"My blessed blankets!" he was lamenting. "You damned scoundrels! you'll not leave one in the hut. Fighting in bed just the same as if you were lyin' in a pig-sty. What the devil was I thinkin' of when I took on that pig of a Moleskin Joe?"
Billy ceased thinking just then, for a wild swing of Moleskin's heavy fist missed Gahey and caught the ganger under the ear. The whiskered one dropped with a groan amid the floor-planks and lay, kicking, shouting meanwhile that Moleskin had murdered him. Someone lit a match, and my bedmates ceased fighting and seemed little the worse for their adventure. Billy's face looked ghastly, and a red streak ran from his nose into the puddle in which he lay. He had now stopped speaking and was fearfully quiet. I jumped out of bed, shaking in every limb, for I thought that the old ganger was killed.
"A tin of water thrown in his face will bring him round," I said, but feared at the same time that it would not.
"Or a bucketful," someone suggested.
"Stab a pin under the quick of his nail."
"Burn a feather under his nose."
"Give him a dig in the back."
"Or a prod in the ribs."
The match had gone out, no one could find another, and the voices of advice came from the darkness in all the corners of the room. Even old Sandy MacDonald, who could find no cure for his own complaint, the wasting disease, was offering endless advice on the means of curing Red Billy Davis.
A match was again found; the lamp was lit, and after much rough doctoring on the part of his gang, the ganger recovered and swore himself to sleep. Joe and Gahey came back together and stood by the bed.