________________________________________________
_ After dinner there were two dances in the pavilion, and then the
band led the way to the race track for the games. The dancers
followed, and all through the grounds the picnic parties left
their tables to join in. Five thousand packed the grassy slopes
of the amphitheater and swarmed inside the race track. Here,
first of the events, the men were lining up for a tug of war. The
contest was between the Oakland Bricklayers and the San Francisco
Bricklayers, and the picked braves, huge and heavy, were taking
their positions along the rope. They kicked heel-holds in the
soft earth, rubbed their hands with the soil from underfoot, and
laughed and joked with the crowd that surged about them.
The judges and watchers struggled vainly to keep back this crowd
of relatives and friends. The Celtic blood was up, and the Celtic
faction spirit ran high. The air was filled with cries of cheer,
advice, warning, and threat. Many elected to leave the side of
their own team and go to the side of the other team with the
intention of circumventing foul play. There were as many women as
men among the jostling supporters. The dust from the trampling,
scuffling feet rose in the air, and Mary gasped and coughed and
begged Bert to take her away. But he, the imp in him elated with
the prospect of trouble, insisted on urging in closer. Saxon
clung to Billy, who slowly and methodically elbowed and
shouldered a way for her.
"No place for a girl," he grumbled, looking down at her with a
masked expression of absent-mindedness, while his elbow
powerfully crushed on the ribs of a big Irishman who gave room.
"Things'll break loose when they start pullin'. They's been too
much drink, an' you know what the Micks are for a rough house."
Saxon was very much out of place among these large-bodied men and
women. She seemed very small and childlike, delicate and fragile,
a creature from another race. Only Billy's skilled bulk and
muscle saved her. He was continually glancing from face to face
of the women and always returning to study her face, nor was she
unaware of the contrast he was making.
Some excitement occurred a score of feet away from them, and to
the sound of exclamations and blows a surge ran through the
crowd. A large man, wedged sidewise in the jam, was shoved
against Saxon, crushing her closely against Billy, who reached
across to the man's shoulder with a massive thrust that was not
so slow as usual. An involuntary grunt came from the victim, who
turned his head, showing sun-reddened blond skin and unmistakable
angry Irish eyes.
"What's eatin' yeh?" he snarled.
"Get off your foot; you're standin' on it," was Billy's
contemptuous reply, emphasized by an increase of thrust.
The Irishman grunted again and made a frantic struggle to twist
his body around, but the wedging bodies on either side held him
in a vise.
"I'll break yer ugly face for yeh in a minute," he announced in
wrath-thick tones.
Then his own face underwent transformation. The snarl left the
lips, and the angry eyes grew genial.
"An' sure an' it's yerself," he said. "I didn't know it was yeh
a-shovin'. I seen yeh lick the Terrible Swede, if yeh WAS robbed
on the decision."
"No, you didn't, Bo," Billy answered pleasantly. "You saw me take
a good beatin' that night. The decision was all right."
The Irishman was now beaming. He had endeavored to pay a
compliment with a lie, and the prompt repudiation of the lie
served only to increase his hero-worship.
"Sure, an' a bad beatin' it was," he acknowledged, "but yeh
showed the grit of a bunch of wildcats. Soon as I can get me arm
free I'm goin' to shake yeh by the hand an' help yeh aise yer
young lady."
Frustrated in the struggle to get the crowd back, the referee
fired his revolver in the air, and the tug-of-war was on.
Pandemonium broke loose. Saxon, protected by the two big men, was
near enough to the front to see much that ensued. The men on the
rope pulled and strained till their faces were red with effort
and their joints crackled. The rope was new, and, as their hands
slipped, their wives and daughters sprang in, scooping up the
earth in double handfuls and pouring it on the rope and the hands
of their men to give them better grip.
A stout, middle-aged woman, carried beyond herself by the passion
of the contest, seized the rope and pulled beside her husband,
encouraged him with loud cries. A watcher from the opposing team
dragged her screaming away and was dropped like a steer by an
ear-blow from a partisan from the woman's team. He, in turn, went
down, and brawny women joined with their men in the battle.
Vainly the judges and watchers begged, pleaded, yelled, and swung
with their fists. Men, as well as women, were springing in to thc
rope and pulling. No longer was it team against team, but all
Oakland against all San Francisco, festooned with a free-for-all
fight. Hands overlaid hands two and three deep in the struggle to
grasp the rope. And hands that found no holds, doubled into
bunches of knuckles that impacted on the jaws of the watchers who
strove to tear hand-holds from the rope.
Bert yelped with joy, while Mary clung to him, mad with fear.
Close to the rope the fighters were going down and being
trampled. The dust arose in clouds, while from beyond, all
around, unable to get into the battle, could be heard the shrill
and impotent rage-screams and rage-yells of women and men.
"Dirty work, dirty work," Billy muttered over and over; and,
though he saw much that occurred, assisted by the friendly
Irishman he was coolly and safely working Saxon back out of the
melee.
At last the break came. The losing team, accompanied by its host
of volunteers, was dragged in a rush over the ground and
disappeared under the avalanche of battling forms of the
onlookers.
Leaving Saxon under the protection of the Irishman in an outer
eddy of calm, Billy plunged back into the mix-up. Several minutes
later he emerged with the missing couple--Bert bleeding from a
blow on the ear, but hilarious, and Mary rumpled and hysterical.
"This ain't sport," she kept repeating. "It's a shame, a dirty
shame."
"We got to get outa this," Billy said. "The fun's only
commenced."
"Aw, wait," Bert begged. "It's worth eight dollars. It's cheap at
any price. I ain't seen so many black eyes and bloody noses in a
month of Sundays."
"Well, go on back an' enjoy yourself," Billy commended. "I'll
take the girls up there on the side hill where we can look on.
But I won't give much for your good looks if some of them Micks
lands on you."
The trouble was over in an amazingly short time, for from the
judges' stand beside the track the announcer was bellowing the
start of the boys' foot-race; and Bert, disappointed, joined
Billy and the two girls on the hillside looking down upon the
track.
There were boys' races and girls' races, races of young women and
old women, of fat men and fat women, sack races and three-legged
races, and the contestants strove around the small track through
a Bedlam of cheering supporters. The tug-of-war was already
forgotten, and good nature reigned again.
Five young men toed the mark, crouching with fingertips to the
ground and waiting the starter's revolver-shot. Three were in
their stocking-feet, and the remaining two wore spiked
running-shoes.
"Young men's race," Bert read from the program. "An' only one
prize--twenty-five dollars. See the red-head with the spikes--the
one next to the outside. San Francisco's set on him winning. He's
their crack, an' there's a lot of bets up."
"Who's goin' to win?" Mary deferred to Billy's superior athletic
knowledge.
"How can I tell!" he answered. "I never saw any of 'em before.
But they all look good to me. May the best one win, that's all."
The revolver was fired, and the five runners were off and away.
Three were outdistanced at the start. Redhead led, with a
black-haired young man at his shoulder, and it was plain that the
race lay between these two. Halfway around, the black-haired one
took the lead in a spurt that was intended to last to the finish.
Ten feet he gained, nor could Red-head cut it down an inch.
"The boy's a streak," Billy commented. "He ain't tryin' his
hardest, an' Red-head's just bustin' himself."
Still ten feet in the lead, the black-haired one breasted the
tape in a hubbub of cheers. Yet yells of disapproval could be
distinguished. Bert hugged himself with joy.
"Mm-mm," he gloated. "Ain't Frisco sore? Watch out for fireworks
now. See! He's bein' challenged. The judges ain't payin' him the
money. An' he's got a gang behind him. Oh! Oh! Oh! Ain't had so
much fun since my old woman broke her leg!"
"Why don't they pay him, Billy?" Saxon asked. "He won."
"The Frisco bunch is challengin' him for a professional," Billy
elucidated. "That's what they're all beefin' about. But it ain't
right. They all ran for that money, so they're all professional."
The crowd surged and argued and roared in front of the judges'
stand. The stand was a rickety, two-story affair, the second
story open at the front, and here the judges could be seen
debating as heatedly as the crowd beneath them.
"There she starts!" Bert cried. "Oh, you rough-house!"
The black-haired racer, backed by a dozen supporters, was
climbing the outside stairs to the judges.
"The purse-holder's his friend," Billy said. "See, he's paid him,
an' some of the judges is willin' an' some are beefin'. An' now
that other gang's going up--they're Redhead's." He turned to
Saxon with a reassuring smile. "We're well out of it this time.
There's goin' to be rough stuff down there in a minute."
"The judges are tryin' to make him give the money back," Bert
explained. "An' if he don't the other gang'll take it away from
him. See! They're reachin' for it now."
High above his head, the winner held the roll of paper containing
the twenty-five silver dollars. His gang, around him, was
shouldering back those who tried to seize the money. No blows had
been struck yet, but the struggle increased until the frail
structure shook and swayed. From the crowd beneath the winner was
variously addressed: "Give it baok, you dog!" "Hang on to it,
Tim!" "You won fair, Timmy!" "Give it back, you dirty robber!"
Abuse unprintable as well as friendly advice was hurled at him.
The struggle grew more violent. Tim's supporters strove to hold
him off the floor so that his hand would still be above the
grasping hands that shot up. Once, for an instant, his arm was
jerked down. Again it went up. But evidently the paper had
broken, and with a last desperate effort, before he went down,
Tim flung the coin out in a silvery shower upon the heads of the
crowd beneath. Then ensued a weary period of arguing and
quarreling.
"I wish they'd finish, so as we could get back to the dancin',"
Mary complained. "This ain't no fun."
Slowly and painfully the judges' stand was cleared, and an
announcer, stepping to the front of the stand, spread his arms
appealing for silence. The angiy clamor died down.
"The judges have decided," he shouted, "that this day of good
fellowship an' brotherhood--"
"Hear! Hear!" Many of the cooler heads applauded. "That's the
stuff!" "No fightin'!" "No hard feelin's!"
"An' therefore," the announcer became audible again, "the judges
have decided to put up another purse of twenty-five dollars an'
run the race over again!"
"An' Tim?" bellowed scores of throats. "What about Tim?" "He's
been robbed!" "The judges is rotten!"
Again the announcer stilled the tumult with his arm appeal.
"The judges have decided, for the sake of good feelin', that
Timothy McManus will also run. If he wins, the money's his."
"Now wouldn't that jar you?" Billy grumbled disgustedly. "If
Tim's eligible now, he was eligible the first time. An' if he was
eligible the first time, then the money was his."
"Red-head'll bust himself wide open this time," Bert jubilated.
"An' so will Tim," Billy rejoined. "You can bet he's mad clean
through, and he'll let out the links he was holdin' in last
time."
Another quarter of an hour was spent in clearing the track of the
excited crowd, and this time only Tim and Red-head toed the mark.
The other three young men had abandoned the contest.
The leap of Tim, at the report of the revolver, put him a clean
yard in the lead.
"I guess he's professional, all right, all right," Billy
remarked. "An' just look at him go!"
Half-way around, Tim led by fifty feet, and, running swiftly,
maintaining the same lead, he came down the homestretch an easy
winner. When directly beneath the group on the hillside, the
incredible and unthinkable happened. Standing close to the inside
edge of the track was a dapper young man with a light switch
cane. He was distinctly out of place in such a gathering, for
upon him was no ear-mark of the working class. Afterward, Bert
was of the opinion that he looked like a swell dancing master,
while Billy called him "the dude."
So far as Timothy McManus was concerned, the dapper young man was
destiny; for as Tim passed him, the young man, with utmost
deliberation, thrust his cane between Tim's flying legs. Tim
sailed through the air in a headlong pitch, struck spread-eagled
on his face, and plowed along in a cloud of dust.
There was an instant of vast and gasping silence. The young man,
too, seemed petrified by the ghastliness of his deed. It took an
approciable interval of time for him, as well as for the
onlookers, to realize what he had done. They recovered first, and
from a thousand throats the wild Irish yell went up. Red-head won
the race without a cheer. The storm center had shifted to the
young man with the cane. After the yell, he had one moment of
indecision; then he turned and darted up the track.
"Go it, sport!" Bert cheered, waving his hat in the air. "You're
the goods for me! Who'd a-thought it? Who'd a-thought it?
Say!--wouldn't it, now? Just wouldn't it?"
"Phew! He's a streak himself," Billy admired. "But what did he do
it for? He's no bricklayer."
Like a frightened rabbit, the mad roar at his heels, the young
man tore up the track to an open space on the hillside, up which
he clawed and disappeared among the trees. Behind him toiled a
hundred vengeful runners.
"It's too bad he's missing the rest of it," Billy said. "Look at
'em goin' to it."
Bert was beside himself. He leaped up and down and cried
continuously.
"Look at 'em! Look at 'em! Look at 'em!"
The Oakland faction was outraged. Twice had its favorite runner
been jobbed out of the race. This last was only another vile
trick of the Frisco faction. So Oakland doubled its brawny fists
and swung into San Francisco for blood. And San Francisco,
consciously innocent, was no less willing to join issues. To be
charged with such a crime was no less monstrous than the crime
itself. Besides, for too many tedious hours had the Irish
heroically suppressed themselves. Five thousands of them exploded
into joyous battle. The women joined with them. The whole
amphitheater was filled with the conflict. There were rallies,
retreats, charges, and counter-charges. Weaker groups were forced
fighting up the hillsides. Other groups, bested, fled among the
trees to carry on guerrilla warfare, emerging in sudden dashes to
overwhelm isolated enemies. Half a dozen special policemen, hired
by the Weasel Park management, received an impartial trouncing
from both sides.
"Nohody's the friend of a policeman," Bert chortled, dabbing his
handkerchief to his injured ear, which still bled.
The bushes crackled behind him, and he sprang aside to let the
locked forms of two men go by, rolling over and over down the
hill, each striking when uppermost, and followed by a screaming
woman who rained blows on the one who was patently not of her
clan.
The judges, in the second story of the stand, valiantly withstood
a fierce assault until the frail structure toppled to the ground
in splinters.
"What's that woman doing?" Saxon asked, calling attention to an
elderly woman beneath them on the track, who had sat down and was
pulling from her foot an elastic-sided shoe of generous
dimensions.
"Goin' swimming," Bert chuckled, as the stocking followed.
They watched, fascinated. The shoe was pulled on again over the
bare foot. Then the woman slipped a rock the size of her fist
into the stocking, and, brandishing this ancient and horrible
weapon, lumbered into the nearest fray.
"Oh!--Oh!--Oh!" Bert screamed, with every blow she struck "Hey,
old flannel-mouth! Watch out! You'll get yours in a second. Oh!
Oh! A peach! Did you see it? Hurray for the old lady! Look at her
tearin' into 'em! Watch out, old girl! ... Ah-h-h."
His voice died away regretfully, as the one with the stocking,
whose hair had been clutched from behind by another Amazon, was
whirled about in a dizzy semicircle.
Vainly Mary clung to his arm, shaking him back and forth and
remonstrating.
"Can't you be sensible?" she cried. "It's awful! I tell you it's
awful!"
But Bert was irrepressible.
"Go it, old girl!" he encouraged. "You win! Me for you every
time! Now's your chance! Swat! Oh! My! A peach! A peach!"
"It's the biggest rough-house I ever saw," Billy confided to
Saxon. "It sure takes the Micks to mix it. But what did that dude
wanta do it for? That's what gets me. He wasn't a bricklayer--not
even a workingman--just a regular sissy dude that didn't know a
livin' soul in the grounds. But if he wanted to raise a
rough-house he certainly done it. Look at 'em. They're fightin'
everywhere."
He broke into sudden laughter, so hearty that the tears came into
his eyes.
"What is it?" Saxon asked, anxious not to miss anything.
"It's that dude," Billy explained between gusts. "What did he
wanta do it for? That's what gets my goat. What'd he wanta do it
for?"
There was more crashing in the brush, and two women erupted upon
the scene, one in flight, the other pursuing. Almost ere they
could realize it, the little group found itself merged in the
astounding conflict that covered, if not the face of creation, at
least all the visible landscape of Weasel Park.
The fleeing woman stumbled in rounding the end of a picnic bench,
and would have been caught had she not seized Mary's arm to
recover balance, and then flung Mary full into the arms of the
woman who pursued. This woman, largely built, middle-aged, and
too irate to comprehend, clutched Mary's hair by one hand and
lifted the other to smack her. Before the blow could fall, Billy
had seized both the woman's wrists.
"Come on, old girl, cut it out," he said appeasingly. "You're in
wrong. She ain't done nothin'."
Then the woman did a strange thing. Making no resistance, but
maintaining her hold on the girl's hair, she stood still and
calmly began to scream. The scream was hideously compounded of
fright and fear. Yet in her face was neither fright nor fear. She
regarded Billy coolly and appraisingly, as if to see how he took
it--her scream merely the cry to the clan for help.
"Aw, shut up, you battleax!" Bert vociferated, trying to drag her
off by the shoulders.
The result was that The four rocked back and forth, while the
woman calmly went on screaming. The scream became touched with
triumph as more crashing was heard in the brush.
Saxon saw Billy's slow eyes glint suddenly to the hardness of
steel, and at the same time she saw him put pressure on his
wrist-holds. The woman released her grip on Mary and was shoved
back and free. Then the first man of the rescue was upon them. He
did not pause to inquire into the merits of the affair. It was
sufficient that he saw the woman reeling away from Billy and
screaming with pain that was largely feigned.
"It's all a mistake," Billy cried hurriedly. "We apologize,
sport--"
The Irishman swung ponderously. Billy ducked, cutting his apology
short, and as the sledge-like fist passed over his head, he drove
his left to the other's jaw. The big Irishman toppled over
sidewise and sprawled on the edge of the slope. Half-scrambled
back to his feet and out of balance, he was caught by Bert's
fist, and this time went clawing down the slope that was slippery
with short, dry grass. Bert was redoubtable. "That for you, old
girl--my compliments," was his cry, as he shoved the woman over
the edge on to the treacherous slope. Three more men were
emerging from the brush.
In the meantime, Billy had put Saxon in behind the protection of
the picnic table. Mary, who was hysterical, had evinced a desire
to cling to him, and he had sent her sliding across the top of
the table to Saxon.
"Come on, you flannel-mouths!" Bert yelled at the newcomers,
himself swept away by passion, his black eyes flashing wildly,
his dark face inflamed by the too-ready blood. "Come on, you
cheap skates! Talk about Gettysburg. We'll show you all the
Americans ain't dead yet!"
"Shut your trap--we don't want a scrap with the girls here,"
Billy growled harshly, holding his position in front of the
table. He turned to the three rescuers, who were bewildered by
the lack of anything visible to rescue. "Go on, sports. We don't
want a row. You're in wrong. They ain't nothin' doin' in the
fight line. We don't wanta fight--d'ye get me?"
They still hesitated, and Billy might have succeeded in avoiding
trouble had not the man who had gone down the bank chosen that
unfortunate moment to reappear, crawling groggily on hands and
knees and showing a bleeding face. Again Bert reached him and
sent him downslope, and the other three, with wild yells, sprang
in on Billy, who punched, shifted position, ducked and punched,
and shifted again ere he struck the thiird time. His blows were
clean end hard, scientifically delivered, with the weight of his
body behind.
Saxon, looking on, saw his eyes and learned more about him. She
was frightened, but clear-seeing, and she was startled by the
disappearance of all depth of light and shadow in his eyes. They
showed surface only--a hard, bright surface, almost glazed,
devoid of all expression save deadly seriousness. Bert's eyes
showed madness. The eyes of the Irishmen were angry and serious,
and yet not all serious. There was a wayward gleam in them, as if
they enjoyed the fracas. But in Billy's eyes was no enjoyment. It
was as if he had certain work to do and had doggedly settled down
to do it.
Scarcely more expression did she note in the face, though there
was nothing in common between it and the one she had seen all
day. The boyishness had vanished. This face was mature in a
terrifying, ageless way. There was no anger in it, Nor was it
even pitiless. It seemed to have glazed as hard and passionlessly
as his eyes. Something came to her of her wonderful mother's
tales of the ancient Saxons, and he seemed to her one of those
Saxons, and she caught a glimpse, on the well of her
consciousness, of a long, dark boat, with a prow like the beak of
a bird of prey, and of huge, half-naked men, wing-helmeted, and
one of their faces, it seemed to her, was his face. She did not
reason this. She felt it, and visioned it as by an unthinkable
clairvoyance, and gasped, for the flurry of war was over. It had
lasted only seconds, Bert was dancing on the edge of the slippery
slope and mocking the vanquished who had slid impotently to the
bottom. But Billy took charge.
"Come on, you girls," he commanded. "Get onto yourself, Bert. We
got to get onta this. We can't fight an army."
He led the retreat, holding Saxon's arm, and Bert, giggling and
jubilant, brought up the rear with an indignant Mary who
protested vainly in his unheeding ears.
For a hundred yards they ran and twisted through the trees, and
then, no signs of pursuit appearing, they slowed down to a
dignified saunter. Bert, the trouble-seeker, pricked his ears to
the muffled sound of blows and sobs, and stepped aside to
investigate.
"Oh! look what I've found!" he called.
They joined him on the edge of a dry ditch and looked down. In
the bottom were two men, strays from the fight, grappled together
and still fighting. They were weeping out of sheer fatigue and
helplessness, and the blows they only occasionally struck were
open-handed and ineffectual.
"Hey, you, sport--throw sand in his eyes," Bert counseled.
"That's it, blind him an' he's your'n."
"Stop that!" Billy shouted at the man, who was following
instructions, "Or I'll come down there an' beat you up myself.
It's all over--d'ye get me? It's all over an' everybody's
friends. Shake an' make up. The drinks are on both of you. That's
right--here, gimme your hand an' I'll pull you out."
They left them shaking hands and brushing each other's clothes.
"It soon will be over," Billy grinned to Saxon. "I know 'em.
Fight's fun with them. An' this big scrap's made the days howlin'
success. what did I tell you!--look over at that table there."
A group of disheveled men and women, still breathing heavily,
were shaking hands all around.
"Come on, let's dance," Mary pleaded, urging them in the
direction of the pavilion.
All over the park the warring bricklayers were shaking hands and
making up, while the open-air bars were crowded with the
drinkers.
Saxon walked very close to Billy. She was proud of him. He could
fight, and he could avoid trouble. In all that had occurred he
had striven to avoid trouble. And, also, consideration for her
and Mary had been uppermost in his mind.
"You are brave," she said to him.
"It's like takin' candy from a baby," he disclaimed. "They only
rough-house. They don't know boxin'. They're wide open, an' all
you gotta do is hit 'em. It ain't real fightin', you know." With
a troubled, boyish look in his eyes, he stared at his bruised
knuckles. "An' I'll have to drive team to-morrow with 'em," he
lamented. "Which ain't fun, I'm tellin' you, when they stiffen
up." _
Read next: BOOK I: CHAPTER V
Read previous: BOOK I: CHAPTER III
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