Told in the Hills: A Novel

"Not exactly," she answered with a little laugh; "what an observer you are, Jim! I suppose the atmosphere of the cabin was the effect of the storm last night."

"What? Well, the storm wasn't much worse to plow through last night than the wet timber this morning," he answered morosely; "but say, here's the sun coming out at last – by George! How the wind lifts the fog when it gets started. Look at it!" And then, as the sunlight really crept in a great shimmer through the pines, he added: "It might just as well have come earlier, or else kept away altogether, for we're as wet now as we can get."

"Be thankful that it shines at all, Jim."

"Oh, the shine's all right, but it shines too late."

"Yes," agreed the girl, with a memory of shamed, despairing eyes flitting through her brain. "Yes, it always shines too late – for someone."

"It's for two of us this time," replied grumbling Jim, taking her speech literally. "We've had a Nick of a time anyway this trip. Why that storm had to wait until just the day we got lost, so as we'd get wet, an' straggle home dead beat – an' without the sheep – I can't see."

"No, we can't see," said Rachel, with a queer little smile. "Perhaps – perhaps it's all because this is the end instead of the beginning of a cultus corrie."

PART THIRD

"PRINCE CHARLIE"

CHAPTER I.

IN THE KOOTENAI SPRING-TIME

In the spring that followed, what a spirit of promise and enterprise was abroad on the Hardy ranch! What multitudes of white lambs, uncertain in the legs, staggered and tottered about the pasture lands! and what musical rills of joy in the mountain streams escaping through the sunshine from their prisons of ice! The flowers rose from the dead once more – such a fragrant resurrection! slipping from out their damp coffins and russet winding-sheets with dauntless heads erect, and eager lips open to the breath of promise. Some herald must bear to their earth-homes the tidings of how sweet the sun of May is – perhaps the snow sprites who are melted into tears at his glances and slip out of sight to send him a carpet of many colors instead of the spotless white his looks had banished. It may be so, though only the theory of an alien.

And then the winged choruses of the air! What matinees they held in the sylvan places among the white blossoms of the dogwood and the feathery tassels of the river willow, all nodding, swaying in the soft kisses sent by the Pacific from the southwest – soft relays of warmth and moisture that moderate those western valleys until they are affronted by the rocky wall that of old was called by the Indians the Chippewyan Mountains, but which in our own day, in the more poetical language of the usurper, has been improved upon and dubbed the "Rockies." But all the commonplaces of those aliens can not deprive the inaccessible, conservative solitudes of their wild charms. And after those long months of repression, how warmly their smile bursts forth – and how contagious it is!

Laugh though the world may at the vibrations of poet hearts echoing the songs of the youngest of seasons, how can they help it? It is never the empty vessel that brims over, and with the spring a sort of inspiration is wakened in the most prosaic of us. The same spirit of change that thrills the saplings with fresh vitality sends through human veins a creeping ecstasy of new life. And all its insidious, penetrating charm seemed abroad there in the Northern-land escaped from under the white cloak of winter. The young grass, fresh from the valley rains, warmed into emerald velvet in the sunshine, bordered and braced with yellow buttons of dandelion; while the soil was turned over with the plows, and field and garden stocked with seed for the harvest.

Energetic, busy days those were after the long months of semi-inaction; even the horses were too mettlesome for farm drudgery – intoxicated, no doubt, by the bracing, free winds that whispered of the few scattered droves away off to the north that bore no harness and owned no master. All things were rebellious at the long restraint, and were breaking into new paths of life for the new season.

Even a hulking Siwash, with his squaw and children, came dragging down the valley in the wake of the freshets, going to the Reservation south, content to go any place where they could get regular meals, with but the proviso to be "good Injun."

They loafed about the ranch two days, resting, and coming in for a share of rations from the Hardy table; and the little barefooted "hostiles" would stand about the gate and peer in around the posts of the porch, saying in insinuating tones:

"Pale papoose?"

Yes, the spirit of the hills and grazing lands had crept under the rafters and between the walls, and a new life had been given to the world, just as the first violets crept sunward.

And of course no other life was ever quite so sweet, so altogether priceless, as this little mite, who was already mistress of all she surveyed; and Aunty Luce – their one female servant – declared:

"Them eyes o' hers certainly do see everything in reach of 'em. She's a mighty peart chile, I'm tellin' ye."

Even Jim had taken to loafing around the house more than of old, and showing a good deal of nervous irritation if by any chance "she" was allowed to test her lungs in the slightest degree. The setter pups paled into insignificance, and a dozen times a day he would remark to Ivans that it was "the darndest, cutest, little customer he ever saw."

"Even you have become somewhat civilized, Rachel, since baby's arrival," remarked Tillie in commendation.

Yes, Rachel was still there. At the last moment, a few appealing glances from Tillie and some persuasive words from Hen had settled the question, and a rebellion was declared against taking the home trail, and all the words of the Houghtons fell on barren soil, for she would not – and she would not.

"They will never miss me back there in Kentucky," she argued; "there are so many girls there. But out here, femininity is at a premium. Let me alone, Clara; I may take the prize."

"And when am I to tell the folks you will come back?" asked Mrs. Houghton, with the purpose of settling on a fixed time and then holding her to it.

"Just tell them the truth, dear – say you don't know," answered the girl sweetly. "I may locate a claim out here yet and develop into a stock-grower. Do not look so sulky. I may be of use here; no one needs me in Kentucky."

"What of Nard Stevens?" was a final query; at which Rachel no longer smiled – she laughed.

"Oh, you silly Clara!" she burst out derisively. "You think yourself so wise, and you never see an inch beyond that little nose of yours. Nard needs me no more than I need him – bless the boy! He's a good fellow; but you can not use him as a trump card in this game, my dear. Yes, I know that speech is slangy. Give my love to Nard when you see him – well, then, my kind regards and best wishes if the other term conflicts with your proper spirit, and tell him I have located out here to grow up with the country."

And through the months that followed she assuredly grew to the country at all events; the comparative mildness of the winters proving a complete surprise to her, as, hearing of the severe weather of the North, she had not known that its greatest intensity extends only to the eastern wall of the great mountain range, and once crossing the divide, the Chinook winds or currents from the Pacific give the valleys much the temperature of our Middle States, or even more mild, since the snow-fall in the mountains is generally rain in the lowlands. Sometimes, of course, with the quick changes that only the wind knows, there would come a swoop downward of cold from the direct North, cutting through the basins, and driving the Pacific air back coastward in a fury, and those fitful gusts were to be guarded against by man and beast; and wise were growing those eastern prophets in their quickness to judge from the heavens whether storm or calm was to be with them.

But despite Clara's many predictions, the days did not grow dull to Rachel, and the ranch was not a prison in winter-time. She had too clearly developed the faculty of always making the best of her surroundings and generally drawing out the best points in the people about her.

It was that trait of hers that first awakened her interest in that splendid animal, their guide from the Maple range.

He had disappeared – gone from the Kootenai country, so they told her. But where? or for what? That none could answer.

Her memory sometimes brought her swift flushes of mortification when she thought of him – of their association so pregnant with some sympathy or subtle influence that had set the world so far beyond them at times. Now that he was gone, and their knowledge of each other perhaps all over, she tried to coolly reason it all out for herself, but found so much that contained no reason – that had existed only through impulses – impulses not easy to realize once outside the circle of their attending circumstances.

Those memories puzzled her – her own weakness when she lay in his arms, and her own gift of second-sight that gave her an understanding of him that morning when she turned champion for him against himself.

Was it really an understanding of him? or was it only that old habit of hers of discovering fine traits in characters voted worthless? – discoveries laughed at by her friends, until her "spectacles of imagination" were sometimes requested if some specimen of the genus homo without any redeeming points was under discussion.

Was it so in this case? She had asked herself the question more than once during the winter. And if she had been at all pliable in her opinions, she would long ere spring have dropped back to the original impression that the man was a magnificent animal with an intellect, and with spirituality and morality sleeping.

But she was not. A certain stubbornness in her nature kept her from being influenced, as the others were, by the knowledge that after all they had had a veritable "squaw man" as a guide.

Hardy was surprised, and Tillie was inconsolable.

"I never will believe in an honest face again!" she protested.

"Nonsense!" laughed Rachel. "Pocahontas was an Indian and Rolfe was not hustled out of society in consequence."

"N – No," assented Tillie, eyeing Rachel doubtfully "but then, you see Rolfe married Pocahontas."

"Yes?"

"And – and Ivans told Hen he heard that the squaw you saw at Genesee's was only a sort of slave. Did he tell you and Jim that she was his wife?"

"I – I don't know;" and Rachel suddenly sat down on a chair near the window and looked rather hopelessly at the questioner. "No, I don't believe he said so, but the circumstances and all – well, I took it for granted; he looked so ashamed."

"And you thought it was because of a marriage ceremony, not for the lack of one?"

"Yes," acknowledged the girl, inwardly wondering why that view of the question had not presented itself to her. Had she after all imagined herself sighting an eagle, and was it on nearer acquaintance to develop into a vulture – or, worse still, a buzzard – a thing reveling only in carrion, and knowing itself too unclean to breathe the same air with the untainted! So it seemed; so Tillie was convinced; so she knew Clara would have thought. In fact, in all the range of her female acquaintances she could think of none whose opinion would not have been the same, and she had an impatient sort of wonder with herself for not agreeing with them. But the memory of the man's face that morning, and the echo of that "God bless you, girl!" always drifted her away from utter unbelief in him.

She heard considerable about him that winter; that he was thought rather eccentric, and belonged more to the Indians than the whites, sometimes living with a tribe of Kootenais for weeks, sometimes disappearing, no one knew where, for months, and then settling down in the cabin again and placidly digging away at that hole in the hill by the little lake – the hill itself called by the Indians "Tamahnous," meaning bewitched, or haunted. And his persistence in that work was one of the eccentric things that made some people say significantly:

"They allowed Genesee was a good man, but a little 'touched' on the silver question."

And for Tillie's benefit Hen had to explain that the term "good" had nothing whatever to do with the man's moral or spiritual worth; its use was in a purely physical sense.

After the snows fell in the mountains there were but few strangers found their way to the new ranch. Half locked in as it was by surrounding hills, the passes were likely to be dangerous except to the initiated, and there were not many who had business urgent enough to push them through the drifts, or run their chances with land-slides. But if a stray hunter did come their way, his call was not allowed to be a short one. They had already become too thoroughly Western in their hospitality to allow the quick departure of a guest, a trait of which they had carried the germs from old Kentucky.

What cheery evenings there were in the great sitting-room, with the logs heaped high in the stone fire-place! An uncarpeted room, with long, cushioned settees along two sides of it – and mighty restful they were voted by the loungers after the day's work; a few pictures on the wall, mostly engravings; the only color given the furnishing was in the pink and maroon chintz curtains at the windows, or cushions to the oak chairs. There in the fire-light of the long evenings were cards played, or stories told, or magazines read aloud, Rachel and Hen generally taking turn about as reader. And Tillie in the depths of the cushioned rocker, knitting soft wool stuffs, was a chatelaine, the picture of serene content, with close beside her a foil in the form of black Aunty Luce, whom only devotion to her young miss would ever have tempted into those wilds; and after the work was over for the night, it was a usual thing to see her slipping in and snuggling down quietly to listen to the stories told or read, her big eyes glancing fearfully toward windows or doors if the Indian question was ever touched on; though occasionally, if approached with due ceremony and full faith shown in her knowledge, she would herself add her share to the stories told, her donation consisting principally of sure "hoodoos," and the doings of black witches and warlocks in the land of bayous; for Aunty Luce had originally come from the swamps of Louisiana, where the native religion and superstitions have still a good following. And old Aunty's reminiscences added to the variety of their evening's bill of entertainment.

A mail-carrier unexpectedly sprang up for them in the winter in the person of a young half-breed called Kalitan, or the Arrow. He had another name, his father, an Englishman, and agent for a fur company, had happened to be around when his swarthy offspring was ushered into the world, and he promptly bestowed on him his own name of Thomas Alexander. But it was all he did bestow on him – and that only by courtesy, not legality; and Alexander Junior had not even the pleasure of remembering his father's face, as his mother was soon deserted. She went back to her tribe and reared her son as an Indian, even his name in time was forgotten, as by common consent the more characteristic one of Kalitan was given him because of the swiftness of foot that had placed him among the best "runners" or messengers in the Indian country – and the average speed of a runner will on a long march out-distance that of cavalry. At the military post at Fort Missoula, Kalitan's lines had first fallen among those of Genesee, and for some unexplained reason his adherence to that individual became as devoted as Mowitza's own. For a long time they had not ranged far apart, Genesee seldom leaving the Kootenai country that Kalitan did not disappear as well. This last trip his occupation was gone, for word had been left with MacDougall that the trail was not clear ahead, but if Kalitan was wanted he would be sent for, and that sinewy, bronze personage did not seem to think of doing other than wait – and the waiting promised to be long.

He took to hanging around Scot's Mountain more than of old, with the query, "Maybe Genesee send lettah – s'pose? I go see."

And go he would, over and over again, always with a philosophic "S'pose next time," when he returned empty-handed. Sometimes he stopped at the ranch, and Rachel at once recognized him as the youth who had brought her the black bear skin months before, and pretended at the time utter ignorance of Chinook. He would speak Chinook fast enough to her now if there was any occasion, his white blood, and the idea that she was Genesee's friend, inclining him to sociability seldom known to the aristocratic conservatives of the Indian race.

The nearest mail station was twenty miles south, and it was quite an item to find a messenger as willing as was Kalitan; storm or calm, he would make the trip just the same, carrying his slip of paper on which all the names were written and which he presented as an order to the postmaster. A big mail was a cause of pride to him, especially magazines or packages. Letters he did not think of much account, because of their size.

To Aunty Luce he was a thing of dread, as were all of his race. She was firmly convinced that the dusky well-featured face belonged to an imp of the evil one, and that he simply slid over the hills on the cold winds, without even the aid of a broom-stick. The nights that he spent at the ranch found Aunty's ebony face closer than ever to the side of Mistress Tillie's chair.

Another member had been added to the visiting list at Hardy's, and that was the sovereign of Scot's Mountain.

Along in midwinter, Kalitan brought a scrawled note from "Ole Man Mac," asking for some drugs of which he stood in need. The request brought to light the fact that Kalitan one day while paying visits had found "Ole Man Mac" sick in bed – "heap sick – crank – no swallow medicine but white man's."

The required white man's medicine was sent, and with it a basket with white bread, fresh butter, and various condiments of home manufacture that Tillie's kindly heart prompted her to send to the old trapper – one of their nearest neighbors.

The following day Rachel and her henchman Jim started on Kalitan's trail, with the idea of learning personally if any further aid that the ranch could give was needed at the cabin. A snow three days old covered the ground, in which Kalitan's trail was easily followed; and then Rachel had been over the same route before, starting light-hearted and eager, on that cultus corrie.

They reached Scot's Mountain a little after noon, and found its grizzled, unshaven owner much better than he had been the day before, and close beside him on the pillow lay his one companion, the cat.

"Well, well! to think o' this!" said the old man, reaching a brawny hand to her from the bunk. "You're the first white woman as ever passed that door-post, and it's rare and glad I am that it's your own self."

"Why myself more than another?" she asked, rather surprised at his words. "I would have come long ago if I had known I was wanted, or that you even knew of me."

"Have I not, then?" he queried, looking at her sharply from under his wrinkled, half-closed lids. "But sit ye down, lady. Kalitan, bring the chair. And is that a brother – the lad there? I thought I had na heard of one. Sit you down close that I can see ye – a sight good for sore een; an' I have no heard o' ye? Ah, but I have, though. Many's the hour the lad has lain lazy like on the cot here, an' told me o' the gay folk frae the East. Ye know I'd be a bit curious o' my new neighbors, an' would be askin' many's the question, an' all the tales would end wi' something about the lass that was ay the blithe rider, an' ever the giver o' good judgment."

The girl felt her face grow hot under those sharp old eyes. She scarcely knew what to say, and yet could give no sensible reason for such embarrassment; and then —

"The lad – what lad?" she asked at last.

"Oh – ay. I clean forgot he is no lad to you. Kalitan, will ye be building up that fire a bit? When we have quality to visit we must give them a warm welcome, if no more. An' the lad, as I was sayin'," he continued, "was but Genesee – no other; though he looked more the lad when I called him so first."

"You are such old friends, then?"

"No so old as so close, ye might say. It's a matter o' five year now since he come up in these hills wi' some men who were prospectin', an' one an' another got tired and dropped down the country again till only Genesee was left. He struck that haunted hill in the Maple range that they all said was of no good, an' he would na leave it. There he stuck in very stubbornness, bewitched like by it; an' the day before his flittin' in the fall found him clear through the hill, helped a bit by striking into an old mine that nobody knew aught of. Think o' that! – dug into a mine that had been abandoned by the Indians generations ago, most like."

"I did not know that the Indians ever paid attention to mining. They seem to know no use for gold or silver until the white men teach them it."

"True enough; but there the old mine stands, as a clear showin' that some o' the heathen, at some time, did mine in that range; an' the stone mallets an' such like that he stumbled on there shows that the cave was not the result o' accident."

"And has he at last given it up as hopeless?"

"That's as time may happen to tell," answered the old man sagely; "an' old Daddy Time his own self could na keep his teeth shut more tight than can Genesee if there's a bit secret to hold. But o' the old mine he said little when he was takin' the trail, only, 'It has kept these thousand o' years, Davy – it will most like keep until I get back.'"

From that speech Rachel gathered the first intimation that Genesee's absence from the Kootenai country was only a transient one. Was he then to come back and again drop his life into its old lines? She did not like to think of it – or to question. But that winter visit to "Ole Man Mac," as Kalitan called him, was the beginning of an avowed friendship between the old hermit of the northern hills and the young girl from the southern ones.

Her independent, curious spirit and youthful vitality were a sort of tonic to him, and as he grew better he accepted her invitation to visit the ranch, and from that time on the grizzled head and still athletic frame of the old fellow were not strange to the Hardy household. He was there as often as was consistent with the weather in the hills and almost seventy years of braving their hardships; for of late years MacDougall did not range widely. His traps could find too many nooks near home for mink, lynx, and the black bear, and from the Kootenai tribes on the north he bought pelts, acting the trader as well as trapper; and twice a year making a trip to a settlement to dispose of his wares, with horses from his Indian neighbors to transport them with.

Rachel learned that for forty years he had followed that isolated life – moving steadily farther west or farther north as the grip of civilization made itself felt behind him; and he felt himself crowded if a settler's prairie schooner was sighted within twenty-five miles of him. The girl wondered, often, the cause of that self-exile, but no word or sign gave her any clew. He had come from the eastern highlands of Scotland when less than thirty years old, and had struck out at once for the extreme borders of civilization in America; and there he had remained – always on the borders – never quite overtaken.

"It will be but a few more stands I can make," he would say to her sometimes. "Time is little content to be a laggard, and he is running me close in a race he has na' a doubt of winning."

With advancing years, the barrier, whatever the foundation, that he had raised between himself and the world was evidently weakening somewhat; and first through Genesee, and now through this girl, had come a growing desire for intercourse with his own race once more. And much teasing did the girl get in consequence of the visits that by the family in general were conceded to belong to Rachel in particular, teasing, however, which she bore with indifference, openly claiming that the stronger interest was on her side, and if he forgot his visits she would certainly go herself to Scot's Mountain to learn the why and wherefore. This she did more than once, through the season, when indoor life grew at all monotonous; sometimes with Jim as a companion, and sometimes with Kalitan trotting at her mare's head, and guiding very carefully Betty's feet over the dangerous places – Aunty Luce always watching such a departure with prophecies of "Miss Rache's sea'p a-hangin' round the neck o' that red nigger some o' these days, I'm a-tellin' yeh!"