“I didn't follow, LeGrand. It was all an accident.”
“Then it's a lucky accident, Minnie. This is the end. From now on—”
“Yes, it's the end!” bitterly cried the other woman. “It's the end of everything. Oh, if I could only make it the end for Jean Carnot, I'd be satisfied. He made me what I am—an outcast from the world. If I could find Jean Carnot—”
And then, with the suddenness of a bird wheeling in mid air, the blonde woman turned and rushed away in the darkness.
For an instant Colonel Ashley hesitated in his hiding place. And then he murmured:
“I guess you'll keep, LeGrand Blossom, and you, too, Minnie Webb. Morocco Kate needs watching. And I think, now, she'll lead me right where I've been wanting to go for a long time. The darkness is fast fading away,” which was a strange thing to say, seeing that the night was blacker than ever.
Back on the desolate moor, near the bridge under which the black tide was now hurrying, murmuring and whispering to the rushes tales of the deep and distant sea, stood two figures.
“Do you believe in me, Minnie?” asked the man brokenly.
There was a pause. The murmuring of the tide grew louder, and it seemed to sing now, as it rose higher and higher.
“Do you?” he repeated, wistfully.