"Sit down and rest, Miss Osborne; we will try and find Hubert in the morning."
"You are very kind."
She seemed gentle and subdued now. It was the calm after the storm. Dyke saw that he was not recognized, however, and the madness was not gone from the poor girl's brain.
It was a very sad case, indeed.
Several stools were in the room, and some blankets hung against the further wall, proving that some one had lately occupied the cabin. Undoubtedly it had been used as a hiding-place for outlaws, and it was a question in the mind of the detective as to how soon the cabin would be revisited. The presence of the insane girl necessarily altered his plans somewhat. He could not leave her to perish in the woods.
Removing the blankets from the wall, Dyke Darrel improvised a bed for the poor girl, and induced her to lie thereon. He then replenished the fire with some dry sticks that lay beside the stove, since the night air was chill, and sat himself upon the floor, with his head reclining against the logs. Before doing this, however, he had taken the precaution to secure the only door with a wooden latch that had been made for the purpose.
The window, of course, he was unable to secure.
It did not seem hardly safe to sleep under the circumstances, but Dyke Darrel was very tired, having been without much rest for several nights, and he was on the present occasion extremely drowsy.
Resolving not to fall into a deep slumber, the detective sat with his revolver at his side, and went off into the land of dreams before he was aware of it.
Dyke Darrel slept heavily.