The Sky Line of Spruce. Edison Marshall
itself? There might have been also depths of latent passion such as is known to all who live the full, strong life of the woods. The lines were soft about her lips and eyes, indicating a marked sweetness and tenderness of nature; but these traits did not in the least deny her parentage. No one but the woodsman knows how gentle, how hospitably tender, the forest may be at times.
She had fine, dark straight brows that served to darken her eyes, dark brown hair waving enough to soften every line of her face, a girlish throat and a red mouth surprisingly tender and childish. As might have been expected her garb was neither rich nor smart, but it was pretty and well made and evidently fitted for her life: a loose "middy," blue skirt, woolen stockings and rather solid little boots.
As she passed the door of the hotel one of the younger men who had been lounging about the stove strode out and accosted her. She half-turned, recognized his face in the lamplight, and frankly recoiled.
She had been lost in dreams before, vaguely pensive, for Beatrice had been watching the darkness overspread and encompass the dark fringe of the spruce forest that enclosed the town. Now, because she recognized the man and knew his type—born of the wild places even as herself, but a bastard breed—the tender, wistful half-smile sped from her childish mouth and her eyes grew alert and widened as if with actual fear. She halted, evidently in doubt as to her course.
"Going home?" the man asked. "I'm going up to see your pop, and I'll see you there, if you don't mind."
Ray Brent's voice had an undeniable ring of power. It was deeply bass, evidently the voice of a passionate, reckless, brutal man. The covetous caress of his thick hand upon her arm indicated that he was wholly sure of himself in regard to her.
She stared with growing apprehension into his even-featured, not unhandsome face. Evidently she found it hard to meet his eyes—eyes wholly lacking in humor and kindliness, but unquestionably vivid and compelling under his heavy, dark brows. "I'm going home," she told him at last. "I guess, if you're going up to see Pop, you can walk along too."
The man fell in beside her, his powerful frame overshadowing hers. It was plain at once that the manner of her consent did not in the least disturb him. "You're just letting me because I'm going up there anyway, eh?" he asked. "I'll walk along further than that with you before I'm done."
The girl paused, as if in appeal. "Ray, we've thrashed that out long ago," she responded. "I wish you wouldn't keep talking about it. If you want to walk with me—"
"All right, but you'll be changing your mind one of these days." Ray's voice rang in the silence, indicating utter indifference to the fact that many of the loungers on the street were listening to the little scene. "I've never seen anything I wanted yet that I didn't get—and I want you. Why don't you believe what your pop says about me? He thinks Ray Brent is the goods."
"I'm not going to talk about it any more. I've already given you my answer—twenty times."
The man talked on, but the girl walked with lifted chin, apparently not hearing. They followed the board sidewalk into the shadows, finally turning in at a ramshackle, three-room house that was perched on the hillside almost at the end of the street at the outer limits of the village.
The girl turned to go in, but the man held fast to her arm. "Wait just a minute, Bee," he urged. "I've got one thing more to say to you."
The girl looked into his face, now faintly illumined by the full moon that was rising, incredibly large and white, above the dark line of the spruce tops. For all the regularity of his rather handsome features, his was never an attractive face to her, even in first, susceptible girlhood; and in the moonlight it suddenly filled her with dread. Ray Brent was a dangerous type: imperious willed, slave to his most degenerate instincts, reckless, as free from moral restraint as the most savage creatures that roamed his native wilds. Now his facial lines appeared noticeably deep, dark like scars, and curious little flakes of iniquitous fire danced in his sunken eyes.
"Just one minute, Bee," he went on, wholly rapt in his own, devouring desires. The dark passions of the man, always just under the skin, seemed to be getting out of bounds. "When I want something, I don't know how to quit till I get it. It's part of my nature. Your pop knows that—and that's why he's made me his pardner in a big deal."
"If my father wants men like you—for his pardners, I can't speak for his judgment."
"Wait just a minute. He's told me—and I know he's told you too—that I'd suit him all right for a son-in-law. He and I agree on that. And this country ain't like the places you read about in your story books—it's a man's country. Oh, I know you well enough. It's time you got down to brass tacks. If you're going to be a northern woman, you've got to be content with the kind of men that grow up here. Up here, the best man wins, the hardest, strongest man. That's why I'm going to win you."
Because he was secretly attacking her dreams, the dearest part of her being, she felt the first surge of rising anger.
"You're not the best man here," she told him, straightening. "If you were, I'd move out. You may be the strongest in your body, and certainly the hardest, going further to get your own way—but a real man would break you in two in a minute. Some one more than a brute to beat horses to death and jump claims. I'm going in now. Please take away your hand."
"One thing more. This is the North. We do things in a man's way up here—not a story-book way. The strong man gets what he wants—and I want you. And I'll get you, too—just like I get this kiss."
He suddenly snatched her toward him. A powerful man; she was wholly helpless in his grasp. His arms went about her and he pressed his lips to hers—three times. Then he released her, his eyes glowing like red coals.
But she was a northern girl, trained to self-defense. As he freed her, her strong, slender arm swung out and up—with really startling force. Her half-closed hand struck with a sharp, drawing motion across his lips, a blow that extinguished his laughter as the wind extinguishes a match-blaze.
"You little—devil!"
The tempest of the forest was upon her, and her eyes blazed as she hastened around the house.
V
Jeffery Neilson and Chan Heminway were already in session when Ray Brent, his face flushed and his eyes still angry and red, joined them. Neilson was a tall, gaunt man, well past fifty—from his manner evidently the leader of the three. He had heavy, grizzled brows and rather quiet eyes, a man of deep passions and great resolve. Yet his lean face had nothing of the wickedness of Brent's. There had evidently been some gentling, redeeming influence in his life, and although it was not in the ascendancy, it had softened his smile and the hard lines about his lips. Notorious as he was through the northern provinces he was infinitely to be preferred to Chan Heminway, who sat at his left who, a weaker man than either Ray or Neilson, was simply a tool in the latter's hand—a smashing sledge or a cruel blade as his master wished. He was vicious without strength, brutal without self-control. Locks of his blond hair, unkempt, dropped over his low forehead into his eyes.
"Where's Beatrice?" Neilson asked at once. "I thought I heard her voice."
Ray searched for a reply, and in the silence all three heard the girl's tread as she went around the house. "She's going in the back door. Likely she didn't want to disturb us."
Ray looked up to find Neilson's eyes firmly fixed upon his face. Try hard as he might he couldn't restrain a surge of color in his cheeks. "Yes, and what's the rest of it?" Neilson asked.
"Nothing—I know of."
"You've got some white marks on your cheeks—where it ain't red. The kid can slap, can't she—"
Ray flushed deeper, but the lines of Neilson's face began to deepen and draw. Then his voice broke in a great, hearty chuckle. He had evidently tried to restrain it—but it got away from him at last. No man could look at him, his twinkling eyes