"Who did it?" Baird asked with interest.
"That's what we don't know—we never will know, I suppose. The family tried to fasten it on a Penniman, old William Penniman's father, but they had no proof at all—except that there was bad blood between them—there always had been, ever since a Penniman got part of the Westmore tract by buying the old house over there. The accusations of our family didn't help matters. I've always had my theory about it, though: old Penniman's father had nothing to do with it; those men my great-grandparents worked up there in the Banks didn't all die or leave the country—somebody's son or son's son did it." He shrugged with a look of bitter disgust. "Lord! the thing's nearly a hundred years old, and still we go on with it! There's not a Penniman will bend his head to a Westmore, or a Westmore to a Penniman. We go on with things endlessly—just our sickening, effete pride! It gets on my nerves." He looked as if it did; he looked harried.
"There's one Penniman who doesn't seem to bear a grudge," Baird remarked, "the little girl who came to your rescue yesterday morning."
"Ann?... Ann's young and light-hearted. There's plenty of time for the Penniman to develop in her," he answered carelessly, but Baird noticed that his color rose.
Garvin dropped the subject, talked of trivial things, until they reached the Post-Road. They came upon a man here, a sturdily-built, dark-featured man, clad in neat business gray and carrying a bag. He stood at the juncture of the three roads, the Westmore Road, the Back Road to the Hunt Club and the Penniman farm, and the Post-Road. His hat was tipped back like one who had walked far and was warm, and had stopped to rest and look about him. He was looking at the Mine Banks; when the two riders came up out of the cut, he looked at them, or, rather, at Garvin; he had merely glanced at Baird.
It was his steady grim stare at Garvin that arrested Baird's attention. There was no curiosity in it, it was too cold; fraught with recognition and a settled frozen antagonism. He stood his ground though Garvin's horse almost brushed him, planted firmly, like one who would instantly contest the few inches he covered. There was a quiet determined force about the man; Baird was affected by it, even before they reached him.
Baird glanced questioningly at Garvin and saw that he was giving the man stare for stare, erect in his saddle, chin slightly lifted. But Garvin's look lacked the animosity that froze the other man's features, and just before they passed Baird saw Garvin's hand lift half-way to his cap then drop. They passed with Garvin's eyes shifted to look straight ahead, but the man's stare never wavered.
"Speak of the devil and you see him," Garvin muttered, after they had passed.
"Who is he?" Baird asked.
"Coats Penniman.... No forgiveness for the past there—why should I have any compunctions over the future." He spoke icily. The cut he had received had evidently stung.