"Lay down that knife!"
As though his incisive tones had broken the spell, Casey moved. He looked wildly to right and to left; then flung the knife from him and buried his face in his hands.
"Your requests are granted," said Coleman shortly; then to Marshal
North: "Open the door and bring him out."
LXI
On the veranda of the unoccupied house above the jail Nan Keith stood rigid, her hand upon her heart. During the period of the committee's absence inside the jail she did not alter her position by a hair's breadth. She was in the hypnosis of a portentous waiting. Time fell into the abyss of eternity: whether it were ten minutes or ten hours did not matter in the least.
For this was to Nan in the nature of a revelation so sudden and so complete that it filled her whole soul. Had she known what Mrs. Sherwood was taking her to see, she would have pre-visualized a drunken, disorderly, howling, bloodthirsty mob; a huge composite of brawling antagonisms, of blind fury, of vulgar irrationalisms. Here were men filled with purpose; This was what caught at her breath—the grim silent purpose of it! The orderly progression of events, moving with the certainty of a fate, was like the steady crescendo of solemn music. And this crescendo rose in her as a tide of emotion that overflowed and drowned her. The right and wrong—as she had examined them intellectually or through, the darkened glasses of her caste prejudices—were quite lost. This was merely something primitive, wonderful, beautiful. The spectacle was at the moment of suspense, yet she felt so impatience—the wheel must turn in its own majestic circle—but only an intense expectation. And in this she felt, subconsciously, that she was one with the multitude.
The jail door swung open. The committee came out. In the middle of their compact group walked a stranger.
"Casey!" breathed a vast voice from the crowd.
An indescribable burst of grateful relief fluttered across the upturned faces as a breeze across water. It was almost timid at first, but gathered strength as it spread. It rolled up the hillside. A great, deep breath seemed to fill the lungs of the throng. The murmur swelled suddenly, was on the point of bursting into the frantic cheering of twenty thousand men.
But Coleman, his hat removed, raised his hand. In obedience to the simple gesture the cheer was stifled. In an instant all was still. The little group entered the carriages, which immediately wheeled and drove away.