omy man, with a mystery of much
knowledge in his face: "Are gents around here going to be murdered, and
the murderers go free?"

"Well?"

"Sinclair and Arizona--that's what's up! They're going to bust loose."

"I dunno about Arizona, but Sinclair, they say, is a square shooter."

"Who told you that? Sinclair himself? He's got a rep as long as my arm.
He's a bad one, son!"

"You don't say!"

"I do say. And something has got to be done, or Sour Creek won't be a
decent man's town no more."

"Let me in." Off they went arm in arm.

Cartwright saw half a dozen little interviews of this nature, as he
entered the hotel. Men were excited, they hardly knew why. There is no
need for reason in a mob. One has only to cry, "Kill!" and the mob will
start of its own volition to find something that may be slain. Also, a
mob has no conscience and no remorse. It is the nearest thing to a
devil that exists, and it is also the nearest thing to the divine mercy
and courage. It is braver than the bravest man; it is more timorous
than the most fearful; it is fiercer than a lion, gentler than a lamb.
All these things by turns, and each one to the exclusion of all the
others.

Now the thunderclouds were piling on the horizon, and Cartwright could
feel the electricity in the air. He went to Pop.

"I got to have a rifle."

"What for?"

"You know," said Cartwright significantly.

The hotelkeeper nodded. He brought out an old Winchester, still mobile
of action and deadly. With that weapon under his arm, Cartwright
started back, but then he remembered that there were excellent chances
of missing even with a rifle, when he was shooting through the shadows
and by the treacherous moonlight. It would be better, far better, to
have his horse with him. Then, if he actually succeeded in wounding one
or both of them, he could run his victim down, or, perhaps, keep up a
steady fire of rifle shots from the rear, that would bring half the
town pouring out to join in the chase.

So he swung back to the stables, saddled his horse, trotted it around
in a comfortably wide detour, and, coming within sound distance of the
cottonwoods behind the blacksmith shop, he dismounted and led his horse
into a dense growth of shrubbery. That close approach would have been
impossible without alarming the girl, had it not been for a stiff wind
blowing across into his face, completely muffling the noise of his
coming. In the bushes he ensconced himself safely. O