The three men moved forward until they were within arm's reach of
Reivers, and stood regarding him with open grins on their hairy faces.
Reivers, reading the import of their grins, knew that they were bent
upon enjoying themselves at his expense, and tried swiftly to guess what
form their amusement might take. If it were only horse-play he would be
able to continue in the helpless character he had assumed. If it were to
be rougher than that, if they set out to break him in real earnest, he
feared that his acting was at an end.
Even for the sake of the gold that he was after he would hardly be able
to submit, humbly and helplessly as became a drunken squaw-man, to their
efforts to make a wreck of him. He calculated his chances of coming
through alive if the situation developed to this extreme, and decided
that the odds were a trifle too heavy against him.
The element of surprise would be on his side, but his right shoulder
still was weak from the old bullet-wound. With his terrible ability to
use his feet he calculated that he could drop Moir and Tammy with broken
bones as they rushed him. To do that he would have to drop to his back,
and Joey, the third man, wore a long skinning-knife on his hip. No, if
he began to fight he would never get what he had come after. He wiped
his mouth furtively and swayed from the knees up.
"I want some hooch, mister, that's what I want," he whined shakily. "You
promised you'd give me a drink when we got here, you know you did.
Haven't had a drop since morning. I wouldn't 'a' come if I'd known you
were going to treat me like this."
Then he did the best acting of his life. He jumped sideways and
shuddered; he frantically plucked imaginary bugs off his coat sleeve; he
stepped high as if stepping over something on the ground; his eyes and
face muscles worked spasmodically.
"O-ooh! Gimme a drink," he begged. "Please gimme a drink. I gotta have
it."
The grins faded from the faces before him. They knew full well the signs
of incipient delirium tremens. Tammy laughed dryly.
"Hast brought home more than an old ox and a cow, Shanty," he said.
"Hast brought a whole menagerie. Yon stick'll have tuh Wullies in a
minute if he's not liquored."
Reivers dropped to his knees, shuddering, his arms shielding his eyes
from imaginary beasts of the bottle.
"Take 'em away, boys," he pleaded. "Kill the big ones, let the little
ones go."
With a snarl Moir leaped to his sledge and knocked the neck off a bottle
of hooch.
"Drink, you scut!" he growled. "I'll have dealings with you when you're
sobered up."
Reivers drank and began to doze. Moir kicked him upright.
"Get into the shed with t'other jackass," he commanded, propelling him
toward the dugout into which MacGregor had crawled. "And in tuh morning
you go to work, e'en though snakes be crawling all o'er 'ee."
A faintly muttered curse greeted Reivers as he crawled into the dugout.
"You poor curs! What do you want with me now?" came MacGregor's voice
from a corner of the tiny room. "You skunk----"
"Easy, MacGregor Roy," whispered Reivers quietly. "It's not one of the
'skunks.'"
"MacGregor Roy!" By the light that entered by a slit in the skin-flap
Reivers could see the Scotchman painfully lifting his head from his
miserable bunk, as he hoarsely repeated his own name. "MacGregor Roy!
Who are you, stranger, to call James MacGregor by his family name?"
"I'm the man that Shanty Moir brought in this afternoon," whispered
Reivers.
"I know, I know," gasped MacGregor weakly. "But men do not call me
MacGregor Roy. James MacGregor they call me, unless--unless----"
"Unless they have the 'Roy' straight from the lips of your daughter,
Hattie."
For a full minute MacGregor sat stricken speechless.
"Man, man! Speak!" The unfortunate man came wriggling over and laid his
hands pleadingly on Reivers. "Don't play with me. Is my daughter Hattie
alive and well?"
"Very much alive," replied Reivers, "and as well as can be expected of a
girl who is worrying her heart out over why her father doesn't return or
send her word."
"Have they no' guessed--has no' my brother Duncan guessed by this time?"
gasped MacGregor. "Can not they understand that I must be dead or held
captive since I do not return? Speak, man, tell me how 'tis with them!"
Reivers waited until the poor man had become more quiet before replying
to him.
"You'd better quiet down a little MacGregor," he whispered then. "You
can't tell when your friends might be listening, and it wouldn't do
either of us any good if they heard what we're saying."
"True," said the old man more quietly. "I'm acting like an old woman.
But for three months I've been trapped like this, and my head fairly
swims when I hear you speak of Hattie. How come you to know of her?"
Reivers related briefly that he had been ill and had been cared for at
the MacGregor cabin.
"And my little Hattie is well? No harm came to her from the black devil
they sent to steal her? You must know, man, they taunted me by
sending----"
"I know," interrupted Reivers; and he told how he had disposed of the
kidnapper.
"You--you did that?" MacGregor clutched Reivers's hand. "You saved my
little Hattie?"
"None of that," snapped Reivers, snatching away his hand. "I did nothing
for your little Hattie. Why should I? What is your Hattie to me? I
simply put that black-beard out of business because I needed food and he
had it on the sledge."
"Yet you're not one of the gang here--now? You are no' anything but a
friend of me and mine?"
"A friend?" sneered Reivers. "I'll tell you, Mac: I'm here as my own
friend, absolutely nothing else."
"But Hattie--and my brother Duncan--they understand about me now."
"They know you're either dead or worse," was the reply. "And they're at
Dumont's Camp now, waiting for Moir to come there on a spree, when they
expect to trail him back to this camp."
MacGregor nodded his head weakly.
"Aye. Taken the trail for revenge. No less could be expected. Please
Heaven, they'll soon win here. And James MacGregor will not forget what
he owes you, stranger, for the help you gave his daughter, when the time
of reckoning comes with Moir and his poor curs."
Reivers laughed coldly under his breath.
"You speak pretty confidently, old-times, for a man who's trussed up the
way you are."
"God willna let this dog of a Moir have his will with me much longer,"
said the Scot firmly. "It isna posseeble."
"'This dog of a Moir' must be a better man than you are," taunted
Reivers. "He fooled you and trapped you as soon as you'd found this
mine."
"Did he?" MacGregor flared up. "Shanty Moir a better man than me? Hoot,
no! He fooled me, yes, for I didna know that he'd got word to these
three hellions of his that the mine was here. I trusted him; he was my
pardner. And when we returned with proveesions for the Winter the three
devils were waiting for us, just inside the wall, where the creek comes
through. Shanty Moir alone never could ha' done it. The three of them
jumped on me from above. I had no chance. Then they strapped me.
"They've kept me strapped ever since. I'm draft beast for them. Twice a
day they feed me. And between whiles Shanty Moir taunts me by playing
before my eyes with the dust and nuggets that are half mine."
"Oh, well, it doesn't look to me as if there'd be enough gold here to
bother about," said Reivers casually. "It's nothing but a little freak
pocket by the looks of it."
"So it is. A freak pocket. It could be nothing else in this district.
'Twas only by chance we found it, exploring the creek in here out of
curiosity. 'Twas in the bowels of the warm spring up yon, where the
creek starts, that the pocket was originally. The spring boiled it out
into the creek, and the creek washed it down here in its bed of sand.
The sand lodged here, against these rock walls. There's about a hundred
feet of the sand, running down under the cliffs, and it's all pocket.
Not a rich pocket, as you say, but Shanty Moir is filthy with nuggets
and dust now, and there'll be some more in the sand that's left to work
over.
"Not a bonanza, man, but a good-sized fortune. 'Twould be enough to send
my Hattie to school. 'Twould give her all the comforts of the world.
'Twould make folk look up to her. And Shanty Moir, the devil's spawn,
has it in his keeping."
"And he'll probably see that it continues in his keeping, too," yawned
Reivers.
"Never!" swore MacGregor, rising to the bait. "Shanty Moir did me dirt
too foul to prosper by it, and I'm a better man than he is, besides. The
stuff will come into my hands, where it belongs, some way. I dinna see
just how for the present. But the stuff, and my revenge I will have.
E'en shackled as I am I'll have my revenge, though it's only to bite the
windpipe out of Shanty Moir's throat like a mad dog."
"Huh!" Reivers was lying face down on some blankets, apparently but
little interested. "And suppose you do get Shanty Moir? What good will
that do you? I'll bet Shanty's got the gold hid where nobody could find
it without getting directions from him. Suppose you get him. Suppose you
get all three of 'em. Shanty Moir being dead, the nuggets and dust
probably'd be as completely lost as they were before you two boys found
the pocket in the first place."
For a long time MacGregor sat in his corner of the dugout without
replying. Reivers could see that at times he raised his head, even
opened his mouth as if to speak, then sank back undecided. At last he
hunched himself forward inch by inch to the front of the dugout and
lifted the flap.
The light of day had gone from the cavern. On the sand before the larger
dugout blazed a brisk cooking-fire. In the confined space the light from
its flames was magnified, reflecting from rock-wall and running water,
and illuminating brightly the miserable hole in which Reivers and
MacGregor lay.
MacGregor held up the flap for several minutes, studying Reivers, and
though Reivers looked back with the look in his eyes that made most men
quail, the old man's sharp grey eyes studied him unruffled, even as the
eyes of his daughter had done before.
"By the Big Nail, 'tis a man's man!" muttered MacGregor, dropping the
flap at last. "How in the name of self-respect did the likes of you fall
prey to the cur, Shanty Moir?"
"Self-respect?" sniggered Reivers. "Did you notice me out there when you
were laying your curse on Moir?"
"Aye. You were far gone in liquor then--by the looks of you. You'll mind
I say 'by the looks of you.' You are not in liquor now. That's what
puzzled. A man does not throw off a load of hooch so quickly. You were
playing at being drunk. Now, why might that be?"
"To enable me to get into his hole and leave Moir thinking I'm a drunken
squaw-man without brains or nerve enough to do anything but sponge for
hooch."
"Aye? And your reason for that?"
"My reason for that?" Reivers laughed under his breath. "Why, did you
ever hear of a more popular reason for a man risking his throat than
gold? I heard the story of this deal from your brother Duncan and your
daughter. I need--or rather, I want money. Shanty Moir had won over you
and had gold. I came to win over Moir and get the gold away from him.
Isn't that simple?"
"Simple and spoken well," said MacGregor calmly. "Will you answer me one
question: Did you serve notice on my brother Duncan that you were out on
this hunt?"
"I did."
"Fair enough again. A man has a right to take trail and do what he can
if he speaks out fair. I take it you hardly calculated to find me here
alive?"
"No, I didn't think Moir was such an amateur as to take any chances."
"Ah, he needed a draft beast, lad; that's why I'm alive, and no other
reason. And finding me here alive, does it alter your plans any?"
"Only a trifle. You see, I'd made up my mind to bring Moir and your
daughter Hattie face to face to see if she could make good on her big
talk of taking revenge for putting you out of business. Now that I see
you're still alive--well, I won't let any little foolishness like that
interfere with the business I've come on."
"I mean about the gold, man?"
Reivers looked at his questioner in surprise.
"About the gold?" he repeated.
"Yes. Finding me, the rightful owner of half of the gold, here, alive
and hoping to win back with my share to my daughter Hattie--does it make
any change in your plans?"
Reivers chuckled softly.
"Not in the slightest," he replied. "I came to get the stuff that's come
out of this mine. Take a look at me. Do I look like a soft fool who'd
let anything interfere with my plans?"
MacGregor looked and shook his head, puzzled.
"I dinna understand ye, mon," he said. "I canna make you out. By the
look of you I'd be wishful to strike hands with you as one good man to
another; but your talk, man, is all wrong, all wrong. Half of the stuff
that's been taken out of this mine--Shanty Moir's half--I have made up my
mind shall be yours for the strong blow you dealt to save my Hattie from
black shame. Will you na' strike hands on a partnership like that
between us?"
Reivers yawned.
"Why should I? You're 'all in.' You can't help me any. I'll have to do
the job of getting the gold away from Moir. I came here to get it all. I
don't want any help, and I certainly won't make any unnecessary split."
"Man," whispered MacGregor in horror, "is there naught but a piece of
ice where your heart should be? Do you not understand it's for a poor,
unprovided girl I'm talking? A man you might rob; but have you the
coldness in your heart to rob my little, unfortunate Hattie?"
"'Little, unfortunate Hattie!'" mocked Reivers. "Consider her robbed
already. What then?"
"A word to Shanty Moir and you're as good as dead," retorted MacGregor
hotly.
Reivers' long right arm shot out and terrible fingers clutched
MacGregor's throat. The old man wriggled and gasped and tried to cry
out, but Reivers held him voiceless and helpless and smiled.
"One word to Shanty Moir, and--you see?" he said, releasing his hold.
"Then your little, unfortunate Hattie would be robbed for sure."
"Man--man--what are you, man or devil?" gasped MacGregor.
"Devil, if it suits you," said Reivers. "But, remember, I'll manage to
be within reach of you when Shanty Moir's about, and I rather fancy Moir
would be glad to have me put you out of business. Now listen to me. I've
no objection to your getting out of here alive--if you can. I've no
objection to your getting your revenge on Moir, if you can, provided
that none of this interferes with my getting what I came after. You know
now what I can and will do if necessary. Your life lies right there." He
opened and closed his right hand significantly. "Well, I'll trade you
your life for a little information. Where does Shanty keep his gold?"
MacGregor ceased gasping. He began to laugh. He leaned over and laughed.
He rocked from side to side.
"Man, man! Do you not know that? That proves you're only human!" he
chuckled. "You came out here, like a lamb led to slaughter, to find
where Shanty Moir keeps his gold. You were on the trail with Shanty. You
had him where it was only one man to one. Well--well, the joke is too
good to keep: Shanty Moir, day and night, wears a big buckskin belt
about the middle of him, and the gold--the gold is in the belt!"