In five minutes he will be at that window to say what he pleases.
Ten minutes later he will be hanged." And he turned and walked
calmly into the jailer's door. Not a Tolliver nor a Falin made a
movement or a sound. Young Dave's eyes had glared savagely when he
first saw Hale, for he had marked Hale for his own and he knew
that the fact was known to Hale. Had the battle begun then and
there, Hale's death was sure, and Dave knew that Hale must know
that as well as he: and yet with magnificent audacity, there he
was--unarmed, personally helpless, and invested with an insulting
certainty that not a shot would be fired. Not a Falin or a
Tolliver even reached for a weapon, and the fact was the subtle
tribute that ignorance pays intelligence when the latter is forced
to deadly weapons as a last resort; for ignorance faced now
belching shot-guns and was commanded by rifles on every side. Old
Judd was trapped and the Falins were stunned. Old Buck Falin
turned his eyes down the line of his men with one warning glance.
Old Judd whispered something to a Tolliver behind him and a moment
later the man slipped from the band and disappeared.
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