There he would
finish the matter of disputing the road.
Mallows drew himself out of his cramped ambuscade and started for his
new point, to the completion of his business--but before he had taken
many steps a sudden and violent distress assailed him. He pressed his
hand to his side with a feeling of vague surprise and it came away
blood-covered. He stopped and took account of his condition--and found
himself shot in the chest. In the excitement of the moment he had not
felt the sting, but now he was becoming rapidly and alarmingly weak.
He stumbled on, but several times he fell, and each time it was with a
greater burden of effort that he regained his feet. He clamped his
teeth and pressed doggedly forward, but the ranges began to swim in
giddy circles and a thickening fog clouded his eyes. When he dropped
down next time he did not rise again.
As night fell in the mine the temper of the men there became
increasingly ugly. Some had recourse to the flasks that they carried
in their pockets, and as their blood warmed into an alcoholic glow,
their eyes, through the slits in their masks, began dwelling on
Alexander's beauty of figure and face with a menacing and predatory
greed.
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