"Thet man," he shouted, "hes bore ther semblance of yore friend, but he aims ter deestroy ye.... I knows because I've done been his slave an' he's told me so ... he aims ter hev ye murder Parish Thornton fer him fust ... an' then ter penitenshery ye fer doin' his dirty work. Ye hain't nothin' on God's green y'arth but only his dupes!"
Squires paused for breath, and instead of the clamour and outcry for which he had braced himself he encountered a hushed stillness through which he could hear the hammering of his own heart.
Rowlett had started to bellow out an enraged denial, but he had swiftly reconsidered and chosen instead to treat the accusation with a quieter and more telling contempt. Now he laughed derisively as he turned toward Joyce.
"I reckon," he suggested, "I don't even need ter gainsay no sich damn lie es thet, does I?"
But of late there had been so much traitorousness that no man knew whom he could trust. Now to Rowlett's astonished discomfiture he recognized the stern and ominous note of doubt in Joyce's response.
"Ef I was you, I wouldn't only gainsay hit, but I'd strive master hard ter prove my denial."
"I hain't done yit," shouted Sim with a new vigour of aggressiveness, and at the sight of this human hurricane which had developed out of a man heretofore regarded as unimportant, the tempest violence of the mob hung suspended, inquisitive, astonished.
The tanned face of the witness had become pallid, but out of it his eyes shot jets of fire, hysterical to madness, yet convincing in an earnestness that transcended the fear of death and carried indubitable conviction. His body shook with a palsy as he confronted the man whom, next to Bas Rowlett, he had feared above all others; and now in evidence of his impassioned sincerity he blurted out his own confession.
"I kilt Joe Joyce," announced Sim Squires, "an' I sought ter kill Parish Thornton, too, when he fust come hyar, but I done both them deeds because I didn't dast gainsay ther man thet bade me do 'em. His bull-dozin' terrified me ... his power over me made me a craven, an' his dollars in my pocket paid me fer them dasterdly jobs. Thet man war Bas Rowlett thar!"
The leader of the mob stood for an instant with the stunned senses of an ox struck by a cleaver, and after that first dumfounded moment he wanted the truth, as a starving man wants food. Joe Joyce had been his nephew, and if this witness were telling the truth it would not appease him to take vengeance on the servant only. A more summary punishment was owing to the master.