They were so little, seemingly so inoffensive:  these dark berries in the shadows of the covert.  They were scarcely to be noticed twice.  But not even the savage grizzly was of such might; storms or seas were not so deadly.  There they were, inconspicuous among their sister plants, waiting for her hand.

It was right that they should be black in color.  Their blackness was as of a black night without a star shining through,—­a black cloud with never a rainbow to promise hope.  She could not turn her eyes away!  How black they were among the green leaves—­lightless as death itself.

A handful of them meant death:  her father had warned her about them long ago.  But half a handful—­perhaps a dozen of the sable berries in the palm of her hand—­what did they mean?  Just a sickness wherein one could no longer guard a prisoner.  They were a powerful alkaloid, she knew; and a dozen of them would likely mean hours and hours of deep, dreamless sleep,—­a sleep in which one could take no reckoning of hands fumbling at a cartridge belt!  Half a handful would, in all probability, fail to strike the life from such a powerful frame as Ben’s, but would certainly act upon him like a powerful opiate and leave him helpless in her hands.

Eagerly her fingers plucked the black berries.

XXXIII

In one of the tin cups Beatrice pressed the juice from the nightshade, obtaining perhaps a tablespoonful of black liquor.  To this she added considerable sugar, barely tasting the mixture on the end of her finger.  The balance was inclining toward the success of her plan.  The sugar mostly killed the pungent taste of the berries.

Then she concealed the cup in a cluster of vines, ready for the moment of need.  Her next act was to procure from among the supplies the little cardboard box containing half a dozen or so of her pistol shells.  The way of safety was to destroy these first.  The effect of the poison might be of only a few minutes’ duration, and every motion might count.  Under any conditions, they would be out of the way.  She was careful, with a superlative cunning, to take the box as well as its contents.  She foresaw that in all likelihood Ben would seek the shells as soon as he fired the few that remained in his pistol magazine; and an empty container might put him upon his guard.  On the other hand, if he could not find the box at all, he could easily be led to believe that it had been simply misplaced among the other supplies.

She scattered the shells in the heavy brush where not even the bright, searching eyes of the Canada jay might ever find them.  Then she hastened up the ridge to meet Ben on his way to the cave.

She waited a few minutes, then spying his stalwart form at the edge of the beaver meadow, she tripped down to meet him.  He was not in the least suspicious of this little act of friendship.  It was quite the customary thing, lately, for her thus to watch for his coming; and his brown face always lighted with pleasure at the first glimpse of her graceful form framed by the spruce.  She too had always taken pleasure in these little meetings and in the gay talk they had as they sped down toward the cavern; but her delight was singularly absent to-day.  She tried to restrain the wild racing of her heart.