The saloon was behind Peter now. Its lights were still burning. For the condemned man was to remain there with his guards until the appointed time.
Peter remembered Jim’s look when he finally bade him leave him. Could he ever forget it? He had seen death in many forms in his time. He had seen many men face it, each in his own way. But never in his life had he seen such calmness, such apparent indifference as Jim Thorpe had displayed.
When the ballot was taken and the doctor pronounced sentence, there was never a tremor of an eyelid. There was not even one quick-drawn breath. Nor was there a suggestion of any emotion––save that of indifference.
Then when the doctor had named the manner of his death––a rawhide rope on the bough of a tree––Jim had turned with a smile to Peter.
“I’d prefer to be shot,” he said quietly. “But there, I s’pose this thing must proceed by custom.”
So Jim received the pronouncement of the final penalty for a crime of which Peter was convinced he was innocent.
It had suddenly set his loyal heart longing with a mad, passionate longing to have his great hands about the mean throat of the man Smallbones. It had set him wild with rebellion against the merciless customs which permitted such an outrage upon justice. He had even challenged the doctor in his fury, on his right to administer 366 justice and accept the condemnation of the men gathered there for the purpose.
In his desire to serve his friend he passed beyond the bounds of all discretion, of all safety for himself. He threatened that he would move the whole world to bring just retribution upon those who had participated in that night’s work. And his threats and violence had been received with a tolerant laughter. A derision more stinging and ominous than the most furious outbreak.
The work would go on. The death penalty would be carried out. He knew it. He knew it.
Then when it was all over, and the prisoner’s guards had been appointed, Jim had begged him to leave him.