CHAPTER XII -- EXIT DUNKE
Dunke plowed back through the tunnel in a blind whirl of passion. Rage,chagrin, offended vanity, acute disappointment, all blended with adull heartache to which he was a stranger. He was a dangerous man ina dangerous mood, and so Wolf Struve was likely to discover. But theconvict was not an observant man. His loose upper lip lifted in the uglysneer to which it was accustomed.
"Got onto you, didn't she?"
Dunke stuck his candle in a niche of the ragged granite wall, strodeacross to his former partner in crime, and took the man by the throat.
"I'll learn you to keep that vile tongue of yours still," he saidbetween set teeth, and shook the hapless man till he was black in theface.
Struve hung, sputtering and coughing, against the wall where he had beenthrown. It was long before he could do more than gasp.
"What--what did you do--that for?" His furtive ratlike face lookedvenomous in its impotent anger. "I'll pay you for this--and don'tyou--forget it, Joe Dunke!"
"You'd shoot me in the back the way you did Jim Kinney if you got achance. I know that; but you see you won't get a chance."
"I ain't looking for no such chance. I--"
"That's enough. I don't have to stand for your talk even if I do have totake care of you. Light your candle and move along this tunnel lively."
Something in Dunke's eye quelled the rebellion the other contemplated.He shuffled along, whining as he went that he would never have lookedfor his old pal to treat him so. They climbed ladders to the next level,passed through an empty stope, and stopped at the end of a drift.
"I'll arrange to get you out of here to-night and have you run acrossthe line. I'm going to give you three hundred dollars. That's the lastcent you'll ever get out of me. If you ever come back to this countryI'll see that you're hanged as you deserve."
With that Dunke turned on his heel and was gone. But his contempt forthe ruffian he had cowed was too fearless. He would have thought soif he could have known of the shadow that dogged his heels through thetunnel, if he could have seen the bare fangs that had gained Struvehis name of "Wolf," if he could have caught the flash of the knife thattrembled in the eager hand. He did not know that, as he shot up in thecage to the sunlight, the other was filling the tunnel with imprecationsand wild threats, that he was hugging himself with the promise of arevenge that should be sure and final.
Dunke went about the task of making the necessary arrangementspersonally. He had his surrey packed with food, and about eleven o'clockdrove up to the mine and was lowered to the ninth level. An hour laterhe stepped out of the cage with a prisoner whom he kept covered with arevolver.
"It's that fellow Struve," he explained to the astonished engineer inthe shaft-house. "I found him down below. It seems that Fraser tookhim down the Jackrabbit and he broke loose and worked through to ourground."
"Do you want any help in taking him downtown, sir? Shall I phone for themarshal?"
His boss laughed scornfully.
"When I can't handle one man after I've got him covered I'll let youknow, Johnson."
The two men went out into the starlit night and got into the surrey. Theplay with the revolver had hitherto been for the benefit of Johnson,but it now became very real. Dunke jammed the rim close to the other'stemple.
"I want that letter I wrote you. Quick, by Heaven! No fairy-tales, butthe letter!"
"I swear, Joe--"
"The letter, you villain! I know you never let it go out of yourpossession. Give it up! Quick!"
Struve's hand stole to his breast, came out slowly to the edge of hiscoat, then leaped with a flash of something bright toward the other'sthroat. Simultaneously the revolver rang out. A curse, the sound ofa falling body, and the frightened horses leaped forward. The wheelsslipped over the edge of the narrow mountain road, and surrey, horses,and driver plunged a hundred feet down to the sharp, broken rocks below.
Johnson, hearing the shot, ran out and stumbled over a body lying inthe road. By the bright moonlight he could see that it was that of hisemployer. The surrey was nowhere in sight, but he could easily makeout where it had slipped over the precipice. He ran back into theshaft-house and began telephoning wildly to town.