“Hey, Wah, this soup is rotten!” called a young fellow from the end of the table.
“Oh, lubbly, lubbly soup!” chanted Wah. “Lubbly, me bludder, lubbly.”
“I’m not your bludder, Wah,” answered the man politely. “I would rather have an ape for a brother than you.”
“You me bludder, allee samee, allee samee.” Saying which, Wah disappeared into the kitchen, only to stick his head a moment later through the connecting window, and call: “Oh, you pig-faced Swede, Oh, you pig-faced Swede! La, la, boom, boom!”
But even Wah was unable to break the tension that surrounded the supper. As the men were lighting their pipes at the close of the meal, from the gulch behind the camp where were the saloons, came the sound of a fusillade of shots and a burst of shrill yelling.
“The game is on,” thought Loring.
As the noise outside became louder, Stephen said to the men: “I want all you fellows to get your guns and go over into the office to guard the safe. Go as quietly as you can so as not to stir things up. Keep quiet in there and don’t shoot unless you are compelled to. We have just issued some new stock, and if there is news of any fighting here the value will go all to pieces. We must just wait, and keep quiet. Remember a fight means almost ruin, and we have got to avoid it.”
Knowlton looked quickly over to McKay, and nodded. Both were experienced men, and they knew that now was no time to think of stock values, but of actually saving the mine, and the lives of the white men there. They knew that serious trouble was intended, as since the shooting, every outlet of the camp had been guarded by Mexicans. They knew that the only chance, not for avoiding a fight, but for avoiding a massacre, lay in an immediate attack on the Mexicans, before they were completely out of hand. And Loring was thinking of stock values! Still, they remembered that he was inexperienced, and they set down to indecision what seemed like criminal folly. As for McKay, he had known Loring to fall once before, and he was not hopeful for the outcome.
“Knowlton,” continued Loring, “you had better stay here with me. It won’t do for the miners to think that you are hidden.”
“Well, I won’t be,” exclaimed Knowlton decisively. “There is only one thing in this world that I am afraid of, and that is a fool!”