CLUTCH OF THE BREED
Making her way down Glacier Creek, giving no attention to the working
Siwashes and receiving none from them, Moira O'Malley wondered what
discovery this enigma of the Mounted had held back from her. She did
not resent particularly his lack of confidence, feeling that she had
not earned it. That he seemed to disbelieve what the _klootchmen_
had told her of the continued presence of the white and near-white
spoilers at once troubled and gratified her. She hated to think that
the Indian women would mislead her; but she did want the slayer of
her cousin's sweetheart captured and punished. Hope of that seemed
built on the Thursday morning absence of either Kluger or his partner.
At the start of this requested exit, the girl did not hurry, but
ambled along squaw fashion. Once across the creek and out of sight
of the upper diggings, she meant to take to the brush. The Glacier
natives would see her no more until Seymour came for her. That he
would come for her--that he would be able to come for her, she did
not doubt. From the moment she had seen him stride into the tent of
Bonnemort as if he owned it, she had felt certain of his ultimate
success.
She reached the creek and was about to climb to the foot log when she
heard some one start across it from the other side. Raising the eyes
which she had held downcast throughout the walk from the tent, she
saw, with a tremor of alarm, that Bonnemort had beaten her to the
improvised bridge. She sidled away from the log's end and seemed
intent on watching the stream. Of course, the up-risen breed would
be above noticing a squaw drudge, but she preferred to take no
unnecessary chances.
With eyes steadily averted, she waited. The heavy steps drew nearer
as the big man set his feet on the flattened surface. Then suddenly,
they ceased. He had halted at the end of the log.
"Look up here, you _klootch_!"
The tone was that of a request, but it brought to the girl a sudden
chill of terror. She dared not look up, yet scarcely dared she
refuse.
Evidently patience with a squaw was not held a virtue by the master.
"Sulky, eh?" he grumbled and sprang down from the log to stand
directly in front of her. Reaching out, he took her chin between
thumb and forefinger and tilted it until her stained face looked up
into his.
"A new one, ain't you?" he asked. "Thought I hadn't seen you before,
princess."
A look came into his dark eyes that frightened her more. Not daring
to utter protest for fear her Chinook would betray her, she cuffed at
the hand which held her and broke his hold. Bonnemort's chuckle
sounded more ominous to her than an imprecation.
"A Siwash _klootch_ with spirit--and a beauty to boot!" he exclaimed.
"There is something new under the sun. Your light's been hidden long
enough, young wildcat. Take a stroll up to my tent and we'll talk it
over."
His huge hand closed upon her shoulder with a firm grasp, but without
undue violence. When he started back to camp, she stepped, perforce,
at his side. Although tall for a woman, the red-haired breed was
head and shoulders above her, and she recognized a captor that could
only be circumvented by guile.
He tried her out with several impertinent questions. Was she
married? What would she take for a kiss? Did she like white men,
the big bear kind?
He seemed to disown the Indian blood that was reputed to flow in his
veins. Evidently he spoke little Chinook, for he complained at her
refusal to understand English.
As they strolled slowly along, Moira wasted no thought on
self-censure. Seymour had been right--her exploit was absolutely
wild. Escape she must, but if humanly possible by her own wit,
without involving the Mountie or even disturbing him in his
investigation. A plan flashed into her mind and she hastened to
perfect it.
With just the reluctance she thought her role required, she
accompanied him to the placers. The Siwash men who looked up from
their mining grinned at her or turned stolidly away. It was nothing
to them that this skookum Boston chief saw fit to pay attention to
one of their women. No hope of help lay in that quarter.
When she reached that section of the placer where the two squaws to
whom she had disclosed herself earlier in the morning were working a
sluice, she began to struggle, hoping they would come to her rescue
without disclosing her identity. But with her first jerk,
Bonnemort's fingers tightened like a vise, as though he had been
expecting some such move. She continued to struggle.
Fear that Seymour had gone into ambush within the tent and would come
to her aid, to the upsetting of all his plans, kept her from crying
out for help. One of the squaws did throw down her shovel and start
toward her, but the other called her back. They whispered a moment,
then turned their backs and resumed their toil.
Even the realization that her Indian friends, hardened by the sorcery
of too much gold, had failed her, did not lift her voice. At the
head of the creek, she glimpsed the glacier imbedded in the
mountainside like a gigantic prism, its innumerable facets reflecting
the sunlight in all the colors of the rainbow. On either side lay a
fringe of brush and timber. All these invited her, offering
sanctuary from a fate that promised to be worse than death. But
first, before she could flee to the hope of escape they held out, she
must break the clutch of Bonnemort, the half-breed.
As she twisted and squirmed, her nails marked his face with furrowing
scratches; but the smart of these seemed only to inflame him the
more. As penalty, he demanded a kiss then and there where all her
tribe could see. In the struggle to enforce his low-voiced decree,
the bandanna that bound Moira's head fell to the ground. Her
marvelous hair was revealed.
Both hands seized her and held her off, as helpless in his clutch as
though she had been a child. For a moment his eyes enjoyed the oddly
masked beauty of her. But soon, with comprehension, there entered a
new light--that of recognition.
"So!" he muttered, baring his teeth as an angry beast bares its
fangs. Transferring his hold to her streaming hair, Bonnemort flung
the girl from her feet and started to drag her toward the tent.
At last, all other hope gone, Moira O'Malley screamed for help---the
help of her Mountie. The green old glacier broadcasted her distress,
reverberating her shrieks until the gulch rang with them.
Within Bonnemort's tent "Scarlet" Seymour knelt before a chest, the
lock of which he had just succeeded in breaking. He was staring with
dilated eyes upon the real wealth of the Glacier Creek placers--truly
richer than gold.
As he reached out his fingers to run them through the heaping gray
wealth, a scream sounded. It might have been the cry of a buzzard
soaring in the blue above the camp.
But the next moment the shriek took definite form as a human's cry
for help. Then came the shrill of his name--a long-drawn "Russell!"
In a flash he comprehended. Moira had been discovered and had fallen
into the hands of the despoilers. Without closing the lid of the
treasure chest, he sprang to his feet and lunged out of the tent. A
hundred yards down the path, he saw the breed and the girl in
desperate struggle. Toward the scene of the unequal combat hastened
a score of Argonaut natives.
Seymour charged down the incline. "Coming, Moira!" he shouted.
The breed heard and flung his intended victim from him to the rocks.
One glance at the oncoming figure enlightened him. "Wolves run in
pairs!" he exclaimed. "And die together!"
Moira saw him draw a revolver. Had he fired from the hip, her
opportunity never would have come. But Bonnemort, confident in the
distance that still separated him from the unknown rescuer, paused to
take aim. The girl's fingers had closed around a rock. With all her
might she hurled it at his head.
Her aim was poor, but its faultiness proved fortunate. The missile
struck Bonnemort's wrist as his finger pressed the trigger. The
bullet went wild. The gun was knocked from his hand and was thrown,
by some muscular freak, within Moira's reach.
For a second, Bonnemort stood nursing his injured wrist; then, with a
snarled curse, he sprang to recover his weapon. But Seymour, at the
end of his rush, crowded him off; the girl seized the gun and
scrambled to her feet.
She could not understand why the sergeant did not draw and declare
himself. As the enemy already had fired, he was no longer under
restraint of that Quixotic slogan.
Bonnemort, too, looked puzzled, but evidently took heart from his
foe's restraint, for he advanced threateningly. Fearing that Seymour
would be no match in a rough-and-tumble, Moira tried to press the
miner's gun upon him, but the sergeant waved her back.
"Hold off the Siwashes," he demanded. "This brute has a beating
coming to him."
Bonnemort advanced with a chortle of joy, delighted that luck favored
him with the respite of physical combat. So many things could happen
in a battle of fists. The man-to-man struggle was on.
After his initial rush, which the sergeant cleverly side-stepped, the
breed's main idea seemed to be to throw his powerful arms about his
opponent. Except for occasional swings, which would have knocked
Seymour out had they found their mark, his efforts were directed to
this end.
The sergeant had his Armistice detail to thank for his ability to
evade. The Eskimo of the Arctic foreshore is above average height,
large muscled and trained by occasional necessity to battle with
Polar bears. When boxing matches were put on at the detachment, in
lieu of other diversion, Seymour had acted as instructor. His
greatest difficulty had been to break his pupils of "hugging" and to
teach them that a punch was more effective than a clinch any day or
where. As a result, he was not only trained to the minute, but
highly practiced in slipping out of clinches.
From the first, Bonnemort fought like the Eskimo, trying again and
again for a crushing embrace. With each vain effort, Seymour exacted
punishment with jabs and cuts to the face. Never was he caught by
the other's powerful arms.
For the alleged half-breed, the contest was soon sanguinary. His
eyes and lips suffered and his nose became grotesque. On the other
hand, Seymour was practically unmarked except for a lump on his
forehead and a splotch on his cheek where Bonnemort's fist had
touched him.
_Klootchmen_ and braves had come from all parts of the diggings and
stood in an irregular circle, staring in open-eyed wonder at the
battle. Moira was having an easy task keeping them back, although
she still held the gun ready. No partisan spirit developed. If
anything, their grunts at clinches evaded and blows sent home favored
the strange, more compact fighter. The sergeant was unknown to them,
but the fact that the mission girl sponsored him with gun point was
enough for them.
Bonnemort's wind was first to fail him and for an untimed round or
two, Seymour played for him with hard punches to the body at every
opportunity. It became clear that the spoiler's bulk was more "beef"
than muscle. He was becoming a spectacle. His rushes lost their
force; his swings grew hopelessly wild; his guard, never effective,
broke down entirely.
"Punishment enough for manhandling you?" Seymour asked Moira, as the
whirligig of battle brought him facing her.
"Yes--yes, he's paid!" she cried.
The sergeant waded in then, regardless of the embrace he no longer
feared. He beat Bonnemort to his knees. No _coup de grâce_ was
necessary, as the overgrown miner was blubbering for mercy. The
Siwash gallery was beginning to grumble that none was delivered when
they saw the victor produce a pair of handcuffs and snap them on the
defeated one's wrists. Bonnemort seemed too dazed to notice the
official trend in the situation, until--
"I arrest you, Harry Karmack, in the name of the King for the murder
of Oliver O'Malley, at Armistice, Northwest Territories."
Stunned by the surprise of his capture, turned white by the shock of
the unexpected charge, the former factor stared about him wildly.
As for Moira O'Malley, the double surprise was almost too much.
Fright had prevented her recognition of the familiar features of her
Northern suitor now that his hair was turned to red; and all through
the hunt, no hint had come to her from the close-lipped sleuth of the
open places that the man he had sworn to "get" had raised his hand
against her brother.