Adventure stories; Beaver Island (Mich.) -- Fiction
He sought his own camp and found it undisturbed. As he rolled up in
his blankets that evening, it came to him that he had not yet
settled matters with Matt Big Mary.
“Good thing!” he murmured. “But I wonder--was he worse hurt than they
said? That yarn didn’t sound very plausible about his falling over
the engine--hm! Should have thought of that before. I don’t like that
fellow Hughie Dunlevy. No matter. Tomorrow’s Sunday, and I’ll keep
quiet--and watch. Good night, Nelly Callahan, and pleasant dreams!”
He fell asleep, smiling.
CHAPTER VI
Sunday on Beaver Island was theoretically a day of devotion. Not
even the mailboat came over from Charlevoix, since there were no
fish-boxes to be transported. It was a day for visiting, for going
to the church down the highway three miles from St. James, for
eating and drinking and talking. The only man on the island who went
his way regardless was old Cap’n Fallows, who was a socialist and
proud of it; but as the old skipper had been here thirty years and
was by this time related to everyone else, he was regarded with
unusual tolerance--a shining bad example of a godless old man, happy
in his iniquity and glorying in his lonesome politics. Also, the
Cap’n was something of a doctor, after a fashion.
He was in demand this Sunday. Marty Biddy Basset was dead and buried
that day, and Owen John had gone to Charlevoix on the mailboat,
talking in his fever but talking no sense; but down the island by
the old Russian baron’s farm lay Matt Big Mary Callahan, with a hurt
leg and a hurt head. Matt had been struck by a big pile and had
fallen over the engine of the boat, and would not walk again for two
days, so he had gone home to the farm and Cap’n Fallows was
doctoring him with liniment and talk on the rights of man.
There was much to talk about, and there was a gathering at the store
all day long, while out at Jimmy Basset’s farm the keg of white
liquor grew lower every hour. The Bassets and Dunlevys were taking
counsel here and there, the older heads advising patience, the
younger heads listening to Hughie Dunlevy and his brother Connie,
who was badly bruised but not seriously hurt. Connie was two years
younger than Hughie, and if not so strong, was just about as hard to
kill.
It was true enough that Vesty Gallagher spoke a word to the priest;
and the priest, who was the only man obeyed by other men on Beaver
Island, passed along the word. Thus it came about that Hardrock
Callahan was accepted as neither a revenue man nor an enemy, and his
affair with the Dunlevy brothers was taken for what it was--a private
matter. Hughie Dunlevy heard of this, and moved cautiously and spoke
softly; but with his brother Connie and four other lads he was
neither cautious nor soft. He and they gathered in Jimmy Basset’s
kitchen that evening and went into the affair at length.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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