A Circle In The Sand

A Circle in the Sand

By Kate Jordan

Author of "The Kiss of Gold." "The Other House." etc. etc.

copyright 1898. By the Aveaor ....

"An ye'll write what I tell ye, miss. Ye'll spek the truth. Ye'll belike mek people a bit sorry. Aye, aye," she said, nodding at the dead ashes on the hearth, "ye'll say our hearts are breakin, that shame an hunger's eno' to mek men distraught, but ah, miss, ye won't mek 'em feel it; ye can't mek 'em feel it! I'd ha' to tek my heart out an put it inside ye before ye could know what I do an what I canna tell ye, miss'

Anne  could not utter one of the comforting, philosophical things she had fancied at her command. She let her hand rest for an istant on the forehead whener care had set a skein of tangled lines, gave a circular glance in the hopeless rom and went out, her heart affrighted.

Donald was not among the crowd, but she went on, expecting him to join her. He did not appear, and soon she found herself close to the mine around which the straggling village was built.

Before her stood the high, coal blackened building similar to a wooden lighthouse which miners call a breaker. She knew when the mines were working big cars were impelled up to this height from the fastnesses of the earth, that there the coal was broken, sorted and sent down through iron grooves to waiting cars. A feeling of curiosity impelled her to go up. It would be strange to stand in a high breaker, look out on a level with the hills, fancy the riven coal leaping down the rafters, and there write her notes of the morning.

Passing the silent engine houses and empty furnaces, she went up the steep ladders to the top. On the last step she paused, made suddenly aware the breaker was tenanted. Donald was sketching some one. Moving to one side, unseen, she saw the model was little Joe Evans, the murderer's son. He had assumed his working position beside an empty shoot, his head lowered, his hand extended, as if picking the refuse from the sliding coal. He had evidently digested the fact that his picture was being made for a newspaper, for there was exaltation in his face. Hidden in the shadow, Anne leaned against one of the posts and watched.

"The air must be filled with dust when the coal comes tumbling down before you, " Donald was saying, and he whistled softly as he waited for a reply.

"It's that what gives us the asthma." said Joe, backiung up his words by a most awful cough.

"Got anything on under that rag of a coat?" asked Donald cheerfully. "Let's see. "

The child's blue pallor went crimson, but in a half fearful way he opened the jacket and bared his puny chest.

"All right," Donald nodded. "I wanted to know; that's all." And he  commenced whistling softly, while Anne's heart grew hot. This was artistic savagery run amuck.

"How old are you, Joe?"

"Nine."

"What do yon think of all day as you sit picking the slate from the coal?'

"Nuthin !" His violet eyes were vapid wells between grimy lashes.

"Do you know what the sea is, Joe?" He shook his head negatively without any interest.

"The great, shining sea where ships sail–never saw that, Joe? Just turn your head a little the other way –so. Often hungry, I suppose?"

Joe smiled wanly as if at a jest. There was no need to affirm a self evident truth.

"The coal rushing down the shoot without a moment of rest must make your head ache, I should think?"

Joe forgot about the proper angle for showing off his knife blade chin and drawn eyelid. He dropped his head to his scrap of a hand, ornamented by knuckles and nails beyond redemption. His eyes looked up with unquestioning patience.

"It always aches. It's achin now. "

A sigh came from his dry mouth, and it had the effect of a clarion call on Donald. The apathy went from him. He flung his book to the floor. His face was twitching. His eyes burned.

"By–– , child, how terrible you are!" Kneeling, he brought his face to a level with Joe's, his hands grasping the boy's shoulders.

"Don't be afraid, Joe. Don't cry. I'm not mad, " he said, a sob creeping between his set teeth. "Oh, you poor little chap, you sad eyed little slave ! Oh, hungry and sick and old and only 9, picking the coal the whole day through, thinking of nothing and breathing death ! Joe ! Joe ! Where is your God and mine, that a child like you exists under the sky?"

Fascinated, shrinking, Joe looked into his eyes and said nothing. Anne could hear her heart in the stillness. Her eyes fastened first on Donald's discarded sketchbook, then on his kneeling figure.

"Joe," he said after a long silence, and now his voice was quiet, "something wonderful is going to happen to you, something better than your starved mind can understand. I'm going to take you to a great big city with me. I'm going to give you good things to eat, better than anything you ever tasted–warm clothes, too," he said, slipping his hand through the broken jacket and laying it on Joe's flesh. "You shall see the sea and everything that boys love. Oh, I've never loved anything, but I'll love you ! You'll be a happy boy yet if it's not too late"– he groaned defiantly– "if it's not too late. Oh, you poor, little baby with your terribly wise eyes,

"Don't be afraid , Joe. Don't Cry. I'm not mad," he said.

will you come with me? Joe, will you.'"

Anne made her way down the shaking ladders without being heard. Her swollen heart seemed crowding her throat. She stood in the chilling rain quivering with excitement. She had had her first glimpse into Donald's soul, and it had terrified her.

It was still early when they returned for lunch to the hotel. Joe, stunned into silence and with round eyes, accompanied them.

"I'm going to adopt him," was all the explanation of bis presence Donald had given. He was again as unreadable as a mollusk, and Anne could almost believe the scene in the breaker had been of her imagining.

Hours afterward, as she sat in the rainy dusk writing an impassioned account of the day, a faint knock sounded on her door. Donald stood outside, very pale, an unusual eagerness in his manner.

"If yon want to see what a mine looks like, Miss Garrick, this will be your only chance. The sheriff and bis men have come over with militia, and for the past hour the engines have been going, pumping down air, you know. They think that perhaps Red Evans is hiding there. "

"But could he? How could he get down if the cage wasn't working?"

"You see, besides the cage there's an iron bar - a sort of ladder with flat prongs laid upon it, the whole only half a yard wide. This goes down through a separate opening. It's put there as a precaution in case of explosions or injury to the cage, but it's a matter of life and death to use it. A desperate man, however, wouldn't hesitate to take the one chance. The sheriff fancies Red Evans may be clinging to the bar a good way down beyond sight, yet not too far from the air. I don't believe it. It's almost absurd. But they're going down and will take us along.

"All right, " said Anne. "But I won't tell Dr. Ericsson. He might be nervous."

Twenty minutes later they were again at the mine. The scene was animated now. Lanterns like the eyes of uncanny animals shot from one point to another in the falling night. A line of soldiers controlled the swell of the mountain, and above the strikers, with their families, sullenly watched. From wooden sheds came the braying of mules. Four men stood near the cage, which resembled a huge brass boiler with a round opening for air at a man's height. The hissing and throbbing of engines and the sound of many voices filled the valley with life.

Anne's fingers were unsteady as she put on the miner's protecting outfit. This was a rubber blouse to her knees and a wide brimmed, glazed hat, a little oil lamp flickering in front just above the brim.

"Ready !" said the sheriff, and the wire rope throbbed.

The cage shot down with tremendous speed. The lamps on the hats flared in the gust through the circular opening in the wall. It was a breathless, anxious descent. Anne closed her eyes and stood like one in a trance until the journey was completed.

When by Donald 's side she stepped into the underworld, an overwhelming depression seized her. She bad not dreamed how the knowledge of being 2,000 feet beneath the ground she trod so lightly could chili a heart. The rank, moist place smelled of death. She gazed at the jagged ceiling of coal upheld by tremendous tree trunks placed at regular distances and forming a rude aisle, the fungus on props and beams, the sluggish pools in every depression, the empty mule carts and discarded picks. Just where the hat lamps flung their beams there was light, and beyond lay appalling mystery.

"You'd better sit on this knoll."

And Donald, circling his lantern over his head, showed her the up hill recesses of a vast worked out chamber. " I'll go with the men down this gangway a bit. We'll not be far away. See, they're looking in the mule carts. I'd like to be on the spot if they get him. I want his face."

"I'll be alone here!" was Anne's inward exclamation. "You won't be long," she said and sat down, apparently calm.

"We're just going down this gangway." And Donald turned away, his fingers tingling to sketch her as she sat there, the light flaring above her eyes.

Ten minutes passed. Anne saw the men entering into the various hewn chambers, plunging their lanterns into clumsy carts, leaping into pits. Her heart seemed to have ceased beating. She found herself waiting for a cry of triumph and fancied the searchers dragging out a struggling, stormy browed figure, the murderer at bay.

Then an unlooked for thing happened. Without warning the moving throng of figures turned a corner, and she was alone in silence save for the dropping of water, in darkness save for the light upon her bat. She seemed to become a stone surrounded by an atmosphere of horror.

This paralyzing spell broke, and her blood crept in cold currents around her spine, for up in the black hollow behind her she heard a quick breath, then another, and a piece of coal tinkled down the declivity to her feet. The breathing came closer. It was just behind her now. There was a step, and she knew a horror unnamable stood at her back. She did not turn or move the stiff fingers clasping her knee or flicker an eyelid.

She was roused from the thrall of terror by a sight to haunt her while she lived. A man groveled before her, his supplicating clutch upon her knee. The uncertain flame of her lamp flung blue splashes into the hollows of his face. His red hair was glued to his throat. The red streaked flannel shirt was open to the waist, showing his hairy chest. Mildew and coal black covered him. There was a mortal hunger in his glance. She was gazing at Red Evans and he was praying for his life, but praying was a mild word for the spurting whispers from his gaping mouth as his eyes shot from right to left in fear of the returning hunters.

"Didn't set out for to kill Binkley, as God hears me, miss. No, 'twas fair fight, an he druv me mad. I flung the stone. I didn't believe him dead till he fell back wi' the blood bubblin from him. I been hidin here for two days, starvin on that ladder, 'tween earth an hell, crawled down when the engines begun to work, been lyin on my face up here ever since. They'll hang me. Don 't let 'em. Help me. I've had a hard life eno' 'thout hangin at the end o't. Oh," and the word was a long shudder, "my God, for one chance! I never had noan. One chance - one."

It seemed to Anne as if a great length of time had passed, as if herself and her life were myths, and nothing in all the world was as positive as this man's misery and his claim. She sat motionless with strained, bright eyes.

He had taken another's life, it was clear. She was a newspaper woman, face to face with an important opportunity. If she gave the murderer to his pursuers, The Citizen would have gained , a story unshared by its rivals. As a newspaper woman she should make the most of this moment. She hesitated. The man's eyes looked up at her like a famished dog's. As a newspaper woman, yes, but as a woman, no.

She sprang up, fired by the desire to save him. His eyes were terrible as he crouched in the slime at her feet. He had suffered enough.

"Come along, " she said, her voice harsh with fear as a man's laugh distantly awakened echoes in the caverns. "They've already searched the mule carts. Climb into this one. They won't look again. Lie down low, so. I'll put my cloak over you. Try to breathe more softly. Hush, they're coming. "

Donald hurried toward her first and found her sitting where he had left her.

"Wagner said he'd come back and stay near you," he said hurriedly as he wiped his brow. "I've just found out that he sneaked on, the little beast. "

"Did you find any trace of Evans?" she managed to ask.

"No, he's not here. They might have known that. You're shivering. Why, where's your cloak?"

"Say nothing about that," she said in sudden fear, springing up. "Manage to have the others go up first. I'll explain after. They must go up first. Leave me here."

The cage had been very crowded coming down, and when every worked out recess had been searched the men were glad to let the newspaper people wait for a seocnd trip.

"Well, that's settled," Anne heard a man say, his throaty tones inflated with satisfaction. "He ain't in the mine, he ain't on the ladder, and d–n him wherever he is."

The cage leaped beyond her sight. Donald, with the ineffectual light making big shadows leap around him, came down the alley and stood before her. He knew some disclosure was trembling on her lips.

"We're alone now," he said. "You look awful. Take a little. "

He held out a flask of whisky, and Anne greedily swallowed a mouthful. It revived her and made her brave again. She listened to the creaking of the wire ropes, but instead of fear her eyes flashed with determination.

"I'm going to trust you, Donald Sefain, "she said slowly, rising and touching his arm. "Yes, I'm going to trust you. I believe in your pity and your honor."

His eyes answered her; he held his breath. "

I know where Red Evans is," she said. "He's near us, hidden under my cloak. He begged his life - oh, how he begged it - and I couldn't give him up. He prayed for one chance. I'll give it to him. Will you?"

Anne pressed her hands upon his shoulders, the divinity of a mediator in her eyes.

(To be continued)