breathless, is finally halted two squares farther on, only a dozen
broken-headed wretches remain along the street to represent the
furious mob that confronted them a few minutes before. Only these few
and one writhing, bleeding form, around which half a dozen policemen
are curiously gathered, and at whose side the battalion surgeon has
just knelt.
"He's shot through and through," is his verdict, presently. "No power
can save him. Who is he?"
"About the worst and most dangerous ringleader of riot this town has
known, sir," is the answer of one of the police officials. "No one
knew where he came from either--or his real name."
And then in his dying agony the fallen demagogue turns, and the other
side of his twitching face comes uppermost. Even through the thin,
grizzly beard there is plainly seen an ugly, jagged scar stretching
from ear to chin.
"This isn't his first row by any manner of means, if it is his last,"
says a sergeant of police. "Look at that! Who shot him, anyhow?"
"I did," is the cool, prompt answer, and Sergeant Feeny raises his
hand to his carried carbine and stands attention as he sees the
surgeon kneeling there. "I did, and just in the nick of time. He had
drawn a bead on our lieutenant; but even if he hadn't I'd have downed
him, and so would any man in that company yonder." And Feeny points to
where "C" troop stands resting after its charge.
"You knew him, then?"
"Knew him instantly, as a deserter, thafe, highway-man, and
murderer,--knew him as Private Bland in Arizona, and would know him
anywhere by that scar."
A policeman bends and wrenches a loaded revolver from the clutching,
quivering fingers just as Wing comes striding back and shoulders a way
into the group.
"Is he badly hurt, doctor? That was an awful whack."
"It isn't the lieutenant, sir," says Feeny, respectfully, but with
strange significance in his tone as he draws a policeman aside.
"Look!"
And Wing, bending over, gives one glance into the dying face, then
covers his eyes with his hands and turns blindly, dizzily, away.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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