A Mountain Woman [27]
and pleasant to the sense; and oblivion came to save her from further misery.
She was alive -- just barely alive -- when Gillispie and Henderson got there, three hours later, the very balls of their eyes almost frozen into blindness. But for an instinct stronger than reason they would never have been able to have found their way across that trackless stretch. The chil- dren lying unconscious under their coverings were neither dead nor actually frozen, al- though the men putting their hands on their little hearts could not at first discover the beating. Stiff and suffering as these young fellows were, it was no easy matter to get the window back into place and re-light the fire. They had tied flasks of liquor about their waists; and this beneficent fluid they used with that sense of appreciation which only a pioneer can feel toward whiskey. It was hours before Catherine rewarded them with a gleam of consciousness. Her body had been frozen in many places. Her arms, outstretched over her children and holding the clothes down about them, were rigid. But consciousness came at length, dimly struggling up through her brain; and over her she saw her friends rubbing and rubbing those strong firm arms of hers with snow.
She half raised her head, with a horror of comprehension in her eyes, and listened. A cry answered her, -- a cry of dull pain from the baby. Henderson dropped on his knees beside her.
"They are all safe," he said. "And we will never leave you again. I have been afraid to tell you how I love you. I thought I might offend you. I thought I ought to wait -- you know why. But I will never let you run the risks of this awful life alone again. You must rename the baby. From this day his name is John. And we will have the three Johns again back at the old ranch. It doesn't matter whether you love me or not, Catherine, I am going to take care of you just the same. Gillispie agrees with me."
"Damme, yes," muttered Gillispie, feeling of his hip-pocket for consolation in his old manner.
Catherine struggled to find her voice, but it would not come.
"Do not speak," whispered John. "Tell me with your eyes whether you will come as my wife or only as our sister."
Catherine told him.
"This is Thanksgiving day," said he. "And we don't know much about praying, but I guess we all have something in our hearts that does just as well."
"Damme, yes," said Gillispie, again, as he pensively cocked and uncocked his re- volver.
A Resuscitation
AFTER being dead twenty years, he walked out into the sunshine.
It was as if the bones of a bleached skele- ton should join themselves on some forgotten plain, and look about them for the vanished flesh.
To be dead it is not necessary to be in the grave. There are places where the worms creep about the heart instead of the body.
The penitentiary is one of these. David Culross had been in the penitentiary twenty years. Now, with that worm-eaten heart, he came out into liberty and looked about him for the habiliments with which he had formerly clothed himself, -- for hope, self-respect, courage, pugnacity, and industry.
But they had vanished and left no trace, like the flesh of the dead men on the plains, and so, morally unapparelled, in the hideous skeleton of his manhood, he walked on down the street under the mid-June sunshine.
You can understand, can you not, how a skeleton might wish to get back into its comfortable grave? David Culross had not walked two blocks before he was seized with an almost uncontrollable desire to beg to be shielded once more in that safe and shameful retreat from which he had just been released. A horrible perception of the largeness of the world swept over him. Space and eternity could seem no larger to the usual man than earth -- that snug and insignificant planet -- looked to David Culross.
"If I go back," he cried, despairingly, looking up to the great building that arose above the stony hills, "they will not take me in." He was absolutely without a refuge, utterly without a destination; he did not have a hope. There
She was alive -- just barely alive -- when Gillispie and Henderson got there, three hours later, the very balls of their eyes almost frozen into blindness. But for an instinct stronger than reason they would never have been able to have found their way across that trackless stretch. The chil- dren lying unconscious under their coverings were neither dead nor actually frozen, al- though the men putting their hands on their little hearts could not at first discover the beating. Stiff and suffering as these young fellows were, it was no easy matter to get the window back into place and re-light the fire. They had tied flasks of liquor about their waists; and this beneficent fluid they used with that sense of appreciation which only a pioneer can feel toward whiskey. It was hours before Catherine rewarded them with a gleam of consciousness. Her body had been frozen in many places. Her arms, outstretched over her children and holding the clothes down about them, were rigid. But consciousness came at length, dimly struggling up through her brain; and over her she saw her friends rubbing and rubbing those strong firm arms of hers with snow.
She half raised her head, with a horror of comprehension in her eyes, and listened. A cry answered her, -- a cry of dull pain from the baby. Henderson dropped on his knees beside her.
"They are all safe," he said. "And we will never leave you again. I have been afraid to tell you how I love you. I thought I might offend you. I thought I ought to wait -- you know why. But I will never let you run the risks of this awful life alone again. You must rename the baby. From this day his name is John. And we will have the three Johns again back at the old ranch. It doesn't matter whether you love me or not, Catherine, I am going to take care of you just the same. Gillispie agrees with me."
"Damme, yes," muttered Gillispie, feeling of his hip-pocket for consolation in his old manner.
Catherine struggled to find her voice, but it would not come.
"Do not speak," whispered John. "Tell me with your eyes whether you will come as my wife or only as our sister."
Catherine told him.
"This is Thanksgiving day," said he. "And we don't know much about praying, but I guess we all have something in our hearts that does just as well."
"Damme, yes," said Gillispie, again, as he pensively cocked and uncocked his re- volver.
A Resuscitation
AFTER being dead twenty years, he walked out into the sunshine.
It was as if the bones of a bleached skele- ton should join themselves on some forgotten plain, and look about them for the vanished flesh.
To be dead it is not necessary to be in the grave. There are places where the worms creep about the heart instead of the body.
The penitentiary is one of these. David Culross had been in the penitentiary twenty years. Now, with that worm-eaten heart, he came out into liberty and looked about him for the habiliments with which he had formerly clothed himself, -- for hope, self-respect, courage, pugnacity, and industry.
But they had vanished and left no trace, like the flesh of the dead men on the plains, and so, morally unapparelled, in the hideous skeleton of his manhood, he walked on down the street under the mid-June sunshine.
You can understand, can you not, how a skeleton might wish to get back into its comfortable grave? David Culross had not walked two blocks before he was seized with an almost uncontrollable desire to beg to be shielded once more in that safe and shameful retreat from which he had just been released. A horrible perception of the largeness of the world swept over him. Space and eternity could seem no larger to the usual man than earth -- that snug and insignificant planet -- looked to David Culross.
"If I go back," he cried, despairingly, looking up to the great building that arose above the stony hills, "they will not take me in." He was absolutely without a refuge, utterly without a destination; he did not have a hope. There