"Ostensiblee y'r correct, Bill, me son," spoke up Lawson; "but y'r a
dummy, and you can lay to that for another cold frozen fact. Takes a sea
farmer to learn you landsmen things. Ever hear of a pair of shears? Then
clap y'r eyes to this."
The sailor worked rapidly. From the pile of dunnage where they had
pulled up the boat the preceding fall, he unearthed a pair of long oars.
These he lashed together, at nearly right angles, close to the ends of
the blades. Where the handles rested he kicked holes through the snow to
the sand. At the point of intersection he attached two guy-ropes, making
the end of one fast to a cake of beach-ice. The other guy he passed over
to Red Bill. "Here, me son, lay holt o' that and run it out."
And to his horror, Jan saw his gallows rise in the air. "No! no!" he
cried, recoiling and putting up his fists. "It is not goot! I vill not
hang! Come, you noddleheads! I vill lick you, all together, von after
der odder! I vill blay hell! I vill do eferydings! Und I vill die
pefore I hang!"
The sailor permitted the two other men to clinch with the mad creature.
They rolled and tossed about furiously, tearing up snow and tundra, their
fierce struggle writing a tragedy of human passion on the white sheet
spread by nature. And ever and anon a hand or foot of Jan emerged from
the tangle, to be gripped by Lawson and lashed fast with rope-yarns.
Pawing, clawing, blaspheming, he was conquered and bound, inch by inch,
and drawn to where the inexorable shears lay like a pair of gigantic
dividers on the snow. Red Bill adjusted the noose, placing the hangman's
knot properly under the left ear. Mr. Taylor and Lawson tailed onto the
running-guy, ready at the word to elevate the gallows. Bill lingered,
contemplating his work with artistic appreciation.
"Herr Gott! Vood you look at it!"
The horror in Jan's voice caused the rest to desist. The fallen tent had
uprisen, and in the gathering twilight it flapped ghostly arms about and
titubated toward them drunkenly. But the next instant John Gordon found
the opening and crawled forth.
"What the flaming--!" For the moment his voice died away in his throat
as his eyes took in the tableau. "Hold on! I'm not dead!" he cried out,
coming up to the group with stormy countenance.
"Allow me, Mistah Gordon, to congratulate you upon youah escape," Mr.
Taylor ventured. "A close shave, suh, a powahful close shave."
" Congratulate hell! I might have been dead and rotten and no thanks to
you, you--!" And thereat John Gordon delivered himself of a vigorous
flood of English, terse, intensive, denunciative, and composed solely of
expletives and adjectives.
"Simply creased me," he went on when he had eased himself sufficiently.
"Ever crease cattle, Taylor?"
"Yes, suh, many a time down in God's country."
"Just so. That's what happened to me. Bullet just grazed the base of my
skull at the top of the neck. Stunned me but no harm done." He turned
to the bound man. "Get up, Jan. I'm going to lick you to a standstill
or you're going to apologize. The rest of you lads stand clear."
"I tank not. Shust tie me loose und you see," replied Jan, the
Unrepentant, the devil within him still unconquered. "Und after as I
lick you, I take der rest of der noddleheads, von after der odder,
altogedder!"