Black Rock Part 16

'Yes,' replied Graeme, 'ever since I spoiled your cut-throat game in 'Frisco. How is the little one?' he added sarcastically.

Idaho's face lost its smile and became distorted with fury as he replied, spitting out his words, 'She--is--where you will be before I am done with you.'

'Ah! you murdered her too! You'll hang some beautiful day, Idaho,' said Graeme, as Idaho sprang upon him.

Graeme dodged his blow and caught his forearm with his left hand and held up high the murderous knife. Back and forward they swayed over the floor, slippery with whisky, the knife held high in the air. I wondered why Graeme did not strike, and then I saw his right hand hung limp from the wrist. The men were crowding upon the barricade. I was in despair.

Graeme's strength was going fast. With a yell of exultant fury Idaho threw himself with all his weight upon Graeme, who could only cling to him. They swayed together towards me, but as they fell I brought down my bar upon the upraised hand and sent the knife flying across the room.

Idaho's howl of rage and pain was mingled with a shout from below, and there, dashing the crowd right and left, came old Nelson, followed by Abe, Sandy, Baptiste, Shaw, and others. As they reached the barricade it crashed down and, carrying me with it, pinned me fast.

Looking out between the barrels, I saw what froze my heart with horror.

In the fall Graeme had wound his arms about his enemy and held him in a grip so deadly that he could not strike; but Graeme's strength was failing, and when I looked I saw that Idaho was slowly dragging both across the slippery floor to where the knife lay. Nearer and nearer his outstretched fingers came to the knife. In vain I yelled and struggled.

My voice was lost in the awful din, and the barricade held me fast.

Above me, standing on a barrel-head, was Baptiste, yelling like a demon.

In vain I called to him. My fingers could just reach his foot, and he heeded not at all my touch. Slowly Idaho was dragging his almost unconscious victim toward the knife. His fingers were touching the blade point, when, under a sudden inspiration, I pulled out my penknife, opened it with my teeth, and drove the blade into Baptiste's foot. With a blood-curdling yell he sprang down and began dancing round in his rage, peering among the barrels.

'Look! look!' I was calling in agony, and pointing; 'for heaven's sake, look! Baptiste!'

The fingers had closed upon the knife, the knife was already high in the air, when, with a shriek, Baptiste cleared the room at a bound, and, before the knife could fall, the little Frenchman's boot had caught the uplifted wrist, and sent the knife flying to the wall.

Then there was a great rushing sound as of wind through the forest, and the lights went out. When I awoke, I found myself lying with my head on Graeme's knees, and Baptiste sprinkling snow on my face. As I looked up Graeme leaned over me, and, smiling down into my eyes, he said--

'Good boy! It was a great fight, and we put it up well'; and then he whispered, 'I owe you my life, my boy.'

His words thrilled my heart through and through, for I loved him as only men can love men; but I only answered--

'I could not keep them back.'

'It was well done,' he said; and I felt proud. I confess I was thankful to be so well out of it, for Graeme got off with a bone in his wrist broken, and I with a couple of ribs cracked; but had it not been for the open barrel of whisky which kept them occupied for a time, offering too good a chance to be lost, and for the timely arrival of Nelson, neither of us had ever seen the light again.

We found Craig sound asleep upon his couch. His consternation on waking to see us torn, bruised, and b.l.o.o.d.y was laughable; but he hastened to find us warm water and bandages, and we soon felt comfortable.

Baptiste was radiant with pride and light over the fight, and hovered about Graeme and me giving vent to his feelings in admiring French and English expletives. But Abe was disgusted because of the failure at Slavin's; for when Nelson looked in, he saw Slavin's French-Canadian wife in charge, with her baby on her lap, and he came back to Shaw and said, 'Come away, we can't touch this'; and Shaw, after looking in, agreed that nothing could be done. A baby held the fort.

As Craig listened to the account of the fight, he tried hard not to approve, but he could not keep the gleam out of his eyes; and as I pictured Graeme dashing back the crowd thronging the barricade till he was brought down by the chair, Craig laughed gently, and put his hand on Graeme's knee. And as I went on to describe my agony while Idaho's fingers were gradually nearing the knife, his face grew pale and his eyes grew wide with horror.

'Baptiste here did the business,' I said, and the little Frenchman nodded complacently and said--

'Dat's me for sure.'

'By the way, how is your foot?' asked Graeme.

'He's fuss-rate. Dat's what you call--one bite of--of--dat leel bees, he's dere, you put your finger dere, he's not dere!--what you call him?'

'Flea!' I suggested.

'Oui!' cried Baptiste. 'Dat's one bite of flea.'

'I was thankful I was under the barrels,' I replied, smiling.

'Oui! Dat's mak' me ver mad. I jump an' swear mos' awful bad. Dat's pardon me, M'sieu Craig, heh?'

But Craig only smiled at him rather sadly. 'It was awfully risky,' he said to Graeme, 'and it was hardly worth it. They'll get more whisky, and anyway the League is gone.'

'Well,' said Graeme with a sigh of satisfaction, 'it is not quite such a one-sided affair as it was.'

And we could say nothing in reply, for we could hear Nixon snoring in the next room, and no one had heard of Billy, and there were others of the League that we knew were even now down at Slavin's. It was thought best that all should remain in Mr. Craig's shack, not knowing what might happen; and so we lay where we could and we needed none to sing us to sleep.

When I awoke, stiff and sore, it was to find breakfast ready and old man Nelson in charge. As we were seated, Craig came in, and I saw that he was not the man of the night before. His courage had come back, his face was quiet and his eye clear; he was his own man again.

'Geordie has been out all night, but has failed to find Billy,' he announced quietly.

We did not talk much; Graeme and I worried with our broken bones, and the others suffered from a general morning depression. But, after breakfast, as the men were beginning to move, Craig took down his Bible, and saying--

'Wait a few minutes, men!' he read slowly, in his beautiful clear voice, that psalm for all fighters--

'G.o.d is our refuge and strength,'

and soon to the n.o.ble words--

'The Lord of Hosts is with us; The G.o.d of Jacob is our refuge.'

How the mighty words pulled us together, lifted us till we grew ashamed of our ign.o.ble rage and of our ign.o.ble depression!

And then Craig prayed in simple, straight-going words. There was acknowledgement of failure, but I knew he was thinking chiefly of himself; and there was grat.i.tude, and that was for the men about him, and I felt my face burn with shame; and there was pet.i.tion for help, and we all thought of Nixon, and Billy, and the men wakening from their debauch at Slavin's this pure, bright morning. And then he asked that we might be made faithful and worthy of G.o.d, whose battle it was. Then we all stood up and shook hands with him in silence, and every man knew a covenant was being made. But none saw his meeting with Nixon. He sent us all away before that.

Nothing was heard of the destruction of the hotel stock-in-trade.

Unpleasant questions would certainly be asked, and the proprietor decided to let bad alone. On the point of respectability the success of the ball was not conspicuous, but the anti-League men were content, if not jubilant.

Billy Breen was found by Geordie late in the afternoon in his own old and deserted shack, breathing heavily, covered up in his filthy, mouldering bed-clothes, with a half-empty bottle of whisky at his side.

Geordie's grief and rage were beyond even his Scotch control. He spoke few words, but these were of such concentrated vehemence that no one felt the need of Abe's a.s.sistance in vocabulary.

Poor Billy! We carried him to Mrs. Mavor's home; put him in a warm bath, rolled him in blankets, and gave him little sips of hot water, then of hot milk and coffee; as I had seen a clever doctor in the hospital treat a similar case of nerve and heart depression. But the already weakened system could not recover from the awful shock of the exposure following the debauch; and on Sunday afternoon we saw that his heart was failing fast. All day the miners had been dropping in to inquire after him, for Billy had been a great favourite in other days, and the attention of the town had been admiringly centred upon his fight of these last weeks. It was with no ordinary sorrow that the news of his condition was received.

As Mrs. Mavor sang to him, his large coa.r.s.e hands moved in time to the music, but he did not open his eyes till he heard Mr. Craig's voice in the next room; then he spoke his name, and Mr. Craig was kneeling beside him in a moment. The words came slowly--

'Oi tried--to fight it hout--but---oi got beaten. Hit 'urts to think 'E's hashamed o' me. Oi'd like t'a done better--oi would.'

'Ashamed of you, Billy!' said Craig, in a voice that broke. 'Not He.'

'An'--ye hall--'elped me so!' he went on. 'Oi wish oi'd 'a done better--oi do,' and his eyes sought Geordie, and then rested on Mrs.

Mavor, who smiled back at him with a world of love in her eyes.

'You hain't hashamed o' me--yore heyes saigh so,' he said looking at her.

'No, Billy,' she said, and I wondered at her steady voice, 'not a bit.

Why, Billy, I am proud of you.'

He gazed up at her with wonder and ineffable love in his little eyes, then lifted his hand slightly toward her. She knelt quickly and took it in both of hers, stroking it and kissing it.