第27章

Then don't look at me like that, Kate; no, I played straight all the time---then I ran into Buck and he and I had tried each other out, we had at least one thing in common"--here he looked at Buck and they both flushed--"and we made a partnership of it.We've been together five years now.""I knew you could break away, Lee.I used to tell you that.""You helped me more than you knew," he said quietly.

She smiled and then turned to escape him."And now you, Buck?""Since then we've made a bit of coin punching cows and we've blown it in again prospecting.Blown it in? Kate, we've shot enough powder to lift that mountain yonder but all we've got is color.You could gild the sky with what we've seen but we haven't washed enough dust to wear a hole in a tissue-paper pocket.I'll tell you the whole story.Lee packs a jinx with him.But--Haines, did you ever see a lion as big as that?"The dimness of evening had grown rapidly through the room while they talked and now the light from the door was far less than the glow of the fire.The yellow flicker picked out a dozen pelts stretching as rugs on the floor or hanging along the wall; that to which Buck pointed was an enormous skin of a mountain lion stretched sidewise, for if it had been hung straight up a considerable portion of the tail must have dragged on the floor.Buck went to examine it.Presently he exclaimed in surprise and he passed his fingers over it as though searching for something.

"Where was it shot, Kate? I don't find nothin' but this cut that looks like his knife slipped when he was skinnin'.""It was a knife that killed it."

"What!"

"Don't ask me about it; I see the picture of it in my dreams still.The lion had dragged the trap into a cave and Bart followed it.Dan went in pushing his rifle before him, but--when he tried to fire it jammed.""Yes?" they cried together.

"Don't ask me the rest!"

They would hardly have let her off so easily if it had not been for the entrance of Joan who had come back on account of the darkness.Black Bart went promptly to a corner of the hearth and lay down with his head on his paws and the little girl sat beside him watching the fire, her head leaning wearily on his shoulder.Kate went to the door.

"It's almost night," she said."Why isn't he here?""Buck, they couldn't have overtaken--"

She started."Dan?"

Buck Daniels grinned reassuringly.

"Not unless his hoss is a pile of bones; if it has any heart in it, Dan'll run away from anything on four legs.No call for worryin', Kate.He's simply led 'em a long ways off and waited for evenin' before he doubled back.He'll come back right enough.If they didn't catch him that first run they'll never get the wind of him."It quieted her for a time, but as the minutes slipped away, as the darkness grew more and more heavy until a curtain of black fell across the open door, they could see that she was struggling to control her trouble, they could see her straining to catch some distant sound.Lee Haines began to talk valiantly, to beguile the waiting time, and Buck Daniels did his share with stories of their prospecting, but eventually more and more often silences came on the group.They began to watch the fire and they winced when a log crackled, or when the sap in a green place hissed.By degrees they pushed farther and farther back so that the light would not strike so fully upon them, for in some way it became difficult to meet each other's eyes.

Only Joan was perfectly at ease.She played for a time with the ears of Black Bart, or pried open his mouth and made him show the great white fangs, or scratched odd designs on the hearth with pieces of charcoal; but finally she lost interest in all these things and let her head lie on the rough pelt of the wolf-dog, sound asleep.The firelight made her hair a patch of gold.

Black Bart slept soundly, too, that is, as soundly as one of his nature could sleep, for every now and then one of his ears twitched, or he stirred a paw, or an eyelid quivered up.Yet they all started when he jumped from his sleep into full wakefulness; the motion made Joan sit up, rubbing her eyes, and Black Bart reached the center of the room noiselessly.He stood facing the door, motionless.

"It's Dan," cried Kate."Bart hears him! Good old Bart!"The dog pointed up his nose, the hair about his neck bristled into a ruff, and out of his quaking body came a sound that seemed to moan and whimper from the distance at first, but drew nearer, louder, packed the room with terror, the long drawn howl of a wolf.