CHAPTER XIX
THE QUEST.
Perhaps Helen might have slept better had she known what was in thewallet, but it would have been difficult. Dr. Wright, accompanied byDouglas, crept silently into the tent just before the camp broke upfor the night and found her pulse absolutely normal. His patient wassleeping so peacefully that he sought his hammock thoroughly contentedwith the treatment he had administered in the first case of snake bitethat he had met in his practice.
Dawn was in the neighborhood of four o'clock. It was so still it seemedimpossible that thirty persons were camping on that mountain side. Thenight noises had ceased. Katy-dids and tree-frogs, who had been makingas much clatter as though they had been getting out a morning paper, hadgone home to rest until it should be time to commence on the nextedition.
This lull between night and morning lasted only a few moments and thenthere was "the earliest pipe of half-awakened birds." At the firstsleepy note, Dr. Wright stirred in the hammock which he had stretchedtightly between two giant pines a little way from the camp. He had toldhimself he was to awake at dawn, and now that he had done it, what wasit all about? He lay still for a few moments drowsily drinking in thebeauties of the dawn. A mocking bird had constituted himself waker-up ofthe bird kingdom since he could speak all languages. He now began tocall the different bird notes and was sleepily answered from bush andtree. When he felt that a sufficient number was awake to make it worthhis while, he burst into a great hymn of praise and thanksgiving; atleast that was what it seemed to the young doctor, the only human beingawake on that mountain side.
"I'd like to join you, old fellow, I'm so thankful that Helen is safe,"and then he remembered why he had set himself the task of waking atdawn.
He slid from his hammock and in a short while was taking the trail ofthe day before, back to the Devil's Gorge. It seemed but a short walk tothe athletic young man as he swung his long legs, delighting in theexercise. He reached the gorge in much less than half the time it hadtaken the hikers of yesterday.
The morning light was clear and luminous but the gorge was as gruesomeas ever. Sun light never penetrated its gloom, and Dr. Wright noticedthat no birds seemed to sing there. He let himself carefully down thecliff, practicing what he had preached and looking where he stepped. Inthe exact spot where Helen had jumped, he saw a snake coiled as thoughwaiting for another pretty little gray shoe to come his way.
"It may not be the same snake," muttered the young man, "but I am goingto presume it is and kill him if I can."
He was standing on the ledge where Helen had been when she called toLewis Somerville, just before the fatal leap. The wallet was in plainview, caught in a crotch of the scrub oak, and the hateful snake wascurled up directly under the tree as though put there by some evilmagician to guard a secret treasure.
"You needn't look at me with your wicked eyes. I am going to kill you ifI can, and why, I don't know, because I believe in a way you have doneme a pretty good turn. Helen trusts me now, at least!"
He raised a great bowlder over his head and with a sure aim hurled itdown on the serpent, who was even then making his strange rattle likedry leaves in the wind.
"That was your swan song, old boy," and so it was. The snake was crushedby the blow, only his tail sticking out, twitching feebly, the rattlevibrating slowly, making a faint lonesome sound.
"I think I'll take this for a souvenir!" The doctor got out one of hisever ready instruments and deftly extracted the rattle from the nowharmless reptile. "Some day we may laugh over this," but I don't knowwhy this made him blush as it did, there all by himself in the Devil'sGorge.
The rattle in his pocket, he started back up the cliff, when hesuddenly remembered his quest. "Well, by Jove, it looks as though thatmysterious wallet was destined to be left in the branches of the dwarfoak!" he exclaimed, as he made his way back down to the spot and thistime got the leather wallet. It was very tightly wedged into the tree,in fact, it had become incorporated, as it were, into the growth of thetree, and one of the gnarled and twisted limbs had to be cut away beforehe could free the object of his morning walk.
It was a bulky pocket-book, made of alligator skin which, because of itstoughness, had evidently been able to withstand the weather that Dr.Wright felt sure it must have had to undergo for years, judging by theway the branches of the tree had grown around it.
"I won't open it now, but will take it to Helen. It was her find and Iam not going to jump her claim."
The camp was stirring when he returned. Much shouting from thebath-house assured him that the boys were undergoing a shower of thefreezing mountain water. He waited until the last glowing, damp-hairedyouth filed out and then took a sprinkle himself, which refreshed himgreatly but left him so hungry that the delightful odors from the openair kitchen almost maddened him. Roe herring he was sure of,--that isalways unmistakable; hot rolls were holding their own in the riot ofsmells; bacon was asserting itself; there was a burnt sugar effect thatmust mean fried June apples; and threading its way through the symphonyof fragrance and rising supreme over all was a coffee motive.
"Do you blame any one for stealing food when he is hungry?" he askedGwen, whom he found in the pavilion setting the tables. "I don't."
"You have been up a long time, sir. I saw you a little after four on thetrail near Aunt Mandy's."
"Were you up then?"
"Oh, yes, sir. I always get up early to milk and put the cabin in orderbefore I come over here. It will be a little while before breakfast.Shall I get you a cup of coffee now?"
"That would be very kind of you! I am famished, and perhaps a cup ofcoffee would keep me from disgracing myself when breakfast is ready."
Gwen had changed a great deal in the few weeks since she had come soshyly from behind the bowlder to offer herself as factotum to Lewis andBill. She still had the modest demeanor, but had lost her extremeshyness and also much of her primness. She was now a more natural girlof fourteen, thanks to Nan and Lucy, who had tried to make her feel athome with them. Shoes and stockings had helped her to recover from hertimidity. She had always had an idea that people were looking at herbare feet. Over her skimpy little dress she now wore a bungalow apron,which was vastly becoming to her Puritan type of beauty. The first moneyshe made had been spent on shoes and aprons. Helen had wanted to presenther with these things, but Gwen and Josh were alike in wanting nothingthey had not honestly earned.
As the girl came towards the doctor, bearing in her steady little brownhands a tray with a smoking cup of coffee and a hot buttered roll, justto tide him over until breakfast, he thought he had never seen a moreattractive child.
"And it wasn't because she was feeding me, either," he said to Helenlater on, "but because she had such a fine upstanding look to her andbecause her hand was so capable and steady and her gaze so open andhonest. No great lady, trained in the social graces, could have handedone a cup of coffee with more assurance and ease of manner."
"Miss Helen was asking for you," said Gwen, as she put down thedelectable tray.
"Oh, is she all right?" and the physician jumped up, ready to leave hisuntasted food if he were needed.
"Oh, yes, she is as well as can be, and when I took her some coffeeearly this morning, she told me she had slept so well and was famishedfor food. I am going to straighten up her tent just as soon as the girlsare out of it, so you can go in to see her. I told her I had seen youtaking a walk at four o'clock. She wants to see you."
"I wonder if heavenly messengers wear blue aprons and tennis shoes," theyoung man said to himself, "because if they do, I am sure Gwen is one ofthem." He patted his breast pocket to make sure the bulky wallet wasthere, hoping it held in some way good for the little English girl butdetermined to say nothing about it until Helen had her first peep.
"Can it be possible that I am falling in love with Helen?" he muttered."She is not more than seventeen, and, besides, it was only yesterdaythat I determined never to put myself in the way of being insulted byher again so long as I should live.
Here I am starving to death (thisroll and coffee will be only a drop in the bucket of my great appetite)and still I'd rather go see her than eat the breakfast I can smellcooking. I promised the father and mother to look after the childrenwhile they were taking my prescription, and this is a fine way to do it:to fall in love with one of them! Besides, Helen is not a bit prettierthan Douglas, not so clever as Nan, and so spoiled that she can becertainly very disagreeable, but still--still--she is Helen--and Bobbyloves her best of all. Anyhow, I think I'll eat my breakfast firstbefore I go to her, since she does not need my professional services."
"I never see folks eat like these here week-enders," declared Oscar, asbreakfast progressed and he came to the kitchen for more hot rolls. Healso brought directions from Douglas for Susan to scramble a dish ofeggs for some of the late comers who found nothing but herring tails fortheir portion of a dish ever dear to the heart of all Virginians.
"I don't see how the young ladies 'spects to clar nothin' out'n theirventur'some if'n all the payin' guests eats ekal to these here," saidSusan, as she took another pan of rolls out of the oven and put askillet on the stove to get hot for the eggs. "I's done been to manysprings an' sich with Mis Carter when I was a-nussin' of Bobby an' Inever yet seed any of the pr'ietors knock up a dish er eggs fer nosleepy haids. Fus' come, fus' serve, an' las' come satisfy theyselveswith herrin' tails an' coffee drugs. Miss Gwen done made three pots ercoffee already an' she mought jes' as well be pourin' it down thebottomless pit fer all the showin' it's done made. If'n these folks isgonter eat all mornin', I'd like ter know whin we's ter git the disheswashed."
"Well, dey won't need no scrapin'," laughed Oscar, as he bore away theplates heaped with crusty turnovers. "I been a-bettin' on Mr. BillTinsley, but looks lak Dr. Wright kin hole his own with the bes' ofthem."
"One thing sho," grumbled Susan, who had the customary bad humor of theSunday morning cook, "th'ain't no use'n a clock up'n in this here camp.Whin you gits through with breakfast, it's time ter begin dinner."