A thousand deaths by Jack London

lungs. Besides, he is a physician and knows. He would never

permit it.”

“Then what are you going to do?” she demanded again, with a tense,

quiet utterance that boded an outbreak.

Messner regarded her in a way that was almost paternal, what of the

profundity of pity and patience with which he contrived to suffuse

it.

“My dear Theresa, as I told you before, I don’t know. I really

haven’t thought about it.”

“Oh! You drive me mad!” She sprang to her feet, wringing her

hands in impotent wrath. “You never used to be this way.”

“I used to be all softness and gentleness,” he nodded concurrence.

“Was that why you left me?”

“You are so different, so dreadfully calm. You frighten me. I

feel you have something terrible planned all the while. But

whatever you do, don’t do anything rash. Don’t get excited – ”

“I don’t get excited any more,” he interrupted. “Not since you

went away.”

“You have improved – remarkably,” she retorted.

He smiled acknowledgment. “While I am thinking about what I shall

do, I’ll tell you what you will have to do – tell Mr. – er –

Haythorne who I am. It may make our stay in this cabin more – may

I say, sociable?”

“Why have you followed me into this frightful country?” she asked

irrelevantly.

“Don’t think I came here looking for you, Theresa. Your vanity

shall not be tickled by any such misapprehension. Our meeting is

wholly fortuitous. I broke with the life academic and I had to go

somewhere. To be honest, I came into the Klondike because I

thought it the place you were least liable to be in.”

There was a fumbling at the latch, then the door swung in and

Haythorne entered with an armful of firewood. At the first

warning, Theresa began casually to clear away the dishes.

Haythorne went out again after more wood.

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25

“Why didn’t you introduce us?” Messner queried.

“I’ll tell him,” she replied, with a toss of her head. “Don’t

think I’m afraid.”

“I never knew you to be afraid, very much, of anything.”

“And I’m not afraid of confession, either,” she said, with

softening face and voice.

“In your case, I fear, confession is exploitation by indirection,

profit-making by ruse, self-aggrandizement at the expense of God.”

“Don’t be literary,” she pouted, with growing tenderness. “I never

did like epigrammatic discussion. Besides, I’m not afraid to ask

you to forgive me.”

“There is nothing to forgive, Theresa. I really should thank you.

True, at first I suffered; and then, with all the graciousness of

spring, it dawned upon me that I was happy, very happy. It was a

most amazing discovery.”

“But what if I should return to you?” she asked.

“I should” (he looked at her whimsically), “be greatly perturbed.”

“I am your wife. You know you have never got a divorce.”

“I see,” he meditated. “I have been careless. It will be one of

the first things I attend to.”

She came over to his side, resting her hand on his arm. “You don’t

want me, John?” Her voice was soft and caressing, her hand rested

like a lure. “If I told you I had made a mistake? If I told you

that I was very unhappy? – and I am. And I did make a mistake.”

Fear began to grow on Messner. He felt himself wilting under the

lightly laid hand. The situation was slipping away from him, all

his beautiful calmness was going. She looked at him with melting

eyes, and he, too, seemed all dew and melting. He felt himself on

the edge of an abyss, powerless to withstand the force that was

drawing him over.

“I am coming back to you, John. I am coming back to-day . . .

now.”

As in a nightmare, he strove under the hand. While she talked, he

seemed to hear, rippling softly, the song of the Lorelei. It was

as though, somewhere, a piano were playing and the actual notes

were impinging on his ear-drums.

Suddenly he sprang to his feet, thrust her from him as her arms

attempted to clasp him, and retreated backward to the door. He was

in a panic.

“I’ll do something desperate!” he cried.

LOVE OF LIFE AND OTHER STORIES

26

“I warned you not to get excited.” She laughed mockingly, and went

about washing the dishes. “Nobody wants you. I was just playing

with you. I am happier where I am.”

But Messner did not believe. He remembered her facility in

changing front. She had changed front now. It was exploitation by

indirection. She was not happy with the other man. She had

discovered her mistake. The flame of his ego flared up at the

thought. She wanted to come back to him, which was the one thing

he did not want. Unwittingly, his hand rattled the door-latch.

“Don’t run away,” she laughed. “I won’t bite you.”

“I am not running away,” he replied with child-like defiance, at

the same time pulling on his mittens. “I’m only going to get some

water.”

He gathered the empty pails and cooking pots together and opened

the door. He looked back at her.

“Don’t forget you’re to tell Mr. – er – Haythorne who I am.”

Messner broke the skin that had formed on the water-hole within the

hour, and filled his pails. But he did not return immediately to

the cabin. Leaving the pails standing in the trail, he walked up

and down, rapidly, to keep from freezing, for the frost bit into

the flesh like fire. His beard was white with his frozen breath

when the perplexed and frowning brows relaxed and decision came

into his face. He had made up his mind to his course of action,

and his frigid lips and cheeks crackled into a chuckle over it.

The pails were already skinned over with young ice when he picked

them up and made for the cabin.

When he entered he found the other man waiting, standing near the

stove, a certain stiff awkwardness and indecision in his manner.

Messner set down his water-pails.

“Glad to meet you, Graham Womble,” he said in conventional tones,

as though acknowledging an introduction.

Messner did not offer his hand. Womble stirred uneasily, feeling

for the other the hatred one is prone to feel for one he has

wronged.

“And so you’re the chap,” Messner said in marvelling accents.

“Well, well. You see, I really am glad to meet you. I have been –

er – curious to know what Theresa found in you – where, I may say,

the attraction lay. Well, well.”

And he looked the other up and down as a man would look a horse up

and down.

“I know how you must feel about me,” Womble began.

“Don’t mention it,” Messner broke in with exaggerated cordiality of

voice and manner. “Never mind that. What I want to know is how do

you find her? Up to expectations? Has she worn well? Life been

LOVE OF LIFE AND OTHER STORIES

27

all a happy dream ever since?”

“Don’t be silly,” Theresa interjected.

“I can’t help being natural,” Messner complained.

“You can be expedient at the same time, and practical,” Womble said

sharply. “What we want to know is what are you going to do?”

Messner made a well-feigned gesture of helplessness. “I really

don’t know. It is one of those impossible situations against which

there can be no provision.”

“All three of us cannot remain the night in this cabin.”

Messner nodded affirmation.

“Then somebody must get out.”

“That also is incontrovertible,” Messner agreed. “When three

bodies cannot occupy the same space at the same time, one must get

out.”

“And you’re that one,” Womble announced grimly. “It’s a ten-mile

pull to the next camp, but you can make it all right.”

“And that’s the first flaw in your reasoning,” the other objected.

“Why, necessarily, should I be the one to get out? I found this

cabin first.”

“But Tess can’t get out,” Womble explained. “Her lungs are already

slightly chilled.”

“I agree with you. She can’t venture ten miles of frost. By all

means she must remain.”

“Then it is as I said,” Womble announced with finality.

Messner cleared his throat. “Your lungs are all right, aren’t

they?”

“Yes, but what of it?”

Again the other cleared his throat and spoke with painstaking and

judicial slowness. “Why, I may say, nothing of it, except, ah,

according to your own reasoning, there is nothing to prevent your

getting out, hitting the frost, so to speak, for a matter of ten

miles. You can make it all right.”

Womble looked with quick suspicion at Theresa and caught in her

eyes a glint of pleased surprise.

“Well?” he demanded of her.

She hesitated, and a surge of anger darkened his face. He turned

upon Messner.

LOVE OF LIFE AND OTHER STORIES

28

“Enough of this. You can’t stop here.”