The Luck of the Mounted | Page 6

echoing up the stairway. Involuntarily they
all sprang to an attitude of alert attention. Rarely did Tom Belcher have
to speak twice around Barracks.
"There's the S.M.!" muttered George. Aloud he responded "Coming,
Sergeant-Major!" And he swung downstairs where a powerfully-built
man in a snow and ice-incrusted fur coat awaited him.
"The O.C.'s orders, Redmond!--get your kit packed and hold yourself in
readiness to pull out on the eleven o'clock West-bound to-morrow.
You're transferred to the Davidsburg detachment. I'll give you your
transport-requisition later."
The storm doors banged behind him, and then, Redmond, not without
design, forced himself to saunter slowly--very slowly--upstairs again,

whistling nonchalantly the while.
Expectant faces greeted him. "What's up?" they chorused. With a fine
assumption of indifference he briefly informed them. McSporran
received the news with his customary stolidity, only his gray eyes
twinkled and he chuntered something that was totally unintelligible to
anyone save himself. But its effect upon McCullough and Hardy was
peculiar, not to say, startling in the extreme. With brush and burnisher
clutched in their respective hands they both turned and gaped upon him
fish-eyed for the moment. Then, as their eyes met, those two worthies
seemed to experience a difficulty of articulation.
Dumfounded himself, George looked from one to the other, "What the
devil's wrong with you fools?" he queried irritably.
Thereupon, McCullough, still holding the eyes of the Cockney, gasped
out one magical word--"Yorkey!"
The spell was broken. "W'y, gorblimey!" said Hardy, "Ain't that
queer?--that's jes' wot I wos a-thinkin' . . . Well, Gawd 'elp Sorjint
Slavin now!" With which cryptic utterance he resumed his eternal
polishing.
"Amen!" responded the farrier piously, "Reddy, here, an' Yorkey on th'
same detachment. . . . What th' one don't know t'other'll teach him. . . .
You'd better let 'em have th' parrot, too."
McSporran, back on his cot with hands clasped behind his head,
gobbled an owlish "Hoot, mon! th' twa o' them thegither! . . . Losh! but
that beats a' . . . but, hoo lang, O Lard? hoo lang?"
From various sources George had picked up the broken ends of many
strange rumours relating to the personality and escapades of one
Constable Yorke, of the Davidsburg detachment, whom he had never
seen as yet. A hint here, a whisper there, a shrug and a low-voiced jest
between the sergeant-major and the quartermaster, overheard one day
in the Matter's store. To Redmond it seemed as if a veil of mystery had
always enveloped the person and doings of this man, Yorke. The

glamour of it now aroused all his latent curiosity.
"Why, what sort of a chap is this Yorke?" he inquired casually.
McCullough, busily burnishing a bit, shrugged deprecatingly and
laughed. Hardy, putting the last touches to his revolver-holster, made
answer, George thought, with peculiar reticence.
"Wot, Yorkey? . . . oh, 'e's a 'oly terror 'e is. . . . You arst Crampton," he
mumbled--"arst Taylor--they wos at Davidsburg wiv 'im. Slavin's orl
right but Yorkey!". . . He looked unutterable things. "Proper broken
down Old Country torff 'e is, too. 'E's right there wiv th' goods at police
work, they s'y, but 'e's sure a bad un to 'ave to live wiv. Free weeks on'y,
Crampton stuck it afore 'e applied for a transfer--Taylor, 'e on'y stuck it
free d'ys."
Redmond made a gesture of exasperation. "Ah-h! come off the perch!"
he snarled pettishly, "what sort of old 'batman's' gaff are you trying to
'get my goat' with?"
His display of irritation drew an explosive, misthievous cachinnation
from the trio.
"Old 'batman's' gaff?" echoed the Cockney grinning, "orl right, my
fresh cove--this time next week you'll be tellin' us wevver it's old
'batman's' gaff, or not."
Outside, the blizzard still moaned and beat upon the windows, packing
the wind-driven snow in huge drifts about the big main building. Inside,
the canteen roared--
"_Then--I--say, boys! who's for a drink with me? Rum, tum!
tiddledy-um! we'll have a fair old spree!_"
McSporran slid off his cot with surprising alacrity. "Here's ane!" he
announced blithely. Hardy, carefully hanging up his spotless, glossy
equipment at the head of his cot, turned to the farrier who was likewise
engaged in arranging a bridle and a pipe-clayed headrope.

"Wot abaht it, Mac?" he queried briskly.
McCullough, in turn looked at Redmond. "All right!" responded that
young gentleman with a boyish shrug and grin, "come on then, you
bloomin' old sponges! let's wet my transfer. I'll have time to pack my
kit to-morrow, before the West-bound pulls out."
Upon their departing ears, grown wearily familiar to its monotonous
repetition, fell the parrot's customary adieu, as that disreputable-looking
bird swung rhythmically to and fro on its perch.
"Goo' bye!" it gabbled, "A soldier's farewell' to yeh! goo' bye! goo'
bye!"

CHAPTER II
_Homeless, ragged and