So long as he was alive, so long as he could feel the weight of the dagger in his sleeve, it was temperamentally impossible for him to believe that he was going to die that day.
Plans he made and smoothed them in the dirt with his toe.

If they did not bind his arms...

They had not tied Sandy's arms, he remembered; and he wondered if a dagger concealed in Sandy's sleeve would have made any essential difference in the result of that particular crime of the Committee.

He sickened at a vivid memory of how Sandy had ridden away, just a week or so before; and of the appealing glance which he had sent toward Bill's place when Shorty started to lead the buckskin from before the prison tent with six men walking upon either side and a curious crowd straggling after.

Would a dagger in Sandy's sleeve have made any difference?
Then his thoughts swung to the Mexican who had told him of the trick, only the night before.