Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-08-05
THESKY-MAN
Henry Kitchel1 Webster.
1
BY the Century
CHAPTER XIX.-Continued.
Copyright. 1910.
BY the Century Company


CHAPTER XIX.-Continued.
| Comrade. at least. was the WORD she
had settled upon to designate the RELATION
that existed between them. 1t did not al
| together cover the ground, to be sure
but tentatively and for temporary pur-
poses it was, perhaps, more comfortable
than word or phrase would have been
| that possessed the merit of greater &C
curacy. And yet when alone, as she was
now. she INDUCED in specializing how she
| should frame that more accurate phrase,
| should necessity arise for doing so.
AS if to make up for the Kaleidoscope
character of those three first incredible
days of her acquaintance with Cayley,
days which had changed the meaning and
the value of all that had entered into her
life before-as if to compensate for that
| experience, the weeks which had passed
since then had slipped away in an al
most unbroken routine. There were oc-
casional reminders of Roscoe's existence
and few unimportant discoveries OF
| articles of USE either i'm the cave or OBJ
servatory A furious snowstorm had
ragged for a week. and had kept them i'm
| prisoned in their hut for as long again.
| These were the only incidents to break
| the routine
They still divided their days as they
had set out to do upon Cayley's discovery
| of the tracks of an unknown man in the
| snow. They kept watch and watch, ="
| as the sailors say, the two OF them
never sleeping at the same time.
| But if the time had gone monotonously,
it had slipped away wonderfully rast.
| She had not been bored nor melancholy,
indeed. she and Cayley had both been too
| busy for that forlorn indulgence. There
was an incredible number of things to do,
things which would make such a diff
ference to their comfort and security,
| that what they had to resist was a FEVER
ish haste and an attempt to get every
| thing done at once. And she was gen.
orally so tired when it came time to call
| Cayley at midnight for the beginning Of
| his watch. that she slept like child until
| 8 o'clock the next morning, when another
days work began.
There was always something delicious
| about that part Of the day. The fact
| that she and Cayley were together only
for those eight hours made 1t possible to
| condense their compan1onship to rather
| higher tension than is ordinarily possible
| for people who are always in each other s
company.
| But STILL she said to herself. as she lay
there on the bearskin. gazing up. laz1ly,
at the soaring creature that seemed SO
| unrelated to the man who was the sub
| ject of her thoughts, but still companion
| ship was the word for it. He had not
made love to her: he had never repeated
the declaration that he had made to her
| that morning on the beach when she had
discovered that the yacht was gone and
what it's absence meant Once in a while
| he had used some caressing little word
| of endearment in speaking to her, and,
more rarely Still-much more rarely-had
offered her the caress of his hands or of
| an arm across her shoulders.
But that had happened almost never
at all lately. 1t rather noticeably had
| not happened. Her own expressions of
affection were rather impulsively demon
strative, and she had noticed, once or
| twice, that he had seemed to shrink
| away from them.
That was the way she reviewed the
situation in her own mind. So far, at
least, there was no reason for quarrellng
| with the designation "comrade." But
she knew perfectly well that she had
| only reviewed one side of it.
| On the other side, to begin with, was
| the great luminous fact that here, upon
this frozen arctic land alone. and worse
| than alone. amid privations she would
| once have thought 1ntolerable, and in
daily peril Of death, she and Cayley had
| been unfeignedly and delightedly happy
she and this man whom she never saw
until two days before that amazing con-
junction of circumstances that had
thrown them thus together. They two,
| strangers as the world reckons such mat
ters, had been living for weeks within the
| confines of an enforced intimacy, which
| would have become irksome with any
| other person, her father excepted. per-
| haps, that she had ever known. But it
| was not irksome to them. They began
| the eight hours they called their day to-
gether. with the high spirits of pair of
| children, and they ended them with re-
| luctance. tempered only by the anticipa-
| ton of another tomorrow.
There was more than comradeShip in
! that certainly. She and Tom Fanshaw
| had been comrades and, as she had told
| the thought of spending an arctic winter
with him she smiled rather wryly.
| Was she quite honest after all in tell
| ing herself that Cayley had not maze
| love to her? He had put nothing of the
sort into words to be sure, and he had
| sought none, not even the most easily
granted Of a lovers privileges, had even,
| as she had noticed, shrunk away a little
| offered him. Jeanne was woman but
| she was still enough of a girl to wonder
little why he did that.
| But this was DEPRESSION from the
main theme. After ALL no matter what
| he was saying or doing, there was some
thing in his eyes and something in his
voice that made love to her every day.
Perhaps it was that something which
| gave a new, exciting righteousness to
| each Of the shortening days that passed.
about 1t. 1t was like long-Suspended
| harmony in music. But she knew all the
while that some day or other that sus-
pension would be resolved. That first day
| on the beach, when he had told her that
| he loved her, that her warmth, her faith,
| her fragrance were, indeed, the very soul
of him, he had said she need make no
answer, need come to no decision.
| He had never asked for her answer
since. and yet she knew that some day
| he would take up that scene where he
| had left 1t. 1t might be on a day when
the coming of the relief would open the
world to them again, the old world which
| seemed as if it might be concerned with
another planet altogether, it was so far
away; or it might be upon darker day.
| the last of that precious little string Of
days that they had stolen, one at time,
out of the palm of death. But on one or
| the other of those days it would come;
she felt sure of that.
| She sat up suddenly, erect. upon the
| bearskin, with the realization that it was
nearly dark. Their hours OF daylight
were getting very scanty now. Today's
allowance was gone, although 1t was not
yet three in the afternoon.
She looked aloft for Cayley, but could
not see him. Then, the next moment, she
| heard the whine of the air through his
rigging and he sailed down on q long