Part 7 (2/2)
”Ah-h!” snarled Harrigan, and s.h.i.+fted his grip lower, his thumbs digging relentlessly into the great throat. This time the giant limbs of the captain relaxed as if in sleep. Then through the fierce singing in his ears the Irishman heard a yell. He turned his head. The wolf pack saw their prey pulled down at last. They ran now to join the kill, not men, but raging devils. Harrigan sprang to his feet, catching up a marlinspike, and whirled it above his head.
”Back!” he shouted.
They shrank back, growling one to the other savagely, irresolute. There came a moan at Harrigan's feet. He leaned over and lifted the bulk of the captain's inert body. As if through a haze he saw the chief engineer and the two mates running toward him and caught the glitter of a revolver in the hands of the first officer. The Irishman's battered lips stretched to a shapeless grin.
”Help me to the captain's cabin,” he said. ”He's afther bein' sick.”
CHAPTER 8
And the four of them went aft carrying McTee's body. On the promenade they pa.s.sed Kate Malone. She shrank against the rail, her eyes blank and her face white.
”He's dead!” she cried.
”He's just beginnin' to live,” said Harrigan.
The captain was muttering faintly as they laid him on the bunk in his room. ”Now get out,” commanded Harrigan. ”I will be alone with him when he wakes up. I have something to whisper in his ear.”
”Is it safe?” said the first mate to the chief engineer, gesturing with his weapon.
Harrigan s.n.a.t.c.hed it away and waved it like a club above his head.
”Get out, or I'll bash your skull in.”
His face was hideous, cut and blood-stained, starved with the long hunger and lighted with the victory. They slunk from the cabin, backing out as if they expected him to rush them. Harrigan locked the door and started to tend the captain. He washed McTee to the waist, cleansed the cut places carefully, and covered them with narrow strips of adhesive tape which he found in a small medicine chest. As the heavier breathing of the captain indicated that he was about to recover his senses, Harrigan performed the same services for himself. It was slow work, for now that the stimulus of action was gone, his weakness grew on him in recurrent waves. Finally a sound made him turn to see McTee propping himself up on the bunk with one elbow; his eyes, unconfused and steady, looked brightly out at Harrigan.
”You beat me?”
”It was the swing of the deck that rolled you over and broke your grip.
I've stayed to tell you that.”
”Chances or no chances, you beat me.”
”Man, you'd have busted my back if it hadn't been for that buck of the s.h.i.+p. When your hand came away, it took the skin with it.”
”And that's why you didn't finish me?”
”Aye.”
”You'll never have the chance again.”
”I want no chances; I want no help except my own strength as it was before you withered me with your h.e.l.lfire.”
”When we stand up again, I'll kill you, Harrigan.”
”When we stand up again, I'll break you, Black McTee--like a rotten stick.”
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