XXXVII
Of what took place on board during the rest of that night I had only the vaguest of knowledge. Once I had an indistinct impression of consciousness, such as one may have through the film of opiates. Dr. Olson was explaining to some one that it was a pretty close call, considering that it wasn’t going to amount to anything. Brack’s bullet had struck me under the angle of the left jaw, had ranged upward through the muscles of the neck and gone out squarely above the occiput.
“Those cuts in his leg will give him more trouble,” the doctor was saying.
My next impression was of hearing the same sharp report as had ushered me into unconsciousness. I smiled. My senses had cleared now and I was sure that what I fancied I heard was simply the echo of Brack’s shot in my disordered mind.
I sank gratefully back toward the slumber that invited me, and then— Crack! Crack-crack! Crack-crack-crack! Up on the after deck a perfect splatter of shots which seemed echoed from a distance, drove the sleepiness from my head.
I opened my eyes and sat up. I was in bed in my own stateroom, and the gray light of dawn was coming through the port-hole. From a distance far off came two more reports, and on the steel plates of the Wanderer’s after cabin resounded two heavy, dull blows.
I was out of bed and on my feet ere the two shots from our stern spat out their reply. I understood the significance of those sounds now. Brack and his gang were attacking at the first light of dawn, and they had not caught our men napping.
My legs bent weakly under me as I stood up, the thigh which Barry had cut seemed numb and helpless, and my head whirled till I nearly fell. With my hands hugging the wall for support I made my way to the door. I wished to step out on deck, and so, naturally, in my tumbled mental condition it was the door leading into the cabin saloon that I found.
I opened the door but slightly and stopped. Betty was sitting before the door. Her back was toward me, there was a book in her lap and her hair was hanging down her back in the disordered condition of a woman who has kept ceaseless vigil, regardless of appearances, through the night.
Softly as I closed the door she heard and was up in a flash.
“Gardy! Mr. Pitt! Are you up?” she called, her hand on the knob. I had slipped the catch as I closed the door so she could not come in. “Do you want anything? I’ll get it for you. You mustn’t move, you know. Are you—are you feeling stronger—Mr. Pitt?”
“I am all right,” I said.
“Oh! Are you really? Are you able to get up?”
“Certainly.” I was flinging a dressing gown about me. “What is happening aft?”
Another volley of shots from the shore was answered from the yacht.
“Brack and his men shot Mr. Wilson, and now they’re trying to shoot the rest of us.”
“Badly? Is Wilson hurt badly?”
“I don’t know. I—I’ve been sitting here. You—you have been so terribly quiet for such a long time, Mr. Pitt.”
“And who’s back there? Who’s doing the shooting on our side?”
“All of them. Pierce, and the negro, and Dr. Olson, and George.”
I opened the door and stepped out.
“Oh! Oh, you mustn’t,—Mr. Pitt! Really you mustn’t. Go back—what are you going to do?”
I laughed.
“George mustn’t be allowed to risk his life, you know.”
She recoiled with a sudden wilting, as a child before an unexpected blow.
“Oh!” she moaned. “Oh! How can you?”
My weakness forced me to clutch the wall for support.
“I can’t,” I said, “unless you get me some whisky.”
She was still shrinking, her hands to her breast, and her face white.
“Oh! I didn’t know—I couldn’t believe—there was anything like—like this in you.”
“Hidden country,” I laughed, stumbling along the wall. “There’s hidden country in all of us.”
My hand was on the door of George’s stateroom. I pushed it open. Simmons was lying in George’s bed, a horrified expression upon his wooden-like countenance as he viewed his surroundings.
“Not my fault, sir,” he apologized as I betrayed surprise at seeing him there. “I was put here, sir; I couldn’t help it.”
“Glory be, Simmons! You’re looking sound.”
“Oh, I’m doing nicely, thank you, sir. A bit shot off the bottom of my liver, sir, the doctor says. I’ll do, says he, thank you.”
A revolver was lying on a table and I picked it up. It was loaded.
“Whisky, Simmons! Where is it? I’ve got to have some, quick.”
He grimaced guiltily.
“I—I had a tiny bottle in my coat, sir. It’s lying over there. If the bottle isn’t smashed—ah! The master’s silver flask, so it was. I—I had a bit of cold, sir, and there was no other bottle——”
I drank the stuff like water. My veins, which had felt empty and slack, seemed to fill with warm blood.
I drank again. My legs stiffened and grew firm. My head was in a whirl, but I had strength enough to move easily now, and I went out of the room with a rush. Betty tried to stop me as I went through the saloon, but I lurched on.
The sound of firing came to me as if from far away. In the whirl of my head it seemed first in one direction then in another. I steadied myself for an instant as I came out on deck. The yacht seemed to be heaving and falling, and presently it felt as if it were whirling in a maelstrom.
Where was the aft? Where was the firing? I held my head to steady it. The firing broke out afresh. There it was! It was in front of me. No, it was behind me. A non-drinker shouldn’t take so much whisky. Ah! There it was. I lurched forward, intending to go aft. It was not strange that I should cross the fore-deck on my way aft. Nothing was strange in my present condition. Not even the fact that Brack and Garvin were climbing over the rail at the bow, as I came forward.
I was very steady.
“Hello, Brack.”
At the sound of my voice and the sight of the revolver in my hand Garvin gave a spring backward and splashed into the water. Brack smiled and vaulted on to the deck. There was a wound on one side of his head where the negro’s bullet had marked him, but he bore himself as confidently and masterful as ever. He had two revolvers in his belt, but as I made ready to shoot him when his hands moved toward them he desisted and smiled again.
“So I didn’t quite get you, eh, Pitt? Well, it was pretty dark, though you did step out into the light like an accommodating lamb to the butcher. Well, what are you going to do?”
“Put up your hands.”
He looked at me, smiled, and calmly folded his arms across his chest.
“Putting up one’s hands is undignified. I do not do so. What are you going to do about it?”
I was nonplussed. Here I was, the victor. I was armed, he was helpless; and yet he had taken the upper hand. What did one do under such circumstances?
“This revolver is loaded, Brack,” I warned, but I knew that my speech was futile.
“I know it is: I can see the lead in the cylinder. That doesn’t make any difference. To be of any danger to me said loaded revolver must be in the hands of a man who is capable of shooting another man. You can’t do that, Pitt; you know you can’t. You’re too civilized. Try it. Just try it. Pick out a certain spot on me—my forehead, for instance—point the gun at that spot and pull the trigger. Try it. You’ll find that it’s a very hard thing to do—impossible for you, in fact.”
He laughed low.
“No, Pitt, you can’t shoot me.” With imperceptible movements he began to approach me. “Do you hear me, Pitt: You can’t shoot me—you can’t shoot me.”
Suddenly he stopped. His countenance seemed to break into flame. I heard a light step behind me and understood.
“Go back, Betty!” I said, keeping my eyes on Brack. “Go back!”
I was retreating slowly. For the moment Brack was invincible, he was great! His colossal will was mastering us. With it he was driving me back, helpless in spite of my weapon, and he was holding Betty fascinated to the spot.
“Go back!” My shoulder had touched hers. I turned to look at her.
“Gardy!” she gasped, pointing.
I turned. Brack’s mighty spring had carried him on to us, and I sprang between him and Betty. He paid scarcely any attention to me, merely struck with his right arm and smashed me to the deck. Then he had Betty in his arms, kissing her, sweeping her to his breast like a struggling child, and retreating toward the rail, the girl held as a shield before him.
I sprang up and ran toward them. My weapon had been knocked from my hands, and as Brack crouched to spring over the rail with his burden I threw myself on him. He shifted Betty to his left arm and with his right drove me back with a single blow.
“Never fear, Pitt,” he laughed, tugging at his revolver, “I don’t intend leaving before I’ve settled you.”
I rushed again as his weapon came free. I struck him between the eyes and tore Betty from his grasp. My blow staggered and blinded him for the instant. He was at the rail brushing his hand across his eyes when two rifle reports sounded far across the bay and Brack fell flat on the deck without a struggle.
“But you’ve got to admit he was game—game as a mad ol’ silver-tip,” said the patriarchal Slade when a boat had brought him and Harris aboard from the point from which they had shot Brack. “A devil he was, with a twisted laugh, but too game to live if he was licked. Me ’n’ Bill we was hiding up in the hills and come down to take a peek when the shooting begun. We see him and the other fellow crawling up the anchor-chains, and Brack was driving the other fellow with a gun.
“We couldn’t believe it was him at first; didn’t seem any man’d try anything so desp’rit; but when we see you scuffling with him, Mr. Pitt, we knew it was him, and savvied how he’d had his gang to start shooting from the other shore to draw everybody aft so we could take one desp’rit whirl at you. Me ’n’ Bill we put the sights on him then, but we was afraid of hitting your young lady. So I prayed a little for a clear shot, and the Lord answered my prayer pretty pronto. Amen.”