The Mucker

  CHAPTER II. THE ESCAPE

  BYRNE had no time to pick any particular spot to jump for. When he didjump he might have been directly over a picket fence, or a bottomlesspit--he did not know. Nor did he care.

  As it happened he was over neither. The platform chanced to be passingacross a culvert at the instant. Beneath the culvert was a slimy pool.Into this the two men plunged, alighting unharmed.

  Byrne was the first to regain his feet. He dragged the deputy sheriff tohis knees, and before that frightened and astonished officer of the lawcould gather his wits together he had been relieved of his revolver andfound himself looking into its cold and business-like muzzle.

  Then Billy Byrne waded ashore, prodding the deputy sheriff in the ribswith cold steel, and warning him to silence. Above the pool stood alittle wood, thick with tangled wildwood. Into this Byrne forced hisprisoner.

  When they had come deep enough into the concealment of the foliage tomake discovery from the outside improbable Byrne halted.

  "Now say yer prayers," he commanded. "I'm a-going to croak yeh."

  The deputy sheriff looked up at him in wild-eyed terror.

  "My God!" he cried. "I ain't done nothin' to you, Byrne. Haven't Ialways been your friend? What've I ever done to you? For God's sakeByrne you ain't goin' to murder me, are you? They'll get you, sure."

  Billy Byrne let a rather unpleasant smile curl his lips.

  "No," he said, "youse ain't done nothin' to me; but you stand for thelaw, damn it, and I'm going to croak everything I meet that stands forthe law. They wanted to send me up for life--me, an innocent man. Yourkind done it--the cops. You ain't no cop; but you're just as rotten. Nowsay yer prayers."

  He leveled the revolver at his victim's head. The deputy sheriff slumpedto his knees and tried to embrace Billy Byrne's legs as he pleaded forhis life.

  "Cut it out, you poor boob," admonished Billy. "You've gotta die and ifyou was half a man you'd wanna die like one."

  The deputy sheriff slipped to the ground. His terror had overcome him,leaving him in happy unconsciousness. Byrne stood looking down upon theman for a moment. His wrist was chained to that of the other, and thepull of the deputy's body was irritating.

  Byrne stooped and placed the muzzle of the revolver back of the man'sear. "Justice!" he muttered, scornfully, and his finger tightened uponthe trigger.

  Then, conjured from nothing, there rose between himself and theunconscious man beside him the figure of a beautiful girl. Her face wasbrave and smiling, and in her eyes was trust and pride--whole worlds ofthem. Trust and pride in Billy Byrne.

  Billy closed his eyes tight as though in physical pain. He brushed hishand quickly across his face.

  "Gawd!" he muttered. "I can't do it--but I came awful close to it."

  Dropping the revolver into his side pocket he kneeled beside the deputysheriff and commenced to go through the man's clothes. After a moment hecame upon what he sought--a key ring confining several keys.

  Billy found the one he wished and presently he was free. He still stoodlooking at the deputy sheriff.

  "I ought to croak you," he murmured. "I'll never make my get-away if Idon't; but SHE won't let me--God bless her."

  Suddenly a thought came to Billy Byrne. If he could have a start hemight escape. It wouldn't hurt the man any to stay here for a few hours,or even for a day. Billy removed the deputy's coat and tore it intostrips. With these he bound the man to a tree. Then he fastened a gag inhis mouth.

  During the operation the deputy regained consciousness. He lookedquestioningly at Billy.

  "I decided not to croak you," explained the young man. "I'm just a-goin'to leave you here for a while. They'll be lookin' all along the right o'way in a few hours--it won't be long afore they find you. Now so long,and take care of yerself, bo," and Billy Byrne had gone.

  A mistake that proved fortunate for Billy Byrne caused the penitentiaryauthorities to expect him and his guard by a later train, so nosuspicion was aroused when they failed to come upon the train theyreally had started upon. This gave Billy a good two hours' start that hewould not otherwise have had--an opportunity of which he made good use.

  Wherefore it was that by the time the authorities awoke to the factthat something had happened Billy Byrne was fifty miles west of Joliet,bowling along aboard a fast Santa Fe freight. Shortly after night hadfallen the train crossed the Mississippi. Billy Byrne was hungry andthirsty, and as the train slowed down and came to a stop out in themidst of a dark solitude of silent, sweet-smelling country, Billy openedthe door of his box car and dropped lightly to the ground.

  So far no one had seen Billy since he had passed from the ken of thetrussed deputy sheriff, and as Billy had no desire to be seen he slippedover the edge of the embankment into a dry ditch, where he squatted uponhis haunches waiting for the train to depart. The stop out there in thedark night was one of those mysterious stops which trains are prone tomake, unexplained and doubtless unexplainable by any other than a higherintelligence which directs the movements of men and rolling stock. Therewas no town, and not even a switch light. Presently two staccato blastsbroke from the engine's whistle, there was a progressive jerking atcoupling pins, which started up at the big locomotive and ran rapidlydown the length of the train, there was the squeaking of brake shoesagainst wheels, and the train moved slowly forward again upon itslong journey toward the coast, gaining momentum moment by moment untilfinally the way-car rolled rapidly past the hidden fugitive and thefreight rumbled away to be swallowed up in the darkness.

  When it had gone Billy rose and climbed back upon the track, along whichhe plodded in the wake of the departing train. Somewhere a road wouldpresently cut across the track, and along the road there would befarmhouses or a village where food and drink might be found.

  Billy was penniless, yet he had no doubt but that he should eat when hehad discovered food. He was thinking of this as he walked briskly towardthe west, and what he thought of induced a doubt in his mind as towhether it was, after all, going to be so easy to steal food.

  "Shaw!" he exclaimed, half aloud, "she wouldn't think it wrong for a guyto swipe a little grub when he was starvin'. It ain't like I was goin'to stick a guy up for his roll. Sure she wouldn't see nothin' wrong forme to get something to eat. I ain't got no money. They took it all awayfrom me, an' I got a right to live--but, somehow, I hate to do it. Iwisht there was some other way. Gee, but she's made a sissy out o' me!Funny how a feller can change. Why I almost like bein' a sissy," andBilly Byrne grinned at the almost inconceivable idea.

  Before Billy came to a road he saw a light down in a little depressionat one side of the track. It was not such a light as a lamp shiningbeyond a window makes. It rose and fell, winking and flaring close tothe ground.

  It looked much like a camp fire, and as Billy drew nearer he saw thatsuch it was, and he heard a voice, too. Billy approached more carefully.He must be careful always to see before being seen. The little fireburned upon the bank of a stream which the track bridged upon a concretearch.

  Billy dropped once more from the right of way, and climbed a fence intoa thin wood. Through this he approached the camp fire with small chanceof being observed. As he neared it the voice resolved itself intoarticulate words, and presently Billy leaned against a tree close behindthe speaker and listened.

  There was but a single figure beside the small fire--that of a mansquatting upon his haunches roasting something above the flames. At oneedge of the fire was an empty tin can from which steam arose, and anaroma that was now and again wafted to Billy's nostrils.

  Coffee! My, how good it smelled. Billy's mouth watered. But thevoice--that interested Billy almost as much as the preparations for thecoming meal.

  We'll dance a merry saraband from here to drowsy Samarcand. Along the sea, across the land, the birds are flying South, And you, my sweet Penelope, out there somewhere you wait for me, With buds of roses in your hair and kisses on your mouth.

  The words took hold of Billy somewhere and made him f
orget his hunger.Like a sweet incense which induces pleasant daydreams they were waftedin upon him through the rich, mellow voice of the solitary camper, andthe lilt of the meter entered his blood.

  But the voice. It was the voice of such as Billy Byrne always hadloathed and ridiculed until he had sat at the feet of Barbara Hardingand learned many things, including love. It was the voice of cultureand refinement. Billy strained his eyes through the darkness to have acloser look at the man. The light of the camp fire fell upon frayed andbagging clothes, and upon the back of a head covered by a shapeless, anddisreputable soft hat.

  Obviously the man was a hobo. The coffee boiling in a discarded tin canwould have been proof positive of this without other evidence; but thereseemed plenty more. Yes, the man was a hobo. Billy continued to standlistening.

  The mountains are all hid in mist, the valley is like amethyst, The poplar leaves they turn and twist, oh, silver, silver green! Out there somewhere along the sea a ship is waiting patiently, While up the beach the bubbles slip with white afloat between.

  "Gee!" thought Billy Byrne; "but that's great stuff. I wonder where hegets it. It makes me want to hike until I find that place he's singin'about."

  Billy's thoughts were interrupted by a sound in the wood to one side ofhim. As he turned his eyes in the direction of the slight noise whichhad attracted him he saw two men step quietly out and cross toward theman at the camp fire.

  These, too, were evidently hobos. Doubtless pals of the poetical one.The latter did not hear them until they were directly behind him. Thenhe turned slowly and rose as they halted beside his fire.

  "Evenin', bo," said one of the newcomers.

  "Good evening, gentlemen," replied the camper, "welcome to my humblehome. Have you dined?"

  "Naw," replied the first speaker, "we ain't; but we're goin' to. Now canthe chatter an' duck. There ain't enough fer one here, let alonethree. Beat it!" and the man, who was big and burly, assumed a menacingattitude and took a truculent step nearer the solitary camper.

  The latter was short and slender. The larger man looked as thoughhe might have eaten him at a single mouthful; but the camper did notflinch.

  "You pain me," he said. "You induce within me a severe and highlylocalized pain, and furthermore I don't like your whiskers."

  With which apparently irrelevant remark he seized the matted beard ofthe larger tramp and struck the fellow a quick, sharp blow in the face.Instantly the fellow's companion was upon him; but the camper retainedhis death grip upon the beard of the now yelling bully and continued torain blow after blow upon head and face.

  Billy Byrne was an interested spectator. He enjoyed a good fight as heenjoyed little else; but presently when the first tramp succeeded intangling his legs about the legs of his chastiser and dragging him tothe ground, and the second tramp seized a heavy stick and ran forward todash the man's brains out, Billy thought it time to interfere.

  Stepping forward he called aloud as he came: "Cut it out, boes! Youcan't pull off any rough stuff like that with this here sweet singer.Can it! Can it!" as the second tramp raised his stick to strike the nowprostrate camper.

  As he spoke Billy Byrne broke into a run, and as the stick fell hereached the man's side and swung a blow to the tramp's jaw that sentthe fellow spinning backward to the river's brim, where he tottereddrunkenly for a moment and then plunged backward into the shallow water.

  Then Billy seized the other attacker by the shoulder and dragged him tohis feet.

  "Do you want some, too, you big stiff?" he inquired.

  The man spluttered and tried to break away, striking at Billy as he didso; but a sudden punch, such a punch as Billy Byrne had once handed thesurprised Harlem Hurricane, removed from the mind of the tramp the lastvestige of any thought he might have harbored to do the newcomer bodilyinjury, and with it removed all else from the man's mind, temporarily.

  As the fellow slumped, unconscious, to the ground, the camper rose tohis feet.

  "Some wallop you have concealed in your sleeve, my friend," he said;"place it there!" and he extended a slender, shapely hand.

  Billy took it and shook it.

  "It don't get under the ribs like those verses of yours, though, bo," hereturned.

  "It seems to have insinuated itself beneath this guy's thick skull,"replied the poetical one, "and it's a cinch my verses, nor any otherwould ever get there."

  The tramp who had plumbed the depths of the creek's foot of water andtwo feet of soft mud was crawling ashore.

  "Whadda YOU want now?" inquired Billy Byrne. "A piece o' soap?"

  "I'll get youse yet," spluttered the moist one through his waterywhiskers.

  "Ferget it," admonished Billy, "an' hit the trail." He pointed towardthe railroad right of way. "An' you, too, John L," he added turningto the other victim of his artistic execution, who was now sitting up."Hike!"

  Mumbling and growling the two unwashed shuffled away, and were presentlylost to view along the vanishing track.

  The solitary camper had returned to his culinary effort, as unruffledand unconcerned, apparently, as though naught had occurred to disturbhis peaceful solitude.

  "Sit down," he said after a moment, looking up at Billy, "and have abite to eat with me. Take that leather easy chair. The Louis Quatorze istoo small and spindle-legged for comfort." He waved his hand invitinglytoward the sward beside the fire.

  For a moment he was entirely absorbed in the roasting fowl impaled upona sharp stick which he held in his right hand. Then he presently brokeagain into verse.

  Around the world and back again; we saw it all. The mist and rain

  In England and the hot old plain from Needles to Berdoo. We kept a-rambling all the time. I rustled grub, he rustled rhyme-- Blind-baggage, hoof it, ride or climb--we always put it through.

  "You're a good sort," he broke off, suddenly. "There ain't many boesthat would have done as much for a fellow."

  "It was two against one," replied Billy, "an' I don't like them odds.Besides I like your poetry. Where d'ye get it--make it up?"

  "Lord, no," laughed the other. "If I could do that I wouldn't bepan-handling. A guy by the name of Henry Herbert Knibbs did them. Great,ain't they?"

  "They sure is. They get me right where I live," and then, after a pause;"sure you got enough fer two, bo?"

  "I have enough for you, old top," replied the host, "even if I only hadhalf as much as I have. Here, take first crack at the ambrosia. SorryI have but a single cup; but James has broken the others. James is verycareless. Sometimes I almost feel that I shall have to let him go."

  "Who's James?" asked Billy.

  "James? Oh, James is my man," replied the other.

  Billy looked up at his companion quizzically, then he tasted the dark,thick concoction in the tin can.

  "This is coffee," he announced. "I thought you said it was ambrose."

  "I only wished to see if you would recognize it, my friend," replied thepoetical one politely. "I am highly complimented that you can guess whatit is from its taste."

  For several minutes the two ate in silence, passing the tin can back andforth, and slicing--hacking would be more nearly correct--pieces of meatfrom the half-roasted fowl. It was Billy who broke the silence.

  "I think," said he, "that you been stringin' me--'bout James andambrose."

  The other laughed good-naturedly.

  "You are not offended, I hope," said he. "This is a sad old world, youknow, and we're all looking for amusement. If a guy has no money to buyit with, he has to manufacture it."

  "Sure, I ain't sore," Billy assured him. "Say, spiel that part again'bout Penelope with the kisses on her mouth, an' you can kid me till thecows come home."

  The camper by the creek did as Billy asked him, while the latter satwith his eyes upon the fire seeing in the sputtering little flames theoval face of her who was Penelope to him.

  When the verse was completed he reached forth his hand and took the tincan in his strong fingers, raising it before his face.
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  "Here's to--to his Knibbs!" he said, and drank, passing the batteredthing over to his new friend.

  "Yes," said the other; "here's to his Knibbs, and--Penelope!"

  "Drink hearty," returned Billy Byrne.

  The poetical one drew a sack of tobacco from his hip pocket and arumpled package of papers from the pocket of his shirt, extending bothtoward Billy.

  "Want the makings?" he asked.

  "I ain't stuck on sponging," said Billy; "but maybe I can get even someday, and I sure do want a smoke. You see I was frisked. I ain't gotnothin'--they didn't leave me a sou markee."

  Billy reached across one end of the fire for the tobacco and cigarettepapers. As he did so the movement bared his wrist, and as the firelightfell upon it the marks of the steel bracelet showed vividly. In the fallfrom the train the metal had bitten into the flesh.

  His companion's eyes happened to fall upon the telltale mark. Therewas an almost imperceptible raising of the man's eyebrows; but he saidnothing to indicate that he had noticed anything out of the ordinary.

  The two smoked on for many minutes without indulging in conversation.The camper quoted snatches from Service and Kipling, then he came backto Knibbs, who was evidently his favorite. Billy listened and thought.

  "Goin' anywheres in particular?" he asked during a momentary lull in therecitation.

  "Oh, south or west," replied the other. "Nowhere in particular--anyplace suits me just so it isn't north or east."

  "That's me," said Billy.

  "Let's travel double, then," said the poetical one. "My name's Bridge."

  "And mine's Billy. Here, shake," and Byrne extended his hand.

  "Until one of us gets wearied of the other's company," said Bridge.

  "You're on," replied Billy. "Let's turn in."

  "Good," exclaimed Bridge. "I wonder what's keeping James. He should havebeen here long since to turn down my bed and fix my bath."

  Billy grinned and rolled over on his side, his head uphill and his feettoward the fire. A couple of feet away Bridge paralleled him, and infive minutes both were breathing deeply in healthy slumber.