“Why, Tolley! here’s your dead man now. As I’m a sinner—and the parson assures me that I am—this is Dick Beckworth.”
“Dick the Devil!” ejaculated two or three in chorus.
“This is a nice sort of a day for him to come back,” muttered Tolley, evidently quite as much amazed as the others.
Hunt peered into the face of the senseless man. There was a certain regularity of feature, in spite of the sharpness and blueness caused by the extreme cold he had suffered, which the parson saw might lead the casual observer to consider Dick Beckworth handsome. His complexion was as spotless as a girl’s; the skin scarcely tanned; ears and nose small and perfectly formed; the closed eyes, long-lashed; and the brows as delicately marked as though done with a stencil.
He was shaved, although he had come out of the wilderness, and his jet-black mustache was as silky as his long hair. Dick Beckworth, gambler and lady’s man, without doubt made a striking appearance wherever he went. Even lying there on the bench, colorless, and with his eyes closed, the parson realized that the man would be indeed a “heart-breaker”—among young and inexperienced women at least.
It could not be doubted that he had made a strong impression upon the almost childish mind and heart of Nell Blossom. She must have been attracted by this man just as she would have been by a gaudy flower or a bird of brilliant plumage.
Hunt felt a strange loathing for the gambler, much as his present state should excite pity. This was the man, he believed, who had brought about the change that Joe Hurley said had suddenly come over Nell Blossom’s character.
Beckworth had hidden the fact that he had escaped death through his fall into the canyon and so had laid a burden of terror and anguish upon Nell’s heart, which was reason enough for her apparent hatred of all mankind.
Nobbs, the barkeeper, brought the drink at Tolley’s command. They forced open Dick’s jaws and poured the potent stuff into him. The color almost instantly stained his cheeks. His eyelids fluttered. He choked.
“What was it Andy McCann said about him?” Hurley said thoughtfully. “He’s got the luck of a hanged man. He’s coming around all right. But there are others out in the storm that need help more than this fellow.”