CHAPTER XXI
THE SHORT CUT
Wanda Leland, her lithe body bending gracefully and easily as she droveher light skis over the glistening crust of the snow, shot down thelast long slope in a sort of ecstasy inspired by the exhiliration ofsilent speed and the crisp brightness of the early afternoon. Stoopingforward a little she took the short leap across the three foot widegulch at the base of the knoll upon which the house stood, and laughedaloud as she landed and with gathered impetus sped a score of feet upthe knoll itself.
She had left Wayne happy in the two things which mattered: He loved hereven as she loved him; he was a strong man and a true. There was stillsadness in her breast but it was but a sunspot in the great glory ofher happiness. But now suddenly, even while her lips curved redly toher gay laughter, was the gladness to go out of her.
She saw Willie Dart upon the porch, saw him start towards her in aneagerness little less than frantic. He fairly hurled himself from thesteps into the deep snow, floundered helplessly, and progressing byhard fought inches came on to meet her. As her skis, running up hill,came slowly to a stop she watched him with amused eyes. But when shesaw his face, twisted with despair, she grew suddenly afraid.
"They've gone to arrest Red!" he wailed. "The sheriff and Hume and twoother guys. Where is he?"
"He has gone back to the Bar L-M," she answered swiftly. "What do youmean?"
"I mean them crooks have gone to arrest him for murder," he called toher. "They left nearly an hour ago. It's a skin game of the worstkind. They want him tied up so they can work some sneaking gag and robhim of his land. Hume wants him where he can't ride a race in thespring so he'll grab Red's five thousand. The money's already up. Godknows what else they've got up their dirty sleeves."
For one dizzy moment the girl grew faint with fear. And when thatmoment passed she saw clearly that as matters stood Wayne Shandon had aman's work ahead of him. Thrown into jail, charged with so serious acrime as fratricide, with Hume, and perhaps her own father, doingeverything in the world that they could do to hamper him, he would becarrying a handicap to break the back of a man's hope.
"They mustn't do this thing!" she cried passionately, the eyes that hadbeen tender a moment ago growing fierce. "Does my father know this?"
"Sure," grunted Dart disgustedly. "He's one of the combine."
"And they left an hour ago?"
"Seems like a million years. It must be awful close to an hour. Say,Wanda, I tried, honest to God, I did--"
She did not hear. She had turned away from him and was staring at thelong billowing sweep of snow lying between her and those men who hadgone to arrest Wayne Shandon. She saw the broken imprints of theCanadian snowshoes, the smooth tracks of the skis, and demanded sharply:
"Which men wore the webs?"
"Them tennis racket things? MacKelvey and one of his thieves."
He looked at her wonderingly. What difference did that make? ButWanda took no time for explanations. She was thinking swiftly thatMacKelvey would be the man to make the arrest, that the others wouldaccommodate their gait to his, that upon a crust like this the Canadianshoes could make no such speed as a pair of skis.
"Tell mamma, no one else, where I have gone," she cried.
And, swinging about, she took the side of the knoll in a long sweep,shot down into a hollow, rose upon the far side, crossed the trail thatthe four men had made, seemed to Mr. Dart's staring eyes to bebalancing a moment upon a line where snow and sky met and then was gonefrom him, dropping out of sight into the wilderness of snow.
"She's some game little kid," he moaned, shaking his head and making aslow retreat back to the house. "But with them cutthroats an hourahead of her, she ain't got a show. Poor old Red."
But Wanda's heart was beating steadily now, her muscles were obeyingthe calm command of her will, and she was telling herself resolutelythat she did have a chance. MacKelvey and Hume and the others wouldsee no imperative need for a wild burst of speed; they would travelswiftly but they would not know that she was moving more swiftly behindthem. Up and down hill they would go step by step while she, followingthe way she knew so well, the trails she had followed winter afterwinter, would find the long slopes down which she would shoot like aflash of light. It was more than possible that they would take overtwo hours in making the trip; she must make it in less than an hour.
"If I had only come home half an hour sooner," she cried as she foughther oblique way up a ridge she must top, "I could have laughed at them.God be with me and I'll laugh at them yet!"
She was going too fast; she came to the crest of the ridge panting, herheart beating wildly, her body shaking. She sought to relax hermuscles as she took the long racing ride down upon the far side. Shewent more slowly as she climbed the next ridge. She was thinkingcoolly now, she saw the need both of speed and of a conservation ofenergy. She felt no fatigue from the trip of the forenoon; she hadrested long at the cave with Wayne; and yet she knew that unless shesaved her strength she would be unfit for the last burst of speed atthe end.
She did not follow the track the four men had left. She knew thesewoods too well to lose a precious yard now. Where they had turned hereand there to avoid thick clumps of firs the girl, looking far ahead,economised strength and shortened distances.
"I _must_ get there first," she cried over and over again. "If thesemen will do the sort of thing Wayne says that they have done, if theywill stop at nothing to gain their ends, what hope has he if theyarrest him and charge him with Arthur's murder? There will beevidence, they will make evidence, and he will be in jail where he cannot help himself."
Once she heard a faint cracking sound under her feet and her heartstopped. If a ski had broken now-- But it was only a dead brush, snowcovered, and one of the lifeless twigs had snapped. She became morecareful of the way, wary of being tricked by the blinding snow thatappeared level when there were mounds and hollows that might havebroken a ski had she been careless and unlucky. The sudden hideousfancy leaped out upon her that the breaking of a ski now might mean thedeath of a man, the only man in the world for her.
At last, from the crest of the highest ridge, the one from which eachyear she took her favourite ride down to the river, she caught sight ofthe little party that menaced Wayne Shandon's liberty. The men hadbeen making better time than she had let herself believe they would;evidently MacKelvey wanted to get the thing over with, to get back tothe Echo Creek that night. Beyond them, straight ahead, was the bridge.
"I can't do it! I can't do it!" she cried aloud, her voice broken withhopelessness.
Even as she hesitated, poising upon the top of the rise, one of the menfar ahead turned and saw her. It was Sledge Hume. She saw his quickgesture; she almost fancied that she could hear his laugh. He wouldknow why she followed them. He would be mocking her. Oh, how shehated the man then!
"They will leave one of the deputies at the bridge," she thought indespair. "He won't let me across. Oh, God, if there were only anothercrossing!"
_There was another crossing; a snowshoe rabbit had shown it to her_.He had sought to leap it just to save the little flame of life in thetiny furred breast. He had gone to his death valiantly, but he hadshown her the place, the short cut, the way that was full of menace andyet that was possible.
Her face whitened; she hesitated just a fraction of a second,balancing. Now the men were following the wide crescent of the curvewhich would lead them to the bridge. There was another course lyingstraight between the two tips of that crescent, and a great gap filledwith the thunder of raging water against crags that were like thehorrible teeth of a monster, broke the short cut in two.
Again Hume had turned; she noted even across the distance thecontemptuous carriage of his big body and she knew that he waslaughing. And again, as though it were already just before her, shefancied that she saw the chasm of the river.
"It is Wayne's ruin, it maybe Wayne's death, if they take him now!"
It seemed
to her that it had not been her voice, that whispered thewords. It seemed that they had come to her from the air, that some oneelse had spoken them. And as, hesitating no longer, she stoopedforward and sped down the long slope, she swerved still further fromthe track the four men had made, heading straight to the river abovethem, opposite the Bar L-M ranch house, straight toward the only waythat was left her.
She had made up her mind. She was resolute now and yet she wasfrightened. In a little while the roar of the river smote her ears andit seemed at once to call to her and jeer at her. She fancied that itwas like Hume's voice, mocking her. She remembered just how the banksfell straight down to the whirlpools; she remembered again the splashof the falling snow when she had come so close to her death. The veryfeeling that had gripped her then, like ice against the beatings of herheart, gripped her now. She was as one in a nightmare, drawn on,rushing on to the peril from which she shrank.
She lost sight of Hume and the rest as she left the straight, clearedroadway and the trees came between her and them.
"They're all the same," Sledge Hume was laughing as he turned andwaited a moment for MacKelvey to come up with him. "I never saw awoman yet who wasn't willing to tackle the impossible in a flash andthen go to pieces with hysterics in the middle of the job."
On, gathering speed with the flinging of each yard behind her, herpolished skis singing as they leaped downward, hardly seeming to touchthe brittle crust of snow underfoot, standing erect that she might seefar ahead and turn in time for a mound that spoke of a boulder, Wandawas rushing on toward the river. Its shouting voices, like the voicesof many giant things In brutal laughter, swelled and thundered evermore distinct, ever more jeering. It seemed to her that there were tenthousand Sledge Humes taunting her, sneering at the blind recklessnessof a mere woman. She knew that the blood had crept out of her face andthat she was afraid. And she knew that there is one thing in theworld, God-created, that is greater, stronger than fear.
"I have leaped distances greater than that before," she told herselfstubbornly.
"With certain death dragging at you if you missed?" the rude laughterof the river through its rocky way taunted her.
Her skis were running slowly again; she had come to the level land oncemore. She must make a little turn to avoid the thick grove throughwhich she had gone slowly last year after the rabbit. She must turnupstream a little too. There were ten minutes of driving one ski afterthe other, then the steep climb of another ridge, the last ridge lyingbetween her and the river. She climbed it swiftly, stubbornly andunhesitatingly.
"If Wayne were coming to me would he hesitate?" she asked herselfangrily. "Because I am not a man am I a coward? Shall I fail him thefirst time in our lives that he has need of me? Is a woman like that afit thing to be a strong man's wife?"
At the top of this last climb she paused. She was not afraid now. Thecolour had come back into her face, her blood was running steadily.She might be going to her death. Was death then so great a thing? Wasit as great as her love?
"If I were afraid now," she told herself quietly, "I should know that Ido not love Wayne as other women have loved other men. Then I shouldnot deserve to live to love him weakly."
From here she could not see MacKelvey, Hume and the others. She knewthat by this time they would have crossed the bridge. Then she triednot to think of them. Briefly she studied the steep sloping sweep ofthe snow, trying to mark the way she must go. She found the spot therabbit had chosen, the narrowest place with the far bank three or fourfeet lower than the near bank. Frowningly seeking the detail of asheet of glaring white which seemed without mound or hollow but whichshe knew was full of uneven ridges and sinks, she made out at last sucha ridge lying parallel to the river's edge and close to it. A log hadfallen there; she remembered having seen it in the summer. With thelittle hollow this side, with the short upward slope that would giveher a natural take-off, she would make it help her.
She would strike this low up-sloping mound in a moment when she sweptdown upon it from the crest of the ridge upon which she now stood; shewould take the tiny dip in a fraction of a second too brief to have aname; she would rise, leaping as she rose--
The supreme moment came.
She loosened the band about her waist, breathing deeply. She bent herslender body this way and that, straightening up, stooping, twistingfrom side to side. She felt that every individual muscle must be madeready, keyed up to the work that was to be done in a flying moment.She must be steady, she must be sure. Not a fibre of her being mustweaken or tremble or be uncertain.
"Dear God," she whispered, "make me strong and worthy and unafraid."
Then she lifted her hands a little, holding them out from her sides,her fingers outstretched, her arms taking the place of the pole she hadtossed away. Her skis clung to the snow. She slipped the right footback and forth, making sure that it had gathered none of the featherystuff that lay just under the thin crust. When it ran smoothly shetested the left ski. And then slowly she stooped forward, her handsstill out. She felt a little stir, knew that she was moving, justbarely moving. She stooped further forward now, quickly. The shiftingof her weight had its instantaneous effect. The slow, scarcelyperceptible moving was changed into a smooth glide that grew in a yardto a swiftly accelerating speed. Then she straightened up, balancingwith taut muscles, rushing downward.
Now she was flying as a bird flies that skims the snow. Only thelittle whine of the ski song over the crust, the flying particles frombefore the upturned ends, a dust of diamonds, told that the speedingbody was not in reality defying gravity, scorning the earth beneath.The pitch steepened before her, the skis rose and dipped over thelittle uneven places, the air cut at her face, stung her eyes. Halfway down, when the skis struck a little mound from which she dared nottry to swerve, she in sober truth flew, not touching the crust againfor five or six feet. She landed easily, crouching a little, tensingher already taut muscles, steadying herself, plunging onward at a speedthat was like an eagle's dip. And then another second, another and sheheard the whine of the air about her ears, saw the black gulf fromwhich the roar of the river boomed up at her and her skis rose to thetake-off she had chosen.
As never before in all her life did the girl's will call upon themuscles of her body. Her hands far out now, like the still pinions ofsome strange being of a strange white world, her lithe body as tense aswire, she gathered her strength, felt her body rising as the skisslipped up the short slope of the mound, knew that in one flying secondthere lay both success and death. At the very instant, when, had shelet herself go, she would be slipping down to the water that wasgrinding at the rocks, she leaped.
Higher and higher she rose in the air, carried onward, upward by theimpetus of her wild race and by the slight aid of her take-off hadgiven her. Higher yet and further out although it seemed to her stillheart that her body was hanging motionless, that it was the earthleaping beneath her, flying backward, rushing away, hurling the chasmof the river under her. She did not look down; it might have meantdeath to look down. She kept her eyes fastened now upon the far bank,the place where she sought to land, where she must throw herselfforward to avoid slipping back.
And yet she saw the black gulf under her. It was too black, too wide,too full of shrieking menace for her not to see it even while she didnot look at it. She was hanging still in air, it was rushing at her,there was an instant filled with eternity. And then, Wayne's name uponher lips, she had described the great arc, she had struck six feet fromthe treacherous margin on the far side, her skis were running smoothlyunder her, at first swiftly, then slowly, and a glad cry ofthankfulness broke from her lips.
She had not even fallen, she did not have to hurl herself prone toclutch at the snow with her fingers. She sped on, came slowly to astandstill and then her heart leaping, her blood racing, her eyesbright and wet she was over the ridge and speeding forward again, theroar of the river lost to her ears, the form of a man bringing a horseout of a snow s
urrounded barn in her eyes.
He cried out as he saw her racing across the snow to him, cried out inwonder. He dropped his horse's rope and turned to meet her. She sawthat he was still on his skis, saw too that not a thousand yards beyondthe house four men were coming on swiftly.
"Wanda!"
"Wayne." She had come close enough to call now and lifted her voiceclearly. "MacKelvey and Hume and two more men are there, right there.They are going to arrest you for Arthur's murder. They mean to keepyou shut up in jail until they ruin you. They will make evidence tohang you. You must go, go quick."
He swung about quickly, caught sight of the four men who had seen Wandaand who were lessening the distance by quick strides. His faceblackened to a great anger. Then he turned back to her and his faceflushed with a great happiness. For in the man as in the woman lovewas stronger than fear or hatred.
"You golden hearted, wonderful woman!" he cried softly. He reached outhis arms as she swept by and gathered her into them. He kissed hersoftly. And then, swiftly, he turned away.
"After a few days, come to the cave," he said eagerly. "If I let themtake me now it would mean more than my ruin, more than my death, Wanda.They won't take me. When a man is arrested for Arthur's murder it isgoing to be the right man."
And striking out mightily, steadily he left her, driving his straightway toward the broken country of the upper end of the valley.
When they came to where she lay, Hume first, they found Wanda Lelandvery still and white, motionless save for the little sobs shaking her.Hume's anger broke out into a wordy fury. He shook his fist at herprostrate body and cursed. But he did not sneer. There was too deep awonder in his heart. He knew, they all knew, what it meant to havedone what she had done. And MacKelvey, a hard man robbed by her of hisprey, took off his hat and lifted her gently and said simply, and infull reverence:
"By God!"