But the guide, true to his calling, shouted:
"Surrender, or you are a dead man! The Bottomless Pit is right ahead of you."
The fugitive halted a moment, glanced back, then dashed on again in defiance. At a sudden projection he tripped and fell, discharging the pistol into his own body. The sound reverberated in a thousand echoes. The wounded man staggered to his feet, and managed to gain the frail bridge. Here he fell across the railing, swayed there an instant; then as his pursuers came up with helping hands, he plunged into the abyss below.
The denizens of Cave City never tire of telling how Eldon Brand and his wife came back to the world, and how they fared in their romantic retreat. But there was a part of the story as strange as it was tragic. Upon dismantling the boudoir a leathern girdle was found, which contained several hundred dollars in gold, and a letter which ran thus:—
"I am a dying man. I cannot find my way out. I have not strength to call, I must perish here of disease and want. I will make one more effort, but feel that I shall fail. I have made my peace with God. In leaving this world I leave only one enemy behind. This is Jason Hammond, who has wronged me foully. Living or dead, I shall haunt him. To whomsoever shall give this poor body Christian burial, I bequeath my estate." (Here followed the location and description of the property).
"Signed:
"DAVID HAMMOND."
The paper was almost illegible. It had been written in pencil. An extended search was made and the skeleton of a man was found in one of the most inaccessible recesses of the cave's many turnings. Beside the body lay a torch and an exhausted lunch basket. Eldon Brand had the remains reverently committed to earth.