CHAPTER XIX

CHAPTER XIXHUSBAND AND WIFEIT WAS THEend of the day, and Joy Gargrave, kneeling down on a litter of young spruce boughs, in the shadow of a wind screen, stretched her mittened hands towards the fire. Then she removed her face mask and looked at her foster-sister, who having changed her moccasins was placing the pair she had worn through the day near the fire where they would dry slowly.“Tired, Babette?”“Not more than ordinary,” was the reply, “though I will own to having found those last two miles against the wind a little trying.”They had been travelling for a week, and were growing used to the evil of the trail. Body stiffness no longer troubled them, and having been inured to the task from childhood, the agony of cramp brought on by snow-shoe work was unknown to them, the hard exercise of the trail inducing no more than a healthy tiredness at the end of the day. Joy stretched herself luxuriously on the spruce, and looked round. The darkness of the woods was behind them, and in front the waste of snow showed dimly. In the circle of firelight the Indian George was preparing the evening meal, whilst his son Jim was feeding the dogs. The girlwatched them meditatively for a moment or two, then she spoke to Miss La Farge—“A little different to the Ritz, Babette!”Babette looked up from the steaming moccasins.“What do you mean, Joy?”Joy waved her hand in a half circle. “Why, everything—the trees, the snow, the darkness, the dogs, the camp-fire, George and Jim, and you and I like a couple of Dianas.”Babette laughed and looked round appreciatively. “It makes me think of a picture which I saw when we were in London. It had a fancy name—’When the World was Young,’ or something like that—and whoever painted it knew the wilderness well. It is, as you say, a little different to the Ritz—and ever so much better. I wonder how long we shall be on trail, not that I’m tired of it. Even hard work has its pleasures and compensations.”“I do not know how long we shall be. I am content that we are on the right trail. The strange Indian with whom George talked today told a story of a white man, an officer of police, who had been taken to the winter camp of his tribe with a broken leg. The leg had healed, and the officer had departed ten days ago on the trail of a bad white man, and he went Northward. From the description given the officer was almost certainly Corporal Bracknell, and I have an idea that he may have news of Dick Bracknell and be following his trail, in which case I pray that we may come up with him soon; for if there was trouble between them, and the Corporal killed his cousin, it would be avery terrible thing, in view of the situation as regards the succession to Harrow Fell.”“Yes,” answered Miss La Farge slowly, “but it is no use shutting one’s eyes to facts. The death of Dick Bracknell would be a relief to many people—yourself included!”“It would be no relief to me if Dick Bracknell died by his cousin’s hand,” answered Joy in a low voice. “It would be quite terrible; it is more than I dare contemplate.”“Why?” As Babette La Farge shot the question at her foster-sister she looked at her keenly, and saw a wave of warm blood surge over the beautiful face, and as she saw it her own grew suddenly tender. “No,” she added hurriedly, “don’t answer the question, Joy. There is no need. I can guess the answer, which I am sure you would not give me. I think you are right—for everybody’s sake nothing must happen between those two men. At all costs that must be prevented.”She dropped the moccasins, took a couple of steps forward, and stopping, kissed Joy’s warm cheek. “My dear,” she said, “you must not worry. Time will unravel this dreadful tangle, and after all you are young yet.”Joy looked up at her trying bravely to smile, but there was the gleam of unshed tears in her eyes. She was about to speak, when the servant George announced that supper was ready, and she contented herself with a glance that was full of love and gratitude.The next morning, just before they broke camp the younger Indian, who had been out inspectingthe trail, returned with news. He had been a little way up the river and had encountered a strange Indian in the act of taking a marten from a trap. He had talked with this man, and when the latter had heard who his mistress was he had betrayed considerable excitement, and had asked him to wait for him a little time, as he might have a message for his mistress. He had gone away, and a little later had returned and had then told Jim that his master—a white man—was lying sick in a cabin on a creek a little way up the river, and that he earnestly desired that Miss Gargrave would go and speak with him.“Did he give his master’s name?” asked Joy, as a quick hope awoke within her.“No, Miss, but he hav’ yours; he say you know him. And I wonder if he is the man we seek.”Joy also wondered, wondered and hoped, and after consideration she nodded her head. “Yes, I will go and see this man. He may be Corporal Bracknell, or he may have seen him recently. In any case it is a Christian charity to visit any stricken white man in this desolate bush, and it will mean only a short delay. Where is the creek, Jim?”“Up the river a little way, miss. The man he waits at the point where it joins the river.”“Then Miss La Farge and I will go on ahead, and you can come on behind, and if you do not overtake us, you can await us at the mouth of the creek.”The two girls started off, and presently reached the creek, where stamping his feet in the snow,Dick Bracknell’s man, Joe, awaited them. Both of them glanced at him keenly, but he was a stranger to them, and then Joy addressed him.“Your master, where is he?”The Indian pointed up the creek. “Him sick man, I take you to him!”Without waiting for further words the man turned in his tracks and swung up the creek at such a pace that the two girls had hard work to keep up with him. Joy questioned the man as to his master’s name, but the man either did not or would not understand, for he merely shook his head, and pressed forward. In a few minutes they reached the little cabin at the edge of the trees, and maintaining a wooden face, the Indian swung the door open and motioned them to enter.Joy pressed forward eagerly with her foster-sister at her heels. The Indian softly closed the door behind them, an evil smile wrinkling his scarred face, then going to the rear of the hut, a moment later he appeared with a bow and some arrows in his hand, and entering the shadow of the trees, he began to walk towards the mouth of the creek.... As she entered the cabin Joy Gargrave looked quickly about her. The only light came through a parchment window and from the improvised stove, and in the semi-darkness, at first, she could see nothing. But after a moment she discerned a tall figure standing but a little way from her. The face was in shadow, and she could not make out the features, but as her eyes fell on him, the man gave vent to a thin, choking laugh.“Good morning, my dear Joy! This is an unexpected pleasure!”At the sound of the voice Joy started, and with a dawning fear in her eyes leaned forward and stared into the haggard face before her. As she did so, her fear increased, and she asked suddenly, “Who are you, that you should address me in that way?”“Then you do not recognize me?” asked the voice mockingly. “I am not surprised. Time has wrought inevitable changes—but of course, it does not change the constant heart. Look again, my dear, and you will see——”Overwhelming fear surged in the girl’s heart. She knew who this haggard man was; indeed, she had known from the first word that he had spoken, and now she turned abruptly towards the door as if to flee. The door was closed, and as she stretched a hand towards the wooden latch, the thin cackling laugh broke out again.“The door is fastened, my dear Joy—on the outside. I remember how you ran from me at Alcombe, and when I arranged this joyous meeting, I foresaw that you might be startled, that you might try to repeat that old folly; therefore I took steps—and my man Joe keeps the door outside. But I am glad to see you, dear wife, most unfeignedly glad to see you, and there is no need that you should hurry away; indeed, I am afraid that until I give permission for you to go, you will have to remain here.”“What do you want?” asked Joy, striving in vain to keep her voice steady.“What do I want?” there was an accent of mock surprise in Dick Bracknell’s voice as he echoed the question, and then he laughed again in a way that made the girl shiver. “What a question to ask a husband who has not seen his wife since his marriage morning! Really, my dear, such a question ought to be quite unnecessary.”He broke off as his cough took him, and for perhaps half a minute he was shaken by it, and could not speak. When he resumed it was in a different tone.“Sit down,” he said, “I want to talk to you, and there is no need that you stand on ceremony in your husband’s house. I regret the scarcity of chairs, but there is a log by the fire there—and if you will accept the advice of an expert you will throw off your furs.... You won’t? Well, self-will is one of the characteristics of your sex, and no doubt you will please yourself. But all the same allow me to express my gratitude to you that you should have left your home in mid-winter to come and look for me. Such solicitude is beyond what I had ex——”“I was not looking for you,” Joy broke in. “You are the last person I was expecting to meet!”“Is that so?” The mockery had gone out of Bracknell’s voice now, and there was a dangerous ring in it. The eyes in the haggard face were blazing, and to both the girls it was clear that he had much ado to keep himself in hand. “You dare to tell me that—me, your lawful husband? Perhaps you will tell me for whom you did leave yourhome then? Whom you were following and seeking on a winter trail?”Joy felt her face flush suddenly. Could she tell him? she asked herself, and immediately her mind answered “No!” In the wild mood that was on him Dick Bracknell would be sure to put a false interpretation on any explanation that she might offer him. Realizing this she was silent, and a moment later he broke out again, wrathfully—“You won’t tell me? You’re ashamed to tell me, I suppose. But accept my assurances that there is no need. I already know. My cousin Roger is the favoured man, is he not? You start at that! Then it is all true what I have heard, that not only is he to supplant me at Harrow Fell, but in my wife’s affections also? Well, that is not going to happen. I will have Harrow Fell and you also—and you first, my Joy, for there shall be no cuckoo in my nest.... Yes, I will have Harrow Fell. I can face five years at Portland or at Parkhurst for that. But first, I will have you. You are here, in your husband’s house, where you have come of your own accord, and here you remain. Take off your furs!”To Joy it was clear that Dick Bracknell was almost insanely jealous, and her face blanched as the possibilities of the situation flashed themselves upon her. The man took a step forward as if to enforce his order, and she shrank back against the rough logs of the shack. Bracknell laughed savagely, but the next moment there came an intervention.“Stand back, Mr. Bracknell!”The speaker was Miss La Farge, and as she stepped resolutely forward, holding a small but serviceable looking machine pistol in her hand, Dick Bracknell came to a standstill.“What——”“Do as I tell you. Lay a finger on Joy, and I will shoot you. She may be your wife, but she is my more-than-sister, and I will brook no violence from you.”Bracknell looked at her irresolutely. It was very clear to him that she would keep her word, and after a moment he stepped back and laughed to cover his discomfiture.“A she-lynx—and with claws! Well, time is on my side. You will grow tired of standing there, and Joe will be back in a minute or two, then I shall know how to deal with you.”Babette did not even reply to him. She glanced at the door and addressed herself to Joy.“Try and open the door, Joy.”Joy sprang to the door, and lifting the wooden latch tugged hard at the door. Dick Bracknell watched her with amused eyes, and when all her efforts failed, he spoke again.“It is no use, my dear Joy. The door is fastened on the outside. We are all prisoners until Joe returns.”“No!” replied Miss La Farge stubbornly. “Not until then. Our men will be here in a few minutes if we do not meet them at the mouth of the creek. Then——”A sharp cry of agony sounded somewhere outside,and as it reached them, the girl’s speech suddenly froze.“What was that?” asked Joy, looking at Bracknell.A deep frown had come upon his face, and there was apprehension in his voice as he replied, “I—I do not know. Some one may have been hurt. I——”He was still speaking, haltingly, when the crash of a rifle broke on his words, followed by a shout, and that in turn by a great stillness. The three people in the shack looked at one another helplessly.The girls’ faces were white, and Bracknell’s features showed wrathful. In silence they waited and nothing further happened. Half an hour passed, during which the girls whispered to each other, and still the silence outside was maintained, and to those in the cabin it seemed to hold a menace of mysterious things. Another half hour crept by, and then Bracknell spoke hoarsely—“Something must have happened, or the Indian would have been back before this. And your men—you said they were to meet you at the mouth of the creek!”“Yes,” answered Joy composedly. “And no doubt they are waiting there now.”“I am afraid not,” answered her husband. “Something has occurred—what, we must find out!” He glanced at the window of skin parchment, then added, “That is the only way. We must cut that out. One of us must climb through and open the door——”“Joy shall go!” said Miss La Farge firmly.“It doesn’t matter who goes! This is a business of life and death. There is an axe in the corner there. If one of you will use it, I shall be obliged. I am afraid that the state of my lungs does not permit much exertion on my part.”Babette looked at Joy, who, finding the ax, attacked the window, and a moment later the freezing air drove into the cabin. When the rough frame was quite clear the man nodded at her. His manner was now very quiet and betrayed nothing of the jealous rage which had possessed him an hour ago.“Go through, Joy. Take the axe with you. You may need it to knock out the staple. Have no fear,” he said as she visibly hesitated. “I give you my word that this is no trap. Believe me, I am very anxious for the safety of all of us.”Joy glanced once at him. It was plain to her that he was sincere, and two seconds later she climbed to the window and dropped down into the snow. A minute later the door swung open, and she was joined by Babette and Dick Bracknell. All three stood there looking down the creek. No sound reached them. Everywhere was the appalling inscrutable silence of the Northern wilderness.CHAPTER XXDICK BRACKNELL LEARNS THE TRUTH“WE MUSTfind out what has happened!” said Joy, looking at Bracknell.“Yes,” he said slowly, “but you must not go alone. If you will wait a moment I will accompany you.”“But your cough——” Joy began, a tone of solicitude in her voice.“My cough!” Dick Bracknell laughed bitterly. “That is nothing to what may lie before us, and in any case it is not safe for you to go alone.”Something in his voice and manner convinced her that he was not speaking idly, and that he had his own reasons for apprehension.“Very well,” she said, “we will wait for you. We will go down the creek together.”He turned back into the hut, and the two girls looked at each other. They were used to the stillness of the forest, but somehow the silence that prevailed seemed ominous of fateful things. Both of them were conscious of vague forebodings, and as Babette looked at her foster-sister, and saw the light of apprehension in her eyes, she whispered, “What do you think, Joy? What do you think has happened?”“I do not know, but I feel that it is somethingdreadful and I am afraid.” She looked towards the cabin, and added, “He is afraid also. You can see that!”“Yes! That is very clear.”They stood waiting until Dick Bracknell appeared, and then without speaking all three started down the creek. A few minutes walking brought them in sight of the main trail, and suddenly Joy gave a cry, and pointed ahead. The figure of a man was lying prone in the snow, and as he caught sight of it, Dick Bracknell broke into a feeble run. For a moment the two girls stood quite still, looking each at the blanched face of the other, then they followed, slowly, the premonition of tragedy mounting in their hearts.When they reached Bracknell they found him stooping over the figure, with a look of consternation in his eyes.“Do you know him? Is it your——”“Oh!” cried Babette. “It is George!”“George! Who is——”“He was my father’s man, and he is mine!” said Joy, staring at the fallen Indian with stricken eyes.“No,” said Dick Bracknell quietly, “he is yours no longer! He has gone to the happy hunting grounds.”“Dead?” cried Joy, as the truth broke upon her. “George dead! But how? What——”Bracknell looked up at her, moved by the anguish in her tones, then he pointed to what she had not seen, a feathered arrow head, half hidden by the crook of the arm.“Oh!” she sobbed. “He has been killed. He——”“But where is Jim? Where are the dogs?” cried her foster-sister. “Both have been here! See, here are the tracks, and there goes the trail northward!”It was as she said, and as Dick Bracknell looked down and read the signs a dark look came on his face. Babette looked from her foster-sister, sobbing in the snow, to the man who was her husband.“What do you think has happened?” she asked.He looked from her to Joy commiseratingly. “I can only guess,” he said in a troubled voice. “I think the Indian who was with me is responsible for this, the man who brought you to my shack—you know. When you came to the cabin he had instructions to look out for your men at the mouth of the creek. I—I am afraid he exceeded my instructions. I think that he must have attacked your men——”“But why should he do that, if you did not tell him?”As Joy flung this question at him, a troubled look came upon his face.“I think he wanted your dogs and outfit, that we might get away from here!”“Our dogs and outfit?”“Yes. He is devoted to me, but twice lately I have had trouble on that point. Once when my cousin Roger Bracknell came——”He broke off suddenly as Joy sprang to her feet. “Your cousin Roger has been here?” she cried. “He is alive then?”As she flung her questions at him eagerly, impetuously, the man’s face clouded, and again a jealous light came in his eyes. It was a moment before he answered the questions, and to Babette, watching him it appeared that he was struggling hard for self-mastery.“Yes,” he replied, at last, in a hoarse voice. “He is alive! He came to my cabin by accident. He had broken his leg, and had lain in an Indian encampment for weeks. There he had heard news which had sent him hot foot on the trail of a man who was responsible for your father’s death!”“For my father’s death?” as she cried the words Joy’s face was white as the snow about her. “But—but——”Her voice faltered, and guessing what she would have said, Bracknell explained. “I am afraid it will come as a shock to you even after these three or four years, but it appears to be the fact that your father’s death was not altogether accidental.“My cousin had a very circumstantial story of the affair, and he was on the trail of the man who was responsible for the crime, the same man, as he believes, who shot me on the night when I had arranged that meeting with you at North Star.”“But who is the man?” asked Joy quickly.“My cousin gave me no name, indeed he declined to do so. But he had his theory, and he went so far as to tell me that not only did the Indian who was with him know the man, but that he himself believed that he knew him.”“Ah!” cried Joy.Her husband looked at her. “You also guess?”“Yes!” she answered. “I guess—but no more than guess!”“Who is the man?” asked Bracknell quickly.“His name is Adrian Rayner!”“Rayner!” cried Bracknell excitedly. “The son of old Rayner, your guardian?”“Yes! He is in the North now. I believe that he is looking for Roger Bracknell.”“God in heaven!”“What is the matter?” asked Joy. “You look as if something had occurred to you!”“Yes!” he said simply. “Something has—something very significant. Two or three days after Roger left the shack a stranger arrived——”“Mr. Bracknell,” interrupted Miss La Farge, “don’t you think we had better postpone explanations for a little time? If we remain talking here we shall freeze. And there are things to be done. There is Jim to find—and there is the team and the outfit. Then we must bury George. We can’t possibly leave him lying here for the wolves!”“Yes,” answered Bracknell. “I was forgetting.” He considered a moment and then spoke again. “The sled tracks run up the river. If you two were to follow a little way, till you get to that spur there, you will have a long view of the trail, and possibly you will be able to see something of the team and your man. But don’t go too far. It won’t be safe. Whilst you are away, I will arrange tree-burial for this poor fellow. And when you return we can discuss the situation. Do you agree?”“Yes,” answered Joy.“Then I will waste no time, nor, I hope, will you.”He turned and began to walk up the creek in a way that revealed what an effort it was for him, and for a second or two Joy watched him with pitying eyes, then as her foster-sister spoke, she turned, and without answering began to follow the sled tracks.After they had trudged a little way, Babette spoke.“Dick Bracknell is a strange man. Two hours ago he was within an ace of violence towards you, and now I believe he is really solicitous for your welfare.”“Yes,” answered Joy. “He is full of contradictions. There are many men like him, I suppose. When he is good he is very good, and when he is bad he is almost satanic. When I first met him he was a gentleman, an attractive one; and but for unfortunate influences he might have continued—but now——”“Now he is a wreck, physical and moral,” answered Babette, and then asked sharply, “Suppose we do not find Jim and the dogs, Joy?”“We must find them!”“But suppose we do not? What then?”“Then we shall have to take refuge in the cabin.”She said no more, and Babette asked no more questions. In half an hour they reached the wooded spur round which the river turned, and as they reached the further side, both came to a standstill and looked at the frozen waste.For two or three miles the course of the river was visible between low, wooded banks. Snow was everywhere, and nowhere was the white surface broken by any moving figure. It was a land of death—death white and cold. Babette shivered as she looked on it.“They are not here, Joy,” she whispered. “Neither Jim nor the dogs.”“No,” answered Joy stonily.“We shall have to go back to the cabin to—to—your husband.”“Yes, there is no other way!” A sob broke from her, then she bit her lip, and added, “It is a strange irony that now my safety should depend on him.”“Dare you trust him—Joy?”“Yes,” answered Joy thoughtfully. “I can trust him—now. As you have seen he is a very sick man, and in spite of the way in which he raved in the cabin, I believe that now he is greatly concerned for my safety, and yours. Did you notice the sudden change in his attitude after I had mentioned Adrian Rayner’s name?”“Yes, he was startled. His manner completely altered. Something struck him with your mention of the name. I wonder what it was?”“I do not know. I cannot even guess, but no doubt we shall hear presently. There is nothing for us to do but to return to the cabin.”Her foster-sister nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, we shall have to do that. We can do nothing else.” She paused a moment and then asked, “You don’t think George’s son has deserted us, Joy?”“No!” answered Joy emphatically. “Something has driven him away. But he will return—if he can. I am sure of that!”They turned in their tracks and slowly retraced their way to the cabin. Dick Bracknell was standing at the door, evidently waiting for them, and as they approached he flashed a look of inquiry at Joy. She shook her head.“No,” she said quietly. “There is nothing to be seen anywhere.”“I am sorry,” answered Bracknell simply. “You must wait here. Perhaps your other man will return, or if he does not my man may.”He opened the door and held it for them to pass in.“You can take off your furs,” he said, as they entered. “I have blocked the window with snow, and stretched a blanket over it. I am afraid that it will be rather dark, but that is unavoidable.”The two girls followed his suggestion and seated themselves by the stove. For a little time no one spoke, and the red glow of the fire shining on their faces showed them very thoughtful. At last, Joy broke the silence.“You were saying that two or three days after your cousin left here a stranger arrived. Who was it? Do you know?”Dick Bracknell laughed mirthlessly. “I do not know for certain. I can only guess.”“And you guess——”“That it was old Rayner’s son—Adrian, I think you called him. Of course he didn’t tell me who he was, but he let out that he was looking for myCousin Roger, and posed as a lawyer’s clerk. I’m morally certain, however, that he was young Rayner!”Joy remembered his sudden change of manner when she had said that Adrian Rayner was in the North, looking, as she believed for Roger Bracknell, and after a moment, urged by something deeper than curiosity, she spoke, “You hinted that something very significant had occurred to you. What was it?”Dick Bracknell hesitated, and it was evident that he was wondering whether to tell her or not. Then he laughed bitterly. “You may as well know all the kinds of fool I am. This stranger pitched a yarn about you and Roger, and I was fool enough to believe him.”He broke off and looked at Joy, whose face was flaming. Even in the red glow of the firelight the flush revealed itself to him, but though he frowned a little, he continued in an even voice. “He told me that my brother Geoffrey was dead, and that as I was either dead or as good as dead, Roger quite naturally was reckoned as the heir to Harrow Fell. He said further that you knew of this and that you were looking for Roger with the news and with the intention of marrying him.”“Oh!”As the exclamation broke from her, Joy abruptly hid her face in her hands, Bracknell coughed a little and then resumed—“He claimed to be the agent of old Rayner, and declared he was looking for Roger Bracknell in order to warn him of your previous marriage, andto give him warning that I was alive, in case you—a—should not regard that marriage as binding.”He looked at Joy again. Her face was still hidden in her hands.“As I said, I was fool enough to believe him, and that accounts for my amiable reception of you just now. It even accounts for your presence here, for when my man Joe brought news that you were out in the Northward trail, the trail that Roger was following, I was morally certain that you were out upon his track, and I set out to trap you. You must own that your unexpected presence did give colour to Rayner’s story, and that I had some excuse for——”“Iwaslooking for your cousin Roger,” interrupted Joy, suddenly lifting her face, and meeting his questioning gaze.He looked at her but did not immediately reply. And in the silence that followed Miss La Farge rose from her seat and began to put on her furs.“I am going outside,” she said. “It is better that I should. You two have things to say to each other that should only be said between you.”She passed out, shutting the door behind her, and after a little time, Dick Bracknell spoke again.“You say you were looking for my Cousin Roger? That is a very damaging admission, is it not? It would seem that, after all, that fellow Rayner was not far off the mark.”“You do not believe that?” answered Joy, meeting his gaze with steady eyes.He laughed shortly. “No,” he admitted. “Ido not believe it—now, but I will own that I am a little curious as to the reason why you should follow on my cousin’s trail. It is—er—a little unusual.”“I was following him, as I believed, to save him. Adrian Rayner wanted to marry me, and I had accused him of trying to kill you at North Star. He knew all about my marriage to you, though how he got the knowledge I cannot tell——”“That is simple enough!” broke in her husband. “I wrote to old Rayner and told him——”“But my uncle did not know, I am sure he did not know. He himself wanted me to marry Adrian, and I can’t believe he knew.”“Perhaps not,” admitted Bracknell thoughtfully. “It is possible that young Rayner got hold of my letter to his father and that the old man never saw it at all. But what has this to do with my cousin!”“This! Adrian Rayner told me that he was coming here in order to prove that you were dead but I was morally certain that he was coming here to find your cousin Roger and to—to——”“To shoot him, hey? Why should he want to do that?”“Because he knew that your cousin suspected him of that attempt on your life at North Star!”“Wanted to get rid of a witness, I suppose. And you were following Roger to warn him.”“Yes! That was one reason.”“Um! It’s a nice coil, for sure. I entertain the man who tried to murder me, and I set him on thetrail of my cousin who was trying to bring him to justice. That is about as pretty a kettle of fish as——”“But you did not tell Adrian Rayner where Roger had gone?” cried Joy, springing to her feet. “Surely you did not tell him?”“At that time,” answered Bracknell slowly, “it seemed to me that I had little cause to love my Cousin Roger. You are to remember that I was in ignorance of much that I have learned this morning.”“You told him?” cried Joy.“I certainly put him on the track,” answered the man.“Then God forgive you! God forgive you!” cried Joy in anguished tones.Dick Bracknell’s face set hard, and only by an effort was he able to control himself. But after a moment he replied quietly, “As I have said, I did not know Rayner. I had no inkling of his game.”“No!” said Joy stonily. “I understand that.”“You hinted that there was another reason,” said Bracknell, watching her closely. “I wonder if you would mind telling me——”“Oh, I don’t mind at all,” broke in Joy impulsively. “Your brother Geoffrey was killed whilst I was in England. Indeed, I was the one to find him dead. No one knew whether you were alive or dead, even I did not know, and Roger was regarded as the heir. But I knew that when he left North Star that he was going to try and learn what had really happened to you, and I was afraid that ifthere was a collision between you, and anything dreadful happened, people might say that he—that he——”She broke off, and hesitated.“I understand,” said her husband. “You need not say it. I dare say you are quite right. This world is full of Christian charity.”“I cabled him and tried to get in touch with him. I learned that he was missing. I came out, and at Regina I discovered that nothing whatever had been heard about him, but I discovered also that Adrian Rayner had been making inquiries, that he was on his trail. Then I was certain of his evil purpose, and when I reached North Star and found Adrian there, I accused him, for I was very sure of his intentions. As soon as I could I started to look for your cousin myself——”“You seem very anxious about my cousin,” broke in her husband quietly.“Oh, how can I help being?” cried Joy.Dick Bracknell took a step forward, and put a hand on her shoulder. She did not shrink, and as his eyes searched her face, she met his gaze steadily. They stood there silent for what seemed a long time, then Bracknell dropped his hand.“I think I understand,” he said wearily, “and I do not blame you. And I am sure that both Roger and you have played the game! Well, I’m crocked, and——”He broke off and laughed harshly. Then his haggard face grew suddenly convulsed with rage. “That—Rayner! If only I could meet him again I think I could die happily!”Joy looked at him, her heart wrung with pity for him. She stretched a hand impulsively, and was about to speak when the door was flung open violently, and Miss La Farge rushed in, hastily barring the door behind her.CHAPTER XXIUNDER COVER OF NIGHTSHE STOODthere gasping for breath, and unable to speak; and to both the others in the cabin it was evident that something startling had occurred. Dick Bracknell found his tongue first.“What is the matter, Miss La Farge? What has happened?”Babette found her breath and cried pantingly,“Some one tried to kill me?”“To kill you!” her listeners cried together incredulously.“Yes. I was walking down the creek, wondering where Jim and our dogs were gone to, when I heard a sharp sound, just like the twang of a bowstring and looked round. I could see nothing, and the woods on the banks were quite still and silent, nothing moving anywhere. I was still looking, and convincing myself that I had imagined the sound when it occurred again, and a second later an arrow struck a tree close by me, and remained there, quivering. I did not remain to see any more, or to try and learn who had sent it. I turned in my tracks and ran back here, and once as I ran an arrow passed clean through my parka, and buried itself in the snow beyond.”Dick Bracknell broke out, suddenly, “Confoundit,” he cried, “this is intolerable. That Indian Joe must have gone mad!”“You think it is your man?” asked Joy quickly.“I am sure of it! Who else can it be in this God-forsaken wilderness? It must be he, but I will soon find out!”He moved towards the door and throwing down the bar, opened it. There was nothing visible but the snow, and the dark woods. He took a step forward, and as he did so something came swishing through the air and struck the door post. He knew what it was before he saw it, and cried out.“Joe, you confounded fool, what——”The sharp crack of a rifle broke in on the words, and a bullet cut the fur off his coat at the top of the shoulder. He turned quickly round, and tumbled backward into the cabin, kicking the door to behind him. Joy ran forward, and dropped the bar in place, then looked at him.“You are hurt?” she cried anxiously.“No,” he answered, as he picked himself up.“Only knocked over with surprise.”“But that was a rifle, wasn’t it? Some one fired at you?”“Yes, some one certainly did!” He gave a wheezy laugh as he lifted a hand to his shoulder.“And he almost got me. He made the fur fly, and if it had struck an inch or two lower down I should have been out of action for a while at any rate. He must be a rotten shot, for out there on the snow I must have been a perfect mark!”“But what on earth can your man be——”“It is not Joe,” broke in Bracknell with conviction.“Even if he has gone clean into lunacy he’d never do a thing like that to me. Besides, Joe had no gun with him. Our guns are there in the corner, and as we’ve run out of ammunition they are no use. It simply can’t be Joe.”“Then who can it be? And why should he want to do a thing like that?”“It may be your other man—Jim, didn’t you call him? He may have returned, and thinking you were prisoners here, may have tried to get me in the hope of releasing you.”“But you forget the attack on Babette! Some one shot arrows at her and——”“By Jove! I had forgotten something! Stand away from the door. I’m going to open it. There’s something I want to get.”“Oh, be careful!” cried Joy.He swung around and looked at her whimsically, then he said quietly, “I’ll be careful for your sake, not my own. I’ve got to get you safely out of this. That much I owe you at any rate.”He turned again to the door and cautiously opening it a little way, peeped out. There was nothing visible, and quickly he opened the door wider and thrusting out an arm, gripped the arrow which was sticking in the post, and hastily flung the door in place once more. Even as he did so, something crashed into the wood, and the sound of a shot reverberated through the stillness outside.The two girls looked at him, their faces were white and they were much alarmed. Bracknell looked at the door and laughed shortly.“It seems that we are to stand a regular siege,” he said. “That man of yours is of the persevering sort.”Neither Joy nor her foster-sister replied, and moving towards the stove Bracknell threw on a spruce log, and as it caught and flamed up he stopped, and by its light he examined the arrow in his hand. Quarter of a minute later he stood up.“This settles it,” he said. “This arrow is not Joe’s. It is too finely made, with an ivory barb on which somebody has spent time. Joe’s bow and arrows were makeshifts, and his barbs were of moose bone!”“Then who can it be?” asked Joy. “Jim would have no arrows at all, and he certainly would not have fired them at Babette if he had.”Dick Bracknell shook his head. “I cannot think. It may be a roving band of Indians from the far North. This arrow tells its own story. It is like those made by the Indian Esquimaux in the North Behring. I’ve been up there and I’ve seen arrows like it before.”“But at least one of our attackers has a rifle,” said Miss La Farge.“Yes,” answered Bracknell thoughtfully.“And why should they attack us at all?” asked Joy.“They may be out for plunder. Most of these fellows have a weakness for the possessions of white men. I’ve seen one of them risk his life for a woodman’s axe, and they’ll give their heads for a sheath knife. They will have seen the cabin and may think that there are things worth having here, but in anycase they will find out the mistake in a very few days.”“Why?”“Because we haven’t more than two or three days’ stock of food,” replied Bracknell grimly. “There’s only a small stock of coffee, a few beans and some frozen moose meat. That’s why I suspected Joe of trying to get your outfit. But I’ve changed my mind now. I think that those fellows outside may have killed your man—and Joe also, if we only knew!”“Then our position is rather desperate?”Bracknell nodded. “If those beggars really mean business, we’re in a pretty tight corner. They may rush the cabin or they may wait. In either case they will get us!”“There is one possibility that you have not thought of yet,” said Babette slowly.“What is that?”“It is that this attack may not have been made by any roving tribe at all.”“But who——”“Adrian Rayner!”“God in heaven!” as the exclamation broke from his lips Dick Bracknell looked at her in amazed conviction. “Of course, I never thought of him!”“He is the one man who has cause to do such a thing. He knows that Joy and I suspect him of shooting you at North Star. He wanted to marry her, and he knows that that is now out of the question altogether. But he is Joy’s cousin, and Joy, as you know, is immensely wealthy. If she died up here——”“Heavens! yes! And I would stake my life that he’s the man Roger is after, the man who caused your father’s death. He——”“You did not tell me!” cried Joy. “How did my father die?”“Some one blew up the ice on the river, the ice which he was bound to pass over in the morning. Of course the river froze over again in the night, but it was not strong enough to carry a man, let alone a man and a heavy sled team. He went through—and died, but if Roger is right he was diabolically murdered.”Joy did not move. She looked at him with horror in her eyes. Then her face grew hard. “I believe, your cousin Roger is right. Adrian Rayner was abroad about the time when my father must have died. And he wanted to marry me after you had been shot at North Star, though he could not have been sure of your death.... It was my money he was after, and——”“He’s after it yet!” cried Bracknell with conviction, “Miss La Farge is right. If you died up here—but have you made a will?”Joy shook her head. “It was never suggested to me!”“No—for a very good reason. As your next of kin Rayner and his father would step in if you died. The fellow has been working to that end all the time—he’s working now! And he’s cunning—most damnably cunning. The way he arranged your father’s death proves that, and if Miss La Farge here is right, and Adrian Rayner is the man behindthe gun, then we’re in a hole. The fellow will show us no mercy. He——”“S-s-s-h-h!”As she gave the warning, Miss La Farge lifted a hand, in signal for silence, and bent forward in a listening attitude. The other two listened also, but heard nothing save the splutter and hiss of the logs on the fire.“What is it?” whispered Bracknell.“Some one walked round the cabin. I heard him quite plainly. Ah—again.”They listened. Crunch! crunch! came the sound of footsteps in the frozen snow outside. All round the cabin the steps passed, slowly, as if some one were making an inspection, and whilst they still sat listening, the steps receded and passed out of earshot. They looked at one another and Bracknell was the first to break the silence.“A pretty cool customer, whoever he is! He was spying out the land.”“Yes!” answered Miss La Farge in a half whisper.“I wonder what he will do?” said Joy.“Nothing, if he is wise,” answered Bracknell slowly. “Having walked round he’ll have made the discovery that we keep our wood at the rear of the cabin, and he’ll easily guess that we have no great stock inside. He has only to wait until the necessity for replenishing the stock arrives, and then he can get one of us at any rate.... He’ll know we have no dogs, and that we are tied to the cabin——”“But are we?” interjected Joy.“Well, the open trail without dogs is a risk that few men would care to undertake. I’ve been at it on one or two occasions, carrying my own stores, and it’s not a course to be recommended. The trail——”“But we’ve very few stores to pack!” said Joy obstinately, “and if we stay here we shall be driven out by hunger. Do you know of any tribe of Indians in the neighborhood?”Bracknell nodded. “There’s an encampment thirty or forty miles to the North on the Wolverine. Joe was talking to me about them the other day, and we considered once over whether we’d pay them a call or not. In the end we decided against it.”“Why?”“Well,” was the reply, “they’re rather a pagan lot, and not over scrupulous. Joe was telling me that in times of scarcity they sometimes offer sacrifices——”“Sacrifices! What kind of sacrifices?”’“Well, the most barbaric sort—human. There are some queer things done North of the Barrens, I can tell you. The world up here is still a primitive world, and the police patrol up the Mackenzie to Herschell Island can’t possibly take note of anything that doesn’t come right under its nose.”“But the Indians cannot possibly be worse than Adrian Rayner!”“No!” Bracknell laughed hoarsely. “He’s a tiger, for certain. Though I will own he didn’t look it when he was here the other day.” He was silent for a moment, then he said slowly, “Of course if wedecide to leave the cabin and if we go North, we may stumble on my Cousin Roger. It’s only a chance, but——” He broke off again, and looked at Joy as if wondering how she would take the suggestion, then added, “Well, we might take it, if we can manage to get away from here. What do you think?”Joy hesitated. Her face flushed a little, then she said quietly, “I put myself in your hands.”“Thank you. I am——”A fit of coughing broke in on his speech, and when it had passed he did not attempt to complete his sentence, but as his eyes from time to time fell on her there was a soft glow in them, which revealed an unspoken gratitude.They sat for a long time discussing the desperate situation, and late in the afternoon prepared for departure. Such food as the cabin held was made up in three packs, and when that was done, and all was ready, they rested, waiting for the hour of departure, Joy reflecting on the strange irony of circumstances which now made her dependent for help on the man who had so wronged her, and of whom she had lived in fear.All was quiet outside and Babette was offering a tentative suggestion that perhaps after all the enemy outside had withdrawn, then again they caught the crunch! crunch! of cautious feet on the frozen snow, and as all three grew alert, they heard the steps pause by the door, and the next moment there was a rustling sound on the rough woodwork.“Somebody feeling for the latch-string,” whispered Bracknell, then he hailed the intruder, as thelatter having found the string thrust a heavy shoulder against the barred door. “Hallo! Who goes there?”To this challenge there was no reply, but a second or two later they again heard the steps receding across the snow.“Came to make sure we were still here,” commented Bracknell in a low voice, “and whoever he was he has made a bee line from the door. That means that the camp they’re sitting in is somewhere in front; and in all probability they’ve forgotten the window at the back, or as it’s blocked with snow haven’t noticed it. We shall be able to quit that way.”They waited a little time longer, and then removed the moose hide from the window and very cautiously began to cut away the snow with which it had been blocked. That done they listened. No sound whatever was to be heard. Bracknell put out his head and peered into the darkness. There was nothing visible save the foreground of snow and the shadowy background of the forest. He climbed out, and very cautiously crept to the corner of the cabin to reconnoitre. In the shadow of the trees on the other side of the creek he caught the glow of a fire and discerned three men sitting round it. At that sight he crept back, and, whispering to the two girls to be very careful, assisted them out of the narrow window. Then without pausing they stole quietly across to the shadow of the sheltering woods.

CHAPTER XIXHUSBAND AND WIFEIT WAS THEend of the day, and Joy Gargrave, kneeling down on a litter of young spruce boughs, in the shadow of a wind screen, stretched her mittened hands towards the fire. Then she removed her face mask and looked at her foster-sister, who having changed her moccasins was placing the pair she had worn through the day near the fire where they would dry slowly.“Tired, Babette?”“Not more than ordinary,” was the reply, “though I will own to having found those last two miles against the wind a little trying.”They had been travelling for a week, and were growing used to the evil of the trail. Body stiffness no longer troubled them, and having been inured to the task from childhood, the agony of cramp brought on by snow-shoe work was unknown to them, the hard exercise of the trail inducing no more than a healthy tiredness at the end of the day. Joy stretched herself luxuriously on the spruce, and looked round. The darkness of the woods was behind them, and in front the waste of snow showed dimly. In the circle of firelight the Indian George was preparing the evening meal, whilst his son Jim was feeding the dogs. The girlwatched them meditatively for a moment or two, then she spoke to Miss La Farge—“A little different to the Ritz, Babette!”Babette looked up from the steaming moccasins.“What do you mean, Joy?”Joy waved her hand in a half circle. “Why, everything—the trees, the snow, the darkness, the dogs, the camp-fire, George and Jim, and you and I like a couple of Dianas.”Babette laughed and looked round appreciatively. “It makes me think of a picture which I saw when we were in London. It had a fancy name—’When the World was Young,’ or something like that—and whoever painted it knew the wilderness well. It is, as you say, a little different to the Ritz—and ever so much better. I wonder how long we shall be on trail, not that I’m tired of it. Even hard work has its pleasures and compensations.”“I do not know how long we shall be. I am content that we are on the right trail. The strange Indian with whom George talked today told a story of a white man, an officer of police, who had been taken to the winter camp of his tribe with a broken leg. The leg had healed, and the officer had departed ten days ago on the trail of a bad white man, and he went Northward. From the description given the officer was almost certainly Corporal Bracknell, and I have an idea that he may have news of Dick Bracknell and be following his trail, in which case I pray that we may come up with him soon; for if there was trouble between them, and the Corporal killed his cousin, it would be avery terrible thing, in view of the situation as regards the succession to Harrow Fell.”“Yes,” answered Miss La Farge slowly, “but it is no use shutting one’s eyes to facts. The death of Dick Bracknell would be a relief to many people—yourself included!”“It would be no relief to me if Dick Bracknell died by his cousin’s hand,” answered Joy in a low voice. “It would be quite terrible; it is more than I dare contemplate.”“Why?” As Babette La Farge shot the question at her foster-sister she looked at her keenly, and saw a wave of warm blood surge over the beautiful face, and as she saw it her own grew suddenly tender. “No,” she added hurriedly, “don’t answer the question, Joy. There is no need. I can guess the answer, which I am sure you would not give me. I think you are right—for everybody’s sake nothing must happen between those two men. At all costs that must be prevented.”She dropped the moccasins, took a couple of steps forward, and stopping, kissed Joy’s warm cheek. “My dear,” she said, “you must not worry. Time will unravel this dreadful tangle, and after all you are young yet.”Joy looked up at her trying bravely to smile, but there was the gleam of unshed tears in her eyes. She was about to speak, when the servant George announced that supper was ready, and she contented herself with a glance that was full of love and gratitude.The next morning, just before they broke camp the younger Indian, who had been out inspectingthe trail, returned with news. He had been a little way up the river and had encountered a strange Indian in the act of taking a marten from a trap. He had talked with this man, and when the latter had heard who his mistress was he had betrayed considerable excitement, and had asked him to wait for him a little time, as he might have a message for his mistress. He had gone away, and a little later had returned and had then told Jim that his master—a white man—was lying sick in a cabin on a creek a little way up the river, and that he earnestly desired that Miss Gargrave would go and speak with him.“Did he give his master’s name?” asked Joy, as a quick hope awoke within her.“No, Miss, but he hav’ yours; he say you know him. And I wonder if he is the man we seek.”Joy also wondered, wondered and hoped, and after consideration she nodded her head. “Yes, I will go and see this man. He may be Corporal Bracknell, or he may have seen him recently. In any case it is a Christian charity to visit any stricken white man in this desolate bush, and it will mean only a short delay. Where is the creek, Jim?”“Up the river a little way, miss. The man he waits at the point where it joins the river.”“Then Miss La Farge and I will go on ahead, and you can come on behind, and if you do not overtake us, you can await us at the mouth of the creek.”The two girls started off, and presently reached the creek, where stamping his feet in the snow,Dick Bracknell’s man, Joe, awaited them. Both of them glanced at him keenly, but he was a stranger to them, and then Joy addressed him.“Your master, where is he?”The Indian pointed up the creek. “Him sick man, I take you to him!”Without waiting for further words the man turned in his tracks and swung up the creek at such a pace that the two girls had hard work to keep up with him. Joy questioned the man as to his master’s name, but the man either did not or would not understand, for he merely shook his head, and pressed forward. In a few minutes they reached the little cabin at the edge of the trees, and maintaining a wooden face, the Indian swung the door open and motioned them to enter.Joy pressed forward eagerly with her foster-sister at her heels. The Indian softly closed the door behind them, an evil smile wrinkling his scarred face, then going to the rear of the hut, a moment later he appeared with a bow and some arrows in his hand, and entering the shadow of the trees, he began to walk towards the mouth of the creek.... As she entered the cabin Joy Gargrave looked quickly about her. The only light came through a parchment window and from the improvised stove, and in the semi-darkness, at first, she could see nothing. But after a moment she discerned a tall figure standing but a little way from her. The face was in shadow, and she could not make out the features, but as her eyes fell on him, the man gave vent to a thin, choking laugh.“Good morning, my dear Joy! This is an unexpected pleasure!”At the sound of the voice Joy started, and with a dawning fear in her eyes leaned forward and stared into the haggard face before her. As she did so, her fear increased, and she asked suddenly, “Who are you, that you should address me in that way?”“Then you do not recognize me?” asked the voice mockingly. “I am not surprised. Time has wrought inevitable changes—but of course, it does not change the constant heart. Look again, my dear, and you will see——”Overwhelming fear surged in the girl’s heart. She knew who this haggard man was; indeed, she had known from the first word that he had spoken, and now she turned abruptly towards the door as if to flee. The door was closed, and as she stretched a hand towards the wooden latch, the thin cackling laugh broke out again.“The door is fastened, my dear Joy—on the outside. I remember how you ran from me at Alcombe, and when I arranged this joyous meeting, I foresaw that you might be startled, that you might try to repeat that old folly; therefore I took steps—and my man Joe keeps the door outside. But I am glad to see you, dear wife, most unfeignedly glad to see you, and there is no need that you should hurry away; indeed, I am afraid that until I give permission for you to go, you will have to remain here.”“What do you want?” asked Joy, striving in vain to keep her voice steady.“What do I want?” there was an accent of mock surprise in Dick Bracknell’s voice as he echoed the question, and then he laughed again in a way that made the girl shiver. “What a question to ask a husband who has not seen his wife since his marriage morning! Really, my dear, such a question ought to be quite unnecessary.”He broke off as his cough took him, and for perhaps half a minute he was shaken by it, and could not speak. When he resumed it was in a different tone.“Sit down,” he said, “I want to talk to you, and there is no need that you stand on ceremony in your husband’s house. I regret the scarcity of chairs, but there is a log by the fire there—and if you will accept the advice of an expert you will throw off your furs.... You won’t? Well, self-will is one of the characteristics of your sex, and no doubt you will please yourself. But all the same allow me to express my gratitude to you that you should have left your home in mid-winter to come and look for me. Such solicitude is beyond what I had ex——”“I was not looking for you,” Joy broke in. “You are the last person I was expecting to meet!”“Is that so?” The mockery had gone out of Bracknell’s voice now, and there was a dangerous ring in it. The eyes in the haggard face were blazing, and to both the girls it was clear that he had much ado to keep himself in hand. “You dare to tell me that—me, your lawful husband? Perhaps you will tell me for whom you did leave yourhome then? Whom you were following and seeking on a winter trail?”Joy felt her face flush suddenly. Could she tell him? she asked herself, and immediately her mind answered “No!” In the wild mood that was on him Dick Bracknell would be sure to put a false interpretation on any explanation that she might offer him. Realizing this she was silent, and a moment later he broke out again, wrathfully—“You won’t tell me? You’re ashamed to tell me, I suppose. But accept my assurances that there is no need. I already know. My cousin Roger is the favoured man, is he not? You start at that! Then it is all true what I have heard, that not only is he to supplant me at Harrow Fell, but in my wife’s affections also? Well, that is not going to happen. I will have Harrow Fell and you also—and you first, my Joy, for there shall be no cuckoo in my nest.... Yes, I will have Harrow Fell. I can face five years at Portland or at Parkhurst for that. But first, I will have you. You are here, in your husband’s house, where you have come of your own accord, and here you remain. Take off your furs!”To Joy it was clear that Dick Bracknell was almost insanely jealous, and her face blanched as the possibilities of the situation flashed themselves upon her. The man took a step forward as if to enforce his order, and she shrank back against the rough logs of the shack. Bracknell laughed savagely, but the next moment there came an intervention.“Stand back, Mr. Bracknell!”The speaker was Miss La Farge, and as she stepped resolutely forward, holding a small but serviceable looking machine pistol in her hand, Dick Bracknell came to a standstill.“What——”“Do as I tell you. Lay a finger on Joy, and I will shoot you. She may be your wife, but she is my more-than-sister, and I will brook no violence from you.”Bracknell looked at her irresolutely. It was very clear to him that she would keep her word, and after a moment he stepped back and laughed to cover his discomfiture.“A she-lynx—and with claws! Well, time is on my side. You will grow tired of standing there, and Joe will be back in a minute or two, then I shall know how to deal with you.”Babette did not even reply to him. She glanced at the door and addressed herself to Joy.“Try and open the door, Joy.”Joy sprang to the door, and lifting the wooden latch tugged hard at the door. Dick Bracknell watched her with amused eyes, and when all her efforts failed, he spoke again.“It is no use, my dear Joy. The door is fastened on the outside. We are all prisoners until Joe returns.”“No!” replied Miss La Farge stubbornly. “Not until then. Our men will be here in a few minutes if we do not meet them at the mouth of the creek. Then——”A sharp cry of agony sounded somewhere outside,and as it reached them, the girl’s speech suddenly froze.“What was that?” asked Joy, looking at Bracknell.A deep frown had come upon his face, and there was apprehension in his voice as he replied, “I—I do not know. Some one may have been hurt. I——”He was still speaking, haltingly, when the crash of a rifle broke on his words, followed by a shout, and that in turn by a great stillness. The three people in the shack looked at one another helplessly.The girls’ faces were white, and Bracknell’s features showed wrathful. In silence they waited and nothing further happened. Half an hour passed, during which the girls whispered to each other, and still the silence outside was maintained, and to those in the cabin it seemed to hold a menace of mysterious things. Another half hour crept by, and then Bracknell spoke hoarsely—“Something must have happened, or the Indian would have been back before this. And your men—you said they were to meet you at the mouth of the creek!”“Yes,” answered Joy composedly. “And no doubt they are waiting there now.”“I am afraid not,” answered her husband. “Something has occurred—what, we must find out!” He glanced at the window of skin parchment, then added, “That is the only way. We must cut that out. One of us must climb through and open the door——”“Joy shall go!” said Miss La Farge firmly.“It doesn’t matter who goes! This is a business of life and death. There is an axe in the corner there. If one of you will use it, I shall be obliged. I am afraid that the state of my lungs does not permit much exertion on my part.”Babette looked at Joy, who, finding the ax, attacked the window, and a moment later the freezing air drove into the cabin. When the rough frame was quite clear the man nodded at her. His manner was now very quiet and betrayed nothing of the jealous rage which had possessed him an hour ago.“Go through, Joy. Take the axe with you. You may need it to knock out the staple. Have no fear,” he said as she visibly hesitated. “I give you my word that this is no trap. Believe me, I am very anxious for the safety of all of us.”Joy glanced once at him. It was plain to her that he was sincere, and two seconds later she climbed to the window and dropped down into the snow. A minute later the door swung open, and she was joined by Babette and Dick Bracknell. All three stood there looking down the creek. No sound reached them. Everywhere was the appalling inscrutable silence of the Northern wilderness.

HUSBAND AND WIFE

IT WAS THEend of the day, and Joy Gargrave, kneeling down on a litter of young spruce boughs, in the shadow of a wind screen, stretched her mittened hands towards the fire. Then she removed her face mask and looked at her foster-sister, who having changed her moccasins was placing the pair she had worn through the day near the fire where they would dry slowly.

“Tired, Babette?”

“Not more than ordinary,” was the reply, “though I will own to having found those last two miles against the wind a little trying.”

They had been travelling for a week, and were growing used to the evil of the trail. Body stiffness no longer troubled them, and having been inured to the task from childhood, the agony of cramp brought on by snow-shoe work was unknown to them, the hard exercise of the trail inducing no more than a healthy tiredness at the end of the day. Joy stretched herself luxuriously on the spruce, and looked round. The darkness of the woods was behind them, and in front the waste of snow showed dimly. In the circle of firelight the Indian George was preparing the evening meal, whilst his son Jim was feeding the dogs. The girlwatched them meditatively for a moment or two, then she spoke to Miss La Farge—

“A little different to the Ritz, Babette!”

Babette looked up from the steaming moccasins.

“What do you mean, Joy?”

Joy waved her hand in a half circle. “Why, everything—the trees, the snow, the darkness, the dogs, the camp-fire, George and Jim, and you and I like a couple of Dianas.”

Babette laughed and looked round appreciatively. “It makes me think of a picture which I saw when we were in London. It had a fancy name—’When the World was Young,’ or something like that—and whoever painted it knew the wilderness well. It is, as you say, a little different to the Ritz—and ever so much better. I wonder how long we shall be on trail, not that I’m tired of it. Even hard work has its pleasures and compensations.”

“I do not know how long we shall be. I am content that we are on the right trail. The strange Indian with whom George talked today told a story of a white man, an officer of police, who had been taken to the winter camp of his tribe with a broken leg. The leg had healed, and the officer had departed ten days ago on the trail of a bad white man, and he went Northward. From the description given the officer was almost certainly Corporal Bracknell, and I have an idea that he may have news of Dick Bracknell and be following his trail, in which case I pray that we may come up with him soon; for if there was trouble between them, and the Corporal killed his cousin, it would be avery terrible thing, in view of the situation as regards the succession to Harrow Fell.”

“Yes,” answered Miss La Farge slowly, “but it is no use shutting one’s eyes to facts. The death of Dick Bracknell would be a relief to many people—yourself included!”

“It would be no relief to me if Dick Bracknell died by his cousin’s hand,” answered Joy in a low voice. “It would be quite terrible; it is more than I dare contemplate.”

“Why?” As Babette La Farge shot the question at her foster-sister she looked at her keenly, and saw a wave of warm blood surge over the beautiful face, and as she saw it her own grew suddenly tender. “No,” she added hurriedly, “don’t answer the question, Joy. There is no need. I can guess the answer, which I am sure you would not give me. I think you are right—for everybody’s sake nothing must happen between those two men. At all costs that must be prevented.”

She dropped the moccasins, took a couple of steps forward, and stopping, kissed Joy’s warm cheek. “My dear,” she said, “you must not worry. Time will unravel this dreadful tangle, and after all you are young yet.”

Joy looked up at her trying bravely to smile, but there was the gleam of unshed tears in her eyes. She was about to speak, when the servant George announced that supper was ready, and she contented herself with a glance that was full of love and gratitude.

The next morning, just before they broke camp the younger Indian, who had been out inspectingthe trail, returned with news. He had been a little way up the river and had encountered a strange Indian in the act of taking a marten from a trap. He had talked with this man, and when the latter had heard who his mistress was he had betrayed considerable excitement, and had asked him to wait for him a little time, as he might have a message for his mistress. He had gone away, and a little later had returned and had then told Jim that his master—a white man—was lying sick in a cabin on a creek a little way up the river, and that he earnestly desired that Miss Gargrave would go and speak with him.

“Did he give his master’s name?” asked Joy, as a quick hope awoke within her.

“No, Miss, but he hav’ yours; he say you know him. And I wonder if he is the man we seek.”

Joy also wondered, wondered and hoped, and after consideration she nodded her head. “Yes, I will go and see this man. He may be Corporal Bracknell, or he may have seen him recently. In any case it is a Christian charity to visit any stricken white man in this desolate bush, and it will mean only a short delay. Where is the creek, Jim?”

“Up the river a little way, miss. The man he waits at the point where it joins the river.”

“Then Miss La Farge and I will go on ahead, and you can come on behind, and if you do not overtake us, you can await us at the mouth of the creek.”

The two girls started off, and presently reached the creek, where stamping his feet in the snow,Dick Bracknell’s man, Joe, awaited them. Both of them glanced at him keenly, but he was a stranger to them, and then Joy addressed him.

“Your master, where is he?”

The Indian pointed up the creek. “Him sick man, I take you to him!”

Without waiting for further words the man turned in his tracks and swung up the creek at such a pace that the two girls had hard work to keep up with him. Joy questioned the man as to his master’s name, but the man either did not or would not understand, for he merely shook his head, and pressed forward. In a few minutes they reached the little cabin at the edge of the trees, and maintaining a wooden face, the Indian swung the door open and motioned them to enter.

Joy pressed forward eagerly with her foster-sister at her heels. The Indian softly closed the door behind them, an evil smile wrinkling his scarred face, then going to the rear of the hut, a moment later he appeared with a bow and some arrows in his hand, and entering the shadow of the trees, he began to walk towards the mouth of the creek.

... As she entered the cabin Joy Gargrave looked quickly about her. The only light came through a parchment window and from the improvised stove, and in the semi-darkness, at first, she could see nothing. But after a moment she discerned a tall figure standing but a little way from her. The face was in shadow, and she could not make out the features, but as her eyes fell on him, the man gave vent to a thin, choking laugh.

“Good morning, my dear Joy! This is an unexpected pleasure!”

At the sound of the voice Joy started, and with a dawning fear in her eyes leaned forward and stared into the haggard face before her. As she did so, her fear increased, and she asked suddenly, “Who are you, that you should address me in that way?”

“Then you do not recognize me?” asked the voice mockingly. “I am not surprised. Time has wrought inevitable changes—but of course, it does not change the constant heart. Look again, my dear, and you will see——”

Overwhelming fear surged in the girl’s heart. She knew who this haggard man was; indeed, she had known from the first word that he had spoken, and now she turned abruptly towards the door as if to flee. The door was closed, and as she stretched a hand towards the wooden latch, the thin cackling laugh broke out again.

“The door is fastened, my dear Joy—on the outside. I remember how you ran from me at Alcombe, and when I arranged this joyous meeting, I foresaw that you might be startled, that you might try to repeat that old folly; therefore I took steps—and my man Joe keeps the door outside. But I am glad to see you, dear wife, most unfeignedly glad to see you, and there is no need that you should hurry away; indeed, I am afraid that until I give permission for you to go, you will have to remain here.”

“What do you want?” asked Joy, striving in vain to keep her voice steady.

“What do I want?” there was an accent of mock surprise in Dick Bracknell’s voice as he echoed the question, and then he laughed again in a way that made the girl shiver. “What a question to ask a husband who has not seen his wife since his marriage morning! Really, my dear, such a question ought to be quite unnecessary.”

He broke off as his cough took him, and for perhaps half a minute he was shaken by it, and could not speak. When he resumed it was in a different tone.

“Sit down,” he said, “I want to talk to you, and there is no need that you stand on ceremony in your husband’s house. I regret the scarcity of chairs, but there is a log by the fire there—and if you will accept the advice of an expert you will throw off your furs.... You won’t? Well, self-will is one of the characteristics of your sex, and no doubt you will please yourself. But all the same allow me to express my gratitude to you that you should have left your home in mid-winter to come and look for me. Such solicitude is beyond what I had ex——”

“I was not looking for you,” Joy broke in. “You are the last person I was expecting to meet!”

“Is that so?” The mockery had gone out of Bracknell’s voice now, and there was a dangerous ring in it. The eyes in the haggard face were blazing, and to both the girls it was clear that he had much ado to keep himself in hand. “You dare to tell me that—me, your lawful husband? Perhaps you will tell me for whom you did leave yourhome then? Whom you were following and seeking on a winter trail?”

Joy felt her face flush suddenly. Could she tell him? she asked herself, and immediately her mind answered “No!” In the wild mood that was on him Dick Bracknell would be sure to put a false interpretation on any explanation that she might offer him. Realizing this she was silent, and a moment later he broke out again, wrathfully—

“You won’t tell me? You’re ashamed to tell me, I suppose. But accept my assurances that there is no need. I already know. My cousin Roger is the favoured man, is he not? You start at that! Then it is all true what I have heard, that not only is he to supplant me at Harrow Fell, but in my wife’s affections also? Well, that is not going to happen. I will have Harrow Fell and you also—and you first, my Joy, for there shall be no cuckoo in my nest.... Yes, I will have Harrow Fell. I can face five years at Portland or at Parkhurst for that. But first, I will have you. You are here, in your husband’s house, where you have come of your own accord, and here you remain. Take off your furs!”

To Joy it was clear that Dick Bracknell was almost insanely jealous, and her face blanched as the possibilities of the situation flashed themselves upon her. The man took a step forward as if to enforce his order, and she shrank back against the rough logs of the shack. Bracknell laughed savagely, but the next moment there came an intervention.

“Stand back, Mr. Bracknell!”

The speaker was Miss La Farge, and as she stepped resolutely forward, holding a small but serviceable looking machine pistol in her hand, Dick Bracknell came to a standstill.

“What——”

“Do as I tell you. Lay a finger on Joy, and I will shoot you. She may be your wife, but she is my more-than-sister, and I will brook no violence from you.”

Bracknell looked at her irresolutely. It was very clear to him that she would keep her word, and after a moment he stepped back and laughed to cover his discomfiture.

“A she-lynx—and with claws! Well, time is on my side. You will grow tired of standing there, and Joe will be back in a minute or two, then I shall know how to deal with you.”

Babette did not even reply to him. She glanced at the door and addressed herself to Joy.

“Try and open the door, Joy.”

Joy sprang to the door, and lifting the wooden latch tugged hard at the door. Dick Bracknell watched her with amused eyes, and when all her efforts failed, he spoke again.

“It is no use, my dear Joy. The door is fastened on the outside. We are all prisoners until Joe returns.”

“No!” replied Miss La Farge stubbornly. “Not until then. Our men will be here in a few minutes if we do not meet them at the mouth of the creek. Then——”

A sharp cry of agony sounded somewhere outside,and as it reached them, the girl’s speech suddenly froze.

“What was that?” asked Joy, looking at Bracknell.

A deep frown had come upon his face, and there was apprehension in his voice as he replied, “I—I do not know. Some one may have been hurt. I——”

He was still speaking, haltingly, when the crash of a rifle broke on his words, followed by a shout, and that in turn by a great stillness. The three people in the shack looked at one another helplessly.

The girls’ faces were white, and Bracknell’s features showed wrathful. In silence they waited and nothing further happened. Half an hour passed, during which the girls whispered to each other, and still the silence outside was maintained, and to those in the cabin it seemed to hold a menace of mysterious things. Another half hour crept by, and then Bracknell spoke hoarsely—

“Something must have happened, or the Indian would have been back before this. And your men—you said they were to meet you at the mouth of the creek!”

“Yes,” answered Joy composedly. “And no doubt they are waiting there now.”

“I am afraid not,” answered her husband. “Something has occurred—what, we must find out!” He glanced at the window of skin parchment, then added, “That is the only way. We must cut that out. One of us must climb through and open the door——”

“Joy shall go!” said Miss La Farge firmly.

“It doesn’t matter who goes! This is a business of life and death. There is an axe in the corner there. If one of you will use it, I shall be obliged. I am afraid that the state of my lungs does not permit much exertion on my part.”

Babette looked at Joy, who, finding the ax, attacked the window, and a moment later the freezing air drove into the cabin. When the rough frame was quite clear the man nodded at her. His manner was now very quiet and betrayed nothing of the jealous rage which had possessed him an hour ago.

“Go through, Joy. Take the axe with you. You may need it to knock out the staple. Have no fear,” he said as she visibly hesitated. “I give you my word that this is no trap. Believe me, I am very anxious for the safety of all of us.”

Joy glanced once at him. It was plain to her that he was sincere, and two seconds later she climbed to the window and dropped down into the snow. A minute later the door swung open, and she was joined by Babette and Dick Bracknell. All three stood there looking down the creek. No sound reached them. Everywhere was the appalling inscrutable silence of the Northern wilderness.

CHAPTER XXDICK BRACKNELL LEARNS THE TRUTH“WE MUSTfind out what has happened!” said Joy, looking at Bracknell.“Yes,” he said slowly, “but you must not go alone. If you will wait a moment I will accompany you.”“But your cough——” Joy began, a tone of solicitude in her voice.“My cough!” Dick Bracknell laughed bitterly. “That is nothing to what may lie before us, and in any case it is not safe for you to go alone.”Something in his voice and manner convinced her that he was not speaking idly, and that he had his own reasons for apprehension.“Very well,” she said, “we will wait for you. We will go down the creek together.”He turned back into the hut, and the two girls looked at each other. They were used to the stillness of the forest, but somehow the silence that prevailed seemed ominous of fateful things. Both of them were conscious of vague forebodings, and as Babette looked at her foster-sister, and saw the light of apprehension in her eyes, she whispered, “What do you think, Joy? What do you think has happened?”“I do not know, but I feel that it is somethingdreadful and I am afraid.” She looked towards the cabin, and added, “He is afraid also. You can see that!”“Yes! That is very clear.”They stood waiting until Dick Bracknell appeared, and then without speaking all three started down the creek. A few minutes walking brought them in sight of the main trail, and suddenly Joy gave a cry, and pointed ahead. The figure of a man was lying prone in the snow, and as he caught sight of it, Dick Bracknell broke into a feeble run. For a moment the two girls stood quite still, looking each at the blanched face of the other, then they followed, slowly, the premonition of tragedy mounting in their hearts.When they reached Bracknell they found him stooping over the figure, with a look of consternation in his eyes.“Do you know him? Is it your——”“Oh!” cried Babette. “It is George!”“George! Who is——”“He was my father’s man, and he is mine!” said Joy, staring at the fallen Indian with stricken eyes.“No,” said Dick Bracknell quietly, “he is yours no longer! He has gone to the happy hunting grounds.”“Dead?” cried Joy, as the truth broke upon her. “George dead! But how? What——”Bracknell looked up at her, moved by the anguish in her tones, then he pointed to what she had not seen, a feathered arrow head, half hidden by the crook of the arm.“Oh!” she sobbed. “He has been killed. He——”“But where is Jim? Where are the dogs?” cried her foster-sister. “Both have been here! See, here are the tracks, and there goes the trail northward!”It was as she said, and as Dick Bracknell looked down and read the signs a dark look came on his face. Babette looked from her foster-sister, sobbing in the snow, to the man who was her husband.“What do you think has happened?” she asked.He looked from her to Joy commiseratingly. “I can only guess,” he said in a troubled voice. “I think the Indian who was with me is responsible for this, the man who brought you to my shack—you know. When you came to the cabin he had instructions to look out for your men at the mouth of the creek. I—I am afraid he exceeded my instructions. I think that he must have attacked your men——”“But why should he do that, if you did not tell him?”As Joy flung this question at him, a troubled look came upon his face.“I think he wanted your dogs and outfit, that we might get away from here!”“Our dogs and outfit?”“Yes. He is devoted to me, but twice lately I have had trouble on that point. Once when my cousin Roger Bracknell came——”He broke off suddenly as Joy sprang to her feet. “Your cousin Roger has been here?” she cried. “He is alive then?”As she flung her questions at him eagerly, impetuously, the man’s face clouded, and again a jealous light came in his eyes. It was a moment before he answered the questions, and to Babette, watching him it appeared that he was struggling hard for self-mastery.“Yes,” he replied, at last, in a hoarse voice. “He is alive! He came to my cabin by accident. He had broken his leg, and had lain in an Indian encampment for weeks. There he had heard news which had sent him hot foot on the trail of a man who was responsible for your father’s death!”“For my father’s death?” as she cried the words Joy’s face was white as the snow about her. “But—but——”Her voice faltered, and guessing what she would have said, Bracknell explained. “I am afraid it will come as a shock to you even after these three or four years, but it appears to be the fact that your father’s death was not altogether accidental.“My cousin had a very circumstantial story of the affair, and he was on the trail of the man who was responsible for the crime, the same man, as he believes, who shot me on the night when I had arranged that meeting with you at North Star.”“But who is the man?” asked Joy quickly.“My cousin gave me no name, indeed he declined to do so. But he had his theory, and he went so far as to tell me that not only did the Indian who was with him know the man, but that he himself believed that he knew him.”“Ah!” cried Joy.Her husband looked at her. “You also guess?”“Yes!” she answered. “I guess—but no more than guess!”“Who is the man?” asked Bracknell quickly.“His name is Adrian Rayner!”“Rayner!” cried Bracknell excitedly. “The son of old Rayner, your guardian?”“Yes! He is in the North now. I believe that he is looking for Roger Bracknell.”“God in heaven!”“What is the matter?” asked Joy. “You look as if something had occurred to you!”“Yes!” he said simply. “Something has—something very significant. Two or three days after Roger left the shack a stranger arrived——”“Mr. Bracknell,” interrupted Miss La Farge, “don’t you think we had better postpone explanations for a little time? If we remain talking here we shall freeze. And there are things to be done. There is Jim to find—and there is the team and the outfit. Then we must bury George. We can’t possibly leave him lying here for the wolves!”“Yes,” answered Bracknell. “I was forgetting.” He considered a moment and then spoke again. “The sled tracks run up the river. If you two were to follow a little way, till you get to that spur there, you will have a long view of the trail, and possibly you will be able to see something of the team and your man. But don’t go too far. It won’t be safe. Whilst you are away, I will arrange tree-burial for this poor fellow. And when you return we can discuss the situation. Do you agree?”“Yes,” answered Joy.“Then I will waste no time, nor, I hope, will you.”He turned and began to walk up the creek in a way that revealed what an effort it was for him, and for a second or two Joy watched him with pitying eyes, then as her foster-sister spoke, she turned, and without answering began to follow the sled tracks.After they had trudged a little way, Babette spoke.“Dick Bracknell is a strange man. Two hours ago he was within an ace of violence towards you, and now I believe he is really solicitous for your welfare.”“Yes,” answered Joy. “He is full of contradictions. There are many men like him, I suppose. When he is good he is very good, and when he is bad he is almost satanic. When I first met him he was a gentleman, an attractive one; and but for unfortunate influences he might have continued—but now——”“Now he is a wreck, physical and moral,” answered Babette, and then asked sharply, “Suppose we do not find Jim and the dogs, Joy?”“We must find them!”“But suppose we do not? What then?”“Then we shall have to take refuge in the cabin.”She said no more, and Babette asked no more questions. In half an hour they reached the wooded spur round which the river turned, and as they reached the further side, both came to a standstill and looked at the frozen waste.For two or three miles the course of the river was visible between low, wooded banks. Snow was everywhere, and nowhere was the white surface broken by any moving figure. It was a land of death—death white and cold. Babette shivered as she looked on it.“They are not here, Joy,” she whispered. “Neither Jim nor the dogs.”“No,” answered Joy stonily.“We shall have to go back to the cabin to—to—your husband.”“Yes, there is no other way!” A sob broke from her, then she bit her lip, and added, “It is a strange irony that now my safety should depend on him.”“Dare you trust him—Joy?”“Yes,” answered Joy thoughtfully. “I can trust him—now. As you have seen he is a very sick man, and in spite of the way in which he raved in the cabin, I believe that now he is greatly concerned for my safety, and yours. Did you notice the sudden change in his attitude after I had mentioned Adrian Rayner’s name?”“Yes, he was startled. His manner completely altered. Something struck him with your mention of the name. I wonder what it was?”“I do not know. I cannot even guess, but no doubt we shall hear presently. There is nothing for us to do but to return to the cabin.”Her foster-sister nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, we shall have to do that. We can do nothing else.” She paused a moment and then asked, “You don’t think George’s son has deserted us, Joy?”“No!” answered Joy emphatically. “Something has driven him away. But he will return—if he can. I am sure of that!”They turned in their tracks and slowly retraced their way to the cabin. Dick Bracknell was standing at the door, evidently waiting for them, and as they approached he flashed a look of inquiry at Joy. She shook her head.“No,” she said quietly. “There is nothing to be seen anywhere.”“I am sorry,” answered Bracknell simply. “You must wait here. Perhaps your other man will return, or if he does not my man may.”He opened the door and held it for them to pass in.“You can take off your furs,” he said, as they entered. “I have blocked the window with snow, and stretched a blanket over it. I am afraid that it will be rather dark, but that is unavoidable.”The two girls followed his suggestion and seated themselves by the stove. For a little time no one spoke, and the red glow of the fire shining on their faces showed them very thoughtful. At last, Joy broke the silence.“You were saying that two or three days after your cousin left here a stranger arrived. Who was it? Do you know?”Dick Bracknell laughed mirthlessly. “I do not know for certain. I can only guess.”“And you guess——”“That it was old Rayner’s son—Adrian, I think you called him. Of course he didn’t tell me who he was, but he let out that he was looking for myCousin Roger, and posed as a lawyer’s clerk. I’m morally certain, however, that he was young Rayner!”Joy remembered his sudden change of manner when she had said that Adrian Rayner was in the North, looking, as she believed for Roger Bracknell, and after a moment, urged by something deeper than curiosity, she spoke, “You hinted that something very significant had occurred to you. What was it?”Dick Bracknell hesitated, and it was evident that he was wondering whether to tell her or not. Then he laughed bitterly. “You may as well know all the kinds of fool I am. This stranger pitched a yarn about you and Roger, and I was fool enough to believe him.”He broke off and looked at Joy, whose face was flaming. Even in the red glow of the firelight the flush revealed itself to him, but though he frowned a little, he continued in an even voice. “He told me that my brother Geoffrey was dead, and that as I was either dead or as good as dead, Roger quite naturally was reckoned as the heir to Harrow Fell. He said further that you knew of this and that you were looking for Roger with the news and with the intention of marrying him.”“Oh!”As the exclamation broke from her, Joy abruptly hid her face in her hands, Bracknell coughed a little and then resumed—“He claimed to be the agent of old Rayner, and declared he was looking for Roger Bracknell in order to warn him of your previous marriage, andto give him warning that I was alive, in case you—a—should not regard that marriage as binding.”He looked at Joy again. Her face was still hidden in her hands.“As I said, I was fool enough to believe him, and that accounts for my amiable reception of you just now. It even accounts for your presence here, for when my man Joe brought news that you were out in the Northward trail, the trail that Roger was following, I was morally certain that you were out upon his track, and I set out to trap you. You must own that your unexpected presence did give colour to Rayner’s story, and that I had some excuse for——”“Iwaslooking for your cousin Roger,” interrupted Joy, suddenly lifting her face, and meeting his questioning gaze.He looked at her but did not immediately reply. And in the silence that followed Miss La Farge rose from her seat and began to put on her furs.“I am going outside,” she said. “It is better that I should. You two have things to say to each other that should only be said between you.”She passed out, shutting the door behind her, and after a little time, Dick Bracknell spoke again.“You say you were looking for my Cousin Roger? That is a very damaging admission, is it not? It would seem that, after all, that fellow Rayner was not far off the mark.”“You do not believe that?” answered Joy, meeting his gaze with steady eyes.He laughed shortly. “No,” he admitted. “Ido not believe it—now, but I will own that I am a little curious as to the reason why you should follow on my cousin’s trail. It is—er—a little unusual.”“I was following him, as I believed, to save him. Adrian Rayner wanted to marry me, and I had accused him of trying to kill you at North Star. He knew all about my marriage to you, though how he got the knowledge I cannot tell——”“That is simple enough!” broke in her husband. “I wrote to old Rayner and told him——”“But my uncle did not know, I am sure he did not know. He himself wanted me to marry Adrian, and I can’t believe he knew.”“Perhaps not,” admitted Bracknell thoughtfully. “It is possible that young Rayner got hold of my letter to his father and that the old man never saw it at all. But what has this to do with my cousin!”“This! Adrian Rayner told me that he was coming here in order to prove that you were dead but I was morally certain that he was coming here to find your cousin Roger and to—to——”“To shoot him, hey? Why should he want to do that?”“Because he knew that your cousin suspected him of that attempt on your life at North Star!”“Wanted to get rid of a witness, I suppose. And you were following Roger to warn him.”“Yes! That was one reason.”“Um! It’s a nice coil, for sure. I entertain the man who tried to murder me, and I set him on thetrail of my cousin who was trying to bring him to justice. That is about as pretty a kettle of fish as——”“But you did not tell Adrian Rayner where Roger had gone?” cried Joy, springing to her feet. “Surely you did not tell him?”“At that time,” answered Bracknell slowly, “it seemed to me that I had little cause to love my Cousin Roger. You are to remember that I was in ignorance of much that I have learned this morning.”“You told him?” cried Joy.“I certainly put him on the track,” answered the man.“Then God forgive you! God forgive you!” cried Joy in anguished tones.Dick Bracknell’s face set hard, and only by an effort was he able to control himself. But after a moment he replied quietly, “As I have said, I did not know Rayner. I had no inkling of his game.”“No!” said Joy stonily. “I understand that.”“You hinted that there was another reason,” said Bracknell, watching her closely. “I wonder if you would mind telling me——”“Oh, I don’t mind at all,” broke in Joy impulsively. “Your brother Geoffrey was killed whilst I was in England. Indeed, I was the one to find him dead. No one knew whether you were alive or dead, even I did not know, and Roger was regarded as the heir. But I knew that when he left North Star that he was going to try and learn what had really happened to you, and I was afraid that ifthere was a collision between you, and anything dreadful happened, people might say that he—that he——”She broke off, and hesitated.“I understand,” said her husband. “You need not say it. I dare say you are quite right. This world is full of Christian charity.”“I cabled him and tried to get in touch with him. I learned that he was missing. I came out, and at Regina I discovered that nothing whatever had been heard about him, but I discovered also that Adrian Rayner had been making inquiries, that he was on his trail. Then I was certain of his evil purpose, and when I reached North Star and found Adrian there, I accused him, for I was very sure of his intentions. As soon as I could I started to look for your cousin myself——”“You seem very anxious about my cousin,” broke in her husband quietly.“Oh, how can I help being?” cried Joy.Dick Bracknell took a step forward, and put a hand on her shoulder. She did not shrink, and as his eyes searched her face, she met his gaze steadily. They stood there silent for what seemed a long time, then Bracknell dropped his hand.“I think I understand,” he said wearily, “and I do not blame you. And I am sure that both Roger and you have played the game! Well, I’m crocked, and——”He broke off and laughed harshly. Then his haggard face grew suddenly convulsed with rage. “That—Rayner! If only I could meet him again I think I could die happily!”Joy looked at him, her heart wrung with pity for him. She stretched a hand impulsively, and was about to speak when the door was flung open violently, and Miss La Farge rushed in, hastily barring the door behind her.

DICK BRACKNELL LEARNS THE TRUTH

“WE MUSTfind out what has happened!” said Joy, looking at Bracknell.

“Yes,” he said slowly, “but you must not go alone. If you will wait a moment I will accompany you.”

“But your cough——” Joy began, a tone of solicitude in her voice.

“My cough!” Dick Bracknell laughed bitterly. “That is nothing to what may lie before us, and in any case it is not safe for you to go alone.”

Something in his voice and manner convinced her that he was not speaking idly, and that he had his own reasons for apprehension.

“Very well,” she said, “we will wait for you. We will go down the creek together.”

He turned back into the hut, and the two girls looked at each other. They were used to the stillness of the forest, but somehow the silence that prevailed seemed ominous of fateful things. Both of them were conscious of vague forebodings, and as Babette looked at her foster-sister, and saw the light of apprehension in her eyes, she whispered, “What do you think, Joy? What do you think has happened?”

“I do not know, but I feel that it is somethingdreadful and I am afraid.” She looked towards the cabin, and added, “He is afraid also. You can see that!”

“Yes! That is very clear.”

They stood waiting until Dick Bracknell appeared, and then without speaking all three started down the creek. A few minutes walking brought them in sight of the main trail, and suddenly Joy gave a cry, and pointed ahead. The figure of a man was lying prone in the snow, and as he caught sight of it, Dick Bracknell broke into a feeble run. For a moment the two girls stood quite still, looking each at the blanched face of the other, then they followed, slowly, the premonition of tragedy mounting in their hearts.

When they reached Bracknell they found him stooping over the figure, with a look of consternation in his eyes.

“Do you know him? Is it your——”

“Oh!” cried Babette. “It is George!”

“George! Who is——”

“He was my father’s man, and he is mine!” said Joy, staring at the fallen Indian with stricken eyes.

“No,” said Dick Bracknell quietly, “he is yours no longer! He has gone to the happy hunting grounds.”

“Dead?” cried Joy, as the truth broke upon her. “George dead! But how? What——”

Bracknell looked up at her, moved by the anguish in her tones, then he pointed to what she had not seen, a feathered arrow head, half hidden by the crook of the arm.

“Oh!” she sobbed. “He has been killed. He——”

“But where is Jim? Where are the dogs?” cried her foster-sister. “Both have been here! See, here are the tracks, and there goes the trail northward!”

It was as she said, and as Dick Bracknell looked down and read the signs a dark look came on his face. Babette looked from her foster-sister, sobbing in the snow, to the man who was her husband.

“What do you think has happened?” she asked.

He looked from her to Joy commiseratingly. “I can only guess,” he said in a troubled voice. “I think the Indian who was with me is responsible for this, the man who brought you to my shack—you know. When you came to the cabin he had instructions to look out for your men at the mouth of the creek. I—I am afraid he exceeded my instructions. I think that he must have attacked your men——”

“But why should he do that, if you did not tell him?”

As Joy flung this question at him, a troubled look came upon his face.

“I think he wanted your dogs and outfit, that we might get away from here!”

“Our dogs and outfit?”

“Yes. He is devoted to me, but twice lately I have had trouble on that point. Once when my cousin Roger Bracknell came——”

He broke off suddenly as Joy sprang to her feet. “Your cousin Roger has been here?” she cried. “He is alive then?”

As she flung her questions at him eagerly, impetuously, the man’s face clouded, and again a jealous light came in his eyes. It was a moment before he answered the questions, and to Babette, watching him it appeared that he was struggling hard for self-mastery.

“Yes,” he replied, at last, in a hoarse voice. “He is alive! He came to my cabin by accident. He had broken his leg, and had lain in an Indian encampment for weeks. There he had heard news which had sent him hot foot on the trail of a man who was responsible for your father’s death!”

“For my father’s death?” as she cried the words Joy’s face was white as the snow about her. “But—but——”

Her voice faltered, and guessing what she would have said, Bracknell explained. “I am afraid it will come as a shock to you even after these three or four years, but it appears to be the fact that your father’s death was not altogether accidental.

“My cousin had a very circumstantial story of the affair, and he was on the trail of the man who was responsible for the crime, the same man, as he believes, who shot me on the night when I had arranged that meeting with you at North Star.”

“But who is the man?” asked Joy quickly.

“My cousin gave me no name, indeed he declined to do so. But he had his theory, and he went so far as to tell me that not only did the Indian who was with him know the man, but that he himself believed that he knew him.”

“Ah!” cried Joy.

Her husband looked at her. “You also guess?”

“Yes!” she answered. “I guess—but no more than guess!”

“Who is the man?” asked Bracknell quickly.

“His name is Adrian Rayner!”

“Rayner!” cried Bracknell excitedly. “The son of old Rayner, your guardian?”

“Yes! He is in the North now. I believe that he is looking for Roger Bracknell.”

“God in heaven!”

“What is the matter?” asked Joy. “You look as if something had occurred to you!”

“Yes!” he said simply. “Something has—something very significant. Two or three days after Roger left the shack a stranger arrived——”

“Mr. Bracknell,” interrupted Miss La Farge, “don’t you think we had better postpone explanations for a little time? If we remain talking here we shall freeze. And there are things to be done. There is Jim to find—and there is the team and the outfit. Then we must bury George. We can’t possibly leave him lying here for the wolves!”

“Yes,” answered Bracknell. “I was forgetting.” He considered a moment and then spoke again. “The sled tracks run up the river. If you two were to follow a little way, till you get to that spur there, you will have a long view of the trail, and possibly you will be able to see something of the team and your man. But don’t go too far. It won’t be safe. Whilst you are away, I will arrange tree-burial for this poor fellow. And when you return we can discuss the situation. Do you agree?”

“Yes,” answered Joy.

“Then I will waste no time, nor, I hope, will you.”

He turned and began to walk up the creek in a way that revealed what an effort it was for him, and for a second or two Joy watched him with pitying eyes, then as her foster-sister spoke, she turned, and without answering began to follow the sled tracks.

After they had trudged a little way, Babette spoke.

“Dick Bracknell is a strange man. Two hours ago he was within an ace of violence towards you, and now I believe he is really solicitous for your welfare.”

“Yes,” answered Joy. “He is full of contradictions. There are many men like him, I suppose. When he is good he is very good, and when he is bad he is almost satanic. When I first met him he was a gentleman, an attractive one; and but for unfortunate influences he might have continued—but now——”

“Now he is a wreck, physical and moral,” answered Babette, and then asked sharply, “Suppose we do not find Jim and the dogs, Joy?”

“We must find them!”

“But suppose we do not? What then?”

“Then we shall have to take refuge in the cabin.”

She said no more, and Babette asked no more questions. In half an hour they reached the wooded spur round which the river turned, and as they reached the further side, both came to a standstill and looked at the frozen waste.

For two or three miles the course of the river was visible between low, wooded banks. Snow was everywhere, and nowhere was the white surface broken by any moving figure. It was a land of death—death white and cold. Babette shivered as she looked on it.

“They are not here, Joy,” she whispered. “Neither Jim nor the dogs.”

“No,” answered Joy stonily.

“We shall have to go back to the cabin to—to—your husband.”

“Yes, there is no other way!” A sob broke from her, then she bit her lip, and added, “It is a strange irony that now my safety should depend on him.”

“Dare you trust him—Joy?”

“Yes,” answered Joy thoughtfully. “I can trust him—now. As you have seen he is a very sick man, and in spite of the way in which he raved in the cabin, I believe that now he is greatly concerned for my safety, and yours. Did you notice the sudden change in his attitude after I had mentioned Adrian Rayner’s name?”

“Yes, he was startled. His manner completely altered. Something struck him with your mention of the name. I wonder what it was?”

“I do not know. I cannot even guess, but no doubt we shall hear presently. There is nothing for us to do but to return to the cabin.”

Her foster-sister nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, we shall have to do that. We can do nothing else.” She paused a moment and then asked, “You don’t think George’s son has deserted us, Joy?”

“No!” answered Joy emphatically. “Something has driven him away. But he will return—if he can. I am sure of that!”

They turned in their tracks and slowly retraced their way to the cabin. Dick Bracknell was standing at the door, evidently waiting for them, and as they approached he flashed a look of inquiry at Joy. She shook her head.

“No,” she said quietly. “There is nothing to be seen anywhere.”

“I am sorry,” answered Bracknell simply. “You must wait here. Perhaps your other man will return, or if he does not my man may.”

He opened the door and held it for them to pass in.

“You can take off your furs,” he said, as they entered. “I have blocked the window with snow, and stretched a blanket over it. I am afraid that it will be rather dark, but that is unavoidable.”

The two girls followed his suggestion and seated themselves by the stove. For a little time no one spoke, and the red glow of the fire shining on their faces showed them very thoughtful. At last, Joy broke the silence.

“You were saying that two or three days after your cousin left here a stranger arrived. Who was it? Do you know?”

Dick Bracknell laughed mirthlessly. “I do not know for certain. I can only guess.”

“And you guess——”

“That it was old Rayner’s son—Adrian, I think you called him. Of course he didn’t tell me who he was, but he let out that he was looking for myCousin Roger, and posed as a lawyer’s clerk. I’m morally certain, however, that he was young Rayner!”

Joy remembered his sudden change of manner when she had said that Adrian Rayner was in the North, looking, as she believed for Roger Bracknell, and after a moment, urged by something deeper than curiosity, she spoke, “You hinted that something very significant had occurred to you. What was it?”

Dick Bracknell hesitated, and it was evident that he was wondering whether to tell her or not. Then he laughed bitterly. “You may as well know all the kinds of fool I am. This stranger pitched a yarn about you and Roger, and I was fool enough to believe him.”

He broke off and looked at Joy, whose face was flaming. Even in the red glow of the firelight the flush revealed itself to him, but though he frowned a little, he continued in an even voice. “He told me that my brother Geoffrey was dead, and that as I was either dead or as good as dead, Roger quite naturally was reckoned as the heir to Harrow Fell. He said further that you knew of this and that you were looking for Roger with the news and with the intention of marrying him.”

“Oh!”

As the exclamation broke from her, Joy abruptly hid her face in her hands, Bracknell coughed a little and then resumed—

“He claimed to be the agent of old Rayner, and declared he was looking for Roger Bracknell in order to warn him of your previous marriage, andto give him warning that I was alive, in case you—a—should not regard that marriage as binding.”

He looked at Joy again. Her face was still hidden in her hands.

“As I said, I was fool enough to believe him, and that accounts for my amiable reception of you just now. It even accounts for your presence here, for when my man Joe brought news that you were out in the Northward trail, the trail that Roger was following, I was morally certain that you were out upon his track, and I set out to trap you. You must own that your unexpected presence did give colour to Rayner’s story, and that I had some excuse for——”

“Iwaslooking for your cousin Roger,” interrupted Joy, suddenly lifting her face, and meeting his questioning gaze.

He looked at her but did not immediately reply. And in the silence that followed Miss La Farge rose from her seat and began to put on her furs.

“I am going outside,” she said. “It is better that I should. You two have things to say to each other that should only be said between you.”

She passed out, shutting the door behind her, and after a little time, Dick Bracknell spoke again.

“You say you were looking for my Cousin Roger? That is a very damaging admission, is it not? It would seem that, after all, that fellow Rayner was not far off the mark.”

“You do not believe that?” answered Joy, meeting his gaze with steady eyes.

He laughed shortly. “No,” he admitted. “Ido not believe it—now, but I will own that I am a little curious as to the reason why you should follow on my cousin’s trail. It is—er—a little unusual.”

“I was following him, as I believed, to save him. Adrian Rayner wanted to marry me, and I had accused him of trying to kill you at North Star. He knew all about my marriage to you, though how he got the knowledge I cannot tell——”

“That is simple enough!” broke in her husband. “I wrote to old Rayner and told him——”

“But my uncle did not know, I am sure he did not know. He himself wanted me to marry Adrian, and I can’t believe he knew.”

“Perhaps not,” admitted Bracknell thoughtfully. “It is possible that young Rayner got hold of my letter to his father and that the old man never saw it at all. But what has this to do with my cousin!”

“This! Adrian Rayner told me that he was coming here in order to prove that you were dead but I was morally certain that he was coming here to find your cousin Roger and to—to——”

“To shoot him, hey? Why should he want to do that?”

“Because he knew that your cousin suspected him of that attempt on your life at North Star!”

“Wanted to get rid of a witness, I suppose. And you were following Roger to warn him.”

“Yes! That was one reason.”

“Um! It’s a nice coil, for sure. I entertain the man who tried to murder me, and I set him on thetrail of my cousin who was trying to bring him to justice. That is about as pretty a kettle of fish as——”

“But you did not tell Adrian Rayner where Roger had gone?” cried Joy, springing to her feet. “Surely you did not tell him?”

“At that time,” answered Bracknell slowly, “it seemed to me that I had little cause to love my Cousin Roger. You are to remember that I was in ignorance of much that I have learned this morning.”

“You told him?” cried Joy.

“I certainly put him on the track,” answered the man.

“Then God forgive you! God forgive you!” cried Joy in anguished tones.

Dick Bracknell’s face set hard, and only by an effort was he able to control himself. But after a moment he replied quietly, “As I have said, I did not know Rayner. I had no inkling of his game.”

“No!” said Joy stonily. “I understand that.”

“You hinted that there was another reason,” said Bracknell, watching her closely. “I wonder if you would mind telling me——”

“Oh, I don’t mind at all,” broke in Joy impulsively. “Your brother Geoffrey was killed whilst I was in England. Indeed, I was the one to find him dead. No one knew whether you were alive or dead, even I did not know, and Roger was regarded as the heir. But I knew that when he left North Star that he was going to try and learn what had really happened to you, and I was afraid that ifthere was a collision between you, and anything dreadful happened, people might say that he—that he——”

She broke off, and hesitated.

“I understand,” said her husband. “You need not say it. I dare say you are quite right. This world is full of Christian charity.”

“I cabled him and tried to get in touch with him. I learned that he was missing. I came out, and at Regina I discovered that nothing whatever had been heard about him, but I discovered also that Adrian Rayner had been making inquiries, that he was on his trail. Then I was certain of his evil purpose, and when I reached North Star and found Adrian there, I accused him, for I was very sure of his intentions. As soon as I could I started to look for your cousin myself——”

“You seem very anxious about my cousin,” broke in her husband quietly.

“Oh, how can I help being?” cried Joy.

Dick Bracknell took a step forward, and put a hand on her shoulder. She did not shrink, and as his eyes searched her face, she met his gaze steadily. They stood there silent for what seemed a long time, then Bracknell dropped his hand.

“I think I understand,” he said wearily, “and I do not blame you. And I am sure that both Roger and you have played the game! Well, I’m crocked, and——”

He broke off and laughed harshly. Then his haggard face grew suddenly convulsed with rage. “That—Rayner! If only I could meet him again I think I could die happily!”

Joy looked at him, her heart wrung with pity for him. She stretched a hand impulsively, and was about to speak when the door was flung open violently, and Miss La Farge rushed in, hastily barring the door behind her.

CHAPTER XXIUNDER COVER OF NIGHTSHE STOODthere gasping for breath, and unable to speak; and to both the others in the cabin it was evident that something startling had occurred. Dick Bracknell found his tongue first.“What is the matter, Miss La Farge? What has happened?”Babette found her breath and cried pantingly,“Some one tried to kill me?”“To kill you!” her listeners cried together incredulously.“Yes. I was walking down the creek, wondering where Jim and our dogs were gone to, when I heard a sharp sound, just like the twang of a bowstring and looked round. I could see nothing, and the woods on the banks were quite still and silent, nothing moving anywhere. I was still looking, and convincing myself that I had imagined the sound when it occurred again, and a second later an arrow struck a tree close by me, and remained there, quivering. I did not remain to see any more, or to try and learn who had sent it. I turned in my tracks and ran back here, and once as I ran an arrow passed clean through my parka, and buried itself in the snow beyond.”Dick Bracknell broke out, suddenly, “Confoundit,” he cried, “this is intolerable. That Indian Joe must have gone mad!”“You think it is your man?” asked Joy quickly.“I am sure of it! Who else can it be in this God-forsaken wilderness? It must be he, but I will soon find out!”He moved towards the door and throwing down the bar, opened it. There was nothing visible but the snow, and the dark woods. He took a step forward, and as he did so something came swishing through the air and struck the door post. He knew what it was before he saw it, and cried out.“Joe, you confounded fool, what——”The sharp crack of a rifle broke in on the words, and a bullet cut the fur off his coat at the top of the shoulder. He turned quickly round, and tumbled backward into the cabin, kicking the door to behind him. Joy ran forward, and dropped the bar in place, then looked at him.“You are hurt?” she cried anxiously.“No,” he answered, as he picked himself up.“Only knocked over with surprise.”“But that was a rifle, wasn’t it? Some one fired at you?”“Yes, some one certainly did!” He gave a wheezy laugh as he lifted a hand to his shoulder.“And he almost got me. He made the fur fly, and if it had struck an inch or two lower down I should have been out of action for a while at any rate. He must be a rotten shot, for out there on the snow I must have been a perfect mark!”“But what on earth can your man be——”“It is not Joe,” broke in Bracknell with conviction.“Even if he has gone clean into lunacy he’d never do a thing like that to me. Besides, Joe had no gun with him. Our guns are there in the corner, and as we’ve run out of ammunition they are no use. It simply can’t be Joe.”“Then who can it be? And why should he want to do a thing like that?”“It may be your other man—Jim, didn’t you call him? He may have returned, and thinking you were prisoners here, may have tried to get me in the hope of releasing you.”“But you forget the attack on Babette! Some one shot arrows at her and——”“By Jove! I had forgotten something! Stand away from the door. I’m going to open it. There’s something I want to get.”“Oh, be careful!” cried Joy.He swung around and looked at her whimsically, then he said quietly, “I’ll be careful for your sake, not my own. I’ve got to get you safely out of this. That much I owe you at any rate.”He turned again to the door and cautiously opening it a little way, peeped out. There was nothing visible, and quickly he opened the door wider and thrusting out an arm, gripped the arrow which was sticking in the post, and hastily flung the door in place once more. Even as he did so, something crashed into the wood, and the sound of a shot reverberated through the stillness outside.The two girls looked at him, their faces were white and they were much alarmed. Bracknell looked at the door and laughed shortly.“It seems that we are to stand a regular siege,” he said. “That man of yours is of the persevering sort.”Neither Joy nor her foster-sister replied, and moving towards the stove Bracknell threw on a spruce log, and as it caught and flamed up he stopped, and by its light he examined the arrow in his hand. Quarter of a minute later he stood up.“This settles it,” he said. “This arrow is not Joe’s. It is too finely made, with an ivory barb on which somebody has spent time. Joe’s bow and arrows were makeshifts, and his barbs were of moose bone!”“Then who can it be?” asked Joy. “Jim would have no arrows at all, and he certainly would not have fired them at Babette if he had.”Dick Bracknell shook his head. “I cannot think. It may be a roving band of Indians from the far North. This arrow tells its own story. It is like those made by the Indian Esquimaux in the North Behring. I’ve been up there and I’ve seen arrows like it before.”“But at least one of our attackers has a rifle,” said Miss La Farge.“Yes,” answered Bracknell thoughtfully.“And why should they attack us at all?” asked Joy.“They may be out for plunder. Most of these fellows have a weakness for the possessions of white men. I’ve seen one of them risk his life for a woodman’s axe, and they’ll give their heads for a sheath knife. They will have seen the cabin and may think that there are things worth having here, but in anycase they will find out the mistake in a very few days.”“Why?”“Because we haven’t more than two or three days’ stock of food,” replied Bracknell grimly. “There’s only a small stock of coffee, a few beans and some frozen moose meat. That’s why I suspected Joe of trying to get your outfit. But I’ve changed my mind now. I think that those fellows outside may have killed your man—and Joe also, if we only knew!”“Then our position is rather desperate?”Bracknell nodded. “If those beggars really mean business, we’re in a pretty tight corner. They may rush the cabin or they may wait. In either case they will get us!”“There is one possibility that you have not thought of yet,” said Babette slowly.“What is that?”“It is that this attack may not have been made by any roving tribe at all.”“But who——”“Adrian Rayner!”“God in heaven!” as the exclamation broke from his lips Dick Bracknell looked at her in amazed conviction. “Of course, I never thought of him!”“He is the one man who has cause to do such a thing. He knows that Joy and I suspect him of shooting you at North Star. He wanted to marry her, and he knows that that is now out of the question altogether. But he is Joy’s cousin, and Joy, as you know, is immensely wealthy. If she died up here——”“Heavens! yes! And I would stake my life that he’s the man Roger is after, the man who caused your father’s death. He——”“You did not tell me!” cried Joy. “How did my father die?”“Some one blew up the ice on the river, the ice which he was bound to pass over in the morning. Of course the river froze over again in the night, but it was not strong enough to carry a man, let alone a man and a heavy sled team. He went through—and died, but if Roger is right he was diabolically murdered.”Joy did not move. She looked at him with horror in her eyes. Then her face grew hard. “I believe, your cousin Roger is right. Adrian Rayner was abroad about the time when my father must have died. And he wanted to marry me after you had been shot at North Star, though he could not have been sure of your death.... It was my money he was after, and——”“He’s after it yet!” cried Bracknell with conviction, “Miss La Farge is right. If you died up here—but have you made a will?”Joy shook her head. “It was never suggested to me!”“No—for a very good reason. As your next of kin Rayner and his father would step in if you died. The fellow has been working to that end all the time—he’s working now! And he’s cunning—most damnably cunning. The way he arranged your father’s death proves that, and if Miss La Farge here is right, and Adrian Rayner is the man behindthe gun, then we’re in a hole. The fellow will show us no mercy. He——”“S-s-s-h-h!”As she gave the warning, Miss La Farge lifted a hand, in signal for silence, and bent forward in a listening attitude. The other two listened also, but heard nothing save the splutter and hiss of the logs on the fire.“What is it?” whispered Bracknell.“Some one walked round the cabin. I heard him quite plainly. Ah—again.”They listened. Crunch! crunch! came the sound of footsteps in the frozen snow outside. All round the cabin the steps passed, slowly, as if some one were making an inspection, and whilst they still sat listening, the steps receded and passed out of earshot. They looked at one another and Bracknell was the first to break the silence.“A pretty cool customer, whoever he is! He was spying out the land.”“Yes!” answered Miss La Farge in a half whisper.“I wonder what he will do?” said Joy.“Nothing, if he is wise,” answered Bracknell slowly. “Having walked round he’ll have made the discovery that we keep our wood at the rear of the cabin, and he’ll easily guess that we have no great stock inside. He has only to wait until the necessity for replenishing the stock arrives, and then he can get one of us at any rate.... He’ll know we have no dogs, and that we are tied to the cabin——”“But are we?” interjected Joy.“Well, the open trail without dogs is a risk that few men would care to undertake. I’ve been at it on one or two occasions, carrying my own stores, and it’s not a course to be recommended. The trail——”“But we’ve very few stores to pack!” said Joy obstinately, “and if we stay here we shall be driven out by hunger. Do you know of any tribe of Indians in the neighborhood?”Bracknell nodded. “There’s an encampment thirty or forty miles to the North on the Wolverine. Joe was talking to me about them the other day, and we considered once over whether we’d pay them a call or not. In the end we decided against it.”“Why?”“Well,” was the reply, “they’re rather a pagan lot, and not over scrupulous. Joe was telling me that in times of scarcity they sometimes offer sacrifices——”“Sacrifices! What kind of sacrifices?”’“Well, the most barbaric sort—human. There are some queer things done North of the Barrens, I can tell you. The world up here is still a primitive world, and the police patrol up the Mackenzie to Herschell Island can’t possibly take note of anything that doesn’t come right under its nose.”“But the Indians cannot possibly be worse than Adrian Rayner!”“No!” Bracknell laughed hoarsely. “He’s a tiger, for certain. Though I will own he didn’t look it when he was here the other day.” He was silent for a moment, then he said slowly, “Of course if wedecide to leave the cabin and if we go North, we may stumble on my Cousin Roger. It’s only a chance, but——” He broke off again, and looked at Joy as if wondering how she would take the suggestion, then added, “Well, we might take it, if we can manage to get away from here. What do you think?”Joy hesitated. Her face flushed a little, then she said quietly, “I put myself in your hands.”“Thank you. I am——”A fit of coughing broke in on his speech, and when it had passed he did not attempt to complete his sentence, but as his eyes from time to time fell on her there was a soft glow in them, which revealed an unspoken gratitude.They sat for a long time discussing the desperate situation, and late in the afternoon prepared for departure. Such food as the cabin held was made up in three packs, and when that was done, and all was ready, they rested, waiting for the hour of departure, Joy reflecting on the strange irony of circumstances which now made her dependent for help on the man who had so wronged her, and of whom she had lived in fear.All was quiet outside and Babette was offering a tentative suggestion that perhaps after all the enemy outside had withdrawn, then again they caught the crunch! crunch! of cautious feet on the frozen snow, and as all three grew alert, they heard the steps pause by the door, and the next moment there was a rustling sound on the rough woodwork.“Somebody feeling for the latch-string,” whispered Bracknell, then he hailed the intruder, as thelatter having found the string thrust a heavy shoulder against the barred door. “Hallo! Who goes there?”To this challenge there was no reply, but a second or two later they again heard the steps receding across the snow.“Came to make sure we were still here,” commented Bracknell in a low voice, “and whoever he was he has made a bee line from the door. That means that the camp they’re sitting in is somewhere in front; and in all probability they’ve forgotten the window at the back, or as it’s blocked with snow haven’t noticed it. We shall be able to quit that way.”They waited a little time longer, and then removed the moose hide from the window and very cautiously began to cut away the snow with which it had been blocked. That done they listened. No sound whatever was to be heard. Bracknell put out his head and peered into the darkness. There was nothing visible save the foreground of snow and the shadowy background of the forest. He climbed out, and very cautiously crept to the corner of the cabin to reconnoitre. In the shadow of the trees on the other side of the creek he caught the glow of a fire and discerned three men sitting round it. At that sight he crept back, and, whispering to the two girls to be very careful, assisted them out of the narrow window. Then without pausing they stole quietly across to the shadow of the sheltering woods.

UNDER COVER OF NIGHT

SHE STOODthere gasping for breath, and unable to speak; and to both the others in the cabin it was evident that something startling had occurred. Dick Bracknell found his tongue first.

“What is the matter, Miss La Farge? What has happened?”

Babette found her breath and cried pantingly,

“Some one tried to kill me?”

“To kill you!” her listeners cried together incredulously.

“Yes. I was walking down the creek, wondering where Jim and our dogs were gone to, when I heard a sharp sound, just like the twang of a bowstring and looked round. I could see nothing, and the woods on the banks were quite still and silent, nothing moving anywhere. I was still looking, and convincing myself that I had imagined the sound when it occurred again, and a second later an arrow struck a tree close by me, and remained there, quivering. I did not remain to see any more, or to try and learn who had sent it. I turned in my tracks and ran back here, and once as I ran an arrow passed clean through my parka, and buried itself in the snow beyond.”

Dick Bracknell broke out, suddenly, “Confoundit,” he cried, “this is intolerable. That Indian Joe must have gone mad!”

“You think it is your man?” asked Joy quickly.

“I am sure of it! Who else can it be in this God-forsaken wilderness? It must be he, but I will soon find out!”

He moved towards the door and throwing down the bar, opened it. There was nothing visible but the snow, and the dark woods. He took a step forward, and as he did so something came swishing through the air and struck the door post. He knew what it was before he saw it, and cried out.

“Joe, you confounded fool, what——”

The sharp crack of a rifle broke in on the words, and a bullet cut the fur off his coat at the top of the shoulder. He turned quickly round, and tumbled backward into the cabin, kicking the door to behind him. Joy ran forward, and dropped the bar in place, then looked at him.

“You are hurt?” she cried anxiously.

“No,” he answered, as he picked himself up.

“Only knocked over with surprise.”

“But that was a rifle, wasn’t it? Some one fired at you?”

“Yes, some one certainly did!” He gave a wheezy laugh as he lifted a hand to his shoulder.

“And he almost got me. He made the fur fly, and if it had struck an inch or two lower down I should have been out of action for a while at any rate. He must be a rotten shot, for out there on the snow I must have been a perfect mark!”

“But what on earth can your man be——”

“It is not Joe,” broke in Bracknell with conviction.“Even if he has gone clean into lunacy he’d never do a thing like that to me. Besides, Joe had no gun with him. Our guns are there in the corner, and as we’ve run out of ammunition they are no use. It simply can’t be Joe.”

“Then who can it be? And why should he want to do a thing like that?”

“It may be your other man—Jim, didn’t you call him? He may have returned, and thinking you were prisoners here, may have tried to get me in the hope of releasing you.”

“But you forget the attack on Babette! Some one shot arrows at her and——”

“By Jove! I had forgotten something! Stand away from the door. I’m going to open it. There’s something I want to get.”

“Oh, be careful!” cried Joy.

He swung around and looked at her whimsically, then he said quietly, “I’ll be careful for your sake, not my own. I’ve got to get you safely out of this. That much I owe you at any rate.”

He turned again to the door and cautiously opening it a little way, peeped out. There was nothing visible, and quickly he opened the door wider and thrusting out an arm, gripped the arrow which was sticking in the post, and hastily flung the door in place once more. Even as he did so, something crashed into the wood, and the sound of a shot reverberated through the stillness outside.

The two girls looked at him, their faces were white and they were much alarmed. Bracknell looked at the door and laughed shortly.

“It seems that we are to stand a regular siege,” he said. “That man of yours is of the persevering sort.”

Neither Joy nor her foster-sister replied, and moving towards the stove Bracknell threw on a spruce log, and as it caught and flamed up he stopped, and by its light he examined the arrow in his hand. Quarter of a minute later he stood up.

“This settles it,” he said. “This arrow is not Joe’s. It is too finely made, with an ivory barb on which somebody has spent time. Joe’s bow and arrows were makeshifts, and his barbs were of moose bone!”

“Then who can it be?” asked Joy. “Jim would have no arrows at all, and he certainly would not have fired them at Babette if he had.”

Dick Bracknell shook his head. “I cannot think. It may be a roving band of Indians from the far North. This arrow tells its own story. It is like those made by the Indian Esquimaux in the North Behring. I’ve been up there and I’ve seen arrows like it before.”

“But at least one of our attackers has a rifle,” said Miss La Farge.

“Yes,” answered Bracknell thoughtfully.

“And why should they attack us at all?” asked Joy.

“They may be out for plunder. Most of these fellows have a weakness for the possessions of white men. I’ve seen one of them risk his life for a woodman’s axe, and they’ll give their heads for a sheath knife. They will have seen the cabin and may think that there are things worth having here, but in anycase they will find out the mistake in a very few days.”

“Why?”

“Because we haven’t more than two or three days’ stock of food,” replied Bracknell grimly. “There’s only a small stock of coffee, a few beans and some frozen moose meat. That’s why I suspected Joe of trying to get your outfit. But I’ve changed my mind now. I think that those fellows outside may have killed your man—and Joe also, if we only knew!”

“Then our position is rather desperate?”

Bracknell nodded. “If those beggars really mean business, we’re in a pretty tight corner. They may rush the cabin or they may wait. In either case they will get us!”

“There is one possibility that you have not thought of yet,” said Babette slowly.

“What is that?”

“It is that this attack may not have been made by any roving tribe at all.”

“But who——”

“Adrian Rayner!”

“God in heaven!” as the exclamation broke from his lips Dick Bracknell looked at her in amazed conviction. “Of course, I never thought of him!”

“He is the one man who has cause to do such a thing. He knows that Joy and I suspect him of shooting you at North Star. He wanted to marry her, and he knows that that is now out of the question altogether. But he is Joy’s cousin, and Joy, as you know, is immensely wealthy. If she died up here——”

“Heavens! yes! And I would stake my life that he’s the man Roger is after, the man who caused your father’s death. He——”

“You did not tell me!” cried Joy. “How did my father die?”

“Some one blew up the ice on the river, the ice which he was bound to pass over in the morning. Of course the river froze over again in the night, but it was not strong enough to carry a man, let alone a man and a heavy sled team. He went through—and died, but if Roger is right he was diabolically murdered.”

Joy did not move. She looked at him with horror in her eyes. Then her face grew hard. “I believe, your cousin Roger is right. Adrian Rayner was abroad about the time when my father must have died. And he wanted to marry me after you had been shot at North Star, though he could not have been sure of your death.... It was my money he was after, and——”

“He’s after it yet!” cried Bracknell with conviction, “Miss La Farge is right. If you died up here—but have you made a will?”

Joy shook her head. “It was never suggested to me!”

“No—for a very good reason. As your next of kin Rayner and his father would step in if you died. The fellow has been working to that end all the time—he’s working now! And he’s cunning—most damnably cunning. The way he arranged your father’s death proves that, and if Miss La Farge here is right, and Adrian Rayner is the man behindthe gun, then we’re in a hole. The fellow will show us no mercy. He——”

“S-s-s-h-h!”

As she gave the warning, Miss La Farge lifted a hand, in signal for silence, and bent forward in a listening attitude. The other two listened also, but heard nothing save the splutter and hiss of the logs on the fire.

“What is it?” whispered Bracknell.

“Some one walked round the cabin. I heard him quite plainly. Ah—again.”

They listened. Crunch! crunch! came the sound of footsteps in the frozen snow outside. All round the cabin the steps passed, slowly, as if some one were making an inspection, and whilst they still sat listening, the steps receded and passed out of earshot. They looked at one another and Bracknell was the first to break the silence.

“A pretty cool customer, whoever he is! He was spying out the land.”

“Yes!” answered Miss La Farge in a half whisper.

“I wonder what he will do?” said Joy.

“Nothing, if he is wise,” answered Bracknell slowly. “Having walked round he’ll have made the discovery that we keep our wood at the rear of the cabin, and he’ll easily guess that we have no great stock inside. He has only to wait until the necessity for replenishing the stock arrives, and then he can get one of us at any rate.... He’ll know we have no dogs, and that we are tied to the cabin——”

“But are we?” interjected Joy.

“Well, the open trail without dogs is a risk that few men would care to undertake. I’ve been at it on one or two occasions, carrying my own stores, and it’s not a course to be recommended. The trail——”

“But we’ve very few stores to pack!” said Joy obstinately, “and if we stay here we shall be driven out by hunger. Do you know of any tribe of Indians in the neighborhood?”

Bracknell nodded. “There’s an encampment thirty or forty miles to the North on the Wolverine. Joe was talking to me about them the other day, and we considered once over whether we’d pay them a call or not. In the end we decided against it.”

“Why?”

“Well,” was the reply, “they’re rather a pagan lot, and not over scrupulous. Joe was telling me that in times of scarcity they sometimes offer sacrifices——”

“Sacrifices! What kind of sacrifices?”’

“Well, the most barbaric sort—human. There are some queer things done North of the Barrens, I can tell you. The world up here is still a primitive world, and the police patrol up the Mackenzie to Herschell Island can’t possibly take note of anything that doesn’t come right under its nose.”

“But the Indians cannot possibly be worse than Adrian Rayner!”

“No!” Bracknell laughed hoarsely. “He’s a tiger, for certain. Though I will own he didn’t look it when he was here the other day.” He was silent for a moment, then he said slowly, “Of course if wedecide to leave the cabin and if we go North, we may stumble on my Cousin Roger. It’s only a chance, but——” He broke off again, and looked at Joy as if wondering how she would take the suggestion, then added, “Well, we might take it, if we can manage to get away from here. What do you think?”

Joy hesitated. Her face flushed a little, then she said quietly, “I put myself in your hands.”

“Thank you. I am——”

A fit of coughing broke in on his speech, and when it had passed he did not attempt to complete his sentence, but as his eyes from time to time fell on her there was a soft glow in them, which revealed an unspoken gratitude.

They sat for a long time discussing the desperate situation, and late in the afternoon prepared for departure. Such food as the cabin held was made up in three packs, and when that was done, and all was ready, they rested, waiting for the hour of departure, Joy reflecting on the strange irony of circumstances which now made her dependent for help on the man who had so wronged her, and of whom she had lived in fear.

All was quiet outside and Babette was offering a tentative suggestion that perhaps after all the enemy outside had withdrawn, then again they caught the crunch! crunch! of cautious feet on the frozen snow, and as all three grew alert, they heard the steps pause by the door, and the next moment there was a rustling sound on the rough woodwork.

“Somebody feeling for the latch-string,” whispered Bracknell, then he hailed the intruder, as thelatter having found the string thrust a heavy shoulder against the barred door. “Hallo! Who goes there?”

To this challenge there was no reply, but a second or two later they again heard the steps receding across the snow.

“Came to make sure we were still here,” commented Bracknell in a low voice, “and whoever he was he has made a bee line from the door. That means that the camp they’re sitting in is somewhere in front; and in all probability they’ve forgotten the window at the back, or as it’s blocked with snow haven’t noticed it. We shall be able to quit that way.”

They waited a little time longer, and then removed the moose hide from the window and very cautiously began to cut away the snow with which it had been blocked. That done they listened. No sound whatever was to be heard. Bracknell put out his head and peered into the darkness. There was nothing visible save the foreground of snow and the shadowy background of the forest. He climbed out, and very cautiously crept to the corner of the cabin to reconnoitre. In the shadow of the trees on the other side of the creek he caught the glow of a fire and discerned three men sitting round it. At that sight he crept back, and, whispering to the two girls to be very careful, assisted them out of the narrow window. Then without pausing they stole quietly across to the shadow of the sheltering woods.

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