"By sundown!" Grassette said, and he turned with a determined gesture to
leave the cell.

At the gate of the prison, a fresh, sweet air caught his face.
Involuntarily he drew in a great draught of it, and his eyes seemed
to gaze out, almost wonderingly, over the grass and the trees to the
boundless horizon. Then he became aware of the shouts of the crowd--
shouts of welcome. This same crowd had greeted him with shouts of
execration when he had left the Court House after his sentence. He stood
still for a moment and looked at them, as it were only half comprehending
that they were cheering him now, and that voices were saying, "Bravo,
Grassette! Save him, and we'll save you."

Cheer upon cheer, but he took no notice. He walked like one in a dream,
a long, strong step. He turned neither to left nor right, not even when
the friendly voice of one who had worked with him bade him: "Cheer up,
and do the trick." He was busy working out a problem which no one but
himself could solve. He was only half conscious of his surroundings; he
was moving in a kind of detached world of his own, where the warders and
the Sheriff and those who followed were almost abstract and unreal
figures. He was living with a past which had been everlasting distant,
and had now become a vivid and buffeting present. He returned no answers
to the questions addressed to him, and would not talk, save when for a
little while they dismounted from their horses, and sat under the shade
of a great ash-tree for a few moments, and snatched a mouthful of
luncheon. Then he spoke a little and asked some questions, but lapsed
into a moody silence afterwards. His life and nature were being passed
through a fiery crucible. In all the years that had gone, he had had an
ungovernable desire to kill both Bignold and Marcile if he ever met them,