"I've been looking for you, Blair," he said, "I know what you've been trying to do, but most of the crowd don't and won't. They're ugly. You'd better keep back."
For answer Ben eyed the cowboy squarely.
"I thought I left you in charge of the ranch," he said evenly.
The weather-stained face of the foreman reddened in the shifting lantern light, but the eyes did not drop.
"I have been. I just got here." A dignity which well became him spoke in the steady voice. "I had a reason for coming."
Ben released his gaze.
"The others are here too?"
"No, they're all at the ranch. Graham and I attended to that."
"I just saw Russell and Stetson. They couldn't possibly have got here to-day from home. Has--has this been planned?"
Grannis nodded. "Yes. Kennedy and his gang have been watching here and at the ranch for days. They thought you'd show up at one place or the other. The whole country is out. There are lots of strangers here, from ranches I never heard of before. Seems as though everybody knew Rankin and heard of his being shot. You'd better let them have it their way. It'll amount to the same in the end, and death itself couldn't stop them now."
He took a step forward; for Ben, understanding all, had at last moved on.
"Blair!" he called after him, again extending a detaining hand. His voice took on a new note--intimate, personal, a tone of which no one would have thought it capable. "Blair, listen to me! Stop!"
But he might as well have spoken to the swiftly flowing water beneath the ice of the great river. Of a sudden, from out a passage leading into the cell-room of the court-house basement, a black swarm of men had emerged, bearing by sheer animal force a struggling object in their midst. The silence of those who waited, the lull before the storm, on the instant ended. A very Babel of voices took its place. By common consent, as though drawn by centripetal force, actors and spectators crowded together until they were a solid block of humanity. Caught in the midst, Grannis and Ben alike could for a moment but move with the mass. So fierce was the crush that their very breath seemed imprisoned in their lungs.
Like molten metal the crowd began to flow--to the right, in the direction of the railroad track. With each passing moment the confusion was, if possible, greater than before. Here and there a cowboy, unable to control his excess of feeling, emptied his revolver into the air. Once Ben heard the wailing yelp of a dog caught under foot of the mass. To his left, a little man with a white collar, obviously a mere spectator, pleaded loudly to be released from the pressure. Adding to the confusion, the bell on the town-hall began ringing furiously.