It was hard going against the wind; Philip was the only one who managed his skis very satisfactorily, and Lawrence, of course, had to be a.s.sisted, but the crust was smooth and clear, and they made great sport of it. The two men placed Claire between them and crossed hands in front of her, like skaters. The fresh snow-filled air blew into their lungs, and they laughed like boys on a holiday. Claire glanced at the two and thought: "What a pair to be between!" Then laughed again. All the morbidity was gone, she was not thinking follies now, and neither of them was more than a good friend. Philip was thinking that Claire was good to see as she moved along between them, her graceful stroke carrying her over the snow, her cheeks stung red in the wind. Lawrence was not thinking at all. He was simply moving, deeply enjoying the wind and the exercise and the soft, strong little hand upon his own, helping to guide him through his darkness.

When they turned and stood close together, the wind caught them like a sail and sent them skimming before it. The sense of tobogganing was keenly exhilarating. Home, problems, worries, the future, all seemed very simply, very easy, and not at all a matter for long conversations before a hot fire.

CHAPTER IX.

CLAIRE'S ABAs.e.m.e.nT.

The following days and even weeks pa.s.sed quickly, carried on the wave of light-hearted play which Philip had so wisely started that Christmas night. February came with clear sun that set the snow glittering like a field of crystal under the dark pines, and they laughed with exuberance of spirit as they swept over it on their skis. Even Lawrence became an adept as long as he had one of their guiding hands to hold. All speculation was gone for the time being. Lawrence and Claire gave themselves up to a frank comradeship, in which Philip formed a splendid third, so that they seemed a trio of happy, healthy animals whose lives flowed without a break in the mere pleasure of living.

But one morning early in the month, Philip said after breakfast, over his coffee and cigarette, "I'm going for the day to my farthest traps across the river. Claire, would you care to go? We'll get back late this evening."

"I would," she said promptly. "I'll be ready in a few minutes."

Lawrence did not say anything, but to his sudden surprise he felt his heart sink. An insistent inner voice was saying, "I wish she wouldn't go."

He heard her, back of the curtain, dressing for the trip, and his little petulant thought grew into gloom at the prospect of her being away. He felt irritated at Philip for suggesting that she go.

"You'll have to leave me a good spread, Claire," he said finally when she emerged into the room.

"I'll fix you up a great meal," she laughed. "You can eat all day, if you like." In her voice there was an unusual warmth, for at his words she felt suddenly as though she were thoughtless of him in going. For a minute she pondered giving up the trip, then concluded that to do so would seem ridiculous, and set about preparing his lunch.

Philip rose and, putting on his heavy coat, said carelessly, "You can carve us a new wooden image, Lawrence."

The words were casual and without intention, but they angered. Lawrence felt as though both of them were trying to make amends to him for their going, as though, being blind, he must of course stay at home, but ought to have something to occupy his time. His resentment grew stronger as he continued to think of their supposed condescension.

When the lunches were ready Claire and Philip started. At the door she paused and said gaily: "Keep the house warm for our returning, Lawrence."

He was sullenly angry and made no reply. The frank way in which she spoke of herself and Philip somehow recalled to his mind other couples, married lovers starting out somewhere, and his heart tightened perceptibly. After they were gone he sat thinking for a long time, and his impulsive feeling clarified into certainty. Claire and Philip were in love. Perhaps they did not know it yet themselves, and had not spoken, perhaps they had; at any rate, they were in love. It had grown between them in his very presence, and he, doubly blind fool, had not known. If he could have seen, it would have been clear to him, of course.

He thought of Claire's husband, and grew virtuously angry at Claire.

Howard Barkley would mourn his days out, never knowing that his beloved wife was living in Bolivia with a Spanish trapper! He saw Claire going about the cabin as Philip's wife and doing for love the things she now did out of a desire to be of use, and his rage grew. Was it not for love that she did them now? But she was just as thoughtful of him as she was of Philip. "Of course, idiot," he muttered, "she pities you; you poor, abandoned, blind man, you are to be cared for, don't you see?" He strove to shake himself into a different mood by self-ridicule. Was this the philosopher who made life a matter of calm acceptance of circ.u.mstances which he knew to be his master? He laughed at himself, but the laugh was bitter, and he knew that he was not willing to accept this particular turn of circ.u.mstances.

But what right had he to judge what she did? She was not his wife nor the woman who would be his wife. She could never be his wife. There was her husband. No, it was not her husband that counted, but Philip!

Suddenly Lawrence realized the point that he had reached.

He loved Claire Barkley.

The admission of that at last in frank, utter avowal set him dreaming of the joys she might have been to him. He thought of a thousand little intimacies, cares, thoughtfulnesses, that she might have given him and received from him, and they were all made vital, real, by the now ardent memory of her in his arms, of the hands he had held in his own so often of late in the open.

In the afternoon he grew disgusted with himself. He had moped all day in his chair, moving only to replenish the fire or get a cigarette, and he now shook himself vigorously free from his thoughts. "You love her, yes, and she obviously does not love you," he told himself. "Why, then, make the best of it, if you can't do better, and at least don't be a beast in your treatment of your host when he comes back to his own hearth."

With that he dragged out a block of wood, took his knife, and went to work. As was his way, he was soon unconscious of everything but the piece of wood beneath his hand. He had never done wood-carving before, and he was learning the technique that made it very different from clay.

He had gone at this piece without any special intent and was shaping it into a cherub merely out of whim, but he was giving to the task every atom of his skill, and his hands worked with every nerve strained to detect and keep line and proportion.

Swiftly under his knife the child's body grew in shape, and he caressed the rough form tenderly. He would polish it later, and then what pleasure it would represent! It would make a great decoration for the cabin--for her cabin. He winced--yes, for hers and Philip's cabin.

"Fool!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "Forget it!" He bent again to his work, but it did not go so smoothly. Out there she and Philip would be laughing merrily together, skimming over the snow in long, sweeping strides, hand in hand. Would they think of him? Probably not, or if they did it would be to say, "Poor Lawrence! It's a pity he's blind. He has real talent."

He gritted his teeth. Well, he had real talent, and they should know it.

She should know it. He would show her such carving as she had never thought possible. After all, was her love to him, Lawrence the artist, the capable, blindness-conquering artist? "I am reconstructing my life,"

he thought, "so that I can still find it valuable without the woman I want." He again laughed bitterly and said to himself, "You poor, blind, groveling beast, you, what a poor excuse for life you have, and what a tawdry subst.i.tute you would offer Claire for the vast joy that is hers!

Oh, it is contemptible!"

He bent over his work again, and the door opened.

Claire came across the room and leaned over him, her body radiating a cool, healthy perfume as she laid her hand on his shoulder.

"Oh, what a splendid piece of work, Lawrence!"

Her voice was joyous, triumphant, and his heart beat desperately against his chest. "They've declared their love," he thought, and then he said simply, his voice vibrant with the emotion he did not otherwise show, "It's been beastly lonesome to-day, Claire."

She laughed gaily, while her eyes clouded. Then she noticed the untouched food on the table.

"Why, Lawrence, didn't you like the lunch I fixed for you?"

"It was bully, Claire," he answered quickly, "but I wasn't very hungry to-day--I don't know why."

The emotional coloring in his voice set her whole being atremble. She had come in, radiant with the day's pleasure, and he had met her with his need. He had been too blue even to eat. She was suddenly seized with pity for him, as she thought of his long day alone. But more than that, over and over in her heart she kept saying, with a joy she could not conceal from herself, "He loves me! He loves me!"

Philip came in and bent over them both to look at the wooden child.

"_Caramba!_ it is a marvelous thing!" he exclaimed. The unconscious use of the Spanish word showed the genuineness of his admiration.

Claire laughed joyously. She was glad that Philip knew the power of this blind man who loved her, and a vague feeling came over her that she was now somehow safe from Philip. Instantly she wondered at her feeling the need of safety from him. Glancing back over Lawrence's head, she met Ortez's eyes and read in their look a tenderness that he did not know was there. Her heart leaped unsteadily, and her lashes dropped. She was saying to herself, "How wonderful he is!"

Then she turned and almost ran behind the curtain that walled her room.

On the edge of her bed she sat, her face in her hands, hot tears burning her eyes, while over and over the blood rushed into her cheeks and out again.

"Claire! Claire! What sort of a woman are you?" she moaned.

Her heart beat irregularly under the surge of emotion that shook her.

She was glad, glad that Lawrence loved her. She had looked into the eyes of Philip Ortez, and her own had dropped, while her mind had leaped into admiration of him, warm, yielding admiration. What was it that had swept her on the discovery of one man's love to a deep, vibrant gladness--that another man's eyes had been filled with tenderness for her? Was she so changed from the Claire of old? Was she utterly degraded? Did she want both men to love her? Did she love either of them? What of her husband?

She sank down on the bed and wept silently.

They were talking out there in the cabin. She heard Lawrence say laughingly: "One gets accustomed to hearing your voices around, and to hearing Claire do things, so that a day alone seems endless."

"Hearing Claire do things"--that was it--and suppose he knew what she was, would he want to hear her then?

"Oh, I know," Philip was answering. "It gets to be a sort of necessity, doesn't it, when we have so many a.s.sociations and memories all among ourselves? I shall find the place dreary next winter, I am afraid, when you are back among your friends, and Claire"--he paused slightly--"will be going about as ever, doing things for her husband somewhere up there in the States."

Would her husband ever imagine or discover what she was? If he did, he would leave her. She remembered a girl in the slums at home who had refused to be uplifted. "Aw, one fellow ain't enough. A plain ham is all right for some, but I want a club-sandwich." She shuddered now at the memory of the girl's words, and shrank together on her bed. Was she another of that sort, abnormal, degenerate, whose life must find its level at last in the sordid riot of promiscuity, disguising itself as love? If Claire had never touched the bed-rock of self-abas.e.m.e.nt before, she was doing it now, there in that cabin.

She heard Ortez starting to get supper, and she sat up quickly. With stern control she forced herself to seem composed and quiet, while within her pa.s.sions raged like a tornado. Self-contempt, wonder, amazement, pity for her husband, for Lawrence, and hatred for Philip Ortez swept round and round in her brain like a maelstrom.

She stepped through her curtain and said gaily: "You're preempting my privilege, Philip."