George Gibbs - The Silent Battle

“It’s enough, God knows,” he said, sitting upright. “You must have suffered.”

“I did—I wonder what got into me. I’ve never been frightened in the woods before.” She turned her head over her shoulder and peered into the shadows. “I don’t seem to be frightened now.”

“I’m glad. I’m going to try to make you forget that. You’re in no danger here. To-morrow I’ll try to find my back trail—or Joe Keegón may follow mine. In the meanwhile”—and he started to his feet, “I’ve got a lot to do. Just sit quietly there and nurse your ankle while I make your bed. And if I don’t make it properly, the way you’re used to having it, just tell me. Won’t you?”

“Hair, please, with linen sheets, and a down pillow,” she enjoined.

“I’ll try,” he said with a laugh, for he knew now that the tone she used was only a cloak to hide the shrinking of her spirit. She sat as he had commanded, leaning as comfortably as she could against the tree trunk, watching his dim figure as it moved back and forth among the shadows. First he trod upon and scraped the ground, picking up small stones and twigs and throwing them into the darkness until he had cleared a level spot. Then piece by piece he laid the caribou moss as evenly as he could. He had seen Joe do this some days ago when they had made their three-day camp. The cedar came next; and, beginning at the foot and laying the twig ends upward, he advanced to the head, a layer at a time, thus successively covering the stub ends and making a soft and level couch. When it was finished, he lay on it, and made some slight adjustments.

“I’m sorry it’s not a pneumatic—and about the blankets—but I’m afraid it will have to do.”

“It looks beautiful,” she assented, “and I hate pneumatics. I’ll be quite warm enough, I’m sure.”

To make the matter of warmth more certain, he pitched two of the biggest logs on the flames, and then made a rough thatch of the larger boughs over the supports that he had set in position. When he had finished, he stood before her smiling.

“There’s nothing left, I think—but to get to bed. I’m going off for enough firewood to last us until morning. Shall I carry you over now or–”

“Oh, I think I can manage,” she said, her lips dropping demurely. “I did before—while you were away, you know.” She straightened and her brows drew together. “What I’m puzzled about now is about you . Where are you going to sleep?”

“Me? That’s easy. Out here by the fire.”

“Oh!” she said thoughtfully.

Dragging his lagging feet, Gallatin struggled on until his task was finished. He took the saucepan and cup to the stream, washed them carefully, and filled them with water. Then he untied the handkerchief from around his neck and washed that, too. When he got back to the fire, he found the girl lying on the couch, her head pillowed on her arm, her eyes gazing into the fire.

“I’ve brought some water. I thought you might like to wash your face,” he said.

“Thanks,” gratefully. “You’re very thoughtful.”

He mended the fire for the night, and waiting until she had finished her impromptu toilet, took the saucepan to the stream and rinsed it again. Then he cleared the remains of the fish away, hung the creels together on the limb of a tree and, without looking toward the shelter, threw himself down beside the fire, utterly exhausted.

“Good night,” she said. He turned his head toward her. The firelight was dancing in her eyes, which were as wide open as his own.

“Good night,” he said pleasantly, “and pleasant dreams.”

“I don’t seem to be a bit sleepy—are you?”

“No, not yet. Aren’t you comfortable?”

“Oh, yes. It isn’t that. I think I’m too tired to sleep.”

He changed his position a little to ease his joints.

“I believe I am, too,” he smiled. “You’d better try though. You’ve had a bad day.”

“I will. Good night.”

“Good night.”

But try as he might, he could not sleep. Each particular muscle was clamoring in indignant protest at its unaccustomed usage. The ground, too, he was forced to admit was not as soft as it might have been, and he was sure from the way his hip bone ached, that it was on the point of coming through his flesh. He raised his body and removed a small flat stone which had been the cause of the discomfort. As he did so he heard her voice again.

“You’re dreadfully unhappy. I don’t see why–”

“Oh, no, I’m not. This is fine. Please go to sleep.”

“I can’t. Why didn’t you make another bed for yourself?”

“I didn’t think about it,” he said, wondering now why the thought had never occurred to him. “You see,” he lied cautiously, “I’m used to this sort of thing. I sleep this way very often. I like it.”

“Oh!”

What an expressive interjection it was as she used it. It ran a soft arpeggio up the scale of her voice and down again, in curiosity rather than surprise, in protest rather than acquiescence. This time it was mildly skeptical.

“It’s true—really. I like it here. Now I insist that you go to sleep.”

“If you use that tone, I suppose I must.” She closed her eyes, settled one soft cheek against the palm of her hand.

“Good night,” she said again.

“Good night,” he repeated.

Gallatin turned away from her so that she might not see his face and lay again at full length with his head pillowed on his arms, looking into the fire. His mental faculties were keenly alive, more perhaps by reason of the silence and physical inaction than they had been at any time during the day. Never in his life before, it seemed, had he been so broadly awake. His mind flitted with meddlesome agility from one thought to another; and so before he had lain long, he was aware that he was entirely at the mercy of his imagination.

One by one the pictures emerged—the girl’s flight, the wild disorder of her appearance, her slender figure lying helpless in the leaves, the pathos of her streaming eyes, and the diminutive proportions of her slender foot. It was curious, too, how completely his own difficulties and discomforts had been forgotten in the mitigation of hers. Their situation he was forced to admit was not as satisfactory as his confident words of assurance had promised.

He had not forgotten that most of his back-trail had been laid in water, and it was not to be expected that Joe Keegón could perform the impossible. Their getting out by the way he had come must largely depend upon his own efforts in finding the spot up-stream where he had come through. The help that could be expected from her own people was also problematical. She had come a long distance. That was apparent from the condition of her gaiters. For all Gallatin knew, her camp might be ten, or even fifteen miles away. Something more than a mild curiosity possessed him as to this camp and the people who were using it; for there was a mystery in her sudden separation from the “companion” to whom she had so haltingly and vaguely alluded.

It was none of his business, of course, who this girl was or where she came from; he was aware, at this moment of vagrant visions, of an unequivocal and not unpleasant interest in this hapless waif whom fortune, with more humor than discretion, had so unceremoniously thrust upon his mercies. She was very good to look at. He had decided that back in the gorge where she had first raised her elfin head from the leaves. And yet, now as he lay there in the dark, he could not for the life of him guess even at the color of her eyes or hair. Her hair at first had seemed quite dark until a shaft of the declining light in the west had caught it, when he had decided that it was golden. Her eyes had been too light to be brown and yet—yes, they had been quite too dark to be blue. The past perfect tense seemed to be the only one which suited her, for in spite of the evidences of her tangibility close at hand, he still associated her with the wild things of the forest, the timid things one often heard at night but seldom glimpsed by day. Cautiously he turned his head and looked into the shelter. She lay as he had seen her last, her eyes closed, her breath scarcely stirring her slender body. Her knees were huddled under her skirt and she looked no larger than a child. He remembered that when she had stood upright she had been almost as tall as he, and this metamorphosis only added another to the number of his illusions.