"Hit air er lie," he repeated with a rasping voice, as he dashed the blood and dirt from his lips. "We war fightin' ter kill, an' I reckon yo' kin guess what hit war erbout," he added, flinging the last words up at the girl.

Once again Donald attempted to save her still greater distress by a white lie. "I chanced to stumble on his hidden still, Smiles, and he thought that I would betray him."

"Oh, Juddy," cried the girl wringing her hands, "I've been erfeerin' this. In course I knowed erbout hit, fer yo' showed me the still yerself, but I've been worryin', and hit war ter warn ye ... ter beg ye ter quit fer leetle Lou's sake erfore hit war too late thet I came. Yo' must quit, oh please, Judd." In her eagerness she ran down the bank and toward him. "I knows thet Doctor Mac wouldn't tell, but hit's a warnin'."

As though hypnotized, Judd gazed into her pleading face, with his pa.s.sion for her overwhelming that other one, which had so short a time before swayed him. He stepped to meet her with a gesture of hopelessness, and, realizing that he was for the moment forgotten, Donald moved softly to the mountaineer's rifle, ejected the cartridges from the magazine and pocketed them un.o.bserved.

"I kaint quit, Rose," answered Judd, looking into her face with a hungry expression. "I kaint stop. Hit's my work, an' hit pays better then ever hit done. I wants ter make money ... fer yo'. Besides, ef hit hadn't ha' been fer the white liquor what I sell ter the storeman down in Fayville, I wouldn't have been able ter sell yo'r baskets for ye. I wouldn't hev had no money ter give ..."

He checked his impetuous, unconsidered words too late. The girl's quick mind delved into his unspoken thought. She started and stepped back, crying, "'To give?' Judd Amos, war hit yo' thet paid me ther extry price on them baskets?"

Confused and distressed, the other remained silent until she repeated her question insistently. Then he answered pleadingly, "I loves ye, Smiles. Yo' know hit, an' so does he. I wanted ter holp ye, an' 'twar ther only way."

Even while Donald--rejoicing in the opportunity to regain his self-possession--had stood apart from the other two, none of the conversation had escaped him. With his wrath now fanned to flame afresh by Judd's apparent falsehood, he, too, burst into hot words without pausing to consider the effect of them on the girl, "What? You dare attempt to curry favor with her by lyingly claiming credit for the additional money her work brought, you cur? You didn't know that I held the cards to call that outrageous bluff, too, did you? You didn't know that I bought every one of those baskets, and told the storekeeper what price to pay for them, did you?"

No sooner had the anger-impelled words left his lips than Donald felt heartily ashamed of himself, and wished that he might unsay them. Half afraid, he turned his eyes toward the girl to find his fears realized. Her eyes were flaming from her deathly white face, and a mingled look of hurt pride and bitter scorn struggled for supremacy on her lips.

"Yo' ... yo' think I would accept yo'r charity?" she cried. "Yo' think I would take money gifts from any man? I allows ter pay ye both every cent uv thet money; and I hates ye ... I hates ye both."

For an instant she stood trembling with anger and mortification, then turned and sped up the bank and away into the woods.

Judd sank down with a m.u.f.fled groan, but Donald, shocked at the result of his ill-advised and hasty words, forgot his late adversary and sprang in pursuit, crying, "Smiles. Dear child, wait. I want to talk with you, to explain...."

He ran over rock and crag blunderingly into the forest in the direction she had taken, and, as he disappeared, Mike, who, during the combat, had continually raged at his leash in futile frenzy, made a last desperate effort, snapped the leather collar, although the effort drew a yelp of pain from him, and tore after him.

He pa.s.sed his master and overtook the fleeing girl, sagaciously sensing the situation; but, as she paid no heed to his appealing barks and tugs at her skirt, but merely ran the faster, he turned back to await his lord. Body-weary and discomforted, Donald likewise gave up the chase as the sound of Smiles' flight grew more distant and died away.

Eventually she too dropped into a walk, and finally stopped altogether, with a deep, gasping sob. Throwing herself down at the foot of an ancient tree, she pressed her flushed face hard against the rough bark, her mind in a wretched turmoil.

For the first time in Smiles' young life her eyes had been opened, and she had looked upon the brute pa.s.sions of men, had tasted the bitter gall of trust abused, had felt an anger which brought with it the desire to hurt another as she herself had been hurt.

Stabbed to the quick of her soul, she lay on the moss-bedded roots of the impa.s.sive tree, her body quivering with soundless, shuddering sobs.

She hated herself, the two men--and Judd less than Donald, for she had known and excused his shortcomings, while in her childish eyes Dr. MacDonald had been all that was n.o.ble, a super-man, an idol whose feet were now clay. She hated the world where such things were possible.

For a long time Rose lay as she had fallen, hardly moving, and when--pale and dry-eyed--she did arise to return to the cabin through the twilight shadows, something beautiful, but indefinable, which had gone to make up the fresh, childlike charm of her face, had vanished.

Meanwhile, Donald walked heavily on with bowed head, heedless of the direction he took. The sound of rushing waters finally struck upon his ear, and his heated, dirt-covered body turned instinctively in their direction. A few minutes brought him to the river at a point where it tore through a narrow ravine of rock, in dashing cataract and noisy rapid. Donald, with increasing lameness, made his way painfully along the craggy bank until it descended to the river's edge, and, kneeling beside the leaping waters, he plunged his bruised, aching hands and face into them gratefully.

As he stood up again at last, his ears caught faintly above the river's tumult the distant crack of a rifle, followed immediately by another sound nearer at hand on the bank above him.

It was the agonized yelp of pain from a dog. Donald sprang erect, his heart seeming to lift with a convulsive action, and crowd his throat. He well knew that canine cry, now filled with mortal agony.

Almost blind with reborn rage and fear, Donald sprang up the steep bank, scrambling, stumbling, heedless of boughs which lashed across his face, and rocks which bruised his legs. He reached the top, and, parting the bushes, found what he had sought--and feared to find. On the stubbly gra.s.s lay little Mike, whining and biting at a spot on his side where the tawny hair was already matted and dark with flowing blood.

Made speechless by the clutching pressure in his throat, and suddenly dizzy from a mist which rose before his eyes, the man bent and lifted the panting animal--his bosom friend and faithful companion through many days and nights--in his trembling arms.

Mike painfully turned his head and licked his master's drawn face. The next instant came the sound of crashing underbrush, and, through vistas, Donald saw a man approaching them on a lumbering run. It was Big Jerry. His beard and clothing were dishevelled, and, as he drew near, his deep, gasping breaths became audible. From his ghastly gray and working face his deep eyes looked forth with an expression which spelt pain of body and wrack of mind.

Donald stood up, with the dog clasped to his breast, and a terrible expression on his countenance.

"Mike ... my friend ... shot ... he is dying," came his words, in an unnatural voice. "G.o.d have mercy on the man who did it. I shall not!"

The giant's frame seemed to collapse visibly; two big tears started from his eyes and ran down the furrows of his cheeks as he moved closer and laid his big, shaking hand on the dog's head.

"I done hit," he answered dully.

Mike licked the wrinkled hand which moved in slow caress over his jaws.

"You?" whispered Donald in amazed unbelief.

"Gawd help me, yes. I shot him ... I wish hit hed er been myself," returned the old man, between breaths which came in deep, body-shaking gasps.

Slowly the doctor bent, laid his chum back on the ground, and knelt beside him until the fast glazing eyes--which never wavered from his--closed forever, and the pain-tortured little body lay still. Big Jerry, too, sank down and dropped his ma.s.sive head onto his hands, while his frame rose and fell with convulsive heaving.

"Hit war this erway," he began to speak at last, and told his story in broken, laboring sentences. "I war erhuntin' with ... with yo'r rifle-gun in the woods thar beyond ther ravine. Jest es I war startin' fer the cabin, I seen ... I seen a man erstandin' hyar on the bank, er peerin' down towards the river, thar. I looked whar he war erlookin', an' seen ye down thar, bathin' yo'r face in ther water. The man war ertotin' a rifle-gun, an' uv a sudden he drapped ter his knee an' raised hit, an' I knowed he war kalkerlatin' ter shoot ye.

"I tried fer ter shout, ter cry out a warnin' ter ye, but my voice hed somehow lost hits power, an' wouldn't kerry above the noise of the falls. Thar war but one thing fer ter do, an' hit called fer powerful quick action.

"Yo' war my foster-son, an' ef 'twar yo'r life er his'n I allowed I knowed whar my duty lay. But I didn't aim fer ter kill him.... I wish ter Gawd I hed. 'Taint boastin' none fer me ter say ter ye thet I aimed only fer ter shoot the arm what war holdin' the gun.

"In course hit takes time fer ter tell ye all this, but I acted like I thought. Then ..." he paused, and went on only with a supreme effort, "then, jest as I started the trigger-pull, I seen ... I seen leetle Mike spring out o' the bushes straight at ... at the man. I seen him, I tells ye, erfore I fired. My mind told me not ter pull thet trigger, an' ... an' I done hit. My aim war true, but ..." he stopped altogether.

"The man," asked Donald at length, through clenched teeth. "What happened to him?"

"He turned et the crack of my gun. He ... he seen me, and run off inter the wood thar."

There ensued a long silence. Then Donald's hand stretched out and grasped that of the sorrowing giant.

"Jerry," he said steadily. "Don't feel so bad, it wasn't your fault. You did all that man could do. You were trying to ... to save my life, just as ... as Mike was, G.o.d bless the little dog. He must have realized that Judd was following me by the exercise of a sense beyond our knowledge, and rushed back to attack him--for my sake."

"Yo' said ... yo' said ... 'Judd.' How did yo' come ter know 'twar him?"

With new and deepened remorse, Donald sadly outlined the chief incidents of the quarrel, without, however, mentioning the discovery of the still, or the immediate cause of the combat.

"Gawd help us all ef er new feud hes broken out hyar," said Jerry solemnly, as he finished. "But yo' air my friend, enjyin' ther hospitality of my roof, an' from this day Judd Amos air my mortal enemy, even though he be my next neighbor."

Donald sadly removed his coat, and, wrapping it around the body of his chum, arose, and the silent, painful journey home was begun.

CHAPTER XVI.

THE AFTERMATH.

Supper was over. With kindly hands night had laid her deep purple mantle over the new-made mound back of the cabin, hiding it from the grieving gaze of the three who sat before the door in painful silence beneath the star-pierced dome of heaven. In the poignancy of her own sorrow, and her overwhelming sympathy for Donald, when she had come to a realization of the meaning of the bundle which he brought out of the woods and laid so tenderly down on the gra.s.s before the cabin's stoop, every vestige of Smiles' anger had instantly vanished.

"Oh, the pity, the uselessness of it," cried Donald's heart, as his thoughts again and again turned back to the tragic series of events which had made the afternoon a thing of horror. The bitter culmination,--the death of Mike, poor, courageous, self-sacrificing little Mike--was the most needless of all, for, although he had not mentioned the fact to Big Jerry, Donald knew that in all human probability Judd's rifle was empty of cartridges. And, although Jerry himself uttered no word of complaint, the physician knew, only too well, that the gripping excitement, against which he had warned the old man only a few hours earlier, had brought its inevitable aftermath. The giant's breath came with labored, audible gasps, and his very appearance told the story of the increased pain within his breast. For these disasters--as well as the mortal enmity of the young mountaineer and the heart-ache of the innocent girl--he, and he alone, was to blame. Donald groaned under his breath.

The silence was finally ended by Smiles crying out bitterly, "Oh, Doctor Mac, I can't understand why grandfather pulled that trigger, and shot dear little Mike. He saw him spring at Judd."

"It wasn't in any wise his fault, dear heart. He could not possibly have helped it. You see our brains are telegraph stations from which the nerves run like wires, carrying messages to all the different parts of our bodies. Big Jerry had sent a command to his finger, ordering it to pull the trigger, and the muscles had started to obey. The second message countermanding the first--quick as it was--came too late to halt the purely muscular action; that is all."

"Another good evening, my friends," came a cheery voice, and the mountain minister approached out of the shadows, and joined them. "I am just back from a journey into the wilderness, like John the Baptist's, and ... Why, what's wrong? Do I see the ghost of a sorrow sitting amid this group, which should be so happy?"

"Oh, Mr. Talmadge," cried Rose, jumping up and stepping to his side as he paused. "Many ghosts are here to-night. I think that you took G.o.d away with you on your journey, for His spirit has not been in Webb's Gap this afternoon."

"Tell me, what has happened, my dear?" he answered quietly, as he seated himself within the circle.

Then, step by step, the whole unhappy story was haltingly poured into his ears, save only that Smiles consciously refrained from mentioning the cause which Judd had--by implication--given for the quarrel and Donald kept his promise and made no allusion to his finding of the still. Since the minister asked no questions and made no comment concerning the cause, it is fair to a.s.sume that he guessed the truth and wisely held his own counsel. When he had brought the patchwork recital to an end, the doctor laughed with a bitter note.

"You see how much good the brief glimpse which I had last night of the eternal light did me! Before one full day has elapsed, I sound a lower depth in primitive, brutal pa.s.sion then I ever had before in my life. I am sick at heart when I think how quickly and easily I could forget everything which goes to make up civilization. There was no excuse for it--that's the worst part. I was infinitely more to blame than Judd, even leaving out of consideration the fact that a greater degree of self-restraint and forbearance should reasonably have been expected of me, a city-bred man, than of him, a more primitive son of the hills."

Donald placed his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands with a stifled sound, which might have been groan or curse, and very gently Smiles' hand stole up in the darkness and stroked his tumbled hair, until the man's own fumblingly sought and held it close, to find mute comfort in her warm clasp.

"Perhaps I understand better than you think the reasons which underlie these most unhappy events," answered the old man slowly. There was no rebuke in his quiet voice.

"Although it is true, doctor, that the deeper we get into the heart of primal nature, the closer we get to the heart of nature's G.o.d, it is equally true that the nearer we also get to the primal in man.

"I cannot help feeling that the city's laws and conventions trammel the spirit in its free exercise of self, which is ill; but yet the inbred realization of those very laws and conventions, and the fear of consequences if they are broken, act as a salutary check on the primitive pa.s.sions inherited by every one of us from our savage ancestors.

"Of course, I know that, in places where men are crowded together, such man-made laws and conventions are wise and necessary; but the life which results is not--cannot be--full and natural as it may be in an isolated place like this, when honest obedience is paid to the still higher laws of G.o.d--and it is for that obedience which all of us must strive constantly.

"You failed in the test to-day; but, believe me, there are many in these mountains who, lacking all the advantages of training and education which are yours, meet it. Their lives are lived under nature's higher laws in perfect sincerity, and, although they might not conform to the standards of so-called civilization, they are surely purer in G.o.d's sight than those of millions who pattern theirs by printed precept."

"I reckon," murmured Smiles, "that St. Peter had to put many black marks on three books to-day ... yes, mine too, for I was wickedly angry. It was hate that made me run away from Doctor Mac, and if I hadn't done it, M ... M ... Mike wouldn't have been shot." She leaned her head against Donald's arm, and cried softly.

"'The wages of sin is death,'" said the minister. "And he paid the penalty for you, Dr. MacDonald, sacrificing himself because of his great love. Poor little Mike. Such faithful animals as he must have souls, and his is now in its own paradise."

No one spoke for a little, and then Mr. Talmadge continued to muse aloud.

"Mere repentance, such as the doctor now feels, is not enough. You remember the parable of the woman who drove the evil spirit from her fleshly temple, and swept it clean, but failed to fill its place with another guest, and seven other devils came and repossessed it? So it is always with human life, Dr. MacDonald. Nature abhors a vacuum, and so does the spirit. If a man does not fill his soul--swept free of past evil by repentance--with that which is actively good, the repentance is of little avail."

"Yes, yes, I can readily understand that, for it has a parallel in bodily illness," answered Donald, somewhat impatiently. "We all know that, when the sick physical being is freed of its disease, it is left weak and an easy prey for new troubles. We can bring back to it the strength to resist by giving nerve-and tissue-building food and tonics, but how is the spirit to be ..."

"How persistently the earth-man kicks against the p.r.i.c.ks," cried Mr. Talmadge. "Child, your friend will not lift his eyes from the maze of doubt. You pledged yourself to help him. Help him now."

Her face suddenly glowing with light, Rose turned to Donald eagerly, and said without hesitation, "Oh, Doctor Mac, don't you see? The answer is so clear, so simple that even I know it. The dear G.o.d spirit is everywhere, just waiting for you to call it to your aid. Please pray to Him to give you new strength so that you may not be weak again, and I will pray, too."

"Yes," supplemented the minister, "'Whence cometh my help? My help cometh even from the Lord, which hath made heaven and earth.'"

Donald was strongly moved at the eager interest in him which these two displayed. Shifting uncomfortably he replied, "I need His help, I know; but ... but I guess I have forgotten how to pray for it."

"Open your heart with sincerity, and He will enter and bestow the strength you need in order to take up your task anew, and carry on until your purpose here on earth has been accomplished. That is all that prayer need be, for He is ever more ready to give than we to receive. Verbal pet.i.tions are vain and empty things; honest communion with Him is prayer."

He arose, content to say no more, and to leave the sorely troubled spirit of the stranger to Smiles' tender ministrations. "I am deeply sorry for you in your distress, Dr. MacDonald, but although there is small comfort in the remark, I cannot help but feel that what has happened was ordained to complete your lesson, so that you may leave these hills with a new understanding and higher purpose in life. Good night, and G.o.d be with you all."

CHAPTER XVII.

THE PARTING PLEDGE AND Pa.s.sING DAYS.

"Doctor Mac," began Smiles timidly, at length. "I'm sorry for what I said to you this afternoon, and I want to take it back. I guess when you're angry you don't see things as they are, and I'm sure that you were only being very, very kind to me when you ... you bought those baskets. I love you for it, really I do, and if ... if you want me to keep the money, and it would hurt your feelings if I...."

"Of course I want you to keep it, dear. Yesterday you took me for a foster-brother, and I hope that you will always let me do for you as I would for a real flesh-and-blood sister."

"I promise, and I will always do the same for you if I can, dear Don," she whispered softly, adding, "but somehow to-night--oh please don't laugh at me now--somehow to-night I feel more like ... like a mother, than a sister to you."

"And I truly think you are--a spiritual mother, little woman. I need you much more than you need me, I guess."

"Do you know," he went on, after a moment, "I am beginning to believe that I was wrong this afternoon when I said that ... that Judd lied about adding to the money he received for your baskets. Of course I have no way of making sure, unless you have kept accounts, but I actually begin to think that he did."

"I know it," she replied promptly; but with a troubled voice. "Judd has been very wicked, but he doesn't lie. I think that he meant it the way ... the way you did, too; but he's different and I mean to give it all back to him." There was another pause, and then Smiles said gently, "Donald, it makes my heart ache like, to tell you this, but I've got to now. I want that you should go away early to-morrow morning."

"What?" he burst out angrily, springing to his feet. "And have him believe that I ran away from him again? No, how can you ask it, Rose?"

"It isn't that. We know, and he knows now, that you're not afraid of him. But this mountain is his home, and, if you stay here, there is sure to be more trouble, and I couldn't bear that, Don. Even if one of you wasn't ... wasn't hurt in the body, wicked thoughts would hurt your souls. I know it is so, and you must go ... but, oh, how I am going to miss you."

For a moment Donald stood tense; then his body relaxed weakly and he answered, "Yes, you are right, Smiles. It is up to me to go; but I know that some day these clouds are going to be lifted somehow, and we shall see each other again and be happy together."

"I know it, too," she answered, with a sob catching her breath. As she spoke, the clouds, which had been covering the moon for some time, broke, letting the cool, white light flood the mountain side like a promise, and her face lit up with the old wondrous smile. "Of course we will," she cried. "Why, I mean to be your own special nurse some day, and help you always. Good-night, dear Don."

She turned and ran quickly into the cabin, so that he should not see the tears which followed the smile.

"Rose war right erbout yo'r goin',--I reckon she air allus right," came Big Jerry's voice. "Yo' hev got ter go; but I'm ergoin' ter miss ye powerful, likewise, lad."

"But I'll see you again, too, before long. I've got some of my sense back, and I mean to write Judd that I am engaged to a girl in the city--not that I want his friendship after what has happened, however--and I will be down here again, for a few days at least, when the atmosphere has cleared--perhaps early this winter."

"Taint likely yo'll ever see me ergin on earth, son," Jerry said heavily. "Reckon I'm most done fer."

"Your heart? Is it very bad?" queried Donald.

"I allows. .h.i.t's nigh ter bustin'," was the steady response. "But mebbe I'll last some while yet--I hopes so, fer leetle Smiles' sake. I haint blind ter what hes happened, an' I knows thet the time air comin' when she's es plumb sartain ter fly erway from this hyar mountain es a homein' dove; fer she hes heard the call uv her city blood, an' hit haint ter be denied. But I reckon she haint ready ter leave the old nest yet, so I aims ter stay on erwhile longer ... fer her, though hit haint goin' ter be in no wise easy fer ter do."

The younger man knew not what answer to make to this affecting declaration; but the necessity of a reply was forestalled, for Big Jerry stepped closer and continued earnestly, "Since yo' wished fer ter be a son ter me, I air ergoin' ter treat ye es sich, an' tell ye something thet I've done fer the leetle gal, an' thet she don't yet know erbout.