Gold Part 49

"I hope G.o.d Almighty will strike every one of you with forked lightning and that I shall meet you all in the lowest pit of h.e.l.l!" he snarled.

Morton kept a stubborn and rather dignified silence. Catlin alternately pleaded and wept. Jules answered Danny's question:

"Sure thing! Pull off my boots for me. I don't want it to get back to my old mother that I died with my boots on!"

In silence and gravely this ridiculous request was complied with. The crowd, very attentive, heaved and stirred. The desperadoes, shouldering their way here and there, were finding each other out, were gathering in little groups.

"They'll try a rescue!" whispered the man next to me.

"Men," Danny's voice rang out, clear and menacing, "do your duty!"

At the words, across the silence the click of gunlocks was heard as the Vigilantes levelled their weapons at the crowd. From my position near the condemned men I could see the s.h.i.+fting components of the mob freeze to immobility before the menace of those barrels. At the same instant the man who had been appointed executioner jerked the box from beneath Catlin's feet.

"There goes one to h.e.l.l!" muttered Charley.

"I hope forked lightning will strike every strangling----" yelled Crawford. His speech was abruptly cut short as the box spun from under his feet.

"Kick away, old fellow!" said Scar-face Charley. "Me next! I'll be in h.e.l.l with you in a minute! Every man for his principles! Hurrah for crime! Let her rip!" and without waiting for the executioner, he himself kicked the support away.

Morton died without a sign. Catlin, at the last, suddenly calmed, and met his fate bravely.

Before the lull resulting from the execution and the threat of the presented weapons could break, Danny Randall spoke up.

"Gentlemen!" he called clearly. "The roster of the Vigilantes is open.

Such of you as please to join the a.s.sociation for the preservation of decency, law, and order in this camp can now do so."

The guard lowered their arms and moved to one side. The crowd swept forward. In the cabin the applicants were admitted a few at a time.

Before noon we had four hundred men on our rolls. Some of the bolder roughs ventured a few threats, but were speedily overawed. The community had found itself, and was no longer afraid.

PART IV

THE LAW

CHAPTER XL

THE RAINS

No sooner had this radical clean-up of the body politic been consummated than the rains began. That means little to any but a Californian. To him it means everything. We were quite new to the climate and the conditions, so that the whole thing was a great surprise.

For a month past it had been threatening. The clouds gathered and piled and blackened until they seemed fairly on the point of bursting. One would not have given two cents for his chances of a dry skin were he to start on a journey across the street. Yet somehow nothing happened. Late in the afternoon, perhaps, the thunderous portents would thin. The diffused light would become stronger. Far down in the west bars of sunlight would strike. And by evening the stars shone brilliantly from a sky swept clear. After a dozen repet.i.tions of this phenomenon we ceased to pay any attention to it. Somebody named it "high fog," which did well enough to differentiate it from a genuine rain-bringing cloud. Except for that peculiar gourd that looks exactly like a watermelon, these "high fogs" were the best imitation of a real thing I have ever seen.

They came up like rain clouds, they looked precisely like rain clouds, they went through all the performances of rain clouds--except that never, never did they rain!

But the day of the Vigilante execution the sky little by little turned s.h.i.+mmering gray; so that the sun s.h.i.+ning from it looked like silver; and the shadows of objects were diffused and pale. A tepid wind blew gently but steadily from the southeast. No clouds were visible at first; but imperceptibly, around the peaks, filmy veils formed seemingly out of the gray substance of the very sky itself. How these thickened and spread I did not see; but when I came out of the Bella Union, after a long and interesting evening of discussion, I found no stars; and, as I stood looking upward, a large warm drop splashed against my face.

Sometime during the night it began to rain in earnest. We were awakened by its steady drumming on the canvas of our tent.

"My Lord! but she sure is _raining_!" said Johnny across the roar of sound.

"Don't tech the canvas!" warned Old. "If you do, she'll leak like a spout where you teched her!"

"Thank heaven, that high fog scared us into ditching around the tent,"

said Cal fervently.

But our satisfaction was short-lived. We had ditched the tent, to be sure, but we had badly underestimated the volume of a California downpour.

Before many minutes had pa.s.sed Johnny gave a disgusted snort.

"I'm lying in a mars.h.!.+" he cried.

He struck a light, and we all saw the water trickling in a dozen little streams beneath the edge of the tent.

"We're going to be ruined!" cried Johnny comically.

He arose, and in doing so brushed his head violently against the slanting canvas roof. Almost immediately thereafter the rays of the lantern were reflected from tiny beads of water, like a sweat, appearing as though by magic at that spot. They swelled, gathered, hesitated, then began to feel their way slowly down the dry canvas. The trickle became a stream. A large drop fell straight down. Another followed.

"Anybody need a drink?" inquired Cal.

"I'm sorry!" said Johnny contritely.

"You needn't be," I consoled him. "The whole thing is going to leak, if this keeps up."

"What's the matter with going over to the Morena cabin?" queried Yank.

We hesitated a little. The events of the day had affected us all more deeply than we liked to acknowledge; and n.o.body but Yank much liked the idea of again entering that bloodstained abode.

"We'd drown getting there," said Cal at last. "I move some of you fellows with two good arms rustle out and fix that ditch." He laughed.

"Nothing like having a hole in you to get out of work."

We took his advice, and managed to turn the flood, though we got very wet in the process.

Then we returned to the tent, changed our clothes, crept into our blankets, and wrapped ourselves close. The spot brushed by Johnny's head dripped steadily. Otherwise our roof shed well. The rain roared straight down with steady, deadly persistency.

"She can't keep this up long, anyway; that's a comfort," muttered Johnny sleepily.

Couldn't she? All next morning that flood came down without the let-up of even a single moment. It had all the volume and violence of a black thunderstorm at its height; only the worst of the thunderstorm lasts but a few moments, while this showed no signs of ever intending to end. Our stout canvas continued to turn the worst of it, but a fine spray was driven through, to our great discomfort. We did not even attempt to build a fire, but sat around wrapped in our damp blankets.

Until about two of the afternoon the deluge continued. Our unique topic of conversation was the marvel of how it could keep it up! We could not imagine more water falling were every stream and lake in the mountains to be lifted to the heavens and poured down again.

"Where the devil does it all come from?" marvelled Old, again and again.

"Don't seem like no resevoy, let alone clouds, could hold so much!"