The Land of Frozen Suns: A Novel, Page 4

  CHAPTER IV--A FORTHRIGHT FIGHTING-MAN

  In due time the foodstuffs and other goods were unloaded, and the _Moon_began to take on her return cargo of buffalo hides and sundry bundles offurs, the harvest of the past winter's hunting and the spring trade. Hadit been left to our loud-mouthed captain there would have been nocessation of labor until the last pelt was stowed; he would have workedus twenty-four hours to the day. But Benton was not St. Louis, and themen who loaded ship were of a different calibre from the stevedores atthe River City. A certain number of hours would they work, and nolonger, though the _Moon_ rotted at her slip. So we of the regular crewhad a breathing spell as sundown approached. And the first spare time atmy command I used to write a letter to Bolton, detailing mymisadventures. This I posted, so that in case anything kept me fromreturning on the _Moon_, he would at least know whither I had gone andhow I had fared.

  It took two days to unload. The evening of the third day Bilk and Istole away from the boat and went uptown. There was not much of it, tobe sure, but what little there was lacked nothing in the way of life andcolor. One could see any sort of costume, from sober broadcloth and finelinen to the rainbow garb of a blanket Indian. Even the long-hairedfrontiersman sacred to fiction was represented by a specimen or two.Altogether it was a motley, high-spirited crowd that we mixed with thatnight. Of the quieter residential portion of Benton I saw nothing, thattime. My way, guided thereto by Bilk, was down the main street, wherelights shone and glasses clinked merrily; into divers places whereancient pianos tinkled dance music. Drink and dance and gamble, that wasthe night life of the town. Wherever we went, wherever any man went, upand down the length of that one garish street, he could get a run forhis money, if he had money to spend. In every saloon and dance hall theknights of farobank and draw poker held tourney on the field of greencloth. It was all very new and strange and fascinating to me.

  Bilk stood treat in one of the saloons, and after we had emptied ourglasses we stepped across the room to where a knot of men were watchingan unkempt individual buck a roulette wheel with twenty-dollar goldpieces in lieu of chips. He had a dirty felt hat on the table beforehim, the crown of it half full of gold and silver, and he was scatteringthe double eagles two and three on a number. It was heavy play, Ithought, but the dealer spun the little white ball and called the numberand color in a bored sort of manner. The buffalo-runner lost half adozen bets, and then all at once he caught the double O with threetwenty-dollar coins resting on it. I gasped. Twenty-one hundred dollarsin fifteen seconds! When the dealer passed over the stacks of gold, theunkempt one opened his mouth for the first time.

  "How much'll yuh turn for?" he asked.

  The dealer jerked his thumb upward. "We'll take the roof off," heanswered carelessly, "if yuh want to play 'em that high."

  The buffalo-runner grinned and deliberately set about placing handfulsof coin here and there on the board. And while I stood there whollyengrossed, eagerly watching the ivory ball in its circular race, someone grabbed me by the shoulders and hurled me unceremoniously out thedoor. Once outside and free of that powerful grip, I turned and beheldTupper the red-whiskered, very drunk and very angry, flourishing apistol and shouting vile epithets at me.

  "Git back t' the _Moon_, yuh ---- son of a sea-cook! I'll jerk an armoff yuh an' beat yuh t' death with the bloody end of it, if yuh show uphere again. Scoot!"

  Naturally, I "scooted," Mr. Tupper meanwhile emphasizing his threats bysending a bullet or two skyward. I wondered, at the time, why no peaceofficer appeared to put a quietus on this manifestation of exuberance,but later in the game I learned that in frontier towns the popping of apistol was regarded as one of the accessories of a properly joyful mood,men handled their guns to make a noise, a la the small boy with a bunchof holiday firecrackers. One could burn powder with impunity, so long ashe had due care for innocent bystanders.

  Of Bilk I saw no more, for a while. Thinking that since Tupper'shostility had been directed at me, Bilk might have concluded to keep outof it, and see Benton by himself, I went on to the boat and curled up ona bale of buffalo hides, to sit a while in the moonlight and thepleasant night air before bedding down in the vile hole where we of theroustabout fraternity were permitted to rest o' nights. An hour or so Isat there, and about the time I began to think of turning in, a figurecame slouching up the wharf and aboard. The glare of a deck light showedme that it was Bilk. I called to him, and when he came a little nearer Isaw further that he, too, had met with rough usage; for his face wasbruised and his lips cut and swollen.

  "Aw, that dam' mate!" he said, in answer to my questioning. "He gits ona razoo like this every once in a while. Yuh was lucky he just throwedyuh out. The son of a gun nailed me after that an' like t' beat m' headoff. He's tearin' drunk an' plumb on the fight. Chances is he'll comedown here before mornin' an' want t' lick the captain, the cook, an' thewhole blame crew."

  "Somebody ought to take an axe to him," I suggested bitterly.

  "Yuh betche. That's what he needs," Bilk agreed. "I've heard tell abouthim gettin' on these fightin' drunks, but this here's the first time heever got t' me. Yuh wait. I'll git him some uh these times for this."And Bilk went below, muttering dark threats.

  I followed shortly, and rolled in. There was no disturbance during thenight, and when we stood by for the loading after breakfast Tupper wason hand, a trifle surlier than usual, more or less red about the eyes,but otherwise showing no signs of his carouse. All that day we labored.Again at eventide part of the crew sallied uptown. Before ten o'clockall of them were back, one or two badly damaged about the face, and oneand all filled with tales of the mate's pugnacious mood.

  "He sez, by the great horn spoon, he'll bust the head of aryhide-slingin' wharf-rat that sticks his nose up the main street. Hewants the whole town t' himself, the blamed hog!" one indignantlydeclared; and from what I'd seen of Tupper I could very well believethat he would have it to himself so far as the crew of the _Moon_ wasconcerned.

  The next morning found Mr. Tupper still on deck. Evidently a steady dietof strong whisky and rough-and-tumble fighting agreed with his peculiarconstitution. That night we were all but done; two hours' work in themorning would put the _Moon_ in shape for the down-river journey. Andwhen evening fell I took a notion to walk up and down the streets ofBenton once more. It may have been that the prospect of getting to St.Louis in the near future made me desire to flaunt my independence in theface of the mate. Anyway, without stopping to make a critical analysisof motives, I slipped away from the _Moon_ when dark closed in. Theengineer came aboard a minute before I left, and I heard him call to hisassistant that Tupper was a sheet and a half in the wind, and stillwearing his fighting-clothes. But I took no thought of turning back.

  Right up the main street I marched, venturing into one saloon afteranother without mishap. I felt quite elated, like a small boy playing"hookey" from school. And when, in the course of my prowling about, Iran into a half dozen hilarious cowpunchers I clean forgot Mr. Tupperand the unkind things he had promised to do to me.

  The camp of these cattlemen, I gathered from their talk, was on thedivide that loomed to the north of Benton, and after the manner of theirkind they were "taking in the town" for the first time in many weeks.Wherefore, they were thirsty and noisy, and insistent that everybodyshould drink and be joyful. To one of them, a youngster near my own age,slim, sinewy, picturesque in his hair-faced chaps and high-heeled boots,I talked a little, but it was a hit-and-miss conversation, by reason ofthe general uproar, and the rapidity with which drinks came. I was allfor information, and in his free-and-easy way he shed beams of lightupon my black ignorance of range affairs. But alas! a discordant elementburst rudely in upon our talk-_fiesta_. Tupper stalked in from thestreet, and chance decreed that his roving, belligerent eye shouldsingle me out of the crowd. I was leaning against a disreputablebilliard table, at the time, and straight for me he came, not saying aword, but squinting up his little, pig eyes in a manner that boded ill.

  I didn't move. Thoug
h my heart flopped like a new-landed trout, Icouldn't quite bring myself to slink away. Beaten and bluffed and cowedas I had been for the past two weeks, I hadn't quite lost the power toresent, and though I shrank from the weight of Tupper's ungodly fists Ishrank more from absolute flight. Something of the atmosphere of theranges had crept into me that evening. I did not know what I was aboutto do, except that I was not going to run away from any red-whiskeredbrute from St. Louis or any other section of the globe.

  He came up close to me, stopped, and regarded me a moment, as if amazedto see me standing there and making no move to go. And then with a quickhunch of his shoulders he swung a dirty fist for my jaw. But that time Ifooled Mr. Tupper by sidestepping; I was watching him, and he was a bitoversure. Again he struck out, first with one hand and then the other.This time one of the blows landed, glancingly. His red, ugly countenancelurching toward me, his whisky-sodden breath in my face was more than Icould stand; and when that vicious swing grazed my chin as I backedaway, I ducked under his arm and smashed him on his reviling mouth.

  It almost paid me for all the abuse I'd taken off him, that one goodblow. The backward roll of his head, the quick spurt of blood where myknuckles split his lip, sent a quiver of joy over me. Had he been of thebigness of a house and equipped with two pair of fists I would gladlyhave fought him after that one punch. It showed me that I could hurthim. It gave me a hungry craving for more. I wanted to beat his uglylittle eyes, his squat, round-nostriled nose, and his whisky-guzzlingmouth into indistinguishable pulp.

  But it was new business to me, and so instead of keeping at him hammerand tongs till he was down and out, I waited for him to rush me again.Wherein I made a sad mistake. If I had battered him down then andthere--if--if! At any rate, he did come with a rush, and he camefortified with a wide knowledge of fist tactics to protect him fromanother such blow as I had dealt him. He fought me halfway across theroom, and had me bleeding like a stuck pig before I connected with himagain. But eventually one of my wild swings slipped through his guard,and jolted his head backward; the little bloodshot eyes of him blinkedwith the jar of it. And again I made a mistake. Instead of standing offand hammering him with clean straight punches, I rushed to closequarters. Half crazed with pain and anger I stepped in, swinging shortright and left blows for his wabbling head, and so came within the sweepof his great arms.

  He clinched, and in his grip I was next thing to helpless. One thingonly could I do, and that was to butt him in the face with myhead--which kindly office I performed to the best of my ability, untilhe jammed me hard against the billiard table and bent me backward till Ifelt my bones crack. And then with his thumb he deliberately set aboutgouging out one of my eyes.

  I can feel it yet, the fierce pain and the horrible fear that overtookme when he jabbed at my eye-ball. I don't know how I broke his hold. Ionly recollect that, half-blinded, hot searing pangs shooting along myoptic nerve, I found myself free of him. And as I backed away from hisoutstretched paws my hand, sweeping along the billiard table, met andclosed upon a hard, round object. With all the strength that was in me Iflung it straight at his head. He went to the floor with a neat,circular depression in his forehead, just over the left eye.

  There was a hush in the saloon. One of the cattlemen stooped over him.

  "_Sangre de Cristo!_" he laughed. "A billiard ball sure beats asix-shooter for quick action. I'll bet he was dead when he hit thefloor."