CHAPTER XV AN ENCOUNTER AT THE LODGE

IT WAS MID-DAY, and as they marched between the high banks on a hard trail, Joy Gargrave’s heart grew light.

“Another hour, Babette, and we shall be home.”

“Yes,” was the reply, “home! That is what North Star is to us, and I wonder you ever left it, Joy.”

“I was afraid,” answered Joy. “Dick Bracknell’s letter startled me. He plainly meant to assert himself and I was glad of Sir Joseph’s summons to England, because it helped me to get away from the complications here.”

“It does not matter much where one goes,” answered Babette philosophically, “one carries one’s real complications with her. Here or there—what matters? The heart is ever the same.”

“Yes, that is true,” answered Joy, thinking of the complications of her own life. “We are the victims of our emotions quite as much as of circumstances.”

“Of our inexperience more than our emotions, I should say,” answered Babette— “of our inexperience and the ruthlessness of those who are prepared to take advantage of them. But here, better than in most places, we can live our own life, untrammelled, and for the most part free from the worser[165] cares. This lodge of ours is like a sanctuary in the wilderness, and the serenity, the woods, the snow and the silences have their own healing for the troubles of life.”

“Yes, but there is something to be said for companionship with one’s own kind. I notice we are always a little excited when we have callers at the Lodge. We——”

A rifle shot cracked in on her words, and before either of them could speak again, a moose broke suddenly from the woods, and plunged down the steep bank not five hundred yards ahead of them. The wolf-dogs in the sleds gave tongue, and notwithstanding the burden behind them, leaped forward. Joy laughed gaily.

“There’s an end of philosophic reflection. The moose is hit. I wonder who——”

A man emerged from the woods, dropped on one knee, and sighted the wide-horned beast. Then his shot rang, and the moose toppled over in the snow. The hunter stood up and caught sight of the oncoming party. He scrutinized it carefully for a moment and then waved his hand.

“It is George,” cried Babette, naming an Indian servant. “See, he recognizes us.”

The hunter descended the bank, and instead of going to inspect his kill waited for them to come up. As they did so a smile crumpled his grave copper-coloured face.

“How!” he said. “Very glad to see you, Miss Joy and Miss Babette. My words are not as my heart, for my tongue is not easy of speech. But glad am I to behold you, glad as if your coming[166] were the breath of the south spring wind upon the cheek.”

Joy laughed with pleasure. “Not more glad than are we, George. And you must not belittle that tongue of yours. If you only knew it you talk poetry. But tell me, how are things at the Lodge? All right, I hope, and Nanette and the papoose, they are well?”

“They are well,” answered the Indian. “But we dwell not alone. With us are Rayner and two men of the Kwikpak tribe. They are bad men.”

“Rayner!” as she echoed the name Joy’s eyes flashed fire.

“Yes, with two bad men of the Kwikpak tribe.”

“When did they arrive?” asked Joy quickly.

“At nightfall five days ago. They were very weary, having followed the trail hard and long. Rayner brought word from you that he stay to look for some man, but he brought no word of your coming.”

“No, I dare say not,” answered Joy sharply. “He would not expect us so soon. We also have pushed the trail hard. What has Mr. Rayner been doing since he arrived, George?”

“The first day he rest and smoke and ask many questions.”

“Questions? About what?”

“He asked if Nanette or I have beheld two men, one of whom is Corporal Bracknell, who took the Northward trail when you went southward. He ask if we have seen him since that time, and I answer no, for it is the truth, and Rayner he smile[167] to himself as is the way of a man with a hidden thought.”

“And the second man of whom he asked?”

“I know him not!” answered the Indian, “neither him nor the name of Dick which he bore.”

“Dick!” Joy swung round to her companion. “You hear, Babette. He asks after Dick, whose body, as he told me, he had thrust into an ice-hole. I thought when he told me that he lied and now I know.”

She turned to the Indian again. “And the other days?”

“The other days,” answered the Indian gravely, “he drink much brandy and a little coffee, and the two bad men they go on a journey and return yesterday. They bring news I think, for at dawn tomorrow they depart with Rayner.”

“No! Not tomorrow,” cried Joy, “but this very day.”

“That will be as you desire, mistress. When we return——”

“Where are they going? Do you know, George?”

“They take the Northward trail. Rayner tell me that when he have drunk much brandy. ‘From North Star to the North Star we go,’ he say, ‘you old graven image, and when we come back the girl shall be ours!’ I do not understand such words, for there is no girl there, but such are the words that Rayner speak.”

Joy looked at Babette. “He knows something,” she said.

[168]

“Yes,” answered her foster-sister, “but there is one thing he does not know, and that is a woman’s heart. He surely cannot hope——”

“I do not know what he may hope. I know what I shall do. My cousin Adrian is intolerable in his pretensions.”

“What will you do, Joy? I begin to fancy that away from the restraints of civilization Adrian Rayner is possibly a dangerous man. And we are ‘North of fifty-three!’”

“I do not care. I am not afraid. There is, as you once hinted, the law of the wilderness, and at least I will be mistress in my own house.” She turned to her servant. “We will leave you one of the sleds, George. You will then be able to bring some of the meat home. I will talk with you again when you arrive.”

She gave orders for one team to push on and one to remain, then as she and her foster-sister recommenced their march she spoke again.

“I wonder why Adrian Rayner has lingered so long at North Star?”

“He has evidently been using the Lodge as his headquarters whilst he made the necessary inquiries. Also there is another possibility,” answered Babette.

“And what is that?”

“I have a thought that he may be desirous of assuring himself that you have arrived here. It is only a possibility, but it is there.”

“I do not see why——”

“Why do you suppose he wished to marry you?” asked Babette quickly. “Because he loved you?[169] Possibly! But you are a rich woman, and I think that may have more to do with the question than you have yet thought. It may have more to do with his journey here than anything else. Have you made a will, Joy?”

“No!” answered Joy quickly. “I have never thought of it. My uncle never suggested it to me.”

“That is not surprising,” was the answer. “After Dick Bracknell, your uncle is your next of kin. He and your cousin are your only blood relatives. Without a will, your marriage being unknown, your estate would fall to them if you were to die.”

Joy’s face showed a dawning horror. “Oh, but my uncle——”

“Your uncle is human, Joy, and what is more he has his difficulties. Whilst we were at Claridge’s I overheard two men talking. I said nothing to you at the time, regarding it as mere gossip, but they were discussing Sir Joseph, and one of them said that he had gathered some confounded bad eggs during the last year or two, and that he must be very rich to stand it. Supposing he is not very rich. Supposing the bad eggs are more than he can stand. Then your money——”

“But I cannot think that of my uncle, Babette; it is monstrous.”

“Of your uncle. No! Perhaps not! But your cousin is another matter. Let us suppose that he knows of Sir Joseph’s losses. We know he is not scrupulous. Knowing of your marriage to Dick Bracknell, he paid you attention. He asked you to[170] marry him. He even stooped to threats, as you told me. Why? Because he wanted to be able to control your fortune, to keep the money, some of which was badly needed. You may shake your head, Joy, but that is at least a possibility; and that is why I suggest that it is possible that Adrian Rayner may be desirous of assuring himself of your arrival here. You are beginning to know him; do you think that after his attempt to lure you into a bigamous marriage, and after his threats, that he will be at all chary of using any means that circumstances may offer of putting him in possession of your fortune? I do not! And he has been drinking, if what George says is true; and drink makes a tempted man dangerous. You must be careful, Joy, even diplomatic if necessary.”

“I shall order him to leave North Star the moment we arrive there!” answered Joy stubbornly. “If there is a shadow of truth in your surmises, there is all the more reason why I should do so.”

“You will do as you please, Joy,” replied her foster-sister, breaking into a smile, “and at any rate we have the big battalions on our side. With the drivers and George, and George’s son, Jim, we shall be able to enforce your will.”

“And I shall do so,” answered Joy. “Here I am strong enough to disregard his threats.”

As it happened, the first person they encountered when they left the river trail and swung into the clearing which led to the Lodge, was Adrian Rayner. He was walking towards the river, with a rifle in the crook of his arm, and as he saw them swinging towards him, he halted suddenly, and[171] remained quite still, until Joy reached him. The look on his face betrayed his surprise, and to Joy it was clear that he had not expected to encounter her before his departure from the lodge. He stood there a little nonplussed and it was Joy who spoke first.

“You have not wasted time, Cousin Adrian,” she said, and there was an unmistakable edge to her tones.

“No,” he answered with an awkward laugh. “I promised you I would find that man who was in the wood when you shot your hus——”

“No!” she interrupted sharply, “not when I did, but when you shot my husband!”

There was accusation in her eyes, her voice, and Rayner visibly quailed before it. Then he cried—

“What confounded nonsense is this?”

“It is not nonsense,” she answered. “It is at least a possibility. You were in the wood that night, and you had a rifle with you. There were two shots, and one of them hit Dick Bracknell. One of those shots came from my rifle, but from whose rifle did the second come? Yours! I say.”

“Mine!” he cried harshly. “You must be mad. You cannot have thought over what you are saying.”

“No,” she countered, “I am not mad, I am quite sane, and I have thought a great deal over the matter.”

“But why should I shoot Dick Bracknell masquerading as Koona Dick? He was not my husband?”

“No,” replied Joy coolly, “but he was mine, and[172] you had somehow become aware of the fact. If I am not mistaken, you yourself aspired to marry me——”

“Men are sometimes smitten with madness,” he interposed sneeringly. “But there is another possibility that I can suggest to you, of which you do not seem to have thought. That precious corporal who was here; he had a gun! Also, I fancy that he would find the death of Dick Bracknell no heartbreaking business, as it would bring him within a step of the succession to Harrow Fell; and as Jeff Bracknell is now dead, it puts him absolutely on the doorstep. Have you thought of that?”

“There is no need that I should,” answered Joy promptly. “Roger Bracknell had no knowledge that the man whom he knew as Koona Dick was his cousin, until he picked up a note which Dick had written to me, which was some time after the firing had taken place. I know that, and your suggestion is merely preposterous.”

“You think so,” he laughed. “I wonder why?” Something in his tones brought the blood flaming to Joy Gargrave’s face. Her eyes flashed indignantly. Rayner laughed again brutally.

“Not that there is any need for wonder,” he said maliciously. “You seem to be in great vogue with the Bracknells. It must be a family weakness for——”

“How dare you?” She took a step forward, and suddenly raised the dog whip in her hand. Rayner backed quickly, and instinctively raised his hand. But the long lash smote him on the face, and he gave vent to a savage oath.

[173]

“You—virago! Would you?”

He had lost complete control of himself, and what would have happened is only to be conjectured, but at that moment the Indian George stepped quietly from behind some tall bushes. He still carried his rifle, and though there was an impassive look on his brown face, his eyes were blazing. The white man saw him, and as he met those eyes, the wrath in him was checked. The Indian spoke no word, but very deliberately opened the breech of his rifle, as if to assure himself that it was loaded. Then he closed it and looked at Rayner again, and at that second look the white man shivered, for in it he saw something threatening and ominous, which unsealed the springs of fear within him. Joy was the first to speak.

“George,” she said, addressing her henchman, “Mr. Rayner takes the trail in an hour. Anything he needs for his journey he is to have; but he goes within the hour, and never again is he to visit North Star. Do you understand?”

The Indian nodded his head in grave assent, and without another look at Adrian Rayner, Joy turned and went up the road towards the house.