Bear Creek Johnson was in the van, fostering and fomenting a sentiment for violence. The unworthy Bear Creek was not lacking in qualities of leadership; he realised, as by an instinct, that a mob must have time to pen before it is put to work. Wherefore, Bear Creek, while cursing and threatening with the rest, delayed. He paused, as it were, with his thumb on the angry pulse of the multitude, waiting to seize the moment psychological. Hemmed in by four hundred pushing, threatening, cursing, human wolves, those agents of prohibition whitely sat and shivered. They knew their peril; also they felt that sense of utter helplessness which will only come to men when forced to face the brainless fury of a mob. What should be done? What could be done? In that moment of extremity the proprietor of the boarding-house, with the fear of death upon him, could think of nothing beyond sending for Mr. Wright. To be courier in this hour of strain a girl of twelve was sent out by a rear door. There was craft in this selection of a messenger. No Western mob, however bloody of intention, would dream of interfering with a girl. Besides, Mr. Wright would never refuse a girl’s request. Mr. Wright might have been as pleased had he not been called upon. To oppose the insurrectionists was neither a work of pleasure nor of safety, and the opportunity to thus put himself in feud with a half regiment of men whose blood was up, and with whom when the smoke of battle blew aside he must still do business, could not be called a boon. But the little girl’s lips were blue with terror, and her frightened eyes showed round and big, as she besought Mr. Wright to save the life of her father—it was he to be proprietor of Gallon’s—and the lives of those visiting gentlemen, representative of prohibition. Getting wearily up from the poker game in which he was employed, Mr. Wright made ready to go with the little girl. “You had better come too, Bat,” said Mr. Wright, addressing Mr. Masterson. “I think you can do more with a Dodge mob than I can. They’ve seen more of your shooting.” “Of course I’ll go, Bob,” returned Mr. Masterson, laying down a reluctant hand in which dwelt a pair of aces—a highly hopeful pair before the draw!—“of course I’ll go. But it seems hard that I must leave just when the hands are beginning to run my way. I wish Bear Creek had put off this uprising another hour. I’d have been a mile on velvet.” When Mr. Masterson and Mr. Wright arrived at the seat of war, the mob was more or less impressed and its howls lost half their volume. Mr. Masterson and Mr. Wright walked through the close-set ranks, and went in by the front door. No back door for Mr. Masterson and Mr. Wright; especially under the eyes of ones whom they must presently outface. “What is your desire, gentlemen?” asked Mr. Masterson, when he and Mr. Wright found themselves with the beleaguered ones.