“No, no, you shall come with me. If this valley is closed to me and I can never come back, how can I leave you behind, and me perhaps in hiding from the police with never a chance of a message? It’s with me you must come. I know a good woman in the place I come from, and it’s there I’d leave you till we can get married. Will you come?”

“Yes, Jack, I will come.”

“God bless you for your trust in me! It’s a fiend out of hell that I should be if I abused it. Now, mark you, Ettie, it will be just a word to you, and when it reaches you, you will drop everything and come right down to the waiting room at the depot and stay there till I come for you.”

“Day or night, I’ll come at the word, Jack.”

Somewhat eased in mind, now that his own preparations for escape had been begun, McMurdo went on to the lodge. It had already assembled, and only by complicated signs and countersigns could he pass through the outer guard and inner guard who close-tiled it. A buzz of pleasure and welcome greeted him as he entered. The long room was crowded, and through the haze of tobacco smoke he saw the tangled black mane of the Bodymaster, the cruel, unfriendly features of Baldwin, the vulture face of Harraway, the secretary, and a dozen more who were among the leaders of the lodge. He rejoiced that they should all be there to take counsel over his news.

“Indeed, it’s glad we are to see you, Brother!” cried the chairman. “There’s business here that wants a Solomon in judgment to set it right.”

“It’s Lander and Egan,” explained his neighbour as he took his seat. “They both claim the head money given by the lodge for the shooting of old man Crabbe over at Stylestown, and who’s to say which fired the bullet?”

McMurdo rose in his place and raised his hand. The expression of his face froze the attention of the audience. There was a dead hush of expectation.

“Eminent Bodymaster,” he said, in a solemn voice, “I claim urgency!”

“Brother McMurdo claims urgency,” said McGinty. “It’s a claim that by the rules of this lodge takes precedence. Now, Brother, we attend you.”

McMurdo took the letter from his pocket.

“Eminent Bodymaster and Brethren,” he said, “I am the bearer of ill news this day; but it is better that it should be known and discussed, than that a blow should fall upon us without warning which would destroy us all. I have information that the most powerful and richest organizations in this state have bound themselves together for our destruction, and that at this very moment there is a Pinkerton detective, one Birdy Edwards, at work in the valley collecting the evidence which may put a rope round the necks of many of us, and send every man in this room into a felon’s cell. That is the situation for the discussion of which I have made a claim of urgency.”

There was a dead silence in the room. It was broken by the chairman.

“What is your evidence for this, Brother McMurdo?” he asked.

“It is in this letter which has come into my hands,” said McMurdo. He read the passage aloud. “It is a matter of honour with me that I can give no further particulars about the letter, nor put it into your hands; but I assure you that there is nothing else in it which can affect the interests of the lodge. I put the case before you as it has reached me.”