The terror was still white upon the face of Haw-Haw, but something stronger than fear kept him in the room and even drew him a slow step towards Mac Strann; and his eyes moved from the face of the dead man to the face of the living and seemed to draw sustenance from both.  He moistened his lips and was able to speak.

“Forget you, Mac?  Not if you get the man that fixed him.”

“Would you want me to get him, Jerry?” asked Mac Strann.  And he waited for an answer.

“I dunno,” he muttered, after a moment.  “Jerry was always for fightin’, but he wasn’t never for killin’.  He never liked the way I done things.  And when he was lyin’ here, Haw-Haw, he never said nothin’ about me gettin’ Barry.  Did he?”

Astonishment froze the lips of Haw-Haw.  He managed to stammer:  “Ain’t you going to get Barry?  Ain’t you goin’ to bust him up, Mac?”

“I dunno,” repeated the big man heavily.  “Seems like I’ve got no heart for killing.  Seems like they’s enough death in the world.”  He pressed his hand against his forehead and closed his eyes.  “Seems like they’s something dead in me.  They’s an ache that goes ringin’ in my head.  They’s a sort of hollow feelin’ inside me.  And I keep thinkin’ about times when I was a kid and got hurt and cried.”  He drew a deep breath.  “Oh, my God, Haw-Haw, I’d give most anything if I could bust out cryin’ now!”

While Mac Strann stood with his eyes closed, speaking his words slowly, syllable by syllable, like the tolling of a bell, Haw-Haw Langley stood with parted lips—­like the spirit of famine drinking deep; joy unutterable was glittering in his eyes.

“If Jerry’d wanted me to get this Barry, he’d of said so,” repeated Mac Strann.  “But he didn’t.”  He turned towards the dead face.  “Look at Jerry now.  He ain’t thinkin’ about killin’s.  Nope, he’s thinkin’ about some quiet place for sleep.  I know the place.  They’s a spring that come out in a holler between two mountains; and the wind blows up the valley all the year; and they’s a tree that stands over the spring.  That’s where I’ll put him.  He loved the sound of runnin’ water; and the wind’ll be on his face; and the tree’ll sort of mark the place.  Jerry, lad, would ye like that?”

Now, while Mac Strann talked, inspiration came to Haw-Haw Langley, and he stretched out his gaunt arms to it and gathered it in to his heart.

“Mac,” he said, “don’t you see no reason why Jerry wouldn’t ask you to go after Barry?”

“Eh?” queried Mac Strann, turning.

But as he turned, Haw-Haw Langley glided towards him, and behind him, as if he found it easier to talk when the face of Mac was turned away.  And while he talked his hands reached out towards Mac Strann like one who is begging for alms.

“Mac, don’t you remember that Barry beat Jerry to the draw?”

“What’s that to do with it?”

“But he beat him bad to the draw.  I seen it.  Barry waited for Jerry.  Understand?”