Snow-Blind | Page 3

for the pelts," he said royally, "I'll take them down myself."
Bella looked slowly up.
"You think I don't mean it, I suppose?" Hugh demanded.
They did not answer, but the eyes of the boy and the woman met. This silence and this dumb exchange of understanding infuriated Garth. He clinched his hands on the carved arms of his chair and leaned a little forward.
"I'll take the pelts myself," he repeated boisterously. "I'm not afraid to be seen at the station. I'm sick of skulking. Buried here--with my talents--in this damn country, spending my days trapping and skinning beasts to keep the breath in our three useless bodies. Wouldn't death be better for a man like me? Easier to bear? Fifteen years of it! Fifteen years! My best years!" He stared over Pete's head. "In all that time no beauty to feed my starved senses, no work for my starved brain, no hope for my starved heart." The woman and the youth watched him still in silence. "That fox I killed this morning had a better life to lose than I."
"It wouldn't be safe for you to go, Hugh," said Pete gently.
"Why not--watchdog?"
The sneer deepened the flush on Pete's face, but he answered with the same gentleness, fixing his blue eyes on his brother's.
"Because not two months ago there was a picture of you tacked up in the post-office."
Bella's face whitened, and Hugh's cheeks grew a shade more leaden. "T-two months ago!" he stammered painfully; "but that's not p-possible. They--they've given me up. They've f-forgotten me. They th-think I'm dead. After fifteen years? My God, Pete! Why didn't you tell me?" He pleaded the last with a shaken sort of sharpness, in pitiful contrast to the bombast of the preceding speech.
"I didn't see the good of telling you. I was waiting until this trip to see if the picture was still there, and maybe to ask some questions."
"What does it mean?" whispered Bella.
"It means they've some fresh reason to hunt me--some fresh impulse--God knows what or why. How can we tell out here, buried in the snows of fifteen winters. Well!" He struck his hands down on the table edge and stood up. He drew his mouth into a crooked smile and looked at the other two as a naughty child looks at its doting but disapproving elders. The smile transfigured his ugliness. "I've a fancy to see that picture. Want to be reminded of what I looked like fifteen years ago. I was a handsome fellow then. I'm going to take the pelts."
Pete looked dumbly up at him, his lips parted. Bella twisted her apron about her hands. Both seemed to know the hopelessness of protest. In the same anxious dumbness they watched Garth make ready for his trip. As he pulled his cap down close about his ears, Pete at last found his voice.
"Hugh," he began doubtfully, "I wish you wouldn't risk it. We can get on without supplies until next trading-day, when I'll surely be all right."
"Hold your tongue! I'm going," was the answer. "I tell you, the spirit of adventure has me. Who knows what I may meet with out there?" He flung back the door and, pointing with a long arm, stood silhouetted against the dazzle.
"Beauty? Opportunity? Danger? Hope? Death? I shan't shirk it this time. I'll meet whatever comes. But--" He came back a step into the room. His harsh face melted to a shamefaced gentleness; his voice softened. "If they get me down there, if I _don't_ come back, you two try to think kindly of me, will you? I know what you think of me now. I know you won't see me as I am--no one but God will ever do me that kindness; but you two--be easy with me in your memories."
Bella, her arms now twisted to their red elbows in her apron, took a few stiff steps across the floor. Her face was expressionless, her eyes lowered. Garth smiled at them both and went out, shutting the door. They heard him singing as he put on his skis:
A hundred men were riding, A-hunting for Pierre. They rode and rode, but nothing could they find. They rode around by moonlight; They rode around by day; They rode and rode, but nothing could they find.
Then came the sharp scraping of his runners across the surface of the snow on a level with the buried roof. It lessened from a hissing speech to a hissing whisper. It sighed away. Bella sat down abruptly on a chair, pulled in her chin like an unhappy child; her bosom lifted as though a sob would force its way out.
"If he doesn't come back!" she murmured. "If he doesn't come back!" She was speaking to God.

CHAPTER II
Pete blinked, swallowed hard and began to talk fast and hopefully.
"He'll come back. I