“A man has to eat,” said Joe good-naturedly. “And I reckon I do my share. But I walked my share of line, too.”
“I guess maybe you did,” said the old man enviously. “You got the legs for it, man! I guess you kept an extra measure of traps this winter, eh?”
“Extra lot of traps?” echoed poor old Joe Bigot feebly, feeling that the blow was about to fall.
“Why, yes. They told me you had a man out with you…somebody that wandered into your shack during a storm, and…”
The cat was out. Could it be whistled back into the bag?
Chapter 8
“In your cabin this winter?” cried Alice Cary with great eyes of astonishment.
“In my cabin? Why, yes,” said Joe. “But, come to think about it, I guess I didn’t write that he was there.”
Jack Trainor was utterly astonished. He had never dreamed that the big, honest trapper had such possibilities. Taking it all in all, it was as roundly delivered a lie as he had ever heard told. And this from slow Joe Bigot!
“Write to me about him? You certainly didn’t! But how long was he there?”
That vital question was avoided deftly by Joe Bigot. Just as it began, he blurted out some remark to the trapper about the severity of the winter and then expressed a desire to see him soon and declared that he would look him up. With that and a farewell wave, they passed on. Alice Cary repeated her question.
“How long was the stranger with you, Joe, and who was he? And what was he doing in a storm in the mountains?”
Again Jack Trainor was breathless. Again he felt the eyes of Bigot fumble hopelessly toward him, then, realizing that there was no succor in his companion, he searched about in his own brain for a sufficient answer. How much better it would have been if, at all costs, those letters had never been written, and if the pure truth could be told!
“He was a Russian, I think,” said Joe Bigot. “His name was Rasmussen. He was running a line of traps up north of mine. But he was new to the country. One day a norther caught him out when he was hunting south, away off from his line. He’d seen my smoke, so he decided that it would be easier to make for my place than it would be to turn around and buck the wind and the snow to get back to his own lean-to. So he came down my way and got there just about froze.”
“Poor fellow!” cried Alice. “Was he very far gone?”
Jack Trainor heaved a faint sigh of relief. It seemed that the great crisis was passed. Then he turned a little and looked at Larry Haines. That worthy had fastened his ferret eyes upon the face of Joe Bigot, and, although he never spoke, a subtle disbelief, a subtle mockery, had overspread his features. Apparently he had arrived at more of a conclusion than the girl had been able to come to in seeing through the untruths that Joe was telling.
Joe Bigot was continuing his new story with a great deal of fluency that more and more surprised Jack Trainor.
“He wasn’t very far gone. But he thought he was. He wasn’t used to the cold, you see.”
“Not used to the cold! But I thought you said that he was a Russian?”
“I did. But he came out of the south of Russia.”
“But don’t they have cold winters every place in Russia?”
“Not down by Turkey, I think,” put in Trainor calmly.
Larry Haines, who had been pricking his ears during these remarks, now flashed upon Jack an absolutely wolfish glance, and then forced his eyes deliberately away, as though he feared to reveal too much of his own malignance through that look.
“He came out of the south of Russia, down by Turkey,” went on the big man glibly with a flash of gratitude toward Jack. “He wasn’t used to the cold, and he was scared because he’d got numbed in places. But I brought him around. It didn’t take long. There’s some think that the only thing to do when folks are frozen is to rub them with snow. But I’ve always figured that to be fool talk. First I use cold water, and then I take water that’s a little warmer and a little warmer, and that way I get the circulation going gradual again. I’ve tried rubbing with snow, and I’ve tried the other way. There ain’t any comparison, I think. He came around fine, and after that I saw a good deal of him.”
“He lived with you…and left his own trap line? That old fellow said that somebody was really living with you.”
“Yes, I told them about it at the store once.”
That unlucky day when he had told the storekeeper of the arrival of the stranger! How many details did the other trapper in the town know?
“He left his trap line because he thought that it was worth his while to learn what he could about setting out traps from me. Him and me used to walk my line of traps together, and so he picked up a good deal that I knew and that he didn’t.”
Here the girl laughed. “Joe,” she confessed, “when he spoke at first about somebody being with you, I thought that there was a secret about it.”
“Secret?” muttered Joe Bigot with an assumption of a vast innocence. “Why should there be any secret about it?”
Indeed, more and more Trainor began to feel that there had been possibilities of intelligence and quick wit in Bigot that he had completely overlooked. He had quite smoothed the matter over for Alice Cary, so it seemed, and it only remained to see how far Larry Haines could press his suspicions.
On the whole, Jack would have been happier had Haines taken an opportunity to cross-question the big trapper on the spot. But this he showed no intention of doing. He made no effort to corner Bigot. But the tiger was nevertheless in view in the face that Trainor saw. Sooner or later he would get on the trail of Joe, and then he would be merciless should he run him down.
A moment later, Haines parted from them, shaking hands with Joe again and saying that he was glad to see him back, and shaking hands with Trainor, also. But he did this silently, and the eyes that they raised to each other were dark with enmity.
After that, they went on to the girl’s house, and there they would both stay for supper. They were alone for a moment when she ran in while they were putting up their horses.
“I’m done for!” gasped Joe Bigot, turning white the instant they were by themselves.
“You’re not done for,” said Trainor hotly. “You’re as safe as though you’d never told anything but the truth if you stick to what you’ve said. Keep going over it until you’ve got it safe in your head. Remember what you said…Rasmussen is a good name. It sounds like the sort of name that a man would never make up. The trouble with it is that it’s a hard name to remember and keep straight. Then there’s the yarn about Russia. Why the devil you had to make him a Russian, I can’t tell.”
“I can’t, either,” said Joe wretchedly. “That name Rasmussen…it popped out of somewhere in my head. After I’d used it, I thought that I’d have to explain it. So I just said that he was a Russian. You see? And then the stuff about his trap line…”
“That’s all right, because you had to have some reason for him being out there in the snows. And, taking it all in all, Joe, I want to say right here that it was about the best lying that I’ve heard in my life.” He laughed softly at the thought. “I’ve been cornered myself once or twice, but I’ve never been able to invent things as fast as you did today, Joe. Why in the name of the devil, though, didn’t you tell me that you’d mentioned me to somebody?”
“It was the storekeeper. I spoke about you after that first time. And then I plumb forgot what I’d said. Storekeeper went right out of my head. Talking to him ain’t like talking to other folks, anyway. Sort of takes it for granted that when you go into the store you’ll tell him everything you know. It’s like talking to yourself. And listening to him talk is just like reading a newspaper. Nobody would ever think of wondering where he learned what he knows. He just seems to get all the gossip out of the air. But now the point is that it’s done and can’t be helped. I’ve told ’em that I’ve only knowed you a couple of days.What’s to be done now? Jack, hadn’t I better confess everything to Alice?”