Page:Allan Dunn--Dead Man's Gold.djvu/141

Rh from their scant footholds into the furnace below, three had been dragged inside the cave where Harvey had stabbed the last resistance out of one and Stone had smashed in another's skull. Larkin had choked his to submission and then finished him with his own tomahawk. They were not unscathed. Bruises and slashes in the flesh were the worst, however, with nothing serious. Larkin gaspingly cursed at Healy.

"You bloody mucker, you measly quitter!" he panted. "Why didn't yer reload the pistols? Didn't heven 'and hover your hown. You hain't got the nerve of a newborn louse!"

"They got me with an arrow through my right arm," said Healy, exhibiting his wound, with the shaft clinging to the forearm. "I couldn't load with one hand."

Larkin was swift in contrition.

"'Ere, I'm sorry," he said. "I tyke it hall back. Let's 'ave a look at it. Gawd! Went clean through. That barb's narsty."

The metal, sharply serrated point of the arrow protruded a couple of inches from the flesh. The shaft had gone fairly between the two bones. Healy was suffering as much from terror as pain. Stone fancied.

"Think it's poisoned?" the gambler asked, faintly.

"No," said Harvey. "But we got to git it out an' thar's on'y one way." He took the arm and with his knife sheared off the butt of the shaft with its feathers close to the flesh. Then gripping the point