epaw«ct?V: ,,-mi ■m* ! W CHAFFEE I ROARING HORSE 5 BY ERNEST HAYCOX_|j§ The posse was almost down; guns began to wake the echoes Across on the ferry ■tde old man Lee straightened and ran momentarily out of sight. When he reappeared there was a short barreled ahotgxin in his fists. He peered through the thin fog, raising the gun uncertainly, not knowing what to expect. Mack Moran yelled at him, but the •ound of the water only blurred Mack's meaning. The posse raced to the river’s edge and laid a line of fire against the boat, ail shots falling short The woman screamed again and It may have been that Xavier Francois Lone star Lee heard that scream, though the noise of the can yon might have absorbed so shrill a sound before it reached Uie man’s ears. Hut at any rate he saw the posse through the fog and he heard them shooting; and he obeyed a natural, primitive impulse. Raising the shotgun he fired point-blank at the nearing boat. The fine shot sang and snapped in the water. Mack yelled again and ducked.“Let *er gof The loon’s reachin’ for ■tore shells!" The second blast came sleet ing across the Interval, inde scribably vicious as it sheered and spat In the current and whined against the boat’s side. Jim Chaffee felt a thin, sharp pain slicing Into his shoulder; turning, he saw that Lee was making ready for another aim, and he under stood then how Impossible the situation had of a sudden become. Buckshot was deadly; he dared not attempt to bluff through It So he reversed the Impulse of the oars and the boat, urged onward by the added force, raced into the dim, droaning depths of the canyon tanck Moran s immediate re action was one of absurd, hi larious satisfaction. “Doggone that Lee person. He’ll never get this boat back again. Serves him right.” Then he noticed Chaffee’s wrist muscles snapping hard against the oars and at that point the Stall rcaliation of the ap proaching ordeal smote him squarely in the middle of his shoulder blades. His leathery cheeks tightened; through he gray gloom his face seemed to pucker owlishly, and there appeared to be a withdrawal of blood from his compressed lips. “Man, let’s you and me hit for the shore sudden;" “What shore?” “Huh?* Mack looked around, startled. The lower end of that gravel strip upon which Lee's house precariously perched war, sliding past them, starrowing swiftly to nothing ■tore than a ledge. Even as he looked that ledge fell away Into the river and was ab sorbed by the sheer face of the canyon wall and there was nothing left but a stubborn, black expanse of pitted rock aising and vanishing beyond the curling mists. The boom ing fury of water struggling through 1he farther recesses grew perceptibly louder. Chaf iee threw his weight against the oare and the skiff, travel ing stern foremost, shot along like a thing alive. Mack pro tested. “Say. we’re goin’ thirty miles an hour, or I’m an Aus tralian boomerang thrower. What’s the need of all this hustle? Let's slow down some and consider the matter .in de tail. Me. 1 don’t like to rush.” “Ain't going as fast as we ■eem, said Chaffee. “But we might Just as well get this mrer with. It don’t do any good to think about Devil’s Boil too long. Wonder if that posse is racin' along the rim to reach Underman's ahead of us?” Sight of Ice’s ferry long ago had been shut off by the fog 20 wreath. “Last I saw," said Mack, “they was all lined up on the shore, gawpin' at us. Didn’t seem to be in no hurry.” “Reasonable for them to look at it that way,” was Chaf fee’s grim observation. “Better take off your boots and shirt.” “No, sir, I hate to get my feet wet.” “Well, here’s where we start. Lay down on the bottom, Mack, so I can see the rocks cornin’ up.” Mack obeyed. The boat be- ‘ gan to pitch, stern rising and slapping into the rollers. Up from the throat of the gorge came the sound as of a high wind beating through a forest, of water pouring over a cliff. Chaffee lifted his oars and let the craft drift of its own mo mentum. Ahead, the river seemed to slant at an in creased angle—another piece of deception moving water holds up to man—and from wall to wall there was nothing but white spearheads flashing dully in the half light. The boat leaped onward and began to turn. Chaffee dipped an oar, almost losing it. He dug the current, and rester again. The black Jaws of a rock yawned beside him, spray lashed out and spattered the prone Mack. “Sunk?” yelled Mack, half rising. The boat rose and dropped with a force that knocked the puncher flat on his face. They were gripped by warring eddies, pulled and battered and rocked. Chaffee lowered both oars and braked the boat’s speed, body weaving, muscles and joints cracking with the immense pressure. Mack lifted his head again and found himself canted against one side, staring into a hollow that appeared to be carved from green glass. The boat sprang back; all this was behind him, smooth water lapped against the boards. Chaffee sagged and wiped sweat and spray from his face. Mack crawled to the stern seat and rolled a cigaret, try ing to speak casually. “Well, guess that was the worst of it, uh?’r “You know better. We ain’t been nowhere yet.” “Our sunny, light-hearted friend speakin’. Never thought I’d ever get seasick out in the middle of the desert. But I shore squirmed back yonder. Say—look—there’s a place we could step ashore. See that shelf?” “Yeah. And see what’s back of it. A wall, straight up. Would it buy us anything to land? Can’t fly out of this hole. And nobody’s goin’ to row down after us.” “If I ever get ashore once —” muttered Mack. “Do you hear somethin’?” The canyon trembled with it—a faint, pulsating snore that sounded like the gutter ing of some primeval monster; yet the tempo remained con stant, never varying, never dying out. The farther they floated the deeper and more thunderous was the rever beration thrown across the towering walls. And somehow, for all the advancing light of day, the gorge was plunged in a more profound twilight. It began to narrow, and Chaffee discovered a point jutting out in front of them. The smooth ness of the stream face was broken into warning ridges. White water beckoned. Around that approaching point began the Long Slide, terminating in the Devil’s Boil. Of the four men who had started from Lee’s in the past thirty years, three had lost their lives in the Boil; and to that mad, tortured area with its great vaults battered by dynamic hydraulic attacks and its tem pestuous suction Mack Moran ana Jim Chaffee were now rapidly approaching. "Yuh, I hear it,” gurmbled Mack. He looked longingly to the faint strip of shelving on the south side. "I bet a man could cut some sort of a stone ladder up there, Jim.” "What with?” "There yuh go again. Well, call me for breakfast, Mister Chaffee. If I hear a trumpet or a harp I’ll know it won’t be beans and bacon. Go to it, kid” The rough water took them, the boat shot around the jut ting point of the south wall. The incline of the river’s bed seemed far greater than at any previous stage of the trip. As they straightened into the Long Slide a vast roar battered either precipice and they were actually dizied by the impact of a vibrating, stutter ing conflict of force against force just beyond sight. In another moment a charging white wall of water broke through the fog; spray covered them. Chaffee, dog tired, pulled in the oars. "What’s the use of dippin’ a toothpick in Niagara?” The torrent of sound tore the words out of his mouth. Mack looked backward. Chaffee leaned down. "One man made it! Hang on to your pants! Here we go!” Mack’s face was blurred in the mist, but he winked and clamped both arms around the stern seat. Chaffee Jammed his feet between boat bottom and the middle seat. The skiff swayed and lurched into a trough; at that moment Chaffee had a clear view of the Devil’s Boil—nothing but cascading fury to one side and a slick uprearing wall af water that seemed to defy the law of gravity on the other. Seeing it, he pushed the oars under him, pulled himself as low as he could, and tightened all muscles. There is in water a power that nothing else under the blue canopy of heaven pos sesses. Man may dam it, yet the slowly impounding force laps away at the barrier, con stantly making sallies and thrust and forever threaten ing to break free; man may ride upon it, but never with a sure sense of safety, for it is a thing alive, ceaseless and destructive. It wears away all before it; it moves onward, nor can anything check its final victory. So, as Chaffee rode into the mists of fury, he resigned himself to •eath as others had done, even though in the dim recesses of his being the unquenchable flame of life desire still burned. One man had made it, and therefore some alley existed through the wild and charging torrent. Thus, with hope and despair alternating, he saw himself being drawn into the terrific maw of the Boil. The boat was past any one’s power to check, racing along the slide with a speed that taxed his senses. He felt a suction pulling it lower in the water. Whether or not it was true, he did see that tae surface of the stieam sliced nearer the gunwales, ac companied by a sound that was something like the frying of bacon in a pan. The mists turned by degrees from a damp blanket to an actual downpour; moment by mo ment the canyon walls became dimmer and his ears were drummed with an intensity of attack he had never yet ex perienced. From the heights of the canyon he often had heard the drone of this cata clysmic force; down here, caught in its grip, the sound was more like a mingled screaming and exploding of the elements. The boat was filled with water. So far the speed or the suction had kept it iron pitching much, but as the last sight of the walls obscured and died, and even the bulk of the craft itself was barely visible, the suction appeared to let go; instantly it began a crazy, side for side and end to end careening. The water gushed around Chaffee's feet. Great cascades drenched him, ' strangled mm; and an tne while he was alone, one tiny cell of living life surrounded by destruction. In a moment of clearheadedness he won dered if Mack was still in the boat. He didn’t know, couldn’t hear his partner even if Mack shouted at the top of his lungs, and couldn’t see him. More things were happening in those few seconds than he could grasp. But he did feel a slacking off of the punish ment, and then the suction took hold again and the boat i began to travel in a vast circle, impelled to a greater speed, thrown higher at each revolution until it seemed certain that in time it would reach some top-heavy angle and turn over. Nothing, he knew, kept the boat from be ing beaten into fragments but the steady rhythm of the whirlpool they were in. And he lost control entirely of the time. But it seemed forever. It seemed like since he and Mack had embarked from Lee’s ferry. So much for the illusion of time. The mighty rever beration played tricks with him; seemed first behind him, then in front of him. And actually appeared to sink be low. Then—and it was like being released alive from a burial vault—he caught a faint sight of the sky. and he saw one rim of the canyon perched at some crazy angle They were traveling upward no doubt of it. The sensation was too acute to be mistaken; and in another moment he had a small view of Mack, all in a knot. They were traveling again at great speed—and straight ahead. The sky be came clearer, and for an in terval the drenching sprays diminished; Chaffee even wondered if he might try the oars.. It was an idle thought at the moment, for the boat was checked, smashed by some reverse current; and then they fell dizzily, the pit of Chaffee’s stomach rising and his feet pushing harder and harder against the floor boards to avert what must be the fatal crash. The crash never came. It was as if they were hooked to a great cradle, swinging from side to side. Then, in one more i flashing interval of time, that I was all changed. The boat leaped high, swung around poised and turned over, the both of them struggling be neath it. Chaffee, trying to keep some order in his head, unlocked his body, pulled him self to the surface and looked around. Mack was perched on the upturned bow, aand ahead of them lay the finest sight the most beautiful streten ol j nature Chaffee thought he I had ever laid eyes upon— calm water. The Boil was behind, and 1 somehow the sound of it was j no longer sinster. Actually it Looked like a pretty fine spectacle. So they went rock ing precariously through the lee riffles and struck a slug gish eddy. ‘G-got a cigaret?” said ! Mack in a voice that was but a thin shadow of itself. ‘ What makes you stutter?” questioned Chaffee, nor could he understand the reedy little noise in his throat. • Got a bit cold,” explained Mack, and then began to swear. ‘‘Y’don’t look so light hearted yoreself, by—” Chaffee studied the receding Boil. ‘‘Mack, have you got any mortal idea how we squeezed through that cataract? Hell, it’s a mile high and forty feet | thick.” ‘ No. and I ain't aimin’ to i go back to find out, either, j Man. I died so many times in the last few minutes I got no fear of the grave left. I bet St. Peter is hangin’ up a set of wings right now which he was aimin’ to try on me.” •Well, it’s over. Oars gone, boat leakin’, everything ready to fall apart, includin’ the contents. Let’s try to push this thing ashore and empty it out. Then proceed with due leksure to Linderman’s” (TO B* CONTINUED) ~IBua**ra 1m Not Approved. The Nomad in the Boston Tran script. Apropos ef the Nomad's recent fmuTU on tiie pronunciation at tts» Dames of states, "M" writes. ~Uom do sive us the correct pro •mncuium ol one more state—Mis mrt It surely can't be that the final V is pronounced as 'er'. And th> the name Gotham—long or abort ‘a’'’ bThumni should have been in trhofcad is Use Nomad's list. It is or 4toudj pronounced “Mizzoorie," the ■**■*’ as ts ” and the last sylla ble the short ‘l ". Sometimes the natives say “Mizzoura," but that is not approved, and there is, of i course, no sense in it. Tlie dictionaries say "Go-tham or Goth-am." The approve,* pro- I nunciation of the Nottinghamshire i village in England is Goth-am. but ! Go-tham is common in this coun try, where New York City has been sarcastically called by the namel ever since Irving, in "Salmagundi,” applied the term in honor of the supposed stupidity of the Manhat tanites. And vet the inhabitants of the original Gotham were not so stupid after all, for they only played the fool in order to dis courage King John from passing through the place--thereby getting out of the expense of entertaining him. There is a tradition, probably based on this thrifty performance, that the Nottinghamshire village was settled by Scots. Irving fixed the name irremovably on Manhattan. Gotham obtained its place in Eng lish classics with Mother Goose's beautiful quartrain: Three wise men of Gotham Went to sea in a bowl. If their boat had been stronger My song had been longer. - ♦ • Advised to Wait. From Kansas City star Among the modern works of art to be put into the corner stone of a new apartment hctel Ui New York. is a copv of Eugene O'Neill's ‘Strange Interlude.” The contractor should be told to wait until Mr. O'Neill's new play is ready. "Strange Interlude" Is only about a li\e-hour pi-ay- the new one runs three nights, and will hold down the corner stone a lot more securely. —- ♦ ♦ -* SLUMP SAVES PA1K ALIMONY Bridgeport, Conn. — 'UP* — Due t