Alleys of Darkness

Darkness

Author: Robert E. Howard * A Project Gutenberg of Australia eBook *
eBook No.: 0609051.txt Language: English Date first posted:
December 2006 Date most recently updated: December 2006
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Alleys of Darkness Robert E. Howard
WHEN THE GONG ended my fight with Kid Leary in the Sweet
Dreams Fight Club, Singapore, I was tired but contented. The first
seven rounds had been close, but the last three I'd plastered the Kid all
over the ring, though I hadn't knocked him out like I'd did in Shanghai
some months before, when I flattened him in the twelfth round. The

scrap in Singapore was just for ten; another round and I'd had him.
But anyway, I'd shaded him so thoroughly I knowed I'd justified the
experts which had made me a three to one favorite. The crowd was
applauding wildly, the referee was approaching, and I stepped forward
and held out my glove hand--when to my utter dumfoundment, he
brushed past me and lifted the glove of the groggy and bloody Kid
Leary!
A instant's silence reigned, shattered by a nerve-racking scream from
the ringside. The referee, Jed Whithers, released Leary, who collapsed
into the rosin, and Whithers ducked through the ropes like a rabbit. The
crowd riz bellowing, and recovering my frozen wits, I gave vent to
lurid langwidge and plunged outa the ring in pursuit of Whithers. The
fans was screaming mad, smashing benches, tearing the ropes offa the
ring and demanding the whereabouts of Whithers, so's they could hang
him to the rafters. But he had disappeared, and the maddened crowd
raged in vain.
I found my way dazedly to my dressing-room, where I set down on a
table and tried to recover from the shock. Bill O'Brien and the rest of
the crew was there, frothing at the mouth, each having sunk his entire
wad on me. I considered going into Leary's dressing-room and beating
him up again, but decided he'd had nothing to do with the crooked
decision. He was just as surprised as me when Whithers declared him
winner.
Whilst I was trying to pull on my clothes, hindered more'n helped by
my raging shipmates, whose langwidge was getting more appalling
every instant, a stocky bewhiskered figger come busting through the
mob, and done a fantastic dance in front of me. It was the Old Man,
with licker on his breath and tears in his eyes.
"I'm rooint!" he howled. "I'm a doomed man! Oh, to think as I've
warmed a sarpint in my boozum! Dennis Dorgan, this here's the last
straw!"
"Aw, pipe down!" snarled Bill O'Brien. "It wasn't Denny's fault. It was

that dashety triple-blank thief of a referee--"
"To think of goin' on the beach at my age!" screamed the Old Man,
wringing the salt water outa his whiskers. He fell down on a bench and
wept at the top of his voice. "A thousand bucks I lost--every cent I
could rake, scrape and borrer!" he bawled.
"Aw, well, you still got your ship," somebody said impatiently.
"That's just it!" the Old Man wailed. "That thousand bucks was dough
owed them old pirates, McGregor, McClune & McKile. Part of what I
owe, I mean. They agreed to accept a thousand as part payment, and
gimme more time to raise the rest. Now it's gone, and they'll take the
ship! They'll take the Python! All I got in the world! Them old sharks
ain't got no more heart than a Malay pirate. I'm rooint!"
The crew fell silent at that, and I said: "Why'd you bet all that dough?"
"I was lickered up," he wept. "I got no sense when I'm full. Old Cap'n
Donnelly, and McVey and them got to raggin' me, and the first thing I
knowed, I'd bet 'em the thousand, givin' heavy odds. Now I'm rooint!"
He throwed back his head and bellered like a walrus with the
belly-ache.
I just give a dismal groan and sunk my head in my hands, too
despondent to say nothing. The crew bust forth in curses against
Whithers, and sallied forth to search further for