Sinclair laid hold on the bars with his big hands and pressed his face close to the iron, staring at her.

“You ain’t coming along with us?” he asked.

“I—­no.”

“Are you going to stay here?”

“Perhaps!  I don’t know—­I haven’t made up my mind.”

“Has Cartwright—­”

She broke away from those entangling questions.  “I must go.”

“But you’ll be at the place with the horses?”

“Yes.”

“Then so long till the time comes.  And—­you’re a brick, Jig!”

Once outside the jail, she set to work at once.  As for getting the roan, it was the simplest thing in the world.  There was no one in the stable behind the hotel, and no one to ask questions.  She calmly saddled the roan, mounted him, and rode by a wider detour to the cottonwoods behind the blacksmith shop.

Her own horse was to be for Sinclair.  But before she took him, she went into the hotel, and the first man she found on the veranda was Cartwright.  He came to her at once, shifting away from the others.

“How are things?”

“Good,” said Cartwright.  “Ain’t you heard ’em talking?”

Here and there about the hotel, men stood in knots of three and four, talking in low voices.

“Are they talking about that?”

“Sure they are,” said Cartwright, relieved.  “You ain’t heard nothing?”

“Not a word.”

“Then the thing for you to do is to keep under cover.  You don’t want to get mixed up in this thing, eh?”

“I suppose not.”

“Keep out of sight, honey.  The crowd will start pretty soon and tear things loose.”  He could not resist one savage thrust.  “A rope, or a pair of ropes, will do the work.”

“Ropes?”

“One to tie Kern, and one to tie his deputy,” he explained smoothly.  “Where you going now?”

“Getting their retreat ready,” she whispered excitedly.  “I’ve already warned them where to go to get the horses.”

She waved to him and stepped back into the night, convinced that all was well.  As for Cartwright, he hesitated, staring after her.  After all, if his plan developed, it would be wise for him to allow the others to do the work of mischief.  He had no wish to be actively mixed up with a lynching party.  Sometimes there were after results.  And if he had done no more than talk, there would be small hold upon him by the law.

Moreover, things were going smoothly under the guidance of Whitey.  The pale-faced man had thrown himself body and soul into the movement.  It was a rare thing to see Whitey excited.  Other men were readily impressed.  After a time, when anger had reached a certain point where men melt into hot action, these fixed figures of men would sweep into fluid action.  And then the fates of Arizona and Sinclair would be determined.

It pleased Cartwright more than any action of his life to feel that he had stirred up this movement.  It pleased him still more to know that he could now step back and watch the work of ruin go on.  It was like disturbing the one small stone which starts the avalanche, which eventually smashes the far-off forest.