nd supporters at once. They came pushing forward, the
resentment of insult and oppression darkening their faces, to shake
threatening fists in the faces of the Dutchman and his companions.

"The best medicine for a gang like this is a cottonwood limb and a
rope," the man who had spoken declared.

It began to look exceedingly dark for the unlucky desperadoes inside of
the next minute. The suggestion of hanging them immediately became an
avowed intention; preparations for carrying it into effect began on the
spot. While some ran to the hardware store for rope, others discussed
the means of employing it to carry out the public sentence.

Hanging never had been popular in Ascalon, mainly because of the
barrenness of the country, which offered no convenient branches except
on the cottonwoods along the river. Wagon tongues upended and propped by
neckyokes had been known to serve in their time, and telegraph poles
when the railroad built through. But gibbets of this sort had their
shortcomings and vexations. There was nothing so comfortable for all
concerned as a tree, and trees did not grow by nature or by art in
Ascalon. So there was talk of an expedition to the river, where all the
six might be accommodated on one tree.

The girl who had taken the branding iron from Morgan and cooled the heat
of his resentment and vengeance quicker than the iron had cooled, stood
looking about into the serious faces of the men who suddenly had
determined to finish for Morgan the business he had begun. Her face was
white, horror distended her eyes; she seemed to have no words for a plea
against this rapidly growing plan.

One of the doomed men behind her began to whimper and beg, appealing to
her in his mother's name to save him. He was a young man, whose weak
face was lined by the excesses of his unrestrained days in Ascalon. His
hat had fallen off, his foretop of brown hair straggled over his wild
eyes.

"Come away from here," said Morgan, turning to her now, his voice rough
and still shaken by his subsiding passion. He took the hot iron from
her, thinking of the trough at the public well where he might cool it.

"Don't let them do it," she implored, putting out her hands to him in
appeal.

"Now Miss Rhetta, you'd better run along," a man urged kindly.

Morgan stood beside her in the narrowing circle about the six men who
had been condemned by public sentiment in less than sixty seconds and
scarcely more words, the hot end of the