"Shame on you, men of Macon!" cried Glenning, standing erect and pale under the flickering light of the iron sconce. "Do you bring such a thing as that with you to hang a white man, however low?"
"Nobody told 'im to come!" called a voice. "He hooked on!"
"Listen to me a minute, men!" resumed Glenning, speaking very earnestly, "Most of you don't realize what you want to do tonight. You've come out to commit murder. Do you know that—murder! Every man among you would be guilty of that crime did you break into this jail and drag out the fellow you are after and string him to a limb. What good would it do? I know what the Bible says—'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth' and 'Whosoever sheddeth man's blood by man shall his blood be shed.' But let the law do it, men. If you do this thing you will be as lawless and as guilty as that cringing thing back there in its cell. You would deserve his fate! Let us not behave as barbarians. Don't make the records of our State blacker than they are. I'm not here to fight. I know you can overcome me. Accident alone apprised me of what was going forward tonight, and I've come here to try and show you where you're wrong. Don't let tomorrow's papers tell the news to the civilized world that down in Kentucky a mob trespassed the law and hung a prisoner by night! It's been done too often already. We're good people, but our blood runs hot, and we're hasty. We act first, and think after, which is wrong. You haven't thought this thing over. Somebody started it and you fell in with the plan. Go home now, and go to bed, and in the morning you'll thank God that your consciences are clear!"
For a moment there was a tense silence, broken only by the low groans of the suffering negro.
"He shot Dick Goodloe, and he's got to die! Dick was my friend!"
It was the ringleader speaking, dogged and unpersuaded.
John leaned forward suddenly, and looked at the man.
"Is the marshal dead?" he asked.
"He wasn't dead half an hour ago, but he was mighty low," came a voice from the darkness.
"There!" exclaimed John, triumphantly, standing erect. "You have no sort of right to take this man now! You shall not hang him! I'll make a compact with you, gentlemen—fellow citizens! Send at once to the home of Dick Goodloe. If he is dead, I'll find you the keys, and step aside. If he lives, you are to go home and leave this jail unmolested. Do you agree?"