FullReads

“I guess I need them now,” he said, smiling, and with the child still in his arms drew her to a window looking northward. As far as the eye could see, nothing but snow, like a blanket spread over the land. Here and there in the wide expanse a tree silhouetted against the sky, a tracery of eccentric beauty, and off in the far distance a solitary horseman riding toward the post–riding hard.

“It was root, hog, or die with me, Sally,” he continued, “and I rooted…. I wonder–that fellow on the horse–I have a feeling about him. See, he’s been riding hard and long–you can tell by the way the horse drops his legs. He sags a bit himself…. But isn’t it beautiful, all that out there–the real quintessence of life.”

The air was full of delicate particles of frost on which the sun sparkled, and though there was neither bird nor insect, nor animal, nor stir of leaf, nor swaying branch or waving grass, life palpitated in the air, energy sang its song in the footstep that crunched the frosty ground, that broke the crusted snow; it was in the delicate wind that stirred the flag by the barracks away to the left; hope smiled in the wide prospect over which the thrilling, bracing air trembled. Sally had chosen right.

“You had a big thought when you brought me here, guinea-girl,” he added, presently. “We are going to win out here”–he set the child down–“you and I and this lucky sixpence.” He took up his short fur coat. “Yes, we’ll win, honey.” Then, with a brooding look in his face, he added:

“‘The end comes as came the beginning,
And shadows fail into the past;
And the goal, is it not worth the winning,
If it brings us but home at the last?
While far through the pain of waste places
We tread, ’tis a blossoming rod
That drives us to grace from disgraces,
From the fens to the gardens of God!'”

He paused reflectively. “It’s strange that this life up here makes you feel that you must live a bigger life still, that this is only the wide porch to the great labor-house–it makes you want to do things. Well, we’ve got to win the stake first,” he added, with a laugh.

“The stake is a big one, Jim–bigger than you think.”

“You and her and me–me that was in the gutter.”

“What is the gutter, dadsie?” asked Nancy.

“The gutter–the gutter is where the dish-water goes, midget,” he answered, with a dry laugh.

“Oh, I don’t think you’d like to be in the gutter,” Nancy said, solemnly.

“You have to get used to it first, miss,” answered Jim. Suddenly Sally laid both hands on Jim’s shoulders and looked him in the eyes. “You must win the stake, Jim. Think–now!”

She laid a hand on the head of the child. He did not know that he was playing for a certain five millions, perhaps fifty millions, of dollars. She had never told him of his father’s offer. He was fighting only for salvation, for those he loved, for freedom. As they stood there, the conviction had come upon her that they had come to the last battle-field, that this journey which Jim now must take would decide all, would give them perfect peace or lifelong pain. The shadow of battle was over them, but he had no foreboding, no premonition; he had never been so full of spirits and life.

To her adjuration Jim replied by burying his face in her golden hair, and he whispered: “Say, I’ve done near four years, my girl. I think I’m all right now–I think. This last six months, it’s been easy–pretty fairly easy.”

“Four months more, only four months more–God be good to us!” she said, with a little gasp.

If he held out for four months more, the first great stage in their life-journey would be passed, the stake won.