The yelling had ceased and men stared white faced. This was not the fighting they were used to; they understood only the quick, frenzied fighting of fury, where men pummel each other in blind rage, fighting close--as tigers fight--gouging and biting one another as they roll upon the ground locked in each other's grip. The men gazed in awe, with a strange, unspoken terror creeping into their hearts, upon the vicious battering blows, the coldly gleaming eyes and smiling lips of the man who fought, not in any fume of passion, but deliberately, smoothly, placing his terrific blows at will with a cold, deadly accuracy that smashed and tore. Moncrossen rushed again. "And now for the other things," Bill continued; "the attacks upon the defenseless girl--the attempted murder from ambush--and the starving of an old woman." Blow followed blow, until in the crowd men cried out sharply, and those who had watched a hundred fights turned away white lipped. Moncrossen fought blindly now. His eyes were closed and his face one solid mass of blood. And still the blows fell. Smash! Smash! Smash! It was horrible--those deliberate, tearing blows, and the lips that smiled in cold, savage cruelty. No blow landed on the point of the jaw, on the neck, on the heart, or the pit of the stomach--blows that bring the quiet of oblivion; but each landed with a cutting twist that ground into the flesh. At last, with his face beaten to a crimson pulp, Moncrossen sagged to his knees, tried to rise, and crashed limp and lifeless to the ground. And over him stood Bill Carmody, smiling down at the broken and battered wreck of the bad man of the logs. Gradually the circle that surrounded the fighters broke into little groups of white-faced, silent men who shot nervous, inquiring glances into each other's faces and swore softly under their breath--the foolish, meaningless oaths of excitement. Minutes passed as Ethel stood gazing in terrible fascination from the big man to the thing on the ground at his feet. And as she looked, a hideous old squaw, apparently too weak to stand, struggled from her place of vantage among the feet of the men, and crawled to the limp, sprawled form. Leaning close she peered into the shapeless features, crooning and gurgling, and emitting short, sharp whines of delight. Her beady eyes glittered wickedly, like the eyes of a snake, and the withered lips curled into a horrid grin, exposing the purple snag-toothed gums. Suddenly the bent form knelt upright, the skeleton arms raised high above the tangle of gray-black hair, the thin, high-pitched voice quavered the words of a weird chant, the clawlike fingers twitched in short, jerky spasms, and the emaciated body swayed and weaved to the wild, barbaric rhythm of the chanted curse.