Book: The Fighting Chance

R >> Robert W. Chambers >> The Fighting Chance




“You know I’m right, Kemp.”

“Always, dear. And now that we have the world off our hands for a few
minutes, suppose we gallop?”

But she held her horse to a walk, riding forward, grave, thoughtful,
preoccupied with a new problem, only part of which she had told her
husband.

For that night she had been awakened in her bed to find standing beside
her a white, wide-eyed figure, shivering, limbs a-chill beneath her
clinging lace. She had taken the pallid visitor to her arms and warmed
her and soothed her and whispered to her, murmuring the thousand little
words and sounds, the breathing magic mothers use with children. And
Sylvia lay there, chilled, nerveless, silent, ignorant why her
sleeplessness had turned to restlessness, to loneliness, to an awakening
perception of what she lacked and needed and began to desire. For that
sad void, peopled at intervals through her brief years with a vague
mother-phantom, had, in the new crisis of her career, become suddenly an
empty desolation, frightening her with her own utter isolation. Fill it
now she could not, now that she needed that ghost of child-comfort, that
shadowy refuge, that sweet shape she had fashioned out of dreams to
symbolise a mother she had never known.

Driven she knew not why, she had crept from her room in search of the
still, warm, fragrant nest and the whispered reassurance and the caress
she had never before endured. Yes, now she craved it, invited it, longed
for safe arms around her, the hovering hand on her hair. Was this
Sylvia?

And Grace Ferrall, clearing her sleepy eyes, amazed, incredulous of the
cold, child-like hands upon her shoulders, caught her in her arms with a
little laugh and sob and drew her to her breast, to soothe and caress
and reassure, to make up to her all she could of what is every child’s
just heritage.

And for a long while Sylvia, lying there, told her nothing--because she
did not know how--merely a word, a restless question half ashamed, barely
enough to shadow forth the something stirring her toward an awakening in
a new world, where with new eyes she might catch glimpses of those dim
and splendidly misty visions that float through sunlit silences when a
young girl dreams awake.

And at length, gravely, innocently, she spoke of her engagement, and the
worldly possibilities before her; of the man she was to marry, and her
new and unexpected sense of loneliness in his presence, now that she had
seen him again after months.

She spoke, presently, of Siward--a fugitive question or two, offered
indifferently at first, then with shy persistence and curiosity, knowing
nothing of the senseless form flung face downward across the sheets in a
room close by. And thereafter the murmured burden of the theme was
Siward, until one, heavy eyed, turned from the white dawn silvering the
windows, sighed, and fell asleep; and one lay silent, head half buried
in its tangled gold, wide awake, thinking vague thoughts that had no
ending, no beginning. And at last a rosy bar of light fell across the
wall, and the warm shadows faded from corner and curtain; and, turning
on the pillow, her face nestled in her hair, she fell asleep.


Nothing of this had Mrs. Ferrall told her husband.

For the first time in her life had Sylvia suffered the caresses most
women invite or naturally lavish; for the first time had she attempted
confidences, failing because she did not know how, but curiously
contented with the older woman’s arms around her.

There was a change in Sylvia, a great change stealing in upon her as she
lay there, breathing like a child, flushed lips scarcely parted. Through
the early slanting sunlight the elder woman, leaning on one arm, looked
down at her, grey eyes very grave and tender--wise, sweet eyes that
divined with their pure clairvoyance all that might happen or might fail
to come to pass in this great change stealing over Sylvia.


Nothing of this could her husband understand had she words to convey it.
There was nothing he need understand except that his wife, meaning well,
had meddled and regretted.

And now, turning in her saddle with a pretty gesture of her shoulders:

“I meddle no more! Those who need me may come to me. Now laugh at my
tardy wisdom, Kemp!”

“It’s no laughing matter,” he said, “if you’re going to stand back and
let this abandoned world spin itself madly to the bow-wows--”

“Don’t be horrid. I repent. The mischief take Howard Quarrier!”

“Amen! Come on, Grace.”

She gathered bridle. “Do you suppose Stephen Siward is going to make
trouble?”

“How can he unless she helps him? Nonsense! All’s well with Siward and
Sylvia. Shall we gallop?”


All was very well with Siward and Sylvia. They had passed the rabbit-
brier country scathless, with two black mallard, a jack-snipe, and a
rabbit to the credit of their score, and were now advancing through that
dimly lit enchanted land of tall grey alders where, in the sudden
twilight of the leaves, woodcock after woodcock fluttered upward
twittering, only to stop and drop, transformed at the vicious crack of
Siward’s gun to fluffy balls of feather whirling earthward from mid-air.

Sagamore came galloping back with a soft, unsoiled mass of chestnut and
brown feathers in his mouth. Siward took the dead cock, passed it back
to the keeper who followed them, patted the beautiful eager dog and
signalled him forward once more.

“You should have fired that time,” he said to Sylvia--“that is, if you
care to kill anything.”

“But I don’t seem to be able to,” she said. “It isn’t a bit like
shooting at clay targets. The twittering whirr takes me by surprise--it’s
all so charmingly sudden--and my heart seems to stop in one beat, and I
look and look and then--whisk! the woodcock is gone, leaving me
breathless--”

Her voice ceased; the white setter, cutting up his ground ahead, had
stopped, rigid, one leg raised, jaws quivering and locking alternately.

“Isn’t that a stunning picture!” said Siward in a low voice. “What a
beauty he is--like a statue in white and blue-veined marble. You may
talk, Miss Landis; woodcock don’t flush at the sound of the human voice
as grouse do.”

“See his brown eyes roll back at us! He wonders why we don’t do
something!” whispered the girl. “Look, Mr. Siward! Now his head is
moving--oh so gradually to the left!”

“The bird is moving on the ground,” nodded Siward; “now the bird has
stopped.”

“I do wish I could see a woodcock on the ground,” she breathed. “Do you
think we might by any chance?”

Siward noiselessly sank to his knees and crouched, keen eyes minutely
busy among the shadowy browns and greys of wet earth and withered leaf.
And after a while, cautiously, he signalled the girl to kneel beside
him, and stretched out one arm, forefinger extended.

“Sight straight along my arm,” he said,” as though it were a rifle
barrel.”

Her soft cheek rested against his shoulder; a stray strand of shining
hair brushing his face.

“Under that bunch of fern,” he whispered; “just the colour of the dead
leaves. Do you see? … Don’t you see that big woodcock squatted flat,
bill pointed straight out and resting on the leaves?”

After a long while she saw, suddenly, and an exquisite little shock
tightened her fingers on Siward’s extended arm.

“Oh, the feathered miracle!” she whispered; “the wonder of its
cleverness to hide like that! You look and look and stare, seeing it all
the while and not knowing that you see it. Then in a flash it is there,
motionless, a brown-shaped shadow among shadows. … The dear little
thing! … Mr. Siward, do you think--are you going to--”

“No, I won’t shoot it.”

“Thank you. … Might I sit here a moment to watch it?”

She seated herself soundlessly among the dead leaves; he sank into place
beside her, laying his gun aside.

“Rather rough on the dog,” he said with a grimace.

“I know. It is very good of you, Mr. Siward to do this for my pleasure.
Oh--h! Do you see! Oh, the little beauty!”

The woodcock had risen, plumage puffed out, strutting with wings bowed
and tail spread, facing the dog. The sudden pigmy defiance thrilled her.
“Brave! Brave!” she exclaimed, enraptured; but at the sound of her voice
the bird crouched like a flash, large dark liquid eyes shining, long
bill pointed straight toward them.

“He’ll fly the way his bill points,” said Siward. “Watch!”

He rose; she sprang lightly to her feet; there came a whirring flutter,
a twittering shower of sweet notes, soft wings beating almost in their
very faces, a distant shadow against the sky, and the woodcock was gone.

Quieting the astounded dog, gun cradled in the hollow of his left arm,
he turned to the girl beside him: “That sort of thing wins no cups,” he
said.

“It wins something else, Mr. Siward,--my very warm regard for you.”

“There is no choice between that and the Shotover Cup,” he admitted,
considering her.

“I--do you mean it?”

“Of course I do, vigorously!”

“Then you are much nicer than I thought you. … And after all, if the
price of a cup is the life of that brave little bird, I had rather shoot
clay pigeons. Now you will scorn me I suppose. Begin!”

“My ideal woman has never been a life-taker,” he said coolly. “Once,
when I was a boy, there was a girl--very lovely--my first sweetheart. I
saw her at the traps once, just after she had killed her seventh pigeon
straight, ‘pulling it down’ from overhead, you know--very clever--the
little thing was breathing on the grass, and it made sounds--” He
shrugged and walked on. “She killed her twenty-first bird straight; it
was a handsome cup, too.”

And after a silence, “So you didn’t love her any more, Mr.
Siward?”--mockingly sweet.

They laughed, and at the sound of laughter the tall-stemmed alders
echoed with the rushing roar of a cock-grouse thundering skyward. Crack!
Crack! Whirling over and over through a cloud of floating feathers, a
heavy weight struck the springy earth. There lay the big mottled bird,
splendid silky ruffs spread, dead eyes closing, a single tiny crimson
bead twinkling like a ruby on the gaping beak.

“Dead!” said Siward to the dog who had dropped to shot; “Fetch!” And,
signalling the boy behind, he relieved the dog of his burden and tossed
the dead weight of ruffled plumage toward him. Then he broke his gun,
and, as the empty shells flew rattling backward, slipped in fresh
cartridges, locked the barrels, and walked forward, the flush of
excitement still staining his sunburnt face.

“You deal death mercifully,” said the girl in a low voice. “I wonder
what your ci-devant sweetheart would think of you.”

“A bungler had better stick to the traps,” he assented, ignoring the
badinage.

“I am wondering,” she said thoughtfully, “what I think of men who kill.”

He turned sharply, hesitated, shrugged. “Wild things’ lives are brief at
best--fox or flying-tick, wet nests or mink, owl, hawk, weasel or man.
But the death man deals is the most merciful. Besides,” he added,
laughing, “ours is not a case of sweethearts.”

“My argument is purely in the abstract, Mr. Siward. I am asking you
whether the death men deal is more justifiable than a woman’s gift of
death?”

“Oh, well, life-taking, the giving of life--there can be only one answer
to the mystery; and I don’t know it,” he replied smiling.

“I do.”

“Tell me then,” he said, still amused.

They had passed swale after swale of silver birches waist deep in
perfumed fern and brake; the big timber lay before them. She moved
forward, light gun swung easily across her leather-padded shoulder; and
on the wood’s sunny edge she seated herself, straight young back against
a giant pine, gun balanced across her flattened knees.

“You are feeling the pace a little,” he said, coming up and standing in
front of her.

“The pace? No, Mr. Siward.”

“Are you a trifle--bored?” She considered him in silence, then leaned
back luxuriously, rounded arms raised, wrists crossed to pillow her
head.

“This is charmingly new to me,” she said simply.

“What? Not the open?”

“No; I have camped and done the usual roughing it with only three guides
apiece and the champagne inadequately chilled. I have endured that sort
of hardship several times, Mr. Siward. … What is that furry hunch up
there in that tall thin tree?”

“A raccoon,” he said presently. “Can you see the foxy head peeping so
slyly down at us? Look at Sagamore nosing the air in that droll blind
mole-like way. He knows there’s something furry up aloft somewhere; and
he knows it’s none of his business.”

They watched the motionless ball of fur in the crotch of a slim forest
elm. Presently it uncurled, cautiously; a fluffy ringed tail unfolded;
the rounded furry back humped up, and the animal, moving slowly into the
tangent foliage of an enormous oak, vanished amid bronzing leafy depths.

In the silence the birds began to reappear. A jay screamed somewhere
deep in the yellowing woods; black-capped chickadees dropped from twig
to twig, cheeping inquiringly.

She sat listening, bright head pillowed in her arms, idly attentive to
his low running comment on beast and bird and tree, on forest stillness
and forest sounds, on life and the wild laws of life and death governing
the great out-world ’twixt sky and earth. Sunlight and shadows moving,
speech and silence, waxed and waned. A listless contentment lay warm
upon her, weighting the heavy white lids. The blue of her eyes was very
dark now--almost purple like the colour of the sea when the wind-flaws
turn the blue to violet.

“Did you ever hear of the ‘Lesser Children’?” she asked. “Listen then:

“‘Multitudes, multitudes, under the moon they stirred! The weaker
brothers of our earthly breed; … … All came about my head and at my feet
A thousand thousand sweet, With starry eyes not even raised to plead:
Bewildered, driven, hiding, fluttering, mute!

And I beheld and saw them one by one Pass, and become as nothing in the
night.’

“Do you know what it means?

“‘Winged mysteries of song that from the sky Once dashed long music
down--’

“Do you understand?” she asked, smiling.

“‘Who has not seen in the high gulf of light What, lower, was a bird!’”

She ceased, and, raising her eyes to his: “Do you know that plea for
mercy on the lesser children who die all day to-day because the season
opens for your pleasure, Mr. Siward?”

“Is it a woodland sermon?” he inquired, too politely.

“The poem? No; it is the case for the prosecution. The prisoner may
defend himself if he can.”

“The defence rests,” he said. “The prisoner moves that he be
discharged.”

“Motion denied,” she interrupted promptly.

Somewhere in the woodland world the crows were holding a noisy session,
and she told him that was the jury debating the degree of his guilt.

“Because you’re guilty of course,” she continued. “I wonder what your
sentence is to be?”

“I’ll leave it to you,” he suggested lazily.

“Suppose I sentenced you to slay no more?”

“Oh, I’d appeal--”

“No use; I am the tribunal of last resort.”

“Then I throw myself upon the mercy of the court.”

“You do well, Mr. Siward. This court is very merciful. … How much do you
care for bird murder? Very much? Is there anything you care for more?
Yes? And could this court grant it to you in compensation?”

He said, deliberately, roused by the level challenge of her gaze: “The
court is incompetent to compensate the prisoner or offer any
compromise.”

“Why, Mr. Siward?”

“Because the court herself is already compromised in her future
engagements.”

“But what has my--engagement to do with--”

“You offered compensation for depriving me of my shooting. There could
be only one adequate compensation.”

“And that?” she asked, coolly enough.

“Your continual companionship.”

“But you have it, Mr. Siward--”

“I have it for a day. The season lasts three months you know.”

“And you and I are to play a continuous vaudeville for three months? Is
that your offer?”

“Partly.”

“Then one day with me is not worth those many days of murder?” she asked
in pretended astonishment.

“Ask yourself why those many days would be doubly empty,” he said so
seriously that the pointless game began to confuse her.

“Then”--she turned lightly from uncertain ground--“then perhaps we had
better be about that matter of the cup you prize so highly. Are you
ready, Mr. Siward? There is much to be killed yet--including time, you
know.”

But the hinted sweetness of the challenge had aroused him, and he made
no motion to rise. Nor did she.

“I am not sure,” he reflected, “just exactly what I should ask of you if
you insist on taking away--” he turned and looked about him through the
burnt gold foliage, “--if you took away all this out of my life.”

“I shall not take it; because I have nothing in exchange to offer … you
say,” she answered imprudently.

“I did not say so,” he retorted.

“You did--reminding me that the court is already engaged for a continuous
performance.”

“Was it necessary to remind you?” he asked with deliberate malice.

She flushed up, vexed, silent, then looked directly at him with
beautiful hostile eyes. “What do you mean, Mr. Siward? Are you taking
our harmless, idle badinage as warrant for an intimacy unwarranted?”

“Have I offended?” he asked, so impassively that a flash of resentment
brought her to her feet, angry and self-possessed.

“How far have we to go?” she asked quietly.

He rose to his feet, turned, hailing the keeper, repeating the question.
And at the answer they both started forward, the dog ranging ahead
through a dense growth of beech and chestnut, over a high brown ridge,
then down, always down along a leafy ravine to the water’s edge--a forest
pond set in the gorgeous foliage of ripening maples.

“I don’t see,” said Sylvia impatiently, “how we are going to obey
instructions and go straight ahead. There must be a stupid boat
somewhere!”

But the game-laden keeper shook his head, pulled up his hip boots, and
pointed out a line of alder poles set in the water to mark a crossing.

“Am I expected to wade?” asked the girl anxiously.

“This here,” observed the keeper, “is one of the most sportin’ courses
on the estate. Last season I seen Miss Page go through it like a scared
deer--the young lady, sir, that took last season’s cup”--in explanation to
Siward, who stood doubtfully at the water’s edge, looking back at
Sylvia.

Raising her dismayed eyes she encountered his; there was a little laugh
between them. She stepped daintily across the stones to the water’s
edge, instinctively gathering her kilts in one hand.

“Miles and I could chair you over,” suggested Siward.

“Is that fair--under the rules?”

“Oh, yes, Miss; as long as you go straight,” said the keeper.

So they laid aside the guns and the guide’s game-sack, and formed a
chair with their hands, and, bearing the girl between them, they waded
out along the driven alder stakes, knee-deep in brown water.

Before them herons rose into heavy flapping flight, broad wings
glittering in the sun; a diver, distantly afloat among the lily pads,
settled under the water to his eyes as a submarine settles till the
conning-tower is awash.

Her arm, lightly resting around his neck, tightened a trifle as the
water rose to his thighs; then the faint pressure relaxed as they
thrashed shoreward through the shallows, ankle deep once more, and
landed among the dry reeds on the farther bank.

Miles, the keeper, went back for the guns. Siward stamped about in the
sun, shaking the drops from water-proof breeches and gaiters, only to be
half drenched again when Sagamore shook himself vigorously.

“I suppose,” said Sylvia, looking sideways at Siward, “your contempt for
my sporting accomplishments has not decreased. I’m sorry; I don’t like
to walk in wet shoes … even to gain your approval.”

And, as the keeper came splashing across the shallows: “Miles, you may
carry my gun. I shall not need it any longer--”

The upward roar of a bevey of grouse drowned her voice; poor Sagamore,
pointing madly in the blackberry thicket all unperceived, cast a
dismayed glance aloft where the sunlit air quivered under the winnowing
rush of heavy wings. Siward flung up his gun, heading a big quartering
bird; steadily the glittering barrels swept in the arc of fire,
hesitated, wavered; then the possibility passed; the young fellow
lowered the gun, slowly, gravely; stood a moment motionless with bent
head until the rising colour in his face had faded.

And that was all, for a while. The astonished and disgusted keeper
stared into the thicket; the dog lay quivering, impatient for signal.
Sylvia’s heart, which had seemed to stop with her voice, silenced in the
gusty thunder of heavy wings, began beating too fast. For the ringing
crack of a gun shot could have spoken no louder to her than the
glittering silence of the suspended barrels; nor any promise of his
voice sound as the startled stillness sounded now about her. For he had
made something a trifle more than mere amends for his rudeness. He was
overdoing everything--a little.

He stood on the thicket’s edge, absently unloading the weapon, scarcely
understanding what he had done and what he had not done.

A moment later a far hail sounded across the uplands, and against the
sky figures moved distantly.

“Alderdene and Marion Page,” said Siward. “I believe we lunch yonder, do
we not, Miles?”

They climbed the hill in silence, arriving after a few minutes to find
others already at luncheon--the Page boys, eager, enthusiastic,
recounting adventure by flood and field; Rena Bonnesdel tired and
frankly bored and decorated with more than her share of mud; Eileen
Shannon, very pretty, very effective, having done more execution with
her eyes than with the dainty fowling-piece beside her.

Marion Page nodded to Sylvia and Siward with a crisp, business-like
question or two, then went over to inspect their bag, nodding
approbation as Miles laid the game on the grass.

“Eight full brace,” she commented. “We have five, and an odd cock-
pheasant--from Black Fells, I suppose. The people to our left have been
blazing away like Coney Island, but Rena’s guide says the ferns are full
of rabbits that way, and Major Belwether can’t hit fur afoot. You,” she
added frankly to Siward, “ought to take the cup. The birches ahead of
you are full of woodcock. If you don’t, Howard Quarrier will. He’s into
a flight of jack-snipe I hear.”

Siward’s eyes had suddenly narrowed; then he laughed, patting Sagamore’s
cheeks. “I don’t believe I shall shoot very steadily this afternoon,” he
said, turning toward the group at luncheon under the trees. “I wish
Quarrier well--with the cup.”

“Nonsense,” said Marion Page curtly; “you are the cleanest shot I ever
knew.” And she raised her glass to him, frankly, and emptied it with the
precision characteristic of her: “Your cup! With all my heart!”

“I also drink to your success, Mr. Siward,” said Sylvia in a low voice,
lifting her champagne glass in the sunlight. “To the Shotover Cup--if you
wish it.” And as other glasses sparkled aloft amid a gay tumult of
voices wishing him success, Sylvia dropped her voice, attuning it to his
ear alone: “Success for the cup, if you wish it--or, whatever you
wish--success!” and she meant it very kindly.

His hand resting on his glass he sat, smiling silent acknowledgment to
the noisy generous toasts; he turned and looked at Sylvia when her low
voice caught his ear--looked at her very steadily, unsmiling.

Then to the others, brightening again, he said a word or two, wittily,
with a gay compliment well placed and a phrase to end it in good taste.
And, in the little gust of hand-clapping and laughter, he turned again
to Sylvia, smilingly, saying under his breath: “As though winning the
cup could compensate me now for losing it!”

She leaned involuntarily nearer: “You mean that you will not try for
it?”

“Yes.”

“That is not fair--to me!”

“Why not?”

“Because--because I do not ask it of you.”

“You need not, now that I know your wish.”

“Mr. Siward, I--my wish--”

But she had no chance to finish; already Rena Bonnesdel was looking at
them, and there was a hint of amused surprise in Eileen Shannon’s
mischievous eyes, averted instantly, with malicious ostentation.

Then Marion Page took possession of him so exclusively, so calmly, that
something in her cool certainty vaguely irritated Sylvia, who had never
liked her. Besides, the girl showed too plainly her indifference to
other people; which other people seldom find amusing.

“Stephen,” called out Alderdene, anxiously counting the web loops in his
khaki vest, “what do you call fair shooting at these damnable ruffed
grouse? You needn’t be civil about it, you know.”

“Five shells to a bird is good shooting,” answered Siward. “Don’t you
think so, Miss Page?”

“You have a better score, Mr. Siward,” said Marion Page with a hostile
glance at Alderdene, who had not made good.

“That was chance--and this year’s birds. I’ve taken ten shells to an old
drummer in hard wood or short pines.” He smiled to himself, adding: “A
drove of six in the open got off scot free a little while ago. Miss
Landis saw it.”

That he was inclined to turn it all to banter relieved her at once. “It
was pitiable,” she nodded gravely to Marion; “his nerve left him when
they made such a din in the briers.”

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