The "Wild West" Collection. William MacLeod Raine
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policy of having the firm investigate at once, he fell in with the idea, and--here we are! Now, that is about all I can tell you of Haydon, and how he came here."
"Less would have been plenty," said Overton, with a pretended sigh of relief. "I didn't ask to be told his sister's love affairs or his brother-in-law's failings. I was asking about the man himself."
"Well, I don't know what to tell you about him; there doesn't seem to be anything to say. He is T. J. Haydon, a man who inherited both money and a genius for speculation. Not a plunger, you know; but one of those pursy, far-seeing fellows who always put their money on the right number and wait patiently until it wins. I might tell you that he was sentimental once in his life, and got married; and I might tell you of a pretty daughter he has (and whom he used to be very much afraid I would make love to), but I suppose you would not be interested in those exciting details, so I will refrain. But as to the man himself and his trip here, I can only say, if you have made a strike up here, he is the very best man I know to get interested. Better even than Seldon, for Seldon always defers to Haydon, while Haydon always acts on his own judgment. And say, old fellow, long as we have talked, you have not yet told me one word of the new gold mine. I suspected none of the Ferry folks knew of it, from the general opinion that your trip here was an idiotic affair. Even the doctor said there was no sane reason why you should have dragged Harris and 'Tana into the woods as you did. I kept quiet, remembering the news in your letter, for I was sure you did not decide on this expedition without a good reason. Then the contents of that letter I read the night Harris collapsed--well, it stuck in my mind, and I got to wondering if your bonanza was the one he had found before. Oh, I've been doing some surmising about it. Am I right?"
"Pretty nearly," assented Overton. "Of course I knew some of the folks would raise a howl because I let 'Tana come along; but it was necessary, and I thought it would be best for her in the end, else you may be sure--be very sure--I would not have had her come. She--was to have gone back--at once--the very next day; but when the next day came, she was not able. I have done what I could, but nothing seems to count. She does not get well, and the gold doesn't play much of a figure in this camp just now. One-third of the find is hers, and the same for Harris and me; but I'd give my share cheerfully this minute if it would buy back health for her and let me see her laughing and bright again."
Lyster reached out his hand and gave Overton's arm an affectionate pressure.
"Don't I know it, Dan?" he asked kindly. "Can't I see that you have just worked and worried yourself sick over her illness--blaming yourself, perhaps--"
"Yes, that is it--blaming myself for--many things," he agreed, brokenly, and then he checked himself as Lyster's curious glance was turned on him. "So you see I am in no fit condition to talk values with this Mr. Haydon. All my thoughts are somewhere else. Doctor says if she is not better to-night she will not get well. That means she will not live. Tell your friend that something worse than a gold crisis is here just now, and I can't talk to him till it is over. Don't mind if I'm even a bit careless with you, Max. Look after yourselves as well as you can. You are welcome--you know that; but--what's the use of words? Perhaps 'Tana is dying!"
And turning his back abruptly on his friend, he walked away, while Lyster looked after him with some surprise.
"I seem to be dropped by everybody," he remarked, "first Haydon and now Dan. But I don't believe there is danger of her dying. I _won't_ believe it! Dan has worried himself sick and fearful during these terrible days, but I'll do my share now and let him get some rest and sleep. 'Tana die! I can't think it. But I care ten times more for Dan, just because of his devotion to her. I wonder what he would think if he knew why I wanted her to go to school, or how much she was in my mind every hour I was gone. I felt like telling him just now, but better not--not yet. He thinks she is only a little child yet. Dear old Dan!"
He entered the cabin and spoke to Harris, whom he had not seen before, and who looked with pleasure at him, though, as ever, speechless and moveless, but for that nod of his head and the bright, quick glance of his eyes.
From him he went again to 'Tana; but she lay still and pale, with closed eyes and no longer muttering.
"There ain't a blessed thing you can do, Mr. Max," said Mrs. Huzzard, in a wheezing whisper; "but if there is, you may be sure I'll let you know and glad to do it. Lavina says she's going to help me to a rest; and you must help Dan Overton, for slept he has not, and I know it, these eight nights since I've been here. And if that ain't enough to kill a man!"
"Sure enough. But now that I am here, we will not have any night watches on his part," decided Lyster. "Between Miss Slocum and myself I think we can manage to do some very creditable nursing."
"I am willing to do my best," said Miss Lavina, with a shrinking glance toward Flap-Jacks, who just slouched past with a bucket of water; "but I must confess I do feel a timidity in the presence of these sly-looking Indians. And if at night I can only be sure none of them are very close, I may be able to watch this poor girl instead of watching for them with their tomahawks."
"Never fear while I am detailed as guard," answered Lyster, reassuringly. "They will reach you only over my dead body."
"Oh, but--" and the timid one arose as if for instant flight, but was held by Mrs. Huzzard.
"Now, now!" she said reprovingly to the young fellow, "it's noways good-natured of you to make us more scared of the dirty things than we are naturally. But, Lavina, I'll go bail that he never yet has seen a dead body of their killing since he came in the country. Lord knows, they don't look as if they would kill a sheep, though they might steal them fast enough. It ain't from Dan Overton that you ever learned to scare women, Mr. Max; you wouldn't catch him at such tricks."
"Now I beg that whatever you do, Mrs. Huzzard, you will not compare me to that personage," objected Lyster; "for I am convinced that anything human would in your eyes suffer by such a comparison. Great is Dan in the camp of the Kootenais!"
Mrs. Huzzard only laughed at his words, but Miss Lavina did not. She even let her eyes wander again to Akkomi, in order to show her disapproval of frivolous comment on Mr. Overton; a fact Lyster perceived and was immensely amused by.
"She has set her covetous maidenly eyes on him, and if she doesn't marry him before the year is over, he will have to be clever," he decided, as he left them and went to look up Haydon. "Serves Dan right if she did, for he never gives any other fellow half a chance with the old ladies. The rest of us have to be content with the young ones."
CHAPTER XVI.
THROUGH THE NIGHT.
The soft dusk of the night had fallen over the northern lands, and the pale stars had gleamed for hours on the reflecting waves of mountain streams. It was late--near midnight, for the waning sickle of the moon was slipping from its dark cover in the east and hanging like a jewel of gold just above the black crown of the pines. Breaths from the heights sifted down through the vast woods, carrying sometimes the dreary twitter of a bird disturbed, or the mellow call of insects singing to each other of the summer night. All sounds of the wilderness were as echoes of rest and utter content.
And in the camp of the Twin Springs, shadows moved sometimes with a silence that was scarce a discord in the wood songs of repose. A camp fire glimmered faintly a little way up from the stream, and around it slept the Indian boatman, the squaw, and old Akkomi, who, to the surprise of Overton, had announced his intention of remaining until morning, that he might know how the sickness went with the little "Girl-not-Afraid."
A dim light showed through the chinks of 'Tana's cabin, where Miss Lavina, the doctor, and Lyster were on guard for the night. The doctor had grown sleepy and moved into Harris' room, where he could be comfortable on blankets. Lyster, watching the girl, was trying to make himself think that their watching was all of no use; her sleep seemed so profound, so healthfully natural, that he could not bring himself to think, as Dan did, that the doctor's worst prophecy could come true--that out of that sleep she might awake to consciousness, or that, on the other hand, she might drift from sleep to lethargy and thus out of life.
Outside a man stood peering in through a chink from which he had stealthily pulled the moss. He could not see the girl's face, but he could see that of Lyster as he