"Stop this, Zoraida!" he said excitedly. "Stop it! You are mad. Have you forgotten?--Good G.o.d!"
"Betty--" said Kendric, hardly knowing what he would say. He wanted her to understand--
"Don"t speak to me!" Betty flung the words at him pa.s.sionately. "You are an unthinkable beast!"
Bruce heard nothing that was said, saw nothing but Zoraida. He came two steps toward her and then stopped, staring at her.
"Zoraida," he commanded, as one who speaks with love"s authority, "you don"t realize what you are doing. It is that cursed wine you have drunk or there is just desperation in the air and it has got into you.
This hideous jest has gone far enough--too far. Tell them, tell Kendric, that it was all a jest. Nothing more."
"Had you won," said Zoraida sweetly, "what then, Senor Bruce? Would you have been jesting?"
Bruce"s lips moved but no words came. Suddenly he whirled from her upon Kendric, his face distorted with rage.
"d.a.m.n you!" he burst out.
No longer was it merely a case of murder in his look. The urge to kill had swept into his heart, rushed hotly along his pounding arteries.
Before now had Kendric seen men frenzy-lashed, like Bruce, briefly insane with the blood impulse and as Bruce cursed him he knew that he meant to kill him. There were half a dozen paces between the two men and already was Bruce"s hand lost under the skirt of his coat. Kendric sprang to his feet and as he did so Bruce whipped out his pistol.
There seemed no loss of time between the action and the discharge. But Kendric had been quick and only his promptness saved the life in him that night. As he went to his feet he swept up in his hand a heap of the shining gold pieces and flung them straight into the boy"s purpling face. The bullet went by Kendric"s head doing no harm beyond splintering the wall behind him. Before Bruce could shake his head and fire again Kendric was upon him, worrying him as a dog worries a cat.
Bruce, even in the desperation driving him, and with a gun in his hand, was little more than a stripling in the hard hands at his wrist and throat. A sudden heave and mighty jerk came close to breaking his arm and freed the pistol from his claw-like fingers. Kendric hurled him back so that Bruce staggered half across the room and crashed to the floor. Before he could come to his feet the pistol had been dropped into Kendric"s coat pocket.
During the whole time Twisty Barlow had sat like a man bereft of volition, his face puckered queerly, his mouth a little open. He looked at the gold on the table top and at Zoraida; when Kendric had hurled the coins into Bruce"s face he looked at the gold rolling across the floor and again back to Zoraida. Rios, having risen quietly, stood with one hand on the back of his chair, one hand at his mustache, looking steadily at his cousin. Even while Kendric and Bruce battled Rios gave them scant attention. He was watching Zoraida as though his life itself depended on his reading her wild heart aright.
Slowly, as though he had been half stunned, Bruce rose from the floor.
Once more his face was white and looked sick. He had in his eyes the startled expression of a man rudely awakened from profound slumber. He walked with dragging feet across the room and dropped wearily into a chair. He put his elbows on his knees and his head into his hands.
Zoraida, seeing that Kendric would not come to her, caught up her gown and leaped lightly down, landing softly like a cat. She put into her eyes what she pleased, a confusion of messages, a swooning pa.s.sion, a maidenly tenderness, a joy that seemed to peep forth shyly. On tiptoes, as though she would not break the hush of the room, she went to the hall door, smiling a little in her backward look. A moment she whispered to the serving man at the door; then she was gone and they heard only the light patter of her slippers.
The man to whom Zoraida had whispered spoke in an undertone to his fellows. One of them went out swiftly; the others threw wide the three doors and then gathered up the fallen gold. It was replaced in its box and gravely presented to Kendric. He threw back the lid, thrust into his pocket without counting what he deemed equal to the amount he had played and tossed the box back to the servant.
"Divide with your friends," he said shortly, and turned toward Betty.
But already, with the doors open, she had sought escape. He saw the whisk of her skirt and marked the erect carriage of her head of brown hair as she went out.
Jim Kendric stood looking about him and cursed himself for a fool.
Headlong he had always been, plunging ever into deep waters that were not over clear, but he could not recall the time he had been a greater blunderer. He had no more than decided that the one thing for him to do was to simplify matters than here he went already interfering in other people"s business and making a mess of the whole thing. Betty adjudged him being desirous of becoming Zoraida"s lover; Bruce sought his death; Rios"s eyes were like knives; Barlow still sent his sullen glances from the box of gold in a servant"s hands to the door through which Zoraida had pa.s.sed. Kendric went to where Bruce still sat and put his hand gently on the slack shoulder.
"Bruce, old man----" he said.
But Bruce, though with little spirit in the movement, shook the hand away.
"There"s no call for talk between you and me, Jim," he said wearily.
"Talk can"t change things. Just now I wanted to kill you!" He shuddered.
The man with whom Zoraida had whispered was speaking quietly with Rios.
Kendric, seeing them beyond Bruce"s bowed head, saw a fire of rebellion burning in Rios"s eyes. Then, surprising him when he expected an outburst, Rios merely shrugged his shoulders and left the room. The servant came on to Barlow. Again he whispered. Barlow heard him through stolidly, then for the first time looked long and steadily at Kendric. Kendric guessed from the workings of his face that he was struggling with his own problem. Gradually the sailor closed his mouth until at last the teeth were clamped tight, the muscles at the corners of his jaw bulging.
"Barlow," said Kendric then, "there"s too infernally much whispering in corners in this house. Even if we three seem to be at cross purposes now we have been friends----"
"You talk of friendship!" Barlow spoke with cold bitterness. "When here I crawl around with a hole in my shoulder; when West there in his chair has just tried to bore you and got smashed in the face for his trouble? After what"s happened tonight, man, you and me are done." He stalked off to the door. But at the threshold he paused long enough to turn and mutter: "We all know what we are after, I guess. Don"t fool yourself, Jim Kendric, that everything"s landslidin" you [Transcriber"s note: your?] way."
Plainly Zoraida"s orders had been intended to clear the room save for Kendric. For the servant came to Bruce when Barlow had gone and spoke to him. Kendric tried to catch the words but could not. But he saw Bruce suddenly jerk up his head and watched a slow return of color into the drawn face. Then Bruce, eyeing Kendric with suspicion and in open hostility, quitted him in a silence that was ominous.
Kendric"s anger, ever ready like his mirth, burned hot through him. He had shot Barlow in Bruce"s quarrel, not knowing Barlow in the dark, and for this Barlow hated him. Bruce had sought to kill him, and for this Bruce hated him. He had sought to befriend Betty, and Betty hated him.
He had played fair with them all, and now all of them were set against him.
"Devil take the whole outfit!" he cried out pa.s.sionately. "From now on, Jim Kendric, you feather your own nest and hit the one-man trail for the open."
The servingman, whom Zoraida"s commands had const.i.tuted a sort of master of ceremonies, came to Kendric, his look curious but not unfriendly. The box with its gold was still in his hands.
"You will follow me, senor?" he invited. "_La Senorita Reinita_ awaits you."
"I"ll do nothing of the sort," snapped Kendric. "I am going outside for a smoke and you can tell your lady queen so with my compliments."
But the man stood in front of him, shaking his head dubiously. He looked distressed. In his simple mind orders from Zoraida were orders absolute, and yet such largesse as Jim"s bought respect and something akin to affection.
"Later you will smoke outside, senor," he urged. "Now it would be best--oh, surely, best, senor!--to follow me to La Senorita."
Jim shoved by him toward the door. The fellow looked a trifle uncertain, his small calibre brain confused by two contending impulses.
But in an instant long habit and an old fear that was greater than his new liking, a.s.serted themselves. He slipped between Kendric and the door and at his glance the other servant joined him. The two glanced at each other and then at Kendric"s set and determined face and then looked swiftly down the long hallway behind them. This look was eloquent and Kendric guessed its meaning; that way had their companion gone hastily when Zoraida had left; that way, perhaps, would he be returning presently with others of her hireling pack at his heels.
"Stand aside," commanded Jim. "I"m on my way."
They were stalwart men and they did not stand aside. Rather they stepped closer together, shoulder to shoulder, grim in their stubborn obedience to the orders they had been given. Sick of waiting and words and obstructions, Kendric bore down on them, vowing to go through though they might raise an outcry and double their strength. They were ready for him and stood up to him. But their impulse of obedience and routine duty was a pale weak motive before his rage at eternal hindrance. He charged them like a mad bull; he struck to right and left with the mighty blows of l.u.s.ty battle-joy, and though they struck back and sought to grapple with him he hurled one of them against the wall with a bleeding mouth and sent the other toppling backward, crashing to the floor in the hall. And through he went, growling savagely. But only to confront the third man returning with half a dozen sullen-eyed half breeds at his heels, only to see beyond them the bright interested eyes of Zoraida.
"Call your hound dogs off," he roared at her. "I"m going through."
Zoraida clapped her hands.
"_Muchachos_," she commanded them, "tame me this wild man! But no pistols or knives, mind you!"
She drew up close to one wall and watched; she might have been an excited child at a three-ring circus. Kendric found time to marvel at her even as he shot by her, hurling the whole of his compact weight into the ma.s.s of bodies defying him pa.s.sageway. And as flesh struck flesh, Zoraida clapped her hands again and watched eagerly.
"One against six--seven," she whispered. "One against nine!" she added, for already the two men who had sought to hold Kendric back from the hallway were up and after him. "He is a mad fool--and yet, by the breath of G.o.d, he is a man!"
And a man"s fight did he treat her to, carried out of himself, gone for the moment the madman she had named him. It was Jim Kendric"s way to fight in silence, but now he shouted as he struck, defying them, cursing them, striking as hard as G.o.d had given him strength, recking not in the least of blows received, heart and mind centered alone on the pulsing, throbbing prayer to feel a bone crack before him, to see a head snap back, to feel blood gush forth from a battered face. A man tripped him cunningly from the side and he all but fell. But he struck back with his boot and steadied himself by hurling his toppling body against a resisting body and crashed on. Yes, and through, though they clutched at him and dragged after him! A man hung to his belt and he dragged him four or five steps; then he turned and drove his fist into the man"s neck and freed himself and bore on. So he came to the end of the hall and to a locked door and turned with his back to the wall.
And again Zoraida"s hound dogs were in front of him.
He laughed at them and taunted them and reviled them. They were nine men and upon many of the dark faces were signs of his pa.s.sing. And as they came closer there was respect as well as caution in their look.
They meant to beat him down; in their minds was no doubt of the ultimate outcome, for were they not nine to one? But they had felt his fists and had no joy in the memory. So they drew on slowly.
Kendric watched them narrowly. In the eyes of the nearest man he saw a sudden flickering; it flashed over him that the fellow meant trickery and no fair man-to-man fight. He stood with his back to the door; he saw the approaching man"s eyes switch to it briefly. Then it flashed upon Kendric that he was to be attacked from behind--
But even as the thought came and before he could leap aside, the door was jerked open and from behind he felt arms about him. He struggled and strained in a tensing grip. Not just one man was there behind him; two at the very least and maybe three. He heard them muttering. Then the men in front came on in a flying body and with a dozen men piling over him Jim Kendric at last went down. And once down, being the man to know when he had played out his string, he lay still.
"Will _el senor_ Jim come with me?" Zoraida was above him, smiling curiously. "Or shall I have him carried along by my men?"
"I"ll come," he answered shortly. "Having no choice. Call them off before I stifle."