human
Jeems, she said softly.
gpt
I'm not sorry--now--that I came up to Cardigan's place that day--when you thought you were dying. I wasn't wrong. You are different. And I made fun of you then, and laughed at you, because I knew that you were not going to die. Will you forgive me?
human
It's funny how little things work out, sometimes, he said.
gpt
Wasn't a kingdom lost once upon a time because some fellow didn't have a horseshoe? Anyway, I knew of a man whose life was saved because of a broken pipe-stem. And you came to me, and I'm here with you now, because--
human
Of what?
gpt
Because of something that happened a long time ago, he said.
human
Something you wouldn't dream could have anything to do with you or with me. Shall I tell you about it, Marette?
gpt
Yes.
human
Of course, it's a story of the Police, he began.
gpt
And I won't mention this fellow's name. You may think of him as that red-headed O'Connor, if you want to. But I don't say that it was he. He was a constable in the Service and had been away North looking up some Indians who were brewing an intoxicating liquor from roots. That was six years ago. And he caught something. Le Mort Rouge, we sometimes call it--the Red Death--or smallpox. And he was alone when the fever knocked him down, three hundred miles from anywhere. His Indian ran away at the first sign of it, and he had just time to get up his tent before he was flat on his back. I won't try to tell you of the days he went through. It was a living death. And he would have died, there is no doubt of it, if it hadn't been for a stranger who came along. He was a white man. Marette, it doesn't take a great deal of nerve to go up against a man with a gun, when you've got a gun of your own; and it doesn't take such a lot of nerve to go into battle when a thousand others are going with you. But it does take nerve to face what that stranger faced. And the sick man was nothing to him. He went into that tent and nursed the other back to life. Then the sickness got him, and for ten weeks those two were together, each fighting to save the other's life, and they won out. But the glory of it was with the stranger. He was going west. The constable was going south. They shook hands and parted.
human
And the constable never forgot, Gray Goose. He wanted the day to come when he might repay. And the time came. It was years later, and it worked out in a curious way. A man was murdered. And the constable, who had become a sergeant now, had talked with the dead man only a little while before he was killed. Returning for something he had forgotten, it was the sergeant who found him dead. Very shortly afterward a man was arrested. There was blood on his clothing. The evidence was convincing, deadly. And this man--
gpt
Was the man you lied to save,
human
Yes. When the halfbreed's bullet got me, I thought it was a good chance to repay Sandy McTrigger for what he did for me in that tent years before. But it wasn't heroic. It wasn't even brave. I thought I was going to die and that I was risking nothing.
gpt
And all the time you were lying so splendidly, Jeems--I KNEW, she cried.
human
I knew that you didn't kill Barkley, and I knew that you weren't going to die, and I knew what happened in that tent ten years ago. And--Jeems--Jeems--
gpt
I knew that you didn't kill John Barkley, she repeated.
human
And--SANDY MCTRIGGER DIDN'T KILL HIM!
gpt
But--
human
He DIDN'T, she interrupted him, almost fiercely.
gpt
He was innocent, as innocent as you were. Jeems--I Jeems--I know who killed Barkley. Oh, I KNOW--I KNOW!
human
Don't think that I haven't faith in you because I can't tell you more now, Jeems, she said.
gpt
You will understand--quite soon. When we are safe from the Police, I shall tell you. I shall keep nothing from you then. I shall tell you about Barkley, and Kedsty--everything. But I can't now. It won't be long. When you tell me we are safe, I shall believe you. And then--
human
And then--what?
gpt
You may not like me, Jeems.
human
I love you, he whispered.
gpt
Nothing in the world can stop my loving you.
human
Even if I tell you--soon--that I killed Barkley?
gpt
No. You would be lying.
human
Or--if I told you--that I--killed--Kedsty?
gpt
No matter what you said, or what proof there might be back there, I would not believe you.
human
Jeems--
gpt
Yes, Niska, Little Goddess--?
human
I'm going to tell you something--now!
gpt
It is going to--shock you--Jeems.
human
Are you listening?
gpt
Yes, I am listening.
human
Because I'm not going to say it very loud. And then she whispered,
gpt
Jeems--I LOVE YOU!