Skoonly yelled and squirmed, when they began unwinding the bandages from his arm, as if the action caused him the most intense pain, and begged them to stop, while his face grew so white that even Ham himself began to fear that the arm, at least, bore no false testimony; but the unwinding went steadily on.
And, lo and behold! when the last bandage was off, there lay the arm, sound of bone, and without even a bruise or discoloration along its whole length!
"Wal, I'll be durned! Jest as I thought! The cur! An' that is th' kind of evidence you was a-go-in' tew hang them boys on!" and Ham's angry eyes swept the circle of surrounding faces.
A murmur, that swiftly swelled into a roar of hundreds of angry voices, broke from the surrounding crowd, when Ham's testimony and the result of the examination of Skoonly's bandaged arm became known.
"A rope! Get a rope! Hang him!" yelled a hoarse voice; and the cry was taken up by hundreds of voices; and the jam of enraged men pressed closer and closer to the cowering man, whose face grew livid with fear, as he glared wildly around, seeking some means of escape. But there was none; and despair and a great dread, the dread of a sudden and frightful death, took possession of his soul.
"Save me! Save me!" he yelled, throwing himself at Fremont's feet. "I did not mean tew git th' boys hanged. They, Bill an' Spike, told me 'twas jest tew scare them. They was a-tryin' tew frighten th' boys intew doin' sumthin' for them—Oh-h-h, don't let them git me! Save me!" and he clutched Fremont's legs with both his quivering hands, as the roar of the crowd became louder and more threatening.
"Quick," and Fremont bent over him, "will you tell all, all that you know of this horrible affair, if we will save your neck?"
"Yes! Yes!" eagerly agreed the terror-stricken man. "I'll tell ever'thing! Afore God I'll tell ever'thing! It's Bill an' Spike who is responsible, not me. It's them you want."
"Men," and Fremont again leaped up on top of the barrel, both hands outstretched for silence. "Listen, men, listen!"
For a minute the roar of the crowd continued, and then swiftly subsided, as all eyes caught sight of the tall figure of Fremont standing on the barrel top.