“Did you know that Gordon is dead?” Weir asked, all at once.
Vorse lowered the tray to the bar and ran the tip of his tongue over his lips.
“No,” said he, “we didn’t know it.”
“He deeded his property over this evening and then swallowed poison,” the engineer stated. “He saw the game was up.”
“You can’t make me believe your lies,” came sneering from Sorenson. “And you shall pay, you and that girl, for every broken bone in my boy’s body. I’ll spend my last dollar for that if necessary. Madden, do your duty and lock him up.”
The sheriff said nothing, but lifted his gun a little. Vorse by a slight movement of his body had edged from the bar as if to gain freedom for action.
“The game’s up for you men too,” Weir said. “You’ve murdered and robbed and swindled in this country long enough; I’ve got the proof and I’m going to remove you from this community. It’s not I who will be arrested. You killed Jim Dent after cleaning him out at cards and then made my father believe he was guilty of the crime. All I fear is that the court will hang you instead of sending you up for life; that would be too good for you. I want your crooked souls to die a thousand deaths within stone walls before you die in body. The game’s up, I say. I’ve Saurez’ deposition and I’ve the man who was the boy looking in the back door there that day thirty years ago and saw you shoot Dent, and he’ll go on the stand against you.”
A stillness so profound that one could hear the tiny insects hovering about the lamps succeeded this statement. If words had not been enough, Weir’s cold, harsh face would have removed the men’s last hope, for on it was not a single trace of relenting. A stone could have been no flintier.