"For Heaven's sake, then, get it over with! I need that money and--I
have nerves."
The former speaker opened his coat and DeVoe saw that he had left the
house with no protection whatever beneath it, except trousers and
footgear. His body was wet from the climb, but he exposed it openly to
the storm until he was blue with cold, while the younger man stamped
about, threshing his arms and lamenting his own discomfort.
That night Murray repeated his Turkish bath, swallowed his usual
narcotic, and lay down upon his draughty couch to be awakened some time
after midnight by a cry of "Fire." He noted dully that a vivid glare was
flickering through his open windows, and saw that the roofs adjoining
were silhouetted against a redly glowing sky; he heard a great clamor of
shouting voices, gunshots, bells, running feet, so arose and dressed
himself. Instead of donning his regular clothing, however, he drew on a
pair of trousers, thrust his bare feet into rubber boots, then buttoned
a rubber coat over his naked shoulders.
When he undertook to rouse DeVoe, Henry refused to get up, murmuring
sourly beneath his blankets:
"It's too cold and I've just fallen asleep--been tossing around for
hours."
"Very well. If it should spread in this direction I'll come back and
help get the things out."
The blizzard of the previous day had increased in violence, and as
Murray stepped out into it the cold sank through his thin garb and cut
him to the bone. His rain-coat was almost no protection, the rubber
boots upon his bare feet froze quickly, but he smiled with a grim,
distorted sense of satisfaction as he decided that here perhaps was his
long-awaited opportunity.
A winter fire in a desert mining-camp is a serious calamity. Water is
scarce at all times, and at this particular season Goldfield was even
drier than usual. Volunteers had already joined the insufficient fire
department, but the blaze was gaining headway in spite of all. The wind
played devilish pranks, serving not only to fan the conflagration, but
to deaden human hands and reduce human bodies to helpless, clumsy
things.
Butler Murray plunged into the fight with an abandon that won admiration
even in this chaos. He had no fear, he courted danger, he led where
others shrank from following. In and out of the flames he went, now
blistered by the heat, now numbed by the wintry gale. His body became
drenched with sweat, only to be caked in ice from the spray a moment
later. Icicles clung to his brows, his boots filled with water. It was
he who laid the dynamite, it was he who set it off and razed the
buildings in the path of the conflagration, checking the swift march of
destruction. Although he labored like a giant, taking insane risks at
every opportunity, his life seemed charmed, and dawn found him
uninjured, although staggering from weakness. Women brought him hot
coffee and sandwiches, then when the fire was under control he returned
to his quarters, half naked, as he had set out. It had been one long
battle against the blind god luck and he had emerged unscathed. And yet
he had not lost, for no human body could withstand a strain like this;
his previous exposures had been as nothing compared with what he had
undergone these many hours. If this did not bring pneumonia nothing
could.
As he lurched up the frozen street men cheered him and something warm
awoke in his heart, but when he stumbled into DeVoe's room he found that
young man still in bed, his cheeks flushed and feverish. Henry was
coughing and groaning; he complained of pains in his head and chest.
An hour later a doctor pronounced it pneumonia, and when the patient
grew rapidly worse he was moved to the wretched excuse for a hospital.
Murray snatched a few hours' sleep that night as he sat by his friend's
bedside and the next day found him as fit as ever. But in spite of every
attention DeVoe's fever mounted, his lungs began to fill, and on the
second night he died.
The suddenness of this tragedy stunned Butler Murray and its mockery
enraged him. He had promised DeVoe, toward the last, to take his body
East, and now decided it was just as well to do so, for he had proven,
to his own satisfaction at least, that he could not catch pneumonia, no
matter how hard he tried. A few hours later, therefore, he was on the
overland train bound for New York.
He had wasted a month of valuable time, but as to relinquishing his
purpose, the idea never occurred to him.