walked submissively away in the direction indicated, looking to
neither the right nor the left; hardly daring to breathe, his head
and back actually aching with a prophecy of buckshot.

Brower was as courageous a criminal as ever lived to be hanged; that
was shown by the conditions of awful personal peril in which he had
coolly killed his brother-in-law. It is needless to relate them
here; they came out at his trial, and the revelation of his calmness
in confronting them came near to saving his neck. But what would
you have?--when a brave man is beaten, he submits.

So they pursued their journey jailward along the old road through
the woods. Only once did Brower venture a turn of the head: just
once, when he was in deep shadow and he knew that the other was in
moonlight, he looked backward. His captor was Burton Duff, the
jailer, as white as death and bearing upon his brow the livid mark
of the iron bar. Orrin Brower had no further curiosity.

Eventually they entered the town, which was all alight, but
deserted; only the women and children remained, and they were off
the streets. Straight toward the jail the criminal held his way.
Straight up to the main entrance he walked, laid his hand upon the
knob of the heavy iron door, pushed it open without command, entered
and found himself in the presence of a half-dozen armed men. Then
he turned. Nobody else entered.

On a table in the corridor lay the dead body of Burton Duff.