The Spoilers of the Valley Part 28

"Don't know I have one--so it must be all right!"

"What do you think about paying off old scores?" Mischief was lurking in his eyes.

"Oh, let's forget that, Jim! It is too cold-blooded for me."

"Cold-blooded nothing! The dirty skunk didn't look at it that way when you were as weak as Meeting-house tea and hardly able to stand on your two pins."

"That's no lie, either!"

"And he'd do it again if he thought it would work."

Phil looked at Jim.

"I guess you are right,--and I feel mad enough to sc.r.a.p with anybody."

"Right! Let us work it as near as we can the way he worked it on you."

They went over to the table near the window and rehea.r.s.ed quietly their method of operation, and it was not long before a noise in the back room signalled the break-up of the card game. Half a dozen rough-looking fellows from Redmans Creek followed one another out to the saloon, headed, as usual, by McGregor, straddling his legs and swaggering, looking round with a cynical twist on his handsome face.

They went over to the bar.

McGregor pushed himself in at the far end, brus.h.i.+ng an innocent individual out of his way in the operation. The man who followed McGregor wedged himself in next. McGregor slid along and two more harmless men at the bar gave way. It was an old trick and they knew how to perform it. Still the McGregor gang pushed in, one after another, until the entire counter was taken up by the six, who stood there, legs and elbows sprawled, laughing and jeering at the men they had displaced and at their lack of courage in not endeavouring to hold their own.

They stood in this fas.h.i.+on for possibly five minutes, blocking the counter and not allowing anyone else to get near it.

Suddenly Phil jumped up from his seat and walked over to the bar.

"Say, fellows! Come on all and have a drink on me!" he shouted.

The six at the bar swung round to look at the speaker.

"Come on,--ease up, you ginks!--unless you've hired the Kenora saloon for the night."

No one moved, so Phil caught the man nearest to him by the belt and yanked him out deftly. Langford, who was immediately behind Phil, caught the next one and repeated the performance.

There was a scramble and some of the more aggressive bystanders joined in to Phil's and Jim's a.s.sistance. Then the more timid followed, with the ultimate result that five of McGregor's gang were dislodged, as a dozen men crowded alongside and around their champion. McGregor still held his place defiantly, elbows and legs asprawl as before. Phil was close up to him, with Jim at Phil's left hand.

"Guess you think you're some kid!" McGregor remarked, spitting a wad of chewing tobacco on to the floor.

"Quit your sc.r.a.pping," returned Phil in a.s.sumed irritation. "Have a drink!--it's on me. It isn't often I stand treat. Name your poison!"

"Well,--if that's all you're up to, guess I might as well," he answered, in reluctant conciliation.

"Come on, fellows! This h.e.l.l-for-leather blacksmith wants to blow in his week's wages on drinks. We ain't goin' to stop him."

The bar-tenders served as fast as they could. Phil paid the score, then turned to have a fresh look at McGregor. The latter was watching him closely out of the corner of his eyes. He took up his gla.s.s.

"Guess you think you're puttin' one over," he snarled. "Well,--you've got another guess comin'."

He put his tumbler up against Phil's jacket, tilted it deliberately, sending the contents trickling all the way down Phil's clothes right to his boot. He looked into Ralston's eyes with a sneer on his face and slowly set his tumbler on the counter, watching every movement in the room through narrowed eyes.

Phil's temper flared out and he swung on McGregor with tremendous quickness.

To his surprise, quick as he was, his fist fell on McGregor's wrist.

In a second, they were in the centre of the room, tables and chairs were whirled into corners as by magic, and the two were in a ring formed by a wall of swaying bodies and eager faces, for more than a few of them had witnessed the previous encounter between the pair and had been wondering just when the return match would take place.

Phil waited with bated breath for the bull-like rush which he expected, while Langford's voice could be heard high over the hubbub, shouting in the Doric to which he had risen in his excitement:--

"Mair room! Gi'e them mair room. Widen oot, can ye no!--widen oot!"

But instead of the rush for grips that Phil antic.i.p.ated, he found himself faced by a man, strong as a lion, with arms out in the true pugilistic att.i.tude. He guessed it for a ruse and a bit of play-acting, and sprang in. He struck three times for separate parts of the cowpuncher's body, but each time he struck he encountered a guarding arm or fist. This more than surprised him, for it was well known that McGregor's strong and only point was his brute force.

In order to give himself time to think the matter out, Phil sprang away again.

McGregor's face was sphinx-like in its inscrutable cynicism.

They circled, facing each other like sparring gamec.o.c.ks of a giant variety.

Phil, determined on having another try, jumped in on his huge opponent.

He struck, once--twice. He was about to strike again, when he staggered back as if he had been hit by a sledge hammer fair on the chin. The saloon swung head over heels in a whirligig movement. Phil's arms became heavy as lead and dropped to his side. His legs sagged under him.

In a state of drugging collapse, he felt himself seized and crushed as into a pulp; a not unpleasant sensation of swinging, a hurtling through the air and splintering,--then, well,--that was all.

When he came to, he was being carried up the stairs to his bedroom, to the accompaniment of Mrs. Clunie's repeated regrets, in broad Scotch, that it was a pity "weel bred young chiels couldna agree to disagree in a decent manner, wise-like and circ.u.mspectly, withoot fechtin' like a wheen drucken colliers."

This did not prevent that good lady from was.h.i.+ng and binding Phil's numerous but not very deadly cuts and bruises.

It was two days before he was able to be out of bed, and during these two days he heard a number of stories, through Mrs. Clunie, of what had happened at the Kenora Hotel after his hurried exit through the window. These stories he refused to believe, for his faith in Jim Langford's ability was too strong to be easily shaken. But one thing he had to give credence to was, that Jim had not shown face at Mrs.

Clunie's since the night of the trouble.

Mrs. Clunie complained that half a dozen times she had chased "that hauf-witted, saft sannie o' a daftie, ca'ed Laugher, or Smiler or something," from the back door, and she was sure he was "efter nae guid."

On the morning of the third day, Phil, stiff and a little wobbly, set out for the smithy, where big Sol Hanson welcomed him back with an indulgent grin.

Hanson had learned all about the affray, as everyone else in town seemed to have done.

"But has anyone seen Langford?" asked Phil in some concern, as they discussed the matter.

"Oh, Langford go on one big booze," laughed Sol. "He turn up maybe in about one month, all shot to h.e.l.l, then he sober up again for long time."

"But doesn't anyone know where he is?"

"Sure, sometimes!--maybe at Kelowna, then Kamloops. Somebody see him at Armstrong, then no see him for another while. Best thing you leave Jim Langford till he gets good and ready to come back. Only make trouble any other way. Everybody leave big Jim when he goes on a big toot."

"Well," said Phil with some decision, "I'm going after him anyway, and I'm going to stay right with him till he's O.K."

"All right, son--please yourself! We are not so busy now, but I tell you it no d.a.m.n good. I know Jim Langford, five, maybe six year,--see!"