Chapter VI: Part III (2)

“Well, I ain’t goin’ to so much as ask you ’f it’s so; but I’m goin’ to tell you how _mean_ I’ve b’en to listen to ’t an’ to keep a-wonderin’ if it c’u’d be so,—an’ then see if you can forgive me. I’ve b’en hearin’ that you don’t light no torch nor ketch no salmon when you go a-spearin’, but that you an’ him go off by yourselves an’ stay—an’ that he—he”—the words seemed to stick in his throat—“he’s cut me out.”

After a little Lavinia said—“Is that all?”

“All! Yes. Ain’t that enough?”

“Yes, it’s enough—plenty for you to ’a’ believed about me. I wouldn’t ’a’ believed that much about you.” The humor of this remark seemed to appeal to her, for she smiled a little. Then she got up. “But it’s all right, Bart. I ain’t mad. If that’s all, I guess I’ll go back to bed. You tell maw I couldn’t put them roastin’-ears on—my head feels so.”

He caught her to his breast and kissed her several times, with something like a prayer in his eyes, and with a strong, but sternly controlled passion that left him trembling and staggering like a drunken man when she was gone.

* * * * *

After Lavinia and Diller were gone that night Bart sat out on the kitchen steps, smoking his pipe. He stooped forward, his elbows resting on his knees. His right hand held the pipe, and the left supported his right arm. His eyes looked straight before him into the purple twilight. The wind had gone down, but now and then a little gust of perfume came around the corner from the wild clover, still in delicate pink blossom on the north side of the house. The stars came out, one by one, in the deep blue spaces above, and shrill mournful outcries came from winged things in the green depths of the ferns. Already the torches of the salmon-spearers were beginning to flare out from the shadow of the cliffs across the bay. Mr. Vaiden was not at home, but Mrs. Vaiden was walking about heavily in the kitchen, finishing the evening work.

Mrs. Vaiden was not quite easy in her mind. She really liked Bart Winn, but, to be unnecessarily and disagreeably truthful, she liked even better his noble donation claim, which he was now selling off in town lots. Time and time again during the past month she had cautioned Lavinia to not “go galivantin’ ’round with that Diller so much;” and on numerous occasions she had affirmed that “she’d _bet_ Laviny would fool along till she let Bart Winn slip through her fingers, after all.” Still, it had been an unconfessed satisfaction to her to observe Mr. Diller’s frank admiration for her daughter—to feel that Lavinia could “have her pick o’ the best any day.” She knew how this rankled in some of the neighbors’ breasts. She wished now that she had been more strict. She said to herself, as she went out to the spring-house: “I wish I’d ’a’ set my foot right down on his goin’ a step with her. An’ there I started it myself, a-sendin’ her off to that c’noe race with him, just to tantalize Mis’ Bentley an’ her troop o’ girls. But land knows I never dreamt o’ its goin’ on this way. What’s a newspaper fello’ compared to a donation claim, _I’d_ like to know?”

At nine o’clock she went to the door and said, in that tone of conciliatory tenderness which comes from a remorseful conscience: “Well, Bart, I guess I’ll go to bed. I’m tired. You goin’ to set up for Laviny?”

“Yes,” said Bart; “good-night.”

“Well, good-night, Bart.” She stood holding a lighted candle in one hand, protecting its flame from the night air with the other. “I reckon they’ll be home by ten.”

“I reckon so.”

At the top of the stairs Mrs. Vaiden remembered that the parlor windows were open, and she went back to close them. The wind was rising again, and as she opened the parlor door it puffed through the open windows and sent the curtains streaming out into the room; then it went whistling on through the house, banging the doors.

After a while quiet came upon the house. Bart sat smoking silently. The Vaidens lived on a hill above the town, and usually he liked to watch the chains of electric lights curving around the bay; but to-night he watched the torches only. Suddenly he flung his pipe down with a passionate movement and stood up, reaching inside the door for his hat. But he sat down again as suddenly, shaking himself like a dog, as if to fling off something that was upon him. “No; I’m damned if I will!” he said in his throat. “I _won’t_ watch her! She said it wa’n’t so, an’ I believe her.” But he did not smoke again, and he breathed more heavily as the moments ticked by and she did not come. At half-past ten Mrs. Vaiden came down in a calico wrapper and a worsted shawl.

“Why, ain’t she come _yet_?” she asked, holding the candle high and peering under it at the back of the silent figure outside.

“No,” said Bart quietly; “she ain’t.”

“Why, it’s half-after ten! She never’s b’en out this a-way before. D’you think anything c’u’d ’a’ hapened?”

“No,” said Bart, slowly; “I guess they’ll be along.”

“Well, I don’t want that she sh’u’d stay out till this time o’ night with anybody but you. She’s old enough to know better. It don’t look well.”

“It looks all right, as fur as that goes,” said Bart.

“Oh, if _you_ think so.”

Mrs. Vaiden lowered the candle huffily.

Bart arose and came inside. He was pale but he spoke calmly, and he looked her straight in the eyes.

“It’s all right as fur as she goes; I’d trust her anywheres. But how about him? What kind of a man is he?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Mrs. Vaiden, weakly. “How d’ you expect me to know what kind of a _man_ he is? He’s a nice-appearin’, polite sort of a fello’, an’ he writes for a newspaper ’n New York—one o’ them big ones. But he don’t seem to me to have much backbone or stand-upness about him. I sh’u’d think he’s one o’ them that never _intends_ to do anything wrong, but does it just because it’s pleasant for the time bein’, and then feels sorry for ’t afte’ards.”

Bart’s brows bent together blackly.

“But I must say”—Mrs. Vaiden’s tone gathered firmness—“you might pattern after him a little in politeness, Bart. I think Laviny likes it. He’s alwus openin’ gates for her, an’ runnin’ to set chairs for her when she comes into a room, an’ takin’ off his hat to her, an’ carryin’ her umberella, an’ fetchin’ her flow’rs; an’ I b’lieve he’d most die before he’d walk on the inside o’ the sidewalk or go over a crossin’ ahead o’ her. An’ I can see Laviny likes them things.”

She put the candle on the table and huddled down into a chair.

The look of anger on the man’s face gave place to one of keen dismay.

“I didn’t know she liked such things. I never thought about ’em. I wa’n’t brought up to such foolishness.”

“Well, she likes ’em, anyhow. I guess most women do.” Mrs. Vaiden sighed unconsciously. “Why, Bart, it’s a quarter of, an’ she ain’t here yet. D’ you want I sh’u’d go after her?”

“No, I don’t want you sh’u’d go after her. I want you sh’u’d let her alone, an’ show her we got confidence in her. She’s just the same as my wife, an’ I don’t want her own mother sh’u’d think she’d do anything she hadn’t ort to.”

Mrs. Vaiden’s feelings were sensitive and easily hurt; and she sat now in icy silence, looking at the clock. But when it struck eleven she thawed, being now thoroughly frightened.

“Oh, Bart, I do think we’d best look in her room. She might ’a’ got in someway without our hearin’ her—an’ us settin’ hyeer like a couple o’ bumps on a lawg.”

“She might ’a’,” said Bart, as if struck by the suggestion. “You get me a candle an’ I’ll go up and see. You stay here,” he added, over his shoulder, as he took the candle and started.

“Look out!” she cried, sharply, as the blue flame plowed a gutter down one side of the candle. “Don’t hold it so crooked! You’ll spill the sperm onto the stair-carpet!”

It was with a feeling of awe that Bart went into the dainty little room. There were rosebuds on the creamy wall-paper, and the ceiling, slanting down on one side, was pale, pale blue, spangled with silver stars; the windows were closed, and thin, soft curtains fell in straight folds over them; the rag carpet was woven in pink-and-cream stripes; there was a dressing-table prettily draped in pink. For a moment the man’s love was stronger than his anxiety; the prayer came back to his eyes as he looked at the narrow, snowy bed.

Then he went to the dressing-table and saw a folded slip of paper with his name upon it.

* * * * *

After a while he became conscious that he had read the letter a dozen times, and still had not grasped its meaning. He stooped closer to the candle and read it again, his lips moving mechanically:

“DEAR BART:—I’m goin’ away. I’m goin’ with him. I told you what
wa’n’t so this mornin’. I do like him the best. I couldn’t
have you after knowin’ him. I feel awful bad to treat you this
a-way, but I haf to.

“LAVINY.”

“P. S.—I want that you sh’u’d marry somebody else as soon as
you can, an’ be happy.”

A querulous call came from the hall below. He took the candle in one hand and the letter in the other and went down, stumbling clumsily on the stairs. A great many noises seemed to be ringing in his head, and the sober paper with which the walls of the hall were covered to have suddenly taken on great scarlet spots. He felt helpless and uncertain in his movements, as if he had no will to guide him. He must have carried the candle very crookedly, for Mrs. Vaiden, who was watching him from below, cried out, petulantly: “There, you _are_ spillin’ the sperm! Just look at you!” But she stopped abruptly when she saw his face.

“Why, whatever on this earth!” she exclaimed, solemnly. “What you got there? A letter?”

“Yes.” He set the candle on the table and held the letter toward her. “It’s from Laviny.”

“From Laviny! Why, what on earth did she write to you about?”

He burst into wild, terrible laughter. “She wants I sh’u’d marry somebody else as soon as I can, an’ be happy.” These words, at least, seemed to have written themselves on his brain. He groped about blindly for his hat, and went out into the shrill, whistling night. The last torch had burnt itself out, and everything was black save the electric lights, winking in the wind, and one strip of whitening sky above Mount Baker, where presently the moon would rise, silver and cool.

* * * * *

It was seven o’clock in the morning when he came back. He washed his hands and face at the sink on the porch, and combed his hair before a tiny mirror, in which a dozen reflections of himself danced. Mrs. Vaiden was frying ham. At sight of him she began to cry, weakly and noiselessly. “Where you been?” she sniffled. “You look forty year old. I set up till one o’clock, a-waitin’ for you.”

“Mrs. Vaiden,” said Bart, quietly, “I’m in great trouble. I’ve walked all night, tryin’ to make up my mind to ’t. I’ve done it at last; but I cu’dn’t ’a’ come back tell I did. I’m sorry you waited up.”

“Oh, I don’t mind that as long as you’re gettin’ reconciled to ’t, Bart.” Mrs. Vaiden spoke more hopefully. “You set right down an’ have a bite to eat.”

“I don’t want anything,” he replied; but he sat down and took a cup of coffee. It must have been very hot, for suddenly great tears came into his eyes and stood there. Mrs. Vaiden sat down opposite to him and leaned her elbow on the table and her head on her hand. “Bart,” she said, solemnly, “I don’t want you sh’u’d think I ever winked at this. It never entered my head. My heart’s just broke. To see a likely girl, that c’u’d ’a’ had her pick anywheres, up an’ run away with a no-account newspaper fello’—when she c’u’d ’a’ had you!” The man’s face contracted. “Whatever on earth the neighbors’ll say I don’t know.”

“Who cares what neighbors say?”

“Oh, that’s all very well for you to say; you ain’t her mother.”

“No,” said Bart, with a look that made her quail; “I ain’t. I wish to God I was! Mebbe ’twouldn’t _hurt_ so!”

“Well, it ’ad ort to hurt more!” retorted the lady, with spirit. “Just ’s if you felt any worse ’n I do!” He laid his head on his hand and groaned. “Oh, I know it’s gone deep, Bart”—her tone softened—“but ’s I say, you ain’t her mother. You’ll get over it an’ marry again—like Laviny wanted that you sh’u’d. It was good o’ her to think o’ that. I will say that much for her.”

“Yes,” said Bart; “it was good of her.” Then there came a little silence, broken finally by Mrs. Vaiden. Her voice held a note of peevish regret. “There’s that fine house o’ your’n ’most finished—two story an’ a ell! An’ that liberry across the front hall from the parlor! When I think how vain Laviny was o’ that liberry! What’ll you do with the house, now, Bart?”

“Sell it!” he answered, between his teeth.

“An’ there’s all that fine furnitur’ that Laviny an’ you picked out. She fairly danced when she told me about it. All covered with satin—robin-egg green, wa’n’t it?”

“Blue.” The word dropped mechanically from his white lips.

“Well, blue, then. What’ll you do with it?”

“I guess they’ll take it back by my losin’ my first payment,” he answered, with a kind of ghastly humor.

“Well, there’s your new buggy—all paid for. They won’t take that back.”

“I’ll give that to you,” he said, with a bitter smile.

“Oh, you!” exclaimed Mrs. Vaiden, throwing out her large hand at him in a gesture of mingled embarrassment and delight. “As if I’d take it, after Laviny’s actin’ up this a-way!”

He did not reply, and presently she broke out, angrily, with:

“The huzzy! The ungrateful, deceitful jade! To treat a body so. How do we know whether he’s got anything to keep a wife on? I’ll admit, though, he was alwus genteel-dressed. I do think, Bart, you might ’a’ took pattern ’n that. ’Twa’n’t like as if you wa’n’t able to wear good clo’es—an’ Laviny liked such things.”

“I wish you’d ’a’ told me a good spell ago what she liked, Mrs. Vaiden.”

“Well, that’s so. There ain’t much use ’n lockin’ the stable door after the horse ’s gone. Oh, that makes me think about your offerin’ me that buggy—’s if I w’u’d!”

“I guess you’ll have to. I’m goin’ to leave on the train, an’ I’ll order it sent to you.”

“Oh, you! Why, where you goin’, Bart?”

“I’m goin’ to follow _him_!” he thundered, bringing his fist down on the table in a way that made every dish leap out of its place. “I ain’t goin’ to hurt him—unless talk hurts—but I’m goin’ to say some _things_ to him. I ain’t had a thought for three year that that girl ain’t b’en in! I ain’t made a plan that she ain’t b’en in. I’ve laid awake night after night just too happy to sleep. An’ now to have a—a _thing_ like him take her from me in one month. But that ain’t the worst!” he burst out, passionately. “We don’t know how he’ll treat her, an’ she’ll be too proud to complain—”

“I can’t see why you care how he treats her,” said Mrs. Vaiden, “after the way she’s treated you.”

“No,” he answered, with a look that ought to have crushed her, “I didn’t s’pose you c’u’d see. I didn’t expect you to see that, or anything else but your own feelin’s—the way the thing affex you. But that’s what I’m goin’ to follow him for, Mrs. Vaiden. An’ when I find him—I’m goin’ to tell him”—there was an awful calm in his tone now—“that if he ever misuses her, now that he’s married her, I’ll kill him. I’ll shoot him down like a dawg!”

“My Lord!” broke in Mrs. Vaiden, with a new thought. “What if he ain’t married her! She never said so ’n her letter. Oh, Bart!” beginning to weep hysterically. “Mebbe you c’u’d get her back.”

He leaped to his feet panting like an animal; his great breast swelled in and out swiftly, his hands clenched, his eyes burned at her.

“What!” he said. “Do you _dare_? _Her mother!_ Oh, you—you—God! but I wish you was a man!”

The whistle of a coming train broke across the morning stillness. He turned, seized his hat and crushed it on his head. Then he came back and took up the chair in which he had been sitting.

“Mrs. Vaiden,” he said, quietly, “d’ you see this chair? Well, if he ain’t married her—”

With two or three movements of his powerful wrists he wrenched the chair into as many pieces and dropped them on the floor.

* * * * *

After a while Mrs. Vaiden emerged from the stupefaction into which his last words had thrown her, and resumed her breakfast.

“Well,” she said, stirring her coffee until it swam round and round in a smooth eddy in the cup, “if I ever see his beat! Whoever’d ’a’ thought he’d take his cuttin’-out that a-way? I never ’d ’a’ thought it. Worryin’ about her, after the way she’s up and used him! A body ’d think he’d be glad if she was treated shameful, and hatto lead a mis’rable life a-realizin’ what she’d threw away. But not him. Well, they say still water runs deep. Mebbe it’s ungrateful to think it after his givin’ me that fine buggy—(How Mis’ Bentley will stare when I drive roun’ to see her!” she interjected with a smile of anticipation.) “But after seein’ how he showed up his temper just now I ain’t sure but Laviny’s head was level when she took the other ’n. ’F _only_ he had a donation claim!”

ZARELDA

ZARELDA

“’Reldy! Say, ’Reldy Za-_rel_-dy!”

The girl was walking rapidly, but she stopped at once and turned. She wore a cheap woolen dress of a dingy brown color. The sleeves were soiled at the wrists, but the narrow, inexpensive ruffle at the neck was white and fresh. Her thick brown hair was well brushed and clean. It was woven into a heavy, glistening braid which was looped up and tied with a rose-colored ribbon. Her shoes were worn out of shape and “run down” at the heels, and there were no gloves on the roughened hands clasped over the handle of her dinner-bucket.

“Oh, you?” she said, smiling.

“Yes, me,” said the other girl, with a high color, as she joined Zarelda. They walked along briskly together. “I’ve been tryin’ to ketch up with you for three blocks. Ain’t you early?”

“No; late. Heard the whistle blow ’fore I left home. Didn’t you hear it? Now own up, Em Brackett.”

“No, I didn’t—honest,” said the other girl, laughing. “I set the clock back las’ night an’ forgot to turn it ahead ag’in this mornin’.”

This young woman’s dress and manner differed from her companion’s. Her dress was cheap, but of flimsy, figured goods that under close inspection revealed many and large grease spots; the sleeves were fashionably puffed; and there were ruffles and frills and plaitings all over it. At the throat was a bit of satin ruffling that had once been pale blue. Half her hair had been cut off, making what she called her “bangs,” and this was tightly frizzed over her head as far back as her ears. Her back hair—coarse and broken from many crimpings—was braided and looped up like Zarelda’s, and tied with a soiled blue ribbon. She wore much cheap jewelry, especially amethysts in gaudy settings. She carried herself with an air and was popularly supposed by the young people of factory society to be very much of a belle and a coquette.

Zarelda turned and looked at her with sudden interest.

“What in the name o’ mercy did you turn the clock back for?”

Em tossed her head, laughing and blushing.

“Never you mind what for, ’Reldy Winser. It ain’t any o’ your funeral, I guess, if I did turn it back. I had occasion to—that’s all. You wasn’t at the dance up at Canemah las’ night, was you?” she added suddenly.

“No, I wasn’t. I didn’t have anybody to go with. You didn’t go, either, did you?”

“Unh-hunh; I did.”

Em nodded her head, looking up the river to the great Falls, with dreamy, remembering eyes. “We had a splendid time, an’ the walk home along the river was just fine.”

“Well, I could of gone with you if I’d of knew you was goin’. Couldn’t I? Maw was reel well las’ night, too.”

She waited for a reply, but receiving none, repeated rather wistfully—“Couldn’t I?”

Em took her eyes with some reluctance away from the river and looked straight before her.

“Why, I guess,” she said, slowly and with slight condescension. “At least, I wouldn’t of cared if my comp’ny wouldn’t; an’ I guess”—with a beautiful burst of generosity—“he wouldn’t of minded much.”

“Oh,” said Zarelda, “you had comp’ny, did you?”

“W’y, of course. You didn’t s’pose I went up there all alone of myself, did you?”

“You an’ me ust to go alone places, without any fellow, I mean,” said Zarelda. A little color came slowly into her face. She felt vaguely hurt by the other’s tone. “I thought mebbe you went with some o’ the other girls.”

“I don’t go around that way any more.” Em lifted her chin an inch higher. “When I can’t have an—escort”—she uttered the word with some hesitation, fearing Zarelda might laugh at it—“I’ll stay home.”

Then she added abruptly in a reminiscent tone—“Maw acted up awful over my goin’ with him. Thought for a spell I wouldn’t get to go. But at last I flared all up an’ told her if I couldn’t go I’d just up an’ leave for good. That brought her around to the whipple-trees double quick, I can tell you. I guess she won’t say much agen my goin’ with him another time.”

“Goin’ with who?” said Zarelda. Em looked at her, smiling.

“For the land o’ love! D’ you mean to say you don’t know? I thought you’d of guessed. W’y, that’s what made maw so mad—she was just hoppin’, I tell you. That’s what made her act up so. Said all the neighbors ’u’d say I was tryin’ to get him away from you.”

In an instant the blood had flamed all over Zarelda’s face and neck.

“Get who away from me, Em Brackett?”

“As if there was so many to get!” said Em, laughing.

“Who are you a-talkin’ about?” said Zarelda, sternly. Her face was paling now. “What of I got to do with you an’ your comp’ny an’ your maw’s actin’-ups, I’d like to know. Who _was_ your comp’ny?”

“Jim Sheppard; he”—

“Jim Sheppard!” cried Zarelda, furiously. She turned a white face to her companion, but her eyes were blazing. “What do I care for Jim Sheppard? Aigh? What do I care who he takes to dances up at Canemah? Aigh? You tell your maw, Em Brackett, that she needn’t to trouble to act up on my account. She can save her actin’-ups for somebody that needs ’em! You tell her that, will you?”

“Well, I will,” said Em, unmoved. “I’m glad you don’t mind, ’Reldy. I felt some uneasy myself, seein’ ’s how stiddy he’d been goin’ with you.”

“Well, that don’t hender his goin’ with somebody else, does it? I ain’t very likely to keep him from pleasin’ hisself, am I?”

“Don’t go to workin’ yourself up so, ’Reldy. If you don’t care, there’s no use in flarin’ up so. My! Just look at this em’rald ring in at Shindy’s. Ain’t that a beaut’?”

“I ain’t got time.” Zarelda walked on with her head up. “Don’t you see we’re late a’ready? The machin’ry’s all a-goin’, long ago.”

The two girls pushed through the swinging gate and ran up the half-dozen steps to the entrance of the big, brick woolen mills. A young man in a flannel shirt and brown overalls was passing through the outer hall. He was twirling a full, crimson rose in his hand.

As the girls hurried in, he paused and stood awkwardly waiting for them, with a red face.

“Good mornin’,” he said, looking first at Em and then, somewhat shamefacedly, at Zarelda.

“Good mornin’, Jim,” said Zarelda, coolly. She was still pale, but she smiled as she pressed on into the weaving-room. The many-tongued roar of the machinery burst through the open door to greet her. Em lingered behind a moment; and when she passed Zarelda’s loom there was a crimson rose in her girdle and two more in her cheeks.

Five hours of monotonous work followed. Zarelda stood patiently by her loom, unmindful of the toilers around her and the deafening noise; she did not lift her eyes from her work. She was the youngest weaver in the factory and one of the most careful and conscientious.

The marking-room was in the basement, and in its quietest corner was a large stove whereon the factory-girls were permitted to warm their lunches. When the whistle sounded at noon they ceased work instantly, seized their lunch baskets, and sped—pushing, laughing, jostling—down the stairs to the basement. There was a small, rickety elevator at the rear of the factory, and some of the more reckless ones leaped upon it and let themselves down with the rope.

Zarelda was timid about the elevator; but that noon she sprang upon it and giving the rope a jerk went spinning down to the ground. As she entered the marking-room one of the overseers saw her. “What!” he exclaimed, “Did you come down that elevator, ’Reldy? I thought you had more sense ’n some o’ the other girls. Why, it ain’t safe! You’re liable to get killed on it.”

“I don’t care,” said Zarelda, with a short, contemptuous laugh. “I’d just as soon go over the falls in an Indian dug-out.”

“You must want to shuffle off mighty bad,” said the overseer. Then he added kindly, for he and all the other overseers liked her—“What’s got into you, ’Reldy? Anything ail you?”

“No,” said the girl; “nothin’ ails me.” But his kind tone had brought sudden, stinging tears to her eyes.

She went on silently to the stove and set her bucket upon it. It contained thick vegetable soup, which, with soda crackers, constituted her dinner. She sat down to watch it, stirring it occasionally with a tin spoon. Twenty other girls were crowding around the stove. Em was among them. Zarelda saw the big red rose lolling in her girdle. She turned her eyes resolutely away from it, only to find them going back again and again.

“Hey! Where ’d you get your rose at, Em Brackett?” cried one of the girls.

“Jim Sheppard gave it to her,” trebled another, before Em could reply. “I see him have it pinned onto his flannel shirt before the whistle blew.”

“_Jim Sheppard!_ Oh, my!”

There was a subdued titter behind Zarelda’s back. She stirred the soup without lifting her eyes. “She went livid, though, an’ then she went white!” one of the girls who read yellow novels declared afterward, tragically.

“Well,” said Matt Wilson, sitting down on a bench and commencing to eat a great slice of bread thinly covered with butter, “who went to the dance up at Stringtown las’ night?”

All the girls but two flung unclean hands above their heads. There was a merry outcry of “I did! I did!”

“Well, I didn’t,” said Matt. “My little lame sister coaxed me to wheel her down town, an’ then it was too late.”

“Why wasn’t you there, Zarelda Winser?” cried Belle Church, opening her dinner-bucket and examining the contents with the air of an epicurean.

For a second or two Zarelda wished honestly that she had a lame sister or an invalid mother. Then she said, quite calmly—“I didn’t have any body to go with. That’s why.” She turned and faced them all as she spoke.

With a fine delicacy which was certainly not acquired by education, every girl except Matt looked away from Zarelda’s face. Matt, not having been to the dance, was not in the secret.

But Zarelda did not change countenance. She sat calmly eating her soup from the bucket with the tin spoon. She took it noisily from the point of the spoon; it was so thick that it was like eating a vegetable dinner.

“Didn’t have anybody to go with?” repeated Matt, laughing loudly. “I call that good. A girl that’s had steady comp’ny for a year! Comp’ny that’s tagged her closer ’n her shadder! An’ I did hear”—she shattered the shell of a hard-boiled egg by hammering it on the bench, and began picking off the pieces—“that your maw was makin’ you up a whole trunkful o’ new underclo’s—all trimmed up with tattin’ an’ crochet an’ serpentine braid—with insertin’ two inches wide on ’em, too. You didn’t have anybody to go with, aigh? What’s the matter with Jim Sheppard?”

Zarelda set her eyes on the red rose, as if that gave her courage.

“He took Em Brackett.”

“Not much!” said Matt, turning sharply. “Honest? Well, then, he only took her because you couldn’t go an’ ast him to take her instid.”

“Why, the idee!” exclaimed Em, coloring angrily and fluttering until the rose almost fell out of her girdle. “Zarelda Winser, you tell her that ain’t so!”

“No, it ain’t so,” said Zarelda, composedly, finishing her soup and beginning on a soda cracker. “He didn’t ask me at all. He asked Em hisself.”

“My!” said Net Carter, who had not been giving attention to the conversation. “What larrapin’ good lunches you do have, Em Brackett. Chicken sandwich, an’ spiced cur’nts, an’ cake! My!”

Em Brackett looked out of the cobwebbed window at a small dwelling between the factory and the river. “I wonder why Mis’ Allen don’t hide up that ugly porch o’ her’n with vines,” she said, frostily. In factory society “larrapin” was not considered a polite word and a snub invariably awaited the unfortunate young woman who used it. The line must be drawn.

When the whistle blew the girls started leisurely for the stairs. There would be fifteen minutes during which they might stand around the halls and talk to the young men. Zarelda fell back, permitting all to precede her. Em looked back once or twice to see where she was.

“Well, if that ’Reldy Winser ain’t grit!” whispered Nell Curry to Min Aster. “Just as good as acknowledgin’ he’s threw off on her, an’ her a-holdin’ up her head that way. There ain’t another girl in the factory c’u’d do that—without flinchin’, too.”

When Zarelda reached the first hall she looked about her deliberately for Jim Sheppard. It had been his custom to meet her at the head of the stairs and going with her to one of the windows overlooking the Falls, to talk until the second whistle sent them to their looms. With a resolute air she joined Em Brackett, who was looking unusually pretty with a flush of excitement on her face and a defiant sparkle in her eyes.

In a moment Jim Sheppard came in. He hesitated when he saw the two girls together. A dull red went over his face. Then he crossed the hall and deliberately ignoring Zarelda, smiled into Em’s boldly inviting eyes and said, distinctly—“Em, don’t you want to take a little walk? There’s just time.”

“Why, yes,” said Em, with a flash of poorly concealed triumph. “’Reldy, if you’re a-goin’ on upstairs, would you just as lieve pack my bucket up?”

“I’d just as lieve.” Zarelda took the bucket, and the young couple walked away airily.

This was the way the factory young men had of disclosing their preferences. It was considered quite proper for a young man and a young woman to “go together” for months, or even years, and for one to “throw off” on the other, when attracted by a fresher face, with no explanation or apology.

“Well,” whispered Belle Church, “I guess there ain’t one of us but’s been threw off on some time or other, so we know how it feels. But this is worse. He’s been goin’ with her more’n a year—an then to stop off so sudden!”

“It’s better to stop off sudden than slow,” said Matt Wilson, with an air of grim wisdom. “It hurts worse, but it don’t hurt so long. Well, if I ever! Just look at that!”

Out of sheer pity Frank Haddon had sidled out of a group of young men and made his way hesitatingly to Zarelda. “’Reldy,” he said, “don’t you want to—want to—take a walk, too?”

The girl’s eyes flamed at him. She knew that he was pitying her, and she was not of a nature to accept pity meekly. “No!” she flashed out, with scorn. “I don’t want to—want to”—mimicking his tone—“take a walk, too. If I did, I guess I know the road.”

She went upstairs, holding her head high.

When Zarelda went home that evening she found the family already at the supper table. The Winsers were not very particular about their home manners.

“We don’t wait on each other here,” Mrs. Winser explained, frequently, with pride, to her neighbors. “When a meal’s done, on the table it goes in a jiffy, an’ such of us as is here, eat. I just put the things back in the oven an’ keep ’em hot for them that ain’t on hand.”

Zarelda was compelled to pass through the kitchen to reach the stairs.

“Well, ’Reldy,” said her mother, “you’re here at last, be you? Hurry up an’ wash yourself. Your supper’s in the oven, but I guess the fire’s about out. It does beat all how quick it goes out. Paw, I do wish you’d hump yourself an’ git some dry wood. It ’u’d try the soul of a saint to cook with that green stuff. Sap fairly _oozes_ out of it!”

“I don’t want any supper, maw,” said Zarelda.

“You don’t want any supper! What ails you? Aigh?”

“I don’t feel hungry. I got a headache.”

She passed the table without a glance and went upstairs. Her mother arose, pushing back her chair with decision and followed her. When she reached Zarelda’s room, the girl was on her knees before her trunk. She had taken out a small writing-desk and was fitting a tiny key in the lock. Her hat was still on her head, but pushed back.

She started when the door opened, and looked over her shoulder, flushing with embarrassment and annoyance. Then, without haste or nervousness, she replaced the desk and closing the trunk, stood up calmly and faced her mother.

“Why don’t you want any supper?” Mrs. Winser took in the trunk, the desk, and the blush at one glance. “Be you sick?”

“I got a headache.” Zarelda took off her hat and commenced drawing the pins out of her hair. She untied the red ribbon and rolled it tightly around three fingers to smooth out the creases.

“Well, you wasn’t puttin’ your headache ’n your writin’-desk, was you?”

“No, I wasn’t.”

“Now, see here, ’Reldy,” said Mrs. Winser, very kindly, coming closer and resting one large hand on the bureau; “there’s somethin’ ails you besides a headache, an’ you ain’t a-goin’ to pull any wool over my eyes. You’ve hed lots an’ lots o’ headaches an’ et your supper just the same. What ails you?”

“Nothin’ ails me, maw.”

“There does, too, somethin’ ail you. I guess I know. Now, what is it? You might just as well spit it right out an’ be done with it.”

Zarelda was silent. She began brushing her hair with a dingy brush from which tufts of bristles had been worn in several places. Her mother watched her patiently for a few moments, then she said—“Well, ’Reldy, be you goin’ to tell me what ails you?”

Still there was no reply.

“You ain’t turned off in the fact’ry, be you?”

Zarelda shook her head.

“Well, then,” said Mrs. Winser slowly, as if reluctantly admitting a thought that she had been repelling, “it’s somethin’ about Jim Sheppard.”

The girl paled and brushed her hair over her face to screen it from her mother’s searching gaze.

“Have you fell out with him?”

“No, I ain’t fell out with him. Hadn’t you best eat your supper before it gets cold, maw?”

“No, I hadn’t best. I ain’t a-goin’ to budge a blessed step out o’ this here room tell I know what ails you. Not if I have to stay here tell daylight.” After a brief reflection she added—“Now, don’t you tell me he’s been cuttin’ up any! I always said he was a fine young man, an’ I say so still.”

“He ain’t been cuttin’ up any,” said Zarelda. “At least, not as I know of.”

She laid down the brush and pushing her hair all back with both hands, fronted her mother suddenly, pale but resolute.

“If you want to know so bad,” she said, “I’ll tell you. He’s threw off on me.”

Mrs. Winser sunk helplessly into a chair. “Threw off on you!” she gasped.

“Yes, threw off on me.” Zarelda kept her dry, burning eyes on her mother’s face. “D’ you feel any better for makin’ me tell it?”

Certainly her revenge for the persecution was all that heart could desire. Her mother sat limp and motionless, save for the slow, mechanical sliding back and forth of one thumb on the arm of her chair.

After a while Zarelda resumed the hair-brushing, calmly. Then her mother revived.

“Who—who in the name of all that’s merciful has he took up with now?” she asked, weakly.

“Em Brackett.”

“What!” Mrs. Winser almost screamed. “That onery hussy! ’Reldy Winser, be you a-tellin’ me the truth?”

“Yes, maw. He took her to the dance up at Canemah las’ night, an’ she told me about it this mornin’!”

“The deceitful jade. Smiled sweet as honey at me when she went by. You’d of thought sugar wouldn’t melt in her mouth. I answered her ’s short as lard pie-crust—I’m glad of it now. Has he took her any place else?”

“He took her walkin’ at noontime. Stepped right up when she was standin’ alongside o’ me an’ never looked at me, an’ ast her—right out loud so’s all of ’em could hear, too.”

“Well, he’d ought to be ashamed of hisself! After bein’ your stiddy comp’ny for more’n a year—well onto two years—an’ a-lettin’ all of us think he was serious!”

“He never said he was, maw.”

“He never said he was, aigh? ’Reldy Winser, you ain’t got enough spunk to keep a chicken alive, let alone a woman! ‘He never said he was,’ aigh? Well, ain’t he been a-comin’ here three nights a week nigh onto two year, an’ a-takin’ you every place, an’ never a-lookin’ at any other girl? An’ didn’t he give you an amyfist ring las’ Christmas, an’ a reel garnet pin on your birthday? An’ didn’t he come here one evenin’, a-laffin’ an’ a-actin’ up foolish in a great way an’ holler out—‘Hello, maw Winser?’ Now, don’t you go a-tellin’ me he never meant anything serious.”

“Well, he never said so,” said the girl, stubbornly.

“I don’t care if he _never_ said so. He acted so. Why, for pity’s sake! You’ve got a grease-spot on your dress. I never see you with a grease-spot before—you’re so tidy. How’d you get it on?”

“Oh, I don’t know.”

“Benzine’ll take it out. Well—I’m a-goin’ to give him a piece o’ my mind!”

Zarelda lifted her body suddenly. She looked tall. Her eyes flamed out their proud fire.

“Now, see here, maw,” she said, “you don’t say a word to him—not a word. This ain’t your affair; it’s mine. It’s the fashion in fact’ry society for a girl an’ a fellow to go together, an’ give each other things, without bein’ real engaged; an’ she has to take her chances o’ some other girl gettin’ him away from her. If he wants to throw off on her, all he’s got to do ’s to take some other girl to a dance or out walkin’. An’ then, if he’s give her a ring or anything, it’s etiquette for her to send it back to him, an’ he’ll most likely give it to the other girl. I don’t think it’s right, an’ I don’t say but what it’s hard—” her voice trembled and broke, but she conquered her emotion stubbornly and went on—“but it’s the way in fact’ry society. There ain’t a girl in the fact’ry but what’s had to stand it some time or other, an’ I guess I can. You don’t want me to be a laffin’-stawk, do you?”

“No, I don’t.” Her mother looked at her in a kind of admiring despair. “But I never hear tell of such fashions an’ such doin’s in all my born days. It’s shameful. Your paw an’ me ’d set our minds on your a-marryin’ him an’ gettin’ a home o’ your own. It’s been a burden off o’ our minds for a year past—”

“Oh, maw!”

“Just to feel that you’d be fixed so’s you could take care o’ your little sisters in case we dropped off. An’ there I’ve went an’ made up all them underclo’s!” She leaned her head upon her hand and sat looking at the floor with a forlornly reminiscent expression. “An’ put tattin’ on three sets, an’ crochet lace on three, an’ serpentine edgin’ on three. An’ inserting on all of ’em! That ain’t the worst of it. I’ve _worked his initial in button-hole stitch_ on every blessed thing!”

“Oh, maw, you never did that, did you?”

“Yes, I did. An’ what’s more, I showed ’em all to old Miss Bradley, too.”

“You might just as well of showed ’em to the whole town!” said poor Zarelda, bitterly.

“They looked so nice I had to show ’em to somebody.”

“Sister,” piped a little voice at the foot of the stairs, “Mis’ Riley’s boy’s come to find out how soon you’re a-comin’ over to set up with the sick baby.”

“Oh, I’d clear forgot.” Zarelda braided her hair rapidly. “Tell him I’ll be over ’n a few minutes.”

“Now, see here, ’Reldy,” said her mother, getting up and laying her hand affectionately on the girl’s arm, “you ain’t a-goin’ to budge a single step over there to-night. You just get to bed an’ put an arnicky plaster on your forehead—”

Zarelda laughed in a kind of miserable mirth.

“Oh, you can laff, but it’ll help lots. I’ll go over an’ set up with that baby myself.”

“No, you won’t, maw.” She slipped the last pin in her hair and set her hat firmly on the glistening braids. “I said I’d set up with the baby, an’ I will. I ain’t goin’ to shirk just because I’m in trouble.”

She went out into the cool autumn twilight. Her mother followed her and stood looking after her with sympathetic eyes. At last she turned and went slowly into the poor and gloomy house; as she closed the door she put all her bitterness and disappointment into one heavy sigh.

The roar of the Falls came loudly to Zarelda as she walked along rapidly. The dog-fennel was still in blossom, and its greenish snow was drifted high on both sides of her path. Still higher were billows of everlasting flowers, undulating in the soft wind. The fallen leaves rustled mournfully as she walked through them. Some cows were feeding on the commons near by; she heard their deep breathing on the grass before they tore and crushed it with their strong teeth; she smelled their warm, fragrant breaths.

She came to a narrow bridge under the cotton-woods where she saw the Willamette, silver and beautiful, moving slowly and noiselessly between its emerald walls. The slender, yellow sickle of the new moon quivered upon its bosom.

Zarelda stood still. The noble beauty of the night—all its tenderness, all its beating passion—shook her to the soul. Her life stretched out before her, hard and narrow as the little path running through the dog-fennel—a life of toil and duty, of clamor and unrest, of hurried breakfasts, cold lunches and half-warm suppers, of longing for knowledge that would never be hers—the hard and bitter treadmill of the factory life.

A sob came up into her dry throat, but it did not reach her lips.

“I won’t!” she said, setting her teeth together hard. “I hate people who whine after what they can’t have, instead o’ makin’ the best o’ what they’ve got.”

She lifted her head and went on. Her face was beautiful; something sweeter than moonlight shone upon it. She walked proudly and the dry leaves whirled behind her.

IN THE BITTER ROOT MOUNTAINS

IN THE BITTER ROOT MOUNTAINS

“Go slow, boys, for God’s sake! If we miss this landing, we are lost. The rapids begin just around that bend.”

Four men stood upon a rude raft, and with roughly-made oars and long fir poles were trying to guide it out of the current of the swollen Clearwater River into a small sheltered inlet.

Both shores of the river rose abruptly to steep and terrible mountains. Not far above was the snow-line.

The men’s faces were white and haggard, their eyes anxious, half desperate. Huddled upon a stretcher at one end of the raft was a young man, little more than a boy, whose pallid, emaciated face was turned slightly to one side. His eyes were closed; the long black lashes lay like heavy shadows upon his cheeks. The weak November sunshine, struggling over the fierce mountains, shone through his thin nostrils, turning them pink, and giving an unearthly look to the face. A collie crouched close beside him, shivering with fear, yet ever and anon licking the cold hand lying outside the gray blanket; occasionally he lifted his head and uttered a long, mournful howl. Each time the four men shuddered and exchanged looks of despair,—so humanly appealing was it, and so deeply did it voice the terrible dread in their own hearts.

It was now two months since they had left Seattle on a hunting expedition in the Bitter Root Mountains in Idaho. For six weeks they had been lost in those awful snow fastnesses. Their hunting dogs had been killed by wild beasts. Their twelve pack-ponies had been left to starve to death when, finding further progress on land impossible on account of the snow, they constructed a raft and started on their perilous journey down the Clearwater.

The cook had been sick almost the entire time, and their progress had been necessarily slow and discouraging. They had now reached a point where the river was so full of boulders and so swift that they could proceed no farther on the raft.

For several days the cook had been unconscious, lying in a speechless stupor; but when they had, with much danger and excitement, landed and made him comfortable in a protected nook, he suddenly spoke,—faintly but distinctly.

“Polly,” he said, with deep tenderness, “lay your hand on my head. I guess it won’t ache so, then.”

The four men, looking at him, grew whiter. They could not look at each other. The dog, having already taken his place beside him, lifted his head and looked at him with pitiable eagerness.

“Oh, Polly!”—there was a heart-break in the voice,—“you don’t know what I’ve suffered! The cold, and then the fever! The pain has been awful. Oh, I’ve wanted you so, Polly—I’ve wanted you so!... But it’s all right, now that I’m home again.... Where’s the baby, Polly? Oh, the nights that I’ve laid, freezing and suffering in the snow, just kept alive by the thought o’ you an’ the little man! I knew it ’u’d kill you ’f I died—so I _w’u’dn’t_ give up! An’ now I’m here ’t home again. Polly——”

“We must fix some supper, boys,” said Darnell, roughly, turning away to hide his emotion. “Let’s get the fire started.”

“We’ve just got enough for one more good meal,” said Roberts, in a tremulous voice. “There’s no game around here, either. Guide, you must try to find a way out of this before dark, so we can start early in the morning.”

Without speaking, the guide obeyed. It was dark when he returned. The men were sitting by the camp-fire, eating their supper. The dog still lay by his master, from whom even hunger could not tempt him.

The three men looked at the guide. He sat down and took his cup of coffee in silence. “Well,” said Darnell, at last, “can we go on?”

“Yes,” said the guide, slowly; “we can. In some places there’ll be only a few inches’ foothold; an’ we’ll hev to hang on to bushes up above us, with the river in some places hundreds o’ feet below; but we can do it, ’f we don’t get rattled an’ lose our heads.”

There was a deep and significant silence. Then Brotherton said, with white lips, “Do you mean that we can’t take _him_?”

“That’s what I mean.” The guide spoke deliberately. He could not lift his eyes. Some of the coffee spilled as he lifted the cup to his lips. “We can’t take a thing, ’cept our hands and feet,—not even a blanket. It’ll be life an’ death to do it, then.”

There was another silence. At last Darnell said: “Then it is for us to decide whether we shall leave him to die alone while we save ourselves, or stay and die with him?”

“Yes,” said the guide.

“There is positively not the faintest chance of getting him out with us?”

“By God, no!” burst forth the guide, passionately. “It seems like puttin’ the responsibility on me, but you want the truth, an’ that’s it. He can’t be got out. It’s leave him an’ save ourselves, or stay with him an’ starve.”

After a long while Roberts said, in a low voice: “He’s unconscious. He wouldn’t know we had gone.”

“He cannot possibly live three days, under any circumstances,” said Brotherton. “Mortification has already begun in his legs.”

“Good God!” exclaimed Darnell, jumping up and beginning to walk rapidly forth and back, before the fire. “I must go home, boys! My wife—when I think of her, I am afraid of losing my reason! When I think what she is suffering——”

Brotherton looked at him. Then he sunk his face into both his hands. He, too, had a wife. The guide put down his coffee; large tears came into his honest eyes. He had no wife, but there was one——

Roberts got up suddenly. He had the look of a tortured animal in his eyes. “Boys,” he said, “my wife is dead. My life doesn’t matter so much, but—I’ve three little girls! I _must_ get back, somehow!”

The sick man spoke. They all started guiltily, and looked toward him. “Yes, yes, Polly,” he said, soothingly, “I know how you worried about me. I know how you set strainin’ your eyes out the window day an’ night, watchin’ fer me. But now I’m home again, an’ it’s all right. I guess you prayed, Polly; an’ I guess God heard you.... There’s a boy fer you! He knows me, too.”

The silence that fell upon them was long and terrible. The guide arose at last, and, without speaking, made some broth from the last of the canned beef, and forced it between the sick man’s lips. When he came back to the fire, Darnell took a silver dollar out of his pocket.

“Boys,” he said, brokenly, “I don’t want to be the one to settle this, and I guess none of you do. It is an awful thing to decide. I shall throw this dollar high into the air. If it falls heads up, we go; tails—we stay.”

The men had lifted their heads and were watching him. They were all very white; they were all trembling.

“Are you willing to decide it in this way?”

Each answered, “Yes.”

“I swear,” said Darnell, slowly and solemnly, “that I will abide by this decision. Do you all swear the same?”

Each, in turn, took the oath. Trembling now perceptibly, Darnell lifted his hand slowly and cast the piece of silver into the air. Their eyes followed its shining course. For a second it disappeared; then it came singing to the earth.

Like drunken men they staggered to the spot where it had fallen, and fell upon their knees, staring with straining eyes and bloodless lips.

“It is heads,” said Darnell. He wiped the cold perspiration from his brow.