed, he must knock 'em up."

The two negroes returned in less than fifteen minutes; they had found the trace without trouble: Miss Franklin had taken the river road towards Warm Springs.

"Saddle my horse," said Chase; "and you, Jeff, as soon as I have started, put the pair in the light carriage and drive down to Crumb's.

Have the lamps in good order and burning brightly, and see that the curtains are b.u.t.toned down so as to keep the inside dry. Felicity, put in shawls and whatever's necessary; the ladies are no doubt under cover somewhere; but they may have got wet before reaching it. Perhaps one of you had better go along?" he added, looking at the two women reflectively, as if deciding which one would be best.

"Yes, sir; I can be ready in a moment," said Diana, going out.

"Ah! for _two_ there is not enough place," murmured Felicite, relieved.

Chase ate a few mouthfuls of something while his horse was being saddled; then, less than half an hour after his arrival, he was off again. It was very dark, but he did not slacken his speed for that, nor for the rough, stony ascents and descents, nor for the places where the now swollen river had overflowed the track. The distance which Dolly's slow old pony had taken five hours to traverse, this hard rider covered in less than half the time. At one o'clock he reached Crumb's. It was the first house in that direction after the village and its outskirts had been left behind. Along the mile or two beyond it, farther towards the west, were three smaller houses, and at one of the four he hoped to find his wife. As he drew near Crumb's, he saw that the windows were lighted. "They're here!" he said to himself, with a long breath of relief. As he rode up to the porch, Portia, who had heard his horse's footsteps, looked out.

"They're here?" he asked.

"Yes," answered Portia, "they be."

"And all right?"