CHAPTER II.
The Fall of the Tree.
Next morning the year had grown perceptibly older; or so it seemed toStephanie, as she stood in the doorway of the log-cabin, looking acrossthe misty clearing to the golden forests that encircled it. The fallenleaves looked browner, each furred at the edge with a delicate fringeof hoar-frost; and the newly risen sun strove as yet in vain to sendsome heat through the faint, cold haze. It was more penetratinglychill than if it had been the drier winter time. Stephanie snuggledinto her little gray shawl with a keen appreciation of its roughwarmth, and watched her breath floating as tiny silver clouds in thealmost motionless air.
She was a tall, strong girl, with an unexpectedly plaintive face--aquaint, dark-eyed face which suited well with her quaint foreign name.Already she looked older than Dick, for her eyes were grave, and hermouth had taken a firm, responsible curve; it was a look which comessometimes to motherless girls who have men-folk to manage and care for.
The room behind her was neat and clean, but almost bare of even suchcomforts as might have been found in pioneer homes. Here and theresome little stool or shelf showed that her brother's deft fingers hadbeen at work; but in this as in most things he lacked the steadiness ofapplication which would have served to better their lot. And CaptainUnderwood was a broken man, plunged in a lethargy of remorse anddisappointment which threatened never to lighten. Since her mother'sdeath, life would have been almost unendurable to Stephanie had it notbeen for two things: these were the passionate affection existingbetween herself and Dick, and her intense love for and kinship withnature. All her scanty hours of idleness she spent roaming about theclearing or the edge of the forest--she knew the haunts of every weedand flower for a mile around. In the winter, flocks of little hungrybirds were her pensioners, and it is likely that she would haveseriously diminished their own stores in feeding them, had not Dickcollected berries and wild rice and seeds in the fall as a provisionfor emergencies.
On this keen autumn morning there were very few birds about; the robinshad flown, and the owls were going to bed; far away some noisy crowswheeled and cawed above the trees, but no longer could Stephanie hearthe innumerable small twitterings and tentative songs of a morning inthe summer. The forest was very silent. Indeed, the only sound thatbroke the half-awakened quietness was the distant thud and throb ofaxes biting deep into the trunk of a tree.
It was a curiously insistent sound, that seemed to claim more noticethan it was worth. Very clearly on the clear air was borne the noiseof every blow, and occasionally a faint crack as of a blade beingwrenched away. It forced itself on Stephanie's attention, growinglouder and fainter as slight breaths of wind moved the hazy air, butnever ceasing in its continual, irregular thud--thud; thud--thud. Herfather and Dick were chopping down the half-dead pine; she coulddistinguish the difference between the weight of their respectivestrokes.
Half unconsciously she listened. There was no cessation in the dullnoise; and to her it seemed full of threat and menace. She fanciedthat the other trees must be shaking all their remaining leaves in fearthat a like fate might befall them, and she hoped that Dick hadremembered to chase the chipmunk out of his hole. The chipmunk hadbeen a friend of hers, and she used to drop acorns at the foot of thetree where he might find them. Vaguely she wondered whether she wouldrecognise the little fellow again if she saw him in some other tree,and concluded that it was scarcely possible. While all the time thethud--thud of the axes seemed to weave itself into a sort of irregularaccompaniment to her wandering thoughts. And then suddenly she wasaware that it had stopped, and that a brief silence had once morefallen over the golden woods and the hazy field of corn.
The silence was broken by a sharp crack. Then a series of smalltearing, rushing, rending sounds ended in a mighty crash. Stephanieknew that the tree was down, and an odd little feeling of regret cameover her; once more there was a moment of utter silence. Then, sharpand keen and terribly distinct, she heard a wild cry from Dick.
She had run down the garden almost before that cry ceased to ring inthe air, and now she fled over the rough ground outside with as swiftand sure a step as a young deer might use. Her face was grey and drawnwith the sense of coming disaster, but neither her feet nor her breathfailed her as she breasted the low rise of ground, slippery with pineneedles, which lay between her and the place from which that cry hadcome.
As she gained the crest of the hill, she staggered back a step andalmost fell, but recovered and ran on, though for a minute she wasblind and deaf and scarcely conscious.
The pine, shorn of its few branches, lay upon the ground, and near thestump lay her father, with Dick kneeling beside him. When her sightcame back to her, she found that she also was kneeling there, staringstupidly at her brother's agonised face, and at the great branch tornfrom a neighbouring maple, which told all the terrible tale. Somewherein the silent woods a chipmunk chattered shrilly, and she wondered whenit would stop, for the noise hurt her head. Someone seemed to besaying drearily over and over again, "What are we to do? What are weto do?" and she felt angry with the momentous question. Surely silencewas the only fitting thing.
Then her senses seemed suddenly to wake into painful life again, andshe stood up and looked about in dry-eyed desperation. That her fatherwas seriously injured she knew, for the branch had struck him at thebase of the head. But he appeared to be still living; and what werethey to do for the best? A feeling of their utter loneliness sweptover her, bringing back that other irremediable loss of two years ago.Once more she knelt in the rustling leaves, sobbing her heart out."Oh, mother!" she cried, "oh, mother, mother, mother!"
The words held the most passionate prayer she had ever prayed in herlife. And presently she rose to her feet again, with dimmed eyes andtrembling lips, but strong to do and to endure. She seemed almost tohave grown a woman in that moment, and unconsciously she took the lead,though she was the younger of the two.
"Dick," she said steadily, "go and harness Murphy. We must take fatherto the Collinsons."
Dick stumbled off blindly to do her bidding. Murphy was the one leanox who had done all their carting and ploughing; and before long theboy came back again, driving the slow brute in the clumsy, creakingox-cart. Between them they managed to draw their father up twoinclined boards until his inert body rested safely in the cart; andthen fleet-footed Stephanie ran back to the cabin for all the coveringsand pillows in their poor store. Before half-an-hour had passed, theclumsy conveyance was creaking down the rough old Indian trail whichled by many windings to the Collinson homestead, bearing theunconscious Captain, while Dick and Stephanie walked beside, urgingMurphy to his best pace. Their hearts were sick with dread; motherlessthey had been for two years--were they now to be fatherless also?
It had all been so terribly sudden they had scarcely time to think, butit was the best thing they could do. At the Collinson homestead theirfather would be certain to receive the tenderest care, and perhapsmedical attendance if things turned out fortunately. But would theyever get him alive over those long, jolting miles? The same fear wasin the eyes of each as they looked at one another.
They were never to reach their journey's end. Before long the Captainbegan slowly to regain consciousness, and his first question was afaintly-uttered "What's this? Where are you taking me?"
They told him, with white, anxious faces bending over the rough sidesof the cart, while Murphy tried to reach a tempting bit of green grassunder the trees. But the injured man shook his head. "It is no use,my dears," he said feebly, "another two miles would kill me at once.And I must die where she died, for I cannot recover. Stephanie"--itwas curious how he turned from the elder child to hisyounger--"Stephanie, take me back! Promise to take me back!"
Who could have withstood the pitiful appeal in his eyes? With achinghearts they promised, and once more he relapsed into unconsciousness,muttering fragments of old orders which he had given as captain of thegreat merchantman Theseus, in the long ago days. They
looked at eachother in miserable helplessness.
Dick broke the wretched silence. "Stephanie," he said, "you must takehim home again, and I must go on to the Collinsons--for if he will notbe taken to help, help must be brought to him. I shall be able to taketwo or three short cuts, and they will ride or drive back with me, soit won't be so very long. But oh, my dear, I do hate to leave you!"
Stephanie shook her head. "We are thinking of him now," she saidquietly, and without another word turned Murphy round. With a lasthurried look, Dick plunged rapidly into the bushes at the side of thetrail, and she could hear the rustling of his footsteps growing fainterin the distance. Then began the weary journey home again.
They had only travelled a short distance from the little clearing, butto Stephanie it seemed hours before the log-cabin and the field of corncame into view. And having reached home, she had to face a newdifficulty. She could not, unaided, lift her father from the cart. Soshe backed it into a sheltered place among the trees, and brought therough chairs and barrels from the log-cabin to support the shafts.Then she unharnessed Murphy, and led him to his shed, moving as if shewere in some terrible dream.
Returning to the cabin, which already looked deserted and strange, sheransacked every corner until she found a little of some coarse, crudespirit in an old bottle. Mixing it with water, she strove to forcesome into her father's mouth, but he did not seem able to swallow. Soshe began her long helpless vigil beside the cart, knowing that therewas nothing she could do. If only Dick were there! The shadows grewlong and longer, and still the Captain lay motionless in the cartbeneath the great trees; and still Stephanie kept her patient watchbeside him. Only once did her father speak in all those terriblehours. She had been bending over him adjusting his coverings, when shefound him looking up at her with a brighter, more gentle look than shehad seen upon his face for years. "I thought you were your mother,little girl," he said faintly, "your hands move as hers did."
"They are not as soft as hers, father," said Stephanie in a brokenvoice.
"No," answered the Captain, "they are not as soft, poor brave littlehands. But their touch is as tender, my dear, their touch is astender."
After that the silence fell again--a greater, deeper, more divinesilence, though Stephanie did not know it. And still she sat besidethe cart in the gathering shadows, waiting for the help that was tocome.