Conscious of my responsibility, I picked up the shotgun, walked out of the office and stood behind the gate to guard it. Dangerous Dagwood walked straight up to me, leaned over the gate so that his nose was just above mine and almost touching it, and smiled from one cauliflower ear to the other. The grin was about as reassuring as the first fissure of a major earthquake.
“Mornin’,” he greeted me.
“Good morning.” I held the shotgun at the ready.
“Iffen you’ll open this here gate, I reckon I’ll mosey on in so’s we can have a chat,” he suggested politely.
“About what?” I made no move to open the gate.
“Shucks, be friendly ’n lemme in and I’ll tell you ’bout what.”
I shook my head.
“Wal then, I’ll just have to open it myself.” He reached behind the gate and started to lift the latch.
I fired the shotgun from my hip. The shot creased the back of his hand and shattered the latch. He sucked at the scratch and looked at me with mock amazement.
“You bein’ hostile, boy?” Dangerous Dagwood asked mildly. “Naw. I can’t believe that. You just helpin’ me open the gate. Right?” He swung the gate open with a flick of his hand. “But Belch ain’t gonna like you blowin’ off his latch like that. Your ’ployer a big un for property values. Don’t you worry none though. I’rn gonna see to it personally that Belch don’t be too harsh with you.” He took a step through the opened gateway.
“That’s far enough.” I pointed the shotgun at his chest.
Dangerous Dagwood moved like greased lightning. His pistol leaped out of its holster and the shotgun exploded out of my hands before I could pull the trigger. I dived to retrieve it, but he was too fast for me.
He grabbed me by my collar and the seat of the pants and lifted me off the ground. In his powerful grasp I felt as fragile as a glass yo-yo being bounced by an overly aggressive kid. Dangerous Dagwood lifted me high and hung me from the top of the gatepost by my shirt collar. He loosened my belt, stood off a few paces, and leveled his pistol at me. “Now dance!” he commanded.
I felt the heat of his first shot grazing my instep. I danced, flapping my arms futilely, wildly. He fired again and I redoubled my efforts. My pants dropped down around my knees. Two more shots and they were bunched around my ankles, pinning my feet together.
Chortling, Dangerous Dagwood paused to reload. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that he’d soon tire of his sport and finish me off. It would be one helluva way to go—hanging there in my long underwear like laundry on a clothesline. It lacked dignity, if you see what I mean.
What saved me was that Dangerous Dagwood’s sport had attracted attention. Belch and Flame had come out of the saloon and seen what was happening. Belch pulled out his gun and started to my rescue just as Dangerous Dagwood inserted the last bullet and spun the chamber closed. I had a dangling seat right on the fifty yard line for what followed.
“You stay outa this, Belch!” Dangerous Dagwood turned to face him.
“Dangerous Dagwood, you trespassin’ on my turf!” Belch belched angrily. “Git off, or slap leather!”
There was a scramble in the mud as the onlookers got out of the line of fire.
“What the hell you mean ‘slap leather’? I already got my gun out.” Dangerous Dagwood twirled the weapon.
“Then this here’s a showdown!” Belch twirled his gun and dropped it in the slush.
“Then draw!”
“Just you wait a minute now, Dangerous Dagwood. Don’t be rushin’ me. You kin see for yourself I can’t draw lessen I pick my gun outa the mud first.”
“Well, get a move on, Belch. I ain’t got all day.”
“Just hold your hawses. I can’t find it. Wait. Here it is.” Belch gingerly picked up a large lump of mud and began skimming it. Finally he wiped his hands on his pants and held the gun out. “I’m comin’ for you, Dangerous Dagwood. Git off my property, or slap leather, you bastard!”
“Again with the ‘slap leather’ bit?” Dangerous Dagwood shook his head sadly. “Smile when you say that, podner,” he added. He fired casually and Belch jumped as the bullet pinged into the mud at his feet.
“Close. But not close enough.” Belch belched with relief. He held out his gun to fire. But the barrel was slimy with mud and it popped out of his hand. “Damn!” Frustrated, he squelched the belch.
“You sure the sloppiest gun in the Northwest,” Dangerous Dagwood observed.
“Ain’t my fault. It’s slippery,” Belch belched whinily. “ ’Sides, I ain’t had too much experience. I’m just a beginner. Be a mite charitable an’ have patience.”
“All right. I’m a fair-minded man,” Dangerous Dagwood allowed. “You all wiped off an’ ready to get killed now?”'
“Just a minute.” Belch belched the mightiest belch of all. “Reckon I’m ready now,” he told Dangerous Dagwood.
“Look out behind you!”‘ Dangerous Dagwood yelled to Belch .
Belch whirled around, pistol at the ready.
Dangerous Dagwood shot him in the back.
“You shot him in the back!” I protested indignantly from my hang-up.
“Pshaw! Wha’d you ’spect from the meanest, most ornery cuss in the Klondike?” Dangerous Dagwood wondered aloud. “They don’t call me Dangerous Dagwood for nothin’!”
Belch was still swaying. “That wasn’t fair!” He belched with outrage over his shoulder at Dangerous Dagwood. He fell on his face in the mud.
Flame ran over and knelt beside him. “I think he’s dead,” she said. A loud belch bubbled up from the slush. “Maybe not,” she hoped. She turned Belch over on his back. “Nope, he’s dead all rght,” she announced. “That was just a death belch.”
“S’posed to be a death rattle,” someone reminded her from the sidelines.
“Not for Belch!” Flame was firm. “He died the way he lived.” She brushed away a tear and got to her feet. “He who lives by the belch dies by the belch.” She pronounced the eulogy.
“It was a dirty trick,” I told Dangerous Dagwood. “You broke the Code of the Klondike. You shot him in the back.”
“You’re right,” he replied. “I’m real ’shamed of myself. But I’m gonna reform. I promise you. An’ just to prove it, I ain’t gonna shoot you in the back nohow. I’m gonna shoot you face to face.” He raised his gun and drew a bead on me.
“Oh no you’re not!” Flame leaped into action. Grabbing a horsewhip from the hands of a man who’d pulled up his buggy to watch the excitement, she charged Dangerous Dagwood.
She was on him before he could gather his wits. The lash snapped viciously around his wrist and the gun went flying from his grasp. The whip cracked again and a streak of blood appeared on the length of his cheek: Dangerous Dagwood threw his hands up in front of his face to protect himself and backed away from the gateway to the mine. But Flame’s fury was too much for him to retreat with dignity. When the whip struck again, he gave up altogether. He turned tail and bolted.
“Curse you!” he called over his shoulder, shaking his fist in the air and running for the hills.
“We haven’t seen the last of him,” Flame said as she returned to the gateway and looked up at me. “Pull up your pants and git down from there,” she added.
“Yep.” A man had come up beside her. “Git down afore I arrest you.”
“Arrest me? For what?” I Wanted to know.
“I’m the law in these here parts.” He flashed a marshal’s badge. “An’ Dawson’s a respectable community. We got laws ’bout menfolk droppin’ their jeans in public. They’s women an’ kids hereabouts an’ we got to perteck their morals.” He spat, catching the wind so that he narrowly missed the corpse of Belch stretched out in the mud.