All of them—the judge, Mrs. Mile, and Porley, as well as Eve—could hear the paddles now; the night, save for the occasional shouts, was very still. Eve stood at the window. “Will the Indians hear him, and go down?”
But they did not hear him. In another five minutes Paul had joined them.
Hollis, who was with him, gave a hurried explanation. “We’re all right, now that you are here,” he concluded; “we are more than a match for the drunken scamps if they should come prowling up this way. When the whiskey’s out of ’em to-morrow, we can reduce ’em to reason.”
“Why wait till to-morrow?” said Paul.
“No use getting into a fight unnecessarily.”
“I don’t propose to fight,” Paul answered.
“They’re eleven, Tennant,” said the judge; “you wouldn’t have time to shoot them all down.”
“I’m not going to shoot,” Paul responded. He went towards the door.
“Don’t go,” pleaded Eve, interposing.
He went straight on, as though he had not heard her.