Bonanza

It had often been my lot to fight the animals and the elements, but now for the first time I faced my fellow-creatures, every one my superior in experience of the world, and every one apparently my inferior in muscle. As I glanced them over I knew that I was strong enough to break most of them up like so many corn-stalks. I could have shouted as depression left me, and glorious life throbbed along every muscle of each limb. There was not a weak spot in my body. My eye was so true that a man might have indicated a spot twenty feet distant and I could have jumped cleanly upon that mark. I was exhilarated as I stood in the doorway, with the whole camp against me. I was soon to learn how fickle a crowd can be.

Behind me stood Akshelah, so that her breath caressed my neck. I put out my hand and pushed her back. The factor stood against the side wall, peering into the passage, fetching breath suddenly.

“I guess you’ll quit, an’ give over the gal, stranger,” a big-bodied man confronted and advised me.

“She’s mine,” I said, and I was glad to find my voice steady and clear.

“She’s come around here,” went on the representative of public opinion. “An’ now she’s a-comin’ down to the saloon to dance to us.”

“I’ll see you all darned,” I said quietly.

A babel of tongues hummed round my head. A mighty shadow appeared to fall, and for one moment I cooled and weakened. A huge negro pushed aside the big-bodied man, and stood within hand-grip of me. He was a hideous creature, his face scarred, his front teeth gone, one ear frozen off, and when he moved I saw that his mighty body was supple and packed with muscle. He wore a loose cotton shirt and white pants, which exaggerated his great size. This apparition glowed upon me with small malevolent eyes, and said:

“’Pears like, stranger, you forgot hittin’ dis chile. Hit him on de nose an’ eye. You take what you give, eh?”

I understood that I was being challenged, and replied: “I guess.”

“You gimme de gal, an’ stop de trubble?” suggested the fearful creature.

I merely replied: “She’s mine.”

“That’s so, boys,” bellowed the revived factor. “The gal’s his, and she followed down here to find him. Where I come from, a feller’s got a right to his own gal.”

“He knocked us around,” said a voice.

“Hit me on de nose an’ eye,” repeated the negro. “No man hit dis chile, an’ not git it back. I’m ready fo’ you.” He slapped his arm. “No knives, no shootin’. Jest strip an’ scrap, and de best scrapper take de gal.”

“I’m ready,” I said.

Old MacCaskill was at my elbow, and Akshelah between us. My partner was cold with excitement.

“The boys’ll be just, Rupe, if you show devil,” he whispered. “It’s Jake Peterssen you’ve got to fight, and they say he’s never ben bested. Keep quiet, and don’t waste yourself. Get at his neck, if you can, and if you can’t, get at the side of his jaw. Mind that—mind, the side of the jaw hard.”

The saw-mills were stopping, because the gloom of the night hung around Gull. The news flew about like thistle seed in a windy fall. The mob surged and shouted round us, as we passed from Tecumseh House into the cold rain, and down to a long shed used for meetings and dances, on the brink of the high rocks that made an eyebrow to the lake. The wind howled round this exposed spot, and I could hear the beat of the waves, the lash of clouds of spray, and the sullen song of the shifting shingle, while the crowd poured in to take up their stand on tables and barrels, and a score of greasy lanterns were being lighted and hoisted to the roof. The floor was of well-trodden soil, and while we were being made ready a procession of men appeared with sacks of lake sand, which they poured and levelled upon the space reserved for the fight. I was shivering from head to foot, but it was with excitement and muscular strength, not fear. Akshelah was as white as the sand, and MacCaskill looked eighty when he began to strip me.

“This ain’t like knockin’ down Redpath,” he muttered hoarsely. “Keep his fist outer your neck and jaw, an’ mind your stomach. Love o’ Heaven, mind your stomach! If he touches your wind you’ve got to go down.”

A couple of coarse-faced men came up, chewing tobacco.

“Out er the way, old man,” said one.

They took me in hand, stripped me to the waist; and one of them took off his belt and strapped me, saying, as he pulled it in:

“Shout when it starts to pinch.”

When I was stripped I found myself the centre of a great deal of attention. My skin was fair and hairless, my arms so slight, that I could have felt ashamed of my appearance; indeed, at first I thought my examiners were bent upon ridicule, as first one horny hand and then another patted my chest and pinched my forearm or the back of my leg. But it was not so.

One man, with a sharp, pinched face, turned from me, expectorated, and remarked to the negro:

“If he gits a fair holt on yer, Jake, mercy on yer soul! He ain’t got one ounce of fat under all his skin.”

My opponent’s arms were like trunks of trees, and his neck resembled a polished iron cylinder. When I looked at him I thought that if I should get at his neck I should do nothing but tear the skin off my knuckles.

We were oiled from chin to waist with fresh fish-oil, and then the Master of Ceremonies came out and told me the rules. Anything above the waist was fair fight, either catching or hitting, except kicking and biting, and the use of the nails. The catch might be made with the hand or the arm, but the hit only with the clenched fist. There would be no intervals, and the fight would continue until one of us should be disabled for twenty-five seconds.

The hubbub was indescribable; but once it dropped, when a startling black figure, well wrapped up, pushed in quietly. It was Father Lacombe; and a great shout uprose when it became published that the priest had come with no idea of interference, but to see fair play.

The voices went up again, shouting out bets or making jests, until I took my stand opposite my gigantic opponent, and then they dropped to deep murmurs and whisperings which, when the word had been given, became merely deep and long breathings. The familiar beat of the wind and waves cheered me from outside.

Akshelah stood unmolested beside MacCaskill, and I knew no one would take any notice of her until the fight was done. There was a certain morality in the camp of Gull. If I won, the girl would be resigned to me, and not a man would insult her; if I lost, the camp at Yellow Sands would mourn for her as one who had passed away from them.

The negro and I stood watching one another, each starting in response to any movement on the other’s part. His great body shone in the lamplight, and the oil glistened on his outstretched arms. There was a knife scar where his neck came to the shoulder above the collar-bone, and I determined to hit that if I had the chance. It makes a man wince to feel an old wound struck. I was magnificently cool; my excitement had passed, and my brain was as clear as my own little river of Yellow Sands.

With a surprisingly rapid motion the negro dashed upon me, and I bent, when he made feint with his right arm, and met the crashing blow of his left fist with my forearm.

A cold, numbing sensation raced through me, but I swung my arm sharply, and the pain was gone in an instant; and springing up, I caught the great body and cannoned against it, swinging him round.

He fell on his knee; but this was a trick, for when I pressed on he came up and opened himself by hitting me full in the shoulder, and I staggered back, but steadied myself in time.

Again we stood facing each other as at first, only breathing a little faster.

It was my turn to make the advance, and I did so, making sure of every foothold in the sand. The negro worked round as I came on, and I hovered in front of him, until I became fascinated by a grotesque face which had been tattooed upon his chest. It seemed to me that I had two adversaries to contend with, the negro and his mascott. After dodging I slipped round sharply, sprang into the air, hitting away his arm, and had him gripped by the waist, his right arm fastened to his side. Silence was broken for the first time as we swung together, I trying to capture his free arm, and he endeavouring to stun me with it. While this arm was upraised I hit him upon the scar as well as I could at close quarters, then dashed my head to one side, striking his flat face with my cheek, and avoiding at the same time the blow which just grazed my shoulder. Hanging on, I dashed my knee into his stomach, but in doing so lost my hold. He got in a blow upon my forehead that knocked me to the sand. I was up, literally at a rebound, and just in time to avoid another blow, which, if successful, would have ended the contest. We stood again as at first, and I heard a far-away voice mutter, “Waste him, yer young fool!”

I was grateful for the hint. Unless I came to receive a knock-down blow, I could last for ever. I had no waste flesh to carry. I was hard and sound, while my adversary was heavy, and comparatively short of wind. He had drunk plenty of corn whisky in his time, while my system was entirely free from alcohol. I could see his great neck palpitating already, and his mouth was open. Obviously I was wasting myself by trying to throw his massive bulk. I determined to make him move, and to wait for the opportunity of reaching his windpipe. So I came to close quarters and kept at my opponent, worrying him like a dog, and he watched me with his small, half-closed eyes, and hit at me with his superior science while I skirmished, doubtless with the hope that one of these mighty blows might reach the fatal spot and lay me out. But I was too careful of the vital parts, and though the heavy hammering on my shoulders jarred and weakened me, I retained my presence of mind and kept my system, and stayed by him, always feigning an attack, but never wearing myself by striking. His dark hands were stained with my blood, which I could feel trickling over my face. I had to wipe it away from my eyes, knowing what nobody else did, that I was as strong as at the beginning, and the letting of a little blood would do me good after the forced inaction of the past few days.

“Jake’s winnin’!” shouted a triumphant voice, though I had lost sight of all spectators. “Drinks to the crowd on Jake.”

“Take yer,” called another. “Listen at the breathin’. The young ’un ain’t in trouble, an’, be Heaven, he could throw a locomotive.”

I backed, and the negro followed, lurching and lunging at me every step. Round the ring we went three times, until I did not know whether the noise in my ears came from the spectators or from the lake outside. The negro’s eyes were two shining slits, and his hideous face wore an expression of stolid satisfaction, as he kept coming upon me, his fists beating and sounding on my bruised arms. He thought he was winning as he liked; I could not stand before him; he had only to break down my hard arms, and then he could smash his fist into my jaw and end the fight. He grinned exultantly when I began to gasp, but I was fooling him. I could breathe as well that way, and I gasped to let him think that I was distressed. I was as fresh as ever, and went back dancing lightly on my toes, every muscle true and elastic. But my opponent was too seasoned a fighter to grow careless. He kept smiting at me, without giving me a chance to smite back. He was exhausting himself, but he imagined, I believe, that I was at least as much spent as himself.

His opportunity came. I trod on the side of my foot, and was almost off my balance. The negro came upon me like a cyclone, and the yells in my ears resembled a February blizzard. There was no avoiding that black thunderbolt, and it seemed to me on an instant that my head might be wrenched from its trunk. A sick feeling stabbed me; my brain spun round like a wheel; every tooth ached violently, and a horrible hand seemed to clutch at and twist my spine. He had reached my jaw. Another half-inch, and I should have gone down, unconscious, perhaps a cripple for life.

The revelry around took voice, and went up with a shout, “The boy’s bested!”

I recovered in time to ward off the following blow and the negro gripped me, but I drew in my breath and escaped, his hands gliding off my well-oiled flesh, and again I ran back, my adversary following to finish me, and we were both breathing furiously.

Then a clear silver voice rang out and came upon my ears, like the note of the wavy telling its promise of spring.

“Naspich milwashiu! Sakehanou!”

It was the cry of the Dance of Friendship.

Again I heard the drone and whirr of the drums, the soft wind sighing in the trees. Again I saw the pale moon over the clearing, and the stars looking down, as we excitedly paced the measure round and round the fires of the lodge, our hands aloft, our hearts throbbing, our eyes flashing as they met, exchanging the vow of eternal fellowship. I snorted like a horse when he smells the coming bush fire. I sprang out, feeling a giant’s strength idealised in my body, and closing with the negro, I threw him, while the ground seemed to shake and reel about me. The madness of that strength given by the dance! As he started up I was on him, and beating down his ponderous arms smote him upon the neck, and he fell again with a rattle and a gurgle in his throat. But I could do no more, for when a man comes to his end he must stop.

We were three paces apart, each of us bent, and the negro spat blood into the sand. I could not see Akshelah, but I could guess the look of triumph on her pale, beautiful face, and I could also imagine MacCaskill biting his moustache, his arms twitching, his eyes wet with excitement.

“Get on!” the voices yelled madly, and instinctively I felt that the majority were addressing themselves to me, because I had won their sympathy. My blood trickling into my mouth revived me. I wiped my hands in the sand, and came forward towards the black, palpitating mass of flesh, while the lumbermen shouted, and sweated, and swore, letting loose their passions in the delirium of watching ours.

The negro gathered himself to meet me, and again his huge arms came out. The oily sweat rolled off his body, and his legs staggered under his bulk. I resumed my former tactics of drawing him on, but he saw my design and baulked me. He refused to act any longer upon the offensive. Unless I would have him recover himself, I should have to attack. I came at him, struck, and stepped back; my arms were longer than his. When he hit back, I jumped round to his side, bent when his arm swung round, and hit him on the remnant of his frozen ear. He growled fiercely, the first exclamation he had made, and snatched at me, but I was away, and came with the persistency of a mosquito to his other side, and so continued, until he was unsteady, and his dry tongue sought moisture from his lips.

Suddenly he gave a great groan, and bore down upon me, his arms working like hammers. Round and round he beat me by sheer weight, like a dog-wolf wearing down a jack-rabbit, and the blows came so fast that I could not distinguish one arm from another.

I defended as best I could, knowing this could not last, and once he had almost done me, because my eyes were blinded with blood. Every breath seemed to be giving him pain, and I was gasping in sheer earnest, and my arms were so heavy that I appeared to be holding great weights in my hands.

We were both men who had never known defeat; but this was my first serious encounter, while my opponent had won many a hard fight. There was little advantage either way. I was stronger in wind and steadier, but I was having my weak moments, and I knew that if my enemy should get in one of his smashing blows the fight would be over, and he would have added another to a long list of victories. I could not hit with the power he was able to command, because I had not the weight to throw behind a blow. If his arms resembled the trunks of hard-wood trees, mine might have been compared to wire ropes. He could smash me, but I could not smash him.

When he staggered towards me again, a new thought took possession of my brain. If I could not smash I might break. So I went on dodging his blows, and watched my chance to seize him; but he guessed my plan, and evaded my hands with all the cleverness of his science.

I was failing. I had it in me to make one more effort, but I knew it would have to be the last. My opponent could do little beyond holding me out, and I guessed that he, too, was reserving himself for an opening to expend his last gasp of strength. He could not be sure of placing his feet accurately, and more than once I feared he might fall, holding me, and bearing me to the ground by his sheer weight. I could have dropped gladly and gone to sleep, but the thought of Akshelah steadied me. I was fighting for her. Were I to be defeated, I could never appear in Yellow Sands again.

I closed again with Jake Peterssen, though I was sobbing for breath, and a hot pain pricked each side of my body. He met me, and for a few seconds we fought as strongly as though we had come together for the first time. It was the expiring effort of both of us. We had both everything to lose. He braced himself with another groan, and smashed at me straight and strong. I was just able to get back, and then as he came towards me, following his blow with his weight, he overbalanced, and I caught him at last. I caught his arm, and bending, swung him round, though I seemed to be tearing out my heart, and in the midst of the darkness and pain following that awful effort I heard the sharp sound like the cracking of a pistol shot, and the building shook about me again. I had broken his thick right arm!

He was fight to the death. As the darkness lifted I tottered across the sand, while the universe seemed to be roaring in my ears, and he dragged himself up and staggered upright, and lurched towards me, his left arm half-raised, his eyes shut, his jaw dropping. He could do nothing. He could only stand like an ox before its slayer, and though I was stabbed and racked by every effort to find breath, I was able, by virtue of the strength I now began to realise, to come out and hit him for the last time. Full on his exposed neck came my feeble blow, and he went down again, a great heap of black flesh, and lay nearly doubled, motionless, insensible, while the twenty-five seconds were counted out by yells and oaths.

By a final effort I got the mastery over my legs, and stood upright, swaying to and fro, and groping, until the arms of MacCaskill closed in exhilaration about me, and the sweetness of the knowledge of victory breathed into my body the breath of new life.

Out of the revelry about me it dawned upon my understanding that I had won the freedom of the Camp of Gull.