The Colonel s.n.a.t.c.hed up the smaller bag and thrust it into the man"s hands. Jack made for the door. The Colonel stopped him.
"Better take to the woods," he said, with a motion back towards the window. The Colonel opened the half-closed door and looked out, as Jack pushed aside the table, tore away the red curtain, hammered at the sash, then, desperate, set his shoulder at it and forced the whole thing out. He put his maimed hand on the sill and vaulted after the shattered gla.s.s.
They could see him going like the wind up towards his own shack at the edge of the wood, looking back once or twice, doubling and tacking to keep himself screened by the haphazard, hillside cabins, out of sight of the lynchers down at the river.
"Will you stay with this?" the Colonel had asked Keith hurriedly, nodding at the treasure-covered table, and catching up the finger-marked block before Jack was a yard from the window.
"Yes," Keith had said, revolver still in hand and eyes on the man Minook was to see no more. The Colonel met the Boy running breathless up the bank.
"Can"t hold "em any longer," he shouted; "you"re takin" it pretty easy while a man"s gettin" killed down here."
"Stop! Wait!" The Colonel floundered madly through the slush and mud, calling and gesticulating, "I"ve got the thief!"
Presto all the backs of heads became faces.
"Got the money?" screamed Maudie, uncovering her eyes. She had gone to the execution, but after the rope was brought, her nerve failed her, and she was sobbing hysterically into her two palms held right over her eyes.
"Oh, you had it, did you?" called out McGinty with easy insolence.
"Look here!" The Colonel held up the bit of flooring with rapid explanation.
"Where is he?"
"Got him locked up?"
Everybody talked at once. The Colonel managed to keep them going for some moments before he admitted.
"Reckon he"s lit out." And then the Colonel got it hot and strong for his clumsiness.
"Which way"d he go?"
The Colonel turned his back to the North Pole, and made a fine large gesture in the general direction of the Equator.
"Where"s my money?"
"Up in your cabin. Better go and count it."
A good many were willing to help since they"d been cheated out of a hanging, and even defrauded of a shot at a thief on the wing. n.o.body seemed to care to remain in the neighbourhood of the crooked cotton-wood. The crowd was dispersing somewhat sheepishly.
n.o.body looked at b.u.t.ts, and yet he was a sight to see. His face and his clothes were badly mauled. He was covered with mud and blood. When the men were interrupted in trying to get the noose over his head, he had stood quite still in the midst of the crowd till it broke and melted away from him. He looked round, pa.s.sed his hand over his eyes, threw open his torn coat, and felt in his pockets.
"Who"s got my tobacco?" says he.
Several men turned back suddenly, and several pouches were held out, but n.o.body met b.u.t.ts" eyes. He filled his pipe, nor did his hand shake any more than those that held the tobacco-bags. When he had lit up, "Who"s got my Smith and Wesson?" he called out to the backs of the retiring citizens. Windy Jim stood and delivered. b.u.t.ts walked away to his cabin, swaying a little, as if he"d had more hootch than he could carry.
"What would you have said," demanded the Boy, "if you"d hung the wrong man?"
"Said?" echoed McGinty. "Why, we"d "a" said that time the corpse had the laugh on us." A couple of hours later Keith put an excited face into his shack, where the Colonel and the Boy were just crawling under their blankets.
"Thought you might like to know, that Miners" Meeting that was interrupted is having an extra session."
They followed him down to the Court through a fine rain. The night was heavy and thick. As they splashed along Keith explained:
"Of course, Charlie knew there wasn"t room enough in Alaska now for b.u.t.ts and him; and he thought he"d better send b.u.t.ts home. So he took his gun and went to call."
"Don"t tell me that poor devil"s killed after all."
"Not a bit. b.u.t.ts is a little bunged up, but he"s the handier man, even so. He drew the first bead."
"Charlie hurt?"
"No, he isn"t hurt. He"s dead. Three or four fellows had just looked in, on the quiet, to kind of apologise to b.u.t.ts. They"re down at Corey"s now givin" evidence against him."
"So b.u.t.ts"ll have to swing after all. Is he in Court?"
"Yes--been a busy day for b.u.t.ts."
A confused noise came suddenly out of the big cabin they were nearing.
They opened the door with difficulty, and forced their way into the reeking, crowded room for the second time that night. Everybody seemed to be talking--n.o.body listening. Dimly through dense clouds of tobacco-smoke "the prisoner at the Bar" was seen to be--what--no!
Yes--shaking hands with the Judge.
"Verdict already?"
"Oh, that kind o" case don"t take a feller like Corey long."
"What"s the decision?"
"Prisoner discharged. Charlie Le Gros committed suicide."
"Suicide!"
"--by goin" with his gun to b.u.t.ts" shack lookin" f trouble."
CHAPTER XIX
THE ICE GOES OUT
"I am apart of all that I have seen."
It had been thawing and freezing, freezing and thawing, for so long that men lost account of the advance of a summer coming, with such balked, uncertain steps. Indeed, the weather variations had for several weeks been so great that no journey, not the smallest, could be calculated with any a.s.surance. The last men to reach Minook were two who had made a hunting and prospecting trip to an outlying district.
They had gone there in six days, and were nineteen in returning.
The slush was waist-deep in the gulches. On the benches, in the snow, holes appeared, as though red-hot stones had been thrown upon the surface. The little settlement by the mouth of the Minook sat insecurely on the boggy hillside, and its inhabitants waded knee-deep in soaking tundra moss and mire.