Going Some Part 20

"_Look out!_" Gla.s.s barked the words, and undertook to deflect the weapon with his hand.

"Let it alone or it'll go off!"

Gla.s.s dropped his hand as if it had been burned, and stared down his bulging front with horrified, fascinated eyes.

"Now, listen. We've stood for you as long as we can. You've made your talk and got away with it, but from now on you're working for us. We've framed a foot-race, and put up our _panga_ because you said you had a champeen. Now, we ain't sayin' you lied--'cause if we thought you had, I'd gut-shoot you here, now."

Willie paused, while Gla.s.s licked his lips and undertook to frame a reply. The black muzzle of the weapon hovering near his heart, however, stupefied him. Mechanically he thrust the stem of his pipe between his lips while Willie continued to glare at him balefully. "You're boss is a guest, but you ain't. We can talk plain to you."

"Y--yes, of course."

"You said just now you'd answer for him with your life. Well, we aim to make you! We ain't a-goin' to lose this foot-race under no circ.u.mstances whatever, so we give you complete authority over the body, health, and speed of Mr. Speed. It's up to you to make him beat that cook."

"S-s-suppose he gets sick or sprains his ankle?" Gla.s.s undertook to move his body from in front of the weapon, but it followed him as if magnetized.

"There ain't a-goin' to be no accidents or excuses. It's pay or play, money at the tape. You're his trainer, and it's your fault if he ain't fit when he toes the mark. Understand?"

Willie lowered the muzzle of his weapon, and fired between the legs of Gla.s.s, who leaped into the air with all the grace of a gazelle. It was due to no conscious action on his part that the trainer leaped; his muscles were stimulated spasmodically, and propelled him from the floor. At the same time his will was so utterly paralyzed that he had no control over his movements; he did not even hear the yell that burst from his throat as his lungs contracted; he merely knew that he was in the supremest peril, and that flight was futile. Therefore he undertook to steady himself. Every tissue of his body seemed to creep and crawl. The flesh inside his legs was quivering, the close-cropped hair of his thick neck rose and p.r.i.c.kled, and his capacious abdomen throbbed and pulsated like a huge bowl of jelly. He laid his hands upon it to still the disturbance. Then he became conscious that he had bitten his pipe-stem in two and swallowed the end. He felt it sticking in his throat.

"Did you hear what I said?" demanded Willie, in a voice that sounded like the sawing of a meat bone.

Gla.s.s opened his mouth, and when no sound issued, nodded.

"And you understand?"

Again the trainer bobbed his head. The pipe-stem had cut off all power of speech, and he knew himself dumb for life.

"Then I guess that's all. It's up to you." Willie replaced his gun, and the fat man threatened to fall. "Come on, boys!" The cowboys filed out silently, but on the threshold Willie paused and darted a venomous glance at his enemy. "Don't forget what I said about Mr. Colt and the equality of man."

"Yes, sir!--yes, ma'am!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the frightened trainer, nervously. When they were gone he collapsed.

"They are rather severe, aren't they?" ventured Fresno.

"Severe!" cried the unhappy man. "Why, Speed can't--" He was about to explain everything when the memory of Willie's words smote him like a blow. That fiend had threatened to kill him, Lawrence Gla.s.s, without preliminary if it became evident that a fraud had been practiced. Manifestly this was no place for hysterical confidences. Larry's mouth closed like a trap, while the Californian watched him intently. At length he did speak, but in a strangely softened tone, and at utter variance with his custom.

"Say, Mr. Fresno! Which direction is New York?"

"That way." Fresno pointed to the east, and the other man stared longingly out through the bunk-house window.

"It's quite a walk, ain't it?"

"Walk?" Berkeley laughed. "It's two or three thousand miles!"

Gla.s.s sighed heavily. "Why do you ask?"

"Oh, nothin'. Jest gettin' homesick." He calmed himself with an effort, entered the gymnasium as if in search of something, and then set forth to find Speed.

That ecstatic young gentleman wrenched his gaze away from the blue eyes of Miss Blake to see his trainer signalling him from afar.

"What is it, Lawrence?"

"Got to see you."

"Presently."

"Nix! I got to see you _now!_" Gla.s.s's ruddy face was blotched, and he seemed to rest in the grip of some blighting malady. Beneath his arm he carried a tight-rolled bundle. Sensing something important back of this unusual demeanor, Speed excused himself and followed Larry, who did not trust to speech until they were alone in the gymnasium with the doors closed. Then he unrolled the bundle he carried, spread it upon the floor, and stepped into its exact centre.

"Are you standing on my prayer-rug?" demanded his companion, angrily.

"I am! And from this on I'm goin' to make it work itself to death. She said a feller couldn't get hurt if he stood on it and said 'Allah.' Well, I'm goin' to wear it out."

"What's wrong?"

"Do you know what's goin' to happen to me if Covington don't get here and beat this cook?"

"Happen to you?"

"Yes, me! These outlaws have put it up to me to win this bet for them."

"Well, Covington can beat anybody."

"But Covington isn't here yet."

"Not yet, but--" The young man smiled. "You're not frightened, are you?"

"Scared to death, that's all," acknowledged the other. Then when his employer laughed openly, he broke out at a white-heat. "Joke, eh? Well, you'd better have a good laugh while you can, because Humpy Joe's finish will be a ten-course dinner to what you'll get if Covington misses his train."

"How easily frightened you are!"

"Yes? Well, any time people start shooting shots I'm too big for this earth. The hole in a gun looks as big as a gas-tank to me."

"But n.o.body is going to shoot you!" exclaimed the mystified college man.

"They ain't, hey? I missed the Golden Stairs by a lip not half an hour ago. I got a pipe-stem crossways in my gullet now, and it tickles." He coughed loudly, then shook his head. "No use; it won't come up." With feverish intensity he told of his narrow escape from destruction, the memory bringing a sweat of agony to his brow. "And the worst of it is," he concluded, "I'm 'marked'

with guns. I've always been that way."

"Tut! tut! Don't alarm yourself. If Covington shouldn't come, the race will be declared off."

"No chance," announced the trainer, with utter conviction. "These thugs have made it pay or play, and the bets are down."

"You know I can't run."

"If he don't come, you'll _have_ to!"

"Absurd! I shall be indisposed."

"If you mean you'll get sick, or sprain an ankle, or break a leg, or kill yourself, guess again. I'm responsible for you now.

Something may go wrong with me, that pipe-stem is liable to gimme a cancer, but nothin' is goin' to happen to you. My only chance to make a live of it is to cough up that clay, and get some one to outrun this cook. You're the only chance I've got, if Culver don't show, and the first law of nature ain't never been repealed."

"Self-protection, eh?"