The Promise Page 31

  CHAPTER XXX

  CREED

  That night the four sat late about the campfire.

  Old Wa-ha-ta-na-ta, silent and forbidding, as usual, but with a sharpear for all that was said, listened as they laid their plans.

  At their conclusion the others sought their blankets, while Jacquestook the trail for the camp of old Wabishke whose help was needed inthe undertaking which was to involve no small amount of labor.

  As the two women finished the preparation of breakfast the followingmorning, the half-breed appeared, followed closely by the old Indiantrapper whose scarred lips broke into a hideous grin at the sight ofBill.

  "This is Wabishke, of whom I spoke," said Jacques, indicating theIndian. Bill laughingly extended his hand, which the other took.

  "Well! If it isn't my friend, the Yankee!" he exclaimed. "Wabishke andI are old friends. He is the first man I met in the woods." The Indiannodded, grunted, and pointed to his feet which were encased in a veryserviceable pair of boots.

  "Oh, I remember, perfectly," laughed Bill. "Have you still got mymatches?" Wabishke grinned.

  "You keel _loup-garou_ with knife?" he asked, as if seekingcorroboration for an unbelievable story.

  "I sure did," Bill answered. "The old gal tried to bite me."

  The Indian regarded him with grave approval and, stepping to his side,favored him with another greasy hand-shake, after which ceremony hesquatted by the fire and removing a half-dozen pieces of bacon from thefrying-pan proceeded to devour them with evident relish.

  Breakfast over, the three men accompanied by Jeanne set out for theriver, leaving to old Wa-ha-ta-na-ta the work of the camp. Sliding acanoe into the water, they took their places, Jacques and Wabishke atthe paddles, with Jeanne and Bill seated on the bottom amidships.

  Close to the opposite bank the canoe was headed down-stream and, underthe swift, strong strokes of the paddles, glided noiselessly in theshadows. A few minutes later, at a sign from Jacques who was in thebow, Wabishke, with a deft twist of his paddle, slanted the canoebankward.

  With a soft, rustling sound the light craft parted the low hangingbranches of killikinick and diamond willow, and buried its nose in thesoft mud.

  Peering through the tangle of underbrush the occupants of the canoemade out, some fifty yards below their position, a small clearing inthe center of which, just above the high-water mark of the river, was asmall pyramid of logs.

  Seated beside the pile, with his back resting against the ends of thelogs, sat a man holding a rifle across his knees.

  Bill Carmody's fighting spirit thrilled at the sight. Here at last wasaction. Here were the stolen logs of bird's-eye, and guarding them wasCreed!

  While the others steadied the canoe he stepped noiselessly onto thebank, where he sank to his ankles in the mud, and, seizing hold of thebow shot the canoe out into the current.

  Creed had been left in the woods by Moncrossen, ostensibly to guard theBlood River camp against pilfering Indians and chance forest fires, buthis real mission was to keep watch on the bird's-eye until it could besafely rafted to the railway.

  Moncrossen promised to return about the middle of June, and tenmornings Creed had skulked the three miles from the lumber camp to thelogs, and ten evenings he had skulked fearfully back again, mutteringfutile curses at the boss's delay.

  Creed was uneasy. Not since the evening the greener had walked into HodBurrage's store at the very moment when he, Creed, was recounting tothe interested listeners the circumstances attending his demise, had hebeen entirely free from a haunting, nameless fear.

  True, as he told Blood River Jack, he had afterward seen with his owneyes, the greener go down under the rushing jam where no man couldpossibly go down and live.

  But, nevertheless, deep in his heart was the _terror_--nameless,unreasoning, haunting,--that clung to him night and day. So that ahundred times a day, alone in the timber, he would start and castquick, jerky glances over his shoulder and jump, white-faced andtrembling, at the snapping of a twig.

  As the days went by the nameless terror grew, dogging his footsteps,phantomlike by day, and haunting him at night, as he lay shaking in hisbunk in the double-locked little office.

  With the single exception of Blood River Jack, he had seen no humanbeing since the drive, and his frenzied desire for companionship wouldhave been pitiful, had it been less craven.

  He slept fitfully with his rifle loaded and often cocked in his bunkbeside him, while during the day it was never out of reach of his hand.

  In his daily excursions to the bird's-eye rollway he never took thesame route twice, but skulked, peering fearfully about in theunderbrush, avoiding even the game trails.

  And always he detoured widely the place where he had seen the greenerdisappear beneath the muddy, log-ridden waters.

  And so it was that upon this particular morning Creed sat close againstthe pyramid of logs--waiting.

  At a sound from the river he jerked his rifle into readiness forimmediate action and sat nervously alert, his thumb twitching on thehammer. Approaching down-stream came a canoe.

  Creed leaped to his feet with a maudlin grin of relief as he recognizedthe three occupants. Apparently they had not seen him, and he steppedto the bank fearful lest they pass.

  "Hey! You, Jack!" he called, waving his cap.

  The bow-man ceased paddling and gazed shoreward in evident surprise;the man on the bank was motioning them in with wide sweeps of the arm.The half-breed called a few hasty words over his shoulder and the canoeshot toward shore.

  "Where y' goin'?" asked Creed, as the three stepped onto the bank.Blood River Jack replied with an indefinite sweep of his arm to thesouthward.

  "Well, y' ain't in no hurry. Never seen a Injun yet cudn't stop long'nough to take a drink o' licker. Har, har, har!"

  He laughed foolishly, with an exaggerated wink toward the old Indian.

  "How 'bout it, Wabishke; leetle fire-water make yer belt fit better?'Tain't a goin' to cost y' nawthin'."

  The Indian grinned and grunted acquiescence, and Creed inserted his armbetween two logs and withdrew a squat, black bottle.

  "Here's some reg'lar ol' 'rig'nal red-eye. An' here's lookin' at ye,"he said, as he removed the cork and sucked greedily at the contents."Jest tuk a taste fust, 'cause I don't like to give vis'tors whisky Iwudn't drink m'self, har, har, har! Anyways, the way I figger, it'swhite men fust, then half white, then Injuns." He passed the bottle toJacques.

  "'Fraid's little too strong fer ladies," he smirked, at Jeanne, and,reaching out quickly, jerked the upturned bottle from Wabishke's lips.

  "Hey, y' ol' pirate! Y' don't need fer to empty it all to wunst. Setroun' a while, an' bimeby we'll have 'nother. 'S all on me to-day; thishere's my party."

  They seated themselves on the ground and engaged in conversation, inwhich Creed did most of the talking.

  "Trade rifles?" asked Blood River Jack, idly picking up Creed's gun andexamining it minutely.

  "Beats all how a Injun allus wants to be a tradin'," grinned Creed."Don't know but what I mought, though, at that. What's yourn?"

  "Winchester, 30-40," replied Jacques, handing it over for inspection.

  "Mine, too," said Creed; "only mine's newer. What'll y' give to boot?"Jacques did not hurry his answer, being engaged in removing thecartridges for the better inspection of magazine and chamber.

  "Mine's better kep'," he opined after a careful squinting down themuzzle.

  "Kep' nawthin'! 'S all nicked up. An', besides, it pulls hard."

  Jacques was deliberately refilling the magazine, but so intent wasCreed in picking out fancied defects in the other's weapon that hefailed to notice that the cartridges which were being placed in his ownrifle had had their bullets carefully drawn, while his originalcartridges reposed snugly in the pocket of the half-breed's mackinaw.

  "Tell y' what I'll do," said Creed, speaking in a tone of the utmostgenerosity. "Give me ten dollars to boot, an' we'll call it a trade."

  Jacques laughed loud
ly and, handing the other his rifle, picked up hisown.

  "We must be goin'," he observed, and rose to his feet.

  "Better have 'nother drink 'fore y' go," said Creed, tendering thebottle. They drank around and Creed returned the bottle to its cache,while the others took their places in the canoe.

  "Make it five, then," Creed extended the rifle as though giving itaway.

  Jacques shook his head, and pushed the canoe out into the stream.

  The man on shore eyed the widening strip of water between the bank andthe canoe.

  "I'll make it three, seein' ye're so hell-bent on a trade," he called.But his only answer was a loud laugh as the canoe disappeared around asharp bend of the river.

  Creed resumed his position with his back against the ends of the logs.

  At a point some fifty feet up-stream from the diminutive rollway, andabout the same distance from the shore, a blackened snag thrust itsugly head above the surface of the water, and against this snagbrushwood and drift had collected and was held by the push of thestream which gurgled merrily among its interstices.

  Creed's gaze, resting momentarily upon this miniature island, failedentirely to note that it concealed a man who stood immersed in theriver from his neck down, and eyed him keenly through narrowed grayeyes; and that also this man was doing a most peculiar thing.

  Reaching into the pocket of his water-soaked shirt he withdrew severallong, steel-jacketed bullets and, holding them in the palm of his hand,grinned broadly.

  Then, one by one, he placed them in his mouth, drew a long breath, anddived. The water at this point was about four feet in depth and the manswam rapidly, close to the bottom.

  Creed's glance, roving idly over the river, was arrested by a quickcommotion upon the surface of the water almost directly in front ofhim.

  He seized his rifle and leaped to his feet, hoping for a shot at astray otter. The next instant the rifle slipped from his nervelessfingers and struck upon the ground with a muffled thud.

  Instead of an otter he was looking directly into the face of a man.

  "God A'mi'ty," he gurgled, "it's the greener!" He leaned heavilyagainst the logs, plucking foolishly at the bark. His scalp tingledfrom fright.

  His mouth sagged open and the lolling, flabby tongue drooled thickly.His face became a dull, bloodless gray, glistening glaireously withclammy sweat, and his eyes dilated until they seemed bulging from theirsockets.

  It seemed ages he stood there, staring in horrible fascination at theman in the river--and then the man moved!

  He was advancing slowly shoreward, with a curious limp, as he hadentered Burrage's store. Creed's ashen lips moved stiffly, and histongue seemed to fill his mouth.

  "I've got 'em! I've got 'em," he maundered. "'S the booze, an' I'mseein' things!"

  His groping brain grasped at the idea, and it gave him strength--betterthe "snakes" than _that_! But he must do something, the man was comingtoward him--only hip-deep now--

  "Go 'way! Go 'way!" he shrieked in a sudden frenzy of action. "Damnyou! Y're dead! D'ye hear me! Go 'way from here!"

  Suddenly his weakening knees stiffened under him, and he reachedswiftly for the rifle on the ground at his feet.

  Slowly and deliberately he raised it, cocked it, rested it across alog, and took deliberate aim at the center of the man's face--twentypaces away.

  "Bang!" The crack of the rifle sounded loud and sharp in the tensestillness.

  The apparition, at the water's edge, raised its hand slowly to itslips, and from between its teeth took a small object which it tossedtoward the other. The object struck lightly against Creed's breast anddropped to the ground.

  He looked, downward--it was a 30-40 bullet--his own! He stared dumblyat the thing on the ground. Then, automatically, he fired again, takingcareful aim.

  Again the ghost's hand moved slowly toward its mouth, and again thelight tap upon his chest--and two bullets lay upon the ground at hisfeet.

  His head felt strange and large, and inside his skull things weremoving--long, gray maggots that twisted, and writhed, and squirmed,like fishing worms in a can.

  He laughed flatly, a senile, cackling laugh. He did not want to laugh,but laughed again and, stooping, reached for the bullets. He stared athis fingers, bewildered; they groped helplessly at a spot a foot fromthe place where lay the two bullets with their shining steel jackets.

  He must move his fingers to the right--this way. Again hestared--puzzled; they were moving farther and farther toward theleft--away from the bullets. Again the dry, cackling laugh. He wouldfool his fingers. He would move them _away_ from the bullets.

  He tried, and the next instant the groping fingers closed unerringlyupon the little cylinders. The laugh became an inarticulate babble ofsatisfaction, his knees collapsed, and he pitched forward and lay stillwith wide, staring eyes, while upon the corners of his mouth appearedlittle flecks of white foam.

  A shadow fell across his face--he was staring straight into the eyes ofthe greener, who stood, dripping wet with the water of the river intowhich he had fallen more than two months before.

  The man leaped from the ground in a sudden frenzy of terror, and fledscreaming into the forest, crashing, wallowing, tearing through theunderbrush, he plunged, shrieking like a demon.

  The greener stood alone in the clearing and listened to the diminishingsounds.

  At length they ceased and, in the silence, the greener turned towardthe sparkling river, and as he looked there came to his ear faint andfar, one last, thin scream.