_St. Agnes' Eve. Ah! bitter chill it was.
The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold;
The hare limped, trembling, through the frozen grass;
And drowsy was the flock in woolly fold_.
ST. AGNES' EVE
Edmond did not have to wait long. Sounding faint and far off came the
silvery ring of sleigh-bells, gradually swelling in volume until, with a
measured crunch! crunch! of hoofs on packed snow, a smart Police cutter,
drawn by a splendid bay team, swung around a bend of the trail and pulled
up at the platform. Redmond regarded with a little awe the huge,
bear-like, uniformed figure of the teamster, whom he identified at once
from barrack gossip.
"Sergeant Slavin?" he enquired respectfully, eyeing the bronzed,
clean-shaven face, half hidden by fur cap and turned-up collar.
"Meself, lad!" came a rich soft brogue, "I was afther gettin' a wire from
th' O.C., tellin' me he was thransfering me another man. Yer name's
Ridmond, ain't it?---Whoa, now! T an' B!--lively wid thim kit-bags,
son!--team's pretty fresh an' will not shtand."
They swung off at a spanking trot. George surveyed the white-washed
cattle-corrals and few scattered shacks which seemed to comprise the
hamlet of Davidsburg.
"Not a very big place, Sergeant?" he remarked, "how far's the detachment
from here?"
"On'y 'bout a mile" grunted the individual, squirting a stream of
tobacco-juice to leeward, "up on the high ground beyant. Nay! 'tis just
a jumpin' off place an' shippin' point for th' ranches hereabouts.
Business is mostly done at Cow Run--East. Ye passed ut, comin'. Great
doin's there--whin th' cowpunchers blow in. Some burg!"
"Sure looked it!" Redmond agreed absently, thinking of the casual glimpse
he had got of the dreary main street.
They were climbing a slight grade. The sun-glare on the snow was
intense; the cutter's steel runners no longer screeched, and the team's
hoofs began to clog up with soft snow.
"They're 'balling-up' pretty bad, Sergeant!" remarked Redmond. And, as
he spoke the "off" horse suddenly slipped and fell, and, plunging to its
feet again, a leg slid over the cutter's tongue.
"Whoa, now! whoa!" barked Slavin, with an oath, as the mettled,
high-strung animal began to kick affrightedly. Slipping again it sank
down in the snow and remained still for some tense moments.
Like a flash Redmond sprang from the cutter, and rapidly and warily he
unhooked the team's traces. This done he crept to their heads and
slipped the end of the tongue out of the neck-yoke ring. Slavin by this
time was also on his feet in the snow, with the situation well in hand.
He clucked softly to his team, the fallen horse plunged to its feet again
and the next moment all was clear. George, burrowing around in the snow
unearthed a big stone, with which he proceeded to tap the team's shoes
all round until the huge snow-clogs fell out. In silence the two men
hooked up again and were soon on their way.
"H-mm!" grunted the big Irishman at last, eyeing his subordinate with a
sidelong glance of approval, "h-mm! teamster?"
"Oh, I don't know, Sergeant" responded Redmond deprecatingly, "of course
I've been around teams some--down East, on the old man's farm. . . I
don't know that I can claim to be a real teamster--as you judge them in
the Force."
"H-mm!" grunted Slavin again, "ye seem tu have th' makin's anyway." He
expectorated musingly. "Wan time--down at Coutts 'twas--a young feller
was sint tu me for tu dhrive. Mighty chipper gossoon, tu. 'Teamster?'
sez I--'Some!' sez he, as if he was a reg'lar gun at th' business--'but
I'm gen'rally reckoned handier wid a foursome 'n a single team.'"
"'Oh!' sez I, 'fwhere?' An' he tould me--Regina. Sez I thin ''tis
Skinner Adams's undershtudy ye must have bin?--for he was Reg'mentil
Teamster Sarjint there, an' sure fwas a great man wid a four-in-hand
team.'"
"'Fwat, ould Skinner Adams?' sez me bould lad, kind av contempshus-like,
'Humph! at shtringin' out four I have Skinner Adams thrimmed tu a peak.'
We was dhrivin' from th' station tu th' detachmint--same like tu we're
doin' now. Whin we gits in I unhitches an' puts up th' team. 'Give us a
hand tu shling th' harniss off!' sez I tu him--an' me shmart Aleck makes
a shtab at ut wid th' nigh horse. He was not quite so chipper--thin, an'
I noticed his hands thremblin', an' he was all th' time watchin' me close
how I did wid th' off harse. I dhraws off wid th' britchin' on me
arrum--'Come!' sez I--an' he shtarts in--unbucklin' th' top hame-shtrap.
"'As ye were!' sez I 'that's enough! I'm thinkin' th' on'y 'four' you
iver shtrung out me young flapdhoodle was a gang av prisoners, an'
blarney me sowl! ye shall go back tu th' Post right now, an' du
prisoner's escort agin for awhile.'"
They had now reached the top of the grade where the trail swung due east,
and faced a dazzling sun and cutting wind which whipped the blood to
their cheeks and made their eyes water.
"Behould our counthry eshtate!" said Sergeant Slavin grandiloquently,
with an airy wave of his arm, "beyant that big pile av shtones on th'
road-allowance."
He chirped to his team which broke into an even, fast trot, and presently
they drew up outside a building typical in its outside appearance of the
usual range Mounted Police detachment. It was a fairly large dwelling,
roughly but substantially-built of squared logs, painted in customary
fashion, with the walls--white, and the shingled roof--red. A
strongly-guyed flagstaff jutting out from one gable, and copies of the
"Game" and "Fire Acts" tacked on the door gave the abode an unmistakable
official aspect. Over the doorway was nailed a huge, prehistoric-looking
buffalo-skull, bleached white with the years--the time-honoured insignia
of the R.N.W.M.P. being a buffalo-head, which is also stamped on the
regimental badge and button.
Dumping off the kit-bags, the two men drove round to the stable in the
rear of the main dwelling, where they unhitched and put up the team. The
sergeant led the way into the house. Passing through a small store-house
and kitchen they emerged into the living room. On a miniature scale it
was a replica of one of the Post barrack-rooms, except that the table
boasted a tartan-rugged covering, that two or three easy chairs were
scattered around, and some calfskin mats partially covered the painted
hardwood floor. The walls, for the most part were adorned with many
unframed copies of pictures from the brush of that great Western artist,
Charles Russell, and black and white sketches cut from various
illustrated papers. Three corners of the room contained cots, one of
which the sergeant assigned to Redmond. The room, with its big stove, in
a way looked comfortable enough, and was regimentally neat and clean and
homelike.
George peered into the front room beyond which bore quite a judicial
aspect. At one end of it a small dais supported a severe-looking
arm-chair and a long flat desk, on which were piled foolscap, blank legal
forms, law-books, and the Bible. In front was a long, form-like bench,
with a back to it. At the rear of the room were two strongly-built
cells, with barred doors. Around the walls were scattered a double row
of small chairs and, on a big, green-baize-covered board next the cells
hung a brightly burnished assortment of handcuffs and leg-irons.
"'Tis here we hould coort," Slavin informed him, "whin we have any
shtiffs tu be thried."
Opening the front door George lugged in his bedding and kit-bags and,
depositing them on his cot, flung off his fur coat, cap, and serge.
Slavin divested himself likewise and, as the burly, bull-necked man stood
there, slowly filling his pipe, Redmond was able to scan the face and
massive proportions of his superior more closely.
Standing well over six feet, for the presentment of vast, though
perchance clumsy, gorilla-like strength, George reflected with slight awe
that he had never seen the man's equal. His wide-spreading shoulders
were more rounded than square; his deep, arching chest, powerful, stocky
nether limbs and disproportionately long, huge-biceped arms seeming to
fit him as an exponent of the mat rather than the gloves. Truly a
daunting figure to meet in a close-quarter, rough-and-tumble encounter!
thought Redmond. The top of his head was completely bald; his thick,
straight black brows indicating that what little close-cropped iron-gray
hair remained must originally have been coal-black in colour. His
Irish-blue eyes, alternately dreamy and twinklingly alert, were deeply
set in a high-cheeked-boned, bronzed face, with a long upper-lipped,
grimly-humorous mouth. Its expression in repose gave subtle warning that
its owner possessed in a marked degree the strongly melancholic,
emotional, and choleric temperament of his race. There was no
moroseness--no hardness in it, but rather the taciturnity that invariably
settles upon the face of those dwellers of the range who, perforce, live
much alone with their thoughts. Sheathed in mail and armed, that face
and bulky figure to some imaginations might have found its prototype in
some huge, grim, war-worn "man-at-arms" of mediaeval times. Redmond
judged him to be somewhere in his forties; forty-two was his exact age as
he ascertained later.
In curious contrast to his somewhat formidable exterior seemed his mild,
gentle, soft-brogued voice. And with speech, his taciturn face relaxed
insensibly into an almost genial expression, George noted.
Attracted by a cluster of pictures and photographs above and around the
cot in the corner opposite his own, the young fellow crossed over and
scanned them attentively. Tacked up with a random, reckless hand, the
bizarre collection was typically significant of someone's whimsical,
freakish tastes and personality. From the sublime to the ridiculous--and
worse--subjects pious and impious, dreamily-beautiful and lewdly-vulgar,
comic and tragic, also many splendid photographs were all jumbled
together on the walls in a shockingly irresponsible fashion. Many of the
pictures were unframed copies cut apparently from art and other journals;
from theatrical and comic papers.
George gazed on them awhile in utterly bewildered astonishment; then,
with a little hopeless ejaculation, swung around to the sergeant who met
his despairing grin with benign composure.
"Whose cot's--"
"'Tis Yorke's," said Slavin simply. It was the first time he had
mentioned that individual's name. He struck a match on the seat of his
pants and standing with his feet apart and hands clasped behind his back
smoked awhile contentedly.
"Saw ye iver th' like av that for divarsiment?" he continued, with a wave
of his pipe at the heterogeneous array, "shtudy thim! an', by an' large
ye have th' man himsilf. He's away on pay-day duty at th' Coalmore mines
west av here--though by token, 'tis Billy Blythe at Banff shud be doin'
ut, 'stead av me havin' tu sind a man from here. He shud be back on
Number Four th' night."
His twinkling orbs under their black smudge of eyebrow appraised the
junior constable with faint, musing interest. "A quare chap is Yorkey,"
he continued gently--shielding a match-flame and puffing with noisy
respiration--"a good polisman--knows th' Criminal Code from A tu Z--eyah!
but mighty quare. I misdoubt how th' tu av yez will get along." He
sighed deeply, muttering half to himself, "I may have tu take
shteps--this time! . . ."
A rather ominous beginning, thought George. But, curbing his natural
curiosity, he resolutely held his peace, awaiting more enlightenment.
This not being forthcoming--his superior having relapsed once more into
taciturn silence--he turned again to Yorke's exhibits with pondering
interest. Sounding far-off and indistinct in the frosty stillness of the
bleak foothills came the faint echoes of a coyote's shrill
"ki-yip-yapping"--again and again, as if endeavouring to convey some
insidious message. George continued to stare at the pictures. Gad! what
a strange fantastic mind the man must have! he mused--what rotten,
erratic desecration to shove pictures indiscriminately together like
that! . . . Lack of space was no excuse. Millet's "Angelus," "Ally
Sloper at the Derby," a splendid lithograph of "The Angel of Pity at the
Well of Cawnpore," Lottie Collins, scantily attired, in her song and
dance "Tara-ra-ra-boom-de-ay," Sir Frederick Leighton's "Wedded," a
gruesome depiction of a Chinese execution at Canton, an old-fashioned
engraving of that dashing, debonair cavalry officer, "Major Hodson," of
Indian Mutiny fame, George Robey, as a nurse-maid, wheeling Little Tich
in a perambulator, the grim, torture-lined face of Slatin Pasha, a
ridiculously obscene picture entitled "Two coons scoffing oysters for a
wager," that glorious edifice the "Taj Mahal" of India, and so on.
"Divarsiment" indeed!
To this ill-assorted admixture three exceptions only were grouped with
any sense of reason. The central picture was a beautifully coloured
reproduction of Sir Hubert Herkomer's famous masterpiece "The Last
Muster." Lovers of art subjects are doubtless familiar with this
immortal painting. It depicts a pathetic congregation of old,
white-haired, war-worn pensioners attending divine service in the chapel
of Old Chelsea Hospital, with the variegated lights from the
stained-glass windows flooding them with soft gentle colours. Flanking
it on either side were portraits of the original founders of this
historical institution in 1692--Charles II (The Merry Monarch) and his
kindly-hearted "light o' love" Sweet Nell Gwynn of Old Drury.
With curiously mixed feelings George finally tore himself away from
Yorke's pathetically grotesque attempt at wall-adornment. Strive as he
would within his soul to ridicule, the pictures seemed somehow almost to
shout at him with hidden meaning. As if a voice--a drunken voice, but
gentlemanly withall--was hiccuping in his ear: "Paradise Lost, old man!
(hic) Paradise Lost!"
And, mixed with it, came again out of the silence of the foothills the
coyote's faintly persistent mocking wail--its "ki-yip-yap" sounding
almost like "Bah! Yah! Baa!" . . . Some lines of an old quotation,
picked up he knew not where, wandered into his mind--
_Comedy, Tragedy, Laughter and Tears!
Thou'rt rolled as one in the Dust of Years_!
With a sigh he turned to his own cot and began to unpack and arrange his
kit; in regulation fashion, and with such small faddy fixings customary
to men inured to barrack life. Thus engaged the time passed rapidly.
Later in the day he assisted the sergeant in making out the detachment's
"monthly returns" and diary. This task accomplished, in the gathering
dusk he attended "Evening Stables." There were two saddle-horses beside
the previously-mentioned team. A splendid upstanding pair, George
thought them. He was good with horses; possessing the faculty of
handling them that springs only from a patient, kindly, instinctive love
of animals.
"Nay! I dhrive mostly," Slavin was telling him, "buckboard an' team's
away handier for a man av weight like meself. Eyah!" he sighed, "tho'
time was whin I cud throw a leg over wid th' best av thim. Yorke--he
gen'rally rides th' black, Parson, so ye'll take th' sorrel, Fox, for yeh
pathrols. He's a good stayer, an' fast. Ye'll want tu watch him at
mounthin' tho'--he's not a mane harse, but he has a quare thrick av
turnin' sharp tu th' 'off'--just as ye go tu shwing up into th' saddle.
Many's th' man he's whiraroo'd round wid wan fut in th' stirrup an' left
pickin' up dollars off th' bald-headed.' Well! let's tu supper."
With the practised hand of an old cook he prepared a simple but hearty
repast, upon which they fell with appetites keenly edged with the cold
air.
"Are ye anythin' av a cuk?"
Redmond grinned deprecatingly and then shook his head.
"Eyah!" grumbled Slavin, "seems I cannot hilp bein' cuk an' shtandin'
orderly-man around here. I thried out Yorkey. . . . Wan day on'y
tho'--'tis th' divil's own cuk he is. 'Sarjint!' sez he, 'I'm no
bowatchee'--which in Injia he tells me means same as cuk. An' he tould
th' trute at that."
Some three hours later, as they lay on their cots, came to them the
faint, far-off _toot_! _toot_! of an engine, through the keen atmosphere.
"That's Number Four from th' West," remarked Slavin drowsily, "Yorkey
shud be along on ut. Well! a walk will not hurt th' man if--"
He chuntered something to himself.
Half an hour elapsed slowly--three quarters. Slavin rolled off his cot
with a grunt and strode heavily to the front door, which he opened.
Redmond silently followed him and together the two men stepped out into
the crisply-crunching hard-packed snow. It was a magnificent night.
High overhead in the star-studded sky shone a splendid full moon, its
clear cold rays lighting up the white world around them with a sort of
phosphorescent, scintillating brilliance.
Though not of a particularly sentimental temperament, the calm, peaceful,
unearthly beauty of the scene moved George to murmur--half to himself:
"_Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky,
That dost not bite so nigh
As benefits forgot, alas!
As benefits forgot_."
To his surprise came Slavin's soft brogue echoing the last lines of the
old Shakespearian sonnet, with a sort of dreamy, gentle bitterness: "As
binifits forghot--forghot!--as binifits forghot! . . . . Luk tu that
now! eyah! 'tis th' trute, lad! . . . . for here--unless I am mistuk,
comes me bould Yorkey--an' dhrunk as 'a fiddler's ---- again. Tchkk! an'
me on'y just afther warnin' um. . . ."
And, a far-away black spot as yet, down the moonlit, snow-banked trail,
indistinctly they beheld an unsteady figure slowly weaving its way
towards the detachment. At intervals the night-wind wafted to them
snatches of song.
"Singin', singin'," muttered Slavin, "from break av morrn 'till jewy
eve! . . . Misther B---- Yorke! luks 'tis goin' large y'are th' night."
Nearer and nearer approached the stumbling black figure, weaving an
eccentric course in and out along the line of telephone poles; and, to
their ears came the voice of one crying in the wilderness:--
"_O, the Midnight Son! the Midnight Son! (hic)
You needn't go trottin' to Norway--
You'll find him in ev'ry doorway--_"
A sudden cessation of the music, coupled with certain slightly
indistinct, weird contortions of the vocalist's figure, apprised the
watchers that a snow-bank had momentarily claimed him. Then, suddenly
and saucily, as if without a break, the throbbing, high-pitched tenor
piped up again--
"_You'll behold him in his glory
If you on'y take a run (hic)
Down the Strand--that's the Land
Of the Midnight Son_."
Dewy eve indeed!--a far cry to the Strand! . . . How freakish sounded
that old London variety stage ditty ridiculing the nightly silence of the
great snow-bound Nor' West. Redmond could not refrain an explosive,
snorting chuckle as he remarked the erratic gait of the slowly
approaching pedestrian. As Slavin had opined, he was "going large." His
vocal efforts had ceased temporarily, and now it was the junior
constable's merriment that broke the frosty stillness of the night.
But Slavin did not laugh. Watchfully he waited there--curiously still,
his head jutting forward loweringly from between his huge shoulders.
"Tchkk!" he clucked in gentle distaste--"In uniform . . . an' just afther
comin' off the thrain! . . . th' like av that now 'tis--'tis
scandh'lus! . . ."
Suddenly Redmond shivered, and his mirth died within him. The air seemed
to have become charged with a tense, ominous something that filled him
with a great dread--of what? he knew not. He felt an inexplicable
impulse to cry out a warning to that ludicrous figure, whose crunching
moccasins were now the only sounds that broke the uncanny stillness of
the night. To him, the whole scene, bathed in the cold brilliance of its
moonlit setting, seemed ghostly and unreal--a disturbing dream of comedy
and tragedy, intermingled.
Inwards, between the telephone poles, the man came stumbling along,
gradually drawing nigh to the motionless watchers. Halting momentarily,
during his progress he made a quick stooping action at the base of one of
the poles, as if with vague purpose, which action was remarked at least
by Redmond.
Then, for the first time, he seemed to become aware of their presence,
and making a pitiful attempt to dissemble his condition and assume a
smart, erect military carriage he waved his riding-crop at them by way of
salutation. Something in his action, its graceful, airy mockery, trivial
though it was, impressed the gestures firmly in Redmond's mind. He
became cognizant of a flushed, undeniably handsome face with reckless
eyes and mocking lips; a slimly-built figure of a man of medium height,
whose natural grace was barely concealed by the short regimental fur coat.
Halting unsteadily within the regulation three paces pending salute, he
struck an attitude commonly affected by Mr. Sothern, in "Lord Dundreary,"
and jauntily twirled his crop, the while he declaimed:--
"_Waltz me round again, Willie, Willie,
Round and round and--_"
"_Round_!" finished Slavin, with a horrible oath. There seemed something
shockingly aboriginal--simian--in the swift, gorilla-like clutch of his
huge dangling hands, as they fastened on the throat and shoulder of the
drunken man and whirled him on his back in the snow--something deadly and
menacing in his hard-breathing, soft-brogued invective:
"Yeh bloody nightingale! come off th' perch! . . . I'm fed up wid
yeh!--I'll waltz yeh!--I'll tache yeh tu make a mock av Burke Slavin,
time an' again! I'll--"
Redmond interposed, "Steady, Sergeant!" he implored shakily, his hand on
his superior's shoulder, "For God's sake--"
But Slavin, in absent fashion, shoved him off. He seemed to put no
effort in the movement, but the tense muscular impact of it sent Redmond
reeling yards away.
"Giddap, Yorkey! God d----n ye for a dhrunken waster!--giddap! or I'll
put th' boots tu yeh!" Terrible was the menace of the giant Irishman's
face, his back-flung boot and his snarling, curiously low-pitched voice.
"No! not Burke, old man! . . . ah, don't!" gasped the rich tenor voice
pleadingly from the snow--"ah, don't, Burke! . . . remember,
remember . . . St. Agnes' Eve--
"St. Agnes' Eve. Ah! bitter chill it was,
The--"
It broke--that throbbing voice with its strange, impassioned appeal. Far
away over the snow the faint, silvery ring of a locomotive gong fell upon
the ears of the trio almost like the deep, solemn tolling of bells.
Then slowly, and seemingly in pain, the prostrate man arose.
And yet! Redmond mused, sorry a figure as he cut just then, minus
fur-cap and plastered with snow, alone with the shame which was his, he
had an air, a certain dignity of mien, this man, Yorke, which stamped him
far above the common run of men.
The junior constable, as he noted the dark hair, silvering and worn away
at the temples, adjudged him to be somewhere between thirty and
forty--thirty-five was his exact age as he ascertained later.
Now, with the air of a fallen angel, he stood there in the cold,
snow-dazzling moonlight; his face registering silent resignation as to
whatever else might befall him. The sergeant had stepped forward.
Redmond looked on, in dazed apprehension. A solemn hush had fallen upon
the strange scene, and stranger trio. Their figures flung weird,
fantastic shadows across the diamond-sparkling snow-crust. George
glanced at Slavin, and that individual's demeanor amazed him still
further. The big man's face was transformed. There seemed something
very terrible just then in the pathetic working of his rugged features,
as if he were striving to allay some powerful inward emotion. Then
huskily, but not unkindly--as perchance the father may have spoken to the
prodigal son--came his soft brogue:
"Get yu tu bed, Yorkey! get yu tu bed, man! . . . an' thry me no
more! . . . ."
Mutely, like a child, Yorke obeyed the order. Glancing at Redmond he
turned and walked unsteadily into the detachment.
Perturbed and utterly mystified at the sordid drama he had witnessed, its
amazing combination of brutality and pathos, George remained rooted to
the spot as one in a dream. Instinctively though, he felt that this was
not the first time of its enactment. Mechanically he watched the door
close; then sounding far off and indistinct, Slavin's hoarse whisper in
his ear brought him down to Mother Earth again with a vengeance:
"Did ye mark him stoop an' 'plant' th' 'hootch?'"
George nodded. "I wasn't quite wise to what he was at," he answered.
"Let us go get ut!" said Sergeant Slavin grimly, marching to the spot, "I
will not have dhrink brought into th' detachment! . . . 'tis against
ordhers."
He bent down, straightened up, and turning to Redmond who had joined him
exhibited a bottle. He held it up to the light of the moon. It appeared
to be about half empty. Extracting the cork, he smelt.
"'Tis whiskey," he murmured simply--much as Mr. Pickwick said: "It is
punch." He made casual examination of the green and gold label.
"'Burke's Oirish,' begob! . . . eyah! a brave ould uniform but"--he
turned a moist eye on his subordinate--"a desp'ritly wounded souldier
that wears ut--betther out av pain. 'Tis an' ould sayin': 'Whin ye meet
th' divil du not turn tail but take um by th' harns.' . . . Bhoy! I
thrust the honest face av yeh--I have tuk tu ye since th' handy lad ye
showt yersilf with that team mix-up th' morn."
Redmond, mollified, grinned shiveringly. "I don't mind a snort,
Sergeant," he said, "it's d----d cold out here. Beer's more in my line
though. Salue!"
He took a swallow or two; the bottle changed hands.
"Eyah!" remarked Slavin sometime later--cuddling the bottle at the "port
arms." "'Tis put th' kibosh on many a good man in th' ould Force has
this same dhrink. Th' likes av Yorkey there"--he jerked his head at the
lighted window--"shud never touch ut--never touch ut! . . . Cannot
flirrt wid a bottle--'tis wedded they wud be tu ut. Now meself"--he
paused impressively--"I can take me dhrink like a ginthleman--can take
ut, or lave ut alone."
Absorptive demonstration followed. Came a long-drawn, smacking "Ah-hh!"
"A sore thrial tu me is that same man," he resumed, "wan more break on
his part, as ye have seen this night . . . an' I musht--I will take
shteps wid um."
"Why don't you transfer him back to the Post?" queried George,
wonderingly, mindful of how swiftly that disciplinary measure had
rewarded his own reckless conduct at the Gleichen detachment. "He's got
nothing on you, has he?"
"_Fwhat_?" . . . Slavin, turning like a flash, glared sharply at him out
of deep-set scowling eyes, "Fwhat?"
Tonelessly, George repeated his query,
Slavin's glare gradually faded. "Eyah!" he affirmed presently, "he
has! . . ." came a long pause--"but not as yu mane ut . . . oh! begorrah,
no!" His eyes glittered dangerously and his wide mouth wreathed into an
unholy grin, "'Tis a shmart man that iver puts ut over on me at th'
Orderly-room. . . Fwhy du I not sind him into th' Post? . . . eyah! fwhy
du I not? . . ."
Chin sunk on his huge chest, he mused awhile.
George waited.
"Listen, bhoy!" A terrible earnestness crept into the soft voice. "I'll
tell ye th' tale. . . . 'Twas up at th' Chilkoot Pass--in the gold rush
av '98. . . . Together we was--Yorkey an' meself--stationed there undher
ould Bobby Belcher. Wan night--Mother av God! will I iver forghet ut?
Bitther cowld is th' Yukon, lad; th' like av ut yu' here in Alberta du
not know. Afther tu crazy lost _cheechacos_ we had been that day. We
found thim--frozen. . . . A blizzard had shprung up, but we shtrapped
th' stiffs on th' sled an' mushed ut oursilves tu save th' dogs.
"I am a big man, an' shtrong . . . . but Yorkey was th' betther man av us
tu that night--havin less weight tu pack. I was all in--dhrowsy, an'
wanted tu give up th' ghost an' shleep--an' shleep. . . . Nigh unto
death I was. . . ."
The murmuring voice died away. A shudder ran through the great frame at
the remembrance, while the hand clutching the bottle trembled violently.
Unconsciously Redmond shook with him; for the horror Slavin was living
over again just then enveloped his listener also.
"But Yorkey," he continued "wud not let me lie down. . . . God! how that
man did put his fishts an' mucklucks tu me an' pushed an' shtaggered wid
me' afther th' dogs, beggin' an' cursin' an' prayin' an' callin' me names
that ud fairly make th' dead relations av a man rise up out av their
graves. . . . Light-headed he got towards th' ind av th' thrail, poor
chap! shoutin' dhrill-ordhers an' Injia naygur talk, an' singin' great
songs an' chips av poethry--th' half av which I misremimber--excipt
thim--thim wurrds he said this night. 'Shaint Agnus Eve,' he calls ut.
Over an' over he kept repeathin' thim as he helped me shtaggerin'
along. . . 'God!' cries he, betune cursin' me an' th' dogs an' singin'
'Shaint Agnus Eve'--'Oh, help us this night! let us live, God! . . . oh,
let us live!--this poor bloody Oirishman an' me! . . .'"
The sergeant's head was thrown back now, gazing full at the evening star
the moonbeams shining upon his upturned, powerful face. Cold as was the
night Redmond could see glistening beads of sweat on his forehead. As
one himself under the spell of the fear of death, the younger man
silently watched that face--fascinated. It was calm now, with a great
and kindly peace. Slowly the gentle voice took up the tale anew:
"We made ut, bhoy--th' Post--or nigh tu ut . . . in th' break av th'
dawn. . . . For wan av th' dogs yapped an' they come out an' found us in
th' snow. . . . Yorkey, wid his arrums round th' neck av me--as if he
wud shtill dhrag me on . . . . an' cryin' upon th' mother that bore
um. . . . Tu men--in damned bad shape--tu shtiffs . . . . an' but three
dogs lift out av th' six-team we'd shtarted wid. . . . So--now ye know;
lad! . . . Fwhat think ye? . . ."
What George thought was: "Greater love hath no man than this." What he
said was: "He's an Englishman, isn't he?"
Slavin nodded. "Comes of a mighty good family tu, they say, but 'tis
little he iwer cracks on himself 'bout thim. Years back he hild a
commission in some cavalry reg'mint in Injia, but he got broke--over a
woman, I fancy. He's knocked about th' wurrld quite a piece since thin.
Eyah! he talks av some quare parts he's been in. Fwhat doin'? Lord
knows. Been up an' down the ladder some in _this_ outfit--sarjint one
week--full buck private next. Yen know th' way these ginthlemin-rankers
run amuck?"
"How does he get away with it every time?" queried Redmond. "Hasn't any
civilian ever reported him to the old man?"
"Yes! wance--an' 'Father,' th' ould rapparee! he went for me baldheaded
for not reporthin' ut tu."
With a sort of miserable heartiness Slavin cursed awhile at the
recollection. "Toime an' again," he resumed, "have I taken my hands tu
um--pleaded wid um, an' shielded um in many a dhirty scrape, an' ivry
toime sez he, wid his ginthlemin's shmile: 'Burke! will ye thry an'
overlook it, ould man?' . . . Eyah! he's mighty quare. For some rayson
he seems tu hate th' idea av a third man bein' here, tho' th' man' wud
die for me. Divil a man can I kape here, anyway. In fwhat fashion he
puts th' wind up 'him, I do not know; they will not talk, out av pure
kindness av heart an' rispict for meself, I guess. But--a few days here,
an' bingo!--they apply for thransfer. Now ye know ivrythin', bhoy--fwhat
I am up against, an' fwhy I will not 'can' Yorkey. Ye've a face that
begets thrust--do not bethray ut, but thry an' hilp me. Bear wid Yorke
as best ye can--divilmint an' all--for my sake, will yeh?"
Not devoid of a certain simple dignity was the grim, rugged face that
turned appealingly to the younger man's in the light of the moon.
And Redmond, smiling inscrutably into the deep-set, glittering eyes,
answered as simply: "I will, Sergeant!"
He declined an offer. "_Nemoyah_! (No) thanks, I've had enough."
For some unaccountable reason, Slavin smiled also. His huge clamping
right hand crushed George's, while the left described an arc heavenwards.
Came a throaty gurgle, a careless swing of the arm, and--
"Be lay loike a warrior takin' his rist,
Wid his--
"I misrimimber th' tail-ind av ut," sighed Sergeant Slavin, "'Tis toime
we turned in."
In silence they re-entered the detachment. Yorke, minus his moccasins,
fur-coat and red-serge, lay stretched out upon his cot sleeping heavily,
his flushed, reckless, high-bred face pillowed on one outflung arm.
Above him, silent guardians of his rest, his grotesque mixture of prints
gleamed duskily in the lamp-light.
Into Redmond's mind--sunk into a deep oblivion of dreamy, chaotic
thought--came again Slavin's words:
"Shtudy thim picthures, bhoy! an', by an' large ye have th' man himsilf"
Soon, too, he slept; and into his fitful slumbers drifted a ridiculously
disturbing dream. That of actually witnessing the terrible scene of the
long-dead Indian Mutiny hero, Major Hodson, executing with his own hand
the three princes of Oude.
_Inshalla_! it was done--there! there! against the cart, amidst the
gorgeous setting of Indian sunset and gleaming minaret. "Deen! Deen!
Futteh _Mohammed_!" came a dying scream upon the last shot--the smoking
carbine was jerked back to the "recover"--a moment the scarlet-turbaned,
scarlet-sashed English officer gazed with ruthless satisfaction at his
treacherous victims then, turning sharply, faced him.
And lo! to Redmond it seemed that the stern, intolerant,
recklessly-handsome countenance he looked upon bore a striking
resemblance to the face of Yorke.