The crowd that had been listening to the sheriff's discourse before the arrival of the highwayman, scattered at sight of the drawn weapon—all except Lahoma.
"Brick!" she cried, "oh, Brick, Brick!"
There was something in her voice he could not understand, but he dared not turn to examine her face; he could not trust himself if he once looked at her.
"Get out your warrant," he cried savagely, "and get it out quick if you want ME!" His great breast heaved with the conflict of powerful emotions.
"I'm sure sorry to see you, old man," Mizzoo declared. "We know Red Feather done what we was charging up against you. But I guess there's no other course open to me. As my aunt used to say (Miss Sue of Missouri) 'I got a duty—do it, I must.'" He thrust his hairy hand into his bosom and drew forth the fateful paper.
Lahoma laughed. "Read it, Mizzoo, read it aloud—read all of it!" she cried gleefully.
Wilfred looked at her, bewildered. The crowd stared also, knowing her love for Brick, therefore dazed at the sound of mirthful music. Brick turned his head at last; he looked, also, not reproachfully but with a question in his hard stern eyes.
Mizzoo turned red. "Well, yes, I'll read it," he said, defiantly. "Sure! I guess as sheriff of Greer County I'll make shift to get through with it alive."
He began to read, slowly, doggedly; Brick, without movement save for that heaving of his bosom, facing him with a mingling on his face of supreme defiance for the reader and superstitious awe for the legal instrument.
"That's all," Mizzoo at last announced. "You'll have to come with me, Willock."