A low and dangerous murmur ran over the crowd, but Bear Cat Stacy stilled it with his raised hands.
"I believes thet Kinnard connived with ther Judas revenuer to jail my paw expressly ter cl'ar ther road fer this murder. Ef thet's true he didn't jest attack a furriner, but he affronted every Stacy an' busted ther truce ter boot! Till I kin prove what I suspicions, I aims ter hold my hand; but I stud in Brother Fulkerson's house last night amids ther ashes of sorrow an' I've done dedicated what's left of my life ter one aim.
"I don't know whether I'll hev holp or go single-handed, but as Almighty God hears me, I aims ter clean up these hills! I aims thet 'stid of grumblin' like old grannies because our fields air littered with rock an' our roads air all dirt, we shell take ther rock outen ther fields an' put hit on ther roads. I aims thet every child thet hankers fer enough larnin' ter raise himself above ther level of beasts shell hev a school whar he kin git hit. I aims thet when yore baby falls sick or thar's a bornin' at yore house, ther doctor kin git thar—in time!"
He paused, and his audience, swept by the abandon of his extemporaneous fervor, fell into an excited approval. The magic of inherent strength and sheer personality was at work upon them.
"Before sich things es them kin be brought ter pass," began the speaker again in a voice dropping suddenly to stern calm, "ther wrath of numerous folks will flare up ter murder-hate—because thar's a stumblin' block in ther path thet's ancient an' thet hes got ter be man-powered loose. Betwixt us an' betterment stands ther thing thet all our troubles springs from—an' though hit don't profit but one man in every score, yit thar be some amongst ye thet'll die fer hit!"
He stopped and looked down into faces puzzled and uncomprehending. Eyes turned up to the speaker out of lean and serious visages, waiting for his next sentence, and he himself stood there for a moment or two in a silence which was as much an emphasis as a blank margin which stresses the conspicuousness of print.
His own face, still drawn with the travail of last night's gamut of emotion, and his figure motionless with the pent-up dynamics of a tight-wound coil, carried the impression of action presently to burst with a force beyond governing. They had always thought of him as a man bred for action but short of speech; a man bound like themselves by the constrictions which generations of taciturn ancestors had laid upon fluency, damming it into difficulty. But now self-consciousness was as absent from his attitude as though the torrential quality of his thoughts and words came from an external force sweeping through him and speaking through him.
Abruptly he thrust a hand into the breast pocket of his coat—a coat torn recently by bullets meant for his heart—and drew out a thing familiar to every man in that assemblage: a flat flask of colorless glass, filled with a fluid as white as itself. He held the thing high above his head, and ripped out his words with a crackling force.
"Thar's ther enemy thet's laid hits curse on the men an' women of these-hyar mountings! Thar's ther thing thet's hatched from ther worm of their still—ther pizen thet breeds in ther la'rel! That's what turns kindly men inter brutes an' wives inter widders an' children inter orphans! Thar's ther thing thet hes made ther purest blood in all America bear ther repute afore ther rest of ther world of a people of bloody outlaws!
"Hit's bottles like thet thet hes shut ther doors of our country against progress an' prosperity—an' barred out ther future from ther hills. Hit's bottles like thet thet hes chained us ter ther dead past when our kinsmen down below war a-marchin' on ter advancement. Hit's ther false idee thet a man hes a license ter break ther law in blockadin', even ter ther hurt of them thet don't blockade, thet's carried along with hit a contempt fer all other law—an' raised up a spirit of murder an' lay-wayin'."