The Collected Works of James Oliver Curwood (Illustrated Edition). James Oliver Curwood
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between his feet a thin, white, ghostly line ran out until it lost itself in the blackness under the lantern. It was the fuse, leading to the box of dynamite on which he was sitting!
Madly he struggled at the thongs that bound him until he sank exhausted against the row of powder sacks at his back. Like words of fire the last warning of Meleese burned in his brain--"You must go, to-morrow--to-morrow--or they will kill you!" And this was the way in which he was to die! There flamed before his eyes the terrible spectacle which he had witnessed a few hours before--the holocaust of fire and smoke and thunder that had disrupted a mountain, a chaos of writhing, twisting fury, and in that moment his heart seemed to cease its beating. He closed his eyes and tried to calm himself. Was it possible that there lived men so fiendish as to condemn him to this sort of death? Why had not his enemies killed him out among the rocks? That would have been easier--quicker--less troublesome. Why did they wish to torture him? What terrible thing had he done? Was he mad--mad--and this all a terrible nightmare, a raving find unreal contortion of things in his brain? In this hour of death question after question raced through his head, and he answered no one of them. He sat still for a time, scarcely breathing. There was no sound, save the beating of his own heart. Then there came another, almost unheard at first, faint, thrilling, maddening.
Tick--tick--tick!
It was the beating of his watch. A spasm of horror seized him.
What time was it? The coyote was to be fired at nine o'clock. It was four when he left his cabin. How long had he been unconscious? Was it time now--now? Was MacDonald's finger already reaching out to that little white button which would send him into eternity?
He struggled again, gnashing furiously at the thing which covered his mouth, tearing the flesh of his wrists as he twisted at the ropes which bound him, choking himself with his efforts to loosen the thong about his neck. Exhausted again, he sank back, panting, half dead. As he lay with closed eyes a little of his reason asserted itself. After all, was he such a coward as to go mad?
Tick--tick--tick!
His watch was beating at a furious rate. Was something wrong with it? Was it going too fast? He tried to count the seconds, but they raced away from him. When he looked again his gaze fell on the little yellow tongue of flame in the lantern globe. It was not the steady, unwinking eye of a few minutes before. There was a sputtering weakness about it now, and as he watched the light grew fainter and fainter. The flame was going out. A few minutes more and he would be in darkness. At first the significance of it did not come to him; then he straightened himself with a jerk that tightened the thong about his neck until it choked him. Hours must have passed since the lantern had been placed on that rock, else the oil would not be burned out of it now!
For the first time Howland realized that it was becoming more and more difficult for him to get breath. The thing about his neck was tightening, slowly, inexorably, like a hot band of steel, and suddenly, because of this tightening, he found that he had recovered his voice.
"This damned rawhide--is pinching--my Adam's apple--"
Whatever had been about his mouth had slipped down and his words sounded hollow and choking in the rock-bound chamber. He tried to raise his voice in a shout, though he knew how futile his loudest shrieks would be. The effort choked him more. His suffering was becoming excruciating. Sharp pains darted like red-hot needles through his limbs, his back tortured him, and his head ached as though a knife had cleft the base of his skull. The strength of his limbs was leaving him. He no longer felt any sensation in his cramped feet. He measured the paralysis creeping up his legs inch by inch, driving the sharp pains before it--and then a groan of horror rose to his lips.
The light had gone out!
As if that dying of the little yellow flame were the signal for his death, there came to his ears a sharp hissing sound, a spark leaped up into the blackness before his eyes, and a slow, creeping glow came toward him over the rock at his feet.
The hour--the minute--the second had come, and MacDonald had pressed the little white button that was to send him into eternity! He did not cry out now. He knew that the end was very near, and in its nearness he found new strength. Once he had seen a man walk to his death on the scaffold, and as the condemned had spoken his last farewell, with the noose about his neck, he had marveled at the clearness of his voice, at the fearlessness of this creature in his last moment on earth.
Now he understood. Inch by inch the fuse burned toward him--a fifth of the distance, a quarter--now a third. At last it reached a half--was almost under his feet. Two minutes more of life. He put his whole strength once again in an attempt to free his hands. This time his attempt was cool, steady, masterful---with death one hundred seconds away. His heart gave a sudden bursting leap into his throat when he felt something give. Another effort--and in the powder-choked vault there rang out a thrilling cry of triumph. His hands were free! He reached forward to the fuse, and this time a moaning, wordless sob fell from him, faint, terrifying, with all the horror that might fill a human soul in its inarticulate note. He could not reach the fuse because of the thong about his neck!
He felt for his knife. He had left it in his room. Sixty seconds more--forty--thirty! He could see the fiery end of the fuse almost at his feet. Suddenly his groping fingers came in contact with the cold steel of his pocket revolver and with a last hope he snatched it forth, stretching down his pistol arm until the muzzle of the weapon was within a dozen inches of the deadly spark. At his first shot the spark leaped, but did not go out. After the second there was no longer the fiery, creeping thing on the floor, and, crushing his head back against the sacks, Howland sat for many minutes as if death had in reality come to him in the moment of his deliverance. After a time, with tedious slowness, he worked a hand into his trousers' pocket, where he carried a pen-knife. It took him a long time to saw through the rawhide thong about his neck. After that he cut the rope that bound his ankles.
He made an effort to rise, but no sooner had he gained his feet than his paralyzed limbs gave way under him and he dropped in a heap on the floor. Very slowly the blood began finding its way through his choked veins again, and with the change there came over him a feeling of infinite restfulness. He stretched himself out, with his face turned to the black wall above, realizing only that he was saved, that he had outwitted his mysterious enemies again, and that he was comfortable. He made no effort to think--to scheme out his further deliverance. He was with the powder and the dynamite, and the powder and the dynamite could not be exploded until human hands came to attach a new fuse. MacDonald would attend to that very soon, so he went off into a doze that was almost sleep. In his half-consciousness there came to him but one sound--that dreadful ticking of his watch. He seemed to have listened to it for hours when there arose another sound--the ticking of another watch.
He sat up, startled, wondering, and then he laughed happily as he heard the sound more distinctly. It was the beating of picks on the rock outside. Already MacDonald's men were at work clearing the mouth of the coyote. In half an hour he would be out in the big, breathing world again.
The thought brought him to his feet. The numbness was gone from his limbs and he could walk about. His first move was to strike a match and look at his watch.
"Half-past ten!"
He spoke the words aloud, thinking of Meleese. In an hour and a half he was to meet her on the trail. Would he be released in time to keep the tryst? How should he explain his imprisonment in the coyote so that he could leave MacDonald without further loss of time? As the sound of the picks came nearer his brain began working faster. If he could only evade explanations until morning--and then reveal the whole dastardly business to MacDonald! There would be time then for those explanations, for the running down of his murderous assailants, and in the while he would be able to keep his appointment with Meleese.
He was not long in finding a way in which this scheme could be worked, and gathering up the severed ropes and rawhide he concealed them between two of the powder sacks so that those who entered the coyote would discover no signs of his terrible imprisonment. Close to the mouth of the tunnel there was a black rent in the wall of rock, made by a bursting charge of dynamite, in which he could conceal himself. When the men were busy examining the broken fuse he would step out and join them. It would look as though he had crawled through the tunnel after them.