Page:Judiths Gift to her editor.djvu/2

Rh one was in sight. The boat chugged on, and Judith started up a narrow trail. Huge fir trees dripped on each side; a dense undergrowth of ferns and bracken, fresh washed, shone in its rich, dark green. The forest held little life. She heard no singing birds, she saw no squirrels: just stillness, an awful, ominous, oppressive stillness. She followed the silent trail deeper into the dark woods. She ran, and presently, all out of breath, she came upon a clearing in the center of which stood an imposing structure built of immense logs. Smoke slowly ascended against the damp air from a single chimney. She stopped and knocked on the rough slabwood door.



Heavy steps slowly crossed a bare floor within, and the door was opened. A ranch woman stood there, broad of face, heavy of body, but young and wholesome appearing.

"I am a friend of Mrs. Sloane's," Judith said. "Tell her Judith Wells is here."

"She won't see you," the woman replied, not asking her in. "She won't see anyone."

"She must!" Judith protested. "We have been like sisters since we were babies."

"Sure you're not a reporter?"

Judith winced. Before she could frame a reply the woman spoke again.

"There's a return boat at the upper dock in an hour. Two others from Seattle have gone to get it. You'd better take it too."

"You mean the best in the world," Judith said, "and I appreciate what you are trying to do for Mrs. Sloane; but it is best for her that I stay."

Something boiled over on the kitchen stove, and the woman, with the concern of the good cook,—which she looked to be, every inch of her,—turned and hurried to the kitchen. Judith stepped in, hung her cap and cape on a peg back of the door, then sat down before the open fire and put out her feet to dry. Presently the woman returned. Seeing Judith so perfectly at home, she was disarmed. Possibly she was glad, too, to share the responsibility, after she had done her best to carry out instructions.

"She's awful bad," she began, taking a chair opposite and beginning to rock. "I'd have a doctor, if I had my way."

"Hysteria?"

"She lays and clutches tight to the bedding, and won't say anything but 'Don't let anyone in, Jenny!' That's all her fear,—of people coming."

It went through Judith like a flash—could it be possible? Her Spanish blood—her hotheadedness! But instantly she dismissed the thought. Helen might strike in a passion; but she could not deliberately do a real wrong. They talked on.

The woman gave such details as she knew of the drowning. She told how one of the ranch hands had come up the trail from the river carrying the body,—the water being shallow and clear, he had got it almost immediately,—and of finding Helen prostrate on the ground by the bank; of how she had carried her forcibly to the house and put her to bed; and how she had refused to move or talk or eat since.

"I've cooked the best the house affords three times and carried it up to her," she added ruefully, "and never a bite has she swallowed!"

"Of course she must eat," said Judith, seizing on the woman's chief weakness—or strength, as the case might be. "You fix up a nice tray for the two of us—it's nearly noon—and I'll carry it to her. Maybe she will eat with me. Many's the time we've had our bibs tied on and our bowls of bread and milk together."

The passion of the born cook overcame the woman's last scruples. She went to the kitchen, and soon there was a great slapping about of pans and broilers. When she finally brought in the tray there rested on it a couple of broiled squabs, a stack of golden toast, and a pot of steaming tea. She nodded to Judith, and started toward the broad stairway. Judith followed. The woman paused before a door on the upper balcony, put the tray in Judith's hands, then pushed open the door, closing it after her.

UDITH stood within a huge, bare room, in the far corner of which was a bed, where Helen lay, face downward, a crumpled heap.

She set down the tray and went over to the bed. Helen lay motionless as one dead. She picked up a brush and began to smooth out her heavy mass of matted hair. She could see that Helen was awake; but she gave no sign, probably mistaking her for the housekeeper. Judith continued her task till the mass of purple black hair lay in smooth strands; then she divided it and made two long braids. She pulled off her flaming tie, tore it in two, and made bright bows just above the paint brush ends, as Helen's hair had always been done when a child. She tiptoed across the room, secured a mirror, and coming back slipped her arm round the limp body and by a sudden twist turned Helen and held the mirror before her eyes.

"Childhood days, Nelly," she cried gaily, trying to laugh; but at sight of the pinched white face she dropped into sobbing. Every emotion died in her but her oldtime love for this playmate who was now so troubled. The tears came to Helen's eyes, and the two girls cried together, until at last, from sheer weakness, Helen became quiet, save for long, dry, shivery sobs that racked her body.

Judith picked up one of the squabs and tore it in two. "Eat it with me;" she begged, drawing Helen to a sitting posture.

Helen took a fragment and made an effort to eat; but a few bites and the poor girl could not go on. She dropped her head against Judith's shoulder and implored her not to leave. She seemed to have forgotten everything but that here at last out of the awful blackness had appeared a friend. The realization swept over Judith that Helen trusted her implicitly. Oh, if only she might stay on as her friend! If only there was no newspaper, no editor! But she must get her story—as a friend. She must worm her way into Helen's confidence to satisfy the thousands of curiosity seekers—but then, too, she was also serving her friend. All these reflections raced through her mind as she held Helen in her arms and soothed and comforted her. Time was an object, too. She must get the six o'clock boat back—with the story. She must get Helen out of bed, stop her brooding, and make her talk. She looked across to the cheerless fireplace.

"Don't leave me!" the poor girl pleaded, clutching tightly.

"I won't, Dear; but I'm freezing. Just a moment."

She called down the stairs to the housekeeper, and soon had a blazing log on the hearth. She tidied up the room,—Jenny was a better cook than chambermaid,—and found a woolly dressing gown and some slippers. She made Helen put them on; then, pulling up a great leather chair, half carried the protesting girl to it. She crowded down beside her, and they put their feet out to the flames. How often as children they had sat thus on a rainy afternoon intent over a fairy story! Poor Helen! She looked like a child now with her long braids and her mournful black eyes; just as she had looked the time she had typhoid fever so many years ago.

Judith talked of childish things. "Do you remember the day we broke Blanche's head, and there wasn't any glue to mend her, and you cried so? And old Nancy made us some gingerbread dolls to comfort us? I've often wondered how she made it. I've tried all the recipes I can find, and mine never tastes like hers."

At last Helen's face relaxed, she let her head fall on Judith's breast, the chair swayed gently, the warmth enfolded her, and she slept. Judith maintained her cramped position. If only Helen could rest, she might dare talk to her of the tragedy; but in her present mood she must keep her mind off it.

HEN she opened her eyes at last she looked up with a happy smile; but almost instantly realization came over her and her face became troubled again.

"Nelly darling, tell me all about it. You'll feel better to get it off your mind. Tell me everything that happened all day."

"Oh, Judie, it was horrible!"

"It won't be so horrible with two to share it."

"We had quarreled dreadfully the evening before," she began. "It was awful. His mother and father took his part, and that made him worse, and he struck off into the woods after saying he would never come back. He was so jealous, Judie! He wanted me all alone—that was why he brought me to this place. He couldn't bear for me to speak to another man. He didn't know—oh, Judie, it's horrible!—but he didn't know enough not to be jealous of the ranch hands. You know we were always taught to be polite to servants; but if I so much as spoke a pleasant good morning to one of them he would go into a black rage.

"I told him that day that he would make me hate him, and that I would leave him, if he didn't stop being suspicious. And I didn't hate him, Judie; for he did love me just for myself. He knew I wouldn't have any money,—I told him so,—but he wanted just me. I had always been so afraid of being married for my money. You see my people were so anxious for me to marry money that I supposed everyone else was equally crazy on the subject. Well, poor Dan wasn't a bit. He didn't care a rap for money: it was all just me.

"And so I got up early yesterday morning,—it was a sunny day,—and I thought I would go for a long walk and try to think things out alone. I came across him sitting on a great log looking so white and desolate,—he'd been there all night,—and the first thing I knew I was in his arms begging him to try to understand me. We talked a long time, and I tried to make him see that a woman of my class couldn't flirt with a servant, a ranch hand. He reminded me that I had married a man who had been worse. Then I began to get his viewpoint, and little by little got into sympathy with him; for, Judie, he did love me. If you could have seen his eyes when he looked at me—when he wasn't jealous, I mean! And I promised never to make him unhappy again. And to celebrate he proposed that we spend the whole day alone in the woods. So he went to the house for a lunch and—oh, yes, I called to him to bring my camera, and we set off.

"Judie, I haven't been so happy in months; for he was so happy, and his eyes shone so when he looked at me. He seemed so elemental and real! He loved the woods, and he loved me, and we played like children. We Robinson Crusoed, and he called me his man Friday, and we built a stove of stones, and broiled bacon for lunch. And then we began getting pictures. He would perch me high in the boughs and snap me, or we'd pose like two birds on a limb and fix the camera so we could snap ourselves; and we laughed and played all day among the things he could understand. I tell you, Judie, a man like that understands a lot about life that we artificial society people miss altogether. We just gossip our lives away while a man like that lives. What