There was no reply. Mrs. Narby had hurled herself down the stairs and they could hear her harsh voice clamouring for her son, and for drink to revive her. Shortly the murmur of many voices swelled out. Evidently the woman had summoned the neighbours, and Herries shivered at the snarl of an enraged mob. "I never killed the man," he wailed, utterly broken up. "I know nothing about him,--I never saw him,--I didn't,----" "Shut up," snapped Narby roughly, and pushed him back again on to the disordered bed. "I've known a man lynched, down 'Frisco way, for less than this. I reckon you'll dance at the end of a rope, before the month's out. See here," he went to the window, glanced out and returned to shake a large and menacing finger, more American in speech than ever. "You try an' light out that way, sonny, an' I shoot you straight. I keep my Derringer for use, not for show. D'ye see; you stop here." "I am perfectly willing," retorted Herries, now beginning to recover his courage, since the worst of the shock was over. "I can easily clear my character." Narby smiled grimly, and shook his head. "Better say no more," he advised, "what you say, will tell against you." "Surely you don't believe me guilty?" "You make me tired," said Narby sharply, "you are in the next room to a murdered man, you show me a blood-stained razor, and you have blood on your shirt, and the key of the next room. Believe you guilty! Well, I guess I do. Say your prayers, sonny, for you'll hang as sure as you're a living man, which you won't be long," and without another word, the burly landlord left the room, locking the door after him. With an eminently human impulse to seek immediate safety, the prisoner ran to the window. But there was no escape that way. He could easily drop into the garden, climb over the low fence and fly across the marshes, hidden by the kindly mists. But the palings which parted the garden from the village street were now lined with curious and horrified spectators. Men and women and children stared insistently at the mean house, with that fascination begotten of a morbid love of crime. No such exciting event had happened in the dull little Essex village for many a year,--if indeed ever before; and the whole population was agog with excitement. Mrs. Narby was haranguing her neighbours, and fiercely pointing at intervals towards the house, crying wildly that the inn was ruined. Catching sight of Herries at the window, she shook a large fist, and a sea of faces looked upward. Then came a howl of execration. From that terrible sound Herries, though courageous enough, shrank back, and closed the window in a panic. Then he staggered to the bed and lying down tried to reason calmly.