Wl^kD PI B 21 3 
 
 ANNA ALICE CH API N
 
 342 C
 
 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 DWV, OF GALIF. LIBRARY. LOS ANGELES
 
 'If she guessed what I am feeling now," he thought, "she would never 
 speak to me again"
 
 Mountain Madness 
 
 BY 
 
 ANNA ALICE CHAPIN 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 "THE EAGLE'S MATE," ETC. 
 
 Illustrations by 
 GEORGE W. GAGE 
 
 NEW YORK 
 W. J. WATT & COMPANY 
 
 PUBLISHERS
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY 
 W. J. WATT & COMPANY 
 
 PBE98 OF 
 
 BRAUNWORTH & CO. 
 
 OOK MAftUfACTUHERS 
 
 BROOKLYN. N. V.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE VALLEY . . i 
 
 II. FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE HILLS .... 12 
 
 III. A SHORT STUDY IN CONTRASTS ... 25 
 
 IV. THE TOLL-GATE HOUSE 35 
 
 V. GIRLS 47 
 
 VI. ENID OF THE GOLDEN EYES . . 60 
 
 VII. MOUNTAIN LAUREL 72 
 
 VIII. ENID is LEFT BEHIND 87 
 
 IX. THE HOLD-UP 100 
 
 X. MIDNIGHT ON THE MOUNTAIN TOP 117 
 
 XL ON THE TRAIL 128 
 
 XII. DANGEROUS BLOOMS 139 
 
 XIII. MALONE'S SHACK 154 
 
 XIV. ENID'S PATIENT 165 
 
 XV. THE OTHER WAY 175 
 
 XVI. NOON IN THE VALLEY 185 
 
 XVII. AT TWILIGHT 196 
 
 XVIII. PREPARATIONS 205 
 
 XIX. ENID: LADY ERRANT 215 
 
 XX. BEFORE THE STORM 223 
 
 XXI. MEN 230 
 
 V 
 
 2126284
 
 vi CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XXII. AT THE POWDER DANCE 239 
 
 XXIII. ELECTRIC LIGHT AND LIGHTNING 249 
 
 XXIV. THE UNSIGNED NOTE 258 
 
 XXV. THE LEARNED JUDGE 269 
 
 XXVI. MRS. FORSYTHE TAKES A HAND. 280 
 
 XXVII. ANOTHER DAWN 288 
 
 XXVIII. SHADOWS FROM THE PAST 299 
 
 XXIX. SUNSHINE AT THE FOUR TRAIL 
 
 CROSSING 305
 
 MOUNTAIN MADNESS
 
 Never a trail but strange it seems, 
 
 When it crosses another trail: 
 One a pathway of joys and dreams, 
 One that leads through treacherous streams, 
 One as frail as the moon's own beams; 
 
 One where you conquer, one where you fail. 
 
 Every trail runs a different way; 
 
 To a million points is the Great Map laid; 
 By the garden walk to the hills we stray, 
 The mountain path leads home some day; 
 But God be kind, is all we can say, 
 
 When the trails are crossed for a man and a maid! 
 
 Crossed Trails. 
 
 The sense to value Riches, with the Art 
 T' enjoy them, and the Virtue to impart, 
 
 Not sunk by sloth, nor rais'd by servitude; 
 To balance Fortune by a just expense, 
 Join with Economy, Magnificence. . . . 
 
 ALEXANDER POPE.
 
 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE VALLEY 
 
 , I wonder," said Judge Denby, smiling 
 in his wonderful quiet, sunshiny way, 
 "just what those dear children are doing?" 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe smiled, too, and shook her head. 
 
 "They do so love prowling over these moun- 
 tains!" she said. "Tell me, Judge Denby" (her 
 years of acquaintanceship gave her the right to a 
 more intimate form of speech, but she had never 
 availed herself of it) "are all the things one hears 
 of about this part of the world really true? It 
 seems so odd, here in these terribly civilized, 
 sophisticated surroundings, to imagine that a 
 really wild, lawless, adventurous life may be going 
 on all about us ! Do these exciting things that are
 
 2 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 reported really happen, or are they just fairy 
 tales?" 
 
 It would be hard to describe the life of the 
 Warm Sulphur Springs colony to one who had not 
 seen it. Imagine all of Broadway, Fifth Avenue 
 and Wall Street reduced to a finely accentuated 
 and condensed quantity, and you may have a faint 
 idea of what this tiny oasis of ultra-fashion stands 
 for or did in the days which this story records 
 in the center of towering ranges representing vast 
 and undirected conditions and impulses. In the 
 great hotel and its little entourage of cottages, 
 casinos, bath-houses, etc., were all the salient and 
 living facts of wealth and luxury, raised, by isola- 
 tion, to a point of insolent exaggeration hard to 
 equal even in this day of extravagant extravagance. 
 
 Here were booths and rooms where jewelry, 
 laces, model gowns, books, flowers and so on, 
 could be had for but very little more than twice 
 their normal market value. Here the stock- 
 brokers had their feverish, pulsing tickers; the 
 women their tea-rooms and bridge. For the more 
 uncontrollably restless souls there was always rou- 
 lette in private rooms, 'Private,' because the
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE VALLEY 3 
 
 management did not officially countenance gam- 
 bling. There was also dancing, and the best or- 
 chestra that Ned Sperry, the hotel manager, could 
 get together. 
 
 "Are they all fairy tales?" repeated Mrs. 
 Forsythe, clinging to her first idea, which was 
 the undoubted incongruity of the law-abiding and 
 well-ordered place, and the lawless matter under 
 discussion. 
 
 Judge Denby hesitated a moment before he 
 answered her. 
 
 "Not altogether," he said, quietly. 
 
 The Judge and Mrs. Forsythe sat in the mam- 
 moth hotel office, which might have belonged to a 
 perfectly good palace, among clusters of palms 
 and fragrant flowering plants, with well-groomed 
 men and beautifully gowned women moving about. 
 It was one of Sperry's fads to make his foyer (as 
 he called it) a rainbow place, of many-colored 
 lights, and the chain of electric jewels ran soft 
 and lustrous for what seemed an incredible dis- 
 tance. 
 
 The Judge was still considering Mrs. Forsythe's 
 question.
 
 4 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "And what have you heard concerning these 
 fairy tales?" he asked, at length. 
 
 "Why, I heard," proceeded Mrs. Forsythe, 
 "that there had been mobs, lynchings even, near 
 here!" 
 
 Judge Denby's handsome old face hardened for 
 a moment. 
 
 "A man was lynched five miles away a year or so 
 ago," he said, "but they paid they paid!" 
 
 "Tell me," urged Mrs. Forsythe, with that mor- 
 bid curiosity almost invariably present among the 
 virtuous and normal ornaments of society, "what 
 had he done this poor man?" 
 
 "He was a murderer, and worse," said the 
 Judge. 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe shivered, as though something 
 terrible and unknown had paused in passing to 
 touch her on the shoulder. 
 
 "But the gangs or bands of outlaws," she went 
 on, "one hears so much about them. Are they 
 bogies, or what?" 
 
 "There are such bands," said Judge Denby, 
 slowly. "The man who was lynched was one of 
 them."
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE VALLEY 5 
 
 "Then the others the ones who 'paid' were 
 law-keeping citizens?" 
 
 "They were not keeping the law when they 
 lynched a man," her companion said grimly. "As 
 I tell you, they paid quite a number of them. 
 But there are other things less gruesome, dear 
 lady, and almost as exciting. Let me tell you, for 
 instance about a case " 
 
 And all the time she tried to understand the 
 problem of the lynching of that unknown man. 
 Why was the Judge so bitterly, even revengefully 
 proud of having made them "pay" for that? She 
 looked at the clean-cut profile of her old friend, in 
 a helpless puzzled way. Though she was not a 
 subtle woman, she had her intuitions, and she 
 sensed something not only incomprehensible, but 
 sinister. 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe was a plump, well-dressed, typi- 
 cal woman, still blond of hair, fair of face and 
 carefully groomed at all times, the sort you see 
 by the thousand in every fashionable resort in 
 America, only varying in degrees of clothes and 
 manners. Mrs. Forsythe was superlative in both. 
 She was a frankly conventional being, and on
 
 studying her one felt instinctively that never by any 
 condition of chance could she have done anything 
 but the proper thing. Jack Radnor, engaged to 
 her daughter Enid, sometimes felt a spasm of 
 panic as he looked from one to the other. They 
 were absurdly alike in looks, in spite of Enid's 
 present youth and slenderness and alert ways. 
 Jack used to wonder in terror whether Enid would 
 be exactly like her mother when she reached her 
 age! He liked Mrs. Forsythe, but he hated to 
 look forward to a day, however remote, when he 
 should have to pass down the pathway of life with 
 her replica. 
 
 If he had even seen a certain wistfulness in her 
 eyes a wistfulness which betrayed itself seldom, 
 and of which she herself was hardly conscious 
 he might have altered his uncompromising twenty- 
 seven-year-old judgment of his future mother-in- 
 law. 
 
 There was, however, none of the wistfulness in 
 her expression at present. She looked very well 
 indeed in the pretty light, already the little elec- 
 tric lamps were glowing through their soft-toned
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE VALLEY 7 
 
 shades, and the negro waiters were passing tea in 
 the big palm-lined hotel office. 
 
 Judge Denby, looking at her critically, yet smil- 
 ing, thought he had never seen a woman who held 
 her coloring and her carriage so well. He had 
 known her as a young man, when she was some- 
 thing of a belle, and he and the late James For- 
 sythe were only drops in the metaphorical bucket 
 of her admirers. 
 
 The orchestra, composed of strings only in the 
 afternoon (Sperry had a discriminating instinct 
 worthy of a stage manager when it came to effects) 
 was playing, "Then you'll remember me." 
 
 It is one of the simplest, yet most plaintive of 
 airs, and because it is simple and plaintive and old- 
 fashioned it stands among the immortal little melo- 
 dies of the world. 
 
 "When other lips and other hearts," sang the 
 violins; you could almost hear the words. The 
 strain carried both Denby and Mrs. Forsythe 
 back a quarter of a century. They looked at each 
 other and smiled, rather sadly. 
 
 "How you used to flirt!" said the Judge with 
 seeming irrelevance.
 
 8 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Surely not!" Her smile was less sad. 
 
 "Surely yes! Look at me! and poor Dick!" 
 
 The smile left her lips. 
 
 "I have not thought of him for nearly thirty 
 years," she said quietly. "I don't believe I ever 
 flirted with him." 
 
 Judge Denby lifted his eyebrows, but did not 
 contest the point. 
 
 "He dropped out, you know," he went on. 
 
 "Yes," she said, looking straight before her. 
 "I know he dropped out. There ! They are play- 
 ing that new thing of Sousa's. I think I am glad. 
 Those old songs make one sentimental, don't 
 they?" 
 
 Judge Denby looked at her curiously. He won- 
 dered just what connection there was between 
 "those old songs," sentimentality and Dick, who 
 had dropped out so many years before. However, 
 he was a man who conserved his mental forces. 
 He wasted no time, intellectually speaking. Such 
 minutes as he spent in speculation were usually 
 with a definite purpose. 
 
 A bell boy came up with a tray and envelope,
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE VALLEY 9 
 
 and Mrs. Forsythe, with a murmured apology to 
 the Judge, examined it. 
 
 "It's a telegram and for Enid!" she exclaimed. 
 "I really think I'm justified in opening this 
 though I have theories about interfering with my 
 daughter's correspondence." 
 
 She tore open the envelope. "Why Enid will 
 be delighted!" she cried, and read aloud: 
 
 "Was going North but changed my mind at 
 Covington. Coming up to the Springs to spend 
 Sunday with you. ALICE." 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe laughed. 
 
 "How like Alice Baker ! Making up her mind 
 in a second's time like that and the telegram ! 
 About twice as many words as necessary ! But Fm 
 so glad she's coming. So, I think," she added, 
 with a significant pleasant glance at Judge Denby, 
 "will be some other people !" 
 
 "Ralph?" His fine eyebrows lifted quizzically, 
 his smile was not displeased. 
 
 "Miss Baker is attractive," he said. "I am glad 
 to see that my boy is carrying out the traditional 
 good taste of the family, though, of course, if it 
 might have been your daughter "
 
 io MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 She laughed at him. 
 
 "But Enid is such a thoroughly settled propo- 
 sition," pursued the Judge, "that it seems heresy 
 to even think of her connection with any one but 
 young Radnor." 
 
 "Do you think so?" Enid's mother looked 
 thoughtful. Just a shadow of the wistful look 
 came into her eyes just a ghostly expression of 
 something she was trying to understand in her 
 child. "Sometimes I wish I could be quite sure! 
 But I know she cares for Jack. It's just that I 
 don't think they have quite found each other yet, 
 at least sometimes I think so. More often I 
 don't. You know I am not a bit of a consistent 
 person!" 
 
 She laughed and helped herself to tea. The 
 Judge declined. He seemed vaguely restless, and, 
 in fact, after watching Mrs. Forsythe sip from her 
 cup for half a minute, rose as impetuously as 
 could be expected of fifty odd years and two hun- 
 dred and twenty pounds. 
 
 "I have important business to attend to, dear 
 lady," he explained, bowing in his own inimitable 
 way over her hand. It was a courtly way and yet
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE VALLEY u 
 
 very gently mocking, as though he played a charm- 
 ing game which he knew by heart. 
 
 "Arthur Denby is just what he was twenty-five 
 years ago," said Mrs. Forsythe to herself, look- 
 ing after his tall, commanding figure as it swung 
 its way among palms, and glittering tea-tables, and 
 pretty women, to the great doors. "How do men 
 with such heavy responsibilities keep their youth? 
 I suupose it is because the life he leads is so vital, 
 so active, so out of the rut of things." 
 
 She finished her tea, and went to join some 
 women friends in a quiet game of bridge before 
 dinner.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE HILLS 
 
 We fair fine ladies, who park out our lives 
 From common sheep-paths, cannot help the crows 
 From flying over, we're as natural still 
 As Blowsalinda. Drape us perfectly 
 In Lyons velvet, we are not, for that, 
 Lay-figures ; look you, we have hearts within, 
 Warm, live, improvident, indecent hearts. . . . 
 
 E. B. BROWNING. 
 
 A T that very moment her daughter Enid was 
 resting during a long ride with her fiance, 
 Jack Radnor, on one of the mountains of which 
 Judge Denby talked. 
 
 They had dismounted and climbed to a tiny peak 
 from which it seemed as though the whole world 
 were visible. 
 
 Jack, on the rock above her, stared down at her 
 bright head as she sat perched a little below him. 
 
 12
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE HILLS 13 
 
 He could not see her face so he could know noth- 
 ing of the varied current of emotion that was pass- 
 ing over it in ripples of expression. She looked as 
 usual : Enid, exquisitely groomed, lovely of figure, 
 a perfect, dainty thing, crowned with living gold, 
 that made him very hungry with longing as he 
 looked. 
 
 "If she guessed what I am feeling now," he 
 thought, "she would never speak to me again !" 
 
 And, if he could but have known it, Enid was 
 thinking very much the same thing! 
 
 Slim and straight as a little white birch tree, 
 Enid carried with her an elasticity, a delicacy, and 
 a freshness that was almost a fragrance. "What 
 a lovely young girl!" people always said, and, 
 sometimes unconsciously, the emphasis was apt to 
 be upon the young. She was golden-fair of hair, 
 and her eyes were golden, too, a strange and ex- 
 quisite color-combination, very startling indeed 
 when first come upon. Her fair skin was just the 
 creamy side of pure white; there was nothing of 
 the skim-milk variety about it, yet it was of lily- 
 like purity. And her mouth was a bright though 
 very light scarlet, as were the swift wonderful
 
 14 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 flushes that came and went in her cheeks and chin, 
 Enid's coral-tinted chin was the despair of her 
 rivals and her adorers for different reasons! 
 
 Her dearest friend, Alice Baker, always said 
 that Enid had picked out Jack Radnor because his 
 coloring toned in with hers so splendidly. He was 
 a study in browns, just as she was a symphony in 
 the tone gamut of ivory and gold. His hair and 
 his eyes and his clean, clear skin, were all brown. 
 
 "Such a pity!" Alice had once mourned, 
 "They're lovely as a picture, but eugenically quite 
 impossible. They couldn't have a blue-eyed baby, 
 and blue-eyed ones are far the prettiest !" 
 
 Enid herself did not quite know why she had 
 chosen Jack from the half dozen eligible young 
 men on her string. Of course, any one of twenty 
 women she knew could have given her twenty per- 
 fectly good reasons, which she would doubtless 
 have discarded with disdain. There were quite a 
 number of "points" to be accredited to Jack, even 
 by a disinterested observer, and there were prac- 
 tically no disinterested observers, among the 
 women. He was very decidedly good to look at. 
 He was an excellent all-round sport; he had a
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE HILLS 15 
 
 brain, and business ability. He had a sense of 
 humor, and he could dance, and he was just as 
 polite to old ladies as to young ones at dinners, 
 that is to say, he made them feel that he wasn't 
 being polite at all. He was considered a typi- 
 cal man's man, the kind always most popular 
 with women and had the utter simplicity which 
 nothing but breeding has ever been known to 
 give. 
 
 These things, however, as have been hinted, 
 were largely discounted by Enid. In fact, they 
 annoyed her by their obviousness, and puzzled her 
 as to why, in spite of them, she had selected to be- 
 stow upon him her favor. She felt that not one 
 nor all of such qualities could have won her with- 
 out something much bigger than they behind them. 
 This something she called "Primitive Force," the 
 "Eternal Masculine," the "Elemental Male," and 
 so on. But there was nothing aggressively primi- 
 tive about Jack Radnor. Of course, he was a nice, 
 strong, manly, well-set-up chap, but he was very 
 far indeed from being a Cave Man. If he ever 
 had any desire to knock her down and carry her 
 off to a lair, he concealed it with exasperating sue-
 
 1 6 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 cess. Enid herself was quite sure that it would 
 have horrified him to dream that speculation of 
 such a nature had ever entered her debutante head. 
 What then was the answer? 
 
 The answer, though she was destined to travel 
 a long road before finding it, was in Enid herself. 
 
 She had completely convinced Jack Radnor that 
 she was the Perfectly Proper Young Person, and, 
 though he loved her to distraction, he would have 
 choked rather than faintly shock her maidenly 
 reserve and well-trained sensibilities by even an 
 intonation that was too unrestrained. 
 
 "Jack," said Enid, abruptly, "what interests you 
 most on earth?" 
 
 "You," said Jack, promptly, truthfully, but with- 
 out undue fervor. 
 
 Enid flushed angrily. 
 
 "You don't Viave to say things like that!" she 
 snapped. 
 
 "All right," her fiance returned, unruffled, "then 
 I won't. May I smoke?" 
 
 "I wish you would smoke just once without ask- 
 ing permission!" 
 
 He lighted a cigarette without answer, and, as
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE HILLS 17 
 
 she was not looking, bent forward and very lightly 
 touched her hair. It thrilled him through and 
 through, but when she turned upon him sharply he 
 was smoking unconcernedly, with quite a detached 
 expression in his brown eyes. 
 
 Enid drew a deep breath of exasperation. 
 
 "You are so trying!" she complained. "You 
 always do the proper thing in the proper way 
 and " 
 
 "So do you, bless you!" he said, smiling indul- 
 gently. "Don't fuss, Enid! Isn't it too good a 
 day to waste on a quarrel?" 
 
 Enid scowled, but stared out over the valleys, 
 silver-threaded, that lay at their feet. 
 
 "It is a good day, Jack!" She stopped, and did 
 not seem to know how to go on. Which of us 
 have not felt the urge of that which we cannot even 
 define, much less express! After a minute, Jack 
 put his hand upon her shoulder, very gently. It 
 was a mute question and encouragement, and a 
 promise, too, if she had been old enough to read 
 more than printed matter. But perversity made 
 Enid shrink from the tentative caress a trifle petu- 
 lantly, and Jack, with a slight tightening of his
 
 1 8 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 lips, leaned back, thinking: "There's no use! 
 They've made a waxen image of her the darling. 
 When we're married, shall I ever be able to turn 
 her into a real honest-to-God woman?" 
 
 And Enid thought: "If he had been a real man 
 he would have kissed me anyway !" 
 
 Sometime, some Titan god engaged in the 
 formation of the universe, spilled a great giant 
 arm load of his properties upon that area of land 
 which was one day to be called "Virginia." Enough 
 of caverns and mountains and glades and gorges 
 and boiling springs growling of hell, and sunlit 
 peaks singing of heaven, and fertile valleys, and 
 sweet gardens, and lonely waste spaces, were flung 
 upon Virginia to fit out a dozen ordinary states. 
 
 And, given some of nature's most mad and 
 gorgeous stage-settings, man went to work to build 
 bizarre monuments to what we are pleased to call 
 Civilization. Here in a small section men and 
 women live the superlatively social existence; yet 
 here, in the wild area all around, men and women 
 touch depths of human and untamed experience 
 hard to credit by those with a restricted education. 
 Perhaps nowhere in the world do super-cultivation
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE HILLS 19 
 
 and super-savagery come so close together. The 
 adventurous soul could lunch among millionaires 
 and dine among outlaws, without the slightest 
 difficulty. 
 
 Only there are no adventurous souls, so they 
 don't find that out. Or if they do, they keep it to 
 themselves, as one would keep the secret of a new 
 and highly valuable patent. 
 
 "Jack," Enid gave a little gasp, "what does it all 
 mean that?" 
 
 She pointed to the great gleaming gold and 
 green stretch between them and the purple moun- 
 tain range beyond. 
 
 "What is it?" she added, vaguely and ineptly, 
 as she realized, "what is it to you?" 
 
 "A background for you, dear." 
 
 He was quite sincere. And he was not lacking 
 in depth nor subtlety either. Enid Forsythe was 
 all that he loved and wanted on this earth, and the 
 green and golden and violet world was, to him, 
 barely good enough for her stage-setting. 
 
 But, because she could not think of him like that, 
 she only winced, as at a sort of impertinent and 
 casual persiflage and shrank again. And the glory
 
 20 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 of the day, and the valley, and the rippling ranges 
 royal in their purple and gold hurt her very 
 much indeed. 
 
 "Have you any idea," she demanded cruelly, 
 "how entirely you are out of the picture?" 
 
 "What is the matter with me?" was his im- 
 perturbable query. 
 
 "Your clothes, for one thing. So rotten per- 
 fect! Imagine those riding togs on a primeval 
 peak like this!" 
 
 "I don't believe," said Jack, mildly, "that a 
 bear skin, or any thing of that sort, would do any 
 better. Hard to ride in, you know, and on a horse 
 one does want to be comfortable." 
 
 "Oh, I know you're frightfully keen on your 
 riding!" cried Enid, frowning pettishly. "But 
 your sort of riding always suggests polo to me, 
 or steeple-chasing and and that!" 
 
 "Well," said Jack, still without rancor, "that's 
 all right. You have to ride a bit even in polo, 
 you know. Likewise steeple-chasing." 
 
 His clothes were good; whether the fact were 
 against him or not could be best determined by un- 
 prejudiced arbitration. Being big, brown, and
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE HILLS 21 
 
 about as well put together as a man may reason- 
 ably be, not to say a bit better, he seemed to 
 belong in his riding breeches, just as he belonged 
 on his horse. 
 
 It was an unfortunate accident, considering 
 Enid's point of view, that he really preferred cor- 
 rectly built clothes to those of amateurish design 
 and manufacture. Enid knew that he was hand- 
 some prepared for a horse, and handsomest of all 
 when he was on one ; but it irritated her that he did 
 not appear before her arrayed in a Mexican som- 
 brero, flannel shirt and the rest of it. It was an 
 insult to her elemental emotions that she had never 
 seen him unshaved, and that his boots were made 
 by Morton and Morton's and fitted. 
 
 "Heaven's! We'll be late for tea!" she re- 
 marked suddenly, rising and shaking out her rid- 
 ing-skirt. 
 
 The loop and the button that held it at her side 
 had missed connections, and she adjusted it with 
 a lithe bend of her young little body and a pretty 
 show of trim black riding boot. 
 
 It was against Enid's principles or what she 
 thought were her principles to notice hands, at
 
 22 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 least, a man's hands. Hands were, or should be, 
 necessary appendages to the human, utilitarian 
 frame. But she had never been able to avoid no- 
 ticing Jack Radnor's. 
 
 They were hands that meant something a 
 man's hands, a gentleman's hands and full of 
 power: long-fingered, strong, sensitive, strikingly 
 handsome. They had a language of their own 
 the more eloquent because he used them seldom 
 and sparingly, and only to definite effect. Enid 
 had more than once caught herself shrinking from 
 vagrant pictures of those firm, well-shaped gentle 
 hands: sometimes knocking a man down, some- 
 times caressing a woman. . . . 
 
 As Jack Radnor busied himself with her reins 
 and stirrups, she had a queer cringing, yet appeal- 
 ing self-hatred, because she could not take her gaze 
 from his fine fingers as they moved deftly about 
 her business and comfort. 
 
 When he and she were both mounted, it was 
 with an infinitely greater shock that she realized 
 that all the time she had been wishing that these 
 same hands which after all, and with all her 
 vagaries, she loved best of all the hands ever made
 
 FIVE O'CLOCK IN THE HILLS 23 
 
 by God had just once lingered in their self-ap- 
 pointed task of touching her. 
 
 Turning, she accepted Jack's help and made her 
 way down the rocks to where the horses were wait- 
 ing. 
 
 "You may put me up," she said in her sweetly 
 imperious way. 
 
 Jack bent, and in bending hid a smile that was 
 just a little bitter. As the small boot rested in his 
 clasped palms and he let her swoop lightly upward 
 to the saddle, he felt a mad desire to stop her half- 
 way, to catch that springing, exquisite body to his 
 heart and hold it close, to rain kisses on her face 
 and hair, and to treat her for one short moment as 
 the Woman he Loved, instead of the Girl he was 
 Engaged To. 
 
 However, he mounted her with punctilious in- 
 difference, caught the hanging curb to place in her 
 hand, and examined the girth, as impersonally as 
 though she were not two inches away from him all 
 the time. 
 
 "She's hopeless," he thought, swinging himself 
 onto his horse. 
 
 "He's impossible!" was Enid's indignant de-
 
 24 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 cision and her indignation, in some queer in- 
 verted way, seemed to rankle more against her- 
 self than him. 
 
 And just then they came in sight of two figures, 
 which reaching their vision at that particular in- 
 stant, registered in an astounding fashion. 
 
 After one glance, they turned to each other in 
 sheer wonder. 
 
 "How simply magnificent!" they murmured, as 
 with one voice. 
 
 Surely it is needless to add that the two figures 
 coming toward them along the trail, were those of 
 a man and a woman.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 A SHORT STUDY IN CONTRASTS 
 
 A restlessness of heart, a silent yearning, 
 A sense of something wanting, incomplete 
 Not to be put in words, perhaps avoided 
 By mute consent. . . . 
 
 ROBERT BROW KING. 
 
 . . . O Pan, 
 How gracious is the mountain at this hour ! 
 
 . . . The sun 
 
 Is shining on the brilliant mountain crests, 
 And on the highest pines. . . , 
 
 MATTHEW ARNOLD. 
 
 "DOTH were well worth looking at. The man 
 was tall as tall as Radnor himself and 
 exhibited a prodigal expenditure of strength and 
 magnificence quite in keeping with the mountains 
 of which he seemed an integral part. He was fair, 
 
 25
 
 26 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 one gathered as much from his rough tawny 
 crop of hair. His skin was burnt deeply by the 
 sun not to the smooth brown that covered Jack's 
 clear-cut face, but to a color more ruddy and alive ; 
 the sunburn of a very fair man. With his hawk- 
 like blue eyes, the splendid fling ot his great limbs, 
 and that glowing, coppery coloring, he might have 
 been a young god, just descended from the daz- 
 zling ether, or sprung up from the flaming heart of 
 the earth. Enid absolutely gasped when she saw 
 him. Even his clothes were right a loose shirt, 
 open at the neck to show his strong sun-burnt 
 throat and sleeves rolled high up his fine arms, and 
 the roughest of trousers and top-boots. He car- 
 ried a shabby old hat in one hand, and a huge 
 bunch of mountain laurel in the other. 
 
 As for the girl if Jack did not actually gasp 
 at the sight of her, he certainly did pull up his 
 mount with an involuntary jerk, which much sur- 
 prised that animal. Champion had been hired by 
 Radnor by the month and had grown used to the 
 lightest of snaffle riding, and the most reassuring 
 of knee-pressure. So he reared, did the horse, just 
 to show his amazement. But, even in quieting him
 
 A SHORT STUDY IN CONTRASTS 27 
 
 with apologetic hand and voice, Jack Radnor did 
 not once take his eyes off the girl of the mountains. 
 
 She was what was she like? He discarded a 
 dozen similes in a single breath. A June rose? 
 But a June rose suggested something a trifle too 
 cultivated. If there were a June rose, as opulent 
 and as gorgeous as the hothouse variety, yet grow- 
 ing wild, then it might be like this woman. She 
 was very young, yet mature with the adolescence 
 of almost savage conditions. Her feet were bare 
 and not small but beautifully shaped, her supple 
 waist was large and her neck straight. One knew 
 at once that she had never worn shoes nor corsets 
 in her life. 
 
 Her coloring was dark and radiant, all crimson 
 bloom and deep eyes that could flash or dream, 
 or both at once. She was a Woman, first and 
 foremost. She reminded Jack of Eve, as she 
 might have looked in God's First Garden. And the 
 temperamental possibilities in her struck fire from 
 his own none too tame impulses. There was a 
 girl who would know how to love ! he thought. 
 
 And even in thinking it, he felt vaguely ashamed 
 and disconcerted, not only at an indirect disloyalty
 
 28 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 to Enid, but at an equally indefinite disrespect to 
 the woman herself. 
 
 He would have ridden on at once, but he saw 
 that Enid had reined up. 
 
 "I beg your pardon," she was saying, in her 
 clear, rather quick utterance, "but would you very 
 much mind telling us where you got that lovely 
 laurel? I've ridden all over this range, and it's the 
 most perfect I've seen." 
 
 The young mountaineer stared at her as though 
 he were a trifle dazzled by the vision she made 
 in her light tan habit, with the sun on her hair. 
 Her hat was hung from her pommel and her head 
 looked as though covered all of gold. In a mo- 
 ment he spoke, slowly: 
 
 "I reckon you wouldn't find this, likely; it grows 
 up on Gray Crag, where the climbing's stiff." 
 
 He hesitated a moment, then added, dropping 
 his eyes from the brightness of her face: "I'll get 
 you-all some, if you like." 
 
 Jack felt his face heat quickly as Enid said, in 
 an eager tone: "Oh, I wish you would!" 
 
 Gray Crag, eh? And "stiff climbing!" And he 
 was tacitly assumed to be unequal to the feat. The
 
 A SHORT STUDY IN CONTRASTS 29 
 
 peculiar, calm rage that comes to deep-feeling men 
 well schooled to self-control, assailed him. He sat 
 like a statue on his horse, without a change of ex- 
 pression, not even realizing that Champion was 
 curvetting about and doing a few restless stunts on 
 his own initiative, until the fair-haired mountaineer 
 remarked with a slow grin : 
 
 "Say, stranger, you can ride some, can't you?" 
 
 Then, pulling up, Radnor caught not the man's 
 but the woman's eyes. They were dark and very 
 eloquent. Irritation against Enid, and perhaps 
 something more, made him in his turn join the 
 conversation. 
 
 "We've gone a bit out of our regular riding 
 range. To get back to Warm Sulphur Springs the 
 shortest way just where do we turn?" 
 
 It was the girl at whom he looked, and, speaking 
 for the first time, it was she who answered him, in 
 a rich drawling voice : 
 
 "Better go through the Toll-Gate at Four Trail 
 Crossing. That's Dad's." 
 
 She was looking at him with a candid, yet timid, 
 wonder in her beautiful eyes. Jack, in speaking to 
 her had, as a matter of course, uncovered; and
 
 30 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 while she had seen plenty of men without hats, this 
 was probably the first time that one had doffed his 
 on her account. In common with many women, 
 she loved incense, and had never had nearly 
 enough of it; and this new and delicate deference 
 went to her head. 
 
 She looked at him accordingly. 
 
 A woman's eyes may convey the subtlest flattery 
 in this round world. If the flattery is too obvious 
 and, so to speak, plainly labeled, it is rather apt 
 to put a man off; but there is another sort, sincere 
 and yet shy, which will wing its way to the most 
 adamantine sensibilities. This girl's flattery was 
 of that sort and Jack's sensibilities were not pre- 
 cisely adamantine. 
 
 "Why, then, of course, we'll go on there!" said 
 Enid promptly. And to the man she added: 
 "Won't you show us the way, please?" To the 
 girl: "Perhaps you could let me have a glass of 
 water when we get there. I'm so thirsty !" 
 
 The man and the girl of the hills turned and 
 led the way down the trail, and then to another 
 trail aslant from it. With the heavy deep emerald 
 foliage for a setting they looked more splendid
 
 A SHORT STUDY IN CONTRASTS 31 
 
 than ever. But neither Enid nor Jack turned eyes 
 in their direction. 
 
 Enid toyed with her reins, and tried to keep her 
 face averted from her lover. After a moment, he 
 said, with some constraint: 
 
 "Aren't we a bit late as it is?" 
 
 "Well," returned she, with spirit, "that's all the 
 more reason to go the shortest way we can. Isn't 
 it?" 
 
 "Surely," said Radnor, "if you are certain it 
 will be the shortest way." 
 
 They rode on without speaking again. 
 
 The path ran in a sharp slant from the upper 
 Ridge, through close-crowding mountain trees. It 
 was steep and rough, and deeply shaded for the 
 most part. Once in a while, it would zig-zag out 
 into the orange light of the late afternoon, and 
 the mountainside would seem all at once to drop 
 away from them, leaving man and girl riding only 
 on the edge of open space. 
 
 The lower hills, heavily plumaged with rich and 
 various gradations of green, swept in great waves 
 to the east. A stormy enough sea they made at 
 close range, but as they melted into the purples
 
 32 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 and blues of distance, they grew calmer of aspect, 
 presenting a misty, undulant expanse, softened by 
 miles of cloudy air, suggestive of dreams and mys- 
 tery. Beyond rose the crests of other and higher 
 mountain ranges, saffron in the sunlight, pure in- 
 digo where the cloud shadows lay upon them. 
 
 They rode on in silence. A constraint was on 
 them. More than once, one or the other would 
 draw a quick breath, startled by a sudden brilliant 
 glimpse of sunlit valley or far-off hills, but they 
 did not speak to each other. 
 
 They plunged into a darker, more thickly 
 wooded stretch. It was the faintest possible trail 
 to follow, evidently but little traveled, and car- 
 peted with moss and dead leaves. It smelt heavily 
 of the woods, the fragrance that always lingers 
 where sunlight seldom finds its way between inter- 
 lacing branches. The horses' hoofs made no 
 sound; there was only the infinitesimal clink of the 
 bits, the subdued creak of leather. ... It was 
 cool and dim, and the path, eternally turning and 
 twisting before them, kept them wondering as to 
 what was around the next bend. 
 
 Then, all at once after a sharper turn than
 
 A SHORT STUDY IN CONTRASTS 33 
 
 usual, it suddenly mounted toward a bare sky-line. 
 There were no more trees, only low scrub oaks, 
 and the other dwarf things that are significant of 
 high places and higher winds. The trail became as 
 steep to ascend as it had been to descend. The 
 horses strained upward, stumbled on loose stones, 
 and seemed to pull themselves to that bleak sky- 
 line with a series of scrambling plunges. Another 
 effort; they were up! And 
 
 This time there was no suppressing the involun- 
 tary gasp. For, apparently, they were poised on 
 the utmost edge of infinity. 
 
 A little clearing, set at a dizzy angle, sloped 
 straight before them for perhaps a hundred feet. 
 There was a small, low house perched against the 
 background of blue ether, and there was a sign 
 nailed to the front of it. Red-brown roads ran 
 from it east and west for a few yards, then dis- 
 appeared enigmatically below the edge of the pla- 
 teau. And all around was mile upon reaching mile 
 of Nothing! Clouds, sky, swimming sunshine, 
 winds so boisterous and tingling that they seemed 
 almost visible, but nothing else. 
 
 As they gazed marveling, a bird came into view
 
 34 
 
 far away, floating speck In blue and golden space. 
 It looked immeasurably lonely, and gave a strange 
 and convincing impression of the unbelievable 
 height and emptiness of the element through which 
 it was slowly winging its way. 
 
 It was their first sight of Four Trail Crossing, 
 that remote high place, posed sublimely, almost 
 miraculously, above the solid facts of the old 
 brown earth and its ways.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE TOLL-GATE HOUSE 
 
 I got up the mountain edge and from the top saw the world 
 stretch out. . . . And then I thought no more, but my heart 
 leapt to meet the wind. 
 
 MAURICE HEWLETT. 
 
 VERYTHING in this world can be seen from 
 different angles, under different lights that 
 make for a million results and eventualities. The 
 lady in the poem who said "yes" because it was 
 candle-light and not day, understood this truth. 
 We all know that the artist's eye can discern pur- 
 ple in a rail fence, and it is an indubitable fact that 
 a grouchy German critic once declared Verdi's 
 melodies to be "hard and harsh!" Behold, my 
 comrades, there is no essential Truth; it is all and 
 always a Point of View ! 
 
 The sudden panorama which opened out before 
 35
 
 3* MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Enid and Radnor, as they let their horses advance, 
 took on an incredible glamour from the mood and 
 the conditions which controlled their first glimpse 
 of it. They had seen wonderful and impressive 
 views before, but this seemed something new, and 
 utterly marvelous. 
 
 The vision of mountains far beneath may sug- 
 gest wonder, awe, terror, admiration a variety of 
 things. To Radnor and Enid certainly, and per- 
 haps to the other two as well, it spoke of romance 
 and the impossibly lovely. The trail just before 
 was thickly wooded, and when they reached that 
 great open sweep of the unknown they trembled 
 and dreamed. 
 
 The young mountain couple were standing in 
 front of the Toll-gate House as Enid and Radnor 
 rode down to it, and in a moment a very tall, 
 roughly dressed man with a flowing gray beard 
 came to the open door and scrutinized them with 
 the keen peering look common to those who are ac- 
 customed to facing the wind and sun. 
 
 "This is Dad," said Polly, briefly but with a rich 
 drawl. She seemed to consider it an ample and 
 adequate introduction.
 
 THE TOLL-GATE HOUSE 37 
 
 "Going to Middletown?" the Toll Keeper 
 asked. 
 
 He clearly considered them in the light of 
 travelers; so Polly felt it incumbent upon her to 
 elucidate. 
 
 "She wants water," she said, indicating Enid. 
 
 The Toll Keeper's face changed pleasantly. He 
 promptly became unofficial and cordial. They 
 were now his guests and he received them accord- 
 ingly. 
 
 "We can find her something better than water!" 
 he exclaimed. "Polly, can't you make some tea?" 
 
 He was looking at Enid with a kind sharpness 
 that puzzled her. One would almost have said 
 that he found something familiar about her, and 
 could not entirely place it. 
 
 Still looking at her closely, and in a gentle tone 
 that contrasted in a singular fashion with his un- 
 polished appearance, he added, "May I help you 
 down?" 
 
 They noted that he did not say "ma'am," and 
 that when he came to her stirrup it was with a car- 
 riage and air lacking alike in self-consciousness or 
 servility.
 
 38 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 When they had dismounted, the younger moun- 
 taineer went with Radnor to the barn, and helped 
 him with the two saddle horses. Enid meanwhile 
 went in to the Toll-gate House with the old man 
 and his daughter. 
 
 So it came about that these four went together 
 to the Toll Gate and Four Trail Crossing, and 
 were made welcome by Richard Mason, who kept 
 it and who was the girl's father. It appeared that 
 her name was Polly : the sunburnt young god who 
 was "going with her" (Enid had never heard the 
 phrase before) was Martin Hale. 
 
 Richard Mason was what nearly anyone would 
 have styled a delightful and perfect type. Only 
 they would have been reasonably certain to get the 
 type wrong. Classifying types is a tricky business; 
 picking winners is child's play to it. The psycholo- 
 gist or the novelist or many of those unnatural, im- 
 pertinent beings doomed by vocation or avocation 
 to prey upon, and to pry eternally into, persons' 
 affairs, would almost unanimously have put him 
 down as a splendid specimen of the Old Moun- 
 taineer, rugged and hardy, not too scrupulous 
 and dowered with the inevitable charm which
 
 THE TOLL-GATE HOUSE 39 
 
 theater-goers can always discover in no education 
 and objectionable table manners. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the Toll Keeper was as per- 
 fect a host as Enid Forsythe had ever met, for all 
 his ostentatiously rough and awkward ways. He 
 was a splendid-looking old man, with great dignity 
 and authority of bearing, and when he bowed over 
 her fair little hand, she had a fleeting impression 
 that he had for the moment forgotten his part and 
 was playing himself! 
 
 He flatly refused toll, and insisted that they 
 make him the debtor by taking tea in the Toll- 
 gate House. 
 
 It was the strangest, airiest, most remote place 
 in which Enid had ever been. It was as clean and 
 fresh as water and hill winds could keep it, but 
 there was something more about it something 
 free and fine and far. After trying to analyze the 
 impression, she realized that it was partly because 
 the house stood so high, and on such a barren 
 space, that there was nothing to be seen from 
 doors or windows but sky. One might as well 
 have been floating above the world. . . . 
 
 Polly brought out queer, old-fashioned blue
 
 40 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 cups, and Enid settled herself with an air well 
 known to her lover of having made up her will- 
 ful little mind to stay and probably to stay for 
 quite a time. 
 
 As they had tea, they grew friendly enough, 
 though it was not until much later that Enid and 
 Jack found out any but the most superficial partic- 
 ulars of the lives of their new acquaintances. What 
 they learned later, we may quite as well learn now. 
 
 Richard Mason was something of a mystery 
 even to those who knew him best. He had come 
 to the hills many years before, had married a 
 woman of the mountains, and had never to any- 
 one's knowledge, left the upper range even for a 
 day. There was a vague general impression that 
 he had been a man of education before he had 
 turned to the wilderness, though usually he made 
 a point of affecting a manner ruder and views more 
 primitive than his mountaineer associates. On 
 rare occasions he had been known to speak with 
 profound bitterness of some great wrong once 
 done him, some unspeakable injustice which after 
 these many years could still whip him to fury with 
 a bare recollection. But he made no close confi-
 
 THE TOLL-GATE HOUSE 41 
 
 dants. Perhaps the most intimate friend he had 
 was Martin Hale. 
 
 It was an odd friendship; for they were thirty 
 years and more apart in age, and both were silent 
 men, solitary by nature and sternly reticent. But 
 they liked and understood each other, and when 
 Hale had proposed to Polly, unemotional as he 
 had made himself, Mason had felt something al- 
 most akin to joy in the thought of giving his girl 
 into such good keeping. 
 
 Martin Hale had been born in the mountains, 
 of a long race of mountain people. Something of 
 the hills' strength and quiet, something of their dig- 
 nity and aloofness, had gone to his making. Like 
 all mountain-bred folk, he had strange eyes; they 
 seemed focused on horizons, infinitely wider than 
 those of people of the valleys ; they looked always 
 a trifle absent and abstracted, as though seeing 
 visions and dreaming dreams. 
 
 He had lived all his life among the hills where 
 he was born. His father was a type by no means 
 uncommon in the Virginias; a man of good and 
 sound stock, but a stock run wild. With no edu- 
 cation himself, old Hale had seen no reason why
 
 42 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 his son should have any. Martin's secret mastery 
 of reading and writing had, when discovered by his 
 father, been the cause of their first stormy quarrel. 
 First, but far from last. The two had wrangled 
 intermittently for the length of the elder man's 
 life, and the bitterness of his early youth had in- 
 evitably increased Martin's innate reserve. He 
 had gone on with his reading, and had contrived to 
 give himself a measure of education, but, although 
 his father had left him with enough money, he had 
 never availed himself of the possibility of going 
 away to see the world of men. As a boy he had 
 dreamed of faring forth to dare and do, but as a 
 man he shrank from it. He found himself with 
 each year growing more a part of his native 
 ranges, and now indeed it seemed to him that he 
 could scarcely breathe any air but that of Liberty 
 Ridge. 
 
 But his love for the refined and graceful and 
 cultivated things of life and civilization remained. 
 It was the same instinct which had made him turn 
 to books and fight for them. Mountaineer though 
 he was, he would always be essentially a man to 
 whom the delicate, the rare, the fine, the balanced
 
 THE TOLL-GATE HOUSE 43 
 
 and restrained, would speak in a special music of 
 their own. 
 
 This impromptu tea party was an epoch-mak- 
 ing affair for Hale. He was too shy to look at 
 Enid very often, but he was acutely conscious of 
 her all the time. And he liked Jack Radnor at 
 once. 
 
 An instant freemasonry sprang up between the 
 two young men. Each recognized in the other 
 something big and vital and male, something 
 which they could mutually respect. Jack Radnor, 
 in spite of his superficial conventionality, was very 
 democratic at heart. There was not a trace of 
 snobbishness in him, and the young mountaineer 
 had fine enough acumen to sense the fact, and to 
 accept the Valley man as an equal and as a possible 
 friend. 
 
 It was "Radnor" and "Hale" within twenty 
 minutes, and immediately they plunged deep in 
 man's talk of riding and shooting and fishing, 
 while Enid made friends with the Toll Keeper and 
 his daughter. 
 
 The old man was easy enough to get on with, 
 but the dark, lovely girl was as shy as some sensi-
 
 44 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 tive wild creature of her own mountains, and 
 disposed, it seemed, to regard Miss Forsythe, 
 if not precisely as an enemy, at least as an in- 
 truder. 
 
 Now, though Jack Radnor liked old Mason and 
 young Hale, and admired Polly who had never 
 looked more beautiful than she did now as she 
 moved with her quiet lynx-like step about the 
 room, he still felt annoyed with Enid. She had 
 pointedly ignored his existence since they had met 
 the mountain couple, and, though in many ways 
 Radnor was a simple soul, he did not like it. Also, 
 once in a while, he really preferred to have his 
 own way. So did Enid. 
 
 It is odd that temperamental persons can almost 
 never understand each other. He who is addicted 
 to moods and impulses is as a rule the last to com- 
 prehend the moods and impulses of others. So, 
 when Enid, acting on an impetuous and entirely 
 insincere instinct, said: "How lovely! Of course, 
 I shall stay for tea 1" Jack was furious. 
 
 "Don't you think your mother will be anxious?" 
 he remarked, as formally and coolly as he could 
 for he deeply desired to shake her.
 
 THE TOLL-GATE HOUSE 45 
 
 Enid adored her mother, and, if Jack had not 
 admonished her in that superior and chilly way, 
 she would doubtless have expressed contrition, 
 anxiety and a wish to relieve the maternal mind 
 as swiftly as possible. As it was, she hastily 
 killed a pang which was beginning to rend her 
 conscience, and turned a perverse back upon her 
 fiance. 
 
 "I am sure that Mother will know that I am 
 quite able to take care of myself!" she said, even 
 more icily than he had spoken. 
 
 It was impossible to mistake the inference. So 
 far as taking care of her went, Jack Radnor was 
 as completely dimissed, not to say eliminated, as 
 though she had rubbed him off the slate. 
 
 He went white with anger this time, and said 
 frigidly: 
 
 "In that case, and since you don't need me, I 
 shall explore the neighborhood. Hale, will you 
 have a cigarette with me outside?" 
 
 He could not have stayed in the same room 
 with her another moment without becoming vio- 
 lent. 
 
 The young man went out with him, and both
 
 46 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 girls followed them with their eyes with what 
 a conflict and complexity of thoughts and emotions 
 no mere writer could record. 
 
 The cigarettes lighted, Jack remarked casually: 
 "By the bye, just whereabouts is Gray Crag?"
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 GIRLS 
 
 To mount a hill is to lift with you something lighter and 
 brighter than yourself or than any meaner burden. You lift the 
 world, you raise the horizon; you give a signal for the distance 
 to stand up. . . . The distances unfold unlocked for 
 wings. . . . 
 
 ALICE MEYNELL. 
 
 A BIT later Martin Hale came back into the 
 room of the Toll-gate House, with the 
 shadow of a grin upon his handsome face. The 
 golden-haired lady had asked him to go to Gray 
 Crag for the superlatively lovely mountain laurel, 
 but it was the other fellow who had hazarded that 
 enterprise for her after all. And who was he to 
 stop Jack Radnor from risking his neck for a 
 whim of his sweetheart's if he wanted to? They 
 were both men, and they played a man's game. 
 
 47
 
 48 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Where is Mr. Radnor?" aked Enid Forsythe, 
 before she had time to think. Then she flushed 
 and bit her lips. 
 
 "Oh, round somewhere," said Hale, with 
 another slight grin. 
 
 Polly had one of her quiet, almost uncanny in- 
 spirations. 
 
 "I reckon he's gone to Gray Crag for that lau- 
 rel," she drawled. 
 
 Enid stared from one to the other of them. 
 Martin Hale nodded slowly. 
 
 "Gray Crag," she repeated. "Where But 
 of course, I remember But you said it was 
 awfully hard to climb !" 
 
 "Nastiest bit hereabouts," agreed old Mason, 
 cheerfully. 
 
 Enid half rose to her feet. 
 
 "But but it must be dangerous!" she ex- 
 claimed. 
 
 "Sure !" nodded Martin Hale. "Leastways, for 
 one that's not used to it." 
 
 Enid controlled herself, but she found to her 
 horror that her lips were quivering. 
 
 "He he'll never be able to do it!" she said.
 
 GIRLS 49 
 
 "Of course, he'll give it up, and turn back, when 
 he finds " 
 
 "Not he!" said Martin Hale. "He'll do it all 
 right." 
 
 He liked Jack Radnor. 
 
 "He's all right?" said Mason to Hale, with 
 marked emphasis. 
 
 "Sure! But there'll be trouble to-night, take it 
 from me." 
 
 "I'm afraid so!" said the Toll Keeper. Then, 
 as though dismissing something, he turned to Enid. 
 
 "Don't you worry, missy," he said. 
 
 "I'm not worrying!" she said sharply, and crim- 
 soned resentfully. 
 
 Then dimly conscious that her very denial had 
 in a sense convicted her, she flushed more deeply 
 than before, and, turning to her young hostess, 
 said, "Won't you let me brush my hair, please? It 
 must be shockingly messy!" 
 
 Polly led the way to her own room without a 
 word, but a sort of wonder was in Martin Hale's 
 eyes. Did this slim little gold-haired goddess 
 really think that she needed a brush or anything 
 else for that matter to make her more dainty,
 
 50 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 more adorable than she was? Never had Hale 
 seen such fineness and delicacy; such trimness and 
 perfection of finish. If only Polly would keep her 
 hair tidy, like that, and take pains with her clothes, 
 and his vague discontent trailed off uncertainly. 
 Even he realized that Polly could never be a sec- 
 ond Enid. They were types as different as the 
 poles. Hale with his curious poet's soul yearned 
 at present toward the refinements of life rather 
 than the elementals. To him, though he hesitated 
 at admitting as much to himself, Polly seemed 
 overblown; not quite coarse (she had too much 
 natural sweetness and dignity for that) but cer- 
 tainly too primitive. Enid to this man of the 
 mountains stood for those fragile, idealistic things 
 that one may dream of without daring to think 
 of touching. 
 
 Masks! Is there anyone who does not wear 
 them, and wear them to their own undoing at that? 
 Polly, had he only known it, was far closer to the 
 girl of his ideals the spiritual, aloof thing that he 
 had made a mental picture of, than Enid. Enid 
 was as much more of a savage primitive woman, 
 for all her well-cut clothes, and her dainty ways,
 
 GIRLS 51 
 
 as Radnor was more of a savage, primitive man 
 than this tanned young mountaineer. Right at 
 their hand, you perceive, just what each wanted, to 
 be had for the asking and none of the four knew 
 it! 
 
 Polly Mason's bedroom was shabby, but it 
 showed a distinct effort toward beauty. Clearly 
 this girl, who had admitted during their talk that 
 she only visited the Valley for semi-annual shop- 
 ping expeditions, had an artist's soul in her, 
 evinced in a dozen pretty tricks of arrangement, 
 and light, and decoration. 
 
 All around the room was a dado or frieze 
 of something so new and exquisite that Enid 
 exclaimed involuntarily at sight of it. Subcon- 
 sciously, she had been hunting for something of 
 Polly's (beside the girl herself) that she could 
 admire wholeheartedly. Well, she had found 
 it! 
 
 A foot or so below the ceiling ran the frieze, and 
 It was made all of leaves beautiful silhouettes of 
 leaves on a silvery background, truly lovely, In- 
 describably decorative. Enid's Inexperienced eyes 
 picked out maples, rose-red, brownish-green oak-
 
 52 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 leaves, and many others, all in their natural and 
 inimitable colors. 
 
 "And that?" she questioned softly, pointing 
 with her riding crop to a delicate five-leaved out- 
 line. "Woodbine, isn't it?" 
 
 "We all call it Virginia Creeper," replied Polly 
 Mason. "You see, two of the leaves are red; I 
 got it in the fall." 
 
 Enid looked again more closely. 
 
 "Why, they're all real!" she exclaimed in won- 
 der. 
 
 Polly laughed. 
 
 1 'Course they're real," she said. "You don't 
 suppose we can afford to buy picture-things, Dad 
 and I, do you?" 
 
 She explained the process: that of picking the 
 most perfect leaf specimens possible, pressing 
 them carefully, and mounting them on squares of 
 birch bark. 
 
 "Mart cuts the bark," she said, "and sees 
 that it's even. Then we glaze it cover it with 
 varnish, and and it looks right pretty, don't 
 you think?" 
 
 "I think it's too lovely for words !" Enid replied
 
 GIRLS 53 
 
 with sincerity. "But how do you keep the pro- 
 portion the balance the composition " 
 
 She sought for words that would be com- 
 prehensible for the other. But Polly understood 
 her easily enough, and found words for her, 
 too. 
 
 "You mean how do I know what leaves to put 
 next each other?" she suggested, with simplicity. 
 "Which won't spoil the others?" 
 
 Enid nodded. 
 
 "It it's so right I" she said. "Your taste must 
 be very perfect and true !" 
 
 "I've always liked that sort of thing," said the 
 mountain girl indifferently. "Here's a brush and 
 comb, if you-all want to fix your hair." 
 
 Enid began to pull out hairpins, and her vividly 
 golden locks fell in shining waves about her shoul- 
 ders. Busied with their arrangement, she did not 
 notice the look in Polly's eyes as she stared at the 
 bright ripples. Then a question, very slowly 
 drawled, fell on her ears: 
 
 "Do you dye it often?" 
 
 She turned and stared, with the hair-brush in 
 her hand.
 
 54 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Heavens, no!" she gasped. "I don't dye it at 
 all. Why on earth should you think that?" 
 
 "I didn't know the Lord ever made anyone with 
 hair that color," said Polly, calmly. "I thought 
 they had to do it themselves. I know I'd be will- 
 ing to ! Look at my hair !" 
 
 She pulled forward a ruffled dark tress, and 
 glowered at it; then she turned her spendid eyes 
 upon Enid's. 
 
 They stared at each other in a rather hostile 
 fashion for almost a minute; then, suddenly, they 
 both laughed, and so became friends. 
 
 The law of equation is a queer thing; hard men 
 married to saccharine wives find their outlook 
 broadening and softening in proportion as the 
 ladies become more and more restricted and 
 adamantine in their ideas. Because the society 
 girl and Polly of Four Trail Crossing were so un- 
 like, an uncanny sympathy sprang up between 
 them. The men in whom they were interested 
 figured largely of course, men always do, but, 
 to their mutual astonishment, the girls themselves 
 liked each other, independently of any male ele- 
 ment.
 
 GIRLS 55 
 
 "You're the loveliest thing I ever saw in all my 
 life !" Enid said to Polly, with an honesty that 
 robbed the remark of insolence. 
 
 Polly laughed outright at that, and showed her 
 white teeth. 
 
 "So are you I" she cried. 
 
 Then they laughed together, and all at once 
 some mask which each of them had felt bound to 
 wear dropped, and they stared at each other, with 
 the laughter, warm and sympathetic, on their lips. 
 
 "Listen to me !" said Enid impetuously, throwing 
 aside the brush. She looked like an adorable little 
 girl when her hair was down. "He Mr. Hale 
 said something just now about trouble. Is he 
 are any of you in trouble, truly?" 
 
 Polly hesitated, but the other girl's golden eyes 
 were so clear and candid that she made an impul- 
 sive movement nearer her. 
 
 "You know," Enid went on eagerly, "I do want 
 to help somehow if I can!" 
 
 Polly hardly knew how to answer her; how to 
 put the situation. She did not express herself 
 readily anyway, she had few woman-friends, and 
 training of years had made her secretive concern-
 
 56 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 ing mountain matters. But something sweet and 
 sincere and girlish in this "young lady from the 
 valley" broke down a great barrier in a very 
 speedy fashion, and, answering Enid's quick, sym- 
 pathetic outreaching of hands by putting hers into 
 them, she said, rather huskily: 
 
 "We're all in bad, Dad, and and Mart, 
 and the bunch. The others the rest of our folks 
 have gotten a heap more daring lately more rot- 
 ten, Dad and Mart say; and You won't tell?" 
 
 "Tell!" Enid's voice rang with a fiery scorn. 
 She flung her arm about the other's shoulder. "Go 
 on please!" 
 
 With her face hidden, and speaking almost as 
 though it were against her will yet pressing closer 
 to that slender protecting arm, Polly tried to ex- 
 plain : 
 
 "There are a lot of things that Dad and Mart 
 won't do. They they're not strong for the law, 
 either of 'em, but they believe in fair play and 
 decency. But some of the others get sort of 
 crazy; and they we all have to stand together. 
 See?" 
 
 In truth, Enid was beginning to see.
 
 GIRLS 57 
 
 "You mean," she said slowly, "that your father 
 and Martin Hale have to stick to this gang they're 
 in with, even when things are done that they don't 
 approve of, and wouldn't do themselves?" 
 
 Polly nodded. 
 
 "It's pretty hard on them," she said. "They 
 can't give any of the lot away, but " 
 
 "But," interrupted Enid vehemently, "why don't 
 they break away from them? They can do that 
 surely!" 
 
 Polly looked at her, smiled quietly, and shook 
 her dark head. 
 
 "I reckon you-all don't know much about the 
 mountains," she said. " 'Tisn't healthy to back out, 
 once you're in, not among us it isn't !" 
 
 "They're not afraid!" Enid started as if stung. 
 
 And over Polly's warm brown face spread a 
 deep flush of resentment and pride in one. 
 
 "I reckon there's not much this side of hell 
 they're afraid of, either of 'em!" she said, with- 
 drawing. "But there's someone in the Valley 
 that has hold on 'em. I don't rightly know who 
 it is, but they can't afford to get into trouble, either 
 way, because he could get back at 'em too hard."
 
 5 8 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "But even so," broke Enid hotly, from the 
 depths of her inexperience, "they're men, and can 
 face it! There's no real reason " 
 
 "There's me," said Polly. 
 
 The resentment had died out of her voice and 
 face. She stood before Enid a little limply, 
 strangely humble in her admission of being, in some 
 psychological fashion, a burden. She seemed al- 
 most to have shrunk in physical stature in a single 
 moment. 
 
 Enid stared at her, realizing the situation which 
 demanded the "false truth" of males for the pro- 
 tection of the women they loved best. Then she 
 held out her arms, with her face breaking into 
 lovable, beautiful little lines of understanding and 
 sympathy. 
 
 "Oh, you poor darling!" she murmured, and 
 her voice shook. 
 
 Polly went into her arms without a word. 
 
 Somehow, without many words, things got 
 cleared up and explained in a marvelous fashion 
 then. With Enid's bright gold hair falling over 
 Polly's dark head, with their two voices mixing 
 and sobbing and breaking off, the thing became
 
 GIRLS 59 
 
 extraordinarily plain, without any accurate exposi- 
 tion of the facts in the case. Words are, after all, 
 the least useful of all means of human expression. 
 
 As it turned out from Polly's eloquent, if incoher- 
 ent, whispers and her still more eloquent hesita- 
 tions, it was not that any individual of the "gang" 
 had designs upon her. It was only that Polly had 
 learned a simple, rather terrible truth that in the 
 wild places of the world a woman is always a fac- 
 tor tremendous for good or evil usually the 
 latter. 
 
 "Are any of them in love with you then?" asked 
 Enid adding quickly, "I mean " 
 
 She stopped, but Polly flushed as though she 
 interpreted what she did not say. 
 
 " 'Tisn't that," she said, very low. "But Dad 
 says when men like that are round he'd sooner 
 lock me up than the toll-takings." 
 
 She dropped, shamed and serious, in saying this. 
 But Enid, looking at her, experienced an odd sen- 
 sation. She found it difficult to analyze it at first, 
 and it appalled her when she realized with a shock 
 that she almost envied Polly because she was so 
 much desired,
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 ENID OF THE GOLDEN EYES 
 
 . . . One whose tedious toil 
 Had watched for years in forlorn hermitage, 
 Who had not from mid-life to utmost age 
 Eased in one accent his o'er-burdened soul, 
 Even to the trees. . . . 
 
 JOHN KEATS. 
 
 1\/r ARTIN HALE and old Mason smoked in 
 the living-room of the Toll-gate House. 
 The winds that were never still at the Crossing 
 talked insistently at the doors and windows in- 
 terpolating, interrupting, interpreting as winds 
 will. The younger man was restless, more than 
 once he rose from his seat by the fire and went to 
 stare out into the cloudy dusk; more than once he 
 glanced at the closed door of Polly's room behind 
 which the two girls still talked inaudibly. 
 
 60
 
 ENID OF THE GOLDEN EYES 61 
 
 The older man was thinking of the past, the 
 younger of the future, no ! Not of the future ! 
 It was the present that Martin Hale thought of. 
 . . . And oddly enough, the thoughts of both of 
 them centered on Enid, the lovely little lady from 
 the Valley. To the Toll Keeper she stood sym- 
 bolic of all that he had once had and lost. 
 
 Polly's mother had been a shy, silent creature 
 of the hills; it was not of her that he was think- 
 ing. She had been beautiful in a wildwood style, 
 but neither clever nor of vivid personality. Polly 
 had inherited her physical loveliness but little else. 
 It was Richard Mason's own keen mind and 
 vibrant vitality which made the girl so splendidly 
 appealing and alive. Mason, soured and embit- 
 tered by early wrongs, had turned savagely to the 
 opposites of everything which before had gone to 
 make up life for him. A man of violent extremes 
 in all things, he plunged into primitive existence as 
 fiercely, as whole-heartedly as, in his first youth, 
 he had plunged into the subtler atmosphere of 
 civilization. He was determined that the future 
 should be as widely different as possible from the 
 past.
 
 62 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Because he had been in his day something of an 
 exquisite in a wholesome way, he took a perverse 
 pleasure in adopting the rough clothes and rougher 
 manners of the mountaineers; because he had once 
 been impulsive and gregarious, he now elected to 
 live almost entirely alone, consorting only with men 
 as habitually unsocial as himself. Because the 
 girl he had loved had been the quintessence of 
 daintiness and breeding, a charming, polished 
 young creature who was the veritable flower of 
 his Great World, he chose for his wife the inarticu- 
 late, shy woman of the hills who was Polly's 
 mother. 
 
 And as he sat there smoking he was think- 
 ing of that other girl. She was smiling at 
 him across a great gulf of years, but even 
 from so great a distance the smile came beauti- 
 fully familiar. It was a smile which was an old 
 friend. . . . 
 
 Martin Hale took another restless turn up and 
 down the room, he had let his pipe go out. The 
 Toll Keeper watched him without seeming to do 
 so for a space; at last he laid his pipe down on the 
 arm of his chair and spoke in the quiet way that
 
 ENID OF THE GOLDEN EYES 63 
 
 never jars upon the most ragged nerves nor the 
 most capricious moods: 
 
 "Funny, isn't it, how all at once a little thing'll 
 set you-all off your track?" 
 
 Hale started and stood in his uneasy pacing. 
 The older man continued meditatively, as though 
 to himself. 
 
 "There's me, for instance. Live shut up in these 
 hills funny thing to say 'shut up' in the hills, eh, 
 boy? But I reckon you could feel shut up in God 
 Almighty's house of mansions if you weren't 
 well, let's say acclimated some ! But anyhow I've 
 been here, rooted at Four Trail Crossing for a 
 quarter of a century and never a jolt in all that 
 time to get me out of the rut that was leading 
 straight to the grave." 
 
 He paused, picked up the pipe and puffed. 
 
 "Well?" said Martin Hale, rather gruffly. 
 
 "Eh?" Mason had apparently forgotten what 
 he had been speaking of. 
 
 "What has jolted you?" 
 
 "That little girl there." The Toll Keeper 
 jerked his head sideways toward the closed door. 
 
 "You mean, Miss "
 
 64 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Yes, her. She's like a little piece out of my 
 young days come to life after all this time 
 after all this time!" 
 
 He gazed into the fire with the veil of dreams 
 showing before his face. 
 
 "She's very beautiful," said the young man, and 
 it seemed as though he spoke with difficulty. 
 
 "Eh? Oh, yes beautiful. She's more than 
 that. She's just all the sweetness and the foolish- 
 ness and the lovingness and the unreasonableness 
 of girls tied up in one dear little woman. Our 
 Polly's worth ten of her, I reckon, but that yel- 
 low-haired lassie is going to make more trouble 
 and more joy than ever Polly will. ... I loved 
 a girl once that was the copy of her. The same 
 gold hair and gold eyes and the same pretty way 
 with her that said: 'Do it for me because no 
 one can have so much right to it as I, and it's 
 mighty nice of me to let you do it!' Yes, just 
 such another." 
 
 Old Mason laughed rather tenderly. Hale and 
 he were not of the kind given to exchanging con- 
 fidences, but in a moment the young man said 
 bluntly, yet without impertinence.
 
 ENID OF THE GOLDEN EYES 65 
 
 44 What happened?" 
 
 "Happened? Oh, my best friend lied about me 
 and kicked me out of her running. That's why I 
 came up here to the hills. I married Polly's 
 mother, and and I've never seen the Valley 
 since I've even stopped thinking of it much until 
 until to-night. That girl set me thinking " 
 
 "And the other girl the one you loved mar- 
 ried the other chap, I suppose?" 
 
 The old man's face hardened grimly. 
 
 "No. That she didn't! She married, but not 
 him. I've yet my score to settle with him. I don't 
 know where she is now. But after all these years 
 she seems to-night to stand almost at my elbow. 
 An old fool I am, to be sure!" 
 
 The door of Polly's room opened quickly and 
 Enid Forsythe came out. Her face was pale and 
 eager; her golden eyes burned like stars. 
 
 "Mr. Hale," she said abruptly, and with a sort 
 of sweet authority, very characteristic of her, 
 "won't you let me speak to you a moment?" 
 
 Though she did not add the word "alone" it 
 made itself almost audible in the pause that fol- 
 lowed her swift speech. And her simple and
 
 66 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 naturally imperial manner robbed the request of 
 any element of discourtesy to the Toll Keeper. 
 Here, it seemed, was an inherently royal young 
 creature so sure of herself as to be able to com- 
 mand and request with equal immunity from the 
 suggestion of offense. 
 
 Without a word Martin Hale rose and, going 
 to the door, held it open for her. She passed 
 through it, and he followed, closing it behind them. 
 Polly came slowly out from the room and her eyes 
 grew vaguely troubled as she stared at the door 
 through which they had gone. Her father looked 
 at her and sighed. Then he fixed his wise old 
 eyes once more upon the fire before him and went 
 on smoking. 
 
 Outside Enid and Hale stood in the swirl of the 
 quickening breezes that swept the plateau before 
 the Toll-gate House. The sky was beryl green in 
 the west; the valleys lay a tumbled chaos of black 
 and purple and blue ... the sigh of innumer- 
 able voices was in the air a faint and plaintive 
 clamor of urgent yet untranslatable tongues. The 
 cold, clean, scentless savor of the hilltops reached 
 their nostrils and the delicate chill of summer
 
 ENID OF THE GOLDEN EYES 67 
 
 nights among the clouds made Enid shiver 
 lightly. 
 
 "Tell me, Mr. Hale," she began quickly, and 
 then she hesitated. The mountaineer was looking 
 at her in a steady, disconcerting sort of way. He 
 bulked big against the evening sky, and with noth- 
 ing behind him on the horizon line it gave her a 
 queer sense that he was for the moment the only 
 fact of creation. She did not quite know how to 
 go on. But, as he waited, in that still strength of 
 his which thrilled her with its potentialities, she 
 made shift to begin again, more haltingly. 
 
 "She she told me that you were in some sort 
 of trouble." 
 
 "Polly?" 
 
 She nodded. 
 
 "Polly oughtn't to talk," was his comment, ac- 
 companied by a frown; she could see it in this open 
 half-light of eventide. 
 
 "But you said so yourself, didn't you or Im- 
 plied it?" Enid went on swiftly, her great eyes 
 pleading and clear. "I 'must know of some way 
 to help ! Won't you show me how to help you, 
 to help you-all?"
 
 68 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 It was not altogether her fault that the last 
 word came as an afterthought even though a 
 hurried one. The man's personality was unmis- 
 takably convincing; when she was with him it was 
 paramountly him first of all whom she wished to 
 help. She was not flirting with him; she was 
 merely demonstrating the fact that she was a real 
 woman and he a real man. 
 
 Martin Hale hesitated, but it was something 
 the same with him as it had been with Polly; the 
 spell of the golden eyes held him in spite of him- 
 self, and drew from him words that he had never 
 meant to utter. 
 
 "There's trouble in the Valley!" he muttered. 
 
 "I know that. Is it a sort of double trouble? 
 Something that calls you there that you don't want 
 to answer to? Is it?" 
 
 The man did not answer at once, and she real- 
 ized that he was sparring for time, and time she 
 would not grant him. She had an inspiration. 
 Hers were not the instincts of Polly, but they were 
 feminine, which is saying something. 
 
 In her well-ordered young life she seldom had a 
 chance a good, full-sized chance to use her in-
 
 ENID OF THE GOLDEN EYES 69 
 
 tuitions. Here it seemed was one, and all the ad- 
 venturous, masked soul of the girl rose to the op- 
 portunity of doing something at last! 
 
 "Mr. Hale," she said, in a lower, but a very dif- 
 ferent tone, "something is being done or is 
 going to be done that is wrong. . . . Isn't 
 that true?" 
 
 He assented silently. 
 
 When she spoke again it was in hushed tones, 
 and yet it came to him like a kind of cry : 
 
 "I don't know anything about this situation, and 
 and I don't suppose a girl's much good any- 
 way, in times like this! But I'm going to stick 
 to you people! Somehow I know you're right! 
 And there might be something I could do I don't 
 know yet " 
 
 Her voice failed her, but she still faced him 
 in the twilight, eager and honest. Martin Hale 
 responded to her instantly and without fore- 
 thought. 
 
 "It's all in a nutshell, Miss Forsythe. Since 
 Polly's told you so much, there's no need hiding 
 a little more. The boys here on the range have 
 something on foot to-night, that Mr. Mason and
 
 70 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 I would like to stop if we could. But we're stalled 
 every way." 
 
 "If it's anything big " she broke in. 
 
 "It is big," he answered her. "You see, I'm 
 trusting you." 
 
 "Thank you," she said, looking out over the 
 blue-green mist of the shadowed valleys. She was 
 not ironic. It was the finest compliment ever paid 
 her yet. "Go on," she said. 
 
 And Martin Hale went on: 
 
 "It's going to mean the loss of money to some 
 people, certain sure. And maybe it'll be loss of 
 life to others. I don't know that." 
 
 Enid shuddered. 
 
 "But," she gasped, "isn't there anything to be 
 done? Oh I know I understand it's danger- 
 ous to go back on your friends, but oughtn't real 
 right to come first? Oh, please !" She was plead- 
 ing with him, and her voice shook. "Isn't there 
 any way?" 
 
 "I I could tip off the sheriff's gang," he said in 
 a low voice. "I mean that, you know tip off; 
 just that, and no more. I wouldn't tell on a pal 
 anyway!" he ended fiercely.
 
 ENID OF THE GOLDEN EYES 71 
 
 "But if you could save life and property " 
 
 "I'd do it!" he declared, flinging up his hand- 
 some head. "I'd do it, and take my chances after- 
 wards if I could!" 
 
 "And why can't you " 
 
 "Because I haven't a horse! Easy, isn't it?" 
 He laughed bitterly. 
 
 "I don't understand!" Enid faltered. 
 
 "I tramped over to-day from my own shack," 
 he said, "and if there's any tipping-off to be done, 
 it's got to be quick!" 
 
 "But surely they have a horse here!" 
 
 Hale laughed, almost angrily. 
 
 "A plug! That couldn't do a stiff stretch at a 
 stiff pace even in daylight! No, thanks! I want 
 a real horse. If I were at heart one of the 
 gang I don't suppose I'd mind being a horse- 
 thief and I'd have taken Radnor's. But I 
 won't!" 
 
 There was just a moment of breathless waiting. 
 Then Enid turned to him quickly. 
 
 "Take mine !" she said.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 MOUNTAIN LAUREL 
 
 There is rock to the left, and rock to the right, and low lean 
 
 thorn between, 
 And ye may hear a breech-bolt snick where never a man is seen, 
 
 There was not a man but carried his feud with the blood of the 
 mountaineer. 
 
 RUDYARD KIPLING. 
 
 1Y/T EANWHILE, Jack Radnor was climbing 
 Gray Crag in quest of mountain laurel for 
 the girl he loved. 
 
 Gray Crag certainly presented some interesting 
 exhibits of what Martin Hale had called "stiff 
 climbing." Jack was not an expert mountain 
 climber, though he had done his bit both in Swit- 
 zerland and the Rockies; but he prided himself 
 upon being able to do whatever any ordinary able- 
 
 72
 
 MOUNTAIN LAUREL 73 
 
 bodied man could do not superlatively well, of 
 course, for he was perfectly modest about his own 
 capabilities, but certainly creditably. It first sur- 
 prised and then annoyed him to find that Gray 
 Crag was the stiffest proposition in the climbing 
 line ever put up to him yet. Then a sort of half- 
 amused, half-grim defiance filled him. Climb Gray 
 Crag, would he? Well, watch 'him! 
 
 Climbing Gray Crag was a good deal like walk- 
 ing up a wall, with the added handicap of ledges 
 to which one had to crawl from underneath, and 
 deceptive footholds that were not footholds at 
 all, but shivering, flimsy lumps of sand. 
 
 Occasionally a pebble started by his heavy rid- 
 ing boot would rattle off into silence. Occasion- 
 ally, the bush or cluster of growing twigs he caught 
 at for his balance came away in his hand, leaving 
 him for the moment slightly sick, as, glancing over 
 his shoulder he saw what lay beneath and behind 
 him. Radnor was very far removed from being a 
 coward, but he had an imagination. 
 
 The fear of high places is, in normally coura- 
 geous natures, changed to the vital realization of 
 high places. Jack Radnor, climbing, pausing,
 
 74 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 working his way up sheer rock walls and jagged 
 granite slabs, had the strange sensation known to 
 aviators and alpine adventurers. He was detached 
 from the world, high above it, spiritually and 
 materially superior to it, and yet at its mercy. 
 The lower mountains tumbled together in huge and 
 mad disorder, the valleys growing misty with the 
 gathering dusk, the rivers and ponds that he could 
 now only locate by some occasional pin-point of 
 light they all lay far, far below, mysterious and 
 superbly cruel. He was an atom clinging to a mast 
 a league high, and a hungry ocean waited for him. 
 
 Once, a great bird winged past him with a rush 
 and startled cry, and his hold nearly loosened. 
 Luckily, he had an unusually steady head and had 
 never been dizzy in his life. 
 
 After a century or so, he pulled himself up to 
 an inconceivably narrow summit, and, drenched 
 and aching, threw himself down to rest. 
 
 Over him the blue sky was turning to violet. A 
 faint rose glow was stealing into it a tint re- 
 flected in the blooming masses about him. For he 
 had found the mountain laurel there was no 
 question about that. As he lay at full length he
 
 MOUNTAIN LAUREL 75 
 
 reached out a lazy hand and pulled a cluster of the 
 tiny pink cups to his face : they had the fresh, cool 
 earthy fragrance of all wild flowers. After a min- 
 ute he rose and gathered an armful of the lovely 
 things. 
 
 And then he started, for at the root of the 
 laurel shrubs lay a revolver a heavy and old 
 weapon, which had seen service. 
 
 It was growing dark, and he knew he must 
 hurry; for going down would be far harder and 
 more risky than climbing up. So he wasted no 
 time in cogitation, but slipped the gun into his 
 pocket. It was too good to leave it behind where 
 it would get rusted by night dews. He could find 
 out later to whom it belonged. 
 
 He paused on that remote pinnacle and looked 
 at the deepening glory in the west, and thought of 
 Enid. He was not given to praying, but his 
 thoughts at that moment were not very much 
 unlike a prayer a man's prayer addressed to 
 the sort of Creator who made both men and 
 women. 
 
 Then, with his laurel burden, he began the 
 descent.
 
 76 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 The air of the hills had suddenly grown cool 
 and almost sharp. Scents and sounds, as is their 
 way in mountain atmosphere, came out emphat- 
 ically, fixing themselves poignantly upon the per- 
 ceptions. Until that moment, it seemed to Rad- 
 nor, all impressions had been merged into one 
 mystic hlend ; now all at once he caught odors and 
 echoes rhat he had not noticed in the equalizing 
 light of day. Does night really raise the pitch, 
 increase the vibration of all things? 
 
 He was walking under crowding, stooping trees, 
 the perfume of which, wildwood-like and elo- 
 quent, made a scent-music in his ears. Low rus- 
 tlings spoke to his heart as actual vision might have 
 done. The senses, by being raised to their power, 
 became interchangeable at will. The whole world 
 was awake, and living so keenly that his own blood 
 pounded in response. 
 
 And at that moment he found himself con- 
 fronted by a group of men still visible in the twi- 
 light, one of whom, tall, slim, and muscular, came 
 toward him with an upraised hand. 
 
 "Hold on a moment," he said, and the voice 
 sounded vaguely familiar, though Jack could not
 
 MOUNTAIN LAUREL 77 
 
 place it. "What are you up to on this trail to- 
 night?" 
 
 "What the " Jack brought up short, and in- 
 stinctively dug his hand into his breeches pocket. 
 
 "We've the drop," spoke up one of the men 
 behind the leader. "Don't get fresh." 
 
 "We shall have to search you," said the slim 
 stranger, advancing. 
 
 "Like hell you will!" rejoined Jack hotly. He 
 had released his hold on the revolver in his pocket; 
 now he flung aside his armful of laurel, and stood 
 ready. 
 
 The slim young man promptly jumped for him. 
 
 "Thank the Lord!" said Jack with devout 
 fury, and grappled. He did know something about 
 wrestling, but so, it seemed, did his assailant. The 
 men stood about in a very sportsmanlike fashion, 
 without interfering, and after a stiff little scrim- 
 mage, Radnor succeeded in throwing his adver- 
 sary. 
 
 The man, stumbling to his feet, advanced with 
 an outstretched hand. 
 
 "I've an idea," he said, "there are only a few
 
 fellows that know that particular hold, and if 
 someone would just give us a light " 
 
 But already Jack had recognized him. It was 
 Judge Denby's son. 
 
 "Ralph, by all the gods!" 
 
 Jack had known Ralph Denby since early Groton 
 days; they had been at Harvard together, though 
 in different classes, and their fathers were old 
 friends. Ralph was about Radnor's height, but a 
 year or so younger and slighter. He was, as he 
 had always been, a trained athlete, and Jack re- 
 marked ruefully, "Hang you, you haven't forgot- 
 ten that old fall of yours, have you?" 
 
 Both men stood back and laughed at each 
 other, though both were breathing heavily. Then 
 Jack picked up his flowers, and Ralph turned to 
 his troop of followers : 
 
 "It's all right; it's a mistake." 
 
 The others laughed, too, and then, as they all 
 swung down the trail together, Ralph Denby said : 
 
 "What on earth brings you here, anyway, at this 
 hour?" 
 
 "Mountain laurel!" answered Radnor, laughing 
 again.
 
 MOUNTAIN LAUREL 79 
 
 He was amazed at the effect of this simple state- 
 ment. 
 
 "Mountain laurel!" repeated young Denby, and 
 stopped short in the trail. "See here, are 
 you " 
 
 Jack interrupted him with some irritation. 
 
 "Really I can't see why you should make such 
 an ass of yourself, Denby! I came up here to get 
 some laurel for Enid " 
 
 "On the level?" 
 
 It was too dark by now to be sure, but Radnor 
 felt that his friend's eyes were on him in searching 
 fashion. In the twilight he flushed. 
 
 "What I say usually is," he rejoined stiffly. 
 
 Ralph seemed to relax, and put his hand on his 
 arm. 
 
 "That goes, Jack!" he said, in a different tone. 
 "You see, I'm deputy sheriff for the night " 
 
 "The devil you are!" 
 
 "Yes! And old Heaton has put me on the job 
 of patrolling some of these trails. There's some- 
 thing in the wind, and we want to get a line on it 
 before they get started." 
 
 "Just who are 'they' ?"
 
 8o MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "These mountain chaps the fellows who go 
 in for moonshining, and road-agenting, and " 
 
 "And supplying the moving-picture business 
 with material!" said Jack. "I know! Don't 
 believe in them myself." 
 
 "I'm not sure that I don't," said Denby. "The 
 governor says there's a lot of lawlessness up 
 here." 
 
 "Well, your father ought to know." 
 
 "You bet he ought, and you bet he does! As 
 a Judge, he can't do very much himself, you un- 
 derstand, but has to depend on Sheriff Heaton, 
 and I, if you please, am run in on the job ! I 
 don't know exactly what they think is on for to- 
 night, but orders have been pretty strict. Where 
 are you going, by the bye?" 
 
 "To meet Enid at the Toll Gate," returned 
 Jack, who had just paused at the crossing of the 
 trails. 
 
 Ralph Denby whistled softly. 
 
 "There's a den of thieves, if you like!" he said. 
 "At least, that's the reputation of Four Trails. A 
 sort of rounding-up place for all the mountain 
 thugs and blacklegs. Well take care of your-
 
 MOUNTAIN LAUREL 81 
 
 self, and good-night to you you and your moun- 
 tain laurel!" 
 
 "You've left me some nice-looking specimens of 
 it!" remarked Radnor resentfully. "We must 
 have walked on it, up there!" 
 
 Even in the dusk it was obvious that the flowers 
 had been crushed, as well as wilted. 
 
 "Sorry!" said Denby, heartlessly. "My re- 
 gards to Miss Forsythe. All right, boys." 
 
 He went off with his men, and the lot of them 
 disappeared in the dimness of the overhanging, 
 perfumed trees. 
 
 Within thirty feet, Radnor was challenged 
 again. 
 
 "Hands up !" said some one. 
 
 "Not so you'd notice it!" exclaimed Jack, who 
 was beginning to feel thoroughly wrathful. He 
 pulled the recently acquired revolver from his 
 pocket. "I'm armed, so you can come on and 
 fire, and be damned to you !" Then, as no one ac- 
 cepted the invitation, he added: "This looks to 
 me like some sort of joke, and a confoundedly 
 bad one. What on earth do you want me for, 
 anyway?"
 
 82 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 One of the men, only a shadow in the darkness, 
 came forward. 
 
 "Name and password, please!" 
 
 "Not on your life!" 
 
 There was a sound of muttered laughter at 
 this. Whatever else they were, these various hold- 
 up men seemed of a genial disposition. 
 
 "Where are you going?" was the next question. 
 It was pacifically given, but Radnor wanted to 
 retort "None of your business." Instead, how- 
 ever, he merely said, resignedly: 
 
 "See here, my affairs appear to be very much 
 more interesting to you than to me, this eve- 
 ning. So let's save time by having the full particu- 
 lars. My name is John Worth Radnor, of New 
 York at present, of Warm Sulphur Springs, 
 and " 
 
 "Cut all that." 
 
 "With pleasure ! I am at this moment supposed 
 to be taking a ride." 
 
 The laughter was unrestrained this time. 
 
 "Where's the horse?" some one demanded. 
 
 "Hold on a moment! I'm trying to tell you. 
 The horse is at Four Trail Crossing, the Toll
 
 For the first time Jack saw engraved upon it the initials "M. II."
 
 MOUNTAIN LAUREL 83 
 
 Gate, where I am going as soon as you get through 
 asking me questions." 
 
 "Four Trail Crossing!" 
 
 The exclamation was general and deep, and 
 there was no laughter in it. 
 
 "That's different," said the man who had spoken 
 first. 
 
 He walked up to Jack, struck a match and 
 scrutinized him closely. His inspection was brief, 
 but Radnor felt as though he had never been 
 looked over so thoroughly. The investigator was 
 a small man, with a noticeably brown and wrinkled 
 face. Now as he frowned in a puzzled way, his 
 skin seemed to form in a hundred creases, and he 
 seemed like a gnome. 
 
 "May I have a look at that gun of yours, 
 stranger?" he said. 
 
 "Certainly!" replied Radnor with exaggerated 
 politeness. 
 
 A second match light flung the out-held revolver 
 into sharp relief, and for the first time Jack saw 
 engraved upon it the initials "M. H." 
 
 One of the other men, phantom-like among the 
 trees, spoke at the same instant:
 
 84 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "What's that you're carrying beside the gun?" 
 
 And another added quickly. 
 
 "Any one to vouch for you in the Valley?" 
 
 "I can only answer one question at a time," said 
 Jack, who was becoming more at ease in the gen- 
 eral madness of the adventure. "What I am 
 carrying, besides the revolver, which I should very 
 much like to have back, by the bye, if you don't 
 mind ah, thanks! is mountain laurel. Prob- 
 ably the best known man in the Valley will answer 
 for me Judge Denby and see that you answer, 
 too, if necessary," he added significantly. "Any- 
 thing else you would like to know, gentlemen?" 
 
 "Nothing else at all," said the small leader, 
 thoughtfully. "A date at Four Trail Crossing, 
 Martin Hale's gun, mountain laurel, and Judge 
 Denby " he paused just a second "are good 
 enough for us!" 
 
 "Are you more of Heaton's men?" demanded 
 Radnor. 
 
 "Not a chance," returned his latest challenger 
 in an amused tone. "Don't you worry a mite, 
 stranger; we're with you! Good-night and good 
 luck!"
 
 MOUNTAIN LAUREL 85 
 
 They melted into the odorous darkness, as 
 noiselessly as they had appeared, and Radnor put 
 his hand to his head, wondering whether he had 
 dreamed them entirely. 
 
 Four Trail Crossing Martin Hale these 
 things seemed natural enough in combination. 
 Mountain laurel, as he saw clearly enough now, 
 was evidently the password for the night. But 
 where did Judge Denby come in? What was his 
 connection with this mysterious outlaw company? 
 
 With his head very full of conjectures that were 
 but the baseless fabric of dreams after all, and 
 irritated him by their absurdity and unreality, he 
 tramped around a bend and came in sight of the 
 Toll-gate House. 
 
 With his arms filled with the dawn-pink blooms 
 set in the darkness of their glossy leaves and they 
 were still lovely in spite of their adventures ! he 
 went along the little rocky trail that led to the 
 Toll Gate at Four Trail Crossing. 
 
 And against a beryl sky he saw Enid, standing 
 crisply outlined with a big, splendidly proportioned 
 form bending before her. Martin Hale was kiss- 
 ing her hands, first one and then the other.
 
 86 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 For one moment, Jack thought of hurling him 
 into the gorge below; then of hurling his trophies 
 in the same direction. But something harder in 
 him sent him into the Toll-gate House; just, in 
 fact, as Enid entered by another door. 
 
 He did not even look at her, but walked straight 
 to Polly Mason. 
 
 "I'm afraid," he said, in that gentle, courteous 
 way that was so new to her and so seductive, "that 
 you have too many of these as it is, and they 
 are rather tired-looking, aren't they? But they've 
 had quite a bit of a trip. You see, I went to Gray 
 Crag this afternoon, and found these; and I 
 thought perhaps wilted as they are that you 
 would accept these few extra ones just as a very 
 great favor to a stranger."
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 ENID IS LEFT BEHIND 
 
 Ladies, like variegated Tulips, show; 
 
 'Tis to their Changes half their charms we owe. . . . 
 
 ALEXANDER POPE. 
 
 ' A RE you ready to go home now?" Jack 
 asked formally, turning at last toward 
 Enid. 
 
 Her small face was colorless and her golden 
 eyes were flames. A thing of fire she seemed; 
 she almost burned him with the look of her. 
 "No," she answered, in a level tone. "I do not 
 expect to be ready for some time." 
 
 Jack Radnor stood and looked at her. Polly 
 and her father had moved away, and were talking 
 together in low tones. 
 
 "I quite understand your willingness to stay in 
 this charming place," said Jack, with fiendish 
 
 87
 
 88 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 politeness fiendish because neither of the others 
 was listening, and he knew it. "But " 
 
 She interrupted him with a blazing look even 
 more golden. 
 
 "I've noticed that you find it charming!" she 
 snapped. 
 
 Jack raised his eyebrows, smiling slightly. 
 
 "You have the advantage of me there," he said. 
 "I personally have been here such a very short 
 time that, of course, I am no real judge." 
 
 "One can judge some things very quickly!" she 
 flared at him, detesting herself for feeling sick and 
 shaky all over as she spoke. 
 
 "Yes," Radnor said quietly. "I have noticed 
 that. But what I am trying to get at at present 
 is this: why should you spend so much time here 
 now, when it is so entirely easy to come back when- 
 ever you like?" 
 
 "I can't walk all the way," she remarked, and 
 turned her head away. 
 
 Jack Radnor was frankly bewildered. 
 
 "But your horse " he began. 
 
 "Martin Hale has him!" she said sharply, and 
 fell again silent.
 
 ENID IS LEFT BEHIND 89 
 
 "Martin Hale!" 
 
 Jack stared at the back of her yellow head 
 blankly, then he said in rather a low, restrained 
 tone: 
 
 "What happened?" 
 
 Silence. 
 
 "Where has Martin Hale gone with your 
 horse?" he went on. 
 
 "I can't tell you." 
 
 "You'll have to!" 
 
 "I won't!" 
 
 Radnor thought rapidly. If Enid had indeed 
 been idiot enough to lend Hale her horse for 
 some nefarious and secret doings, the question 
 resolved itself into something close to sim- 
 plicity. 
 
 "Then you'll have to go back on my mount, 
 postilion-wise," he said, without attempting to 
 argue. 
 
 Enid turned upon him and he nearly recoiled 
 before the fury in her eyes. 
 
 "I wouldn't ride postilion-wise with -you to 
 Heaven!" she declared; and there was no doubt 
 that she meant it.
 
 90 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Mason and his daughter approached at this 
 point. 
 
 "If you want to go back to Warm Sulphur 
 Springs, you'll have to go alone!" proceeded Enid. 
 
 Again Jack thought. There were two bands of 
 fairly unceremonious men upon the range that 
 night. He himself had encountered them. Could 
 he take the chance of putting Enid's saddle upon 
 Champion, and trusting her alone down those dark 
 and mysterious ways? 
 
 Unexpectedly, the old Toll Keeper came to his 
 rescue. 
 
 "What's the trouble, sir, if I may ask?" 
 
 "The lady has lost her horse," said Jack, too 
 angry to be diplomatic. 
 
 "Lost her " Richard Mason's expression 
 was so astounded that Jack exonerated him from 
 any complicity in whatever was on foot. It made 
 him, strangely enough, the more enraged against 
 his fiancee. 
 
 "The problem is simply of getting her to the 
 Valley," he went on. 
 
 "There isn't any way by which I'll go to the 
 Valley!" said Enid, with her eyes flashing.
 
 ENID IS LEFT BEHIND 91 
 
 The Masons were people of few words, and 
 rapid understandings. 
 
 "Why don't you leave her here with us, sir?" 
 he said. 
 
 And Polly came quickly to Enid, and put her 
 arm around her waist. 
 
 Jack's eyes searched the older man's deeply. 
 
 "It's all right, sir," Mason said, with a smile 
 that would have reassured any one. "We'll 
 look after her, Polly and I." 
 
 Radnor drew a deep breath. 
 
 After all, he had to trust them; there was no 
 other way that he could see. And surely Enid 
 would be safe here, with an old man of Mason's 
 sterling type, and a girl like Polly. 
 
 "All right," he said briefly. "Thanks. I won't 
 be long." He swung about and looked at Enid. 
 
 "I'm going," he said casually. 
 
 Enid did not even turn around. 
 
 "Good-night," she said, and he could not see that 
 her face was working inexplicably. "I suppose 
 I'll see you in the morning, some time?" 
 
 Radnor laughed, not particularly pleasantly. 
 
 "You'll see me to-night," he said. "I'm merely
 
 92 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 going down to the hotel to set your mother's mind 
 at rest and to get you another horse. It ought not 
 to take me more than two or three hours. You 
 can't get rid of me as easily as all that not to- 
 night at least. To-morrow you may do just what 
 you like. But I am going to get you a horse first 
 and believe me, you won't be able to give this 
 one away so easily as you did the other.'* 
 
 He turned to their hosts, shook Mason's hand 
 hard, and bowed low over Polly's. In another 
 minute he had gone. 
 
 "Say," said the Toll Keeper, gazing after him 
 in a way that was almost affectionate, "I could love 
 that boy!" 
 
 But neither Polly nor Enid said anything at all. 
 
 The door closed on Jack, and no one spoke. 
 A sound in the stable sent old Mason out to help. 
 Still no words in the Toll-gate House. The two 
 girls stood motionless, without facing each other, 
 without addressing each other. 
 
 A rattle and rush of hoofs, a shout of farewell 
 from the Toll Keeper; then came his boisterous 
 entrance, which somehow seemed to break a sort 
 of spell.
 
 ENID IS LEFT BEHIND 93 
 
 Jack Radnor was galloping down the trail when 
 Enid, suddenly transformed into a young fury, 
 confronted the father and daughter in the center 
 of the room. 
 
 For the time being she appeared to have 
 gone mad, and to have completely forgotten 
 where she was and who were listening to what she 
 said. 
 
 It was of Jack that she spoke; savage, eternally 
 feminine sentences, panted, gasped, broken by 
 heaving pauses more eloquent than any of the most 
 fluent words. And now and again tears rained 
 down her white face tears that instinctively one 
 knew must burn and sear her as they fell. 
 
 "And he said that he loved me!" she breathed, 
 first very low and then her voice rose to a 
 harsh and strident key. "Love me! And he 
 could leave me like this ! He could talk as though 
 I were something to be carried about a copy of 
 a woman, just as he is a copy of a man!" She 
 turned furiously upon Polly, who, being of frailer 
 fiber, in spite of her appearance, shrank toward 
 her father. "He gave you my flowers!" she 
 gasped, with that strange yellow blaze in her eyes.
 
 94 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Mine, do you hear? That / wanted! He gave 
 them to you! He " 
 
 The mountain girl was frankly terrified, but the 
 old man seemed to sense some emotion that was 
 not unfamiliar. He put his daughter aside with 
 a big, gentle hand, and went up to the half-crazed 
 girl. 
 
 "What's it all about?" he asked, in the soft, 
 great, rumbling tones that bring such rest to 
 women. "You love him, and you think that he 
 doesn't love you? Is that it?" 
 
 "Love me!" shrilled Enid. "He doesn't know 
 how to love; it isn't in him. He oh, " She 
 seemed to stretch upward like a thin gleaming 
 flame, until one wondered whether she were not 
 a living column of fire. "I hate him!" she cried 
 desperately. "I hate him! I hate him!" 
 
 She dropped in a heap on the floor. 
 
 "Poor little kid!" said the Toll Keeper gently, 
 looking down at her. 
 
 "She doesn't appreciate him !" said his daughter 
 hotly. But she was on her knees beside the un- 
 conscious girl, and was loosening her high white 
 riding stock, even as she spoke.
 
 ENID IS LEFT BEHIND 95 
 
 It was an odd paradox that the very faults which 
 Enid found with Jack recommended him the more 
 strongly to Polly. The mistake which Enid had 
 made in believing him a bloodless sort of autom- 
 aton, was in time to bring Polly into risks which 
 neither of them were likely to take into account, 
 for the time being at all events. 
 
 Enid moved, breathed deeply, opened her great 
 yellow eyes, and stared wonderingly at the faces 
 of the Toll Keeper and his daughter. 
 
 At this moment, a rap sounded on the door, 
 and without waiting for a response, a large, red- 
 and-white-haired, sloppy-looking woman of the 
 hills entered. She was dressed in a sort of sordid 
 and squalid finery that did not particularly har- 
 monize with her fat, rather vacant yellowish face 
 and supermature figure. 
 
 "Dear, dear! What's wrong here?" she ex- 
 claimed in a kind of heavy consternation, lumber- 
 ing forward. 
 
 Polly scowled and retreated. She detested the 
 Widow Short, their nearest neighbor. She was 
 convinced that she had designs on her father, and 
 she knew that Mrs. Short was one of the most
 
 96 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 shiftless of female mortals. But widows and 
 widowers have a way of drifting together in the 
 high ranges. Polly foresaw but dreaded the day 
 when Mrs. Short, and her slovenly efforts towards 
 finery and her lackadaisical Southern ways, should 
 enter the Toll-gate House as its mistress. 
 
 Had she only known it, she need not have wor- 
 ried in the least; but she was not subtle enough 
 to recognize that her father was more amused than 
 anything else by their neighbor's cumbrous at- 
 tempts at personal ornamentation, always of the 
 cheapest and most unsuitable sort. Polly thought 
 it horrid of him to so ostentatiously mention the 
 widow's pea-green hair-ribbons and pink belt in 
 combination. It was horrid of him, as a matter 
 of fact, too, though not in any sense that 
 Mrs. Short (or Polly either) could appreciate. 
 Richard Mason was one of those rare, delightful 
 and intrinsically demoralizing creatures who can 
 enjoy making fun of others without giving the fact 
 away. 
 
 Mrs. Short and Polly helped Enid into Polly's 
 bedroom and onto the bed, and, as though utterly 
 exhausted by her abnormally acute emotions, Enid
 
 ENID IS LEFT BEHIND 97 
 
 sank back upon the pillows almost, it seemed, life- 
 less. 
 
 "She's real pretty, ain't she?" said Mrs. Short, 
 gazing down at the clearly cut little features. 
 Polly's eyes were dark and deep, as, after a mo- 
 ment, she answered: 
 
 "Yes; she is." 
 
 Her father's voice called her to the other room, 
 and Mason said to her in a low voice: 
 
 "Now that Mrs. Short is here, I don't mind so 
 much leaving you two girls here alone." 
 
 "Alone!" 
 
 "Yes! I've an idea that Mart has gone out to 
 help out this mess somehow, and I don't want 
 to " he hesitated. 
 
 Polly was just enough like him to laugh. 
 
 "To miss anything?" she suggested. 
 
 Mason laughed, too, and hugged her. "That's 
 it! I won't go far, but " 
 
 "Dad, dear," she entreated, "you know that 
 you've had two or three attacks of your heart 
 lately! You will be careful?" 
 
 "You bet I will! I'm not going to get mixed 
 up in anything, only, I cannot just stay at home
 
 98 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 like a rusty gun! Look out for that little girl, 
 Poll ! She's worth it, if I'm not mistaken." 
 
 He kissed her, took his rifle from the wall, and 
 went out with his swinging step. Polly followed 
 him anxiously with her eyes. His heart had acted 
 badly of late, and she hated to see him go out into 
 the night alone, especially when times were 
 hazardous, like these. She made a move as though 
 to follow him, for after all, she adored him 
 more than anything in the world; but Mrs. Short's 
 voice stopped her from the door of the bedroom. 
 
 "She wants you," she said, almost unctuously, 
 the tone was so kind. "The sweet, pretty young 
 things wants you! I've got to be getting home. 
 *I've loaves in the oven, and Lord knows what has 
 happened to them by this time! Good-night, 
 dearie!" 
 
 Polly politely evaded the caress that accom- 
 panied the adieu; she felt that if the Widow Short 
 should ever by chance kiss her she should die. 
 
 Mrs. Short departed, and, with a curious sense 
 of dread about her that she could not explain to 
 herself, Polly went in to Enid. 
 
 She had spent many lonely hours at the Toll
 
 ENID IS LEFT BEHIND 99 
 
 Gate before this, but never before had she known 
 this sense of isolation, of was it, could it be 
 dread? She and the Valley girl were alone on 
 the mountain top, evil things were abroad, and the 
 old wooden clock in the living-room was ticking 
 out the hour of nine. 
 
 ; Nine is not a late hour in cities, but among the 
 peaks, Polly went forward to the bed to meet 
 Enid's worried eyes as tranquilly as might be. 
 
 The girl on the bed put a question which was 
 curiously disconcerting : 
 
 "Is everything all right?" she said.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE HOLD-UP 
 
 Rebellious subjects, enemies to peace, 
 Profaners of this neighbor-stained steel, 
 Will they not hear? What, ho! you men, you beasts, 
 . . . From those bloody hands 
 
 Throw your mistemper'd weapons to the ground. . . . 
 
 SHAKESPEARE. 
 
 "A OWN the steep, zig-zag trail, Jack Radnor 
 urged Champion, with the sighing moun- 
 tain winds, chill and strange-savored, in his face 
 as he rode. The night is always alive more 
 alive than by day but this night seemed to the 
 young man more instinct with vitality, potentiali- 
 ties, sounds and suggestions and stirrings that he 
 could give no name to, than any that he had yet 
 experienced. Two or three times he could have 
 sworn that he heard stealthy footsteps on the trail 
 
 IOO
 
 THE HOLD-UP 101 
 
 and in the close-packed shrubbery on either side. 
 More than once some echo came to him as he 
 halted on a precipitous, open space to get his bear- 
 ings, which was not so very unlike a human voice. 
 But he knew that the hills are deceptive, and that 
 sounds are magnified, diminished and transformed 
 even more trickily than on the water. Also, he 
 knew that he was in a highly wrought mood, and 
 had too much sense to trust his own senses! If 
 Liberty Ridge and the trail that led down from 
 it seemed more alive and more busy than would 
 be normal on a late summer evening, he was con- 
 tent to put it down to his own imagination. 
 
 But one or two things happened that he could 
 not attribute to fancy; horsemen passed him on 
 the trail, in evident haste. And once, at least, he 
 heard a distant sound that could only have been 
 a shot. The sound reminded him of the fact that 
 he still carried Martin Hale's revolver in his 
 pocket. And he fell to conjecturing what business 
 Martin Hale might have so urgent that he was 
 obliged to borrow Enid Forsythe's horse for the 
 purpose of seeing it through. He could not very 
 well help trying to piece together all the little
 
 102 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 things, trifling in themselves, which had gone to 
 make up a rather puzzling evening. 
 
 And then conjecture ceased for the time, and 
 recognition of something very wrong somewhere, 
 took its place in his mind. 
 
 He was riding along a part of the trail which 
 slanted along the mountainside overlooking the 
 Valley. The trees below him happened to be 
 somewhat scanty just there, and he could see far 
 down the gorge, beyond the Warm Sulphur 
 Springs colony, beyond the railway station, beyond 
 the livery stables, the switchback, even the last 
 stiffly graded turn of the little railway line. It 
 was well after nine, he knew, and the evening train 
 from Covington was long overdue, but delays 
 were common enough up there, where there were 
 no other trains to connect with on schedule time, 
 and where even a slight wash-out might put the 
 track out of commission for quite a bit. But 
 there was the train, as surely as he was sitting 
 on Champion's back, and it was standing still, 
 and he had descended a third of the mountain- 
 side, so could see clearly enough, there were one 
 or two inexplicable flashes along its length, espe-
 
 THE HOLD-UP 103 
 
 daily at that end of it where he knew must be 
 the engine. 
 
 Then and then only did his formless suspicions 
 and intuitions take forcible shape. 
 
 "By God, that's it!" he exclaimed aloud. 
 "They're holding up the train!" 
 
 Champion had never felt spurs from this 
 peculiar rider before, but he felt them now, and 
 bounded forward with a startled violence that 
 nearly sent them both down into the gorge; for 
 the trail was at no point a very ample one, and 
 notably narrow just there. Radnor sat as far 
 back in his saddle as he could, gave the horse his 
 head, and told him to "Go like hell!" 
 
 Which Champion did. He had been a real 
 horse in his day, before an impoverished English- 
 man sold him to the Warm Sulphur Springs livery 
 concern to cover a big bill. Two or three years 
 of bad hack riding had saddle-galled him, and put 
 him a little out of condition, but Jack Radnor had 
 been riding him all summer, and he had recovered 
 nearly all his old spirit and efficiency. He could 
 still go like hell when occasion demanded it, and 
 when the man whom he had by this time accepted
 
 104 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 as his master gave him to understand that speed 
 was what was wanted of him, he gathered himself 
 together and tore down the steep dark trail at a 
 breakneck pace. 
 
 "God love you, old fellow!" praised Jack Rad- 
 nor, leaning well back, and clinching with his 
 knees so that there should not even be any extra 
 drag on the stirrups, "I only hope and pray that 
 you don't break your knees, nor get let down for 
 all time!" 
 
 Champion was sure-footed, and he had a good 
 horse's pride in those slack reins and stirrups. His 
 god trusted to his making it, and he should not 
 trust in vain. Most of the way it was too dark 
 to see the path, and Radnor wondered just when 
 the two of them would go over a cliff or turn a 
 somersault. Once Champion stumbled, almost 
 stopped, and Jack felt the big muscles gathering 
 under his leg-grip. The next moment Champion 
 rose clean in the air, jumped not one but three 
 fallen logs across the trail, recovered himself gal- 
 lantly, and stretched himself again to that racking 
 downgrade gallop. 
 
 Another open part showed the train again, and
 
 THE HOLD-UP 105 
 
 now it was lit by a lurid light that flickered against 
 the dark. 
 
 "The damned cowards!" said Radnor through 
 his teeth, "they're scaring the passengers out 
 of the cars, by setting the train on fire. Hurry, 
 old chap, hurry! Let's have all that's in 
 you!" 
 
 They were nearing the bottom now, and there 
 was one mad chance that Radnor could take. 
 Champion had done all and more than any horse 
 could do; now, he gathered up the reins once 
 more, and, to his mount's bewilderment, he was 
 getting cou n tless surprises to-night, was Cham- 
 pion, swung him off the trail straight down the 
 mountainside to the road that led through the 
 Valley. 
 
 Champion, in his day, had made some rough 
 runs, but he had never encountered anything like 
 this. It is nerve-breaking for a horse to go at 
 full speed downhill; but when to that is added the 
 hazard of hillock and gulch, fallen tree, and clut- 
 ter of undergrowth, sudden dips and falls, and 
 sharp rises that have to be scrambled over some- 
 how at expense to temper, patience and legs,
 
 106 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 then the thing becomes torture to mount and man 
 alike. 
 
 Champion fell once, and though he was not 
 hurt badly, only a strained muscle, and Radnor 
 had flung clear of the saddle in time, he was 
 deeply ashamed. But there was no leisure for 
 stopping; they must go on, on, both of them, 
 sliding down sandslopes, splashing through unex- 
 pected mountain stfeams, leaping hummocks, 
 breasting stinging thickets of trees, until they 
 reached open level ground, and under the stars 
 the Valley was about them. The hills they had 
 left behind. 
 
 They were almost exactly at the crossing of the 
 two broad roadways, one leading from Warm 
 Sulphur Springs, one from the stables and stations 
 and so on, onto what was generally called the 
 Warm Springs Highway. 
 
 A horseman galloped at full speed up from the 
 lower road and, passing Jack, threw his horse 
 into the tangle of shrubbery at the base of the 
 mountain. There were shots in the near distance, 
 and more galloping hoofs. Then, as Radnor 
 paused to consider what he would best do, a little
 
 THE HOLD-UP 107 
 
 band of men rode past him at racing pace, and 
 fled into the starlit dark. 
 
 A man on foot, and hurrying and muttering to 
 himself, came stumbling along. 
 
 "For God's sake, what's happened?" demanded 
 Jack. 
 
 "The train !" panted the other. "They've held 
 it up, and there's a lot of stuff stolen!" He ran 
 on, with uncertain steps. 
 
 Jack wasted no more time, but spurred Cham- 
 pion on, and took the triangle of darkened grass 
 between the two roads at one great leap. 
 
 "Now for it!" he said, bending his head close 
 to the horse's, after a curious friendly fashion 
 all his own. "If there's anything doing we want 
 to be there, don't we?" 
 
 Bruised and stiff as he was, Champion managed 
 to fling up his head with a sort of noble defiance, 
 and raced toward the stables. He knew now 
 where he was going, but it did not enlighten him 
 much. All that he thought of, dear horse, was 
 that it was needful to get there quickly. 
 
 In a rush of forced speed, Jack and Champion
 
 io8 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 found themselves in the thick of another rush of 
 action that demanded instant participation. 
 
 A struggling mob, lighted now and again by the 
 flashes of gunplay, surrounded the forward end 
 of the train. He heard men cursing and, he 
 thought, a woman crying. In the blaze of flame 
 that he dashed into, the first face he recognized 
 was that of Ralph Denby. 
 
 They knew each other immediately this time, 
 and both cried: 
 
 "You!" 
 
 "What is it, anyway?" demanded Radnor. He 
 found difficulty in holding Champion still. In 
 spite of his hard trip, the horse felt that he had 
 found himself, and having gotten, as it were, his 
 second wind, was mad to be off and doing again. 
 
 "The blackguards have fired the train and got- 
 ten away with God knows how much !" said Ralph, 
 bitterly. "What are you doing here? We only 
 just arrived, too late, of course!" 
 
 "I saw the fire from the mountain," said Jack. 
 "Hush, boy, hush!" he added to the restless and 
 heroic Champion. "Do you mean to say that 
 they've all gotten away?"
 
 THE HOLD-UP 109 
 
 "But," exclaimed Ralph mystified, "I thought 
 you were with Miss Forsythe, gotten away, by 
 Gad! Look at that!" 
 
 He wheeled his horse and was off after a flee- 
 ing figure like lightning. Jack followed. 
 
 Then a curious thing happened. The man who 
 was riding away from them turned in his saddle 
 and shot. The bullet went wide, but Denby an- 
 swered it instantly, and Jack, acting on an instinct 
 as old as man, pulled Hale's revolver from his 
 pocket and fired also. The escaping horse 
 stumbled and fell; both Radnor and Ralph fired 
 again, as they saw the rider leap and start for the 
 woods. The man stumbled, evidently hit, but 
 in another moment had made his get-away among 
 the clumps of fir-trees, so hard to explore in that 
 light. 
 
 Ralph suddenly wheeled his horse, and said 
 sharply : 
 
 "Here, Jack, this is none of your funeral ! Get 
 back there and look after Alice!" 
 
 "Alice ! Is Miss Baker in that pandemonium?" 
 
 Ralph half-groaned and said: "Yes! I didn't 
 even know she was on the train; it must have
 
 no MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 been a sudden plan on her part I thought she 
 was going North for a house party. But she's 
 back there right enough, I saw her. I can't leave 
 my job, so you're in charge, old man!" 
 
 "Right!" returned his friend, briefly, and turned 
 his horse's head. 
 
 He knew that Denby was in love with Alice 
 Baker, and that he had been paid a full-fledged 
 compliment by being sent to look out for her. 
 
 Ralph, with a curt good-bye called over his 
 shoulder, tore off up the road, and Jack rode back 
 to the scene of confusion below the switchback. 
 
 The fire was out, and traps had arrived from 
 the Springs stable to take the guests up to the 
 hotel. But there was still lamentation among the 
 women and profanity among the men. The en- 
 gine driver was trying to mop up the blood on his 
 face with a greasy black cloth and cursing with 
 a steady fluency and an imaginative variety which 
 would be well worth listening to if Jack had had 
 the time to stop. 
 
 He rode past him and the little groups of men, 
 who, gesticulating furiously, were trying to explain
 
 THE HOLD-UP in 
 
 to each other just what ought to have been done 
 and wasn't. 
 
 He found Alice Baker, a tall, dark girl dash- 
 ingly dressed, in the most towering rage he had 
 ever seen a woman. 
 
 "Isn't there a single man in this crowd?" she 
 exclaimed. "It doesn't look so! Mr. Radnor! 
 I didn't see you! Isn't it outrageous? They 
 stood around and let the women be robbed, 
 actually stood and looked on!" 
 
 "Well, my dear young lady," deprecatingly said 
 a sallow little millionaire who had lost about six 
 hundred dollars in the mix-up, "they were point- 
 ing guns at us, you know, and as they seemed to 
 be in a highly excited condition, I feel sure that 
 any sudden action on our part might have made 
 some of those guns go off!" 
 
 "What of it?" cried Alice Baker so vehemently 
 that her hat fell off. "I should think you'd rather 
 have been killed than " 
 
 "But we wouldn't have been a bit more good 
 to you dead than alive," said the little millionaire, 
 mildly. 
 
 "Did they get much from you, Miss Baker?"
 
 ii2 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 asked Radnor, picking up the hat. He hoped that 
 putting it on might distract her mind, but it seemed 
 to infuriate her the more. 
 
 "They took my two lovely pearl hatpins !" she 
 declared tragically. "And twenty-five dollars, 
 and my dressing case with a lot of little things, 
 that little emerald brooch Enid gave me was 
 among them, and and I can't even keep my hat 
 on!" 
 
 Jack burst out laughing, and after staring at 
 him in cold anger for half a minute, she broke 
 down and laughed, too. 
 
 "It's all over but the shouting, anyway, Miss 
 Baker," he said. "Come up to the hotel and let's 
 do the shouting there." 
 
 She and the sallow little millionaire got into a 
 carriage which had just been driven up and Jack 
 rode beside them up the road that followed the 
 track. 
 
 "This," said Alice, "is what I get for coming 
 to see my dearest friend unexpectedly! But I'm 
 glad I came anyway. I'm crazy to see Enid. I 
 suppose she'll have heard about the hold-up and 
 be anxious."
 
 THE HOLD-UP 113 
 
 "Enid," said Jack, "is at the present moment 
 about ten miles from here, on the top of the moun- 
 tain." 
 
 "For heaven's sake, what's she doing there?" 
 
 "At present, waiting for me," he returned, half- 
 laughing. 
 
 "And in that case, what are you doing here?" 
 
 "Holding down Ralph's job!" said Jack, low 
 and audaciously. 
 
 "Ralph!" he heard her exclaim under her 
 breath. "Why doesn't he hold it down himself?" 
 she demanded, with spirit. 
 
 "He's chasing bandits." 
 
 She sniffed scornfully. 
 
 "He'd better," she said. "There's a garnet and 
 pearl Harvard stick-pin he gave me among the 
 loot! But is he in any danger, Mr. Radnor?" 
 
 "Lots!" rejoined Jack cheerfully. "There, 
 that serves you right, Miss Baker, for losing your 
 temper!" 
 
 "What served me right?" 
 
 "The shock you got when I said 'lots!' Non- 
 sense! Of course, it was a shock: I heard you 
 gasp! Here we are at the hotel!"
 
 ii4 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 They were, in fact, drawing up in front of the 
 hotel, the great white-pillared veranda of which 
 was crowded with excited guests awaiting the ad- 
 venture-scared travelers. Bell boys ran down the 
 broad steps, and anxious voices called down in- 
 coherent questions. 
 
 Jack dismounted, helped Alice out, and followed 
 her as she ran up the steps, and into Mrs. For- 
 sythe's embrace. 
 
 "My dear girl ! I've been frightened to death. 
 We heard the shooting and they telephoned up 
 from the station but you must be dead! Jack 
 Radnor! Thank goodness! I thought something 
 awful had happened to you and Enid, too. Really, 
 I have been at my wits' ends. Why didn't she 
 come up from the court with you?" 
 
 Her fair face grew quite pale. "There's 
 nothing the matter?" she asked quickly. 
 
 He hastened to reassure her, and to explain as 
 well as he could in a few words. Then he went 
 off to order two other horses, one to lead bridled 
 but unsaddled. Enid would use no saddle but 
 her own, and that was in the Toll-gate barn. 
 
 As he turned to start again down the steps, he
 
 THE HOLD-UP 115 
 
 met Judge Denby, dignified, handsome and kindly 
 as ever, coming up them. The Judge looked 
 grave and troubled. 
 
 "What's all this?" he said to Radnor. 'There 
 appears to have been another outbreak among 
 these lawless creatures of the hills! Was there 
 really a hold-up?" 
 
 "There certainly was! Ralph is out with the 
 Sheriff's posse now. Surely, you knew." 
 
 The Judge nodded. 
 
 "I knew that. Heaton told me there had been 
 ransoms, but really, this is quite unexpected! To 
 hold up the Millionaire's Local! Such a thing 
 has never happened before in my experience !" 
 
 "Well, it seems to have been easy enough," 
 said Jack. "The wonder is no one ever thought 
 of doing it before." 
 
 "Do you know," said Judge Denby, seriously, 
 "that is quite true? I really do wonder that no 
 one ever thought of doing it before!" 
 
 Jack started to pass him, paused, opened his 
 lips to speak, then closed them again. 
 
 "What were you going to say?" asked the 
 Judge, eying him keenly.
 
 ii6 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Nothing," said Jack, shaking his head and 
 smiling. "At least, nothing now. I'm in a bit of 
 a hurry! See you later, sir." 
 
 He ran down the steps, asking himself what 
 had stopped him from demanding why the out- 
 laws of the mountains had shown so much respect 
 for Judge Denby's name. 
 
 The horses were in the court almost as soon as 
 he was, and three minutes later he was cantering 
 along the Warm Sulphur Springs highway, to- 
 ward the lower end of the trail that led up to 
 the Toll-gate House. 
 
 As he turned on to the softer soil of the bridle 
 path and slowed up for the ascent, he was startled 
 to hear a sound, unmistakable and inevitably dis- 
 turbing to normal human hearing the moan of 
 some one in great distress or pain. It came from 
 the ink-black shrubbery that edged the trail and 
 in the darkness seemed a veritable cry for help. 
 Jack reined up sharply and listened.
 
 MIDNIGHT ON THE MOUNTAIN TOP 
 
 And we will talk, until thought's melody 
 Become too sweet for utterance, and it die 
 In words, to live again in looks, which dart 
 With thrilling tone into the voiceless heart, 
 Harmonizing silence without a sound. 
 
 PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. 
 
 ~1T7"HEN Enid asked her if everything was all 
 right, Polly experienced a quick sense of 
 comfort, undoubted comfort, though unaccount- 
 able. The alien girl of the valleys had somehow 
 divined the element of uneasiness that tinged the 
 atmosphere of the Toll-gate House that night. 
 Polly knew that by her voice, her eyes, by a certain 
 steady alertness of manner that suggested a pre- 
 pared apprehension, a reasoning appreciation of 
 possibilities that, however foreign to her, she was 
 still able to recognize. 
 
 117
 
 n8 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "All right?" she repeated, half-smiling, in a 
 sort of oddly relaxed way. "Why, I suppose so! 
 Only " 
 
 She laughed outright The other girl had be- 
 come, if only for the moment, a comrade. "One 
 never knows just what-all's going to happen up 
 here!" she confessed. "I reckon nothing much'll 
 turn up, only there's a right-smart lot of trouble 
 doing to-night and Four Trails is a mighty handy 
 place to stop off at!" 
 
 She laughed again, her dark eyes frankly appre- 
 ciative of the danger and adventure in which she 
 habitually lived, moved and breathed. Then her 
 tanned, lovely young face grew sober. 
 
 "Dad's gone off," she said, hesitatingly. "He 
 got sort of upset, wondering how things were 
 going, and seemed like he had to go. I I feel 
 sort of worried about him. His heart's queer, 
 and he oughtn't to be running about at night, 
 alone." 
 
 There was real trouble in her voice. Enid re- 
 sponded to it by starting up with vigor. 
 
 "Why on earth didn't you go with him?" she 
 demanded, almost indignantly.
 
 MIDNIGHT ON MOUNTAIN TOP 119 
 
 "Well " Polly was rather at a loss as to how 
 to put it. "You were here, and " 
 
 "Polly Mason!" exclaimed the other, without 
 ceremony. "If you dare to say that you let your 
 father go off alone on my account " 
 
 "He wouldn't have let me go with him any- 
 how," the mountain girl put in hastily. "He hates 
 being watched, and babied, and that sort of thing. 
 But if I could have kind of followed, and 
 and " 
 
 "Well," declared Enid, with decision, standing 
 up and arranging her hair with firm little 
 hands, "you're going to go off and 'kind of follow' 
 him right away, do you hear? And I'll go with 
 you." 
 
 But of this Polly would not hear. If she did go, 
 if Enid should insist on her going (which Enid 
 accordingly did) she should go alone. Enid would 
 be quite safe in the Toll-gate House, if she 
 weren't afraid just of 'the lonesomeness.' Polly 
 admitted that it was lonesome there at night some- 
 times. But Enid stoutly declared that she wasn't 
 the least bit afraid. She would sit by the fire in 
 the living room and wait for Polly to come home.
 
 izo MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "And mind you bring your father with you 
 when you do come!" she commanded her. 
 
 So Polly set out in the windy dark and Enid, 
 after watching her off through the shadows that 
 seemed to crowd threateningly close to the Toll- 
 gate House, closed the door upon them and came 
 back to the fire to listen to the old wooden clock 
 ticking off the hours, and to think a vast number 
 of brand-new thoughts. 
 
 And so engrossed was she in these meditations 
 of hers that she could not have said how long nor 
 how short a time had elapsed before she heard a 
 step outside the house, and a hand upon the latch. 
 
 She almost screamed in swift terror, but the 
 moment of panic was short-lived for the door 
 swung open promptly and disclosed to her the 
 big figure of Martin Hale framed against the 
 night. The quiet of the lamp-lit, fire-lit room 
 which had made her feel oddly safe a minute be- 
 fore suddenly became only a stage setting to throw 
 out, by contrast, the almost terribly splendid per- 
 sonality of the man who had come so unexpectedly 
 to encroach upon her midnight vigil. 
 
 The fate of the Lady of Shalott was a romantic
 
 MIDNIGHT ON MOUNTAIN TOP 121 
 
 one, take it all in all. She could not, to be sure, 
 taste of the fullness or joy of life, but she had 
 two great blessings: she had no sense of humor, 
 and she could be just as sentimental as she liked. 
 These are boons denied to the modern, all-round 
 girl. 
 
 Enid would have loved, just once in a while, to 
 be in a romantic situation, even if it were a 
 tragically romantic one, and, best of all, to be able 
 to give her mind to it without seeing its absurdity. 
 But so far, much as she had thirsted for passion- 
 ate sentiment a perverse imp inside her mind had 
 ridiculed every possibility as it had come up. And 
 anyway, modern life is against that sort of thing, 
 whatever your personal inclinations. I wonder if 
 the Lady of Shalott wasn't happier at her mirror 
 and spinning wheel than Enid was in playing golf 
 and bridge, riding, wearing pretty clothes, and 
 generally enjoying the comfortable realities of 
 existence? 
 
 At all events when she confronted Martin Hale 
 in the lonely Toll-gate House with the winds 
 whispering outside and not another sound save the 
 ticking of the clock, she felt as though Romance
 
 122 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Adventure the Fairy Tale element were for the 
 first time beckoning to her. Not that she loved 
 Jack less, nor that she loved Martin more either 
 but she was young, secretly emotional (which 
 is the most dangerous way to be emotional), and, 
 being furious with Jack, ripe to be attracted by 
 another man. Or perhaps it would be fairer 
 to say attracted by the possibilities of being alone 
 with another man. She did not mean to flirt with 
 Martin Hale, but she had a latent wish that he 
 would try to make love to her in a very respect- 
 ful fashion, of course or at least, want to, and 
 show it. 
 
 In short, she was preparing to engage in the 
 time-honored game called 'Playing with Fire.' 
 
 He came forward slowly, looming huge in the 
 lamplight. Heavens, how big the man was, and 
 how overpoweringly good-looking ! 
 
 "Well," he said, "I did it." 
 
 She gave an exclamation of enthusiasm. 
 
 "Gave the warning?" 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 "Met some of the Sheriff's men, and told them. 
 I feel rotten about it, too giving the boys away!"
 
 MIDNIGHT ON MOUNTAIN TOP 123 
 
 "But it was the right thing!" she urged. 
 
 "Oh, yes, it was the right thing," he admitted, 
 but his tanned fair face held still a lowering look. 
 "I want to tell old Mason about it," he said, look- 
 ing around. 
 
 "He's gone out. Miss Mason, too." 
 
 "Polly gone!" His expression was startled and 
 a little anxious. "She ain't alone?" 
 
 Then Enid did a horrid thing. She knew that 
 if Martin Hale thought Polly was alone he would 
 go and hunt for her, so after a second's hesita- 
 tion she deliberately gave him a false impression. 
 
 "There was a woman here," she said, slowly, 
 "a queer-looking woman, funnily dressed." 
 
 "The Widow Short?" His face relaxed into 
 a smile. "So Polly went back with her, eh? I'll 
 go over there after a spell and fetch her back." 
 
 He threw his shabby hat on the table and came 
 nearer to her. Big as he was, and untutored in 
 the social graces, there was nothing awkward 
 about him. He moved with natural ease and dig- 
 nity as a fine animal moves. He could not be 
 clumsy if he tried. 
 
 J-Ie leaned against the mantelpiece looking down
 
 I2 4 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 at Enid, her lovely little face coral pink in the 
 firelight, her hair burnished gold. 
 
 "Seems sort of hard you being here all alone," 
 he said, his big voice softened unaccountably. 
 "Long?" 
 
 She was unused to the brevity of hill-talk, and 
 repeated "Long?" 
 
 "Long since they left you-all here alone," he 
 elucidated. 
 
 "It seemed long," she said truthfully. It was 
 inevitable that she should add with that danger- 
 ous candor which is part and parcel of the game 
 of "Playing with Fire" : "I'm so thankful that you 
 came!" 
 
 In Martin Hale was the soul of a poet. To 
 him, this meeting on the mountain tops with a 
 Fairy Princess such as Enid was like a dream 
 hitherto unrealized, a phantom too long hushed in 
 fancy, a coming-true of exquisite unrealities which 
 he had been guarding in his heart of hearts. 
 
 He loved Polly deeply and truly, but she did not 
 spell for him the magic of existence, the glamour, 
 the idealism, the phantasmal mirror of things 
 which seemed tangled in the bright web of Enid's
 
 MIDNIGHT ON MOUNTAIN TOP 125 
 
 hair, which seemed to glow mystically upon him 
 from her gold-colored eyes. 
 
 "Must seem lonely to you the Ridge," he 
 said, in a commonplace way. 
 
 "Not now!" she ventured with the ghost of a 
 smile, then grew quickly sober. "Oh, but it was 
 lonely at first. Until" she quite forgot any 
 game called "Playing with Fire," and therefore 
 played it the better "until I began to feel that 
 up here one couldn't be lonely!" 
 
 He looked at her fixedly. He didn't under- 
 stand her words, but he vaguely understood her 
 feeling, and nodded slightly, waiting for her to 
 go on. 
 
 "You see," she proceeded breathlessly, "when 
 one is down in the Valley there are so many 
 things to hear, and notice, so many things going 
 on that one one gets tongue-tied and lonely, 
 just as we were saying. Oh, you don't under- 
 stand!" 
 
 "I reckon maybe I do," he said, slowly, gazing 
 at her vivid face. "Seems like you can't get a 
 full breath down there, doesn't it?" 
 
 "It's more than that," Enid said. "It's"
 
 126 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 she had a sort of inspiration "that the loneliest 
 thing in this world is never to have any time with 
 yourself." 
 
 There was another pause. Pauses were com- 
 ing more frequently now, and lasting longer, she 
 realized that, with an unsteady pulse to punctuate 
 the fact. For a few minutes longer they spoke 
 and stopped and spoke again phrases which 
 seemed to have less and less meaning as their 
 eyes grew unconsciously and uncontrollably more 
 eloquent. They were both, for the time being, a 
 little mad. 
 
 Fairy Princess and Mountain God, they stood 
 for a moment on the edge of that mystical and 
 perilous labyrinth where the rainbow beckons and 
 the sirens call. Stood, for Enid had arisen, al- 
 most without realizing it, and faced him trembling 
 slightly. 
 
 The winds outside had risen and drowned all 
 other sounds. 
 
 "You are beautiful!" said Martin Hale, low 
 and unsteadily. He gazed at her as though she 
 were a divine apparition, and yet he leaned closer 
 to her even as he worshiped. With all his ideals
 
 MIDNIGHT ON MOUNTAIN TOP 127 
 
 and dreams he was a man. Closer he bent, and 
 she could not move. It was as though a spell, 
 inscrutable and ruthless, were laid upon them 
 both. Their pulses sang and there was a ring of 
 fairy fire about them. . . . 
 
 And just at that moment the door was flung 
 open.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 ON THE TRAIL 
 
 And over rough and smooth he rode, 
 Nor yet for anything abode, 
 Till dark night swallowing up the day 
 With blindness his swift course must stay. 
 
 So, leading on his wearied beast, 
 Blindly he crept from tree to tree, 
 Till slowly grew that light to be 
 The thing he looked for, and he found 
 A hut on a cleared space of ground. . . . 
 
 WILLIAM MORRIS. 
 
 / T A O go back a trifle. 
 
 Again the man in the undergrowth groaned, 
 and Jack quickly made up his mind. Alighting, 
 he made his way into the darkness. 
 
 Evidently the man was not yet very far gone, 
 for he said, though hazily, "Password?" 
 
 Remembering his experience of the earlier part 
 of the night, and having no idea in view but that 
 
 128
 
 ON THE TRAIL 129 
 
 of succoring the man, whoever he might be, Jack 
 answered pacifically: 
 
 "Mountain laurel." 
 
 The man gave another groan in which relief 
 figured largely. "I was afraid you were one of 
 Heaton's men!" he muttered faintly, and lost con- 
 sciousness. 
 
 Jack struck a match and saw the brown wizened 
 features of the little leader who had challenged 
 him for the second time that evening. He felt 
 more puzzled than ever, but anyway the im- 
 mediate thing to be done was to get the wounded 
 man under shelter. He felt for just a moment 
 a trifle rueful, as he realized his predicament: 
 a mountain to climb, Enid to take care of, 
 a horse to lead, a wounded man to rescue it 
 seemed to him that he would never be able to 
 get to the end of the problem that confronted 
 him. 
 
 Naturally, his first impulse was to take the man 
 back to the valley to be looked out for; Enid 
 could wait. He lifted the limp body and prepared 
 to hoist it into his saddle. He could ride the led 
 horse, even though it was barebacked.
 
 1 30 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Now, then," he said soothingly, "Dr. Clay will 
 fix you up in no time." 
 
 The effect of these simple and encouraging 
 words was electrical. Weak as he was, the 
 wounded man began to struggle, crying in a fierce, 
 trembling tone: 
 
 "Damn you! You're running me in: that's 
 what you're doing! You're not playing on the 
 square!" 
 
 "What are you talking about?" broke in Rad- 
 nor, none too gently. "I don't want to leave you 
 to die in the road, but I swear I will if there's any 
 more of that sort of talk. If I take you to Dr. 
 Clay's, there's no way of his knowing who you 
 are and, as a patient, I don't think he'd give you 
 away anyhow." 
 
 But the man only mumbled: "I'll never go! 
 You sha'n't drag me! Damn you, let me alone!" 
 
 "Well," said Jack, "you're too sick a man at 
 present to be held accountable for what you say, 
 so I shall let you off an apology for those 'damn 
 you's' and a few other little innuendos. If you 
 won't go to Dr. Clay's, where do you want to 
 go?"
 
 ON THE TRAIL 131 
 
 "To the mountains quick! I've a shack up 
 there that I use sometimes. I've got to keep clear 
 of the valley for a while. Not even he could 
 save me, if it were known. I've been in that train 
 mix-up." 
 
 "He? Who?" 
 
 But the man was swaying to and fro, and seemed 
 unable to answer. 
 
 "Look, here," said Jack, speaking as though to 
 a sick and unreasonable child, "you'll never be 
 able to make the mountains. You're all in as it is." 
 
 "Feel left-hand coat pocket," gasped the 
 other. 
 
 Jack prepared to obey, but in feeling about in 
 the darkness accidentally touched the right-hand 
 pocket first. The man fairly shrieked at him. 
 
 "Left I said left! So that was your little 
 game! To rob me, to double-cross me!" 
 
 "You're out of your head," said Jack, half-dis- 
 gusted, and half-sorry for him. "If it's your gun 
 that you're keeping in that precious right-hand 
 pocket of yours, you're jolly well welcome to keep 
 it. I've one of my own. Now, then left, you 
 said: here we are! Oh, I see!"
 
 132 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 He pulled out a pocket flask, unscrewed the 
 top and handed it to his captive or was it 
 patient? who proceeded to drink deeply. 
 
 "I've always heard that Virginians never stirred 
 without something helpful like that along," re- 
 flected Jack aloud, "but I didn't know it was so. 
 Came in handy this time, anyhow. Feeling bet- 
 ter?" 
 
 The man nodded. 
 
 "Have a drop yourself," he said, in slightly 
 stronger tones. Radnor had an idea that he was 
 ashamed of the way he had spoken the minute 
 before. 
 
 "No, thanks hold on, I believe I will!" A 
 sudden idea had occurred to him, confirmed by 
 the swallow he took of the contents of the flask. 
 It had quite a definite taste of its own entirely 
 new to Jack. 
 
 "That's not whiskey!" 
 
 "Not on your life !" said the other. "It's the 
 real thing. Genuine white liquor the best made 
 on the range." 
 
 He spoke proudly. 
 
 So they were not just yarns, these tales Jack had
 
 ON THE TRAIL 133 
 
 heard of the uncivilized Southern hills! People 
 really did hold up trains, and there was still a 
 moonshining business, government reports not- 
 withstanding. 
 
 Jack laughed almost incredulously. The thing 
 was impossible; but the thing was so, so why 
 waste time to disbelieve it? Meanwhile, since this 
 wounded maniac wanted to go to his "shack," he 
 supposed it was up to him to take him. The 
 "white liquor" had given the man a bit of strength 
 and he was able to mount Jack's horse without 
 much assistance. He groaned, as he settled him- 
 self, but was fit enough now to watch with curiosity 
 and some admiration Radnor's mounting of the 
 saddleless horse a somewhat effective perform- 
 ance even in that dim light. "You've a good 
 seat," he remarked, when Radnor was up. 
 
 "I'll need it on these trails with no stirrups I" 
 was the rather grim response. "Anything I can 
 do to make you more comfortable?" 
 
 "No thanks." 
 
 Jack smiled in the dark at the second word, 
 clearly an afterthought, and said: "You'd better 
 go first, so you can lead the way to your place."
 
 i 3 4 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 The two rode upward through the damp, still 
 darkness, and neither spoke a word. 
 
 It seemed to have been a ride ages long when 
 Jack broke the silence between them by asking : 
 
 "Where is this place this shack of yours, or 
 whatsoever you call it, anyway?" 
 
 The man riding up the trail ahead of him mur- 
 mured something unintelligible; then as Jack re- 
 peated his question more sharply, he said: 
 
 "It's just a piece beyond Four Trail Cross- 
 ing." 
 
 "We're almost there then," said Radnor, who 
 could already smell the untainted winds of the 
 upper ranges. It was strange, the way the air be- 
 gan to move and surge like a waking spirit as 
 they climbed up above the slow and stagnant 
 valley currents. 
 
 The next moment the men started and their 
 horses with them. For somewhere and not too 
 far away could be heard the sounds of shots. 
 
 "By the Lord!" gasped the man ahead. 
 "They're at it! And me knocked out like this!" 
 
 Tp himself Jack said exultingly: "I knew
 
 ON THE TRAIL 135 
 
 Ralph would never let the lot of them get away 
 like that." 
 
 But now he was first and foremost anxious to 
 get his wounded companion to a place of safety, 
 and then to be in the thick of whatever trouble 
 there was. And he had a pretty shrewd guess 
 that whatever it turned out to be his friend would 
 be moderately sure to be in it. 
 
 "See here!" he exclaimed hurriedly, "I I'll 
 have to leave you somewhere, and go on a bit to 
 see what can be done. Would you mind being 
 left at the Toll Gate?" 
 
 "Toll Gate's all right," said the other, but more 
 feebly. The sudden burst of excitement at the 
 crowd and the shots seemed to have left him 
 weaker than ever. Jack's heart jumped with re- 
 lief. Here was a partial solution to several 
 problems at any rate. He would leave the man 
 at Four Trail Crossing, reassure Enid, leave the 
 led horse in the Toll-gate stable, and with the 
 mount the wounded leader was now riding, go to 
 the assistance of Ralph and his friends. 
 
 A few moments more saw the two horses climb- 
 ing onto the level plateau where stood the Toll
 
 136 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Gate. The shots still sounded at intervals in the 
 distance. 
 
 In less time than it takes to write it, Radnor 
 had slipped from his horse, raced to the Toll-gate 
 House, and flung open the door confronting 
 Enid and Martin Hale, alone together and ob- 
 viously not expecting to see any one. 
 
 For a moment Jack Radnor was vaguely 
 stunned. Astonishment that neither old Mason 
 nor his daughter was there dwarfed all other 
 feelings. But Enid's scarlet flush and Hale's 
 stiffening of muscles as he faced him changed his 
 first plain surprise into something sharper and 
 more bitter. 
 
 He hardly recognized his own voice as he came 
 forward and spoke. 
 
 "Miss Mason and her father are not here?" 
 
 "No," she said, also in an unnatural tone. "I 
 have been quite alone until Mr. Hale came." 
 
 "I hope that you were not alone long," said 
 Jack, icily, "and I am glad you have been, since, 
 so well protected!" 
 
 Hale's flush was dusky through his tan. He 
 said nothing, however. Both he and Enid stood
 
 ON THE TRAIL 137 
 
 still as though they were too paralyzed to move. 
 In both of them was the stark, flat sense of reac- 
 tion. The siren's song had gone, the glamour 
 had faded. They felt bitterly annoyed with them- 
 selves and each other, as Jack Radnor looked them 
 both over for a moment or two more. 
 
 Then he said to Enid, in a voice void of expres- 
 sion : "I have a wounded man outside. You will 
 have to look out for him a bit." 
 
 She gave an exclamation of concern, and Hale, 
 without being asked, went outside to help lift the 
 man from his saddle. 
 
 Half an hour later the wounded man was com- 
 fortable on a rough couch in the living-room, and 
 Radnor faced Hale coldly across him. 
 
 "I imagine Miss Forsythe can get along 
 now," he said significantly, "without either of 
 us." 
 
 Hale, with a shrug of his great shoulders, 
 moved toward the door. He and Enid had not 
 looked at each other since Jack's unexpected en- 
 trance. The big mountaineer was conscious of a 
 shudder through his whole being as he remem-
 
 138 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 bered the way he had felt. The thing was past, 
 but it had left its mark. 
 
 "Oh, by the way," said Jack, pausing as he 
 turned to follow him, "it's rather an upset 
 night, you know and though I don't think it's 
 even possible, we'll provide against the odd 
 chance." 
 
 He took the wounded man's revolver from his 
 pocket and gave it to Enid. 
 
 "Careful," he reminded her. "It's loaded. I 
 don't imagine you're the sort likely to lose your 
 head, but take care. I'll feel better if you have it." 
 
 Something in his words hurt Enid, the im- 
 plication that being "not the sort likely to lose your 
 head," she was in a way thrust outside the pale 
 of ordinary emotional, impulsive feminine hu- 
 manity. 
 
 "I will take care," she said coldly. 
 
 And Radnor and Hale left the room together, 
 neither of them looking at her.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 DANGEROUS BLOOMS 
 
 . . To burst all links of habit there to wander far away, 
 
 There raethinks would be enjoyment more than in this march of 
 
 mind, 
 In the steamship, in the railway, in the thoughts that shake 
 
 mankind. 
 There the passions cramp'd no longer shall have scope and 
 
 breathing-space ; 
 I will take some savage woman. ... 
 
 ALFRED TENNYSOW. 
 
 outside the door the two men did not 
 waste time over personalities. Whatever 
 Radnor's individual prejudices or grievances 
 against Hale or his behavior, he had a man's 
 ability to merge them in more immediate and, 
 generally speaking, more important issues. 
 
 "See here, Hale," he said quickly, "what side 
 139
 
 HO MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 are you on? Man to man, mind, and no dodging! 
 I want to know whether you are with the law or 
 against it!" 
 
 The light from the Toll Gate windows shone 
 upon them, and each could see the other's face 
 clearly. 
 
 Martin Hale hesitated, then he flung back his 
 head and said roughly: 
 
 "You go your way, Radnor, and I'll go mine." 
 
 Jack Radnor felt himself get hot from the 
 crown of his head to the soles of his feet. He 
 wanted to kill the man, to wreck him with a 
 tempest of primitive fury. But these receding gun 
 echoes ! He had to get to Ralph's help. 
 
 "Go ahead, then," he said quickly. "It's none of 
 my business. Wait a minute you'll want your 
 revolver." 
 
 He felt in his pocket, but the revolver was 
 gone. 
 
 "I've lost it!" he exclaimed, blankly. 
 
 "There'll be plenty in the house," said Hale. 
 "I'll go back and get one." 
 
 He turned on his heel and went once more into 
 the room that held Enid Forsythe. Jack laughed
 
 DANGEROUS BLOOMS 141 
 
 briefly, mounted and set his horse at a quick gal- 
 lop along the top-range trail. If Enid were the 
 sort of girl to have a flirtation with a moun- 
 taineer, and if that mountaineer were practically 
 a self-confessed member of a lawless people 
 then his concern with the affair was of the most 
 nominal and formal sort Help Denby he would; 
 bring Enid home safely he would; but he tried 
 to tell himself that beyond these obligations he 
 took no interest. 
 
 However, his heart ached, for he loved Enid 
 better than all the round world. 
 
 A bough wet with night dews brushed his face. 
 He pressed on in a sort of grim violence, born 
 of his own hurt mood almost as much as of his 
 fear for Ralph Denby and his men. 
 
 A woman's cry came to him. It rang so unex- 
 pectedly through the night that he was nearly 
 unseated. And the cry was close at hand. As he 
 reined up hastily, the shots he was in quest of 
 were for the time being silenced. 
 
 The cry came again, more appealing and at the 
 same time more explanatory: 
 
 "Oh, please won't some one help?"
 
 142 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 With a sharp ejaculation, Jack swung himself 
 to the ground. 
 
 "Where are you?" he asked quickly. "Who is 
 it? What is wrong?" 
 
 He nearly stumbled over something soft and 
 restless, something struggling and tossing on the 
 ground. As he knelt beside her, she fairly flung 
 herself into his arms sobbing. 
 
 "Oh, it's Mr. Radnor; then it's all right 1 
 You'll take care of me, won't you?" 
 
 "But who " he began helplessly. 
 
 "Oh, don't you know? It's Polly Mason. And 
 I've twisted my ankle !" 
 
 At first Jack mentally consigned her to the 
 nethermost depths of Gehenna. Then something 
 in the clinging touch of her melted him. He was 
 sincerely sorry for her predicament, and she was 
 unusually attractive. 
 
 Brokenly she explained the situation. She told 
 him about her father's departure, secure in the 
 belief that the Widow Short would stay with the 
 two girls at the Toll Gate; her own anxiety, at 
 the sound of shots; her vain search for her father
 
 DANGEROUS BLOOMS 143 
 
 and finally the luckless fall which had landed her 
 helpless by the wayside. 
 
 "But," said Jack, still holding her as she leaned 
 against his shoulder, crying with worrying pain, 
 "isn't there some place this Short woman's or 
 some one's where I could take you to rest, for 
 a bit? You see " He hesitated. "I'm afraid 
 that there may be a lot that I ought to do 
 and " 
 
 She gave a low cry and clutched him more 
 closely. 
 
 "No no," she paused. "You won't leave me? 
 I've been so frightened, all alone I And my foot 
 hurts so!" 
 
 There was no doubt as to the girl's sincerity, 
 and Radnor felt at his wits' ends. The sudden 
 quiet which had descended upon the shooting had 
 somewhat relieved his mind of an instinctive sense 
 of urgent responsibility! 
 
 "Let's try getting you on my horse, Miss 
 Mason " 
 
 She interrupted him with agonized appeal. 
 
 "Please please couldn't you take me to 
 Malone's shack? That is nearest. It's only a
 
 144 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 piece down the mountain only you have to go 
 cross-trail to get to it." 
 
 Jack wanted to say that he had been going 
 cross-trail all the evening, but refrained. 
 
 The sharp memory of Enid flushing scarlet 
 of Hale, the mountaineer, straightening to meet 
 him stung Jack Radnor. Men are human after 
 all. He lifted Polly gently in his arms, and lead- 
 ing his horse at the same time carried her care- 
 fully along the trail. 
 
 Following the girl's directions, he found that 
 Malone's shack was a bit down hill on the farther 
 side of the main trail; and even in coming to it 
 Radnor remembered the goal his wounded friend 
 had wanted to make for. Also he remembered 
 the heavy flask with the engraved silver letter 
 upon it, that might have been "M." 
 
 "What sort of a chap does this Malone look 
 like?" he asked Polly. 
 
 "Oh, he's little and dark dreadfully ugly! I 
 hate him!" He felt her shudder, and had a 
 shrewd idea that her hatred was based on some- 
 thing more tangible and at the same time more 
 significant than mere antipathy.
 
 DANGEROUS BLOOMS 145 
 
 Jack wondered. It was his man, then. Queer 
 sort of a fellow, with his silver flask, and his 
 moonshining, and his apparent respect for the law 
 in the person of Judge Denby. 
 
 They reached the shack in a moment or two, 
 and, after depositing Polly on the floor, Jack lit a 
 match and surveyed the place. 
 
 It was very bare, and there were no signs of 
 being constantly occupied. He remembered that 
 the man had said he "used it sometimes." Then 
 he was a Valley man, and this was only an occa- 
 sional retreat a hiding place, possibly. 
 
 Radnor took off his coat, and made Polly as com- 
 fortable upon it as he could, then produced more 
 matches and set about getting some illumination 
 and a little warmth. For it was chilly here with 
 that thrilling cold of the hills that at night can 
 strike through you even were it summer. 
 
 And Polly cuddled into his coat and watched 
 him with softly brilliant eyes. 
 
 There are many types of men in the world, at- 
 tracted by many types of women, but there seem 
 qualities very nearly usual in the decent male : the 
 little boy spirit that adores being mothered
 
 i 4 6 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 and spoiled, and falls in love with almost any 
 sympathetic woman who does it well; and the 
 protective instinct which makes them absurdly 
 charming and tender to helpless things to chil- 
 dren, and small animals, and especially to women 
 who need this care and lean upon this strength. 
 
 That this is rooted really in masculine vanity 
 is a truism, but only partly true, like most 
 truisms. It has something much sweeter and 
 nobler than that in it, and even egotism turned 
 to such good use becomes a fine thing. There is 
 nothing prettier and more touching to watch than 
 the gentleness of a big man with a fragile little 
 woman or a baby. 
 
 So it was that Jack Radnor treated Polly with 
 the hurt ankle as she had never been treated be- 
 fore, with a consideration, and a kindness, and 
 half-teasing, half-bullying, wholly tender protec- 
 tiveness that made her ready to kneel down and 
 worship him. 
 
 It was only after he had kindled a fire on the 
 hearth, lighted a guttering candle which he found 
 on the shelf of the shack, and after softly ex- 
 amining the foot, found that there was nothing
 
 DANGEROUS BLOOMS 147 
 
 wrong with it other than a painful wrench, that 
 he really remembered that Polly was not only 
 a weak and suffering creature to be cared for but 
 a very lovely woman as well, one to defend him- 
 self against at that. He had never been uncon- 
 scious of the fact, as has been intimated, but the 
 realization had been kept in abeyance by her help- 
 lessness. Now in the rosy glow of the leaping fire, 
 she looked a little less helpless; even for Radnor 
 was not new to the game and could analyze, even 
 admit, facts when he met them a little dangerous. 
 
 There are flowers that one longs to touch and 
 to breathe the fragrance of. Polly was like one 
 of those flowers. Not essentially more material 
 than other girls, in fact, in most essentials, less 
 so, she still exhaled a lure that drove men dis- 
 tracted in spite of themselves. It was not a 
 wicked lure, for she was not a siren by avocation, 
 but it was the sort of enchantment that sings to 
 you from the heart of a lovely rose, when dusk 
 falls and the hour gives to it all its destined 
 sweetness and wonder. 
 
 It was all very well for Polly to make him out 
 a sort of emasculated figurehead of romantic
 
 148 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 manhood; he wasn't, and there was an end to that. 
 No woman, much less one so innocently pro- 
 vocative as Polly Mason, could move about with 
 those naive caressing touches, those eager linger- 
 ings of eyes and smiles, without laying a spark 
 under a manhood which was anything but emas- 
 culated. Radnor was in no sense a Don Juan, 
 and a young girl under any ordinary circumstances 
 could have traveled around the world with him 
 without having her ideals even faintly besmattered 
 by the mud of misunderstanding. But the con- 
 ditions were peculiar. 
 
 First of all, one must take into consideration 
 what one never does take into consideration: his 
 present attitude of mind, or mood, if that 
 elastic phrase happens to please you best. Young 
 men and women are not supposed to be swayed by 
 emotions, but it happens that they are. And the 
 emotions are violent and complicated according 
 to the situations in which they are fostered. Jack 
 and Polly were both in love, he with Enid, and 
 she with Martin, but that, terrible as it may 
 seem to the Victorian understanding, did not pre- 
 vent them from being still human.
 
 DANGEROUS BLOOMS 149 
 
 In Polly's brain, inherently literal in spite of an 
 extraordinary coloring of sentiment, was a sort 
 of boundary line between Gentlemen and Men. 
 This is a peculiarly unlucky type of hallucination, 
 because the two sorts, practically speaking, can- 
 not exist independently. A real man must have 
 something of the gentleman in him before he can 
 pass muster among his kind; and may God de- 
 fend us from the "gentleman" who is not first of 
 all a man. 
 
 However, this is beside the question. 
 
 Polly stood in the position of a traveler in a 
 strange land in which she is assured she will have 
 full legal and actual protection, whatever she does. 
 Hence, she took liberties with Jack Radnor which 
 she would never have dreamed of taking with 
 one of the mountain men to whom she was ac- 
 customed. 
 
 He stood on a side of the line supposedly in- 
 nocuous and, being a creature of another and more 
 subtle and refined world, was assumed by her to 
 be beyond vulgar male instincts or temptations. 
 
 How much of her delight in adventuring in this 
 Safe Land was due to her intuitive attraction to
 
 150 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Radnor is not to be recorded here. Certainly 
 she did not recognize it; that much may be re- 
 corded, at any rate. 
 
 So she was very much surprised and enraged 
 when, whipped beyond endurance, he kissed her. 
 
 He could not help it. 
 
 Could you help smelling a bunch of violets if it 
 were held close to your face? And Polly was so 
 close to him that he felt her. We won't explain 
 that in case some one out of the many readers we 
 hope to have, chance to understand it. 
 
 Her lips were deep red, not scarlet-coral in 
 tint, and as he crushed his to them they made 
 him vaguely giddy. Staggering back from that 
 close, mad clasp, he felt a frantic distaste and 
 revulsion of feeling. Such kisses should have 
 been kept for Enid, only he felt very sure that 
 Enid would not have accepted them. 
 
 Which shows just how much he knew about it. 
 
 Polly in a wild revulsion of feeling, a frantic 
 turbulence of disturbed ideals, shot backwards 
 half across the room, as white as she had been 
 rose-red before. 
 
 "How dare you ?" she stammered,
 
 DANGEROUS BLOOMS 151 
 
 Jack Radnor knew that there were no words in 
 which to excuse himself to her, and he felt hor- 
 ribly, abysmally ashamed. He would not say the 
 mechanical : "I beg your pardon," for it was alto- 
 gether too inadequate. He merely stood with 
 lowered head, tense in every muscle, and wonder- 
 ing whether he should ever be able to look Enid 
 in the face again. 
 
 "I thought you were a gentleman!" Polly flung 
 at him. 
 
 "So did I," was his simple response. 
 
 She laughed, an angry low laugh; and she had 
 never looked lovelier in her life, though he could 
 not know it since he was not looking at her. 
 
 "I wish your girl joy of you!" she went on, 
 fiercely sullen. "Why don't you make love to 
 her for a change ? She's alone, and might like it !" 
 
 "Alone!" 
 
 Polly retreated even further before the look 
 in his eyes, and the tone in his voice. She had 
 not told him before that Enid Forsythe was alone 
 at the Toll-gate House. She did not quite know 
 why. 
 
 "Miss Forsythe is alone?" repeated Jack Rad-
 
 152 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 nor, all softness gone from his clear brown eyes. 
 "You left her there alone?" 
 
 Polly, who liked to play with fire, but hated to 
 admit it even to herself, nodded, with her head 
 turned away. 
 
 "She's alone, all right !" she retorted. "And it 
 seems to me that's a fine question for you to ask!" 
 
 For the first time since the fatal kiss, they 
 looked at each other, and it was as though they 
 met the eyes of strangers. Suddenly they had 
 slipped back across their crossed trails, and re- 
 garded each other with a hostile or at least an 
 alien gaze. 
 
 It is a curious fact that, as Jack Radnor and 
 Polly Mason kissed, they had not thought of one 
 another. Now, facing the cold disillusionment of 
 afterwards, they wondered, both of them, how the 
 thing could ever have happened. Polly was not 
 a passionate woman, in spite of her appearance, 
 and she did not like being made love to too des- 
 perately. Jack was altogether too passionate to 
 be able to endure for more than a passing mo- 
 ment any one except the girl whom he really 
 loved with all of him, heart, soul and body.
 
 DANGEROUS BLOOMS 153 
 
 "Miss Mason," he said, with his eyes now very 
 far from her face, "I am afraid that we would 
 better go on toward the Four Trail Crossing. We 
 we may find some news of your father 
 there " 
 
 It was lame, and he knew it. Polly, throwing 
 her cape about her, knew it, too, and she looked 
 at him with a deep and resentful scorn. 
 
 Jack went, quickly out into the open air, and 
 breathed the night wind in deep gulps. He felt 
 it is hardly worth while to put down what he 
 felt. Anyway, out of the many self-reproaches 
 which the Black Evils in his conscience hurled at 
 him and kept on hurling relentlessly, there was one 
 which seemed to stay fixed in his heart like a 
 barbed and poisoned arrow. Without intention, 
 and without consequence, he had played Martin 
 Hale false. All his life, that would be a debt to 
 be paid somehow whether Martin Hale ever 
 knew it or not.
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 MALONE'S SHACK 
 
 . . . This Ijfe is wine, red wine, 
 Under the greenwood boughs! Oh, still to keep it, 
 One little glen of justice in the midst 
 Of multitudinous wrong. 
 
 ALFRED NOYFS. 
 
 "T ISTEN!" exclaimed Polly, sharply. 
 
 Jack sprang to the door, and flung it 
 open. Voices and galloping hoofs were rapidly 
 nearing the shack. 
 
 Farther away rang out a shot, and then came 
 the crash of a horse taking to the shrubbery. 
 With an exclamation, Jack turned back, and picked 
 up Polly and carried her to the one other room the 
 cabin boasted. If there was to be trouble, she 
 must at least be as far out of range of it as pos- 
 sible. 
 
 i54
 
 MALONE'S SHACK 155 
 
 Then, turning quickly, he stood still in amaze- 
 ment, for it was Ralph's voice that he heard, and 
 he was saying rather breathlessly: 
 
 "Come on, Hale. This is our best chance, 
 old Malone's shack. It's built to stand a good bit 
 of a siege, if I know Malone!" 
 
 Into the cabin dashed Denby and Martin Hale, 
 closing the door and lowering the great bars into 
 place as soon as they were inside. Jack realized 
 for the first time how unusually stoutly the shack 
 was prepared for defense. 
 
 Then the two men turned and saw him. After 
 one gasp of mutual astonishment, they promptly 
 dismissed the stranger that had brought them to- 
 gether again under these circumstances, and went 
 to work closing the wooden shutters, and other- 
 wise strengthening their position. 
 
 "It's the train-robbing crowd," said Ralph hur- 
 riedly to Radnor. "Or at least a detachment of 
 them. They separated us " he indicated Hale 
 "from our own men and we had to run for it. 
 Old Heaton will round them up, of course, but 
 meanwhile too bad to get you mixed up in it 
 like this, Jack!"
 
 156 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Rot!" said Jack, who was ransacking the 
 cabin for firearms. But even as he hunted he 
 was wondering how on earth Martin Hale and 
 Ralph Denby should be on the same side, and 
 why, if they both were with Sheriff Heaton's men, 
 they should come so confidently to Malone's for 
 refuge? The thing was getting more mixed up 
 every minute. And the complications were not 
 helped by Polly's presence in the next room. 
 What would Martin Hale say to that? He re- 
 membered very well how he himself had felt that 
 evening when he had come upon the young moun- 
 taineer and Enid in the Toll-gate House. 
 
 However, a gun was the thing he wanted now, 
 and he couldn't find a sign of one. 
 
 "Damn the man! Does he keep them locked 
 up?" he growled impatiently. 
 
 "Not armed, Jack?" said Denby. "You were, 
 earlier in the evening." 
 
 "I lost that," said Radnor shortly. Until he 
 understood the situation more clearly there was 
 nothing to be gained by stating that it was Hale's 
 revolver that he had lost. 
 
 "By Jove, that's a pity!" exclaimed Denby. He
 
 MALONE'S SHACK 157 
 
 turned to Hale : "He's a crack shot, better than 
 I am, and I'm willing to bet he's better than 
 you, too!" 
 
 "Easy enough," said the young hill man, briefly. 
 "I'm fair, but I'm not a dead shot." 
 
 "Hello !" cried Denby, in suppressed excitement, 
 "I believe they're coming!" 
 
 Crash after crash in the underbrush and a sud- 
 den shout told them that their enemies had seen 
 the light in the cabin window. 
 
 Denby turned impressively to Jack, and held 
 out his revolver. 
 
 "I hate to be out of a scrap," he said, "but I 
 can't use this as well as you can! Go to it!" 
 
 At the same moment, Hale held out his weapon 
 to Radnor. 
 
 "Here's old man Mason's," he said. "Better 
 keep yours, Mr. Denby. I'm not needing it to- 
 night." 
 
 Ralph stared at him. Outside the cabin, the 
 rush and stumble of horses sharply stopped filled 
 the brief pause. 
 
 "But " Denby began. 
 
 Hale stopped him. "These fellows outside are
 
 158 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 my crowd," he said simply. "I couldn't pull a 
 gun on them, could I?" 
 
 A heavy knock came on the door. 
 
 "Is Billy Malone there?" demanded a rough 
 voice. 
 
 "No!" said Denby, clearly. 
 
 There was a sort of snarl outside, and con- 
 fused and broken sentences reached them: "That's 
 him!" "That's the chap with Heaton's men. I 
 knew some of 'em had run in here!" "Damned 
 lucky for the skunks that Malone's away!" Then 
 the voices became more threatening. 
 
 "Open the door!" commanded some one. 
 "Open the door, or we'll smash it and you, 
 too!" 
 
 "I'll open no door when I'm asked to in that 
 fashion!" retorted Ralph, wrathfully. He had 
 Southern blood himself, and could not stand being 
 ordered about. 
 
 "Steadily!" warned Jack with his hand on his 
 arm. Ralph shook him off and cried: 
 
 "I am Deputy Sheriff, and I represent the Law. 
 If you fellows will talk sense instead of threat- 
 ening me, I'll open the door and have it out with
 
 MALONE'S SHACK 159 
 
 you. But " Radnor caught hold of him again 
 
 and made him listen to him almost by physical 
 force. His was in all ways the stronger will and 
 personality and he forced it on his friend, until 
 Ralph most unwillingly stood silent. 
 
 "You idiot!" said Jack, in a low tone, but with 
 deep and fervent emphasis. "Don't you see you're 
 going about the whole thing wrong end first? 
 We're in no position to dictate terms. Use your 
 head, Ralph, if you can get the blood out of it 
 long enough. Violence is just what we don't 
 want, anything but that, because if it comes to 
 that we haven't a dog's chance. Do you really 
 suppose you and I with a gun apiece can uphold 
 the Majesty of the Law against a gang of high- 
 wayers and cut-throaters? Will you keep your 
 fool mouth shut for a minute while we decide what 
 to do?" 
 
 "Do what you damn please," said Denby, a 
 little suddenly but more sensibly. 
 
 "Better decide quick!" come the harsh voice at 
 the door. "Do we break down the door or not? 
 We'd burn you out, you rats, if you weren't in 
 Bill's shack!"
 
 i6o MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Jack turned quickly to Martin Hale. 
 
 "Have you any influence with these men?" he 
 demanded, in a sharp undertone. 
 
 "Only in one way," said Hale, speaking slowly. 
 He seemed to be nerving himself for some- 
 thing. Suddenly he squared his splendid shoul- 
 ders. "We'll try it anyhow," he said firmly. "I 
 guess it's coming to me!" 
 
 He raised his powerful voice and called: 
 
 "Malone's not here, boys, but I am Hale!" 
 
 "Hale!" There was a chorus of excited aston- 
 ishment. Through it ran a rising surge of resent- 
 ment that culminated in the fierce and accusing 
 query : 
 
 "What are you doing with one of Heaton's 
 men, Mart Hale?" 
 
 "If I open the door and tell you," said Martin, 
 "will you agree not to start anything till we've 
 thrashed the whole thing out?" 
 
 "Good for you!" muttered Jack. 
 
 "If you're with the Deputy Sheriff we won't 
 agree to anything!" shouted one of the men out- 
 side. "Come on, boys down with her!" 
 There was a rush for the door, but before they
 
 MALONE'S SHACK 161 
 
 could reach it both Jack and Martin had sprung 
 to the big bars, lifted them, and swung the door 
 wide open. It was a desperate chance but the 
 only one. 
 
 "Now speak to them, quick !" commanded Jack. 
 
 The men, astonished by the unexpected opening 
 of the door paused for just an instant. It was 
 enough. Hale stopped and frowned facing them 
 with his hands up. There was a puzzled silence, 
 and Martin spoke quietly, while Jack and Denby 
 stood tense and waiting close at hand, the former 
 with old Mason's revolver firmly clutched in his 
 coat pocket. 
 
 "You see I'm not armed," said Hale. "I want 
 to talk to you a moment." 
 
 "Boys," said Hale, "I'm one of you and you 
 can trust me. I'll never land one of you in trouble 
 and you know it. But, boys, I'm through. I 
 want to quit the game and I'm putting it up to you 
 straight. Ain't I got the right to?" 
 
 No one spoke, though so far they listened to 
 him without breaking in. After a wistful look 
 over the sullen faces, Hale squared his shoulders 
 sharply and said, in a voice that rang:
 
 1 62 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "I gave the hold-up away, boys I" 
 
 Above the roar of fury from the mob came 
 Polly's shrill cry of "Martin oh, Martin! 
 They'll kill you!" 
 
 The shuddering notes of her voice seemed to 
 put new strength and authority into the man. He 
 raised one powerful arm and stilled the tumult as 
 all real force, either spiritual or physical, can al- 
 ways still disturbance. 
 
 "Listen to me !" he ordered sharply. "I've been 
 one of you, stuck by you, and you'd kill me like 
 a 'possum, because I dared " 
 
 The growling wave of anger rose more men- 
 acingly than before, but before it could break 
 into its foam of violence Jack Radnor had taken 
 a hand. He held the revolver in his hand and 
 composedly though casually moved it on a slow 
 and cursory orbit covering intermittently every 
 point in the crowd the while he talked. 
 
 "Maybe you think," he said, in his clean-cut, 
 well-bred accents that commanded at least atten- 
 tion, "that Hale was only trying to do you a 
 dirty trick when he tipped Heaton off to that black- 
 guardly business down the track to-night. Hold
 
 MALONE'S SHACK 163 
 
 on there ! I'm running this show till I get through 
 talking, and I don't like being interrupted!" 
 
 Acting on a sudden impulse he deliberately 
 flung up his revolver and shot at a swaying branch 
 disclosed by the wavering light from behind him. 
 A delicate flutter of leaves descended. He singled 
 out a spot on the trunk a bit farther down and 
 hit that. A man moved uncomfortably in the 
 crowd, and the seemingly leisurely and preoccu- 
 pied revolver covered him instantly. A hat be- 
 gan to duck stealthily and suddenly flew into the 
 air. It was a risky game, but it appealed to the 
 rough viewpoint of the men. Somebody laughed. 
 "All right, mister," he called, "I reckon we'll 
 listen!" 
 
 Jack, however, still held the gun, as he went on 
 speaking as though there had been no interrup- 
 tion. 
 
 "As a matter of fact, you confounded idiots," 
 he said, "Hale did you the whitest turn any man 
 ever did a set of ruifians. He was one of you, 
 and he did his damnedest to keep you from queer- 
 ing yourselves into the penitentiary. I'm not 
 preaching. I'm talking horse-sense at the end of
 
 1 64 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 a gun, which is the only way any chap has a 
 chance to talk sense in this part of the world, as 
 far as I can see ! " 
 
 "What was that?" muttered Ralph, quickly in 
 his ear. Horses, unquestionably, were coming 
 nearer. A hope sprang contagiously from breast to 
 breast among the three young men in the shack, 
 but Radnor raised his voice to cover the approach- 
 ing sounds. 
 
 "Hale is the last man on earth to turn State's 
 evidence, if that means getting any of his pals 
 into trouble. He listen to me, you chicken- 
 heads, don't keep turning around like that! 
 Haven't you lived in the hills long enough to get 
 used to bats and hoot-owls? He " 
 
 But the play was over. A crash in the under- 
 brush started every man's hand toward his hip, 
 but the subsequent click made them each pause 
 half-way. Sheriff Heaton's husky drawl, sharp- 
 ened by urgency, cut the air definitely. 
 
 "Hands up, everybody! If that's Martin Hale 
 standing at Malone's door, he's under arrest!"
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 ENID'S PATIENT 
 
 . . . Doing ill, 
 Expect some ill be done thee! . . . 
 
 ... In the toils 
 
 O' the net, where swords spring forth, will he be fast 
 Minded to kill his neighbors the arch-knave! 
 
 . . . A dying man, 
 Your foe, that pays the price of deeds he did. 
 
 ROBERT BROWNING. 
 
 T EFT alone in the Toll-gate House, Enid 
 confronted her charge with mingled feel- 
 ings. The little wizened man Malone by name, 
 though she did not know it was not an attractive 
 specimen of humanity at his best. Wounded and 
 with his ugly features pinched and haggard, he 
 was a still less agreeable vision. Enid was de- 
 cidedly repelled by him; moreover, she was not 
 used to sick-nursing and her ministering instincts 
 
 165
 
 1 66 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 were as yet somewhat embryotic. Add to her dis- 
 concerted attitude of mind the reaction of mood 
 after her dangerous play with Martin and you 
 may guess something of the chaotic condition of 
 her sensations as she looked at the wounded man 
 left in her care. She was very far from heart- 
 less, however, and really did her best after a cer- 
 tain instinctive fastidious shrinking to do what she 
 could for her patient. Under her light hands, 
 busied in smoothing the cushion under his head 
 and easing the position of his injured arm, he 
 opened his eyes. 
 
 "Are you feeling better?" asked Enid kindly. 
 
 The lamplight on her fair hair gave her, for 
 the moment, a sort of nimbus, and the man 
 blinked at her in a puzzled way. 
 
 She brought a cup of spirits and water mixed by 
 Radnor for emergencies and put it to his lips. 
 
 "Who the devil are you?" demanded the sick 
 man, staring up at her. 
 
 "Your nurse," returned Enid, thinking that 
 she might just as well waive full explanations as 
 long as possible. At any rate, she did not know 
 much about the true inwardness of the situation.
 
 ENID'S PATIENT 167 
 
 Jack had been in anything but an illuminating 
 mood. 
 
 "Nurse !" repeated the man. "Which of us Is 
 dopey?" 
 
 Enid wanted to laugh, and yet she realized that 
 the situation could not be accepted as a laughing 
 matter. In the first place the man might die on 
 her hands. As she looked at him he moaned 
 harshly. 
 
 "You're in pain," Enid said pityingly. "Let me 
 help you to lie more comfortably." 
 
 Radnor and Hale had cut his sleeve away and 
 the slit coat was rumpled up underneath him in 
 a way which must have aggravated his suffering. 
 She bent to arrange it more easily, and started as 
 though transfixed. For from the sagging pocket 
 at the side of the coat, which had been cut off, 
 slipped suddenly a small shining thing a thing 
 which Enid recognized, unless indeed as she had 
 half-believed more than once that night she were 
 really at home in bed dreaming the whole busi- 
 ness. She did not betray her astonishment, but 
 bent in an unconcerned way and picked up the 
 glittering little object. It was just what she had
 
 1 68 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 imagined the quaint little emerald pin she had 
 given Alice Baker the Christmas before. How 
 on earth had it gotten into the pocket of this 
 horrid little man of the hills? Alice Baker was, 
 so Enid told herself, many miles from Warm 
 Sulphur Springs. What was her brooch doing 
 here ? And yet there was no doubt about it. The 
 setting made the matter certain, for it was unusual 
 and unmistakable. Enid had bought it at an 
 antique shop and recognized even the odd dent in 
 the beaten silver rim. She slipped it unostenta- 
 tiously into the front of her shirtwaist and eyed 
 her patient with growing distrust and disfavor. 
 However the pin had come into his hands it could 
 scarcely have been by any honest means. Acting 
 on a sudden impulse, Enid suggested his turning 
 slightly on his other side, with his face away from 
 her. This was accomplished with comparatively 
 little trouble. As soon as his head was turned 
 aside, Enid quickly plunged her hand into the 
 pocket and drew out a handful of jewelry of 
 varying value. Among them was a little college 
 pin of garnets and pearls a white "H" upon a 
 deep red flag. She had one exactly like it, given
 
 ENID'S PATIENT 169 
 
 her by Jack Radnor, and she knew that Ralph 
 Denby had given Alice one. 
 
 Suddenly she knew that this man was some one 
 who might some day be very much wanted by a 
 great many persons. And yet she must stay here 
 and nurse him instead of giving him up to justice. 
 Before she had time, however, to feel more than 
 the beginnings of dismay at this situation, all re- 
 sponsibility was taken out of her hands by the 
 man turning on her with an unexpected, cat-like 
 twist, and catching her in the very act of exam- 
 ining his loot! 
 
 The quick rage that lighted his eyes made the 
 girl retreat from the couch. She had never be- 
 lieved a human countenance could be capable of 
 so much vengeful malevolence. 
 
 "So!" snarled the man, breathing hard and 
 painfully. "You'd rob a chap that's sick and not 
 able to take care of himself! You're a pretty 
 one, you are! But you'll not get off so easy 
 you " 
 
 He struggled to get off the couch. 
 
 "Oh, don't!" cried Enid in real distress, her 
 new-born excitement in the role of amateur de-
 
 170 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 tective lost In the purely humane desire to keep htm 
 from hurting himself. "You mustn't! You'll 
 start your wound bleeding again 1 I only hap- 
 pened to see the things " 
 
 "You lie! You're a rotten spy!" croaked the 
 man venomously. "They left you here to spy on 
 me and rob me ! But I won't stand for it d'you 
 hear? I won't " 
 
 Tottering weakly, he did actually manage to 
 stagger to his feet and with his face the more 
 terrifying because of its ghastliness started toward 
 her. A deep red streak widened on his dirty 
 shirt sleeve with every movement that he made. 
 
 Beseeching him to be quiet, to lie down, Enid 
 backed away from him, wondering what in the 
 world she ought to do. Again the decision was 
 taken out of her hands by the Chance that seemed 
 to rule this strange night. 
 
 The quiet darkness outside suddenly became 
 populous and violent. Down the clear long 
 stretch from the Ridge Trail horses were plunging 
 at a dangerous pace. The ring of shots in the 
 distance was caught by the granite crags about 
 and multiplied in very tantalizing echoes. Men's
 
 ENID'S PATIENT 171 
 
 voices came stridently nearer and there was the 
 crunch of gravel under slurring hoofs, and the 
 unmistakable creak of leather. A horse snorted 
 and sneezed, pulled up abruptly and the rough 
 voices lowered to tense urgency. . . . 
 
 The door opened quickly and vehemently to 
 admit the Toll-gate Keeper himself. With him 
 was Martin Hale and behind them a knot of the 
 hill outlaws. 
 
 The situation, hastily, not to say sketchily, ex- 
 plained by old Mason, was this: 
 
 The men of the hills, realizing that Martin 
 Hale had not meant to betray them, had suddenly 
 turned in his favor. When Heaton's posse had 
 appeared it had only been a minute before these 
 rough but sincere mountaineers had rallied around 
 their old comrade and contrived one of those 
 elusive and baffling get-aways with him that are 
 forever exasperating even to the most experienced 
 minions of law and order. Somewhere from 
 under old Heaton's eyes they had abstracted the 
 prisoner and with him had melted away among 
 the rough undergrowth that fringed the Ridge. 
 At the plateau before the Toll-gate House they
 
 172 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 had met with Mason who was now about to help 
 Hale to safety. Seeing Malone, he gave a sharp 
 ejaculation and said: "He must be looked to, 
 as well, boys! Lord knows / didn't want to be 
 mixed up in these doings any longer, but Mart's 
 innocent and has to get off and we can't leave 
 Malone for them to pick up at their convenience." 
 
 "What'll you do send 'em by the Other 
 Way?" demanded one of the mountaineers. 
 
 Mason nodded. 
 
 "I reckon," he said. "Anyhow, you can leave 
 the two of 'em here all right. They'll not be 
 taken, I'll bet ye!" 
 
 "That's good enough," said the man who had 
 spoken before. "Good-night, partner." 
 
 A low mutter of "good-nights" rumbled through 
 the darkness a darkness which Enid thought was 
 beginning almost imperceptibly to lighten to a 
 faint and ghostly gray. A moment later the Toll- 
 gate Keeper closed the door and turned to her. 
 
 "Well," he said, kindly enough, "are you game, 
 young lady? Your mother was." 
 
 "Do you know my mother?" asked Enid, sur- 
 prised.
 
 ENID'S PATIENT 173 
 
 The old man nodded. 
 
 "Maybe I do and maybe I don't. I think so. 
 Anyhow, we've no time for all that now. We've 
 got to send these chaps the Other Way." 
 
 "And what," asked Enid, utterly mystified, "is 
 the Other Way? It sounds creepy, somehow, 
 though I don't know why." 
 
 The Toll-keeper laughed. 
 
 "The Other Way," he explained, "is simply a 
 way of saying the way that other folks don't 
 know of, not the regular way, not the known 
 way, not the above-ground way. Don't look so 
 puzzled, child. You'll see in a moment what I 
 mean." 
 
 Hale helped him to move a chair and a rug 
 away from a certain spot in the floor. The board- 
 ing underneath showed on close scrutiny a defi- 
 nitely square outline. Almost at once Enid saw 
 what it must be : a trapdoor of some sort leading 
 where? 
 
 "The Other Way," proceeded Richard Mason, 
 kneeling to insert a stubby knife blade in a crack, 
 as a prier, "is the way through the underground 
 caves of these mountains of ours. We use it very
 
 174 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 seldom, but it is a safe, secret country in emer- 
 gencies and this is the door of it!" 
 
 He bent farther over and, fascinated, Enid's 
 eyes followed the deft movement of his hand.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 THE OTHER WAY 
 
 So I'm aff and away to the muirs, . . . 
 Ranging far frae frowning faces, and the douce folk here; 
 Crawling up through burn and bracken, louping down the screes, 
 Looking out frae crag and headland, drinking up the simmer 
 breeze. 
 
 Oh, to hear the eagle screaming, sweeping, ringing round the 
 
 sky 
 That's a bonnier life than stumbling ower the muck to colt and 
 
 kye. 
 
 CHARLES KINGSLEY. 
 
 LOWLY the solid oak lid of the door moved 
 upward : for a breathless moment Enid gazed 
 into a hot darkness that thrilled her with myste- 
 rious potentialities. So the Toll-gate House was 
 built like this, on a veritable volcano, or what 
 seemed actually worse than a volcano a space, 
 an abyss of undreamed of depth and reach,
 
 176 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 warmed and freshened by strange underworld 
 airs that faintly murmured, or so she fancied, 
 like captive winds. Already Hale was carrying 
 the wounded man across the room. It was a pain- 
 ful business, for he was fretful with pain half 
 delirious indeed and Martin was forced to pause 
 more than once to ease the tortured shoulder and 
 wipe the cold sweat from his drawn face. And 
 before the black gap in the floor could be reached 
 they all started and listened with strained at- 
 tention. For they were coming the men of the 
 law. The voices of men and the scrambling 
 tread of pressed horses drew always closer. 
 There was no time for escape now. Noiselessly, 
 with a frowning look, Richard Mason lowered the 
 trapdoor. Hale, holding his burden, hesitated 
 and Enid pulled the couch quickly forward. 
 
 "Lay him here!" she said. Hale did so; the 
 couch was sufficiently close to the trapdoor to 
 hide it from the casual observer. There had been 
 no time to replace the rag rug. It was Enid, too, 
 who, even as heavy footballs sounded at the door 
 of the Toll-gate House, seized the cloth on the 
 center table. Mason, quicker-witted than Hale,
 
 THE OTHER WAY 177 
 
 raised the lamp enough to let her pull the cover- 
 ing off. She flung it over Malone, whispering 
 "Don't move, as you value your life!" 
 
 Then she pushed Martin down back of the 
 couch, so that he crouched close to the edge of 
 the trapdoor. Mason saw her idea. 
 
 "We'll do it yet!" he muttered exultantly, and 
 then called aloud: "Coming, coming! What's 
 all the row about?" 
 
 As he hurried to the door he could not suppress 
 a chuckle as he caught a glimpse of Enid calmly 
 settling herself upon the couch, leaning back 
 against the covered form of Malone as non- 
 chalantly as though his bumpy little person were 
 a pile of sofa cushions. 
 
 The opening door admitted Jack, carrying 
 Polly, Ralph Denby and Heaton. The rest of the 
 Sheriff's men waited outside pushing as close to 
 the door as possible in order to miss nothing. 
 Even in these wild hills a night like this was some- 
 thing a bit out of the ordinary. 
 
 It was a question as to which face, Jack's or 
 Enid's, was the greater study at that moment, 
 his when he saw her languidly lounging there, ap-
 
 178 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 parently quite indifferent to the turbid happen- 
 ings of the night, or hers when she stared at him 
 carrying Polly Mason in his arms. 
 
 However, there was no time for personalities 
 of any sort, as the business of the moment was the 
 apprehension of Martin Hale. Mason, with a 
 coolness which the Sheriff's men found disconcert- 
 ing, told them to search the place. Enid, as they 
 proceeded to do so, stretched herself even more 
 lazily and comfortably against the curiously 
 padded back-rest of her couch. And as two of 
 the posse passed into one inner room to search, 
 one into another, and a fourth went to peer 
 through the back door, Enid's eyes caught those 
 of the Toll-keeper in a swift illuminating flash. 
 Jack Radnor saw that look and stood rooted to 
 the floor, for it was as though he saw Enid for 
 the first time. That alert, alive, significant ex- 
 pression that could not belong to his conventional 
 little fiancee. He had no time for wonder, how- 
 ever. Almost as soon as that lightning glance 
 had passed between them, old Mason had clumsily 
 stumbled against the heavy center table. Down 
 it went, lamp and all, and after a crazy flash and
 
 THE OTHER WAY 179 
 
 a great deal of evil smell, the Toll-gate House 
 was in complete darkness. So many sounds were 
 audible, or seemed to be audible, in that dark- 
 ness, that it was hard to say what one heard and 
 what one did not. There seemed to be faint 
 groans, sundry creakings, as from rusty hinges 
 or the like, and a faint, dull bang, then a scuf- 
 fling, shuffling sound, and then some one found 
 a match and struck it. Its fitful flare showed 
 Enid standing erect, with some heavy drapery in 
 her hands. A tardily discovered candle disclosed 
 the same thing, only revealing further that she 
 was crying hysterically with her face buried in the 
 folds of what she held. It appeared to be the 
 cover which had been upon the couch. 
 
 Jack, stirred instantly at sight of her over- 
 wrought condition, took a quick step forward to- 
 ward her, but she turned from him and sank in 
 a heap on the floor not far from the couch. As 
 she crouched there she listened eagerly for the 
 sounds that would tell her that Martin Hale 
 and Malone were escaping on the Other Way. 
 For, naturally, they had taken the opportunity that 
 Mason had given them by overturning the lamp.
 
 i8o MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 And, of course, Jack Radnor had to choose that 
 moment to say : 
 
 "Enid, is there anything I can do for you?" 
 She turned on him in an irritation that posi- 
 tively made her tremble. For the h'rst time in her 
 proper little life she let herself go: 
 
 "Yes!" she cried vehemently, "Go to the devil!" 
 Radnor stared blankly at her and walked 
 out. 
 
 Heaton and his men scattered to hunt for the 
 fugitive Hale, and Mason bent over his daughter, 
 petting her and making much of the hurt ankle. 
 Enid hid her face and did not lift it again until 
 Radnor came in again with the formal announce- 
 ment that the horses were ready. 
 
 This time when he asked her if she wanted to 
 go home Enid agreed without demur. If there 
 was a certain distant atmosphere about her, her 
 fiance did not seem to notice it. He mounted her 
 carefully and impersonally and they set out in the 
 red of an unseasonably hot and fiery sunrise! 
 Something in the air was close and oppressive, and 
 though the winds were still, anyone who knew 
 the mountains would have had a presentiment of
 
 THE OTHER WAY 181 
 
 impending evil weather. Not for nothing and 
 for no reason do these sultry lurid dawns come 
 thundering in the late summer. Inevitably they 
 are sinister heralds, flinging their blood-red ban- 
 ners across a cowed world, announcing the de- 
 vastation and storm that follow, hungrily, in their 
 wake. 
 
 Old Mason stood at the door of the Toll-gate 
 House and watched them go. 
 
 "She's like her mother," he said, half-aloud. 
 "More spirited, outwardly, but I wonder 
 whether she has half the spirit within her?" 
 
 Then he went in to his daughter. Polly was 
 crying a little and nursing her wrenched foot. 
 She had not done anything wrong, but she felt 
 vaguely ashamed, and, at the same time, sorry 
 for herself. 
 
 "Oh, Dad," she moaned, softly into the Toll- 
 keeper's sympathetic shoulder, "there seems to be 
 an awful lot more things we-all girls have to worry 
 about than you-all men!" 
 
 " May seem so, honey," he comforted her, "but 
 I reckon men and women are mighty like each
 
 1 82 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 other, take it all in all. Now I'll make you some 
 coffee, little girl!" 
 
 Down the trail rode Radnor and Enid, silent in 
 that still red dawning. Already the air was hot; 
 a haze lay over the Valley. 
 
 "Your friend, Miss Baker, is down there," Jack 
 remarked casually. 
 
 Enid's tired body straightened in her saddle as 
 if galvanized. 
 
 "Jack Radnor, what are you talking about? 
 Alice isn't within miles of Warm Sulphur 
 Springs." 
 
 "She wasn't, but she is now," interrupted Rad- 
 nor, as patiently as he could. Enid's attitude had 
 not been a comfortable one with which to asso- 
 ciate, and as for being tired well, the dear Lord 
 knew he was tired himself. He didn't waste 
 words this morning. 
 
 However, as Enid pressed the matter, her 
 feminine curiosity utterly vanquishing her fatigue, 
 he gave her in a somewhat cut-and-dried style an 
 account of the events of the night in the Valley. 
 
 Enid listened, utterly absorbed, and when he 
 had finished his narrative of the hold-up of the
 
 THE OTHER WAY 183 
 
 Millionaire's Local she drew a deep excited 
 breath. 
 
 "And to think I've got those things of Alice's !" 
 
 It was Jack's turn to stare. "How came you to 
 have them?" he was beginning, but Enid hurried 
 on. 
 
 "Well, I have! Right here, only look!" She 
 spread out some small bright objects in her bare 
 pink palm and they gleamed in the rose-red 
 sunrise light. "There's her Harvard pin just 
 like mine, and " 
 
 "By the Lord Harry!" laughed Jack, heartily. 
 "You've double-crossed our friend the bandit this 
 time!" 
 
 "How double-crossed him? You didn't tell me 
 he was a bandit if you mean the man you left 
 me to take care of do you?" 
 
 "You bet I do! And you've gotten his loot, 
 without even knowing what you were doing! 
 Aren't you proud of yourself?" 
 
 "For what?" she wanted to know. 
 
 "For regaining valuables from a desperate out- 
 law, who had succeeded in holding up the " 
 
 "Stuff and nonsense!" said Enid, disdainfully,
 
 1 84 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "I'm only glad I got this stuff because, if Alice is 
 here, she'll want to wear some of it at the Powder 
 Dance to-night." 
 
 Jack stared at her. Powder Dance ! How had 
 she contrived to remember such a thing, here at 
 dawn, among the everlasting hills? Her hair 
 glowed like a nimbus around her small ivory-pale 
 face. She looked exalted, exquisite, yet, she was 
 already considering the Powder Dance in the 
 Valley that night! 
 
 Girls were queer things and no mistake !
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 NOON IN THE VALLEY 
 
 She frowns no goddess, and she moves no queen, 
 
 The softer charm that in her manner lies 
 
 Is framed to captivate, yet not surprise; 
 
 It justly suits the expression of her face. ... 
 
 SHERIDAN. 
 
 CTORM brooded over the Valley all that day, 
 but it was storm couchant, in abeyance, wait- 
 ing craftily and sullenly behind the thick golden 
 haze which scarcely stirred from hour to hour, so 
 seldom did a wind arise. At the Warm Sulphur 
 Springs, the atmosphere was quite as usual. 
 People who came to the Springs were accustomed 
 to having their own way, irrespective of weather or 
 seasons; a consistent artificiality even in the 
 normal matters of life had made them impervious 
 to those conditions which affect more elementary 
 
 185
 
 1 86 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 beings. When they came to the mountains it was 
 for certain definite and defined purposes, and 
 nothing could stand in their way. If it rained, 
 they played bridge instead of golf; that was all 
 the difference it made. They did not even deign 
 to complain; it would have been a confession of 
 mere mortal weakness to have admitted that a 
 beneficent not to say partial God had by any chance 
 made them uncomfortable. 
 
 So, in spite of the sultriness and the falling 
 barometer, half-past eleven in the morning saw 
 the place in full swing. The real patients, rheu- 
 matic and gouty cripples on crutches and in 
 chairs, made their way to the Bath House. Those 
 jaded men and fagged women who were paying 
 the price of too much pleasure, or too much work, 
 or too much society, or too much gormandising, 
 or too much ambition, or too much of the vari- 
 ously expensive pursuits of life, were straggling 
 out to play such games as they dared to play 
 without creating too inconvenient an appetite for 
 food and drink. 
 
 The band was playing in the pagoda-shaped 
 bandstand overlooking the tennis courts. It was
 
 NOON IN THE VALLEY 187 
 
 pre-eminently the voice of the place, that band, 
 eloquently expressive of its energetic, yet care- 
 free and luxurious life, a life given up solely to 
 having the best possible time compatible with tak- 
 ing a cure. The same wise instinct which made 
 Ned Sperry confine his afternoon tea music to 
 violins and 'cellos, caused him to prescribe brass 
 in large doses in the middle of the day. 
 
 The members of the hotel orchestra were domi- 
 ciled in a tumbledown old house on the outskirts 
 of the golf-links, where their practice could not 
 disturb the guests, and it was generally believed 
 that Sperry made august visitations in the dead 
 of night with menus, one means programs, of 
 course, for each day. It is possible enough, for 
 like all geniuses, no detail was too trifling to 
 command his attention. At any rate the Warm 
 Springs Band was getting a deserved reputation. 
 He had contrived to put the Virginia sunshine 
 into the clarionets and trombones, even as he 
 put the colored electric lights into the soft and 
 often muted strings. 
 
 Usually melodies rang out blithely, seeming to 
 come dancing down the fresh winds that blew
 
 1 88 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 robustly from the northern end of the Valley. 
 But to-day the very blithest melodies selected by 
 Sperry and approved by his leader, or vice-versa, 
 seemed to fall with a heavier cadence than they 
 should have. 
 
 "There's something wrong with the air!" said 
 one of the musicians, a bit disconsolately. He 
 was artistic and a sensitive soul. 
 
 But the Springs resorters were for the most 
 part not sensitive. Already the whole place, sur- 
 faced with rolling lawns that looked like bright 
 green plush, was dotted with men in white flannel 
 and ducks and women in rainbow gowns. 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe was sitting with Judge Denby 
 near the tennis court where their two children, 
 with Alice Baker and Jack Radnor, were playing 
 tennis. Mrs. Forsythe looked a shade tired, 
 for she had been in a fever of nervousness until 
 Enid reached the hotel safely at sunrise, but she 
 was as charming as usual, in an exquisitely simple 
 two-hundred dollar embroidered muslin frock, of 
 a subtle lavender which was close enough to rose 
 color to bring out the delicate flush of her smooth 
 cheeks.
 
 NOON IN THE VALLEY 189 
 
 "Look at that child of mine, if you please!" 
 she exclaimed in humorous despair. "She came 
 home at daybreak this morning, and she is playing 
 tennis as enthusiastically as though she had had 
 nine hours of sleep!" 
 
 "And every one of the nine a beauty sleep!" 
 supplemented Judge Denby. "She really is the 
 most radiantly pretty thing that I have seen in 
 many a day!" 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe smiled fondly at the vivid little 
 figure as it sped across the court with the swift- 
 ness and grace of a wheeling bird. 
 
 Enid was dressed in white and scarlet, and 
 had thrown her hat aside as usual. The sun 
 burned her hair to flame; her face was flushed and 
 eager. 
 
 She was playing with Ralph Denby against Alice 
 Baker and Jack. This assorting of partners was 
 entirely her doing. She laughingly insisted that 
 Alice and Ralph were no good when they played 
 together, but it was really because she did not 
 want Jack for a partner, a fact of which he was 
 perfectly well aware. He felt decidedly angry 
 with her, and his mood made him, if anything,
 
 1 90 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 somewhat handsomer than usual, putting an added 
 touch of color in his brown cheek, and an un- 
 wonted sparkle in his dark eyes. 
 
 "What a decorative thing he is!'* Alice had 
 murmured in Enid's ear when they had come down 
 to join the young men an hour earlier. 
 
 To which Enid had retorted, with marked 
 acidity : 
 
 "Useless articles have to have some excuse for 
 being made !" 
 
 " 'A thing of beauty is a joy forever!' " Alice 
 had reminded her. "You unappreciative little 
 savage ! A perfectly good objet d'art is being 
 wasted on you!" 
 
 Alice herself was looking very handsome in- 
 deed; but, though she was neither awkward nor 
 heavily built, she looked both when compared to 
 Enid. Jack Radnor found some perverse and 
 grudging satisfaction in looking at Enid across 
 the net. She might be hard and obstinate and 
 wilful and numberless other unpleasant things, 
 but she was adorable. 
 
 A ball bounded across the court and along the 
 lawn.
 
 NOON IN THE VALLEY 191 
 
 Judge Denby sprang up almost as alertly as his 
 son might have done, and tossed it back with an 
 easy pitch. Mrs. Forsythe, watching him, thought 
 him as handsome in his own way as either of the 
 young fellows on the court. 
 
 "I think," she said to him, smiling, when he 
 had returned to her side, "that you are as im- 
 pertinently fresh and energetic as Enid! No, I 
 truly believe you are worse ! What do you mean 
 by looking like that when, as I know perfectly 
 well, you have been up practically all night, wait- 
 ing for Ralph? 'Do you think at your age it's 
 quite right?' " 
 
 The Judge laughed, a round and mellow 
 laugh. 
 
 "It is because of a clear conscience and a beauti- 
 ful disposition!" he confided. "There is nothing 
 like them to keep one feeling and looking young! 
 As you must know!" he added, with the old- 
 fashioned, flattering intonation which always 
 pleased Mrs. Forsythe. 
 
 "I do not believe," he went on meaningly, "in 
 encouraging the shameless feminine sport of fish- 
 ing, but "
 
 192 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 He paused with one of his merry eloquent looks. 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe laughed. 
 
 "Augustine is a very remarkable maid I" she 
 said demurely. 
 
 "Is she wholly responsible?" 
 
 "Wholly! I tell you, she is truly remarkable." 
 
 "She is beyond price!" said the Judge with 
 solemn emphasis. 
 
 Judge Denby's little compliments and gallan- 
 tries, his air of deference and admiration, always 
 made Mrs. Forsythe feel more interested in life 
 than usual. Under his flattering glance, she 
 blushed very slightly, her womanly vanity rather 
 pleasantly and innocently aroused. 
 
 Ultra-modern and mondaine as she was, she still 
 loved the pretty exaggerations and formalities of 
 an older day. Many women of the world acquire, 
 with years, this taste for the ruffles and snuff-box 
 period. For that was pre-eminently the golden 
 era for men and women of middle age or past. 
 The grandiloquent, stilted, charming times, for- 
 ever associated in our minds with spinets and 
 pot-pourri and flowery and long-winded talk, were 
 times when maturity reigned supreme. Youth ran
 
 NOON IN THE VALLEY 193 
 
 through it, chattering, kissing, laughing, fight- 
 ing, sobbing, for youth is pretty much the same 
 at all dates and in all latitudes. But that was not 
 an age in which youth was at all dominant. Young 
 things, with their violent tragedies and even more 
 violent romances, were out of key with the tune 
 that went with sweeping curtsies and high-heeled 
 shoes. Middle age, with its sober and delicate 
 comedies, its enchanting restraints and equally en- 
 chanting absurdities, flourished in whimsical aus- 
 terity in those lost years wherein living was an 
 artistic achievement and not an emotional neces- 
 sity. 
 
 It was, one must remember, a time of High 
 Comedy, and in rose-white youth there is not, 
 and never has been, even a breath of Comedy! 
 
 As they sat there, Judge Denby yielded to an 
 impulse such as comes in moments of enervation 
 even to the strongest and the most self-sufficient 
 of natures. 
 
 "Did you ever know," he said, "of the trouble 
 between Dick and myself?" 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe started. 
 
 "Dick!" she repeated. And then she said, in
 
 194 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 an odd tone: "What made you think of Dick 
 just now?" 
 
 "I hardly know," the Judge answered her ab- 
 stractedly. "I was thinking of you as you used to 
 be, you had a look just a moment ago that I 
 have often seen on your face when you were a 
 girl. And when I think of you as a girl, I al- 
 ways, somehow, think of Dick, too." 
 
 As he said it, he realized with a faint shock, 
 how true it was. She and Dick had been almost 
 inseparable when they were all young things to- 
 gether years ago. The recollection made him feel 
 curiously lonely. . . . 
 
 He hurried on : 
 
 "When Dick dropped out it was my fault. 
 I " he paused and his face hardened oddly, 
 "I was not honest. I let him suffer when I could 
 have saved him. No; I was not honest." 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe could hardly believe her ears. 
 But as she looked at him, amazed, she saw that 
 he looked suddenly old. 
 
 "Why did you speak of it now?" she whispered, 
 with a shiver, in spite of the sultriness of the 
 day.
 
 NOON IN THE VALLEY 195 
 
 "I don't know," said Judge Denby. "I seem 
 to feel Dick closer to me than ever before, 
 than ever before! . . . Ah! They have finished 
 the set ! Well, children, and which side has won?"
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 AT TWILIGHT 
 
 . . . We catch love, 
 And other fevers, in the vulgar way: 
 Love will not be outwitted by our wit, 
 Nor outrun by our equipages. 
 
 E. B. BROWNING. 
 
 FORSYTHE and Alice Baker were ex- 
 changing twilight confidences. It was late 
 on the same afternoon, the afternoon of the 
 Cotillon Poudre, the Powder Dance in regard to 
 which Enid had been so concerned. Alice had 
 come to Enid's room ostensibly to help her curl, 
 dress and powder her hair for the dance, but in 
 reality to "have a comfortable talk." Every 
 woman knows what that means. 
 
 The girls had not seen each other for some 
 time, and in spite of certain reserves and surface 
 
 196
 
 AT TWILIGHT 197 
 
 subterfuges inevitable between girls of their train- 
 ing and environment, they were genuinely fond 
 of each other and wanted the shy luxury of con- 
 fessing, discovering and generally discussing their 
 respective heart-dramas. 
 
 It was not yet quite dark. The sunset light 
 was sifting in through the closed curtains com- 
 bining with the colored glow within. The maid 
 would have closed the heavier draperies, shutting 
 out the gloaming, but Enid stopped her. Through 
 the two squares that made the windows one could 
 still see the big mountain range, undulating black 
 against the sky. And the sky was tinged with 
 that magical afterglow which only the eastern 
 heavens may know in perfection. The mood of 
 the hour stole into the room and affected the two 
 girls. 
 
 Enid, enveloped in a great gold-embroidered 
 kimono, sat on the foot of the chaise longue. 
 Alice, in vivid green, wandered restlessly about. 
 
 They made a charming picture in their con- 
 trasting good looks. Enid so delicately fair and 
 golden, so young and so deceptively fragile in ap- 
 pearance; Alice so dark, and little and vivacious.
 
 198 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 The electric lights in Enid's room had all been 
 softened by rose-colored shades and the chaise 
 longue was heaped with mauve cushions. The 
 maid at the dressing-table went about her business 
 of arranging exquisite things until Enid stopped 
 her, gently enough, and asked her to make tea, 
 her own particular brand, not the sort that one 
 could order by telephone, from the hotel office. 
 
 "Mais, parfaitement, Mademoiselle," agreed 
 Augustine, and, unseeing, the brush she had 
 thought to put upon the dressing-table, slid to the 
 floor. Alice, lolling back in a low wicker chair, 
 picked it up. It was, apparently, of delicately 
 carved gold. 
 
 "My word!" said Alice. Enid looked up ab- 
 stracted, and then laughed. 
 
 "Oh, surely! That is nice, isn't it? I had a 
 fit once and decided to have all my ugly silver 
 things 'dipped.' That's one of the results. 
 Gorgeous, isn't it? Of course, it's only plate." 
 
 "It looks like Benvenuto Cellini!" declared 
 Alice. 
 
 "That was the intention. I always like those 
 queer Italian curlycue things " Suddenly she
 
 AT TWILIGHT 199 
 
 broke off. Alice was looking straight at her and 
 Enid was truly an honest little soul. "Oh, Alice," 
 she burst out, "I feel all at odds and ends! I 
 don't know what's the matter with me, but I'm 
 on edge, and uncomfortable and I wish I were 
 dead!" 
 
 She suddenly began to cry though she had not 
 shed a tear before. Alice scowled at her a mo- 
 ment in worried tenderness and then got up, 
 stalked over to the chaise longue, and gathered 
 her consolingly up in her strong arms. Alice went 
 in for athletics and could play the Amazonian 
 type very well. 
 
 There was no playing about this, however; 
 Alice really loved Enid and she could see that 
 Enid was dreadfully and unaccountably upset. 
 Anybody, almost, could see, and Alice was de- 
 cidedly better than "anybody." 
 
 "Honey," she said coaxingly, as she cuddled 
 Enid. "What's the matter with Jack Radnor?" 
 
 It sounds vulgar and slangy; but it was the 
 earnest expression of Alice's highly affectionate 
 heart. Enid hid her face against her friend's 
 shoulder, and began to cry.
 
 200 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 It all came out then with a rush the story of 
 the mountain top and the midnight madness that 
 had thrilled, yet revolted her. As she told Alice 
 about it, it all seemed clearer and less jumbled 
 than it had in her own disturbed memory. Not 
 only could she see with a deeper flush of shame 
 her own incredible weakness where Martin Hale 
 had been concerned, but she could see with an 
 even more troubled perception what he still might 
 mean to her. She knew for the first time the 
 ageless spell which we call sex and which may 
 be dissociated from sense and sentiment alike. 
 She spoke of the mountain man with a so r t 
 of awe; it was he who had opened up to her 
 this new and perilous complication in a com- 
 plicated life. Yet she knew she did not love 
 him. 
 
 "He was extraordinary!" said Enid, in a 
 secret sort of voice. 
 
 Alice nodded. She understood. Because she 
 understood, she spoke, as it were casually, playing 
 about among costly trifles that lay upon the table 
 close at hand. 
 
 "I know. Funny how a new thing strikes you,
 
 AT TWILIGHT 201 
 
 all at once, as it were! And after all it isn't 
 a new thing at all!" 
 
 Enid leaped at that, the light from the shaded 
 electric lamps so thrown that her golden eyes 
 glowed and her soft face was idealized by a mist 
 of romance. 
 
 "That's just it!" she proclaimed, almost ex- 
 citedly. "He was extraordinary. And yet as 
 you say it wasn't a new thing at all ! It's turned 
 my whole life upside down, and I don't know 
 where I am, no, I don't know even what I am!" 
 
 Alice scowled, patted and smiled. She was sane 
 and human. Her normal impulses and judgment 
 had never been submitted to quite the atrophying 
 process Enid had known. But she had a quaint 
 good sense all her own. It had made her the 
 outspoken lovable creature she was, a girl of 
 the world, who could make allowances for the 
 freaks of the world and those of inherent human 
 nature as well. Out of the wisdom of her twenty 
 comfortable years, she spoke and Enid cuddled 
 closer to her, finding a certain comfort in the very 
 notes of her warm unhurried Southern utterance. 
 
 "Say, honey," said Alice Baker, after a thought-
 
 202 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 ful silence. "I reckon I've often seemed a weird 
 sort of animal to you-all you being brought up 
 North and all that and I'll admit that there's a 
 whole lot that we old-time Southerners take for 
 granted that we find a heap oftener in Northerners 
 than in our own folks. But there's one thing 
 Southern girls do get a line on early" Enid loved 
 her mixed idiom "and that's men, honey lamb. 
 Maybe it's sort of undignified calling 'em 'things,' 
 but anyhow you know what I mean. Since I was 
 a youngster, I knew men were all just youngsters, 
 too, and that the women that knew it were the 
 women who'd win out ! Say, darling, am I getting 
 on your nerves, chattering and gibbering like this?" 
 
 "Rather not!" Enid was reduced to a candid 
 procedure which she liked while it embarrassed 
 her. 
 
 With a sort of triumphant rush of outwelling 
 honesty she flung her gauntlet down before Alice. 
 
 "I nearly ran away with him! I'm not a bit 
 sure that I wouldn't feel the same way again if 
 things happened to work out like that. Stop 
 looking at me like that! I'm just telling you the 
 truth. I've always wanted something that I
 
 AT TWILIGHT 203 
 
 couldn't get. I don't know what it is exactly, but 
 I know Martin Hale can give it to me, and I 
 know I'd rather have it from Jack than Heaven! 
 from any one else. Only I can't. Jack would 
 think it all quite horrid. And I dare say it 
 is." 
 
 "Men are queer!" ruminated Alice Baker, as 
 she picked up Enid's forgotten cream-lace cap and 
 put it on the table. "They butt in on other chaps' 
 preserves, gunning for game that they could get 
 on their home estate! And I don't reckon that 
 we girls are a bit better. We never know when 
 we're well off, and we're always looking for 
 trouble, even when by a queer chance trouble 
 isn't looking for us!" 
 
 The world detests violent interruptions, and yet 
 the world would very quickly go to seed without 
 them. 
 
 So it happens quite naturally and rationally that 
 Enid's maid should put in her appearance at about 
 this point with: 
 
 "The young lady says she must see you, Miss. 
 I tried to put her off, but " Enid rose nervously. 
 
 "Of course!" she said.
 
 204 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Already she knew who was to face her. Some- 
 thing deeper than apprehension shook her. 
 
 "Show her in," she said. 
 
 Polly Mason, pale and lovely, stood in the 
 doorway.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 PREPARATIONS 
 
 Thou who with hermit heart 
 
 Disdains the wealth of art, 
 And gauds and pageant weeds, and trailing pall, 
 
 But comes't a decent maid, 
 
 In Attic robe arrayed, 
 O chaste, unboastf ul nymph, to thee I call ! 
 
 WILLIAM COLLINS. 
 
 OOLLY had evidently screwed her courage to 
 the sticking point. There was something 
 almost pathetic in the bravado with which she 
 came forward. Almost at once Enid knew there 
 would be a pretext a subterfuge. It came 
 sooner than could have been expected. Miss 
 Mason drew something from the pocket of her 
 loose coat. 
 
 "Your glove," she said. Enid had a sensitive 
 instinct to accept the silly explanation. She put 
 forth a hand courteously. But Alice laughed out- 
 
 205
 
 206 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 right. And something artificial in the situation 
 was blown away by her clean rush of honest 
 laughter. 
 
 "Will you please forgive me," she said, in those 
 same warm tones so hard to resent, "but did you 
 come all this way to give Miss Forsythe that 
 glove?" 
 
 Polly turned on her. They were almost of a 
 height and size, and far more nearly of the same 
 temperament than Enid. 
 
 "Of course, I didn't 1" she flashed. "Do I look 
 like a fool?" 
 
 Again Alice Baker laughed this time delight- 
 edly. 
 
 "You bet you don't," she retorted, with char- 
 acteristic slanginess. "You look stunning!" 
 
 Polly had never looked so lovely. A rough 
 dark cloak was about her and above it her face 
 was exquisite, tragic and beautiful in its appeal. 
 With a simple dignity that recognized and met the 
 situation she went toward Enid. 
 
 "Martin Hale is in danger," she said quietly, 
 but with just a catch between her words now and 
 then. "It was partly that that brought me. But,"
 
 PREPARATIONS 207 
 
 she looked from Enid to Alice with great appeal- 
 ing eyes, "I don't reckon he's in much danger 
 now. It was something else." 
 
 Neither answered, knowing that she would go 
 on. She did, breathlessly. 
 
 "All my life I've wanted the things that you- 
 all are born to. I've wanted fine clothes and I 
 can wear 'em, too! I've wanted a place a great 
 bright place to be glad in. I " She stumbled 
 over the words. "I want to go to that ball to- 
 night, if I die to-morrow." 
 
 No one stirred for a moment and the mountain 
 girl clasped her hands tensely. 
 
 "I know," she said restlessly, "that I sound 
 wild, but Oh, you don't know you can't know 
 how I've wanted how I've dreamed of something 
 like that ! I know I belong to another world from 
 you-all " 
 
 She hesitated, looking from one to the other of 
 them piteously. Enid could not answer, did not 
 know how to. It was Alice who put in swiftly 
 and with honest force: 
 
 "I should rather say you did belong to another 
 world a much nicer one than ours, my dear girl !"
 
 208 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Enid hesitated, half-puzzled, but Alice Baker 
 made a quick movement forward, and flung her 
 arms around Polly. 
 
 "Don't you see," cried Alice, "she must have 
 her chance! She must go to the ball!" 
 
 Polly's eyes were like big dark stars. 
 
 "You do understand!" she gasped, amazed. 
 
 "Of course, we understand!" Alice Baker ex- 
 claimed and the whirlwind of her response swept 
 Enid along with it. "You're a splendid thing, 
 child, and you're going to be the 'Queen of 
 Hearts.' You were meant to be for to-night, 
 anyway. Isn't she, Enid?" 
 
 Enid nodded, deeply flushed. There was a ter- 
 rible sense of guilt on the part of both herself and 
 the mountain girl. Each had tampered with the 
 other's legitimate lover; they could hardly meet 
 each other's eyes. 
 
 "Come!" said Alice briskly. "We must dress 
 her up. My clothes will be just the thing. You're 
 built something like me, child, only infinitely 
 better!" 
 
 There was a great business getting Polly into
 
 PREPARATIONS 209 
 
 Alice Baker's things. Alice was the only one who 
 was wholly jubilant. Enid was too engrossed in 
 her own problems and Polly too terrified and 
 thrilled by the present triumphant situation to ex- 
 perience an unalloyed joy. But Alice was minded 
 to take advantage of this unexpected yet for- 
 tuitous happening to steal a little extra time with 
 Ralph Denby unknown to anyone. Hence did 
 she enthusiastically deck Polly out in her own 
 raiment, executing small steps of exultation behind 
 the backs of every one except Enid's maid, who 
 was a wise soul and saw through her, yet con- 
 trived to remain discreet. 
 
 Alice's dress was of a deep rose-red which suited 
 Polly's dark loveliness quite as well as her own. 
 After she had been hurried into it the hooks 
 straining a bit, because of her fuller and more 
 natural development, the other women gaped at 
 her until she blushed. 
 
 "No rouge needed here!" proclaimed Alice. 
 "What a color ye gods!" 
 
 "But later?" suggested Enid. "You know lots 
 of us have a color at the beginning of the evening; 
 it's the excitement, but later "
 
 210 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "For her " began Miss Baker, but Polly's 
 rich tones swept in ahead of what she would have 
 said. 
 
 "For me," she said, "it will be all excitement. 
 And the color will last." 
 
 The French maid murmured something that 
 sounded like " Vous crois bien," but they were all 
 too keyed up to count their own or each other's 
 words. 
 
 "But what arc you to wear?" Polly remem- 
 bered to ask. 
 
 "Never you worry about me!" declared Miss 
 Baker with a splendid pirouette. She had, as has 
 been mentioned, her own plans. 
 
 When the maid tucked a big towel about Polly's 
 superb shoulders and started to apply cornstarch, 
 "No!" exclaimed Polly, suddenly. "I don't want 
 the powder." 
 
 "Why not?" demanded Miss Baker, in aston- 
 ishment. 
 
 "I don't know why," said the hill girl 
 rather awkwardly, "only it just doesn't go with 
 me." 
 
 Alice surveyed her critically. "You're right,"
 
 PREPARATIONS 211 
 
 she said, after a moment or two. "It doesn't. 
 My dear child, I think you're an amazing egotist. 
 You know so jolly well that you can't approve of 
 yourself." 
 
 Polly was not listening to the words, but she 
 recognized the tone as not unkindly. The crim- 
 son in her cheeks came and went and she looked 
 at herself in the glass with a shy interest in her 
 lovely eyes. 
 
 Enid was already dressed. She had accom- 
 plished it subtly, hastily. She had not powdered 
 her hair, but otherwise she was ready for conquest 
 in pale blue. The thought had come to her that 
 she would like to see Jack Radnor before Polly 
 appeared before him in that amazing and conquer- 
 ing glory. She was ashamed of the petty jeal- 
 ousy, but there it was. Having a suite of 
 several rooms, she slipped out unnoticed, while 
 the maid was dressing Polly's hair and Alice 
 was cutting bits of black court-plaster for the final 
 touches. 
 
 "There!" Enid heard Alice say, as she slipped 
 away, "this bit close to your mouth, and this 
 under one eye, and this on your neck "
 
 212 
 
 A primitive jealousy blazed in Enid as she went 
 quietly out. Her neck ! Of course, the girl's neck 
 was splendid, but 
 
 She went brazenly down the hotel corridor to 
 do what she had never done in all her well-ordered 
 life, to see a man in his rooms Radnor's quarters 
 were on the same floor, a rather pretentious 
 suite where she and her mother had had tea once 
 or twice. At this hour he would be almost sure 
 to be alone. Her heart pounded, but she stole on, 
 hushing the swish of her silken skirts. 
 
 She met nobody on her way and stopped, 
 trembling, at his parlor door. With a shaking 
 hand she tried it, she was afraid to knock and 
 in a second it was ajar. She wondered if he were 
 dressing, and if she need be afraid of his man. 
 Then she stood transfixed. For inside came 
 Ralph Denby's voice, clear and unmistakable: 
 "We'll get him to-night." Jack's followed: "I'm 
 sorry you've got it in for Hale, Ralph. I think 
 he's a decent fellow." 
 
 "He's in with the bunch. He'll go to jail if 
 Dad and 7 can do it." 
 
 Enid was a modern girl, but she had nerves
 
 PREPARATIONS 213 
 
 nerves keenly strung up to-night. She gasped 
 faintly, but, as it happened, audibly. 
 
 Before she could get away from the door it had 
 been flung open. As she confronted Jack Radnor 
 a sort of joy touched her. She loved him so, in 
 spite of her vagaries! She moved instinctively 
 toward him, and his response was as eager as she 
 could have wished. 
 
 "Enid! Was there anything you need me for? 
 Is everything all right, dear?" 
 
 If Ralph Denby and the valet had not been 
 there she might have thrown herself into his arms, 
 asked him to admire her dress, confessed her 
 jealousy of Polly, who knows what? As it was, 
 she cast wildly about in her mind for a good 
 excuse for her highly unconventional presence. 
 Then, moved partly by that discretionary and self- 
 protective impulse, and more by a sincere anxiety, 
 she cried: 
 
 "Is Martin Hale really in danger?" 
 
 Jack Radnor's face hardened to stone or 
 rather to bronze, since that was his coloring. His 
 brown eyes sharpened and chilled until all the 
 warm golden light had gone out of them. He
 
 214 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 drew away and looked at Enid as though she had 
 been something less than a stranger. 
 
 "He is most decidedly in danger," he said. 
 Then a passing glitter leaped into the brown eyes. 
 "So that is why you are here!" he said. 
 
 Sick and cold and shaking, Enid turned from 
 him blindly and fled along the corridor. To save 
 her soul from torment she could not have ex- 
 plained she could not have explained.
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 ENID : LADY ERRANT 
 
 . . . Good at need, 
 Mount thee on the wightest steed; 
 Spare not to spur, nor stint to ride, 
 
 Say that the fated hour is come. 
 
 SIR WALTER SCOTT. 
 
 ' I A HE doors in the Forsythe apartment did not 
 only connect, but all opened into the cor- 
 ridor, so Enid was able to slip back into her own 
 bedroom without being seen or heard. It was 
 in her dressing-room that the other three girls 
 were still chattering and "preparing for the 
 party." 
 
 Enid was a curious girl, very elemental at 
 heart; very correct outside. Her revulsions and 
 reactions were peculiar and were controlled by in- 
 
 215
 
 216 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 side moods and outside impressions. To-night a 
 primitive impulse had taken her down the hall- 
 way to her fiance's quarters. Flung back upon 
 itself, that primitive impulse, curdled by the bit- 
 terness of her passing experience, urged to a plan 
 of action entirely unthought of by her hereto- 
 fore. 
 
 Martin Hale was in danger! 
 
 This was the point which leaped up paramountly 
 before her mental vision. The picture of him 
 the mountain god as she had trembled before 
 him in the midnight hours on the mountain top 
 appeared before her there in her perfumed, half 
 darkened bedroom. His coming, even spiritually, 
 was incongruous, vaguely shocking. She felt 
 her face burn and did not know where to look. 
 But the fact must be faced; he was in danger. 
 
 Of course she knew that it was her duty to go 
 straight in to the girl in the other room, the girl 
 dressing up even at that moment in the rose-red 
 gown, the girl who had a right to him, and tell 
 her. But she wouldn't! 
 
 There was something in her that made her de- 
 termine to do what was to be done herself. She
 
 ENID: LADY ERRANT 217 
 
 knew the way to the Four Trail Crossing and 
 surely old Mason would be able to communicate 
 with him. There was a savage sort of exulta- 
 tion in the thought that she the "lady," sup- 
 posed to be even now resting before her conquests 
 at the Powder Ball, should win out over Polly, 
 the girl of the hills on ground where Polly and 
 riot she rightfully belonged. Enid felt suddenly 
 liberated, exhilarated. Whether Martin Hale 
 was really the man for her or not, she was about 
 to embark upon an enterprise which conventional 
 girls did not as a rule consider. She was not 
 going to any Cotillon Poudre; she was going alone 
 into the mountain fastnesses at night, to try to 
 save a man's life or at least his freedom. The 
 fierce, adventurous spirit in her gloried that no 
 one was going to know her mission. She was 
 going unaided, unadvised. But she was going! 
 
 She walked casually into the dressing-room. 
 She could only reach her riding clothes by cross- 
 ing it. 
 
 "What's the matter?" said Alice Baker, turn- 
 ing, and staring at her friend's white little face. 
 "You look as though you had seen a ghost."
 
 2i 8 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "How do you know I haven't?" asked Enid, 
 a trifle hardly. She was in the mood when one 
 must be either hard or emotional. She preferred 
 the former. 
 
 "Because," said Alice, "ghosts have aristocratic 
 tastes and don't patronize hotels." 
 
 "I suppose," said Enid, with a desperate sense 
 of protecting herself, "that ghosts are like other 
 creatures and go where they can find the best 
 hunting." 
 
 "Enid!" exclaimed Alice, staring. "You don't 
 sound or look a bit like yourself." 
 
 "Isn't that comforting?" said Enid calmly. 
 "Oneself is nearly always such a dull sort of 
 person." 
 
 Before Miss Baker could put in any other dis- 
 concerting word, she added, smiling at beautiful 
 flushed Polly in the dress that matched her cheeks. 
 "Do you mind my telling you how exquisite you 
 are, Miss Mason?" 
 
 Polly's flush grew a bit too deep for perfect 
 beauty, but Alice said lightly: 
 
 "She's going to be 'belle of the ball !' Look out 
 for your laurels, Enid!"
 
 ENID: LADY ERRANT 219 
 
 "Oh, no!" said Enid, with that sharp thrill of 
 triumph known only to a woman when she really 
 bests another. "I'll leave my laurels to her. I'm 
 going to look after hers!" 
 
 Wherewith she vanished from the room. 
 
 "What on earth did she mean?" said Alice 
 Baker, knitting her brows. She turned on Polly, 
 "Did you understand?" she demanded. 
 
 "I didn't understand the words entirely," said 
 Polly, with bowed head. "But I I reckon I 
 understood the the idea." 
 
 Alice stared a little more. 
 
 "I swear you're all the worst lot of puzzles 
 I ever struck!" she declared impatiently. "I 
 wish any of you could just stick to one line for 
 five minutes ! But, there, child, pin up the curl 
 over your right ear, and be careful to mince a 
 bit as you walk. You're so gorgeously strong and 
 free that you might spoil the picture. Walk across 
 the floor now." 
 
 Polly strode splendidly across, her round long 
 lines swinging and curving into exquisite poses as 
 she moved.
 
 220 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "No no!" exclaimed Alice Baker. Then she 
 stopped and surveyed Polly all over again. 
 
 "Yes!" she said. "Do it like that! No one 
 here has ever seen anything half so beautiful." 
 
 A minute later Enid, having more or less pre- 
 pared her way, sauntered back into the dressing 
 room. Her maid was watching her this time. 
 
 She walked into the large closet at the further 
 end of the dressing room, and quickly and silently 
 selected a complete outfit of riding things. As 
 she did so she could hear Alice and Polly laugh- 
 ing together over the difficulty of placing one 
 particular court-plaster patch upon the snowy 
 shoulder blade. 
 
 Turning, with her arms full, she confronted 
 the horrified face of her own maid. 
 
 "Mademoiselle!" she gasped. "What " 
 
 "Chut!" hissed Enid, imperatively. "These 
 things must be taken into my bedroom. No one 
 must know." Even in the dimness her eyes were 
 compelling. The woman loved her, anyway. 
 
 "One moment!" she murmured. Then she 
 seized a big wrapper of velvet and fur from a 
 near-by hook and, taking Enid's burden into her
 
 ENID: LADY ERRANT 221 
 
 own arms, covered it effectively. They went out 
 of the closet casually, carelessly. Enid stopped 
 to tell Polly how charming she looked; the maid 
 passed on unobserved into the other room. Then 
 Enid followed her and in dead silence and a faint 
 light changed her dress. 
 
 "Mademoiselle is no going into danger?" 
 whispered the maid. 
 
 Enid laughed under her breath. Already the 
 sting of the adventure was whipping her blood. 
 
 "I don't know!" she whispered back, almost 
 gayly. "These things are in the hands of the gods, 
 Augustine!" 
 
 "I would rather," said the Frenchwoman sin- 
 cerely and irrepressively, "that they were in the 
 hands of Monsieur Radnor!" 
 
 Enid chilled and stiffened. 
 
 "You need not 'rather' anything," she said, with 
 a sort of hushed asperity. "I am going out and 
 no one not even Madame, is to know anything 
 about it. Anyway," she added, with a momenta- 
 rily returning gleam of humor, "you don't know 
 where I am going, so you couldn't tell them any- 
 way."
 
 222 
 
 "As if I would, Mademoiselle 1" 
 
 "You might not!" returned Enid, softening. 
 "Anyway, talk to no one of my going." 
 
 "And M. Radnor?" 
 
 "M. Radnor last of all." 
 
 "But if Mademoiselle did not come back. If 
 there were if there might be trouble then I 
 am free from my promise and may speak?" 
 
 "I suppose so," said Enid indifferently, as she 
 moved warily towards the door. She laughed 
 noiselessly and slipped out. 
 
 Augustine stood still in the center of the room 
 nodding her head silently. Then she murmured 
 to herself with unaffected relief, as though carry- 
 ing on the conversation. "Then I may speak 
 and to M. Radnor first of all!" 
 
 A minute later she shivered, and glanced to- 
 ward the window. It was already dusk, but a 
 curious half glow, almost more illuminating than 
 light, lay on all things. 
 
 "Dieu nous garde !" muttered Augustine, cross- 
 ing herself. "A thunderstorm is on the way!" 
 She trembled from head to foot. Augustine was 
 afraid of thunderstorms!
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 BEFORE THE STORM 
 
 Before a midnight breaks in storm, 
 
 Ye know what wavering gusts inform 
 The greater tempest's path! 
 Till the loosed wind 
 Drive all from mind, 
 
 Except Distress, which, so will prophets cry, 
 O'ercame them, houseless, from the unhinting sky. 
 
 RUDYARD KIPLING. 
 
 Comes a vapor from the margin, blackening over heath and holt, 
 Cramming all the blast before it, in its breast a thunderbolt. 
 
 ALFRED TENNYSON. 
 
 TIP through the brooding silence Enid rode. 
 The heaviness of an impending storm was 
 upon her. It seemed as though even her horse 
 breathed in more labored fashion than was 
 natural. It was not long past seven o'clock. Be- 
 low, the valley lay in gloom ; the great gorges, or 
 
 223
 
 224 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 gaps, as they were called in this region, had a 
 strange, almost a ghostly look. They were full 
 of shadows, and a purple-gray light if sucK a 
 tint could be called light lay on all things. No 
 mist. What vapors there might be appeared to 
 have been drawn up into the massed, cumulous 
 thunder-heads that piled the heavens with their 
 looming menace. 
 
 A flock of birds wheeled sharply across her 
 path. It looked as though they were flying low 
 because they cowered under an impending peril. 
 So that was what it meant, Enid said to herself, 
 "Swallows flying low." Did the winged creatures 
 really sense a tangible pressure above them, forc- 
 ing them down, hampering yet goading their wings 
 to this earth-bound, panic-stricken flight. 
 
 She pushed onward, upward. There was no 
 wind. The air was dead and dull. What life 
 there was she felt to be psychical, in abeyance, like 
 an electric dynamo temporarily stilled. Her face 
 was hot and wet, and she wiped it mechanically. 
 So! She had been as spent as that? Her mount 
 too was lathered, though she was too good a 
 horsewoman to have forced him unduly.
 
 BEFORE THE STORM 225 
 
 Once, in a tunnel, she had had the sense of a 
 bursting pressure on her ears and brain. Then it 
 was physical. Now, she had much the same feel- 
 ing, though it must, of course, be largely mental, 
 if not entirely so. 
 
 Her nerves were drawn tense, and light sounds, 
 like the stir of leaves or a pebble under her 
 horse's hoof, rang through her head until the ex- 
 aggerated persistence appertained to the impres- 
 sions of high fever. 
 
 Startled more by her own strained condition 
 than by anything else, she reined up and, breath- 
 ing deeply, collected her thoughts. 
 
 It was very quiet here among the hills so quiet 
 that, as has been stated, the lightest echoes 
 sounded disproportionately. On one side of her, 
 the left, was a sheer fall of mountainside that 
 flanked the trail. Distances immeasurable lay 
 before her that way. But they were distances 
 that terrified. She who was singularly free from 
 feminine attacks of vertigo shivered, turned her 
 head away, and looked for comfort to the closely 
 overhanging rock ledges and parapets on her 
 right. At first the rising hill gave her panic a
 
 226 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 lull; it was so immensely solid, so settled! One 
 could cling there forever, even if eternity itself 
 yawned on the other side but a few feet away. 
 Then, flung back upon itself, her terror took a 
 new form rather an added one. If the vague 
 deeps on the one side suggested the unfathomable, 
 so the somber heights on the other proclaimed 
 the unscalable. She felt herself an atom shivering 
 between two implacable alternatives. 
 
 The fear was momentary, and escaping it, she 
 bent low over her horse's neck and urged him 
 recklessly up the narrow trail. The clatter they 
 made was frightening but, for her, salutary. When 
 the mount had clambered into the summit of the 
 Ridge, Enid had her nerves as thoroughly in hand 
 as her reins. 
 
 Then it was that the first heavy throbs of 
 thunder shook the whole range like the blows of 
 Vulcan at his Forge. 
 
 Looking up, Enid saw that all at once, the low 
 sky had swooped even closer. The Valley was 
 black. Far under the piling clouds a dead-white 
 ghostly glimmer showed to her the horizon lay 
 somewhere in West Virginia. ... A voice spoke
 
 BEFORE THE STORM 227 
 
 in the trees about her, the voice of the wind. It 
 was a tone new to her: not the soft caroling of 
 summer afternoons, nor the loud knocking of 
 fierce tempests, nor the low wail of melancholy 
 rains, but a pertinacious, deadly undertone like the 
 hushed tuning of an individual instrument of a 
 great orchestra just before an immortal symphony 
 is to begin. 
 
 A swift, short light-blue glare made her horse 
 rear. But she quieted him. 
 
 She had dreamed she knew what lightning was 
 before. But this was like the rending asunder of 
 a merciful veil, showing suddenly the blaze of 
 Hell or Heaven, she could not say which. 
 
 After it, the thunder rolled, pulsed, and died 
 away among the hills. Again the wind wailed in 
 semi-darkness for what? 
 
 And her horse was trembling. She patted his 
 neck, hardly knowing what she did. What was 
 going to happen to them both? 
 
 On the Ridge, the sky seemed within touching 
 distance, and blue-black. Panting, white and 
 soaked with the cold sweat of a terror which she 
 could not as yet analyze, she looked from the
 
 228 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 right to the left of her. On the Warm Sulphur 
 Springs side, the view opened clear and sharp 
 the sharper apparently for the weird half light. 
 On the right on the far edge of the rippling 
 lower ranges, was a blur. Mist? As yet she had 
 seen no mist in the valleys. Yet the clouds 
 seemed unaccountably merged into the earth in 
 one broad patch. One broad patch was it not 
 widening drawing nearer? 
 
 Fascinated, she stared at it. It was advancing 
 like a square of vaporous curtain stuff blown 
 strongly onward toward her. It had the look of 
 a half-washed slate lighter in tint than the 
 cloud-stuff above. And it was coming quickly, 
 quickly. And it came, the curious low note in the 
 trees about her grew faintly sharp, and shrill; a 
 breeze, ice-cold and definite, as though from a 
 hand, touched her cheek. Up from the valleys 
 on either side of her rose a great damp, chilly 
 breath. . . . The blurred patch was coming closer. 
 And as she stared, frightened, yet thrilled, she 
 saw a shiver of white across the vast wooded 
 mountainside on the other side of the Valley land 
 on her right. The silver tremor made her pause
 
 Enid, riding madly along the ridge, was racing one of the great 
 mountain storms
 
 BEFORE THE STORM 229 
 
 and marvel until she realized what it was. Then, 
 with a gasp, she struck her horse sharply with 
 her crop and darted headlong along the bleak 
 Bridge Trail. 
 
 It was a great wind that bent the forests there 
 beyond until they were silvered and tremulous 
 beneath it: the big wind that heralds those mo- 
 ments when the elements rise laughing to assert 
 themselves in the face of civilized power and 
 control. The blur that, coming straight and re- 
 lentless from the horizon, now seemed to blot out 
 almost all the world, was rain a cloud-burst 
 probably. 
 
 Enid, riding madly along the Ridge, was racing 
 one of the great mountain storms.
 
 CHAPTER XXI 
 
 MEN 
 
 They have looked each other between the eyes, and there they 
 
 found no fault, 
 
 They have taken the Oath of the Brother-in-Blood. . . . 
 
 RUDYARD KIPLING. 
 
 TACK RADNOR parted from his friend Ralph 
 
 Denby at the door of his rooms, and without 
 
 being in the slightest degree conscious of the 
 
 process, permitted himself to be helped into his 
 
 evening coat. 
 
 Jack Radnor was, as has been said before, a 
 very primitive man at heart. To this fact he 
 owed much of his charm, for there is no more de- 
 lightful creature than the cave-man with irre- 
 proachable manners. No one not born with the 
 elemental fires in his make-up ever learns the true 
 control of flame. Bloodless men and women of 
 
 230
 
 MEN 231 
 
 breeding and of the world are like dead pearls, 
 perfect, but with neither sparkle nor great value: 
 primitive persons also of breeding and of the 
 world are like those same pearls imbued with a 
 living blaze that makes them prismatic, arresting, 
 beyond price. 
 
 Standing with every muscle rigid, as his man 
 brushed imaginary dust from his coat, Radnor ex- 
 perienced two choking emotional desires one to 
 follow Enid and wrest the truth of her own feel- 
 ings out of her by violence if necessary, the other 
 to find Martin Hale and kill him for having, even 
 momentarily, arrested her interest. But he made 
 no outward demonstration and probably had 
 never looked cooler nor handsomer in his life. 
 Only, as he stared at himself in the glass, he 
 could see a pinching pallor about his lips and a 
 glitter in his eyes which were something of a 
 self-revelation. 
 
 "So that's what I am!" he reflected, unclench- 
 ing his hands and feeling his palms wet and cold, 
 "a brute beast, with just about the same feelings 
 as a wild boar!" 
 
 His own self-contempt stung him, but had no
 
 232 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 power to shake that bitterly savage secret mood. 
 He was jealous sickeningly, maddeningly jealous, 
 and there was not a nerve nor muscle in his body 
 that did not ache with the grip of it. 
 
 "A boutonniere, sir?'* 
 
 Jack stared at the man as though he had sud- 
 denly been recalled from a great distance. A 
 boutonniere! It seemed like a particularly silly 
 joke, in his present frame of mind. He laughed, 
 not very pleasantly, and the man started. He had 
 been with Radnor since he left college and knew 
 every inflection in his voice. There was something 
 out of tune about that laugh. "There is a gar- 
 denia, sir," he said, soothingly, "or if you would 
 rather have a few violets, or " 
 
 "Have you any mountain laurel?" asked Jack, 
 sardonically. 
 
 Ware tried to conceal his instant fear that his 
 master was ill or had lost his wits. 
 
 "I I imagine it could be obtained, sir," he 
 said, even more placatingly. 
 
 Again Radnor laughed, but there was a more 
 human note in it this time. He was fond of the 
 man. All at once he realized that the bouton-
 
 MEN 233 
 
 mere was only one of a thousand symbols of the 
 control which the civilized man places over the 
 cave-man within him. 
 
 "Let's have the gardenia, Ware," he said, 
 gently. 
 
 The waxen white flower lay cold and perfect 
 against the black of his coat: it set a sort of final 
 seal upon his acceptance of the conventional world 
 and its ways. He did not like gardenias, but the 
 Lord knew they were symbolic! And the very 
 perfume of this thing emphasized what he was 
 trying to keep in mind, self-mastery, gentleness, 
 courtesy, good breeding, chivalry. 
 
 Suddenly he felt tired and depressed. If Enid 
 did not care and he could hardly persuade him- 
 self now that she had ever cared what a mean- 
 ingless business it all was! He might as well 
 chuck up everything and go west, or ship on a 
 whaler, or 
 
 "Atavism!" he muttered, half laughing to him- 
 self. 
 
 "I beg pardon, sir?" said Ware. 
 
 There was a knock on the door rather an odd 
 knock. When you come to think of it, there is a
 
 234 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 good deal of individuality in the way persons an- 
 nounce their wish to enter. There is the obse- 
 quious tap of the servant, the light, confident 
 touch of the intimate hand, the uncompromising 
 thud of, let us say, the relentless bill col- 
 lector. This knock was repeated twice; it was 
 neither light nor loud. A man's hand had done 
 it, and a man who was urgent and yet not 
 excited. 
 
 When Ware opened the door Martin Hale 
 stood looking in. 
 
 Jack suppressed an exclamation as he sprang 
 forward. 
 
 "How on earth did you get here?" he de- 
 manded. 
 
 "Asked the fellow downstairs for the number 
 of your room and came up," said Martin in his 
 slow, unhurried way. The calm poise and dig- 
 nity of the man had never been more notice- 
 able. 
 
 "Did anyone see you?" said Jack, quickly. 
 
 "Quite a heap, I reckon," said Hale, without 
 emotion. "Stared as though they'd never seen a 
 flannel shirt before in their lives."
 
 MEN 235 
 
 He grinned amiably. 
 
 There is one queer thing about men. Hate they 
 never so viciously they keep a certain loyalty and 
 freemasonry of sex all the time. Three minutes 
 before Radnor had wanted to wring the moun- 
 taineer's neck. Now, with his enemy in im- 
 mediate danger and facing it so coolly, he actually 
 forgot his personal grievance and was filled with 
 one idea to stand by him. A woman is not 
 often like that; she may help her rival out of 
 trouble but she is silently conscious of her grudge 
 all the while. 
 
 "Here come in!" exclaimed Jack, almost per- 
 emptorily, and Hale swung his great, graceful 
 bulk into the room. "Ware, close that door I 
 Hale, you're running an awful chance coming 
 here! Denby is out after you and every one in 
 the place is tipped off." 
 
 "I know," said Martin laconically. "But I had 
 to come. I've come for Polly Mason." 
 
 "Pol But Miss Mason isn't here !" 
 
 "Yes, she is. She came down here this after- 
 noon. Fellow told me he'd seen her coming into 
 the hotel. I've got to find her."
 
 236 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 He looked at Jack Radnor searchingly, then 
 nodded his head as though satisfied. 
 
 "I reckon you don't know any more about her 
 than I do," he said. 
 
 "I?" exclaimed Radnor, in surprise and then 
 flushed darkly. "You thought " 
 
 "I didn't think anything," cut in Hale. "Rad- 
 nor, you're a white man. Help me out in this. 
 I've got to get Polly." 
 
 Jack thought rapidly. 
 
 "If you asked for my room," he said abstract- 
 edly. "You can't stay here, in my place, I 
 mean." 
 
 "I don't want to stay here," Martin Hale said, 
 interrupting him again. "I want to hunt for 
 her." 
 
 Ware stood bewildered, gazing first at one man 
 and then at the other. His well-oiled little world 
 was going very rustily indeed. He could not un- 
 derstand its gyrations at all. 
 
 "I have it!" cried Radnor, with enthusiasm. 
 "But no," he added, considering, "it would be too 
 risky, I suppose."
 
 MEN 237 
 
 "What?" Martin, as we know, was not given 
 to wasting words. 
 
 "It only occurred to me," said Jack, "that if you 
 could get into this Powder Dance we are having 
 this evening, you could come and go as you liked 
 without being noticed. Every one will be masked 
 until midnight, and you could probably locate 
 Pol Miss Mason before that. Still, as I say, 
 it's risky." 
 
 "It's all right," said Martin, without seeming 
 to need time for deliberation. "I'll take a sport- 
 ing chance anyway. But I'll need some clothes." 
 
 He looked down at his rough garments and 
 then glanced at Jack's unexceptional evening 
 dress. 
 
 "You know," said Radnor, "I think we're both 
 mad you especially!" 
 
 "I reckon so sort of," rejoined Martin Hale, 
 and smiled. But his face was drawn and anxious. 
 "You see, it's this way: Polly's father's sick 
 one of his heart attacks. She's got to go to him, 
 and I've got to take her." 
 
 "But " Radnor was beginning when Hale 
 stopped him.
 
 238 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Hold on!" he said. "I know what I'm doing 
 just exactly and I know what it means better 
 than you do. So don't spring any 'huts' on me; 
 they're an old story! If you can help me, do it! 
 If not " He paused, and his steady, unclouded 
 gaze met Jack's. 
 
 "I can go to the devil?" supplemented the lat- 
 ter, but he was already tingling from the force 
 of the other's persuasions and personality. 
 
 "Something like that!" agreed Martin Hale, 
 nodding. "I'll manage it somehow anyway. Only 
 this will be the squarest way." 
 
 For a moment the two men looked at each 
 other. Then Radnor said, flushing darkly with 
 understanding and masculine appreciation: 
 
 "By the Lord, you're a sport! Come on, man! 
 I'll find you the war paint, and then the game's 
 up to you! Only remember you can't duck me 
 at the finish! I'm in with you to the last lap!" 
 
 And he gripped the hand of the man whom he 
 had been yearning to murder but a short half hour 
 before. It is also a fact, curious but unquestion- 
 able, that for that moment, much as he loved 
 Enid, he had forgotten her very existence !
 
 CHAPTER XXII 
 
 AT THE POWDER DANCE 
 
 . . . My mind misgives 
 Some consequence, yet hanging in the stars, 
 Shall bitterly begin his fearful date 
 With this night's revels. . . . 
 
 SHAKESPEARE. 
 
 FT was a Cotillon Poudre, which meant that 
 the women dressed in powder and patches 
 uniformly and the men did what they liked. 
 There were five or six golf coats hunting pink 
 was taboo because the shade clashed with the 
 cruder scarlet of the golf club. Here and there 
 a venturesome male sported a domino or some 
 vague attempt at a costume. But the girls were, 
 one and all, arrayed in fluffy, pale-colored frocks, 
 with their piled hair full of starch and court- 
 plaster planted at alluring distances over their 
 faces and shoulders.
 
 240 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 The favor table was piled high with dainty 
 trifles most of them made by the women most 
 concerned in the Cotillon. There were masks 
 and snuff-boxes, tall canes and flower baskets, and 
 a pretty innovation started by Enid in the first 
 place wee lanterns by which each dancer could 
 find his or her partner. 
 
 The table was presided over by five of the 
 smartest women of the Smart Eastern Set. When 
 Radnor led Martin into a side apartment opening 
 into the main ballroom, it was introducing him 
 to an atmosphere which many social climbers had 
 longed to breathe in vain. 
 
 The ballroom at the Casino was very charming 
 that night. It was not a general dance: a small 
 committee of select dowagers had gotten it up and 
 blue-penciled the invitations. As Warm Sulphur 
 Springs, at certain seasons of the year, is almost 
 as smart as Newport, Tuxedo and Aiken com- 
 bined, an exclusive party meant not a few heart- 
 burnings. 
 
 Persons counting on the lalsser-faire of the 
 average summer resort and reckoning the Casino 
 to be a democratic and universal possession were
 
 AT THE POWDER DANCE 241 
 
 outraged to find that for one evening, once in a 
 while it was as hard to enter as the Celestial 
 Gates. 
 
 Martin Hale and Jack Radnor passed the re- 
 ceiving ladies, and Hale's bow was as deep and 
 as courtly as the others. He carried his borrowed 
 plumes with an air which was a never ceasing 
 surprise to Radnor and the two or three other 
 men who were in the secret. Fitting him out had 
 been no easy task. Jack's own things were out 
 of the question, for Martin bulked obviously 
 larger than did he, so he had sought out Ted 
 Meredith, ex-football star and amateur fighter, 
 and justly proud of his depth of chest, breadth of 
 shoulder, and length of limb. He was somewhat 
 chagrined to find that his evening clothes could 
 only be put upon the frame of the big mountain 
 fellow at the imminent risk of bursting out at 
 every seam. Eventually Nicholas Wayne rose to 
 the emergency a stolid young giant, with a huge, 
 though not particularly athletic body. What 
 Nick had in superfluous flesh Hale made up in 
 hard muscle, and the suit did well enough. The 
 effect was excellent indeed, Jack feared it was
 
 242 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 too noticeably so, for no one could have failed 
 to look twice at the big, easily moving figure with 
 the tawny shock of hair. That there would be 
 many conjectures as to his identity was unavoid- 
 able. They could only hope that Hale would find 
 Polly as early in the evening as possible and dis- 
 appear with her before he was discovered. 
 
 Jack looked anxiously about for Ralph Denby, 
 but could see no signs of him. With Hale he 
 moved on past the favor table under the luminous 
 softness of the colored electric lights. 
 
 "Who is that?" demanded Martin, and Jack 
 felt the shoulder under his friendly hand stiffen 
 to iron. He could not follow the other's gaze, 
 because of the mask, but vaguely he turned in the 
 direction toward which Hale was fronting. Im- 
 mediately he noted the tall figure, the black hair, 
 the rose-red dress, and remembered what Enid 
 had told him' about the prospective costumes for 
 the evening. 
 
 "That's Alice Baker," he said at once, but even 
 as he spoke he doubted his own statement. Martin 
 put the doubt into words by returning swiftly: 
 "That? Never I That's Polly Mason!"
 
 AT THE POWDER DANCE 243 
 
 "You're crazy!" said Jack for the second time 
 that night. 
 
 This time the mountaineer was less amiable 
 about it. 
 
 "If that's not Polly, then I am crazy!" he said 
 bluntly and stood still, stiffly at attention, watching 
 the tall, masked girl in the rose-red frock. 
 
 Puzzled and fascinated, Radnor watched her, 
 too. It was quite true that, like as she was to 
 Enid's friend, in stature, dress and coloring, she 
 was quite different in some obscure way hard to 
 define. Her black hair was piled high on her 
 proudly held head with no sprinkling of white. 
 That, in itself, would be like Miss Baker. She 
 was erratic and would doubtless, at a Powder 
 Dance, choose to be a shining, unpowdered ex- 
 ception ! 
 
 Yet the puzzle lingered. Alice was of naturally 
 erect and free carriage, her figure was full and 
 beautiful, she moved with ease and grace and 
 energy. But here was something more. The 
 black-haired woman who glided in stately yet sinu- 
 ous fashion down the alley-way of palms was to 
 Alice Baker what the moon is to the arc light.
 
 244 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Not that Alke was artificial, but this was reality 
 itself, personified, incarnate. It seemed to Jack 
 Radnor that he had never seen complete natural 
 freedom and beauty wedded to utter dignity and 
 grace in all his life. Then his mind leaped back 
 to the trail on the Ridge, to Malone's shadowed 
 cabin. . . . Yes, she had moved like that! But 
 where had she learned this added subtle queenli- 
 ness and ease? Was it part of her gown, her 
 setting? Was it merely her wonderful adapta- 
 bility, or was it that for the first time she found 
 herself in the environment which best brought out 
 her points, her finest values? At all events, there 
 was no longer any doubt in his brain as to her 
 identity. 
 
 "It's Miss Mason all right," he said simply to 
 Hale. "I don't know where Alice is, nor what it 
 all means, but it's so ! Do you want me to tell 
 her you're here?" 
 
 Hale nodded, then drew a quick breath and 
 shook his head. His outstretched hand fell on 
 Radnor's arm. 
 
 "Just a moment!" he muttered. "I want to 
 look at her ! She she's very beautiful, isn't she ?"
 
 AT THE POWDER DANCE 245 
 
 The words wer^ a question, as though he 
 feared to trust his own vision. It was an odd 
 question, too: a woman masked, and to call her 
 beautiful. . . . Yet, gazing also, Jack understood. 
 There was very real beauty in this masked woman 
 a beauty not merely of well-proportioned lines 
 and curves and values, but a beauty of inherent 
 personality, which made each slightest gesture of 
 hers a symphony, each step a step in a sort of 
 gently regal progress. 
 
 Suddenly Martin started forward. 
 
 "What are you doing?" said Jack. "Wait, and 
 I'll get her to come to speak to you where people 
 won't " 
 
 "Wait! Not fof a moment!" Hale strode 
 straight to the side of the rose-hued figure and 
 caught her hand in his. Jack saw her start and 
 her other hand go to her breast. And even as 
 he saw that, he saw something far more disquiet- 
 ing, the form of Ralph Denby standing in one 
 of the open doorways. He was adjusting his 
 mask, according to the rules of the ballroom, but 
 Jack knew him and his heart sank. 
 
 For only a moment Ralph Denby stood motion-
 
 246 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 less, looking fixedly at the b'j- sunny-haired man 
 beside the girl in the rose-red dress. Then he 
 walked quickly up to him and laid his hand on his 
 arm. 
 
 "Martin Hale!" he said sharply. 
 
 There was a little stir of excitement. Many 
 of the people present had heard of the man whom 
 the Denbys and Sheriff Heaton were trying to 
 trap. The general impression was that he was a 
 sort of bandit. Was it possible that this large, 
 composed individual standing so imperturbably 
 there in their flower-decked ballroom was the 
 same desperate character who had led the hold-up 
 on the Millionaires' Local? 
 
 Jack sprang forward. "Hold on a moment, 
 Ralph!" he began. 
 
 The girl in the rose-red dress was panting hur- 
 riedly, more, it seemed, in excitement than fear. 
 
 "How do you-all know he's Martin Hale?" she 
 cried, in a warm contralto voice unwontedly 
 quickened by emotion. "He's masked." 
 
 "And no one unmasks until midnight I" said 
 Jack, grasping young Denby's arm. "Be a sport, 
 Ralph!"
 
 AT THE POWDER DANCE 247 
 
 "I tell you I know " began Ralph hotly. 
 
 But the big man in the mask was speaking. His 
 slow, indolent words carried to every ear there. 
 
 "I'm not telling who I am just at present," he 
 said. "You-all can make out I'm one person or 
 another. Suit yourself. But I've got something 
 to say before you fix on who I am. I came here 
 to-night taking right much of a chance " 
 
 "I told you!" broke in Ralph. 
 
 "Wait!" muttered Jack Radnor. 
 
 The quiet voice continued : 
 
 "I came here, taking the chance of losing a 
 whole lot of things folks like to hang on to 
 my liberty, for instance." 
 
 He paused a moment, then he turned to the 
 girl beside him and with infinite gentleness drew 
 her hand within his arm. Then he addressed the 
 whole ballroom. 
 
 "This lady's father's right ill, dying, maybe" 
 a choking cry came from her lips and he patted 
 her hand "and so I well, I just came to fetch 
 her, that's all. I want to see her safe with her 
 father, and then " He swung back to Ralph 
 Denby, and his voice came with a quicker, harder
 
 248 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 cadence, "Then I'll come back here and unmask 
 at midnight when the rest do!" 
 
 There was a second's breathless pause and then 
 one of the men gave an irrepressible cheer. It 
 was caught up by dozens and the ballroom rang. 
 
 "Now, sir," said the masked stranger to Ralph, 
 "do you-all ask me unmask?" 
 
 Ralph turned away. 
 
 "At midnight, with the rest," he said briefly. 
 
 "I thank you-all, sir." 
 
 The tawny-haired man and the girl in the rose- 
 red dress walked out of the ballroom. Jack went 
 with them. Just outside he held out his hand 
 to Hale, without a word. Their fingers met and 
 clasped hard. To Polly, Radnor said: 
 
 "Good-bye, Miss Mason. My congratulations. 
 He's the finest gentleman and the best sport I 
 ever knew." 
 
 And Polly, crying and clinging to her lover's 
 arm, knew that it was true. Whatever trouble 
 might come now, she had found herself. 
 
 "Good-bye until midnight!" said Martin Hale 
 to Radnor, and went away into the darkness with 
 the rose-red gown glimmering beside him.
 
 CHAPTER XXIII 
 
 ELECTRIC LIGHT AND LIGHTNING 
 
 Then dress, then dinner, then awakes the world ! 
 Then glare the lamps. . . . 
 
 Thrice happy he who, after a survey 
 
 Of the good company, can win a corner, 
 
 And look on as a mourner, or a scorner, 
 Or an approver, or a mere spectator, 
 Yawning a little as the night grows later. 
 
 LORD BYRON. 
 
 ~O ADNOR stood a moment staring after them. 
 It occurred to him that he had not the 
 slightest idea how they were going to get up the 
 mountain; then he laughed as he told himself that 
 Martin Hale was not likely to have neglected 
 arrangements or preparations of any kind. 
 
 The rustle of a skirt beside him made his heart 
 leap. For the first time in over an hour he 
 
 249
 
 250 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 thought of Enid and turned eagerly in the hope 
 that it might be she. But it was Alice Baker, 
 not in costume but ordinary evening dress, with 
 her mask dangling from her wrist. 
 
 "I heard it all!" she whispered excitedly, "and 
 I think it's just perfectly thrilling. What a stun- 
 ning couple they are! Is he as handsome un- 
 masked as Enid says?" she ended with malice. 
 
 "Quite, I fancy," said Jack, suppressing a desire 
 to box her ears. "Where on earth is Enid, any- 
 way?" ' 
 
 Alice looked at him in astonishment. "Don't 
 you know?" she asked. "I thought, of course, she 
 was with you." 
 
 "I! No: I've been too busy stage-managing 
 Hale even to look her up. I supposed she was 
 late, that's all." 
 
 "And I supposed that she had sneaked off to 
 a corner of the veranda, the way I did, so that 
 her best young man could come and talk to her 
 undisturbed." 
 
 "Isn't she with her mother ?",. demanded Rad- 
 nor, a little more anxiously. 
 
 "No: Mrs. Forsythe is at the favor table, and
 
 ELECTRIC LIGHT AND LIGHTNING 251 
 
 she is looking all over for Enid. Peep through 
 the window and you can see her." 
 
 Jack took a frowning survey of Enid's mother, 
 who sat at the long table of pretty many-hued 
 trifles, the picture of incarnate restlessness and 
 worry properly subdued for the occasion. 
 
 "And" proceeded Alice irrelevantly, "that girl, 
 that raving beauty from the top of nowhere, has 
 gone off with my dress!" 
 
 "She'll return it," said Jack absently. He was 
 thinking of Enid with more and more concern. 
 
 "Return it!" repeated Miss Baker with scorn. 
 "And what will there be left to return, I ask you, 
 after this storm?" 
 
 Jack started. 
 
 "I believe it is going to rain," he said, noticing 
 the change in the air for the first time. 
 
 "He believes it is going to rain," repeated 
 Alice, with open disdain. "My dear man, the 
 storm has been growling and spitting like a wild 
 cat for half an hour. Listen!" 
 
 Low and sullen the echo of the thunder came 
 to them through the thick, damp night. It was 
 indeed not unlike the snarling growl of some wild
 
 25 2 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 beast chained far away, yet straining to break its 
 fetters. The sky was black and close. The smell 
 of the rain was in the air. As a matter of fact, 
 it had been raining for some time on the moun- 
 tain ridge less than two miles from where they 
 stood. 
 
 "I wonder " Alice was beginning, when a 
 step checked her. 
 
 "Well, young people ! Have you been playing 
 'Change your partners?' Where is my boy, and 
 where is my little friend Miss Enid?" 
 
 Judge Denby, carefully dressed and groomed, 
 and the picture of courtly, urbane, middle-aged 
 dignity, stood beside them. 
 
 "You will forgive this?" he said, indicating his 
 cigar. "I just came down from the hotel and 
 wanted a breath of air before I went into that 
 very attractive, but exceedingly warm-looking, 
 ballroom. It is going to be a big storm, Radnor." 
 
 "I'm afraid so," said Jack, thinking of Hale 
 and Polly on the trail. Lucky for him that he 
 did not know Enid was out there, too, somewhere 
 in the rain-threatened night! 
 
 "There is always something exhilarating to me
 
 ELECTRIC LIGHT AND LIGHTNING 253 
 
 in these mountain storms," said the Judge, puffing 
 comfortably. "They are so huge, so dynamic that 
 they soothe one. One's very helplessness becomes 
 restful one's own small violences become as 
 nothing compared with the great passions of the 
 elements." 
 
 "If you'll both excuse me," said Alice Baker, 
 abruptly, "I'll go to look again for Enid." 
 
 She slipped away quickly, and the Judge offered 
 Jack his cigar case. 
 
 "Thanks, not now. Hello! That was a flash 
 and no mistake!" 
 
 The storm held its breath, as it were, for a 
 space. You might have fancied that it did so 
 viciously, taunting the apprehensive earth as an 
 animal tortures its prey, or as a savage postpones 
 the sacrifice hour by hour to prolong his victim's 
 fears. 
 
 The music from the ballroom, gay and sweet 
 and seductive, drowned the snarl of the thunder, 
 drowned the thud of the first heavy drops upon 
 the roof. But a gust of wind blew boisterously 
 in at one of the open windows and scattered a 
 score of dainty favors. The next blaze of light-
 
 254 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 ning was so close and so vivid that they could 
 notice it even in the brightly lighted ballroom. A 
 wild rush of rain drove the Judge and Radnor 
 close to the wall of the Casino. In a moment the 
 veranda was wet to within a foot of where they 
 stood. The big trees about the Casino were sigh- 
 ing in great moaning gasps. Their bending leaf- 
 loaded branches showed in the light that streamed 
 from the windows. Some Japanese lanterns 
 strung up for the occasion blew down and went 
 scuttling off upon the wet gale. 
 
 "Well," said Radnor, "you may like moun- 
 tain storms, Judge, but I always have a queer 
 feeling of being up before the Judgm'ent Seat 
 when I strike a peach of a one like this. I'd 
 hate to have any very black crime on my soul 
 and face that lightning!" 
 
 He laughed, but the Judge did not laugh. 
 Rather a strange look came over his face. 
 
 "I never thought of that," he said, half mus- 
 ingly. "What made you think of it now?" 
 
 Jack laughed again. "I haven't the faintest 
 idea ! I was thinking that wickedness might serve 
 as a kind of lightning conductor "
 
 ELECTRIC LIGHT AND LIGHTNING 255 
 
 "The the rain is growing a little too much for 
 a rheumatic old man," interrupted Judge Denby 
 brusquely. "I'm going inside." 
 
 That evening was one which Jack Radnor never 
 forgot. Enid could not be found. No one had 
 seen her; no one knew even where or whether 
 she had dined. Mrs. Forsythe and Alice had each 
 believed her to be with the other. And yet the 
 mother still had to smile and give out favors 
 and talk platitudes with her associate matrons, 
 and Jack Radnor had to dance with the girls who 
 hadn't enough partners or whose mothers had 
 asked him to week-ends and yachting cruises. 
 And the storm raged with increasing fury outside 
 so that the roar of the rain upon the earth could 
 now be heard persistently through all the charm- 
 ing rhythms of the dances. The electric lights 
 failed once, and there was a faint panic until two 
 dripping electricians came to the rescue. The 
 thunder sounded, as one girl said shakily, "like 
 the ghosts of the big guns of the Civil War come 
 back to haunt the place!" A general sense of 
 nervousness seemed to pervade the dance. The 
 laughter was a bit forced, and when a great glare
 
 256 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 of blue would pour blindingly in through a win- 
 dow, women would shrink and gasp a little. 
 Judge Denby even was not so debonnair as usual. 
 His handsome, florid face was somewhat paler 
 than its wont, and he talked less, and less 
 oratorically. 
 
 As for Jack, whether he danced or talked, sat 
 out or purveyed refreshments, he was in a sort of 
 daze of unreality. It seemed like a fantastic 
 dream ; as if all of them were actors in the night- 
 marish play of a madman. Once in a while his 
 eyes met those of Mrs. Forsythe, and in both was 
 the same mute question. Jack told himself that 
 this anxiety was foolish. Enid had other friends 
 in the Homestead Hotel, who had not come to 
 the dance. She might have decided at the last 
 moment to spend the evening with any one of 
 them. She was extremely independent and er- 
 ratic in her actions, and often even her mother 
 had not the faintest idea where to look for her. 
 Still 
 
 Another thing gave the evening an element of 
 subdued excitement. Every one was wondering 
 if Martin Hale would return, as he had promised,
 
 ELECTRIC LIGHT AND LIGHTNING 257 
 
 before the time came to unmask. As the time 
 drew on toward midnight people looked often at 
 the door. Radnor found himself with his watch 
 in his hand every two minutes. Hale could, of 
 course, make it if he had good horses, but it 
 would be hard going. . . . 
 
 Twelve o'clock, and the unmasking had begun. 
 Outside was by this time a solid wall of roaring 
 rain that shut them in as though their gay little 
 Casino were a prison. 
 
 "What preposterous tale is this," said Judge 
 Denby to Jack, "about that ruffian Hale coming 
 here and getting away again with some cock-and- 
 bull promise of coming back? Really, I am 
 deeply annoyed with Ralph!" 
 
 "Are you?" said Jack, in an odd tone. "Look 
 there!" 
 
 A man, streaming with rain water, stood in the 
 doorway. He wore a mask, which he removed 
 even as they all gazed at him. 
 
 "I hope I'm not late," said Martin Hale.
 
 CHAPTER XXIV 
 
 THE UNSIGNED NOTE 
 
 Night, and one single ridge of narrow path 
 
 . . . The woods 
 
 Waving and muttering, for the moonless night 
 Has shaped them into images of life, 
 Like the uprising of the giant-ghosts. . . . 
 
 ROBERT BROWNING. 
 
 NID FORSYTHE soon discovered that a 
 mountain storm and a girl on horseback 
 are not very evenly matched. The competition 
 is decidedly unfair. Blinded and deafened by the 
 rain, the lightning, the rolling thunderbolts, and 
 the mad gale, all increased a hundredfold by the 
 vast augmenting mountain tops, among which she 
 rode, she was bent to her pommel, and shaken 
 with cold and nervousness. Dauntless in spirits 
 beyond most girls, she was, for the time being, 
 
 258
 
 THE UNSIGNED NOTE 159 
 
 effectually beaten by this tempest. And with the 
 sense of helplessness and defeat came a sick reac- 
 tion from the mood which had sent her up the 
 trail that night. What was she doing here, what 
 good could she be to Martin Hale or anybody 
 else, she, this poor wretched, drenched piece of 
 feminine humanity, drooping in her saddle and 
 wishing from the bottom of her heart that she 
 had never left the Valley? 
 
 But Enid was made of better stuff than she 
 knew. She was not really beaten, only baffled. 
 With a fresh impetus her will and pluck would 
 spur her on again. Meanwhile, all she longed 
 for was a shelter. And she found it! 
 
 It was Malone's mountain shack, though she 
 did not know that. When he was there he left 
 a big, draught-proof, oil lantern burning to guide 
 him home, and it was this yellow glimmer wink- 
 ing between the writhing, dripping trees of the 
 Ridge that beckoned Enid with what at that in- 
 stant seemed a blissful promise. Somewhere 
 there was a light and a roof, and a respite from 
 the relentless winds that tore at her with their 
 cruel fingers. Sick with the ordeal of the last
 
 260 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 half mile along the dreadful Ridge, she guided 
 the horse toward the light, and in a few minutes 
 more she was in the shack. 
 
 No one was there. Her first feeling was one 
 of relief. Then she was sorry because she had 
 hoped to find some man who could look out for 
 her horse, which had suffered nearly as much as 
 she. Then she sat down on a hard chair, cov- 
 ered her face with her hands, and tried to get her 
 breath and her assurance back again. 
 
 It was there that the Fates sent her the im- 
 petus necessary to carry her farther on her ad- 
 venture. On the table at her elbow was an open 
 letter and, half-unseeing at first, Enid's eyes 
 wandered to it. 
 
 The note was in a writing which she did not 
 know, a very forcible, clear writing, though in 
 pencil. Enid would not have read it if she had 
 not seen a sharp square U H" in the middle of it. 
 
 "H" suggested Hale, and, almost mechani- 
 cally, she read the words that immediately fol- 
 lowed : "He has been unmanageable lately" 
 
 Then quite deliberately and with no qualms of 
 conscience she went back and deciphered the whole
 
 THE UNSIGNED NOTE 261 
 
 letter. It ran: "Make it on the 27 th. Word, 
 Mountain Laurel. Look out for H. He has 
 been unmanageable lately. If necessary, fix things 
 on him. He'd be safer in jail." 
 
 There was no apparent identity. Whoever had 
 written those nonchalant and unscrupulous sen- 
 tences knew that he spoke with authority, and 
 that his briefest scribbled word would be recog- 
 nized, understood, and obeyed. 
 
 So this was what it all meant! They were 
 "fixing things" on Martin Hale, because he had 
 become "unmanageable" and would be "safer in 
 jail!" Enid had never heard the expression 
 "frame up," but she grasped the significance of 
 that curt, hasty note only too well. Her blood 
 burned in her veins, with indignation and defiance. 
 So they were trying to do that? Well, they 
 shouldn't! They shouldn't! She would die first. 
 The man who wrote that note should be exposed 
 if it took her final breath, and her last ounce of 
 energy. 
 
 She flung open the cabin door, all forgetful of 
 the weather which had driven her to this strange 
 shelter. But she was forced to stagger back
 
 262 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 against the fury of the wind and rain which 
 assaulted her. For a moment, clinging to the 
 door, she felt hopeless and desperate. Even the 
 elements were against her. Then, breathing hard, 
 but thinking steadily, she made up her mind. This 
 storm might rage for the rest of the night. It 
 would doubtless be succeeded by days of heavy, 
 unremitting rain. She knew by experience that 
 at times weeks of black weather were in the moun- 
 tains. In that case, there would be washouts 
 and landslides and the trails would bernrr>e steadily 
 more difficult to travel. Places that were now 
 only risky would soon be dangerous if not im- 
 passable. The fords around the foot of the hills 
 would be rivers; half the narrower paths would 
 be washed away. Therefore, if she was to get 
 to the Valley with the mysterious document that 
 would seem to clear Hale and incriminate another 
 man, she would lose and not gain by waiting. 
 
 She knew that the high Ridge Trail was per- 
 fectly safe, however terrifying to follow in this 
 tempest. 
 
 She must ride up to it, then go not south but 
 north, toward the Toll Gate. Then, if the
 
 THE UNSIGNED NOTE 263 
 
 lower road had already become treacherous, she 
 would have to walk down to Warm Sulphur 
 Springs, and hire some sort of trap to drive her 
 over to the Homestead. This was a perfectly 
 good plan. There was, indeed, only one thing 
 against it, a thing which she was to discover in 
 a minute or so. 
 
 Closing the door she seriously prepared for 
 her undertaking. She thanked Heaven that she 
 wore a safety habit easily detached. She dropped 
 it off, and stood a slim, boyish figure in high boots 
 and knickers, which she wore under her riding 
 skirt. She discarded her long coat, too; it was 
 clumsy, and as she was certain to get drenched 
 anyway it didn't make much difference whether 
 it was through whipcord or linen shirtwaist. Her 
 hat she then flung aside, and her heavy gloves. 
 She had the paper in the bosom of her blouse, 
 taking the precaution to wrap it first in one of 
 the gloves, as a protection against the wet. 
 
 Then dressed as "light" as she reasonably 
 could be, carrying only her slender crop, she 
 boldly opened the door again and, staggering a 
 bit from the force of the gale, went boldly out
 
 264 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 to where her horse was fastened. But it was 
 then that Fate played upon her one of her most 
 unfriendly tricks. Just as she swung herself into 
 the dripping saddle, a fresh access of tempest 
 filled the heavens with flame and thunder. Her 
 mount, just freed from the hitching-post, backed 
 away frantic with terror, and plunged wildly 
 down the heavily wooded mountainside, in pre- 
 cisely the opposite direction from that which she 
 had intended to take ! She was powerless to con- 
 trol the beast, for he was half crazed by the 
 lightning and thunder. In a moment, sick with 
 dread herself, she saw that she must not stay on 
 his back. At any moment she might be thrown, 
 dragged from her saddle by the crowding shrub- 
 bery, bruised against a tree. And, if he kept up 
 this plunging gait, he would almost surely go 
 down. She took a deep breath, kicked her foot 
 clear of the stirrup, and waited for the next ter- 
 rific illuminating glare of lightning. 
 
 Afterwards, she could never tell just how she 
 did it. It always seemed to her as though some 
 one else, not herself, had actually experienced it. 
 
 But, somehow, as the maddened horse struggled
 
 THE UNSIGNED NOTE 265 
 
 downward through that dense shrubbery, she flung 
 up her arms and caught a great overhanging 
 branch, black against the throbbing purple-blue 
 light that filled the heavens. 
 
 In another second, she had drawn herself up 
 to safety, and sat clinging and gasping there while 
 her horse crashed away from her in the tempest 
 and the dark. 
 
 The branch to which she was clinging swayed 
 and shook in the high wind. In the intermittent 
 lightning she took in the outlook. Just beneath 
 her was, oh, thank Heaven ! she had not been 
 it before! a deep, ragged gulch as though a 
 monstrous handful had been torn from the side 
 of the living mountain. Had her horse gone into 
 that? She could not know, but she grew dizzy 
 as she thought what she had escaped. Then she 
 began to plan once more. She turned and peered 
 upward toward the cabin from which she had 
 been borne by the maddened horse. There was 
 the light she had left still faintly glimmering, but 
 it looked tiny and far away. She must have 
 plunged down a greater distance than she had 
 guessed. She was debating with herself how to
 
 266 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 get back, when something happened. It was a 
 huge something, so unexpected, so cataclysmic 
 so sudden and horrifying that she did not at first 
 know what it was. She only realized that the 
 jagged blue blades quivering in the dark above 
 her all at once became merged into one titan 
 weapon of destruction, and after one instant of 
 awful hesitancy fell violently. Not upon her, 
 though it at first seemed that it was really herself 
 that had been struck. The crash of a great tree 
 just above her, the blaze of a sharp flame, the 
 smell of smoke, and then the smitten tree fell like 
 a wounded giant in her direction. It missed the 
 branch to which she was holding, but threw its 
 mighty weight against the branch of the tree it- 
 self. She heard the crackle of bent and breaking 
 wood, felt herself flung forward still clinging to 
 the branch out over the ragged black pit be- 
 low. She had no time for terror. She clung 
 blindly as the tree fell and she with it. But in- 
 stinct working at the last without any conscious 
 mental guidance, made her throw herself out and 
 forward, clearing the thud of breaking boughs 
 as they crashed to the ground. She picked herself
 
 THE UNSIGNED NOTE 267 
 
 up after a few minutes, and at first she thought 
 the storm had ceased, for she could not hear any- 
 thing just at first. Then her senses came back 
 as clear as ever, and she looked tremblingly on the 
 wreck from which she had escaped. The impos- 
 sible had happened. The fallen tree had carried 
 her over that impassable gulch. It lay black and 
 threatening before her, but she was safe on the 
 other side ! The huge trunk lay like a bridge across 
 it. But she fled suddenly. Another and yet an- 
 other crash told her that more trees had fallen 
 between her and the shack close below the trail. 
 She stumbled down the mountainside blindly, and 
 after a thousand years came to a trail, a very 
 slight one blazed probably by woodcutters or 
 other mountain folk. Along this she flooded in 
 ankle-deep mud, heading as nearly as she knew 
 in the general direction of Four Trail Crossing. 
 But Nature who performs miracles on occasion 
 and gives us the strength and temerity to do and 
 dare impossible things, eventually presents her 
 bills. Enid had been through just about as much 
 as even her last jot of reserve force could stand. 
 The darkness, the wildness of the night, the
 
 268 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 danger through which she had passed, the heavy 
 going on the trail, also, probably, her recent 
 close proximity to the tree which the lightning 
 had struck, all combined to leave her in a state of 
 helpless exhaustion, almost insensibility. Slowly 
 and still more slowly she went forward, until the 
 one great mercy overtook her. She staggered to 
 the comparative shelter offered by a great clump 
 of shrub oaks, crawled under them, and sank into 
 unconsciousness.
 
 CHAPTER XXV 
 
 THE LEARNED JUDGE 
 
 . . . The statesman thus, 
 
 Up the steep road where proud ambition leads, 
 Aspiring, first uninterrupted winds 
 His prosp'rous way; nor fears miscarriage foul, 
 While policy prevails, and friends prove true: 
 But that support soon failing. . . . 
 
 . . . From his airy height 
 Headlong he falls . . . 
 
 WILLIAM COWPER. 
 
 >T~^HEY were assembled in Judge Denby's 
 * library, and it was a scant three-fourths of 
 an hour later. A trap had been summoned and 
 they had driven through the atrophying down- 
 pour to the Judge's house. A silence had 
 wrapped them in the transit. It had seemed to 
 Jack Radnor that the Judge had winced from 
 the thunder crashes and lightning flares now and 
 
 269
 
 270 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 again, but that might easily have been an impres- 
 sion created by his own overwrought nerves. 
 
 In the quiet scholarly library, with its shaded 
 reading lamp and rows of austerely bound works, 
 its heavy curtains and deep easy-chairs, the storm 
 was farther away than in the gay casino. Here 
 a sort of ascetic yet epicurean barrier had been 
 raised against the rough things of the world. The 
 powdered dancers in the ballroom might tremble 
 at the thunderbolts of heaven; Judge Denby in 
 his luxurious study need not even take count of 
 them. 
 
 A certain nervousness, or at least illness of 
 ease, in the Judge which had more than once ob- 
 truded itself upon Jack's consciousness during that 
 curious evening slipped from him triumphantly 
 as he entered his own domain. It was as though 
 he passed instantly and with a sort of supreme 
 relief and resolution into the picture or harmony 
 to which he rightfully belonged. The color that 
 appeared all at once in his pale, clean-cut face 
 might have been a rush of returning blood and 
 spirit, or the reflection of the deep-red portieres. 
 Whatever lent it, it gave him again his old win-
 
 THE LEARNED JUDGE 271 
 
 some air of authority and benignity in one. He 
 glowed, in his sober, distinguished fashion, there 
 in his characteristic and fine-flavored room. 
 Friends and enemies must have admired him alike. 
 
 Present were his son Ralph, Martin Hale, the 
 prisoner, old Sheriff Heaton, and Jack Radnor. 
 It was to be a sort of informal inquiry pending 
 the more strict legal proceedings, and it was 
 largely due to Radnor that the Judge had con- 
 sented to it. He protested that it was irregular, 
 but consented under Jack's urgency, to consider 
 the facts of the case out of court. 
 
 Martin Hale was as still as a statue. From 
 the moment of his surrender and his conveyance 
 to the Denby house he had said nothing. Radnor 
 had a sense of furious sympathy with him. But 
 now just to show that men are as unreasonable 
 as women his interest in Hale did not drown 
 his anxiety about Enid. He ached with the wild 
 yearning to know if all was well with her. It 
 never occurred to him to think that she had left 
 Warm Sulphur Springs. He still flagellated his 
 spirit by telling himself that he was an utter fool 
 to be so upset. But it was nearly one o'clock, and
 
 272 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 no one knew what had come to her. His frantic 
 efforts to communicate with Augustine, the maid, 
 had availed nothing. Either she was with Enid 
 wherever she was, or she would not answer the 
 telephone. Meanwhile, they sat in Judge Denby' s 
 study and the storm poured past them without like 
 a swollen river washing its banks and all but 
 carrying them away. 
 
 No one spoke for a minute; then the Judge's 
 son sprang up with an angry backward fling of 
 his shoulders and faced Martin Hale. 
 
 "So you're a liar both ways!" exclaimed Ralph, 
 hotly. 
 
 Hale flushed darkly and his breathing was 
 labored. However, he controlled himself enough 
 to answer quietly: "I don't lie, Mr. Denby." 
 
 Ralph turned to the Sheriff. 
 
 "This man came to me on the Ridge," he said, 
 indignantly, "and gave me warning of the train 
 robbery. I can't imagine why he did it, unless 
 he expected a reward of some sort " 
 
 Hale made an angry movement, but again 
 checked himself. 
 
 "Then," young Denby went on, "he went into
 
 THE LEARNED JUDGE 273 
 
 the rotten shooting game himself! Talk about 
 doubled-dyed renegades and turncoats!" 
 
 "That's a lie!" burst from Martin Hale, furi- 
 ously. "I'm no turncoat to you anyway! I did 
 give the hold-up plot away, because I thought it 
 was only decent. I never told on one of the gang, 
 and you know it, but I did warn you about the 
 train, and, so far as that went, I was with you 
 and ready to fight fair and square, though you 
 may remember I wouldn't pull a gun on my old 
 crowd. I've been straight with you and you 
 needn't try any frame-up on me, pretending to 
 prove I haven't! 
 
 "You've called me a liar without cause. Now 
 I'll call you one with cause ! It's a lie that I was 
 in that hold-up, I tell you ! I wasn't in the Valley 
 at all that night !" 
 
 "Save your breath, man," Denby said con- 
 temptuously. "We know you were." 
 
 "You can't prove it!" 
 
 "No?" Ralph held out the revolver with the 
 initials M. H. on it. "Isn't this your gun, Hale?" 
 
 "Sure," said Martin, "but I wasn't carrying it 
 then. I lost it early and "
 
 274 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "I had it," Jack interrupted. "And I suppose 
 I dropped it in the mix-up." 
 
 Judge Denby entered the conversation for the 
 first time. His kindly, handsome, almost un- 
 wrinkled face was lighted by just the suggestion 
 of a smile. 
 
 "My dear Jack," he protested, "isn't that rather 
 a wild tale? I don't mean " he hastened to 
 add, "that I don't believe you exactly I should 
 hate to have to go so far as that but well, 
 I'm afraid we must have some proof other than 
 your bare word that you were carrying Hale's re- 
 volver." 
 
 "But," exclaimed Radnor, bewildered, "Ralph 
 knows that I was armed. I was with him that 
 night, and he knows I shot " 
 
 "But have you no revolver of your own?" per- 
 sisted the Judge. 
 
 "Why, yes," admitted Jack, utterly at sea. 
 "Certainly I have one. But I don't carry it about 
 with me on afternoon rides, though I think I'd 
 better after this !" 
 
 He said the last words laughingly, but he was 
 vaguely troubled. He could not imagine why
 
 THE LEARNED JUDGE 275 
 
 Judge Denby should doubt his word should, it 
 seemed, almost want to doubt it. Was he it was 
 ridiculous and yet Jack instinctively felt sure of 
 it trying to fix some undeserved blame upon 
 Martin Hale? He looked at his friend, but 
 Ralph was scowling in a puzzled way. If Jack 
 could have known it, he was just as much at sea 
 as himself. "Why in thunder," young Denby was 
 thinking, "should he try to shield Hale like this?" 
 "Judge," said Martin Hale earnestly, "I was 
 angry a minute ago, and I wasn't going to ask 
 anything of you-all, but I reckon I was kind of 
 selfish. There there are people kind of looking 
 to me, Judge, and so I reckon I better eat humble 
 pie and tell the truth. I was right close in with 
 a whole bunch of folks that you-all are after, but 
 a right smart lot of 'em weren't any worse than 
 I was." He paused, for never in his life had he 
 had to talk as much as he had to-night. "Some 
 of us went into it for fun, and the danger, and 
 some because we were bred to it, and some be- 
 cause we were scared into it." Again he paused, 
 but this time the pause suggested poignantly some- 
 thing which he might have said. What was it?
 
 276 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Come, come, my friend!" interposed Judge 
 Denby, not unkindly, but with a trace of testiness. 
 "You aren't going to pretend that you were bul- 
 lied into becoming a crook!" 
 
 "No, sir," said Hale quietly, meeting his eyes, 
 "I don't reckon anyone was ever able to bully 
 me much and I never was a crook. But 
 there's a whole heap of things that can be said 
 between those two facts. 'Tisn't bullying for a 
 man to find out right soon where his safety lies; 
 and 'tisn't bullying to " 
 
 Jack Radnor suddenly sprang to his feet with 
 a lifted hand. The Judge's servant was talking 
 with someone just outside the library door. The 
 sound of the voice had a curious effect upon the 
 occupants of the room. Every one there recog- 
 nized it. When the door opened they all knew 
 the man they were going to see. It was Malone. 
 
 Small, brown, wizened and ugly he came for- 
 ward laboriously, his arm in a sling, his face 
 still seamed with lines of fretful pain. 
 
 "Just came to let you know, Judge," he began. 
 Then he caught sight of Martin Hale and his 
 jaw dropped. "You've got him!" he exclaimed.
 
 THE LEARNED JUDGE 277 
 
 Jack Radnor felt the tingling excitement that 
 presages revelations even before one knows pre- 
 cisely what they are going to be. Here was 
 Malone, the outlaw, the confederate of Mason 
 and Hale and the rest, coming to Judge Denby's 
 house at one in the morning as though he were 
 a detective reporting a case! 
 
 "Malone!" he gasped. "How on earth do you 
 dare to come here?" 
 
 "Why, didn't you know?" exclaimed Ralph, 
 looking at him in amazement, "Malone is Father's 
 right-hand man!" 
 
 "Is that right?" said Jack, with an odd flutter 
 of his pulse. Somehow a number of things were 
 becoming plain to him. "Is that right, sir?" he 
 repeated, looking at Judge Denby. 
 
 The Judge's face was rather a curious study. 
 The fresh color and pleasant look of it had some- 
 how disappeared and a mask looked at them in- 
 stead something which obstinately refused to 
 give them a single secret. 
 
 Malone peered at him with his little eyes. 
 
 "It's right, isn't it, your Honor?" he said with
 
 278 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 rather a sardonic intonation. "If I'm not your 
 right-hand man, who is?" 
 
 The Judge seemed to pull himself together 
 with a big effort. 
 
 "Malone is certainly in my employ," he said, 
 but his voice did not sound quite like himself. 
 
 "Ah!" said old Heaton. "Sort of private de- 
 tective, eh Judge? But I guess he's double- 
 crossed you." He shook his head as though in 
 regret, and lifted his awkward, angular length 
 from his chair. "I'm afraid I have to arrest 
 him just the same " He produced a pair of 
 handcuffs. 
 
 "Judge!" shrieked Malone, "tell him that I'm 
 your man, in your pay ! Tell him I never double- 
 crossed you ! Tell him I " 
 
 "Mr. Heaton," said Judge Denby, perceptibly 
 paler, "I will vouch for Malone." 
 
 The Sheriff looked at him a moment, and again 
 shook his head very gently. 
 
 "I wouldn't Judge, if I were you," he said. 
 "We've got the goods. If I were you, I'd " 
 
 Suddenly he stopped. For again there were 
 voices at the door, women's voices this time in
 
 THE LEARNED JUDGE 279 
 
 pressing eagerness to enter. Radnor recognized 
 one of those voices, and started toward the door. 
 The Judge's voice stopped him. 
 
 "Just a moment, Radnor! Mr. Heaton, there 
 has been a a bad mix-up here." 
 
 "I think so," said the Sheriff, dryly. 
 
 "And I dare say that Justice " the Judge 
 gulped "may have miscarried. I confess that I 
 had my suspicions of Martin Hale, but I think 
 I may have been wrong. Suppose you let both 
 him and Malone go, on the understanding that 
 the outlaws of the Ridge disband?" 
 
 "On their word alone?" asked Heaton. 
 
 "Well," said Denby suavely, "purely as a 
 magistrate and as a disinterested observer, I 
 should be willing to take a chance on them. / 
 will guarantee their word, Mr. Heaton!" 
 
 His magnificent air seemed to clothe him in 
 purple and gold. The Sheriff stared at him in 
 undisguised admiration. Then he uttered a 
 cryptic remark: 
 
 "It's a good thing never to leave your nerve be- 
 hind you when you go out Judge, what you say 
 goes!"
 
 CHAPTER XXVI 
 
 MRS. FORSYTHE TAKES A HAND 
 
 A conscience for his own soul, not his realm; 
 A twilight conscience lighted thro' a chink. ... 
 
 ALFRED TENNYSON. 
 
 door swung open and precipitably pass- 
 ing the Judge's protesting servant, Mrs. 
 Forsythe hurried into the room, followed by a 
 young woman who was sobbing hysterically. She 
 was Augustine, Enid's French maid. 
 
 "Judge Denby! Jack!" faltered Mrs. For- 
 sythe, who was very white, but trying to maintain 
 some composure. "I had to come! Augustine 
 says Augustine ! Tell them ! Stop crying and 
 tell them at once!" 
 
 The girl addressed herself to Jack Radnor 
 whom she adored and spoke with melodramatic 
 gestures but evident sincerity: "It is, Monsieur, 
 
 280
 
 MRS. FORSYTHE TAKES A HAND 281 
 
 that Mademoiselle Oh, le bon Dieu guard her 
 Mademoiselle, at the very hour when they were 
 preparing for the cotillon, la-bas, has done the 
 so strange a thing!" 
 
 Jack could have wrung her neck for the delay. 
 "For God's sake, what is it?" he demanded, 
 whiter now than Mrs. Forsythe herself. "What 
 did Mademoiselle do?" 
 
 "She dressed Oh, Monsieur, but conceive 
 it! At that hour, and with this storm coming 
 on, though it is true that one could not know it 
 then." 
 
 Jack groaned aloud. Was the woman wound 
 up? 
 
 "She dressed " Augustine could not help a 
 dramatic pause "in her riding habit!" 
 
 In the silence that followed the clamor of the 
 storm mocked them. Radnor closed his eyes for 
 a moment, visualizing his Enid, a mere little atom 
 of precious, helpless life, whirled about some- 
 where in that inferno of rain and wind. Only 
 for a moment. The next he was mechanically 
 dragging on his raincoat and Hale, he felt dully, 
 was helping him and putting his cap into his hand.
 
 282 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "Where?" he asked Augustine, in a sharp hard 
 tone, very unlike his usual voice. 
 
 "Not the Toll Gate!" put in Hale, speaking 
 for the first time. "I left there less than two 
 hours ago, and she had not reached there." 
 
 "Where?" repeated Jack, looking at Augustine. 
 But Martin's words had brought fresh lines into 
 his face. 
 
 "Ah, but Monsieur! I do not know. That is 
 what Mademoiselle said, that if I did not know 
 I could not tell. She did not want anyone to 
 know unless, she said, if she should not return." 
 
 "But," broke in Mrs. Forsythe, wildly, "you 
 have known this all the evening, Augustine! 
 Why, why didn't you let us know before? You 
 did not even answer the telephone!" 
 
 "Ah, Madame," wept Augustine, "it is the ton- 
 nerre the terrible thunderstorm! I always am 
 afraid, and I have heard it is at such times death 
 to go to the telephone!" 
 
 Jack did not wait for anything further, but 
 dashed out into the darkness and the trap that 
 was waiting for Mrs. Forsythe. In his rooms at 
 the hotel he hurriedly changed while he was wait-
 
 MRS. FORSYTHE TAKES A HAND 283 
 
 ing for a horse to be brought up from the stable, 
 and Ware was more upset than ever as he saw 
 the set sternness of his master's face. Of course, 
 Radnor knew now what had happened. Eni.d 
 had heard what young Denby had said to him 
 about the plans for Martin Hale, and had ridden 
 off like the headstrong madcap she was to carry 
 him a warning in his mountain hiding place. 
 What had happened to her no one could now hope 
 to guess. He had sent the trap back to Judge 
 Denby's house for Mrs. Forsythe and now left 
 a note for her: 
 
 "I shall go first to the Toll Gate and see if she 
 has reached there yet. Then I shall search. Try 
 not to worry any more than you can help. J." 
 
 Five minutes later he was on the back of the 
 best horse they had in the Warm Sulphur Springs 
 stable, galloping straight and hard on the Warm 
 Springs road. He knew that the trails by this time 
 would be practically impassable, and had no mind 
 to be delayed by washouts, so he took the longer 
 way as the surest means to his end. As he rose
 
 284 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 he thought of the amazing selfishness of man- 
 kind. He had seen Hale and Polly go out into 
 the threatening storm with only a passing thought 
 of their having difficulties. But Enid was another 
 matter! Another? She was all that mattered in 
 the world even if, and the thought did leave a 
 stab, she had gone without a word to warn an- 
 other man. Fie wished that he had asked Hale 
 more about the roads. It was unlike him, he 
 knew, to start upon any enterprise so impetuously, 
 with so little forethought and preparation. But 
 then, never before had he faced anything like 
 this. The girl he loved, lost or at least missing, 
 in a raging storm at night among the mountain 
 ranges and for six no, nearly seven hours ! The 
 fury of the tempest in his own face even in the 
 Valley suggested to him what it must be on the 
 Ridge; the difficulties of keeping an easy seat 
 even for his strong polo-trained muscles was some 
 fa'mt indication of what an ordeal it would be for 
 a slender girl to ride against such a storm. Every 
 time his horse plunged or reared at a thunder- 
 clap or a lightning flash, every time a wet hoof 
 slid stumbling over a wet stone, he had agon-
 
 MRS. FORSYTHE TAKES A HAND 285 
 
 izing visions of Enid thrown, or perhaps lying 
 hurt who knows where, among those cruel ever- 
 lasting hills. 
 
 And as he rode with set teeth and a twisted 
 heart, another expedition was setting out. Enid 
 was making, in fact, about as much trouble as 
 is practicable for one small maiden. 
 
 When Jack had plunged out of the room, 
 Martin Hale had turned to Judge Denby. 
 
 "Am I free to go, sir?" 
 
 The Judge nodded. He was sincerely con- 
 cerned, and now he went to Mrs. Forsythe and 
 pressed her hand. 
 
 "Dear lady," he said, "I know how anxious you 
 are, but I am sure unnecessarily so! Your 
 daughter is an expert horsewoman, and " 
 
 "I'm going," said Hale at the door. "I'll take 
 the trail, for I reckon Radnor took the main 
 road to get faster going. We ought to find her 
 between us." 
 
 "I'll go, too," said Ralph Denby. 
 
 They were off in another moment 
 
 "Judge Denby," said Mrs. Forsythe, suddenly, 
 and wan and pale as she was there was a fire in
 
 286 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 her eyes as vital as the fire of youth, "I am 
 going after my child myself!" 
 
 "My dear lady " began the Judge, in expostu- 
 lation. 
 
 "I am!" she declared. "I have suffered enough 
 during this dreadful evening. I won't suffer half 
 so much if I'm doing something!" 
 
 "But you can't go alone!" Denby protested. 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe was fastening her wrap with that 
 brilliant look still in her golden eyes eyes so like 
 Enid's own. She paused and looked at the Judge. 
 
 "Well," she said, "why don't you go with 
 me?" 
 
 Judge Denby stared at her, when he walked 
 across the room to his desk and began to finger 
 some letters that lay there. His hand seemed 
 to be trembling. 
 
 Malone was still in the room. He flashed his 
 beady eyes into the Judge's own and said: 
 
 "Better go, Judge." 
 
 Denby started, and looked involuntarily at 
 Heaton. The latter slowly nodded. 
 
 "The road beyond the Toll Gate leads to 
 Middletown," he said, with seeming irrelevance.
 
 MRS. FORSYTHE TAKES A HAND 287 
 
 "And there's nothing," added Malone, speak- 
 ing also with no apparent reference to anything in 
 particular, "like knowing the right time to do a 
 thing." 
 
 The Judge looked from one to the other of 
 them silently. Then he straightened up and took 
 a deep breath. 
 
 "I think you are both right," he said. He 
 hesitated, and added, "Thank you, Heaton." 
 And he had never spoken with more dignity. 
 "Mrs. Forsythe, I shall be only too delighted to 
 accompany you to Four Trail Crossing, to look 
 for your daughter." 
 
 He offered his arm and they left the room to- 
 gether. The two men inside looked at each other. 
 After a minute Heaton spoke: 
 
 "No occasion for State's Evidence, Malone. I'd 
 rather have it this way, I reckon. Your gang's 
 busted, and I'm glad well, I'm glad things 
 turned out the way they did. Say!" He 
 helped himself to one of the Judge's cigars 
 "he's a thoroughbred all right! Have one of 
 these? I reckon he won't be asking for 'em for 
 some time!"
 
 CHAPTER XXVII 
 
 ANOTHER DAWN 
 
 And round about his home the glory 
 
 That blushed and bloomed 
 Is but a dim-remembered story 
 
 Of the old time entombed. 
 
 EDGAR ALLAN FOB. 
 
 "A-pHERE'S not been such a night here in fifteen 
 years!" said the keeper of the Toll Gate. 
 He was propped up with pillows in a chair 
 before the fire and Polly crouched beside him, her 
 head against his arm. The heart attack had 
 passed: when Polly had arrived hours before it 
 was already over but he still looked ill and 
 weary. She had not taken off the rose-red frock 
 lent her by Alice Baker; it was splashed and 
 muddy about the skirt even as Alice had known 
 it would be ! And her heavy black hair loosened 
 
 288
 
 ANOTHER DAWN 289 
 
 by the long drive to the Crossing had not been 
 put up again but streamed like spilled ink upon 
 her shoulders. 
 
 She shivered now, and pressed closer to her 
 father's shoulder. 
 
 "Listen to the wind!" she murmured. "Seems 
 like it'd lift us straight off the Crossing and blow 
 us away, don't it, Dad?" 
 
 A great puff of smoke came down the chimney, 
 and the whole house shook. The gust, passing, 
 left a wail above the roof like the keen of a 
 banshee. 
 
 "A wild night, a wild night !" muttered the Toll- 
 keeper. "What's the matter, honey?" 
 
 For Polly was softly crying. 
 
 "It's Martin!" she whispered brokenly. "Dad, 
 how will we know if he comes out of it all 
 right?" 
 
 "He'll come out of it," said her father, with 
 odd confidence. "Martin Hale is not going to 
 be beaten, anyway around. And if the worst 
 comes to the worst, / can take care of him." 
 
 "You, Dad!" She drew back and looked at 
 him in astonishment.
 
 2 9 o MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 He nodded. 
 
 "Yes. I've kept silence a long time, now. But 
 I reckon I can talk if I have to." 
 
 The leaping fire showed grim determination 
 in his face. She had no idea what he meant, but 
 a sort of comfort came to her. She had abound- 
 ing trust in her father. If he said that things 
 were coming out right, she was sure that they 
 would. 
 
 "Dad," she said, very low, "it's it's lonely 
 here at the Toll Gate, isn't it?" 
 
 He smiled and turned to look down at her 
 face, rosy with something more than the fire- 
 light and the reflection of the red gown. 
 
 "Is it all right between you and Martin now, 
 honey?" he asked. 
 
 She did not speak, but her hand stole up to 
 touch his. The Toll Keeper nodded his head 
 wisely. 
 
 "The trails get crossed now and then," he said, 
 addressing the fire, "but we can usually find our 
 own if we keep our eyes open." 
 
 The clock struck three and almost with the mo- 
 ment of its striking Jack Radnor came into the
 
 ANOTHER DAWN 291 
 
 Toll Gate House without even knocking. He was 
 breathing hard and dripped rain like a living 
 fountain. 
 
 "Enid Miss Forsythe?" he demanded. 
 
 "Great heavens, man, you look as though you'd 
 been drowned!" cried the Toll-keeper. 
 
 "Did she come here?" went on Radnor un- 
 heeding. 
 
 The Masons both shook their heads. A sort 
 of tense look in Jack's pale face gave way to such 
 a reaction of discouragement and anxiety that the 
 old man hastened to add: 
 
 "But maybe she couldn't have gotten here yet? 
 When did she start?" 
 
 "At seven o'clock last night," said Jack drearily. 
 
 Polly suppressed a little cry. 
 
 "Tut! Tut!" sympathized the Toll-keeper 
 soberly. "That's bad and she was headed for 
 Four Trails, Mr. Radnor?" 
 
 "I don't know." Jack told the few facts he did 
 know, and could not help noting even in that 
 moment of stress, that Polly's lovely face paled 
 and stiffened when he spoke of his conviction that 
 her errand had been to warn Martin Hale.
 
 292 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 For the rest, however, he and the mountain girl 
 could look at each other now without self-con- 
 sciousness. Whatever mistaken trails they had 
 each been tempted along, both of them were set 
 the right way now. That bewitched hour in 
 Malone's shack was like a dream or a memory 
 of some other life and incarnation. 
 
 Suddenly Polly burst out with tears in her 
 eyes: 
 
 "In this rain ! Oh, Mr. Radnor, what will she 
 do? What has happened to her?" 
 
 Jack winced. 
 
 "That's what I'm going to find out," he said, 
 dully and turned to the door once more. 
 
 "Wait!" exclaimed the Toll-keeper, sharply. 
 "I'm an old man, Radnor" it was odd how 
 easily he dropped the respectful prefix "and I 
 know something of the way to go about the sort 
 of job you have in hand. You can't do it spent 
 and weak; and you can't do it in weather like 
 this, without changing horses. Hold on to your- 
 self, man, and think on her account, mind you: 
 not on your own. The first thing to do is to take 
 a drink white liquor won't hurt you for once
 
 ANOTHER DAWN 293 
 
 in your life, son! Then go out and stable your 
 horse in my barn and change your saddle to 
 mine. She's not a prize winner but she's fresh 
 and yours can't be up to much by this. Then 
 come back here, and we'll decide what to do. 
 The storm is letting up now and it will begin to 
 be light in half an hour. With the dawn, and 
 the rain stopped, and a new horse and something 
 hot under your belt you can start out with some 
 sense and hopes of finding her. Now, then, drink 
 it down, and do as I say!" 
 
 When Jack had gone to the stable, the old Toll- 
 keeper pulled himself out of his chair with an 
 alert look on his face. 
 
 "You aren't going to do anything Dad!" said 
 Polly anxiously. "Your heart " 
 
 Her father laughed. 
 
 "My heart would break, Poll, if I sat still when 
 trouble's in the wind. You know me! But no; 
 I'm going to behave myself; you needn't worry. 
 Only, I can't sit still ! I'm going out to see when 
 the storm will break." 
 
 The storm had, as a matter of fact, already 
 broken; more, it had almost ceased. The last
 
 294 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 wild rage of it seemed to have exhausted its 
 vigor. The winds were trailing off in faint flur- 
 ries. The rain was fine and feathery now and a 
 fine gray light showed a whole continent of 
 clouds rolling away beneath the Crossing. Light? 
 It seemed not yet light indeed, so much as some 
 mystic agent that made things visible in darkness. 
 The dawn was on her way, but so far only the 
 misty veil of her and her subtle perfume was all 
 of which the world might take cognizance. 
 
 "It's over," said Richard Mason, breathing 
 deep of the wonderful air, "but it's all but taken 
 the mountain away from under us!" 
 
 "I told you it felt like that!" said Polly, coming 
 to his side. "Oh, Dad, it's it's awful," she 
 gasped. 
 
 The slope above them leading to the top of the 
 Ridge was a roaring torrent. They could see the 
 gleam and hear the noise of it. On one side of 
 the Toll Gate House a vast gulley had been 
 washed almost to the very walls. The roads 
 both ways were well nigh obliterated. Trees on 
 every side those small yet tough trees that grow 
 on mountain tops had been wrenched from the
 
 ANOTHER DAWN 295 
 
 streaming earth and lay prone and shattered or 
 toppled limply with leaf-stripped branches. A 
 tidal wave could scarcely have worked more 
 havoc. 
 
 The dawn came more quickly now, as is its 
 wont in summer after that first hesitating awaken- 
 ing. The horizon was suddenly splashed with 
 greenish silver and a cold pale light crept out 
 over the trumbled chaos of retreating rain clouds. 
 
 Jack Radnor came out of the stable leading 
 Mason's brown mare, saddled. 
 
 "And now," he said, "I am going to start 
 back along the Ridge, and stop at Malone's shack. 
 She might have taken shelter there." 
 
 Mason looked doubtfully up at the brown river 
 flooding down toward them. 
 
 "Doubtful," he was beginning, when Polly 
 cried out joyfully. 
 
 Radnor's heart leaped then and sank, for it 
 was Martin Hale riding slowly up from the Warm 
 Springs direction. 
 
 "I couldn't make it on the Ridge," he called, 
 before he was up to them. "It's nothing but a 
 string of washouts all the way up, though I
 
 296 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 reckon the top'd be safe enough if you could get 
 to it. No news? Sorry, Radnor." 
 
 Polly's pleading face at the door drew him 
 inside the house "or a moment. "I'll be out to 
 start with you," he said to Jack as he vanished. 
 
 "I'll slip away while he's inside," said Radnor, 
 wearily. "He's had trouble enough for one man. 
 Let him stay with your daughter. That's where 
 he belongs. This this is my job." 
 
 Old Mason nodded. 
 
 "You're men, both of you," he said tersely. It 
 was the highest praise he knew. 
 
 A flock of twittering birds flew quickly up into 
 the clearing ether. It was the first note of sum- 
 mer that had been heard since the beginning of 
 what the people of that region were to call the 
 Great Storm. Also with equal suddenness the 
 smell of growing things woke in the clearing. 
 The August day had fairly begun. 
 
 Suddenly Jack gave a sharp cry, and pointed, 
 almost articulate. For up into the clearing beside 
 the Toll Gate, plain enough now in the summer 
 dawn, trolled wearily a jaded black horse with a 
 side-saddle rather loose upon his back.
 
 ANOTHER DAWN 297 
 
 "Hers?" breathed old Mason. 
 
 Radnor nodded. He had ascertained from the 
 stable man which horse Miss Forsythe had ridden. 
 
 The animal made his way to the front of the 
 Toll Gate House, and as Jack sprang to his head 
 did not even start. 
 
 "The beast's done," said the younger man over 
 his shoulder. 
 
 Mason came to the horse's head. 
 
 "Pumping like a steam engine!" he agreed as 
 he watched the heaving sides. 
 
 "But look the way he's come!" said Jack, 
 staring past the black horse into the mysterious 
 valley growing ever more strange and more full 
 of possibilities with the waxing light of dawn. 
 
 "I reckon," said Richard Mason, succinctly, 
 "that you better get after your job, son, I'll look 
 out for the beast." 
 
 Jack seemed to start the mare and mount her 
 in midair, so fast was his departure. The old 
 Toll-keeper smiled, sighed and shook his head, 
 as he hooked his arm into the black's loose snaffle, 
 and watched the other go. But Radnor was not 
 unduly reckless. The road was practically a river
 
 298 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 except on the edges. It required navigating. 
 Without doubt navigate was the word ! He knew 
 that any horse would have enough sense to pick 
 the soundest way, and peering cautiously, began 
 to follow the foot-deep hoof prints of the black 
 horse down the mud and ooze. Somewhere at 
 the end of that unknown trail Enid was waiting, 
 but how ?
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII 
 
 SHADOWS FROM THE PAST 
 
 Old wishes, ghosts of broken plans, 
 And phantom hopes assemble. . . . 
 
 ALFRED TENNYSOK. 
 
 A BEAM of actual summer sunshine was lying 
 on the threshold of the Toll-gate House 
 when Mrs. Forsythe and Judge Denby crossed 
 it an hour later. In a light rig they had made 
 nearly as good time as had the men on horse- 
 back. 
 
 The Toll-keeper and his daughter met them 
 with polite bewilderment. But old Mason's look 
 changed almost instantly. Recognition lighted his 
 whole weather-beaten face. 
 
 "Edith!" he said. And then: "I felt it; I knew 
 she must be your daughter." 
 
 299
 
 300 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 "It's thirty years, Dick!" she said quietly. 
 Then turned to the Judge. "You remember each 
 other?" 
 
 The two men's eyes were hard as steel in 
 meeting. It was Denby's which softened to some- 
 thing very like an appeal. 
 
 "Won't you shake hands, Dick?" 
 
 Mason looked at the outstretched hand and 
 shook his head. 
 
 "Why should I?" he said. "You sent me up 
 here; made me an outcast and an outlaw and then 
 helped to keep me what you'd made me. Oh, 
 I've a damned lot of reasons for wanting to shake 
 hands with you, your Honor, haven't I?" 
 
 He laughed grimly. The two women looked 
 at him utterly perplexed. Even more puzzling 
 was Judge Denby's attitude. All his confident, 
 assured bearing was gone; his clean-cut handsome 
 mouth was trembling. Richard Mason might 
 have been the Judge and he the outlaw from the 
 look of them. 
 
 "I treated you shamefully, Dick, long ago," he 
 said, low and hurriedly, "but I've tried to be 
 square to you in this I mean of late."
 
 SHADOWS FROM THE PAST 301 
 
 "You mean," supplemented Mason, "in this 
 rotten mountain-crook business of yours." 
 
 "You were in it as well as I," defended Denby. 
 Mrs. Forsythe could hardly believe her ears, 
 but that is what he said, "And I always pro- 
 tected you, Dick, as soon as I knew who you 
 were." 
 
 "I was in it," said the Toll-keeper, "because 
 at first I drifted into it, feeling that as long as 
 I had been turned out by society I might as well 
 go the limit. And then I stayed in it because I 
 found out who the ringleader was, and I was set 
 to get that man before I died and see him in the 
 jail he was born to fill!" 
 
 "Dad!" cried Polly, softly, "don't! You'll 
 hurt yourself getting all worked up like that." 
 
 "Dick," said Denby, and he looked old for the 
 first time in his life, "I came to bring Edith," 
 he called her so for the first time, "and to " 
 He hesitated while he tried his best to force some 
 sort of a smile onto his twisted lips, "I believe 
 Heaton calls it 'making a get-away' what I'm go- 
 ing to do," he said. 
 
 They stared at him. And for just a moment
 
 302 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 something of his old dignity and authority came 
 back to help him out. 
 
 "I'm through," he said. "Malone Is ready to 
 sell me out. I haven't a friend left. Heaton has 
 been very generous. He will let me get away, 
 and perhaps perhaps Ralph will never find out 
 just how much of a criminal his father was. If 
 I stayed and faced my just deserts everything 
 would have to come out, and it is he who would 
 suffer. For me well, it's not the easiest thing 
 to carry fifty odd years and such years out 
 into the world for a fresh start. But it's all I 
 can do now to make up for what I have done in 
 the past. Edith I hope with all my heart your 
 daughter will return to you in safety. But my 
 presence here will only make you more miserable 
 while waiting for news. I will go outside a little." 
 
 "Before you say good-bye," said Mrs. For- 
 sythe, faintly. She was in fact terribly anxious 
 to be free from his presence. And it was not 
 solely repulsion she felt, shocked as she had been 
 to learn of his duplicity. There was also in her 
 heart an unreasoning pity and regret that one 
 who had stood so high in the eyes of men should
 
 SHADOWS FROM THE PAST 303 
 
 be brought so low even in his own. She added 
 impulsively: "I'm sorry Arthur." 
 
 The Judge compressed his lips a bit more 
 firmly. "I thank you, Edith," he said, with his 
 old, beautiful courtly bow, and went out slowly 
 into the morning light. 
 
 "Edith, there are tears in your eyes," said 
 Richard Mason. 
 
 "Oh, Richard," she said, "my heart aches for 
 for almost everyone, I think, to-day. Do you 
 oh, do you believe that I shall have my little girl 
 back safe and sound?" 
 
 "I believe that young Radnor would swim the 
 Styx to get her back," said the Toll-keeper. "Sit 
 down, dear woman, and try to rest a little. You 
 must be worn out." 
 
 "Why look!" Polly's voice was full of 
 amazement. The eyes of the others followed her 
 outstretched hand. 
 
 Down the muddy, streaming yellow road that 
 led to the farther side of the Ridge, with his back 
 turned toward the Warm Spring Valley and all 
 within it, walked a man. He did not stride with 
 the free tread of one used to going on foot, but
 
 304 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 slowly, even awkwardly, like a man moving with 
 bandaged eyes. So did Judge Denby walk out 
 of their lives and out of his two diverse and ex- 
 tensive careers to regions unknown. No one of 
 them not even his son ever saw him again.
 
 CHAPTER XXIX 
 
 SUNSHINE AT THE FOUR TRAIL CROSSING 
 
 Does the road wind up-hill all the way? 
 
 Yes, to the very end. 
 Will the day's journey take the whole long day? 
 
 From morn to night, my friend. 
 
 Shall I meet other wayfarers at night? 
 
 Those who have gone before. 
 Then must I knock, or call when just in sight? 
 
 They will not keep you standing at the door. 
 
 CHRISTINA ROSSETTI. 
 
 / I A HE ego that was Enid Forsythe struggled up 
 through infinite fathoms of unconscious- 
 ness. 
 
 First came bewilderment; then physical discom- 
 fort; stiffened limbs and a sense of chill. Then 
 darkness again. But Enid was superbly healthy. 
 She was not really hurt and her splendid youth 
 was already at work in its healing processes. 
 
 305
 
 306 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 Even as she lay motionless on the ground, she was 
 remembering why she had come, and all that 
 had happened. . . . And then she heard a horse 
 coming and the creak of leather. 
 
 "Wouldn't it be funny," she thought, languidly, 
 "if, after I had come to find him, Martin Hale 
 should find me?" 
 
 She struggled to lift herself and gave a little 
 cry to attract the rider's attention. Then she sank 
 back into half-swoon once more. 
 
 As she drifted off a low, almost a harsh ex- 
 clamation sounded in her ears : "Enid !" 
 
 She had not the smallest doubt that it was 
 Martin Hale now. He had found her, just as 
 she had imagined he might. He was big and 
 strong. He would take care of her. 
 
 She felt herself caught up almost roughly in 
 strong arms, and thrilled, even through the en- 
 ervation of her fatigue, at the uncompromis- 
 ingly masterful way in which she was being 
 handled. 
 
 "Thank God for a man," she whispered in 
 her heart, but there was a sting in the thought, 
 too. If it could have been Jack. "But it could
 
 never have been Jack!" she told herself reck- 
 lessly. 
 
 "I may love him best in one way," but in the 
 Big Primitive Things of Life women want some- 
 thing Big and Primitive to hold on to!" 
 
 She had an odd sense of trying to convince 
 herself of something against her own will. 
 
 "I came here I braved everything for Martin 
 Hale and he has found me! . . . Better yet 
 I have found myself!" 
 
 She was so exhausted that her very mental 
 processes were confused. She felt herself lifted 
 to the man's saddle like a sack of meal; felt 
 the spring of the horse beneath her, the steady 
 grip of the hands that held her, the warm strength 
 of the firm body against which she rested. In the 
 semi-stupor of her state she seemed to see, as in 
 an hallucination, the shadowy figure of Jack Rad- 
 nor fading into infinitudes of distance. Her eye- 
 lids drooped into a sort of frown, but the vision 
 persisted. It might be Martin Hale, Primitive 
 Man of the Hills who held her, who had res- 
 cued her, but, as her senses swam into oblivion 
 it was Jack Radnor of whom she thought with a
 
 308 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 dull ache, Jack Radnor whom, after all, she 
 loved ! 
 
 She was she admitted it to herself with a sort 
 of sick sinking of her heart miserable because 
 it was Martin Hale who had rescued her. 
 
 It was bright sunlight when Jack Radnor car- 
 ried his light burden into the Toll-gate House. 
 He laid Enid on the couch and leaned against the 
 table suddenly dizzy with the reaction of his 
 hours of anguish. 
 
 Mrs. Forsythe and Polly flew to the half-con- 
 scious girl, and the Toll-keeper piled wood upon 
 the fire and put on the kettle. The sunshine 
 streamed into the room. The long night was 
 gone like a bad dream. 
 
 But though color had come back to Enid's lips 
 and cheeks, she did not seem to wish to make 
 any effort to become herself again. 
 
 She lay lethargically on the couch, too weary 
 in heart and body to open her eyes or move. She 
 was reluctant, too, for with each pulse of return- 
 ing strength in her blood she resented Martin 
 Hale's rescue of her, and longed for the man 
 she really loved. Dully, and as though from a
 
 SUNSHINE AT THE CROSSING 309 
 
 distance, she heard voices, Martin Hale's among 
 them, but could only hear a word now and then. 
 "Must be pretty well done up" . . . "riding half 
 the night" . . . "Worst storm on record." 
 
 Loving hands held hot drinks to her lips and 
 smoothed her hair. 
 
 "Mamma!" she whispered softly, but still she 
 did not open her eyes. 
 
 "Thank God! Thank God!" whispered her 
 mother, caressing her with trembling hands. 
 "And Jack," she added with a broken laugh, "for 
 bringing you back to me!" 
 
 Enid's great golden eyes flashed suddenly wide 
 open and a fiery flush swept from her chin to 
 her shining hair. Jack! Impossible! Jack 
 wasn't the sort who rode all night in storms in 
 search of stray maidens i It But standing 
 close beside her was, undoubtedly, Jack. A very 
 different Jack from the man to whom she had be- 
 lieved herself engaged but the same. He was 
 haggard with anxiety and sleeplessness and he 
 needed a shave badly. But the whole of Enid's 
 heart and soul leaped in her throat as she 
 saw him, and she sobbed, "Jack!" in such a
 
 3 io MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 tone that the others were fain to turn their 
 eyes away. Radnor went up to her, as she 
 lay a little figure of burning gold in the blaze 
 of the golden sunshine that was streaming into the 
 room. 
 
 "Are you strong enough to come outside with 
 me?" he asked her in a low voice. For answer 
 she sprang up, life running swift and eager in 
 her healthy young veins. For her trail too was 
 clear before her at last; nothing would ever be 
 able to cross it again. 
 
 But if Enid expected a love scene she was 
 doomed to astonishment. 
 
 For, when he had her outside the Toll-gate 
 House, Jack seized her by the shoulders and con- 
 fronted her with a look she had never seen be- 
 fore. It was a look though, which went very well 
 with the headlong rescue of her at dawn. He 
 was extremely pale as white as a dark man can 
 get and there were shadows about his eyes. His 
 usually correct dress was in startling disarray and 
 his hair was in a wet tumble above the most 
 stormingly scowling brows she had ever seen. 
 His lips, however, trembled and so did the strong
 
 SUNSHINE AT THE CROSSING 3 1 1 
 
 hands that held her with a grasp that hurt. 
 There was something of genuine anger as well 
 a: love in the passion that shook him. 
 
 "How dared you," he said, in a queer breath- 
 less voice that she would never have dreamed 
 could come from his lips. "How dared you 
 frighten me like this!" 
 
 "Frighten?" She was too surprised to more 
 than repeat the word feebly. 
 
 He almost groaned. "I've died twenty deaths 
 in the last three hours," he said, fiercely. "I've 
 seen you in fragments at the bottom of cliffs, and 
 drowned, and stunned by lightning and " He 
 broke off. "You little fiend," he muttered, very 
 low but vehemently. "And you've nearly killed 
 your mother as well!" 
 
 "But Jack," she stammered wild-eyed, "it 
 it's so queer. I never dreamed you'd feel like 
 that!" 
 
 "Didn't you?" he said grimly. 
 
 And then he shook her, not at all gently; and 
 then clasping her close, kissed her lips over and 
 over again hard, stormy kisses that took her 
 breath away. His arms felt to her like white-hot
 
 312 MOUNTAIN MADNESS 
 
 steel quivering from some pulsing flame within 
 them. . . . 
 
 "Oh, Jack!" gasped Enid when she could speak, 
 "why why didn't you do that before?" 
 
 FINIS.
 
 
 
 
 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
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