A score of Taylor men surged forward to Norton’s side; the crowd split, forming two sections—one group of men massing near Norton, the other congregating around a tall man who seemed to be the leader of their faction. A number of other men—the cautious and faint-hearted element which had no personal animus to spur it to participation in what seemed to threaten to develop into a riot—retreated a short distance up the street and stood watching, morbidly curious. But though violence, concerted and deadly, was imminent, it was delayed. For Taylor had not yet finished, and the crowd was curiously following his movements. Taylor was a picturesquely ludicrous figure. He was covered with dust from head to foot; his face was streaked with it; his hair was full of it; it had been ground into his cheeks, and where blood from a cut on his forehead had trickled to his right temple, the dust was matted until it resembled crimson mud. And yet the man was still smiling. It was not a smile at which most men care to look when its owner’s attention is definitely centered upon them; it was a smile full of grimly humorous malice and determination; the smile of the fighting man who cares nothing for consequences. The concerted action which had threatened was, by the tacit consent of the prospective belligerents, postponed for the instant. The gaze of every partisan—and of all the non-partisans—was directed at Taylor. He had not yet finished. For an instant he stood looking down at Carrington and Danforth—both now beginning to recover from their chastisement, and sitting up in the dust gazing dizzily about them—then with a chuckle, grim and malicious, Taylor dove toward the door of the courthouse, where Littlefield was standing. The judge had been stunned by the ferocity of the action he had witnessed. Whatever judicial dignity had been his had been whelmed by the paralyzing fear that had gripped him, and he stood, holding to the door-jambs, nerveless, motionless. He saw Taylor start toward him; he saw a certain light leaping in the man’s eyes, and he cringed and cried out in dread. But he had not the power to retreat from the menace that was approaching him. He threw out his hands impotently as Taylor reached him, as though to protest physically. But Taylor ignored the movement, reaching upward, a dusty finger and thumb closing on the judge’s right ear. There was a jerk, a shrill cry of pain from the judge, and then he was led into the street, near where Carrington and Danforth had fallen, and twisted ungently around until he faced the crowd.