‘Psha! what’s the use of talking in that manner, Kay?’ said the other ruffian, to whom this proposition was addressed; ‘we have no time to spare; besides, we have half dug the grave here, and I dare say the old chap will lie as contented here as he would a foot or two off. Come, come, let’s finish the business and begone, for I am almost tired of it, and if we remain here much longer, there’s no knowing but that we might be discovered.’
‘Oh, very well,’ said Kay, as the other man had called him, ‘it matters very little, so let’s go to work, and get done as quick as possible.’
‘I think we have given him depth enough,’ remarked the other wretch, ‘and he’ll not pop up again in a hurry by himself. Come, out with him, and let’s finish the job at once.’
This, as may be imagined, was a moment of unutterable horror to our heroine, who had watched the proceedings, and listened to the conversation of the assassins with the most breathless attention; and a shuddering seized upon her frame which she found it impossible to resist.—It would, however, be useless to attempt to describe the relief she felt when she heard the observations of the first ruffian, by which he was persuaded from entering the place in which she was concealed; but every moment that they prolonged their stay increased her terror and anxiety, for fear that her infant should awake, and, crying loud, betray her.
After having untied the mouth of the sack, they drew it nearer to the edge of the grave they had been digging, and turned out the body of a stout but aged man, whose long grey locks were matted together with large clots of blood that had issued from several deep wounds in the skull.
Horror enchained all the faculties of Inez, and with distended eyelids, she fixed her straining eyeballs upon the dreadful spectacle.
Her blood seemed turned to ice, and her heart seemed almost to cease its pulsation. Should the wretches find out that she was there concealed, and had been watching them, and overheard the acknowledgement of their dreadful crime, the death of herself would be certain to follow.
These reflections passed rapidly in the mind of Inez, as she watched, in a state of the most breathless suspense, the actions of the murderers, as they, in the most callous manner, tossed the body of their wretched victim into the grave they had dug for its reception, and commenced filling it up, occupying the interval during the disgusting scene, with the most ribald conversation, which smote the heart of our heroine with horror, as she listened to it.
‘There,’ exclaimed Kay, as he placed the last spade-full of earth on the grave of their murdered victim, ‘that job’s finished, and a long and sound rest to the old drover. The business has been performed throughout in a tradesman-like manner, and no suspicion can ever attach itself to us.’
‘Suspicion,’ reiterated the other with a laugh, ‘oh no, we might almost as well imagine that somebody has been watching us all this time in this lonely place, as to suppose that even the shadow of an idea of we being the murderers of the old man could attach itself to us.’