A Mating in the Wilds | Page 3

does not expect to meet, men who belong 'to the legion of the lost ones, the cohort of the damned,' who have buried their old selves for ever. I wonder if that man is one of them?"
Gerald Ainley's face had regained its natural colour. Again he laughed as he replied: "If he is the man I knew he is certainly of the lost legion, for he has been in prison."
"In prison?" echoed the woman quickly. "He does not look like a gaol-bird. What was the crime?"
"Forgery! The judge was merciful and gave him three years' penal servitude."
"What is his name?"
"Stane--Hubert Stane!" replied the man shortly. As he spoke he glanced back over his shoulder towards the man whom they were discussing, then hastily averted his eyes.
The man from the river had turned round and was looking at him with concentrated gaze. His face was working as if he had lost control of his facial muscles, and his hands were tightly clenched. It was clear that the meeting with Ainley had been something of a shock to him, and from his attitude it appeared that he resented the other man's aloofness.
"The hound!" he whispered to himself, "the contemptible hound!"
Then as Ainley and the factor's wife disappeared in the store, he laughed harshly and relit his pipe. As he did so, his fingers shook so that the match bobbed against the pipe-bowl, and it was very manifest that he was undergoing a great strain. He stood there staring at the store. Once he began to move towards it irresolutely, then changed his mind and came to a standstill again.
"No!" he whispered below his breath. "I'll wait till the cad comes out--I'll force him to acknowledge me."
But scarcely had he reached the decision, when on the quiet air came the clear notes of a bugle sounding the alert and turning his thoughts in a new direction. The notes came from the river, and were so alien to that northern land that he swung round to discover their origin. At the same moment the two half-breeds leapt from the bench and began to run towards the wharf. John Rodwell, the factor and his wife, emerged from the store and hurried in the same direction, followed by the Indian who had been bartering. Two other men appeared at the warehouse door, and as the strains of the bugle sounded again, also began to run towards the wharf, whilst from the factor's house came a boy and girl, followed by a white woman and a couple of Indian servants, all of whom followed in the wake of the others.
The man in the Square did not move. Having turned towards the river as the bugle-call floated clear and silvery, and being unable to see upstream because of the fort buildings, he remained where he was, keeping one eye on the store. The man who had passed him in the Square had not emerged. Stane stood there for two or three minutes watching first the river and then the door. At the end of that time, with a resolute look on his face, he began to stride towards the store. He was half-way there when the sound of a thin cheer reached him from the wharf. He turned and looked round. His change of position had given him an enlarged view of the river, and distant perhaps a quarter of a mile or so away he saw a brigade of boats. He stood and stared at them wonderingly for a moment, then resumed his way towards the store.
As he entered he looked round, and, standing near the parchment window he caught sight of the man for whom he was looking. Ainley was rather white of face, but his eyeglass was in its place, and outwardly he was collected and cool. Hubert Stane regarded him silently for a moment, then he laughed mirthlessly.
"Well, Ainley," he said abruptly, "this is a strange meeting place."
"Ah!" said the other quickly. "It is you, Stane, after all!"
"Surely you knew that just now?" was the reply in a cutting voice.
"No, you wrong me there! I was not sure. You must remember that I was not expecting to see you up here. You had dropped out, and I had never heard a word of you since--since----"
"Since I went to Dartmoor," Stane laughed again his cold, mirthless laugh. "There is no need to mince matters, Ainley. All the world knows I went there, and you need not go to any trouble to spare my feelings. When a man has been through hell nothing else matters, you know."
Gerald Ainley did not reply. He stood there with an embarrassed look on his face, obviously ill at ease, and the other continued: "You do not seem pleased to see me--an old friend--you cut me just now. Why?"
"Well--er--really, Stane you--you