Part 76

"Who are you and what is your business with this house?" he inquired, grimly. The criminal in him was now in the ascendant; he was alert, cool, suspicious, and insolent. He saw in anybody who approached his house the menace of discovery, perhaps an intentional and cunning attempt to entrap and destroy him. All that was evil in him came to the surface; the fear that anybody might forcibly frustrate his revenge--if he chose to revenge himself--raised a demon in him that blanched his naturally pallid face and started his lip muscles into that curious recession which, in animals, is the first symptom of the snarl.

"What do you want?" he repeated. "Why do you knock and then slink away?"

"I did not know you were at home," said the girl, faintly.

"Then why do you come knocking? Who are you, anyway?" he demanded, harshly, knowing perfectly well who she was.

"I am the postmistress at Nauvoo," she faltered--"that is, I was--"

"Really," he said, angrily; "your intelligence might teach you to go where you are more welcome."

His brutality seemed to paralyze the girl. She looked at him as though attempting to comprehend his meaning. "Are you not Mr. Helm?" she asked, in a sweet, bewildered voice.

"Yes, I am," he replied, shortly.

"I thought you were a gentleman," she continued, in the same stunned voice.

"I'm not," said Helm, bitterly. "I fancy you will agree with me, too. Good-night."

He deliberately turned his back on her and sat down on the wooden steps of the porch; but his finely modelled ears were alert and listening, and when to his amazement he heard her open his gate again and re-enter, he swung around with eyes contracting wickedly.

She met his evil glance quite bravely, wincing when he invited her to leave the yard. But she came nearer, crossing the rank, soaking grass, and stood beside him where he was sitting.

"May I tell you something?" she asked, timidly.

"Will you be good enough to pass your way?" he answered, rising.

"Not yet," she replied, and seated herself on the steps. The next moment she was crying, silently, but that only lasted until she could touch her eyes with her handkerchief.

He stood above her on the steps. Perhaps it was astonishment that sealed his lips, perhaps decency. He had noticed that she was slightly lame, although her slender figure appeared almost faultless. He waited for a moment.

Far on the clearing's dusky edge a white-throated sparrow called persistently to a mate that did not answer.

If Helm felt alarm or feared treachery his voice did not betray it. "What is the trouble?" he demanded, less roughly.

She said, without looking at him: "I have deceived you. There was a letter for you to-day. It came apart and--I found--this--"

She held out a bit of paper. He took it mechanically. His face had suddenly turned gray.

The paper was fibre paper. He stood there breathless, his face a ghastly, bloodless mask; and when he found his voice it was only the ghost of a voice.

"What is all this about?" he asked.

"About fibre paper," she answered, looking up at him.

"Fibre paper!" he repeated, confounded by her candor.

"Yes--government fibre. Do you think I don't know what it is?"

For the first time there was bitterness in her voice. She turned partly around, supporting her body on one arm. "Fibre paper? Ah, yes--I know what it is," she said again.

He looked her squarely in the eyes and he saw in her face that she knew what he was and what he had been doing in Nauvoo. The blood slowly stained his pallid cheeks.

"Well," he said, coolly, "what are you going to do about it?"