"We shall play for her," exclaimed the Italian, shuming the deck, "and whoever wins, keeps her."
"Let us drink to that," said Stabutch. "Five games, eh, and the first to win three takes her?"
"Another drink to seal the bargain!" exclaimed the Italian. "The best three out of five!"
Stabutch won the first game, while Jezebel sat looking on in ignorance of the purpose of the bits of pasteboard, and only knowing that in some way they were to decide her fate. She hoped the younger man would win, but only because he had said that he was her friend. Perhaps she could persuade him to take her back to Danny. She wondered what kind of water was in the bottle from which they drank, for she noticed that it wrought a change in them. They talked much louder now and shouted strange words when the little cards were thrown upon the rug, and then one would appear very angry while the other always laughed immoderately. Also they swayed and lurched in a peculiar manner that she had not noticed before they bad drunk so much of the water from the bottle.
Capietro won the second game and the third. Stabutch was furious, but now he became very quiet. He exerted all his powers of concentration upon the game, and he seemed almost sober as the cards were dealt for the fourth game.
"She is as good as mine!" cried Capietro, as he looked at his hand.
"She will never be yours," growled the Russian.
"What do you mean?"
"I shall win the next two games."
The Italian laughed loudly. "That is good!" he cried. "We should drink to that." He raised the bottle to his lips and then passed it to Stabutch.
"I do not want a drink," said the Russian, in a surly tone, pushing the bottle aside.
"Ah, ha! My friend is getting nervous. He is afraid he is going to lose and so he will not drink. Sapristi! It is all the same to me. I get the brandy and the girl, too."
"Play!" snapped Stabutch.
"You are in a hurry to lose," taunted Capietro.
"To win," corrected Stabutch, and he did.
Now it was the Italian's turn to curse and rage at luck, and once again the cards were dealt and the players picked up their hands.
"It is the last game," said Stabutch.
"We have each won two," replied Capietro. "Let us drink to the winner—although I dislike proposing a toast to myself," and he laughed again, but this time there was an ugly note in his laughter.
In silence, now, they resumed their play. One by one the little pasteboards fell upon the rug. The girl looked on in wondering silence. There was a tenseness in the situation that she felt, without understanding. Poor little Jezebel, she understood so little!
Suddenly, with a triumphant oath, Capietro sprang to his feet. "I win!" he cried. "Come, friend, drink with me to my good fortune."
Sullenly the Russian drank, a very long draught this time. There was a sinister gleam in his eye as he handed the bottle back to Capietro. Leon Stabutch was a poor loser.
The Italian emptied the bottle and flung it to the ground. Then he turned toward Jezebel and stooping lifted her to her feet. "Come, my dear," he said, his coarse voice thick from drink, "Give me a kiss."
Jezebel drew back, but the Italian jerked her roughly to him and tried to draw her lips to his.
"Leave the girl alone," growled Stabutch. "Can't you see she is afraid of you?"
"What did I win her for?" demanded Capietro. "To leave her alone? Mind your own business."
"I'll make it my business," said Stabutch. "Take your bands off her." He stepped forward and laid a hand on Jezebel's arm. "She is mine by rights anyway."
"What do you mean?"
"You cheated. I caught you at it in the last game."
"You lie!" shouted Capietro and simultaneously he struck at Stabutch. The Russian dodged the blow and closed with the other.
Both were drunk and none too steady. It required much of their attention to keep from falling down. But as they wrestled about the interior of the hut a few blows were struck—enough to arouse their rage to fury and partially to sober them. Then the duel became deadly, as each sought the throat of the other.
Jezebel, wide eyed and terrified, had difficulty in keeping out of their way as they fought to and fro across the floor of the hut; and so centered was the attention of the two men upon one another that the girl might have escaped had she not been more afraid of the black men without than of the whites within.
Several times Stabutch released his hold with his right hand and sought for something beneath his coat and at last he found it—a slim dagger. Capietro did not see it.
They were standing in the center of the hut now, their arms locked about one another, and resting thus as though by mutual consent. They were panting heavily from their exertions, and neither seemed to have gained any material advantage.
Slowly the Russian's right hand crept up the back of his adversary. Jezebel saw, but only her eyes reflected her horror. Though she had seen many people killed she yet had a horror of killing. She saw the Russian feel for a spot on the other's back with the point of his thumb. Then she saw him turn his hand and place the dagger point where his thumb had been.
There was a smile upon Stabutch's face as he drove the blade home. Capietro stiffened, screamed, and died. As the body slumped to the ground and rolled over on its back the murderer stood over the corpse of his victim, a smile upon his lips, and his eyes upon the girl.
But suddenly the smile died as a new thought came to the cunning mind of the slayer and his eyes snapped from the face of Jezebel to the doorway of the hut, where a filthy blanket answered the purpose of a door.
He had forgotten the horde of cut-throats who had called this thing upon the floor their chief! But now he recalled them and his soul was filled with terror. He did not need to ask himself what his fate would be when they discovered his crime.
"You have murdered him!" cried the girl suddenly, a note of horror in her voice.
"Be quiet!" snapped Stabutch. "Do you want to die? They will kill us when they discover this."
"I did not do it," protested Jezebel.
"They will kill you just the same—afterwards. They are beasts."
Suddenly he stooped, seized the corpse by the ankles and, dragging it to the far end of the hut, he covered it with rugs and clothing.
"Now keep quiet until I come back," he said to Jezebel. "If you give an alarm I'll kill you myself before they have a chance to."
He rummaged in a dark corner of the but and brought forth a revolver with its holster and belt, which he buckled about his hips, and a rifle which he leaned beside the doorway.
"When I return be ready to come with me," he snapped, and raising the rug that covered the doorway, he stepped out into the village.
Quickly he made his way to where the ponies of the band were tethered. Here were several of the blacks loitering near the animals.
"Where is the headman?" he asked, but none of them understood English. He tried to tell them by means of signs, to saddle two horses, but they only shook their heads. If they understood him, as they doubtless did, they refused to take orders from him.
At this juncture the headman, attracted from a nearby but, approached. He understood a little pidgin English, and Stabutch had no difficulty in making him understand that he wanted two horses saddled; but the headman wanted to know more. Did the chief want them?
"Yes, he wants them," replied Stabutch. "He sent me to get them. The chief is sick. Drink too much." Stabutch laughed and the headman seemed to understand.
"Who go with you?" asked the headman.
Stabutch hesitated. Well, he might as well tell him—everyone would see the girl ride out with him anyway. "The girl," he said.
The headman's eyes narrowed. "The Chief say?" he asked. "Yes. The girl thinks the white man not dead. The Chief send me to look for him."
"You take men?"