Concerning that night s ride, the man spoke most eloquently for
himself, in a little shed back of a saloon on the San Francisco water
front.
All I get is fifty for it, he grumbled; an I wouldn t do it over
for a thousand, cold cash.
His hand was wrapped in a bloody handkerchief, and the right trouser
leg was ripped from knee to ankle.
How much did the other mug get? the saloon-keeper demanded.
A hundred, was the reply. Wouldn t take a sou less, so help me.
That makes a hundred and fifty, the saloon-keeper calculated; and
he s worth it, or I m a squarehead.
The kidnapper undid the bloody wrappings and looked at his lacerated
hand. If I don t get the hydrophoby
It ll be because you was born to hang, laughed the saloon-keeper.
Here, lend me a hand before you pull your freight, he added.
Dazed, suffering intolerable pain from throat and tongue, with the life
half throttled out of him, Buck attempted to face his tormentors. But
he was thrown down and choked repeatedly, till they succeeded in filing
the heavy brass collar from off his neck. Then the rope was removed,
and he was flung into a cagelike crate.
There he lay for the remainder of the weary night, nursing his wrath
and wounded pride. He could not understand what it all meant. What did
they want with him, these strange men? Why were they keeping him pent
up in this narrow crate? He did not know why, but he felt oppressed by
the vague sense of impending calamity. Several times during the night
he sprang to his feet when the shed door rattled open, expecting to see
the Judge, or the boys at least. But each time it was the bulging face
of the saloon-keeper that peered in at him by the sickly light of a
tallow candle. And each time the joyful bark that trembled in Buck s
throat was twisted into a savage growl.
5