The Crimson Gardenia and Other Tales of Adventure
the truth? She hated McGill, and she loved another! There had never been
an instant when her heart had not called.
And then, to make matters worse, Barclay came. He had spent most of the
long winter at the steamboat landing, being too angry to show himself in
Ophir, but the woman-hunger had grown upon him, as upon all men in the
North, and it finally drew him to her with a strength that would have
snapped iron chains. Hearing, shortly after his arrival, that McGill was
out on the creeks and never returned until dark, he went to the cabin.
Alice opened the door at his knock, then fell back with a cry. He shut
out the cold air behind him and stood looking at her until she gasped:
"Why have you come here?"
"Why? Because I couldn't stay away. You knew I'd have to come, didn't
you?"
"McGill!" she whispered, and cast a frightened look over her shoulder.
"Does he know?"
She shook her head.
"I hear he's broke--like the rest." Barclay laughed mockingly, and she
nodded. "Have you had enough?"
"Yes, yes! Oh yes!" she wailed, suddenly. "Take me away, Bob. Oh, take
me away!"
She was in his arms with the words, her breast to his, her arms about
his neck, her hot tears starting. She clutched him wildly, while he
covered her face with kisses.
"Don't scold me," she sobbed. "Don't! I'm sorry, I'm sorry. You'll take
me away, won't you?"
"Hush!" he commanded. "I can't take you away; there's no place to go to.
That's the worst of this damned country. He'd follow--and he'd get us."
"You must, Bob! You _must_! I'll die here with him. I've stood it as
long as I can--"
"Don't be a fool. You'll have to go through with it now until spring.
Once the river is open--"
"No, no, no!" she cried, passionately.
"Do you want us to get killed?"
Mrs. McGill shivered as if some wintry blast had searched out her
marrow, then freed herself from his embrace and said, slowly: "You're
right, Bob. We must be very careful. I--I don't know what he might do."
That evening she met McGill with a smile, the first she had worn for
some time, and she was particularly affectionate.
Instead of returning down-river, Barclay found lodgings and remained in
Ophir. He was not the most industrious of men, and before long became a
familiar figure around the few public places. McGill met him frequently,
seeing which Barclay's fellow-passengers from below raised their
eyebrows and muttered meaningless commonplaces; then, when the younger
man took to spending more and more of his time at the miner's cabin,
they ceased making any comment whatever. These are things that wise men
avoid, and a loose tongue often leads to an early grave when fellows
like McGill are about. Some of the old-timers who had wintered with the
miner in the "upper country" shook their heads and acknowledged that
young Barclay was a braver man than they gave him credit for being.
Of course McGill was the last to hear of it, for he was of the simple
sort who have faith in God and women and such things, and he might have
gone on indefinitely in ignorance but for Hopper, who did not care much
for the Barclay person. The saloon-man, being himself uneducated and
rough, like McGill, cherished certain illusions regarding virtue, and
let drop a hint his friend could not help but heed. The husband paid for
his drink, then went back to the rear of the room, where he sat for an
hour or more. When he went home he was more gentle to his wife than
ever. He brooded for a number of days, trying to down his suspicion, but
the poison was sown, and he finally spoke to her.
"Barclay was here again this afternoon, wasn't he?"
She turned her face away to hide its pallor. "Yes. He dropped in."
"He was here yesterday, and the day before, too, wasn't he?"
"Well?"
"He'd ought to stay away; people are talking."
She turned on him defiantly. "What of it? What do I care? I'm lonesome.
I want company. Mr. Barclay and I were good friends."
"You're my wife now."
"Your wife? Ha! ha! Your wife!" She laughed hysterically.
"Yes. Don't you love me any more, Alice?"
She said nothing.
"I've noticed a change, lately, and--I can't blame you none, but if you
loved me just a little, if I had even that much to start on, I wouldn't
mind. I'd take you away somewhere and try to make you love me more."
"You'd take me away, would you?" the woman cried, gaining confidence
from his lack of heat. "Away, where I'd be all alone with you? Don't you
see I'm dying of lonesomeness now? That's what's the matter. I'm half
mad with the monotony. I want to see people, and live, and be amused.
I'm young, and pretty, and men like me. You're old, McGill. You're old,
and I'm young."
Her husband withered beneath her words; his whole big frame sagged
together as if the life had ebbed out of it; he felt weary and sick and
burned out. His brain held but one thought--Alice did not love him,
because he was old.
"Don't go on this way," he said, finally, to check her. "I suppose it's
true, but I've felt like a daddy and a mother to you, along with the
other feeling, and I hoped you wouldn't notice it. I don't reckon any
young man could care for you like that. You see, it's all the loves of
my whole life wrapped up together, and I don't see, I don't see what we
can do about it. We're married!" It was characteristic of him that he
could devise no way out of the difficulty. A calamity had befallen them,
and they must adjust themselves to it as best they could. In his eyes
marriage was a holy thing, an institution of God, with which no human
hands might trifle.
"No," he continued, "you're my wife, and so we've got to get along the
best way we can. I know you couldn't do anything wrong--you ain't that
kind." His eyes roved over the homely little nest and the evidences of
their married intimacy. "No, you couldn't do that."
"Then you won't make it any harder for me than you can help?"
"No." He rose stiffly. "You're entitled to a fair show at anything you
want. I don't like Barclay, but if you want him around, I won't object.
Try to be as happy as you can, Alice; maybe it'll all come out right.
Only--I wish you'd known it wasn't love before you married me." He put
on his cap and went out into the cold.
During the ensuing week or two he devoted himself to his work, spending
every daylight hour on his claim, in this way more than satisfying
Barclay and the woman, who felt that a great menace had been removed.
But Hopper determined that his friend should know all and not part of
the truth, for good men are rare and weak women in the way, so he put on
his parka and walked out to the place where McGill was working, and
there, under a bleak March sky, with the snow-flurries wrapping their
legs about, he told what he had learned. Hopper was a little man, but he
had courage.
"I've heard it from half a dozen fellers," he concluded, "and they'd
ought to know, because they come up on the same boat with them. Anyhow,
you can satisfy yourself easy enough."
McGill moistened his lips and, thanking his informant, said, "Now you'd
better hustle back to camp; we're due for a storm."
It was still early afternoon when he walked swiftly out of the gulch and
into the straggling little town. On his way down from the claim the
blizzard had broken, or so it seemed, for the narrow valley had suddenly
become filled with a whirling smother through which he burst like a ship
through a fog. When he emerged upon the flats he saw that it was no more
than a squall and the wind was abating again.
His moccasins made no sound as he came up to his own house, and the
first inkling of his presence that the two inside received was when the
door opened and he stood before them. Something in his bearing caused
his wife to clutch at the table for support, and Barclay to retreat with
his back to the opposite wall, his hand inside his coat.
McGill never carried a weapon, having yet to feel the need of one. He
spoke now in a harsh, cracked voice. "Take your hand off that gun,
Barclay."
"What's the matter with you?" the younger man questioned.
Mrs. McGill's eyes were wide with terror, her frame racked by
apprehension, when her husband turned upon her and asked:
"Is it true? Do you love--him?" He jerked his head in Barclay's
direction. "Answer me!" he rumbled, savagely, as she hesitated.
Her lips moved, and she nodded without removing her gaze from him.
"How long have you loved him?"
When she still could not master herself, he softened his voice: "You
needn't be scared, Alice. I couldn't hurt _you_."
"A long--time," she said, finally.
McGill leveled a look at the other man.
"That's right," Barclay agreed. "You might as well know."
"They tell me that you and her had--" McGill ground his teeth, and his
little eyes blazed--"that she didn't have no right to marry
without--telling me something about you."
The former answered through white lips: "Well? Everybody knew it except
you, and you could have found out. I'd have married her sometime,
myself, if you hadn't come along."
McGill's fingers opened slowly, at which the woman burst forth:
"No, no! Don't--do that. You can't blame him, Dan. I did it. Don't you
understand? _I'm_ the one. I loved him in 'Frisco, long before I saw
you, and I've loved him ever since. Take it out on me, if you want to,
but don't hurt him."
"I don't reckon I'd have minded it much if I'd known the truth at the
start," said McGill. "Most women have made mistakes at one time or
another, at least most of those I've known have. No, it ain't that, but
you married me knowing that you loved him all the time."
"I tried to quit," cried the wife. "I tried to, but I couldn't."
"And what's the rottenest of all"--McGill's voice was ugly again--"you
made him best man at the wedding, or just the same. He stood up with us.
Didn't you, Barclay?"
The wife flung herself into the breach once more with a self-sacrifice
that wrenched her husband's heart. "He didn't want to, but I made him. I
thought you had money, and I was mad at him for letting me go, so I
tried to hurt him. I wanted him to marry me, but he wouldn't, and I took
you. When it was over and I saw the kind of man you are I tried to love
you--honestly I did, but I couldn't. You're so--I--I couldn't do it,
that's all." She broke into a torrent of tears, holding herself on her
feet by an effort. Her wretched sobbing was the only sound in the cabin
for a time, then Barclay inquired:
"Well, what are you going to do?"
McGill turned to his wife, ignoring Barclay. "I guess I understand
things pretty well now, and I'm beginning to see your side. Of course I
never aimed to hurt _you_, Alice--I couldn't; but I aimed to kill this
man, and I will if he stays here." Over his shoulder he flung out,
quickly: "Oh, the gun won't help you none. You've got to go, Barclay."
"I'll go with him," cried Mrs. McGill, desperately. "If he goes, I'll
go, too."
"That's exactly what you've got to do. You can't stay here now, neither
of you. If he ain't able to take care of you, why, I will as long as I
live, but you've both got to go."
"It's the best course under the circumstances," Barclay agreed, with
relief. "We'll take the first boat--"
"You'll go to-day, now," said the husband, grimly, "before I have time
to think it over."
"But where?"
"To hell! That's where you're headed."
"We can't go afoot," the woman cried in a panic.
"I've got dogs! And don't argue or I'll weaken. I'm letting him go
because you seem to need him, Alice. Only remember one thing, both of
you--there ain't no town big enough to hold all three of us. Now go,
quick, before I change my mind, for if the sun ever goes down on Barclay
and me together, so help me God! it won't rise on both of us. There