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He stepped forward and removed the heavy wrench from Smaltz's reach. "I'll give you just one minute by the watch there to make up your mind. You'd better write, for you won't be able when I'm through!" They measured each other, eye to eye again. Each could hear the breathing of the other in the silence while the watch ticked off the seconds.
The last thing he remembered was Smaltz's raucous voice in the bar-room below boasting of the wicked rapids he had shot in the tumultuous "Colo-rady" and on the Stikine in the far north. The noise of the bar-room ceased at an early hour and the little mountain town grew quiet but Bruce was not conscious of the change.
I almost forgot you." There was sneering, utter contempt in Smaltz's voice. "Fakir," he reiterated, "you get that, do you, for I'm pickin' my words and not callin' names by chance. You're the worst that ever come off the Pacific coast and that's goin' some." He turned sharply to Bruce. "You know even a liar sometimes tells the truth and I'm goin' to give it to you straight now.
They were clumsy looking enough, these flat-bottomed barges, but the only type of boat that could ride the rough water and skim the rocks so menacingly close to the surface. "There's nothin' left to do now but say our prayers." Smaltz's jocularity broke the silence.
It was too late to run, useless to evade, so he stood waiting while shrieking, screeching at every step, the Chinaman came on. He flew at Smaltz's face like a wild-cat, clawing, scratching, digging in his nails and screaming with every breath: "I savvy you! I savvy you!"
He motioned into the wilderness as he threw the doors wide. Incredulity, amazement, appeared on Smaltz's face. In the instant that he stood staring a vein swelled on Bruce's temple and in a spasm of fury he cried: "Go, I tell you! Go while I can keep my hands off you you " he finished with an oath. Smaltz went. He snatched his coat from its nail as he passed but did not stop for his hat.
She had intended to tell him of Sprudell, to show him Smaltz's confession, and the options which would defeat Sprudell's plotting, but in the face of his narrow obstinacy, his deep prejudices, she felt the futility of words or argument. She had not for a moment counted upon such opposition; now she felt helpless, impotent before this armor of hardness. "I don't care what he's had to fight.
When I recall the suspicious happenings that should have warned me from Jenning's incompetency to Smaltz's villainy I have no words in which to express my mortification. The stockholders cannot condemn me more severely for my failure than I condemn myself. You are the beginning and end of everything with me. All my hopes, my ambitions, my life itself have come to centre in you.
"You oughtn't to say those rude, harsh things. They're apt to hurt the feelin's of a sensitive feller like me." "What you steal?" Toy pointed a trembling finger at the inside pocket of Smaltz's coat where it bulged. "You wrong me," said Smaltz sorrowfully in mock reproach. "That's my Bible, Chink." After Smaltz had gone Toy lighted a candle and poked among the boxes, cans, and sacks.
Smaltz's face wore an expressive grin as he put his strength on the rope of the block-and-tackle, which gave him the pull of a four-horse team. Bruce heard the cross-arm splinter as he came up the trail through the brush. Jennings turned to Woods and said offensively: "Old as you are, I guess I kin learn you somethin' yet." The carpenter's face had turned white.
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