We three pressed through the swarm and took our stand beside Gloria,
not hesitating to thrust the other women aside. They dragged at their
men-folk to call attention to us, but the argument was too hot to
be missed, and the women clawed and screamed in vain.

"I believe we could get out!" I shouted in Will's ear. But he shook
his head. At least six men were standing on the trap, and we could
not have driven them off it because there was no other space on the
floor that they could occupy. So I turned to Fred.

"Couldn't we shake those ruffians off the ladder, and climb up it
and escape?" I shouted. But Fred shook his head, and went on listening,
trying to follow the course of the dispute.

At last somebody with louder lungs than any other man made Ephraim
understand that it was I who sent the messenger to Zeitoon. Instantly
that solved the problem to his mind. I should be hanged, and that
would be all about it. He gesticulated. The men swarmed down off
the ladder to the already overcrowded floor, and mistaking Will for
me several men started to thrust him forward. A face appeared through
the hole in the roof and its owner was sent running for a rope.
I had not recovered my pistol, and my rifle was slung at my back
where I could not possibly get at it for the crowd. But Fred had
a Colt repeater handy in his hip-pocket and he promptly screwed the
muzzle of it into Ephraim's ear. What he said to him I don't know,
but Ephraim's convictions underwent a change of base and he began
to yell for silence. The men who had seized Will let go of him just
as the rope with a disgusting noose in the end was lowered through
the roof. And then Ossa was imposed on Pelion.