Casey strode into the Stag, his bosom a storm-center for every black emotion. The sophisticated Auggy smelled instant trouble on him, as one smells fire in a house. Bending over the friendly shoulder of Whitey Dutch, Auggy spoke in a low tone of warning.
“There's Phil Casey,” he said, “an' t'ree of his bunch. It's apples to ashes he's gunnin' for Goldie. If Chick were here, now, he'd somehow put the smother on him.”
“Give him a call-down your own self,” was Whitey's counsel. “W'at with Chick's license bein' revoked in Park Row, an' Joe Rocks goin' to the hospital from here only a little over a mont' ago, the least bit of cannonadin' 's bound to put th' joint in Dutch all the way from headquarters to the State excise dubs in Albany.”
“I know it,” returned Auggy, in great trouble of mind. “If a gun so much as cracks once, it'll be th' fare-you-well of the Stag.”
“Well, w'at do youse say?” demanded the loyal Whitey. “I'm wit' youse, an' I'm wit' Chick, an' I'm wit' Goldie. Give th' woid, an' I'll pull in a harness bull from off his beat.”
“No, none of that! Chick'd sooner burn the joint than call a cop.”
“I'll go give Casey a chin,” said Whitey, “meb-by I can hold him down. You put Goldie wise. Tell him to keep his lamps on Casey, an' if Casey reaches for his gatt to beat him to it.”
Casey the decisive moved swiftly, however, and the proposed peace intervention failed for being too slow. Casey got a glimpse of Goldie through the separating screen doors. It was all he wanted. The next moment he had charged through.
Chairs crashed, tables were overthrown, women shrieked and men cursed. Twenty guns were out. Casey fired six times at Goldie Louie, and six times missed that lucky meddler with other people's pocket-books. Not that Casey's efforts were altogether thrown away. His first bullet lodged in the stomach of Fog-eye, while his third broke the arm of Brother Bill.
Whitey Dutch reached Casey as the latter began his artillery practice, and sought by word and moderate force to induce a truce. Losing patience, however, Whitey, as Casey fired his final shot, pulled his own gun and put a bullet through and through that berserk's head. As Casey fell forward, a second bullet—coming from anywhere—buried itself in his back.