in, only to leap up again
in a moment, run to the door, and listen as if she sought a voice out of
the riotous sound.

Judge Thayer had none of this poignant concern for Morgan's welfare. He
was not a little nettled over his failure to find the marshal, and that
officer's apparent shunning of duty in face of this mocking challenge to
his authority.

"Why, Rhetta, you wanted him to take the office, you urged him to," he
reminded her. "I don't understand this sudden concern for the man's
safety in disregard of his oath and duty, this--this--unaccountable----"

"I didn't know him then--I didn't _know_ him!" she said, in piteous low
moan.

Judge Thayer looked at her with a sudden sharp turning of the head, as
if her words had expressed something beyond their apparent meaning. He
came slowly to the door, where he stood beside her a little while in
silence, hand upon her shoulder tenderly.

"I'll look around again," he said, "and come back in a little while."

Meanwhile, in Peden's place the celebrants at the altar of alcohol were
rejoicing in this triumph of personal liberty. Where was this man-eating
city marshal? What had become of that knock-kneed horse wrangler from
Bitter Creek they had heard so much about? They drank fiery toasts to
his confusion, they challenged him in the profane emphasis of scorn.
Upon what was his fame based? they wanted to be told. The mere
corraling of certain stupid drunk men; the lucky throw of a rope. _He_
never had killed a man!

With the mounting of their hastily swilled liquor the hilarious patrons
of Peden's hall became more contemptuous of the city marshal. His
apparent avoidance of trouble, his unaccountable absence, his failure to
step up and meet this challenge from Peden, became a grievance against
him in their inflamed heads.

They had counted on him to make some kind of a bluff, to add something
either of tragedy or comedy to this big show. Now he was hiding out, and
they resented it in the proper spirit of men deprived of their rights.
They began to talk of going out to find him, of dragging him from his
hole and starting a noise behind him that would scare him out of the
country.

Peden encouraged this growing notion. If Morgan wouldn't bring his show
there, go after him and make him stand on his hind legs like a dog.
After a few more drinks, after a dance, after another stake on the
all-devouring tables of chance. They turned to these diversions in the
zest of long ab