"Just as plain as a bright moon and stars could show it to me."
"How? How—"
Jessup had struggled up from his pillow, but fell back almost fainting, with his wild eyes fixed steadily on the young man's face.
"I had just passed under the cedar-trees, when you came in sight, walking fast, as if you were in a hurry to find some one."
"It was you I was looking for. I was on my way to find you," whispered Jessup, so hoarsely that Storms had to bend low to catch his words.
"Me! What for, I should like to know?"
"Because I thought you had lied to me," answered the old man, turning his face from the light. "Oh, that it had been so—if it only had been so!"
A sob shook that strong frame, and from under the wrinkled eyelids two great tears forced their way.
A flash of intelligence gleamed across Storms' face. He was gaining more information than he had dared to hope for. But craft is the refuge of knaves, and the wisdom of fools. He had self-command enough for deception, and pretended not to observe the anguish of that proud man, for proud he was, in the best sense of the word.
"I was hanging about the grounds, too savage for home or anything else," he went on to say. "I had seen enough to drive a man mad, and was almost that, when you came up. There was another man under the cedar-trees. I had been watching for him all the evening. You know who that was."