“What time did you come to bed?”
“It was early,” Lilith lied promptly. “I was still awake.”
Eve’s chin lifted. “No, it wasn’t. It was late.” “Daughter”—Zebulon Prescott’s voice was stern—“I’ll only ask you once. Is there anything for your ma and pa to worry about?”
“No … no, there ain’t, pa. There’s not a thing.” Eve turned back to the lean-to and took up the washpan and, with Lilith beside her, started toward the river. Under the tree where she had made the bed of boughs there was only the mat of twisted branches now. The blankets were gone. “Lilith … look!” Eve went around the tree and pointed. On the tree, cut deep into the bark, were two hearts, freshly cut, and cut deep. They were joined by a deep gash.
Lilith was amazed, and envious. “You mean … you mean you actually got a grown man to do that? Did you get him to say those crazy words, too?” “I did … just like in the book. Seemed like he enjoyed it.”
“Eve Prescott, you’re lyin’ worse than pa! You cut those hearts yourself!” “I won’t say I didn’t coax a little, but he did it. He said it was a mighty solemn occasion, like shootin’ rapids without a paddle.” “Well, it sure didn’t keep him by you. More’n likely he did it just so’s he could get away. You know how driftin’ men are … they never want to stay put. You’re lucky he’s gone. Do you want to live out your days like some squaw? Like an Indian squaw? More’n likely that’s all he’s used to.” “I’ll see him again,” she said confidently. “I know I will … and he hasn’t got a wife and six kids, either. Not yet he hasn’t!” Evening brought coolness to the river. Behind Linus the setting sun painted fading colors upon the darkening waters. The bluffs were higher now, and the trunks of the forest trees were merging into one solid wall of blackness, although their tops still etched a jagged line against the sky. It had been a slow day. The current seemed stronger than before, and perhaps he was not trying quite as hard. It irritated him that his thoughts kept reverting to the girl at last night’s camp. His mind was usually crystal clear, open for impressions, warnings, dangers. His instincts were alive to every change of sunlight or shadow, to every hint of movement.
“That was quite a woman,” he said aloud. “Now, if’n I was a marryin’ man—“ He could see the white of the sign before he could make out the words. The sign was on the river bank, and behind it a path wound up the bluff to a cave where a feeble glow of light could still be seen.
With a sweep of his paddle he swung nearer to read the sign, feathering the blade as he swung alongside.
FINE OLD LIKKER SOLD HERE
The sign presented an invitation and a challenge. Besides, it was getting late. A few drinks would make him sleep good and sound, and it wasn’t often he dared trust himself to let go and really sleep.
“Waal, now …” He turned the canoe deftly to the spot where two dugouts were moored.
From the cave above came a faint sound of music, harmonica music, played with a dancing lilt. “Waal, now!” he repeated. “I don’t mind if I do. This ain’t Pittsburgh, but a man might as well try a hair of the dog that’s goin’ to bite him.”
Tying the canoe, Linus took his rifle and mounted the trail. Off to the left, through the trees, he saw just the vestige of another trail. It was not dark, although the sun was down sometime since. That old trail was long out of use, but it indicated that somebody had probably lived here long before these folks had moved in. More than likely it had been an Indian trail, or one made by some early hunters.
Then from above he heard the music break and a voice called out, “Customer!” A bare-footed, yellow-haired girl, quite pretty despite the rags she wore, appeared at the mouth of the cave.
“Thirsty, mister?” she called. “This here’s prime whiskey.” “Drier’n a grasshopper on a hot griddle.” Linus wiped the back of his hand across his mouth and followed her into the cave. The harmonica player, he noticed—for he noticed most things—was a lean, scrawny youth who looked at him with a queer, taunting expression, as though he had just scored some victory over Rawlings.
The cave’s interior was lighted by a fire that burned in a sort of natural fireplace, the smoke issuing through an opening in the cave roof. There was a bar composed of two planks laid across two barrels, and beyond the end of the bar Linus could see a high, narrow opening that gave into another room. A faint stir of breeze came through that opening.
Two haggard, hard-looking men played cards near the wall, using the bottom of a packing case for a table. Another man leaned on the bar in conversation with the white-haired patriarch who stood behind it.
The patriarch thrust out his hand. “Name is Hawkins, suh. Colonel Jeb Hawkins, late of Alabama. Where you bound, suh?”
“Pittsburgh.”
“He looks like a mountain man, pa. I’ll bet he’s got a canoe full of furs.” “Ah? Now, suh, that I admire! A man bold enough to face westward, to dare the redskin of the plains, to challenge the distance and the mountains. Suh, the first drink is on me. Set down, suh!”
Linus leaned his rifle against the bar and watched the colonel take down a pewter cup and a brown earthenware jug.
“No pepper, no rattlesnake heads in this whiskey, suh. Just pure grain and the sweet kiss of malt, and water from the springs of Bourbon County, Kentucky. Finest spring water this side of heaven, suh. We call the whiskey bourbon, after the county.”
Linus ignored the cup and reached for the jug, turning it easily over his bent elbow, and let the liquor flow down his throat. The men at the card table stopped their game to watch in open-mouthed admiration. At last Linus paused for breath. “Yes, sir! You’re right. That there’s real sippin’ whiskey.”
“Springs of Bourbon County, m’boy! You can’t make good whiskey without pure water, and this here’s the best. Limestone water, she is. Limestone cuts all the impurities out, leaves nothing but the pure and sparkling. Drink up, suh!” “Pa,” the girl suggested tentatively, “him bein’ a trapper and all, d’you suppose he’d know what that varmint is we’ve got?” “Well, now, Dora, he might at that. Suh”—he watched Linus Rawlings’ Adam’s apple bob with the whiskey—“we cotched some kind of a cave-dwellin’ critter like no man in these parts ever seen before. Be mighty interestin’ if you could tell us what it be.”
“Don’t know much about cave-dwellin’ varmints.” The whiskey had reached his brain and Linus turned his head slowly. “Of course, I’ve seen a few varmints in my time, and I might—“ “It’s just yonder”—Dora pointed toward the inner cave— “and you can bring the jug.” She smiled invitingly, holding out a hand for his. “I’ll show you.” There was just a hint of something more than a varmint to be found in that inner cave; and she was, Linus told himself, a likely filly. Torchlight flickered from the walls. She passed her torch to him and, taking another from a small pile, lighted it. This cave was smaller, and Linus heard a distant roaring sound as of water running.
“Do you know any sweet-talkin’ girls in Pittsburgh?”
“Nary a one—not yet, anyway.”
“Pa an’ me, we figure to winter here.”
She was closer now, her hip touched his … was that an accident? “I’ll be at the Duquesne House if it ain’t burned down.” He held the torch to one side and looked down at her. She was mighty young, but she was rounded in all the right places, and there was nothing so young about that look in her eyes. “Are you sure you’ve got a varmint back here?” “We keep him in the hole yonder.”
She indicated what seemed to be a pit at the end of the cave, a hole perhaps six feet square. “You’ll have to look mighty close, dark like it is.” She held his arm as if for protection, keeping her body close to him, hanging back just a little. He lifted his torch and bent forward. “Where—?” In that instant of incredible realization he felt the girl’s grip on his arm suddenly tighten, jerking downward and forward, and a leg was thrust sharply between his legs. Off-balance, he started to fall forward toward the blackness of the pit, gripping the torch in one hand, the jug in the other. As she tripped him and he went forward, her hand jerked free. He did not see the knife, but he felt the bite of the blade; he was already falling, and the knife ripped only buckskin and a little hide … and then he was toppling into the awful blackness of the pit.