Frontier Stories. Bret Harte
He kept his word. He appeased his eager companions with a promise of future fortune, and exhibited the present and tangible reward. By a circuitous route known only to himself, he led Miss Mortimer to the road before the cabin. There was a pink flush of excitement on her somewhat faded cheek.
"And it was here?" she asked, eagerly.
"I found it here."
"And the body?"
"That was afterward. Over in that direction, beyond the clump of buckeyes, on the Red Chief turnpike."
"And any one coming from the road we left just now and going to—to—that place, would have to cross just here? Tell me," she said, with a strange laugh, laying her cold nervous hand on his, "wouldn't they?"
"They would."
"Let us go to that place."
Cass stepped out briskly to avoid observation and gain the woods beyond the highway. "You have crossed here before," she said. "There seems to be a trail."
"I may have made it: it's a short cut to the buckeyes."
"You never found anything else on the trail?"
"You remember, I told you before, the ring was all I found."
"Ah, true!" she smiled sweetly; "it was that which made it seem so odd to you. I forgot."
In half an hour they reached the buckeyes. During the walk she had taken rapid recognizance of everything in her path. When they crossed the road and Cass had pointed out the scene of the murder, she looked anxiously around. "You are sure we are not seen?"
"Quite."
"You will not think me foolish if I ask you to wait here while I go in there"—she pointed to the ominous thicket near them—"alone?" She was quite white.
Cass's heart, which had grown somewhat cold since his interview with Miss Porter, melted at once.
"Go; I will stay here."
He waited five minutes. She did not return. What if the poor creature had determined upon suicide on the spot where her faithless lover had fallen? He was reassured in another moment by the rustle of skirts in the undergrowth.
"I was becoming quite alarmed," he said, aloud.
"You have reason to be," returned a hurried voice. He started. It was Miss Porter, who stepped swiftly out of the cover. "Look," she said, "look at that man down the road. He has been tracking you two ever since you left the cabin. Do you know who he is?"
"No!"
"Then listen. It is three-fingered Dick, one of the escaped road agents. I know him!"
"Let us go and warn her," said Cass, eagerly.
Miss Porter laid her hand upon his shoulder.
"I don't think she'll thank you," she said, dryly. "Perhaps you'd better see what she's doing, first."
Utterly bewildered, yet with a strong sense of the masterfulness of his companion, he followed her. She crept like a cat through the thicket. Suddenly she paused. "Look!" she whispered, viciously, "look at the tender vigils of your heart-broken May!"
Cass saw the woman who had left him a moment before on her knees on the grass, with long thin fingers digging like a ghoul in the earth. He had scarce time to notice her eager face and eyes, cast now and then back toward the spot where she had left him, before there was a crash in the bushes, and a man—the stranger of the road—leaped to her side. "Run," he said; "run for it now. You're watched!"
"Oh! that man, Beard!" she said, contemptuously.
"No, another in a wagon. Quick. Fool, you know the place now—you can come later; run!" And half-dragging, half-lifting her, he bore her through the bushes. Scarcely had they closed behind the pair when Miss Porter ran to the spot vacated by the woman. "Look!" she cried, triumphantly, "look!"
Cass looked, and sank on his knees beside her.
"It was worth a thousand dollars, wasn't it?" she repeated, maliciously, "wasn't it? But you ought to return it! Really you ought."
Cass could scarcely articulate. "But how did you know it?" he finally gasped.
"Oh, I suspected something; there was a woman, and you know you're such a fool!"
Cass rose, stiffly.
"Don't be a greater fool now, but go and bring my horse and wagon from the hill, and don't say anything to the driver."
"Then you did not come alone?"
"No; it would have been bold and improper."
"Please!"
"And to think it was the ring, after all, that pointed to this," she said.
"The ring that you returned to me."
"What did you say?"
"Nothing."
"Don't, please, the wagon is coming."
In the next morning's edition of the "Red Chief Chronicle" appeared the following startling intelligence:
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