Carolina watchman. [volume] (Salisbury, N.C.) 1871-1937, 1917-07-11
Copyright by the Bobbs-N1errill Company.
CHAPTER XVI.
Professor McGi!I.

gambling, a few fights n enough
LIQUOR to create excitement now and
then, but the presence of the mounted
Dolice had served to keep things I'M
usually tame compared with events q
Sew hundred miles farther north, in the
Dawson country. The entertainment
proposed by SANDY -leIH:S-e' and Jan
Harker met with nE':te@ favor. The
news spread for twenty miles about
Red Gold City and there had never
been greater excitement in the town
than on the afternoon and night of the
big fight. This was largely because
Kazan and the huge Dane had been
placed on exhibition, each dog in a
s~pecially made cage of his own and a
fever of betting began. Three hundred
men, each of whom was paying five
dollars to see the battle, viewed the
gladiators through the bars of their
cages. Harker's dog was a combina-
ton of Great Dane and mastiff, born in
the north, and bred to the traces. Bet
ting favored him by the odds of two to
one. Occasionally it ran three to one.
At these odds there was plenty of ka-
zan money. Those who were risking
their money on him were the older
wilderness men-men who had spent
their lives among dogs, and who knew
what the red light in kazan's eyes
meant. An old Kootenay miner spoke
low in another's ear
"Td bet on i'm even. I'd give odds
If l had to. He'll fight all around Il
Dane. The Dane won't have no
method"
"But he's got the weight" said the
other obviously. Look at his jaws,
an his shoulders"
can his big feet, an his soft throat,
an the clumsy thickness of his belly"
interrupted the hootenay man. For
heavens sake, man take my word for
1t, an don't put your money N the
Dane!"
Others thrust themselves between
Gl1em. At first Fazan had snarled at
Ail these faces about him But now
ne lay back against the boarded side
of the cage and eyed them ~sullenly
from between his forepaws.
The fight was to be pulled off in Har-
ker's place, a combination of saloon
and cafe. The benches and tables had
been cleared out and in the center of
the n big room a cage tenf feet square
rested on a platform three and q half
feet from the floor. Seats for the three
hundred spectators were drawn closely
around this. Suspended just above the
open top of the cage were two big Oil
lamps with glass ret1ectors.
It was eight O'Clock when Harker,
McTrigger and two other men bore ka-
zan to the arena by means of the wood
en- bars that projected from the bottom
of his cage. The big Dane was already
in the fighting cage. He stood blinking
his eyes in the brilliant light of the
rejecting lamps. He pricked up his
ears when he saw kazan. kazan did
not show his fangs. Neither revealed
the expected animosity. 1t was the first
they had seen Of each other, and a muir
muir of disappointment swept the ranks
Of the three hundred men. The Dane
remained as mOtiOnleSS as a rock when
kaZan WaS prOdded from his own cage
into the fighting cage. He did not leap
Oh Snarl. He regarded kaZan with a
dubious questioning poise to his splen-
did head, and then looked again to the
,4a1pectant and excited faces of the wait
Ing men. For a few moments kaZan
stood stiff-legged, facing the Dane.
Then his shoulders dropped, and he,
too, coolly faced the crowd that had eX-
pected a fight to the death. A laugh of
derision swept through the closely seat
ed rows. Catcalls, jeering, taunts flung
at McTrigger and Harker, and angry
voices demanding their money back
mingled with a tumult of growing dis
content. Sandy's face was red with
modification and rage. The blue veins
in Harker's forehead had swollen twice
their normal size. He shook his fist in
the face of the crowd, and shouted:
swat! Give 'em a chance, you
FOOLS"
At his words every voice was stilled.
Kazan had turned. He was facing the
Dane. The Dane had turned his eyes
to kazan. Cautiously, prepared for a
1ulSe OF d SlueoIep, hdAdu duFduCeu
q little. The Danes shoulders bristled.
He, too, advanced upon kazan. -Four
feet apart they stood rigid. One could
have heard a whisper In the room now.
Sandy and Harker, standing close to
she cage, scarcely breathed. Splendid
IN every limb and muscle, warriors Of
a hundred fights, and fearless to the
point of death, the two half-wolf vic
tins of man stood facing each other.
None could see the questioning look in
their brute eyes. None knew that in
this thrilling moment the unseen hand
of the wonderful Spirit God of the will
derness lowered between them, and
that one of it's miracles was descending
upon them. 1t was understanding.
Meeting in the open-rivals in the
traces-they would have been rolling
in the throes Of terrific battle. Blu here
came that mute appeal Of b~rotkNrhood,