Page:Fighting blood (IA fightingblood00witw).pdf/317

 "and we're gonna teach him he can't take the bread and butter out of our mouths and get away with it. We're gonna tar and feather the yellah dog!"

"And ride him on a rail out of town!" adds another ex-carpet weaver joyfully.

Judy gasps and I must say for a split second I felt highly tickled. Rags has double-crossed, framed, and fouled me so often that I wouldn't be human if I didn't get a kick out of seeing him get the worst of it, a reward he richly deserves. I step on the gas and start to steer my bus back through the mob and then all of a sudden I stop dead. I don't know what's the matter with me, but I'm simply crazy about fair play! If just one guy had wanted to tar and feather Rags I would of declared the scheme a good thought and wished him the best of luck, but there's over two hundred of these strikers, and two hundred to one is no fair, not even against a Rags Dempster, now is it? So I dash out of the car and shove my ways through the crowd. I know nearly all of 'em and all of 'em knows me and even in the excitement they make room for the world's light-heavyweight champion.

Rags is in the center of the mob and he sure looks like he's been through the mill, he does for a fact. Half his clothes has been tore off by willing hands, his chalk white face is all bruised and scratched and two or three huskies is pushing him around between 'em like he's a medicine ball.

"Lynch him! String him up! Get a rope!" they commence to howl on the outskirts of the mob.

Rags looks wildly about, recognizes me all of a sud-