right hand got a grip upon
the throat of Jopp, and they saw the grip tighten, tighten, and Jopp's
face go from red to purple, a hundred people gasped. Excited men made as
though to move toward the stage; but the majority still believed that it
all belonged to the play, and shouted, "Sit down!"

Suddenly the voice of Gow Johnson was heard: "Don't kill him--let go,
boy!"

The voice rang out with sharp anxiety, and pierced the fog of passion and
rage in which O'Ryan was moving. He realized what he was doing, the real
sense of it came upon him. Suddenly he let go the lank throat of his
enemy, and, by a supreme effort, flung him across the stage, where Jopp
lay resting on his hands, his bleared eyes looking at Terry with the fear
and horror still in them which had come with that tightening grip on his
throat.

Silence fell suddenly on the theatre. The audience was standing. A woman
sobbed somewhere in a far corner, but the rest were dismayed and
speechless. A few steps before them all was Molly Mackinder, white and
frightened, but in her eyes was a look of understanding as she gazed at
Terry. Breathing hard, Terry stood still in the middle of the stage, the
red fog not yet gone out of his eyes, his hands clasped at his side,
vaguely realizing the audience again. Behind him was the back curtain, in
which the lights of Orion twinkled aggressively. The three men who had
attacked him were still where he had thrown them.

The silence was intense, the strain oppressive. But now a drawling voice
came from the back of the hall.

"Are you watching the rise of Orion?" it said. It was the voice of Gow
Johnson.

The strain was broken; the audience dissolved in laughter; but it was not
hilarious; it was the nervous laughter of relief, touched off by a native
humor always present in the dweller of the prairie.

"I beg your pardon," said Terry, quietly and abstractedly, to the
audience.

And the scene-shifter bethought himself and let down the curtain.

The fourth act was not played that night. The people had had more than the
worth of their money. In a few moments the stage was crowded with people
from the audience, but both Jopp and O'Ryan had disappeared.

Among the visitors to the stage was Molly Mackinder. There was a meaning
smile upon her face as she said to Dicky Fergus:

"It was quite wonderful, wasn't it--like a scene out of the classics--the
gladiators or something?"

Fergus gave a wary smile as he answered: "Yes