I would ask the lodge to choose a trusty committee, Mr.Chairman--yourself, if I might suggest it, and Brother Baldwin here, and five more.

Then I can talk freely of what I know and of what I advise should be done." The proposition was at once adopted, and the committee chosen.

Besides the chairman and Baldwin there were the vulture-faced secretary, Harraway, Tiger Cormac, the brutal young assassin, Carter, the treasurer, and the brothers Willaby, fearless and desperate men who would stick at nothing.
The usual revelry of the lodge was short and subdued: for there was a cloud upon the men's spirits, and many there for the first time began to see the cloud of avenging Law drifting up in that serene sky under which they had dwelt so long.

The horrors they had dealt out to others had been so much a part of their settled lives that the thought of retribution had become a remote one, and so seemed the more startling now that it came so closely upon them.

They broke up early and left their leaders to their council.
"Now, McMurdo!" said McGinty when they were alone.