Part 8 (1/2)
”He fights like a Cheyenne,” grinned the young commander. ”How soon do they begin?”
”Right off; now! They come from _all_ round!” was the almost agonized cry.
”Then I won't have to lug you back. You can go!”
And like a frightened hare the young foreigner darted away, dodging and diving up the slope, only to fall exhausted at the top, and then to creep on all-fours to the shelter of the office. Already some of the armed rioters had managed to climb far up the hill-side and from behind rock or ledge to open fire on the platform. The range was full three hundred yards, their aim was poor, and the bullets flew wild, but the effect on this poor lad was all they could ask. He collapsed at the opening door.
Leisurely, yet cautiously, Geordie climbed in his tracks--went first to the office to give warning to Nolan, then round to the compressor to instruct the little guard. c.a.w.ker poked a head from a window and looked anxiously toward the gaping mouth of the ravine. The darkness of night was already settling in its gloomy depths. The homely shed looked black and forbidding. Aloft on each side were precipitous slopes affording but slight foothold. Little likelihood was there of rioters sliding down to attack them, but, suppose they pried loose, or blasted out, some of those huge rocks up the mountain and sent them rolling, bounding, cras.h.i.+ng down? What might _then_ happen?
A bullet tearing through the s.h.i.+ngling, ten feet above c.a.w.ker's protruding head, made him jerk it in, like a turtle, but presently it reappeared at the window.
”It's the dynamite I'm thinking of,” said he. ”A rock lighting on that now--”
”Where is it?” interrupted Graham.
”In that first shed yonder--a dozen boxes.”
”Bring two men and come along,” was the quick order, and it was no time now for reluctance, resentment, much less refusal. The two men summoned shrank back and would not come, but c.a.w.ker found two who dared to follow. It was a case of ”duck and run” for all.
”Watch the hill-side above!” shouted Graham, in tones that rang through every building and reached every ear. ”Shoot down every man that tries to heave rocks into the ravine, or fire at us. We're going to move that dynamite.”
Once within the shelter of the gorge, with comrades carefully sighting the slopes, Geordie felt the danger would not be very great. A swift rush carried all four over the open s.p.a.ce of twenty yards. Three or four shots came zipping from aloft, but the instant ring of Winchesters back of them told that watchful eyes had noted every head that appeared, and the swift crackle of fire from the shop put instant stop to the fun up the slope. Into the store-room the manager led them, and unlocked a heavy little trap-door within; then, one by one, the ominous-looking cases were dragged forth, hoisted, and swiftly borne to the mouth of the mine. Three tunnels there seemed to be, as Geordie hurriedly noted, but into the largest and lowermost they shouldered their perilous burden and carefully, cautiously, stacked the boxes well inside; went back, and searched out, and followed with all the fuse and powder stored at the top. Then, with rock and ore and barrels of earth, they built a stout barrier in front of the tunnel, blocking it from without, and the sun was down and night was upon them when they stumbled back to their posts.
For now still a weightier problem remained to them--how to defend those works in the dark.
In all, Geordie Graham found they had just twenty men on whom he could count. The trembling young Slav at the blacksmith-shop, the blue-lipped boy in the office, and sorely wounded old s.h.i.+ner were out of the fight.
But c.a.w.ker's mine-guards were native born, or Irish, and most of the reinforcements that came with Nolan and himself were Americans, and all were good men and true. By day they could see and shoot at any man or men who sought to approach them with hostile intent. By night they could see nothing. There was only one way, said Graham, to prevent the more daring among the rioters crawling in on them and firing some of the shops, and that was to throw out strong pickets on every side, then trust to their ears, their grit, and their guns.
Already he had been selecting good positions in which to post his sentries. Ten at least, full half his force, would be needed, and while vigilant watch was kept through the twilight, and a warning shot sent at every hat that showed within dangerous range, Geordie went from building to building picking out his men.
Arms, ammunition, and provisions, fortunately, they had in abundance.
The company had long since seen to that. Nolan already had set ”Blue Lips” to work building a fire in the big kitchen stove at the office and setting the kettle to boil. Coffee, hard bread, and bacon, with canned pork and beans, were served to all hands, about five at a time, and then, with Nolan to station the watchers on the south and west fronts, George and his five stole out on the northward slope, alert, cautious, and silent, moving only a few paces at a time.
Afar down in the depths of the valley the cl.u.s.tered lights of the excited town shone brilliantly through the gloaming. Every now and then through the surrounding silence came the bark of dogs, the shrill voices of clamoring women, and occasionally a burst of howls and yells.
Some rude orator was still preaching death and destruction to a more than half-drunken gang, urging them on to the aid of their brethren up the levels above. All about the Silver s.h.i.+eld, however, was ominously still. Over on opposite heights and down in stray gulches could be seen the flitting lights of rival establishments, and away to the west, around the base of the mountain where the railway squirmed by the side of the tortuous stream, two or three locomotive-engines, on stalled trains, had been whistling long and hard for aid. All that was useless.
Above for a mile, below for a league, the track had been torn up in places, and down along Silver Run, toward Hatch's Cove and the foot-hills, culverts and cuts had been mined and blown out for five miles more. No sheriff's posses from below, no hated Pinkertons, no despised militia, no dreaded regulars, should come to the aid of Silver s.h.i.+eld till there was nothing left worth saving.
And up here on the northward flank of the bold, rounded heights that overhung the town, and harbored now both besieged and besiegers, invisible to each other and to the lower world in the darkness, Geordie Graham lay crouching behind a little bowlder, every sense on edge, for to his left front, a little higher up, he could distinctly hear low, gruff voices, confused murmurings and movements, sounds that told him that, relying on their overwhelming numbers, the mob was coming slowly, surely, down to carry out their threat to fire the buildings and to finish as they pleased the wretched defenders.
It was barely nine o'clock. Below him, perhaps twenty yards downhill, was his nearest sentry. Above him, and a little retired, was another, a silent young German-American who had been at the head of the men working tunnel Number Two. Beyond him still, and thrown back toward the head of the ravine, was one of c.a.w.ker's guard, a sharp-eyed, sharp-witted chap who had seemed at first to chafe at Graham's hints and orders, yet had acted on them. And on these two, so far as sound could enable him to judge, all ignorant of their presence and purpose, this uncouth ma.s.s of men was bearing down. Winchester in hand and, as he himself said later, his heart in his mouth, Geordie stole swiftly uphill to the post of the German and found him kneeling and all aquiver with excitement. He, too, had just heard.
”Don't fire till I do,” said Graham. ”I'll be right out where you can hear me challenge.” A few steps higher he climbed, and then called low and clear:
”D'you hear them coming, guard? Can you see anything?”
And the answer came in the drawl of the Southland: