“It's not worth while,” the miner answered. “Mar-den's getting ready to go now, and I only came to bring you a message from Canuck John.”
“I've got one for you that you'll remember longer!”—Three-Ace Artie's smile was ghastly, as he moved back toward the table in a kind of inimical guarantee that the floor space should be equally divided between them. “Come in, Murdock, if you are a man—and shut that door.”
The miner did not move.
“Canuck John is dead,” he said tersely.
“What's that to do with me—or you and me!”—there was a rasp in Three-Ace Artie's voice now. “It's you who have started me on the little journey that I'm going to take, you know, and it's only decent to use the time that's left in bidding me good-bye.”
“I didn't come here to quarrel with you,” Shaw said shortly. “Canuck John regained consciousness for a moment before he died. He couldn't talk much—just a few words. We don't any of us know his real name, or where his home is. From what he said, it seems you do. He said: 'Tell Three-Ace Artie—give goodbye message—my mother and—' And then he died.”
Three-Ace Artie's fingers were twisting themselves around the bag of gold that he had picked up from the table.
“I thought so!” he snarled. “You were yellow this afternoon. I thought you hadn't the nerve to come here, unless you figured you were safe some way or another. And so you think you are going to hide behind a dead man and the sanctimonious pathos of a dying message! Well, I'll see you both damned first! Do you hear!” White to the lips with the fury that, gathering all through the night, was breaking now, he started toward the other, his hand clutching the bag of gold.
Involuntarily the miner stepped back still closer to the door.
“That's not the way out for you!” whispered Three-Ace Artie hoarsely. “If you take it, I'll drop you in the snow before you're ten yards up the street! Damn you, we'll play this hand out now for keeps! You've started something, and we'll finish it. You've rid the camp and rid Alaska of a tainted smell, have you? You sneaked around behind my back with your cursed righteousness to give me a push further on the road to hell! I know your kind—and, by God, I know your breed! Four years ago on the White Pass you took a man's last dollar for a hunk of bread. He could pay or starve! You sleek skunk—do you remember? Your conscience has been troubling you perhaps, and so you went around the camp and collected this, did you—this!” He held up the bag of gold above his head. “No? You didn't recognise me again? Well, no matter—take it back! Tell Ton-Nugget Camp I gave it back to you—to keep!” In a flash his arm swept forward, and, with all his strength behind it, he hurled the bag at the other's head.