“Better do it at the cottonwoods down by the creek,” Buck told Bonfils in a low voice.
The foreman of the Bar Double M moved his head in assent. “All right. Let’s get it over quick as we can.”
A sound of flying feet came from outside. Someone smothered an oath of surprise. Kate Cullison stood in the doorway, all out of breath and panting.
She took the situation in before she spoke, guessed exactly what they intended to do. Yet she flung her imperious question at them.
“What is it?”
They had not a word to say for themselves. In that room were some of the most callous hearts in the territory. Not one man in a million could have phased them, but this slender girl dumfounded them. Her gaze settled on Buck. His wandered for help to Sweeney, to Jake, to Kite Bonfils.
“Now look-a-here, Miss Kate,” Sweeney began to explain.
But she swept his remonstrance aside.
“No—No—No!” Her voice gathered strength with each repetition of the word. “I won’t have it. What are you thinking about?”
To the boy with the rope around his neck she was an angel from heaven as she stood there so slim and straight, her dark eyes shining like stars. Some of these men were old enough to be her father. Any of them could have crushed her with one hand. But if a thunderbolt had crashed in their midst it could not have disturbed the vigilantes more.
“He’s a rustler, Miss Kate; belongs to Soapy Stone’s outfit,” Sweeney answered the girl.
“Can you prove it?”
“We got him double cinched.”
“Then let the law put him in prison.”
“He shot yore paw,” Buck reminded her.
“Is that why you’re doing it?”
“Yes’m,” and “That’s why,” they nodded.
Like a flash she took advantage of their admission. “Then I’ve got more against him than you have, and I say turn him over to the law.”
“He’d get a good lawyer and wiggle out,” Dutch objected.
She whirled on the little puncher. “You know how that is, do you?”
Somebody laughed. It was known that Dutch had once been tried for stealing a sheep and had been acquitted.
Kite pushed forward, rough and overbearing. “Now see here. We know what we’re doing and we know why we’re doing it. This ain’t any business for a girl to mix in. You go back to the house and nurse your father that this man shot.”
“So it isn’t the kind of business for a girl,” she answered scornfully. “It’s work for a man, isn’t it? No, not for one. For nine—eleven—thirteen—seventeen big brave strong men to hang one poor wounded boy.”
Again that amused laugh rippled out. It came from Maloney. He was leaning against the door jamb with his hands in his pockets. Nobody had noticed him before. He had come in after the girl. When Curly came to think it over later, if he had been given three guesses as to who had told Kate Cullison what was on the program he would have guessed Maloney each time.
“Now that you’ve relieved your mind proper, Miss Cullison, I expect any of the boys will be glad to escort you back to the house,” Kite suggested with an acid smile.
“What have you got to do with this?” she flamed. “Our boys took him. They brought him here as their prisoner. Do you think we’ll let you come over into this county and dictate everything we do?”
“I’ve got a notion tucked away that you’re trying to do the dictating your own self,” the Bar Double M man contradicted.
“I’m not. But I won’t stand by while you get these boys to do murder. If they haven’t sense enough to keep them from it I’ve got to stop it myself.”
Kite laughed sarcastically. “You hear your boss, boys.”
“You’ve had yore say now, Miss Kate. I reckon you better say good-night,” advised Buck.
She handed Buck and his friends her compliments in a swift flow of feminine ferocity.
Maloney pushed into the circle. “She’s dead right, boys. There’s nothing to this lynching game. He’s only a kid.”
“He’s not such a kid but what he can do murder,” Dutch spat out.
Kate read him the riot act so sharply that the little puncher had not another word to say. The tide of opinion was shifting. Those who had been worked up to the lynching by the arguments of Bonfils began to resent his activity. Flandrau was their prisoner, wasn’t he? No use going off half cocked. Some of them were discovering that they were not half so anxious to hang him as they had supposed.
The girl turned to her friends and neighbors. “I oughtn’t to have talked to you that way, but you know how worried I am about Dad,” she apologized with a catch in her breath. “I’m sure you didn’t think or you would never have done anything to trouble me more just now. You know I didn’t half mean it.” She looked from one to another, her eyes shiny with tears. “I know that no braver or kinder men live than you. Why, you’re my folks. I’ve been brought up among you. And so you’ve got to forgive me.”
Some said “Sure,” others told her to forget it, and one grass widower drew a laugh by saying that her little spiel reminded him of happier days.
For the first time a smile lit her face. The boy for whose life she was pleading thought it was like sunshine after a storm.
“I’m so glad you’ve changed your minds. I knew you would when you thought it over,” she told them chattily and confidentially.
She was taking their assent for granted. Now she waited and gave them a chance to chorus their agreement. None of them spoke except Maloney. Most of them were with her in sympathy but none wanted to be first in giving way. Each wanted to save his face, so that the others could not later blame him for quitting first.
She looked around from one to another, still cheerful and sure of her ground apparently. Two steps brought her directly in front of one. She caught him by the lapels of his coat and looked straight into his eyes. “You have changed your mind, haven’t you, Jake?”
The big Missourian twisted his hat in embarrassment. “I reckon I have, Miss Kate. Whatever the other boys say,” he got out at last.
“Haven’t you a mind of your own, Jake?”
“Sure. Whatever’s right suits me.”
“Well, you know what is right, don’t you?”
“I expect.”
“Then you won’t hurt this man, our prisoner?”
“I haven’t a thing against him if you haven’t.”
“Then you won’t hurt him? You won’t stand by and let the other boys do it?”
“Now, Miss Kate—”
She burst into sudden tears. “I thought you were my friend, but now I’m in trouble you—you think only of making it worse. I’m worried to death about Dad—and you—you make me stay here—away from him—and torment me.”
Jake gave in immediately and the rest followed like a flock of sheep. Two or three of the promises came hard, but she did not stop till each one individually had pledged himself. And all the time she was cajoling them, explaining how good it was of them to think of avenging her father, how in one way she did not blame them at all, though of course they had seen it would not do as soon as they gave the matter a second thought. Dad would be so pleased at them when he heard about it, and she wanted them