thoughts. He no longer thought of the Indians who would soon be seeking out their trail.
He thought only of the three women, who must have shelter, and especially of the sick woman, who must have care, rest, and good food. Behind him they were coming on, trusting in him. To Janice he was a brute, a savage. It was in her eyes whenever she looked at him. He had saved them, yes. But only by killing and destruction, and she believed him capable of nothing else.
And was he?
Gloomily he stared at the dying embers. There was no time to think of that now. The sick woman could go little farther.
This was new country to him, but like all mountain men and plainsmen, he looked carefully at a country when he rode across it. Riding out that day with Healy, he had noticed a brush-choked ravine. He walked back to meet them, explaining the situation without holding back anything. “We won’t go near the place,” he added. “There’s a ravine cuts back to the north.” Indians might steal horses by night, but they had little liking for night fighting. But that was not true of Barker, if he had not himself been slain. The ravine seemed filled with brush, but there was a game trail along one edge. Mabry led the way, and after a few hundred yards the brush thinned out and there were more trees, poplars with more and more evergreens and occasional clumps of aspens. Suddenly he saw what he wanted, a thick grove of young aspens, most of them no more than an inch thick. Cutting boughs from a pine that stood near the aspens, he made a quick bed on the snow. Atop it he placed a buffalo robe and blankets. Then gently he lifted Maggie from the horse and placed her on the bed. Then he went into the grove. With the ax brought from the wagons he cut off a dozen or ,m trees right at ground level. When he had cleared a space some ten feet in diameter he jumped and caught a young tree as high as he could reach: Then, pulling on its branches, he bent the top over.
While Dodie held it in place, he bent down another from the opposite side and lashed them together with a piggin string from his saddle. He did the same thing with two other trees at right angles to the first two.
Then he pulled down others and tied them all at the center until he had a domelike frame, rooted in the ground. Janice came to watch, and seeing him weaving evergreen boughs into the framework, she pitched in to help. There were a number of two-year-old pines on the slope of the hill behind the aspens. With Dodie, Janice, and Healy helping, the but was soon covered and tight. He left a space near the top of the dome for the escape of smoke.
Inside they made beds of evergreen boughs, taking care to strip none of the trees, but to take only a few boughs from each. When the bed inside was ready, Mabry picked Maggie from the ground and carried her inside. Then he made a windscreen for the horses by weaving boughs into the thick brush. When a fire was going, he circled the outside, looking for any sign of light. Nothing was visible. By using dry wood, smoke could almost be eliminated, and by day it would be somewhat scattered and broken by the branches of the trees overhead.
The wind was rising and there was a smell of snow in the air. And snow at this time would be a godsend, wiping out their trail and covering the shelter with a thick, warm blanket.
Janice sat by the fire, staring into the red coals.
When she saw Mabry step back inside the shelter, she asked, “What will we do?” “Wait.
All we can do.” The firelight flickered against the dark, weaving strange patterns on the walls of their shelter. Maggie stirred restlessly in her sleep, muttering a little.
Fragments of lines spoken long ago, the name of a man whispered lonesomely, longingly.
“Will they come back?” “They’ll come. They know we’re only a few.” Janice sat silent, unable to forget how he had fought with that Indian. He had been welcome, he had saved her from horror and misery, and yet there had been something shocking and terrible in the way he fought.
He seemed to go berserk in battle; he forgot his wounds and everything but killing. At first he had been cool and methodical. She had glimpsed him on the ridge, firing from his knee, and then during the fight his face had been strained, brutal, utterly fierce. What could make a man like that?
He moved suddenly, putting some small sticks on the fire, and then firelight flickered on his moving rifle barrel, there was an instant of cold air, and he was outside in the snow again.
Had he heard something? Or was he just being careful?
She glanced across the fire at Healy. He was lying down, his blankets around him. She felt a sudden desire to reach out and touch him. He was so lost here…. Yet he had gone into that fight with no thought of himself, and he had managed to protect them and stay alive.
She wrapped herself in some blankets and was almost asleep when Mabry returned.. There was no sound, but the blanket curtain at the doorway moved and then he was inside, huddled over the fire.
Janice believed she was the only one awake, but Dodie’s hand reached out and moved the coffeepot toward him. Janice felt a little twinge of irritation, and burrowed deeper into her bed. Yet neither of them spoke. Outside the wind was rising, and she saw snowflakes melting from his sleeve when he poured coffee. Inside the shelter the acrid bite of the smoke made her eyes smart, but it was warm here, and she slept….
She awakened suddenly in the first cold light of breaking day. Only a spot of gray showed where the smoke hole was. Mabry was on his knees by the fire, coaxing it to flame. Then he reached outside and scooped fresh, clean snow into the kettle, and put it on a rock close to the fire. She lay still in the vague light, watching him. She was remembering what Dodie had said, that she loved this man. How silly! She could never love such a man. He was cruel and a brute. Take the way he spoke of Maggie yesterday. Of course, they probably did have to move, but still…
His face was like well-tanned leather in the firelight. He wore a blue wool shirt tucked into his pants, and now he was pulling a fringed buckskin hunting shirt over it.
He got up in one lithe, easy movement. She thought she had never seen a man whose muscular co-ordination was so flawless. He went out the door, and when he was gone she got out from her own bed and went to Maggie. And then she saw that Maggie was covered with Mabry’s buffalo coat. Sometime during the night he must have got up and spread the coat over her. His own coat.
Janice went to the packs and began getting out food for a meal. His action puzzled her, making no part of the man she was creating in her mind. When he had been gone almost an hour he returned suddenly with two good-sized rabbits and some slender branches.
He split the branches with his knife and took out the pith. “Add it to the soup,” he whispered. She looked at it doubtfully, then put it into the pot.
“You stay out here,” he said, “you’ll eat everything.
And be glad to get it.” He added sticks to the fire, then looked at her quizzically. “Panther meat now, that’s best of all.” “Cat?” She looked to see if he was serious.
“Surely you wouldn’t?” “Sure I would. And I have. Mountain men prefer it to venison or bear meat.” Dodie turned over and sat up, blinking like a sleepy child. “It’s warmer.” “Colder,” Mabry said, “only we’re snowed in. Heavy fall last night, and if anybody can see this place at all, it’ll look like an igloo.” Maggie opened her eyes and looked around. For the first time in many hours she seemed perfectly rational.
“Where are we?” she whispered. “It’s all right, ma’am,” King Mabry said. “Just rest She looked up at the shelter of boughs. The air in the place was heavy with the smell of wood smoke and cooking, but fresher than it had ever been in the van.
“You’re a good man,” Maggie said. “A good man.” Obviously embarrassed, Mabry turned and began feeding sticks into the fire. After they had eaten, Mabry lay down, pulled his blankets over him, and slept. He breathed heavily and for the first time seemed to relax completely. Janice stared down at him, torn by a strange mixture of feelings. There was something… yet…