There had been one contretemps; for a man and his wife haddriven up while they were still emptying their revolvers into thesilent body. It had been suggested that they should shoot themboth; but they were harmless folk who were not connected withthe mines, so they were sternly bidden to drive on and keep silent,lest a worse thing befall them. And so the blood-mottled figurehad been left as a warning to all such hard-hearted employers, andthe three noble avengers had hurried off into the mountains whereunbroken nature comes down to the very edge of the furnaces andthe slag heaps. Here they were, safe and sound, their work welldone, and the plaudits of their companions in their ears.
It had been a great day for the Scowrers. The shadow had falleneven darker over the valley. But as the wise general chooses themoment of victory in which to redouble his efforts, so that hisfoes may have no time to steady themselves after disaster, so BossMcGinty, looking out upon the scene of his operations with hisbrooding and malicious eyes, had devised a new attack upon thosewho opposed him. That very night, as the half-drunken companybroke up, he touched McMurdo on the arm and led him aside intothat inner room where they had their first interview.
“See here, my lad,” said he, “I’ve got a job that’s worthy of you atlast. You’ll have the doing of it in your own hands.”
“Proud I am to hear it,” McMurdo answered.
“You can take two men with you—Manders and Reilly. Theyhave been warned for service. We’ll never be right in this districtuntil Chester Wilcox has been settled, and you’ll have the thanksof every lodge in the coal fields if you can down him.”
“I’ll do my best, anyhow. Who is he, and where shall I find him?”
McGinty took his eternal half-chewed, half-smoked cigar fromthe corner of his mouth, and proceeded to draw a rough diagramon a page torn from his notebook.
“He’s the chief foreman of the Iron Dike Company. He’s a hardcitizen, an old colour sergeant of the war, all scars and grizzle.
We’ve had two tries at him; but had no luck, and Jim Carnawaylost his life over it. Now it’s for you to take it over. That’s thehouse—all alone at the Iron Dike crossroad, same as you see hereon the map—without another within earshot. It’s no good byday. He’s armed and shoots quick and straight, with no questionsasked. But at night—well, there he is with his wife, three children,and a hired help. You can’t pick or choose. It’s all or none. If youcould get a bag of blasting powder at the front door with a slowmatch to it—”
“What’s the man done?”
“Didn’t I tell you he shot Jim Carnaway?”
“Why did he shoot him?”
“What in thunder has that to do with you? Carnaway was abouthis house at night, and he shot him. That’s enough for me and you.
You’ve got to settle the thing right.”
“There’s these two women and the children. Do they go uptoo?”
“They have to—else how can we get him?”
“It seems hard on them; for they’ve done nothing.”
“What sort of fool’s talk is this? Do you back out?”
“Easy, Councillor, easy! What have I ever said or done that youshould think I would be after standing back from an order of theBodymaster of my own lodge? If it’s right or if it’s wrong, it’s foryou to decide.”
“You’ll do it, then?”
“Of course I will do it.”
“When?”
“Well, you had best give me a night or two that I may see thehouse and make my plans. Then—”
“Very good,” said McGinty, shaking him by the hand. “I leaveit with you. It will be a great day when you bring us the news. It’sjust the last stroke that will bring them all to their knees.”
McMurdo thought long and deeply over the commission whichhad been so suddenly placed in his hands. The isolated housein which Chester Wilcox lived was about five miles off in anadjacent valley. That very night he started off all alone to preparefor the attempt. It was daylight before he returned from hisreconnaissance. Next day he interviewed his two subordinates,Manders and Reilly, reckless youngsters who were as elated as if itwere a deer-hunt.
Two nights later they met outside the town, all three armed,and one of them carrying a sack stuffed with the powder whichwas used in the quarries. It was two in the morning before theycame to the lonely house. The night was a windy one, with brokenclouds drifting swiftly across the face of a three-quarter moon.
They had been warned to be on their guard against bloodhounds;so they moved forward cautiously, with their pistols cocked intheir hands. But there was no sound save the howling of the wind,and no movement but the swaying branches above them.
McMurdo listened at the door of the lonely house; but all wasstill within. Then he leaned the powder bag against it, ripped ahole in it with his knife, and attached the fuse. When it was wellalight he and his two companions took to their heels, and weresome distance off, safe and snug in a sheltering ditch, before theshattering roar of the explosion, with the low, deep rumble ofthe collapsing building, told them that their work was done. Nocleaner job had ever been carried out in the bloodstained annals ofthe society.
But alas that work so well organized and boldly carried outshould all have gone for nothing! Warned by the fate of the variousvictims, and knowing that he was marked down for destruction,Chester Wilcox had moved himself and his family only the daybefore to some safer and less known quarters, where a guard ofpolice should watch over them. It was an empty house whichhad been torn down by the gunpowder, and the grim old coloursergeant of the war was still teaching discipline to the miners ofIron Dike.
“Leave him to me,” said McMurdo. “He’s my man, and I’ll gethim sure if I have to wait a year for him.”
A vote of thanks and confidence was passed in full lodge, andso for the time the matter ended. When a few weeks later it wasreported in the papers that Wilcox had been shot at from anambuscade, it was an open secret that McMurdo was still at workupon his unfinished job.