America 1881: Legend of the West

Chapter 377 Night Raid on the Logging Camp (3500 words)
Chen Jianqiu rushed to Hanif's residence on flying horses.

"Quickly call all detectives in San Francisco and get weapons!"

He walked into the house and said to Hanif.

Hanif said nothing, nodded and went out.

Everyone had just finished lunch and were chatting. Seeing Chen Jianqiu's face, no one dared to ask more questions.

Finally, Camilla walked up behind Chen Jianqiu who was standing by the window and asked softly:

"What happened?"

"Huang Qingyun took people to Arcata for negotiations." Chen Jianqiu took a deep breath.

He didn't know the private relationship between the Knights of Labor and the local vigilante group, but his intuition was always accurate.

Huang Qingyun's trip may be a disaster.

Those who remained in the room exchanged glances with each other.

Sean subconsciously raised his lips: "Boss, when did they set off?"

"A week ago."

"If you include the round trip, there should be news in the next two days." Camilla counted the time and said.

Chen Jianqiu said nothing.

His eyes suddenly fell on the street not far away.

Several horses were galloping in the direction of the apartment.

In San Francisco, horses are actually not allowed to gallop on the roads.

But He Sanshui and Xiao Liuzi didn't care at all. After they came out of Arcata, they traveled day and night towards San Francisco.

At this time, only Hanif, the California head of the Border Detective Agency, was found and asked to tell Chen Jianqiu the news as soon as possible.

But they saw a familiar figure downstairs in Hanif's apartment.

Chen Jianqiu stood with his hands behind his back, no expression on his face.

Several horses came close to Chen Jianqiu. He Sanshui rolled off the horse and fell in front of Chen Jianqiu, with a crying voice:

"Boss Chen, Master Huang, Master Huang is gone."

These words were like a bolt from the blue, striking into Chen Jianqiu's heart.

The muscles on his face began to tremble.

"When did it happen?" Chen Jianqiu asked calmly.

His face was still, but his chest was exploding like thunder.

He Sanshui cried and told Chen Jianqiu what happened.

Chen Jianqiu slowly closed his eyes.

When he opened his eyes again, there was a blazing fire inside.

"Go and tell the people at the guild hall about this, and the Border Detective Agency will pick it up."

Anyone who kills my people! I will kill them all!

At this time, Hanif had already gathered downstairs with Pinkerton's detectives.

These detectives are divided into two groups. One group is non-Chinese detectives, mainly experienced members hired locally; the second group is Chinese detectives, these people are mainly from Roswell.

"Boss, what are we going to do now?" Hanif asked.

"Go and handle a case." Chen Jianqiu said, "Someone killed someone in Arcata."

By the time Chen Jianqiu and others arrived at Arcata, the sun was already setting in the west.

The setting sun, which was about to sink into the sea level, shed a ray of blood-colored light on the sea and onto the seaside town of Arcata.

"Let everyone rest outside the town for a while. When it gets dark, we will enter the town to arrest people."

Everyone from the Border Detective Agency escaped into a forest one kilometer away from the town.

It was completely dark.

The town in the distance had almost no light and was completely dark.

Residents here are unwilling to spend more money to light the lights.

Under normal circumstances, this was the norm in the American West in the 19th century.

Chen Jianqiu was wearing a dark red leather coat and stood at the exit of the woods.

He was waiting for the people who went out to investigate to come back.

Not long after, several figures appeared at the corner of the woods and trotted over.

"We figured it out. We followed Xiao Liuzi and found the camp. It's still in the same place." Hanif took a breath and said.

"There is a lumberyard further into the camp. Workers usually cut wood there, and if necessary, they would use their guns." He pointed to the town not far away. "There are also some militia members living in the town. There is a logging camp on the other side of the camp. If there is any movement, we will come.”

"Take a group of people and set up a Maxim on the road from the town to the camp. As soon as someone comes to support you, you will sweep it." Chen Jianqiu glanced at the two carriages behind him. "The other one will follow me to the camp."

When Chen Jianqiu came this time, he brought two Maxim machine guns stored in the Border Detective Agency.

These two are fixed to the carriage.

Hanif never used it, so when he took it out of the warehouse, it was still like new.

The two teams set off separately.

They bypassed the town and soon approached the camp.

Chen Jianqiu had already seen the fire in the camp.

Members of the Knights of Labor, militiamen of the vigilante group, or the surrounding lumberjacks, were gathering around the fire in twos and threes, happily grilling meat.

They have no idea how much happiness and warmth the flames bring them now, and how much death it will bring them later.

Chen Jianqiu asked the carriage carrying Maxim behind him to untie the pole, and then stood on it himself.

He adjusted the muzzle of the gun in the direction of the forest.

Chen Jianqiu took a Roswell 1882 from a detective and aimed it at a man with an armband next to the fire.

He pulled the trigger.

The man fell to the ground.

His jaw shattered along with the food he had just put into his mouth.

What came at any moment was a volley of fire from the detectives of the Border Detective Agency.

All of a sudden, four or five people fell beside the fire.

Others began running around the camp, trying to find themselves a place to hide from the bullets.

"There are enemies!" The pipe-smoking man came out of the tent. He held a gun in his hand and looked for the direction of the bullet in the darkness.

"Everyone, get your weapons," the pipe-smoking man yelled, "Hold the camp!"

He leaned against a bucket and complained, "Which road are they from? Could they be from some nearby gang?" The lame man hiding not far from him smiled at him in a sarcastic way.

The biggest gangster in the neighborhood is now being blackmailed in the same camp with you in the name of the Knights of Labor.

"Forget it, who cares? People from the town and the lumber camp will come to support them in a while." The pipe-smoking man fired several shots into the darkness.

Sure enough, gunshots rang out here, and there was a reaction from the other side of the town.

A din spread through the town.

The militiamen took their guns, put on their clothes and rushed out of the house, holding torches and rushing towards the camp.

At the same time, the guns in the hands of Maxim and the detectives on Hanif's side also fired.

Seven or eight people who rushed to the front fell instantly.

"Go back to your house if you don't want to die!" Hanif shouted.

His roar did not stop these people from moving forward.

Those who dare to come to the western seaside to cut wood are all strong men, and the lumberjacks continue to move forward.

So Hanif had to continue ordering the shooting.

In the darkness, he couldn't see clearly how many people were on the opposite side, so he just fired his gun at the flashing fire on the road at the entrance of the town.

As the number of torches gradually decreases.

Fear gradually crept into the hearts of the militiamen.

They suddenly discovered that the firepower of the other side seemed to be far beyond their imagination.

The people who came out of the town retreated one after another.

In the camp on the other side, many people came out of the woods.

They all came from the logging camp.

Chen Jianqiu put down the rifle in his hand and grasped the handle of the Maxim.

He turned on shooter mode.

The woods surrounding the camp in the dark night suddenly became as bright as day.

Chen Jianqiu began to operate the Maxim and started firing at the people who came out of the woods.

"Da da da"

"Da da da"

The sound of a machine gun is cold, monotonous and ruthless. Every burst of fire will take away some lives.

Soon, the area around the camp was littered with corpses.

The battle was brief.

After a barrage of bullets, the militia's fighting spirit was quickly shattered.

They fled in all directions, not even seeing who their enemies were in the darkness.

Chen Jianqiu and the detectives quickly attacked the camp.

At this time, there were only a dozen members of the Knights of Labor and the Pipe Man's loyal militia left in the camp.

They actually wanted to run away, but they couldn't.

These people were brought before Chen Jianqiu.

"You all had a part in killing Huang Qingyun and Lao Qi, right?" Chen Jianqiu sat on a tree stump, staring at the people in front of him intently.

"He killed him, and he shot him with a hidden gun!" The pipe-smoking man pointed his lips at the cripple desperately.

The cripple said nothing, but laughed nervously, but his men couldn't help it: "Bullshit! You didn't shoot?! You fired the most fatal shots!"

The militia and the Knights of Labor began to accuse each other.

Chen Jianqiu didn't say anything. He walked to a tree stump, bent down, picked up an axe from the ground, and then walked to the lame man.

He grabbed the cripple's hair and dragged him towards the big tent in the center of the camp.

The quarrel between the Militia and the Knights of Labor came to an abrupt end.

Because they heard the muffled sound of the axe hitting something and the cripple man's screams.

Every scream of the cripple was like a sharp knife cutting their hearts.

The cripple's screams became weaker and weaker and gradually stopped, but the sound of the axe chopping did not stop.

Thirty-eight times in total.

When Chen Jianqiu appeared in the firelight again, those people were completely frightened.

The man in front of me was covered in blood.

He walked towards the pipe man with an expressionless face.

It looks like he's next.

The pipe man was terrified. He struggled to escape, but Chen Jianqiu grabbed his hair again.

He screamed like a pussy.

By the time he was dragged into the tent, the pipe man was completely stunned by the scene before him.

In the dim firelight he saw that the tent fabric was spattered with blood.

As for those incomplete and shapeless fragments on the ground, he didn't even dare to imagine what they were.

Chen Jianqiu moved his cervical vertebrae and raised the axe again.

The firelight shone on half of his face, making him look like a demon.

"Don't kill me! Don't kill me!" The pipe man was so scared that he was incoherent.

"Who is the mastermind behind this?" Chen Jianqiu asked.

"I don't know. I know about the Knights of Labor. They asked us to expel the Chinese from Arcata and then kidnap important people from the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce. They want us to either force the Chinese to gather and resist or extort a large sum of money from them!"

The pipe-smoking man spoke out the words one after another, like beans pouring out of a bamboo tube.

"I, I also know that the cripple's immediate boss is called O'Neill, that's all I know!"

As soon as the pipe man finished speaking, Chen Jianqiu's axe fell down.

Ten minutes later, Chen Jianqiu came out of the tent again.

"Boss Chen, what should we do with the remaining people?" asked a Chinese detective.

"What should be buried should be buried, what should be fed to sharks should be fed to sharks, and what should be burned should be burned." Chen Jianqiu dropped the axe in his hand.

Perhaps, if it were Peller, he would send all these people to trial.

But Chen Jianqiu wouldn't.

He never said that he was a good person who valued procedural justice.

(End of this chapter)