"You'll lynch him, will you?" he says, a kind of passion getting into his voice fur the first time, and his eyes glittering. "You think you will? Well, you WON'T!
"You won't because I say NOT. Do you hear? I came here to-night to save him.
"You might string HIM up and not be called to account for it. But how about ME?"
He took a step forward, and, looking from face to face with a dare in his eyes, he went on:
"Is there a man among you fool enough to think you could kill Tom Buckner and not pay for it?"
He let 'em all think of that for jest another minute before he spoke agin. His face was as white as a piece of paper, and his nostrils was working, but everything else about him was quiet. He looked the master of them all as he stood there, Colonel Tom Buckner did—straight and splendid and keen. And they felt the danger in him, and they felt jest how fur he would go, now he was started.
"You didn't want to listen to me a bit ago," he said. "Now you must. Listen and choose. You can't kill that man unless you kill me too.
"TRY IT, IF YOU THINK YOU CAN!"
He reached over and took from the teacher's desk the sheet of paper Will had used to check off the name of each man and how he voted. He held it up in front of him and every man looked at it.
"You know me," he says. "You know I do not break my word. And I promise you that unless you do kill me here tonight—yes, as God is my witness, I THREATEN you—I will spend every dollar I own and every atom of influence I possess to bring each one of you to justice for that man's murder."