The long patrol

by Albert M. Treynor

For Alison the day passed with less monotony. The mere fact of being under a roof again served to awaken feminine instincts of orderliness, and she spent the entire afternoon cleaning the dirty and untidy cabin. She swept the floor, dusted the larder shelves, and scrubbed and scoured all the cooking utensils she could find about the place. Later she baked a pan of biscuits, and contrived an amazingly appetizing pudding, made of corn meal and dried apples and molasses, with bear fat for shortening.

That evening Dexter sat down to the first civilized dinner he had tasted in months; and when he finally finished, he got up with a guilty knowledge of having over-eaten. He was a bit alarmed to discover that he had grown very drowsy. To sleep soundly with Crill in the cabin meant to invite death, so he took the precaution of brewing an extra pot of strong coffee to drink before he turned in for the night.

There was only one bunk in the cabin, and this was allotted to Alison. Crill was ordered to spread his blankets before the fireplace, while Dexter made his bed by the opposite wall, where he could guard the front door. Before he retired he took a charred stick from the hearth and drew a half circle around the section of floor assigned to the outlaw.

"Your deadline," he remarked with somber emphasis. "If you stir beyond that mark I'll shoot you down without asking a question. Good night."

Through the long hours of darkness Dexter was permitted but little rest. At times he dozed off, but with every faint creak of sound about the cabin his hand reached automatically towards his revolver and he sat up, wide awake and staring, expecting any moment to see a crouching bulk stealing upon him from the shadow of the hearth. Three times during the night he left the cabin to circle the little island and to gaze up and down the moonlit shore across the way. On each of these occasions he forced Crill to get up and accompany him, and while the man muttered and grumbled over the indignity of being kept awake, he obeyed. Morning arrived at last, and although the outlaw had not yet ventured to make any hostile move, Dexter was fagged by his long vigil, and he knew that flesh and blood could not endure many more such nights.

Except for the fact that time seemed to drag more slowly, the second day was a repetition of the first. The corporal grew heavy-eyed as the hours passed, and by mid-afternoon he would have sold the tunic off his back for a thirty minutes' nap. He drank enormous quantities of coffee, and with Crill as his companion, went outdoors at frequent intervals to tramp doggedly up and down the banks of the rising stream, forcing himself to stay awake.

Alison alone had obtained her full night's rest, and she awakened fresh and clear-eyed, to resume her self-imposed duties about the cabin. She prepared the meals and washed the dishes, and smilingly, but stubbornly, refused to let any one help. When dinner was ready that evening she insisted on her companions sitting down ahead of her, while she waited on table.

"You make me feel like a scoundrel," Dexter protested as she forcibly pushed him to his stool and placed a steaming plate before him. "I don't just see why you're called upon to be the maid of all work."

She laughed pleasantly, and leaned lightly against his shoulder to put his coffee cup on the table. "It saves one from going crazy," she explained—"having something to keep the hands and mind occupied. I'm really glad to do it, and I don't want anybody bothering me."

Before the officer could say anything further, she moved away and bent in seeming absorption over a kettle she had left bubbling in the fireplace. A look of gentleness stole momentarily into Dexter's gray eyes, and without thinking what he was doing, he half turned on his stool to watch the slim, boyish figure bending before the hearth. For the instant he forgot that Crill was seated on the other side of the table, almost within arm's reach. His glance was tracing the graceful curve of the girl's throat and chin, shadowed in the ruddy glow of the fire, when some guarding sentinel of the brain gave him warning.