success that day; perhaps, of my mother's
kindness to him when he was a boy--was yet on his face, stamped there
indelibly by the blow that killed him. There he lay, face upward, as the
murderer had thrown him after bringing him in, stretched out his full
length on the floor, with his quiet face upturned! looking in that
throng of excited, awe-stricken men, just what he had said he was: a
man of peace. His wife, on the other hand, wore a terrified look on her
face. There had been a terrible struggle. She had lived to taste the
bitterness of death, before it took her."

Stokeman, with a little shiver, put his hand over his eyes as though to
shut out the vision that recurred to him. After a long breath he began
again.

"In a short time there was a great crowd there, white and black. The
general mind flew at once to Absalom Turnell. The negroes present were
as earnest in their denunciation as the whites; perhaps, more so, for
the whites were past threatening. I knew from the grim-ness that trouble
was brewing, and I felt that if Absalom were caught and any evidence
were found on him, no power on earth could save him. A party rode off
in search of him, and went to old Joel's house. Neither Absalom nor Joel
were there; they had not been home since the election, one of the women
said.

"As a law officer of the county I was to a certain extent in charge at
Halloway's and in looking around for all the clews to be found, I came
on a splinter of 'light-wood' not as large or as long as one's little
finger, stuck in a crack in the floor near the bed: a piece of a stick
of 'fat-pine,' such as negroes often carry about, and use as tapers. One
end had been burned; but the other end was clean and was jagged just as
it had been broken off. There was a small scorched place on the planks
on either side, and it was evident that this was one of the splinters
that had been used in firing the house. I called a couple of the
coolest, most level-headed men present and quietly showed them the spot,
and they took the splinter out and I put it in my pocket.

"By one of those fortuitous chances which so often happen in every
lawyer's experience, and appear inexplicable, Old Joel Turnell walked
up to the house just as we came out. He was as sympathetic as possible,
appeared outraged at the crime, professed the highest regard for
Halloway, and the deepest sorrow at his death. The sentiment of the
crowd was rather one of sympathy with him, that he