Casey awoke almost sober and considerably surprised when he discovered the handcuffs.-His injured hand was throbbing from the poison in his system and the steel band on his swollen wrist.
His head still ached frightfully and his tongue felt thick and dry as flannel in his mouth.
He rolled over and sat up, staring uncomprehendingly at the cabin full of men.-The sight of Barney Oakes recalled in a measure his performance with the dynamite; at least, he felt a keen disappointment that Barney was alive and whole and grinning.
Casey could not see what there was to grin about, and he took it as a direct insult to himself.
Mart and Joe sat sullenly on a bench against the wall, and Paw reclined in his bunk at the farther end of the room.-A blood-stained bandage wrapped Paw's head turbanwise, and his little, deep-set eyes gleamed wickedly in his pallid face.-Casey looked for Hank, but he was not there.
A strange man was cooking supper, and Casey wanted to tell him that he was slicing the bacon twice as thick as it should be.
The corpulent man, whom he dimly remembered as a coroner, was talking with a big, burly individual whom Casey guessed was the sheriff.-A man came in and announced to the big man that the car was fixed and they could go any time.-Mart, who had been staring morosely down at his shackled wrists, lifted his head and spoke to the sheriff.
"You'll have to do something about my mother," he said, and bit his lip at the manner in which every head swung his way.
"What about your mother?" the sheriff asked moving toward him.
"Is she here?"-His eyes sent a quick glance around the room which obviously had four outside walls.
Mart swallowed.-"She has a cabin to herself," he explained constrainedly.-"She--she isn't quite right.-Strangers excite her. She--hasn't been well since my father was killed in the mine; she's quiet enough with us--she knows us.-I don't know how she'll be now. I'm afraid--but she can't be left here alone; all I ask is, be as gentle as you can."
The sheriff looked from him to Joe.-Joe nodded confirmation.
"Plumb harmless," he said gruffly.-"It IS kinda--pitiful.
Thinks everybody in the world is damned and going to hell on a long lope."-He gave a snort that resembled neither mirth nor disgust.-"Mebbe she's right at that," he added grimly.
The sheriff asked more questions, and Mart stood up.-"I'll show you where she is, sure.-But can't you leave her be till we're ready to start?-She--it ain't right to bring her here."
"She'll want her supper," the sheriff reminded Mart. "We'll be driving all night. Is she sick abed?"
Casey lay down again and turned his face to the wall.-He remembered the old woman now, and he hoped sincerely they would not bring her into the cabin.-But whatever they did, Casey wanted no part in it whatever.-He wanted to be left alone, and he wanted to think. More than all else he wanted not to see again the old woman who chanted horrible things while she rocked and rocked.
He was roused from uneasy slumber by two officious souls, one of whom was Barney Oakes.-Their intentions were kindly enough, they only wanted to give him his supper.-But Casey wanted neither supper nor kindly intentions, and he was still unregenerately regretful that Barney Oakes was not lying out on the garbage heap in a more or less fragmentary condition.-They raised him to a sitting posture, and Casey swung his legs over the edge of the bunk and delivered a ferocious kick at Barney Oakes.
He caught Barney under the chin, and Barney went down for several counts.-After that Casey wore hobbles on his feet, and was secretly rather proud of the fact that they considered him so dangerous as all that.-Had his mood not been a sulky one which refused to have speech with any one there, they would probably have found it wise to gag him as well.
That is one night in Casey's turbulent life which he never recalled if he could help it.-Two cars had brought the sheriff's party, and one was a seven-passenger.-In the roomy rear seat of this car, Casey, shackled and savage, was made to ride with Mart and his mother. Two deputies occupied the folding seats and never relaxed their watchfulness.
Casey's head still ached splittingly, and the jolting of the car did not serve to ease the, pain.-The old woman sat in the middle, with a blanket wound round and round her to hold her quiet; which it failed to do.-Into Casey's ear rolled the full volume of her rich contralto voice as she monotonously intoned the doom of all mankind--together with every cat, every rat, etc.
Mart's fear had proved well-founded. Strangers had excited the woman and it was not until sheer exhaustion silenced her that she ceased for one moment her horrible chant.
I read the story in the morning paper, and made a flying trip to San Bernardino.-Casey was in jail, naturally; but he didn't care much about that so long as he owned a head with an air-drill going inside.-At least, that is what he told me when I was let in to see him.-I was working to get him out of there on bail if possible before I sent word to the Little Woman, hoping she had not read the papers.-I had some trouble piecing the facts together and trying to get the straight of things before I sent word to the Little Woman. I went out and got him some medicine guaranteed, by the doctor who wrote the prescription, to take the hoot out of the hootch Casey had swallowed.-That afternoon Casey left off glaring at me, sat up, accepted a cigarette and consented to talk.