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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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arrive at the little flag station known as College Park. This man talked with Manuel, and money clinked between them. ‘You might wrap up the goods before you deliver ‘m,’ the stranger said gruffly, and Manuel doubled a piece of stout rope around Buck’s neck under the collar. ‘Twist it, an’ you’ll choke ‘m plentee,’ said Manuel, and the stranger grunted a ready affirmative. Buck had accepted the rope with quiet dignity. To be sure, it was an unwonted performance: but he had learned to trust in men he knew, and to give them credit for a wisdom that outreached his own. But when the ends of the rope were placed in the stranger’s hands, he growled menacingly. He had merely intimated his displeasure, in his pride believing that to intimate was to command. But to his surprise the rope tightened around his neck, shutting off his breath. In quick rage he sprang at the man, who met him halfway, grappled him close by the throat, and with a deft twist threw him over on his back. Then the rope tightened mercilessly, while Buck struggled in a fury, his tongue lolling out of his mouth and his great chest panting futilely. Never in all his life had he been so vilely treated, and never in all his life had he been so angry. But his strength ebbed, his eyes glazed, and he knew nothing when the train was flagged and the two men threw him into the baggage car. The next he knew, he was dimly aware that his tongue was hurting and that he was being jolted along in some kind of conveyance. The hoarse shriek of a locomotive whistling a crossing told him where he was. He had travelled too often with the Judge not to know the sensation of riding in a baggage car. He opened his eyes, and into them came the unbridled anger of a kidnapped king. The man sprang for his throat, but Buck was too quick for him. His jaws closed on the hand; nor did they relax till his senses were choked out of him once more. ‘Yep, has fits,’ the man said, hiding his mangled hand from the baggageman, who had been attracted by the sounds of struggle. ‘I’m takin’ ‘im up for the boss to ‘Frisco. A crack dog-doctor there thinks that he can cure ‘im.’ Concerning that night’s ride the man spoke most eloquently for himself, in a little shed back of a saloon on the San Francisco water front. ‘All I get is fifty for it,’ he grumbled; ‘an’ I wouldn’t do it over for a thousand, cold cash.’ His hand was wrapped in a bloody |
