Madelon: A Story

L.-.S

Madelon

By Alfred Lambourne

It was from the laugh of Madelon that one learned that she was crazed; or, if there needed a stronger proof, then one had but to look into her. wildly troubled eyes. Madelon had never divined tjiat love could bring other than happiness, therefore site Was distraught the suddenness of the revelation, its tragedy, ;

ijf^jIriveft'Tier mad. Alway she pleaded: "Pierre, Pierre, give lJl^^ic^Pierre." "And so her grizzled and one-armed father, lying upon his death-bed, learned the truth of the words: "Their sins shall discover them." "He that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool." And Madelon wore her wreath of flowers, believing it ever her bridal-day. And she sat by the ford, watching for a lover who never came. Or, suddenly, she would laugh, that heartchilling laugh, and cry out upon the silence, "Pierre, Pierre, give me back Pierre."

The Island Station and the Island Ranch were situated facing each other upon a high plain. Before them both passed a coach road and between them, dividing them, were the slowlyflowing waters of a "branch," and on three sides of the last Trained, thus making it an island, was a great curve in the course of a wide and turbulent river. The station stood alongside a bareand rocky ledge, but the log cabin of the ranch was shaded by fine old trees, and the island edges were green with herbs and

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grasses and bright with desert bloom. Beyond was the lava plain and that was bounded with broken hills, overlooked by stark and angular mountains. In charge of the station was the father of Madelon, in the cabin lived the father of Pierre. Pierre and Madelon had known, had loved, each other from childhood. And the love of children had changed to the love of man and woman. "Their sins shall discover them." "He that getteth riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool." Why did not the father of Madelon remember that? The promise holds good in a lawless country and in lawless times. "The wages of sin is death." In our brief description we omitted a point. Where the Northern Lights often sent their shafts toward the Polar Star, or moved through the night in phantasmal dancing, their appeared a gap in the hills. This gap marked the course of a stream that worked its way through a wild and sombre pass, and fell into the river a few miles above the Island Station and ranch. It is a place of ill-repute. "Robbers' Roost" is the name it bears. Through this gap the mail coach passed. How easy for a determined man to hold up and to rifle the coach as it came down the steep and winding road. Hardly a trip but the coach was loaded with treasure, gold in sacks of nuggets and yellow dust. Nature favored the robber, the dark tumbled rocks of the pass were overhung with twisted and sombre spruce. What a place to hide, what a place to baffle pursuit! What did the father of Madelon know of that? The station-master, farther down the road, had always been at his post. But the road was compelled to follow the winding course of the stream and the pass, and there was a short trail across the hills. Yet the lone hold-up must have been a daring man. But there was the lure of gold. Of the one-armed father it was generally accepted, believed, that the limb which was missing had been lost through horse. But had the truth been told it would have the kick of a been known that the arm had been shattered by a bullet. Strange, too, this accident occurred at the same time as occurred could the last hold-up of a gold-laden coach. Yet this, of course, have been a coincidence merely. But there came a change. Pierre, the rancher's son, had been made a sheriff, and one night he was upon the seat of a

southward-making coach. And there was to be the marriage; the time was set, the families, that of bridal robe of Madelon was made. The two the rancher, that of the station-master, those who had been

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neighbors for so long, were to be united by closer ties. And then Pierre was missing, and in the laugh, in the eyes of MadeIon was that which told that she was mad.

II

"When the two square buttes, in the west, are directly opposite to the conical peak, in the east, then leave the road and move toward a forked dwarf cedar which grows upon the ridge and is darkly marked against the sky." The directions were simple enough. We found the cave. At its portal the swallows have built uncountable nests, in its dimly-lighted ante-room bats cling to the basalt or flutter and squeak in the unmoved air, but beyond is the stillness and the blackness as of primal nigiit. The cave is an exposure of the course of an ancient, once subterranean river, and to traverse its chilly depth is like a dream. Above is the waving ceiling, high and vaulted, or flat and low, so low that it seems to press upon the brain; or, on either side are the water-carved walls, while below, heavy as iron, yet soft as velvet, is the floor of volcanic dust. And "Hole in the Rock" is connected with the madness of Madelon and the death of Pierre. Well indeed was this place known of the station-master; itwas his place of hidden gold, there he had fired the shot. To reach the final recesses of the cave, one must first climb over masses of already fallen rock, loosened from the cave roof, earthquake shaken in the long ago, or one must pass under others which appear that in the next moment they must fall. Then one came to the room in which the body of Pierre was found, and, lastly, the treasure room, the place of the hidden gold. In truth, however, to reach this room one has a choice of ways. He can go over the fallen rock or through a narrow and twisted passage which has been left against the wall. Lastly it is reached by another passage, low, so low that one must bend his face to the dust. Above him, seeming to press upon, to crush him, is a mighty mass of hanging stone. Once two children, Madelon and Pierre, playing hide and seek among the rocks, had found and looked into the cave. They had even left the imprint of their bare feet upon its inner sands. But beyond the ante-room they had not dared to go. With a shuddering fascination they had gazed into the blackness of the passage-way beyond. Did they with childish intuition read into the coming day? Later, as a man, Pierre had looked into each recess of the cave, but never again would Mad-

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elon go near the place. Never again? Once, and only once, and then

What so exciting as a man-hunt? What so dangerous as a man at bay? There is aroused the fierce delight of the primitive being. To pursue, to kill, to meet cunning with cunning, to satisfy the blood-lust, to retaliate in kind, how quickly in man is aroused the latent brute! There are the same passions in pursuer and pursued. Free, for a moment, the tameless savagery in the heart of man, and then is annulled the civilization of a thousand years. At "Hole in the Rock" two men were at death grips. "Their sins shall discover them." "He that getteth riches and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool." Could it be that the newly-made young sheriff did not recognize the masked station-master? Did not the latter know that his pursuer was Pierre? But there was the mask of night. Of three pursuers Pierre had held out to the last. Strange, when he approached the cave that he did not suspect. Beyond suspicion, because he was in the employ of the company, that station-master comparative safety save for the desgave to the a guardian perate chances of the game. He was, in a certain way, of the coaches he robbed. Now the dawn was breaking. So surprise, that advantageous was "Robber's Roost" as a place of treasure. By rocks and a the hold-up had secured a booty of well was he hidden, such a trap was the turn screen of foliage so and so surely were both guard and driver covered, in the road to toss out the bags ot that there remained no alternative but But the retreating man was followed by a flight aolden dust. Unharmed, the advanof bullets. Then had begun the hunt. tage remained with the man who fled. Two of the pursuers fell.

however, a long range shot of Pierre shattered the banLater, dit's arm. Then they were near to the mouth of the cave.

It was a death wound. Pierre had but a short time to live. hole in his side, it mingled with the A red stream came from a death-thirst was upon Pierre, blood from a shattered arm. The Water dripped from a crevice in he moaned with parched lips. made a tiny basin in a basaltic ledge and the ceiling above, it disappeared in the volcanic dust With water from this basin the thirst of the dying Pierre. By the Nation-master quenched lantern the men looked into each other's eyes. The the light of a too late. mask had fallen, the men knew each other "Their sins shall discover them." "He that getteth riches and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool."

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It was a singular fight— the station-master seeking like a wild beast the depths of the cave, followed by Pierre, his neighbor, the young sheriff, the accepted lover of his daughter, MadeIon. Yes, the night had made both men unknown to each other. In the darkness the pursued man had all but«escaped, yet the coming light revealed a clue. Drops of blood, dashes' of gold dust, led to the cave. In the ante-room the bandit had stopped, there he had bandaged his shattered arm. Blood marked the place, but there he had noticed the bullet gash in the pouch at his side, and no longer his way was marked with sprinklings of the escaping dust. At the foot of the debris he had lighted his — lantern kept secreted among the rocks. This was seen by the advancing Pierre. Over the debris climbed the bandit, through the narrow passage went Pierre. And then the shot. Haggard, at dawn, the bandit emerged from "Hole in the Rock." Upon the volcanic dust of the cave, Pierre lay dead. The station-master was weak from the loss of blood. A wretched man, he moved toward his home. "Their sins shall discover them." "He that getteth riches and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool."

Ill

And soon after came the plight of Madelon. In her laugh, in her eyes was that which said that she was mad. Upon the dust of the cave Pierre lay unburied, in the treasure room lay buried the stolen gold. j

Then Madelon dreamed her dream. In this day many believe not in dreams, yet this was the dream of Madelon. Upon the floor of "Hole in the Rock" she beheld Pierre lying dead. But first it seemed that he had stood before her and motioned toward the cave. And it also seemed that she arose and followed him there. They entered into the dim-lighted ante-room; the startled swallows and the bats wheeled around their heads, and in the volcanic dust there she could see the imprint of her own bare, childish feet, and those of Pierre, as they had left them the years before. And Pierre led her toward that black hallway beneath whose portal she had not dared, when a child, to go. And there she had seen the gleam of scattered gold-dust, and darkened spots of blood. She noticed, too, where her father had sat upon a fallen stone and bandaged his shattered arm. And then while Pierre yet seemed to stand beside her, there was Pierre lying dead upon the dust before her. All was made clear.

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Her mind was illumined from an unknown source, as an unseen light illumined the cave. Sometimes the love of gold, nay often, the love of gold outlives the purpose for which it was collected. For what purpose had the station-master desired the possession of gold? Perhaps it was not so much a greed as an excitation to action in an atmosphere of lawlessness and the constant spectacle of easilyacquired wealth. There was the richly-laden coach, and there were the opportunities for successful escape. But the sudden grasping of opportunity implies a dominant desire, a flaw in the character which makes one grasp at crime. It is the lawless appealing to the lawless. And the response is in harmony with that which allures. But whatever the cause, there in the cave yet lay the gold. To obtain it the station-master must pass by the unburied body of Pierre. Weakened with loss of blood, the bandit had been unable to finish a half-dug grave. That grave must be finished, there the dead lover must be concealed. Madelon should never be told. Never should she learn that her father's arm had been shattered by a bullet fired by Pierre; nor never should she learn that her lover had met his death from a shot fired by her father's hand. He would complete a terrible rite, he would go again to "Hole in the Rock," he would bury the dead lover. The stolen gold should change the life of Madelon in another land. So with eyes that gleamed, in which were opposite emotions, the station-master sought the mouth of the cave. These two thoughts led him on No Madelon need never learn where : ;

Pierre had met his death; or at whose hand, or in what cause. Yes; he would secure the treasure, and with it, in some way, compensate for the ruin he had caused. In neither of these should he be successful.

— Again we write of Madelon the reader foresees the end. Surprised, alarmed at the absence of Pierre, startled, too, at the coincidence of that absence and the shattered arm of her father, she lived in a condition of dark surmise. Then came the dream, followed by a wild resolve. She would go to the cave; she would find if her dream were true. Shall we follow Madelon through "Hole in the Rock" as in her dream? With the courage of love and despair, she sought the place. She did not shrink this time even to enter the back hallway, where she lighted the lamp. Yes, in the volcanic dust of the ante-room, there were yet the impressions of her childish feet; there upon the slab of fallen stone were the spots of darkened blood. Beyond that point in the cave, she never before

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had been. And now upon the velvet dusts, the angular blocks of fallen rock, by the place where the waters of the spring dripped from the ceiling into the pool below, and then One wild, shivering cry as she looked upon the body of Pierre

A guilty father, a maddened daughter —they confronted each other. At the cave mouth the station-master and Madelon met. There was no purpose in the father's dissembling now. Madelon knew the truth, or rather, she had known the truth. In those eyes there shone no light of reason. She no longer knew of that which she had seen. She did not know that she had been in that underground depth, or that she had looked on the body of Pierre. Aghast stood the father; like an apparition stood Madelon. Nerving himself for his ordeal, the stationmaster had come up through the light; through the darkness of the cave had come the girl, and now in her eyes, in her laugh, was that which told that she was mad!

And so the grizzled and one-armed father, lying upon his death-bed, learned the truth of the words: "Their sins shall discover them." "He that getteth riches and not by right shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at the end snail be a fool." And so Madelon wore her wreath of flowers, believing it ever her bridal day. And so she sat by the ford, watching for a lover who never came. Or, suddenly, she would laugh and cry out upon the silence, "Pierre, Pierre, give me back Pierre!"