The Voice of the Pack/Book 3/Chapter 4
IV
Two miles across the ridges, Dan and Snowbird saw a faint mist blowing between the trees. They did n't recognize it at first. It might be fine snow, blown by the wind, or even one of those mysterious fogs that sometimes sweep over the snow.
"But it looks like smoke," Snowbird said.
"But it could n't be. The trees are too wet to burn."
But then a sound that at first was just the faintest whisper in which neither of them would let themselves believe, became distinct past all denying. It was that menacing crackle of a great fire, that in the whole world of sounds is perhaps the most terrible. They were trained by the hills, and neither of them tried to mince words. They had learned to face the truth, and they faced it now.
"It's our house," Snowbird told him. "And father can't get out."
She spoke very quietly. Perhaps the most terrible truths of life are always spoken in that same quiet voice. Then both of them started across the snow, fast as their unwieldy snowshoes would permit.
"He can crawl a little," Dan called to her. "Don't give up, Snowbird mine. I think he 'll be safe."
They mounted to the top of the ridge; and the long sweep of the forest was revealed to them. The house was a singular tall pillar of flame, already glowing that dreadful red from which firemen, despairing, turn away. Then the girl seized his hands and danced about him in a mad circle.
"He's alive," she cried. "You can see him—just a dot on the snow. He crawled out to safety."
She turned and sped at a breakneck pace down the ridge. Dan had to race to keep up with her. But it was n't entirely wise to try to mush so fast. A dead log lay beneath the snow with a broken limb stretched almost to its surface, and it caught her snowshoe. The wood cracked sharply, and she fell forward in the snow. But she was n't hurt, and the snowshoe itself, in spite of a small crack in the wood, was still serviceable.
"Haste makes waste," he told her. "Keep your feet on the ground, Snowbird; the house is gone already and your father is safe. Remember what lies before us."
The thought sobered and halted her. She glanced once at the dark face of her companion. Dan could n't understand the strange light that suddenly leaped to her eyes. Perhaps she herself could n't have explained the wave of tenderness that swept over her,—with no cause except the look in Dan's earnest gray eyes and the lines that cut so deep. Since the world was new, it has been the boast of the boldest of men that they looked their Fate in the face. And this is no mean looking. For fate is a sword from the darkness, a power that reaches out of the mystery, and cannot be classed with sights of human origin. It burns out the eyes of all but the strongest men. Yet Dan was looking at his fate now, and his eyes held straight.
They walked together down to the ruined house, and the three of them sat silent while the fire burned red. Then Lennox turned to them with a half-smile.
"You 're wasting time, you two," he said. "Remember all our food is gone. If you start now, and walk hard, maybe you can make it out."
"There are several things to do first," Dan answered simply.
"I don't know what they are. It is n't going to be any picnic, Dan. A man can travel only so far without food to keep up his strength, particularly over such ridges as you have to cross. It will be easy to give up and die. It's the test, man; it's the test."
"And what about you?" his daughter asked.
"Oh, I 'll be all right. Besides—it's the only thing that can be done. I can't walk, and you can't carry me on your backs. What else remains? I 'll stay here—and I 'll scrape together enough wood to keep a fire. Then you can bring help."
He kept his eyes averted when he talked. He was afraid for Dan to see them, knowing that he could read the lie in them.
"How do you expect to find wood—in this snow?" Dan asked him. "It will take four days to get out; do you think you could lie here and battle with a fire for four days, and then four days more that it will take to come back? You'd have two choices: to burn green wood that I'd cut for you before I left, or the rain-soaked dead wood under the snow. You could n't keep either one of them burning, and you'd die in a night. Besides—this is no time for an unarmed man to be alone in the hills."
Lennox's voice grew pleading. "Be sensible, Dan!" he cried. "That Cranston's got us, and got us right. I 've only one thing more I care about—and that is that you pay the debt! I can't hope to get out myself. I say that I can't even hope to. But if you bring my daughter through—and when the spring comes, pay what we owe to Cranston—I 'll be content. Heavens, son—I 've lived my life. The old pack leader dies when his time comes, and so does a man."
His daughter crept to him and sheltered his gray head against her breast. "I 'll stay with you then," she cried.
"Don't be a little fool, Snowbird," he urged. "My clothes are wet already from the melted snow. It's too long a way—it will be too hard a fight, and children—I'm old and tired out. I don't want to make the try—hunger and cold; and even if you'd stay here and grub wood, Snowbird, they'd find us both dead when they came back in a week. We can't live without food, and work and keep warm—and there is n't a living creature in the hills."
"Except the wolves," Dan reminded him.
"Except the wolves," Lennox echoed. "Remember, we 're unarmed—and they'd find it out. You 're young, Snowbird, and so is Dan—and you two will be happy. I know how things are, you two—more than you know yourselves—and in the end you 'll be happy. But me—I'm too tired to make the try. I don't care about it enough. I'm going to wave you good-by, and smile, and lie here and let the cold come down. You feel warm in a little while—"
But she stopped his lips with her hand. And he bent and kissed it.
"If anybody's going to stay with you," Dan told them in a clear, firm voice, "it's going to be me. But are n't any of the cabins occupied?"
"You know they are n't," Lennox answered. "Not even the houses beyond the North Fork, even if we could get across. The nearest help is over seventy miles."
"And Snowbird, think! Have n't any supplies been left in the ranger station?"
"Not one thing," the girl told him. "You know Cranston and his crowd robbed the place last winter. And the telephone lines were disconnected when the rangers left."
"Then the only way is for me to stay here. You can take the pistol, and you 'll have a fair chance of getting through. I 'll grub wood for our camp meanwhile, and you can bring help."
"And if the wolves come, or if help did n't come in time," Lennox whispered, passion-drawn for the first time, "who would pay what we owe to Cranston?"
"But her life counts—first of all."
"I know it does—but mine does n't count at all. Believe me, you two. I'm speaking from my own desires when I say I don't want to make the fight. Snowbird would never make it through alone. There are the wolves, and maybe Cranston too—the worst wolf of all. A woman can't mush across those ridges four days without food, without some one who loves her and forces her on! Neither can she stay here with me and try to make green branches burn in a fire. She's got three little pistol balls—and we'd all die for a whim. Oh, please, please—"
But Dan leaped for his hand with glowing eyes. "Listen, man!" he cried. "I know another way yet. I know more than one way; but one, if we've got the strength, is almost sure. There is an ax in the kitchen, and the blade will still be good."
"Likely dulled with the fire—"
"I'll cut a limb with my jackknife for the handle. There will be nails in the ashes, plenty of them. We 'll make a rude sledge, and we'll get you out too."
Lennox seemed to be studying his wasted hands. "It's a chance, but it is n't worth it," he said at last. "You 'll have fight enough, without tugging at a heavy sled. It will take all night to build it, and it would cut down your chances of getting out by pretty near half. Remember the ridges, Dan—"
"But we 'll climb every ridge—besides, its a slow, down grade most of the way. Snowbird—tell him he must do it."
Snowbird told him, overpowering him with her enthusiasm. And Dan shook his shoulders with rough hands. "You 're hurting, boy!" Lennox warned. "I'm a bag of broken bones."
"I 'll tote you down there if I have to tie you in," Dan Failing replied. "Before, I 've bowed to your will; but this time you have to bow to mine. I'm not going to let you stay here and die, no matter if you beg on your knees! It's the test—and I'm going to bring you through."
He meant what he said. If mortal strength and sinew could survive such a test, he would succeed. There was nothing in these words to suggest the physical weakling that both of them had known a few months before. The eyes were earnest, the dark face intent, the determined voice did not waver at all.
"Dan Failing speaks!" Lennox replied with glowing eyes. He was recalling another Dan Failing of the dead years, a boyhood hero, and his remembered voice had never been more , more masterful than this he had just heard.
"And Cranston did n't get his purpose, after all." To prove his words, Dan thrust his hand into his inner coat pocket. He drew forth a little, flat package, half as thick as a pack of cards. He held it up for them to see. "The thing Bert Cranston burned the house down to destroy," he explained. "I'm learning to know this mountain breed, Lennox. I kept it in my pocket where I could fight for it, at any minute."
Cranston had been mistaken, after all, in thinking that in fear of himself Dan would be afraid to keep the packet on his person, and would cravenly conceal it in the house. He would have been even more surprised to know that Dan had lived in constant hope of meeting Cranston on the ridges, showing him what it contained, and fighting him for it, hands to hands. And even yet, perhaps the day would come when Cranston would know at last that Snowbird's words, after the fight of long ago, were true.
The twilight was falling over the snow, so Snowbird and Dan turned to the toil of building a sled.