Once more the half-breed emitted a strangling cough, and Tex eyed him narrowly. "Somethin' seems to ail your throat."
"Oui, A'm swal' de piece tabac'."
"Well just hang onto it 'til it gets a little darker an' we'll have supper," said the Texan, dryly, and resumed.
"So there was some talk disparagin' to the lynchin', an' the party that's in, holdin' its tenure by the skin of its teeth, an' election comin' on, sided in with public opinion an' frowned on the lynchin', not as a hangin', you onderstand, but because the hangin' didn't redound none to their particular credit—it not being legal an' regular. All this is brewed while the dance is goin' on, an' by breakfast time next mornin', there bein' a full quorum of Republican war chiefs on hand, they pulls a pow-wow an' instructs their deputies to round up the lynchers. This is done, barrin' a few that's flitted, the boys bein' caught unawares. Well, things begun lookin' serious to 'em, an' as a last resort they decided to fall back on the truth. So they admits that there ain't no lynchin'. They tells how, after they'd got out on the bench a piece they got to thinkin' that the demise of Purdy ain't a serious matter, nohow, so they turned him loose. 'Where is he, then?' says a county commissioner. 'Search us,' replies the culprits. 'We just turned him loose an' told him to vamoose. We didn't stick around an' herd him!'" Again Bat coughed, and the Texan glared at him.
"Maybe a drink of water would help them lacerated pipes of yourn," he suggested, "an' besides it's dark enough so you can start supper a-goin'."
"But," said Endicott, "won't that get the boys all into serious trouble for aiding and abetting a prisoner to escape? Accessories after the fact, is what the law calls them."
"Oh Lord," groaned the Texan inwardly. "If I can steer through all this without ridin' into my own loop, I'll be some liar. This on top of what I told 'em in Wolf River, an' since, an' about Purdy's funeral—I dastn't bog down, now!"
"No," he answered, as he lighted another cigarette. "There comes in your politics again. You see, there was twenty-some-odd of us—an' none friendless. Take twenty-odd votes an' multiply 'em by the number of friends each has got—an' I reckon ten head of friends apiece wouldn't overshoot the figure—an' you've got between two hundred an' three hundred votes—which is a winnin' majority for any candidate among 'em. Knowin' this, they wink at the jail delivery an' cinch those votes. But, as I said before, hangin' is always a popular measure, an' as they want credit for yourn, they start all the deputies they got out on a still-hunt for you, judgin' it not to be hard to find a pilgrim wanderin' about at large. An' this party I met up with was one of 'em."
"Did he suspect that we were with you?" asked Alice, her voice trembling with anxiety.
"Such was the case—his intimation bein' audible, and venomous. I denied it in kind, an' one word leadin' to another, he called me a liar. To which statement, although to a certain extent veracious, I took exception, an' in the airy persiflage that ensued, he took umbrage to an extent that it made him hostile. Previous to this little altercation, he an' I had been good friends, and deemin', rightly, that it wasn't a shootin' matter, he ondertook to back up his play with his fists, and he hauled off an' smote me between the eyes before I'd devined his intentions. Judgin' the move unfriendly, not to say right downright aggressive, I come back at him with results you-all noted. An' that's all there was to the incident of me showin' up with black eyes, an' a lip that would do for a pin cushion."