The saloon doors swung again and four or five dark figures jostled noisily out and came haltingly down the street. They walked crazily, like ships without a rudder, veering from one side of the walk to the other, shouting and singing uncouth, ribald songs, hoarse laughter interspersed with scattered oaths.
"O! Jesus Christ!" came distinctly through the quiet night. The young man felt a distinct pain for the Christ by his side, like the pressing of a thorn into the brow. He seemed to know the prick himself. For these were some of those for whom He died!
It occurred to Courtland that he was seeing everything on this walk through the eyes of the Christ. He remembered Scrooge and his journey with the Ghost of Christmas Past in Dickens's Christmas Carol. It was like that. He was seeing the real soul of everybody! He was with the architect of the universe, noting where the work had gone wrong from the mighty plans. He suddenly knew that these creatures coming giddily toward him were planned to mighty things!
The figures paused before one of the dark houses, pointed and laughed; went nearer to the steps and stooped. He could not hear what they were saying; the voices were hushed in ugly whispers, broken by harsh laughter. Only now and then he caught a syllable.
"Wake up!" floated out into the silence once. And again, "No, you don't, my pretty little chicken!"
Then a girl's scream pierced the night and something darted out from the darkness of the door-step, eluding the drunken men, but slipped and fell!
Courtland broke into a noiseless run.
The men had scrambled tipsily after the girl and clutched her. They lifted her unsteadily and surrounded her. She screamed again, and dashed this way and that blindly, but they met her every time and held her.
Courtland knew, as by a flash, that he had been brought here for this crisis. It was as if he had heard the words spoken to him, "Now go!" He, lowering his head and crouching, came swiftly forward, watching carefully where he steered, and coming straight at two of the men with his powerful shoulders. It was an old trick of the football field and it bowled the two assailants on the right straight out into the gutter. The other three made a dash at him, but he side-stepped one and tripped him; a blow on the point of the chin sent another sprawling on the sidewalk; but the last one, who was perhaps the most sober of them all, showed fight and called to his comrades to come on and get this stranger who was trying to steal their girl. The language he used made Courtland's blood boil. He struck the fellow across his foul mouth, and then clenching with him, went down upon the sidewalk. His antagonist was a heavier man than he was, but the steady brain and the trained muscles had the better of it from the first, and in a moment more the drunken man was choking and limp.
Courtland rose and looked about. The two fellows in the gutter were struggling to their feet with loud threats, and the fellow on the sidewalk was staggering toward him. They would be upon the girl again in a moment. He looked toward her, as she stood trembling a few feet away from him, too frightened to try to run, not daring to leave her protector. A street light fell directly upon her white face. It was Bonnie Brentwood!