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Page 61
Then, to the salvagers, came the most astounding and sinister revelation
of all. Startled oaths burst from them as they beheld now what had
retarded their first pull. Bound tightly to the body with rusted wire
was a huge, hand-squared block of stone. The sergeant's last and
successful cast had resulted in two prongs of the grappling-irons
catching in the enveloping wire.
Slowly and cautiously the whole hideous bulk was finally drawn up the
shelving bank and over the log and onto dry ground. Yorke shouted, and
Slavin, checking the horses, detached the rope from the double-trees.
Handing the lines over to Lanky Jones he joined the others, who were
critically examining their gruesome catch. To their surprise, although
the features were unrecognisable, the corpse was not so decomposed as
they had first imagined, the ice-cold water having preserved it to a
certain extent. Still firmly hooked to the rags of clothing--a
ludicrously grim joke--was the huge jumping, gasping trout which Redmond
had struck and lost.
Suddenly Yorke uttered a low exclamation. "Burke! Burke!" he said
tensely, "there you are! . . . Look at the right hand'"
The eyes of all were centered on the grimy, stiffened, clawlike fist.
They saw that two of the fingers were missing. An exultant oath burst
from Slavin. "By G----!" he said, with grim conviction, "it's him all
right!--that pore hobo shtiff--Dick Drinkwater. Eyah! fwhat's in a name?
Fwhat's in a name?" He pointed to the grinning jaws. "Luk at th' gold
teeth av um, tu!" he added.
The coroner was examining the almost fleshless skull. He gave a cry of
anger and dismay. "Good God!" he gasped. "Look here, all of you! . . .
This man's been shot through the head, too!" He indicated the small,
circular orifice in the occiput, and its egress below the left eye.
"Only an exceedingly powerful, high-pressure weapon could have done
that," he continued significantly, "both holes are alike--bullet hasn't
'mushroomed' at all."
"Eyah!" Slavin agreed wearily. "We know fwhat kind av a gun did ut. And
luk here!" he added savagely, pointing to the bare feet, "here's another
of Mr. Man's little jokes--no boots. If they'd have been lift on they'd
have shtuck tighter'n glue--in that water. Reddy was 'bout right,
Yorkey! Gully, d----n him! did frame us that day. Must have used thim
himsilf tu make thim thracks wid--early in th' mornin'--behfure he met up
wid us on th' thrail. Oh, blarney my sowl! Yes! Had us chasin' for a
whole silly week, all for--"
He broke off abruptly, choking with rage. For awhile, in silence, the
party gazed at the pitiful, hideous monstrosity that had once been a man.
Then the ever-practical Redmond proceeded, with the aid of a large
pebble, to burst, strand by strand, the wire which bound the stone to the
body.
"That stone, too!" said the doctor darkly. "Sergeant, in view of what
you've been telling me, there seems something very, very terrible about
all this. I suppose there's absolutely no doubt in your mind now, who--?"
The Irishman jerked out a great oath. "Doubt!" echoed he grimly, "doubt!
So little doubt, Docthor," added he hoarsely, "that we go get 'um this
very night."
"Alas, poor Yorick!" said Yorke sadly. "Say, Burke!" he continued in an
awe-struck voice "this is like a leaf out of O'Brien's book, with a
vengeance. You remember him, that cold-blooded devil who Pennycuik
nailed up in the Yukon--used to shoot 'em and shove their bodies under
the ice?"
Slavin nodded gloomily. "At Tagish, ye mane? Yeah! I 'member ut.
Penny sure did some good wurrk on that case."
Redmond had by this time completed his gruesome task. "There's lots of
these blocks lying around Gully's," he remarked, "I've seen 'em. Place's
got a stone foundation. Look at the notches he's chipped in this one--to
keep the wire from slipping!"
"Eyah!" said Slavin, with grimly-unconscious humour, "Exhibit B. We must
hang on to ut, heavy as it us--an' th' wire, tu! Well, people, we'd
betther shove this pore shtiff on the buckboard, an' beat ut." He turned
to the doctor's laconic factotum. "Come on, Lanky!" he said briskly.
"Let's go hitch up."
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