Cabin Fever Page 12

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN. CABIN FEVER IN THE WORST FORM

  Bud Moore woke on a certain morning with a distinct and well-definedgrouch against the world as he had found it; a grouch quite differentfrom the sullen imp of contrariness that had possessed him lately. Hedid not know just what had caused the grouch, and he did not care. Hedid know, however, that he objected to the look of Cash's overshoes thatstood pigeon-toed beside Cash's bed on the opposite side of the room,where Bud had not set his foot for three weeks and more. He disliked theaudible yawn with which Cash manifested his return from the deathlikeunconsciousness of sleep. He disliked the look of Cash's rough coat andsweater and cap, that hung on a nail over Cash's bunk. He disliked thethought of getting up in the cold--and more, the sure knowledge thatunless he did get up, and that speedily, Cash would be dressed ahead ofhim, and starting a fire in the cookstove. Which meant that Cash wouldbe the first to cook and eat his breakfast, and that the warped ethicsof their dumb quarrel would demand that Bud pretend to be asleep untilCash had fried his bacon and his hotcakes and had carried them to hisend of the oilcloth-covered table.

  When, by certain well-known sounds, Bud was sure that Cash was eating,he could, without loss of dignity or without suspicion of makingany overtures toward friendliness, get up and dress and cook his ownbreakfast, and eat it at his own end of the table. Bud wondered how longCash, the old fool, would sulk like that. Not that he gave a darn--hejust wondered, is all. For all he cared, Cash could go on forevercooking his own meals and living on his own side of the shack. Budcertainly would not interrupt him in acting the fool, and if Cash wantedto keep it up till spring, Cash was perfectly welcome to do so. It justshowed how ornery a man could be when he was let to go. So far as he wasconcerned, he would just as soon as not have that dead line painted downthe middle of the cabin floor.

  Nor did its presence there trouble him in the least. Just this morning,however, the fact of Cash's stubbornness in keeping to his own sideof the line irritated Bud. He wanted to get back at the old houndsomehow--without giving in an inch in the mute deadlock. Furthermore,he was hungry, and he did not propose to lie there and starve while oldCash pottered around the stove. He'd tell the world he was going tohave his own breakfast first, and if Cash didn't want to set in on thecooking, Cash could lie in bed till he was paralyzed, and be darned.

  At that moment Cash pushed back the blankets that had been banked to hisears. Simultaneously, Bud swung his feet to the cold floor with a thumpdesigned solely to inform Cash that Bud was getting up. Cash turnedover with his back to the room and pulled up the blankets. Bud grinnedmaliciously and dressed as deliberately as the cold of the cabin wouldlet him. To be sure, there was the disadvantage of having to start hisown fire, but that disagreeable task was offset by the pleasure he wouldget in messing around as long as he could, cooking his breakfast. Heeven thought of frying potatoes and onions after he cooked his bacon.Potatoes and onions fried together have a lovely tendency to stick tothe frying pan, especially if there is not too much grease, and if theyare fried very slowly. Cash would have to do some washing and scraping,when it came his turn to cook. Bud knew just about how mad that wouldmake Cash, and he dwelt upon the prospect relishfully.

  Bud never wanted potatoes for his breakfast. Coffee, bacon, and hotcakessuited him perfectly. But just for meanness, because he felt mean andhe wanted to act mean, he sliced the potatoes and the onions into thefrying pan, and, to make his work artistically complete, he let themburn and stick to the pan,--after he had his bacon and hotcakes fried,of course!

  He sat down and began to eat. And presently Cash crawled out into thewarm room filled with the odor of frying onions, and dressed himselfwith the detached calm of the chronically sulky individual. Not oncedid the manner of either man betray any consciousness of the other'spresence. Unless some detail of the day's work compelled them to speech,not once for more than three weeks had either seemed conscious of theother.

  Cash washed his face and his hands, took the side of bacon, and cutthree slices with the precision of long practice. Bud sopped his lasthotcake in a pool of syrup and watched him from the corner of his eyes,without turning his head an inch toward Cash. His keenest desire, justthen, was to see Cash when he tackled the frying pan.

  But Cash disappointed him there. He took a pie tin off the shelf andlaid his strips of bacon on it, and set it in the oven; which is a verygood way of cooking breakfast bacon, as Bud well knew. Cash then tookdown the little square baking pan, greased from the last bakingof bread, and in that he fried his hot cakes. As if that were notsufficiently exasperating, he gave absolutely no sign of being consciousof the frying pan any more than he was conscious of Bud. He did notoverdo it by whistling, or even humming a tune--which would havegiven Bud an excuse to say something almost as mean as his mood.Abstractedness rode upon Cash's lined brow. Placid meditation shoneforth from his keen old blue-gray eyes.

  The bacon came from the oven juicy-crisp and curled at the edges anddelicately browned. The cakes came out of the baking pan brown and thickand light. Cash sat down at his end of the table, pulled his own can ofsugar and his own cup of syrup and his own square of butter toward him;poured his coffee, that he had made in a small lard pail, and began toeat his breakfast exactly as though he was alone in that cabin.

  A great resentment filled Bud's soul to bursting, The old hound! Budbelieved now that Cash was capable of leaving that frying pan dirty forthe rest of the day! A man like that would do anything! If it wasn't forthat claim, he'd walk off and forget to come back.

  Thinking of that seemed to crystallize into definite purpose whathad been muddling his mind with vague impulses to let his mood findexpression. He would go to Alpine that day. He would hunt up Frank andsee if he couldn't jar him into showing that he had a mind of his own.Twice since that first unexpected spree, he had spent a good deal oftime and gold dust and consumed a good deal of bad whisky and beer, intesting the inherent obligingness of Frank. The last attempt had beenthe cause of the final break between him and Cash. Cash had reminded Budharshly that they would need that gold to develop their quartz claim,and he had further stated that he wanted no "truck" with a gambler anda drunkard, and that Bud had better straighten up if he wanted to keepfriends with Cash.

  Bud had retorted that Cash might as well remember that Bud had a halfinterest in the two claims, and that he would certainly stay with it.Meantime, he would tell the world he was his own boss, and Cash needn'tthink for a minute that Bud was going to ask permission for what he didor did not do. Cash needn't have any truck with him, either. It suitedBud very well to keep on his own side of the cabin, and he'd thank Cashto mind his own business and not step over the dead line.

  Cash had laughed disagreeably and asked Bud what he was going todo--draw a chalk mark, maybe?

  Bud, half drunk and unable to use ordinary good sense, had said yes, bythunder, he'd draw a chalk line if he wanted to, and if he did, Cash hadbetter not step over it either, unless he wanted to be kicked back.

  Wherefore the broad, black line down the middle of the floor to wherethe table stood. Obviously, he could not well divide the stove and theteakettle and the frying pan and coffeepot. The line stopped abruptlywith a big blob of lampblack mixed with coal oil, just where necessitycompelled them both to use the same floor space.

  The next day Bud had been ashamed of the performance, but his shamecould not override his stubbornness. The black line stared up at himaccusingly. Cash, keeping scrupulously upon his own side of it, wentcoldly about his own affairs and never yielded so much as a glance atBud. And Bud grew more moody and dissatisfied with himself, but he wouldnot yield, either. Perversely he waited for Cash to apologize for whathe had said about gamblers and drunkards, and tried to believe that uponCash rested all of the blame.

  Now he washed his own breakfast dishes, including the frying pan, spreadthe blankets smooth on his bunk, swept as much of the floor as lay uponhis side of the dead line. Because the wind was in the storm quarter andthe lowering clouds promised more
snow, he carried in three big armfulsof wood and placed them upon his corner of the fireplace, to providewarmth when he returned. Cash would not touch that wood while Bud wasgone, and Bud knew it. Cash would freeze first. But there was smallchance of that, because a small, silent rivalry had grown from thequarrel; a rivalry to see which kept the best supply of wood, whichswept cleanest under his bunk and up to the black line, which washed hisdishes cleanest, and kept his shelf in the cupboard the tidiest. Beforethe fireplace in an evening Cash would put on wood, and when next itwas needed, Bud would get up and put on wood. Neither would stoop tostinting or to shirking, neither would give the other an inch of groundfor complaint. It was not enlivening to live together that way, but itworked well toward keeping the cabin ship shape.

  So Bud, knowing that it was going to storm, and perhaps dreading alittle the long monotony of being housed with a man as stubborn ashimself, buttoned a coat over his gray, roughneck sweater, pulled a pairof mail-order mittens over his mail-order gloves, stamped his feetinto heavy, three-buckled overshoes, and set out to tramp fifteen milesthrough the snow, seeking the kind of pleasure which turns to pain withthe finding.

  He knew that Cash, out by the woodpile, let the axe blade linger inthe cut while he stared after him. He knew that Cash would be lonesomewithout him, whether Cash ever admitted it or not. He knew that Cashwould be passively anxious until he returned--for the months they hadspent together had linked them closer than either would confess. Likea married couple who bicker and nag continually when together, but aremiserable when apart, close association had become a deeply groovedhabit not easily thrust aside. Cabin fever might grip them and impelthem to absurdities such as the dead line down the middle of theirfloor and the silence that neither desired but both were too stubbornto break; but it could not break the habit of being together. So Budwas perfectly aware of the fact that he would be missed, and he wasill-humored enough to be glad of it. Frank, if he met Bud that day, waslikely to have his amiability tested to its limit.

  Bud tramped along through the snow, wishing it was not so deep, or elsedeep enough to make snow-shoeing practicable in the timber; thinkingtoo of Cash and how he hoped Cash would get his fill of silence, and ofFrank, and wondering where he would find him. He had covered perhaps twomiles of the fifteen, and had walked off a little of his grouch, and hadstopped to unbutton his coat, when he heard the crunching of feet in thesnow, just beyond a thick clump of young spruce.

  Bud was not particularly cautious, nor was he averse to meeting peoplein the trail. He stood still though, and waited to see who wascoming that way--since travelers on that trail were few enough to benoticeable.

  In a minute more a fat old squaw rounded the spruce grove and shiedoff startled when she glimpsed Bud. Bud grunted and started on, andthe squaw stepped clear of the faintly defined trail to let him pass.Moreover, she swung her shapeless body around so that she half faced himas he passed. Bud's lips tightened, and he gave her only a glance. Hehated fat old squaws that were dirty and wore their hair straggling downover their crafty, black eyes. They burlesqued womanhood in a way thatstirred always a smoldering resentment against them. This particularsquaw had nothing to commend her to his notice. She had a dirty redbandanna tied over her dirty, matted hair and under her grimy doublechin. A grimy gray blanket was draped closely over her squat shouldersand formed a pouch behind, wherein the plump form of a papoose wascradled, a little red cap pulled down over its ears.

  Bud strode on, his nose lifted at the odor of stale smoke that pervadedthe air as he passed. The squaw, giving him a furtive stare, turned andstarted on, bent under her burden.

  Then quite suddenly a wholly unexpected sound pursued Bud and halted himin the trail; the high, insistent howl of a child that has been deniedits dearest desire of the moment. Bud looked back inquiringly. The squawwas hurrying on, and but for the straightness of the trail just there,her fat old canvas-wrapped legs would have carried her speedily out ofsight. Of course, papooses did yell once in awhile, Bud supposed, thoughhe did not remember ever hearing one howl like that on the trail. Butwhat made the squaw in such a deuce of a hurry all at once?

  Bud's theory of her kind was simple enough: If they fled from you, itwas because they had stolen something and were afraid you would catchthem at it. He swung around forthwith in the trail and went afterher--whereat she waddled faster through the snow like a frightened duck.

  "Hey! You come back here a minute! What's all the rush?" Bud's voice andhis long legs pursued, and presently he overtook her and halted her bythe simple expedient of grasping her shoulder firmly. The high-keyedhowling ceased as suddenly as it had begun, and Bud, peering underthe rolled edge of the red stocking cap, felt his jaw go slack withsurprise.

  The baby was smiling at him delightedly, with a quirk of the lips anda twinkle lodged deep somewhere in its eyes. It worked one hand free ofits odorous wrappings, spread four fat fingers wide apart over one eye,and chirped, "Pik-k?" and chuckled infectiously deep in its throat.

  Bud gulped and stared and felt a warm rush of blood from his heart upinto his head. A white baby, with eyes that laughed, and quirky red lipsthat laughed with the eyes, and a chuckling voice like that, riding onthe back of that old squaw, struck him dumb with astonishment.

  "Good glory!" he blurted, as though the words had been jolted from himby the shock. Where-upon the baby reached out its hand to him and saidhaltingly, as though its lips had not yet grown really familiar with thewords:

  "Take--Uvin--Chal!"

  The squaw tried to jerk away, and Bud gave her a jerk to let her knowwho was boss. "Say, where'd you git that kid?" he demanded aggressively.

  She moved her wrapped feet uneasily in the snow, flickered a filmy,black eyed glance at Bud's uncompromising face, and waved a dirty pawvaguely in a wide sweep that would have kept a compass needle revolvingif it tried to follow and was not calculated to be particularlyenlightening.

  "Lo-ong ways," she crooned, and her voice was the first attractive thingBud had discovered about her. It was pure melody, soft and pensive asthe cooing of a wood dove.

  "Who belongs to it?" Bud was plainly suspicious. The shake of thesquaw's bandannaed head was more artfully vague than her gesture. "Don'know--modder die--fadder die--ketchum long ways--off."

  "Well, what's its name?" Bud's voice harshened with his growing interestand bewilderment. The baby was again covering one twinkling eye withits spread, pink palm, and was saying "Pik-k?" and laughing with thefunniest little squint to its nose that Bud had ever seen. It was soabsolutely demoralizing that to relieve himself Bud gave the squawa shake. This tickled the baby so much that the chuckle burst into arollicking laugh, with a catch of the breath after each crescendo tonethat made it absolutely individual and like none other--save one.

  "What's his name?" Bud bullied the squaw, though his eyes were on thebaby.

  "Don't know!"

  "Take--Uvin--Chal," the baby demanded imperiously.

  "Uh--uh--uh? Take!"

  "Uvin Chal? Now what'd yuh mean by that, oletimer?" Bud obeyed anoverpowering impulse to reach out and touch the baby's cheek with amittened thumb. The baby responded instantly by again demanding that Budshould take.

  "Pik-k?" said Bud, a mitten over one eye.

  "Pik-k?" said the baby, spreading his fat hand again and twinkling atBud between his fingers. But immediately afterwards it gave a little,piteous whimper. "Take--Uvin Chal!" it beseeched Bud with voice andstarlike blue eyes together. "Take!"

  There was that in the baby's tone, in the unbaby-like insistence of itsbright eyes, which compelled obedience. Bud had never taken a baby ofthat age in his arms. He was always in fear of dropping it, or crushingit with his man's strength, or something. He liked them--at a safedistance. He would chuck one under the chin, or feel diffidently thesoft little cheek, but a closer familiarity scared him. Yet when thisbaby wriggled its other arm loose and demanded him to take, Bud reachedout and grasped its plump little red-sweatered body firmly under thearmpits and drew it forth, squirmi
ng with eagerness.

  "Well, I'll tell the world I don't blame yuh for wanting to git outathat hog's nest," said Bud, answering the baby's gleeful chuckle.

  Freed from his detaining grip on her shoulder, the squaw duckedunexpectedly and scuttled away down the trail as fast as her old legswould carry her; which was surprisingly speedy for one of her bulk. Budhad opened his mouth to ask her again where she had gotten that baby. Heleft it open while he stared after her astonished until the baby put upa hand over one of Bud's eyes and said "Pik-k?" with that distractinglittle quirk at the corners of its lips.

  "You son of a gun!" grinned Bud, in the tone that turned the epithetin to a caress. "You dog gone little devil, you! Pik-k! then, if that'swhat you want."

  The squaw had disappeared into the thick under growth, leaving a tracklike a hippo in the snow. Bud could have overtaken her, of course, andhe could have made her take the baby back again. But he could not facethe thought of it. He made no move at all toward pursuit, but instead heturned his face toward Alpine, with some vague intention of turning thebaby over to the hotel woman there and getting the authorities to huntup its parents. It was plain enough that the squaw had no right to it,else she would not have run off like that.

  Bud walked at least a rod toward Alpine before he swung short around inhis tracks and started the other way. "No, I'll be doggoned if I will!"he said. "You can't tell about women, no time. She might spank the kid,or something. Or maybe she wouldn't feed it enough. Anyway, it's toocold, and it's going to storm pretty pronto. Hey! Yuh cold, old-timer?"

  The baby whimpered a little and snuggled its face down against Bud'schest. So Bud lifted his foot and scraped some snow off a nearby log,and set the baby down there while he took off his coat and wrapped itaround him, buttoning it like a bag over arms and all. The baby watchedhim knowingly, its eyes round and dark blue and shining, and gave acontented little wriggle when Bud picked it up again in his arms.

  "Now you're all right till we get to where it's warm," Bud assured itgravely. "And we'll do some steppin', believe me. I guess maybe youain't any more crazy over that Injun smell on yuh, than what I am--andthat ain't any at all." He walked a few steps farther before he addedgrimly, "It'll be some jolt for Cash, doggone his skin. He'll aboutbust, I reckon. But we don't give a darn. Let him bust if he wantsto--half the cabin's mine, anyway."

  So, talking a few of his thoughts aloud to the baby, that presentlywent to sleep with its face against his shoulder, Bud tramped steadilythrough the snow, carrying Lovin Child in his arms. No remote glimmer ofthe wonderful thing Fate had done for him seeped into his consciousness,but there was a new, warm glow in his heart--the warmth that came from achild's unquestioning faith in his protecting tenderness.