“Well, I’ll fight you right now, then,” volunteered Denver accommodatingly but the Slogger did not put up his hands.
“That’s all right,” he said backing sullenly away, “but remember what I told you–I’ll git ye!”
“You’ll git nothing!” returned Denver and laughed him out the door, though there were others 192who muttered warnings in his ears. Slogger Meacham was a fighter as well as a driller and his flight with the prize-money was not the first time that he had lapsed from the ways of strict rectitude. He had killed a man during the riots at Goldfield and had been involved in several ugly brawls; but his record as a bad man did not deter Denver from opposing him and he went out to hunt up Owen.
Tom Owen was a good man, and he was also a good driller, but there was one thing that Denver held against him–he had been a drinking man when Arizona was wet. And a man who has drunk, no matter when, is never quite the same in a contest. He has lost that narrow margin of vital force, those last few ounces of strength and stamina which win or lose at the finish. Yet even at that he was a better man than Meacham, who had laid down like a yellow dog. Denver remembered that too and when he found his man he told him they were due to win. Then he borrowed some drills and a pair of eight-pound hammers and they went through a try-out together. Owen was quick and strong, he made the changes like lightning and struck a heavy blow; but when it was over and he was rolling a cigarette Denver noticed that his hand was trembling. The strain of smashing blows had over-taxed his nerves, though they had worked but three or four minutes.
“Well, do the best you can,” said Denver at last, “and for cripes sake, keep away from this boot-leg.”
There was plenty of it in town on this festive 193occasion, a nerve-shattering mixture that came in from New Mexico and had a kick like a mule. It was circulating about in hip pockets and suit-cases and in automobiles with false-bottomed seats, and Denver knew too well from past experience what the temptation was likely to be; yet for all his admonitions when he met Owen in the morning he caught the bouquet of whisky. It was disguised with sen-sen and he pretended not to notice it but his hopes of first money began to wane. They went out again to the backyard of an old saloon where a great block of granite was embedded and while their admirers looked on they practiced their turn, for they had never worked together. A Cornish miner, a champion in his day, volunteered to be their coach and at each call of: “Change!” they shifted from drill to hammer without breaking the rhythm of their stroke.
“You’ll win, lads,” said the Cornishman, patting them affectionately on the back and Denver led them off for their rub-down.
The band began to play in the street below and the Miners’ Union marched past, after which they banked in about a huge block of granite and the drilling contests began. The drilling rock was placed on a platform of heavy timbers at the lower side of the court-house square, and the slope above it and the windows of all the buildings were crowded with shouting miners. First the men who were to compete in the single-jack contests mounted the platform one by one; and the sharp, peck, peck, 194of their hammers made music that the miners knew well. Then, as their holes were cleaned out and the depth of each measured, the first team of double-jackers climbed up to the platform amid the frantic plaudits of the crowd. The announcer introduced them, they laid out their drills and the hammer-man poised his double-jack; then at the word from the umpire they leapt into action, striking and turning like men gone mad.
There were five teams entered, of which Denver’s was the last, but when Meacham and his partner were announced as the next contestants his impatience would not brook further delay. With his own precious drills tied securely in a bundle and Owen and the coach behind him he fought his way to the base of the platform and sat down where he could watch every blow. They came on together, a team hard to match; Meacham stripped to the waist, his ponderous head thrust forward, the muscles swelling to great knots in his arms. His partner wore the heavy, yellow undershirt of a miner, his trousers draped low on his hips; and to hold them up he had a strand of black fuse twisted loosely in place of a belt. He was a hard, hairy man, with grim, deep-set eyes and a jaw that jutted out like a crag and as he raised his hammer to strike Denver saw that he was out to win.
“Go!” called the umpire and the hammer smote the drill-head till it made the blue granite smoke; and then for thirty seconds he flailed away while Slogger Meacham turned the short starter-drill.