Buck Mason leaned forward with interest, glowering upon John Gaspar.

“This skunk of a John Gaspar gets Sally all tied up with his sappy talk.  Gets her all excited because he’s something brand new and different.  Quade gets sore, nacherallike.  Then he comes to Gaspar and says:  ‘Cut out this soft talk to Sally, or I’ll bust your head.’  Gaspar don’t love Sally, but he’s afraid of Quade.  He goes and gets a gun.  He goes to Quade’s house and tries to be friends.  Quade kicks him out.  Gaspar climbs back on his hoss and, while he’s sitting there, pulls out a gun and shoots poor Quade dead.  Don’t that sound nacheral?  He wouldn’t marry Sally, but he didn’t want another man to have her.  And he wouldn’t give up his soft berth in the house of Sally’s brother.  He knew Quade would never suspect him of having the nerve to fight.  So he takes Quade unready and plugs him, while Quade ain’t looking.  Is that clear?”

“It sure sounds straight to me,” said Buck Mason.

“All right!  Stand up.”

Mason rose.

“Take off your hat.”

The sombrero was withdrawn with a flourish.

“God’s up yonder higher’n that hawk, but seeing you clear, Buck.  Tell us straight.  Is Gaspar guilty or not?”

“Guilty as hell, your honor!”

A sigh from the prisoner.  The last of life seemed to go from him, and Sinclair braced himself to meet a hysterical appeal.  But there was only that slight drooping of the shoulders and declining of the head.

It was an appalling thing for Sinclair to watch.  He was used to power in men and beasts.  He understood it.  A cunning devil of a fighting outlaw horse was his choice for a ride.  “The meaner they are, the longer they last,” he used to say.  He respected men of evil as long as they were men of action.  He was perfectly at home and contented among men, where one’s purse and life were at constant hazard, where a turned back might mean destruction.

To him this meek surrender of hope was incomprehensibly despicable.  If he had hesitated before, his hard soul was firm now in the decision that John Gaspar must die, and so leave Sinclair’s own road free.  With all suspicion of a connection between him and Quade’s death gone, Riley could play a free hand against Sandersen.  He turned a face of iron upon the prisoner.

“Sandersen and Denver Jim, bring the prisoner before me.”

They obeyed.  But when they reached down their hands to Gaspar’s shoulders to drag him to his feet, he avoided them with a shudder and of his own free will rose and walked between them.

“John Irving Gaspar,” said Sinclair sternly, “alias Jig, alias Cold Feet—­which is a fitting and proper name for you—­have you got anything to say that won’t take too long before I pronounce sentence on you?”

He had to set his teeth.  The sad eyes of John Gaspar had risen from the ground and fixed steadily, darkly upon the eyes of his judge.  There was infinite understanding, infinite patience in that look, the patience of the weak man, schooled in enduring buffets.  For the moment Sinclair almost felt that the man was pitying him!