The crowd waited and the knights waited—so long that the Mayor rose in his seat some twenty feet away and called out:
“Go ahead, Budd.”
“You jus' wait a minute—my man ain't come yet,” he said easily, but from various places in the crowd came jeering shouts from the men with whom he had wagered and the Hon. Sam began to look anxious.
“I wonder what is the matter?” he added in a lower tone. “I dressed him myself more than an hour ago and I told him to come last, but I didn't mean for him to wait till Christmas—ah!”
The Hon. Sam sank back in his seat again. From somewhere had come suddenly the blare of a solitary trumpet that rang in echoes around the amphitheatre of the hills and, a moment later, a dazzling something shot into sight above the mound that looked like a ball of fire, coming in mid-air. The new knight wore a shining helmet and the Hon. Sam chuckled at the murmur that rose and then he sat up suddenly. There was no face under that helmet—the Hon. Sam's knight was MASKED and the Hon. Sam slapped his thigh with delight.
“Bully—bully! I never thought of it—I never thought of it—bully!”
This was thrilling, indeed—but there was more; the strange knight's body was cased in a flexible suit of glistening mail, his spear point, when he raised it on high, shone like silver, and he came on like a radiant star—on the Hon. Sam's charger, white-bridled, with long mane and tail and black from tip of nose to tip of that tail as midnight. The Hon. Sam was certainly doing it well. At a slow walk the stranger drew alongside of Marston and turned his spear point downward.
“Gawd!” said an old darky. “Ku-klux done come again.” And, indeed, it looked like a Ku-klux mask, white, dropping below the chin, and with eye-holes through which gleamed two bright fires.
The eyes of Buck and Mollie were turned from Marston at last, and open-mouthed they stared.
“Hit's the same hoss—hit's Dave!” said Buck aloud.