It was the first speech the man had made, and from pure curiosity the crowd went silent, listening—­silent until he was silent; then with the lack of originality ever manifest in a mob, they caught up his words themselves.

“Yes, Bess,” they baited, “he’ll take care of you.  Come, don’t keep him waiting.”

But the girl did not stir.  Had empires depended upon it that moment, she could not have complied.  Could she have cried, as the chin had at first presaged, she might perhaps have done so; but she was beyond the reach of tears now.  The complete meaning of the scene had come to her at last, the realisation of personal menace; and a fear such as she had never before known, gripped her relentlessly.  She could hear, hear every word; but her muscles refused to act.  She merely stood there, the old telescope satchel she carried gripped tight in her hand, her great eyes, wide and soft as those of a wild thing, staring out into the now rapidly accumulating rabble; merely stared and waited.

“Bess,” repeated the persuading voice, “come, please.  Don’t stand there, come.”

At last the girl seemed to hear, to understand.  Hesitatingly, with trembling steps, she came a pace forward, and another; then of a sudden she gave a little cry and her free hand lifted defensively.  But she was not quick enough, had seen too late; and that instant came the denouement. A second turnip, decayed like its predecessor, aimed likewise unerringly, caught her fair in the mouth, spattered, and broke into fragments that fell to the car steps.  Following, swift as rain after a thunderclap, a spurt of blood came to her lips and trickled down her face.

Simultaneously the crowd went silent; silent as the still prairie about them, awed irresistibly by the thing they had themselves wittingly or unwittingly done.  Save one, not a human being stirred.  That one, no need to tell whom, transformed visibly; transformed as they had never seen a human being alter before.  With not a step, but a bound, he was himself on the platform of the coach; the girl, protected behind him, hid from sight.  She was sobbing now; sobbing tumultuously, hysterically.  In the stillness every listening ear on the platform could hear distinctly.  For an instant after he had reached her the Indian stood so, his left arm about her, his back toward them.  He did not say a word, he did not move.  For the first time in his life he dared not.  He did not see red that moment, this man; he saw black—­black as prairie loam.  Every savage instinct in his brain was clamouring for freedom, clamouring until his free hand was clenched tight to keep it from the bulging holster behind his right hip.  Before this instant, when they were baiting him alone, it was nothing, he could forgive; but now—­now—­He stared away from them, stared up into the smiling, sarcastic prairie sky; but, listening, they, who almost with fascination watched, could hear beneath the catch of the girl’s sobs the sound of his breathing.