The Trail of 98 (19 page)

Yet how bitterly I brooded over the business. At times there was even black
murder in my heart. I planned schemes of revenge, grinding my teeth in impotent
rage the while; and my feelings were complicated by that awful gnawing hunger
for Berna that never left me. It was a perfect agony of heart, a panic-fear, a
craving so intense that at times I felt I would go distracted with the pain of
it.

Perhaps I am a poor sort of being. I have often wondered. I either feel
intensely, or I am quite indifferent. I am a prey to my emotions, a martyr to my
moods. Apart from my great love for Berna it seemed to me as if nothing
mattered. All through these stormy years it was like thatnothing else mattered.
And now that I am nearing the end of my life I can see that nothing else has
ever mattered. Everything that happened appealed to me in its relation to her.
It seemed to me as if I saw all the world through the medium of my love for her,
and that all beauty, all truth, all good was but a setting for this girl of
mine.

"Come on," said Jim; "let's go for a walk in the town."

The "Modern Gomorrah" he called it, and he was never tired of expatiating on
its iniquity.

"See that man there?" he said, pointing to a grey-haired pedestrian, who was
talking to an emphatic blonde. "That man's a lawyer. He's got a lovely
home in Los Angeles, an'
three of the sweetest girls you ever saw. A young fellow needed to have his
credentials O. K.'d by the Purity Committee before he came butting round that
man's home. Now he's off to buy wine for Daisy of the Deadline."

The grey-haired man had turned into a saloon with his companion.

"Yes, that's Dawson for you. We're so far from home. The good old moralities
don't apply here. The hoary old Yukon won't tell on us. We've been a Sunday
School Superintendent for ten years. For fifty more we've passed up the
forbidden fruit. Every one else is helping themselves. Wonder what it tastes
like? Wine is flowing like water. Money's the cheapest thing in sight. Cut
loose, drink up. The orchestra's a-goin'. Get your partners for a nice juicy
two-step. Come on, boys!"

He was particularly bitter, and it really seemed in that general lesion of
the moral fibre that civilisation was only a makeshift, a veneer of
hypocrisy.

"Why should we marvel," I said, "at man's brutality, when but an aeon ago we
all were apes?"

Just then we met the Jam-wagon. He had mushed in from the creeks that very
day. Physically he looked supreme. He was berry-brown, lean, muscular and as
full of suppressed energy as an unsprung bear-trap. Financially he was well
ballasted. Mentally and morally he was in the state of a volcano before an
eruption.

You could see in the quick breathing, in the restlessness
of this man, a pent-up energy that
clamoured to exhaust itself in violence and debauch. His fierce blue eyes were
wild and roving, his lips twitched nervously. He was an atavism; of the race of
those white-bodied, ferocious sea-kings that drank deep and died in the din of
battle. He must live in the white light of excitement, or sink in the gloom of
despair. I could see his fine nostrils quiver like those of a charger that
scents the smoke of battle, and I realised that he should have been a soldier
still, a leader of forlorn hopes, a partner of desperate hazards.

As we walked along, Jim did most of the talking in his favourite morality
vein. The Jam-wagon puffed silently at his briar pipe, while I, very listless
and downhearted, thought largely of my own troubles. Then, in the middle of the
block, where most of the music-halls were situated, suddenly we met Locasto.

When I saw him my heart gave a painful leap, and I think my face must have
gone as white as paper. I had thought much over this meeting, and had dreaded
it. There are things which no man can overlook, and, if it meant death to me, I
must again try conclusions with the brute.

He was accompanied by a little bald-headed Jew named Spitzstein, and we were
almost abreast of them when I stepped forward and arrested them. My teeth were
clenched; I was all a-quiver with passion; my heart beat violently. For a moment
I stood there, confronting him in speechless excitement.

He was dressed in that miner's costume in which
he always looked so striking. From his big Stetson
to his high boots he was typically the big, strong man of Alaska, the Conqueror
of the Wild. But his mouth was grim as granite, and his black eyes hard and
repellent as those of a toad.

"Oh, you coward!" I cried. "You vile, filthy coward!"

He was looking down on me from his imperious height, very coolly, very
cynically.

"Who are you?" he drawled; "I don't know you."

"Liar as well as coward," I panted. "Liar to your teeth. Brute, coward,
liar"

"Here, get out of my way," he snarled; "I've got to teach you a lesson."

Once more before I could guard he landed on me with that terrible right-arm
swing, and down I went as if a sledgehammer had struck me. But instantly I was
on my feet, a thing of blind passion, of desperate fight. I made one rush to
throw myself on this human tower of brawn and muscle, when some one pinioned me
from behind. It was Jim.

"Easy, boy," he was saying; "you can't fight this big fellow."

Spitzstein was looking on curiously. With wonderful quickness a crowd had
collected, all avidly eager for a fight. Above them towered the fierce,
domineering figure of Locasto. There was a breathless pause, then, at the
psychological moment, the Jam-wagon intervened.

The smouldering fire in his eye had brightened into
a fierce joy; his twitching mouth was
now grim and stern as a prison door. For days he had been fighting a dim
intangible foe. Here at last was something human and definite. He advanced to
Locasto.

"Why don't you strike some one nearer your own size?" he demanded. His voice
was tense, yet ever so quiet.

Locasto flashed at him a look of surprise, measuring him from head to
foot.

"You're a brute," went on the Jam-wagon evenly; "a cowardly brute."

Black Jack's face grew dark and terrible. His eyes glinted sparks of
fire.

"See here, Englishman," he said, "this isn't your scrap. What are you butting
in about?"

"It isn't," said the Jam-wagon, and I could see the flame of fight brighten
joyously in him. "It isn't, but I'll soon make it mine. There!"

Quick as a flash he dealt the other a blow on the cheek, an open-handed blow
that stung like a whiplash.

"Now, fight me, you coward."

There and then Locasto seemed about to spring on his challenger. With hands
clenched and teeth bared, he half bent as if for a charge. Then, suddenly, he
straightened up.

"All right," he said softly; "Spitzstein, can we have the Opera House?"

"Yes, I guess so. We can clear away the benches."

"Then tell the crowd
to come along; we'll give them a free show."

I think there must have been five hundred men around that ring. A big
Australian pugilist was umpire. Some one suggested gloves, but Locasto would not
hear of it.

"No," he said, "I want to mark the son of a dog so his mother will never know
him again."

He had become frankly brutal, and prepared for the fray exultantly. Both men
fought in their underclothing.

Stripped down, the Jam-wagon was seen to be much the smaller man, not only in
height, but in breadth and weight. Yet he was a beautiful figure of a fighter,
clean, well-poised, firm-limbed, with a body that seemed to taper from the
shoulders down. His fair hair glistened; his eyes were wary and cool, his lips
set tightly. In the person of this living adversary he was fighting an unseen
one vastly more dread and terrific.

Locasto looked almost too massive. His muscles bulged out. The veins in his
forearms were cord-like. His great chest seemed as broad as a door. His legs
were statuesque in their size and strength. In that camp of strong men probably
he was the most powerful.

And nowhere in the world could a fight have been awaited with greater zest.
These men, miners, gamblers, adventurers of all kinds, pushed and struggled for
a place. A great joy surged through
them at the thought of the approaching combat. Keen-eyed,
hard-breathing, a-thrill with expectation, the crowd packed closer and closer.
Outside, people were clamouring for admission. They climbed on the stage, and
into the boxes. They hung over the galleries. All told, there must have been a
thousand of them.

As the two men stood up it was like the lithe Greek athlete compared with the
brawny Roman gladiator. "Three to one on Locasto," some one shouted. Then a
great hush came over the house, so that it might have been empty and deserted.
Time was called. The fight began.

With one tiger-rush Locasto threw himself on his man. There was no
preliminary fiddling here; they were out for blood, and the sooner they wallowed
in it the better. Right and left he struck with mighty swings that would have
felled an ox, but the Jam-wagon was too quick for him. Twice he ducked in time
to avoid a furious blow, and, before Locasto could recover, he had hopped out of
reach. The big man's fist swished through the empty air. He almost overbalanced
with the force of his effort, but he swung round quickly, and there was the
Jam-wagon, cool and watchful, awaiting his next attack.

Locasto's face grew fiendish in its sinister wrath; he shot forth a foul
imprecation, and once more he hurled himself resistlessly on his foe. This time
I thought my champion must go down, but no! With a dexterity that seemed
marvellous, he dodged, ducked and side-stepped; and once more Locasto's blows
went wide and short. Jeers began to go up from the throng. "Even money on the
little fellow," sang out a voice with the flat twang of a banjo.

Locasto glared round on the crowd. He was accustomed to lord it over these
men, and the jeers goaded him like banderilleros goad a bull. Again and again he
repeated his tremendous rushes, only to find his powerful arms winnowing the
empty air,
only to see
his agile antagonist smiling at him in mockery from the centre of the ring. Not
one of his sledgehammer smashes reached their mark, and the round closed without
a blow having landed.

From the mob of onlookers a chorus of derisive cheers went up. The little man
with the banjo voice was holding up a poke of dust. "Even money on the little
one." A hum of eager conversation broke forth.

I was at the ring-side. At the beginning I had been in an agony of fear for
the Jam-wagon. Looking at the two men, it seemed as if he could hardly hope to
escape terrible punishment at the hands of one so massively powerful, and every
blow inflicted on him would have been like one inflicted on myself. But now I
took heart and looked forward with less anxiety.

Again time was called, and Locasto sprang up, seemingly quite refreshed by
his rest. Once more he plunged after his man, but now I could see his rushes
were more under control, his smashing blows better timed, his fierce jabs more
shrewdly delivered. Again I began to quake for the Jam-wagon, but he showed a
wonderful quickness in his footwork, darting in and out, his hands swinging at
his sides, a smile of mockery on his lips. He was deft as a dancing-master; he
twinkled like a gleam of light, and amid that savage thresh of blows he was as
cool as if he were boxing in the school gymnasium.

"Who is he?" those at the ring-side began to whisper. Time and again it
seemed as if he were
cornered, but in a marvellous way he wormed himself free. I
held my breath as he evaded blow after blow, some of which seemed to miss him by
a mere hair's breadth. He was taking chances, I thought, so narrowly did he
permit the blows to miss him. I was all keyed up, on edge with excitement, eager
for my man to strike, to show he was not a mere ring-tactician. But the
Jam-wagon bided his time.

And so the round ended, and it was evident that the crowd was of the same
opinion as myself. "Why don't he mix up a little?" said one. "Give him time,"
said another. "He's all right: there's some class to that work."

Locasto came up for the third round looking sobered, subdued, grimly
determined. Evidently he had made up his mind to force his opponent out of his
evasive tactics. He was wary as a cat. He went cautiously. Yet again he assumed
the aggressive, gradually working the Jam-wagon into a corner. A collision was
inevitable; there was no means of escape for my friend; that huge bulk, with its
swinging, flail-like arms, menaced him hopelessly.

Suddenly Locasto closed in. He swooped down on the Jam-wagon. He had him. He
shortened his right arm for a jab like the crash of a pile-driver. The arm shot
out, but once again the Jam-wagon was not there. He ducked quickly, and
Locasto's great fist brushed his hair.

Then, like lightning, the two came to a clinch. Now, thought I, it's all off
with the Jam-wagon. I saw Locasto's eyes dilate with ferocious joy. He had
the other in his giant
arms; he could crush him in a mighty hug, the hug of a grizzly, crush him like
an egg-shell. But, quick as the snap of a trap, the Jam-wagon had pinioned his
arms at the elbow, so that he was helpless. For a moment he held him, then,
suddenly releasing his arms, he caught him round the body, shook him with a
mighty side-heave, gave him the cross-buttock, and, before he could strike a
single blow, threw him in the air and dashed him to the ground.

"Time!" called the umpire. It was all done so quickly it was hard for the eye
to follow, but a mighty cheer went up from the house. "Two to one on the little
fellow," called the banjo-voice. Suddenly Locasto rose to his feet. He was
shamed, angered beyond all expression. Heaving and panting, he lurched to his
corner, and in his eyes there was a look that boded ill for his adversary.

Time again. With the lightness of a panther the Jam-wagon sprang into the
centre of the ring. More than halfway he met Locasto, and now his intention
seemed to be to draw his man on rather than to avoid him. I watched his every
movement with a sense of thrilling fascination. He had resumed his serpentine
movements, advancing and retreating with shadow-like quickness, feinting,
side-stepping, pawing the air till he had his man baffled and bewildered. Yet he
never struck a blow.