His pistol was on his hip now
and a Winchester was in his left hand.
"Stand where you are--everybody!"
There was the sound of hurrying feet within the jail. There was
the clang of an iron door, the bang of a wooden one, and in five
minutes from within the tall wooden box came the sharp click of a
hatchet and then--dully:
"T-H-O-O-MP!" The dangling rope had tightened with a snap and the
wind swayed it no more.
At his cell door the Red Fox stood with his watch in his hand and
his eyes glued to the second-hand. When it had gone three times
around its circuit, he snapped the lid with a sigh of relief and
turned to his hammock and his Bible.
"He's gone now," said the Red Fox.
Outside Hale still waited, and as his eyes turned from the
Tollivers to the Falins, seven of the faces among them came back
to him with startling distinctness, and his mind went back to the
opening trouble in the county-seat over the Kentucky line, years
before--when eight men held one another at the points of their
pistols. One face was missing, and that face belonged to Rufe
Tolliver. Hale pulled out his watch.
"Keep those men there," he said, pointing to the Falins, and he
turned to the bewildered Tollivers.
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