Jasper County Democrat, Volume 15, Number 9, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 May 1912 — BURNING DAYLIGHT [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

BURNING DAYLIGHT

BY JACK LONDON

Authoj? Of "The Call Of The: Mld "Wh/te Fang* 7/adf/nLdenYfcF Illustrations By Dearborn Mayfil-

(Copyright, 1910, by th® New York Herald Company.) (CoDVriiht. 1910, by the MacMillan Company.

CHAPTER IX. Nathaniel Letton was talking when the door opened; he ceased, and with his two companions gazed with controlled perturbation at Burning Daylight striding into the room. The free, swinging movements of the trail-trav-•eler were unconsciously exaggerated in that stride of his. In truth, it seemed to him that he felt the trail beneath his feet.

“Howdy, gentlemen, howdy,” he remarked, ignoring the unnatural calm with which they greeted his entrance. He shook hands with them in turn, striding from*one to another and grip ping their hands so heartily that Nathaniel Letton could not forbear to wince. Daylight flung himself into a massive chair and sprawled lazily, with an appearance of fatigue. The leather grip he had brought into the room he dropped carelessly beside him on the floor.

“I’ve sure been going some,” he sighed. “We sure trimmed them beautifully. It was real slick. And the beauty of the play never dawned on me till the very end. It was pure and simple knock down and drag out. And the way they fell for ft was amazin’.” Letton made a dry , sound in his throat. Dowsett sat quietly and waited, while Leon Guggenhammer struggled into articulation. “You certainly have raised Cain,” he said. Daylight’s black eyes flashed in a pleasant way. “Didn’t I, though!” he proclaimed, jubilantly. “And didn’t we fool ’em! I was teetotally . surprised. I never dreamed they would be that easy. “And now,” he went on, not permitting the pause to grow awkward, “weall might as well have an accounting. I’m pullin’ West this afternoon on that blamed Twentieth Century.” He tugged at his grip, got it open, and dipped into it. with both his hands. “But don't forget, boys, when you-all want me to hornswoggle Wall Street another flutter, all you-all have to do is whisper the word. I’ll sure be right there with the goods.” His hands emerged, clutching a great mass of stubs, check-books, and brokers’ receipts. These he deposited in a heap on the big table, and dipping again, he fished out the stragglers and added them to the pile. He consulted a slip of paper, drawn from his coat pocket and read aloud: “Ten million tw'enty-seven thousand and forty-two dollars and sixty-eight cents is my figurin' on my expense. Of course that-all’s taken from the winnings before we-all get to figurin’ on the whack-up. Where’s your figures? It must a’ been a mighty big clean-up.”

The three men looked their bepuzzlement at one another. The man was a bigger fool than they had imagined, or else he was playing a game which they could not divine. Nathaniel Letton moistened his lips and spoke up. “It will take some hours yet, Mr. Harnish, before the full accounting can be made. Mr. Howison is at work upon it now. We—ah—as you say, it has been a gratifying clean-up. Suppose we have lunch together and talk it over. I’ll have the clerks work through the noon hour so that you will have ample time to catch your train.” Dowsett and Guggenhammer manifested a relief that was almost obvious. The situation was clearing. It was disconcerting, under the circumstances, to be pent in the same room with this heavy-muscled, Indian-like man whom they had robbed. They remembered unpleasantly the many stories of his strength and recklessness. If Letton could only put him off .long enough for them to escape into the policed world outside the office door, all would be well; and Daylight showed all the signs of being put off.

“I’m real glad to hear that,” he said. “I don’t want to that train, and you-all have done me proud, gentlemen, letting me In on this deal. I just do appreciate it without being able to express my feelings. But lam sure almighty curious, and I’d like terrible to know, Mr. Letton, what your figures of our winning is. Can you-all give me a rough estimate ?” Nathaniel Letton did not look appealingly at his two friends, but in the brief pause they felt that appeal pass out from him. Dowsett, of sterner mold than the others, began to divine that the Klondiker was playing. But the other two were still under the blandishment of his child-like innocence.

“It is extremely—er—difficult,” Leon Guggenhammer began. “You see, Ward Valley has fluctuated so, er—” “That no estimate can possibly be made in advance,” Letton supplemented. / “Approximate it, approximate it,” Daylight counselled, cheerfully. “It don’t hurt if you-all are a million out one side ox the other. The figures’ll Btraighten that tsp. But I’m that curious I’m just itching all over. What d ’ye_saj?”

"wny continue to play at cross purposes?” Dowsett demanded abruptly and coldly. “Let us have the explanation here and now. Mr. Harnish is laboring under a false impression, and he should be set straight. By this time Letton was stiffened by the attitude Dow r sett had taken, and his answer was prompt anc ceimrre. “I fear you are under a misapprehension, JVIr. Harnish. There are no winnings to be divided with you. Now don’t get excited, 1 beg of you. I have but to press this button . . Far from excited, Daylight’had all the seeming of being stunned. He looked at Dowsett and murmured: “It was your deal, all right, and youall dole th,em right, too. Well, I ain’t kicking. I'm like the player in that poker game. It was your deal, and you-all had a right to do your best And you done it—cleaned me out slicker’n a whistle.” He gazed at the heap on the table with an air of Stupefaction. “And that-all ain’t worth the paper it’s written on. Gol dast it, you-all can sure deal ’em ’round when you gel a chance. Oh, no, I ain’t a-kicking. It was your deal, and you-all certainly done me, and a man ain’t half a man that squeals on another man’s deal. And now the hand is played out, and the cards are on the table, and the deal’s over, but . . .” His hand, dipping swiftly into his inside breast pocket, appeared with the big Colt’s automatic. “As I was saying, the old deal’s finished. Now it’s my deal, and I’m a-going to see if I can hold them four aces—- “ Take your hand away, you whited sepulchre!” he cried sharply. Nathaniel Letton’s hand, creeping toward the push-button on the desk, was abruptly arrested. -‘‘Change cars,” Daylight commanded. “Take that chair over there, you gangrene-livered skunk. Jump, or I’ll make you leak till folks’ll think your father was a water hydrant and your mother a sprinkling-cart. You-all move your chair alongside, Guggenhammer; and you-all Dowsett, sit right there, while I just irrelevantly explain the virtues of this here automatic. She’s loaded for big game and she goes off eight times. She's a sure hummer when she gets started. “Preliminary remarks being over, I now proceed to deal. Remember, I ain’t making no remarks about yOur

deal. You done your darndest, and it was all right. But this is my deal, and it’s up to me to do my darndest In the first place, you-all know me. I’m Burning Daylight—iavvee? Ain’t afraid of God, devil, death, nor destruction. Them’s my four aces, and they sure copper your bets.,. Look at that there living skeleton. Letton, you’re sure afraid to die. Your bones is all rattling together you’re that scared. And look at that fat Jew there. This little weapon's sure put the fear of God in his heart. He’s yellow as a sick persimmon. Dowsett, you’re a cool one. You-all ain’t batted an eye nor turned a hair. That’s because you’re great on arithmetic. And that makes you-all dead easy in this deal of mine. You’re sitting there and adding two and two together, and you-all know I sure got you skinned. You know me, and that I ain’t afraid of nothing. And you-all adds up all your money and knows you ain’t a-going to die if you can help it.” “I’ll see you hanged,” was Dowsett’s retort. “Not by a damned sight. When the fun starts, yffii're the first I plug. I’ll hang all right, but you-all won’t live to see it. You-all die here and now while 111 die subject to the law's delay —savvee? Being dead, with grass growing out of your carcasses, you won’t know when I hang, but I’ll sure have the pleasure a long time of knowing you-all beat me to it” “You surely won’t kill us?" Letton asked Jn a oueer. thin voice.

shook his head. J "It’s sure too expensive. You-all ain’t worth it. I’d sooner have my chips back. And I guess you-all ’d sooner give my chips back than go to the dead-house.”

A long silence followed. “Well, I've done dealt. It’s up to you-all to play. But while you're deliberating, I want to give you-all warning: if that door opens and any one of you cusses lets on there’s anything unusual, right here and then I sure start plugging. They ain’t a soul ’ll get out of the room except feet first.” A long session of three hours followed. The deciding factor was not the big automatic pistol, but the certitude that Daylight would use it. Not alone were the three men convinced of this, but Daylight himself was convinced. He was firmly resolved to kill the men if his money was not forthcoming. It was not an easy matter, on the spur of the moment, to raise ten millions in paper currency, and there were vexatious delays. A dozen times Mr. Howison and the head clerk were summoned into the room. On these occasions the pistol lay on Daylight’s lap; covered carelessly bj' a newspaper, while he was usually engaged in rolling or lighting his brown-paper cigarette, But in the end, the thing was accomplished. A suit-case was brought up by one of the clerks from the waiting motor-car, and Daylight snapped it shut on the last package of bills. He paused at the door to make his final remarks.

“There's three several things I sure want to tell you-all. When I get outside this door, you-all’ll be set free to act, and I just want to warn you-all about what to do. In the first place, no warrants for my arrest —savvee? This money’s mine, and I ain’t robbed you of it. If it gets out how you gave me the double cross and how I done you back again, the laugh ’ll be on you, and it’ll be sure an almighty big laugh. You-all can’t afford that laugh. Besides, having got back my stake that you-all jobbed me of, if you arrest me and try to rob me a second time I’ll go gunning for you-all, and I’ll sure get you. No little fraidcat shrimps like yoq-all can skin Burning Daylight. If you w T in you lose, and there’ll sure be some several unexpected funerals around this burg. Just look me in the eye, and you-all’ll savvee I mean business. Them stubs and receipts on the table is all yourn. Good day.”

As the door shut behind him, Nathaniel Letton sprang for the telephone, and Dowsett intercepted him. “What are you going to do?” Dowsett demanded. “The police. It’s downright robbery. I won’t stand it. I tell you I won’t stand It.” Dowsett smiled grimly, but at the same time bore the slender financier back and down into his chair. "We’ll talk it over,” he said; and in Leon Guggenhammer he found an anxious ally. And nothing ever came of it. The thing remained a secret with the three men. Nor did Daylight ever give the secret away, though that afternoon, leaning back in his stateroom on the Twentieth Century, his shoes off, and feet on a chair, fye chuckled long and heartily. New York remained forever puzzled over the affair; nor conld it hit upon a rational explanatifc. By all rights, Burning Daylight should have gone broke, yet it was known that he immediately reappeared in San FVancisco possessing an apparently unimpaired capital. This was evidenced by the magnitude of the enterprises he engaged in, such as, for instance, Panama Mail, by sheer weight of money and fighting power wrestling the control away from Sheftly and selling out in two months to the Harriman interests at a rumored enormous advance. (To be Continued.)

“Now It’s My Deal, and I’m Going to See if I Can Hold Them Four Aces.”