“Remove that man!” he ordered, curtly. He liked Jim, but he could not brook this crying contempt of court. Jim was removed. He went quietly, but shaking his head reproachfully.
“I never would ’a’ thought it o’ the Jedge,” he murmured, disconsolately. “I never would ’a’ thought it.”
There was a movement in the back of the room. A man was making his way out, slipping along, cat-like, trying to evade attention. Quietly Gordon motioned to the sheriff and slipped a paper into his hand.
“Look sharp,” he whispered, his steady eyes on the shifty ones of the sheriff. “If you let him get away, just remember the handwriting on the wall. It’s our turn now.”
Presently, there was a slight scuffle by the door and two men quietly left the improvised court-room.
“Day before yesterday, in the afternoon,” continued Williston, “I managed to knock Nightbird down at the threshold as he was about to enter. I had secretly worked a cross-beam from the low, unfinished ceiling. There was nothing else in the room I might use for a weapon. They were very careful. I think I killed him, your honor and gentlemen of the jury. I am not sorry. There was no other way. But I would rather it had been the maker, not the tool. By the time I had made my way back to the Lazy S, I was too exhausted to go further; so I crawled over to my neighbors, the Whites, and Mother White made me a shake down. I lay there, nearly dead, until this morning.”
He leaned back wearily.
Black stood up. He was not lank nor lazy now, nor shuffling. His body was drawn to its full height. In the instant before the spring, Mary, who was sitting close to the attorneys’ table, met his glance squarely. She read there what he was about to do. Only a moment their eyes held each other’s, but it was time enough for a swift message of understanding, of utter dislike, and of a determined will to defeat the man’s purpose, to pass from the accusing brown eyes to the cruel ones of the defendant.
Quick as a flash, Black seized the chair upon which he had been sitting, sprang clear of the table and his lawyers, and landed close to Mary’s side. With his chair as a weapon, he meant to force his way to the nearest window. Mary’s eyes dilated. Unhesitatingly she seized the half-emptied glass on the table and dashed the contents of it full into the prisoner’s face. Blinded, he halted a moment in his mad rush. Mary’s quick manœuvre made Langford’s opportunity. He grappled with Black. The crowd went mad with excitement.
The prisoner still retained his chair. When Langford grappled with him, he attempted to bring it down upon the fair head of his antagonist. Mary gasped with dread, but Langford grasped the chair with one muscular hand, wrested it from the desperado’s hold, and threw it to the floor. The two men locked in a close embrace. Langford’s great strength was more than sufficient to hold the outlaw until the dazed officers could do their duty—had he been let alone; but two men, who had been standing near the door when the prisoner made his unexpected leap for liberty, had succeeded in worming their way through the excited crowd, and now suddenly threw themselves upon the ranchman, dragging him back.