“It’s got to be just like it was before.  We come together first to keep each other posted, and save ourselves if there was any call to, and little by little you’ve been led into first one thing and then another, ’till you’re every bit and grain as bad as the old crowd was, only there ain’t so many of you, and you’ve kept me in it ’cause I didn’t dare leave my girl.”  Jim paused.  There was an ominous silence in the room.

With his eyes covering every scowling face in the company, Jim spoke again, “But things has changed for me right smart, since our last meetin’, when you give me this stuff to hold.  You boys all know how I’ve kept Wash Gibbs away from my girl, and there ain’t one of you that don’t know I’m right, knowin’ him as we do.  More’n two weeks ago, when I wasn’t around, he insulted her, and would have done worse, if Young Matt hadn’t been there to take care of her.  I called you here to-night, because I knowed that after what happened at the mill, Wash and Bill would be havin’ a meetin’ as soon as they could get around, and votin’ you all to go against Young Matt and his people.  But I’m goin’ to have my say first.”

Wash Gibbs reached stealthily for his weapon, but hesitated when he saw that the dark faced man noted his movement.

Jim continued, in his drawling tones, but his voice rang cold and clear, “I ain’t never been mealy mouthed with no man, and I’m too old to begin now.  I know the law of the order, and I reckon Gibbs there will try to have you keep it.  You boys have got to say whether you’ll stand by him or me.  It looks like you was goin’ to go with him alright.  But whether you do or don’t, I don’t aim to stay with nobody that stands by such as Wash Gibbs.  I’m goin’ to side with decent folks, who have stood by my girl, and you can do your damnedest.  You take this stuff away from here.  And as for you, Wash Gibbs, if you ever set foot on my place again, if you ever cross my path after to-night I’ll kill you like the measly yeller hound you are.”  As he finished, Jim stood with his back to the corner of the room, his hand inside of the hickory shirt where the button was missing.

While her father was speaking, Sammy forgot everything, in the wild joy and pride of her heart.  He was her Daddy, her Daddy Jim; that man standing so calmly there before the wild company of men.  Whatever the past had been, he had wiped it clean to-night.  He belonged to her now, all to her.  She looked toward Wash Gibbs.  Then she remembered the posse, the officers of the law.  They could not know what she knew.  If her father was taken with the others and with the stolen gold, he would be compelled to suffer with the rest.  Yet if she called out to save him, she would save Wash Gibbs and his companions also, and they would menace her father’s life day and night.

The girl drew back from the window.  She must think.  What should she do?  Even as she hesitated, a score of dark forms crept swiftly, silently toward the cabin.  At the same moment a figure left the side of the house near the girl, and, crouching low, ran to the two horses that were tied near the barn.