" The cry rose again, louder: "Run 'em out! String 'em
up! Hang them! Hang them!" and a forward rush was made.
"This way, Jim. Be quick," said Harkless, quietly, bending down and
jerking one of the gamblers half-way up the steps. "Get through the hall
to the other side and then run them to the lock-up. No one will stop you
that way. Watts and I will hold this door." Bardlock hustled his prisoners
through the doorway, and the crowd pushed up the steps, while Harkless
struggled to keep the vestibule clear until Watts got the double doors
closed. "Stand back, here!" he cried; "it's all over. Don't be foolish.
The law is good enough for us. Stand back, will you!"
He was laughing a little, shoving them back with open hand and elbow, when
a small, compact group of men suddenly dashed up the steps together, and a
heavy stick swung out over their heads. A straw hat with a gay ribbon
sailed through the air. The journalist's long arms went out swiftly from
his body in several directions, the hands not open, but clenched and hard.
The next instant he and Mr. Watts stood alone on the steps, and a man with
a bleeding, blaspheming mouth dropped his stick and tried to lose himself
in the crowd. Mr. Watts was returning something he had not used to his
hip-pocket.
"Prophets of Israel!" exclaimed William Todd, ruefully, "it wasn't Eph
Watts's pistol.
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