Angels' Shoes, and Other Stories

by Marjorie L. C. Pickthall

TWO WAYS

“There’s another!” Charron rested his pick amongst the shale, and glanced across at the flanks of Mount Morin, where a new snow-field had broken loose from its moorings, and plunged into the tremendous valley in a spout of diamond dust, with a roar that jarred the rocks. There had been early snow in the hills, followed by warm weather; and the lordly heights of the Nicolum were stripping themselves of their frozen cloaks. Charron looked uneasily at the ranges, then glanced at his chum. “Jack,” he went on, with some hesitation, “I guess the time’s come to decide if both of us, or only one, can go out this year.”

Men don’t speak of leaving the Nicolum before the winter, or of going down from it, or away from it. They say “going out,” and it’s an expressive phrase.

Jack Rainger straightened slowly; a tall fellow, grave, and a little stiff in the back; stiff, you would have said, in the will, too. He smiled across at Charron’s fair-haired, sanguine youth, saying: “Then we’ll have to decide which one’s to go, for there isn’t enough dust to take us both out on a holiday, and bring us both back again in the spring!”

“Sure only one can go, Jack?”

Rainger drew from his belt a little sealskin bag, and tossed it to the other. “Weigh that!” he said. “That’s all we’ve saved. And there’s just about enough dollars in it to pay one fellow’s expenses out and back. The other’ll have to stay behind and work. The question is, which of us two needs to go out the most?”

Charron lowered his eyes, as if a little afraid of what his chum might read in them. Tapping with his pick among the loose stones, he muttered: “And whichever goes, it’ll be deadly hard on the one that stays behind.”

“Yes,” agreed Rainger, quietly. “Deadly hard.”

Charron glanced up, swiftly. “If—if it wasn’t for Maisie,” he said, awkwardly, “you should have every ounce of it, Jack, old man, and welcome. But—I have to think of her too. I—I want to see her . . . .” His voice broke; he turned away, staring at the hills which stand round about the Nicolum as they stood at the world’s birth. “Sometimes,” he went on, hurriedly, “I’ve felt as if I couldn’t stand it another minute, that I’d have to throw over everything—throw you over!—and go out for good, without making my pile or anything, tear these cursed rocks down, kick ’em to powder, just to get a sight of her! I—I made a face in the snow last night, like I used to make of clay in the barn-loft a thousand years ago. Her face. I kissed it when I’d made it. It was like kissing the dead . . . .”

The broken young voice trailed to silence. Rainger stepped across the flume, and lightly touched the shaken shoulder. “I know, Will,” he said, softly. “I know. It’s that way I feel about Laure.”

Charron, without turning, reached for his hand. “I know,” he said, again. “You’re—you’re the best of good chums, Jack. The best. I don’t forget about you and Laure. I don’t forget that it’s two years since you’ve seen her, too. But—you know Maisie!” He turned a flushed, stormy face. “You knew her. You were such friends. You must be able to guess what she’d be to a fellow who was more than a friend. That night I was at her house, saying good-bye, and you had to come to fetch me, for fear I’d miss the train. . . .”

He was silent again, and again Rainger touched his shoulder softly, saying: “You should have the dust without a thought, Will, if—if it wasn’t for Laure.”

“That’s it. It’s because of them. We’ll have to decide as justly as we can, keep the chances level, for their sakes. But I don’t know how.”

He turned, with an attempt at a laugh. Rainger did not echo it. He, in his turn, was staring at the granite barrier, beautiful and terrible, builded between them and their desires. He said: “It’d be only fair, only right, that the one to go out should be the one who needs to go most. But I don’t know which that is.” He moved with a sharp sigh, stooped, and picked from the ground two chips of quartz, shiny as stars. He balanced them in either hand. “Laure—Maisie. Maisie—Laure!” he said, grimly. “Which is it to be? For I take it we’re thinking more of them than of ourselves. Which needs the most to see her promised man?” He dropped the chips abruptly, and turned away. “Come, Will,” he finished, “we may as well quit work for to-day. It’s near sunset, and it’ll be a rough road home, without the darkness added to it.”

He took up his prospecting tools and walked a few yards along the ledge. Charron did not at first follow him, Rainger waited, and at last the other joined him. The younger man, still in a flushed dream, was gazing at something that lay in the palm of his hand. This, with a boyish impulse, he held out to Rainger.

“Look, Jack,” he said, softly. Rainger looked. It was a silver hairpin—a little prong of metal headed with a silver ball, carved like a fourfold flower.

“Maisie’s,” went on Charron, almost in a whisper. “D’you remember that last night when you’d been out to Weston to say good-bye to Laure, and you came on with the outfit in a cab to pick me up at the house in Cedar Street, where I’d been saying good-bye to my Maisie? I remember. You came in, and you found us all in the sitting-room, and Maisie’s mother was teasing her because I’d knocked her hair down. Such pretty hair! It came down because she’d given me this out of it. She had two in, and she gave me one,—warm from her hair, Jack. Later on the rest of it came down; she’d lost the other pin. I begged her to let it stay down, d’you remember? She made a face at me, and she said: ‘I can’t stick it up now the other hairpin’s lost. P’raps I’ve given that to someone else, you old silly!’ And—and then the evening was gone, and there was nothing left of it all but this silver hairpin.” He slipped it back into his inner pocket. “Well, I’m a selfish fool, Jack, but I can’t stop thinking of her. Come on, and we’ll have flapjacks with rum in ’em, and perhaps the gods’ll decide for us.”

They turned in silence down the windy ledges towards the little log-built shanty, that for two years they had called home. And as they went, each saw a face drawn upon the lovely dusk. To those faces their hearts turned with the devouring longing born of uttermost solitude; no man knowing them, could have said which heart yearned the more strongly to its goal. Charron walked with a frowning face, his big fingers clenched upon the little silver pin. Rainger had his face raised; his eyes sought the first star, and rested there.

No human eyes saw them, none awaited them, none expected them; but on the high ridges ahead a watcher rose suddenly to his delicate hooves, shook his great curved horns to the wind, and fled away like a shadow. They had been seen of the mountain sheep; and as the leader wheeled, he loosened a broad stone, which slid, and rested, and slid a little farther. There it gathered to itself a shower of pebbles, bright as roving stars, quartz pebbles, and damp snow; and shifted again, and hung quivering.

Rainger was ten yards ahead when the roar came from the heights immediately above them. And Charron cried out and leapt forward; but if he had gone on wings he would have been too late. The mountain spouted death at them. He saw the snow-slide pouring fluid as foam, eddying like cloud, yet whirling the lesser boulders with it, and tearing the young spruce trees from their hold. Then the fringe of wind and stones and whirling snow-clots caught him and struck him aside, as if he had been a straw; he was bruised, blinded, beaten to his knees, to his face. He rolled instinctively to the inner side of the ledge, and lay huddled there, without feeling, without thought, almost without sense. Only when silence, save for a dying thunder of reverberant echoes, brought strength again to bruised mind and body, he struggled to his feet, his clothes in rags, as if he had been fighting a pack of dogs, and staggered forward, crying to Rainger.

He had no thought that he would find his friend. For the mountain-side was swept as if a vast broom had passed down it. He crawled to the lip of the ledge where it over-hung the sheer abyss. He was sobbing as he looked over; for the hardships and sacrifice of those two iron years had bound him to Rainger, and Rainger to him, in a more than brotherly love. And there, not twenty feet beneath him, he saw Rainger’s body resting against a shattered balsam, draggled as if a tide had swept it, and motionless.

“Jack! Jack! can you hear? I’m coming to you, chum!”

He thought the figure stirred faintly. He was not sure. He looked round desperately for help.

But,—shaken, battered as he was,—all help must come from him. He summoned his reeling will to govern that rebellious brute, the reeling body. He had a thin rope coiled round his waist, which they had used in some of their perilous short-cuts from the claim to the cabin below; he unwound it, the mountains spinning about him in wheels of blue and white and violet as he did so. He was almost afraid to draw breath lest he should start another slide, and the helpless man beneath him be dashed away; but in that event, they would both go . . . . He found a stump which would bear the rope. He was panting all the time: “Jack! Hold on, Jack. I’m coming to you.” There was no response. He wondered, as he lowered himself, scrambling down the steep beneath the ledge, if he would find his friend dead. He couldn’t realize life, somehow, with old Jack out of it . . . .

He brought up with his feet on the balsam roots; they were slippery, for the snow had peeled them of bark as you peel an orange. He turned with caution and stooped to his friend. He was trembling, the strong young man, like a girl. He scarcely dared touch that motionless head, raise the pale face streaked with scarlet, bind the rope about the body. It was long, and new, and unfrayed, and he thanked God for it. When he had adjusted it, and rested Jack once more against the roots, there was plenty of slack. He climbed again to the ledge and rested there a moment. Then, by sheer muscle, hauled the other up, drew him over, laid him on the planed and polished rocks, and went down beside him.

He could do no more for awhile. His strength was as water. He could not even stretch out a hand to find if Rainger still lived.

By and by he drew himself to his knees. He turned to Jack, and lifted his head to an easier position. How pale he was, dear old fellow . . . . He slipped a shaking hand under the torn shirt to feel if the heart beat at all; and sky and hills grew to an awful stillness in their places, as his fingers closed on and drew out a little canvas bag.

It had hung about Rainger’s neck. That same awful stillness of the heights was on Charron as he felt within it a little metal prong headed by a carved ball.

A silver hairpin . . . .

“I can’t stick it up now the other hairpin’s lost. P’raps I’ve given that to someone else, you old silly!”

The remembered words beat upon him in hammer-blows, for all their music of laughter and speech. He looked about him half-stupidly, thinking to see beside him the elfish, teasing face in the cloud of loosened hair. He saw only the ice-veins in the rock, a single fan of golden lichen the avalanche had spared, and then that other face—Jack’s face—frowning now, flushed a little with returning life, trembling back to consciousness.

And all those long months Jack had worn against his heart that other silver hairpin from Maisie’s fair head. Traitor, that he was, to Charron—to Laure. Or was there another traitor! Had he taken it, or had Maisie given it to him?

Charron shrank and twisted as he had writhed away from the snow-slide. But no space could separate him from that doubt. It leapt full-armed to life. It came irresistibly as a tide, drowning every foothold of faith in a moment, washing away every barrier, laying waste the soul. He turned heavily in that aching stillness. He wanted to tear the bag from its cord, grind it into a little scrap of rubbish, and throw it into the deep—that was his first thought. He had let it fall again on Rainger’s breast; he laid a twitching, ice-cold hand on it; and Rainger lifted his own hand and laid it over Charron’s.

“Will!” he said, faintly. Then, in a stronger voice: “Did the slide catch me? I don’t remember. My head’s very bad. Did I go over with it?”

“Yes.”

“And you hauled me out again?”

“Yes.”

Rainger smiled. “Good old boy!” he whispered. “You’d never go back on a chum, would you, Will? I’ll be all right in a little while. I guess I was stunned. Might have been dead but for you, eh?”

“I—wish you had been . . . .”

“Will!”

“I—wish I’d left you to lie there,—you vile thief!”

An appalled wonder settled on Rainger’s face. He raised himself to his elbow, still staring at Charron; got to his knees, then to his feet. They faced each other, those two ragged, battered men, at a yard’s distance. For long minutes neither moved, neither spoke. Then Charron stretched out a shaking hand to the little bag Rainger had covered with his own.

“Tell me where you got it!” he said, thickly.

“What? What? Are you mad, Will?”

“The hairpin. Maisie’s silver hairpin. The other one,—in the bag round your neck!”

“You are mad! There’s no hairpin there!”

“Show me! Show me!”

Rainger’s face hardened. He answered, harshly enough: “No! You can take my word for it!”

“You—vile—liar!” said Charron, heavily, and came nearer.

“Will, old fellow, you’re sick, you’re not yourself . . . .”

“I’m not myself. I shall never be myself again. You and Maisie have . . . . killed me.”

“Will, for God’s sake, listen!”

“To more lies? I felt it there under the canvas; felt the prongs and the ball on the top carved with little silver roses. Maisie’s other pin. She said: ‘P’raps I’ve given that to someone else, you old silly . . . .’ Had she, Jack, had she? Or did you pick it up? I could forgive you then, for you couldn’t help loving her, could you, though I’d be sorry for Laure? Tell me if you found it or if she gave it to you. Tell me . . . . Only tell me the truth, no more lies! All these two years and nothing but lies. Jack!”

Through white lips, Rainger said: “I shall neither speak to you, nor lie to you, as you say, again.” And there was something implacable in his quietness; he was quick to pity where he loved; but doubt was to him the unpardonable sin against any love. And Will—Will!—had refused to believe him.

“You shall tell me if you found it or if she gave it to you!”

Rainger was silent. He had his own dumb devil of pride, which would have kept him silent then, though the world fell.

“Jack! If I kneel to you . . . . ?”

Silent still, and almost with wonder, Rainger stared at the man who doubted. And there rose up against Charron all the bitter longing and desolation of those exiled years. Something seemed poised above him, rushing down on him; an avalanche of darkness such as no hill ever loosed on man. He staggered forward, crying terribly: “You shall tell, if I have to tear the truth out of you with my hands!” He flung himself, panting, on Rainger, bore him backwards. They fell together and rolled to the lip of the ledge. Charron was uppermost. A swift and dreadful energy was his, a sureness of strength. He thrust Rainger outward till his unsupported head was over the sheer fall, the swept rock, and the spruce far below. “Tell now!” he said.

Rainger’s head went back, his eyelids fluttered, he was near fainting again. The edge of rock burnt the back of his neck like hot metal. His anger fell away. He felt that he must keep very quiet, or Will would have something to be sorry for . . . . The thought came mechanically; he could not have spoken to save either Will or himself.

“Did you find it? Did she give it to you?”

Rainger’s senses wavered. He heard the words from a distance. Yet those were Will’s hands brutally grasping him, that was Will’s savage, panting breath. The edge of pain passed to his shoulders and scorched there. His neck was an agony. He was beyond speech then, even if his hurt faith would have let him speak. The sky rode upon his eyes, beneath him the earth swam in vast abysses of silver and amethyst. The universe swung and poised, ready to crush him; then, steadied to a calm star. He knew he could not lose the star. Nearly gone, his eyes rested on it. He just breathed the word: “Laure . . . .”

He was aware of a cry going past him. He felt himself drawn suddenly to safety and laid down. He felt no more. Once again the world went out in a sweep of many waters; but even there he knew his star was with him, and would be with him to the end.

He woke, from swoon or sleep, to a world grown darker. The air was cold, and solemn with an utter quietness. The hills were silvering in moonlight before the day had entirely faded from them. Many stars were there, a great company of witnesses. He sat up; and saw at his feet the black shape of a man crouched upon the rock.

“Will . . . .”

Charron lifted his head slowly from his knees. His face was changed as if years had passed over him. He said slowly: “Do you remember? You’re speaking to a man who would have killed you an hour back.”

“I remember. Is it so long?”

“Yes.” The dead voice altered; he went on, hurriedly. “I have sat here with you. I have not touched you. I am not—fit to touch you. I’ve waited; not knowing if you’d live or die . . . . You can never forgive me, of course. It’s past that. But if you could give me the charity you’d show to any cur, the kindness you have for a lost husky or a hungry Siwash . . . . and then let me go . . . .”

The broken, humble voice died away. After a long silence, Rainger said: “Then you did not look?”

“No.”

“Come and look now, then. I was wrong too, Will. I should have spoken.”

Charron crept to his side. Rainger lifted the little canvas bag and shook something from it into his hand. This he held out to Charron.

“This is what was in it, Will.” Charron’s very life was in abeyance as he looked and looked again.

“Two long needles,” went on Rainger’s quiet voice, “their points stuck in a shrivelled chestnut that Laure picked up in the woods one day. They’re the only needles I’ve got whose points will go through leather. I keep ’em that way round my neck so they won’t get rusty. That’s your silver hairpin, Will.”

After a long time Charron moved. He sank slowly to his face, and lay there with his hands clasped over his head. Presently, he began to cry as a tired child cries, with sobs and broken words. Rainger waited, silently. When that passion had also spent itself, he too, moved. He took from his belt the pouch containing the hoarded gold-dust, and laid it by Charron’s hand. “This is yours, Will,” he said, gently.

Charron looked up. His eyes rested on the compassion of his friend’s face, as Rainger’s eyes had rested on his star.

“I guess this has decided for us, Will. You’re the one who will take the dust and go out and see your girl this winter; for you’re the one who needs to go the most.”

Charron looked at him, still with breathless, humble questioning.

“It’s this way, Will. Laure and I, we’re secure of each other. We can wait. Two years—five years—twenty; if it’s God’s will we can afford to wait a lifetime, and know it will make no difference. She trusts me as I trust her. Love like that—casts out fear.” He finished, almost with tenderness. “If I’d seen you with anything of hers—the most intimate, the most dear things,—in your hands, on your heart, I’d have known there was some explanation. Even then I couldn’t have doubted her . . . . or you.

“But it’s not that way with you. Your love isn’t self-sustaining. It needs to see, to touch, to know; or else it doubts and suffers. Take the dust and go and see Maisie. But—don’t teach her to doubt, poor child.”

“Jack . . . .”

“Ours is the stronger, you see, Will. And the strong things of life can always afford to wait. It’s you who must go and I who must stay, because your need’s the greater of the two.”

He rose unsteadily to his feet, and waited a moment. But there was no word from Charron, flung before him in the dust of the soul. Rainger turned away and took a few steps down the giddy ledge, holding to the rocks as he went. But in a little while he paused, and turned again, and called, wistfully: “Will!”

Some sort of a broken answer. Rainger, his eyes on his serene star, smiled a little.

“I’m kind of—knocked about, Will. Won’t you come and help me home?”

He stood patiently in the clear, kind twilight, till, with a great sobbing cry, Charron rose and ran to him, and put a strong arm around him, holding him as though he would never let him go. And so, under the eternal patience of the stars, they went slowly down together to their home.