Harold Titus

“ Luke Taylor wanted Foraker's Folly! His father, who had experienced his highest moments when his men were taking pine forests from the Michigan valleys, who had grumbled since John could remember that there was no joy in living, who had dreamed aloud of Michigan pine, who had wistfully, irately voiced the futile wish that he might finish his years as he began his ascendency to fortune, harvesting more of the pine which had made him a power! His father saw happiness at last in Helen Foraker's pine! His father wanted to do that which John had wanted to make forever impossible! ”

“ Helen cried and dropped her paddle. "A beauty! He'll go two pounds. And you did it well!" Her eyes danced, her red lips parted in a glad smile and there was an excitement in her face, which Taylor had never seen there before, the enthusiasm for play, and as he looked at her, leaning forward, one arm stretched out to touch the trout, he saw a new part of her to dove-tail with her capability at her work, her tenderness with children: she was at that moment, a laughing, spontaneous young animal, lost in admiration of the fish he had caught, and in admiration of him. ”

“ As she jumped to the seat of the roadster he stood looking after her, arms limp at his side, breath quick. The motor started, the car backed and swung and with a bellow as of contemptuous rage it struck into the road which led out of the forest.
John turned slowly toward the doorway in which Helen had appeared. She was gone, the door closed. He stared blankly at it.
"Fooled!" he muttered. "So—I was the dupe! It wasn't the man—but what he could give!" He put a hand over his eyes and laughed weakly. "And I humbled myself—I crawled on my belly—but, by God!" ”

“ She stumbled into the water and floundered up the bank, heedless of her canoe which went on down with the current.
She struggled up the sand bluff, fighting for strength, mounted the overhanging rim of sod at the top, paddle in her hand. The trail was there, pitted by yesterday's deluge.
And a man's footprints, fresh—and none else! She heard her voice screaming for him—And then heard another voice, that hunting cry, coming down the wind. She had been in time—! She started forward as the wolf appeared, racing toward her through the cool shadows.
"Pauguk!" she cried. "Pauguk!" ”

“ All the way home Taylor drove doggedly. A part of him wanted to turn back, to go away, to leave this mess which he had brought down upon Foraker's Folly. Oh, he had wanted to help, and he had brought the ideal which was represented in the pine forest face to face with a hungry power which was its worst enemy! He had wanted to help and had done the worst he could have done by conscious planning. He had wanted to lighten the burden on Helen's shoulders and had increased it to a crushing weight—so he wanted to run—to run. ”

“ The air was cool and damp and sweet, and from the water back in the rushes, from the midst of the current itself, May flies were hatching, coming to the surface like bubbles, spreading their new, damp wings, struggling a moment and then rising into the air to mingle with millions of their kind, to find mates, to function and pass on in their brief cycle, weakened by their hour of life, dropping back to the water which had given them life and into which they had put the life of their kind. ”

“ The leap of light in the eyes of the man behind Helen Foraker snapped Rowe's gaze from her face and as he stared over her shoulder the sinister quality in his expression deepened.
"There are limits—" he began.
A step sounded beside Helen. Breathing rapidly, she turned and saw John Taylor standing there. She did not see the glare he gave Phil Rowe, did not detect the bewilderment in Rowe's face. Her heart paused in its wild measure. This was the man who had betrayed her, who had done more, even, than menace her forest. ”

“ A million matches scratching; a thousand bull whips popping—A ripping, a tearing—The swale was afire and the flame, bursting from great puffs of thick, greenish smoke, exploding, leaping, swept on down the creek, melting all that stood in its path!
"Get Raymer!" Helen shouted, mouth close to Goddard's ear. "Send him to the top of the bluff—and come yourself—"
Again she sped with her car through the smoke, reckless of others who might be in her path. She went up a rising road, hot ashes falling about her and stopped, leaping out, calling aloud to Black Joe. ”

“ But to Phil Rowe she gave her lips again and laughed close in his face, with her arms about his neck.
Rowe was as keen and ruthless in love as he was in business. He wanted this girl with all the intensity of a selfish heart; he saw through her, knew that she would go to any one of a score of men who might bid the highest, knew that she had favored John Taylor above himself. But there were two things in life he wanted: control of the Taylor millions and possession of Marcia Murray. ”

“ But for the matters closest to his heart there was no outlet—until now, when this city boy sat beside him on a cracker box, watching for a mole, listening, unafraid to betray ignorance by questions—
Lights went out in the shanty; sounds of men ceased. The moon came up and still the two sat, collars up, for the night was cool, whispering, watching the seed bed for the stirring that would end their vigil—
And then Joe talked of the forest, what it had been, what it was and might be; of Foraker himself and of Helen—
Men can say worlds about women with the use of a few simple words. ”

“ With an expulsion of breath like a glad, muffled cry, Taylor's right arm whipped back, above and behind his head. The bamboo bent in a stiff arc. His left arm tooled the line carefully as he gave out, as he took in, and the line itself where it disappeared into the current, laid back fin after fin of silvered water as the trout plowed here and there in his depths in frantic effort to be free. Upstream, downstream, across and back; sulking, moving slowly, rushing mightily; coming to the surface and showing his dorsal fin as he dived again ”

“ Trees rocked and twisted in the force of the draft. A mighty column of smoke spouted into the heavens, rising straight up, seeming uninfluenced by the wind and from it rained needles and twigs and small branches, all blazing, and from it came sounds of terror, sounds that went straight through the reason of strong men and touched raw emotions that had been buried for generations. Fire, man's first friend, had turned into his raging enemy, mighty in its wrath, terrible in its manifestation of power. ”

“ Humphrey Bryant came back with Helen that night and John joined them and listened to the old editor's modest recital of what had taken place in the court house. He saw Helen's relief, detected the justified pride that the old man took in thwarting Harris' carefully conceived plan. He listened, smiling, on the verge of telling the part he had played and which no one knew but Black Joe—the most important part in that day's vicory—when Helen checked her laughter and sighed.
"It's only the skirmish. The real fight is to come." ”

“ She became confident, as instinct shaped itself. She broke again into a lope, racing on silent feet along the trail. Her fangs dripped slaver and her breath came in eager hoarseness, for the scent was stronger, in the air, now, as well as on the earth. She was closing for her vengeance!
Out in the river Helen rounded a sharp bend where the current flung itself at an unyielding bank, water boiling as she kept her broaching canoe from the smart eddy against the land. She straightened away and height loomed before her, faced with yellow sand—Along that landing passed the trail. ”

“ He saw that the impulse which could never be shattered so long as life endures was in their hearts. He knew that though John Taylor was disappearing down the trail that skirted the fringe of swamp and made a short cut to the mill, he was not leaving Helen Foraker. Taylor was gone, but he would be back—that, or the girl would follow him down that trail some day, to the ends of the earth if necessary; she was that sort—
He dropped his wrench. The screen door slammed behind Helen. The wind lulled. Pauguk was whining, straining, eyes on the trail Taylor had taken. ”

“ All day the men who took orders from Helen Foraker had held the fire to the limits set down by the great blast. It burned briskly, hotly, but it was within their grasp and could not get away. The wind blew steadily and there was still danger in letting up until above the shouts and the snap of burning wood, the moan of trees that had been saved, came a heavy shaking boom of thunder. Through the thick smoke scattering rain drops fell, sending up little puffs of dust in the fire line. ”

“ His palms pressed the bark on either side the trunk; then stroked, gently, as a man will stroke some dear possession.
"Pine!" he muttered—"Michigan Pine! Oh, God—I thank you—thank you!—"
He stood a moment watching, listening, feeling, smelling, letting his senses play with this great blessing which was within his grasp. Then he turned and started back into the forest, stride feeble but with returning strength, the strength of hope, of satisfaction—He went faster, with the haste of greed. ”

“ A company of birds made the somber shadows joyous and the Blueberry, wandering through the forest, sped crystal clear over golden sand or dark depths, reflecting the graceful ranks of spruce and balsam which edged it, taking on a border of luscious green where reeds shot through the surface.
Over on the Au Sable, forty miles away, Marcia Murray and a dozen or more of Taylor's Detroit friends were gathered at Dick Mason's Windigo Lodge for one of the protracted house parties which had given the place a name. ”

“ She faced about, raging, clawing to scramble upward, and as she made her first lunge a shout came to them from down the trail and John Taylor, arrested by Helen's cry, ran through the trees. All sounds from the wolf ceased; all her strength went into those swift short leaps upward. Her eyes showed an orange glare, froth gathered on her lips and hate was there not only for the man, now, but for the girl. ”

“ Axe clutched in his hands he raced through the forest, looking back now and then as though fearful of some terrible presence peering over his shoulder, tripping, stumbling, falling, rising and keeping on, breath making sounds like those from a distressed animal. He came out into a fire line and followed it, turning at an intersection. His flight became a feeble flounder and once when he fell he did not try to rise until he had crawled a dozen yards, clinging to his axe, whimpering. ”

“ But here, lost in this country which had been laid waste, a girl, backed only by an aged politician and a group of laborers, carried on her fight, ridiculed, unattended, that homes might be built and cities might grow, that a forest might yield and renew itself for all time!
Taylor felt as small as he had felt before Helen when he first entered her house, a searcher for an easy road to fortune. ”

“ That was her one chance; to beat the wolf to the landing. If she should fail in that she would be behind them and helpless—and Taylor would be helpless before the savage fangs of that animal. She passed the floating tree, left it behind rapidly, sending her canoe forward with all the skill at her command, with all the strength which fear gave her body. Water boiled about the bow, deep eddies fell backward from her frantic paddle to be swallowed in the froth of the eager current. ”

“ Men dropped their tools and ran. Goddard raised his hoarse voice in command to call them back, but he could not be heard—they fled, scattering as the fire leaped the break and fastened itself in the tops of the trees they had sought to safeguard! Thad Parker ran down the line and would have gone on into the forest, heedless of all else except the impulse to escape this fiend, but Helen Foraker caught him by the wrist and swung him about to face her. ”

“ He looked about, bewilderment in his pale, witless eyes. "He ain't goin' to die is he?" in appeal to the doctor. "Jim can't die now, doc, can he?—He was goin' to give me tires." He looked anxiously from face to face. "Tires for my safety—Jim, you can't die, Jim!" He lifted trembling, blackened hands and looked about, at Pelly, at Rowe, at Luke Taylor—
A movement, and young John stepped through the group and there was that in his face and manner which was electric, which made men wait for him to speak, there in the smoke of fire and the shadow of death. ”

“ Not once in her talk had Helen spoken of what it meant to her in wealth, in profit. It was an adventure in practical creation for the sake of building, designed for the benefit of no individual, developed for those who were not yet born and for their children of all time. He had been aware of men and women who had struggled unselfishly that others might find living easier, but those people had always worked among men, had stood in range of the public eye, had been of cities, of great, spectacular movements. ”