"A still-hunter, probably. The
deer come down from the coverts toward evening to drink. Some rock may
have fallen along the river-bank, dislodged by the concussion."

A sense of melancholy was in the air, gathering with the gathering
darkness. The light was fading out of the west, and the early autumnal
dusk was at hand. Lillian was sensible of an accession of lassitude, a
realization of defeat in a cause which she felt now it was futile to have
essayed. Why should he forgive? How was reparation possible? She could
not call back the Past--she could not assuage griefs that time had worn
out long ago, searing over the wounds. She was quite silent as she rose
and together they took their way down toward the bungalow. While she
flagged now and again, she walked without assistance, though he kept
close and ready at her side.

Gladys watched their progress expectantly, but her face fell as they drew
near and she could discern their listless expression and manner. She did
not await their arrival, but turned, disappointed, within. It was already
time to dress for dinner, the ladies habitually observing this formality,
although Briscoe often went in knickerbockers till midnight. Lillian
paused on the veranda and gazed down the road, winding away into the
dusky red flare of the fading west, for the drive must needs be short in
this season of early nightfall. There was no sign of approach along its
smooth and shadowy curves, and at the end of the long vista, where the
jagged verges of crags serrated the serene green sky a star shone, white
and splendid, amidst the vanishing vermilion suffusions of the
sunset-tide.

V.

In the light of after events, one might wonder if the genial, care-free
Edward Briscoe remembered any detail of the discarded arrangement of the
previous evening for the transportation of his transitory guest, Frank
Dean, to Shaftesville; if he realized that at the moment when the revenue
officer would have been starting on the journey, as the host had
insistently planned it, he was himself at the turn of the road and just
beyond the jutting crag; if he divined that the vibrations of the
telephone wire had betrayed the matter to a crafty listening ear on the
party-line in the vacant hotel across the ravine--or was the time too
short for the consideration? Did he even recognize the significance of
the apparition when a swift, erect figure stepped openly from under the
s