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Updated: June 6, 2025
An' I'm the foreman of this here outfit." "Thank you, Brayley." Conniston's anger was pounding in his temples, but he strove to keep it back. "I'm Conniston. I was told to report here by Mr. Crawford to go to work in the morning. I suppose I report to you?" "Conniston are you, huh? All right, Conniston. Now who happened to tell you to slap yourself down in that there chair, huh?"
One thing stood uppermost in Conniston's mind: the foreman, with every deep breath he drew, was shaking off his dizziness, was regaining his strength. The spirit within him, with all of the battering he had received, was still unbroken. And Conniston himself felt his right arm growing numb to the elbow. In a very few seconds he would be like a rag doll in the other's big, strong hands....
"They're working all right," he ended, his eyes coming back to Conniston's. "Yes. They're good men. The four foremen are as capable as a man could ask for." "Were they working this way when you got here?" "No. They were waiting for orders." Mr. Crawford nodded, making no reply. "I don't know," Conniston offered after a moment, "that there is any immediate call for worry.
And before he went on he had turned his eyes steadily upon Conniston's face, studying him. "If you're going to work with us, to get into it with your sleeves rolled up like Bat Truxton and Billy there and me and a few others of us, you might as well know in the beginning what's what in this scrap.
Three strokes with the community comb, dangling from a bit of string, and jerking his neck-handkerchief into place, he lurched toward the table. Five feet away he stopped suddenly, his eyes burning into Conniston's. "Who might you be, stranger?" he snapped, his words coming with unpleasant, almost metallic sharpness. There fell a sudden silence in the bunk-house.
"All right, Mr. Conniston. I'm Jimmie Kent." He put out his hand, which was painfully small, but which gripped Conniston's larger hand like a vise. "There are your five hundred men. Or, to be exact, five hundred and five. I started with five hundred and seven. Lost two on the road." "But," interrupted Conniston, staring half incredulously at him, "Mr. Crawford's telegram " Jimmie Kent laughed.
This was the gang over which Ben was foreman. He glanced quickly at the big Englishman and saw that his eyes were upon the Northlander. Again, not twenty minutes later, came a second brief stoppage, again the Swede was working over a trace-chain and now Ben had swung about and was striding toward Conniston. "Hi say there," he said, as he came to Conniston's side.
It was Conniston's face, suave, smiling, dying, triumphant over life, and Conniston was saying, just as he had said up there in the cabin on the Barren, with death reaching out a hand for him, "It's queer, old top, devilish queer and funny!" Yes, it was funny if one looked at it right, and Keith found himself swinging back into his old view-point.
Conniston's plans for the next day had been founded upon his assurance that Brayley would arrive before morning. But Brayley did not come. And even had he arrived on time Conniston would not have dared leave. At first he had thought to remain overnight with Tommy Garton. Then, remembering that he alone was responsible for the camp, he told Garton good night and rode out into the desert.
But to Brayley the thing had come with a stunning shock of unexpectedness just as he saw the end of the fight, and Conniston was on his feet a second the first. Again as Brayley sprang up, Conniston stood over him. Again Conniston's fist, his left, but driven with all of the power left in him, beat mercilessly into the already cut face, driving Brayley down upon his knees.
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