there, you gangrene-livered skunk. Jump! By God! or I’ll make
you leak till folks’ll think your father was a water hydrant and
your mother a sprinkling-cart. You-all move your chair
alongside, Guggenhammer; and you-all Dowsett, sit right there,
while I just irrelevantly explain the virtues of this here
automatic. She’s loaded for big game and she goes off eight
times. She’s a sure hummer when she gets started.
“Preliminary remarks being over, I now proceed to deal.
Remember, I ain’t making no remarks about your deal. You done
your darndest, and it was all right. But this is my deal, and
it’s up to me to do my darndest. In the first place, you-all
know me. I’m Burning Daylight–savvee? Ain’t afraid of God,
devil, death, nor destruction. Them’s my four aces, and they
sure copper your bets. Look at that there living skeleton.
Letton, you’re sure afraid to die. Your bones is all rattling
together you’re that scared. And look at that fat Jew there.
This little weapon’s sure put the fear of God in his heart. He’s
yellow as a sick persimmon. Dowsett, you’re a cool one. You-all
ain’t batted an eye nor turned a hair. That’s because you’re
great on arithmetic. And that makes you-all dead easy in this
deal of mine. You’re sitting there and adding two and two
together, and you-all know I sure got you skinned. You know me,
and that I ain’t afraid of nothing. And you-all adds up all your
money and knows you ain’t a-going to die if you can help it.”
“I’ll see you hanged,” was Dowsett’s retort.
“Not by a damned sight. When the fun starts, you’re the first I
plug. I’ll hang all right, but you-all won’t live to see it.
You-all die here and now while I’ll die subject to the law’s
delay–savvee? Being dead, with grass growing out of your
carcasses, you won’t know when I hang, but I’ll sure have the
pleasure a long time of knowing you-all beat me to it.”
Daylight paused.
“You surely wouldn’t kill us?” Letton asked in a queer, thin
voice.
Daylight shook his head.
“It’s sure too expensive. You-all ain’t worth it. I’d sooner
have my chips back. And I guess you-all’d sooner give my chips
back than go to the dead-house.”
Burning Daylight
102
A long silence followed.
“Well, I’ve done dealt. It’s up to you-all to play. But while
you’re deliberating, I want to give you-all a warning: if that
door opens and any one of you cusses lets on there’s anything
unusual, right here and then I sure start plugging. They ain’t a
soul’ll get out the room except feet first.”
A long session of three hours followed. The deciding factor was
not the big automatic pistol, but the certitude that Daylight
would use it. Not alone were the three men convinced of this,
but Daylight himself was convinced. He was firmly resolved to
kill the men if his money was not forthcoming. It was not an
easy matter, on the spur of the moment, to raise ten millions in
paper currency, and there were vexatious delays. A dozen times
Mr. Howison and the head clerk were summoned into the room. On
these occasions the pistol lay on Daylight’s lap, covered
carelessly by a newspaper, while he was usually engaged in
rolling or lighting his brown-paper cigarettes. But in the end,
the thing was accomplished. A suit-case was brought up by one of
the clerks from the waiting motor-car, and Daylight snapped it
shut on the last package of bills. He paused at the door to make
his final remarks.
“There’s three several things I sure want to tell you-all. When
I get outside this door, you-all’ll be set free to act, and I
just want to warn you-all about what to do. In the first place,
no warrants for my arrest–savvee? This money’s mine, and I
ain’t
robbed you of it. If it gets out how you gave me the
double-cross
and how I done you back again, the laugh’ll be on you, and it’ll
sure be an almighty big laugh. You-all can’t afford that laugh.
Besides, having got back my stake that you-all robbed me of, if
you
arrest me and try to rob me a second time, I’ll go gunning for
you-all, and I’ll sure get you. No little fraid-cat shrimps like
you-all can skin Burning Daylight. If you win you lose, and
there’ll sure be some several unexpected funerals around this
burg.
Just look me in the eye, and you-all’ll savvee I mean business.
Them stubs and receipts on the table is all yourn. Good day.”
As the door shut behind him, Nathaniel Letton sprang for the
telephone, and Dowsett intercepted him.
“What are you going to do?” Dowsett demanded.
“The police. It’s downright robbery. I won’t stand it. I tell
you I won’t stand it.”
Dowsett smiled grimly, but at the same time bore the slender
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103
financier back and down into his chair.
“We’ll talk it over,” he said; and in Leon Guggenhammer he found
an anxious ally.
And nothing ever came of it. The thing remained a secret with
the three men. Nor did Daylight ever give the secret away,
though that afternoon, leaning back in his stateroom on the
Twentieth Century, his shoes off, and feet on a chair, he
chuckled long and heartily. New York remained forever puzzled
over the affair; nor could it hit upon a rational explanation.
By all rights, Burning Daylight should have gone broke, yet it
was known that he immediately reappeared in San Francisco
possessing an apparently unimpaired capital. This was evidenced
by the magnitude of the enterprises he engaged in, such as, for
instance, Panama Mail, by sheer weight of money and fighting
power wresting the control away from Shiftily and selling out in
two months to the Harriman interests at a rumored enormous
advance.
CHAPTER V
Back in San Francisco, Daylight quickly added to his reputation
In ways it was not an enviable reputation. Men were afraid of
him. He became known as a fighter, a fiend, a tiger. His play
was a ripping and smashing one, and no one knew where or how his
next blow would fall. The element of surprise was large. He
balked on the unexpected, and, fresh from the wild North, his
mind not operating in stereotyped channels, he was able in
unusual degree to devise new tricks and stratagems. And once he
won the advantage, he pressed it remorselessly. “As relentless
as a Red Indian,” was said of him, and it was said truly.
On the other hand, he was known as “square.” His word was as
good as his bond, and this despite the fact that he accepted
nobody’s word. He always shied at propositions based on
gentlemen’s agreements, and a man who ventured his honor as a
gentleman, in dealing with Daylight, inevitably was treated to an
unpleasant time. Daylight never gave his own word unless he held
the whip-hand. It was a case with the other fellow taking it or
nothing.
Legitimate investment had no place in Daylight’s play. It tied
up his money, and reduced the element of risk. It was the
gambling side of business that fascinated him, and to play in his
slashing manner required that his money must be ready to hand.
It was never tied up save for short intervals, for he was
principally engaged in turning it over and over, raiding here,
there, and everywhere, a veritable pirate of the financial main.
A five-per cent safe investment had no attraction for him; but to
risk millions in sharp, harsh skirmish, standing to lose
everything or to win fifty or a hundred per cent, was the savor
of life to him. He played according to the rules of the game,
Burning Daylight
104
but
he played mercilessly. When he got a man or a corporation down
and
they squealed, he gouged no less hard. Appeals for financial
mercy
fell on deaf ears. He was a free lance, and had no friendly
business associations. Such alliances as were formed
from time to time were purely affairs of expediency, and he
regarded his allies as men who would give him the double-cross or
ruin him if a profitable chance presented. In spite of this
point of view, he was faithful to his allies. But he was
faithful just as long as they were and no longer. The treason
had to come from them, and then it was ‘Ware Daylight.
The business men and financiers of the Pacific coast never forgot
the lesson of Charles Klinkner and the California & Altamont
Trust Company. Klinkner was the president. In partnership with
Daylight, the pair raided the San Jose Interurban. The powerful
Lake Power & Electric Lighting corporation came to the rescue,
and Klinkner, seeing what he thought was the opportunity, went
over to the enemy in the thick of the pitched battle. Daylight
lost three millions before he was done with it, and before he was