"Your dog's in bed with the baby, and Ma's give him milk with brandy in it, and he drank it and growled at her, and the boys is holding him down now to keep him from coming out to you, and he ain't much hurt nohow," squealed one of Michael's big-eyed children.
John Flint, stretching his arms above his head, drew in a great gulping mouthful of air, exhaled it, and laughed a deepchested, satisfied laugh, for all he was staggering like a drunken man. Here Michael's wife Katya came puffing out of her house like a traction engine—such was the shape in which nature formed her—and falling on her knees, caught his hand to her vast bosom, weeping like the overflowing of a river and blubbering uncouth sounds.
"Get up, you crazy woman!" snarled John Flint, his face going brick-red. "Stop licking my hand, and get up!" Although he did not know it, Katya symbolized the mental attitude of every laborer in Appleboro toward him from that hour.
"Here's Doctor Westmoreland! And here comes the po-lice!" yelled a boy, joyous with excitement.
Westmoreland cast one by no means sympathetic glance at the wreck on the ground, and his big arms went about John Flint; his fingers flew over him like an apprehensive father's.
"What's all this? Who's been fighting here, you people?" demanded the town marshal's brisk voice. "Big Jan? And—good Lord! Mister Flint!" His eyes bulged. He looked from Big Jan on the ground to the Butterfly Man under Westmoreland's hands, with an almost ludicrous astonishment.
"I'm sure sorry, Mr. Flint, if I have to give you a little trouble for awhile, but—"
"But you'll be considerably sorrier if you do it," said Dr. Walter Westmoreland savagely. "You take that hulk over there to the jail, until I have time to see him. I can't have him sent home to his wife in that shape. And look here, Marshal: Jan got exactly what he deserved; it's been coming to him this long time. If Inglesby's bunch tries to take a hand in this, I'll try to make Appleboro too hot to hold somebody. Understand?"
The marshal was a wise enough man, and he understood. Inglesby's pet foreman had been all but killed, and Inglesby would be furiously angry. But—Mr. Flint had done it, and behind Mr. Flint were powers perhaps as potent as Inglesby's. One thing more may have influenced the marshal: The hitherto timid and apathetic people had merged into a compact and ominous ring around the Butterfly Man and the doctor. A shrill murmur arose, like the wind in the trees presaging a storm. There would be riot in staid Appleboro if one were so foolish as to lay a detaining hand upon John Flint this day. More yet, the beloved Westmoreland himself would probably begin it. Never had the marshal seen Westmoreland look so big and so raging.
"All right, Doctor," said he, hastily backing off. "I reckon you're man enough to handle this."