A thousand deaths by Jack London

McDougall. With Timothy Brown he had left McDougall. Without

Timothy Brown he had arrived at Sunrise. Considered in the light

of his evilness, the unanimous conclusion was that he had killed

Timothy Brown. On the other hand, Leclere acknowledged their

facts, but challenged their conclusion, and gave his own

explanation. Twenty miles out of Sunrise he and Timothy Brown were

poling the boat along the rocky shore. From that shore two rifle-

shots rang out. Timothy Brown pitched out of the boat and went

down bubbling red, and that was the last of Timothy Brown. He,

Leclere, pitched into the bottom of the boat with a stinging

shoulder. He lay very quiet, peeping at the shore. After a time

two Indians stuck up their heads and came out to the water’s edge,

carrying between them a birch-bark canoe. As they launched it,

Leclere let fly. He potted one, who went over the side after the

manner of Timothy Brown. The other dropped into the bottom of the

canoe, and then canoe and poling boat went down the stream in a

drifting battle. After that they hung up on a split current, and

the canoe passed on one side of an island, the poling boat on the

other. That was the last of the canoe, and he came on into

Sunrise. Yes, from the way the Indian in the canoe jumped, he was

sure he had potted him. That was all. This explanation was not

deemed adequate. They gave him ten hours’ grace while the Lizzie

steamed down to investigate. Ten hours later she came wheezing

back to Sunrise. There had been nothing to investigate. No

evidence had been found to back up his statements. They told him

to make his will, for he possessed a fifty-thousand dollar Sunrise

claim, and they were a law-abiding as well as a law-giving breed.

Leclere shrugged his shoulders. “Bot one t’ing,” he said; “a

leetle, w’at you call, favour–a leetle favour, dat is eet. I gif

my feefty t’ousan’ dollair to de church. I gif my husky dog,

Batard, to de devil. De leetle favour? Firs’ you hang heem, an’

den you hang me. Eet is good, eh?”

Good it was, they agreed, that Hell’s Spawn should break trail for

his master across the last divide, and the court was adjourned down

to the river bank, where a big spruce tree stood by itself.

Slackwater Charley put a hangman’s knot in the end of a hauling-

line, and the noose was slipped over Leclere’s head and pulled

tight around his neck. His hands were tied behind his back, and he

was assisted to the top of a cracker box. Then the running end of

the line was passed over an over-hanging branch, drawn taut, and

made fast. To kick the box out from under would leave him dancing

on the air.

“Now for the dog,” said Webster Shaw, sometime mining engineer.

“You’ll have to rope him, Slackwater.”

Leclere grinned. Slackwater took a chew of tobacco, rove a running

noose, and proceeded leisurely to coil a few turns in his hand. He

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75

paused once or twice to brush particularly offensive mosquitoes

from off his face. Everybody was brushing mosquitoes, except

Leclere, about whose head a small cloud was visible. Even Batard,

lying full-stretched on the ground with his fore paws rubbed the

pests away from eyes and mouth.

But while Slackwater waited for Batard to lift his head, a faint

call came from the quiet air, and a man was seen waving his arms

and running across the flat from Sunrise. It was the store-keeper.

“C-call ‘er off, boys,” he panted, as he came in among them.

“Little Sandy and Bernadotte’s jes’ got in,” he explained with

returning breath. “Landed down below an’ come up by the short cut.

Got the Beaver with ‘m. Picked ‘m up in his canoe, stuck in a back

channel, with a couple of bullet-holes in ‘m. Other buck was Klok

Kutz, the one that knocked spots out of his squaw and dusted.”

“Eh? W’at Ah say? Eh?” Leclere cried exultantly. “Dat de one fo’

sure! Ah know. Ah spik true.”

“The thing to do is to teach these damned Siwashes a little

manners,” spoke Webster Shaw. “They’re getting fat and sassy, and

we’ll have to bring them down a peg. Round in all the bucks and

string up the Beaver for an object lesson. That’s the programme.

Come on and let’s see what he’s got to say for himself.”

“Heh, M’sieu!” Leclere called, as the crowd began to melt away

through the twilight in the direction of Sunrise. “Ah lak ver’

moch to see de fon.”

“Oh, we’ll turn you loose when we come back,” Webster Shaw shouted

over his shoulder. “In the meantime meditate on your sins and the

ways of Providence. It will do you good, so be grateful.”

As is the way with men who are accustomed to great hazards, whose

nerves are healthy and trained in patience, so it was with Leclere

who settled himself to the long wait–which is to say that he

reconciled his mind to it. There was no settling of the body, for

the taut rope forced him to stand rigidly erect. The least

relaxation of the leg muscles pressed the rough-fibred noose into

his neck, while the upright position caused him much pain in his

wounded shoulder. He projected his under lip and expelled his

breath upwards along his face to blow the mosquitoes away from his

eyes. But the situation had its compensation. To be snatched from

the maw of death was well worth a little bodily suffering, only it

was unfortunate that he should miss the hanging of the Beaver.

And so he mused, till his eyes chanced to fall upon Batard, head

between fore paws and stretched on the ground asleep. And their

Leclere ceased to muse. He studied the animal closely, striving to

sense if the sleep were real or feigned. Batard’s sides were

heaving regularly, but Leclere felt that the breath came and went a

shade too quickly; also he felt that there was a vigilance or

alertness to every hair that belied unshackling sleep. He would

have given his Sunrise claim to be assured that the dog was not

awake, and once, when one of his joints cracked, he looked quickly

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and guiltily at Batard to see if he roused. He did not rouse then

but a few minutes later he got up slowly and lazily, stretched, and

looked carefully about him.

“Sacredam,” said Leclere under his breath.

Assured that no one was in sight or hearing, Batard sat down,

curled his upper lip almost into a smile, looked up at Leclere, and

licked his chops.

“Ah see my feenish,” the man said, and laughed sardonically aloud.

Batard came nearer, the useless ear wabbling, the good ear cocked

forward with devilish comprehension. He thrust his head on one

side quizzically, and advanced with mincing, playful steps. He

rubbed his body gently against the box till it shook and shook

again. Leclere teetered carefully to maintain his equilibrium.

“Batard,” he said calmly, “look out. Ah keel you.”

Batard snarled at the word and shook the box with greater force.

Then he upreared, and with his fore paws threw his weight against

it higher up. Leclere kicked out with one foot, but the rope bit

into his neck and checked so abruptly as nearly to overbalance him.

“Hi, ya! Chook! Mush-on!” he screamed.

Batard retreated, for twenty feet or so, with a fiendish levity in

his bearing that Leclere could not mistake. He remembered the dog

often breaking the scum of ice on the water hole by lifting up and

throwing his weight upon it; and remembering, he understood what he

now had in mind. Batard faced about and paused. He showed his

white teeth in a grin, which Leclere answered; and then hurled his

body through the air, in full charge, straight for the box.

Fifteen minutes later, Slackwater Charley and Webster Shaw

returning, caught a glimpse of a ghostly pendulum swinging back and

forth in the dim light. As they hurriedly drew in closer, they

made out the man’s inert body, and a live thing that clung to it,

and shook and worried, and gave to it the swaying motion.

“Hi, ya! Chook! you Spawn of Hell!” yelled Webster Shaw.

But Batard glared at him, and snarled threateningly, without

loosing his jaws.

Slackwater Charley got out his revolver, but his hand was shaking,

as with a chill, and he fumbled.

“Here you take it,” he said, passing the weapon over.

Webster Shaw laughed shortly, drew a sight between the gleaming

eyes, and pressed the trigger. Batard’s body twitched with the

shock, threshed the ground spasmodically for a moment, and went

suddenly limp. But his teeth still held fast locked.

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THE STORY OF JEES’ UCK

There have been renunciations and renunciations. But, in its