mand. And he very nearly did, such was his standing in the community by this time. "See Scanlon at once; tell him I'm driving down, and, for God's sake, to hold things until I come."
"I'll tell him," said Thorpe, then volunteered: "But he and Edmunds are egging 'em on—if you ask me. You'll have to hurry, chief."
"Hurry? . . . I'll fly!" promised Harrington; and roaring up the hills and dipping into the valleys, swinging round perilous curves, and dashing madly over straightaways, he drove the seventy miles that lay between the State Capitol and Edgewater.
Harrington found the courthouse corridors packed with excited men, breathing vengeance, loud in denunciation, loud in demand to be led instantly to Hurricane Island—demanding, on his appearance, that he, Henry Harrington, become their leader; but he put them off and made his way to the inner office of the late sheriff. Under-Sheriff Jordan was there, ostensibly in command; but the real commanders were about him, Tom Scanlon, Dan Edmunds, Steve Quackenbaugh and Jim Gaylord, stout upholders of the law, all four of them. In a moment like this greetings were dispensed with.
"Ain't this the devil, Henry?" demanded Scanlon.
"It's awful," confessed Harrington, with a shake of his head. "I'm sure sorry for poor old Jim."
"'S what comes of coddling these lazy Indians anyway," declared Quackenbaugh, with venom; and, it was true that Adam John, take it all the way through, had caused Quackenbaugh a good deal of trouble.
"'S what comes of coddling law-breakers of any kind, white or Indian," amended Gaylord. "You take that
