Billy, watching, moved restlessly on his booted feet. He it was who saw––who feared. He touched her wrist with timid fingers and she flashed him a swift glance that half melted to a smile. Then she forgot him and all the rest––for the Ironwoods were thundering in from the outside levels, were coming into town.
Ahead rode Courtrey, big, black, keen, his wide hat swept back on his iron-grey hair, an imposing presence.
“Here’s your man!” said Kenset softly, rising excitedly on his elbow. “He’s coming! And God grant that there is no bloodshed!”
All of Corvan, so long meek and quiet under Courtrey’s foot, moved dramatically back to give 284 him room to come thundering down to his accounting.
In a few seconds he would be encompassed by his enemies.
And then, on the tick of fate, that universally unknown factor, a woman’s heart, flung its last pawn in the balance.
Lola, gleaming like a bird of paradise in her gay habiliments, leaning forward from the further steps of Baston’s store where she had slipped up unnoticed, cupped her white hands to her scarlet mouth, and sent out a cry like a clarion.
“Buck!” she called, bell-like, clear, far-reaching––“Buck! Turn back! They’ve called your turn! It’s all up for you! Go! Go––down––the Wall! And––God bless you––Buck! Good-bye!”
For one awful moment the great red Ironwood, Bolt, flung up his head and slid forward on his haunches, ploughing up the earth in a cloud.
Then, while the half-stunned crowd gaped in silence, he gathered himself, straightened, whirled, shook his giant frame and leaped clear of the ground in a spectacular turn. The man on his back snatched off his hat and shook it defiantly at the town––the people––the very Valley that he had ruled so long. It was a dramatic gesture––daring, scorning, renouncing. Then, without a 285 word to his henchmen, a single look of farewell, Buck Courtrey struck the Ironwood, and was gone back along the little street.