“There is no use in the world,” the doctor commented cheerfully, “in spending time in vain remorse5. We should decide what must be done now. It may be, the only thing is to wait.”
Beatrice drew a deep quivering sigh. It seemed, in the midst of excitement and the anxiety to atone6, that waiting was the one intolerable thing.
“I can’t bear to wait,” she burst out at last.
“I have never told you,” Dr. Minturn rejoined slowly, “of how Miriam and I came to live here. We used to be in a big city and we had that same full, restless life that most city dwellers7 know. Some people thrive in such an atmosphere, some can endure it, but it was destruction to us both. I had more patients than I could care for, Miriam’s days were as crowded as mine. We saw each other little and were always tired when our daily duties were done. I realized vaguely8 that such unceasing toil9 must kill any man before long, but the excitement of my growing practice was something I could not give up. Then Miriam, one day, asked me some questions; she knew some one who had such and such symptoms, who felt this way during the smoky winter and that way when the air was damp and the wind was raw. I was in haste and my verdict was quick. ‘Such a person could not live a year,’ I declared. And then she told me the person was herself!”
He paused to look down at the quiet house under the trees, where Miriam’s shadow showed on one white curtain after another as she went to and fro about her work. For a minute he watched as though to assure himself that the memory of that terrible day was only a dream.
“It is something we all have to learn; how to watch our whole, secure, happy world fall to pieces before our eyes, and still keep our minds clear and be able to think what to do. ‘A change of climate,’ my fellow-doctors advised; ‘Quiet, rest, no anxiety’; but they all shook their heads. We tried place after place, it would be too long a story to tell how we drifted here at last. The cottage was only half its size, then, but it was habitable; the place seemed good as any; and neither of us had the heart to go farther. The wrench10 of leaving the old life, the weariness of wandering from place to place had all done harm; and the good effect of the change had not yet come. Miriam was always cheerful, always hopeful, but I watched her grow thinner and weaker every day. I stood by, helpless. There was nothing to do but wait, though it seemed that waiting must drive me mad.”
Beatrice nodded understandingly. Waiting—how she hated it! It seemed as though there must always be something to do other than to wait; but it was likely to be the wrong thing.
“There was one morning when I had been watching beside her bed all night, thinking, as she slept, how pinched and thin and shadowy she had grown. We were young then, if you can think of us as that, young like your Aunt Anna and John Herrick, with years to dream of still before us. And that night it seemed as though it all was coming to an end. I can remember how the dawn came in at the windows and how Miriam opened her eyes to look up at me and smile. I believe she was thinking that she would rather die here in the clean, empty quiet than in that roaring, smoke-filled town that we called home.
“But it was no place of peace for me. I called the nurse and flung myself out of the house; I tramped away up the mountain, crushing the roses and forget-me-nots under foot with a savage12 pleasure that I can still recall. I stood on the highest ridge13 at last, looked out over the valley and the dark hills with their summits bathed in sunshine, at the winding14 silver thread of the river, and I held up my arms and opened my lips to curse them all.
“The words I meant to say were never spoken. I heard a footstep on the trail behind me and, as I looked around, a man passed by me and went down the mountain. He was old, far older than I am now, his face was so weather-beaten, his long hair so grizzled, and his back so bent16 that he might have passed for Father Time himself. He said no word, but he gave me one look that seemed to read every thought within me, a glance of complete and utter scorn. Some old prospector17 he was, a man who had spent his life trudging18 over the barren hillsides, looking for new mines, disappointed a thousand times, seeking fortune and never finding it. Others who followed him had prospered19 by his discoveries, had found the riches that he could not keep; for the man who prospects20 is seldom the man who gathers wealth. He gathers other things, however; forbearance, understandings, and a strange, deep patience, born of lonely valleys, endless trails, and wide starry21 skies. It was no wonder he scorned me and my pitiful little anger with the mountains he called his.
“I never saw him again. He stepped into my life and out of it again, and we did not even exchange a word. Yet I have never forgotten the lesson his one look taught me. I went down the hill after a little, and the nurse met me at the door.
“‘I thought you would never come,’ she said. ‘I have been thinking for days that there was a little change, and now I am sure of it.’
“Yes, the broad daylight showed it: the flame of Miriam’s life was burning a little brighter; the mountain air was beginning to do its work at last. In a week she could sit up; in a month she could walk about; and in a year she was well.”
“And you never went home again?” Nancy asked, when a pause marked the end of his tale.
“Home was here now, and we had no wish to go back to a life that had so nearly been the end of both of us. For a time there was no doctor in the valley below us here, so I used to do what I could for the sick people in these mountains. My place at home was soon filled; the tasks I had left went on without me. By and by a younger man moved into this valley to take the work, so that I was free to try that experiment that I had long thought of—what Miriam calls my Christmas-tree Garden. I have helped again when there were epidemics22 in the valley and when our doctor went to war; but I am always glad to lay the burden down and come back to my trees. And the point of all my long story is, my dear, that some time in the course of our growing up, we must learn how to wait. To be eager and ardent23 is part of being young, but to learn that eagerness does not bring all things is a truth that the years bring us.”
He made a gesture toward the summit of Gray Cloud Mountain, a black mass against the twinkling stars.
“He is learning his lesson, too, that boy up there, camping in the dark and the silence, thinking it all out, coming nearer and nearer to the truth of things at last.”
“Do you—oh, do you think that he might change and come back to us in the end?” cried Beatrice in eager hope.
“I believe so. And when the time comes to act, you will know what to do.”
A very sleepy and comforted girl was tucked into bed by the doctor’s wife—a young person who thought she could not sleep on account of her many anxieties, but who was lost in slumber24 almost before the door was closed. She did not even hear the storm of wind and rain that swept over the cottage in the night, but awoke in the morning to see the sun shining, and to hear a camp-robber jay calling so loudly from the nearest tree that she could sleep no longer.
“Your horse is not fit to go back for a day or two,” Dr. Minturn said at breakfast. “You pushed him too hard when you climbed the pass, and you should leave him here to rest. I will lend you my brown Presto25. He is not such a pony26 as Buck27, I admit, but he will carry you safely enough. You can come back for your horse later, or I will send him over the range as soon as some one passes.”
The sun was high when she and Nancy set out together, shining above the pass as they mounted upward.
“But there is something the matter with it,” Beatrice declared to her sister; “there doesn’t seem to be any warmth in it, somehow.” And she shivered a little.
An unusual haze28 seemed to hang like a blanket between them and the sun, and the air held a strange chill. Even when wrapped in their warm coats, the two girls felt cold as they climbed to the summit of the pass and began the descent on the other side. Beatrice said very little, so busy was her mind with many difficult problems. Must she tell Aunt Anna what had happened, and let her know that all hopes of meeting her brother were at an end? Would John Herrick’s house soon be closed, and would Hester have to leave them too?
Would it be of any use—Good heavens! what was that lying beside the trail? Something huge, dark, and unwieldy was stretched out among the bushes: it was a black horse, apparently29 dead. They both knew those white feet and the brand on the flank. It was John Herrick’s black mare30, Dolly.
They dismounted, while the poor creature opened its eyes and managed to raise its head. A horse that is so injured that it cannot get up when a person comes near is sorely hurt indeed. That much Beatrice knew, yet was powerless to discover what was the matter. By some intuition Nancy guessed one thing, at least, that was needed, for she ran to the stream, filled her felt hat with water, and brought it back, spilling and dripping, but with enough left for the poor animal to drink gratefully.
“I wish you could speak,” Beatrice said helplessly, as the mare laid her head down again. Presto nudged her inquiringly with his nose, but she did not move.
They observed as they stood looking at her, that the bridle31 was half torn off—that the big saddle, with broken cantle, was twisted all to one side by the pony’s fall. On the face of the mountain wall above them they could trace Dolly’s disastrous32 course in trampled33 bushes, weeds torn up by the roots, gouges34 in the rocky soil where she had slid and rolled and struggled to regain35 her footing. But look where they might, they could see no sign of John Herrick.
“When the time comes to act, you will know what to do.”
So Dr. Minturn had said, and he had been right. Beatrice knew well that now was the moment for action, not waiting; and she felt her mind surprisingly calm and cool. They must follow the spidery line of trail that zig-zagged back and forth36 over the precipitous mountain-side, and find the spot, high above, from which the black mare had fallen.
“You wait here, Nancy,” she ordered, but she heard the other horse’s hoofs37 pattering behind her even as she turned. It was useless to try to make Nancy stay behind. What was it Hester had said that way was called—that tiny path that crawled out upon the smooth face of the rock wall? It was Dead Man’s Mile.
There were moments when the brown pony slipped, moments when the vast depths below made both the girls so giddy that they were forced to shut their eyes. A big stone rolled under Presto’s foot and he drew back only just in time to keep from plunging38 after it. Beatrice tried not to watch it, but she could not keep her eyes away as it slid and bounded in longer and longer leaps until finally it disappeared into the woods below.
“Are you safe, Nancy?” she called. She did not dare look back.
“Yes,” came the reply, rather unsteadily, from Nancy close behind.
Up and up they went. It seemed as though they would remember for all their lives every treacherous39 inch of that trail along which they crawled as a fly crawls crookedly40 up a window-pane, and yet that they would never be able to find their way down again. Up and up—and there suddenly was John Herrick, lying on a narrow shelf of rock just below them, his white face turned upward to the sky, and the stones and tufts of grass about him stained with blood. Just ahead, at the turn of the trail, they could see his little tent, his various belongings41 heaped together, and the aimless, drifting smoke of his still smoldering42 camp fire.
Before Nancy could even cry out, Beatrice was down from her horse, down from the trail, and was kneeling beside him. A gash43 across the forehead was his most evident injury, but that could not account for all this blood. No, here on the under side of his arm, where the sleeve of his coat was torn away, this was the deeper wound from which had poured forth that crimson44 deluge45 that had soaked his clothes and stained the ground under him. Thanks to instructions that she had received long before, she knew what to do. But could she be quick enough? Might she not be too late? As she twisted her handkerchief, she tried to remember just what she had been told, where the knot was to come, just which spot was the proper one for the pressure.
Those first-aid lectures—it was only because every one else was going to them that she had attended at all. And she was rather bored by the time she had reached the third one, and prone46 to let her mind wander. With maddening clearness, she could recollect47 how she had looked out of the window, glanced at one girl’s hair-ribbon, decided48 she would have a dress like the one in front of her, and with only half her mind had listened to what the lecturer was saying. And now John Herrick’s chance of life was hanging on her memory! Nancy was standing11 beside her, helpless, horrified49, unable to be of use until Beatrice should tell her how. She remembered now: she had found the artery50 where the pulse still beat feebly; she had arranged the pad to press against the bone; she was telling Nancy how to help her twist the bandage tight.
Slowly the trickle51 of blood lessened52, came forth, at last, one drop at a time, and finally ceased altogether. It seemed a long, long wait before John Herrick opened his eyes.
“Was Dolly killed?” he asked first, and then, after a while, “How do you come to be here? Surely you never climbed that trail, you girls, alone?”
It was a grisly nightmare, their attempt to get him up to the level bench of ground where he had pitched his camp, but they managed it at last. One effort they made to lift him into Presto’s saddle, but it was attended with so little success and such evident agony, that they gave it up.
“There’s something broken—besides the cuts in my arm,” John Herrick muttered, and lapsed53 into unconsciousness as they managed to drag him under the shelter of his tent. They propped54 up his injured arm on a roll of blankets, replenished55 the fire, and sat down on each side of him to wait until he should rouse himself again.
Although it was high noon the sky was strangely dark, and even under the sheltering wall of the tent the air was growing very cold. Heavy masses of cloud were sailing across the overcast56 sky, and the mountains were taking on a strange, somber57 color that was so unfamiliar58 as to be terrifying.
Looking down, they saw that John Herrick had opened his eyes again and was staring up at them without moving. In answer to the unspoken question in Beatrice’s eyes, he began to explain very slowly, with long pauses for rest.
“I fell, very early in the morning, before the dawn, just as the storm was going by. I was riding recklessly in the dark. Poor Dolly knew we were in danger and hung back, but I urged her on. She slipped and I was flung clear, but I could not move. I could hear her scrambling59 and rolling and falling farther and farther below me, but I could not even turn my head. You say she was really still alive?”
He was quiet for a long time after this effort, but at last spoke15 again.
“You have made me very comfortable,” he said. “You have done everything possible. Now it is time for you to go.”
“Go?” echoed Nancy. “Why must we go?”
His eyes were looking beyond her at the threatening sky, and that ominous60, deeping color of the range opposite. Only one peak, the highest, stood shining above the others, still bathed in fitful sunshine; but in a moment the enveloping61 shadow had crawled up the slope and quenched62 its brilliance63 at last.
John Herrick spoke again, more insistently64.
“At the very best it makes me shudder65 to have you two go down that trail alone, and you must do it while the light is good and there is nothing to hurry you.” He struggled to raise himself on his elbow and added sharply, “You are not to delay. You can send some one back to find me.”
Nancy got up obediently and went to stand before the tent. The two horses were lingering near the fire: she caught their bridles66 and waited. It was her elder sister who must decide what they were to do.
A long bank of cloud, seething67, boiling, dark below but white at its upper edge, like surf breaking on a reef, was rolling over the summit of the rugged68 height opposite. The slow roar of the rising wind could be heard stirring the tree-tops in the forest below. Seeing Beatrice hesitate at the door of the tent, John Herrick broke forth with the desperate truth.
“There is snow coming. An hour of it will make the trail impassable for you. It will be cold as midwinter before night, and dark long before then. There is not a minute for you to lose. Beatrice, my dear, my dear, what does anything matter if harm comes to you and your sister? Go! Go!”
A breath of wind touched Beatrice for a second and was gone, yet its icy chill cut her to the very bone. Through the comparative warmth of the air about them it had appeared and vanished like the dread69 ghost of that bitter cold, reigning70 up yonder where the snows never melted and the ice-fields clung to the mountain-side the whole year through. Nancy shivered, and the brown horse, trembling too, shouldered close to her. But Beatrice, in the door of the tent, turned suddenly to regard John Herrick with steady eyes, with a look as fixed71 and determined72 as his very own.
“We are not going to leave you,” she said.
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1
rosy
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| adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的 | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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grassy
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| adj.盖满草的；长满草的 | |
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impulsive
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| adj.冲动的，刺激的；有推动力的 | |
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remorse
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| n.痛恨，悔恨，自责 | |
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atone
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| v.赎罪，补偿 | |
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dwellers
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| n.居民，居住者( dweller的名词复数 ) | |
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vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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toil
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| vi.辛劳工作，艰难地行动；n.苦工，难事 | |
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wrench
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| v.猛拧；挣脱；使扭伤；n.扳手；痛苦，难受 | |
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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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ridge
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| n.山脊；鼻梁；分水岭 | |
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winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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16
bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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prospector
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| n.探矿者 | |
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trudging
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| vt.& vi.跋涉，吃力地走（trudge的现在分词形式） | |
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prospered
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| 成功，兴旺( prosper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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prospects
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| n.希望，前途(恒为复数) | |
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starry
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| adj.星光照耀的, 闪亮的 | |
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epidemics
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| n．流行病 | |
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ardent
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，强烈的，烈性的 | |
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slumber
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| n.睡眠，沉睡状态 | |
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presto
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| adv.急速地；n.急板乐段；adj.急板的 | |
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pony
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| adj.小型的；n.小马 | |
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buck
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| n.雄鹿，雄兔；v.马离地跳跃 | |
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haze
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| n.霾，烟雾；懵懂，迷糊；vi.(over)变模糊 | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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mare
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| n.母马，母驴 | |
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bridle
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| n.笼头，束缚；vt.抑制，约束；动怒 | |
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disastrous
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| adj.灾难性的，造成灾害的；极坏的，很糟的 | |
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trampled
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| 踩( trample的过去式和过去分词 )； 践踏； 无视； 侵犯 | |
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gouges
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| n.凿( gouge的名词复数 )；乱要价；（在…中）抠出…；挖出…v.凿( gouge的第三人称单数 )；乱要价；（在…中）抠出…；挖出… | |
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regain
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| vt.重新获得，收复，恢复 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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hoofs
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| n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 ) | |
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38
plunging
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| adj.跳进的，突进的v.颠簸( plunge的现在分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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39
treacherous
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| adj.不可靠的，有暗藏的危险的；adj.背叛的，背信弃义的 | |
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crookedly
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| adv. 弯曲地，不诚实地 | |
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belongings
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| n.私人物品，私人财物 | |
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smoldering
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| v.用文火焖烧，熏烧，慢燃( smolder的现在分词 ) | |
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gash
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| v.深切，划开；n.(深长的)切(伤)口；裂缝 | |
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crimson
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| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
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45
deluge
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| n./vt.洪水，暴雨，使泛滥 | |
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prone
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| adj.(to)易于…的，很可能…的；俯卧的 | |
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recollect
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| v.回忆，想起，记起，忆起，记得 | |
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decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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49
horrified
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| a.(表现出)恐惧的 | |
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50
artery
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| n.干线，要道；动脉 | |
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51
trickle
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| vi.淌，滴，流出，慢慢移动，逐渐消散 | |
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52
lessened
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| 减少的，减弱的 | |
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53
lapsed
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| adj.流失的，堕落的v.退步( lapse的过去式和过去分词 )；陷入；倒退；丧失 | |
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propped
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| 支撑，支持，维持( prop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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replenished
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| 补充( replenish的过去式和过去分词 )； 重新装满 | |
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56
overcast
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| adj.阴天的，阴暗的，愁闷的；v.遮盖，（使）变暗，包边缝；n.覆盖，阴天 | |
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57
somber
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| adj.昏暗的，阴天的，阴森的，忧郁的 | |
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58
unfamiliar
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| adj.陌生的，不熟悉的 | |
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59
scrambling
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| v.快速爬行( scramble的现在分词 )；攀登；争夺；（军事飞机）紧急起飞 | |
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60
ominous
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| adj.不祥的，不吉的，预兆的，预示的 | |
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61
enveloping
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| v.包围，笼罩，包住( envelop的现在分词 ) | |
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62
quenched
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| 解（渴）( quench的过去式和过去分词 )； 终止（某事物）； （用水）扑灭（火焰等）； 将（热物体）放入水中急速冷却 | |
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63
brilliance
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| n.光辉，辉煌，壮丽，（卓越的）才华，才智 | |
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64
insistently
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| ad.坚持地 | |
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65
shudder
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| v.战粟，震动，剧烈地摇晃；n.战粟，抖动 | |
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66
bridles
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| 约束( bridle的名词复数 )； 限动器； 马笼头； 系带 | |
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67
seething
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| 沸腾的，火热的 | |
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68
rugged
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| adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的 | |
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69
dread
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| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
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70
reigning
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| adj.统治的，起支配作用的 | |
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71
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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72
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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