It was the first time Lahoma had ever faced an audience larger than that composed of Brick and Bill and Willock, for in the city she had been content to play an unobtrusive part, listening to others, commenting inwardly. Speech was now but a mode of action, and in her effort to turn the sentiment of the mob, she sought not for words but emotions. Bill's life was at stake. What could she say to make them Bill's friends? After her uplifted hand had brought tense silence, she stood at a loss, her eyes big with the appeal her tongue refused to utter.
The mob was awed by that light in her eyes, by the crimson in her cheeks, by her beauty, freshness and grace. They would not proceed to violence while she stood there facing them. Her power she recognized, but she understood it was that of physical presence. When she was gone, her influence would depart. They knew Brick and Bill had sheltered her from her tenderest years, they admired her fidelity. Whatever she might say to try to move their hearts would come from a sense of gratitude and would be received in tolerant silence. The more guilty the highwayman, the more commendable her loyalty. But it would not change their purpose; as if waiting for a storm to pass, they stood stolid and close-mouthed, slightly bent forward, unresisting, but unmoved.
"I'm a western girl," Lahoma said at last, "and ever since Brick Willock gave me a home when I had none, I've lived right over yonder at the foot of the mountains. I was there when the cattlemen came, before the Indians had given up this country; and I was here when the first settlers moved in, and when the soldiers drove them out. I was living in the cove with Brick Willock when people came up from Texas and planted miles and miles of wheat; and I used to play with the rusty plows and machinery they left scattered about—after the three years' drought had starved them back to their homes. Then Old Man Walker came to Red River, sent his cowboys to drive us out of the cove, and your sheriff led the bunch. And it was Brick and myself that stood them off with our guns, our backs to the wall and our powder dry, and we never saw Mizzoo in our cove again. So you see, I ought to be able to talk to western men in a way they can appreciate, and if there's anybody here that's not a western man—he couldn't understand our style, anyhow—he'd better go where he's needed, for out West you need only western men—like Brick Willock, for instance."
At reference to the well-known incident of Mizzoo's attempt to drive Willock from the cove, there was a sudden wave of laughter, none the less hearty because Mizzoo's face had flushed and his mouth had opened sheepishly. But at the recurrence of Willock's name, the crowd grew serious. They felt the justice of her claim that out West only western men were needed; they excused her for thinking Brick a model type; but let any one else hold him up before them as a model!...
Lahoma's manner changed; it grew deeper and more forceful:
"Men, I want to talk to you about this case—will you be the jury? Consider what kind of man swore out that warrant against Brick—the leader of a band of highwaymen! And who's his chief witness? You don't know Mr. Gledware. I do. You've heard he's a rich and influential citizen in the East. That's true. But I'm going to tell you something to show what he IS—and what Brick Willock is; just one thing; that's all I'll say about the character of either. As to Red Kimball, you don't have to be told. I'm not going to talk about the general features of the case—as to whether Brick was ever a highwayman or not; as to whether he killed Red's brother to save me and my stepfather, or did it in cold blood; as to whether he held up the stage or not. These things you've discussed; you've formed opinions about them. I want to tell you something you haven't heard. Will you listen?"
At first no one spoke. Then from the crowd came a measured impartial voice: "We got lots of time."
She was not discouraged by the intimation in the tone that all her speaking was in vain. Several in the crowd looked reproachfully at him who had responded, feeling that Lahoma deserved more consideration; but in the main, the men nodded grim approval. They had plenty of time—but at the end of it, Bill would either tell all he knew, or....
Lahoma plunged into the midst of her narrative:
"One evening Brick came on a deserted mover's wagon; he'd traveled all day with nothing to eat or drink, and he got into the wagon to escape the blistering sun. In there, he found a dead woman, stretched on her pallet. He had a great curiosity to see her face, so he began lifting the cloth that covered her. He saw a pearl and onyx pin at her throat. It looked like one his mother used to wear. So he dropped the cloth and never looked at her face. She had died the evening before, and he knew she wouldn't have wanted any one to see her THEN. And he dug a grave in the sand, though she was nothing to him, and buried her—never seeing her face—and covered the spot with a great pyramid of stones, and prayed for her little girl—I was her little girl—the Indians had carried me away. You'll say that was a little thing; that anybody would have buried the poor helpless body. Maybe so. But about not looking at her face—well, I don't know; it WAS a little thing, of course, but somehow it just seems to show that Brick Willock wasn't little—had something great in his soul, you know. Seems to show that he couldn't have been a common murderer. It's something you'll have to feel for yourselves, nobody could explain it so you'd see, if you don't understand already."
The men stared at her, somewhat bewildered, saying nothing. In some breasts, a sense of something delicate, not to be defined, was stirred.
"One day," Lahoma resumed, "Brick saw a white man with some Indians standing near that grave. He couldn't imagine what they meant to do, so he hid, thinking them after him. Years afterward Red Feather explained why they came that evening to the pile of stones. The white man was Mr. Gledware. After Red Kimball's gang captured the wagon-train, Mr. Gledware escaped, married Red Feather's daughter and lived with the Indians; he'd married immediately, to save his life, and the tribe suspected he meant to leave Indian Territory at the first chance. Mr. Gledware, great coward, was terrified night and day lest the suspicions of the Indians might finally cost him his life.
"It wasn't ten days after the massacre of the emigrants till he decided to give a proof of good faith. Too great a coward to try to get away and, caring too much for his wife's rich lands to want to leave, he told about the pearl and onyx pin—he said he wanted to give it to Red Flower. A pretty good Indian, Red Feather was—true friend of mine; HE wouldn't rob graves! But he said he'd take Mr. Gledware to the place, and if he got that pin, they'd all know he meant to live amongst them forever. THAT'S why the band was standing there when Brick Willock looked from the mountain-top. Mr. Gledware dug up the body, after the Indians had rolled away the stones—the body of his wife—my mother—the body whose face Brick Willock wouldn't look at, in its helplessness of death. Mr. Gledware is the principal witness against Brick. If you don't feel what kind of man he is from what I've said, nobody could explain it to you."
From several of the intent listeners burst involuntary denunciations of Gledware, while on the faces of others showed a momentary gleam of horror.
Red Kimball's confederate spoke loudly, harshly: "But who killed Red Kimball and his pard and the stage-driver, if it wasn't Brick Willock?"
"I think it was Red Feather's band. I'm witness to the fact that Kimball agreed to bring Mr. Gledware the pearl and onyx pin on condition that Mr. Gledware appear against Brick. After Mr. Gledware deserted Red Flower, or rather after her death, Red Feather carried that pin about him; Mr. Gledware knew he'd never give it up alive. He was always afraid the Indian would find him—and at last he did find him. But Red Kimball got the pin—could that mean anything except that Kimball discovered the Indian's hiding-place and killed him? But for that, I'd think it Red Feather who attacked the stage and killed Red Kimball. As it is, I believe it must have been his friends."
"Now you've said something!" cried Mizzoo. "Boys, don't you think it's a reasonable explanation?"
Some of them did, evidently, for the grim resolution on their faces softened; others, however, were unconvinced.
A stern voice was raised: "Let Brick Willock come do his own explaining. Bill Atkins knows where he's hiding out—and we got to know. We've started in to be a law-abiding county, and that there warrant against Willock has got the right of way."
"You've no warrant against Bill," cried Wilfred, stepping to the edge of the platform, "therefore you've violated the law in locking him up."
"That's so," exclaimed Red Kimball's former comrade. "Well, turn 'im loose, that's what we ask—LET him go—open the jail door!"
"He's locked up for his own safety," shouted Mizzoo. "You fellows agree to leave him alone, and I'll turn him out quick enough. You talk about the law—what you want to do to Bill ain't overly lawful, I take it."
"If he gives up his secret we ain't going to handle him rough," was the quick retort.
Lahoma found that the softening influence she had exerted was already fast dissipating. They bore with her merely because of her youth and sex. She cried out desperately.
"Is there nothing I can say to move your hearts? Has my story of that pearl and onyx pin been lost on you? Couldn't you understand, after all? Are you western men, and yet unable to feel the worth of a western man like Brick?... How he clothed me and sheltered me when the man who should have supported the child left in his care neglected her.... How he taught me and was always tender and gentle—never a cross word—a man like THAT.... And you think he could kill! I don't know whether Bill was told his hiding-place or not. But if I knew it, do you think I'd tell? And if Bill betrayed him,—but Bill wouldn't do it. Thank God, I've been raised with real MEN, men that know how to stand by each other and be true to the death. You want Bill to turn traitor. I say, what kind of men are YOU?"
She turned to Wilfred, blinded by hot tears. "Oh, say something to them!" she gasped, clinging to his arm.
"Go on," murmured Wilfred. "I couldn't reach em, and you made a point, that time. Go on—don't give 'em a chance to think."
"But I can't—I've said all I had to say—"
"Don't stop, dear, for God's sake—the case is desperate! You'll have to do it—for Bill."
"And that isn't all," Lahoma called in a broken pathetic voice, as she turned her pale face upon the curious crowd. "That isn't all. You know Brick and Bill have been all I had—all in this world... You know they couldn't have been sweeter to me if they'd been the nearest of kin—they were more like women than men, somehow, when they spoke to me and sat with me in the dugout—and I guess I know a little about a mother's love because I've always had Brick and Bill. But one day somebody else came to the cove and—and this somebody else, well—he—this somebody else wants to marry me—today. This was the end of our journey," she went on blindly, "and—and it is our wedding-day. I thought there must be SOME way to get Brick to the wedding, but you see how it is. And—and we'll have to marry without him. But Bill's here—in that jail—because he wouldn't betray his friend. And I couldn't marry without either Brick or Bill, could I?"
She took her quivering hand from Wilfred's sturdy arm, and moving to the top of the steps, held out her trembling arms appealingly:
"MEN!— Give me Bill!"
The crowd was with her, now. No doubt of that. All fierceness gone, tears here and there, broad grins to hide deep emotion, open admiration, touched with tenderness, in the eyes that took in her shy flower-like beauty.
"You shall have Bill!" shouted the spokesman of the crowd. And other voices cried, "Give her Bill! Give her Bill!"
"Bring him out!" continued the spokesman in stentorian tones. "We'll not ask him a question. Fellows, clear a path for 'em."
A broad lane was formed through the throng of smiling men whom the sudden, unexpected light of love had softened magically.
While Mizzoo hastened to Bill's cell, some one exclaimed, "Invite us, too. Make it a town wedding!"
And another started the shout, "Hurrah for Lahoma!"
Lahoma, who had taken refuge behind Wilfred's protection, wept and laughed in a rosy glow of triumphant joy.
Mizzoo presently reappeared, leaving the door wide open. He walked to the stairs, the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes deep-cut with appreciation of the situation. "Fellows," he called, "he says you carried him in there, and dinged if you won't have to carry him out, for not a step will he take!"
At this unexpected development, a burst of laughter swelled into a roar. After that mighty merriment, Bill was as safe as a babe. Twenty volunteers pressed forward to carry the wedding-guest from his cell. And when the old man slowly but proudly followed Wilfred and Lahoma to the hotel where certain preparations were to be made—particularly as touching Bill's personal appearance—the town of Mangum began gathering at the newly-erected church whither they had been invited.
When the four friends—for Mizzoo joined them—drove up to the church door in the only carriage available, Bill descended stiffly, his eyes gleaming fiercely from under snowy locks, as if daring any one to ask him a question about Brick. But nobody did.
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