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Dick, Bud, Gandil, take the outside of the place. I'll force the door." Wilbur and the other two raced through the door and raised a shout at once, and then there was a rattle of shots. Big Patterson leaned over Pierre. He said in an awe-stricken voice: "Lad, it's a great work that you've done for all of us, if you've drawn the blood from McGurk."
Even Black Gandil rose to take his share in the ceremony all save Bud Mansie, who had glanced out the window a moment before and then silently left the room. A bottle of whiskey was produced and glasses filled all round. Jim Boone brought in the seventh chair and placed it at the table. They raised their glasses. "To the empty chair," said Boone.
"Do you want to take me, Pierre?" He explained: "Of course. Besides, we have to keep an eye on Wilbur. This girl with the yellow hair " She had altered swiftly again. There was no understanding her or following her moods this day. He decided to disregard them, as he had often done before. "Black Gandil swears that I'm bringing bad luck to the boys at last.
Phil Branch had not spoken, as usual, but now he repeated, with rapt, far-off eyes: "'Hurley was hurt in the wrist and Diaz died? Hurley and Diaz! I played with Hurley, a couple of times." "Speakin' personal," said Garry Patterson, his red verging toward purple in excitement, "which I'm ready to go with you down to Morgantown and bury your father." "And do it shipshape," added Black Gandil.
Pierre was paler still, and there was an uneasy twitching of his right hand which every man understood. He barely whispered. "No; damn you!" But Black Gandil loved evil. He said, with a marvelously unpleasant smile: "Then she was " The voice of Dick Wilbur cut in like the snapping of a whip: "Shut up, Gandil, you devil!"
Black Morgan Gandil reined his horse close by, leaned to peer down, and the shadow of his hat fell across the face of Pierre. "There's no good comes of savin' shipwrecked men. Leave him where you found him, Jim. That's my advice. Sidestep a red-headed man. That's what I say."
And Black Gandil, who heard all things, said without looking up: "A man that saves a ship-wrecked fellow, he gets bad luck for thanks." Pierre turned a considering eye on him, and Gandil scowled back. "You've been croaking for six years, Morgan, about the bad luck that would come to Jim from saving me out of the snow. It's never happened, has it?"
McGurk was back. McGurk was prowling about the last of the gang of Boone, and the lone wolf had pulled down four of the band one by one on successive days. Only two remained, and these two looked at one another with a common thought. "The lights!" cried Jacqueline, turning from the body of Gandil. "He can shoot us down through the windows at his leisure." "But he won't," said her father.
I ain't no shorthorn, Pierre le Rouge." He stepped aside, frowning. "Tomorrow I'll argue the point with you, Jack." She turned at the door and snapped back: "You? You ain't fast enough on the draw to argue with me!" And she was gone. He turned to face the mocking smile of Black Gandil and a rapid volley of questions. "Where's Patterson?" "No more idea than you have." "And Branch?"
Gandil rose and stretched himself leisurely, yet as he sauntered toward the door his backward glance at Pierre was black indeed. He glanced curiously toward Jack who looked away sharply and then turned his eyes to her father. The latter was considering him with a gloomy, foreboding stare and considering over and over again, as Pierre le Rouge well knew, the prophecy of Black Morgan Gandil.
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