So, late in the afternoon, in the privacy of the cell which the two mountaineers complacently shared, the Deacon heard from Red how the boy, Newt, fresh from the penitentiary, was already on the trail of a "marked-down" victim. It was news that disconcerted the master assassin to a degree which he would not have cared to admit. These men depended upon making a case of self-defense, and looked to him to see them through. The gravest element that confronted them was the violent dislike of the bluegrass, where they must face trial, for the murderous tendencies of the mountains. If there should occur on the heels of the first tragedy a second, traceable to a mountain man, the fat would be in the fire. At all costs, young Newt must for the present hold his hand. Above all else, that was imperative. Black Pete questioned the prisoner searchingly and learned that Newt had gone out Main Street, and Red had followed him for some distance. Therefore, that was the road young Newt would watch, and the road upon which young Newt must be watched. Cawsler later reported the manner in which the boy had come demanding arms, and the Deacon bitterly regretted having surrendered to him his own pistol.
And Newt had disappeared. Of each Spooner he met, the Deacon demanded news of his whereabouts. Finally, near the court-house, he met a man who had seen the sought-for one sauntering slowly out the road near the edge of town. Since it was only a few minutes before, he could not have gone far.
The Deacon hurried forward, and from a party of incoming negroes he learned of the dance, which explained the procession of buggies and gave him a clew. Probably, Newt had learned that his intended victim would be there. At least, it would be worth investigating. But of Newt himself he saw nothing, for when he reached the spot where the boy had climbed the fence to kill time behind the hedge, he unwittingly passed him by. At the beginning of the stone fence, where he caught first the music and the light of the festivities, his eye took in the growth of locusts and his mountain mind reckoned by swift processes. Here was such natural cover as a man would be likely to seek in working his way surreptitiously rearward. He had begun to fear he might be too late, in which event his coming at all would be more fatal than staying away. That haste prevented his using the most exhaustive caution, and so he did not explore to the far side of the woodland, but crossed the fence at the nearest corner and went swiftly back, skulking in the shadow. In point of fact, instead of being later than the boy, he arrived first, but on the opposite side of the broad lawn. When he had gone back as far as the house level, his painstaking search commenced. He was not only endeavoring to remain concealed, important as that was, but also to penetrate the shadows and find the other hidden man. It was a thing that would have been sheer impossibility but for his splendid wood-craft and the catlike focus of his eyes in the night. So, when he had exhausted the possibilities on that side of the house to his full satisfaction, he recognized his mistake, and knew that he had wasted precious time. He should be on the far side, and, taking a long detour which carried him far to the rear of the barns and led him behind the fence line of the paddock lots, he worked his way up again to the front until he reached the edge of the lilac bushes, and could see the summer-house. To that spot he began crawling noiselessly, and, led by a sure instinct, and while still some fifty yards away, his trained eye caught a stealthy shadow also hitching forward at his front. There still lay between him and Newt Spooner the matter of some thirty yards, and, even if he rose to his feet and ran for it, he would overtake the boy so close to the vine-covered retreat that any sound of interference would result in the discovery of both. He did not personally know that the summer-house was occupied, but he argued it from the movements of the other skulker. Newt was so engrossed in his hate that at this particular moment he had eyes and ears only for the front. Between the lilac thicket where Black Pete crouched and the vine shadows where Newt knelt, lay an open space of flooding radiance, but it was directly behind the summer-house, and, unless Newt saw him crossing it, no one was apt to see. The Deacon rose to his feet and ran for it.
As Newt thrust the revolver behind him to cock it, Black Pete's hand closed silently around his, and Black Pete's thumb was jammed between the back-drawn hammer and the firing-pin.
Black Pete's thumb was jammed between the back-drawn hammer and the firing pin.
CHAPTER VII
Henry Falkins and Lucinda Merton had not kept close count on the flying moments since they had entered the summer-house. The girl had promised to sit out two consecutive dances with him, since to-morrow morning he must go back to the mountains. So, having only a little while and much to say, he had plunged in, and, though his voice was low, his words came tumultuously. Of course, she knew that he was in love with her, but until to-night it had been a thing which had been given no concrete declaration. Except for a glow of confession in her eyes, she had said nothing of loving him. Yet now, when he wished to claim every moment for himself, she had asked him to tell her about his hills and their people, of whom she and her world knew so little.