Alger Horatio Jr.
The Young Explorer; Or, Claiming His Fortune
CHAPTER XXVIII
THE DUEL OF THE MINERS
O'Reilly's suggestion chimed in with the rough humor of the crowd. They were not bad-hearted men, but, though rough in their manners, not much worse on the average than an equal number of men in the Eastern States. They only thought of the fun to be obtained from the proceeding, and supposed they would be doing the Chinaman no real harm.
"Has anybody got a pair of scissors?" asked O'Reilly, taking the Chinaman by the queue.
"I've got one in my tent," answered one of the miners.
"Go and get it, then."
Ki Sing again uttered a cry of dismay, but it did not seem likely that his valued appendage could be saved. Public sentiment was with his persecutor.
He had one friend, however, among the rough men who surrounded him, the same who had already taken his part.
Richard Dewey's eyes glittered sternly as he saw O'Reilly's intention, and he quietly advanced till he was within an arm's length of Ki Sing.
"What do you mean to do, O'Reilly?" he demanded sternly.
"None of your business!" retorted O'Reilly insolently.
"It is going to be my business. What do you mean to do?"
"Gut off this haythen's pigtail, and I'd just like to know who's going to prevent me."
At this moment the miner who had gone for a pair of scissors returned.
"Give me them scissors!" said O'Reilly sharply.
Richard Dewey reached out his hand and intercepted them. He took them in place of O'Reilly.
"Give me them scissors, Dewey, or it'll be the worse for you!" exclaimed the tyrant furiously.
Dewey regarded him with a look of unmistakable contempt.
There was a murmur among the miners, who were eager for the amusement which the Chinaman's terror and ineffectual struggles would afford them.
"Give him the scissors, Dewey!" said half a dozen.
"Boys," said Dewey, making no motion to obey them, "do you know what you are about to do? Why should you interfere with this poor, unoffending Chinaman? Has he wronged any one of you?"
"No, but that ain't the point," said a Kentuckian. "We only want to play a joke on him. It won't do him no harm to cut his hair."
"Of course not," chimed in several of the miners.
"Do you hear that, Dick Dewey?" demanded O'Reilly impatiently. "Do you hear what the boys say? Give me them scissors."
"Boys, you don't understand the effects of what you would do," said Dewey, taking no notice of O'Reilly, much to that worthy's indignation. "If Ki Sing has his queue cut off, he can never go back to China."
"Is that the law, squire?" asked a loose-jointed Yankee.
"Yes, it is. You may rely on my word. Ki Sing, if you cut off your queue, can you go back to China?"
"No go back-stay in Melica allee time."
"You see he confirms my statement."
"That's a queer law, anyway," said the Kentuckian.
"I admit that, but such as it is, we can't alter it. Now, Ki Sing has probably a father and mother, perhaps a wife and children, in China. He wants to go back to them some time. Shall we prevent this, and doom him to perpetual exile, just to secure a little sport? Come, boys, you've all of you got dear ones at home, that you hope some day to see again. I appeal to you whether this is manly or kind."
This was a sort of argument that had a strong effect. It was true that each one of these men had relatives for whom they were working, the thought of whom enabled them to bear hard work and privations thousands of miles away from home, and Richard Dewey's appeal touched their hearts.
"That's so! Dewey is right. Let him go, O'Reilly!" said the crowd.
The one man who was not touched by the appeal was O'Reilly himself. Not that he was altogether a bad man, but his spirit of opposition was kindled, and he could not bear to yield to Dewey, whose contempt he understood and resented.
His reply was, "I'm goin' to cut off the haythen's pigtail, whether or no. Give me them scissors, I tell you," and he gave a vicious twitch to the Chinaman's queue, which made Ki Sing utter a sharp cry of pain.
Richard Dewey's forbearance was at an end. His eyes blazed with fury, and, clenching his fist, he dashed it full in the face of the offending O'Reilly, who not only released his hold on Ki Sing, but measured his length on the ground.
O'Reilly was no coward, and he possessed the national love of a shindy. He sprang to his feet in a rage, and shouted:
"I'll murder ye for that, Dick Dewey! See if I don't!"
"A fight! a fight!" shouted the miners, willing to be amused in that way, since they had voluntarily given up the fun expected from cutting off the Chipaman's queue.
Richard Dewey looked rather disgusted.
"I don't want to fight, boys," he said. "It isn't to my taste."
"You've got to, you coward!" said O'Reilly, beginning to bluster.
"I don't think you'll find me a coward," said Dewey quietly, as he stood with his arms folded, looking at O'Reilly.
"You'll have to give O'Reilly satisfaction," said one of the miners.
"You've knocked him down, and he's got a right to it."
"Will it be any satisfaction to him to get knocked over again?" asked Dewey, shrugging his shoulders.
"You can't do it! I'll bate you till you can't stand!" exclaimed the angry Irishman. "I'll tache you to insult a gintleman."
"Form a ring, boys!" exclaimed the Kentuck-ian. "We'll see there's fair play."
"One thing first," said Dewey, holding up his hand. "If I come off best in this encounter, you'll all agree to let this Chinaman go free? Is that agreed?"
"Yes, yes, it is agreed!"
Ki Sing stood trembling with fear while these preliminaries were being settled. He would have escaped from the crowd, but his first movement was checked.
"No, Cy King, we can't let you go jest yet," said Taylor. "We're goin' to see this thing through first."
O'Reilly was not in the least daunted by the contest in which he was to engage. Indeed, he felt a good deal of satisfaction at the prospect of being engaged in a scrimmage. Of course, he expected to come off a victor. He was a considerably larger man than Richard Dewey, with arms like flails and flats like sledge-hammers, and he had no sort of doubt that he could settle his smaller antagonist in less than five minutes.
But there was one thing of which he was not aware. Though slender, Dewey had trained and hardened his muscles by exercise in a gymnasium, and, moreover, he had taken a course of lessons in the manly art of self-defense. He had done this, not because he expected to be called upon to defend himself at any time, but because he thought it conducive to keeping up his health and strength. He awaited O'Reilly's onset with watchful calmness.
O'Reilly advanced with a whoop, flinging about his powerful arms somewhat like a windmill, and prepared to upset his antagonist at the first onset.
What was his surprise to find his own blows neatly parried, and to meet a tremendous blow from his opponent which set his nose to bleeding.
Astonished, but not panic-stricken, he pluckily advanced to a second round, and tried to grasp Dewey round the waist. But instead of doing this, he received another knock-down blow, which stretched him on the ground.
He was up again, and renewed the attack, but with even less chance of victory than before, for the blood was streaming down his face, and he could not see distinctly where to hit. Dewey contented himself with keeping on guard and parrying the blows of his demoralized adversary.
"It's no use, O'Reilly!" exclaimed two or three. "Dewey's the better man."
"Let me get at him! I'll show him what I can do," said O'Reilly doggedly.
"As long as you like, O'Reilly," said Richard Dewey coolly; "but you may as well give it up."
"Troth and I won't. I'm stronger than you are any day."
"Perhaps you are; but I understand fighting, and you don't."
"An O'Reilly not know how to fight!" exclaimed the Irishman hotly.
"I could fight when I was six years old."
"Perhaps so; but you can't box."
One or two more attacks, and O'Reilly was dragged away by two of his friends, and Dewey remained master of the field.
The miners came up and shook hands with him cordially. They regarded him with new respect, now that it was found he had overpowered the powerful O'Reilly.
Among those who congratulated him was his Mongolian friend, Ki Sing.
"Melican man good fightee-knock over Ilishman. Hullah!"
"Come with me, Ki Sing," said Dewey. '"I will take care of you till to-morrow, and then you had better go."
CHAPTER XXIX
CHINESE CHEAP LABOR
Though Dewey had received from the miners a promise that they would not interfere with Ki Sing in case he gained a victory over O'Reilly, he was not willing to trust entirely to it. He feared that some one would take it into his head to play a trick on the unoffending Chinaman, and that the others unthinkingly would join in. Accordingly, he thought it best to keep the Mongolian under his personal charge as long as he remained in camp.
Ki Sing followed him to his tent as a child follows a guardian.
"Are you hungry, Ki Sing?" asked Dewey.
"Plenty hungly."
"Then I will first satisfy your appetite," and Dewey brought forth some of his stock of provisions, to which Ki Sing did ample justice, though neither rat pie nor rice was included.
When the lunch, in which Richard Dewey joined, was over, he said: "If you will help me for the rest of the day, I will pay you whatever I consider your services to be worth."
"All lightee!" responded Ki Sing, with alacrity.
Whatever objections may be made to the Chinaman, he cannot be charged with laziness. As a class they are willing to labor faithfully, even where the compensation is small. Labor in China, which is densely peopled, is a matter of general and imperative necessity, and has been so for centuries, and habit has probably had a good deal to do with the national spirit of industry.
Ki Sing, under Richard Dewey's directions, worked hard, and richly earned the two dollars which his employer gave him at the end of the day.
Of course Dewey's action did not escape the attention of his fellow miners. It cannot be said that they regarded it with favor. The one most offended was naturally O'Reilly, who, despite the pounding he had received, was about the camp as usual.
"Boys," he said, "are you goin' to have that haythen workin' alongside you?"
"It won't do us any harm, will it?" asked Dick Roberts. "If Dewey chooses to hire him, what is it to us?"
"I ain't goin' to demane myself by workin' wid a yeller haythen."
"Nobody has asked you to do it. If anybody is demeaning himself it is Dick Dewey, and he has a right to if he wants to."
"If he wants to hire anybody, let him hire a dacent Christian."
"Like you, O'Reilly?"
"I don't want to work for anybody. I work for myself. This Chinaman has come here to take the bread out of our mouths, bad cess to him."
"I don't see that. He is workin' Dick Dewey's claim. I don't see how that interferes with us."
Of course, this was the reasonable view of the matter; but there were some who sided with the Irishman, among others the Kentuckian, and he volunteered to go as a committee of one to Dewey, and represent to him the sentiments of the camp.
Accordingly he walked over to where Dewey and his apprentice were working.
"Look here, Dewey," he began, "me and some of the rest of the boys have takin' over this yere matter of your givin' work to this Chinaman, and we don't like it."
"Why not?" asked Dewey coolly.
"We don't feel no call to associate with sich as he."
"You needn't; I don't ask you to," said Dewey quietly. "I am the only one who associates with him."
"But we don't want him in camp."
"He won't trouble any of you. I will take charge of him."
"Look here, Dewey, you've got to respect public sentiment, and public sentiment is agin' this thing."
"Whose public sentiment—O'Reilly's?"
"Well, O'Reilly don't like it, for one."
"I thought so."
"Nor I for another."
"It strikes me, Hodgson, that I've got some rights as well as O'Reilly. Suppose I should say I didn't choose to work in the same camp with an Irishman?"
"That's different."
"Why is it different?"
"Well, you see, an Irishman isn't a yeller heathen."
Dewey laughed.
"He may be a heathen, though not a yellow one," he said.
"Well, Dewey, what answer shall I take back to the boys?"
"You can say that I never intended to employ the Chinaman for any length of time; but I shall not send him off till I get ready."
"I'm afraid the boys won't like it, Dewey."
"Probably O'Reilly won't. As for you, you are too intelligent a man to be influenced by such a man as he."
All men are sensible to flattery, and Hodgson was won over by this politic speech.
"I won't say you're altogether wrong, Dewey," he said; "but I wouldn't keep him too long."
"I don't mean to."
Hodgson returning reported that Dewey would soon dismiss the Chinaman, and omitted the independent tone which the latter had assumed. The message was considered conciliatory, and pronounced satisfactory; but O'Reilly was not appeased. He still murmured, but his words produced little effect. Seeing this, he devised a private scheme of annoyance.
CHAPTER XXX
A MIDNIGHT VISIT
This conversation set Dewey to thinking. Though he was independent, he was not foolishly so, and he was not willing, out of a spirit of opposition, to expose his new acquaintance to annoyance, perhaps to injury. He did not care to retain Ki Sing in his employment for any length of time, and made up his mind to dismiss him early the next mornng, say, at four o'clock, before the miners had thrown off the chains of sleep.
He did not anticipate any harm to his Mongolian friend during the night; but this was because he did not fully understand the feeling of outraged dignity which rankled in the soul of O'Reilly.
Patrick O'Reilly was like his countrymen in being always ready for a fight; but he was unlike them in harboring a sullen love of revenge. In this respect he was more like an Indian.
He felt that Richard Dewey had got the better of him in the brief contest, and the fact that he had been worsted in the presence of his fellow miners humiliated him. If he could only carry his point, and deprive the Chinaman of his queue after all, the disgrace would be redeemed, and O'Reilly would be himself again.
"And why shouldn't I?" he said to himself. "The haythen will sleep in Dewey's tent. Why can't I creep up, unbeknownst, in the middle of the night, and cut off his pigtail, while he is aslape? Faith, I'd like to see how he and his friend would look in the morning. I don't belave a word of his not bein' allowed to go back to Chiny widout it. That is an invintion of Dewey."
The more O'Reilly dwelt upon this idea the more it pleased him. Once the pigtail was cut off, the mischief could not be repaired, and he would have a most suitable and satisfactory revenge.
Of course, it would not do to make the attempt till Ki Sing and his protector were both fast asleep. "All men are children when they are asleep," says an old proverb. That is, all men are as helpless as children when their senses are locked in slumber. It would be safer, therefore, to carry out his plan if he could manage to do so without awaking the two men.
O'Reilly determined not to take any one into his confidence. This was prudent, for it was sure to prevent his plan from becoming known. There was, however, one inconvenience about this, as it would prevent him from borrowing the scissors upon which he had relied to cut off the queue. But he had a sharp knife, which he thought would answer the purpose equally well.
It was rather hard for O'Reilly to keep awake till midnight-the earliest hour which he thought prudent-but the motive which impelled him was sufficiently strong to induce even this sacrifice.
So, as the shadows darkened, and the night came on, Patrick O'Reilly forced himself to lie awake, while he waited eagerly for the hour of midnight. Meanwhile, Richard Dewey and Ki Sing lay down at nine o'clock and sought refreshment in sleep. Both were fatigued, but it was the Chinaman who first lost consciousness. Dewey scanned with curiosity the bland face of his guest, looking childlike and peaceful, as he lay by his side.
"I wonder if he is dreaming of his distant home in China," thought Dewey. "The cares of life do not seem to sit heavy upon him. Though he has been in danger to-day, and may be so still, he yields himself up trustfully to the repose which he needs. Is it true, I wonder, that cares increase with mental culture? Doubtless, it is true. If I were in China, threatened with a loss which would prevent my returning to my native country, I am sure it would keep me awake. But there can be nothing to fear now."
Richard raised himself on his elbow, and looked about him. The tents of the miners were grouped together, within a comparatively small radius, and on all sides could be heard-it was now past ten-the deep breathing of men exhausted by the day's toils. This would not ordinarily have been the case at so early an hour, for when there was whisky in the camp, there was often late carousing. It chanced, however, at this time that the stock of liquor was exhausted, and, until a new supply could be obtained from San Francisco, necessity enforced the rule of total abstinence. It would have been well if, for months to come, there could have been the same good reason for abstinence, but, as a matter of fact, the very next day some casks were brought into camp, much to the delighted and satisfaction of the anti-temperance party.
Finally Dewey fell asleep, but his sleep was a troubled one. He had unthinkingly reclined upon his back, and this generally brought bad dreams. He woke with a start from a dream, in which it seemed to him that the miners were about to hang Ki Sing from the branch of one of the tall trees near-by, when he detected a stealthy step close at hand.
Instantly he was on the alert. Turning his head, he caught sight of a human figure nearing the tent. A second glance showed him that it was O'Reilly, with a knife in his hand.
"Good heavens!" thought Dewey, "does he mean to kill the poor Chinaman?"
A muttered sentence from O'Reilly reassured him on this point.
"Now, you yeller haythen, I'll cut off your pigtail in spite of that impertinent friend of yours—Dick Dewey. I'll show you that an O'Reilly isn't to be interfered wid."
"So he wants the poor fellow's queue, does he?" said Dewey to himself. "You're not quite smart enough, Mr. O'Reilly."
There was no time to lose.
O'Reilly was already on his knees, with the poor Chinaman's treasured queue in his hand, when he felt himself seized in a powerful grip.
"What are you about, O'Reilly?" demanded Richard Dewey, in a deep, stern voice.
O'Reilly uttered a cry, rather of surprise than alarm.
"What are you about?" repeated Richard Dewey, in a tone of authority.
"I'm goin' to cut off the haythen's pigtail," answered the Irishman doggedly.
"What for?"
"I've said I'd do it, and I'll do it."
"Well, Mr. O'Reilly, I've said you sha'n't do it, and I mean to keep my word."
O'Reilly tried to carry out his intent, but suddenly found himself flung backward in a position very favorable for studying the position of the stars.
"Are you not ashamed to creep up to my tent in the middle of the night on such an errand as that, Patrick O'Reilly?" demanded Dewey.
"No, I'm not. Let me up, Dick Dewey, or it'll be the worse for you," said the intruder wrathfully.
"Give me your knife, then."
"I won't. It's my own."
"The errand on which you come is my warrant for demanding it."
"I won't give you the knife, but I'll go back," said O'Reilly.
"That won't do."
"Don't you go too far, Dick Dewey. I'm your aiqual."
"No man is my equal who creeps to my tent at the dead of night. Do you know what the camp will think, O'Eeilly?"
"And what will they think?"
"That you came to rob me."
"Then they'll think a lie!" said O'Reilly, startled, for he knew that on such a charge he would be liable to be suspended to the nearest tree.
"If they chose to think so, it would be bad for you."
"You know it isn't so Dick Dewey," said O'Reilly.
"I consider your intention quite as bad. You wanted to prevent this poor Chinaman from ever returning to his native land, though he had never injured you in any way. You can't deny it."
"I don't belave a word of all that rigmarole, Dick Dewey."
"It makes little difference whether you believe it or not. You have shown a disposition to injure and annoy Ki Sing, but I have foiled you. And now," here Dewey's tone became deep and stern, "give me that knife directly, and go back to your tent, or I'll rouse the camp, and they may form their own conclusions as to what brought you here."
O'Reilly felt that Dewey was in earnest, and that he must yield. He did so with a bad grace enough and slunk back to his tent, which he did not leave till morning.
Early in the morning, Richard Dewey awakened Ki Sing.
"You had better not stay here, Ki Sing," he said. "There are those who would do you mischief. Go into the mountains, and you may find gold. There you will be safe."
"Melican man velly good-me go," said the Chinaman submissively.
"Good luck to you, Ki Sing!"
"Good luckee, Melican man!"
So the two parted, and when morning came to the camp, nothing was to be seen of the Chinaman.
Dewey returned O'Reilly's knife, the latter receiving it in sullen silence.
It was not long afterward that Richard Dewey himself left Murphy's in search of a richer claim.
