Page:Frank Packard - On the Iron at Big Cloud.djvu/158

 it." Keating stopped suddenly, and again began to cough.

Spirlaw looked at the boy uneasily, and mechanically fumbled with the cords of the package he had laid upon the table. By the time he had removed the wrappers and disclosed two ugly, businesslike looking ·45s and a half-dozen boxes of cartridges, Keating's paroxysm had passed.

"I guess it was exciting enough for me, anyhow"—Keating tried hard to make his laugh ring true. "I'm a little weak from it yet."

"If you weren't sick," Spirlaw burst out, "I'd make you sick for comin' back here. You know well enough we'll get it next—you knew so well you came back to help"

"I told Carleton he ought to send some help down here," Keating interrupted hastily; "and he just looked at me like a crazy man—he was half mad anyhow with the ruin of things. 'Help!' he flung out at me. 'Where's it coming from? Let Spirlaw yank up his stakes and pull out if things get looking bad!

"Pull out!" shouted Spirlaw, in a sudden roar. "Pull out! Me! Not for all the cross-eyed, hamstrung Polacks on the system!"

"I think you'd better," said Keating quietly. "After what I saw last night, I think you'd better. There was no holding them—they were like savages, and the further they went the worse they got. They were backed up by whisky and the worst element in town. I was in the station with Carleton, Regan, Harvey, Riley and Spence and some of the other