‘An’ did ye no’ gang aifter him?’ he asked in indignant surprise, adding with some contempt, ‘Man! but ye’re a feckless buddie.’
‘Billy gone too!’ said Shaw. ‘They might have let Billy alone.’
Poor Craig stood in a dumb agony. Billy’s fall seemed more than he could bear. We went out, leaving him heart-broken amid the ruins of his League.
CHAPTER IX
THE LEAGUE’S REVENGE
As we stood outside of Craig’s shack in the dim starlight, we could not hide from ourselves that we were beaten. It was not so much grief as a blind fury that filled my heart, and looking at the faces of the men about me I read the same feeling there. But what could we do? The yells of carousing miners down at Slavin’s told us that nothing could be done with them that night. To be so utterly beaten, and unfairly, and with no chance of revenge, was maddening.
‘I’d like to get back at ‘em,’ said Abe, carefully repressing himself.
‘I’ve got it, men,’ said Graeme suddenly. ‘This town does not require all the whisky there is in it’; and he unfolded his plan. It was to gain possession of Slavin’s saloon and the bar of the Black Rock Hotel, and clear out all the liquor to be found in both these places. I did not much like the idea; and Geordie said, ‘I’m ga’en aifter the lad; I’ll hae naethin’ tae dae wi’ yon. It’s’ no’ that easy, an’ it’s a sinfu’ waste.’
But Abe was wild to try it, and Shaw was quite willing, while old Nelson sternly approved.