Harrigan, Max Brand [grave mercy .TXT] 📗

light in a dark room. She tilted back her head and laughed, laughed heartily, laughed till the tears brimmed her eyes. The gloomy scowl of Harrigan stopped her at last. As her mirth died out, the tall form of McTee appeared suddenly before them with his arms crossed. Where they touched his breast, the muscles spread out to a giant size. He was turned toward her, but the gleam of his eye fell full upon Harrigan.

"I suppose," said McTee, and his teeth clicked after each word like the bolt of a rifle shot home, "I suppose that you were laughing at me?"

The Irishman rose and faced the Scotchman, his head thrust forward and a devil in his eyes.

"An' what if we were, Misther McTee?" he purred. "An' what if we wer-r-re, I'm askin'?"

Kate leaped to her feet and sprang between them.

"Is there anything we can do," she broke in hurriedly, "to get away from the island?"

"A raft?" suggested Harrigan.

McTee smiled his contempt.

"A raft? And how would you cut down the trees to make it?"

"Burn 'em down with a circle of fire at the bottom."

"And then set green logs afloat? And how fasten 'em together, even supposing we could burn them down and drag them to the water? No, there's no way of getting off the island unless a boat passes and catches a glimpse of our fire."

"Then we'll have to move this fire to the top of the hill," said
Harrigan.

"Suppose we go now and look over the hill and see what dry wood is near it," said McTee.

"Good."

Something in their eagerness had a meaning for Kate.

"Would you both leave me?" she reproached them.

"It was McTee suggested it," said Harrigan.

McTee favored his comrade with a glance that would have made any other man give ground. It merely made Harrigan grin.

"We'll draw straws for who goes and who stays," said McTee.

Kate picked up two bits of wood.

"The short one stays," she said.

"Draw," said Harrigan in a low voice.

"I was taught manners young," said McTee. "After you."

They exchanged glares again. The whole sense of her power over these giants came home to her as she watched them fighting their duel of the eyes.

"You suggested it," she said to McTee.

He stepped forward with an expression as grim as that of a prize fighter facing an antagonist of unknown prowess. Once and again his hand hovered above the sticks before he drew.

"You've chosen the walk to the hill," she said, and showed the shorter stick. "Do you mind?"

"No," mocked Harrigan, "he always walks after meals."

Their eyes dwelt almost fondly upon each other. They were both men after the other's heart. Then the Scotchman turned and strode away.

Kate watched Harrigan suspiciously, but his eyes, following McTee, were gentle and dreamy.

"Ah," he murmured, "there's a jewel of a man."

"Do you like him so much?"

"Do I like him? Me dear, I love the man; I'll break his head with more joy than a shtarvin' man cracks a nut!"

He recovered himself instantly.

"I didn't mean that—I—"

"Dan, you and McTee have planned to fight!"

He growled: "If a man told me that, I'd say he was a liar."

"Yes; but you won't lie to a girl, Harrigan."

She rose and faced him, reaching up to lay her hands on his thick shoulders.

"Will you give me your promise as an honest man to try to avoid a fight with him?"

For she saw death in it if they met alone; certainly death for one, and perhaps for both.

"Kate, would you ask a tree to promise to avoid the lightning?"

She caught a little breath through set teeth in her angry impatience, then: "Dan, you're like a naughty boy. Can't you be reasonable?"

Despite her wrath, she noticed a quick change in his face. The blue of his eyes was no longer cold and incurious, but lighted, warm, and marvelously deep.

And she said rapidly, making her voice cold to quell the uneasy, rising fire behind his eyes: "If you have made McTee angry, aren't you man enough to smooth things over—to ask his pardon?"

He answered vaguely: "Beg his pardon?"

"Why is that so impossible? For my sake, Dan!"

The light went out of his face as if a candle had been snuffed.

"For you, Kate?"

Then she understood her power fully for the first time, and found the thing which she must do.

"For me. I—I—"

She let her head droop, and then glanced up as if beseeching him to ask no questions.

"Look me square in the eye—so!"

He caught her beneath the chin with a grip that threatened a bruise, and his eyes burned down upon her.

"Are ye playin' with me, Kate? Are ye tryin' to torment me, or do ye really care for McTee?"

She tried with all her might, but could not answer. The rumble and ring of his voice brought her heart to her throat.

"You're tremblin'," said Harrigan, and he released her. "So it's all true. McTee!"

He turned on his heel like a soldier, lest she should mark the change of his expression; but she must have noticed something, for she called: "Harrigan—Dan!"

He stopped, but would not face her.

"You have your hands clenched. Are you going out to hunt for McTee in that black mood?"

"Kate," said Harrigan, "by my honor I'm swearin' he's as safe in my hands as a child."

CHAPTER 13

Harrigan strode off through the trees. To loosen the tight, aching muscles of his throat he began to sing—old Irish songs with a wail and a swing to them. He had taken no certain direction, for he only wished to be alone and far away from the other two; but after a time he realized that he was on the side of the central hill to which McTee had gone to look for the dry wood. Above all things in the world he wished to avoid the Scotchman now, and as soon as he became conscious of his whereabouts, he veered sharply to the right. He had scarcely walked a minute in the new direction before he met McTee. The latter had seen him first, and now stood with braced feet in his position of battle, rolling the sleeves of his shirt away from his forearms. Harrigan stepped behind a tree.

"Come out," roared McTee. "I've seen you. Don't try to sneak behind and take me from the back."

With an exceeding bitterness of heart, Harrigan stepped into view again.

"You look sick," went on McTee. "If you knew what would happen when we met, why did you come? If you fear me, go back and hug the skirts of the girl. She'll take pity on you, Harrigan."

The Irishman groaned. "Think your thoughts an' say your say, McTee. I can't lay a hand on you today."

The latter stepped close, stupefied with wonder.

"Do I hear you right? Are you taking water, Harrigan?"

Harrigan bowed his head, praying mutely for strength to endure.

"Don't say it!" pleaded McTee. "I've hunted the world and worn the roads bare looking for one man who could stand up to me—and now that I've found him, he turns yellow inside!"

And he looked upon the Irishman with a sick horror, as if the big fellow were turning into a reptile before his eyes. On the face of Harrigan there was an expression like that of the starving man whom the fear of poison induces to push away food.

"There's no word I can speak to you, McTee. You could never understand.
Go back to the girl. Maybe she'll explain."

"The girl?"

At the wild hope in that voice Harrigan shuddered, and he could not look up.

"Harrigan, what do you mean?"

"Don't ask me. Leave me alone, McTee."

"Here's a mystery," said the Scotchman, "and our little party is postponed. The date is changed, that's all. Remember!"

He stepped off through the trees in the direction of the shelter on the beach, leaving Harrigan to throw himself upon the ground in a paroxysm of shame and hate.

But McTee, with hope to spur him on—a vague hope; a thought half formed and therefore doubly delightful—went with great strides until he came to Kate where she sat tending the fire. He broke at once into the heart of his question.

"I met Harrigan. He's changed. Something has happened. Tell me what it is. He says you know."

He crouched close to her, intent and eager, his eyes ready to read a thousand meanings into the very lowering of her lashes; but she let her glance rove past him.

"Well?" he asked impatiently.

"It is hard to speak of it."

Cold doubt fell upon the captain; he moistened his lips before he spoke.

"Hit straight from the shoulder. There's something between you and the
Irishman?"

She dropped a hand over his mighty fist.

"After all, you are our only friend, Angus. Why shouldn't you know?"

He stood up and made a few paces to and fro, his hands locked behind him and his leonine head fallen low.

"Yes, why shouldn't you tell me! I think I understand already."

All desire to laugh went from her, and deep fear took its place; her eyes were held fascinated upon his interlaced fingers, white under their own terrific pressure; yet she understood that she must go on. If she failed, this mighty force would be turned against Harrigan; and Harrigan, not less grim in battle, as she could guess, would be turned against him.

She said quickly, to conceal her fear: "I thought there was some trouble between you and Dan. I asked him to promise that he would not fight with you. But I don't need to ask you to promise not to fight with him, for now that you know—"

He leaped up and beat his hands together over his head.

"And that was why! I taunted him and all the time he was laughing to himself!"

He stopped and then whispered to himself: "Still, it's only postponed.
The tune will come! The time will come!"

She understood the promise.

"Angus! What are you saying?"

He said quietly: "Harrigan's safe from me while you care for him. Do you think I'm fool enough to make a martyr of him? Not I! But when we get back to the world—"

He finished the sentence by slowly flexing his fingers.

"I love you, Kate, and until the strength goes out of my hands, I'll still love you. I want you; and what I want I get. You'll hate me for it, eh?"

He went off without waiting for an answer, stumbling as he walked like one who was dazed. Her strength held with her until he was out of sight among the trees, but then she sank to the ground, panting. Sooner or later they were sure to discover her ruse, and the moment one of them learned that she did not love the other, they would rush into battle. She only prayed that the discovery would not come till they were safely off the island. Once back in the world the strong arm of the law might suffice to keep them apart.

The falling of the fire roused her at last and she set about gathering wood to keep it alive. It was the Irishman who returned first. He waved her to the shade of the shelter and finished collecting the wood.

CHAPTER 14

Afterward he inquired, frowning: "Where's McTee? I met him an' he started back to find you."

"He's gone off with his thoughts, Dan."

Harrigan sighed, looking up to the stainless blue of the sky: "Aye, that's the way of the Scotch. When they're happy in love, they go off by themselves an' brood like a dog that's thinking of a fight. But were I he, I'd never be leavin' your side, colleen."

His head tilted back in the way she had come to know, and she waited for the soft dialect: "I'd be singin' songs av love an' war-r-r, an' braggin' me hear-rt out, an' talkin' av the sea-green av your eyes, colleen. Look at him now!"

For the great form of McTee left the circle of the trees and approached them.

"He's got his head down between his shoulders like a whipped cur. He's broodin', an' his soul is thick in a fog."

"Dan, I trust you to cheer him up; but