The Holbrook news., 1921-02-25
CHAPTER vII-continued.

''I'm not the Red Mask I didn't kill Louie Solomon. And I don't know where the Blue Moon is''
 The answer was not convincing Nothing he could have said just then would have been. Whether the Jew believed it. or any part of it, his face gave no sign. He backed aVny two steps and leveIed his revolver full at the Pearlhunter's breast, like man about to pistoi another and deliberate Iy planning to make a clean job of 1t. The instant came when the Pearl hunter believed the grimy finger was about to press the trigger and he was almost in the act of diving beneath the muzzle when the Jew mOtioned to- one of the others and said something in Yiddish.
 The man spoken to darted away through the bushes toward the boat landing. The PearIhunter breathed again.
 The man soon reappeared. carrying a piece of rope. One at Q time. he took the Pearlhunter's hands, drew them behind his back, and bound them securely together. Even then. so great was their dread of the man he was supposed to be. that one of them constantly held a gun on him.
 With the Knife still sticking in the dead mans breast. they carried him down to the boat, driving the Pearl hunter before them. There they load ed them in. the dead and the living. and rowed back up the river to the vilIage-the second time that day; the same trip; the same boat; tho same five men. TIen, a great day opening: the greatest .rade ever made among pearl fishers along the Wabash in prospect; nos. the day nearly done; the pearl lost, one of the men dead, another likely soon to bel
 What a diffsyence In the crowd that met them at ti.e wharf, Again driv- ing their pris.ner before them. the three grim heIscnmen carried the dead man up the iilI to a small plot of { open ground west of the Mud Hen and laid him down upon the grass.
 For the second N1ne that day the rilIage eInptied its houses to meet them. Women came this tinle-old AN4itCii NilD SiIlS WllIl blooming cheeks: and children. Hard rien flat had drunk to the Pearlhunt- CT barely two hours ago came out of the Mud Hen and stood staring at him fin sulIen silence. Men from the stores and shops came running Men that had neither stores nor shops strag- gled in from every quarter of the vil- iRge and jostled about in the ever growing. Ominously muttering circle
 Suddenly and unexpectedly. two of the henchmen caught the Pearlhunter and held him while the third tied the red mask over his eyes. Bound as he was lie had flung them loose in an in- stant and raked the mask off against his shoulder But that one brief mo- ment n'as enough. The mischief was done Women screamed; men nut tered ard swOre but all shrank back. widening the circle.
 Who started it, who said it first. wSli never be known. Nobody knows haw the mob forms-a low humble; "a quick flare into frenzy; mild eyes grown wild; stolid faces afire; rab- I,.e: a clamor: reason down, blood fi@St -lD
 Hang i'm. Hang i'm
 Even the women tcok up the cry, so great was the terror of his name-the Red Mask-a nane that might have stampeded the village. The mob charged him. Bound as he was, he dashed at them. 4 butt of his shoul- der caught the foremost man. a bur1y blacksmith. on the jaw. He went down like a beef under the mallet. A 4 drive of his head to the pit of the stomach crumpled up another. A we'll directed kick laid out q third.
 He fought as inc men of his blood had always fought But what can one man. with his hands tied. do against many? They had his blouse ,'pped 0f. h;s shirt in shreds. and