The Lady of Big Shanty Part 29

No one spoke. They watched.

The trapper rose to his feet and laid his hand on the stranger's shoulder. The figure, with a wistful look in his eyes, twisted his emaciated body and held out his hand. The trapper grasped the thin, sinewy fingers in both his own.

"Friend," he said, turning to Thayor, "I'd like to make ye acquainted with my son--Bob Dinsmore."

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

The sudden apparition of this pitiful outcast, worn by exposure and untold suffering--coming as he did into the midst of the little band of refugees struggling with their own misfortunes, and the confidence of the trapper in those he was leading to safety, had brought a sudden joy to the old man's heart. He vowed inwardly now that his son should wander no longer--he would save him with the rest.

It had not been the first time the trapper had acknowledged the hide-out as his son. A week after Bailey was shot he had told Holcomb and Freme--with them he knew his son's secret was safe; they, too, had helped the outcast more than once.

Years ago this strange old man had come out of the forest into the valley below Big Shanty, settled there and, after some years, married.

No one knew where he came from, neither did they know he had been married before. As to his son's name, "Bob Dinsmore," it could hardly be called a.s.sumed, for he had never been known by any other. When a boy of sixteen he had, like his father, appeared in the valley, hailing, like so many others in that remote region, from nowhere in particular. He gave out that he had worked for a man on Black River--that was sufficient. The two built a cabin and the old man and the boy became boon companions. There was nothing strange in this.

When Bob Dinsmore became twenty-two years of age he married--later he killed Bailey. That was the whole story.

After that the old man had become a hermit from choice, helping his son when he could--often at the risk of his own life. Finally this became impossible and he was obliged for a time to let him save himself.

During this enforced exile he had developed both the shyness and the daring of an animal. With him it had become an instinct, when he moved far, or in a dangerous locality, to travel by night--like the panther, whose tracks though rarely seen by others, he often found in his wanderings. When he was forced to take to the woods by day, he either proceeded cautiously or slept. Both his hearing and his eyesight having become acute, he saw and heard with the alertness of a fox, and lived as free--a cruel freedom that became a mockery. He had no clothes save the makes.h.i.+fts he stood in. When it rained he remained soaking wet, like the ground and the trees about him; he became one of them, drying when they did; drenched, frozen or warmed at the will of the weather. He no longer spoke; he became silent like the things about him--when his own voice escaped him it startled him.

Yet even in his isolation he made friends: the cave that sheltered him; the tree whose rotten core always burned for him under his flint and steel; some pure, unfailing spring,--all these had for him a certain dumb comrades.h.i.+p.

And now to be fed and warmed at the same time! To be eating no longer alone, crouched in the dark like a hungry lynx, often in the drenching rain, or hidden under the cold roof of some rock; but among human beings whom he did not fear, men and women who spoke to him kindly and gave him the best they had in their own misfortune. To meet again Billy and Freme; to feel the friendly pressure of the old dog's head upon his thin knees; to be within sight once more of a snug, dry lean-to ready to rest his tired body. These were mercies he had never thought to see again. Yet, thankful as he was for them, they were secondary to his silent joy at seeing his father.

Occasionally the old man spoke to him in a low tone, as he piled the freshly cut night wood beside the fire. In reply the outcast either nodded or shook his head. When he had finished eating--and he ate ravenously--he rose, went over to Thayor, and laying his hand timidly on his arm, motioned him aside.

"I've got something to say to ye, Mr. Thayor," he whispered. "That's what I come for; I'd like to talk to ye _now_."

Thayor nodded and, turning to the others, said:

"Mr. Dinsmore and I have a little matter to talk over."

At last the two had met face to face--this man who, try as he would to banish him from his mind, always rose before him: in the dead of night; before his fire in his own room at home, his wife out at some social function or asleep on the floor below him; in his walks through the woods when he would stop and listen, hoping he might again see the same, worn, shambling figure he had watched from across the brook the day he shot the buck. Why, he could not tell. Perhaps it was because of their mutual loneliness. Perhaps it was because of a woman.

Whatever the cause there was something which seemed to link them together.

With a quick gesture he turned to Holcomb. "Will you keep up the fire, Billy? I want all of you to get some sleep."

"What does it mean, Sam?" asked Alice nervously.

"News, I hope," replied Thayor. "Go to sleep, dear; you need it."

The hide-out stood gazing nervously at the ground. "Do you feel better?" she asked, approaching him. "You are to sleep next to your father, I believe."

"Yes, marm," he stammered awkwardly; "I'm warm. Thank ye for the supper--I ain't hongry no more."

She nodded good night and went back to her blanket next to Margaret.

Bending over the girl she lifted the ma.s.s of fair hair and kissed her on the forehead. Then she drew her own blanket about her.

Thayor and the hide-out seated themselves on a log lying on the other side of the fire, out of hearing.

"Mr. Thayor," began Dinsmore, after a moment's silence, "they've treated ye like a dog."

Thayor met the owl-like eyes grimly, a bitter smile playing about his unshaven chin, but he did not confirm the statement.

"But there's one that'll never trouble ye no more," exclaimed Dinsmore, looking queerly at the man beside him.

"Who?" asked Thayor.

"Bergstein, d.a.m.n him!" returned Dinsmore slowly; "I seen him."

"But he left the camp days ago--the morning I discharged him."

"He's started on consid'ble of a trip _now_," replied the hide-out. "I see what was left of him."

"Dead!" exclaimed Thayor.

"Burned blacker 'n a singed hog. They ain't much left of him, and what they is ain't pleasant to look at. He ain't got but one arm left and that's clutchin' a holt of a empty ker'sene can."

Thayor gave a short gasp.

"And it was that cheat, Bergstein!" he cried in amazement.

"More devil than cheat," replied Dinsmore--"and three-quarters snake.

The gang he trained agin ye done what he told 'em to--they burned ye out with him a-leadin' 'em. I watched him and know--see him with the can 'fore the fire began. It's as plain as day, Mr. Thayor. Father's right--yer life ain't safe till ye git to the cars."

Thayor's grizzled, unshaven jaw closed hard. He sat staring into the fire, every muscle in his haggard face tense.

"There's men me and you know in these woods now," continued Dinsmore, "who ain't no more to blame in this ornery business 'n I be."

Again Thayor looked up in surprise.

"I had hoped as much," he said slowly, shaking his head. "There was not one of them, however, that came forward to help us--I am excepting, you understand, your father, Freme, and Holcomb. I owe them a debt of grat.i.tude which I can never repay. Why have _you_ come, Dinsmore?" he added, turning abruptly, with something of the briskness of his old business-like manner.

"Because ye've been good to me," replied the hide-out; "that's why I come; I wanted to do ye a good turn--I ain't got nothin' else to give ye."

"Good to you--I don't understand."

"I come to thank ye, Mr. Thayor. I see ye once the day ye got the buck. Father told me your name after ye'd gone. He and me eat up what ye left, and I got the money ye left fer me--Myra Hathaway's takin'

care of it--she's got my leetle gal. Yes--I seen ye more 'n once. You ain't never seen me--folks don't see me as a rule; but I've seen you many a time when ye've stepped by me and I've been layin' hid out; times when I'd starved if it hadn't been for him"--and he nodded across the fire to Blakeman.

"I caught a partridge once he'd winged," he went on, "and give it to him, seein' he was a city man and wouldn't know me. He see I was poor--thought I had run away from some gov'ment place and I let it go at that. He used to give me what was left from the kitchen; he'd come out and leave it hid for me 'long 'bout dark--your hired man asleep over thar, I'm talkin' 'bout. He said you wouldn't mind--not if you knowed how bad off I was for a snack to eat. I might hev stole it from ye more'n once, but I ain't never stole nothin'--I ain't a thief, Mr.

Thayor."

"Why didn't you come to me?" asked Thayor, after a moment's pause.

He was strangely moved at the man's story. "I would have helped you, Dinsmore. I have told Holcomb repeatedly I wanted to help you."