第50章

"No," said Shock gravely, "I could not undertake that.""You see, Ike, I am too uncertain.Too far gone, I guess."Ike was too puzzled to reply.He had a kind of dim idea that in Shock there was some help for his boss, and he was disappointed at Shock's answer.

For some time Shock sat in silence, looking at the fire.His heart was sore.He felt his helplessness.This clever, gay-hearted young fellow, with all his gentleness of manner, was unapproachable.He belonged to another world, and yet Shock yearned over him with a tenderness inexplicable to himself.The Kid gave him no opening.

There was a kind of gay defiance in his bearing, as if he had read Shock's heart and were determined to keep him at arm's length.

Instinctively Shock knew that he must wait his opportunity.

"Well, guess we'd better turn in," suggested Ike."Can you two bunk together? That bed'll hold you both, I guess.""No, thanks," said Shock decidedly."That is your bed.I'll spread my blankets on the floor.""In this country," said Stanton, "we give the stranger the bed, so you need not scruple to turn Ike out of his.Ike and I will take the floor.""Not this time," said Shock firmly."I am thankful enough for shelter, without taking a man's bed.Besides," he added, suddenly remembering, "Ike needs his bed to-night, after his sick turn.""Yes, by Jove! By the way," exclaimed Stanton, "what happened, Ike?""A sudden and unexpected predisposition which takes me now and then," turning his back upon Shock and solemnly winking at The Kid;"but I recover just as quickly, and when I do I'm as slick as ever, and slicker.These here turns work off a lot of bad blood, I guess."During his speech he continued winking at The Kid.That young gentleman gazed at him in amazed silence.Gradually, a light broke in upon him.

"Look here, Ike, what in thunder do you mean?""I say, boss," said Ike persuasively, "just go easy.You oughn't to excite yourself.'Taint good for you, and 'taint good for me, either.My doctor says so.I wouldn't persecute your enquiries at this late hour of the night."Ike's gravity was imperturbable.

"Well, I be blanked! I beg your pardon, Mr.Macgregor.Ike, you're a cool one.You've got the nerve of "Here The Kid began to laugh, and Shock, all unsuspecting of Ike's scheme for getting his boss out of the clutches of his spoilers, gazed from the one to the other with an air of such absolute perplexity that The Kid went off into immoderate fits of laughter.Ike's gravity remained unbroken.

"All the same, boss," he said, "you want to keep an eye on that outfit.They'll get even.That man Crawley and the Inspector aint goin' to rest easy.where they are.Marks like what you put on 'em burn to the bone.""They cannot hurt me, Ike," said the Kid lightly, "and I think they will be afraid to try.But Mr.Macgregor here has got into trouble.

Is not Macfarren a church warden, or something, in your Church?""He is a manager, I think," said Shock."Pretty much the same thing.""Well, he is a man to look out for.I can get along without him, but you cannot, can you? I mean, he can hurt you.""No," said Shock quietly, "he cannot hurt me.The only man that can hurt me is myself.No other man can.And besides," he added, pulling a little Bible out of his pocket, "I have a Keeper, as Ike said."As Shock opened the little Bible he became conscious of a sense of mastery.His opportunity had come.

"Listen to this," he said, and he read in a voice of assured conviction: "The Lord is thy keeper.

The Lord shall keep thee from all evil.

He shall keep thy soul.

The Lord shall keep thy going out and thy coming in.

From this time forth and forevermore."

He closed the book and put it in his pocket.

"No," he said, "no man can hurt me." Then turning to Ike he said quietly, "I always say my prayers.My mother started me twenty-five years ago, and I have never seen any reason to quit."While his tone was gentle and his manner simple, there was almost a challenge in his eyes.The fair face of young Stanton flushed through the tan.

"You do your mother honour," he said, with quiet dignity.

"I say," said Ike slowly, "if you kin do it just as convenient, perhaps you'd say 'em out.Wouldn't do us no harm, eh, Kiddie?""No, I should be pleased."

"Thank you," said Shock.Then for a moment he stood looking first at Ike's grave face, and then at The Kid, out of whose blue eyes all the gay, reckless defiance had vanished.

"Don't imagine I think myself a bit better than you," said Shock hastily, voice and lip quivering.

"Oh, git out!" ejaculated Ike quickly."That aint sense.""But," continued Shock, "perhaps I have had a little better chance.

Certainly I have had a good mother."

"And I, too," said the boy, in a husky voice.

So the three kneeled together in Ike's shack, each wondering how it had come about that it should seem so natural and easy for him to be in that attitude.

In a voice steady and controlled Shock made his prayer.Humility and gratitude for all that had been done for him in his life, an overwhelming sense of need for the life demanded in this God-forgetting country, and a great love and compassion for the two men with whom he had so strangely been brought into such close relation swelled in his heart and vibrated through his prayer.

Ike's face never lost its impassive gravity.Whatever may have been his feelings, he gave no sign of emotion.But the lad that kneeled on the other side of Shock pressed his face down hard into his hands, while his frame shook with choking, silent sobs.All that was holiest and tenderest in his past came crowding in upon him, in sad and terrible contrast to his present.

Immediately after the prayer Shock slipped out of the shack.

"I say, boss," said Ike, as he poked the fire, "he's a winner, aint he? Guess he hits the sky all right, when he gets onto his knees.By the livin' Gimmini! when that feller gits a-goin' he raises considerable of a promotion.""Commotion, Ikey," said The Kid gently."Yes, I believe he hits the sky--and he says he needs a Keeper.""Well," said Ike solemnly, "I have a lingerin' suspicion that you're correct, but if he needs a Keeper, what about us?"