back.

Clancy neither intends, nor desires, it to do so now. All he wants with
it, is to bring him face to face with his hated foeman. That done, the
rest he will do himself.

Everything decided and settled, he hastily takes leave of Jupiter, and
starts off along the trail, Brasfort leading.

Both are soon far away.

On the wide waste the mulatto stands alone, looking after--half
reproachfully for being left behind--regretting his master's rashness--
painfully apprehensive he may never see him more.

CHAPTER EIGHTY TWO.

A MAN NEARLY MAD.

"Am I still drunk? Am I dreaming?"

So Richard Darke interrogates himself, retreating from the strangest
apparition human eyes ever saw. A head without any body, not lying as
after careless decapitation, but as though still upon shoulders, the
eyes glancing and rolling, the lips moving, speaking--the whole thing
alive! The head, too, of one he supposes himself to have assassinated,
and for which he is a felon and fugitive. No wonder he doubts the
evidence of his senses, and at first deems it fancy--an illusion from
dream or drink. But a suspicion also sweeps through his soul, which,
more painfully impressing, causes him to add still another
interrogatory:

"Am I mad?"

He shakes his head and rubs his eyes, to assure himself he is awake,
sober, and sane. He is all three; though he might well wish himself
drunk or dreaming--for, so scared is he, there is in reality a danger of
his senses forsaking him. He tries to account for the queer thing, but
cannot. Who could, circumstanced as he? From that day when he stooped
over Clancy, holding Helen Armstrong's photograph before his face, and
saw his eyes film over in sightless gaze, the sure forerunner of death,
he has ever believed him dead. No rumour has reached him to the
contrary--no newspaper paragraph, from which he might draw his
deductions, as Borlasse has done. True, he observed some resemblance to
Clancy in the man who surprised him under the live-oak; but, recalling
that scene under the cypress, how could he have a thought of its being
he? He could not, cannot, does not yet.

But what about the head? How is he to account for that? And the cries
sent after him--still ringing in his ears--his own name, with the added
accusation he himself believes true, the brand, "murderer!"

"Am I indeed mad?" he again asks himself, riding on recklessly, without
giving guidance to his horse. His trembling hand c